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Full text of "The history of England, from the invasion of Julius Cæser to the revolution in 1688"

I v 




THE 



HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



YOL II. 



THE 



HISTORY OF ENGLAND, 



FROM THE 



INVASION OF JULIUS C^SSAR 



TO 



THE REVOLUTION IN 1688. 



BY 

DAVID HUME, ESQ. 



A NEW EDITION, 
WITH THE AUTHOR'S LAST CORRECTIONS AND IMPROVEMENTS. 

TO WHICH IS PREFIXED 
A SHORT ACCOUNT OP HIS LIFE, WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 



IN SIX V GLUMES. 
VOL. II. 



BOSTON: 

LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY 
1854. 



CAMBRIDGE: 

ALLEN AND FARNHAM, PRINTEK3, 

REMINGTON STREET. 
STONE AND SMART, STEREOTYPERS. 



CONTENTS 



VOL. II. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

EDWARD I. 

,/Civil Administration of the King. Conquest of Wales. Affairs of 
Scotland. Competitors for the Crown of Scotland. Reference to 
Edward. Homage of Scotland. Award of Edward in Favour 
of Baliol. War with France. -^Digression concerning the Consti- 
tution of Parliament. War with Scotland. Scotland subdued. 
War with France. Dissensions with the Clergy. Arbitrary 
Measures. Peace with France. Revolt of Scotland. That 
Kingdom again subdued again revolts is again subdued. Ro- 
bert Bruce. Third Revolt of Scotland. Death and Character of 
the King. Miscellaneous Transactions of this Reign . . Page 1 

CHAPTER XIV. V 

EDWARD II. 

Weakness of the King. His Passion for Favourites. Piers Gavas- 
t on. -W Discontent of the Barons. Murder of Gavaston. War 
with Scotland. Battle of Bannockburn. Hugh le Despenser. 
Civil Commotions. Execution of the Earl of Lancaster. Jbon- 
spiracy against the King. -^Insurrection.-^- The King dethroned. 
Murdered. His Character. Miscellaneous Transactions in this 
Reign . "".^ v "" t .'..;. '. . . 79 

CHAPTER XV. 

EDWARD III. 

War with Scotland. -* Execution of the Earl of Kent. Execution 

\/of Mortimer, Earl of March. State of Scotland. War with that 

Kingdom. King's Claim to the Crown of France. Preparations 



v i CONTENTS. 

for War with France. "War. Naval Victory. Domestic Dis- 
turbances. Affairs of Britany. Renewal of the War with France. 
Invasion of France. Battle of Crecy. War with Scotland. 
Captivity of the King of Scots. Calais taken . . . Page 116 

CHAPTER XVI. 

Institution of the Garter. State of France. Battle of Poictiers. 
Captivity of the King of France. State of that Kingdom. In- 
vasion of France. Peace of Bretigni. State of France. Ex- 
pedition into Castile. Rupture with France. 111 Success of the 
English. Death of the Prince of Wales. Death and Character 
of the King, v- Miscellaneous Transactions of this Reign . . 179 

CHAPTER XVII. 

RICHARD II. 

Government .during the Minority. Insurrection of the Common 
-A/Disc 



People. -ADiscontents of the Barons. -vCivil Commotions. Ex- 
pulsion or Execution of the King's Ministers. Cabals of the Duke 
of Gloucester. Murder of the Duke of Gloucester. Banishment 
of Henry, Duke of Hereford. Return of Henry. General Insur- 
rection. Deposition of the King. His Murder. His Character. 
Miscellaneous Transactions during this Reign ..... 225 

CHAPTER XVIII. 

HENRY IV. 

Title of the King. An Insurrection. An Insurrection in Wales. 
The Earl of Northumberland rebels. Battle of Shrewsbury. 
btate of Scotland. Parliamentary Transactions. Death and Cha- 
racter of the King ............ 276 

CHAPTER XIX. 

HENRY V. 

T Dis ? I t ers His Reformation. -The Lollards 
Lord C ob h a 



CHAPTER XX. 

HENRY VI. 

Government during the Minoritv. 

- 



CONTENTS. vii 

of Orleans. The Siege of Orleans raised. The King of France 
crowned at Rheims. Prudence of the Duke of Bedford. Exe- 
cution of the Maid of Orleans. Defection of the Duke of Bur- 
gundy. Death of the Duke of Bedford. Decline of the English 
in France. Truce with France. Marriage of the King with 
Margaret of Anjou. Murder of the Duke of Gloucester. State 
of France. Renewal of the War with France. The English 
expelled France Page 328 



CHAPTER XXL 

Claim of the Duke of York to the Crown. The Earl of Warwick. 
Impeachment of the Duke of Suifolk. His Banishment and 
Death. Popular Insurrection. The Parties of York and Lan- 
caster. First Armament of the Duke of York. First Battle of 
St. Alban's. Buttle of Blore-heath of Northampton. A Par- 
liament. Battle of Wakeijeld. Death of the Duke of York. 
Battle of Mortimer's Cross. Second Battle of St. Alban's. Ed- 
ward IV. assumes the Crown. Miscellaneous Transactions of this 
Reign ..... . . 375 



CHAPTER XXII. 

EDWARD IV. 

Battle of Touton. Henry escapes into Scotland. A Parliament. 
Battle of Hexham. Henry taken Prisoner and confined in the 
Tower. The King's Marriage with Lady Elizabeth Gray. War- 
wick disgusted. Alliance with Burgundy. Insurrection in York- 
shire. Battle of Banbury. Warwick and Clarence banished. 
Warwick and Clarence return. Edward IV. expelled. Henry 
VI. restored. Edward IV. returns. Battle of Barnet, and Death 
of Warwick. Battle of Tewkesbury, and Murder of Prince Ed- 
ward. Death of Henry VI. Invasion of France. Peace of 
Pecquigni. Trial and Execution of the Duke of Clarence. 
Death and Character of Edward IV. 406 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

EDWARD V. RICHARD III. 

Edward V. State of the Court. The Earl of Rivers arrested. 
Duke of Gloucester Protector. Execution of Lord Hastings. 

The Protector aims at the Crown. Assumes the Crown. 
Murder of Edward V. and of the Duke of York. Richard III. 

Duke of Buckingham discontented. The Earl of Richmond. 
Buckingham executed. Invasion by the Earl of Richmond. 
Battle of Bosworth. Death and Character of Richard III. . 448 



CONTENTS. 
CHAPTER XXIV. 

HENRY VII. 

Accession of Henry VII. His Title to the Crown. King's Preju- 
dice against the House of York. His joyful Reception in London. 

His Coronation. Sweating Sickness. A Parliament. Entail 
of the Crown. King's Marriage. An Insurrection. Discon- 
tents of the People. Lambert Simnel. Revolt of Ireland. 
Intrigues of the Duchess of Burgundy. Lambert Simnel invades 
England. Battle of Stoke Page 483 

CHAPTER XXV. 

State of Foreign Affairs. State of Scotland. Of Spain. Of the 
Low Countries. Of France. Of Britany. French Invasion of 
Britany. French Embassy to England. Dissimulation of the 
French Court. An Insurrection in the North Suppressed. 
King sends Forces into Britany. Annexation of Britany to France. 

A Parliament. War with France. Invasion of France. 
Peace with France. Perkin Warbeck. His Imposture. He 
is avowed by the Duchess of Burgundy, and by many of the 
English Nobility. Trial and Execution of Stanley. A Parlia- 
ment 504 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

Perkin retires to Scotland. Insurrection in the West. Battle of 
Blackheath. Truce with Scotland. Perkin taken Prisoner. 
Perkin executed. The Earl of Warwick executed. Marriage of 
Prince Arthur with Catherine of Arragon. His Death. Mar- 
riage of the Princess Margaret with the King of Scotland. Op- 
pressions of the People. A Parliament. Arrival of the King of 
Castile. Intrigues of the Earl of Suffolk. Sickness of the King. 

His Death and Character. His Laws 536 

CHAPTER XXVII. 

HENRY VIII. 

Popularity of the new King. His Ministers. Punishment of Emp- 
son and Dudley. King's Marriage. Foreign Affairs. Julius 
II. League of Cambray. War with France. Expedition to 

Fontarabia. Deceit of Ferdinand. Return of the English. 

Leo X. A Parliament. War with Scotland. Wolsey Minister. 

His Character. Invasion of France. Battle of Guinegate. 
Battle of Flouden. Peace with France 568 



THE 

HISTORY 

OF 

ENGLAND, 



CHAPTER XIII 

EDWARD I. 

CIVIL ADMINISTRATION OP THE KING. CONQUEST OF WALES. AFFAIRS OF 
. SCOTLAND. COMPETITORS FOR THE CROWN OF SCOTLAND. REFERENCE 
TO EDWARD. HOMAGE OF SCOTLAND. AWARD OF EDWARD IN FAVOUR 
OF BALIOL. WAR WITH FRANCE. DIGRESSION CONCERNING THE CON- 
STITUTION OF PARLIAMENT. WAR WITH SCOTLAND. SCOTLAND SUBDUED. 
WAR WITH FRANCE. DISSENSIONS WITH THE CLERGY. ARBITRARY 
MEASURES. PEACE WITH FRANCE. REVOLT OF SCOTLAND. THAT KING- 
DOM AGAIN SUBDUED AGAIN REVOLTS IS AGAIN SUBDUED. ROBERT 

BRUCE. THIRD REVOLT OF SCOTLAND. DEATH AND CHARACTER OF THE 
KING. MISCELLANEOUS TRANSACTIONS OF THIS REIGN. 

THE English were as yet so little inured to obedience CHAP 
under a regular government, that the death of almost every v j 
king, since the Conquest, had been attended with dis- 1272 . 
orders ; and the council, reflecting on the recent civil wars, 
and on the animosities which naturally remain after these 
great convulsions, had reason to apprehend dangerous con- 
sequences from the absence of the son and successor of 
Henry. They therefore hastened to proclaim Prince Ed- 
ward, to swear allegiance to him, and to summon the states 
of the kingdom, in order to provide for the public peace 
in this important conjuncture a . Walter Gifford, Arch- 
bishop of York, the Earl of Cornwall, son of Eichard, king 
of the Romans, and the Earl of Gloucester, were appointed 
guardians of the realm, and proceeded peaceably to the 
exercise of their authority, without either meeting with 
opposition from any of the people, or being disturbed with 

a Rymer, vol. ii. p. 1. Walsing. p. 43. Trivet, p. 239. 
VOL. II. 1 



) HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, emulation and faction among themselves. The high cha- 
^racter acquired by Edward during the late commotions, 
"^ his military genius, his success in subduing the rebels, his 
moderation in settling the kingdom, had procured him 
great esteem, mixed with affection, among all orders of 
men ; and no one could reasonably entertain hopes of 
making any advantage of his absence, or of raising dis- 
turbance in the nation. The Earl of Gloucester himself, 
whose great power and turbulent spirit had excited most 
jealousy, was forward to give proofs of his allegiance ; 
and the other malecontents, being destitute of a leader, 
were obliged to remain in submission to the govern- 
ment. 

Prince Edward had reached Sicily, in his return from 
the Holy Land, when he received intelligence of the death 
of his father ; and he discovered a deep concern on the 
occasion. At the same time, he learned the death of an 
infant son, John, whom his princess, Eleanor of Castile, 
had borne him at Acre, in Palestine \ and as he appeared 
much less affected with that misfortune, the king of 
Sicily expressed a surprise at this difference of sentiment ; 
but was told by Edward, that the death of a son was a loss 
which he might hope to repair \ the death of a father was 
a loss irreparable b . 

Edward proceeded homeward ; but as he soon learned 
the quiet settlement of the kingdom, he was in no hurry 
to take possession of the throne, but spent near a year in 
France before he made his appearance in England. In his 
1273. passage by Chalons, in Burgundy, he was challenged by the 
prince of the country to a tournament which he was pre- 
paring ; and as Edward excelled in those martial and dan- 
gerous exercises, the true image of war, he declined not 
the opportunity of acquiring honour in that great assembly 
of the neighbouring nobles. But the image of war was 
here, unfortunately, turned into the thing itself. Edward 
and his retinue were so successful in the jousts, that the 
French knights, provoked at their superiority, made a 
serious attack upon them, which was repulsed, and much 
blood was idly shed in the quarrel 6 . This rencounter re- 
ceived the name of the petty battle of Chalons. 

t> Walsing. p. 44. Triyet, p. 240. 

Walsing. p. 44. Trivet, p. 241. M. West. p. 402. 



EDWARD I. 3 

Edward went from Chalons to Paris, and did homage CHAP. 
to Philip for the dominions which he held in France Vj^* 1 . 
He thence returned to Guienne, and settled that province, 1274 
which was in some confusion. He made his journey to 
London through France; in his passage, he accommodated, 
at Montreuil, a difference with Margaret, Countess of 
Flanders, heiress of that territory 6 : he was received 
with joyful acclamations by his people, and was solemnly Aug. 19. 
crowned at Westminster by Kobert, Archbishop of Can- 
terbury. 

The king immediately applied himself to the re-estab- Ci . vi i ad - 
lishment of his kingdom, and to the correcting of those tLTo/the 
disorders which the civil commotions and the loose admin- kin s- 
istration of his father had introduced into every part of 
government. The plan of his policy was equally generous 
and prudent. He considered the great barons both as the 
immediate rivals of the crown, and oppressors of the people ; 
and he purposed, by an exact distribution of justice, and 
a rigid execution of the laws, to give at once protection 
to the inferior orders of the state, and to diminish the 
arbitrary power of the great, on which their dangerous au- 
thority was chiefly founded. Making it a rule in his own 
conduct to observe, except on extraordinary occasions, the 
privileges secured to them by the great charter, he acquired 
a right to insist upon their observance of the same charter 
towards their vassals and inferiors; and he made the crown 
be regarded, by all the gentry and commonalty of the 
kingdom, as the fountain of justice, and the general asylum 1275 
against oppression. Besides enacting several useful iGthFeb 
statutes, in a Parliament which he summoned at Westmin- 
ster, he took care to inspect the conduct of all his magis- 
trates and judges, to displace such as were either negligent 
or corrupt, to provide them with sufficient force for the 
execution of justice, to extirpate all bands and confede- 
racies of robbers, and to repress those more silent robberies 
which were committed either by the power of the nobles, 
or under the countenance of public authority. By this 
rigid administration, the face of the kingdom was soon 
changed, and order and justice took place of violence and 
oppression : but amidst the excellent institutions and 
public-spirited plans of Edward, there still appears some- 

a Walsing. p. 45. e Rymer, vol. ii. p. 32, 33. 



4 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, what both of the severity of his personal character, and of 

_ _,the prejudices of the times. 

""^7" As the various kinds of malefactors, the murderers, 
robbers, incendiaries, ravishers, and plunderers, had be- 
come so numerous, and powerful, that the ordinary min- 
isters of justice, especially in the western counties, were 
afraid to execute the laws against them, the king found 
it necessary to provide an extraordinary remedy for the 
evil; and he erected a new tribunal, which however 
useful, would have been deemed in times of more regular 
liberty, a great stretch of illegal and arbitrary power. It 
consisted of commissioners, who were empowered to 
inquire into disorders and crimes of all kinds, and to 
inflict the proper punishments upon them. The officers 
charged with this unusual commission made their circuits 
throughout the counties of England most infested with 
this evil, and carried terror into all those parts of the 
kingdom. In their zeal to punish crimes, they did not 
sufficiently distinguish between the innocent and guilty ; 
the smallest suspicion became a ground of accusa- 
tion and trial ; the slightest evidence was received 
against criminals ; prisons were crowded with malefactors, 
real or pretended; severe fines were levied for small 
offences ; and the king, though his exhausted exchequer 
was supplied by this expedient, found it necessary to stop 
the course of so great rigour; and after terrifying and 
dissipating, by this tribunal, the gangs of disorderly 
people in England, he prudently annulled the com- 
mission 1 ', and never afterwards renewed it. 

Among the various disorders to which the kingdom 
was subject, no one was more universally complained of 
than the adulteration of the coin ; and as this crime 
required more art than the English of that age, who 
chiefly employed force and violence in their iniquities, 
were possessed of, the imputation fell upon the Jews g . 
Edward also seems to have indulged a strong prepos- 
session against that nation ; and this ill-judged zeal for 
Christianity being naturally augmented by an expedition 
to the Holy Land, he let loose the whole rigour of his 

I 

8 Walsing. p. 48. Heming. vol. i. p. 6. 



EDWARD I. - 

justice against that unhappy people. Two hundred and CHAP. 
eighty of them were hanged at once for this crime in^ 
London alone, besides those who suffered in other parts 1275 
of the kingdom h . The houses and lands, (for the Jews 
had of late ventured to make purchases of that kind,) as 
well as the goods of great multitudes, were sold and 
confiscated ; and the king, lest it should be suspected 
that the riches of the sufferers were the chief part of their 
guilt, ordered a moiety of the money raised by these 
confiscations to be set apart and bestowed upon such as 
were willing to be converted to Christianity. But re- 
sentment was more prevalent with them than any temp- 
tation from their poverty and very few of them could 
be induced, by interest, to embrace the religion of their 
persecutors. The miseries of this people did not here 
terminate. Though the arbitrary talliages and exactions 
levied upon them had yielded a constant and consi- 
derable revenue to the crown, Edward, prompted by his 
zeal and his rapacity, resolved some time after 1 to purge 
the kingdom entirely of that hated race, and to seize to 
himself at once their whole property as the reward of 
his labour k . He left them only money sufficient to 
bear their charges into foreign countries, where new per- 
secutions and extortions awaited them : but the inhabit- 
ants of the cinque-ports, imitating the bigotry and avidity 
of their sovereign, despoiled most of them of this small 
pittance, and even threw many of them into the sea : a 
crime for which the king, who was determined to be the 
sole plunderer in his dominions, inflicted a capital punish- 
ment upon them. No less than fifteen thousand Jews 
were at this time robbed of their effects, and banished 
the kingdom : very few of that nation have since lived 
in England : and as it is impossible for a nation to sub- 
sist without lenders of money, and none will lend without 
a compensation, the practice of usury, as it was then 
called, was thenceforth exercised by the English them- 
selves upon their fellow citizens, or by Lombards and 
other foreigners. It is very much to be questioned, 
whether the dealings of these new usurers were equally 
open and unexceptionable with those of the old. By a 

* T. Wykcs, p. 107. i In the year 1290. 

k Walsing. p. 54. Heming. vol. i. p. 20. Trivet, p. 266. 

1* 



G HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, law of Eichard it was enacted, that three copies should 
_, be made of every bond given to a Jew ; one to be put 
"~^ into the hands of a public magistrate, another into those 
of a man of credit, and a third to remain with the Jew 
himself 1 . But as the canon law, seconded by the muni- 
cipal, permitted no Christian to take interest, all trans- 
actions of this kind, must, after the banishment of the 
Jews, have become more secret and clandestine ; and the 
lender, of consequence, be paid both for the use of his 
money, and for the infamy and danger which he incurred 
by lending it. 

The great poverty of the crown, though no excuse, was 
probably the cause of this egregious tyranny exercised 
against the Jews ; but Edward also practised other more 
honourable means of remedying that evil. He employed 
a strict frugality in the management and distribution of 
his revenue : he engaged the Parliament to vote him a 
fifteenth of all moveables ; the pope to grant him the 
tenth of all ecclesiastical revenues for three years ; and 
the merchants to consent to a perpetual imposition of half 
a mark on every sack of wool exported, and a mark on 
three hundred skins. He also issued commissions to 
inquire into all encroachments on the royal demesne ; into 
the value of escheats, forfeitures, and wardships ; and into 
the means of repairing or improving every branch of the 
revenue m . The commissioners in the execution of their 
office, began to carry matters too far against the nobility, 
and to question titles to estates which had been trans- 
mitted from father to son for several generations. Earl 
Warrenne, who had done such eminent service in the 
late reign, being required to show his titles, drew his 
sword ; and subjoined, that William, the Bastard, had not 
conquered the kingdom for himself alone ; his ancestor 
was a joint adventurer in the enterprise ; and he himself 
was determined to maintain what had from that period 
remained unquestioned in his family. The king, sensi- 
ble of the danger, desisted from making farther inquiries 
of this nature. 

Conquest - But the active s P iri t of Edward could not long remain 
of Wales, without employment. He soon after undertook an enter- 
prise more prudent for himself, and more advantageous 

1 Trivet, p. 128. m Ann. Waverl. p. 235. 



EDWARD I. * 

to his people. Lewellyn, Prince of Wales, had been CHAP. 
deeply engaged with the Montfort faction ; had entered 
into all their conspiracies against the crown; had 
quently fought on their side; and till the battle of 
Evesham, so fatal to that party, had employed every ex- 
pedient to depress the royal cause, and to promote the 
success of the barons. In the general accommodation 
made with the vanquished, Lewellyn had also obtained 
his pardon ; but as he was the most powerful, and there- 
fore the most obnoxious vassal of the crown, he had reason 
to entertain anxiety about his situation, and to dread the 
future effects of resentment and jealousy in the English 
monarch. For this reason he determined to provide for 
his security, by maintaining a secret correspondence with 
his former associates ; and he even made his addresses to 
a daughter of the Earl of Leicester, who was sent to him 
from beyond sea, but, being intercepted in her passage 
near the isles of Scilly, was detained in the court of 
England 11 . This incident increasing the mutual jealousy 
between Edward and Lewellyn, the latter, when required 
to come to England, and do homage to the new king, 
scrupled to put himself into the hands of an enemy, 
desired a safe conduct from Edward, insisted upon having 
the king's son and other noblemen delivered to him as 
hostages, and demanded that his consort should previously 
be set at liberty . The king having now brought the 
state to a full settlement, was not displeased with this 
occasion of exercising his authority, and subduing entirely 
the principality of Wales. He refused all Lewellyn's 
demands, except that of a safe conduct; sent him re- 
peated summons to perform the duty of a vassal ; levied 
an army to reduce him to obedience ; obtained a new 
aid of a fifteenth from Parliament ; and marched out with 
certain assurance of success against the enemy. Besides 1277. 
the great disproportion offeree between the kingdom and 
the principality, the circumstances of the two states were 
entirely reversed; and the same intestine dissensions 
which had formerly weakened England now prevailed in 
Wales, and had even taken place in the reigning family. 
David and Roderic, brothers to Lewellyn, dispossessed 

n Walsing. p. 46, 47. Heming. vol. i. p. 5. Trivet, p. 248. 
Rymer, vol. ii. p. 68. Walsing. p. 46. Trivet, p. 247. 



g HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP of their inheritance by that prince, had been obliged to 
xni. have recourse to the protection of Edward, and they 

1 ^seconded with all their interest, which was extensive, his 
!77 ' attempts to enslave their native country. The Welsh 
prince had no resource but in the inaccessible situation 
of his mountains, which had hitherto, through many ages, 
defended his forefathers against all attempts of the Saxon 
and Norman conquerors ; and he retired among the hills 
of Snowdon, resolved to defend himself to the last ex- 
tremity. But Edward, equally vigorous and cautious, 
entering by the north with a formidable army, pierced into 
the heart of the country ; and having carefully explored 
every road before him, and secured every pass behind 
him, approached the Welsh army in its last retreat. He 
here avoided the putting to trial the valour of a nation 
proud of its ancient independence, and inflamed with 
animosity against its hereditary enemies ; and he trusted 
to the slow, but sure, effects of famine, for reducing that 
people to subjection. The rude and simple manners of 
the natives, as well as the mountainous situation of their 
country, had made them entirely neglect tillage, and trust 
to pasturage alone for their subsistence : a method of life 
which had hitherto secured them against the irregular 
attempts of the English, but exposed them to certain ruin, 
when the conquest of the country was steadily pursued 
and prudently planned by Edward. Destitute of maga- 
zines, cooped up in a narrow corner, they, as well as their 
cattle, suffered all the rigours of famine ; and Lewellyn, 
without being able to strike a stroke for his independence, 
was at last obliged to submit at discretion, and receive 

i9th NOV. the terms imposed upon him by the victor p . He bound 
himself to pay to Edward fifty thousand pounds, as a 
reparation of damages ; to do homage to the crown of 
England ; to permit all the other barons of Wales, except 
four near Snowdon, to swear fealty to the same crown ; 
to relinquish the country between Cheshire and the river 
Conway; to settle on his brother Roderic a thousand 
marks a year, and on David five hundred; and to deliver 
ten hostages as security for his future submission* 1 . 

Edward, on the performance of the other articles, re- 

P T. Wykes, p. 105. 

i Rymer, vol. ii. p. 88. Walsing. p. 47. Trivet, p. 251. T. Wykes, p. 106 




EDWARD I. ( 

mitted to the Prince of Wales the payment of the fifty CHAP. 
thousand pounds r , which were stipulated by treaty, nnA 
which it is probable the poverty of the country 
it absolutely impossible for him to levy. But notwith- 
standing this indulgence, complaints of iniquities soon 
arose on the side of the vanquished : the English, insolent 
on their easy and bloodless victory, oppressed the inha- 
bitants of the districts which were yielded to them : the 
lords marchers committed with impunity all kinds of vio- 
lence on their Welsh neighbours : new and more severe 
terms were imposed on Lewellyn himself; and Edward, , 
when the prince attended him at Worcester, exacted a 
promise that he would retain no person in his principality 
who should be obnoxious to the English monarch 8 . There 
were other personal insults which raised the indignation 
of the Welsh, and made them determine rather to en- 
counter a force which they had already experienced to be 
so much superior, than to bear oppression from the 
haughty victors. Prince David, seized with the national 
spirit, made peace with his brother, and promised to con- 
cur in the defence of public liberty. The Welsh flew to 
arms ; and Edward, not displeased with the occasion of 
making his conquest final and absolute, assembled all his 
military tenants, and advanced into Wales with an army 
which the inhabitants could not reasonably hope to resist. 
The situation of the country gave the Welsh at first some 
advantage over Luke de Tany, one of Edward's captains, 
w r ho had passed the Menau with a detachment*: but 
Lewellyn, being surprised by Mortimer, was defeated 
and slain in an action, and two thousand of his followers 
were put to the sword u . David, who succeeded him in 1233. 
the principality, could never collect an army sufficient to 
face the English ; and being chased from hill to hill, and 
hunted from one retreat to another, was obliged to con- 
ceal himself under various disguises, and was at last be- 
trayed in his lurking place to the enemy. Edward sent 
him in chains to Shrewsbury ; and bringing him to a 
formal trial before all the peers of England, ordered this 
sovereign prince to be hanged, drawn, arid quartered, as 
a traitor, for defending by arms the liberties of his native 

r Rymer, p. 92. <> Dr. Powell's Hist, of Wales, p. 344, 345. 

* Walsing. p. 50. Heming. vol. i. p. 9. Trivet, p. 258. T. Wykes, p. 110. 
u Homing, vol. i. p. 11. Trivet, p. 257. Ann. Waverl. p. 235. 



Q HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, country, together with his own hereditary authority \ 
XIIL All the Welsh nobility submitted to the conqueror; 
! 'the laws of England, with the sheriffs, and other ministers 
of justice, were established in that principality ; and though 
it was long before national antipathies were extinguished, 
and a thorough union attained between the people, yet 
this important conquest, which it had required eight 
hundred years fully to effect, was at last, through the 
abilities of Edward, completed by the English. 
1284. The king, sensible that nothing kept alive the ideas 
of military valour and of ancient glory so much as the 
traditional poetry of the people, which, assisted by the 
power of music and the jollity of festivals, made deep 
impression on the minds of the youth, gathered together 
all the Welsh bards, and from a barbarous, though not 
absurd policy, ordered them to be put to death x . 

There prevails a vulgar story, which, as it well suits 
the capacity of the monkish writers, is carefully recorded 
by them : that Edward, assembling the Welsh, promised 
to give them a prince of unexceptionable manners, a 
Welshman by birth, and one who could speak no other 
language. On their acclamations of joy, and promise of 
obedience, he invested in the principality his second son, 
Edward, then an infant, who had been born at Carnarvon. 
The death of his eldest son, Alphonso, soon after, made 
young Edward, heir of the monarchy : the principality of 
Wales was fully annexed to the crown ; and henceforth 
gives a title to the eldest son of the kings of England. 

The settlement of Wales appeared so complete to Ed- 
ward, that, in less than two years after, he went abroad, 
in order to make peace between Alphonso, king of Ar- 
ragon, and Philip the Fair, who had lately succeeded his 
father, Philip the Hardy, on the throne of France y . The 
difference between these two princes had arisen about 
the kingdom of Sicily, which the pope, after his hopes 
from England failed him, had bestowed on Charles, bro- 
ther to St. Lewis, and which was claimed upon other 
titles by Peter, king of Arragon, father to Alphonso. 
Edward had powers from both princes to settle the terms 
of peace, and he succeeded in his endeavours ; but as the 

* Heming. vol. i. p. 12. Trivet, p. 259. Ann. Waverl. p. 238. T. Wykes 
p. 111. M. West. p. 411. x Sir j. Wynne, p. 15. 

y Kymer, vol. ii. p. 149, 150. 174. 



EDWARD I. 

controversy nowise regards England, we shall not enter CHAP. 
into a detail of it. He stayed abroad above three years ; XIIL 
and on his return found many disorders to have prevailed, 
both from open violence, and from the corruption of justice. 

Thomas Chamberlain, a gentleman of some note, had 
assembled several of his associates at Boston, in Lincoln- 
shire, under pretence of holding a tournament, an exer- 
cise practised by the gentry only, but in reality with a 
view of plundering the rich fair of Boston, and robbing 
the merchants. To facilitate his purpose, he privately 
set fire to the town ; and while the inhabitants were 
employed in quenching the flames, the conspirators broke 
into the booths, and carried off the goods. Chamberlain 
himself was detected and hanged ; but maintained so 
steadily the point of honour to his accomplices, that he 
could not be prevailed on, by offers or promises, to dis- 
cover any of them. Many other instances of robbery and 
violence broke out in all parts of England ; though the 
singular circumstances attending this conspiracy have 
made it alone be particularly recorded by historians 2 . 

But the corruption of the judges, by which the fountains 1239. 
of justice were poisoned, seemed of still more dangerous 
consequence. Edward, in order to remedy this prevailing 
abuse, summoned a Parliament, and brought the judges 
to a trial ; where all of them, except two, who were cler- 
gymen, were convicted of this flagrant iniquity, were fined 
and deposed. The amount of the fines levied upon them 
is alone a sufficient proof of their guilt ; being above one 
hundred thousand marks, an immense sum in those days, 
and sufficient to defray the charges of an expensive war 
between two great kingdoms. The king afterwards made 
all the new judges swear that they would take no bribes; 
but his expedient of deposing and fining the old ones 
was the more effectual remedy. 

We now come to give an account of the state of affairs 
in Scotland, which gave rise to the most interesting trans- 
actions of this reign, and of some of the subsequent ; 
though the intercourse of that kingdom with England, 
either in peace or war, had hitherto produced so few 
events of moment, that to avoid tediousness, we have 
omitted many of them, and have been very concise in 

* Heming. vol. i. p. 16, 17. 



12 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, relating the rest. If the Scots had, before this period, 

v_I "*!_' an y rea l history worthy of the name, except what they 
1289 glean from scattered passages in the English historians, 
those events, however minute, yet being the only foreign 
transactions of the nation, might deserve a place in it. 

Affairs of Though the government of Scotland had been conti- 
nd ' nually exposed to those factions and convulsions which 
are incident to all barbarous and to many civilized nations; 
and though the successions of their kings, the only part 
of their history which deserves any credit, had often been 
disordered by irregularities and usurpations ; the true 
heir of the royal family had still in the end prevailed, and 
Alexander III, who had espoused the sister of Edward, 
probably inherited, after a period of about eight hundred 
years, and through a succession of males, the sceptre of all 
the Scottish princes who had governed the nation since 
its first establishment in the island. This prince died in 
1286, by a fall from his horse at Kinghorn 3 , without 
leaving any male issue, and without any descendant, 
except Margaret, born of Eric, king of Norway, and 
of Margaret, daughter of the Scottish monarch. This 
princess, commonly called the Maid of Norway, though 
a female, and an infant, and a foreigner, yet being the 
lawful heir of the kingdom, had, through her grand- 
father's care, been recognized successor by the states 
of Scot! and b ; and on Alexander's death, the disposi- 
tions which had been previously made against that 
event appeared so just and prudent, that no disorders, as 
might naturally be apprehended, ensued in the kingdom. 
Margaret was acknowledged Queen of Scotland ; five 
guardians, the Bishops of St. Andrew's and Glasgow, the 
Earls of Fife and Buchan, and James, Steward of Scotland, 
entered peaceably upon the administration ; and the in- 
fant princess, under the protection of Edward, her great 
uncle, and Eric, her father, who exerted themselves on 
this occasion, seemed firmly seated on the throne of Scot- 
land. The English monarch was naturally led to build 
mighty projects on this incident ; and having lately, by 
force of arms, brought Wales under subjection, he at^ 
tempted, by the marriage of Margaret with his eldest son, 
Edward, to unite the whole island into one monarchy, and 

a Homing, vol. i. p. 29. Trivet, p. 267. b Kymer, vol. ii. p. 266. 



EDWARD I. 13 

thereby to give it security both against domestic convul- CHAP. 
sions and foreign invasions. The amity which had of late xn 
prevailed between the two nations, and which, even 
former times, had never been interrupted by any violent 
wars or injuries, facilitated extremely the execution of 
this project, so favourable to the happiness and grandeur 
of both kingdoms; and the states of Scotland readily gave 
their assent to the English proposals, and even agreed 
that their young sovereign should be educated in the 
court of Edward. Anxious, however, for the liberty and 
independence of their country, they took care to stipulate 
very equitable conditions, ere they intrusted themselves 
into the hands of so great and so ambitious a monarch. 
It was agreed, that they should enjoy all their ancient 
laws, liberties, and customs ; that in case young Edward 
and Margaret should die without issue, the crown of 
Scotland should revert to the next heir, and should be 
inherited by him free and independent ; that the military 
tenants of the crown should never be obliged to go out of 
Scotland, in order to do homage to the sovereign of the 
united kingdoms, nor the chapters of cathedral, collegiate, 
or conventual churches, in order to make elections ; that 
the Parliaments summoned for Scottish affairs should 
always be held within the bounds of that kingdom ; and 
that Edward should bind himself under the penalty of one 
hundred thousand marks, payable to the pope for the use 
of the holy wars, to observe all these articles . It is not 
easy to conceive that two nations could have treated more 
on a footing of equality than Scotland and England main- 
tained during the whole course of this transaction ; and 
though Edward gave his assent to the article concerning 
the future independency of the Scottish crown, with a 
saving of his former rights, this reserve gave no alarm to 
the nobility of Scotland; both because these rights, 
having hitherto been little heard of, had occasioned no 
disturbance, and because the Scots had so near a prospect 
of seeing them entirely absorbed in the rights of their 
sovereignty. 

But this project, so happily formed and so amicably 
conducted, failed of success, by the sudden death of the 
Norwegian princess, who expired on her passage to Scot- 

c Rymer, vol. ii. p. 482. 
VOL. II. 2 



14 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. land d , and left a very dismal prospect to the kingdom. 
^J _, Though disorders were for the present obviated by the 
1291 authority of the regency formerly established, the succes- 
Competi- sion itself of the crown was now become an object of 
crow^o? 6 dispute y an d the regents could not expect that a contro- 
Scotiand. versy, which is not usually decided by reason and argu- 
ment alone, would be peaceably settled by them, or even 
by the states of the kingdom, amidst so many powerful 
pretenders. The posterity of William, King of Scotland, 
the prince taken prisoner by Henry II., being all extinct 
by the death of Margaret of Norway, the right to the crown 
devolved on the issue of David, Earl of Huntingdon, 
brother to William, whose male line being also extinct, 
left the succession open to the posterity of his daughters. 
The Earl of Huntingdon had three daughters ; Margaret, 
married to Alan, Lord of Galloway, Isabella, wife of 
Robert Brus or Bruce, Lord of Annandale, and Adama, 
who espoused Henry Lord Hastings. Margaret; the eldest 
of the sisters, left one daughter, Devergilda, married to 
John Baliol, by whom she had a son of the same name, 
one of the present competitors for the crown : Isabella, 
the second, bore a son, Robert Bruce, who was now alive, 
and who also insisted on his claim : Adama, the third, 
left a son, John Hastings, who pretended that the king- 
dom of Scotland, like many other inheritances, was divisi- 
ble among the three daughters of the Earl of Huntingdon, 
and that he, in right of his mother, had a title to a 
third of it. Baliol and Bruce united against Hastings in 
maintaining that the kingdom was indivisible ; but each 
of them, supported by plausible reasons, asserted the pre- 
ference of his own title. Baliol was sprung from the 
elder branch ; Bruce was one degree nearer the common 
stock : if the principle of representation was regarded, 
the former had the better claim ; if propinquity was con- 
sidered, the latter was entitled to the preference 6 . The 
sentiments of men were divided : all the nobility had 
taken part on one side or the other : the people followed 
implicitly their leaders: the two claimants themselves 
had great power and numerous retainers in Scotland : and 
it is no wonder that, among a rude people, more accus- 
tomed to arms than inured to laws, a controversy of this 

a Heming. vol. i. p. 30. Trivet, p. 268. Homing, vol. i. p. 36. 



EDWARD I. 15 

nature, which could not be decided by any former pre- CHAP 
cedent among them, and which is capable of exciting 
commotions in the most legal and best established govern- 1291 
merits, should threaten the state with the most fatal con- 
vulsions. 

Each century has its peculiar mode in conducting busi- 
ness ; and men, guided more by custom than by reason, 
follow without inquiry the manners which are prevalent 
in their own time. The practice of that age, in contro- 
versies between states and princes, seems to have been to 
choose a foreign prince as an equal arbiter, by whom the 
question was decided, and whose sentence prevented those 
dismal confusions and disorders inseparable at all times 
from war, but which were multiplied a hundredfold, and 
dispersed into every corner, by the nature of the feudal 
governments. It was thus that the English king and 
barons, in the preceding reign*, had endeavoured to com- 
pose their dissensions by a reference to the King of 
France ; and the celebrated integrity of that monarch 
had prevented all the bad effects which might naturally 
have been dreaded from so perilous an expedient. It was 
thus that the Kings of France and Arragon, and after- 
wards other princes, had submitted their controversies to 
Edward's judgment ; and the remoteness of their states, 
the great power of the princes, and the little interest 
which he had on either side, had induced him to acquit 
himself with honour in his decisions. The Parliament of 
Scotland, therefore, threatened with a furious civil war, and 
allured by the great reputation of the English monarch, as 
well as by the present amicable correspondence between Reference 
the kingdoms, agreed in making a reference to Edward ; toEdward - 
and Fraser, Bishop of St. Andrew's, with other deputies, 
was sent to notify to him their resolution, and to claim 
his good offices in the present dangers to which they were 
exposed f . His inclination, they flattered themselves, led 
him to prevent their dissensions, and to interpose with a 
power which none of the competitors would dare to with- 
stand : when this expedient was proposed by one party, 
the other deemed it dangerous to object to it : indif- 
ferent persons thought that the imminent perils of a civil 
war would thereby be prevented : and no one reflected 

f Homing, vol. i. p. 31. 



6 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, on the ambitious character of Edward, and the almost 



_ certain ruin which must attend a small state, divided by 
1291 faction, when it thus implicitly submits itself to the will 

of so powerful and encroaching a neighbour. 
Homage of The temptation was too strong for the virtue of the 
English monarch to resist. He purposed to lay hold of 
the present favourable opportunity, and if not to create, 
at least to revive, his claim of a feudal superiority over 
Scotland ; a claim which had hitherto lain in the deepest 
obscurity, and which, if ever it had been an object of at- 
tention, or had been so much as suspected, would have ef- 
fectually prevented the Scottish barons from choosing him 
for an umpire. He well knew that, if this pretension 
were once submitted to, as it seemed difficult, in the pre- 
sent situation of Scotland, to oppose it, the absolute 
sovereignty of that kingdom (which had been the case 
with Wales) would soon follow ; and that one great vassal, 
cooped up in an island with his liege lord, without resource 
from foreign powers, without aid from any fellow vassals, 
could not long maintain his dominions against the efforts 
of a mighty kingdom, assisted by all the cavils which the 
feudal law afforded his superior against him. In pursuit 
of this great object, very advantageous to England, per- 
haps in the end no less beneficial to Scotland, but ex- 
tremely unjust and iniquitous in itself, Edward busied 
himself in searching for proofs of his pretended supe- 
riority ; and instead of looking into his own archives, 
which, if his claim had been real, must have afforded him 
numerous records of the homages done by the Scottish 
princes, and could alone yield him any authentic testi- 
mony, he made all the monasteries be ransacked for old 
chronicles and histories written by Englishmen, and he 
collected all the passages which seemed anywise to favour 
his pretensions 8 . Yet even in this method of proceed- 
ing, which must have discovered to himself the injustice 
of his claim, he was far from being fortunate. He began 
his proofs from the time of Edward the Elder, and con- 
tinued them through all the subsequent Saxon and 
Norman times ; but produced nothing to his purpose h . 
The whole amount of his authorities during the Saxon 
period, when stripped of the bombast and inaccurate style 

g Walsing. p. 55. h Rymer, vol. ii. p. 559. 



EDWARD I. 1 

of the monkish historians, is, that the Scots had some- CHAP. 
times been defeated by the English, had received peace 
on disadvantageous terms, had made submissions to the 1291 
English monarch, and had even, perhaps, fallen into some 
dependence on a power which was so much superior, and 
which they had not at that time sufficient force to resist. 
His authorities from the Norman period were, if possible, 
still less conclusive : the historians indeed make frequent 
mention of homage done by the northern potentate ; but 
no one of them says that it was done for his kingdom, 
and several of them declare, in express terms, that it was 
relative only to the fiefs which he enjoyed south of the 
Tweed 1 : in the same manner as the King of England 
himself swore fealty to the French monarch for the fiefs 
which he inherited in France. And to such scandalous 
shifts was Edward reduced, that he quotes a passage from 
Hoveden k , where it is asserted that a Scottish king had 
done homage to England but he purposely omits the 
latter part of the sentence, which expresses that this 
prince did homage for the lands which he held in Eng- 
land. 

When William, King of Scotland, was taken prisoner 
in the battle of Alnwick, he was obliged, for the recovery 
of his liberty, to swear fealty to the victor for his crown 
itself. The deed was performed according to all the rites 
of the feudal law : the record was preserved in the English 
archives, and is mentioned by all the historians ; but as it 
is the only one of the kind, and as historians speak of this 
superiority as a great acquisition gained by the fortunate 
arms of Henry II. 1 , there can remain no doubt that the 
kingdom of Scotland was, in all former periods, entirely 
free and independent. Its subjection continued a very 
few years. King Richard, desirous, before his departure 
for the Holy Land, to conciliate the friendship of William, 
renounced that homage which, he says in express terms, 
had been extorted by his father ; and he only retained 
the usual homage which had been done by the Scottish 
princes for the lands which they held in England. 

But though this transaction rendered the independ- 
ence of Scotland still more unquestionable than if no 

* Hoveden, p. 492. 662. M. Paris, p. 109. M. West. p. 256. 

k P. 662. 1 Neubr. lib. ii. cap. iv. Knyghton, p. 2392. 

2* 



18 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, fealty had ever been sworn to the English crown ; the 
XIIL Scottish kings, apprised of the point aimed at by their 

^7^ powerful neighbours, seemed for a long time to have 
retained some jealousy on that head, and, in doing 
homage, to have anxiously obviated all such pretensions : 
when William, in 1200, did homage to John at Lincoln, 
he was careful to insert a salvo for his royal dignity m : 
when Alexander III. sent assistance to his father-in-law, 
Henry III., during the wars of the barons, he previously 
procured an acknowledgment that this aid was granted 
only from friendship, not from any right claimed by the 
English monarch 11 : and when the same prince was invited 
to assist at the coronation of this very Edward, he declined 
attendance till he received a like acknowledgment . 

But as all these reasons (and stronger could not be pro- 
duced) were but a feeble rampart against the power of the 
sword, Edward, carrying with him a great army, which 
was to enforce his proofs, advanced to the frontiers, and 
invited the Scottish Parliament and all the competitors 
to attend him in the castle of Norham, a place situated 
on the southern banks of the Tweed, in order to determine 
that cause which had been referred to his arbitration. 
But though this deference seemed due to so great a 
monarch, and was no more than what his father and the 
English barons, had in similar circumstances, paid to 
Lewis IX., the king, careful not to give umbrage, and 
determined never to produce his claim till it should be 
too late to think of opposition, sent the Scottish barons 
an acknowledgment, that though at that time they passed 
the frontiers, this step should never be drawn into prece- 
dent, or afford the English kings a pretence for exacting 

lothMay. a like submission in any future transaction p . When the 
whole Scottish nation had thus unwarily put themselves 
in his power, Edward opened the conferences at Norham: 
he infonned the Parliament, by the mouth of Koger le 
Brabangon, his chief justiciary, that he was come thither 
to determine the right among the competitors to their 
crown ; that he was determined to do strict justice to all 
parties ; and that he was entitled to this authority, not 
in virtue of the reference made to him, but in quality of 

m Hoveden, p. 811. 

Rymer, vol. ii. p. 844. o See note [A], at the end of the volume. 

P Bymer, vol. u. p. 539. 845. Walsing. p. 56. 



EDWARD I. 19 

superior and liege lord of the kingdom 1 . He then pro- CHAP. 
duced his proofs of this superiority, which he pretended ^j ^ 
to be unquestionable, and he required of them an acknow- 1291 
ledgment of it ; a demand which was superfluous, if the 
fact were already known and avowed, and which plainly 
betrays Edward's consciousness of his lame and defective 
title. The Scottish Parliament was astonished at so new 
a pretension, and answered only by their silence. But 
the king, in order to maintain the appearance of free and 
regular proceedings, desired them to remove into their 
own country, to deliberate upon his claim, to examine 
his proofs, to propose all their objections, and to inform 
him of their resolution : and he appointed a plain at 
Upsettleton, on the northern banks of the Tweed, for 
that purpose. 

When the Scottish barons assembled in this place, 
though moved with indignation at the injustice of this 
unexpected claim, and at the fraud with which it had 
been conducted, they found themselves betrayed into a 
situation, in which it was impossible for them to make 
any defence for the ancient liberty and independence of 
their country. The King of England, a martial and politic 
prince, at the head of a powerful army, lay at a very small 
distance, and was only separated from them by a river 
fordable in many places. Though by a sudden flight 
some of them might themselves be able to make their 
escape, what hopes could they entertain of securing the 
kingdom against his future enterprises ? Without a 
head, without union among themselves, attached all of 
them to different competitors, whose title they had rashly 
submitted to the decision of this foreign usurper, and who 
were thereby reduced to an absolute dependence upon 
him ; they could only expect, by resistance, to entail on 
themselves and their posterity a more grievous and more 
destructive servitude. Yet, even in this desperate state 
of their affairs, the Scottish barons, as we learn from 
Walsingham r , one of the best historians of that period, 
had the courage to reply, that, till they had a king, they 
could take no resolution on so momentous a point : the 

a Rymer, vol. ii. p. 543. See note [B], at the end of the volume. 

r Page 56. M. West. p. 436. It is said by Hemingford, vol. i. p. 33, that the 
king menaced violently the Scottish barons, and forced them to compliance, at 
least to silence. 



20 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, journal of King Edward says, that they made no answer 
all 6 : that is, perhaps, no particular answer or objection 
to Edward's claim : and by this solution it is possible to 
reconcile the journal with the historian. The king, 
therefore, interpreting their silence as consent, addressed 
himself to the several competitors, and, previously to his 
pronouncing sentence, required their acknowledgment 
of his superiority. 

It is evident from the genealogy of the royal family 
of Scotland, that there could only be two questions about 
the succession, that between Baliol and Bruce on the one 
hand, and Lord Hastings on the other, concerning the 
partition of the crown; and that between Baliol and 
Bruce themselves, concerning the preference of their 
respective titles, supposing the kingdom indivisible : yet 
there appeared on this occasion no less than nine claim- 
ants besides : John Comyn, or Cummin, Lord of Bade- 
noch, Florence, Earl of Holland, Patrick D unbar, Earl 
of March, William de Yescey, Robert de Pynkeni, Nicho- 
las de Soules, Patrick Galythly, Roger de Mandeville, 
Robert de Ross ; not to mention the King of Norway, 
who claimed as heir to his daughter Margaret*. Some 
of these competitors were descended from more remote 
branches of the royal family ; others were even sprung 
from illegitimate children ; and as none of them had the 
least pretence of right, it is natural to conjecture that 
Edward had secretly encouraged them to appear in the 
list of claimants, that he might sow the more division 
among the Scottish nobility, make the cause appear the 
more intricate, and be able to choose, among a great 
number, the most obsequious candidate. 

But he found them all equally obsequious on this occa- 
sion 11 . Robert Bruce was the first that acknowledged 
Edward's right of superiority over Scotland, and he had 
so far foreseen the king's pretensions, that even in his 
petition, where he set forth his claim to the crown, he 
had previously applied to him as liege lord of the king- 
dom ; a step which was not taken by any of the other 
competitors w . They all, however, with seeming willing- 
ness, made a like acknowledgment when required ; though 

Rymer, vol. ii. p. 548. t Walsing. p. 58. 

u Rymer, vol. ii. p. 529. 545. Walsing. p. 56. Hemino-. vol i p 33 34. 
Trivet, p. 260. M. West. p. 415. w R ymer , vol. ii. p. 577, 578, 579 



EDWARD I. 21 

Baliol, lest he should give offence to the Scottish nation, CHAP. 
had taken care to be absent during the first days ; and ^_ ^ 
he was the last that recognized the king's title x . Edward 1291 
next deliberated concerning the method of proceeding 
in the discussion of this great controversy. He gave 
orders that Baliol, and such of the competitors as adhered 
to him, should choose forty commissioners : Bruce and 
his adherents forty more : to these the king added twenty- 
four Englishmen: he ordered these hundred and four 
commissioners to examine the cause deliberately among 
themselves, and make their report to him y : and he pro- 
mised in the ensuing year to give his determination. 
Meanwhile he pretended that it was requisite to have 
all the fortresses of Scotland delivered into his hands, in 
order to enable him, without opposition, to put the true 
heir in possession of the crown ; and this exorbitant de- 
mand was complied with, both by the states and by the 
claimants 2 . The governors also of all the castles imme- 
diately resigned their command; except Umfreville, 
Earl of Angus, who refused, without a formal and parti- 
cular acquittal from the Parliament and the several claim- 
ants, to surrender his fortresses to so domineering an ar- 
biter, who had given to Scotland so many just reasons 
of suspicion a . Before this assembly broke up, which 
had fixed such a mark of dishonour on the nation, all 
the prelates and barons there present swore fealty to 
Edward ; and that prince appointed commissioners to 
receive a like oath from all the other barons and persons 
of distinction in Scotland b . 

The king, having finally made, as he imagined, this 
important acquisition, left the commissioners to sit at 
Berwick, and examine the titles of the several competitors 
who claimed the precarious crown, which Edward was 
willing for some time to allow the lawful heir to enjoy. 
He went southwards, both in order to assist at the funeral 
of his mother, Queen Eleanor, who died about this time, 
and to compose some differences which had arisen among 
the principal nobility. Gilbert, Earl of Gloucester, the 
greatest baron of the kingdom, had espoused the king's 
daughter 5 and being elated by that alliance, and still 

x Rymer, vol. ii. p. 546. 7 Ibid. p. 555, 556. 

z Ibid. p. 529. Walsing. p. 56, 57. a Rymer, vol. ii. p. 531. 

b Ibid. p. 573. 



22 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, more by his own power, which, he thought, set him above 
XIIL the laws, he permitted his bailiffs and vassals to commit 

V ^^" X violence on the lands of Humphry Bohun, Earl of Here- 
ford, who retaliated the injury by like violence. But 
this was not a reign in which such illegal proceedings 
could pass with impunity. Edward procured a sentence 
against the two earls, committed them both to prison, 
and would not restore them to their liberty till he had 
exacted a fine of one thousand marks from Hereford, and 
one of ten thousand from his son-in-law. 

1292. During this interval, the titles of John Baliol and of 
Kobert Bruce, whose claims appeared to be the best 
founded among the competitors for the crown of Scotland, 
were the subject of general disquisition, as well as of 
debate among the commissioners. Edward, in order to 
give greater authority to his intended decision, proposed 
this general question both to the commissioners and to 
all the celebrated lawyers in Europe : Whether a person 
descended from the eldest sister, but farther removed by 
one degree, were preferable, in the succession of king- 
doms, fiefs, and other indivisible inheritances, to one de- 
scended from the younger sister, but one degree nearer to 
the common stock ? This was the true state of the case ; 
and the principle of representation had now gained such 
ground everywhere, that a uniform answer was returned 

^ ard ,? to the king in the affirmative. He therefore pronounced 

Edward m , . _ ,. , 

favour of sentence in favour of Baliol; and when Bruce, upon this 
Baiioi. disappointment, joined afterwards Lord Hastings, and 
claimed a third of the kingdom, which he now pretended 
to be divisible, Edward, though his interest seemed more 
to require the partition of Scotland, again pronounced 
sentence in favour of Baliol. That competitor, upon re- 
newing his oath of fealty to England, was put in posses- 
sion of the kingdom ; all his fortresses were restored to 
him d ; and the conduct of Edward, both in the deliberate 
solemnity of the proceedings, and in the justice of the 
award, was so far unexceptionable. 

Had the king entertained no other view than that of 
establishing his superiority over Scotland, though the 
iniquity of that claim was apparent, and was aggravated 
by the most egregious breach of trust, he might have fixed 

Rymer, vol. ii. p. 590, 591. 593. 600. d ibid. p. 590. 



EDWARD I. 23 

his pretensions, and have left that important acquisition CHAP. 
to his posterity : but he immediately proceeded in such 
a manner as made it evident that, not content with this 1293 . 
usurpation, he aimed also at the absolute sovereignty and 
dominion of the kingdom. Instead of gradually inuring 
the Scots to the yoke, and exerting his rights of superi- 
ority with moderation, he encouraged all appeals to Eng- 
land ; required King John himself, by six different sum- 
monses on trivial occasions, to come to London 6 : refused 
him the privilege of defending his cause by a procurator : 
and obliged him to appear at the bar of his Parliament 
as a private person f . These humiliating demands were 
hitherto quite unknown to a King of Scotland : they are, 
however, the necessary consequence of vassalage by the 
feudal law ; and as there was no preceding instance of 
such treatment submitted to by a prince of that country j 
Edward must, from that circumstance alone, had there 
remained any doubt, have been himself convinced that 
his claim was altogether an usurpation^ But his in- 
tention plainly was, to enrage Baliol by these indignities, 
to engage him in rebellion, and to assume the dominion 
of the state, as the punishment of his treason and felony. 
Accordingly Baliol, though a prince of a soft and gentle 
spirit, returned into Scotland highly provoked at this 
usage, and determined at all hazards to vindicate his 
liberty; and the war which soon after broke out between 
France and England gave him a favourable opportunity 
of executing his purpose. 

The violence, robberies, and disorders, to which that age 
was so subject, were not confined to the licentious barons 
and their retainers at land : the sea was equally infested 
with piracy : the feeble execution of the laws had given 
licence to all orders of men : and a general appetite for 
rapine and revenge, supported by a false point of honour, 
had also infected the merchants and mariners; and it 
pushed them, on any provocation, to seek redress by im- 
mediate retaliation upon the aggressors. A Norman an 
an English vessel met off the coast near Bayonne ; and 
both of them having occasion for water, they sent their 
boats to land, and the several crews came at the same 

e Rymer, vol. ii. p. 603. 605, 606. 608. 615, 616. 

f Ryley's Placit. Parl. p. 152, 153. 

e See note [C], at the end of the volume. 



24 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, time to the same spring : there ensued a quarrel for the 
XIIL preference : a Norman, drawing his dagger, attempted to 
stab an Englishman ; who, grappling with him, threw his 
adversary on the ground ; and the Norman, as was pre- 
tended, falling on his own dagger, was slain h . This 
scuffle between two seamen about water soon kindled a 
bloody war between the two nations, and involved a great 
part of Europe in the quarrel. The mariners of the 
Norman ship carried their complaints to the French king : 
Philip, without inquiring into the fact, without demand- 
ing redress, bade them take revenge, and trouble him no 
more about the matter 1 . The Normans, who had been 
more regular than usual in applying to the crown, needed 
but this hint to proceed to immediate violence. They 
seized an English ship in the channel ; and hanging, along 
with some dogs, several of the crew on the yard-arm, in 
presence of their companions, dismissed the vessel k ; and 
bade the mariners inform their countrymen that ven- 
geance was now taken for the blood of the Norman killed 
at Bayonne. This injury, accompanied with so general 
and deliberate an insult, was resented by the mariners of 
the cinque-ports, who, without carrying any complaint to 
the king, or waiting for redress, retaliated, by committing 
like barbarities on all French vessels without distinction. 
The French, provoked by their losses, preyed on the ships 
of all Edward's subjects, whether English or Gascon : the 
sea became a scene of piracy between the nations : the 
sovereigns, without either seconding or repressing the 
violence of their subjects, seemed to remain indifferent 
spectators : the English made private associations with the 
Irish and Dutch seamen ; the French with the Flemish 
and Genoese 1 . And the animosities of the people on 
both sides became every day more violent and barbarous. 
A fleet of two hundred Norman vessels set sail to the 
south for wine and other commodities; and, in their 
passage, seized all the English ships which they met with, 
hanged the seamen, and seized the goods. The inhabi- 
tants of the English sea-ports, informed of this incident, 
fitted out a fleet of sixty sail, stronger and better manned 
than the others, and awaited the enemy on their return. 

h Walsing. p 58. Heming. vol. i. p. 39. i Walsing. p. 58. 

k Hemmg. vol. i. p. 40. M. West. p. 419. i Heminf. vol. i. p. 40. 



EDWARD I. 25 

After an obstinate battle, they put them to rout, and CHAP 
sunk, destroyed, or took the greater part of them m . No , xn ^ 
quarter was given ; and it is pretended that the loss of ^Tg-T"" 
the French amounted to fifteen thousand men ; which is 
accounted for by this circumstance, that the Norman 
fleet was employed in transporting a considerable body 
of soldiers from the south. 

The affair was now become too important to be any 
longer overlooked by the sovereigns. On Philip's send- 
ing an envoy to demand reparation and restitution, the 
king despatched the Bishop of London to the French 
court, in order to accommodate the quarrel. He first said 
that the English courts of justice were open to all men ; 
and if any Frenchman were injured, he might seek re- 
paration by course of law n . He next offered to adjust 
the matter by private arbiters, or by a personal interview 
with the King of France, or by a reference either to the 
pope or the college of cardinals, or any particular cardi- 
nals, agreed on by both parties . The French, probably 
the more disgusted as they were hitherto losers in the 
quarrel, refused all these expedients : the vessels and 
the goods of merchants were confiscated on both sides : 
depredations were continued by the Gascons on the 
western coast of France, as well as by the English in the 
channel : Philip cited the king, as Duke of Guienne, to 
appear in his court at Paris, and answer for these offences : 
and Edward, apprehensive of danger to that province, sent 
John St. John, an experienced soldier, to Bordeaux, 
and gave him directions to put Guienne in a posture of 
defence p . 

That he might, however, prevent a final rupture between 1294. 
the nations, the king despatched his brother, Edmond, 
Earl of Lancaster, to Paris ; and as this prince had es- 
poused the Queen of Navarre, mother to Jane, Queen of 
France, he seemed, on account of that alliance, the most 
proper person for finding expedients to accommodate 
the difference. Jane pretended to interpose with her 
good offices ; Mary, the queen dowager, feigned the same 
amicable disposition ; and these two princesses told Ed- 
mond that the circumstance the most difficult to adjust 

Walsing. p. 60. Trivet, p. 274. Chron. Dunst. vol. ii. p. 609. 

n Trivet, p. 275. o Ibid. P Ibid, p, 276. 

VOL. II. 3 



6 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, was the point of honour with Philip, who thought himself 
XIIL affronted by the injuries committed against him by his 
^^^ sub-vassals in Guienne ; but if Edward would once consent 
to give him seisin and possession of that province, he 
would think his honour fully repaired, would engage to 
restore Guienne immediately, and would accept of a very 
easy satisfaction for all the other injuries. The king was 
consulted on the occasion; and as he then found himself 
in immediate danger of war with the Scots, which he re- 
garded as the more important concern, this politic prince, 
blinded by his favourite passion for subduing that nation, 
allowed himself to be deceived by so gross an artifice q . 
He sent his brother orders to sign and execute the treaty 
with the two queens : Philip solemnly promised to exe- 
cute his part of it ; and the king's citation to appear in 
the court of France was accordingly recalled : but the 
French monarch was no sooner put in possession of 
Guienne, than the citation was renewed ; Edward was 
condemned for non-appearance ; and Guienne, by a for- 
mal sentence, was declared to be forfeited and annexed 
to the crown r . 

Edward, fallen into a like snare with that which he 
himself had spread for the Scots, was enraged ; and the 
more so, as he was justly ashamed of his own conduct in 
being so egregiously over-reached by the court of France. 
Sensible of the extreme difficulties which he should en- 
counter in the recovery of Gascony, where he had not 
retained a single place in his hands, he endeavoured to 
compensate that loss by forming alliances with several 
princes, who, he projected, should attack France on all 
quarters, and make a diversion of her forces. Adolphus 
de Nassau, King of the Komans, entered into a treaty with 
him for that purpose s ; as did also Amadseus, Count of 
Savoy, the Archbishop of Cologne, the Counts of Gueldre 
and Luxembourg, the Duke of Brabant and Count of 
Barre,who had married his two daughters, Margaret and 
Eleanor : but these alliances were extremely burdensome 
to his narrow revenues, and proved in the issue entirely 
ineffectual. More impression was made on Guienne by 



oL { ' P- 42 > 

622 - 



EDWARD I. 27 

an English army, which he completed by emptying the CHAP. 
jails of many thousand thieves and robbers, who had been^ xn ^ 
confined there for their crimes. So low had the pro-^^~" 
fession of arms fallen, and so much had it degenerated 
from the estimation in which it stood during the vigour 
of the feudal system ! 

The king himself was detained in England, first by 1295. 
contrary winds*, then by his apprehension of a Scottish 
invasion, and by a rebellion of the Welsh, w r hom he re- 
pressed and brought again under subjection". The army 
which he sent to Guienne was commanded by his nephew, 
John de Bretagne, Earl of Kichmond, and under him by 
St. John, Tibetot, De Yere, and other officers of reputa- 
tion w ; who made themselves masters of the town of 
Bayonne, as well as of Bourg, Blaye, Keole, St. Severe, 
and other places, which straitened Bourdeaux, and cut 
off its communication both by sea and land. The favour 
which the Gascon nobility bore to the English government 
facilitated these conquests, and seemed to promise still 
greater successes ; but this advantage was soon lost by the 
misconduct of some of the officers. Philip's brother, 
Charles de Yalois, who commanded the French armies, 
having laid siege to Podensac, a small fortress near Reole, 
obliged Giffard, the governor, to capitulate ; and the arti- 
cles, though favourable to the English, left all the Gascons 
prisoners at discretion, of whom about fifty were hanged 
by Charles as rebels : a policy by which he both intimi- 
dated that people, and produced an irreparable breach 
between them and the English x . That prince imme- 
diately attacked Reole, where the Earl of Richmond him- 
self commanded ; and as the place seemed not tenable, 
the English general drew his troops to the waterside, 
with an intention of embarking with the greater part of 
the army. The enraged Gascons fell upon his rear, and 
at the same time opened their gates to the French, who, 
besides making themselves masters of the place, took 
many prisoners of distinction. St. Severe was more 
vigorously defended by Hugh de Yere, son of the Earl 
of Oxford ; but was at last obliged to capitulate. The 

* Chron. Dunst. vol. ii. p. 622. 

u Walsing. p. 62. Heming. vol. i. p. 55. Trivet, p. 282. Chron. Dunst. vol. ii. 
p. 622. w Trivet, p. 279. 

* Heming. vol. i. p. 49. 



28 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. French king, not content with these successes in Gascony, 
xin. threatened England with an invasion ; and, by a sudden 
^J^ attempt, his troops took and burnt Dover y , but were 
obliged soon after to retire. And in order to make a 
greater diversion of the English force, and engage Edward 
in dangerous and important wars, he formed a secret 
alliance with John Baliol, King of Scotland ; the com- 
mencement of that strict union which, during so many 
centuries, was maintained by mutual interests and neces- 
sities, between the French and Scottish nations. John 
confirmed this alliance, by stipulating a marriage between 
his eldest son and the daughter of Charles de Valois z . 

Digression The expenses attending these multiplied wars of Ed- 
concern- T -I 1 !- ,' n ' 1 i -li i' 

ing the ward, and his preparations lor war, joined to alterations 
enofPar wn * cn nac ^ insensibly taken place in the general state of 
liament. affairs, obliged him to have frequent recourse to parlia- 
mentary supplies, introduced the lower orders of the 
state into the public councils, and laid the foundations 
of great and important changes in the government. 

Though nothing could be worse calculated for cultiva- 
ting the arts of peace, or maintaining peace itself, than 
the long subordination of vassalage from the king to the 
meanest gentleman, and the consequent slavery of the 
lower people ; evils inseparable from the feudal system ; 
that system was never able to fix the state in a proper 
warlike posture, or give it the full exertion of its power 
for defence, and still less for offence, against a public 
enemy. The military tenants, unacquainted with obe- 
dience, unexperienced in war, held a rank in the troops 
by their birth, not by their merits or services ; composed 
a disorderly, and consequently a feeble army ; and during 
the few days which they were obliged by their tenures 
to remain in ^ the field, were often more formidable to 
their own prince than to foreign powers, against whom 
they were assembled. The sovereigns came gradually to 
disuse this cumbersome and dangerous machine, so apt 
to recoil upon the hand which held it ; and exchanging 
the military service for pecuniary supplies, enlisted forces 
by means of a, contract with particular officers, (such as 
those the Italians denominate Condottieri,) whom they 

y Trivet, p. 284. Chron. Dunst. vol. ii. p 64* 
Rymer, vol. ii. p. 680, 681. 695. 697. Heming. vol. i. p. 76. Trivet, p. 285. 



EDWARD I. 29 

dismissed at the end of the war a . The barons and knights CHAP. 
themselves often entered into these engagements with 
the prince; and were enabled to fill their, bands, both 
by the authority which they possessed over their vassals 
and tenants; and from the great numbers of loose, dis- 
orderly people, whom they found on their estates, and 
who willingly embraced an opportunity of gratifying 
their appetite for war and rapine. 

Meanwhile the old Gothic fabric, being neglected, went 
gradually to decay. Though the conqueror had divided 
all the lands of England into sixty thousand knights' fees, 
the number of these was insensibly diminished by various 
artifices ; and the king at last found that, by putting the 
law in execution, he could assemble a small part only 
of the ancient force of the kingdom. It was an usual 
expedient for men who held of the king or great barons 
by military tenure, to transfer their land to the church, 
and receive it back by another tenure, called frank- 
almoigne, by which they were not bound to perform any 
service b . A law was made against this practice ; but the 
abuse had probably gone far before it was attended to, 
and probably was not entirely corrected by the new sta- 
tute, which, like most laws of that age, we may conjecture 
to have been but feebly executed by the magistrate 
against the perpetual interest of so many individuals. 
The constable and mareschal, when they mustered the 
armies, often in a hurry, and for want of better inform- 
ation, received the service of a baron for fewer knights' 
fees than were due by him ; and one precedent of this 
kind was held good against the king, and became ever 
after a reason for diminishing the service . The rolls 
of knights' fees were inaccurately kept; no care was 
taken to correct them before the armies were summoned 
into the field d ; it was then too late to think of examin- 
ing records and charters ; and the service was accepted 
on the footing which the vassal himself was pleased to 
acknowledge, after all the various subdivisions and con- 
junctions of property had thrown an obscurity on the 
nature and extent of his tenure e . It is easy to judge of 

a Cotton's Abr. p. 11. b Madox's Baronia Anglica, p. 114. 

c Madox's Baronia Anglica, p. 115. 

d We hear only of one king, Henry II., who took this pains ; and the record, 
called Liber Niger Scaccarii, was the result of it. e Madox, Bar. Ang. p. 116. 



30 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the intricacies which would attend disputes of this kind 
X1IL with individuals ; when even the number of military fees 
"""^ belonging to the church, whose property was fixed and 
unalienable, became the subject of controversy ; and we 
find in particular, that w^hen the Bishop of Durham was 
charged with seventy knights' fees for the aid levied on 
occasion of the marriage of Henry II.'s daughter to the 
Duke of Saxony, the prelate acknowledged ten, and dis- 
owned the other sixty f . It is not known in what man- 
ner this difference was terminated ; but had the question 
been concerning an armament to defend the kingdom, 
the bishop's service would probably have been received 
without opposition for ten fees ; and this rate must also 
have fixed all his future payments. Pecuniary scutages, 
therefore, diminished as much as military services s : other 
methods of filling the exchequer, as well as the armies, 
must be devised : new situations produced new laws and 
institutions ; and the great alterations in the finances and 
military power of the crown, as well as in private pro- 
perty, were the source of equal innovations in every part 
of the legislature or civil government. 

The exorbitant estates conferred by the Norman on his 
barons and chieftains remained not long entire and un- 
impaired. The landed property was gradually shared out 
into more hands ; and those immense baronies were di- 
vided, either by provisions to younger children, by par- 
titions among co-heirs, by sale, or by escheating to the 
king, who gratified a great number of his courtiers, by 
dealing them out among them in smaller portions. Such 
moderate estates, as they required economy, and confined 
the proprietors to live at home, were better calculated for 
duration ; and the order of knights and small barons 
grew daily more numerous, and began to form a very 
respectable rank or order in the state. As they were all 
immediate vassals of the crown by military tenure, they 
were, by the principles of the feudal law, equally entitled 
with the greatest barons to a seat in the national or 

f Ibid. p. 122. Hist, of Exch. p. 404. 

In order to pay the sum of one hundred thousand marks, as King Richard's 
ransom, twenty shillings were imposed on each knight's fee. Had the fees re- 
mained on the original footing as settled by the Conqueror, this scutage would have 
amounted to ninety thousand marks, which was nearly the sum required. But we 
find that other grievous taxes were imposed to complete it: a certain proof that 
many frauds and abuses had prevailed in the roU of kn Uts' fees 



EDWARD I. 3 

general councils ; and this right, though regarded as a CHAP. 
privilege which the owners would not entirely relinquish, XIIL 
was also considered as a burden, which they desired to 
be subjected to on extraordinary occasions only. Hence 
it was provided in the charter of King John, that while 
the great barons were summoned to the national council 
by a particular w r rit, the small barons, under which ap- 
pellation the knights were also comprehended, should 
only be called by a general summons of the sheriff. The 
distinction between great and small barons, like that be- 
tween rich and poor, was not exactly defined ; but, agree- 
ably to the inaccurate genius of that age, and to the sim- 
plicity of ancient government, was left very much to be 
determined by the discretion of the king and his minis- 
ters. It was usual for the prince to require, by a parti- 
cular summons, the attendance of a baron in one Parlia- 
ment, and to neglect him in future Parliaments 11 ; nor 
was this uncertainty ever complained of as an injury. He 
attended when required : he was better pleased, on other 
occasions, to be exempted from the burden ; and as he was 
acknowledged to be of the same order with the greatest 
barons, it gave them no surprise to see him take his seat 
in the great council, whether he appeared of his own ac- 
cord, or by a particular summons from the king. The 
barons, by writ, therefore, began gradually to intermix 
themselves with the barons by tenure ; and as Camden tells 
us i from an ancient manuscript now lost, that after the 
battle of Evesham a positive law was enacted, prohibiting 
every baron from appearing in Parliament who was not 
invited thither by a particular summons, the whole ba- 
ronage of England held thenceforward their seat by writ, 
and this important privilege of their tenures was in effect 
abolished. Only where writs had been regularly conti- 
nued for some time in one great family, the omission of 
them would have been regarded as an affront, and even 
as an injury. 

A like alteration gradually took place in the order of 
earls, who were the highest rank of barons. The dignity 
of an earl, like that of a baron, was anciently territorial 
and official k : he exercised jurisdiction within his county : 

h Chancellor West's Enquiry into the Manner of creating Peers, p. 43. 46, 
47. 55. 

In Britann. p. 122. k Spellm. Gloss, in voce Comes. 



32 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, he levied the third of the fines to his own profit : he was 
XIIlt at once a civil and a military magistrate ; and though 
^^7^^ his authority, from the time of the Norman conquest, 
was hereditary in England, the title was so much con- 
nected with the office, that where the king intended to 
create a new earl, he had no other expedient than to 
erect a certain territory into a county or earldom, and to 
bestow it upon the person and his family 1 . But as the 
sheriffs, who were the vicegerents of the earls, were named 
by the king, and removable at pleasure, he found them 
more dependent upon him ; and endeavoured to throw 
the whole authority and jurisdiction of the office into 
their hands. This magistrate was at the head of the 
finances, and levied all the king's rents within the county : 
he assessed at pleasure the talliages of the inhabitants in 
royal demesne : he had usually committed to him the 
management of wards, and often of escheats : he presided 
in the lower courts of judicature ; and thus, though in- 
ferior to the earl in dignity, he was soon considered, by 
this union of the judicial and fiscal powers, and by the 
confidence reposed in him by the king, as much superior 
to him in authority, and undermined his influence within 
his own jurisdiction 111 . It became usual, in creating an 
earl, to give him a fixed salary, commonly about twenty 
pounds a year, in lieu of his third of the fines : the dimi- 
nution of his power kept pace with the retrenchment of 
his profit : and the dignity of earl, instead of being ter- 
ritorial and official, dwindled into personal and titular. 
Such were the mighty alterations which already had 
fully taken place, or were gradually advancing, in the 
House of Peers, that is, in the Parliament, for there seems 
anciently to have been no other house. 
^ But though the introduction of Barons by writ, and of 
titular earls, had given some increase to royal authority, 
there were other causes which counterbalanced those in- 
novations, and tended in a higher degree to diminish the 
power of the sovereign. The disuse into which the feudal 
militia had in a great measure fallen, made the barons 
almost entirely forget their dependence on the crown : 

l Essays on British Antiquities. This practice, however, seems to have heen 
more familiar in Scotland and the kingdoms on the continent, than in England. 

m T her e are mstances of princes of the blood who accepted of the office of sheriff. 
Spellman, in voce Vicecomes. 



EDWARD I. 33 

by the diminution of the number of knights' fees, the CHAP 
king had no reasonable compensation when he levied^; 
scutages, and exchanged their service for money: the 1295 
alienations of the crown lands had reduced him to poverty; 
and, above all, the concession of the great charter had set 
bounds to royal power, and had rendered it more difficult 
and dangerous for the prince to exert any extraordinary 
act of arbitrary authority. In this situation, it was natural 
for the king to court the friendship of the lesser barons 
and knights, whose influence was no wise dangerous to 
him, and who, being exposed to oppression from their 
powerful neighbours, sought a legal protection under the 
shadow of the throne. He desired, therefore, to have 
their presence in Parliament, where they served to con- 
trol the turbulent resolutions of the great. To exact a 
regular attendance of the whole body would have pro- 
duced confusion, and would have imposed too heavy a 
burden upon them. To summon only a few by writ, 
though it was practised, and had a good effect, served 
not entirely the king's purpose ; because these members 
had no farther authority than attended their personal 
character, and were eclipsed by the appearance of the 
more powerful nobility. He therefore dispensed with 
the attendance of most of the lesser barons in Parliament ; 
and in return for this indulgence (for such it was then 
esteemed) required them to choose in each county a 
certain number of their own body, whose charges they 
bore, and who, having gained the confidence, carried with 
them, of course, the authority of the whole order. This 
expedient had been practised at different times in the 
reign of Henry III. n , and regularly during that of the 
present king. The numbers sent up by each county varied 
at the will of the prince : they took their seat among 
the other peers, because by their tenure they belonged to 
that order p : the introducing of them into that House 
scarcely appeared an innovation ; and though it was easily 
in the king's power, by varying their number, to command 
the resolutions of the whole Parliament, this circumstance 
was little attended to in an age when force was more pre- 

n Rot. Claus. 38 Hen. III. m. 7. and 12. d. : as also, Rot. Claus. 42 Hen. III. m. 

1. d. Prynne's Pref. to Cotton's Abridgment. 

Brady's Answer to Petyt, from the records, p. 151. 
P Brady's Treatise of Boroughs, App. No. 13. 



34 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, valent than laws, and when a resolution, though taken by 
XII] _, the majority of a legal assembly, could not be executed, if 
\^ it opposed the will of the more powerful minority. 

But there were other important consequences which 
followed the diminution and consequent disuse of the 
ancient feudal militia. The king's expense, in levying 
and maintaining a military force for every enterprise, was 
increased beyond what his narrow revenues were able to 
bear : as the scutages of his military tenants, which were 
accepted in lieu of their personal service, had fallen to 
nothing, there were no means of supply, but from volun- 
tary aids granted him by the Parliament and clergy, or 
from the talliages which he might levy upon the towns 
and inhabitants in royal demesne. In the preceding year, 
Edward had been obliged to exact no less than the sixth 
of all moveables from the laity, and a moiety of all eccle- 
siastical benefices q , for his expedition into Poictou, and 
the suppression of the Welsh : and this distressful situa- 
tion, which was likely often to return upon him and his 
successors, made him think of a new device, and summon 
the representatives of all the boroughs to Parliament. 
This period, which is the twenty-third of his reign, seems 
to be the real and the true epoch of the House of Com- 
mons, and the faint dawn of popular government in Eng- 
land. ^ For the representatives of the counties were only 
deputies from the smaller barons and lesser nobility : 
and the former precedent of representatives from the 
boroughs, who were summoned by the Earl of Leicester, 
was regarded as the act of a violent usurpation, had been 
discontinued in all the subsequent Parliaments, and if 
such a measure had not become necessary on other ac- 
counts, that precedent was more likely to blast than give 
credit to it. 

During the course of several years, the kings of Eng- 
land, in imitation of other European princes,had embraced 
the salutary policy of encouraging and protecting the lower 
and more industrious orders of the state; whom they found 
well disposed to obey the laws and civil magistrate, and 
whose ingenuity and labour furnished commodities requi- 
site for the ornament of peace and support of war. Though 



EDWARD I. 35 

the inhabitants of the country were still left at the dis- CHAP. 
posal of their imperious lords, many attempts were made 
to give more security and liberty to citizens., and make 
them enjoy unmolested the fruits of their industry. 
Boroughs were erected by royal patent within the demesne 
lands : liberty of trade was conferred upon them : the in- 
habitants were allowed to farm, at a fixed rent, their 
own tolls and customs 1 : they were permitted to elect their 
own magistrates : justice was administered to them by 
these magistrates, without obliging them to attend the 
sheriff or county-court ; and some shadow of independ- 
ence, by means of these equitable privileges, was gradually 
acquired by the people 8 . The king, however, retained 
still the power of levying talliages or taxes upon them 
at pleasure * ; and though their poverty and the customs 
of the age made these demands neither frequent nor ex- 
orbitant, such unlimited authority in the sovereign was 
a sensible check upon commerce, and was utterly incom- 
patible with all the principles of a free government. 
But when the multiplied necessities of the crown pro- 
duced a greater avidity for supply, the king, whose pre- 
rogative entitled him to exact it, found that he had not 
power sufficient to enforce his edicts, and that it was 
necessary, before he imposed taxes, to smooth the way 
for his demand, and to obtain the previous consent of 
the boroughs, by solicitations, remonstrances, and autho- 
rity. The inconvenience of transacting this business 
with every particular borough was soon felt ; and Edward 
became sensible, that the most expeditious way of ob- 
taining supply was, to assemble the deputies of all the 
boroughs, to lay before them the necessities of the state, 
to discuss the matter in their presence, and to require 
their consent to the demands of their sovereign. For 
this reason, he issued writs to the sheriffs, enjoining them 
to send to Parliament, along with two knights of the shire, 
two deputies from each borough within their county", 
and these provided with sufficient powers from their 
community to consent, in their name, to what he and his 

r Madox, Firma Burgi, p. 21. B Brady of Boroughs, App. 'No. 1, 2, 3. 

* The king had not only the power of talliating the inhabitants within his own 
demesnes, but that of granting to particular barons the power of talliating the inha- 
bitants within theirs. See Brady's Answer to Petyt, p. 118. Madox's Hist, of the 
Exchequer, p. 518. 

u Writs were issued to about one hundred and twenty cities and boroughs. 



36 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, council should require of them. As it is a most equitable 
xn '^ rule, says he, in his preamble to this writ, that what con- 
cerns all, should be approved of by all, and common dangers 
le repelled ly united efforts* ; a noble principle, which 
may seem to indicate a liberal mind in the king, and 
which laid the foundation of a free and an equitable 
government. 

After the election of these deputies by the aldermen 
and common council, they gave sureties for their attend- 
ance before the king and Parliament : their charges were 
respectively borne by the borough which sent them ; and 
they had so little idea of appearing as legislators, a cha- 
racter extremely wide of their low rank and condition x , 
that no intelligence could be more disagreeable to any 
borough, than to find that they must elect, or to any in- 
dividual than that he was elected, to a trust from which 
no profit or honour could possibly be derived 7 . They 
composed not, properly speaking, any essential part of 
the Parliament : they sat apart both from the barons and 
knights z , who disdained to mix with such mean person- 
ages: after they had given their consent to the taxes 
required of them, their business being then finished, they 
separated, even though the Parliament still continued to 
sit, and to canvass the national business*; and as they 
all consisted of men who were real burgesses of the place 
from which they were sent, the sheriff, when he found 
no person of abilities or wealth sufficient for the office, 
often used the freedom of omitting particular boroughs 
in his returns; and as he received the thanks of the 
people for this indulgence, he gave no displeasure to the 
court, who levied on all the boroughs, without distinction, 
the tax agreed to by the majority of deputies b . 

_ * Brady of Boroughs, p. 25. 33, from the records. The writs of the Parliament 
immediately preceding remain, and the return of knights is there required, but not 
a word of the boroughs ; a demonstration that this was the very year in which they 
commenced. In the year immediately preceding, the taxes were levied by a seem- 
ing tree consent of each particular borough, beginning with London. Id. p. 31, 32, 
33, trom the records. Also his answers to Petyt p. 40 41 

Eeliquia Spellm. p. 64. Prynne's Preface to Cotton's Abridgment, and the 



P assim - y Brad y of Boroughs, p. 59, 60. 

z Ibid. p. 37, 38, from the records, and Appendix, p. 19. Also his Appendix to 
his Answer to Petyt record. And his Gloss, in verb. Communitas Eegn. p. 33. 
Ryley s Placit. Parl. p. 241, 242, &c. Cotton's Abridgment, p. 14. 



. , . . 

B <ly of Boroughs, p. 52, from the records. There is even an instance in the 
reign of Edward m. when the king named all the deputies. Id. Answ. to Petyt, 
f he fairly named the most considerable and creditable burgesses, little 
exception would be taken ; as their business was not to check the king, but to 



EDWARD I. 3*; 

The union, however, of the representatives from the CHAP. 
boroughs gave gradually more weight to the whole order ; ^ 
and it became customary for them, in return for the 1295 
supplies which they granted, to prefer petitions to the 
crown, for the redress of any particular grievance of which 
they found reason to complain. The more the king's 
demands multiplied, the faster these petitions increased 
both in number and authority ; and the prince found it 
difficult to refuse men whose grants had supported his 
throne, and to whose assistance he might so soon be ob- 
liged again to have recourse. The Commons, however, 
were still much below the rank of legislators . Their 
petitions, though they received a verbal assent from the 
throne, were only the rudiments of laws : the judges 
were afterwards intrusted with the power of putting 
them into form ; and the king, by adding to them the 
sanction of his authority, and that sometimes without 
the assent of the nobles, bestowed validity upon them. 
The age did not refine so much as to perceive the danger 
of these irregularities. No man was displeased that the 
sovereign, at the desire of any class of men, should issue 
an order which appeared only to concern that class ; and 
his predecessors were so near possessing the whole legis- 
lative power, that he gave no disgust by assuming it in 
this seemingly inoffensive manner. But time and farther 
experience gradually opened men's eyes, and corrected 
these abuses. It was found that no laws could be fixed 
for one order of men without affecting the whole ; and 
that the force and efficacy of laws depended entirely on 
the terms employed in wording them. The House of 
Peers, therefore, the most powerful order in the state, 
with reason expected that their assent should be expressly 
granted to all public ordinances d ; and in the reign of 
Henry V. the Commons required that no laws should be 

reason with him, and consent to his demands. It was not till the reign of Richard 
II. that the sheriffs were deprived of the power of omitting boroughs at pleasure.. 
See Stat. at Large, 5th Richard II. cap. 4. 

c See note [D], at the end of the volume. 

d In those instances found in Cotton's Abridgment, where the king appears to 
answer of himself the petitions of the Commons, he probably exerted no more 
than that power, \vhich was long inherent in the crown, of regulating matters by 
royal edicts or proclamations. But no durable or general statute seems ever to 
have been made by the king from the petitions of the Commons alone, without the 
assent of the Peers. It is more likely that the Peers alone, without the Commons,, 
would enact statutes. 

VOL. II. 4 



38 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, framed merely upon their petitions, unless the statutes 
XIIL were worded by themselves, and had passed their House 
"""^^m the form of a bill 6 . 

But as the same causes which had produced a partition 
of property continued still to operate, the number of 
knights and lesser barons, or what the English call the 
gentry, perpetually increased, and they sunk into a rank 
still more inferior to the great nobility. The equality 
of tenure was lost in the great inferiority of power and 
property ; and the House of Eepresentatives from the 
counties was gradually separated from that of the Peers, 
and formed a distinct order in the state f . The growth 
of commerce meanwhile augmented the private wealth 
and consideration of the burgesses ; the frequent demands 
of the crown increased their public importance ; and as 
they resembled the knights of shires in one material 
circumstance, that of representing particular bodies of 
men, it no longer appeared unsuitable to unite them 
together in the same house, and to confound their rights 
and privileges g . Thus the third estate, that of the 
Commons, reached at last its present form ; and as the 
country gentlemen made thenceforwards no scruple of 
appearing as deputies from the boroughs, the distinction 
between the members was entirely lost, and the Lower 
House acquired thence a great accession of weight and 
importance in the kingdom. Still, however, the office 
of this estate was very different from that which it has 
since exercised with so much advantage to the public. 
Instead of checking and controlling the authority of the 
king, they were naturally induced to adhere to him as 
the great fountain of law and justice, and to support him 
against the power of the aristocracy, which at once was 
the source of oppression to themselves, and disturbed 
him in the execution of the laws. The king, in his turn, 
gave countenance to an order of men so useful and so 
little dangerous: the Peers also were obliged to pay 
them some consideration ; and by this means the third 
estate, formerly so abject in England, as well as in all 
other European nations, rose, by slow degrees, to their 
present importance ; and, in their progress, made arts 

e Brady's Answer to Petyt, p. 85, from the records. 

Cotton's Abridgment, p. 18. 
s See note [E], at the end of the volume. 



EDWARD I. 39 

and commerce, the necessary attendants of liberty and CHAP. 
equality, flourish in the kingdom h . 

What sufficiently proves that the commencement of the 
house of burgesses, who are the true Commons, was not 
an affair of chance, but arose from the necessities of the 
present situation, is, that Edward, at the very same time, 
summoned deputies from the inferior clergy, the first 
that ever met in England 1 , and he required them to im- 
pose taxes on their constituents for the public service. 
Formerly the ecclesiastical benefices bore no part of the 
burdens of the state : the pope indeed, of late, had often 
levied impositions upon them : he had sometimes granted 
this power to the sovereign k : the king himself had in the 
preceding year exacted, by menaces and violence, a very 
grievous tax of half the revenues of the clergy ; but as 
this precedent was dangerous, and could not easily be 
repeated in a government which required the consent of 
the subject to any extraordinary resolution, Edward found 
it more prudent to assemble a lower house of convocation, 
to lay before them his necessities, and to ask some supply. 
But on this occasion he met with difficulties. Whether 
that the clergy thought themselves the most indepen- 
dent body in the kingdom, or were disgusted by the 
former exorbitant impositions, they absolutely refused 
their assent to the king's demand of a fifth of their move- 
ables ; and it was not till a second meeting, that, on their 
persisting in this refusal, he was willing to accept of a 
tenth. The barons and knights granted him, without 
hesitation, an eleventh ; the burgesses a seventh. But 
the clergy still scrupled to meet on the king's writ, lest 
by such an instance of obedience they should seem to ac- 
knowledge the authority of the temporal power : and this 
compromise was at last fallen upon, that the king should 
issue his writ to the archbishop, and that the archbishop 
should, in consequence of it, summon the clergy, who, as 
they then appeared to obey their spiritual superior, no 
longer hesitated to meet in convocation. This expedient, 
however, was the cause why the ecclesiastics were sepa- 
rated into two houses of convocation under their several 

h See note [F], at the end of the volume. 

1 Archbishop Wake's State of the Church of England, p. 235. Brady of 
Boroughs, p. 34. Gilbert's Hist, of the Exch. p. 46. 
k Ann. Waverl. p. 227, 228. T. Wykes, p. 99. 120. 



40 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, archbishops, and formed not one estate, as in other coun- 
xiu. .|. r - es Europe, which was at first the king's intention 1 . 

now return to the course of our narration. 
Edward, conscious of the reasons of disgust which he 
had given to the King of Scots, informed of the dispo- 
sitions of that people, and expecting the most violent 
effects of their resentment, which he knew he had so well 
merited, employed the supplies granted him by his people 
in making preparations against the hostilities of his 
northern neighbour. When in this situation, he received 
intelligence of the treaty secretly concluded between John 
and Philip ; and though uneasy at this concurrence of a 
French and Scottish war, he resolved not to encourage 
his enemies by a pusillanimous behaviour, or by yielding 
to their united efforts. He summoned John to perform 
the duty of a vassal, and to send him a supply of forces 
against an invasion from France, with which he was then 
threatened : he next required that the fortresses of Ber- 
wick, Jedborough, and Eoxborough, should be put into his 
hands as a security during the war m : he cited John to 
appear in an English Parliament, to be held at Newcastle ; 
and when none of these successive demands were com- 
plied with, he marched northward with numerous forces, 
thirty thousand foot and four thousand horse, to chastise 
his rebellious vassal. The Scottish nation, who had little 
reliance on the vigour and abilities of their prince, as- 
signed him a council of twelve noblemen, in whose hands 
the sovereignty was really lodged 11 , and who put the 
country in the best posture of which the present distrac- 
tions would admit. A great army composed of forty 
thousand infantry, though supported only by five hundred 
cavalry, advanced to the frontiers ; and after a fruitless 
attempt upon Carlisle, marched eastwards to defend those 
provinces which Edward was preparing to attack. But 
some of the most considerable of the Scottish nobles, 
Robert Bruce, the father and son, the Earls of March 
and Angus, prognosticating the ruin of their country from 
the concurrence of intestine divisions and a foreign in- 
vasion, endeavoured here to ingratiate themselves with 
Edward by an early submission ; and the king, encou- 

Gilbert's Hist, of Exch. p. 51. 54. 

- 64 - Heming.vol.i.p.84. Trivet, p. 286. 



EDWARD I. 41 

raged by this favourable incident, led his army into the CHAP. 
enemy's country, and crossed the Tweed without oppo-, xu "_, 
sition at Coldstream. He then received a message from 2 sthMarch 
John, by which that prince, having now procured for him- 1206. 
self and his nation Pope Celestine's dispensation from 
former oaths, renounced the homage which had been done 
to England, and set Edward at defiance . This bravado 
was but ill supported by the military operations of the 
Scots. Berwick was already taken by assault : Sir Wil- 
liam Douglas, the governor, was made prisoner : above 
seven thousand of the garrison were put to the sword ; 
and Edward, elated by this great advantage, despatched 
Earl Warrenne, with twelve thousand men, to lay siege 
to D unbar, which was defended by the flower of the 
Scottish nobility. 

The Scots, sensible of the importance of this place, 
which, if taken, laid their whole country open to the 
enemy, advanced with their main army, under the com- 
mand of the Earls of Buchan, Lenox, and Marre, in order 
to relieve it. Warrenne, not dismayed at the great su- 
periority of their number, marched out to give them 
battle. He attacked them with great vigour; and as 27th April. 
undisciplined troops, when numerous, are but the more 
exposed to a panic upon any alarm, he soon threw them 
into confusion, and chased them off the field with great 
slaughter. The loss of the Scots is said to have amounted 
to twenty thousand men : the castle of D unbar, with all 
its garrison, surrendered next day to Edward, who, after 
the battle, had brought up the main body of the English, 
and who now proceeded with an assured confidence of 
success. The castle of Koxborough was yielded by James, 
Steward of Scotland ; and that nobleman, from whom is 
descended the royal family of Stuart, was again obliged 
to swear fealty to Edward. After a feeble resistance, the 
castles of Edinburgh and Stirling opened their gates to 
the enemy. All the southern parts were instantly sub- 
dued by the English ; and, to enable them the better to 
reduce the northern, whose inaccessible situation seemed 
to give them some more security, Edward sent for a strong 
reinforcement of Welsh and Irish, who, being accustomed 
to a desultory kind of war, were the best fitted to pursue 

Rymer, vol. ii. p. 607. Walsing. p. 66. Homing, vol. i. p. 92. 

4* 



42 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the fugitive Scots into the recesses of their lakes and 
xm. moun tains. But the spirit of the nation was already 
^"7<>% broken by their misfortunes: and the feeble and timid 
Scotland Baliol, discontented with his own subjects, and overawed 
subdued, ky ^ e j^g^]^ abandoned all those resources which his 
people might yet have possessed in this extremity. He 
hastened to make his submissions to Edward ; he ex- 
pressed the deepest penitence for his disloyalty to his 
liege lord ; and he made a solemn and irrevocable resig- 
nation of his crown into the hands of that monarch p . 
Edward marched northwards to Aberdeen and Elgin 
without meeting an enemy : no Scotchman approached 
him but to pay him submission and do him homage : even 
the turbulent Highlanders, ever refractory to their own 
princes, and averse to the restraint of laws, endeavoured 
to prevent the devastation of their country, by giving him 
early proofs of obedience : and Edward, having brought 
the whole kingdom to a seeming state of tranquillity, re- 
turned to the south with his army. There was a stone, 
to which the popular superstition of the Scots paid the 
highest veneration : all their kings were seated on it when 
they received the right of inauguration : an ancient tra- 
dition assured them that wherever this stone was placed, 
their nation should always govern : and it was carefully 
preserved at Scone as the true palladium of their mon- 
archy, and their ultimate resource amidst all their mis- 
fortunes. Edward got possession of it, and carried it with 
him to England* 1 . He gave orders to destroy the records, 
and all those monuments of antiquity, which might pre- 
serve the memory of the independence of the kingdom 
and refute the English claims of superiority. The Scots 
pretend, that he also destroyed all the annals preserved 
in their convents ; but it is not probable that a nation, so 
rude and unpolished, should be possessed of any history 
which deserves much to be regretted. The great seal of 
Baliol was broken ; and that prince himself was carried 
prisoner to London, and committed to custody in the 
Tower. Two years after, he was restored to liberty, and 
submitted to a voluntary banishment in France ; where, 
without making any farther attempts for the recovery of 

pRvmer,voLiLp.7l8. Walsing. p. 67. Heming. vol. i. p. 99. Trivet, p. 292. 
<i Walsmg. p. 68. Trivet, p. 299. 



EDWARD I. 43 

his royalty, he died in a private station. Earl Warrenne CHAP. 
was left governor of Scotland 1 "; Englishmen were in-^ _^ 
trusted with the chief offices; and Edward, flattering ^" 
himself that he had attained the end of all his wishes, 
and that the numerous acts of fraud and violence which 
he had practised against Scotland had terminated in the 
final reduction of that kingdom, returned with his vic- 
torious army into England. 

An attempt which he made about the same time, for War with 
the recovery of Guienne, was not equally successful. He 
sent thither an army of seven thousand men, under the 
command of his brother the Earl of Lancaster. That 
prince gained at first some advantages over the French at 
Bourdeaux; but he was soon after seized with a distemper, 
of which he died at Bayonne. The command devolved 
on the Earl of Lincoln, who was not able to perform any 
thing considerable during the rest of the campaign 8 . 

But the active and ambitious spirit of Edward, while 
his conquests brought such considerable accessions to the 
English monarchy, could not be satisfied, so long as Gui- 
enne, the ancient patrimony of his family, was wrested 
from him by the dishonest artifices of the French mon- 
arch. Finding that the distance of that province ren- 
dered all his efforts against it feeble and uncertain, he 
purposed to attack France in a quarter where she ap- 
peared more vulnerable ; and with this view he married 
his daughter, Elizabeth, to John, Earl of Holland, and 
at the same time contracted an alliance with Guy, Earl 
of Flanders, stipulated to pay him the sum of seventy- 
five thousand pounds, and projected an invasion, with 
their united forces, upon Philip, their common enemy fc . 
He hoped that when he himself, at the head of the En- 
glish, Flemish, and Dutch armies, reinforced by his Ger- 
man allies, to whom he had promised or remitted con- 
siderable sums, should enter the frontiers of France, and 
threaten the capital itself, Philip would at last be obliged 
to relinquish his acquisitions, and purchase peace by the 
restitution of Guienne. But, in order to set this great 
machine in movement, considerable supplies were requi- 
site from the Parliament; and Edward, without much 

r Rymer, vol. ii. p. 726. Trivet, p. 295. Homing, vol. i. p. 72, 73, 74. 

* Rymer, vol. ii. p. 761. Walsing. p. 68. 



44 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, difficulty, obtained from the barons and knights a new 
xin. g ran t O f a twelfth of all their moveables, and from the 

^~^Q boroughs, that of an eighth. The great and almost unli- 
mited power of the king over the latter enabled him to 
throw the heavier part of the burden on them ; and the 
prejudices which he seems always to have entertained 
against the church, on account of the former zeal of the 
clergy for the Montfort faction, made him resolve to load 
them with still more considerable impositions ; and he 
required of them a fifth of their moveables. But he 
here met with an opposition, which for some time discon- 
certed all his measures, and engaged him in enterprises 
that were somewhat dangerous to him, and would have 
proved fatal to any of his predecessors. 

Dissen- Boniface YIIL, who had succeeded Celestine in the 
. papal throne, was a man of the most lofty and inter- 
prising spirit ; and, though not endowed with that seve- 
rity of manners which commonly accompanies ambition 
in men of his order, he was determined to carry the au- 
thority of the tiara, and his dominion over the temporal 
power, to as great a height as it had ever attained in any 
former period. Sensible that his immediate predecessors, 
by oppressing the church in every province of Christen- 
dom, had extremely alienated the affections of the clergy, 
and had afforded the civil magistrate a pretence for lay- 
ing like impositions on ecclesiastical revenues, he at- 
tempted to resume the former station of the sovereign 
pontiff, and to establish himself as the common protector 
of the spiritual order against all invaders. For this pur- 
pose, he issued very early in his pontificate a general bull, 
prohibiting all princes from levying, without his consent, 
any taxes upon the clergy, and all clergymen from sub- 
mitting to such impositions; and he threatened both of 
them with the penalties of excommunication, in case of 
disobedience u . This important edict is said to have been 
procured by the solicitation of Robert de Winchelsea, 
Archbishop of Canterbury, who intended to employ it as 
a rampart against the violent extortions which the church 
had felt from Edward, and the still greater, which that 
prince's multiplied necessities gave them reason to appre- 
hend. When a demand, therefore, was made on the clergy 

u Kymer, vol. ii. p. 706. Heming. vol. i. p. 104. 



EDWARD I. 45 

of a fifth of their mo veables, a tax which was probably much CHAP. 
more grievous than a fifth of their revenue, as their lands 
were mostly stocked with their cattle, and cultivated by 
their villains, the clergy took shelter under the bull of 
Pope Boniface, and pleaded conscience in refusing com- 
pliance w . The king came not immediately to extremi- 
ties on this repulse ; but, after locking up all their gra- 
naries and barns, and prohibiting all rent to be paid 
them, he appointed a new synod, to confer with him 
upon his demand. The primate, not dismayed by these 
proofs of Edward's resolution, here plainly told him, that 
the clergy owed obedience to two sovereigns, their spiri- 
tual and their temporal ; but their duty bound them to 
a much stricter attachment to the former than to the lat- 
ter : they could not comply with his commands, (for such, 
in some measure, the requests of the crown were then 
deemed,) in contradiction to the express prohibition of 
the sovereign pontiff x . 

The clergy had seen, in many instances, that Edward 1297. 
paid little regard to those numerous privileges on which 
they set so high a value. He had formerly seized, in an 
arbitrary manner, all the money and plate belonging to 
the churches and convents, and had applied them to the 
public service y ; and they could not but expect more 
violent treatment on this sharp refusal, grounded on such 
dangerous principles. Instead of applying to the pope 
for a relaxation of his bull, he resolved immediately to 
employ the power in his hands ; and he told the ecclesi- 
astics, that, since they refused to support the civil govern- 
ment, they were unworthy to receive any benefit from 
it, and he would accordingly put them out of the pro- 
tection of the laws. This vigorous measure was imme- 
diately carried into execution 2 . Orders were issued to 
the judges to receive no cause brought before them by 
the clergy ; to hear and decide all causes in which they 
were defendants; to do every man justice against them; 
to do them justice against nobody a . The ecclesiastics 
soon found themselves in the most miserable situation 
imaginable. They could not remain in their own houses 

w Heming. vol. i. p. 107. Trivet, p. 296. Chron. Dunst. vol. ii. p. 652. 

x Heming. vol. i. p. 107. y Walsing. p. 65. Heming. vol. i. p. 51. 

z Walsing. p. 69. Heming. vol. i. p. 107. a M. West. p. 429. 



40 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, or convents, for want of subsistence : if they went abroad 
X1IL in quest of maintenance, they were dismounted, robbed 
^""^ of their horses and clothes, abused by every ruffian, and 
no redress could be obtained by them for the most vio- 
lent injury. The primate himself was attacked on the 
highway, was stripped of his equipage and furniture, and 
was at last reduced to board himself, with a single ser- 
vant, in the house of a country clergyman b . The king, 
meanwhile, remained an indifferent spectator of all these 
violences ; and without employing his officers in com- 
mitting any immediate injury on the priests, which might 
have appeared invidious and oppressive, he took ample 
vengeance on them for their obstinate refusal of his de- 
mands. Though the archbishop issued a general sentence 
of excommunication against all who attacked the persons 
or property of ecclesiastics, it was not regarded : while 
Edward enjoyed the satisfaction of seeing the people 
become the voluntary instruments of his justice against 
them, and inure themselves to throw off that respect for 
the sacred order, by which they had so long been over- 
awed and governed. 

The spirits of the clergy were at last broken by this 
harsh treatment. Besides that the whole province of 
York, which lay nearest the danger that still hung over 
them from the Scots, voluntarily, from the first, voted a 
fifth of their moveables : the Bishops of Salisbury, Ely, 
and some others, made a composition for the secular clergy 
within their dioceses ; and they agreed, not to pay the 
fifth, which would have been an act of disobedience to 
Boniface's bull, but to deposit a sum equivalent in some 
church appointed them; whence it was taken by the 
king's officers c . Many particular convents and clergymen 
made payment of a like sum, and received the king's 
protection d .^ Those who had not ready money entered 
into recognizances for the payment. And there was 
scarcely found one ecclesiastic in the kingdom, who 
seemed willing to suffer, for the sake of religious privi- 
leges, this new species of martyrdom, the most tedious 
and languishing of any, the most mortifying to spiritual 

b Heming. vol. i. p. 109. 

i gaming vol. i- P- 108, 109. Chron. Dunst. p. 653. 

* Chron. Dunst. vol. ii. p. 654. 



EDWARD I. 47 

pride, and not rewarded by that crown of glory, which CHAP. 
the church holds up, with such ostentation, to her cle-.j^ 
voted adherents. 1297 . 

But as the money granted by Parliament, though con- Arbitrary 
siderable, was not sufficient to supply the king's necessities, measurcs - 
and that levied by compositions with the clergy came in 
slowly, Edward was obliged, for the obtaining of farther 
supply, to exert his arbitrary power, and to lay an oppres- 
sive hand on all orders of men in the kingdom. He 
limited the merchants in the quantity of wool allowed to 
be exported ; and at the same time forced them to pay 
him a duty of forty shillings a sack, which was computed 
to be above the third of the value 6 . He seized all the 
rest of the wool, as well as all the leather of the kingdom, 
into his hands, and disposed of these commodities for his 
own benefit f ; he required the sheriffs of each county to 
supply him with two thousand quarters of wheat, and as 
many of oats, which he permitted them to seize wherever 
they could find them : the cattle and other commodities 
necessary for supplying his army were laid hold of with- 
out the consent of the owners 8 : and though he promised 
to pay afterwards the equivalent of all these goods, men 
saw but little probability that a prince, who submitted so 
little to the limitations of law, could ever, amidst his 
multiplied necessities, be reduced to a strict observance 
of his engagements. He showed, at the same time, an 
equal disregard to the principles of the feudal law, by 
which all the lands of his kingdom were held ; in order 
to increase his army, and enable him to support that great 
effort which he intended to make against France, he re- 
quired the attendance of every proprietor of land pos- 
sessed of twenty pounds a year, even though he held not 
of the crown, and was not obliged by his tenure to per- 
form any such service h . 

These acts of violence and of arbitrary power, notwith- 
standing the great personal regard generally borne to 
the king, bred murmurs in every order of men ; and it 
was not long ere some of the great nobility, jealous of 
their own privileges as well as of national liberty, gave 
countenance and authority to these complaints. Edward 

e Walsing. p. 69. Trivet, p. 296. * Heming. vol. i. p. 52. 110. 

g Ibid. p. 111. h Walsing. p. 69. 



48 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, assembled on the sea-coast an army, which he purposed 
XIIL to send over to Gascony, while he himself should in per- 
^"^ 'son make an impression on the side of Flanders: and he 
intended to put these forces under the command of 
Humphrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford, the constable, and 
Koger Bigod. Earl of Norfolk, the Mareschal of England. 
But these two powerful earls refused to execute his com- 
mands, and affirmed that they were only obliged by their 
office to attend his person in the wars. A violent alter- 
cation ensued ; and the king, in the height of his passion, 
addressing himself to the constable, exclaimed, Sir earl, 
by God, you shall either go or hang. By God, sir Jdng, 
replied Hereford, / mil neither go nor hang*. And he 
immediately departed, with the mareschal, and above 
thirty other considerable barons. 

Upon this opposition, the king laid aside the project 
of an expedition against Guienne ; and assembled the 
forces which he himself purposed to transport into Flan- 
ders. But the two earls, irritated in the contest and elated 
by impunity, pretending that none of their ancestors had 
ever served in that country, refused to perform the duty of 
their office in mustering the army k . The king, now find- 
ing it advisable to proceed with moderation, instead of 
attainting the earls, who possessed their dignities by 
hereditary right, appointed Thomas de Berkeley, and 
Geoffrey de Geyneville, to act, in that emergence, as con- 
stable and mareschal 1 . He endeavoured to reconcile him- 
self with the church ; took the primate again into favour 111 ; 
made him, in conjunction with Reginald de Grey, tutor 
to the prince, whom he intended to appoint guardian of 
the kingdom during his absence ; and he even assembled 
a great number of the nobility in Westminster-hall, to 
whom he deigned to make an apology for his past conduct, 
He pleaded the urgent necessities of the crown; his 
extreme want of money ; his engagements from honour 
as well as interest to support his foreign allies : and he 
promised, if ever he returned in safety, to redress all their 
grievances, to restore the execution of the laws, and to 
make all his subjects compensation for the losses which 
they had sustained. Meanwhile, he begged them to 



r P< 112 ' k R } Tmer > vo1 - " P- 783. Walsing. p. 70. 

M. West. p. 430. m Heming. vol. i. p. 113. 



EDWARD I. 49 

suspend their animosities ; to judge of him by his future CHAP. 
conduct, of which, he hoped, he should be more master ; ^_ 
to remain faithful to his government, or, if he perished in 1297 
the present war, to preserve their allegiance to his son 
and successor 11 . 

There were certainly, from the concurrence of discon- 
tents among the great, and grievances of the people, 
materials sufficient in any other period to have kindled 
a civil war in England : but the vigour and abilities of 
Edward kept every one in awe ; and his dexterity, in 
stopping on the brink of danger, and retracting the mea- 
sures to which he had been pushed by his violent temper 
and arbitrary principles, saved the nation from so great 
a calamity. The two great earls dared not to break out 
into open violence : they proceeded no farther than 
framing a remonstrance, which was delivered to the king 
at Winchelsea, when he was ready to embark for Flanders. 
They there complained of the violations of the great 
charter and that of forests ; the violent seizures of corn, 
leather, cattle, and, above all, of wool, a commodity which 
they affirmed to be equal in value to half the lands of the 
kingdom ; the arbitrary imposition of forty shillings a 
sack on the small quantity of wool allowed to be exported 
by the merchants ; and they claimed an immediate re- 
dress of all these grievances . The king told them, that 
the greater part of his council were now at a distance, 
and without their advice he could not deliberate on 
measures of so great importance 1 *. 

But the constable and mareschal with the barons of r>issen- 
their party, resolved to take advantage of Edward's ab- 
sence, and to obtain an explicit assent to their demands. 
When summoned to attend the Parliament at London, 
they came with a great body of cavalry and infantry ; and 
before they would enter the city, required that the gates 
should be put into their custody q . The primate, who 
secretly favoured all their pretensions, advised the council 
to comply : and thus they became masters both of the 
young prince and of the resolutions of Parliament. Their 
demands, however, were moderate ; and such as suffi- 

n Homing vol. i. p. 114. M. West. p. 430. 
Walsing. p. 72. Homing, vol. i. p. 115. Trivet, p. 302. 
P Walsing. p. 72. Heming. vol. i. p. 117. Trivet, p. 304. 
<i Homing, vol. i. p. 138. 
VOL. II. 5 



50 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ciently justify the purity of their intentions in all their 
XIIL past measures : they only required, that the two charters 
^1297 ' should receive a solemn confirmation ; that a clause should 
be added to secure the nation for ever against all impo- 
sitions and taxes without consent of Parliament ; and that 
they themselves and their adherents, who had refused to 
attend the king into Flanders, should be pardoned for 
the offence, and should be again received into favour r . 
The Prince of Wales and his council assented to these 
terms ; and the charters were sent over to the king in 
Flanders, to be there confirmed by him. Edward felt the 
utmost reluctance to this measure, which, he apprehended, 
would for the future impose fetters on his conduct, and 
set limits to his lawless authority. On various pretences, 
he delayed three days giving any answer to the deputies ; 
and when the pernicious consequences of this refusal were 
represented to him, he was at last obliged, after many in- 
ternal struggles, to affix his seal to the charters, as also to 
the clause that bereaved him of the power, which he had 
hitherto assumed, of imposing arbitrary taxes upon the 
people 8 . 

That we may finish at once this interesting transaction 
concerning the settlement of the charters, we shall briefly 
mention the subsequent events which relate to it. The 
constable and mareschal, informed of the king's compli- 
ance, were satisfied ; and not only ceased from disturbing 
the government, but assisted the regency with their power 
against the Scots, who had risen in arms, and had thrown 
off the yoke of England*. But being sensible, that the 
smallest pretence would suffice to make Edward retract 
these detested laws, which, though they had often received 
the sanction both of king and Parliament, and had been 
acknowledged during three reigns, were never yet deemed 
to have sufficient validity ; they insisted that he should 
again confirm them on his return to England, and should 
thereby renounce all plea which he might derive from his 
residing in a foreign country, when he formerly affixed his 
seal to them u . It appeared that they judged aright of 
Edward's character and intentions : he delayed his confir- 
mation as long as possible ; and when the fear of worse 

r Walsing. p. 73. Heming. vol. i. p. 138, 139, 140, 141. Trivet, p. 308. 

8 Walsing. p. 74. Heming. vol. i. p. 143 

t Heming. vol. i. p. 143. u ib id . p . 159< 



EDWARD I. 51 

consequences obliged him again to comply, he expressly CHAP. 
added a salvo for his royal dignity or prerogative, which V _ X * 1 _, 
in effect enervated the whole force of the charters w . The 1297 
two earls and their adherents left the Parliament in dis- 
gust ; and the king was constrained, on a future occasion, 
to grant to the people, without any subterfuge, a pure 
and absolute confirmation of those laws x , which were so 
much the object of their passionate affection. Even 
farther securities were then provided for the establishment 
of national privileges. Three knights were appointed to 
be chosen in each county, and were invested with the 
power of punishing, by fine and imprisonment, every trans- 
gression or violation of the charters 7 : a precaution which, 
though it was soon disused, as encroaching too much on 
royal prerogative, proves the attachment which the Eng- 
lish in that age, bore to liberty, and their well-grounded 
jealousy of the arbitrary disposition of Edward. 

The work, however, was not yet entirely finished and 
complete. In order to execute the lesser charter, it was 
requisite, by new perambulations, to set bounds to the 
royal forests, and to disafforest all land which former en- 
croachments had comprehended within their limits. Ed- 
ward discovered the same reluctance to comply^ with this 
equitable demand ; and it was not till after many delays 
on his part, and many solicitations and requests, and even 
menaces of war and violence z , on the part of the barons, 
that the perambulations were made, and exact bounda- 
ries fixed, by a jury in each county, to the extent of his 
forests*. Had not his ambitious and active temper raised 
him so many foreign enemies, and obliged him to have 
recourse so often to the assistance of his subjects, it is 
not likely that those concessions could ever have been 
extorted from him. 

But while the people, after so many successful strug- 
gles, deemed themselves happy in the secure possession 
of their privileges, they were surprised, in 1305, to find 
that Edward had secretly applied to Rome, and had pro- 
cured from that mercenary court an absolution from all 

* Ibid. p. 167, 168. * Ibid. p. 168. y Ibid. p. 170. 

z Walsing. p. 80. We are told by Tyrrel, vol. ii. p. 145, from the chronicle of 
St. Alban's, that the barons, not content with the execution of the charter of 
forests, demanded of Edward as high terms as had been imposed on his father by 
the Earl of Leicester ; but no other historian mentions this particular. 

" Homing, vol. i. p. 171. M. West. p. 431. 433. 



52 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the oaths and engagements, which he had so often 
XIIL reiterated, to observe both the charters. There are some 
^7^7 historians b so credulous as .to imagine, that this perilous 
step was taken by him for no other purpose than to ac- 
quire the merit of granting a new confirmation of the 
charters, as he did soon after ; and a confirmation so 
much the more unquestionable, as it could never after 
be invalidated by his successors, on pretence of any force 
or violence which had been imposed upon him. But 
besides that this might have been done with a better 
grace, if he had never applied for any such absolution, the 
whole tenor of his conduct proves him to* be little suscep- 
tible of such refinements in patriotism ; and this very 
deed itself, in which he anew confirmed the charters, 
carries on the face of it a very opposite presumption. 
Though he ratified the charters in general, he still took 
advantage of the papal bull so far as to invalidate the 
late perambulations of the forests, which had been made 
with such care and attention, and to reserve to himself 
the power, in case of favourable incidents, to extend as 
much as formerly those arbitrary jurisdictions. If the 
power was not in fact made use of, we can only conclude 
that the favourable incidents did not offer. 

Thus, after the contests of near a whole century, and 
these ever accompanied with violent jealousies, often with 
public convulsions, the great charter was finally establish- 
ed ; and the English nation have the honour of extorting, 
by their perseverance, this concession from the ablest, the 
most warlike, and the most ambitious of all their princes . 
It is computed, that above thirty confirmations of the 
charter were at different times required of several kings, 
and granted by them in full Parliament ; a precaution 
which, while it discovers some ignorance of the true 
nature of law and government, proves a laudable jealousy 
of national privileges in the people, and an extreme 
anxiety lest contrary precedents should ever be pleaded 
as an authority for infringing them. Accordingly we find, 
that though arbitrary practices often prevailed, and were 

t> Brady, vol. ii. p. 84. Carte, vol. ii. p. 292. 

_ c It must, however, be remarked, that the king never forgave the chief actors 
m this transaction ; and he found means afterwards to oblige both the constable 
and mareschal to resign their offices into his hands. The former received a new 
grant of it ; but the office of mareschal was given to Thomas of Brotherton, the 
king's second son. 



EDWARD I. 53 

even able to establish themselves into settled customs, the CHAP. 
validity of the great charter was never afterwards for-^J 
mally disputed ; and that grant was still regarded as the ^7T~ 
basis of English government, and the sure rule by which 
the authority of every custom was to be tried and can- 
vassed. The jurisdiction of the Star-chamber, martial 
law, imprisonment by warrants from the privy-council, 
and other practices of a like nature, though established 
for several centuries, were scarcely ever allowed by the 
English to be parts of their constitution : the affection 
of the nation for liberty still prevailed over all precedent, 
and even all political reasoning ; the exercise of these 
powers, after being long the source of secret murmurs 
among the people, was, in fulness of time, solemnly 
abolished as illegal, at least as oppressive, by the whole 
legislative authority. 

To return to the period from which this account of 
the charters has led us : though the king's impatience to 
appear at the head of his armies in Flanders made him 
overlook all considerations, either of domestic discontents 
or of commotions among the Scots, his embarkation had 
been so long retarded by the various obstructions 
thrown in his way, that he lost the proper season for 
action, and, after his arrival, made no progress against 
the enemy. The King of France, taking advantage of 
his absence, had broken into the Low Countries ; had 
defeated the Flemings in the battle of Fumes ; had made 
himself master of Lisle, St. Omer, Courtrai, and Ypres ; 
and seemed in a situation to take full vengeance on the 
Earl of Flanders, his rebellious vassal. But Edward, 
seconded by an English army of fifty thousand men, (for 
this is the number assigned by historians d ,) was able to 
stay the career of his victories ; and Philip, finding all 
the weak resources of his kingdom already exhausted, 
began to dread a reverse of fortune, and to apprehend an 
invasion on France itself. The King of England, on the 
other hand, disappointed of assistance from Adolph, King 
of the Romans, which he had purchased at a very high 
price, and finding many urgent calls for his presence in 
England, was desirous of ending, on any honourable terms, 
a war, which served only to divert his force from the 

d Heming. vol. i. p. 146. 

5* 



54 % HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, execution of more important projects. This disposition 
xm * in both monarchs soon produced a cessation of hostilities 

^"^ for two years ; and engaged them to submit their differ- 
ences to the arbitration of Pope Boniface. 
1298. Boniface was among the last of the sovereign pontiffs 
that exercised an authority over the temporal jurisdiction 
of princes ; and these exorbitant pretensions, which he 
had been tempted to assume from the successful example 
of his predecessors, but of which the season was now 
past, involved him in so many calamities, and were at- 
tended with so unfortunate a catastrophe, that they have 
been secretly abandoned, though never openly relin- 
quished, by his successors in the apostolic chair. Edward 
and Philip, equally jealous of papal claims, took care to 
insert in their reference, that Boniface was made judge 
of the difference by their consent, as a private person, 
not by any right of his pontificate ; and the pope, with- 
out seeming to be offended at this mortifying clause, pro- 
ceeded to give a sentence between them, in which they 
both acquiesced 6 . He brought them to agree that their 
union should be cemented by a double marriage ; that 
of Edward himself, who was now a widower, with Mar- 
garet, Philip's sister, and that of the Prince of Wales, 
with Isabella, daughter of that monarch f . Philip was 
likewise willing to restore Guienne to the English, which 
he had, indeed, no good pretence to detain : but he in- 
sisted that the Scots, and their king, John Baliol, should, 
as his allies, be comprehended in the treaty, and should be 

Peace with restored to their liberty. Their difference, after several dis- 
putes, was compromised, by their making mutual sacrifices 
to each other. Edward agreed to abandon his ally, the 
Earl of Flanders, on condition that Philip should treat 
in like manner his ally, the King of Scots. The prospect 
of conquering these two countries, whose situation made 
them so commodious an acquisition to the respective 
kingdoms, prevailed over all other considerations ; and 
though they were both finally disappointed in their 
hopes, their conduct was very reconcilable to the princi- 
ples of an interested policy. This was the first specimen 
which the Scots had of the French alliance, and which 

e Rymer, vol. ii. p. 817. Heming. vol. i. p. 149. Trivet, p. 310. 
f Rymer, vol. ii. p. 823. 



EDWARD I. 55 

was exactly conformable to what a smaller power must CHAP. 
always expect, when it blindly attaches itself to the will ^J _, 
and fortunes of a greater. That unhappy people, now 1298 
engaged in a brave though unequal contest for their 
liberties, were totally abandoned by the ally in whom 
they reposed their final confidence, to the will of an im- 
perious conqueror. 

Though England, as well as other European countries, Revolt of 

-n r-c j ? i ' -.Scotland. 

was, in its ancient state, very ill qualified lor making, and 
still worse for maintaining, conquests, Scotland was so 
much inferior in its internal force, and was so ill situated 
for receiving foreign succours, that it is no wonder Ed- 
ward, an ambitious monarch, should have cast his eye on 
so tempting an acquisition, which brought both security 
and greatness to his native country. But the instru- 
ments whom he employed to maintain his dominion over 
the northern kingdom were not happily chosen, and acted 
not with the requisite prudence and moderation, in recon- 
ciling the Scottish nation to a yoke which they bore with 
such extreme reluctance. Warrenne, retiring into Eng- 
land on account of his bad state of health, left the ad- 
ministration entirely in the hands of Ormesby, who was 
appointed justiciary of Scotland, and Cressingham, who 
bore the office of treasurer ; and a small military force 
remained to secure the precarious authority of those 
ministers. The latter had no other object than the amass- 
ing of money by rapine and injustice : the former dis- 
tinguished himself by the rigour and severity of his tem- 
per: and both of them treating the Scots as a conquered 
people, made them sensible, too early, of the grievous 
servitude into which they had fallen. As Edward re- 
quired that all the proprietors of land should swear fealty 
to him, every one who refused or delayed giving this tes- 
timony of submission was outlawed and imprisoned, and 
punished without mercy; and the bravest and most 
generous spirits of the nation were thus exasperated to 
the highest degree against the English government^ 

There was one William Wallace, of a small fortune, 
but descended of an ancient family in the west of Scot- 
land, whose courage prompted him to undertake, and 
enabled him finally to accomplish, the desperate attempt 

s Walsing. p. 70. Heming. vol. i. p. 118. Trivet, p. 299. 



56 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of delivering his native country from the dominion of 
foreigners. This man, whose valorous exploits are the 
^Tgg^^ object of just admiration, but have been much exagge- 
rated by the traditions of his countrymen, had been pro- 
voked by the insolence of an English officer to put him 
to death; and finding himself obnoxious, on that account, 
to the severity of the administration, he fled into the 
woods, and offered himself as a leader to all those whom 
their crimes, or bad fortune, or avowed hatred of the 
English, had reduced to a like necessity. He was endowed 
with gigantic force of body, with heroic courage of mind, 
with disinterested magnanimity, with incredible patience, 
and ability to bear hunger, fatigue, and all the severities 
of the seasons ; and he soon acquired, among those des- 
perate fugitives, that authority to which his virtues so 
justly entitled him. Beginning with small attempts, in 
which he was always successful, he gradually proceeded 
to more momentous enterprises; and he discovered 
equal caution in securing his followers, and valour in 
annoying the enemy. By his knowledge of the coun- 
try, he was enabled, when pursued, to ensure a retreat 
among the morasses, or forests, or mountains ; and again 
collecting his dispersed associates, he unexpectedly ap- 
peared in another quarter, and surprised, and routed, and 
put to the sword the unwary English. Every day brought 
accounts of his great actions, which were received with 
no less favour by his countrymen than terror by the 
enemy : all those who thirsted after military fame were 
desirous to partake of his renown ; his successful valour 
seemed to vindicate the nation from the ignominy into 
which it had fallen by its tame submission to the Eng- 
lish: and though no nobleman of note ventured as yet 
to join his party, he had gained a general confidence and 
attachment, which birth and fortune are not alone able 
to confer. 

Wallace having, by many fortunate enterprises, brought 
the valour of his followers to correspond to his own, 
resolved to strike a decisive blow against the English 
government; and he concerted the plan of attacking 
Ormesby, at Scone, and of taking vengeance on him for 
all the violence and tyranny of which he had been guilty. 
The justiciary, apprized of his intentions, fled hastily into 



EDWARD I. 5> 

England : all the other officers of that nation imitated CHAP. 
his example : their terror added alacrity and courage to ^j 
the Scots, who betook themselves to arms in every quar- 1298 
ter. Many of the principal barons, and among the rest 
Sir William Douglas*, openly countenanced Wallace's 
party. Kobert Bruce secretly favoured and promoted the 
same cause : and the Scots, shaking off their fetters, pre- 
pared themselves to defend, by an united effort, that 
liberty which they had so unexpectedly recovered from 
the hands of their oppressors. 

But Warrenne collecting an army of forty thousand 
men in the north of England, determined to re-establish 
his authority ; and he endeavoured, by the celerity of his 
armament and of his march, to compensate for his past 
negligence, which had enabled the Scots to throw off the 
English government. He suddenly entered Annandale, 
and came up with the enemy at Irvine, before their forces 
were fully collected, and before they had put themselves 
in a posture of defence. Many of the Scottish nobles, 
alarmed with their dangerous situation, here submitted 
to the English, renewed their oaths of fealty, promised 
to deliver hostages for their good behaviour, and received 
a pardon for past offences 1 . Others who had not yet de- 
clared themselves, such as the Steward of Scotland and 
the Earl of Lenox, joined, though with reluctance, the 
English army ; and waited a favourable opportunity for 
embracing the cause of their distressed countrymen. But 
Wallace, whose authority over his retainers was more 
fully confirmed by the absence of the great nobles, per- 
severed obstinately in his purpose ; and finding himself 
unable to give battle to the enemy, he marched north- 
wards, with an intention of prolonging the war, and of 
turning to his advantage the situation of that mountain- 
ous and barren country. When Warrenne advanced to 
Stirling, he found Wallace encamped at Cambuskenneth, 
on the opposite banks of the Forth ; and being continu- 
ally urged by the impatient Cressingham, who was actu- 
ated both by personal and national animosities against 
the Scots k , he prepared to attack them in that position, 
which Wallace, no less prudent than courageous, had 

11 Walsing. p. 70. Homing, vol. i. p. 118. 

i Heming. vol. i. p. 121, 122. k Heming. vol. i. p. 127. 



58 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, chosen for his army 1 . In spite of the remonstrances of 
XIIL , Sir Richard Lundy, a Scotchman of birth and family, who 
^2)8 sincerely adhered to the English, he ordered his army to 
pass a bridge which lay over the Forth ; but he was soon 
convinced, by fatal experience, of the error of his conduct. 
Wallace, allowing such numbers of the English to pass 
as he thought proper, attacked them before they were 
fully formed, put them to rout, pushed part of them into 
the river, destroyed the rest by the edge of the sword, 
and gained a complete victory over them m . Among the 
slain was Cressingham himself, whose memory was so 
extremely odious to the Scots, that they flayed his dead 
body, and made saddles and girths of his skin n . War- 
renne, finding the remainder of his army much dismayed 
by this misfortune, was obliged again to evacuate the 
kingdom, and retire into England. The castles of Rox- 
burgh and Berwick, ill fortified and feebly defended, fell 
soon after into the hands of the Scots. 

Wallace, universally revered as the deliverer of his 
country, now received, from the hands of his followers, 
the dignity of regent or guardian under the captive 
Baliol ; and finding that the disorders of war, as well as 
the unfavourable seasons, had produced a famine in Scot- 
land, he urged his army to march into England, to sub- 
sist at the expense of the enemy, and to revenge all past 
injuries, by retaliating on that hostile nation. The Scots, 
who deemed every thing possible under such a leader, 
joyfully attended his call. Wallace, breaking into the 
northern counties during the winter season, laid every 
place waste with fire and sword and after extending on 
all sides, without opposition, the fury of his ravages as 
far as the bishopric of Durham, he returned, loaded with 
spoils, and crowned with glory, into his own country . 
The disorders which at that time prevailed in England, 
from the refractory behaviour of the constable and mare- 
schal, made it impossible to collect an army sufficient to 
resist the enemy, and exposed the nation to this loss and 
dishonour. 

But Edward, who received in Flanders intelligence of 
these events, and had already concluded a truce with 

1 On the llth of September, 1297. 

Walsing. p. 73. Heming. vol. i. p. 127, 128, 129. Trivet, p. 307. 

Heming. vol. i. p. 130. o Heming. vol. i. p. 131, 132, 133. 



EDWARD I. 59 

France, now hastened over to England, in certain hopes, CHAP. 
by his activity and valour, not only of wiping off this dis- 
grace, but of recovering the important conquest of Scot- ^^~ 
land, which he always regarded as the chief glory and 
advantage of his reign. He appeased the murmurs of 
his people by concessions and promises : he restored to 
the citizens of London the election of their own magis- 
trates, of which they had been bereaved in the latter part 
of his father's reign : he ordered strict inquiry to be made 
concerning the corn and other goods which had been 
violently seized before his departure, as if he intended to 
pay the value to the owners p ; and making public pro- 
fessions of confirming and observing the charters, he re- 
gained the confidence of the discontented nobles. Hav- 
ing, by all these popular arts, rendered himself entirely 
master of his people, he collected the whole military force 
of England, Wales, and Ireland, and marched with an 
army of near a hundred thousand combatants to the 
northern frontiers. 

Nothing could have enabled the Scots to resist but for 
one season so mighty a power, except an entire union 
among themselves ; but as they were deprived of their 
king, whose personal qualities, even when he was present, 
appeared so contemptible, and had left among his subjects 
no principle of attachment to him or his family ; factions, 
jealousies, and animosities, unavoidably arose among the 
great, and distracted all their councils. The elevation of 
Wallace, though purchased by so great merit, and such 
eminent services, was the object of envy to the nobility, 
who repined to see a private gentleman raised above 
them by his rank, and still more by his glory and repu- 
tation. Wallace himself, sensible of their jealousy, and 
dreading the ruin of his country from those intestine 
discords, voluntarily resigned his authority, and retained 
only the command over that body of his followers, who, 
being accustomed to victory under his standard, refused 
to follow into the field any other leader. The chief 
power devolved on the Steward of Scotland, and Cum- 
min of Badenoch ; men of eminent birth, under whom 
the great chieftains were more willing to serve in defence 
of their country. The two Scottish commanders, collect- 

P Kymer, vol. ii. p. 813. 



60 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ing their several forces from every quarter, fixed tlieii 
station at Falkirk, and purposed there to abide the as- 

v ^7^"' sault of the English. Wallace was at the head of a third 
body, which acted under his command. The Scottish 
army placed their pikemen along their front ; lined the 
intervals between the three bodies with archers; and 
dreading the great superiority of the English in cavalry, 
endeavoured to secure their front by pallisadoes, tied 
together with ropes q . In this disposition they expected 
the approach of the enemy. 

B 2 at?ie J of y ' ^ ne ki n g? when he arrived in sight of the Scots, was 
pleased with the prospect of being able, by one decisive 
stroke, to determine the fortune of the war ; and divid- 
ing his army also into three bodies, he led them to the 
attack. The English archers, who began about this time 
to surpass those of other nations, first chased the Scottish 
bowmen off the field ; then pouring in their arrows among 
the pikemen, who were cooped up within their intrench- 
rnents, threw them into disorder, and rendered the as- 
sault of the English pikemen and cavalry more easy and 
successful. The whole Scottish army was broken, and 
chased off the field with great slaughter ; which the his- 
torians, attending more to the exaggerated relations of 
the populace than to the probability of things, make 
amount to fifty or sixty thousand men r . It is- only cer- 
tain that the Scots never suffered a greater loss in any 
action, nor one which seemed to threaten more inevita- 
ble ruin to their country. 

In this general rout of the army, "Wallace's military 
skill and presence of mind enabled him to keep his troops 
entire ; and retiring behind the Carron, he marched lei- 
surely along the banks of that small river, which pro- 
tected him from the enemy. Young Bruce, who had 
already given many proofs of his aspiring genius, but who 
served hitherto in the English army, appeared on the 
opposite banks; and distinguishing the Scottish chief, as 
well by his majestic port as by the intrepid activity of his 
behaviour, called out to him, and desired a short confer- 
ence. He here represented to Wallace the fruitless and 
ruinous enterprise in which he was engaged ; and en- 

<i Walsing. p. 75. Heming. vol. i. p 163 

* Walsing. p. 76. T Wykes, p. 127. Heming. vol. i. p. 163, 164, 165. Trivet, 
p. 313, says only twenty thousand. M. West. p. 431, says forty thousand. 



EDWARD I. Q 

deavoured to bend his inflexible spirit to submission under CHAP 
superior power and superior fortune. He insisted on the xm 
unequal contest between a weak state, deprived of its^^j 
head, and agitated by intestine discord, and a mighty 
nation, conducted by the ablest and most martial monarch 
of the age, and possessed of every resource either for pro- 
tracting the war, or for pushing it with vigour and activity. 
If the love of his country were his motive for perse- 
verance, his obstinacy tended only to prolong her misery; 
if he carried his views to private grandeur and ambition, 
he might reflect, that even if Edward should withdraw 
his armies, it appeared from past experience that so many 
haughty nobles, proud of the pre-eminence of their fami- 
lies, would never submit to personal merit, whose supe- 
riority they were less inclined to regard as an object of 
admiration, than as a reproach and injury to themselves. 
To these exhortations Wallace replied, that, if he had 
hitherto acted alone as the champion of his country, it 
was solely because no second or competitor, or, what he 
rather wished, no leader, had yet appeared to place him- 
self in that honourable station : that the blame lay entirely 
on the nobility, and chiefly on Bruce himself, who, uniting 
personal merit to dignity of family, had deserted the post 
which both nature and fortune, by such powerful calls, 
invited him to assume : that the Scots, possessed of such 
a head, would, by their unanimity and concord, have sur- 
mounted the chief difficulty under which they now 
laboured, and might hope, notwithstanding their present 
losses, to oppose successfully all the power and abilities 
of Edward: that Heaven itself could not set a more 
glorious prize before the eyes either of virtue or ambition, 
than to join, in one object, the acquisition of royalty with 
the defence of national independence : and that as the 
interests of his country, more than those of a brave man, 
could never be sincerely cultivated by a sacrifice of liberty, 
he himself was determined, as far as possible, to prolong, 
not her misery, but her freedom, and was desirous that 
his own life, as well as the existence of the nation, might 
terminate, when they could no otherwise be preserved 
than by receiving the chains of a haughty victor. The 
gallantry of these sentiments, though delivered by an 
armed enemy, struck the generous mind of Bruce : the 

VOL. II. 6 



62 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, flame was conveyed from the breast of one hero to that of 

XIIL another : he repented of his engagements with Edward ; 

"""^ ' and opening his eyes to the honourable path pointed out 

to him by Wallace, secretly determined to seize the first 

opportunity of embracing the cause, however desperate, 

of his oppressed country 8 . 

1299. The subjection of Scotland, notwithstanding this great 
victory of Edward, was not yet entirely completed. The 
English army, after reducing the southern provinces, was 
obliged to retire for want of provisions, and left the 
northern counties in the hands of the natives. The Scots, 
no less enraged at their present defeat, than elated by 
their past victories, still maintained the contest for liberty; 
but being fully sensible of the great inferiority of their 
force, they endeavoured, by applications to foreign courts, 
to procure to themselves some assistance. The suppli- 
cations of the Scottish ministers were rejected by Philip, 
isoo. but were more successful with the court of Kome. Boni- 
ag^nTub- f ace > pleased with an occasion of exerting his authority, 
dued. wrote a letter to Edward, exhorting him to put a stop to 
his oppressions in Scotland, and displaying all the proofs, 
such as they had probably been furnished him by the 
Scots themselves, for the ancient independence of that 
kingdom*. Among other arguments, hinted at above, 
he mentioned the treaty, conducted and finished by Ed- 
ward himself, for the marriage of his son with the heiress 
of Scotland ; a treaty which would have been absurd, had 
he been superior lord of the kingdom, and had possessed, 
by the feudal law, the right of disposing of his ward in 
marriage. He mentioned several other 'striking facts, 
which fell within the compass of Edward's own know- 
ledge ; particularly, that Alexander, when he did homage 
to the king, openly and expressly declared in his pre- 
sence, that he swore fealty, not for his crown, but for the 
lands which he held in England ; and the pope's letter 
might have passed for a reasonable one, had he not sub- 
joined his own claim to be liege lord of Scotland ; a claim 
which had not once keen heard of, but which, with a 
singular confidence, he asserted to be full, entire, and 
derived from the most remote antiquity. The affirma- 

' This story is told by all the Scotch writers; though it must be owned, that 
Trivet and Hemmgford, authors of good credit, both agree that Bruce was not at 
that time in Edward's army. t Ry me r vol. ii. p. 844. 



EDWARD I. 

tive style, which had been so successful with him and his CHAP. 
predecessors in spiritual contests, was never before abused ^ XIL 
after a more egregious manner in any civil controversy. 

The reply which Edward made to Boniface's letter, isoi. 
contains particulars no less singular and remarkable 11 . 
He there proves the superiority of England by historical 
facts, deduced from the period of Brutus, the Trojan, who, 
he said, founded the British monarchy in the age of Eli 
and Samuel : he supports his position by all the events 
which passed in the island before the arrival of the Ro- 
mans ; and, after laying great stress on the extensive 
dominions and heroic victories of King Arthur, he vouch- 
safes at last to descend to the time of Edward the elder, 
with which, in his speech to the states of Scotland, he 
had chosen to begin his claim of superiority. He asserts 
it to be a fact, notorious and confirmed by the records of 
antiquity, that the English monarchs had often conferred 
the kingdom of Scotland on their own subjects ; had de- 
throned these vassal kings when unfaithful to them ; and 
had substituted others in their stead. He displays, with 
great pomp, the full and complete homage which Wil- 
liam had done to Henry II., without mentioning the 
formal abolition of that extorted deed by King Richard, 
and the renunciation of all future claims of the same 
nature. Yet this paper he begins with a solemn appeal 
to the Almighty, the searcher of hearts, for his own firm 
persuasion of the justice of his claim ; and no less than 
a hundred and four barons, assembled in Parliament at 
Lincoln, concur in maintaining before the pope, under 
their seals, the validity of these pre tensions w . At the 
same time, however, they take care to inform Boniface, 
that though they had justified their cause before him, 
they did not acknowledge him for their judge : the crown 
of England was free and sovereign : they had sworn to 
maintain all its royal prerogatives, and would never per- 
mit the king himself, were he willing, to relinquish its 
independency. 

That neglect, almost total, of truth and justice, which 1302. 
sovereign states discover in their transactions with each 
other, is an evil universal and inveterate ; is one great 

u Rymer, vol. ii. p. 863. 

w Id. p. 873. Walsing. p. 85. Heming. vol. i. p. 186. Trivet, p. 330. M. 
West. p. 443. 



64 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, source of the misery to which the human race is continu- 
XIIL ally exposed ; and it may be doubted whether, in many 
instances, it be found in the end to contribute to the 
interests of those princes themselves, who thus sacrifice 
their integrity to their politics. As few monarchs have 
lain under stronger temptations to violate the principles 
of equity, than Edward in his transactions with Scotland, 
so never were they violated with less scruple and reserve : 
yet his advantages were hitherto precarious and uncer- 
tain ; and the Scots, once roused to arms and inured to 
war, began to appear a formidable enemy, even to this 
Scotland military and ambitious monarch. They chose John Cum- 
voTts! r< ' min for their regent ; and not content with maintaining 
their independence in the northern parts, they made in- 
cursions into the southern counties, which Edward ima- 
gined he had totally subdued. John de Segrave, whom 
he had left guardian of Scotland, led an army to oppose 
1303. them ; and lying at Roslin, near Edinburgh, sent out his 
' forces in three divisions, to provide themselves with forage 
and subsistence from the neighbourhood. One party was 
suddenly attacked by the regent and Sir Simon Fraser ; 
and being unprepared, was immediately routed and pur- 
sued with great slaughter. The few that escaped, flying 
to the second division, gave warning of the approach of 
the enemy : the soldiers ran to their arms, and were im- 
mediately led on to take revenge for the death of their 
countrymen. The Scots, elated with the advantage 
already obtained, made a vigorous impression upon them; 
the English, animated with a thirst of vengeance, main- 
tained a stout resistance : the victory was long undecided 
between them; but at last declared itself entirely in 
favour of the former, who broke the English, and chased 
them to the third division, now advancing with a hasty 
march to support their distressed companions. Many of 
the Scots had fallen in the two first actions ; most of them 
were wounded ; and all of them extremely fatigued by 
the long continuance of the combat : yet were they so 
transported with success and military rage, that, having 
suddenly recovered their order, and arming the followers 
of their camp with the spoils of the slaughtered enemy, 
they drove with fury upon the ranks of the dismayed 
English. The favourable moment decided the battle, 



EDWARD I. 65 

which the Scots, had they met with a steady resistance, CHAP. 
were not long able to maintain : the English were chased ,^J _, 
off the field : three victories were thus gained in one day x : ^~^~ 
and the renown of these great exploits, seconded by the 
favourable dispositions of the people, soon made the 
regent master of all the fortresses in the south ; and it 
became necessary for Edward to begin anew the conquest 
of the kingdom. 

The king prepared himself for this enterprise with his 
usual vigour and abilities. He assembled both a great 
fleet and a great army ; and entering the frontiers of 
Scotland, appeared with a force which the enemy could 
not think of resisting in the open field : the English 
navy, which sailed along the coast, secured the army from 
any danger of famine ; Edward's vigilance preserved it 
from surprises ; and by this prudent disposition they 
marched victorious from one extremity of the kingdom 
to the other, ravaging the open country, reducing all the 
castles 7 , and receiving the submissions of all the nobility, 
even those of Cummin the regent. The most obstinate 
resistance was made by the castle of Brechin, defended 
by Sir Thomas Maule ; and the place opened not its gates, 
till the death of the governor, by discouraging the garri- 
son, obliged them to submit to the fate which had over- is again 
whelmed the rest of the kingdom. Wallace, though he subdued ' 
attended the English army in their march, found but few 
opportunities of signalizing that valour which had for- 
merly made him so terrible to his enemies. 

Edward, having completed his conquest, which em- 1304 - 
ployed him during the space of near two years, now un- 
dertook the more difficult work of settling the country, 
of establishing a new form of government, and of making 
his acquisition durable to the crown of England. He 
seems to have carried matters to extremity against the 
natives : he abrogated all the Scottish laws and customs 2 : 
he endeavoured to substitute the English in their place : 
he entirely razed or destroyed all the monuments of 
antiquity : such records or histories as had escaped his 
former search were now burnt or dispersed : and he 
hastened, by too precipitate steps, to abolish entirely the 
Scottish name, and to sink it finally in the English. 

x Homing, vol. i. p. 197. y Ibid. p. 205, z Kiley, p. 506. 

6* 



66 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Edward, however, still deemed his favourite conquest 
^_ _, exposed to some danger, so long as Wallace was alive ; 
1305i and being prompted both by revenge and policy, he em- 
ployed every art to discover his retreat, and become master 
of his person. At last that hardy warrior, who was deter- 
mined, amidst the universal slavery of his countrymen, 
still to maintain his independency, was betrayed into 
Edward's hands by Sir John Monteith, his friend, whom 
he had made acquainted with the place of his conceal- 
ment. The king, whose natural bravery and magnanimity 
should have induced him to respect like qualities in an 
enemy, enraged at some acts of violence committed by 
Wallace during the fury of war, resolved to overawe the 
23rd Aug. Scots by an example of severity : he ordered Wallace to 
be carried in chains to London, to be tried as a rebel and 
traitor, though he had never made submissions or sworn 
fealty to England, and to be executed on Tower-hill. 
This was the unworthy fate of a hero, who, through a 
course of many years, had, with signal conduct, intrepidity, 
and perseverance, defended, against a public and oppres- 
sive enemy, the liberties of his native country. 

But the barbarous policy of Edward failed of the pur- 
pose to which it was directed. The Scots, already dis- 
gusted at the great innovations introduced by the sword 
of a conqueror into their laws and government, were 
farther enraged at the injustice and cruelty exercised 
upon Wallace : and all the envy, which, during his life- 
time, had attended that gallant chief, being now buried 
in his grave, he was universally regarded as the champion 
of Scotland, and the patron of her expiring independency. 
The people, inflamed with resentment, were every where 
disposed to rise against the English government ; and it 
was not long ere a new and more fortunate leader pre- 
sented himself, who conducted them to liberty, to victory, 
1306. and to vengeance. 

Robert Bruce, grandson of that Robert who had been 
one of the competitors for the crown, had succeeded, by 
his grandfather's and father's death, to all their rights : 
and the demise of John Baliol, together with the capti- 
vity of Edward, eldest son of that prince, seemed to open 
a full career to the genius and ambition of this young 
nobleman. He saw that the Scots, when the title to 



EDWARD I. 67 

their crown had expired in the males of their ancient CHAP. 
royal family, had been divided into parties, nearly equal 
between the houses of Bruce and Baliol ; and that every 
incident, which had since happened, had tended to wean 
them from any attachment to the latter. The slender 
capacity of John had proved unable to defend them 
against their enemies : he had meanly resigned his crown 
into the hands of the* conqueror: he had, before his 
deliverance from captivity, reiterated that resignation in 
a manner seemingly voluntary ; and had, in that deed, 
thrown out many reflections extremely dishonourable to 
his ancient subjects, whom he publicly called traitors, 
ruffians, and rebels, and with whom he declared he was 
determined to maintain no farther correspondence a : he 
had, during the time of his exile, adhered strictly to that 
resolution ; and his son, being a prisoner, seemed ill 
qualified to revive the rights, now fully abandoned, of his 
family. Bruce therefore hoped, that the Scots, so long 
exposed, from the want of a leader, to the oppressions of 
their enemies, would unanimously fly to his standard, and 
would seat him on the vacant throne, to which he brought 
such plausible pretensions. His aspiring spirit, inflamed 
by the fervour of youth, and buoyed up by his natural 
courage, saw the glory alone of the enterprise, or regarded 
the prodigious difficulties which attended it as the source 
only of farther glory. The miseries and oppressions which 
he had beheld his countrymen suffer in this unequal con- 
test, the repeated defeats and misfortunes which they had 
undergone, proved to him so many incentives to bring 
them relief, and conduct them to vengeance against the 
haughty victor. The circumstances which attended 
Bruce's first declaration are variously related ; but we 
shall rather follow the account given by the Scottish 
historians ; not that their authority is in general anywise 
comparable to that of the English, but because they may 
be supposed sometimes better informed concerning facts 
which so nearly interested their own nation. 

Bruce, who had long harboured in his breast the design 
of freeing his enslaved country, ventured at last to open 
his mind to John Cummin, a powerful nobleman, with 
whom he lived in strict intimacy. He found his friend, 

a Brady's Hist. vol. ii. App. No. 27. 



03 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, as lie imagined, fully possessed with the same sentiments ; 
xm " and he needed to employ no arts of persuasion, to make 

*~^ 6 him embrace the resolution of throwing off, on the first 
favourable opportunity, the usurped dominion of the 
English. But on the departure of Bruce, who attended 
Edward to London, Cummin, who had either all along 
dissembled with him, or began to reflect more coolly in 
his absence on the desperate nature of the undertaking, 
resolved to atone for his crime in assenting to this rebellion, 
by the merit of revealing the secret to the King of Eng- 
land. Edward did not immediately commit Bruce to 
custody, because he intended, at the same time, to seize 
his three brothers, who resided in Scotland ; and he con- 
tented himself with secretly setting spies upon him, and 
ordering all his motions to be strictly watched. A noble- 
man of Edward's court, Bruce's intimate friend, was 
apprised of his danger ; but not daring, amidst so many 
jealous eyes, to hold any conversation with him, he fell 
on an expedient to give him warning that it was full 
time he should make his escape. He sent him, by his 
servant, a pair of gilt spurs, and a purse of gold, which 
he pretended to have borrowed from him ; and left it to 
the sagacity of his friend to discover the meaning of the 
present. Bruce immediately contrived the means of his 
escape ; and as the ground was at that time covered with 
snow, he had the precaution, it is said, to order his horses 

* to be shod with their shoes inverted, that he might deceive 

those who should track his path over the open fields or 
cross roads, through which he purposed to travel. He 
arrived in a few days at Dumfries in Annandale, the 
chief seat of his family interest ; and he happily found a 
great number of the Scottish nobility there assembled, 
and, among the rest, John Cummin, his former associate. 

loth Feb. The noblemen were astonished at the appearance of 
Bruce among them ; and still more when he discovered 
to them the object of his journey. He told them that 
he was come to live or die with them in defence of the 
liberties of his country, and hoped, with their assistance, 
to redeem the Scottish name from all the indignities 
which it had so long suffered from the tyranny of their 
imperious masters : that the sacrifice of the rights of his 
family was the first injury which had prepared the way 



EDWARD I. 69 

for their ensuing slavery ; and by resuming them, which CHAP. 
was his firm purpose, he opened to them the joyful 
pect of recovering from the fraudulent usurper their 
ancient and hereditary independence : that all past mis- 
fortunes had proceeded from their disunion ; and they 
would soon appear no less formidable than of old to 
their enemies, if they now deigned to follow into the 
field their rightful prince, who knew no medium between 
death and victory : that their mountains, and their valour, 
which had, during so many ages, protected their liberty 
from all the efforts of the Koman empire, would still be 
sufficient, were they worthy of their generous ancestors, 
to defend them against the utmost violence of the English 
tyrant : that it was unbecoming men, born to the most 
ancient independence known in Europe, to submit to the 
will of any masters ; but fatal to receive those who, being 
irritated by such persevering resistance, and inflamed with 
the highest animosity, would never deem themselves 
secure in their usurped dominion, but by exterminating 
all the ancient nobility, and even all the ancient inhabit- 
ants ; and that, being reduced to this desperate extremity, 
it were better for them at once to perish like brave men, 
with swords in their hands, than to dread long, and at 
last undergo, the fate of the unfortunate Wallace, whose 
merits in the brave and obstinate defence of his country, 
were finally rewarded by the hands of an English exe- 
cutioner. 

The spirit with which this discourse was delivered, the 
bold sentiments which it conveyed, the novelty of Bruce's 
declaration, assisted by the graces of his youth and manly 
deportment, made deep impression on the minds of his 
audience, and roused all those principles of indignation 
and revenge with which they had long been secretly 
actuated. The Scottish nobles declared their unanimous 
resolution to use the utmost efforts in delivering their 
country from bondage, and to second the courage of 
Bruce, in asserting his and their undoubted rights against 
their common oppressors. Cummin alone, who had 
secretly taken his measures with the king, opposed this 
general determination; and by representing the great 
power of England, governed by a prince of such uncom- 
mon vigour and abilities, he endeavoured to set before 



70 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, them the certain destruction which they must expect, if 
XIIL they again violated their oaths of fealty, and shook oft* 

^^^ their allegiance to the victorious Edward b . Bruce, 
already apprized of his treachery, and foreseeing the 
certain failure of all his own schemes of ambition and 
glory from the opposition of so potent a leader, took im- 
mediately his resolution ; and moved partly by resent- 
ment, partly by policy, followed Cummin on the dissolu- 
tion of the assembly, attacked him in the cloisters of the 
Gray Friars, through which he passed, and running him 
through the body, left him for dead. Sir Thomas Kirk- 
patric, one of . Bruce's friends, asking him soon after if 
the traitor was slain, / believe so, replied Bruce. And 
is that a matter, cried Kirkpatric, to be left to conjecture ? 
I ivitt secure him. Upon which he drew his dagger, ran 
to Cummin, and stabbed him to the heart. This deed 
of Bruce and his associates, which contains circumstances 
justly condemned by our present manners, was regarded 
in that age as an effort of manly vigour and just policy. 
The family of Kirkpatric took for the crest of their arms, 
which they still wear, a hand with a bloody dagger ; and 
chose for their motto these words, I tvitt secure him ; the 
expression employed by their ancestor when he executed 
that violenj, action. 

Third The murder of Cummin affixed the seal to the con- 

spiracy of the Scottish nobles : they had now no resource 
left but to shake off the yoke of England, or to perish in 
the attempt : the genius of the nation roused itself from 
its present dejection: and Bruce, flying to different 
quarters, excited his partisans to arms, attacked with 
success the dispersed bodies of the English, got posses- 
sion of many of the castles, and having made his autho- 
rity be acknowledged in most parts of the kingdom, was 
solemnly crowned and inaugurated in the abbey of Scone 
by the Bishop of St. Andrew's, who had zealously em- 
braced his cause. The English were again chased out of 
the kingdom, except such as took shelter in the fortresses 
that still remained in their hands ; and Edward found 
that the Scots, twice conquered in his reign, and often 
defeated, must yet be anew subdued. Not discouraged 
with these unexpected difficulties, he sent Aymer de 

b M. West. p. 453. 



EDWARD I. 71 

Valence with a considerable force into Scotland, to CHAP. 
check the progress of the malecontents ; and that noble- ^_ _, 
man, falling unexpectedly upon Bruce at Methven in 1306 
Perthshire, threw his army into such disorder as ended 
in a total defeat .' Bruce fought with the most heroic 
courage, was thrice dismounted in the action, and as 
often recovered himself; but was at last obliged to yield 
to superior fortune, and take shelter, with a few fol- 
lowers, in the western isles. The Earl of Athol, Sir 
Simon Fraser, and Si Christopher Seton, who had been 
taken prisoners, were ordered by Edward to be executed 
as rebels and traitors d . Many other acts of rigour were 1307 
exercised by him ; and that prince, vowing revenge 
against the whole Scottish nation, whom he deemed in- 
corrigible in their aversion to his government, assembled 
a great army, and was preparing to enter the frontiers, 
secure of success, and determined to make the defence- 
less Scots the victims of his severity ; when he unex- 
pectedly sickened and died near Carlisle ; enjoining, with 
his last breath, his son and successor to prosecute the 
enterprise, and never to desist, till he had finally subdued 
the kingdom of Scotland. He expired in the sixty-ninth 
year of his age, and the thirty-fifth of his reign, hated by 
his neighbours, but extremely respected and revered by 
his own subjects. 

The enterprises finished by this prince, and the 
jects which he formed and brought near to a conclusion, the king, 
were more prudent, more regularly conducted, and'more 
advantageous to the solid interests of his kingdom, than 
those which were undertaken in any reign either of his 
ancestors or his successors. He restored authority to the 
government, disordered by the weakness of his father ; 
he maintained the laws against all the efforts of his tur- 
bulent barons ; he fully annexed to his crown the princi- 
pality of Wales ; he took many wise and vigorous mea- 
sures for reducing Scotland to a like condition ; and 
though the equity of this latter enterprise may reasonably 
be questioned, the circumstances of the two kingdoms 
promised such certain success, and the advantage was so 
visible of uniting the whole island under one head, that 

c Walsing. p. 91. Heming. vol. i. p. 222, 223. Trivet, p. 344. 
a Heming. vol. i. p. 223. M. West. p. 456. 



72 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, those who give great indulgence to reasons of state in the 
measures of princes, will not be apt to regard this part 
"^^ of his conduct with much severity. But Edward, how- 
ever exceptionable his character may appear on the head 
of justice, is the model of a politic and warlike king :~he 
possessed industry, penetration, courage, vigilance, and 
enterprise : he was frugal in all expenses that were not 
necessary : he knew how to open the public treasures on 
a proper occasion : he punished criminals with severity : 
he was gracious and affable to his servants and courtiers ; 
and being of a majestic figure, expert in all military ex- 
ercises, and in the main well proportioned in his limbs, 
notwithstanding the great length and the smallness of 
his legs, he was as well qualified to captivate the populace 
by his exterior appearance, as to gain the approbation 
of men of sense by his more solid virtues. 

Misceiia- But the chief advantage which the people of England 
transac- reaped, and still continue to reap, from the reign of this 
great prince, was the correction, extension, amendment, 
and establishment of the laws, which Edward maintained 
in great vigour, and left much improved to posterity ; for 
the acts of a wise legislator commonly remain, while the 
acquisitions of a conqueror often perish with him. This 
merit has justly gained *to Edward the appellation of the 
English Justinian. Not only the numerous statutes 
passed in his reign touch the chief points of jurispru- 
dence, and, according to Sir Edward Coke 6 , truly deserve 
the name of establishments, because they were more 
constant, standing, and durable laws than any made 
since ; but the regular order maintained in his adminis- 
tration gave an opportunity to the common law to refine 
itself, and brought the judges to a certainty in their de- 
terminations, and the lawyers to a precision in their 
pleadings. Sir Matthew Hale has remarked the sudden 
improvement of English law during this reign ; and 
ventures to assert, that, till his own time, it had never 
received any considerable increased Edward settled the 
jurisdiction of the several courts; first established the 
office of justice of peace ; abstained from the practice, 
too common before him, of interrupting justice by man- 

e Institute, p. 156. 

f History of the English Law, p. 158. 163. 



EDWARD I. 73 

dates from the privy-council g ; repressed robberies and CHAP. 
disorders 11 ; encouraged trade, by giving merchants an^ _, 
easy method of recovering their debts 1 ; and, in short, in- 1307 
troduced a new face of things by the vigour and wisdom 
of his administration. As law began now to be well 
established, the abuse of that blessing began also to be 
remarked. Instead of their former associations for rob- 
bery and violence, men entered into formal combinations 
to support each other in lawsuits ; and it was found re- 
quisite to check this iniquity by act of Parliament 1 ". 

There happened in this reign a considerable alteration 
in the execution of the laws: the king abolished the 
office of chief justiciary, which he thought possessed too 
much power, and was dangerous to the crown 1 : he com- 
pleted the division of the court of exchequer into four 
distinct courts, which managed each its several branch, 
without dependence on any one magistrate ; and as the 
lawyers afterwards invented a method, by means of their 
fictions, of carrying business from one court to another, 
the several courts became rivals and checks to each other ; 
a circumstance which tended much to improve the prac- 
tice of the law in England. 

But though Edward appeared thus, throughout his , 
whole reign, a friend to law and justice, it cannot be said 
that he was an enemy to arbitrary power; and in a 
government more regular* and legal than was that of 
England in his age, such practices, as those which may 
be remarked in his administration, would have given suf- 
ficient ground of complaint, and sometimes were, even 
in his age, the object of general displeasure. The violent 
plunder and banishment of the Jews ; the putting of the 
whole clergy at once, and by an arbitrary edict, out of 
the protection of the law ; the seizing of all the wool and 
leather of the kingdom ; the heightening of the imposi- 
tions on the former valuable commodity ; the new and 

e Articuli super Cart. cap. 6. Edward enacted a law to this purpose; but it is 
doubtful Avhether he ever observed it. We are sure that scarcely any of his suc- 
cessors did. The multitude of these letters of protection were the ground of a 
complaint by the Commons in the third of Edward II. See Riley, p. 525. This- 
practicc was declared illegal by the statute of Northampton, passed in the second 
of Edward III., but is still continued, like many other abuses. There are instances 
of it so late as the reign of Queen Elizabeth. 

h Statute of Winton. i Statute of Acton Burnel. 

k Statute of Conspirators. 

1 Spellman, Gloss, in verbo Justiciarius. Gilbert's Hist, of the Exchequer, p. 8.. 
VOL. II. 7 



74 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, illegal commission of Trailbaston ; the taking of all the 
xn ^ money and plate of monasteries and churches, even be- 
^^ fore he had any quarrel with the clergy; the subjecting 
of every man possessed of twenty pounds a year to mili- 
tary service, though not bound to it by his tenure ; his 
visible reluctance to confirm the great charter, as if that 
concession had no validity from the deeds of his prede- 
cessors ; the captious clause which he at last annexed to 
his confirmation; his procuring of the pope's dispensa- 
tion from the oaths which he had taken to observe that 
charter; and his levying of talliages at discretion even 
after the statute, or rather charter, by which he had re- 
nounced that prerogative : these are so many demonstra- 
tions of his arbitrary disposition, and prove with what 
exception and reserve we ought to celebrate his love of 
justice. He took care that his subjects should do justice 
to each other; but he desired always to have his own 
hands free in all his transactions, both with them and 
with his neighbours. 

The chief obstacle to the execution of justice in those 
times was the power of the great barons ; and Edward 
was perfectly qualified, by his character and abilities, for 
keeping these tyrants in awe, and restraining their ille- 
gal practices. This salutary purpose was accordingly the 
great object of his attention ; yet was he imprudently 
led into a measure which tended to increase and confirm 
their dangerous authority. He passed a statute which, 
by allowing them to entail their estates, made it imprac- 
ticable to diminish the property of the great families, 
and left them every means of increase and acquisi- 
tion 111 . 

Edward observed a contrary policy with regard to the 
church ; he seems to have been the first Christian prince 
that passed a statute of mortmain ; and prevented by law 
the clergy from making new acquisitions of lands, which, 
by the ecclesiastical canons, they were for ever prohi- 
bited from alienating. The opposition between his maxims, 
with regard to the nobility and to the ecclesiastics, leads 
us to conjecture, that it was only by chance he passed 
the beneficial statute of mortmain, and that his sole ob- 
ject was to maintain the number of knights' fees, and to 

Brady of Boroughs, p. 25, from the Records. 



EDWARD I. 75 

prevent the superiors from being defrauded of the profits CHAP. 
of wardship, marriage, livery, and other emoluments ^J _, 
arising from the feudal tenures. This is indeed the rea- 1307 
son assigned in the statute itself, and appears to have 
been his real object in enacting it. The author of the 
Annals of Waverley ascribes this act chiefly to the king's 
anxiety for maintaining the military force of the king- 
dom; but adds, that he was mistaken in his purpose; 
for that the Amalekites were overcome more by the 
prayers of Moses than by the sword of the Israelites 11 . 
The statute of mortmain was often evaded afterwards by 
the invention of uses. 

Edward was active in restraining the usurpations of 
the church : and excepting his ardour for crusades, 
which adhered to him during his whole life, seems in 
other respects to have been little infected with supersti- 
tion, the vice chiefly of weak minds. But the passion 
for crusades was really in that age the passion for glory. 
As the pope now felt himself somewhat more restrained 
in his former practice of pillaging the several churches 
in Europe, by laying impositions upon them, he permitted 
the generals of particular orders who resided at Rome, to 
levy taxes on the convents subjected to their jurisdiction : 
and Edward was obliged to enact a law against this new 
abuse. It was also become a practice of the court of 
Rome to provide successors to benefices before they be- 
came vacant : Edward found it likewise necessary to pre- 
vent by law this species of injustice. 

The tribute of one thousand marks a year, to which 
King John, in doing homage to the pope, had subjected 
the kingdom, had been pretty regularly paid since his 
time, though the vassalage was constantly denied, and, 
indeed, for fear of giving offence, had been but "little 
insisted on. The payment was called by a new name of 
census, not by that of tribute. King Edward seems 
always to have paid this money with great reluctance, 
and he suffered the arrears at one time to run on for six 
years , at another for eleven p ; but as princes in that age 
stood continually in need of the pope's good offices, for 
dispensations of marriage and for other concessions, the 

n P. 234. See also M. West. p. 409. 

o Rymer, vol. ii. p. 77. 107. P Id. p. 862. 



76 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, court of Rome always found means, sooner or later, to 

XIIL catch the money. The levying of first-fruits was also a 

^^""new device, begun in this reign, by which his holiness 

thrust his fingers very frequently into the purses of the 

faithful; and the king seems to have unwarily given 

way to it. 

In the former reign, the taxes had been partly scu- 
tages, partly such a proportional part of the moveables 
as was granted by Parliament: in this, scutages were 
entirely dropped, and the assessment on moveables was 
the chief method of taxation. Edward, in his fourth 
year, had a fifteenth granted him ; in his fifth year, a 
twelfth ; in his eleventh year, a thirtieth from the laity, 
a twentieth from the clergy ; in his eighteenth year, a 
fifteenth ; in his twenty-second year, a tenth from the 
laity, a sixth from London and other corporate towns, 
half of their benefices from the clergy; in his twenty-third 
year, an eleventh from the barons and others, a tenth from 
the clergy, a seventh from the burgesses ; in his twenty- 
fourth year, a twelfth from the barons and others, an 
eighth from the burgesses, from the clergy nothing, be- 
cause of the pope's inhibition ; in his twenty-fifth year, an 
eighth from the laity, a tenth from the clergy of Canter- 
bury, a fifth from those of York ; in his twenty-ninth year, 
a fifteenth from the laity, on account of his confirming the 
perambulations of the forests; the clergy granted nothing; 
in his thirty-third year, first a thirtieth from the barons 
and others, and a twentieth from the burgesses, then a 
fifteenth from all his subjects ; in his thirty-fourth year, a 
thirtieth from all his subjects for knighting his eldest son. 

These taxes were moderate; but the king had also 
duties upon exportation and importation granted him 
from time to time : the heaviest were commonly upon 
wool. Poundage, or a shilling a pound, was not regu- 
larly granted the kings for life till the reign of Henry V. 

In 1296, the famous mercantile society, called the 
Merchant Adventurers, had its first origin: it was insti- 
tuted for the improvement of the woollen manufacture, 
and the vending of the cloth abroad, particularly at 
Antwerp q ; for the English at this time scarcely thought 
of any more distant commerce. 

i Anderson's History of Commerce, vol. i. 137. 



EDWARD I. 77 

This king granted a charter or declaration of protection CHAP. 
and privileges to foreign merchants, and also ascertained 
the customs or duties which those merchants were 
return to pay on merchandise imported and exported. 
He promised them security; allowed them a jury on 
trials, consisting half of natives, half of foreigners ; and 
appointed them a justiciary in London for their protec- 
tion. But notwithstanding this seeming attention to 
foreign merchants, Edward did not free them from the 
cruel hardship of making one answerable for the debts, 
and even for the crimes, of another that came from the 
same country r . We read of such practices among the 
present barbarous nations. The king also imposed on 
them a duty of two shillings on each tun of wine 
imported, over and above the old duty ; and forty pence 
on each sack of wool exported, besides half a mark, the 
former duty 8 . 

In the year 1303 the exchequer was robbed, and of 
no less a sum than one hundred thousand pounds, as is 
pretended*. The abbot and monks of Westminster 
were indicted for this robbery, but acquitted. It does 
not appear that the king ever discovered the criminals 
with certainty; though his indignation fell on the society 
of Lombard merchants, particularly the Frescobaldi, 
very opulent Florentines. 

The pope having, in 1307 ? collected much money in 
England, the king enjoined the nuncio not to export it 
in specie, but in bills of exchange"; a proof that com- 
merce was but ill understood at that time. 

Edward had by his first wife, Eleanor of Castile, four 
sons ; but Edward, his heir and successor, was the only 
one that survived him. She also bore him eleven 
daughters, most of whom died in their infancy : of the 
surviving, Joan was married, first, to the Earl of Glou- 
cester, and, after his death, to Ralph de Monthermer : 
Margaret espoused John, Duke of Brabant : Elizabeth 
espoused, first, John, Earl of Holland, and afterwards 
the Earl of Hereford : Mary was a nun at Ambresbury. 

r Ibid. p. 146. 

8 Rvmer, vol. iv. p. 361. It is the charter of Edw. I. which is there confirmed by 
Bdw.m. 

4 Rymer, vol. ii. p. 930. u ibid. p. 1092. 



78 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. He had by his second wife, Margaret of France, two 

v^; _, sons and a daughter : Thomas, created Earl of Norfolk, 

1307 and Mareschal of England ; and Edmond, who was 

created Earl of Kent by his brother when king. The 

princess died in her infancy. 




EDWARD II. 79 



CHAPTER XIV. 
EDWAKD II. 

WEAKNESS or THE KING. His PASSION FOR FAVOURITES. PIERS GAVAS- 
TON. DISCONTENT OF THE BARONS. MURDER OF GAVASTON. WAR WITH 
SCOTLAND. BATTLE OF BANNOCKBURN. HUGH LE DESPENSER. CIVIL 
COMMOTIONS. EXECUTION OF THE EARL OF LANCASTER. CONSPIRACY 
AGAINST THE KlNG. INSURRECTION. THE KlNG DETHRONED. MuR- 
DERED. His CHARACTER. MISCELLANEOUS TRANSACTIONS IN THISKEIGN. 

THE prepossessions entertained in favour of young Ed- 
ward kept the English from being fully sensible of the 
extreme loss which they had sustained by the death of 1307 
the great monarch who filled the throne ; and all men 
hastened with alacrity to take the oath of allegiance to 
his son and successor. This prince was in the twenty- 
third year of his age, was of an agreeable figure, of a 
mild and gentle disposition, and having never discovered 
a propensity to any dangerous vice, it was natural to 
prognosticate tranquillity and happiness from his govern- 
ment. But the first act of his reign blasted all 
hopes, and showed him to be totally unqualified for that 
perilous situation, in which every English monarch, 
during those ages, had, from the unstable form of the 
constitution, and the turbulent dispositions of the people 
derived from it, the misfortune to be placed. The inde- 
fatigable Robert Bruce, though his army had been dis- 
persed, and he himself had been obliged to take shelter 
in the western isles, remained not long inactive ; but, 
before the death of the late king, had sallied from his 
retreat, had again collected his followers, had appeared 
in the field, and had obtained by surprise an important 
advantage over Aymer de Yalence, who commanded the 
English forces a . He was now become so considerable 
as to have afforded the King of England sufficient glory 
in subduing him, without incurring any danger of seeing 
all those mighty preparations, made by his father, fail in 
the enterprise. But Edward, instead of pursuing his 

a Trivet, p. 346. 



SO HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, advantages, marched but a little way into Scotland ; and 
XIV ' having an utter incapacity and equal aversion for all 
~^JJ^ application or serious business, he immediately returned 
upon his footsteps, and disbanded his army. His gran- 
dees perceived from this conduct, that the authority of 
the crown, fallen into such feeble hands, was no longer 
to be dreaded, and that every insolence might be prac- 
tised by them with impunity. 

His passion The next measure taken by Edward gave them an 
to*. Hew inclination to attack those prerogatives which no longer 
Gavaston. kept them in awe. There was one Piers Gavaston, son 
of a Gascon knight of some distinction, who had honour- 
ably served the late king, and who, in reward of his 
merits, had obtained an establishment for his son in the 
family of the Prince of Wales. This young man soon 
insinuated himself into the affections of his master by 
his agreeable behaviour, and by supplying him with all 
those innocent though frivolous amusements, which suited 
his capacity and his inclinations. He was endowed with 
the utmost elegance of shape and person, was noted for 
a fine mien and easy carriage, distinguished himself in 
all warlike and genteel exercises, and was celebrated 
for those quick sallies of wit in which his countrymen 
usually excel. By all these accomplishments he gained 
so entire an ascendant over young Edward, whose heart 
was strongly disposed to friendship and confidence, that 
the late king, apprehensive of the consequences, had 
banished him the kingdom, and had, before he died, 
made his son promise never to recall him. But no 
sooner did he find himself master, as he vainly imagined, 
than he sent for Gavaston ; and even before his arrival 
at court, endowed him with the whole earldom of Corn- 
wall, which had escheated to the crown by the death of 
Edmond, son of Richard, King of the Romans*. Not 
content with conferring on him those possessions which 
had sufficed as an appanage for a prince of the blood, he 
daily loaded him with new honours and riches ; married 
him to his own niece, sister of the Earl of Gloucester ; 
and seemed to enjoy no pleasure in his royal dignity, but 
as it enabled him to exalt to the highest splendour this 
object of his fond affections. 

*> Rymer, vol. iii. p. 1. Heming. vol. i. p. 243. Walsing. p. 96. 



EDWARD II. 81 

The haughty barons, offended at the superiority of a CHAP. 
minion, whose birth, though reputable, they despised as ^_ 
much inferior to their own, concealed not their discon- 13 ^~~ 
tent; and soon found reasons to justify their animosity Discontent 
in the character and conduct of the man they hated, barons. 
Instead of disarming envy by the moderation and mo- 
desty of his behaviour, Gavaston displayed his power 
and influence with the utmost ostentation ; and deemed 
no circumstance of his good fortune so agreeable, as its 
enabling him to eclipse and mortify all his rivals. He 
was vain-glorious, profuse, rapacious; fond of exterior 
pomp and appearance ; giddy with prosperity ; and as he 
imagined that his fortune was now as strongly rooted in 
the kingdom, as his ascendant was uncontrolled over the 
weak monarch, he was negligent in engaging partisans, 
who might support his sudden and ill-established gran- 
deur. At all tournaments he took delight in foiling 
the English nobility by his superior address : in every 
conversation he made them the object of his wit and 
raillery : every day his enemies multiplied upon him ; 
and nought was wanting but a little time to cement 
their union, and render it fatal both to him and to his 
master . 

It behoved the king to take a journey to France, both 
in order to do homage for the duchy of Guienne, and to 
espouse the Princess Isabella, to whom he had long been 
affianced, though unexpected accidents had hitherto re- 
tarded the completion of the marriage d . Edward left 
Gavaston guardian of the realm 6 , with more ample powers 
than had usually been conferred f ; and, on his return with 
his young queen, renewed all the proofs of that fond at- 
tachment to the favourite, of which every one so loudly 
complained. This princess was of an imperious and in- 
triguing spirit ; and finding that her husband's capacity 
required, as his temper inclined, him to be governed, she 
thought herself best entitled, on every account, to per- 
form the office ; and she contracted a mortal hatred against 
the person who had disappointed her in these expecta- 
tions. She was well pleased, therefore, to see a combi- 

c T. rle la More, p. 593. Walsing. p. 97. 

d T. de la More, p. 593. Trivet, cont. p. 3. 

e Rymer, vol. iii. p. 47. Ypod. Neust. p. 499. f Brady's App. No. 49. 



82 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, nation of the nobility forming against Gavaston, who, 
XIV< sensible of her hatred, had wantonly provoked her by 

"'new insults and injuries. 

1308. Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, cousin-german to the king, 
and first prince of the blood, was by far the most opulent 
and powerful subject in England, and possessed in his own 
right, and soon after in that of his wife, heiress of the 
family of Lincoln, no less than six earldoms, with a pro- 
portionable estate in land, attended with all the jurisdic- 
tions and power which commonly in that age were an- 
nexed to landed property. He was turbulent and factious 
in his disposition; mortally hated the favourite, whose 
influence over the king exceeded his own ; and he soon 
became the head of that party among the barons, who 
desired the depression of this insolent stranger. The 
confederated nobles bound themselves by oath to expel 
Gavaston : both sides began already to put themselves in 
a warlike posture : the licentiousness of the age broke out 
in robberies and other disorders, the usual prelude of civil 
war ; and the royal authority, despised in the king's own 
hands, and hated in those of Gavaston, became insufficient 
for the execution of the laws, and the maintenance of 
peace in the kingdom. A Parliament being summoned 
at Westminster, Lancaster and his party came thither 
with an armed retinue ; and were there enabled to im- 
pose their own terms on the sovereign. They required 
the banishment of Gavaston, imposed an oath on him 
never to return, and engaged the bishops, who never 
failed to interpose in all civil concerns, to pronounce him 
excommunicated if he remained any longer in the king- 
dom 8 . Edward was obliged to submit h ; but even in 
his compliance gave proofs of his fond attachment to his 
favourite. Instead of removing all umbrage by sending 
him to his own country, as was expected, he appointed 
him Lord Lieutenant of Ireland', attended him to Bristol, 
on his journey thither, and, before his departure, con- 
ferred on him new lands and riches both in Gascony and 
England k . Gavaston, who did not want bravery, and pos- 
sessed talents for war 1 , acted during his government 

Trivet, cont, p. 5. h Eymer, vol. iii. p. 80. 

| Eymer, vol. iii. p. 92. Murimuth, p. 39. k Kymer, vol. iii. p. 87. 

l Heming. vol. i. p. 248. T. de la More, p. 593. 



EDWARD II. 83 

with vigour against some Irish rebels, whom he sub- CHAP. 
dued. J^ 

Meanwhile the king, less shocked with the illegal vio- 1308 
lence which had been imposed upon him, than unhappy 
in the absence of his minion, employed every expedient 
to soften the opposition of the barons to his return ; as 
if success in that point were the chief object of his govern- 
ment. The high office of hereditary steward was con- 
ferred on Lancaster : his father-in-law, the Earl of Lin- 
coln, was bought off by other concessions : Earl Warrenne 
was also mollified by civilities, grants, or promises : the 
insolence of Gavaston being no longer before men's eyes, 
was less the object of general indignation : and Edward, 
deeming matters sufficiently prepared for his purpose, 
applied to the court of Rome, and obtained for Gavaston 
a dispensation from that oath which the barons had com- 
pelled him to take that he would for ever abjure the 
realm m . He went down to Chester to receive him on 
his first landing from Ireland : flew into his arms with 
transports of joy; and having obtained the formal consent 
of the barons in Parliament to his re-establishment, set 
no longer any bounds to his extravagant fondness and 
affection. Gavaston himself, forgetting his past mis- 
fortunes, and blind to their causes, resumed the same 
ostentation and insolence ; and became, more than ever, 
the object of general detestation among the nobility. 

The barons first discovered their animosity by absent- 
ing -themselves from Parliament; and finding that this 
expedient had not been successful, they began to think of 
employing sharper and more effectual remedies. Though 
there had scarcely been any national ground of complaint, 
except some dissipation of the public treasure ; though 
all the acts of maladministration, objected to the king 
and his favourite, seemed of a nature more proper to ex- 
cite heart-burnings in a ball or assembly, than commo- 
tions in a great kingdom ; yet such was the situation of 
the times, that the barons were determined, and were 
able, to make them the reasons of a total alteration in 
the constitution and civil government. Having come to 7th Feb. 
Parliament in defiance of the laws and the king's prohi- 
bition, with a numerous retinue of armed followers, they 

m Kymer, vol. iii. p. 167. 



84 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, found themselves entirely masters ; and they presented 
v_ O a petition, which was equivalent to a command, requiring 
1308 Edward to devolve, on a chosen junto, the whole autho- 
16th March rity, both of the crown and of the Parliament. The king 
was obliged to sign a commission, empowering the pre- 
lates and barons to elect twelve persons who should, till 
the term of Michaelmas in the year following, have au- 
thority to enact ordinances for the government of the 
kingdom and regulation of the king's household ; con- 
senting that these ordinances should thenceforth, and for 
ever, have the force of laws ; allowing the ordainers to 
form associations among themselves and their friends, for 
their strict and regular observance ; and all this for the 
greater glory of God, the security of the church, and the 
honour and advantage of the king and kingdom 11 . The 
barons, in return, signed a declaration, in which they 
acknowledged that they owed these concessions merely 
to the king's free grace ; promised that this commission 
should never be drawn into precedent ; and engaged that 
the power of the ordainers should expire at the time ap- 
pointed . 

isii. The chosen junto accordingly framed their ordinances, 
and presented them to the king and Parliament for their 
confirmation in the ensuing year. Some of these ordi- 
nances were laudable, and tended to the regular execu- 
tion of justice : such as those requiring sheriffs to be 
men of property, abolishing the practice of issuing privy 
seals for the suspension of justice, restraining the practice 
of purveyance, prohibiting the adulteration and alteration 
of the coin, excluding foreigners from the farms of the 
revenue, ordering all payments to be regularly made into 
the exchequer, revoking all late grants of the crown, 
and giving the parties damages in the case of vexatious 
prosecutions. But what chiefly grieved the king, was 
the ordinance for the removal of evil counsellors, by 
which a great number of persons were, by name, ex- 
cluded from every office of power and profit ; and Piers 
Gavaston himself was for ever banished the king's domi- 
nions, under the penalty, in case of disobedience, of being 
declared a public enemy. Other persons, more agreeable 

Brady's App. No. 50. Heming. vol. i. p. 247. Walsing. p. 97. Ryley, p. 526. 
Brady's App. No. 51. 



EDWARD II. 85 

to the barons, were substituted in all the offices. And CHAP. 
it was ordained, that, for the future, all the considerable ^ __, 
dignities in the household, as well as in the law, revenue, 18U / 
and military governments, should be appointed by the 
laronage in Parliament ; and the power of making war, 
or assembling his military tenants, should no longer be 
vested solely in the king, nor be exercised without the 
consent of the nobility. 

Edward, from the same weakness, both in his temper 
and situation, which had engaged him to grant this un- 
limited commission to the barons, was led to give a par- 
liamentary sanction to their ordinances ; but, as a conse- 
quence of the same character, he secretly made a protest 
against them, and declared, that, since the commission 
was granted only for the making of ordinances to the ad- 
vantage of king and kingdom, such articles as should be 
found prejudicial to both were to be held as not ratified 
and confirmed 5 . It is no wonder, indeed, that he retained 
a firm purpose to revoke ordinances which had been im- 
posed on him by violence, which entirely annihilated the 
royal authority, and, above all, which deprived him of 
the company and society of a person, whom, by an un- 
usual infatuation, he valued above all the world, and 
above every consideration of interest or tranquillity. 

As soon, therefore, as Edward, removing to York, had 
freed himself from the immediate terror of the barons 7 
power, he invited back Gavaston from Flanders, which 
that favourite had made the place of his retreat, and 
declaring his banishment to be illegal, and contrary to 
the laws and customs of the kingdom q , openly reinstated 
him in his former credit and authority. The barons, 1312 - 
highly provoked at this disappointment, and apprehen- 
sive of danger to themselves from the declared animosity 
of so powerful a minion, saw that either his or their ruin 
was now inevitable ; and they renewed, with redoubled 
zeal, their former confederacies against him. The Earl 
of Lancaster was a dangerous head of this alliance : Guy, 
Earl of Warwick, entered into it with a furious and pre- 
cipitate passion : Humphrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford, 
the constable, and Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, 

P Ryley's Placit. Parl. p. 580. 541. 
1 Brady's App. No. 53. Walsing. p. 98. 
VOL. II. 8 



86 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, brought to it a great accession of power and interest : 
even Earl Warrenne deserted the royal cause, which 
ne na ^ hitherto supported, and was induced to embrace 
the side of the confederates 1 ". And as Robert de Win- 
chelsea, Archbishop of Canterbury, professed himself of 
the same party, he determined the body of the clergy, 
and consequently the people, to declare against the king 
and his minion. So predominant at that time was the 
power of the great nobility, that the combination of a 
few of them was always able to shake the throne ; and 
such an universal concurrence became irresistible. The 
Earl of Lancaster suddenly, raised an army, and marched 
to York, where he found the king already removed to 
Newcastle 8 : he flew thither in pursuit of him ; and Ed- 
ward had just time to escape to Tinmouth, where he 
embarked, and sailed with Gavaston to Scarborough. 
He left his favourite in that fortress, which, had it been 
properly supplied with provisions, was deemed impreg- 
nable ; and he marched forward to York, in hopes of 
raising an army which might be able to support him 
against his enemies. Pembroke was sent by the con- 
federates to besiege the castle of Scarborough; and 
Gavaston, sensible of the bad condition of his garrison, 
was obliged to capitulate, and to surrender himself pri- 

i9th May. soner*. He stipulated that he should remain in Pem- 
broke's hands for two months ; that endeavours should, 
during that time, be mutually used for a general accom- 
modation ; that if the terms proposed by the barons were 
not accepted, the castle should be restored to him in the 
same condition as when he surrendered it ; and that the 
Earl of Pembroke and Henry Piercy should, by contract, 
pledge all their lands for the fulfilling of these condi- 
tions". Pembroke, now master of the person of this 
public enemy, conducted him to the castle of Dedington, 
near Banbury ; where, on pretence of other business, he 
left him, protected by a feeble guard w . Warwick, pro- 
bably in ^ concert with Pembroke, attacked the castle: 
the garrison refused to make any resistance : Gavaston 
was yielded up to him, and conducted to Warwick 

Murder of castle : the Earls of Lancaster, Hereford, and Arundel, 

Gavaston. 

1st July. r Trivet> cont p 4 8 Walging p< 1Q1 t Ibid> 

Kymer, vol. ii. p. 324. w T. de la More, p. 593. 



EDWARD II. 87 

immediately repaired thither x ; and, without any regard CHAP. 
either to the laws or the military capitulation, they, J^ l J'_j 
ordered the head of the obnoxious favourite to be struck 1312 
off by the hands of the executioner 7 . 

The king had retired northward to Berwick when he 
heard of Gavaston's murder ; and his resentment was 
proportionate to the affection which he had ever borne 
him while living. He threatened vengeance on all the 
nobility who had been active in that bloody scene ; and 
he made preparations for war in all parts of England. 
But being less constant in his enmities than in his friend- 
ships, he soon after hearkened to terms of accommoda- 
tion ; granted the barons a pardon of all offences ; and 
as they stipulated to ask him publicly pardon on their 
knees 2 , he was so pleased with these vain appearances of 
submission, that he seemed to have sincerely forgiven 
them all past injuries. But as they still pretended, not- 
withstanding their lawless conduct, a great anxiety for 
the maintenance of law, and required the establishment 
of their former ordinances as a necessary security for that 
purpose, Edward told them, that he was willing to grant 
them a free and legal confirmation of such of those or- 
dinances as were not entirely derogatory to the preroga- 
tive of the crown. This answer was received, for the 
present, as satisfactory. The king's person, after the 
death of Gavaston, was now become less obnoxious to the 
public ; and as the ordinances insisted on appeared to be 
nearly the same with those which had formerly been ex- 
torted from Henry III. by Montfort, and which had been 
attended with so many fatal consequences, they were, on 
that account, demanded with less vehemence by the 
nobility and people. The minds of all men seemed to be 
much appeased : the animosities of faction no longer 
prevailed : and England, now united under its head, 
would henceforth be able, it was hoped, to take ven- 
geance on all its enemies ; particularly on the Scots, 
whose progress was the object of general resentment and 
indignation. 

Immediately after Edward's retreat from Scotland, 

x Dugd. Baron, vol. ii. p. 44. 

y Walsing. p. 101. T. de la More, p. 593. Trivet, cont. p. 9. 

z Ryley, p. 538. Kymer, vol. iii. p. 366. 



gg HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Eobert Bruce left his fastnesses, in which he intended 
XIY- to have sheltered his feeble army and supplying his 
^~w~<> 'defect of strength by superior vigour and abilities, he 
made deep impression on all his enemies, foreign and 
domestic. He chased Lord Argyle and the chieftain of 
the Macdowals from their hills, and made himself entirely 
master of the high country : he thence invaded, with 
success, the Cummins in the low countries of the north : 
he took the castles of Inverness, Forfar, and Brechin. 
He daily gained some new accession of territory ; and 
what was a more important acquisition, he daily recon- 
ciled the minds of the nobility to his dominion, and en- 
listed under his standard every bold leader, whom he 
enriched by the spoils of his enemies. Sir James Douglas, 
in whom commenced the greatness and renown of that 
warlike family, seconded him in all his enterprises : Ed- 
ward Bruce, Eobert's own brother, distinguished himself 
by acts of valour : and the terror of the English power 
being now abated by the feeble conduct of the king, even 
the least sanguine of the Scots began to entertain hopes of 
recovering their independence ; and the whole kingdom, 
except a few fortresses, which he had not the means to 
attack, had acknowledged the authority of Eobert. 

In this situation, Edward had found it necessary to 
grant a truce to Scotland ; and Kobert successfully em- 
ployed the interval in consolidating his power, and in- 
troducing order into the civil government, disjointed by 
a long continuance of wars and factions. The interval 
was very short : the truce, ill observed on both sides, was 
at last openly violated ; and war recommenced with 
greater fury than ever. Kobert, not content with de- 
1313. fending himself, had made successful inroads into Eng- 
land, subsisted his needy followers by the plunder of that 
country, and taught them to despise the military genius 
of a people who had long been the object of their terror. 
Edward, at last, roused from his lethargy, had marched 
an army into Scotland ; and Eobert, determined not to 
risk too much against an enemy so much superior, re- 
tired again into the mountains. The king advanced 
beyond Edinburgh, but being destitute of provisions, and 
being ill supported by the English nobility, who were 
then employed in framing their ordinances, he was soon 



EDWARD II. 89 

obliged to retreat, without gaining any advantage over CHAP. 
the enemy. But the appearing union of all the parties 
in England, after the death of Gavaston, seemed to re- 1313 
store that kingdom to its native force, opened again the 
prospect of reducing Scotland, and promised a happy con- 
clusion to a war in which both the interests and passions 
of the nation were so deeply engaged. 

Edward assembled forces from all quarters, with a isu. 
view of finishing, at one blow, this important enterprise. 
He summoned the most warlike of his vassals from Gas- 
cony : he enlisted troops from Flanders and other foreign 
countries; he invited over great numbers of the dis- 
orderly Irish as to a certain prey : he joined to them a 
body of the Welsh, who were actuated by like motives : 
and assembling the whole military force of England, he 
marched to the frontiers with an army which, according 
to the Scottish writers, amounted to a hundred thou- 
sand men. 

The army collected by Kobert exceeded not thirty 
thousand combatants ; but being composed of men who 
had distinguished themselves by many acts of valour, who 
were rendered desperate by their situation, and who were 
inured to all the varieties of fortune, they might justly, 
under such a leader, be deemed formidable to the most 
numerous and best appointed armies. The castle of 
Stirling, which, with Berwick, was the only fortress in 
Scotland that remained in the hands of the English, had 
long been besieged by Edward Bruce : Philip de Mow- 
bray, the governor, after an obstinate defence, was at 
last obliged to capitulate, and to promise, that if, before 
a certain day, which was now approaching, he were not 
relieved, he should open his gates to the enemy a . Eobert, 
therefore, sensible that here was the ground on which 
he must expect the English, chose the field of battle with 
all the skill and prudence imaginable, and made the ne- 
cessary preparations for their reception. He posted him- 
self at Bannockburn, about two miles from Stirling; 
where he had a hill on his right flank, and a morass on 
his left : and not content with having taken these pre- 
cautions to prevent his being surrounded by the more 
numerous army of the English, he foresaw the superior 

a Kyraer, vol. iii. p. 481. 
8* 




90 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, strength of the enemy in cavalry, and made provision 
against it. Having a rivulet in front, he commanded 
deep pits to be dug along its banks, and sharp stakes to 
be planted in them, and he ordered the whole to be 
carefully covered over with turf b . The English arrived 
in sight on the evening, and a bloody conflict imme- 
diately ensued between two bodies of cavalry; where 
Kobert, who was at the head of the Scots, engaged in 
single combat with Henry de Bohun, a gentleman of the 
family of Hereford, and, at one stroke, cleft his adver- 
sary to the chin with a battle-axe, in sight of the two 
armies. The English horse fled with precipitation to 
their main body. 

The Scots, encouraged by this favourable event, and 
glorying in the valour of their prince, prognosticated a 
happy issue to the combat on the ensuing day: the Eng- 
lish, confident in their numbers, and elated with former 
successes, longed for an opportunity of revenge ; and the 
night, though extremely short in that season and in that 
climate, appeared tedious to the impatience of the several 
Banno f com k a tants. Early in the morning, Edward drew out 
bum. "" his army, and advanced towards the Scots. The Earl of 
25th June. Gloucester, his nephew, who commanded the left wing 
of the cavalry, impelled by the ardour of youth, rushed 
on to the attack without precaution, and fell among the 
covered pits which had been prepared by Bruce for the 
reception of the enemy 6 . This body of horse was dis- 
ordered : Gloucester himself was overthrown and slain : 
Sir James Douglas, who commanded the Scottish cavalry, 
gave the enemy no leisure to rally, but pushed them off 
the field with considerable loss, and pursued them in 
sight of their whole line of infantry. While the English 
army were alarmed with this unfortunate beginning of 
the action, which commonly proves decisive, they ob- 
served an army on the heights towards the left, which 
seemed to be marching leisurely in order to surround 
them ; and they were distracted by their multiplied fears. 
This was a number of waggoners and sumpter boys, whom 
Eobert had collected; and having supplied them with 
military standards, gave them the appearance, at a dis- 
tance, of a formidable body. The stratagem took effect: 

b T. de la More, p. 594. c ibid. 



EDWAED II. 9} 

a panic seized the English : they threw down their arms 
and fled : they were pursued with great slaughter, for the 
space of ninety miles, till they reached Berwick ; and the 1314 
Scots, besides an inestimable booty, took many persons 
of quality prisoners, and above four hundred gentlemen, 
whom Robert treated with great humanity d , and whose 
ransom was a new accession of wealth to the victorious 
army. The king himself narrowly escaped, by taking 
shelter in D unbar, whose gates were opened to him by the 
Earl of March ; and he thence passed by sea to Berwick. 
Such was the great and decisive battle of Bannock- 
burn, which secured the independence of Scotland, fixed 
Bruce on the throne of that kingdom, and may be deemed 
the greatest overthrow that the English nation, since the 
conquest, has ever received. The number of slain on 
those occasions is always uncertain, and is commonly 
much magnified by the victors : but this defeat made a 
deep impression on the minds of the English ; and it was 
remarked, that, for some years, no superiority of numbers 
could encourage them to keep the field against the Scots. 
Robert, in order to avail himself of his present success, 
entered England, and ravaged all the northern counties 
without opposition : he besieged Carlisle ; but that place 
was saved by the valour of Sir Andrew Harcla, the go- 
vernor : he was more successful against Berwick, which 
he took by assault ; and this prince, elated by his con- 
tinued prosperity, now entertained hopes of making the 
most important conquests on the English. He sent over isis. 
his brother Edward, with an army of six thousand men, 
into Ireland ; and that nobleman assumed the title of 
king of that island : he himself followed soon after with 
more numerous forces. The horrible and absurd oppres- 
sions which the Irish suffered under the English govern- 
ment made them, at first, fly to the standard of the Scots, 
whom they regarded as their deliverers ; but a grievous 
famine, which at that time desolated both Ireland and 
Britain, reduced the Scottish army to the greatest extre- 
mities ; and Eobert was obliged to return, with his forces 
much diminished, into his own country. His brother, 
after having experienced a variety of fortune, was defeated 
and slain near Dundalk by the English, commanded by 
Lord Bermingham ; and these projects, too extensive for 

d Ypod. Ncust. p. 501. 



92 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the force of the Scottish nation, thus vanished into 
smoke. 

Edward, besides suffering those disasters from the in- 
vasion of the Scots, and the insurrection of the Irish, was 
also infested with a rebellion in Wales ; and, above all, 
by the factions of his own nobility, who took advantage 
of the public calamities, insulted his fallen fortunes, and 
endeavoured to establish their own independence on the 
ruins of the throne. Lancaster, and the barons of his 
party, who had declined attending him on his Scottish 
expedition, no sooner saw him return with disgrace, than 
they insisted on the renewal of their ordinances, which, 
they still pretended, had validity; and the king's un- 
happy situation obliged him to submit to their demands. 
The ministry was new-modelled by the direction of 
Lancaster 6 : that prince was placed at the head of the 
council: it was declared, that all the offices should 
be filled, from time to time, by the votes of Parliament, 
or rather by the will of the great barons f : and the nation, 
under this new model of government, endeavoured to put 
itself in a better posture of defence against the Scots. 
But the factious nobles were far from being terrified 
with the progress of these public enemies : on the con- 
trary, they founded the hopes of their own future gran- 
deur on the weakness and distresses of the crown : Lan- 
caster himself was suspected, with great appearance of 
reason, of holding a secret correspondence with the King 
of Scots ; and though he was intrusted with the command 
of the English armies, he took care that every enter- 
prise should be disappointed, and every plan of opera- 
tions prove unsuccessful. 

All the European kingdoms, especially that of England, 
were at this time unacquainted with the office of a prime 
minister, so well understood at present in all regular 
monarchies ; and the people could form no conception 
of a man, who, though still in the rank of a subject, 
possessed all the power of a sovereign, eased the prince of 
the burden of affairs, supplied his want of experience or 
capacity, and maintained all the rights of the crown, 
without degrading the greatest nobles by their submission 
to his temporary authority. Edward was plainly, by nature, 

Eyley, p. 560. Kymer, vol. iii. p. 722. 

f Brady, vol. ii. p. 122, from the Records, App. No. 61. Ryley, p. 560. 



EDWARD II. 93 

unfit to hold himself the reins of government : he had CHAP. 
no vices, but was unhappy in a total incapacity for serious ._ X * V ^ 
business : he was sensible of his own defects, and neces- 1315t 
sarily sought to be governed : yet every favourite whom 
he successively chose was regarded as a fellow-subject 
exalted above his rank and station : he was the object of 
envy to the great nobility : his character and conduct 
were decried with the people: his authority over the 
king and kingdom was considered as an usurpation : and 
unless the prince had embraced the dangerous expedient 
of devolving his power on the Earl of Lancaster, or some 
mighty baron, whose family interest was so extensive as 
to be able alone to maintain his influence, he could ex- 
pect no peace or tranquillity upon the throne. 

The king's chief favourite, after the death of Gavaston, ugh Ie 

' Despenser. 

was Hugh le Despenser, or Spenser, a young man of 
English birth, of high rank, and of a noble family g . He 
possessed all the exterior accomplishments of person and 
address, which were fitted to engage the weak mind of 
Edward ; but was destitute of that moderation and pru- 
dence which might have qualified him to mitigate the 
envy of the great, and conduct him through all the perils 
of that dangerous station to which he was advanced. 
His father, who was of the same name, and who, by means 
of his son, had also attakied great influence over the 
king, was a nobleman venerable from his years, respected 
through all his past life for wisdom, valour, and integrity, 
and well fitted, by his talents and experience, could affairs 
have admitted of any temperament, to have supplied the 
defects both of the king and of his ininion h . But no 
sooner was Edward's attachment declared for young 
Spenser, than the turbulent Lancaster, and most of the 
great barons, regarded him as their rival, made him the 
object of their animosity, and formed violent plans for 
his ruin 1 . They first declared their discontent by with- 
drawing from Parliament ; and it was not long ere they 
found a pretence for proceeding to greater extremities 
against him. 1321 

The kino;, who set no limits to his bounty towards civil com- 

< ~ > ' V -m,~>+;/-Ko 



motions. 



s Pup;d. Baron, vol. i. p. 389. 
h T. de la More, p. 594. 

T. de la More, p. 595. Murimuth, p. 55. 



94 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, his minions, had married the younger Spenser to his 
XIV> niece, one of the co-heirs of the Earl of Gloucester, slain 

^1321^ a ^ Bannockburn. The favourite, by his succession to that 
opulent family, had inherited great possessions in the 
marches of Wales k ; and being desirous of extending 
still further his influence in those quarters, he is accused 
of having committed injustice on the barons of Audley 
and Ammori, who had also married two sisters of the 
same family. There was likewise a baron in that neigh- 
bourhood, called William de Braouse, Lord of Gower, 
who had made a settlement of his estate on John de 
Mowbray, his son-in-law ; and, in case of failure of that 
nobleman and his issue, had substituted the Earl of Here- 
ford in the succession to the barony of Gower. Mow- 
bray, on the decease of his father-in-law, entered imme- 
diately in possession of the estate, without the formality 
of taking livery and seizin from the crown ; but Spen- 
ser, who coveted that barony, persuaded the king to put 
in execution the rigour of the feudal law, to seize Gower 
as escheated to the crown, and to confer it upon him 1 . 
This transaction, which was the proper subject of a law- 
suit, immediately excited a civil war in the kingdom. 
The Earls of Lancaster and Hereford flew to arms : Audley 
and Ammori joined them with all their forces : the two 
Rogers de Mortimer, and Koger de Clifford, with many oth- 
ers, disgusted, for private reasons, at the Spensers, brought 
a considerable accession to the party: and their army 
being now formidable, they sent a message to the king, re- 
quiring him immediately to dismiss or confine the younger 
Spenser ; and menacing him, in case of refusal, with re- 
nouncing their allegiance to him, and taking revenge on 
that minister by their own authority. They scarcely waited 
for an answer ; but immediately fell upon the lands of 
young Spenser, which they pillaged and destroyed, mur- 
dered his servants, drove off his cattle, and burned his 
houses m : they thence proceeded to commit like devasta- 
tions on the estates of Spenser the father, whose character 
they had hitherto seemed to respect ; and having drawn 
and signed a formal association among themselves 11 , they 

k Trivet, cont. p. 25. 

1 Monach. Malmes. m Murimtith, p. 55. 

Tyrrel, vol. u. p. 280, from the register of C. C. Canterbury. 



EDWARD II. 95 

marched to London with all their forces, stationed them- CHAP. 
selves in the neighbourhood of that city, and demanded .j^;^ 
of the king the banishment of both the Spensers. These 132L 
noblemen were then absent ; the father abroad, the son 
at sea ; and both of them employed in different commis- 
sions : the king therefore replied, that his coronation 
oath, by which he was bound to observe the laws, re- 
strained him from giving his assent to so illegal a de- 
mand, or condemning noblemen who were accused of no 
crime, nor had any opportunity afforded them of making 
answer . Equity and reason were but a feeble opposi- 
tion to men who had arms in their hands, and who, being 
already involved in guilt, saw no safety but in success 
and victory. They entered London with their troops ; 
and giving in to the Parliament, which was then sitting, 
a charge against the Spensers, of which they attempted 
not to prove one article, they procured, by menaces and 
violence, a sentence of attainder and perpetual exile 
against these ministers p . This sentence was voted by 
the lay barons alone ; for the Commons, though now an 
estate in Parliament, were yet of so little consideration, 
that their assent was not demanded ; and even the votes 
of the prelates were neglected amidst the present disor- 
ders. The only symptom which these turbulent barons 
gave of their regard to law, was their requiring from the 
king an indemnity for their illegal proceedings' 1 ; after 
which they disbanded their army, and separated, in secu- 
rity, as they imagined, to their several castles. 

This act of violence, in which the king was obliged to 
acquiesce, rendered his person and his authority so con- 
temptible, that every one thought himself entitled to 
treat him with neglect. The queen, having occasion soon 
after to pass by the castle of Leeds, in Kent, which be- 
longed to the Lord Badlesmere, desired a night's lodging, 
but was refused admittance ; and some of her attendants, 
who presented themselves at the gate, were killed r . The 
insult upon this princess, who had always endeavoured to 
live on good terms with the barons, and who joined them 

Walsing. p. 114. 

P Tottle's Collect, part 2, p. 50. Walsing. p. 114. 

1 Tottle's Collect, part 2, p. 54. Rymer, vol. iii. p. 891. 

r Rymer, vol. iii. p. 89. Walsing. p. 114. 115. T. de la More, p. 595. Muri- 
muth, p. 56. 



96 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, heartily in their hatred of the young Spenser, was an 
XIV> action which nobody pretended to justify ; and the king 

\^L thought that he might, without giving general umbrage, 
assemble an army, and take vengeance on the offender. 
No one came to the assistance of Badlesmere, and Edward 
prevailed 8 . But having now some forces on foot, and 
having concerted measures with his friends throughout 
England, he ventured to take off the mask, to attack all 
his enemies, and to recall the two Spensers, whose sen- 
tence he declared illegal, unjust, contrary to the tenor of 
the great charter, passed without the assent of the pre- 
lates, and extorted by violence from him and the estate 
of barons*. Still the Commons were not mentioned by 
either party. 

1322. The king had now got the start of the barons ; an 
advantage which, in those times, was commonly decisive : 
and he hastened with his army to the marches of Wales, 
the chief seat of the power of his enemies, whom he found 
totally unprepared for resistance. Many of the barons 
in those parts endeavoured to appease him by submis- 
sion 11 : their castles were seized, and their persons com- 
mitted to custody. But Lancaster, in order to prevent 
the total ruin of his party, summoned together his vassals 
and retainers ; declared his alliance with Scotland, which 
had long been suspected ; received the promise of a re- 
inforcement from that country, under the command of 
Randolph, Earl of Murray, and Sir James Douglas w ; and 
being joined by the Earl of Hereford, advanced with all 
his forces against the king, who had collected an army of 
thirty thousand men, and was superior to his enemies. 
Lancaster posted himself at Burton upon Trent, and 
endeavoured to defend the passages of the river x ; but 
being disappointed in that plan of operations, this prince, 
who had no military genius, and whose personal courage 
was even suspected, fled with his army to the north, in 
expectation of being there joined by his Scottish allies 7 : 
he was pursued by the king; and his army diminished 
daily, till he came to Boroughbridge, where he found Sir 
Andrew Harcla posted with some forces on the opposite 



8 a M ng * p ' 115> * Rymer, vol. iii. p. 907. T. de la More, p. 595. 

Wa Jsing. p. 115. Murimuth, p. 57. w Rymer, vol. iii. p. 958. 

* Walsmg. p. 115. y yJ 0(L Neust> p . 504 . 



EDWARD II. 97 

side of the river, and ready to dispute the passage with CHAP. 
him. He was repulsed in an attempt which he made to 
force his way; the Earl of Hereford was killed; the 
whole army of the rebels was disconcerted; Lancaster 
himself was become incapable of taking any measures 
either for flight or defence ; and he was seized, without 
resistance, by Harcla, and conducted to the king 25 . In 
those violent times, the laws were so much neglected on 
both sides, that, even where they might, without any sen- 
sible inconvenience, have been observed, the conquerors 
deemed it unnecessary to pay any regard to them. Lan- 
caster, who was guilty of open rebellion, and was taken 
in arms against his sovereign, instead of being tried by 
the laws of his country, which pronounced the sentence 
of death against him, was condemned by a court martial a , 
and led to execution. Edward, however little vindictive 
in his natural temper, here indulged his revenge, and 
employed against the prisoner the same indignities which 
had been exercised, by his orders, against Gavaston. He 23d March. 

i ,1 -i ,. i i i --I Execution 

was clothed in a mean attire, placed on a lean jade with- O f the Earl 
out a bridle, a hood was put on his head, and in this f r Lancas ' 
posture, attended by the acclamations of the people, this 
prince was conducted to an eminence near Pomfret, one 
of his own castles, and there beheaded b . 

Thus perished Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, prince of the 
blood, and one of the most potent barons that had ever 
been in England. His public conduct sufficiently dis- 
covers the violence and turbulence of his character ; his 
private deportment appears not to have been more inno- 
cent ; and his hypocritical devotion, by which he gained 
the favour of the monks and populace, will rather be re- 
garded as an aggravation than an alleviation of his guilt. 
Badlesmere, Giffard, Barret, Cheney, Fleming, and about 
eighteen of the most notorious offenders, were afterwards 
condemned by a legal trial, and were executed. Many 
were thrown into prison : others made their escape be- 
yond the sea : some of the king's servants were rewarded 
from their forfeitures: Harcla received for his services 
the earldom of Carlisle, and a large estate, which he soon 

* T. de la More, p. 596. Walsing. p. 116. 
a Tyrrel, vol. ii. p. 291, from the Records, 
b Leland's Coll. vol. i. p. 668. 
VOL. IT. 9 



98 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, after forfeited, with his life, for a treasonable correspond- 
v _ av< ence with the King of Scotland. But the greater part 
\^C<) of those vast escheats was seized by young Spenser, whose 
rapacity was insatiable. Many of the barons of the king's 
party were disgusted with this partial division of the 
spoils : the envy against Spenser arose higher than ever : 
the usual insolence of his temper, inflamed by success, 
impelled him to commit many acts of violence : the people, 
who always hated him, made him still more the object of 
aversion : all the relations of the attainted barons and 
gentlemen secretly vowed revenge ; and though tranquil- 
lity was, in appearance, restored to the kingdom, the 
general contempt of the king, and odium against Spen- 
ser, bred dangerous humours, the source of future revo- 
lutions and convulsions. 

In this situation no success could be expected from 
foreign wars ; and Edward, after making one more fruit- 
less attempt against Scotland, whence he retreated with 
dishonour, found it necessary to terminate hostilities with 
that kingdom by a truce of thirteen years . Kobert, 
though his title to the crown was not acknowledged in 
the treaty, was satisfied with ensuring his possession of 
it during so long a time. He had repelled with gallan- 
try all the attacks of England : he had carried war both 
into that kingdom and into Ireland : he had rejected 
with disdain the pope's authority, who pretended to im- 
pose his commands upon him, and oblige him to make 
peace with his enemies : his throne was firmly established, 
as well in the affections of his subjects as by force of arms: 
yet there naturally remained some inquietude in his mind, 
while at war with a state, which, however at present dis- 
ordered by faction, was of itself so much an over-match 
for him, both in riches and in numbers of people. And 
this truce was, at the same time, the more seasonable 
for England, because the nation was at that juncture 
threatened with hostilities from France 6 . 
1324. Philip the Fair, King of France, who died in 1315, 
had left the crown to his son, Lewis Hutin, who, after a 
short reign, dying without male issue, was succeeded by 
Philip the Long, his brother, whose death soon after made 
way for Charles the Fair, the youngest brother of that 

Rymer, vol. iii. p. 1022. Murimuth, p. 60. 



EDWARD II. 99 

family. This monarch had some grounds of complaint CHAP. 
against the king's ministers in Guienne ; and as there , XIV '_; 
was no common or equitable judge in that strange species 1324 
of sovereignty established by the feudal law, he seemed 
desirous to take advantage of Edward's weakness, and, 
under that pretence, to confiscate all his foreign domi- 
nions' 1 . After an embassy by the Earl of Kent, the king's 
brother, had been tried in vain, Queen Isabella obtained 
permission to go over to Paris, and endeavour to adjust, 
in an amicable manner, the difference with her brother ; 
but while she was making some progress in this nego- 
tiation, Charles started a new pretension, the justice of 
which could not be disputed, that Edward himself should 
appear in his court, and do homage for the fees which 
he held in France. But there occurred many difficulties 
in complying with this demand. Young Spenser, by 
whom the king was implicitly governed, had unavoid- 
ably been engaged in many quarrels with the queen, who 
aspired to the same influence ; and though that artful 
princess on her leaving England had dissembled her ani- 
mosity, Spenser, well acquainted with her secret senti- 
ments, was unwilling to attend his master to Paris, and 
appear in a court where her credit might expose him to 
insults, if not to danger. He hesitated no less on allow- 
ing the king to make the journey alone; both fearing, 
lest that easy prince should, in his absence, fall under 
other influence, and foreseeing the perils to which he 
himself should be exposed, if, without the protection of 
royal authority, he remained in England, where he was 
so generally hated. While these doubts occasioned de- 
lays and difficulties, Isabella proposed, that Edward should 1325. 
resign the dominion of Guienne to his son, now thirteen 
years of age ; and that the prince should come to Paris, 
and do the homage which every vassal owed to his supe- 
rior lord. This expedient, which seemed so happily to 
remove all difficulties, was immediately embraced : Spen- 
ser was charmed with the contrivance : young Edward 
was sent to Paris ; and the ruin covered under this fatal 
snare was never perceived or suspected by any of the 
English council. 

The queen, on her arrival in France, had there found 

d Kymer, vol. iv. p. 74. 98. 



100 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, a great number of English fugitives,, the remains of the 
QV * Lancastrian faction ; and their common hatred of Spen- 
^^"'ser soon begat a secret friendship and correspondence 
between them and that princess. Among the rest was 
young Koger Mortimer, a potent baron in the Welsh 
marches, who had been obliged, with others, to make his 
submissions to the king ; had been condemned for high 
treason ; but having received a pardon for his life, was 
afterwards detained in the Tower, with an intention of 
rendering his confinement perpetual. He was so fortu- 
nate as to make his escape into France 6 ; and being one 
of the most considerable persons new remaining of the 
party, as well as distinguished by his violent animosity 
against Spenser, he was easily admitted to pay his court 
to Queen Isabella. The graces of his person and address 
advanced him quickly in her affections : he became her 
confidant and counsellor in all her measures ; and gaming 
ground daily upon her heart, he engaged her to sacrifice 
at last to her passion all the sentiments of honour and of 
?a S ainst fi^l^y ^ ner husband f . Hating now the man whom 
the king, she had injured, and whom she never valued, she entered 
ardently into all Mortimer's conspiracies; and having 
artfully gotten into her hands the young prince, and heir 
of the monarchy, she resolved on the utter ruin of the 
king, as well as of his favourite. She engaged her bro- 
ther to take part in the same criminal purpose : her court 
was daily filled with the exiled barons : Mortimer lived 
in the most declared intimacy with her : a correspond- 
ence was secretly carried on with the malecontent party 
in England ; and when Edward, informed of those alarm- 
ing circumstances, required her speedily to return with 
the prince, she publicly replied, that she would never set 
foot in the kingdom, till Spenser was for ever removed 
from his presence and councils : a declaration which pro- 
cured her great popularity in England, and threw a de- 
cent veil over all her treasonable enterprises. 

Edward endeavoured to put himself in a posture of 
defence g ; but besides the difficulties arising from his own 
indolence and slender abilities, and the want of authority 

e Eymer, vol. iv. p. 7, 8. 20. T. de la More, p. 596. Walsing. p. 120. Ypod. 
ISeust. p. 506. 

f T. de la More, p. 598. Murirauth, p. 65. 
g Kymer, vol. iv. p. 184. 188. 225. 



EDWARD II. 101 

which of consequence attended all his resolutions, it was CHAP. 
not easy for him, in the present state of the kingdom 
revenue, to maintain a constant force ready to repel an 
invasion, which he knew not at what time or place he 
had reason to expect. All his efforts were unequal to insurrec- 
the traitorous and hostile conspiracies, which, both at tlc 
home and abroad, were forming against his authority, and 
which were daily penetrating farther even into his own 
family. His brother, the Earl of Kent, a virtuous but 
weak prince, who was then at Paris, was engaged by his 
sister-in-law, and by the King of France, who was also 
his cousin-german, to ,give countenance to the invasion, 
whose sole object, he believed, was the expulsion of the 
Spensers : he prevailed on his elder brother, the Earl of 
Norfolk, to enter secretly into the same design : the Earl 
of Leicester, brother and heir of the Earl of Lancaster, 
had too many reasons for his hatred of these ministers, to 
refuse his concurrence. Walter de Reynel, Archbishop 
of Canterbury, and many of the prelates, expressed their 
approbation of the queen's measures : several of the most 
potent barons, envying the authority of the favourite, 
were ready to fly to arms : the minds of the people, by 
means of some truths and many calumnies, were strongly 
disposed to the same party ; and there needed but the 
appearance of the queen and prince, with such a body 
of foreign troops as might protect her against immediate 
violence, to turn all this tempest, so artfully prepared^ 
against the unhappy Edward. 

Charles, though he gave countenance and assistance 1326 - 
to the faction, was ashamed openly to support the queen 
and prince against the authority of a husband and father ; 
and Isabella was obliged to court the alliance of some 
other foreign potentate, from whose dominions she might 
set out on her intended enterprise. For this purpose, 
she affianced young Edward, whose tender age made him 
incapable to judge of the consequences, with Philippa, 
daughter of the Count of Holland and Hainault h ; and 
having, by the open assistance of this prince, and the 
secret protection of her brother, enlisted in her service 
near three thousand men, she set sail from the harbour 
of Dort, and landed safely, and without opposition, on 

* T. de la More, p. 598. 

9* 



102 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the coast of Suffolk. The Earl of Kent was in her com- 
XIV> pany : two other princes of the blood, the Earl of Norfolk 
^~~^Q and the Earl of Leicester, joined her, soon after her land- 
24th Sept. ing, with all their followers : three prelates, the Bishops 
of Ely, Lincoln, and Hereford, brought her both the force 
of their vassals and the authority of their character * : 
even Robert de Watteville, who had been sent by the 
king to oppose her progress in Suffolk, deserted to her 
with all his forces. To render her cause more favourable, 
she renewed her declaration, that the sole purpose of her 
enterprise was to free the king and kingdom from the 
tyranny of the Spensers, and of Chancellor Baldoc, their 
creature k . The populace were allured by her specious 
pretences : the barons thought themselves secure against 
forfeitures by the appearance of the prince in her army ; 
and a weak irresolute king, supported by ministers gene- 
rally odious, was unable to stem this torrent, which bore 
with such irresistible violence against him. 

Edward, after trying in vain to rouse the citizens of 
London to some sense of duty 1 , departed for the west, 
where he hoped to meet with a better reception ; and he 
had no sooner discovered his weakness, by leaving the 
city, than the rage of the populace broke out without 
control against him and his ministers. They first plun- 
dered, then murdered, all those who were obnoxious to 
them : they seized the Bishop of Exeter, a virtuous and 
loyal prelate, as he was passing through the streets ; and 
having beheaded him, they threw his body into the river m . 
They made themselves masters of the Tower by surprise : 
then entered into a formal association to put to death, 
without mercy, every one who should dare to oppose the 
enterprise of Queen Isabella, and of the prince 11 . A like 
spirit was soon communicated to all other parts of Eng- 
land ; and threw the few servants of the king, who still 
entertained thoughts of performing their duty, into terror, 
and astonishment. 

Edward was hotly pursued to Bristol by the Earl of 
Kent, seconded by the foreign forces under John de 
Hainault. He found himself disappointed in his expec- 

i Walsing. p. 123. Ypod. Neust. p. 507. T. de la More, p. 598. Murimuth, p. 66. 
k Ypod. Neust, p. 508. 1 Walsino- p 123. 

Ibid. p. 124. T. de la More, p. 599. Murimuth p 66 
* Walsing. p. 124. 



EDWARD II, 103 

tations with regard to the loyalty of those parts ; and he CHAP. 
passed over to Wales, where he flattered himself his XIV - 
name was more popular, and which he hoped to find un- ^^~ 
infected with the contagion of general rage, which had 
seized the English . The elder Spenser, created Earl of 
Winchester, was left governor of the castle of Bristol ; 
but the garrison mutinied against him, and he was de- 
livered into the hands of his enemies. This venerable 
noble, who had nearly reached his ninetieth year, was in- 
stantly, without trial, or witness, or accusation, or answer, 
condemned to death by the rebellious barons : he was 
hanged on a gibbet; his body was cut in pieces, and 
thrown to the dogs p ; and his head was sent to Win- 
chester, the place whose title he bore, and was there set 
on a pole, and exposed to the insults of the populace. 

The king, disappointed anew in his expectations of 
succour from the Welsh, took shipping for Ireland ; but 
being driven back by contrary winds, he endeavoured to 
conceal himself in the mountains of Wales : he was soon 
discovered, was put under the custody of the Earl of 
Leicester, and was confined in the castle of Kenilworth. 
The younger Spenser, his favourite, who also fell into the 
hands of his enemies, was executed, like his father, with- 
out any appearance of a legal trial q : the Earl of Arundel, 
almost the only man of his rank in England who had 
maintained his loyalty, was, without any trial, put to 
death at the instigation of Mortimer : Baldoc, the chan- 
cellor, being a priest, could not with safety be so suddenly 
despatched ; but being sent to the Bishop of Hereford's 
palace in London, he was there, as his enemies probably 
foresaw, seized by the populace, was thrown into Newgate, 
and, soon after, expired from the cruel usage which he 
had received r . Even the usual reverence paid to the 
sacerdotal character gave way, with every other conside- 
ration, to the present rage of the people. 

The queen, to avail herself of the prevailing delusion, The kin | 
summoned, in the king's name, a Parliament at West- 
minster ; where, together with the power of her army, 
and the authority of her partisans among the barons, who 

Murimuth, p. 67. 

P Lcland's Coll. vol. i. p. 673. T. de la More, p. 599. Walsing. p. 125. 
M. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 13. <i Walsing. p. 125. Ypod. Neust. p. 508. 

r Walsing. p. 126. Murimuth, p. 68. 



104 HISTOEY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, were concerned to secure their past treasons by commit- 
^J^ting new acts of violence 'against their sovereign, she ex- 

1326. pected to be seconded by the fury of the populace the 
most dangerous of all instruments, and the least answer- 

1327. able for their excesses. A charge was drawn up against 
th Jan. ^ e king, in which, even though it was framed by his in- 
veterate enemies, nothing but his narrow genius, or his 
misfortunes, were objected to him ; for the greatest malice 
found no particular crime with which it could reproach 
this unhappy prince. He was accused of incapacity for 
government, of wasting his time in idle amusements, of 
neglecting public business, of being swayed by evil coun- 
sellors, of having lost, by his misconduct, the kingdom of 
Scotland, and part of Guienne ; and to swell the charge, 
even the death of some barons, and the imprisonment of 
some prelates, convicted of treason, were laid to his ac- 
count 8 . It was in vain, amidst the violence of arms and 
tumult of the people, to appeal either to law or reason : 
the deposition of the king, without any appearing oppo- 
sition, was voted by Parliament: the prince, already 
declared regent by his party*, was placed on the throne ; 
and a deputation was sent to Edward at Kenilworth, to 
require his resignation, which menaces and terror soon 
extorted from him. 

But it was impossible that the people, however cor- 
rupted by the barbarity of the times, still farther inflamed 
by faction, could for ever remain insensible to the voice 
of nature. Here, a wife had first deserted, next invaded, 
and then dethroned her husband ; had made her minor 
son an instrument in this unnatural treatment of his 
father ; had, by lying pretences, seduced the nation into 
a rebellion against their sovereign; had pushed them 
into violence and cruelties that had dishonoured them : 
all those circumstances were so odious in themselves, and 
formed such a complicated scene of guilt, that the least 
reflection^ sufficed to open men's eyes, and make them 
detest this flagrant infringement of every public and 
private duty. The suspicions which soon arose of Isa- 
bella's criminal commerce with Mortimer, the proofs 
which daily broke out of this part of her guilt, increased 

s Knyghton, p. 2765, 2766. Brady's App. No. 72. 
* Rymer, vol. iv. p. 137. Walsing. p. 125. 



EDWARD II. 105 

the general abhorrence against her ; and her hypocrisy, CHAP. 
in publicly bewailing with tears the king's unhappy fate u ,,_ '^ 
was not able to deceive even the most stupid and most 1307 
prejudiced of her adherents. In proportion as the queen 
became the object of public hatred, the dethroned mo- 
narch, who had been the victim of her crimes and her 
ambition, was regarded with pity, with friendship, with 
veneration ; and men became sensible, that all his mis- 
conduct, which faction had sq much exaggerated, had 
been owing to the unavoidable weakness, not to any 
voluntary depravity of his character. The Earl of Lei- 
cester, now Earl of Lancaster, to whose custody he had 
been committed, was soon touched with those generous 
sentiments ; and besides using his prisoner with gentle- 
ness and humanity, he was suspected to have entertained 
stiUmore honourable intentions in his favour. The king, 
therefore, was taken from his hands, and delivered over 
to Lord Berkeley, and Mautravers, and Gournay, who 
were intrusted alternately, each for a month, with the 
charge of guarding him. While he was in the custody 
of Berkeley, he was still treated with the gentleness due 
to his rank and his misfortunes ; but when the turn of 
Mautravers and Gournay came, every species of indignity 
was practised against him, as if their intention had been 
to break entirely the prince's spirit, and to employ his 
sorrows and afflictions, instead of more violent and more 
dangerous expedients, for the instruments of his murder w . 
It is reported that one day, when Edward was to be 
shaved, they ordered cold and dirty water to be brought 
from the ditch for that purpose : and when he desired it 
to be changed, and was still denied his request, he burst 
into tears, which bedewed his cheeks ; and he exclaimed 
that, in spite of their insolence, he should be shaved with 
clean and warm water*. But as this method of laying 
Edward in his grave appeared still too slow to the impa- 
tient Mortimer, he secretly sent orders to the two keepers, 
who were at his devotion, instantly to despatch him ; and 
these ruffians contrived to make the manner of his death 
as cruel and barbarous as possible. Taking advantage of 
Berkeley's sickness, in whose custody he then was, and 

Walsing, p. 126. 

w Anonymi Hist. p. 838. * T. de la More, p. 602. 



10(3 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, who was thereby incapaciated from attending his charge y , 
av< they came to Berkeley castle, and put themselves in pos- 
"^^" x session of the king's person. They threw him on a bed ; 
2ist Sept. held him down violently with a table, which they flung 
murdered. over him; thrust into his fundament a red-hot iron, 
which they inserted through a horn ; and though the out- 
ward marks of violence upon his person were prevented 
by this expedient, the horrid deed was discovered to all 
the guards and attendants, by the screams with which 
the agonized king filled the castle while his bowels were 
consuming. 

Gournay and Mautravers were held in general detesta- 
tion ; and when the ensuing revolution in England threw 
their protectors from power, they found it necessary to 
provide for their safety by flying the kingdom. Gournay 
was afterwards seized at Marseilles, delivered over to. the 
Seneschal of Guienne, put on board a ship, with a view 
of carrying him to England; but he was beheaded at 
sea, by secret orders, as was supposed, from some nobles 
and prelates in England, anxious to prevent any discovery 
which he might make of his accomplices. Mautravers 
concealed himself for several years in Germany; but 
having found means of rendering some service to Edward 
III., he ventured to approach his person, threw himself 
on his knees before him, submitted to mercy, and re- 
ceived a pardon z . 

It is not easy to imagine a man more innocent and 
inoffensive than the unhappy king whose tragical death 
we have related ; nor a prince less fitted for governing 
that fierce and turbulent people, subjected to his autho- 
rity. He was obliged to devolve on others the weight 
of government, which he had neither ability nor inclina- 
tion to bear ; the same indolence and want of penetra- 
tion led him to make choice of ministers and favourites 
who were not always the best qualified for the trust com- 
mitted to them : the seditious grandees, pleased with his 
weakness^ yet complaining of it, under pretence of at- 
tacking his ministers, insulted his person, and invaded 
his authority; and the impatient populace, mistaking 
the source of their grievances, threw all the blame upon 

y Cotton's Abridg. p. 8. 

z Cotton's Abridg. p. 66. 81. Kymer, vol. v. p. 600. 



racter. 



EDWARD II. 107 

the king, and increased the public disorders by their CHAP. 
faction and violence. It was in vain to look for protec- 
tioii from the laws, whose voice, always feeble in those 
times, was not heard amidst the din of arms : what could 
not defend the king was less able to give shelter to any 
of the people : the whole machine of government was 
torn in pieces with fury and violence : and men, instead 
of regretting the manners of their age, and the form of 
their constitution, which required the most steady and 
most skilful hand to conduct them, imputed all errors 
to the person who had the misfortune to be intrusted 
with the reins of empire. 

But though such mistakes are natural, and almost 
unavoidable, while the events are recent, it is a shameful 
delusion in modern historians, to imagine that all the 
ancient princes who were unfortunate in their govern- 
ment, were also tyrannical in their conduct, and that the 
seditions of the people always proceeded from some in- 
vasion of their privileges by the monarch. Even a great 
and a good king was not, in that age, secure against faction 
and rebellion, as appears in the case of Henry II. ; but 
a great king had the best chance, as we learn from the 
history of the same period, for quelling and subduing 
them. Compare the reigns and characters of Edward I. 
and II. The father made several violent attempts against 
the liberties of the people : his barons opposed him : he 
was obliged, at least found it prudent, to submit ; but 
as they dreaded his valour and abilities, they were con- 
tent with reasonable satisfaction, and pushed no farther 
their advantages against him. The facility and weakness 
of the son, not his violence, threw every thing into con- 
fusion : the laws and government were overturned : an 
attempt to reinstate them was an unpardonable crime ; 
and no atonement, but the deposition and tragical death 
of the king himself, could give those barons contentment. 
It is easy to see that a constitution, which depended so 
much on the personal character of the prince, must ne- 
cessarily, in many of its parts, be a government of will, 
not of laws. But always to throw, without distinction, 
the blame of all disorders upon the sovereign, would in- 
troduce a fatal error in politics, and serve as a perpetual 
apology for treason and rebellion ; as if the turbulence 



108 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of the great, and madness of the people, were not, equally 

XIVl with the tyranny of princes, evils incident to human 

\^ 7 society, and no less carefully to be guarded against in 

every well-regulated constitution. 

Misceiia- While these abominable scenes passed in England, the 
transac- theatre of France was stained with a wickedness equally 
tionsdur- barbarous, and still more public and deliberate. The 
order of knights templars had arisen during the first 
fervour of the crusades ; and uniting the two qualities, 
the most popular in that age, devotion and valour, and 
exercising both in the most popular of all enterprises, 
the defence of the Holy Land, they had made rapid ad- 
vances in credit and authority, and had acquired, from 
the piety of the faithful, ample possessions in every 
country of Europe, especially in France. Their great x 
riches, joined to the course of time, had, by degrees, re- 
laxed the severity of these virtues ; and the templars had, 
in a great measure, lost that popularity which first raised 
them to honour and distinction. Acquainted, from ex- 
perience, with the fatigues and dangers of those fruitless 
expeditions to the East, they rather chose to enjoy in 
ease their opulent revenues in Europe; and being all 
men of birth, educated, according to the custom of that 
age, without any tincture of letters, they scorned the 
ignoble occupations of a monastic life, and passed their 
time wholly in the fashionable amusements of hunting, 
gallantry, and the pleasures of the table. Their rival 
order, that of St. John of Jerusalem, whose poverty had 
as yet preserved them from like corruptions, still distin- 
guished themselves by their enterprises against the infi- 
dels, and succeeded to all the popularity which was lost 
by the indolence and luxury of the templars. But 
though these reasons had weakened the foundations of 
this order, once so celebrated and revered, the imme- 
diate cause of their destruction proceeded from the cruel 
and vindictive spirit of Philip the Fair, who, having en- 
tertained a private disgust against some eminent templars, 
determined to gratify at once his avidity and revenge, by 
involving the whole order in an undistinguished ruin. On 
no better information than that of two knights, con- 
demned by their superiors to perpetual imprisonment for 
their vices and profligacy, he ordered, on one day, all 



EDWARD II. 1Q9 

the templars in France to be committed to prison, and CHAP. 
imputed to them such enormous and absurd crimes, as^ 
are sufficient of themselves to destroy all the credit of \^T~ 
the accusation. Besides their being universally charged 
with murder, robbery, and vices the most shocking to 
nature, every one, it was pretended, whom they received 
into their order, was obliged to renounce his Saviour, to 
spit upon the cross a , and to join to this impiety the 
superstition of worshipping a gilded head, which was se- 
cretly kept in one of their houses at Marseilles. They 
also initiated, it was said, every candidate by such in- 
famous rites, as could serve to no other purpose, than to 
degrade the order in his eyes, and destroy for ever the 
authority of all his superiors over him b . Above a hundred 
of these unhappy gentlemen were put to the question, 
in order to extort from them a confession of their guilt : 
the more obstinate perished in the hands of their tor- 
mentors : several, to procure immediate ease, in the 
violence of their agonies acknowledged whatever was re- 
quired of them : forged confessions were imputed to 
others ; and Philip, as if their guilt were now certain, 
proceeded to a confiscation of all their treasures. But 
no sooner were the templars relieved from their tortures, 
than, preferring the most cruel execution to a life with 
infamy, they disavowed their confessions, exclaimed 
against the forgeries, justified the innocence of their 
order, and appealed to all the gallant actions performed 
by them in ancient or later times, as a full apology for 
their conduct. The tyrant, enraged at this disappoint- 
ment, and thinking himself now engaged in honour to 
proceed to extremities, ordered fifty-four of them, whom 
he branded as relapsed heretics, to perish by the punish- 
ment of fire in his capital : great numbers expired, after 
a like manner, in other parts of the kingdom ; and when 
he found that the perseverance of these unhappy victims, 
in justifying to the last their innocence, had made deep 
impression on the spectators, he endeavoured to over- 
come the constancy of the templars by new inhumanities. 
The grand master of the order, John de Molay. and 

a Rymer, vol. iii. p. 31. 101. 

b It was pretended, that he kissed the knights who received him on the mouth, , 
navel, and breech. Dupuy, p. 15, 16. Wals. p. 99. 
VOL. II. 10 



HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, another great officer, brother to the sovereign of Dau- 
XIV * phiny, were conducted to a scaffold, erected before the 

"^ church of Notre Dame, at Paris ; a full pardon was of- 
fered them on the one hand ; the fire, destined for their 
execution, was shown them on the other : these gallant 
nobles still persisted in the protestations of their own 
innocence, and that of their order, and were instantly 
hurried into the flames by the executioner . 

In all this barbarous injustice, Clement V., who was 
the creature of Philip, and then resided in France, fully 
concurred ; and without examining a witness, or making 
any inquiry into the truth of facts, he summarily, by the 
plenitude of his apostolic power, abolished the whole 
order. The templars, all over Europe, were thrown into 
prison ; their conduct underwent a strict scrutiny ; the 
power of their enemies still pursued and oppressed them ; 
but nowhere, except in France, were the smallest traces 
of their guilt pretended to be found. England sent an 
ample testimony of their piety and morals ; but as the 
order was now annihilated, the knights were distributed 
into several convents, and their possessions were, by 
command of the pope, transferred to the order of St. 
John d . We now proceed to relate some other detached 
transactions of the present period. 

The kingdom of England was afflicted with a grievous 
famine during several years of this reign. Perpetual 
rains and cold weather not only destroyed the harvest, 
but bred a mortality among the cattle, and raised every 
kind of food to an enormous price 6 . The Parliament, 
in 1315, endeavoured to fix more moderate rates to 
commodities ; not sensible that such an attempt was 
impracticable, and that, were it possible to reduce the 
price of provisions by any other expedient than by intro- 
ducing plenty, nothing could be more pernicious and 
destructive to the public. Where the produce of a year, 
for instance, falls so far short, as to afford full subsistence 
only for nine months, the only expedient for making it 
last all the twelve, is to raise the prices, to put the 
people, by that means, on short allowance, and oblige 

c Vertot, vol. ii. p. 142. 

a Eymer, vol. iii. p. 323. 956 ; vol. iv. p. 47. Ypod. Neust. p. 506. 

Trivet, cont. p. 17, 18. 



EDWARD II. 11 

them to save their food till a more plentiful season. CHAP. 
But, in reality, the increase of prices is a necessary con-, XIV '_ 
sequence of scarcity ; and laws, instead of preventing it, 1327 
only aggravate the evil, by cramping and restraining 
commerce. The Parliament accordingly, in the. ensuing 
year, repealed their ordinance, which they had found 
useless and burdensome f . 

The prices affixed by the Parliament are somewhat 
remarkable : three pounds twelve shillings of our present 
money for the best stalled ox; for other oxen, two 
pounds eight shillings: a fat hog, of two years old, ten 
shillings: a fat wether, unshorn, a crown; if shorn, 
three shillings and sixpence : a fat goose, seven pence 
halfpenny : a fat capon, sixpence : a fat hen, three pence : 
two chickens, three pence : four pigeons, three pence : 
two dozen of eggs, three pence s . If we consider these 
prices, we shall find that butchers' meat, in this time of 
great scarcity, must still have been sold, by the parlia- 
mentary ordinance, three times cheaper than our middling 
prices at present : poultry somewhat lower ; because, 
being now considered as a delicacy, it has risen beyond 
its proportion. In the country places of Ireland and 
Scotland, where delicacies bear no price, poultry is at 
present as cheap, if not cheaper, than butchers' meat. 
But the inference I would draw from the comparison of 
prices is still more considerable : I suppose that the rates 
affixed by Parliament, were inferior to the usual market 
prices in those years of famine and mortality of cattle ; 
and that these commodities, instead of a third, had really 
risen to half of the present value. But the famine at 
that time was so consuming, that wheat was sometimes 
sold for above four pounds ten shillings a quarter 11 , 
usually for three pounds 1 ; that is, twice our middling 
prices : a certain proof of the wretched state of tillage 
in those ages. We formerly found, that the middling 
price of corn in that period was half of the present 
price ; while the middling price of cattle was only an 
eighth part : we here find the same immense dispropor- 
tion in years of scarcity. It may thence be inferred, 

f Walsingham, p. 107. 

8 Rot, Parl. 7. Edw. II. n. 35, 36. Ypod. Neust. p. 502. 

h Murimuth, p. 48. Walsingham, p. 108, says it rose to six pounds. 

1 Ypod. Neust. p. 502. Trivet, cont. p. 18. 



H2 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, with certainty, that the raising of corn was a species of 
XIV * manufactory which few in that age could practise with 
"^ advantage; and there is reason to think, that other 
manufactures more refined, were sold even beyond their 
present. prices: at least, there is a demonstration for it 
in the reign of Henry VII., from the rates affixed to 
scarlet and other broad cloth by act of Parliament. 
During all those times, it was usual for the princes and 
great nobility to make settlements of their velvet beds 
and silken robes, in the same manner as of their estates 
and manors k . In the list of jewels and plate which had 
belonged to the ostentatious Gavaston, and which the 
king recovered from the Earl of Lancaster, after the 
murder of that favourite, we find some embroidered 
girdles, flowered shirts, and silk waiscoats 1 . It was 
afterwards one article of accusation against that potent 
and opulent earl, when he was put to death, that he had 
purloined some of that finery of Gavaston's. The igno- 
rance of those ages in manufactures, and, still more, their 
unskilful husbandry, seem a clear proof, that the country 
was then far from being populous. 

All trade and manufactures, indeed, were then at a 
very low ebb. The only country in the northern parts 
of Europe, where they seem to have risen to any toler- 
able degree of improvement, was Flanders. When 
Eobert, earl of that country, was applied to by the king, 
and was desired to break off commerce with the Scots, 
whom Edward called his rebels, and represented as ex- 
communicated on that account by the church, the earl 
replied, that Flanders was always considered as common, 
and free and open to all nations" 1 . 

The petition of the elder Spenser to Parliament, com- 
plaining of the devastation committed on his lands by 
the barons, contains several particulars which are curious, 
and discover the manners of the age n . He affirms, that 
they had ravaged sixty-three manors belonging to him, 
and he makes his losses amount to forty-six thousand 
pounds; that is, to one hundred and thirty-eight thousand 
of our present money. Among other particulars, he 

k Dugdale, passim. i Rymer, vo l. iii. p. 388. 

1 Kymer, vol. iii. p. 770. 
" Brady's Hist. vol. ii. p. 143, from Glaus. 15 Edw. II. M. 14. Dors, in cedula. 



EDWARD II. H 

enumerates twenty-eight thousand sheep, one thousand CHAP. 
oxen and heifers, one thousand two hundred cows, with XIV< 
their breed for two years, five hundred and sixty 
horses, two thousand hogs ; together with six hundred 
bacons, eighty carcasses of beef, and six hundred muttons 
in the larder ; ten tuns of cider, arms for two hundred 
men, and other warlike engines and provisions. The 
plain inference is, that the greater part of Spenser's vast 
estate, as well as the estates of the other nobility, was 
farmed by the landlord himself, managed by his stewards 
or bailiffs, and cultivated by his villains. Little or none 
of it was let on lease to husbandmen : its produce was 
consumed in rustic hospitality by the baron or his officers: 
a great number of idle retainers, ready for any disorder 
or mischief, were maintained by him: all who lived 
upon his estate were absolutely at his disposal : instead 
of applying to courts of justice, he usually sought redress 
by open force and violence : the great nobility were a 
kind of independent potentates, who, if they submitted 
to any regulations at all, were less governed by the 
municipal law, than by a rude species of the law of 
nations. The method in which we find they treated the 
king's favourites and ministers is a proof of their usual 
way of dealing with each other. A party which com- 
plains of the arbitrary conduct of ministers ought natu- 
rally to affect a great regard for the laws and constitution, 
and maintain, at least, the appearance of justice in their 
proceedings : yet those barons, when discontented, came 
to Parliament with an armed force, constrained the king 
to assent to their measures, and, without any trial, or 
witness, or conviction, passed from the pretended notoriety 
of facts, an act of banishment or attainder against the 
minister, which, on the first revolution of fortune, was 
reversed by like expedients. The Parliament, during 
factious times, was nothing but the organ of present 
power. Though the persons of whom it was chiefly com- 
posed seemed to enjoy great independence, they really 
possessed no true liberty ; and the security of each indi- 
vidual among them was not so much derived from the 
general protection of law, as from his own private power 
and that of his confederates. The authority of the 
monarch, though far from absolute, was irregular, and 

10* 



HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, might often reach him : the current of a faction might 
X1V ' ; overwhelm him : a hundred considerations, of benefits 
and injuries, friendships and animosities, hopes and fears, 
were able to influence his conduct ; and amidst these 
motives, a regard to equity, and law, and justice, was 
commonly, in those rude ages, of little moment. Nor 
did any man entertain thoughts of opposing present 
power, who did not deem himself strong enough 
to dispute the field with it by force, and was not 
prepared to give battle to the sovereign or the ruling 
party. 

Before I conclude this reign, I cannot forbear making 
another remark, drawn from the detail of losses given in 
by the elder Spenser ; particularly the great quantity of 
salted meat which he had in his larder, six hundred 
bacons, eighty carcasses of beef, six hundred muttons. 
We may observe, that the outrage of which he com- 
plained began after the third of May, or the eleventh 
new style, as we learn from the same paper. It is easy, 
therefore, to conjecture, what a vast store of the same 
kind he must have laid up at the beginning of winter ; 
and we may draw a new conclusion with regard to the 
wretched state of ancient husbandry, which could not 
provide subsistence for the cattle during winter, even in 
such a temperate climate as the south of England ; for 
Spenser had but one manor so far north as Yorkshire. 
There being few or no enclosures, except, perhaps, for 
deer, no sown grass, little hay, and no other resource for 
feeding cattle, the barons, as well as the people, were 
obliged to kill and salt their oxen and sheep in the 
beginning of winter, before they became lean upon the 
common pasture ; a precaution still practised with regard 
to oxen in the least cultivated parts of this island. The 
salting of mutton is a miserable expedient, which has 
every where been long disused. From this circumstance, 
however trivial in appearance, may be drawn important 
inferences with regard to the domestic economy and 
manner of life in those ages. 

The disorders of the times, from foreign -wars and 
intestine dissensions, but, above all, the cruel famine 
which obliged the nobility to dismiss many of their re- 
tainers, increased the number of robbers in the kingdom ; 



s EDWARD II. 115 

and no place was secure from their incursions . They CHAP. 
met in troops like armies, and overran the country. Two ^ XIV '_. 
cardinals themselves, the pope's legates, notwithstanding 1327 
the numerous train which attended them, were robbed, 
and despoiled of their goods and equipage, when they 
travelled on the high way p . 

Among the other wild fancies of the age, it was 
imagined, that the persons affected with leprosy, a dis- 
ease at that time very common, probably from bad diet, 
had conspired with the Saracens to poison all the springs 
and fountains ; and men, being glad of any pretence to 
get rid of those who were a burden to them, many of 
those unhappy people were burnt alive on this chimeri- 
cal imputation. Several Jews also were punished in 
their persons, and their goods were confiscated on the 
same account* 1 . 

Stowe, in his survey of London, gives us a curious in- 
stance of the hospitality of the ancient nobility in this 
period : it is taken from the accounts of the cofferer or 
steward of Thomas, Earl of Lancaster, and contains the 
expenses of that earl during the year 1313, which was 
not a year of famine. For the pantry, buttery, and kitchen, 
three thousand four hundred and five pounds ; for three 
hundred and sixty-nine pipes of red wine, and two of 
white, one hundred and four pounds, &c. The whole, 
seven thousand three hundred and nine pounds ; that is, 
near twenty-two thousand pounds of our present money; 
and making allowance for the cheapness of commodities, 
near a hundred thousand pounds. 

I have seen a French manuscript, containing accounts 
of some private disbursements of this king. There is 
an article, among others, of a crown paid to one for 
making the king laugh. To judge by the events of the 
reign, this ought not to have been an easy undertaking. 

This king left four children, two sons and two daugh- 
ters : Edward, his eldest son and successor ; John, created 
afterwards Earl of Cornwall, who died young at Perth ; 
Jane, afterwards married to David Bruce, King of Scot- 
land ; and Eleanor, married to Keginald, Count of Guel- 
dres. 

Ypod. Neust. p. 502. Wals. p. 107. P Ypod. Neust. p. 503. T. de la 

More, p. 594. Trivet, cont. p. 22. Murimuth, p. 51. * Ypod. Neust. p. 504. 



116 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAPTEK XY. 

EDWARD HI. 

WAR WITH SCOTLAND. EXECUTION OF THE EARL OF KENT. EXECUTION OF 
MORTIMER, EARL OF MARCH. STATE OF SCOTLAND. WAR WITH THAT KING- 
DOM. KING'S CLAIM TO THE CROWN OF FRANCE. PREPARATIONS FOR WAR 
WITH FRANCE. WAR. NAVAL VICTORY. DOMESTIC DISTURBANCES. AF- 
FAIRS OF BRITANT. RENEWAL OF THE WAR WITH FRANCE. INVASION OF 
FRANCE. BATTLE OF CRECY. WAS WITH SCOTLAND. CAPTIVITY OF THE 
KING OF SCOTS. CALAIS TAKEN. 

CHAP. THE violent party, which had taken arms against Edward 
v X J* ;II., and finally deposed that unfortunate monarch, deemed 
^"Tim it requisite, fot their future security, to pay so far an 
aoth Jan. exterior obeisance to the law, as to desire a parliamentary 
indemnity for all their illegal proceedings ; on account 
of the necessity, which it was pretended they lay under, 
of employing force against the Spensers, and other evil 
counsellors, enemies of the kingdom. All the attain- 
ders, also, which had passed against the Earl of Lancas- 
ter and his adherents, when the chance of war turned 
against them, were easily reversed during the triumph 
of their party a ; and the Spensers, whose former attain- 
der had been reversed by Parliament, were now again, 
in this change of fortune, condemned by the votes of 
their enemies. A council of regency was likewise ap- 
pointed by Parliament, consisting of twelve persons ; five 
prelates, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, the 
Bishops of Winchester, Worcester, and Hereford; and 
seven lay peers, the Earls of Norfolk, Kent, and Surrey, 
and the Lords Wake, Ingham, Piercy, and Ross. The 
Earl of Lancaster was appointed guardian and protector 
of the king's person. But though it was reasonable to 
expect, that, as the weakness of the former king had 
given reins to the licentiousness of the barons, great do- 
mestic tranquillity would not prevail during the present 
minority, the first disturbance arose from an invasion by 
foreign enemies. 

War with The King of Scots, declining in years and health, but 
retaining still that martial spirit which had raised his 

* Kymer, vol. iv. p. 245. 257, 258, &c. 



EDWARD III. 117 

nation from the lowest ebb of fortune, deemed the pre- CHAP. 
sent opportunity favourable for infesting England. He V ^ X J-^ V 
first made an attempt on the castle of Norham, in which 1327 
he was disappointed ; he then collected an army of twenty- 
five thousand men on the frontiers, and having given 
the command to the Earl of Murray and Lord Douglas, 
threatened an incursion into the northern counties. The 
English regency, after trying in vain every expedient to 
restore peace with Scotland, made vigorous preparations 
for war ; and, besides assembling an English army of near 
sixty thousand men, they invited back John of Hainault, 
and some foreign cavalry, whom they had dismissed, and 
whose discipline and arms had appeared superior to those 
of their own country. Young Edward himself, burning 
with a passion for military fame, appeared at the head 
of these numerous forces ; and marched from Durham, 
the appointed place of rendezvous, in quest of the enemy, 
who had already broken into the frontiers, and were lay- 
ing every thing waste around them. 

Murray and Douglas were the two most celebrated 
warriors bred in the long hostilities between the Scots 
and English ; and their forces, trained in the same 
school, and inured to hardships, fatigues, and dangers, 
were perfectly qualified, by their habits and manner of 
life, for that desultory and destructive war which they 
carried into England. Except a body of about four 
thousand cavalry, well armed, and fit to make a steady 
impression in battle, the rest of the army were light- 
armed troops, mounted on small horses, which found sub- 
sistence every where, and carried them with rapid and 
unexpected marches, whether they meant to commit de- 
predations on the peaceable inhabitants, or to attack an 
armed enemy, or to retreat into their own country. Their 
whole equipage consisted of a bag of oatmeal, which, as 
a supply in case of necessity, each soldier carried behind 
him ; together with a light plate of iron, on which he 
instantly baked the meal into a cake in the open fields. 
But his chief subsistence was the cattle which he seized ; 
and his cookery was as expeditious as all his other ope- 
rations. After flaying the animal, he placed the skin, 
loose and hanging in the form of a bag, upon some 
stakes ; he poured water into it, kindled a fire below, 




HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and thus made it serve as a caldron for the boiling of his 
victuals b . 

The chief difficulty which Edward met with, after com- 
posing some dangerous frays which broke out between 
his foreign forces and the English 6 , was to come up with 
an army so rapid in its marches, and so little encumbered 
in its motions. Though the flame and smoke of burning 
villages directed him sufficiently to the place of their 
encampment, he found, upon hurrying thither, that they 
had already dislodged ; and he soon discovered, by new 
marks of devastation, that they had removed to some 
distant quarter. After harassing his army during some 
time in this fruitless chase, he advanced northwards, and 
crossed the Tyne, with a resolution of awaiting them on 
their return homewards, and taking vengeance for all 
their depredations 4 . But that whole country was already 
so much wasted by their frequent incursions, that it could 
not afford subsistence to his army ; and he w r as obliged 
again to return southwards, and change his plan of ope- 
rations. He had now lost all track of the enemy ; and 
though he promised the reward of a hundred pounds a 
year to any one who should bring an account of their 
motions, he remained unactive some days, before he re- 
ceived any intelligence of them 6 . He found, at last, 
that they had fixed their camp on the southern banks of 
the Ware, as if they intended to await a battle ; but 
their prudent leaders had chosen the ground with such 
judgment, that the English, on their approach, saw it 
impracticable, without temerity, to cross the river in their 
front, and attack them in their present situation. Ed- 
ward, impatient for revenge and glory, here sent them a 
defiance, and challenged them, if they dared, to meet 
him in an equal field, and try the fortune of arms. The 
bold spirit of Douglas could ill brook this bravado, and 
he advised the acceptance of the challenge ; but he was 
overruled by Murray, who replied to Edward, that he 
never took the counsel of an enemy in any of his opera- 
tions. The king, therefore, kept still his position opposite 
to the Scots ; and daily expected, that necessity would 

b Froissart liv. iv. chap. 18. c ibid. liv. iv. chap. 17. 

a Ibid. liv. iv. chap. 19. 

Kymer, vol. iv. p. 312. Froissart, liv. iv. chap. 19. 



EDWARD III. H 

oblige them to change their quarters, and give him an CHAP. 
opportunity of overwhelming them with superior forces.^; 
After a few days, they suddenly decamped, and marched 1327 
farther up the river ; but still posted themselves in such 
a manner as to preserve the advantage of the ground, if 
the enemy should venture to attack them f . Edward in- 
sisted that all hazards should be run, rather than allow 
these ravagers to escape with impunity ; but Mortimer's 
authority prevented the attack, and opposed itself to the 
valour of the young monarch. While the armies lay in 
this position, an incident happened which had well-nigh 
proved fatal to the English. Douglas, having gotten the 
word, and surveyed exactly the situation of the English 
camp, entered it secretly in the night-time, with a body 
of two hundred determined soldiers, and advanced to the 
royal tent, with a view of killing or carrying off the king, 
in the midst of his army. But some of Edward's attend- 
ants, awaking in that critical moment, made resistance ; 
his chaplain and chamberlain sacrificed their lives for his 
safety; the king himself, after making a valorous de- 
fence, escaped in the dark ; and Douglas, having lost the 
greater part of his followers, was glad to make a hasty 
retreat with the remainder 5 . Soon after the Scottish 
army decamped, without noise, in the dead of night ; and 
having thus gotten the start of the English, arrived with- 
out farther loss in their own country. Edward, on en- 
tering the place of the Scottish encampment, found only 
six Englishmen, whom the enemy, after breaking their 
legs, had tied to trees, in order to prevent their carrying 
any intelligence to their countrymen h . 

The king was highly incensed at the disappointment 
which he had met with in his first enterprise, and at the 
head of so gallant an army. The symptoms which he had 
discovered of bravery and spirit gave extreme satisfaction, 
and were regarded as sure prognostics of an illustrious 
reign : but the general displeasure fell violently on Mor- 
timer, who was already the object of public odium ; and 
every measure which he pursued tended to aggravate, 

f Froissart, liv. iv. chap. 19. 

Ib. liv. iv. chap. 19. Hemingford, p. 268. Ypod. Neust. p. 509. Knyghton, 
P- 2552. h Froissart, liv. iv. chap. 19. 



120 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, beyond all bounds, the hatred of the nation both against 
xv * him and Queen Isabella. 

^^*~ When the council of regency was formed, Mortimer, 
though in the plenitude of his power, had taken no care 
to ensure a place in it; but this semblance of moderation 
was only a cover to the most iniquitous and most ambi- 
tious projects. He rendered that council entirely useless, 
by usurping to himself the whole sovereign authority ; 
he settled on the queen-dowager the greater part of the 
royal revenues ; he never consulted either the princes of 
the blood, or the nobility, in any public measure ; the 
king himself was so besieged by his creatures, that no 
access could be procured to him ; and all the envy which 
had attended Gavaston and Spenser fell much more de- 
servedly on the new favourite. 

1328. Mortimer, sensible of the growing hatred of the people, 
thought it requisite, on any terms, to secure peace 
abroad ; and he entered into a negotiation with Robert 
Bruce for that purpose. As the claim of superiority in 
England, more than any other cause, had tended to inflame 
the animosities between the two nations, Mortimer, be- 
sides stipulating a marriage between Jane, sister of 
Edward, and David, the son and heir of Robert, con- 
sented to resign absolutely this claim, to give up all the 
homages done by the Scottish Parliament and nobility, 
and to acknowledge Robert as independent sovereign of 
Scotland 1 . In return for these advantages, Robert sti- 
pulated the payment of thirty thousand marks to England. 
This treaty was ratified by Parliament 1 " ; but was never- 
theless the source of great discontent among the people, 
who, having entered zealously into the pretensions of 
Edward I., and deeming themselves disgraced by the 
successful resistance made by so inferior a nation, were 
disappointed, by this treaty, in all future hopes both of 
conquest and of vengeance. 

The princes of the blood, Kent, Norfolk, and Lancaster, 
were much united in their councils ; and Mortimer en- 
tertained great suspicions of their designs against him. 
In summoning them to Parliament, he strictly prohibited 

i Eymer, p. 337. Heming. p. 270. Anon. Hist. p. 392. 
* Ypod. Neust. p. 510. 



EDWARD III. 121 

them, in the king's name, from coming attended by an CHAP. 
armed force, an illegal but usual practice in that age. ^J^'_j 
The three earls, as they approached to Salisbury, the 1328 
place appointed for the meeting of Parliament, found, 
that though they themselves, in obedience to the king's 
command, had brought only their usual retinue with 
them, Mortimer and his party were attended by all their 
followers in arms, and they began, with some reason, to 
apprehend a dangerous design against their persons. 
They retreated, assembled their retainers, and were re- 
turning with an army to take vengeance on Mortimer, 
when the weakness of Kent and Norfolk, who deserted 
the common cause, obliged Lancaster also to make his 
submissions 1 . The quarrel, by the interposition of the 
prelates, seemed for the present to be appeased. 

But Mortimer, in order to intimidate the princes, de- 1329. 
termined to have a victim ; and the simplicity, with the 
good intentions, of the Earl of Kent, afforded him soon 
after an opportunity of practising upon him. By himself 
and his emissaries, he endeavoured to persuade that 
prince, that his brother, King Edward, was still alive, 
and detained in some secret prison in England. The 
earl, whose remorses for the part which he had acted 
against the late king probably inclined him to give credit 
to this intelligence, entered into a design of restoring him 
to liberty, of reinstating him on the throne, and of 
making thereby some atonement for the injuries which 
he himself had unwarily done him m . After this harmless isso. 
contrivance had been allowed to proceed a certain length, 
the earl was seized by Mortimer, was accused before the 
Parliament, and condemned by those slavish, though tur- 
bulent barons, to lose his life and fortune. The queen 
and Mortimer, apprehensive of young Edward's lenity 
towards his uncle, hurried on the execution, and the 9th March, 
prisoner was beheaded next day ; but so general was the o^SS 
affection borne him, and such pity prevailed for his un- of Kent - 
happy fate, that though peers had been easily found to 
condemn him, it was evening before his enemies could 
find an executioner to perform the office 11 . 

The Earl of Lancaster, on pretence of his having as- 

1 Knyghton, p. 2554. m Avesbury, p. 8. Anon. Hist. p. 395. 

n Heining. p. 271. Ypod. Neust. p. 510. Knyghton, p. 2555. 
VOL. II. 11 



122 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, sented to this conspiracy, was soon after thrown into pri- 
xv * son : many of the prelates and nobility were prosecuted : 
Mortimer employed this engine to crush all his enemies, 
and to enrich himself and his family by the forfeitures. 
The estate of the Earl of Kent was seized for his younger 
son, Geoffrey : the immense fortunes of the Spensers and 
their adherents were mostly converted to his own use : 
he affected a state and dignity equal or superior to the 
royal : his power became formidable to every one : his 
illegal practices were daily complained of; and all par- 
ties, forgetting past animosities, conspired in their hatred 
of Mortimer. 

It was impossible that these abuses could long escape 
the observation of a prince endowed with so much spirit 
and judgment as young Edward, who, being now in his 
eighteenth year, and feeling himself capable of governing, 
repined at being held in fetters by this insolent minister. 
But so much was he surrounded by the emissaries of 
Mortimer, that it behoved him to conduct the project 
for subverting him with the same secrecy and precaution 
as if he had been forming a conspiracy against his .sove- 
reign. He communicated his intentions to Lord Moun- 
tacute, who engaged the Lords Molins and Clifford, Sir 
John Nevil of Hornby, Sir Edward Bohun, Ufford, and 
others, to enter into their views ; and the castle of Not- 
tingham was chosen for the scene of the enterprise. The 
queen-dowager and Mortimer lodged in that fortress: the 
king also was admitted, though with a few only of his 
attendants : and as the castle was strictly guarded, the 
gates locked every evening, and the keys carried to the 
queen, it became necessary to communicate the design to 
Sir William Eland, the governor, who zealously took part 
in it. By his direction, the king's associates were admit- 
ted through a subterraneous passage, which had formerly 
been contrived for a secret outlet from the castle, but was 
now buried in rubbish ; and Mortimer, without having it 
in his power to make resistance, was suddenly seized in an 
apartment adjoining to the queen's . A Parliament was 
immediately summoned for his condemnation. He was 
accused before that assembly of having usurped regal 
power from the council of regency appointed by Parlia- 

Avesbury, p. 9. 



EDWARD III. 123 

ment ; of having procured the death of the late king ; CHAP. 
of having deceived the Earl of Kent into a conspiracy xv< 
to restore that prince ; of having solicited and obtained ^^~" 
exorbitant grants of the royal demesnes ; of having dis- 
sipated the public treasure ; of secreting twenty thousand 
marks of the money paid by the King of Scotland, and 
of other crimes and misdemeanours p . The Parliament 
condemned him from the supposed notoriety of the facts, 
without trial, or hearing his answer, or examining a wit- 
ness; and he was hanged on a gibbet at the Elmes, in Execution 
the neighbourhood of London. It is remarkable that^cr. 01 
this sentence was, near twenty years after, reversed by 29th Nov - 
Parliament in favour of Mortimer's son ; and the reason 
assigned was the illegal manner of proceeding^. The 
principles of law and justice were established in England, 
not in such a degree as to prevent any iniquitous sen- 
tence against a person obnoxious to the ruling party ; 
but sufficient, on the return of his credit, or that of his 
friends, to serve as a reason or pretence for its re- 
versal. 

Justice was also executed, by a sentence of the House 
of Peers, on some of the inferior criminals, particularly 
on Simon de Bereford : but the barons, in that act of 
jurisdiction, entered a protest, that though they had tried 
Bereford, who was none of their peers, they should not, 
for the future, be obliged to receive any such indictment. 
The queen was confined to her own house at Kisings, 1331. 
near London : her revenue was reduced to four thousand 
pounds a year r ; and though the king, during the remain- 
der of. her life, paid her a decent visit once or twice a 
year, she never was able to reinstate herself in any credit 
or authority. 

Edward, having now taken the reins of government 
into his own hands, applied himself, with industry and 
judgment, to redress all those grievances which had pro- 
ceeded either from want of authority in the crown, or 
from the late abuses of it. He issued writs to the judges, 
enjoining them to administer justice, without paying any 
regard to arbitrary orders from the ministers ; and as the 

P Brady's App. No. 83. Anon. Hist. p. 397, 398. Knyghton, p. 2556. 
<i Cotton's Abridg. p. 85, 86. 
* Ibid. p. 10. 



124 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, robbers, thieves, murderers, and criminals of all kinds, 
xv * had, during the course of public convulsions, multiplied 

"^^to an enormous degree, and were openly protected by 
the great barons, who made use of them against their 
enemies, the king, after exacting from the Peers a solemn 
promise in Parliament that they would break off all con- 
nexions with such malefactors 8 , set himself in earnest to 
remedy the evil. Many of these gangs had become so 
numerous as to require his own presence to disperse 
them ; and he exerted both courage and industry in ex- 
ecuting this salutary office. The ministers of justice, 
from his example, employed the utmost diligence in dis- 
covering, pursuing, and punishing the criminals ; and this 
disorder was by degrees corrected, at least palliated ; the 
utmost that could be expected with regard to a disease 
hitherto inherent in the constitution. 

In proportion as the government acquired authority at 
home, it became formidable to the neighbouring nations ; 
and the ambitious spirit of Edward sought and soon 

state of found an opportunity of exerting itself. The wise and 
valiant Kobert Bruce, who had recovered, by arms, the 
independence of his country, and had fixed it by the last 
treaty of peace with England, soon after died, and left 
David, his son, a minor, under the guardianship of Kan- 
dolf, Earl of Murray, the companion of all his victories. 
It had been stipulated in this treaty, that both the Scot- 
tish nobility, who, before the commencement of the wars, 
enjoyed lands in England, and the English, who inherited 
estates in Scotland, should be restored to their respective 
possessions* ; but though this article had been executed 
pretty regularly on the part of Edward ; Robert, who 
observed that the estates claimed by Englishmen were 
much more numerous and valuable than the others, either 
thought it dangerous to admit so many secret enemies 
into the kingdom, or found it difficult to wrest from his 
own followers the possessions bestowed on them as the 
reward of former services ; and he had protracted the 
performance of his part of the stipulation. The English 
nobles, disappointed in their expectations, began to think 
of a remedy ; and as their influence was great in the 
north, their enmity alone, even though unsupported by 

8 Cotton's Abridg. p. 10. t Kymer, vol. iv. p. 384. 



EDWARD III. 125 

the King of England, became dangerous to the minor CHAP. 
prince, who succeeded to the Scottish throne. ^_ _, 

Edward Baliol, the son of that John who was crowned 1332 
King of Scotland, had been detained some time a pri- 
soner in England after his father was released ; but hav- 
ing also obtained his liberty, he went over to France, and 
resided in Normandy, on his patrimonial estate in that 
country, without any thoughts of reviving the claims of 
his family to the crown of Scotland. His pretensions, 
however plausible, had been so strenuously abjured by 
the Scots, and rejected by the English, that he was uni- 
versally regarded as a private person and he had been 
thrown into prison, on account of some private offence of 
which he was accused. Lord Beaumont, a great English 
baron, who, in the right of his wife, claimed the earldom 
of Buchan in Scotland 11 , found him in this situation, and 
deeming him a proper instrument for his purpose, made 
such interest with the King of France, who was not 
aware of the consequences, that he recovered him his 
liberty, and brought him over with him to England. 

The injured nobles, possessed of such a head, began 
to think of vindicating their rights by force of arms, and 
they applied to Edward for his concurrence and assist- 
ance. But there were several reasons which deterred the 
king from openly avowing their enterprise. In his treaty 
with Scotland, he had entered into a bond of twenty 
thousand pounds, payable to the pope, if within four 
years he violated the peace ; and as the term was not 
yet elapsed, he dreaded the exacting of that penalty by 
the sovereign pontiff, who possessed so many means of 
forcing princes to make payment. He was also afraid 
that violence and injustice would every where be imputed 
to him, if he attacked with superior force a minor king, 
and a brother-in-law, whose independent title had so 
lately been acknowledged by a solemn treaty ; and as 
the Kegent of Scotland, on every demand which had 
been made of restitution to the English barons, had 
always confessed the justice of their claim, and had only 
given an evasive answer, grounded on plausible pretences, 
Edward resolved not to proceed by open violence, but to 
employ like artifices against him. He secretly encouraged 

u Kymer, vol. iv. p. 251. 
11* 



126 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Baliol in his enterprise ; connived at his assembling forces 
i_^J'_j in the north, and gave countenance to the nobles who 
1332. were disposed to join in the attempt. A force of near 
two thousand five hundred men was enlisted under Baliol, 
by Umfreville, Earl of Angus, the Lords Beaumont, 
Ferrars, Fitzwarin, Wake, Stafford, Talbot, and Mow- 
bray. As these adventurers apprehended that the 
frontiers would be strongly armed and guarded, they re- 
solved to make their attack by sea ; and having embark- 
ed at Ravenspur, they -reached in a few days the coast 
of Fife. 

Scotland was at that time in a very different situation 
from that in which it had appeared under the victorious 
Robert. Besides the loss of that great monarch, whose 
genius and authority preserved entire the whole political 
fabric, and maintained an union among the unruly 
barons, Lord Douglas, impatient of rest, had gone over to 
Spain, in a crusade against the Moors, and had there 
perished in battle w : the Earl of Murray, who had long 
been declining through age and infirmities, had lately 
died, and had been succeeded in the regency by Donald, 
Earl of Marre, a man of much inferior talents : the mili- 
tary spirit of the Scots, though still unbroken, was left 
without a proper guidance and direction ; and a minor 
king seemed ill qualified to defend an inheritance which 
it had required all the consummate valour and abilities 
of his father to acquire and maintain. But as the Scots 
were apprised of the intended invasion, great numbers, 
on the appearance of the English fleet, immediately ran 
to the shore, in order to prevent the landing of the 
enemy. Baliol had valour and activity, and he drove 
back the Scots with considerable loss x . He marched 
westward into the heart of the country, flattering himself 
that the ancient partisans of his family would declare 
for him. But the fierce animosities which had been 
kindled between the two nations, inspiring the Scots 
with a strong prejudice against a prince supported by the 
English, he was regarded as a common enemy ; and the 
regent found no difficulty in assembling a great army to 
oppose him. It is pretended that Marre had no less 

w Froissart, liv. i. chap. 21. 

* Heming. p. 272. Walsing. p. 131. Knyghton, p. 2560. 



EDWARD III. 127 

than forty thousand men under his banners; but the CHAP. 
same hurry and impatience that made him collect a force, ^_^'_j 
which, from its greatness, was so disproportioned to the 1339 
occasion, rendered all his motions unskilful and impru- 
dent. The river Earne ran between the two armies; 
and the Scots, confiding in that security, as well as in 
their great superiority of numbers, kept no order in their 
encampment. Baliol passed the river in the night-time ; nth Aug. 
attacked the unguarded and undisciplined Scots ; threw 
them into confusion, which was increased by the dark- 
ness, and by their very numbers to which they trusted ; 
and he beat them off the field with great slaughter 7 . 
But in the morning, when the Scots were at some dis- 
tance, they were ashamed of having yielded the victory 
to so weak a foe, and they hurried back to recover the 
honour of the day. Their eager passions urged them 
precipitately to battle, without regard to some broken 
ground which lay between them and the enemy, and which 
disordered and confounded their ranks. Baliol seized 
the favourable opportunity, advanced his troops upon 
them, prevented them from rallying, and anew chased 
them off the field with redoubled slaughter. There fell 
above twelve thousand Scots in this action ; and among 
these, the flower of the nobility; the regent himself, 
the Earl of Carrie, a natural son of their late king, the 
Earls of Athole and Monteith, Lord Hay, of Errol, con- 
stable, and the Lords Keith and Lindsey. The loss of 
the English scarcely exceeded thirty men ; a strong 
proof, among many others, of the miserable state of 
military discipline in those ages 21 . 

Baliol soon after made himself master of Perth ; but 
still was not able to bring over any of the Scots to his 
party. Patric D unbar, Earl of March, and Sir Archi- 
bald Douglas, brother to the lord of that name, appeared 
at the head of the Scottish armies, which amounted still 
to near forty thousand men ; and they purposed to reduce 
Baliol and the English by famine. They blockaded Perth 
by land ; they collected some vessels, with which they 
invested it by water ; but Baliol's ships, attacking the 
Scottish fleet, gained a complete victory, and opened a 

y Knyghton, p. 2561. 

z Heming. p. 273. Walsing. p. 131. Knyghton, p. 2561. 



128 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, communication between Perth and the sea a . The Scot- 
XV- tish armies were then obliged to disband for want of pay 
and subsistence : the nation was, in effect, subdued by a 
handful of men : each nobleman, who found himself most 
exposed to danger, successively submitted to Baliol: 
27th Sept. that prince was crowned at Scone : David, his competi- 
tor, was sent over to France with his betrothed wife, 
Jane, sister to Edward ; and the heads of his party sued 
to Baliol for a truce, which he granted them, in order 
to assemble a Parliament in tranquillity, and have, his 
title recognized by the whole Scottish nation. 
1333. But Baliol's imprudence, or his necessities, making 
him dismiss the greater part of his English followers, he 
was, notwithstanding the truce, attacked on a sudden 
near Annan, by Sir Archibald Douglas, and other 
chieftians of that party : he was routed ; his brother, 
John Baliol, was slain ; he himself was chased into Eng- 
land in a miserable condition ; and thus lost his king- 
dom by a revolution as sudden as that by which he had 
acquired it. 

While Baliol enjoyed his short-lived and precarious 
royalty, he had been sensible that, without the protec- 
tion of England, it would be impossible for him to main- 
tain possession of the throne ; and he had secretly sent 
a message to Edward, offering to acknowledge his su- 
periority, to renew the homage for his crown, and to 
espouse the Princess Jane, if the pope's consent could 
be obtained for dissolving her former marriage, which 
War with was not yet consummated. Edward, ambitious of re- 
Scotiand. covering that important concession, made by Mortimer 
during his minority, threw off all scruples, and willingly 
accepted the offer ; but as the dethroning of Baliol had 
rendered this stipulation of no effect, the king prepared 
to reinstate him in possession of the crown : an enter- 
prise, which appeared from late experience so easy and 
so little hazardous. As he possessed many popular arts, 
he consulted his Parliament on the occasion ; but that- 
assembly, finding the resolution already taken, declined 
giving any opinion, and only granted him, in order to 
support the enterprise, an aid of a fifteenth, from the 
personal estates of the nobility and gentry, and a tenth 

a Heming. p. 273. Knyghton, p. 2561. 



EDWARD III. 129 

of the moveables of boroughs. And they added a peti- CIIAP. 

tion, that the king would thenceforth live on his own v ^ v ' 

revenue, without grieving his subjects by illegal taxes, 1333 
or by the outrageous seizure of their goods in the shape 
of purveyance b . 

As the Scots expected that the chief brunt of the 
war would fall upon Berwick, Douglas, the regent, 
threw a strong garrison into that place, under the com- 
mand of Sir William Keith, and he himself assembled a 
great army on the frontiers, ready to penetrate into 
England, as soon as Edward should have invested that 
place. The English army was less numerous, but better 
supplied with arms and provisions, and retained in 
stricter discipline ; and the king, notwithstanding the 
valiant defence made by Keith, had, in two months, 
reduced the garrison to extremities, and had obliged 
them to capitulate : they engaged to surrender, if they 
were not relieved within a few days by their country- 
men . This intelligence being conveyed to the Scottish 
army, which was preparing to invade Northumberland, 
changed their plan of operations, and engaged them to 
advance towards Berwick, and attempt the relief of that 
important fortress. Douglas, who had ever purposed to 
decline a pitched battle, in which he was sensible of the 
enemy's superiority, and who intended to have drawn out 
the war by small skirmishes, and by mutually ravaging 
each other's country, was forced, by the impatience of his 
troops, to put the fate of the kingdom upon the event of 
one day. He attacked the English at Halidown-hill, aiQthJuiy. 
little north of Berwick ; and though his heavy-armed 
cavalry dismounted, in order to render the action more 
steady and desperate, they were received with such 
valour by Edward, and were so galled by the English 
archers, that they were soon thrown into disorder, and 
on the fall of Douglas, their general, were totally routed. 
The whole army fled in confusion, and the English, but 
much more the Irish, gave little quarter in the pursuit : 
all the nobles of chief distinction were either slain or 
taken prisoners : near thirty thousand of the Scots fell 
in the action : while the loss of the English amounted 

b Cotton's Abridg. 

c Rymer, vol. iv. p. 564, 565, 566. 



130 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, only to one knight, one esquire, and thirteen private 
x V- soldiers : an inequality almost incredible d . 
^^*~ After this fatal blow, the Scottish nobles had no other 
resource than instant submission ; and Edward, leaving 
a considerable body with Baliol to complete the conquest 
of the kingdom, returned with the remainder of his army 
to England. Baliol was acknowledged king by a Parlia- 
ment assembled at Edinburgh 6 ; the superiority of Eng- 
land was again recognized ; many of the Scottish nobility 
swore fealty to Edward ; and, to complete the misfor- 
tunes of that nation, Baliol ceded Berwick, Dunbar, 
Koxborough, Edinburgh, and all the south-east counties 
of Scotland, which were declared to be for ever annexed 
to the English monarchy f . 

1334. If Baliol, on his first appearance, was dreaded by the 
Scots, as an instrument employed by England for the 
subjection of the kingdom, this deed confirmed all their 
suspicions, and rendered him the object of universal 
hatred. Whatever submissions they might be obliged 
to make, they considered him, not as their prince, but 
as the delegate and confederate of their determined 
enemy ; and neither the manners of the age, nor the 
state of Edward's revenue, permitting him to maintain 
a standing army in Scotland, the English forces were no 

% sooner withdrawn, than the Scots revolted from Baliol, 
and returned to their former allegiance under Bruce. 
Sir Andrew Murray, appointed regent by the party of 
this latter prince, employed with success his valour and 
activity in many small but decisive actions against Baliol 
and, in a short time, had almost wholly expelled him the 

1335. kingdom. Edward was obliged again to assemble an 
army, and to march into Scotland : the Scots, taught by 
experience, withdrew into their hills and fastnesses : he 
destroyed the houses and ravaged the estates of those 
whom he called rebels : but this confirmed them still far- 
ther in their obstinate antipathy to England and to Baliol ; 
and being now rendered desperate, they were ready to 
take advantage, on the first opportunity, of the retreat 
of their enemy, and they soon reconquered their country 
from the English. Edward made anew his appearance * 

d Heming. p. 275, 276, 277. Knyghton, p. 2559. Otterbourne, p. 115. 
e Kymer, vol. iv. p. 590. f Ibid . p> 614 ; * 



EDWARD III. 131 

in Scotland with like success: he found every thing hostile CHAP. 
in the kingdom, except the spot on which he was en- v xv> 
camped ; and though he marched uncontrolled over the ~^J~ 
low countries, the nation itself was farther than ever 
from being broken and subdued. Besides being sup- 
ported by their pride and anger, passions difficult to 
tame, they were encouraged, amidst all their calamities, 
by daily promises of relief from France ; and as a war was 
now likely to break out between that kingdom and Eng- 
land, they had reason to expect, from this incident, a 
great diversion of that force which had so long oppressed 
and overwhelmed them. 

We now come to a transaction, on which depended 1337. 
the most memorable events, not only of this long and^,| s to 
active reign, but of the whole English and French his- the crown 
tory during more than a century ; and it will therefore 
be necessary to give a particular account of the springs 
and causes of it. 

It had long been a prevailing opinion, that the crown 
of France could never descend to a female ; and, in 
order to give more authority to this maxim, and assign 
it a determinate origin, it had been usual to derive it 
from a clause in the Salian code, the law of an ancient 
tribe among the Franks; though that clause, when strictly 
examined, carries only the appearance of favouring this 
principle, and does not really, by the confession of the 
best antiquaries, bear the sense commonly imposed upon 
it. But though positive law seems wanting among the 
French for the exclusion of females, the practice had 
taken place ; and the rule was established beyond con- 
troversy on some ancient, as well as some modern prece- 
dents. During the first race of the monarchy, the Franks 
were so rude and barbarous a people, that they were 
incapable of submitting to a female reign ; and in that 
period of their history there were frequent instances of 
kings advanced to royalty in prejudice of females who 
were related to the crown by nearer degrees of consan- 
guinity. These precedents, joined to like causes, had 
also established the male succession in the second race ; 
and though the instances were neither so frequent nor 
so certain during that period, the principle of excluding 
the female line seerns still to have prevailed, and to have 



132 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, directed the conduct of the nation. During the third 
xv> race, the crown had descended from father to son for 

*"^ eleven generations, from Hugh Capet to Lewis Hutin ; 
and thus, in fact, during the course of nine hundred 
years, the French monarchy had always been governed 
by males ; and no female, and none who founded his title 
on a female, had ever mounted the throne. Philip the 
Fair, father of Lewis Hutin, left three sons, this Lewis, 
Philip the Long, and Charles the Fair, and one daughter, 
Isabella, Queen, of England. Lewis Hutin, the eldest, 
left at his death one daughter, by Margaret, sister to 
Eudes, Duke of Burgundy ; and as his queen was then 
pregnant, Philip, his younger brother, was appointed 
regent, till it should appear whether the child proved a 
son or a daughter. The queen bore a male, who lived 
only a few days. Philip was proclaimed king ; and as 
the Duke of Burgundy made some opposition, and 
asserted the rights of his niece, the states of the king- 
dom, by a solemn and deliberate decree, gave her an 
exclusion, and declared all females for ever incapable of 
succeeding to the crown of France. Philip died after a 
short reign, leaving three daughters; and his brother 
Charles, without dispute or controversy, then succeeded 
to the crown. The reign of Charles was also short : he 
left one daughter ; but as his queen was pregnant, the 
next male heir was appointed regent, with a declared 
right of succession, if the issue should prove female. 
This prince was Philip de Yalois, cousin-german to the 
deceased king; being the son of Charles de Valois, 
brother of Philip the Fair. The Queen of France was 
delivered of a daughter ; the regency ended ; and Philip 
de Valois was unanimously placed on the throne of 
France. 

The King of England, who was at that time a youth 
of fifteen years of age, embraced a notion that he was 
entitled, in right of his mother, to the succession of the 
kingdom, and that the claini of the nephew was prefer- 
able to that of the cousin-german. There could not 
well be imagined a notion weaker or worse grounded. 
The principle of excluding females was, of old, an estab- 
lished opinion in France, and had acquired equal autho- 
rity with the most express and positive law : it was sup- 



EDWARD III. 133 

ported by ancient precedents : it was confirmed by recent CHAP. 
instances, solemnly and deliberately decided : and what xv> 
placed it still farther beyond controversy, if Edward was^^^T" 
disposed to question its validity, he thereby cut off his 
own pretensions ; since the three last kings had all left 
daughters who were still alive, and who stood 'before 
him in the order of succession. He was therefore re- 
duced to assert, that though his mother Isabella was, on 
account of her sex, incapable of succeeding, he himself, 
who inherited through her, was liable to no such objec- 
tion, and might claim by the right of propinquity. But, 
besides that this pretension was more favourable to 
Charles, King of Navarre, descended from the daughter 
of Lewis Hutin, it was so contrary to the established 
principles of succession in every country of Europe 8 , was 
so repugnant to the practice both in private and public 
inheritances, that nobody in France thought of Edward's 
claim : Philip's title was universally recognized 11 ; and he 
never imagined that he had a competitor, much less so 
formidable a one as the King of England. 

But though the youthful and ambitious mind of Ed- 
ward had rashly entertained this notion, he did not think 
proper to insist on his pretensions, which must have im- 
mediately involved him, on very unequal terms, in a dan- 
gerous and implacable war with so powerful a monarch. 
Philip was a prince of mature years, of great experience, 
and, at that time, of an established character both for 
prudence and valour; and by these circumstances, as 
well as by the internal union of his people, and their ac- 
quiescence in his undoubted right, he possessed every 
advantage above a raw youth, newly raised, by injustice 
and violence, to the government of the most intractable 
and most turbulent subjects in Europe. But there im- 
mediately occurred an incident which required that Ed- 
ward should either openly declare his pretensions, or for 
ever renounce and abjure them. He was summoned to 
do homage for Guienne : Philip was preparing to compel 
him by force of arms : that country was in a very bad 
state of defence ; and the forfeiture of so rich an inherit- 
ance was, by the feudal law, the immediate consequence 
of his refusing or declining to perform the duty of a 

s Froissart, liv. i. chap. 4. h Ibid. chap. 22. 

VOL. II. 12 



134 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, vassal. Edward, therefore, thought it prudent to submit 
xv - to present necessity : he went over to Amiens ; did homage 
^337 to Philip ; and as there had arisen some controversy con- 
cerning the terms of this submission, he afterwards sent 
over a formal deed, in which he acknowledged that he 
owed liege homage to France 1 ; which was, in effect, 
ratifying, and that in the strongest terms, Philip's title to 
the crown of that kingdom. His own claim, indeed, was 
so unreasonable, and so thoroughly disavowed by the 
whole French nation, that to insist on it was no better 
than pretending to the violent conquest of the kingdom ; 
and it is probable that he would never have farther 
thought of it, had it not been for some incidents which 
excited an animosity between the monarchs. 

Robert of Artois was descended from the blood royal 
of France, was a man of great character and authority, 
had espoused Philip's sister, and by his birth, talents, and 
credit, was entitled to make the highest figure, and fill 
the most important offices in the monarchy. This prince 
had lost the county of Artois, which he claimed as his 
birthright, by a sentence, commonly deemed iniquitous, 
of Philip the Fair ; and he was seduced to attempt re- 
covering possession by an action so unworthy of his rank 
and character as a forgery k . The detection of this crime 
covered him with shame and confusion: his brother- 
in-law not only abandoned him, but prosecuted him with 
violence : Robert, incapable of bearing disgrace, left the 
kingdom, and hid himself in the Low Countries : chased 
from that retreat by the authority of Philip, he came 
over to England ; in spite of the French king's menaces 
and remonstrances, he was favourably received by Ed- 
ward 1 ; and was soon admitted into the councils, and 
shared the confidence of that monarch. Abandoning him- 
self to all the movements of rage and despair, he endea- 
voured to revive the prepossession entertained by Edward 
in favour of his title to the crown of France, and even 
flattered him, that it was not impossible for a prince of 
his valour and abilities to render his claim effectual. The 
king was the more disposed to hearken to suggestions 

* Rymer, vol. iv. p. 477. 481. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 25. Anon. Hist. p. 394. 
Walsing. p. 130. Murimath, p. 73. 
k Froissart, liv. i. chap. 29. 
1 Kymer, vol. iv. p. 747. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 27. 



EDWARD III. 135 

of this nature, because he had, in several particu- CHAP. 
lars, found reason to complain of Philip's conduct with^J;^ 
regard to Guienne, and because that prince had both 1337 
given protection to the exiled David Bruce, and sup- 
ported, at least encouraged, the Scots, in their struggles 
for independence. Thus resentment gradually filled the 
breasts of both monarchs, and made them incapable of 
hearkening to any terms of accommodation proposed by 
the pope, who never ceased interposing his good offices 
between them. Philip thought that he should be want- 
ing to the first principles of policy, if he abandoned Scot- 
land : Edward affirmed, that he must relinquish all pre- 
tensions to generosity, if he withdrew his protection from 
Kobert. The former, informed of some preparations for 
hostilities which had been made by his rival, issued a sen- 
tence of felony and attainder against Kobert, and de- 
clared, that every vassal of the crown, whether ivithin or 
without the kingdom, who gave countenance to that 
traitor, would be involved in the same sentence ; a me- 
nace easy to be understood : the latter, resolute not to 
yield, endeavoured to form alliances in the Low Coun- 
tries and on the frontiers of Germany, the only places 
from which he either could make an effectual attack upon 
France, or produce such a diversion as might save the 
province of Guienne, which lay so much exposed to the 
power of Philip. 

The king began with opening his intentions to thePrepara- 
Count of Hainault, his father-in-law; and having en-^ S with 
gaged him in his interests, he employed the good offices France. 
and councils of that prince in drawing into his alliance 
the other sovereigns of that neighbourhood. The Duke 
of Brabant was induced, by his mediation, and by large 
remittances of money from England, to promise his con- 
currence 10 : the Archbishop of Cologne, the Duke of Guel- 
dres, the Marquis of Juliers, the Count of Namur, the 
Lords of Fauquemont and Baquen, were engaged by like 
motives to embrace the English alliance 11 . These sove- 
reign princes could supply, either from their own states 
or from the bordering countries, great numbers of war- 
like troops ; and nought was wanting to make the force 

m Eymer, vol. iv. p. 777. 

n Froissart, liv. iv. chap. 29. 33. 36. 



136 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, on that quarter very formidable, but the accession of 
xv< Flanders, which Edward procured by means somewhat 
'extraordinary and unusual. 

As the Flemings were the first people in the northern 
parts of Europe that cultivated arts and manufactures, 
the lower ranks of men among them had risen to a de- 
gree of opulence unknown elsewhere to those of their 
station in that barbarous age ; had acquired privileges 
and independence ; and began to emerge from that state 
of vassalage, or rather of slavery, into which the common 
people had been universally thrown by the feudal insti- 
tutions. It was probably difficult for them to bring their 
sovereign and their nobility to conform themselves to the 
principles of law and civil government, so much neglected 
in every other country : it was impossible for them to 
confine themselves within the proper bounds in their 
opposition and resentment against any instance of tyranny : 
they had risen in tumults ; had insulted the nobles ; had 
chased their earl into France ; and, delivering them- 
selves over to the guidance of a seditious leader, had been 
guilty of all that insolence and disorder, to which the 
thoughtless and enraged populace are so much inclined, 
wherever they are unfortunate enough to be their own 
masters . 

Their present leader was James d'Arteville, a brewer 
in Ghent, who governed them with a more absolute sway 
than had ever been assumed by any of their lawful sove- 
reigns : he placed and displaced the magistrates at plea- 
sure ; he was accompanied by a guard, who, on the least 
signal from him, instantly assassinated any man that hap- 
pened to fall under his displeasure : all the cities of Flan- 
ders were full of his spies : and it was immediate death 
to give him the smallest umbrage : the few nobles who 
remained in the country lived in continual terror from 
his violence : he seized the estates of all those whom he 
had either banished or murdered ; and bestowing a part 
on their wives and children, converted the remainder to 
his own use p . Such were the first effects that Europe 
saw of popular violence, after having groaned during so 
many ages under monarchical and aristocratical tyranny. 

James d'Arteville was the man to whom Edward ad- 

o Froissart, liv. i. chap. 30. Meyerus. p J'roissart, liv. i. chap. 30. 



EDWARD III. 137 

dressed himself for bringing over the Flemings to his CHAP. 
interests; and that prince, the most haughty and most,_ xv> _ y 
aspiring of the age, never courted any ally with so much ^J^ 
assiduity and so many submissions, as he employed to- 
wards this seditious and criminal tradesman. D'Arte- 
ville, proud of these advances from the King of England, 
and sensible that the Flemings were naturally inclined 
to maintain connexions with the English, who furnished 
them the materials of their woollen manufactures, the 
chief source of their opulence, readily embraced the in- 
terests of Edward, and invited him over into the Low 
Countries. Edward, before he entered on this great 
enterprise, affected to consult his Parliament, asked their 
advice, and obtained their consent a ; and the more to 
strengthen his hands, he procured from them a grant of 
twenty thousand sacks of wool, which might amount to 
about a hundred thousand pounds : this commodity was 
a good instrument to employ with the Flemings, and the 
price of it with his German allies. He completed the 
other necessary sums by loans, by pawning the crown 
jewels, by confiscating, or rather robbing, at once, all the 
Lombards, who now exercised the invidious trade for- 
merly monopolized by the Jews, of lending on interest 1 ; 
and being attended by a body of English forces, and by 
several of his nobility, he sailed over to Flanders. 

The German princes, in order to justify their unpro- isss. 
voked hostilities against France, had required the sanc- 
tion of some legal authority ; and Edward, that he might 
give them satisfaction on this head, had applied to Lewis 
of Bavaria, then emperor, and had been created by him 
vicar of the empire ; an empty title, but which seemed to 
give him a right of commanding the service of the 
princes of Germany 8 . The Flemings, who were vassals 
of France, pretending like scruples with regard to the 
invasion of their liege lord, Edward, by the advice of 
D'Arteville, assumed, in his commissions, the title of 
King of France; and, in virtue of this right, claimed 
their assistance for dethroning Philip de Yalois, the 
usurper of his kingdom*. This step, which he feared 

<i Cotton's Abridg. 

r Dugd. Baron, vol. ii. p. 146. s Froissart, liv. i. chap. 35. 

* Heming. p. 303. Walsing. p. 143. 




138 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, would destroy all future amity between the kingdoms, 
and beget endless and implacable jealousies in France, 
was not taken by him without much reluctance and 
hesitation ; and not being in itself very justifiable, it has, 
in the issue, been attended with many miseries to both 
kingdoms. From this period we may date the com- 
mencement of that great animosity which the English 
nation have ever since borne to the French, which has 
so visible an influence on all future transactions, and 
which has been, and continues to be, the spring of many 
rash and precipitate resolutions among them. In all the 
preceding reigns since the conquest, the hostilities be- 
tween the two crowns had been only casual and tempo- 
rary ; and as they had never been attended with any 
bloody or dangerous event, the traces of them were easily 
obliterated by the first treaty of pacification. The Eng- 
lish nobility and gentry valued themselves on their French 
or Norman extraction : they affected to employ the lan- 
guage of that country in all public transactions, and even 
in familiar conversation : and both the English court and 
camp being always full of nobles, who came from differ- 
ent provinces of France, the two people were, during 
some centuries, more intermingled together than any 
two distinct nations whom we meet with in history. 
But the fatal pretensions of Edward III. dissolved all 
these connexions, and left the seeds of great animosity 
in both countries, especially among the English. For it 
is remarkable, that this latter nation, though they were 
commonly the aggressors, and, by their success and situa- 
tion, were enabled to commit the most cruel injuries on 
the other, have always retained a stronger tincture of 
national antipathy ; nor is their hatred retaliated on them 
to an equal degree by the French. That country lies in 
the middle of Europe, has been successively engaged in 
hostilities with all its neighbours, the popular prejudices 
have been diverted into many channels, and, among a 
people of softer manners, they never rose to a great 
height against any particular nation. 

Philip made great preparations against the attack from 
the English, and such as seemed more than sufficient to 
secure him from the danger. Besides the concurrence 
of all the nobility in his own populous and warlike king- 



EDWARD III. 139 

dom, his foreign alliances were both more cordial and CHAP. 
more powerful than those which were formed by his an-,_ x j'^ 
tagonist. The pope, who at this time lived at Avignon, 1338 
was dependent on France, and being disgusted at the 
connexions between Edward and Lewis of Bavaria, whom 
he had excommunicated, he embraced with zeal and sin- 
cerity the cause of the French monarch. The King of 
Navarre, the Duke of Britany, the Count of Bar, were 
in the same interests ; and on the side of Germany, the 
King of Bohemia, the Palatine, the Dukes of Lorraine 
and Austria, the Bishop of Liege, the Counts of Deux- 
ponts, Vaudemont, and Geneva. The allies of Edward 
were in themselves weaker ; and having no object but 
his money, which began to be exhausted, they were slow 
in their motions and irresolute in their measures. The 1339. 
Duke of Brabant, the most powerful among them, seemed 
even inclined to withdraw himself wholly from the alli- 
ance ; and the king was necessitated, both to give the 
Brabanters new privileges in trade, and to contract his 
son Edward with the daughter of that prince, ere he 
could bring him to fulfil his engagements. The summer 
was wasted in conferences and negotiations before Ed- 
ward could take the field ; and he was obliged, in order 
to allure his German allies into his measures, to pretend 
that the first attack should be made upon Cambray, a 
city of the empire which had been garrisoned by Philip u . 
But finding, upon trial, the difficulty of the enterprise, 
he conducted them towards the frontiers of France ; and 
he there saw, by a sensible proof, the vanity of his expec- 
tations ; the Count of Namur, and even the Count of 
Hainault, his brother-in-law, (for the old count was dead,) 
refused to commence hostilities against their liege lord, 
and retired with their troops w . So little account did they 
make of Edward's pretensions to the crown of France ! 

The king, however, entered the enemy's country, and War with 
encamped on the fields of Vironfosse, near Capelle, with Fl 
an army of near fifty thousand men, composed almost 
entirely of foreigners : Philip approached him with an 
army of near double the force, composed chiefly of native 
subjects ; and it was daily expected that a battle would 

u Froissart, liv. i. chap. 39. Heming. p. 305. 
w Froissart, liv. i. chap. 39. 




140 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ensue. But the English monarch was averse to engage 
against so great a superiority : the French thought it 
sufficient if he eluded the attacks of his enemy, without 
running any unnecessary hazard. The two armies faced 
each other for some days : mutual defiances were sent ; 
and Edward, at last, retired into Flanders, and disbanded 
his army x . 

Such was tlie fruitless and almost ridiculous conclusion 
of Edward's mighty preparations ; and as his measures 
were the most prudent that could be embraced in his 
situation, he might learn from experience in what a hope- 
less enterprise he was engaged. His expenses, though 
they had led to no end, had been consuming and destruc- 
tive : he had contracted near three hundred thousand 
pounds of debt 7 ; he had anticipated all his revenue ; he 
had pawned every thing of value which belonged either 
to himself or his queen ; he was obliged, in some measure, 
even to pawn himself to his creditors, by not sailing to 
England till he obtained their permission, and by pro- 
mising, on his word of honour, to return in person, if he 
did not remit their money. 

But he was a prince of too much spirit to be discou- 
raged by the first difficulties of an undertaking : and he 
was anxious to retrieve his honour by more successful and 
more gallant enterprises. For this purpose he had, during 
the course of the campaign, sent orders to summon a 
Parliament by his son Edward, whom he had left with 
the title of guardian, and to demand some supply in his 
urgent necessities. The barons seemed inclined to grant 
his request ; but the knights, who often, at this time, 
acted as a separate body from the burgesses, made some 
scruple of taxing their constituents without their consent ; 
and they desired the guardian to summon a new Parlia- 
ment, which might be properly empowered for that pur- 
pose. The situation of the king and Parliament was, for 
the time, nearly similar to that which they constantly 
fell into about the beginning of the last century; and 
similar consequences began visibly to appear. The king, 
sensible of the frequent demands which he should be 
obliged to make on his people, had been anxious to en- 

* Froissart, liv. i. chap. 41, 42, 43. Heming. p. 307. Walsing. p. 143. 
y Cotton's Abridg. p. 17. 



EDWARD III. 

sure to his friends a seat in the House of Commons, and, CHAP. 
at his instigation, the sheriffs and other placemen had 
made interest to be elected into that assembly; an abuse 
which the knights desired the king to correct by the 
tenour of his writ of summons, and which was accordingly 
remedied. On the other hand, the knights had profes- 
sedly annexed conditions to their intended grant, and 
required a considerable retrenchment of the royal pre- 
rogatives, particularly with regard to purveyance, and the 
levying of the ancient feudal aids for knighting the king's 
eldest son, and marrying his eldest daughter. The new 
Parliament, called by the guardian, retained the same 
free spirit ; and though they offered a large supply of 
thirty thousand sacks of wool, no business was concluded, 
because the conditions which they annexed appeared too 
high to be compensated by a temporary concession. But 
when Edward himself came over to England, he sum- 
moned another Parliament, and he had the interest to 
procure a supply on more moderate terms. A confir- 
mation of the two charters, and of the privileges of 
boroughs, a pardon for old debts and trespasses, and a 
remedy for some abuses in the execution of common law, 
were the chief conditions insisted on ; and the king, in 
return for his concessions on these heads, obtained from 
the barons and knights an unusual grant for two years 
of the ninth sheaf, lamb, and fleece on their estates ; and 
from the burgesses a ninth of their moveables at their 
true value. The whole Parliament also granted a duty 
of forty shillings on each sack of wool exported, on each 
three hundred woolfells, and on each last of leather for 
the same term of years ; but, dreading the arbitrary spirit 
of the crown, they expressly declared, that this grant was 
to continue no longer, and was not to be drawn into pre- 
cedent. Being soon after sensible that this supply, though 
considerable, and very unusual in that age, would come 
in slowly, and would not answer the king's urgent neces- 
sities, proceeding both from his debts and his preparations 
for war ; they agreed, that twenty thousand sacks of wool 
should immediately be granted him, and their value be 
deducted from the ninths which were afterwards to be 
levied. 

But there appeared at this time another -jealousy in 



142 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the Parliament, which was very reasonable, and was 
xv> founded on a sentiment that ought to have engaged 
" them rather to check than support the king in all those 
ambitious projects, so little likely to prove successful, 
and so dangerous to the nation if they did. Edward, 
who, before the commencement of the former campaign, 
had, in several commissions, assumed the title of King 
of France, now more openly in all public deeds gave 
himself that appellation, and always quartered the arms 
of France with those of England in his seals and ensigns. 
The Parliament thought proper to obviate the conse- 
quences of this measure, and to declare, that they owed 
him no obedience as King of France, and that the two 
kingdoms must for ever remain distinct and independent 2 . 
They undoubtedly foresaw that France, if subdued, 
would in the end prove the seat of government ; and 
they deemed this previous protestation necessary, in 
order to prevent their becoming a province to that 
monarchy. A frail security, if the event had really 
taken place ! 

1340. As Philip was apprised, from the preparations which 
were making both in England and the Low Countries, 
that he must expect another invasion from Edward, he 
fitted out a great fleet of four hundred vessels, manned 
with forty thousand men; and he stationed them off 
Sluise, with a view of intercepting the king in his pas- 
Naval sage. The English navy was much inferior in number, 
i3tfi 0r june. consisting only of two hundred and forty sail ; but whe- 
ther it were by the superior abilities of Edward, or the 
greater dexterity of his seamen, they gained the wind of 
the enemy, and had the sun in their backs ; and with 
these advantages began the action. The battle was fierce 
and bloody : the English archers, whose force and ad- 
dress were now much celebrated, galled the French on 
their approach : and when the ships grappled together, 
and the contest became more steady and furious, the 
example of the king, and of so many gallant nobles who 
accompanied him, animated to such a degree the seamen 
and soldiery, that they maintained every where a su- 
perior^ty over the enemy. The French also had been 
guilty of some imprudence in taking their station so 

z 14 Edward III. 



EDWARD III. 143 

near the coast of Flanders, and choosing that place for the CHAP. 
scene of action. The Flemings, descrying the battle, v _ x j'_, 
hurried out of their harbours, and brought a reinforce- ^^"" 
ment to the English; which, coming unexpectedly, had 
a greater effect than in proportion to its power and num- 
bers. Two hundred and thirty French ships were taken : 
thirty thousand Frenchmen were killed, with two of their 
admirals : the loss of the English was inconsiderable, 
compared to the greatness and importance of the victory a . 
None of Philip's courtiers, it is said, dared to inform him 
of the event ; till his fool or jester gave him a hint by 
which he discovered the loss that he had sustained b . 

The lustre of this great success increased the king's 
authority among his allies, who assembled their forces 
with expedition, and joined the English army. Edward 
marched to the frontiers of France at the head of above 
one hundred thousand men, consisting chiefly of fo- 
reigners, a more numerous army than either before or 
since has ever been commanded by any king of England 6 . 
At the same time, the Flemings, to the number of fifty 
thousand men, marched out, under the command of Ko- 
bert of Artois, and laid siege to St. Omer; but this 
tumultuary army, composed entirely of tradesmen in- 
experienced in war, was routed by a sally of the garrison, 
and, notwithstanding the abilities of their leader, was 
thrown into such a panic, that they were instantly dis- 
persed, and never more appeared in the field. The en- 
terprises of Edward, though not attended with so in- 
glorious an issue, proved equally vain and fruitless. The 
King of France had assembled an army more numerous 
than the English ; was accompanied by all the chief no- 
bility of his kingdom ; was attended by many foreign 
princes, and even by three monarchs, the Kings of Bo- 
hemia, Scotland, and Navarre d ; yet he still adhered to 
the prudent resolution of putting nothing to hazard, and 
after throwing strong garrisons into all the frontier towns, 
he retired backwards, persuaded that the enemy, having 
wasted their force in some tedious and unsuccessful en- 
terprise, would afford him an easy victory. 

tt Froissart, liv. i. chap. 51. Avesbury, p. 56. Homing, p. 321. 
b Walsing. p. 148. c Rymer, vol. v. p. 197. 

d Froissart, liv. i. chap. 57. ' 



144 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Tournay was at that time one of the most consider- 
xv - able cities of Flanders, containing above sixty thousand 
inhabitants of all ages, who were affectionate to the 
French government; and as the secret of Edward's de- 
sign had not been strictly kept, Philip learned that the 
English, in order to gratify their Flemish allies, had in- 
tended to open the campaign with the siege of this place : 
he took care, therefore, to supply it with a garrison of 
fourteen thousand men, commanded by the bravest no- 
bility of France ; and he reasonably expected that these 
forces, joined to the inhabitants, would be able to defend 
the city against all the efforts of the enemy. Accord- 
ingly Edward, when he commenced the siege, about the 
end of July, found every where an obstinate resistance : 
the valour of one side was encountered with equal valour 
by the other ; every assault was repulsed, and proved 
unsuccessful ; and the king was at last obliged to turn 
the siege into a blockade, in hopes that the great num- 
bers of the garrison and citizens, which had enabled them 
to defend themselves against his attacks, would but ex- 
pose them to be the more easily reduced by famine 6 . The 
Count of Eu, who commanded in Tournay, as soon as he 
perceived that the English had formed this plan of opera- 
tions, endeavoured to save his provisions, by expelling 
all the useless mouths ; and the Duke of Brabant, who 
wished no success to Edward's enterprises, gave every 
one a free passage through his quarters. 

After the siege had continued ten weeks, the city was 
reduced to distress; and Philip, recalling all his scat- 
tered garrisons, advanced towards the English camp, at 
the head of a mighty army, with an intention of still 
avoiding any decisive action, but of seeking some op- 
portunity for throwing relief into the place. Here Ed- 
ward, irritated with the small progress he had hitherto 
made, and with the disagreeable prospect that lay before 
him, sent Philip a defiance by a herald ; and challenged 
him to decide their claims for the crown of France, 
either by single combat, or by an action of a hundred 
against a hundred, or by a general engagement. But 
Philip replied, that Edward, having done homage to him 
for the duchy of Guienne, and having solemnly acknow- 

e Froissart, liv. i. chap. 54. 



EDWARD III. 145 

ledged him for his superior, it by no means became him CHAP. 

to send a defiance to his liege lord and sovereign : v _, 

that he was confident, notwithstanding all Edward's 1340 
preparations, and his conjunction with the rebellious 
Flemings, he himself should soon be able to chase him 
from the frontiers of France : that as the hostilities from 
England had prevented him from executing his purposed 
crusade against the infidels, he trusted in the assistance 
of the Almighty, who would reward his pious intentions, 
and punish the aggressor, whose ill-grounded claims had 
rendered them abortive : that Edward proposed a duel 
on very unequal terms, and offered to hazard only his 
own person against both the kingdom of France and the 
person of the king ; but that if he would increase the 
stake, and put also the kingdom of England on the issue 
of the duel, he would, notwithstanding that the terms 
would still be. unequal, very willingly accept of the chal- 
lenge 1 . It was easy to see that these mutual bravadoes 
were intended only to dazzle the populace, and that the 
two kings were too wise to think of executing their pre- 
tended purpose. 

While the French and English armies lay in this situ- 
ation, and a general action was every day expected, Jane, 
Countess Dowager of Hainault, interposed with her good 
offices, and endeavoured to conciliate peace between 
the contending monarchs, and to prevent any farther 
effusion of blood. This princess was mother-in-law to 
Edward, and sister to Philip; and though she had taken 
the vows in a convent, and had renounced the world, she 
left her retreat on this occasion, and employed all her 
pious efforts to allay those animosities which had taken 
place between persons so nearly related to her and to each 
other. As Philip had no material claims on his antago- 
nist, she found that he hearkened willingly to the pro- 
posals; and even the haughty and ambitious Edward, 
convinced of his fruitless attempt, was not averse to her 
negotiation. He was sensible, from experience, that he 
had engaged in an enterprise which far exceeded his 
force ; and that the power of England was never likely 
to prevail over that of a superior kingdom, firmly united 
under an able and prudent monarch. He discovered that 

f Du Tillct, Recueil cle Traitez, &c. Homing, p. 325, 326. Walsing. p. 149. 
VOL. II. 13 



146 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, all the allies whom he could gain by negotation were at 
XV- bottom averse to his enterprise ; and though they might 
^~~^Q second it to a certain length, would immediately detach 
themselves, and oppose its final accomplishment, if ever 
they could be brought to think that there was seriously 
any danger of it. He even saw that their chief purpose 
was to obtain money from him ; and as his supplies from 
England came in very slowly, and had much disappointed 
his expectations, he perceived their growing indifference 
in his cause, and their desire of embracing all plausible 
terms of accommodation. Convinced at last that an 
undertaking must be imprudent, which could only be 
supported by means so unequal to the end, he concluded 
3d Sept. a truce, which left both parties in possession of their 
present acquisitions, and stopped all farther hostilities 
on the side of the Low Countries, Guienne, and Scot- 
land, till midsummer next g . A negotiation was soon 
after opened at Arras, under the mediation of the pope's 
legates ; and the truce was attempted to be converted 
into a solid peace. Edward here required that Philip 
should free Guienne from all claims of superiority, and 
entirely withdraw his protection from Scotland ; but as 
he seemed not any wise entitled to make such high de- 
mands, either from his past successes or future prospects, 
they were totally rejected by Philip, who agreed only 
to a prolongation of the truce. 

The King of France soon after detached the Emperor 
Lewis from the alliance of England, and engaged him to 
revoke the title of Imperial Vicar, which he had conferred 
on Edward h . The king's other allies on the frontiers of 
France, disappointed in their hopes, gradually withdrew 
from the confederacy. And Edward, himself, harassed 
by his numerous and importunate creditors, was obliged 
to make his escape by stealth into England. 
Domestic The unusual tax of a ninth sheaf, lamb, and fleece, 
ance?" i m P ose d by Parliament, together with the great want of 
money, and still more of credit, in England, had rendered 
the remittances to Flanders extremely backward ; nor 
could it be expected that any expeditious method of col- 
lecting an imposition which was so new in itself, and 



g Froissart, liv. i. chap. 64. Avesbury, p. 65. 

h Heming. p. 352. Ypod. Neust. p. 514. Knyghton, p. 



2580. 



EDWARD III. 147 

which yielded only a gradual produce, could possibly be CHAP. 
contrived by the king or his ministers ; and though the Lj X J'_^ 
Parliament, foreseeing the inconvenience, had granted, 1340 
as a present resource, twenty thousand sacks of wool, the 
only English goods that bore a sure price in foreign mar- 
kets, and were the next to ready money ; it was impossible 
but the getting possession of such a bulky commodity, 
the gathering of it from different parts of the kingdom, 
and the disposing of it abroad, must take up more time 
than the urgency of the king's affairs would permit, and 
must occasion all the disappointments complained of 
during the course of the campaign. But though nothing 
had happened which Edward might not reasonably have 
foreseen, he was so irritated with the unfortunate issue 
of his military operations, and so much vexed and affronted 
by his foreign creditors, that he was determined to throw 
the blame somewhere off himself, and he came in very 
bad humour into England. He discovered his peevish 
disposition by the first act which he performed after his 
arrival : as he landed unexpectedly, he found the Tower 
negligently guarded ; and he immediately committed to 
prison the constable, and all others who had the charge 
of that fortress, and treated them with unusual rigour 1 . 
His vengeance fell next on the officers of the revenue, 
the sheriffs, the collectors of the taxes, the undertakers 
of all kinds ; and besides dismissing all of them from 
their employments, he appointed commissioners to inquire 
into their conduct ; and these men, in order to gratify 
the king's humour, were sure not to find any person 
innocent who came before them k . Sir John St. Paul, 
keeper of the privy seal, Sir John Stonore, chief justice, 
Andrew Aubrey, mayor of London, were displaced and 
imprisoned ; as were also the Bishop of Chichester, chan- 
cellor, and the Bishop of Lichfield, treasurer. Stratford, 
Archbishop of Canterbury, to whom the charge of col- 
lecting the new taxes had been chiefly intrusted, fell 
likewise under the king's displeasure ; but being absent 
at the time of Edward's arrival, he escaped feeling the 
immediate effects of it. 

There were strong reasons which might discourage the 



1 Ypod. Neust. p. 513. 

k Avesbury, p. 70. Homing, p. 326. Walsing. p. 150. 



148 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, kings of England, in those ages, from bestowing the chief 
^_^^'_j offices of the crown on prelates and other ecclesiastical 
^^ persons. These men had so intrenched themselves in 
privileges and immunities, and so openly challenged an 
exemption from all secular jurisdiction, that no civil 
penalty could be inflicted on them for any malversation 
in office ; and as even treason itself was declared to be 
no canonical offence, nor was allowed to be a sufficient 
reason for deprivation or other spiritual censures, that 
order of men had ensured to themselves an almost total 
impunity, and were not bound by any political law or 
statute. But, on the other hand, there were many 
peculiar causes which favoured their promotion. Besides 
that they possessed almost all the learning of the age, 
and were best qualified for civil employments, the pre- 
lates enjoyed equal dignity with the greatest barons, 
and gave weight, by their personal authority, to the 
powers intrusted with them ; while, at the same time, 
they did not endanger the crown, by accumulating wealth 
or influence in their families, and were restrained, by the 
decency of their character, from that open rapine and 
violence so often practised by the nobles. These motives 
had induced Edward, as well as many of his predecessors, 
to intrust the chief departments of government in the 
hands of ecclesiastics, at the hazard of seeing them disown 
his authority as soon as it was turned against them. 
i34i. This, was the case with Archbishop Stratford. That 
prelate, informed of Edward's indignation against him, 
prepared himself for the storm ; and not content with 
standing upon the defensive, he resolved, by beginning 
the attack, to show the king that he knew the privileges 
of his character, and had courage to maintain them. 
He issued a general sentence of excommunication against 
all who, on any pretext, exercised violence on the person 
or goods of clergymen ; who infringed those privileges 
secured by the great charter, and by ecclesiastical canons'; 
or who accused a prelate of treason, or any other crime, 
in order to bring him under the king's displeasure 1 . 
Even Edward had reason to think himself struck at by 
this sentence : both on account of the imprisonment of 
the two bishops, and that of other clergymen concerned 

l Heming. p. 339. Ang. Sacra, vol. i. p. 21. 22. Walsingham, p. 153. 



EDWARD III. 149 

in levying the taxes, and on account of his seizing their CHAP. 
lands and moveables, that he might make them answer- 
able for any balance which remained in their hands. ^^^ 
The clergy, with the primate at their head, were now 
formed into a regular combination against the king ; and 
many calumnies were spread against him, in order to de- 
prive him of the confidence and affections of his people. 
It was pretended that he meant to recall the general 
pardon, and the remission which he had granted of old 
debts, and to impose new and arbitrary taxes without 
consent of Parliament. The archbishop went so far, in 
a letter to the king himself, as to tell him, that there 
were two powers by which the world was governed, the 
holy pontifical apostolic dignity, and the royal subordinate 
authority : that, of these two powers, the clerical was 
evidently the supreme ; since the priests were to answer 
at the tribunal of the Divine judgment for the conduct 
of kings themselves : that the clergy were the spiritual 
fathers of all the faithful, and, amongst others, of kings 
and princes ; and were entitled, by a heavenly charter, 
to direct their wills and actions, and to censure their 
transgressions : and that prelates had heretofore cited 
emperors before their tribunal, had sitten in judgment on 
their life and behaviour, and had anathematized them for 
their obstinate offences m . These topics were not well 
calculated to appease Edward's indignation ; and when 
he called a Parliament, he sent not to the primate, as to 
the other peers, a summons to attend it. Stratford was 
not discouraged at this mark of neglect or anger : he 
appeared before the gates, arrayed in his pontifical robes, 
holding the crosier in his hand, and accompanied by a 
pompous train of priests and prelates ; and he required 
admittance as the first and highest peer in the realm. 
During two days the king rejected his application ; but, 
sensible either that this affair might be attended with 
dangerous consequences, or that in his impatience he had 
groundlessly accused the primate of malversation in his 
office, which seems really to have been the case, he at 
last permitted him to take his seat, and was reconciled to 
him n . 

Edward now found himself in a bad situation both with 

m Anglia Sacra, vol. i. p. 27. n Ibid. p. 38, 39, 40, 41. 



150 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, his own people and with foreign states ; and it required 
xv * all his genius and capacity to extricate himself from such 

^^^ multiplied difficulties and embarrassments. His unjust 
and exorbitant claims on France and Scotland had en- 
gaged him in an implacable war with these two king- 
doms, his nearest neighbours : he had lost almost all his 
foreign alliances by his irregular payments : he was deeply 
involved in debts, for which he owed a consuming interest : 
his military operations had vanished into smoke ; and, 
except his naval victory, none of them had been attended 
even with glory or renown, either to himself or to the 
nation : the animosity between him and the clergy was 
open and declared : the people were discontented on 
account of many arbitrary measures in which he had 
been engaged : and what was more dangerous, the nobi- 
lity, taking advantage of his present necessities, were 
determined to retrench his power, and by encroaching on 
the ancient prerogatives of the crown, to acquire to them- 
selves independence and authority. But the aspiring 
genius of Edward, which had so far transported him be- 
yond the bounds of discretion, proved at last sufficient 
to reinstate him in his former authority, and, finally, to 
render his reign the most triumphant that is to be met 
with in English story ; though for the present he was 
obliged, with some loss of honour, to yield to the current 
which bore so strongly against him. 

The Parliament framed an act which was likely to 
produce considerable innovations in the government. 
They premised, that, whereas the great charter had, to 
the manifest peril and slander of the king, and damage 
of his people, been violated in many points, particularly 
by the imprisonment of free men, and the seizure of 
their goods, without suit, indictment, or trial, it was 
necessary to confirm it anew, and to oblige all the chief 
officers of the law, together with the steward and cham- 
berlain of the household, the keeper of the privy seal, 
the comptroller and treasurer of the wardrobe, and those 
who were intrusted with the education of the young 
prince, to swear to the regular observance of it. They 
also remarked, that the peers of the realm had formerly 
been arrested and imprisoned, and dispossessed of their 
temporalities and lands, and even some of them put to 



EDWARD III. 151 

death, without judgment or trial; and they therefore CHAP. 
enacted, that such violences should henceforth cease, and xv> 
no peer be punished but by the award of his peers in 1341 
Parliament. They required that, whenever any of the 
great offices above mentioned became vacant, the king 
should fill it by the advice of his council, and the consent 
of such barons as should at that time be found to reside 
in the neighbourhood of the court; and they enacted 
that, on the third day of every session, the king should 
Jennie into his own hand all these offices, except those 
of justices of the two benches, and the barons of ex- 
chequer; that the ministers should for the time be re- 
duced to private persons ; that they should in that con- 
dition answer before Parliament to any accusation brought 
against them; and that, if they were found anywise 
guilty, they should finally be dispossessed of their offices, 
and more able persons be substituted in their place . 
By these last regulations the barons approached as near 
as they durst to those restrictions which had formerly 
been imposed on Henry III. and Edward II., and which, 
from the dangerous consequences attending them, had 
become so generally odious, that they did not expect to 
have either the concurrence of the people in demand- 
ing them, or the assent of the present king in granting 
them. 

In return for these important concessions, the Par- 
liament offered the king a grant of twenty thousand 
sacks of wool ; and his wants were so urgent, from the 
clamours of his creditors, and the demands of his foreign 
allies, that he was obliged to accept of the supply on these 
hard conditions. He ratified this statute in full Par- 
liament; but he secretly entered a protest of such a 
nature as was sufficient, one should imagine, to destroy 
all future trust and confidence with his people ; he de- 
clared that, as soon as his convenience permitted, he 
would, from his own authority, revoke what had been 
extorted from him p . Accordingly, he was no sooner 
possessed of the parliamentary supply, than he issued an 

15 Edward III. 

- P Statutes at Large, 15 Edw. III. That this protest of the king's was secret, 
appears evidently, since otherwise it would have been ridiculous in the Parliament 
to have accepted of his assent ; besides, the king owns that he dissembled, which 
would not have ben the case had his protest been public. 



HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, edict, which contains many extraordinary positions and 
XV- pretensions. He first asserts, that that statute had been 
^7^ enacted contrary to law ; as if a free legislative body could 
ever do any thing illegal. He next affirms, that as it was 
hurtful to the prerogatives of the crown, which he had 
sworn to defend, he had only dissembled when he seemed 
to ratify it, but that he had never in his own breast 
given his assent to it. He does not pretend that either 
he or the Parliament lay under force ; but only that some 
inconvenience would have ensued, had he not seemingly 
affixed his sanction to that pretended statute. He there- 
fore, with the advice of his council, and of some earls and 
barons, abrogates and annuls it ; and though he professes 
himself willing and determined to observe such articles 
of it as were formerly law, he declares it to have thence- 
forth no force or authority q . The Parliaments that were 
afterwards assembled took no notice of this arbitrary 
exertion of royal power, which, by a parity of reason, left 
all their laws at the mercy of the king ; and, during the 
course of two years, Edward had so far re-established his 
influence, and freed himself from his present necessities, 
that he then obtained from his Parliament a legal repeal 
of the obnoxious statute r . This transaction certainly 
contains remarkable circumstances, which discover the 
manners and sentiments of the age ; and may prove what 
inaccurate work might be expected from such rude hands, 
when employed in legislation, and in rearing the delicate 
fabric of laws and a constitution. 

But though Edward had happily recovered his autho- 
rity at home, which had been impaired by the events of 
the French war, he had undergone so many mortifica- 
tions from that attempt, and saw so little prospect of 
success, that he would probably have dropped his claim, 
had not a revolution in Britany opened to him more 
promising views, and given his enterprising genius a full 
opportunity of displaying itself. 

, John III, Duke of Britany, had, during some years, 
found himself declining through age and infirmities ; and 
having no issue, he was solicitous to prevent those dis- 
orders to which, on the event of his demise, a disputed 
succession might expose his subjects. His younger 

<i Statutes at Large, 15 Echv. III. r Cotton's Abridg. p. 38, 39. 



EDWARD III. 153 

brother, the Count of Penthievre, had left only one CHAP. 
daughter, whom the duke deemed his heir ; and as his xv * 
family had inherited the duchy by a female succession, ^^7^ 
he thought her title preferable to that of the Count of 
Mountfort, who, being his brother by a second marriage, 
was the male heir of that principality 8 . He accordingly 
purposed to bestow his niece in marriage on some per- 
son who might be able to defend her rights ; and he cast 
his eye on Charles of Blois, nephew of the King of 
France, by his mother, Margaret of Valois, sister to that 
monarch. But as he both loved his subjects, and was 
beloved by them, he determined not to take this impor- 
tant step without their approbation ; and having assem- 
bled the states of Britany, he represented to them the 
advantages of that alliance, and the prospect which it 
gave of an entire settlement of the succession. The 
Bretons willingly concurred in his choice : the marriage 
was concluded : all his vassals, and among the rest the 
Count of Mountfort, swore fealty to Charles and to his 
consort as to their future sovereigns ; and every danger 
of civil commotions seemed to be obviated, as far as 
human prudence could provide a remedy against them. 

But, on the death of this good prince, the ambition of Renewal of 
the Count of Mountfort broke through all these regula- * 
tions, and kindled a war, not only dangerous to Britany, 
but to a great part of Europe. While Charles of Blois 
was soliciting at the court of France the investiture of 
the duchy, Mountfort was active in acquiring immediate 
possession of it ; and by force or intrigue he made him- 
self master of Rennes, Nantz, Brest, Hennebonne, and 
all the most important fortresses, and engaged many con- 
siderable barons to acknowledge his authority*. Sensible 
that he could expect no favour from Philip, he made a 
voyage to England, on pretence of soliciting his claim to 
the earldom of Richmond, which had devolved to him by 
his brother's death ; and there, offering to do homage to 
Edward as King of France, for the duchy of Britany, he 
proposed a strict alliance for the support of their mutual 
pretensions. Edward saw immediately the advantages 
attending this treaty : Mountfort, an active and valiant 

3 Froissart, liv. i. chap. 64. * Ibid. chap. 65, 66, 67, 68. 



154 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, prince, closely united to him by interest, opened at once 
xv< an entrance into the heart of France, and afforded him 
^"Tj^i much more flattering views than his allies on the side of 
Germany and the Low Countries, who had no sincere 
attachment to his cause, and whose progress was also 
obstructed by those numerous fortifications which had been 
raised on that frontier. Robert of Artois was zealous in 
enforcing these considerations: the ambitious spirit of 
Edward was little disposed to sit down under those re- 
pulses which he had received, and which, he thought, had 
so much impaired his reputation ; and it required a very 
short negotiation to conclude a treaty of alliance between 
two men, who, though their pleas with regard to the 
preference of male or female succession were directly 
opposite, were intimately connected by their immediate 
interests". 

As this treaty was still a secret, Mountfort, on his re- 
turn, ventured to appear at Paris, in order to defend his 
cause before the court of peers ; but observing Philip and 
his judges to be prepossessed against his title, and dreading 
their intentions of arresting him, till he should restore 
what he had seized by violence, he suddenly made his 
escape ; and war immediately commenced between him 
and Charles of Blois w . Philip sent his eldest son, the 
Duke of Normandy, with a powerful army, to the assist- 
ance of the latter; and Mountfort, unable to keep the 
field against his rival, remained in the city of Nantz, 
where he was besieged. The city was taken by the 
treachery of the inhabitants; Mountfort fell into the 
hands of his enemies; was conducted as a prisoner to 
Paris ; and was shut up in the tower of the Louvre x . 
1342. This event seemed to put an end to the pretensions of 
the Count of Mountfort; but his affairs were immediately 
retrieved by an unexpected incident, which inspired new 
life and vigour into his party. Jane of Flanders, Coun- 
tess of Mountfort, the most extraordinary woman of the 
age, was roused by the captivity of her husband, from 
those domestic cares to which she had hitherto limited 
her genius ; and she courageously undertook to support 
the falling fortunes of her family. No sooner did she 

i Froissart, liv. i. chap. 69. w ibid. chap. 70, 71. * Ibid. chap. 73. 



EDWARD III. 155 

receive the fatal intelligence, than she assembled the CHAP. 
inhabitants of Rennes, where she then resided ; and car-^ xy ^ 
rying her infant son in her arms, deplored to them the 1342 
calamity of their sovereign. She recommended to their 
care the illustrious orphan, the sole male remaining of 
their ancient princes, who had governed them with such 
indulgence and lenity, and to whom they had ever pro- 
fessed the most zealous attachment. She declared her- 
self willing to run all hazards with them in so just a 
cause ; discovered the resources which still remained in 
the alliance of England ; and entreated them to make 
one effort against an usurper, who, being imposed on them 
by the arms of France, would in return make a sacrifice 
to his protector of the ancient liberties of Britany. The 
audience, moved by the affecting appearance, and inspi- 
rited by the noble conduct of the princess, vowed to live 
and die with her in defending the rights of her family : 
all the other fortresses of Britany embraced the same 
resolution : the countess went from place to place, encou- 
raging the garrisons, providing them with every thing 
necessary for subsistence, and concerting the proper plans 
of defence ; and after she had put the whole province in a 
good posture, she shut herself up in Hennebonne, where 
she waited with impatience the arrival of those succours 
which Edward had promised her. Meanwhile she sent 
over her son to England, that she might both put him in 
a place of safety, and engage the king more strongly, by 
such a pledge, to embrace with zeal the interests of her 
family. 

Charles of Blois, anxious to make himself master of so 
important a fortress as Hennebonne, and still more to 
take the countess prisoner, from whose vigour and capa- 
city all the difficulties to his succession in Britany now 
proceeded, sat down before the place with a great army, 
composed of French, Spaniards, Genoese, and some Bre- 
tons ; and he conducted the attack with indefatigable 
industry 7 . The defence was no less vigorous ; the be- 
siegers were repulsed in every assault : frequent sallies 
were made with success by the garrison ; and the coun- 
tess herself being the most forward in all military opera- 
tions, every one was ashamed not to exert himself to 

y Froissart, liv. i. chap. 81. 



156 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the utmost in this desperate situation. One day she 
xv< perceived that the besiegers, entirely occupied in an at- 
^J2t2^ tack, had neglected a distant quarter of their camp ; and 
she immediately sallied forth at the head of a body of 
two hundred cavalry, threw them into confusion, did 
great execution upon them, and set fire to their tents, 
baggage, and magazines ; but when she was preparing to 
return, she found that she was intercepted, and that a 
considerable body of the enemy had thrown themselves 
between her and the gates. She instantly took her re- 
solution : she ordered her men to disband, and to make 
the best of their way by flight to Brest : she met them 
at the appointed place of rendezvous, collected another 
body of five hundred horse, returned to Hennebonne, 
broke unexpectedly through the enemy's camp, and was 
received with shouts and acclamations by the garrison, 
who, encouraged by this reinforcement, and by so rare 
an example of female valour, determined to defend them- 
selves to the last extremity. 

The reiterated attacks, however, of the besiegers had 
at length made several breaches in the walls ; and it was 
apprehended that a general assault, which was every hour 
expected, would overpower the garrison, diminished in 
numbers, and extremely weakened with watching and 
fatigue. It became necessary to treat of a capitulation ; 
and the Bishop of Leon was already engaged for that 
purpose, in a conference with Charles of Blois ; when 
the countess, who had mounted to a high tower, and was 
looking towards the sea with great impatience, descried 
some sails at a distance. She immediately exclaimed, 
Behold the succours ! the English succours ! No capitu- 
lation 2 ' ! This fleet had on board a body of heavy-armed 
cavalry, and six thousand archers, whom Edward had 
prepared for the relief of Hennebonne, but who had been 
long detained by contrary winds. They entered the 
harbour under the command of Sir Walter Manny/one 
of the bravest captains of England ; and having inspired 
fresh courage into the garrison, immediately sallied forth, 
beat the besiegers from all their posts, and obliged them 
to decamp. 

But notwithstanding this success, the Countess of 

z Froissart, liv. i. chap. 81. 



EDWARD III. 157 

Mountfort found that her party, overpowered by num- CHAP. 
bers, was declining in every quarter ; and she went over,^ 
to solicit more effectual succours from the King of Eng- 1342 
land. Edward granted her a considerable reinforcement 
under Robert of Artois ; who embarked on board a fleet 
of forty-five ships, and sailed to Britany. He was met 
in his passage by the enemy ; an action ensued, where 
the countess behaved with her wonted valour, and 
charged the enemy sword in hand ; but the hostile fleets, 
after a sharp action, were separated by a storm, and the 
English arrived safely in Britany. The first exploit of 
Robert was the taking of Yannes, which he mastered by 
conduct and address a ; but he survived a very little time 
this prosperity. The Breton noblemen of the party of 
Charles assembled secretly in arms, attacked Vannes of 
a sudden, and carried the place ; chiefly by reason of a 
wound received by Robert, of which he soon after died 
at sea on his return to England b . 

After the death of this unfortunate prince, the chief 
author of all the calamities with which his country was 
overwhelmed for more than a century, Edward under- 
took, in person, the defence of the Countess of Mount- 
fort ; and as the last truce with France was now ex- 
pired, the war, which the English and French had hither- 
to carried on as allies to the competitors for Britany, 
was thenceforth conducted in the name and under the 
standard of the two monarchs. The king landed at 
Morbian near Yannes, with an army of twelve thousand 
men ; and, being master of the field, he endeavoured 
to give a lustre to his arms, by commencing at once 
three important sieges ; that of Yannes, of Rennes, and 
of Nantz. But by undertaking too much, he failed 
of success in all his enterprises. Even the siege of 
Yannes, which Edward in person conducted with vigour, 
advanced but slowly c ; and the French had all the 
leisure requisite for making preparations against him. 
The Duke of Normandy, eldest son of Philip, appeared 
in Britany, at the head of an army of thirty thousand 
infantry, and four thousand cavalry ; and Edward was now 
obliged to draw together all his forces, and to intrench 

a Froissart, liv. i. chap. 93. t> Ibid. chap. 94. 

c Ibid. chap. 95. 

VOL. II. 14 



158 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, himself strongly before Vannes, where the Duke of Nor- 
xv ' mandy soon after arrived, and in a manner invested the 
1342 besiegers. The garrison and the French camp were 
plentifully supplied with provisions ; while the English, 
who durst not make any attempt upon the place in the 
presence of a superior army, drew all their subsistence 
from England, exposed to the hazards of the sea, and 
sometimes to those which arose from the fleet of the 
1343. enemy. In this dangerous situation, Edward willingly 
hearkened to the mediation of the pope's legates, the 
Cardinals of Palestine and Frescati, who endeavoured to 
negotiate, if not a peace, at least a truce between the 
two kingdoms. A treaty was concluded for a cessation 
of arms during three years d ; and Edward had the abili- 
ties, notwithstanding his present dangerous situation, to 
procure to himself very equal and honourable terms. It 
was agreed that Yannes should be sequestered, during 
the truce, in the hands of the legates, to be disposed of 
afterwards as they pleased ; and though Edward knew 
the partiality of the court of Rome towards his antago- 
nists, he saved himself, by this device, from the dishonour 
of having undertaken a fruitless enterprise. It was also 
stipulated, that all prisoners should be released, that the 
places in Britany should remain in the hands of the pre- 
sent possessors, and that the allies on both sides should 
be comprehended in the truce 6 . Edward, soon after 
concluding this treaty, embarked with his army for 
England. 

The truce, though calculated for a long time, was of 
very short duration ; and each monarch endeavoured to 
throw on the other the blame of its infraction. Of course 
the historians of the two countries differ in their account 
of the matter. It seems probable, however, as is affirmed 
by the French writers, that Edward, in consenting to the 
truce, had no other view than to extricate himself from 
a perilous situation into which he had fallen, and was 
afterwards very careless in observing it. In all the me- 
morials which remain on this subject, he complains chiefly 
of the punishment inflicted on Oliver de Clisson, John 
de Montauban, and other Breton noblemen, who, he says, 
were partisans of the family of Mountfort, and conse- 

d Froissart, liv. i. chap. 99. Avesbury, p. 102. Heming. p. 359. 



EDWARD III. 159 

quently under the protection of England f . But it ap- CHAP. 

pears that, at the conclusion of the truce, those noblemen x ^j , 

had openly, by their declarations and actions, embraced 1343 
the cause of Charles of Blois g ; and if they had entered 
into any secret correspondence and engagements with 
Edward, they were traitors to their party, and were justly 
punishable by Philip and Charles for their breach of 
faith ; nor had Edward any ground of complaint against 
France for such severities. But when he laid these pre- 1344. 
tended injuries before the Parliament, whom he affected 
to consult on all occasions, that assembly entered into 
the quarrel, advised the king not to be amused by a 
fraudulent truce, and granted him supplies for the re- 
newal of the war : the counties were charged with a fif- 
teenth for two years, and the boroughs with a tenth : the 
clergy consented to give a tenth for three years. 

These supplies enabled the king to complete his mili- 
tary preparations ; and he sent his cousin Henry, Earl of 
Derby, son of the Earl of Lancaster, into Guienne, for 
the defence of that province 11 . This prince, the most 
accomplished in the English court, possessed, to a high 
degree, the virtues of justice and humanity, as well as 
those of valour and conduct 1 , and not content with pro- 
tecting and cherishing the province committed to his care, 
he made a successful invasion on the enemy. He attacked 
the Count of Lisle, the French general, at Bergerac, beat 
him from his intrenchments, and took the place. He re- 
duced a great part of Perigord, and continually advanced 
in his conquests, till the Count of Lisle, having collected 
an army of ten or twelve thousand men, sat down before 
Auberoche, in hopes of recovering that place, which had 1345 - 
fallen into the hands of the English. The Earl of Derby 
came upon him by surprise, with only a thousand cavalry, 
threw the French into disorder, pushed his advantages, 
and obtained a complete victory. Lisle himself, with 
many considerable nobles, was taken prisoner k . After 

f Rymer, vol. v. p. 453, 454. 459. 466. 496. Heming. p. 376. 

s Froissart, liv. i. chap. 96. p. 100. h Ibid. chap. 103. Aveshury, p. 121. 

1 It is reported of this prince, that having once, before the attack of the town, 
promised the soldiers the plunder, one private man happened to fall upon a great 
chest full of money, which he immediately brought to the earl, as thinking it too 
great for himself to keep possession of it. But Derby told him, that his promise 
did not depend on the greatness or smallness of the sum ; and ordered him to keep 
it all for his own use. k Froissart, liv. i. chap. 104. 



160 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, this important success, Derby made a rapid progress in 
^_ / subduing the French provinces. He took Monsegur, 

]345 Monsepat, Villefranche, Miremont, and Tonnins, with 
the fortress of Damassen. Aiguillon, a fortress deemed 
impregnable, fell into his hands from the cowardice of the 
governor. Angouleme was surrendered after a short siege. 
The only place where he met with considerable resistance 
was Reole, which, however, was at last reduced after a 
^ siege of above nine weeks 1 . He made an attempt on 
Blaye, but thought it more prudent to raise the siege, 
than waste his time before a place of small importance 111 . 

1346. The reason why Derby was permitted to make, with- 
out opposition, such progress on the side of Guienne, was 
the difficulties under which the French finances then 
laboured, and which had obliged Philip to lay on new 
impositions, particularly the duty on salt, to the great 
discontent, and almost mutiny, of his subjects. But after 
the court of France was supplied with money, great pre- 
parations were made ; and the Duke of Normandy, 
attended by the Duke of Burgundy and other great no- 
bility, led towards Guienne a powerful army, which the 
English could not think of resisting in the open field. 
The Earl of Derby stood on the defensive, and allowed 
the French to carry on, at leisure, the siege of Angou- 
leme, which was their first enterprise. John, Lord Nor- 
wich, the governor, after a brave and vigorous defence, 
found himself reduced to such extremities as obliged him 
to employ a stratagem in order to save his garrison, and 
to prevent his being reduced to surrender at discretion. 
He appeared on the walls, and desired a parley with the 
Duke of Normandy. The prince there told Norwich, 
that he supposed he intended to capitulate. " Not at 
all," replied the governor : " but as to-morrow is the feast 
of the Virgin, to whom I know that you, sir, as well as 
myself, bear a great devotion, I desire a cessation of arms 
for that day." The proposal was agreed to ; and Nor- 
wich, having ordered his forces to prepare all their bag- 
gage, marched out next day, and advanced towards the 
French camp. The besiegers, imagining they were to be 
attacked, ran to their arms ; but Norwich sent a mes- 
senger to the Duke, reminding him of his engagement. 

1 Froissart, liv. i. chap. 110. ibid. chap. 112. 



EDWARD III. 16] 

The duke, who piqued himself on faithfully keeping his CHAP. 
word, exclaimed, / see the governor has outwitted me : hit ,_ X J' 
let its be content with gaining the place : and the English 1346 
were allowed to pass through the camp unmolested 11 . 
After some other successes, the Duke of Normandy laid 
siege to Aiguillon ; and as the natural strength of the 
fortress, together with a brave garrison under the com- 
mand of the Earl of Pembroke and Sir Walter Manny, 
rendered it impossible to take the place by assault, he 
purposed, after making several fruitless attacks , to re- 
duce it by famine ; but, before he could finish this enter- 
prise, he was called to another quarter of the kingdom 
by one of the greatest disasters that ever befel the French 
monarchy 1 *. 

Edward, informed by the Earl of Derby of the great 
danger to which Guienne was exposed, had prepared a 
force with which he intended, in person, to bring it re- 
lief. He embarked at Southampton, on board a fleet of 
near a thousand sail of all dimensions, and carried with 
him, besides all the chief nobility of England, his eldest 
son, the Prince of Wales, now fifteen years of age. The 
winds proved long contrary 4 - and the king, in despair 
of arriving in time at Guienne, was at last persuaded by 
Geoffrey d'Harcourt to change the destination of his en- 
terprise. This nobleman was a Norman by birth, had 
long made a -considerable figure in the court of France, 
and was generally esteemed for his personal merit and 
his valour; but being disobliged and persecuted by Philip, 
he had fled into England ; had recommended himself to 
Edward, who was an excellent judge of men ; and had 
succeeded to Robert of Artois in the invidious office of 
exciting and assisting the king in every enterprise against 
his native country. He had long insisted that an expe- 
dition to Normandy promised, in the present circum- 
stances, more favourable success than one to Guienne ; 
that Edward w^ould find the northern provinces almost 
destitute of military force, which had been drawn to the 
south ; that they were full of flourishing cities, whose 
plunder would enrich the English ; that their cultivated 
fields, as yet unspoiled by war, would supply them with 

n Froissart, liv. i. chap. 120. o Ibid. chap. 121. 

P Ibid. chap. 134. i Avesbuiy, p. 123. 

14* 



162 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, plenty of provisions ; and that the neighbourhood of the 
xv * capital rendered every event of importance in those 

^^^ quarters 1 . These reasons, which had not before been duly 
weighed by Edward, began to make more impression, 
after the disappointments which he met with in his voy- 

i2th July, age to Guienne : he ordered his fleet to sail to Normandy, 
and safely disembarked his army at La Hogue. 

invasion This army, which, during the course of the ensuing 
France. cam p a ig n? was crowned with the most splendid success, 
consisted of four thousand men at arms, ten thousand 
archers, ten thousand Welsh infantry, and six thousand 
Irish. The Welsh and the Irish were light, disorderly troops, 
fitter for doing execution in a pursuit, or scouring the 
country, than for any stable action. The bow was always 
esteemed a frivolous weapon, where true military disci- 
pline was known, and regular bodies of well-armed foot 
maintained. The only solid force in this army were the 
men at arms ; and even these, being cavalry, were, on 
that account, much inferior, in the shock of battle, to 
good infantry : and as the whole were new levied troops, 
we -are led to entertain a very mean idea of the military 
force of those ages, which, being ignorant of every other 
art, had not properly cultivated the art of war itself, the 
sole object of general attention. 

The king created the Earl of Arundel constable of his 
army, and the Earls of Warwick and Harcourt mareschals : 
he bestowed the honour of knighthood on the Prince 
of Wales, and several of the young nobility, immediately 
upon his landing. After destroying all the ships in La 
Hogue, Barfleur, and Cherbourg, he spread his army over 
the whole country, and gave them an unbounded license 
of burning, spoiling, and plundering every place of 
which they became masters. The loose discipline then 
prevalent could not be much hurt by these disorderly 
practices ; and Edward took care to prevent any surprise, 
by giving orders to his troops, however they might dis- 
perse themselves in the daytime, always to quarter them- 
selves at night near the main body. In this manner, 
Montebourg, Carentan, St. Lo, Valognes, and other places 
in the Cotentin, were pillaged without resistance ; and 
an universal consternation was spread over the province 8 . 

r Froissart, liv. i. chap. 121. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 122. 



EDWARD III. 1(33 

The intelligence of- this unexpected invasion soon CHAP. 
reached Paris, and threw Philip into great perplexity. , X J' . 
He issued orders, however, for levying forces in all 1346 
quarters ; and despatched the Count of Eu, constable of 
France, and the Count of Tancarville, with a body of 
troops, to the defence of Caen, a populous and commer- 
cial, but open city, which lay in the neighbourhood of 
the English army. The temptation of so rich a prize 
soon allured Edward to approach it ; and the inhabitants, 
encouraged by their numbers, and by the reinforcements 
which they daily received from the country, ventured to 
meet him in the field. But their courage failed them 
on the first shock : they fled with precipitation : the 
Counts of Eu and Tancarville were taken prisoners : the 
victors entered the city along with the vanquished, and 
a furious massacre commenced, without distinction of 
age, sex, or condition. The citizens, in despair, barrica- 
doed their houses, and assaulted the English with stones, 
bricks, and every missile weapon : the English made way 
by fire to the destruction of the citizens : till Edward, 
anxious to save both his spoil and his soldiers, stopped 
the massacre ; and having obliged the inhabitants to lay 
down their arms, gave his troops license to begin a more 
regular and less hazardous plunder of the city. The 
pillage continued for three days : the king reserved for 
his own share the jewels, plate, silks, fine cloth, and fine 
linen ; and he bestowed all the remainder of the spoil 
on his army. The whole was embarked on board the 
ships, and sent over to England, together with three 
hundred of the richest citizens of Caen, whose ransom 
was an additional profit, which he expected afterwards to 
levy*. This dismal scene passed in the presence of two 
cardinal legates, who had come to negotiate a peace 
between the kingdoms. 

The king moved next to Rouen, in hopes of treating 
that city in the same manner ; but found that the bridge 
over the Seine was already broken down, and that the 
King of France himself was arrived there with his army. 
He marched along the banks of that river towards Paris, 
destroying the whole country, and every town and vil- 
lage which he met with on his road u . Some of his light 

* Froissart, liv. i^chap. 124. Ibid. chap. 125. 



[(34 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, troops carried their ravages even to the gates of Paris ; 
xv * and the royal palace of St. Germains, together with 

"^ Nanterre, Ruelle, and other villages, was reduced to 
ashes within sight of the capital. The English intended 
to pass the river at Poissy, but found the French army 
encamped on the opposite banks, and the bridge at that 
place, as well as all others over the Seine, broken down 
by orders from Philip. Edward now saw that the French 
meant to enclose him in their country, in hopes of at- 
tacking him with advantage on all sides : but he saved 
himself by a stratagem from this perilous situation. He 
gave his army orders to dislodge, and to advance farther 
up the Seine ; but immediately returning by the same 
road, he arrived at Poissy, which the enemy had already 
quitted in order to attend his motions. He repaired the 
bridge with incredible celerity, passed over his army, 
\ and having thus disengaged himself from the enemy, ad- 
vanced by quick marches towards Flanders. His van- 
guard, commanded by Harcourt, met with the townsmen 
of Amiens, who were hastening to reinforce their king, 
and defeated them with great slaughter w : he passed by 
Beauvais, and burned the suburbs of that city : but as 
he approached the Somme, he found himself in the same 
difficulty as before : all the bridges on that river were 
either broken down or strongly guarded : an army, under 
the command of Godemar de Faye, was stationed on the 
opposite banks : Philip was advancing on him. from the 
other quarter, with an army of a hundred thousand men : 
and he was thus exposed to the danger of being enclosed, 
and of starving in an enemy's country. In this extremity 
he published a reward to any one that should bring him 
intelligence of a passage over the Somme. A peasant, 
called Gobin Agace, whose name has been preserved by 
the share which he had in these important transactions, 
was tempted, on this occasion, to betray the interests of 
his country ; and he informed Edward of a ford below 
Abbeville which had a sound bottom, and might be 
passed without difficulty at low water*. The king 
hastened thither, but found Godemar de Faye on the 
opposite banks. Being urged by necessity, he deliberated 
not a moment, but threw himself into the river, sword in 

* Froissart, liv. i. chap. 125. x ibid. chap. 126, 127. 



EDWARD III. 1(35 

hand, at the head of his troops ; drove the enemy from CHAP. 
their station ; and pursued them to a distance on the ^J^~ ' 
plain 7 . The French army under Philip arrived at the 1346 
ford when the rear-guard of the English were passing : 
so narrow was the escape which Edward, by his prudence 
and celerity, made from this danger ! The rising of the 
tide prevented the French king from following him over 
the ford, and obliged that prince to take his route over 
the bridge at Abbeville ; by which some time was lost. 

It is natural to think that Philip, at the head of so 
vast an army, was impatient to take revenge on the 
English, and to prevent the disgrace to which he must 
be exposed, if an inferior enemy should be allowed, after 
ravaging so great a part of his kingdom, to escape with 
impunity. Edward also was sensible that such must be 
the object of the French monarch ; and as he had ad- 
vanced but a little way before his enemy, he saw the 
danger of precipitating his march over the plains of 
Picardy, and of exposing his rear to the insults of the 
numerous cavalry, in which the French camp abounded. 
He took, therefore, a prudent resolution; he chose his Battle of 
ground, with advantage, near the village of Crecy ; 
disposed his army in excellent order ; he determined to 
await in tranquillity the arrival of the enemy ; and he 
hoped that their eagerness to engage, and to prevent his 
retreat, after all their past disappointments, would hurry 
them on to some rash and ill-concerted action. He drew 
up his army on a gentle ascent, and divided them into 
three lines : the first was commanded by the Prince of 
Wales, and under him by the Earls of Warwick and 
Oxford, by Harcourt, and by the Lords Chandos, Hol- 
land, and other noblemen: the Earls of Arundel and 
Northampton, with the Lords Willoughby, Basset, Roos, 
and Sir Lewis Tufton, were at the head of the second 
line : he took to himself the command of the third 
division, by which he purposed either to bring succour 
to the two first lines, or to secure a retreat in case of 
any misfortune, or to push his advantages against the 
enemy. He had likewise the precaution to throw up 
trenches on his flanks, in order to secure himself from the 
numerous bodies of the French, who might assail him 

y Froissart, liv. i. chap. 127. 



166 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, from that quarter ; and he placed all his baggage behind 
j him in a wood, which he also secured by an intrench- 
ent z . 

The skill and order of this disposition, with the tran- 
quillity in which it was made, served extremely to com- 
pose the minds of the soldiers; and the king, that he 
might farther inspirit them, rode through the ranks with 
such an air of cheerfulness and alacrity, as conveyed 
the highest confidence into every beholder. He pointed 
out to them the necessity to which they were reduced, 
and the certain and inevitable destruction which awaited 
them, if, in their present situation, enclosed on all 
hands in an enemy's country, they trusted to any thing 
but their own valour, or gave that enemy an opportunity 
of taking revenge for the many insults and indignities 
which they had of late put upon him. He reminded 
them of the visible ascendant which they had hitherto 
maintained over all the bodies of French troops that had 
fallen in their way ; and assured them that the superior 
numbers of the army which at present hovered over them, 
gave them not greater force, but was an advantage easily 
compensated by the order in which he had placed his 
own army, and the resolution which he expected from 
them. He demanded nothing, he said, but that they 
would imitate his own example, and that of the Prince 
of Wales; and as the honour, the lives, the liberties of 
all were now exposed to the same danger, he was con- 
fident that they would make one common effort to ex- 
tricate themselves from the present difficulties, and that 
their united courage would give them the victory over 
all their enemies. 

It is related by some historians a , that Edward, besides 
the resources which he found in his own genius and 
presence of mind, employed also a new invention against 
the enemy, and placed in his front some pieces of artil- 
lery, the first that had yet been made use of on any re- 
markable occasion in Europe. This is the epoch of one 
of the most singular discoveries that has been made 
among men ; a discovery which changed by degrees the 
whole art of war, and by consequence many circumstances 

z Froissart, liv. i. chap. 128. 
Jean Villani, lib. xii. cap. 66. 



EDWARD III. 16 

in the political government of Europe. But the ignorance CHAP. 
of that age in the mechanical arts rendered the progress ^_ 
of this new invention very slow. The artillery first framed 1346 
were so clumsy, and of such difficult management, that 
men were not immediately sensible of their use and effi- 
cacy -, and even to the present times, improvements have 
been continually making on this furious engine, which, 
though it seemed contrived for the destruction of man- 
kind and the overthrow of empires, has, in the issue, 
rendered battles less bloody, and has given greater sta- 
bility to civil societies. Nations by its means have been 
brought more to a level: conquests have become less 
frequent and rapid : success in war has been reduced 
nearly to be a matter of calculation ; and any nation 
overmatched by its enemies either yields to their demands 
or secures itself by alliances against their violence and 
invasion. 

The invention of artillery was at this time known in 
France as well as in England 13 ; but Philip, in his hurry 
to overtake the enemy, had probably left his cannon be- 
hind him, which he regarded as an useless encumbrance. 
All his other movements discovered the same imprudence 
and precipitation. Impelled by anger, a dangerous 
counsellor, and trusting to the great superiority of his 
numbers, he thought that all depended on forcing an 
engagement with the English: and that, if he could 
once reach the enemy in their retreat, the victory on his 
side was certain and inevitable. He made a hasty march, 
in some confusion, from Abbeville ; but after he had 
advanced above two leagues, some gentlemen, whom he 
he had sent before to take a view of the enemy, returned 
to him, and brought Jiim intelligence, that they had 
seen the English drawn up in great order, and awaiting 
his arrival. They therefore advised him to defer the 
combat till the ensuing day, when his army would have 
recovered from their fatigue, and might be disposed into 
better order than their present hurry had permitted 
them to observe. Philip assented to this counsel ; but 
the former precipitation of his march, and the impatience 
of the French nobility, made it impracticable for him to 
put it into execution. One division pressed upon another : 

b Du Cange, Gloss, in verb. Bombarda. 



1(38 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, orders to stop were not seasonably conveyed to all of 
tL _ x J'_, them : this immense body was not governed by sufficient 
1346 discipline to be manageable ; and the French army, 
imperfectly formed into three lines, arrived, already 
fatigued and disordered, in presence of the enemy. The 
first line, consisting of fifteen thousand Genoese cross- 
bowmen, was commanded by Anthony Doria and Charles 
Grimaldi : the second was led by the count of Alen- 
gon, brother to the king : the king himself was at the 
head of the third. Besides the French monarch, there 
were no less than three crowned heads in this engage- 
ment : the King of Bohemia ; the King of the Romans, 
his son ; and the King of Majorca ; with all the nobility 
and great vassals of the crown of France. The army 
now consisted of above one hundred and twenty thou- 
sand men, more than three times the number of the 
enemy. But the prudence of one man was superior to 
the advantage of all this force and splendour. 

The English, on the approach of the enemy, kept their 
ranks firm and immoveable ; and the Genoese first began 
the attack. There had happened, a little before the en- 
gagement, a thunder shower, which had moistened and 
relaxed the strings of the Genoese crossbows: their 
arrows for this reason, fell short of the enemy. The 
English archers, taking their bows out of their cases, 
poured in a shower of arrows upon this multitude who 
were opposed to them, and soon threw them into dis- 
order. The Genoese fell back upon the heavy-armed 
cavalry of the Count of Alengon 6 ; who, enraged at their 
cowardice, ordered his troops to put them to the sword. 
The artillery fired amidst the crowd; the English archers 
continued to send in their arrows among them ; and 
nothing was to be seen in that vast body but hurry and 
confusion, terror and dismay. The young Prince of 
Wales had the presence of mind to take advantage of 
this situation, and to lead on his line to the charge. 
The French cavalry, however, recovering somewhat their 
order, and encouraged by the example of their leader, 
made a stout resistance; and having at last cleared 
themselves of the Genoese runaways, advanced upon 
their enemies, and, by their superior numbers, began to 

c Eroissart, liv. i. chap. 130. 



EDWARD III. 109 

hem them round. The Earls of Arundel and Northamp- CHAP. 
ton now advanced their line to sustain the prince, who,^ _, 
ardent in his first feats of arms, set an example of valour 13 ^~~ 
which was imitated by all his followers. The battle 
became, for some time, hot and dangerous ; and the Earl 
of Warwick, apprehensive of the event from the superior 
numbers of the French, despatched a messenger to the 
king, and entreated him to send succours to the relief of 
the prince. Edward had chosen his station on the top 
of the hill ; and he surveyed in tranquillity the scene of 
action. When the messenger accosted him, his first- 
question was, whether the prince were slain or wounded ? 
On receiving an answer in the negative, Return, said he, 
to my son, and tell him 1 reserve the honour of the day 
to him: I am confident that he will show himself worthy 
of the honour of knighthood, ivhich I so lately conferred 
upon him : he ivill be able, ivitJwut my assistance, to repel 
the enemy*. This speech, being reported to the prince 
and his attendants, inspired them with fresh courage : 
they made an attack with redoubled vigour on the French, 
in which the Count of Alenc,on was slain : that whole 
line of cavalry was thrown into disorder : the riders 
were killed or dismounted : the Welsh infantry rushed 
into the throng, and with their long knives cut the 
throats of all who had fallen ; nor was any quarter given 
that day by the victors 6 . 

The King of France advanced in vain with the rear to 
sustain the line commanded by his brother : he found 
them already discomfited ; and the example of their rout 
increased the confusion which was before but too preva- 
lent in his own body. He had himself a horse killed 
under him. He was remounted ; and though left almost 
alone, he seemed still determined to maintain the com- 
bat ; when John of Hainault seized the reins of his 
bridle, turned about his horse, and carried him off the 
field of battle. The whole French army took to flight, 
and was followed and put to the sword, without mercy, 
by the enemy ; till the darkness of the night put an end 
to the pursuit. The king, on his return to the camp, 
flew into the arms of the Prince of Wales, and exclaimed, 
My brave son ! persevere in your honourable course : you. 

d Froissart, liv. i. chap. 130. e Ibid. 

VOL. II. 15 



170 HISTORY 'OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, are my son ; for valiantly have you acquitted yourself to- 

xv< day : you have shown yourself ivortliy of empire 1 . 
^^46^" This battle, which is known by the name of the battle 
of Crecy, began after three o'clock in the afternoon, and 
continued till evening. The next morning was foggy ; 
and as the English observed that many of the enemy 
had lost their way in the night and in the mist, they 
employed a stratagem to bring them into their power : 
they erected on the eminences some French standards 
which they had taken in the battle ; and all who were 
allured by this false signal were put to the sword, and 
no quarter given them. In excuse for this inhumanity, 
it was alleged that the French king had given like 
orders to his troops ; but the real reason probably was, 
that the English, in their present situation, did not 
choose to be encumbered with prisoners. On the day 
of battle, and on the ensuing, there fell, by a moderate 
computation, twelve hundred French knights, fourteen 
hundred gentlemen, four thousand men at arms, besides 
about thirty thousand of inferior rank s : many of the 
principal nobility of France, the Dukes of Lorraine and 
Bourbon, the Earls of Flanders, Blois, Yaudemont, 
Aumale, were left on the field of battle. The kings 
also of Bohemia and Majorca were slain : the fate of 
the former was remarkable : he was blind from age ; but 
being resolved to hazard his person, and set an example 
to others, he ordered the reins of his bridle to be tied on 
each side to the horses of two gentlemen of his train; 
and his dead body, and those of his attendants, were 
afterwards found among the slain, with their horses 
standing by them in that situation 11 . His crest was three 
ostrich feathers ; and his motto these German words, Ich 
dien, 1 serve, which the Prince of Wales and his succes- 
sors adopted in memorial of this great victory. The 
action may seem no less remarkable for the small loss 
sustained by the English, than for the great slaughter of 
the French : there were killed in it only one esquire 
and three knights 1 , and very few of inferior rank; a 
demonstration, that the prudent disposition planned by 

f Proissart, liv. i. chap. 131. 

s Ibid. Knyghton, p. 2588. 

h Froissart, liv. i. chap. 130. Walsingham, p. 166. 

i Knyghton, p. 2588. 



EDWARD III. 171 

Edward, and the disorderly attack made by the French, CHAP. 
had rendered the whole rather a rout than a battle; 
which was indeed the common case with engagements 1346 
in those times. 

The great prudence of Edward appeared not only in 
obtaining this memorable victory, but in the measures 
which he pursued after it. Not elated by his present 
prosperity, so far as to expect the total conquest of 
France, or even that of any considerable provinces, he 
purposed only to secure such an easy entrance into that 
kingdom, as might afterwards open the way to more 
moderate advantages. He knew the extreme distance 
of Guienne : he had experienced the difficulty and un- 
certainty of penetrating on the side of the Low Countries, 
and had already lost much of his authority over Flanders 
by the death of D'Arteville, who had been murdered by 
the populace themselves, his former partisans, on his 
attempting to transfer the sovereignty of that province 
to the Prince of Wales k . The king, therefore, limited 
his ambition to the conquest of Calais; and after the 
interval of a few days, which he employed in interring 
the slain, he marched with his victorious army, and pre- 
sented himself before the place. 

John of Yienne, a valiant knight of Burgundy, was 
governor of Calais, and being supplied with every thing 
necessary for defence, he encouraged the townsmen to 
perform to the utmost their duty to their king and 
country. Edward, therefore, sensible from the begin- 
ning that it was in vain to attempt the place by force, 
purposed only to reduce it by famine : he chose a secure 
station for his camp ; drew intrenchments around the 
whole city ; raised huts for his soldiers, which he covered 
with straw or broom ; and provided his army with all the 
conveniences necessary to make them endure the winter 
season, which was approaching. As the governor soon 
perceived his intention, he expelled all the useless 
mouths ; and the king had the generosity to allow these 
unhappy people to pass through his camp, and he even 
supplied them with money for their journey 1 . 

While Edward was engaged in this siege, which em- 
ployed him near a twelvemonth, there passed in different 

k Froissart, liv. i. chap. 116. l Ibid. chap. 133. 



172 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, places many other events, and all to the honour of the 
xv> English arms. 

" - ^~" The retreat of the Duke of Normandy from Guienne 
left the Earl of Derby master of the field ; and he was 
not negligent in making his advantage of the superiority. 
He took Mirebeau by assault : he made himself master 
of Lusignan in the same manner : Taillebourg and St. 
Jean d'Angeli fell into his hands : Poictiers opened its 
gates to him; and Derby, having thus broken into the 
frontiers on that quarter, carried his incursions to the 
banks of the Loire, and filled all the southern provinces 
of France with horror and devastation" 1 . 

The flames of war were at the same time kindled in 
Britany. Charles of Blois invaded that province with a 
considerable army, and invested the fortress of Roche de 
Rien ; but the Countess of Mountfort, reinforced by some 
English troops under Sir Thomas Dagworth, attacked 
him during the night in his intrenchments, dispersed his 
army, and took Charles himself prisoner 11 . His wife, by 
whom he enjoyed his pretensions to Britany, compelled 
by the present necessity, took on her the government of 
the party, and proved herself a rival in every shape, and 
an antagonist to the Countess of Mountfort, both in the 
field and in the cabinet. And while these heroic dames 
presented this extraordinary scene to the world, another 
princess in England, of still higher rank, showed herself 
no less capable of exerting every manly virtue. 

War with The Scottish nation, after long defending, with in- 
nd " credible perseverance, their liberties against the superior 
force of the English, recalled their king, David Bruce, 
in 1342. Though that prince, neither by his age nor 
capacity, could bring them great assistance, he gave 
them the countenance of sovereign authority; and as 
Edward's wars on the continent proved a great diversion 
to the force of England, they rendered the balance more 
equal between the kingdoms. In every truce which 
Edward concluded with Philip, the King of Scotland 
was comprehended; and when Edward made his last 
invasion upon France, David was strongly solicited by his 
ally to begin also hostilities, and to invade the northern 

m Froissart, liv. i. chap. 136. 

* Ibid. chap. 143. Walsing. p. 168. Ypod. Neust. p. 517, 518. 



EDWARD III. 173 

counties of England. The nobility of his nation being CHAP. 
always forward in such incursions, David soon mustered v _ xv ' 
a great army, entered Northumberland at the head of 1346 
above fifty thousand men, and carried his ravages and 
devastations to the gates of Durham . But Queen 
Philippa, assembling a body of little more than twelve 
thousand men p , which she entrusted to the command of 
Lord Piercy, ventured to approach him at Neville's 
Cross near that city ; and riding through the ranks of 
her army, exhorted every man to do his duty, and to 
take revenge on these barbarous ravagers q . Nor could nth Oct. 
she be persuaded to leave the field till the armies were 
on the point of engaging. The Scots have often been 
unfortunate in the great pitched battles which they 
fought with the English ; even though they commonly 
declined such engagements where the superiority of 
numbers was not on their side : but never did they 
receive a more fatal blow than the present. They were 
broken and chased off the field : fifteen thousand of them, 
some historians say twenty thousand, were slain ; among 
whom were Edward Keith, earl mareschal, and Sir captivity 
Thomas Charteris, chancellor : and the king himself was King O f 
taken prisoner, with the Earls of Sutherland, Fife, Mon- Scots - 
teith, Carrie, Lord Douglas, and many other noblemen r . 

Philippa, having secured her royal prisoner in the 
Tower 8 , crossed the sea at Dover, and was received in 
the English camp before Calais with all the triumph due 
to her rank, her merit, and her success. This age was 
the reign of chivalry and gallantry : Edward's court ex- 
celled in these accomplishments as much as in policy and 
arms : and if anything could justify the obsequious devo- 
tion then professed to the fair sex, it must be the appear- 
ance of such extraordinary women as shone forth during 
that period. 

The town of Calais had been defended with remark- 13 >7. 
able vigilance, constancy, and bravery by the townsmen, ta ken! 
during a siege of unusual length : but Philip, informed 
of their distressed condition, determined at last to attempt 
their relief; and he approached the English with an 

Froissart, liv. i. chap. 137. P Ibid. chap. 138. ^ 

1 Ibid. chap. 138. * Ibid. chap. 139. 
8 Rymer, vol. v. p. 537. 



174 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, immense army, which the writers of that age make amount 
XV ' to two hundred thousand men. But he found Edward so 
surrounded with morasses, and secured by intrenchments, 
that, without running on inevitable destruction, he con- 
cluded it impossible to make an attempt on the English 
camp. He had no other resource than to send his rival 
a vain challenge to meet him in the open field ; which 
being refused, he was obliged to decamp with his army, 
and disperse them into their several provinces*. 

John of Vienne, governor of Calais, now saw the 
necessity of surrendering his fortress, which was reduced 
to the last extremity by famine and the fatigue of the 
inhabitants. He appeared on the walls, and made a 
signal to the English sentinels, that he desired a parley. 
Sir Walter Manny was sent to him by Edward. " Brave 
knight," cried the governor, " I have been entrusted by 
my sovereign with the command of this town : it is almost 
a year since you besieged me ; and I have endeavoured, 
as well as those under me, to do our duty. But you are 
acquainted with our present condition : we have no hopes 
of relief; we are perishing with hunger; I am willing 
therefore to surrender, and desire as the sole condition, 
to ensure the lives and liberties of these brave men, who 
have so long shared with me every danger and fatigue u ." 

Manny replied, that he was well acquainted with the 
intentions of the King of England ; that that prince was 
incensed against the townsmen of Calais, for their perti- 
nacious resistance, and for the evils which they had made 
him and his subjects suffer ; that he was determined to 
take exemplary vengeance on them ; and would not re- 
ceive the town on any condition which should confine 
him in the punishment of these offenders. " Consider," 
replied Viemie, " that this is not the treatment to which 
brave men are entitled : if any English knight had been 
in my situation, your king would have expected the same 
conduct from him. The inhabitants of Calais have done 
for their sovereign what merits the esteem of every 
prince ; much more of so gallant a prince as Edward. 
But I inform you, that, if we must perish, we shall not 
perish unrevenged ; and that we are not yet so reduced, 

* Froissort, liv. i. chap. 144, 145. Avesbuiy, p. 161, 162. 
u Froissart, liv. i. chap. 146. 



EDWARD III. 175 

but we can sell our lives at a high price to the victors. CHAP. 
It is the interest of both sides to prevent these desperate 
extremities ; and I expect that you yourself, brave knight, ^^~ 
will interpose your good offices with your prince in our 
behalf." 

Manny was struck with the justness of these senti- 
ments, and represented to the king the danger of repri- 
sals, if he should give such treatment to the inhabitants 
of Calais. Edward was at last persuaded to mitigate the 
rigour of the conditions demanded : he only insisted that 
six of the most considerable citizens should be sent to 
him, to be disposed of as he thought proper ; that they 
should come to his camp carrying the keys of the city 
in their hands, bareheaded and barefooted, with ropes 
about their necks ; and on these conditions, he promised 
to spare the lives of all the remainder^ 

When this intelligence was conveyed to Calais, it struck 
the inhabitants with new consternation. To sacrifice six 
of their fellow-citizens to certain destruction for signal- 
izing their valour in a common cause, appeared to them 
even more severe than that general punishment with 
which they were before threatened; and they found them- 
selves incapable of coming to any resolution in so cruel 
and distressful a situation. At last one of the principal 
inhabitants, called Eustace de St. Pierre, whose name de- 
serves to be recorded, stepped forth, and declared him- 
self willing to encounter death for the safety of his friends 
and companions : another, animated by his example, made 
a like generous offer : a third, and a fourth, presented 
themselves to the same fate : and the whole number was 
soon completed. These six heroic burgesses appeared 
before Edward in the guise of malefactors, laid at his feet 
the keys of their city, and were ordered to be led to exe- 
cution. It is surprising that so generous a prince should 
ever have entertained such a barbarous purpose against 
such men ; and still more that he should seriously per- 
sist in the resolution of executing it x . But the entrea- 
ties of his queen saved his memory from that infamy : 
she threw herself on her knees before him, and, with 
tears in her eyes, begged the lives of these citizens. 

w Froissart, liv. i. chap. 146. 

x See note [G], at the end of the volume. 



176 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Having obtained her request, she carried them into her 

.^J'^tent, ordered a repast to be set before them, and, after 

1347 making them a present of money and clothes, dismissed 

them in safety 7 . 

4th Aug. The king took possession of Calais, and immediately 
executed an act of rigour, more justifiable, because more 
necessary, than that which he had before resolved on. 
He knew that, notwithstanding his pretended title to 
the crown of France, every Frenchman regarded him as 
a mortal enemy : he therefore ordered all the inhabitants 
of Calais to evacuate the town, and he peopled it anew 
with English ; a policy which probably preserved so long 
to his successors the dominion of that important fortress. 
He made it the staple of wool, leather, tin, and lead ; 
the four chief, if not the sole commodities of the king- 
dom, for which there was any considerable demand in 
foreign markets. All the English were obliged to bring 
thither these goods : foreign merchants came to the same 
place in order to purchase them : and at a period when 
posts were not established, and when the communication 
between states was so imperfect, this institution, though 
it hurt the navigation of England, was probably of advan- 
tage to the kingdom. 

1348. Through the mediation of the pope's legates, Edward 
concluded a truce with France; but even during this 
cessation of arms, he had very nearly lost Calais, the sole 
fruit of all his boasted victories. The king had entrusted 
that place to Aimery de Pavie, an Italian, who had dis- 
covered bravery and conduct in the wars, but was utterly 
destitute of every principle of honour and fidelity. This 
man agreed to deliver up Calais for the sum of twenty 
thousand crowns; and Geoffrey de Charni, who com- 
manded the French forces in those quarters, and who 
knew that, if he succeeded in this service, he should not 
be disavowed, ventured, without consulting his master, 
to conclude the bargain with him. Edward, informed 
of this treachery by means of Aimery's secretary, sum- 
moned the governor to London on other pretences ; and 
having charged him with the guilt, promised him his 
life, but on condition that he would turn the contrivance 
to the destruction of the enemy. The Italian easily 

y Froissart, liv. i. chap. 146. 



EDWARD III. 177 

agreed to this double treachery. A day was appointed for CHAP. 
the admission of the French ; and Edward having pre- xv ' 
pared a force of about a thousand men, under Sir Walter ^^~" 
Manny, secretly departed from London, carrying with 
him the Prince of Wales ; and, without being suspected, 
arrived the evening before at Calais. He made a proper 
disposition for the reception of the enemy, and kept all 
his forces and the garrison under arms. On the appear- 
ance of Charni, a chosen band of French soldiers was 
admitted at the postern ; and Aimery, receiving the sti- 
pulated sum, promised that, with their assistance, he 
would immediately open the great gate to the troops, 
who were waiting with impatience for the fulfilling of 
his engagement. All the French who entered were iin- 1 j? 49 - 
mediately slain, or taken prisoners: the great gate 
opened : Edward rushed forth with cries of battle and 
of victory : the French, though astonished at the event, 
behaved with valour : a fierce and bloody engagement 
ensued. As the morning broke, the king, who was not 
distinguished by his arms, and who fought as a private 
man under the standard of Sir Walter Manny, remarked 
a French gentleman, called Eustace de Ribaumont, who 
exerted himself with singular vigour and bravery ; and 
he was seized with a desire of trying a single combat 
with him. He stepped forth from his troop, and chal- 
lenging Ribaumont by name, (for he was known to him,) 
began a sharp and dangerous encounter. He was twice 
beaten to the ground by the valour of the Frenchman : 
he twice recovered himself: blows were redoubled with 
equal force on both sides : the victory was long unde- 
cided; till Ribaumont, perceiving himself to be left 
almost alone, called out to his antagonist, .Sir Might, 
I yield myself your prisoner ; and at the same time de- 
livered his sword to the king. Most of the French, being 
overpowered by numbers, and intercepted in their re- 
treat, lost either their lives or their liberty 55 . 

The French officers who had fallen into the hands of 
the English were conducted into Calais ; where Edward 
discovered to them the antagonist with whom they 
had had the honour to be engaged, and treated them 
with great regard and courtesy. They were admitted to 

z Froissart, liv. i. chap. 140, 141, 142. 



178 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, sup with the Prince of Wales and the English nobility ; 
v ^ x j-_ y and after supper the king himself came into the apart- 
1349 ment, and went about, conversing familiarly with one or 
other of his prisoners. He even addressed himself to 
Charni, and avoided reproaching him, in too severe terms, 
with the treacherous attempt which he had made upon 
Calais during the truce : but he openly bestowed the 
highest encomiums on Ribaumont; called him the most 
valorous knight that he had ever been acquainted with ; 
and confessed that he himself had at no time been in so 
great danger as when engaged in combat with him. He 
then took a string of pearls, which he wore about his 
own head, and throwing it over the head of Ribaumont, 
he said to him, " Sir Eustace, I bestow this present upon 
you as a testimony of my esteem for your bravery ; and 
I desire you to wear it a year for my sake. I know you 
. to be gay and amorous, and to take delight in the com- 
pany of ladies and damsels: let them all know from 
what hand you had the present : you are no longer a 
prisoner : I acquit you of your ransom ; and you are at 
liberty to-morrow to dispose of yourself as you think 
proper." 

Nothing proves more evidently the vast superiority 
assumed by the nobility and gentry above all the other 
orders of men during those ages, than the extreme differ- 
ence which Edward made in his treatment of these 
French knights, and that of the six citizens of Calais, who 
had exerted more signal bravery in a cause more justi- 
fiable and more honourable. 



EDWARD in. 179 



CHAPTER XVI. 

INSTITUTION OF THE GARTER. STATE or FRANCE. BATTLE OFPOICTIERS. 
CAPTIVITY OF THE KING OF FRANCE. STATE OF THAT KINGDOM. IN- 
VASION OF FRANCE. PEACE OF BRETIGNI. STATE OF FRANCE. EXPEDI- 
TION INTO CASTILE. KUPTURE WITH FRANCE. ILL SUCCESS OF THE 
ENGLISH. DEATH OF THE PRINCE OF WALES. DEATH AND CHARACTER 
OF THE KING. MISCELLANEOUS TRANSACTIONS OF THIS KEIGN. 

THE prudent conduct and great success of Edward in his 
foreign wars, had excited a strong emulation and a mili- 
tary genius among the English nobility ; and these tur- 1349. 
bulent barons, overawed by the crown, gave now a more 
useful direction to their ambition, and attached them- 
selves to a prince who led them to the acquisition of 
riches and of glory. That he might farther promote the 
spirit of emulation and obedience, the king instituted institution 
the order of the garter, in imitation of some orders of a g a r te e r> 
like nature, religious as well as military, which had been 
established in different parts of Europe. The number 
received into this order consisted of twenty-five per- 
sons, besides the sovereign ; and as it has never been 
enlarged, this badge of distinction continues as honour- 
able as at its first institution, and is still a valuable, 
though a cheap present, which the prince can confer on 
his greatest subjects. A vulgar story prevails, but is not 
supported by any ancient authority, that, at a court-ball, 
Edward's mistress, commonly supposed to be the Coun- 
tess of Salisbury, dropped her garter; and the king, 
taking it up, observed some of the courtiers to smile, as 
if they thought that he had not obtained this favour 
merely by accident: upon which he called out, Horn 
soit qui mal y pense, Evil to him that evil thinks ; and 
as every incident of gallantry among those ancient war- 
riors was magnified into a matter of great importance*, 
he instituted the order of the garter in memorial of this 
event, and gave these words as the motto of the order. 
This origin, though frivolous, is not unsuitable to the 

a See note [H], at the end of the volume. 




180 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, manners of the times ; and it is indeed difficult by any 
other means to account, either for the seemingly un- 
meaning terms of the motto, or for the peculiar badge of 
the garter, which seems to have no reference to any pur- 
pose, either of military use or ornament. 

But a sudden damp was thrown over this festivity 
and triumph of the court of England, by a destructive 
pestilence which invaded that kingdom, as well as the 
rest of Europe ; and is computed to have swept away 
near a third of the inhabitants in every country which 
it attacked. It was probably more fatal in great cities 
than in the country ; and above fifty thousand souls are 
said to have perished by it in London alone b . This 
malady first discovered itself in the north of Asia, was 
spread over all that country, made its progress from one 
end of Europe to the other, and sensibly depopulated 
every state through which it passed. So grievous a 
calamity, more than the pacific disposition of the princes, 
served to maintain and prolong the truce between France 
and England. 

1350. During this truce, Philip de Yalois died, without 
being able to re-establish the affairs of France, which 
his bad success against England had thrown into extreme 
disorder. This monarch, during the first years of his 
reign, had obtained the appellation of Fortunate, and ac- 
quired the character of prudent ; but he ill maintained 
either the one or the other; less from his own fault, 
than because he was overmatched by the superior for- 
tune and superior genius of Edward. But the incidents 
in the reign of his son John gave the French nation 
cause to regret even the calamitous times of his prede- 
cessor. John was distinguished by many virtues, par- 
ticularly a scrupulous honour and fidelity : he was not 
deficient in personal courage; but as he wanted that 
masterly prudence and foresight which his difficult 
situation required, his kingdom was at the same time 
disturbed by intestine commotions and oppressed with 
state of foreign wars. The chief source of its calamities was 
Trance. Charles, King of Navarre, who received the epithet of 

k Stowe's Survey, p. 478. There were buried fifty thousand bodies in one 
church-yard, which Sir Walter Manny had bought for the use of the poor. The 
same author says, that there died above fifty thousand persons of the plague in 
Norwich, which is quite incredible. 



EDWARD III. 181 

the lad or ivicJced, and whose conduct fully entitled him CHAP. 
to that appellation. This prince was descended from^j 
males of the blood royal of France ; his mother was 1354 
daughter of Lewis Hutin ; he had himself espoused a 
daughter of King John ; but all these ties, which ought 
to have connected him with the throne, gave him only 
greater power to shake and overthrow it. With regard 
to his personal qualities, he was courteous, affable, en- 
gaging, eloquent ; full of insinuation and address ; in- 
exhaustible in his resources ; active and enterprising. 
But these splendid accomplishments were attended with 
such defects as rendered them pernicious to his country, 
and even ruinous to himself: he was volatile, inconstant, 
faithless, revengeful, malicious ; restrained by no princi- 
ple or duty ; insatiable in his pretensions ; and whether 
successful or unfortunate in one' enterprise, he imme- 
diately undertook another, in which he was never de- 
terred from employing the most criminal and most dis- 
honourable expedients. 

The constable of Eu, who had been taken prisoner by 
Edward at Caen, recovered his liberty, on the promise 
of delivering as his ransom the town of Guisnes, near 
Calais, of which he was superior lord ; but as John was 
offended at this stipulation, which, if fulfilled, opened 
still farther that frontier to the enemy ; and as he sus- 
pected the constable of more dangerous connexions with 
the King of England, he ordered him to be seized, and, 
without any legal or formal trial, put him to death in 
prison. Charles de la Cerda was appointed constable in 
his place, and had a like fatal end : the King of Navarre 
ordered him to be assassinated : and such was the weak- 
ness of the crown, that this prince, instead of dreading 
punishment, would not even agree to ask pardon for his 
offence, but on condition that he should receive an ac- 
cession of territory : and he had also John's second son 
put into his hands as a security for his person, when he 
came to court, and performed this act of mock penitence 
and humiliation before his sovereign . 

The two French princes seemed entirely reconciled ; 1355< 
but this dissimulation, to which John submitted from 
necessity, and Charles from habit, did not long continue ; 

c Froissart, liv. i. chap. 144. 
VOL. II. 16 



182 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and the King of Navarre knew that he had reason to 
v_ ^apprehend the most severe vengeance for the many 
1355 crimes and treasons which he had already committed, 
and the still greater which he was meditating. To 
ensure himself of protection, he entered into a secret 
correspondence with England, by means of Henry, Earl 
of Derby, now Earl of Lancaster, who at that time was 
employed in fruitless negotiations for peace at Avignon, 
under the mediation of the pope. John detected this 
correspondence ; and to prevent the dangerous effects of 
it, he sent forces into Normandy, the chief seat of the 
King of Navarre's power, and attacked his castles and 
fortresses. But hearing that Edward had prepared an 
army to support his ally, he had the weakness to pro- 
pose an accommodation with Charles, and even to give 
this traitorous subject the sum of a hundred thousand 
crowns, as the purchase of a feigned reconcilement, 
which rendered him still more dangerous. The King of 
Navarre, insolent from past impunity, and desperate 
from the dangers which he apprehended, continued his 
intrigues ; and associating himself with Geoffrey d'Har- 
court, who had received his pardon from Philip de Valois, 
but persevered still in his factious disposition, he in- 
creased the number of his partisans in every part of the 
kingdom. He even seduced, by his address, Charles, the 
King of France's eldest son, a youth of seventeen years 
of age, who was the first that bore the appellation of 
Dauphin, by the reunion of the province of Dauphiny to 
the crown. But this prince, being made sensible of the 
danger and folly of these connexions, promised to make 
atonement for the offence by the sacrifice of his asso- 
ciates ; and, in concert with his father, he invited the 
King of Navarre, and other noblemen of the party, to a 
feast at Rouen, where they were betrayed into the hands 
of John. Some of the most obnoxious were imme- 
diately led to execution ; the King of Navarre was 
thrown into prison d : but this stroke of severity in the 
king, and of treachery in the dauphin, was far from 
proving decisive in maintaining the royal authority. 
Philip of Navarre, brother to Charles, and Geoffrey d'Har- 
court, put all the towns and castles belonging to that 

a Froissart, liv. i. chap. 146. Avesbury, p. 243. 



EDWARD in. 183 

prince in a posture of defence ; and had immediate re- CHAP. 
course to the protection of England in this desperate XVL 
extremity. 1355 

The truce between the two kingdoms, which had 
always been ill observed on both sides, was now expired; 
and Edward was entirely free to support the French 
malecontents. Well pleased that the factions in France 
had at length gained him some partisans in that king- 
dom, which his pretensions to the crown had never been 
able to accomplish, he purposed to attack his enemy both 
on the side of Guienne, under the command of the Prince 
of Wales, and on that of Calais, in his own person. 

Young Edward arrived in the Garronne with his army, 
on board a fleet of three hundred sail, attended by the 
Earls of Warwick, Salisbury, Oxford, Suffolk, and other 
English noblemen. Being joined by the vassals of Gascony, 
he took the field ; and as the present disorders in France 
prevented every proper plan of defence, he carried on 
with impunity his ravages and devastations, according to 
the mode of war in that age. He reduced all the vil- 
lages, and several towns of Languedoc, to ashes: he 
presented himself before Toulouse ; passed the Garronne, 
and burned the suburbs of Carcassonne ; advanced even 
to Narbonne, laying every place waste around him ; and, 
after an excursion of six weeks, returned with a vast 
booty and many prisoners to Guienne, where he took up 
his winter-quarters 6 . The Constable of Bourbon, who 
commanded in those provinces, received orders, though 
at the head of a superior army, on no account to run the 
hazard of a battle. 

The King of England's incursion from Calais was of 
the same nature, and attended with the same issue. He 
broke into France at the head of a numerous army ; to 
which he gave a full license of plundering and ravaging 
the open country. He advanced to St. Omer, where 
the King of France was posted ; and on the retreat of 
that prince followed him to Hesdin f . John still kept at 
a distance, and declined an engagement : but, in order 
to save his reputation, he sent Edward a challenge to 
fight a pitched battle with him; an usual bravado in 

e Froissart, liv. i. chap. 144. 146. 

f Ibid. chap. 144. Avesbury, p. 206. Walsing. p. 171. 



184 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, that age, derived from the practice of single combat, and 

^^J 1 ^ ridiculous in the art of war. The king, finding no sin- 

1355 cerity in this defiance, retired to Calais, and thence went 

over to England, in order to defend that kingdom against 

a threatened invasion of the Scots. 

The Scots, taking advantage of the king's absence, 
and that of the military power of England, had surprised 
Berwick, and had collected an army with a view of com- 
mitting ravages upon the northern provinces; but, on 
the approach of Edward, they abandoned that place, 
which was not tenable while the castle was in the hands 
of the English ; and, retiring to their mountains, gave 
the enemy full liberty of burning and destroying the 
whole country from Berwick to Edinburgh g . Baliol 
attended Edward on this expedition; but finding that 
his constant adherence to the English had given his 
countrymen an unconquerable aversion to his title, and 
that he himself was declining through age and infirmi- 
ties, he finally resigned into the king's hands his pre- 
tensions to the crown of Scotland 11 , and received in lieu 
of them an annual pension of two thousand pounds, with 
which he passed the remainder of his life in privacy and 
retirement. 

During these military operations, Edward received in- 
formation of the increasing disorders in France, arising 
from the imprisonment of the King of Navarre ; and he 
sent Lancaster, at the head of a small army, to support 
the partisans of that prince in Normandy. The war was 
conducted with various success ; but chiefly to the dis- 
advantage of the French malecontents ; till an important 
event happened in the other quarter of the kingdom, 
which had well nigh proved fatal to the monarchy of 
France, and threw every thing into the utmost confusion. 
1356. The Prince of Wales, encouraged by the success of the 
preceding campaign, took the field with an army, which 
no historian makes amount to above twelve thousand 
men, and of which not a third were English ; and with 
this small body he ventured to penetrate into the heart 
of France. After ravaging the Agenois, Quercy, and the 
Limousin, he entered the province of Berry ; and made 
some attacks, though without success, on the towns of 

Walsing. p. 171. h Rymer, vol. v. p. 823. Ypod. Neust. p. 521. 



EDWARD III. 185 

Bourges and Issoudun. It appeared that his intentions CHAP. 
were to march into Normandy, and to join his forces with 
those of the Earl of Lancaster, and the partisans of 
King of Navarre; but finding all the bridges on the 
Loire broken down, and every pass carefully guarded, he 
was obliged to think of making his retreat into Guienne 1 . 
He found this resolution the more necessary, from the 
intelligence which he received of the King of France's 
motions. That monarch, provoked at the insult offered 
him by this incursion, and entertaining hopes of success 
from the young prince's temerity, collected a great army 
of above sixty thousand men, and advanced by hasty 
marches, to intercept his enemy. The prince, not aware 
of John's near approach, lost some days on his retreat, 
before the castle of Eemorantin k ; and thereby gave the 
French an opportunity of overtaking him. They came Battle of 
within sight at Maupertuis, near Poictiers ; and Edward, Poictiers. 
sensible that his retreat was now become impracticable, 
prepared for battle with all the courage of a young hero, 
and with all the prudence of the oldest and most expe- 
rienced commander. 

But the utmost prudence and courage would have 
proved insufficient to save him in this extremity, had the 
King of France known how to make use of his present ad- 
vantages. His great superiority in numbers enabled him 
to surround the enemy; and by intercepting all pro- 
visions, which were already become scarce in the English 
camp, to reduce this small army, without a blow, to the 
necessity of surrendering at discretion. But such was the 
impatient ardour of the French nobility, and so much had 
their thoughts been bent on overtaking the English as 
their sole object, that this idea never struck any of the 
commanders ; and they immediately took measures for 
the assault, as for a certain victory. While the French 
army was drawn up in order of battle, they were stopped 
by the appearance of the Cardinal of Perigord ; who, 
having- learned the approach of the two armies to each 
other, had hastened, by interposing his good offices, to 
prevent any farther effusion of Christian blood. By John's 
permission, he carried proposals to the Prince of Wales ; 

i Walsing. p. 171. 

k Froissart, liv. i. chap. 158. Walsing. p. 171. 

16* 



186 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and found him so sensible of the bad posture of his affairs, 
v ^ x J 1 ^ that an accommodation seemed not impracticable. Ed- 
1356 w ar d told him that he would agree to any terms consist- 
ent with his own honour and that of England ; and he 
offered to purchase a retreat, by ceding all the conquests 
which he had made during this and the former campaign, 
and by stipulating not to serve against France during the 
course of seven years. But John, imagining that he had 
now got into his hands a sufficient pledge for the resti- 
tution of Calais, required that Edward should surrender 
himself prisoner with a hundred of his attendants ; and 
offered, on these terms, a safe retreat to the English army. 
The prince rejected the proposal with disdain; and de- 
clared, that, whatever fortune might attend him, England 
should never be obliged to pay the price of his ransom. 
This resolute answer cut off all hopes of an accommo- 
dation ; but as the day was already spent in negotiating, 
the battle was delayed till the next morning 1 . 

The Cardinal of Perigord, as did all the prelates of the 
court of Kome, bore a great attachment to the French 
interest ; but the most determined enemy could not, by 
any expedient, have done a greater prejudice to John's 
i9th Sept. affairs than he did them by this delay. The Prince of 
Wales had leisure during the night to strengthen, by new 
entrenchments, the post which he had before so judi- 
ciously chosen; and he contrived an ambush of three 
hundred men at arms, and as many archers, whom he put 
under the command of the Captal de Buche, and ordered 
to make a circuit, that they might fall on the flank or 
rear of the French army during the engagement. The 
van of his army was commanded by the Earl of Warwick, 
the rear by the Earls of Salisbury and Suffolk, the main 
body by the prince himself. The Lords Chandos, Audley, 
and many other brave and experienced commanders, were 
at the head of different corps of his army. 

John also arranged his forces in three divisions, nearly 
equal : the first was commanded by the Duke of Orleans, 
the king's brother ; the second by the dauphin, attended 
by his two younger brothers ; the third by the king him- 
self, who had by his side Philip, his fourth son and fa- 
vourite, then about fourteen years of age. There was no 

l Froissart, liv. i. chap. 161. 



EDWARD III. 187 

reaching the English army but through a narrow lane, CHAP. 
covered on each side by hedges ; and in order to open 
this passage, the Mareschals Andrehen and 
were ordered to advance with a separate detachment of 
men at arms. While they marched along the lane, a body 
of English archers, who lined the hedges, plied them on 
each side with their arrows ; and being very near them, 
yet placed in perfect safety, they coolly took their aim 
against the enemy, and slaughtered them with impunity. 
The French detachment, much discouraged by the un- 
equal combat, and diminished in their number, arrived 
at the end of the lane, where they met on the open ground 
the Prince of Wales himself, at the head of a chosen 
body, ready for their reception. They were discomfited 
and overthrown : one of the mareschals was slain ; the 
other taken prisoner : and the remainder of the detach- 
ment, who were still in the lane, and exposed to the 
shot of the enemy, without being able to make resistance, 
recoiled upon their own army, and put every thing into 
disorder 01 . In that critical moment, the Captal de Buche 
unexpectedly appeared, and attacked in flank the dau- 
phin's line, which fell into some confusion. Landas, 
Bodenai, and St. Yenant, to whom the care of that young 
prince and his brothers had been committed, too anxious 
for their charge or for their own safety, carried them off the 
field, and set the example of flight, which was followed 
by that whole division. The Duke of Orleans, seized 
with a like panic, and imagining all was lost, thought no 
longer of fighting, but carried off his division by a retreat, 
which soon turned into a flight. Lord Chandos called 
out to the prince, that the day was won ; and encouraged 
him to attack the division under King John, which, 
though more numerous than the whole English army, 
were somewhat dismayed with the precipitate flight of 
their companions. John here made the utmost efforts 
to retrieve by his valour what his imprudence had be- 
trayed ; and the only resistance made that day was by 
his line of battle. The Prince of Wales fell with im- 
petuosity on some German cavalry placed in the front, 
and commanded by the Counts of Sallebruche, Nydo, 
and Nosto : a fierce battle ensued : one side were encou- 

m Froissart, liv. i. chap. 162. 



188 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, raged by the near prospect of so great a victory ; the 

.^J 1 ^. other were stimulated by the shame of quitting the field 

1356 to an enemy so much inferior ; but the three German 

generals, together with the Duke of Athens, Constable of 

France, falling in battle, that body of cavalry gave way, 

and left the king himself exposed to the whole fury of 

the enemy. The ranks were every moment thinned 

around him : the nobles fell by his side one after another : 

his son, scarce fourteen years of age, received a wound, 

while he was fighting valiantly in defence of his father : 

the king himself, spent with fatigue, and overwhelmed by 

numbers, might easily have been slain ; but every English 

gentleman, ambitious of taking alive the royal prisoner, 

spared him in the action, exhorted him to surrender, and 

offered him quarter : several who attempted to seize him 

suffered for their temerity. He still cried out, Where is 

my cousin, the Prince of Wales ? and seemed unwilling 

Captivity to become prisoner to any person of inferior rank. But 

Kin g e f being told that the prince was at a distance on the field, 

France. h e threw down his gauntlet, and yielded himself to 

Dennis de Morbec, a knight of Arras, who had been 

obliged to fly his country for murder. His son was taken 

with him n . 

The Prince of Wales, who had been carried away in 
pursuit of the flying enemy, finding the field entirely 
clear, had ordered a tent to be pitched, and was reposing 
himself after the toils of battle ; inquiring still, with great 
anxiety, concerning the fate of the French monarch. He 
despatched the Earl of Warwick to bring him intelli- 
gence ; and that nobleman came happily in time to save 
the life of the captive prince, which was exposed to 
greater danger than it had been during the heat of the 
action. The English had taken him by violence from 
Morbec : the Gascons claimed the honour of detaining 
the royal prisoner : and some brutal soldiers, rather than 
yield the prize to their rivals, had threatened to put him 
to death . Warwick overawed both parties, and ap- 
proaching the king with great demonstrations of respect, 
offered to conduct him to the prince's tent. 

Here commences the real and truly admirable heroism 

n Rymer, vol. vi. p. 72. 154. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 164. 
o Froissart, liv. i. chap. 164. 



EDWARD III. 189 

of Edward : for victories are vulgar things in comparison CHAP. 
of that moderation and humanity displayed by a young ^J _, 
prince of twenty-seven years of age, not yet cooled from 1356 
the fury of battle, and elated by as extraordinary and as 
unexpected success as had ever crowned the arms of any 
commander. He came forth to meet the captive king 
with all the marks of regard and sympathy ; administered 
comfort to him amidst his misfortunes ; paid him the tri- 
bute of praise due to his valour ; and ascribed his own 
victory merely to the blind chance of war, or to a supe- 
rior Providence, which controls all the efforts of human 
force and prudence p . The behaviour of John showed 
him not unworthy of this courteous treatment : his pre- 
sent abject fortune never made him forget a moment 
that he was a king : more touched by Edward's genero- 
sity than by his own calamities, he confessed, that not- 
withstanding his defeat and captivity, his honour was 
still unimpaired ; and that if he yielded the victory, it 
was at least gained by a prince of such consummate 
valour and humanity. 

Edward ordered a repast to be prepared in his tent for 
the prisoner ; and he himself served at the royal captive's 
table, as if he had been one of his retinue : he stood at 
the king's back during the meal : constantly refused to 
take a place at table : and declared, that, being a subject, 
he was too well acquainted with the distance between his 
own rank and that of royal majesty, to assume such free- 
dom. All his father's pretensions to the crown of France 
were now buried in oblivion ; John in captivity received 
the honours of a king, which were refused him when 
seated on the throne : his misfortunes, not his title, were 
respected ; and the French prisoners, conquered by this 
elevation of mind, more than by their late discomfiture, 
burst into tears of admiration ; which were only checked 
by the reflection that such genuine and unaltered heroism 
in an enemy must certainly in the issue prove but the 
more dangerous to their native country q . 

All the English and Gascon knights imitated the 1357. 
generous example set them by their prince. The cap- 
tives were every where treated with humanity, and were 
soon after dismissed, on paying moderate ransoms to the 

P Poul. Cemil. p. 197. i Froissart, liv. i. chap. 168. 



190 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, persons into whose hands they had fallen. The extent 
of their fortunes was considered ; and an attention was 
given, that they should still have sufficient means left to 
perform their military service in a manner suitable to 
their rank and quality. Yet so numerous were the noble 
prisoners, that these ransoms, added to the spoils gained 
in the field, were sufficient to enrich the prince's army ; 
and as they had suffered very little in the action, their 
joy and exultation were complete. 

The Prince of Wales conducted his prisoner to Bour- 
deaux ; and not being provided with forces so numerous 
as might enable him to push his present advantages, he 
concluded a two years' truce with France r ; which was 
also become requisite, that he might conduct the captive 
king with safety into England. He landed at Southwark, 
and was met by a great concourse of people of all ranks 
24th May. and stations. The prisoner was clad in royal apparel, 
and mounted on a white steed, distinguished by its size 
and beauty, and by the richness of its furniture. The 
conqueror rode by his side in a meaner attire, and carried 
by a black palfrey. In this situation, more glorious than 
all the insolent parade of a Roman triumph, he passed 
through the streets of London, and presented the King 
of France to his father, who advanced to meet him, and 
received him with the same courtesy as if he had been a 
neighbouring potentate that had voluntarily come to pay 
him a friendly visit 8 . It is impossible, in reflecting on 
this noble conduct, not to perceive the advantages which 
resulted from the otherwise whimsical principles of chi- 
valry, and which gave men, in those rude times, some 
superiority even over people of a more cultivated age 
and nation. 

The King of France, besides the generous treatment 
which he met with in England, had the melancholy con- 
solation of the wretched, to see companions in affliction. 
The King of Scots had been eleven years a captive in 
Edward's hands ; and the good fortune of this latter 
monarch had reduced at once the two neighbouring po- 
tentates, with whom he was engaged in war, to be pri- 
soners in his capital. But Edward, finding that the con- 
quest of Scotland was nowise advanced by the captivity 

* Kymer, vol. vi. p. 3. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 173. 



EDWARD III. 191 

of its sovereign, and that the government, conducted by CHAP. 
Robert Stuart, his nephew and heir, was still able to 
fend itself, consented to restore David Bruce to his 
liberty, for the ransom of one hundred thousand marks 
sterling; and that prince delivered the sons of all his 
principal nobility as hostages for the payment *. 

Meanwhile, the captivity of John, joined to the pre- 
ceding disorders of the French government, had pro- p 
duced in that country a dissolution, almost total, of 
civil authority, and had occasioned confusions, the most 
horrible and destructive that had ever been experienced 
in any age or in any nation. The dauphin, now about 
eighteen years of age, naturally assumed the royal power 
during his father's captivity ; but though endowed with 
an excellent capacity, even in such early years, he pos- 
sessed neither experience nor authority sufficient to de- 
fend a state assailed at once by foreign power and shaken 
by intestine faction. In order to obtain a supply, he as- 
sembled the states of the kingdom : that assembly, in- 
stead of supporting his administration, were themselves 
seized with the spirit of confusion ; and laid hold of the 
present opportunity to demand limitations of the prince's 
power, the punishment of past malversations, and the 
liberty of the King of Navarre. Marcel, provost of the 
merchants, and first magistrate of Paris, put himself at 
the head of the unruly populace ; and from the violence 
and temerity of his character, pushed them to commit 
the most criminal outrages against the royal authority. 
They detained the dauphin in a sort of captivity ; they 
murdered in his presence Robert de Clermont and John 
de Conflans, mareschals, the one of Normandy, the other 
of Burgundy ; they threatened all the other ministers 
with a like fate ; and when Charles, who was obliged to 
temporise and dissemble, made his escape from their 
hands, they levied war against him, and openly erected 
the standard of rebellion. The other cities of the king- 
dom, in imitation of the capital, shook off the dauphin's 
authority ; took the government into their own hands ; 
and spread the disorder into every province. The nobles, 
whose inclinations led them to adhere to the crown, and 

* Ryraer, vol. vi. p. 45, 46. 52. 56. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 174. Walsingham, 
p. 173. i 



192 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, were naturally disposed to check these tumults, had lost 
,_ x y L _j all their influence ; and being reproached with cowardice, 
1358 on account of the base desertion of their sovereign in 
the battle of Poictiers, were treated with universal con- 
tempt by the inferior orders. The troops, who from the 
deficiency of pay, were no longer retained in discipline, 
threw off all regard to their officers, sought the means of 
subsistence by plunder and robbery, and associating to 
them all the disorderly people, with whom that age 
abounded, formed numerous bands which infested all 
parts of the kingdom. They desolated the open coun- 
try ; burned and plundered the villages ; and by cutting 
off all means of communication or subsistence, reduced 
even the inhabitants of the walled towns to the most 
extreme necessity. The peasants, formerly oppressed 
and now left unprotected by their masters, became des- 
perate from their present misery ; and rising every where 
in arms, carried to the last extremity those disorders 
which were derived from the sedition of the citizens and 
disbanded soldiers u . The gentry, hated for their tyranny, 
were every where exposed to the violence of popular 
rage; and instead of meeting with the regard due to 
their past dignity, became only, on that account, the 
object of more wanton insult to the mutinous peasants. 
They were hunted like wild beasts, and put to the sword 
without mercy; their castles were consumed with fire, and 
levelled to the ground. Their wives and daughters were 
first ravished, then murdered : the savages proceeded so 
far as to impale some gentlemen, and roast them alive 
before a slow fire : a body of nine thousand of them 
broke into Meaux, where the wife of the dauphin, with 
above three hundred ladies, had taken shelter : the most 
brutal treatment and most atrocious cruelty were justly 
dreaded by this helpless company : but the Captal de 
Buche, though in the service of Edward, yet moved by 
generosity and by the gallantry of a true knight, flew to 
their rescue, and beat off the peasants with great slaugh- 
ter. In other civil wars, the opposite factions, falling 
under the government of their several leaders, commonly 
preserve still the vestige of some rule and order; but 
here the wild state of nature seemed to be renewed : 

u Froissart, liv. i. chap. 182, 183, 184. 



EDWARD III. 193 

every man was thrown loose and independent of. his fel- CHAP. 
lows : and the populousness of the country, derived from ^J _, 
the preceding police of civil society, served only to in- "~^~ 
crease the horror and confusion of the scene. 

Amidst these disorders, the King of Navarre made his 
escape from prison, and presented a dangerous leader to 
the furious malecontents w . But the splendid talents of 
this prince qualified him only to do mischief, and to in- 
crease the public distractions. He wanted the steadiness 
and prudence requisite for making his intrigues subser- 
vient to his ambition, and forming his numerous parti- 
sans into a regular faction. He revived his pretensions, 
somewhat obsolete, to the crown of France : but while 
he advanced this claim, he relied entirely on his alliance 
with the English, who were concerned in interest to dis- 
appoint his pretensions ; and who, being public and in- 
veterate enemies to the state, served only, by the friend- 
ship which they seemingly bore him, to render his cause 
the more odious. And in all his operations he acted 
more like a leader of banditti, than one who aspired to 
be the head of a regular government, and who was en- 
gaged, by his station, to endeavour the re-establishment 
of order in the community. 

The eyes therefore of all the French, who wished to 
restore peace to their miserable and desolated country, 
were turned towards the dauphin ; and that young 
prince, though not remarkable for his military talents, 
possessed so much prudence and spirit, that he daily 
gained the ascendant over all his enemies. Marcel, the 
seditious provost of Paris, was slain while he was at- 
tempting to deliver the city to the King of Navarre and 
the English ; and the capital immediately returned to its 
duty x . The most considerable bodies of the mutinous 
peasants were dispersed and put to the sword : some 
bands of military robbers underwent the same fate : and 
though many grievous disorders still remained, France 
began gradually to assume the face of a regular civil 
government, and to form some plan for its defence and 
security. 

During the confusion in the dauphin's affairs, Edward 
seemed to have a favourable opportunity for pushing his 

w Froissart, liv. i. chap. 181. x Ibid. chap. 187. 

VOL. II. 17 



194 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, conquests : but besides that his hands were tied by the 
truce, and he could only assist underhand the faction of 

^^^ Navarre, the state of the English finances and military 
power, during those ages, rendered the kingdom inca- 
pable of making any regular or steady effort, and obliged 
it to exert its force at very distant intervals, by which all 
the projected ends were commonly disappointed. Ed- 
ward employed himself, during a conjuncture so inviting, 
chiefly in negotiations with his prisoner ; and John had 
the weakness to sign terms of peace, which, had they 
taken effect, must have totally ruined and dismembered 
his kingdom. He agreed to restore all the provinces 
which had been possessed by Henry II. and his two sons, 
and to annex them for ever to England, without any 
obligation of homage or fealty on the part of the Eng- 
lish monarch. But the dauphin and the states of France 
rejected this treaty, so dishonourable and pernicious to 
the kingdom 7 and Edward, on the expiration of the 
truce, having now, by subsidies and frugality, collected 
some treasure, prepared himself for a new invasion of 
France. 

The great authority and renown of the king and the 
Prince of Wales, the splendid success of their former 
enterprises, and the certain prospect of plunder from the 
defenceless provinces of France, soon brought together 
the whole military power of England, and the same mo- 
tives invited to Edward's standard all the hardy adven- 
turers of the different countries of Europe z . He passed 
over to Calais, where he assembled an army of near a 
hundred thousand men ; a force which the dauphin could 
not pretend to withstand in the open field : that prince, 
therefore, prepared himself to elude a blow which it was 
impossible for him to resist. He put all the considerable 
towns in a posture of defence ; ordered them to be sup- 
plied with magazines and provisions ; distributed proper 
garrisons in all places ; secured every thing valuable in 
-the fortified cities ; and chose his own station at Paris, 
with a view of allowing the enemy to vent their fury on 
the open country. 
1359 The king, aware of this plan of defence, was obliged to 

4th NOV. carry along with him six thousand waggons, loaded with 

y Froissart, liv. i. chap. 201. z Ibid. chap. 205. 



EDWARD III. 195 

the provisions necessary for the subsistence of his army. CHAP. 
After ravaging the province of Picardy, he advanced into 
Champagne ; and having a strong desire of being crowned v ~^^ 
King of France at Rheims, the usual place in which thisinvasion 
ceremony is performed, he laid siege to that city, and of 
carried on his attacks, though without success, for the 
space of seven weeks a . The place was bravely defended 
by the inhabitants, encouraged by the exhortations of 
the archbishop, John de Craon; till the advanced sea- 
son (for this expedition was entered upon in the begin- 
ning of winter) obliged the king to raise the siege. The 136 - 
province of Champagne, meanwhile, was desolated by 
his incursions, and he thence conducted his army, with 
a like intent, into Burgundy. He took and pillaged 
Tonnerre, Gaillon, Avalon, and other small places ; but 
the Duke of Burgundy, that he might preserve his coun- 
try from farther ravages, consented to pay him the sum 
of one hundred thousand nobles b . Edward then bent 
his march towards the Nivernois, which saved itself by a 
like composition : he laid waste Brie, and the Gatinois ; 
and after a long march, very destructive to France, and 
somewhat ruinous to his own troops, he appeared before 
the gates of Paris, and taking up his quartern at Bourg- 
la-Reine, extended his army to Long-jumeau, Mont- 
rouge, and Vaugirard. He tried to provoke the dauphin 
to hazard a battle, by sending him a defiance ; but could 
not make that prudent prince change his plan of opera- 
tions. Paris was safe from the danger of an assault by 
its numerous garrison from that of a blockade, by its 
well-supplied magazines : and as Edward himself could 
not subsist his army in a country wasted by foreign and 
domestic enemies, and left also empty by the precaution 
of the dauphin, he was obliged to remove his quarters ; 
and he spread his troops into the provinces of Maine, 
Beausse, and the Chartraine, which were abandoned to 
the fury of their devastations . The only repose which 
France experienced was during the festival of Easter, 
when the king stopped the course of his ravages. For 
superstition can sometimes restrain the rage of men, 
which neither justice nor humanity is able to control. 

a Froissart, liv. i. chap. 208. Walsing. p. 174. 

t> Kymer, vol. vi. p. 161. Walsing. p. 174. Walsing. p. 175. 



196 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. While the war was carried on in this ruinous manner, 
XVL the negotiations for peace were never interrupted ; but as 
the king still insisted on the full execution of the treaty 
which he had made with his prisoner at London, and 
which was strenuously rejected by the dauphin, there 
appeared no likelihood of an accommodation. The earl, 
now Duke of Lancaster, (for this title was introduced 
into England during the present reign,) endeavoured to 
soften the rigour of these terms, and to finish the war on 
more equal and reasonable conditions. He insisted with 
Edward, that notwithstanding his great and surprising 
successes, the object of the war, if such were to be es- 
teemed the acquisition of the crown of France, was not 
become any nearer than at the commencement of it ; or 
rather was set at a greater distance by those very victo- 
ries and advantages which seemed to lead to it. That 
his claim of succession had not from the first procured 
him one partisan in the kingdom ; and the continuance 
of these destructive hostilities had united every French- 
man in the most implacable animosity against him. That 
though intestine faction had crept into the government 
of France, it was abating every moment ; and no party, 
even during the greatest heat of the contest, when sub- 
jection under a foreign enemy usually appears preferable 
to the dominion of fellow-citizens, had ever adopted the 
pretensions of the King of England. That the King of 
Navarre himself, who alone was allied with the English, 
instead of being a cordial friend, was Edward's most dan- 
gerous rival, and, in the opinion of his partisans, possessed 
a much preferable title to the crown of France. That 
the prolongation of the war, however it might enrich the 
English soldiers, was ruinous to the king himself, who 
bore all the charges of the armament, without reaping 
any solid or durable advantage from it. That if the pre- 
sent disorders of France continued, that kingdom would 
soon be reduced to such a state of desolation, that it 
would afford no spoils to its ravagers ; if it could establish 
a more steady government, it might turn the chance of war 
in its favour, and by its superior force and advantages, be 
able to repel the present victors. That the dauphin, even 
during his greatest distresses, had yet conducted himself 
with so much prudence, as to prevent the English from 



EDWARD III. 197 

acquiring one foot of land in the kingdom ; and it were CHAP. 
better for the king to accept by a peace what he had in 
vain attempted to acquire by hostilities, which, however ^^~ 
hitherto successful, had been extremely expensive, and 
might prove very dangerous : and that Edward, having 
acquired so much glory by his arms, the praise of mode- 
ration was the only honour to which he could now aspire ; 
an honour so much the greater, as it was durable, was 
united with that of prudence, and might be attended 
with the most real ad vantages d . 

These reasons induced Edward to accept of more mo- Peace of 
derate terms of peace ; and it is probable that, in order Breti s m - 
to palliate this change of resolution, he ascribed it to a 
vow made during a dreadful tempest, which attacked 
his army on their march, and which ancient historians 
represent as the cause of this sudden accommodation 6 . 
The conferences between the English and French com- 
missioners were carried on during a few days at Bretigni, 
in the Chartraine, and the peace was at last concluded 8th May< 
on the following conditions f . It was stipulated that 
King John should be restored to his liberty, and should 
pay as his ransom three millions of crowns of gold, about 
one million five hundred thousand pounds of our pre- 
sent money g , which was to be discharged at different 
payments: that Edward should for ever renounce all 
claim to the crown of France, and to the provinces of 
Normandy, Maine, Touraine, and Anjou, possessed by 
his ancestors ; and should receive in exchange the pro- 
vinces of Poictou, Xaintonge, 1'Agenois, Perigort, the 
Limousin, Quercy, Kovergue, 1'Angoumois, and other 
districts in that quarter, together with Calais, Guisnes, 
Montreuil, and the county of Ponthieu, on the other 
side of France : that the full sovereignty of all these pro- 
vinces, as well as that of Guienne, should be vested in 
the crown of England, and that France should renounce 
all title to feudal jurisdiction, homage, or appeal from 
them : that the King of Navarre should be restored to 
all his honours and possessions : that Edward should re- 
nounce his confederacy with the Flemings, John his con- 

d Eroissart, liv. i. chap. 211. e Ibid. 

f Rymer, vol. vi. p. 178. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 212. 
e See note [I], at the end of the volume. 

17* 




HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

nexions with the Scots: that the disputes concerning 
the succession of Britaiiy, between the families of Blois 
and Mountfort, should be decided by arbiters appointed 
by the two kings ; and if the competitors refused to sub- 
mit to the award, the dispute should no longer be a ground 
of war between the kingdoms : and that forty hostages, 
such as should be agreed on, should be sent to England 
as a security for the execution of all these conditions 11 , 
sth July. In consequence of this treaty, the King of France was 
brought over to Calais, whither Edward also soon after 
repaired ; and there both princes solemnly ratified the 
treaty. John was sent to Boulogne ; the king accom- 
panied him a mile on his journey ; and the two monarchs 
parted with many professions, probably cordial and sin- 
cere, of mutual amity 1 . The good disposition of John 
made him fully sensible of the generous treatment which 
he had received in England, and obliterated all memory 
of the ascendant gained over him by his rival. There 
seldom has been a treaty of so great importance so faith- 
fully executed by both parties. Edward had scarcely 
from the beginning entertained any hopes of acquiring 
the crown- of France : by restoring John to his liberty, 
and making peace at a juncture so favourable to his arms, 
he had now plainly renounced all pretensions of this 
nature : he had sold at a very high price that chimerical 
claim ; and had at present no other interest than to re- 
tain those acquisitions which he had made with such sin- 
gular prudence and good fortune. John, on the other 
hand, though the terms were severe, possessed such 
fidelity and honour, that he was determined, at all 
hazards, to execute them, and to use every expedient for 
satisfying a monarch, who had indeed been his greatest 
political enemy, but had treated him personally with sin- 
gular humanity and regard. But, notwithstanding his 
endeavours, there occurred many difficulties in fulfilling 
his purpose ; chiefly from the extreme reluctance which 

h The hostages were the two sons of the French king, John and Lewis ; his 
brother Philip, Duke of Orleans, the Duke of Bourbon, James de Bourbon, Count 
de Ponthieu, the Counts d'Eu, de Longueville, de St. Pol, de Harcourt, de Ven- 
dome, de Couci, de Craon, de Montmorenci, and many of the chief nobility of 
France. The princes were mostly released, on the fulfilling of certain articles ; 
others of the hostages, and the Duke of Berry among the rest, were permitted to re- 
turn upon their parole, which they did not keep. Rymer, vol. vi. p. 278. 285. 287. 

i Froissart, liv. i. chap. 213. 



EDWARD III. 199 

many towns and vassals, in the neighbourhood of Guienne, CHAP. 
expressed against submitting to the English dominion 1 " ; 
and John, in order to adjust these differences, took a re-"^^" 
solution of coming over himself to England. His coun- 1363. 
cil endeavoured to dissuade him from this rash design ; 
and probably would have been pleased to see him em- 
ploy more chicanes for eluding the execution of so dis- 
advantageous a treaty ; but John replied to them, that 
though good faith were banished from the rest of the 
earth, she ought still to retain her habitation in the 
breasts of princes. Some historians would detract from 
the merit of this honourable conduct, by representing 
John as enamoured of an English lady, to whom he was 
glad, on this pretence, to pay a visit ; but besides that 
this surmise is not founded on any good authority, it ap- 
pears somewhat unlikely on account of the advanced age 
of that prince, who was now in his fifty-sixth year. He 1354. 
was lodged in the Savoy, the palace where he had re- 
sided during his captivity, and where he soon after 
sickened and died. Nothing can be a stronger proof of sth April. 
the great dominion of fortune over men, than the ca- 
lamities which pursued a monarch of such eminent valour, 
goodness, and honour, and which he incurred merely by 
reason of some slight imprudences, which in other situa- 
tions would have been of no importance. But though 
both his reign and that of his father proved extremely 
unfortunate to their kingdom, the French crown ac- 
quired, during their time, very considerable accessions, 
those of Dauphiny and Burgundy. This latter province, 
however, John had the imprudence again to dismember, 
by bestowing it on Philip, his fourth son, the object of 
his most tender affections 1 ; a deed which was afterwards 
the source of many calamities to the kingdom. 

John was succeeded in the throne by Charles the 
Dauphin, a prince educated in the school of adversity, 
and well qualified, by his consummate prudence and -ex- 
perience, to repair all the losses which the kingdom had 
sustained from the errors of his two predecessors. Con- 
trary to the practice of all the great princes of those 
times, which held nothing in estimation but military 
courage, he seems to have fixed it as a maxim never to 

k Eroissart, liv. i. chap. 214. 1 Eymer, vol. vi. p. 421. 



200 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, appear at the head of his armies ; and he was the first 
king in Europe that showed the advantage of policy, 
1834. foresight, and judgment, above a rash and precipitate 
valour. The events of his reign, compared with those 
of the preceding, are a proof how little reason kingdoms 
have to value themselves on their victories, or to be 
humbled by their defeats ; which in reality ought to be 
ascribed chiefly to the good or bad conduct of their rulers, 
and are of little moment towards determining national 
characters and manners. 
state of Before Charles could think of counterbalancing so 

France. -17, -, -i . . n i 

great a power as England, it was necessary for him to 
remedy the many disorders to which his own kingdom 
was exposed. He turned his arms against the King of 
Navarre, the great disturber of France during that age : 
he defeated this prince by the conduct of Bertrand du 
Guesclin, a gentleman of Britany, one of the most ac- 
complished characters of the age, whom he had the dis- 
cernment to choose as the instrument of all his vic- 
tories" 1 ; and he obliged his enemy to accept of moderate 
terms of peace. Du Guesclin was less fortunate in the wars 
of Britany, which still continued, notwithstanding the 
mediation of France and England : he was defeated and 
taken prisoner at Auray by Chandos : Charles of Blois 
was there slain, and the young Count of Mountfort soon 
after got entire possession of that duchy 11 . But the pru- 
dence of Charles broke the force of this blow : he sub- 
mitted to the decision of fortune : he acknowledged 
the title of Mountfort, though a zealous partisan of Eng- 
land ; and received the proffered homage for his do- 
minions. But the chief obstacle which the French king 
met with in the settlement of the state proceeded from 
obscure enemies, whom their crimes alone rendered emi- 
nent, and their number dangerous. 

On the conclusion of the treaty of Bretigni, the many 
military adventurers who had followed the standard of 
Edward, being dispersed into the several provinces, and 
possessed of strong holds, refused to lay down their 
arms, or relinquish a course of life to which they were 
now accustomed, and by which alone they could gain a 

m Froissart, liv. i. chap. 119, 120. 

n Ibid. chap. 227, 228, &c. Walsing. p. 180. 



EDWARD III. 201 

subsistence . They associated themselves with the ban- CHAP. 
ditti, who were already inured to the habits of rapine XVL 
and violence ; and, under the names of the companies 1364 
and companions, became a terror to all the peaceable 
inhabitants. Some English and Gascon gentlemen of 
character, particularly Sir Matthew Gournay, Sir Hugh 
Calverly, the Chevalier Verte, and others, were not 
ashamed to take the command of these ruffians, whose 
numbers amounted, on the whole, to near forty thousand, 
and who bore the appearance of regular armies, rather 
than bands of robbers. These leaders 'fought pitched 
battles with the troops of France, and gained victories ; 
in one of which, Jaques de Bourbon, a prince of the 
blood, was slain p : and they proceeded to such a height, 
that they wanted little but regular establishments to 
become princes, and thereby sanctify, by the maxims of 
the world, their infamous profession. The greater spoil 
they committed on the country, the more easy they found 
it to recruit their number : all those who were reduced 
to misery and despair flocked to their standard : the evil 
was every day increasing : and though the pope declared 
them excommunicated, these military plunderers, how- 
ever deeply affected with the sentence, to which they 
paid a much greater regard than to any principles of 
morality, could not be induced by it to betake them- 
selves to peaceable or lawful professions. 

As Charles was not able, by power, to redress so enor- 1366. 
mous a grievance, he was led by necessity, and by the 
turn of his character, to correct it by policy ; and to con- 
trive some method of discharging into foreign countries 
this dangerous and intestine evil. 

Peter, King of Castile, stigmatized by his contempo- 
raries, and by posterity, with the epithet of Cruel, had 
filled with blood and murder his kingdom and his own 
family ; and having incurred the universal hatred of his 
subjects, he kept, from present terror alone, an anxious 
and precarious possession of the throne. His nobles fell 
every day the victims of his severity : he put to death 
several of his natural brothers from groundless jealousy : 
each murder, by multiplying his enemies, became the 
occasion of fresh barbarities : and as he was not destitute 

o Froissart, liv. i. chap. 214. P Ibid. chap. 214, 215. 



202 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of talents, his neighbours, no less than his own subjects, 
were alarmed at the progress of his violence and injus- 
tice. The ferocity of his temper, instead of being 
softened by his strong propensity to love, was rather in- 
flamed by that passion, and took thence new occasion to 
exert itself. Instigated by Mary de Padilla, who had 
acquired the ascendant over him, he threw into prison 
Blanche de Bourbon, his wife, sister to the Queen of 
France ; and soon after made way, by poison, for the 
espousing of his mistress. 

Henry, Count of Transtamare, his natural brother, 
seeing the fate of every one who had become obnoxious 
to this tyrant, took arms against him ; but being foiled 
in the attempt, he sought for refuge in France, where he 
found the minds of men extremely inflamed against Peter, 
on account of his murder of the French princess. He 
asked permission of Charles to enlist the companies in his 
service, and to lead them into Castile ; where, from the 
concurrence of his own friends, and the enemies of his 
brother, he had the prospect of certain and immediate 
success. The French king, charmed with the project, 
employed Du Guesclin in negotiating with the leaders 
of these banditti. The treaty was soon concluded. The 
high character of honour which that general possessed 
made every one trust to his promises : though the in- 
tended expedition was kept a secret, the companies im- 
plicitly enlisted under his standard : and they required 
no other condition before their engagement, than an as- 
surance that they were not to be led against the Prince 
of Wales in Guienne. But that prince was so little 
averse to the enterprise, that he allowed some gentlemen 
of his retinue to enter into the service under Du Guesclin. 

Du Guesclin, having completed his levies, led the army 
first to Avignon, where the pope then resided, and de- 
manded, sword in hand, an absolution for his soldiers, 
and the sum of two hundred thousand livres. The first 
was readily promised him: some more difficulty was 
made with regard to the second. " I believe that my 
fellows," replied Du Guesclin, " may make a shift to do 
without your absolution ; but the money is absolutely 
necessary." The pope then extorted from the inhabit- 
ants in the city and neighbourhood the sum of a hundred 



EDWARD III. 203 

thousand livres, and offered it to Du Guesclin. " It is CHAP. 
not my purpose/' cried that generous warrior, "to oppress .J^^ l '_. 
the innocent people. The pope and his cardinals them- 1366 
selves can well spare me that sum from their own coffers. 
This money, I insist, must be restored to the owners ; 
and should they be defrauded of it, I shall myself return 
from the other side of the Pyrenees, and oblige you to 
make them restitution." The pope found the necessity 
of submitting, and paid him from his treasury the sum 
demanded* 1 . The army, hallowed by the blessings, and 
enriched by the spoils, of the church, proceeded on their 
expedition. 

These experienced and hardy soldiers, conducted by so 
able a general, easily prevailed over the King of Castile, 
whose subjects, instead of supporting their oppressor, 
were ready to join the enemy against him r . Peter fled 
from his dominions, took shelter in Guienne, and craved 
the protection of the Prince of "Wales, whom his father 
had invested with the sovereignty of these conquered 
provinces, by the title of the principality of Aquitaine 8 . 
The prince seemed now to have entirely changed his 
sentiments with regard to the Spanish transactions; 
whether that he was moved by the generosity of support- 
ing a distressed prince, and thought, as is but too usual 
among sovereigns, that the rights of the people were a 
matter of much less consideration ; or dreaded the acqui- 
sition of so powerful a confederate to France as the new 
King of Castile ; or, what is most probable, was impatient 
of rest and ease, and sought only an opportunity for ex- 
erting his military talents, by which he had already ac- i 36 7. 
quired so much renown. He promised his assistance to Expedi- 
the dethroned monarch ; and having obtained the con- Castae. 
sent of his father, he levied a great army, and set out 
upon his enterprise. He was accompanied by his younger 
brother, John of Gaunt, created Duke of Lancaster, in 
the room of the good prince of that name, who had died 
without any male issue, and whose daughter he had 
espoused. Chandos also, who bore among the English 
the same character which Du Guesclin had acquired 

<i Hist, du Guesclin. 

r Froissart, liv. i. chap. 230. 

8 Kymer, vol. vi. p. 384. Froissart, liv. i. chap. 231. 



204 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, among the French, commanded under him in this ex- 

XVL pedition. 

""^^ The first blow which the Prince of "Wales gave to 
Henry of Transtamare was the recalling of all the com- 
panies from his service ; and so much reverence did they 
bear to the name of Edward, that great numbers of them 
immediately withdrew from Spain, and enlisted under 
his banners. Henry, however, beloved by his new sub- 
jects, and supported by the King of Arragon, and others 
of his neighbours, was able to meet the enemy with an 
army of a hundred thousand men; forces three times 
more numerous than those which were commanded 
by Edward. Du Guesclin, and all his experienced offi- 
cers, advised him to delay any decisive action, to cut off 
the Prince of Wales's provisions, and to avoid every en- 
gagement with a general whose enterprises had hitherto 
been always conducted with prudence, and crowned with 
success. Henry trusted too much to his numbers ; and 

3d April, ventured to encounter the English prince at Najara*. 
Historians of that age are commonly very copious in 
describing the shock of armies in battle, the valour of the 
combatants, the slaughter and various successes of the 
day : but though small rencounters in those times were 
often well disputed, military discipline was always too 
imperfect to preserve order in great armies; and such 
actions deserve more the name of routs than of battles. 
Henry was chased off the field, with the loss of above 
twenty thousand men : there perished only four knights 
and forty private men on the side of the English. 

Peter, who so well merited the infamous epithet which 
he bore, purposed to murder all his prisoners in cold 
blood : but was restrained from this barbarity by the re- 
monstrances of the Prince of Wales. All Castile now 
submitted to the victor; Peter was restored to the 
throne ; and Edward finished this perilous enterprise 
with his usual glory. But he had soon reason to repent 
his connexions with a man like Peter, abandoned to all 
sense of virtue and honour. The ungrateful tyrant 
refused the stipulated pay to the English forces; and 
Edward, finding his soldiers daily perish by sickness, and 
even his own health impaired by the climate, was obliged, 

* Froissart, liv. i. chap. 241. 




EDWARD III. 205 

without receiving any satisfaction on this head, to return CHAP. 
into Guienne u . 

The barbarities exercised by Peter over his helpless 
subjects, whom he now regarded as vanquished rebels, 
revived all the animosity of the Castilians against him ; 
and on the return of Henry of Transtamare, together 
with Du Guesclin, and some forces levied anew in France, 
the tyrant was again dethroned, and was taken prisoner. 
His brother, in resentment of his cruelties, murdered him 
with his own hand ; and was placed on the throne of 
Castile, which he transmitted to his posterity. The Duke 
of Lancaster, who espoused in second marriage the eldest 
daughter of Peter, inherited only the empty title of that 
sovereignty, and, by claiming the succession, increased 
the animosity of the new King of Castile against Eng- 
land. 

But the prejudice which the affairs of Prince Edward 1368. 
received from this splendid though imprudent expedition with* 
ended not with it. He had involved himself so much m France - 
debt, by his preparations and the pay of his troops, that 
he found it necessary, on his return, to impose on his 
principality a new tax, to which some of the nobility con- 
sented with extreme reluctance, and to which others 
absolutely refused to submit w . This incident revived 
the animosity which the inhabitants bore to the English, 
and which all the amiable qualities of the Prince of 
Wales were not able to mitigate or assuage. They com- 
plained that they were considered as a conquered people, 
that their privileges were disregarded, that all trust was 
given to the English alone, that every office of honour 
and profit was conferred on these foreigners, and that 
the extreme reluctance which most of them had expressed 
to receive the new yoke, was likely to be long remembered 
against them. They cast, therefore, their eyes towards 
their ancient sovereign, whose prudence, they found, had 

u Froissart, liv. i. chap. 242, 243. Walsingham, p. 182. 

w This tax was a livre upon a hearth ; and it was imagined that the imposition 

would have yielded one million two hundred thousand livres a year, which supposes 

so many hearths in the provinces possessed by the English. But such loose con- 

^ jectures have commonly no manner of authority, much less in such ignorant times. 

' There is a strong instance of it in the present reign. The House of Commons 

granted the king a tax of twenty-two shillings on each parish, supposing that the 

amount of the whole would be fifty thousand pounds. But they were found to be 

in a mistake of near five to one. Cotton, p. 3. And the council assumed the 

power of augmenting the tax upon each parish. 

VOL. II. 18 



9Q6 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, now brought the affairs of his kingdom into excellent 
XVL order ; and the Counts of Armagnac, Commigne, and 
Perigord, the Lord d' Albert, with other nobles, went 
to Paris, and were encouraged to carry their complaints 
to Charles, as to their lord paramount, against these op- 
pressions of the English government 3 ". 

In the treaty of Bretigni, it had been stipulated, that 
the two kings should make renunciations ; Edward, of 
his claim to the crown of France, and to the provinces 
of Normandy, Maine, and Anjou; John, of 'the homage 
and fealty due for Guienne, and the other provinces ceded 
to the English. But when that treaty was confirmed and 
renewed at Calais, it was found necessary, as Edward was* 
not yet in possession of all the territories, that the mutual 
renunciations should for some time be deferred ; and it 
was agreed, that the parties meanwhile should make no 
use of their respective claims against each other 7 . Though 
the failure in exchanging these renunciations had still 
proceeded from France 2 , Edward appears to have taken 
no umbrage at it; both because this clause seemed to 
give him entire security, and because some reasonable 
apology had probably been made to him for each delay. 
It was, however, on this pretence, though directly con- 
trary to treaty, that Charles resolved to ground his claim, 
of still considering himself as superior lord of those pro- 
vinces, and of receiving the appeals of his sub-vassals a . 
1369. But as views of policy, more than those of justice, enter 
into the deliberations of princes ; and as the mortal in- 
juries received from the English, the pride of their tri- 
umphs, the severe terms imposed by the treaty of peace, 
seemed to render every prudent means of revenge 
honourable against them; Charles was determined to 
take this measure, less by the reasonings of his civilians 
and lawyers, than by the present situation of the two 
monarchies. He considered the declining years of Ed- 
ward, the languishing state of the Prince of Wales's 
health, the affection which the inhabitants of all these 
provinces bore to their ancient master, their distance 
from England, their vicinity to France, the extreme ani- 

* Froissart, liv. i. chap. 244. 

y Rymer, vol. vi. p. 219. 230. 234. 237. 243. 

* Rot. Franc. 35 Ed. III. m. 3. from Tyrrel, vol. iii. p. 643. 
a Froissart, liv. i. chap. 245. 



EDWARD III. 207 

mosity expressed by his own subjects against these in- CHAP. 
vaders, and their ardent thirst of vengeance ; and having 
silently made all the necessary preparations, he sent to 
the Prince of Wales a summons to appear in his court 
at Paris, and there to justify his conduct towards his 
vassals. The prince replied, that he would come to 
Paris ; but it should be at the head of sixty thousand 
men b . The unwarlike character of Charles kept Prince 
Edward, even yet, from thinking that that monarch was 
in earnest in this bold and hazardous attempt. 

It soon appeared what a poor return the king had re- 1370. 
ceived by his distant conquests for all the blood and 
treasure expended in the quarrel, and how impossible it 
was to retain acquisitions in an age when no regular force 
could be maintained sufficient to defend them against 
the revolt of the inhabitants, especially if that danger 
was joined with the invasion of a foreign enemy. Charles 
first fell upon Ponthieu, which gave the English an inlet m success 
into the heart of France : the citizens of Abbeville opened E f n 
their gates to him c : those of St. Valori, Rue, and CrO- 
toy, imitated the example, and the whole country was, 
in a little time, reduced to submission. The Dukes of 
Berri and Anjou, brothers to Charles, being assisted by 
Du Guesclin, who was recalled from Spain, invaded the 
southern provinces ; and by means of their good conduct, 
the favourable dispositions of the people, and the ardour 
of the French nobility, they made every day considerable 
progress against the English. The state of the Prince 
of Wales's health did not permit him to mount on horse- 
back, or exert his usual activity : Chandos, the Constable 
of Guienne, was slain in one action d ; the Captal de 
Buche, who succeeded him in that office, was taken pri- 
soner in another 6 ; and when young Edward himself was 
obliged by his increasing infirmities to throw up the com- 
mand, and return to his native country, the affairs of the 
English in the south of France seemed to be menaced 
with total ruin. 

The king, incensed at these injuries, threatened to put 
to death all the French hostages who remained in his 

b Froissart, liv. i. chap. 247, 248. c Walsingham, p. 183. 

d Froissart, liv. i. chap. 277. Walsingham, p. 185. 
e Froissart, liv. i. chap. 310. 



208 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, bands ; but, on reflection,, abstained from that ungene- 
^ ^ rous revenge. After resuming, by advice of Parliament, 
137o; the vain title of King of France f , he endeavoured to send 
succours into Gascony ; but all his attempts, both by sea 
and land, proved unsuccessful. The Earl of Pembroke 
was intercepted at sea, and taken prisoner with his whole 
army near Kochelle, by a fleet which the King of Castile 
had fitted out for that purpose g : Edward himself em- 
barked for Bourdeaux with another army, but was so long 
detained by contrary winds, that he was obliged to lay 
aside the enterprise h . Sir Robert Knolles, at the head 
of thirty thousand men, marched out of Calais, and con- 
tinued his ravages to the gates of Paris, without being 
able to provoke the enemy to an engagement : he pro- 
ceeded in his march to the provinces of Maine and 
Anjou, which he laid waste; but part of his army being 
there defeated by the conduct of Du Guesclin, who was 
now created Constable of France, and who seems to have 
been the first consummate general that had yet appeared 
in Europe, the rest were scattered and dispersed, and the 
small remains of the English forces, instead of reaching 
Guienne, took shelter in Britany, whose sovereign had 
embraced the alliance of England 1 . The Duke of Lan- 
caster, some time after, made a like attempt with an 
army of twenty-five thousand men, and marched the 
whole length of France from Calais to Bourdeaux ; but 
was so much harassed by the flying parties which at- 
tended him, that he brought not the half of his army to 
the place of their destination. Edward, from the neces- 
sity of his affairs, was at last obliged to conclude a truce 
with the enemy k ; after almost all his ancient posses- 
sions in France had been ravished from him, except 
Bourdeaux and Bayonne, and all his conquests except 
Calais. 

The decline of the king's life was exposed to many 
mortifications, and corresponded not to the splendid and 
noisy scenes which had filled the beginning and the 
middle of it. Besides seeing the loss of his foreign do- 

f Rymer, vol. vi. p. 621. Cotton's Abridg. p. 108. 

g Froissart, liv. i. chap. 302, 303, 304. Walsingham, p. 186. 

^ Froissart, liv. i. chap. 311. Walsingham, p. 187. 

i Froissart, liv. i. chap. 291. Walsingham, p. 185. 

k Froissart, liv. i. chap. 311. Walsingham, p. 187. 



EDWARD III. 209 

minions, and being baffled in every attempt to defend CHAP. 
them, he felt the decay of his authority at home, and ex- 
perienced, from the sharpness of some parliamentary re- ^^~ 
monstrances, the great inconstancy of the people, and the 
influence of present fortune over all their judgments 1 . 
This prince, who, during the vigour of his age, had been 
chiefly occupied in the pursuits of war and ambition, 
began, at an unseasonable period, to indulge himself in 
pleasure ; and being now a widower, he attached himself 
to a lady of sense and spirit, one Alice Pierce, who ac- 
quired a great ascendant over him, and, by her influence, 
gave such general disgust, that, in order to satisfy the 
Parliament, he was obliged to remove her from court m . 
The indolence, also, naturally attending old age and in- 
firmities, had made him, in a great measure, resign the 
administration into the hands of his son, the Duke of 
Lancaster, who, as he was far from being popular, weak- 
ened extremely the affection which the English bore to 
the person and government of the king. Men carried 
their jealousies very far against the duke ; and as they 
saw with much regret, the death of the Prince of Wales 
every day approaching, they apprehended lest the suc- 
cession of his son Richard, now a minor, should be de- 
feated by the intrigues of Lancaster, and by the weak 
indulgence of the old king. But Edward, in order to 
satisfy both the people and the prince on this head, de- 
clared, in Parliament, his grandson heir and successor 
to the crown ; and thereby cut off all the hopes of the 
Duke of Lancaster, if he ever had the temerity to enter- 
tain any. 

The Prince of Wales, after a lingering illness, died 1376 - 
in the forty-sixth year of his age ; and left a character D 
illustrious for every eminent virtue, and from his earliest 
youth till the hour he expired, unstained by any blemish. 
His valour and military talents formed the smallest part 
of his merit : his generosity, humanity, affability, mode- 
ration, gained him the affections of all men ; and he was 
qualified to throw a lustre, not only on that rude age in 
which he lived, and which nowise infected him with its 
vices, but on the most shining period of ancient or 

1 Walsingham, p. 189. Ypod. Neust. p. 530. 
m Walsingham, p. 189. 

18* 



210 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, modern history. The king survived about a year this 

V *'_j melancholy incident: England was deprived at once of 

"Tsn both these princes, its chief ornament and support : he 

2ist June, expired in the sixty-fifth year of his age, and the fifty- 

ith ' first of his reign; and the people were then sensible, 

though too late, of the irreparable loss which they had 

sustained. 

mc^of The English are apt to consider, with peculiar fond- 
the king, ness, the history of Edward III., and to esteem his reign, 
as it was one of the longest, the most glorious also, that 
occurs in the annals of their nation. The ascendant which 
they then began to acquire over France, their rival and 
supposed national enemy, makes them cast their eyes on 
this period with great complacency, and sanctifies every 
measure which Edward embraced for that end. But the 
domestic government of this prince is really more ad- 
mirable than his foreign victories ; and England enjoyed, 
by the prudence and vigour of his administration, a longer 
interval of domestic peace and tranquillity than she had 
been blessed with in any former period, or than she ex- 
perienced for many ages after. He gained the affections 
of the great, yet curbed their licentiousness ; he made 
them feel his power, without their daring, or even being 
inclined, to murmur at it : his affable and obliging be- 
haviour, his munificence and generosity, made them sub- 
mit with pleasure to his dominion ; his valour and con- 
duct made them successful in most of their enterprises ; 
and their unquiet spirits, directed against a public enemy, 
had no leisure to breed those disturbances to which they 
were naturally so much inclined, and which the frame of 
the government seemed so much to authorize. This was 
the chief benefit which resulted from Edward's victories 
and conquests. His foreign wars were, in other re- 
spects, neither founded in justice, nor directed to any 
salutary purpose. His attempt against the King of Scot- 
land, a minor, and a brother-in-law, and the revival of 
his grandfather's claim of superiority over that kingdom, 
were both unreasonable and ungenerous ; and he allowed 
himself to be too easily seduced, by the glaring prospect 
of French conquests, from the acquisition of a point 
which was practicable, and which, if attained, might 
really have been of lasting utility to his country and his 



EDWARD III. 211 

successors. The success which he met with in France, CHAP. 
though chiefly owing to his eminent talents, was unex-^J J 1 ^, 
pected; and yet from the very nature of things, not 1377 
from any unforeseen accidents, was found, even during 
his lifetime, to have procured him no solid advantages. 
But the glory of a conqueror is so dazzling to the vulgar, 
the animosity of nations is so violent, that the fruitless 
desolation of so fine a part of Europe as France is totally 
disregarded by us, and is never considered as a blemish 
in the character or conduct of this prince : and, indeed, 
from the unfortunate state of human nature, it will com- 
monly happen, that a sovereign of genius, such as Edward, 
who usually finds every thing easy in his domestic govern- 
ment, will turn himself towards military enterprises, 
where alone he meets with opposition, and where he has 
full exercise for his industry and capacity. 

Edward had a numerous posterity by his queen 
Philippa of Hainault. His eldest son was the heroic 
Edward, usually denominated the Black Prince, from the 
colour of his armour. This prince espoused his cousin 
Joan, commonly called the Fair Maid of Kent, daughter 
and heir of his uncle, the Earl of Kent, who was beheaded 
in the beginning of this reign. She was first married to 
Sir Thomas Holland, by whom she had children. By 
the Prince of Wales she had a son, Richard, who alone 
survived his father. 

The second son of King Edward (for we pass over 
such as died in their childhood) was Lionel, Duke of 
Clarence, who was first married to Elizabeth de Burgh, 
daughter and heir of the Earl of Ulster, by whom he left 
only one daughter, married to Edmund Mortimer, Earl 
of March. Lionel espoused, in second marriage, Violante, 
the daughter of the Duke of Milan n , and died in Italy 
soon after the consummation of his nuptials, without 
leaving any posterity by that princess. Of all the family, 
he resembled most his father and elder brother in his 
noble qualities. 

Edward's third son was John of Gaunt, so called from 
the place of his birth : he was created Duke of Lancas- 
ter ; and from him sprang that branch which afterwards 
possessed the crown. The fourth son of this royal family 

n Kymer, vol. vi. p. 564. 



212 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, was Edmund, created Earl of Cambridge by his father, 

^ ^and Duke of York by his nephew. The fifth son was 

1377 Thomas, who received the title of Earl of Buckingham 

from his father, and that of Duke of Gloucester from 

his nephew. In order to prevent confusion, we shall 

always distinguish these two princes by the title of York 

and Gloucester, even before they were advanced to 

them. 

There were also several princesses born to Edward by 
Philippa ; to wit, Isabella, Joan, Mary, and Margaret, 
who espoused, in the order of their names, Ingelram de 
Courcy, Earl of Bedford, Alphonso, King of Castile, 
John of Mountfort, Duke of Britany, and John Hastings, 
Earl of Pembroke. The Princess Joan died at Bour- 
deaux before the consummation of her marriage. 
Misceiia- It is remarked by an elegant historian , that conquer- 
transac- ors? though usually the bane of human kind, proved 
ref n ^ en ? m those feudal times, the most indulgent of sove- 
n ' reigns. They stood most in need of supplies from their 
people ; and not being able to compel them by force to 
submit to the necessary impositions, they were obliged 
to make them some compensation by equitable laws and 
popular concessions. This remark is, in some measure, 
though imperfectly, justified by the conduct of Edward 
III. He took no steps of moment without consulting 
his Parliament and obtaining their approbation, which he 
afterwards pleaded as a reason for their supporting his 
measures p . The Parliament, therefore, rose into greater 
consideration during his reign, and acquired more regular 
authority, than in any former time ; and even the House 
of Commons, which, during turbulent and factious periods, 
was naturally depressed by the greater power of the crown 
and barons, began to appear of some weight in the con- 
stitution. In the later years of Edward, the king's minis- 
ters were impeached in Parliament, particularly Lord 
Latimer, who fell a sacrifice to the authority of the 
Commons q ; and they even obliged the king to banish 
his mistress by their remonstrances. Some attention 
was also paid to the election of their members; and 
lawyers, in particular, who were at that time men of 

o Dr. Robertson's Hist, of Scotland, b. 1. P Cotton's Abridg. p. 108. 120. 

Q Ibid. p. 122. 



EDWARD III. 213 

character somewhat inferior, were totally excluded the CHAP. 
House during several Parliaments'. 

One of the most popular laws enacted by any prince 
was the statute which passed in the twenty-fifth of this 
reign 8 , and which limited the cases of high-treason, be- 
fore vague and uncertain, to three principal heads, con- 
spiring the death of the king, levying war against him, 
and adhering to his enemies; and the judges were pro- 
hibited, if any other cases should occur, from inflicting 
the penalty of treason without an application to Parlia- 
ment. The bounds of treason were indeed so much 
limited by this statute, which still remains in force with- 
out any alteration, that the lawyers were obliged to en- 
large them, and to explain a conspiracy for levying war 
against the king, to be equivalent to a conspiracy against 
his life ; and this interpretation, seemingly forced, has, from 
the necessity of the case, been tacitly acquiesced in. It 
was also ordained, that a Parliament should be held once a 
year, or oftener, if need be : a law which, like many others, 
was never observed, and lost its authority by disuse*. 

Edward granted about twenty parliamentary confirma- 
tions of the great charter ; and these concessions are 
commonly appealed to as proofs of his great indulgence 
to the people, and his tender regard for their liberties. 
But the contrary presumption is more natural. If the 
maxims of Edward's reign had not been in general some- 
what arbitrary, and if the great charter had not been 
frequently violated, the Parliament would never have 
applied for these frequent confirmations, which could add 
no force to a deed regularly observed, and which could 
serve to no other purpose than to prevent the contrary 
precedents from turning into a rule, and acquiring au- 
thority. It was indeed the effect of the irregular govern- 
ment during those ages, that a statute which had been 
enacted some years, instead of acquiring, was imagined 
to lose force by time, and needed to be often renewed 
by recent statutes of the same sense and tenour. Hence, 
likewise, that general clause so frequent in old acts of 
Parliament, that the statutes enacted by the king's pro- 
genitors should be observed"; a precaution which, if we 

* Cotton's Abridg. p. 18. Chap. 2. * 4 Edward III. cap. 14. 

u 36 Edward III. cap. 1. 37 Edw. III. cap. 1. &c. 



214 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, do not consider the circumstances of the times, might 
appear absurd and ridiculous. The frequent confirma* 
^^^ tions, in general terms, of the privileges of the church, 
proceeded from the same cause. 

It is a clause in one of Edward's statutes, that no man, 
of ivliat estate or condition soever, shall be put out of land 
or tenement, nor taken, nor imprisoned, nor disinherited, 
nor put to death, without being brought in answer by due 
process of the laiv^. This privilege was sufficiently 
secured by a clause of the great charter, which had re- 
ceived a general confirmation in the first chapter of the 
same statute. Why then is the clause so anxiously, 
and, as we may think, so superfluously repeated ? Plainly, 
because there had been some late infringements of it, 
which gave umbrage to the Commons x . 

But there is no article in which the laws are more 
frequently repeated during this reign, almost in the same 
terms, than that of purveyance, which the Parliament 
always calls an outrageous and intolerable grievance, and 
the source of infinite damage to the people y . The Par- 
liament tried to abolish this prerogative altogether, by 
prohibiting any one from taking goods without the con- 
sent of the owners 2 , and by changing the heinous name 
of purveyors, as they term it, into that of buyers* ; but 
the arbitrary conduct of Edward still brought back the 
grievance upon them, though contrary both to the great 
charter, and to many statutes. This disorder was in a 
great measure derived from the state of the public 
finances and of the kingdom, and could therefore the 
less admit of remedy. The prince frequently wanted 
ready money ; yet his family must be subsisted : he was 
therefore obliged to employ force and violence for that 
purpose, and to give tallies, at what rate he pleased, to. 
the owners of the goods which he laid hold of. The 
kingdom also abounded so little in commodities, and the 
interior communication was so imperfect, that, had 
the owners been strictly protected by law, they could 
easily have exacted any price from the king ; especially 

* 28 Edw. III. cap. 3. 

x They assert, in the 15th of this reign, that there had been such instances. 
Cotton's Abridg. p. 31. They repeat the same in the 21st year. See p. 59. 
y 36 Edward III. &c. * 14 Edw. III. cap. 19. 

a 36 Edw. in. cap. 2. 



EDWARD III. 215 

in his frequent progresses, when he came to distant and CHAP. 
poor places, where the court did not usually reside, and ^^^ 
where a regular plan for supplying it could not be easily 1377 
established. Not only the king, but several great lords, 
insisted upon this right of purveyance 15 . 

The magnificent castle of Windsor was built by Ed- 
ward III. ; and his method of conducting the work may 
serve as a specimen of the condition of the people in 
that age. Instead of engaging workmen by contracts 
and wages, he assessed every county in England to send 
him a certain number of masons, tilers, and carpenters, 
as if he had been levying an army . 

They mistake, indeed, very much the genius of this 
reign, who imagine that it was not extremely arbitrary. 
All the high prerogatives of the crown were to the full 
exerted in it ; but what gave some consolation, and pro- 
mised in time some relief to the people, they were always 
complained of by the Commons : such as the dispensing 
power d ; the extension of the forests 6 ; erecting mono- 
polies f ; exacting loans g ; stopping justice by particular 
w r arrants h ; the renewal of the commission of trailbaston 1 ; 
pressing men and ships into the public service k ; levying 
arbitrary and exorbitant fines 1 ; extending the authority 
of the privy council or star chamber to the decision of 
private causes 131 ; enlarging the power of the mareschal's 
and other arbitrary courts"; imprisoning members for 
freedom of speech in Parliament ; obliging people, with- 
out any rule, to send - recruits of men at arms, archers, 
and hoblers to the army p . 

But there was no act of arbitrary power more fre- 
quently repeated in this reign, than that of imposing 
taxes without consent of Parliament. Though that as- 
sembly granted the king greater supplies than had ever 
been obtained by any of his predecessors, his great un- 
dertakings, and the necessity of his affairs, obliged him 
to levy still more ; and after his splendid success against 
France had added weight to his authority, these arbitrary 

b 7 Rich. II. cap. 8. 

Ashmole's Hist, of the Garter, p. 129. d Cotton's Abridg. p. 148. 

e Cotton, p. 71. f Cotton's Abridg. p. 56. 61. 122. 

g Rymer, vol. v. p. 491. 574. Cotton's Abridg. p. 56. h Cotton, p. 114. 

i Ibid. p. 67. k Cotton's Abridg. p. 47. 79. 113. J Ibid. p. 32. 

m Cotton's Abridg. p. 74. * Ibid. Walsing. p. 189, 190. 

P Tyrrel's Hist. vol. viii. p. 554, from the Records. 



216 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, impositions became almost annual and perpetual. Cot- 
^J ^ ton's Abridgment of the Eecords affords numerous in- 
1377 stances of this kind in the first q year of his reign, in the 
thirteenth year r > in the fourteenth 8 , in the twentieth *, in 
the twenty-first 11 , in the twenty-second w ? in the twenty- 
fifth x , in the thirty-eighth 7 , in the fiftieth 2 , and in the 
fifty-first". 

The king openly avowed and maintained this power 
of levying taxes at pleasure. At one time he replied 
to the remonstrance made by the Commons against it, 
that the impositions had been exacted from great neces- 
sity, and had been assented to by the prelates, earls, 
barons, and some of the Commons b ; at another, that he 
would advise with his council . When the Parliament 
desired that a law might be enacted for the punishment 
of such as levied these arbitrary impositions, he refused 
compliance d . In the subsequent year they desired that 
the king might renounce this pretended prerogative ; 
but his answer was, that he would levy no taxes with- 
out necessity, for the defence of the realm, and where 
he reasonably might use that authority e . This incident 
passed a few days before his death ; and these were, in 
a manner, his last words to his people. It would seem 
that the famous charter or statute of Edward I. de 
tallagio non concedendo, though never repealed, was sup- 
posed to have already lost, by age, all its authority. 

These facts can only show the practice of the times ; 
for as to the right, the continual remonstrances of the 
Commons may seem to prove that it rather lay on their 
side ; at least these remonstrances served to prevent the 
arbitrary practices of the court from becoming an esta- 
blished part of the constitution. In so much a better con- 
dition were the privileges of the people, even during the 
arbitrary reign of Edward III., than during some sub- 
sequent ones, particularly those of the Tudors, where 
no tyranny or abuse of power ever met with any check 
or opposition, or so much as a remonstrance, from Par- 
liament. 

i Rymer, vol. iv. p. 363. r P. 17, 18. s Rymer, vol. iv. p. 39. 

t P. 47. u P. 52, 53. 57, 58. * P. 69. * p. 75. 

y P. 101. z P. 138. a P. 152. 

b Cotton, p. 53. He repeats the same answer in p. 60. Some of the Commons 
were such as he should be pleased to consult with. 

c Cotton, p. 57. d Ibid. p. 138. e Ibid. p. 132. 



EDWARD III. 217 

In this reign we find, according to the sentiments of CHAP. 
an ingenious and learned author, the first strongly 
marked, and probably contested, distinction between a ^^~ 
proclamation by the king and his privy council, and a 
law which had received the assent of the Lords and 
Common s f . 

It is easy to imagine that a prince of so much sense 
and spirit as Edward would be no slave to the court of 
Rome. Though the old tribute was paid during some 
years of his minority g , he afterwards withheld it; and 
when the pope, in 1367, threatened to cite him to the 
court of Rome for default of payment, he laid the mat- 
ter before his Parliament. That assembly unanimously 
declared, that King John could not, without a national 
consent, subject his kingdom to a foreign power; and 
that they were therefore determined to support their 
sovereign against this unjust pre tension h . 

During this reign, the statute of provisors was enacted, 
rendering it penal to procure any presentations to bene- 
fices from the court of Rome, and securing the rights 
of all patrons and electors, which had been extremely 
encroached on by the pope 1 . By a subsequent statute, 
every person was outlawed who carried any cause by 
appeal to the court of Rome k . 

The laity, at this time, seem to have been extremely 
prejudiced against the papal power, and e^en somewhat 
against their own clergy, because of their connexions 
with the Roman pontiff. The Parliament pretended 
that the usurpations of the pope were the cause of all 
the plagues, injuries, famine, and poverty of the realm ; 
were more destructive to it than all the wars ; and were 
the reason why it contained not a third of the inhabit- 
ants and commodities which it formerly possessed : that 
the taxes levied by him exceeded five times those which 
were paid to the king ; that , every thing was venal in 
that sinful city of Rome ; and that even the patrons in 
England had thence learned to practise simony without 
shame or remorse 1 . At another time they petition the 
king to employ no churchman in any office of state m ; 

f Observations on the Statutes, p. 193. e Eymer, vol. iv. p. 434. 

h Cotton's Abridg. p. 110. i 25 Eclw. III. 27 Edw. III. 

k 27 Edw. III. 38 Edw. III. l Cotton, p. 74. 128, 129. 
m lbid. p. 112. 

VOL. II. 19 



218 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and they even speak in plain terms of expelling by force 
XVL the papal authority, and thereby providing a remedy 
against oppressions, which they neither could nor would 
any longer endure 11 . Men who talked in this strain 
were not far from the reformation ; but Edward did not 
think proper to second all this zeal : though he passed 
the statute of provisors, he took little care of its execu- 
tion ; and the Parliament made frequent complaints of 
his negligence on this head . He was content with 
having reduced such of the Romish ecclesiastics as pos- 
sessed revenues in England, to depend entirely upon him 
by means of that statute. 

As to the police of the kingdom during this period, 
it was certainly better than during times of faction, civil 
war, and disorder, to which England was so often ex- 
posed ; yet were there several vices in the constitution, 
the bad consequences of which all the power and vigi- 
lance of the king could not prevent. The barons, by 
their confederacies with those of their own order, and 
by supporting and defending their retainers in every ini- 
quity p , were the chief abettors of robbers, murderers, 
and ruffians of all kinds ; and no law could be executed 
against those criminals. The nobility were brought to 
give their promise in Parliament, that they would not 
avow, retain, or support any felon or breaker of the law q ; 
yet this engagement, which we may wonder to see ex- 
acted from men of their rank, was never regarded by 
them. The Commons made continual complaints of the 
multitude of robberies, murders, rapes, and other dis- 
orders, which, they say, were become numberless in 
every part of the kingdom, and which they always ascribe 
to the protection that the criminals received from the 
great r . The King of Cyprus, who paid a visit to Eng- 
land in this reign, was robbed and stripped on the high- 
way, with his whole retinue 8 . Edward himself con- 
tributed to this dissolution of law, by his facility in 
granting pardons to felons from the solicitation of the 
courtiers. Laws were made to retrench this preroga- 
tive*, and remonstrances of the Commons were presented 

* Cotton, p. 41. Ibid. p. 119. 128, 129, 130. 148. 

P 11 Ed\v. III. cap. 14. 4 Edw. III. cap. 2. 15 Edw. III. cap. 4. 

<i Cotton, p. 10. r Ibid. p. 51. 62. 64. 70. 160. 

Walsing. p. 170. * 10 Edw. III. cap. 2. 27 Edw. III. cap. 2. 



EDWARD III. 219 

against the abuse of it u ; but to no purpose. The grati- CHAP. 
fying of a powerful nobleman continued still to be of ._^ L _, 
more importance than the protection of the people. The 1377 
king also granted many franchises, which interrupted 
the course of justice and the execution of the laws w . 

Commerce and industry were certainly at a very low 
ebb during this period. The bad police of the country 
alone affords a sufficient reason. The only exports were 
wool, skins, hides, leather, butter, tin, lead, and such 
unmanufactured goods, of which wool was by far the 
most considerable. Knyghton has asserted, that one 
hundred thousand sacks of wool were annually exported, 
and sold at twenty pounds a sack, money of that age. 
But he is widely mistaken, both in the quantity exported, 
and in the value. In 1349, the Parliament remonstrate 
that the king, by an illegal imposition of forty shillings 
on each sack exported, had levied sixty thousand pounds 
a year x , which reduces the annual exports to thirty 
thousand sacks. A sack contained twenty-six stone, and 
each stone fourteen pounds 7 ; and at a medium was not 
valued at above five pounds a sack z , that is, fourteen or 
fifteen pounds of our present money. Knyghton's com- 
putation raises it to sixty pounds, which is near four 
times the present price of wool in England. According 
to this reduced computation, the export of wool brought 
into the kingdom about four hundred and fifty thousand 
pounds of our present money, instead of six millions, 
which is an extravagant sum. Even the former sum is 
so high as to afford a suspicion of some mistake in the 
computation of the Parliament with regard to the num- 
ber of sacks exported. Such mistakes were very usual 
in those ages. 

Edward endeavoured to introduce and promote the 
woollen manufacture, by giving protection and encourage- 
ment to foreign weavers a , and by enacting a law which 
prohibited every one from wearing any cloth but of Eng- 
lish fabric b . The Parliament prohibited the exportation 
of woollen goods, which was not so well judged, espe- 

Cotton, p. 75. w Ibid. p. 54. * Ibid. p. 48. 69. 

y 34 Edw. III. cap. 5. z Cotton, p. 29. 

a 11 Edw. III. cap. 5. Rymer, vol. iv. p. 723. Murimuth, p. 88. 
* 11 Edw. III. cap. 2. 



220 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, cially while the exportation of unwrought wool was so 

^_ x J L ^ y much allowed and encouraged. A like injudicious law 

1377 was made against the exportation of manufactured iron 6 . 

It appears from a record in the exchequer, that in 
1354 the exports of England amounted to two hundred 
and ninety-four thousand one hundred and eighty-four 
pounds, seventeen shillings, and two pence : the imports 
to thirty-eight thousand nine hundred and seventy 
pounds, three shillings, and sixpence, money of that 
time. This is a great balance, considering that it arose 
wholly from the exportation of raw wool and other rough 
materials. The import w r as chiefly linen and fine cloth, 
and some wine. England seems to have been extremely 
drained at this time by Edward's foreign expeditions and 
foreign subsidies, which probably was the reason why the 
exports so much exceed the imports. 

The first toll we read of in England for mending the 
highways was imposed in this reign : it was that for re- 
pairing the road between St. Giles's and Temple-bar d . 

In the first of Richard II. the Parliament complain 
extremely of the decay of shipping during the preced- 
ing reign, and assert that one sea-port formerly con- 
tained more vessels than were then to be found in the 
whole kingdom. This calamity they ascribe to the 
arbitrary seizure of ships by Edward for the service of 
his frequent expeditions 6 . The Parliament in the fifth 
of Richard renew the same complaint f ; and we like- 
wise find it made in the forty-sixth of Edward III. So 
false is the common opinion, that this reign was favoura- 
ble to commerce. 

There is an order of this king, directed to the mayor 
and sheriffs of London, to take up all ships of forty tons 
and upwards, to be converted into ships of war g . 

The Parliament attempted the impracticable scheme 
of reducing the price of labour after the pestilence, and 
also that of poultry h . A reaper, in the first week of 
August, was not allowed above two-pence a day, or near 
sixpence of our present money ; in the second week a 
third more. A master carpenter was limited through 

c 28 Edw. III. cap. 5. d Kymer, vol. v. p. 520. 

e Cotton, p. 155. 164. f Cap. 3. 

e Rymer, vol. iv. p. 664. b 37 Edw. III. cap. 3. 



EDWARD III. 221 

the whole year to three-pence a day, a common carpenter CHAP. 
to two-pence, money of that age 1 . It is remarkable, 
that, in the same reign, the pay of a common soldier, an 
archer, was sixpence a day ; which, by the change both 
in denomination and value, would be equivalent to near 
five shillings of our present money k . Soldiers were then 
enlisted only for a very short time : they lived idle all 
the rest of the year, and commonly all the rest of their 
lives : one successful campaign, by pay and plunder, and 
the ransom of prisoners, was supposed to be a small fortune 
to a man, which was a great allurement to enter into 
the service 1 . 

The staple of wool, wool-fells, leather, and lead, was 
fixed by act of Parliament in particular towns of Eng- 
land" 1 . Afterwards it was removed by law to Calais : 
but Edward, who commonly deemed his prerogative 
above law, paid little regard to these statutes ; and when 
the Parliament remonstrated with him on account of 
those acts of power, he plainly told them, that he would 
proceed in that matter as he thought proper 11 . It is not 
easy to assign the reason of this great anxiety for fixing 
a staple ; unless perhaps it invited foreigners to a market, 
when they knew beforehand that they should there meet 
with great choice of any particular species of commodity. 
This policy of inviting foreigners to Calais was carried so 
far, that all English merchants were prohibited bylaw 
from exporting any English goods from the staple ; which 
was in a manner the total abandoning of all foreign na- 
vigation, except that to Calais : a contrivance seemingly 
extraordinary. 

It was not till the middle of this century that the 
English began to extend their navigation even to the 

i 25 Edw. III. cap. 1. 3. 

k Dugdale's Baronage, vol. i. p. 784. Brady's Hist. vol. ii. App. No. 92. The 
pay of a man at arms was quadruple. We may therefore conclude that the nume- 
rous armies, mentioned by historians in those times, consisted chiefly of ragamuffins, 
who followed the camp, and lived by plunder. Edward's army before Calais con- 
sisted of thirty-one thousand and ninety-four men ; yet its pay for sixteen months 
was only one hundred and twenty-seven thousand two hundred and one pounds. 
Brady. Ibid. 

1 Commodities seem to have risen since the Conquest. Instead of being ten times 
cheaper than at present, they were, in the age of Edward III., only three or four 
times. This change seems to have taken place in a great measure since Edward I. 
The allowance granted by Edward III. to the Earl of Murray, then a prisoner in 
Nottingham castle, is one pound a week ; whereas, the Bishop of St. Andrew's, 
the primate of Scotland, had only sixpence a day allowed him by Edward I. 

m 27 Edw. III. * Cotton, p. 117. 27 Edw. III. cap. 7. 

19* 



922 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Baltic p ; nor till the middle of the subsequent, that they 
XVL sailed to the Mediterranean* 1 . 

^^~ Luxury was complained of in that age, as well as in 
others of more refinement ; and attempts were made by 
Parliament, to restrain it, particularly on the head of 
apparel, where surely it is the most obviously innocent 
and inoffensive. No man under a hundred a year was 
allowed to wear gold, silver, or silk in his clothes: 
servants also were prohibited from eating flesh-meat or 
fish* above once a day r . By another law it was ordained, 
that no one should be allowed, either for dinner or 
supper, above three dishes in each course, and not above 
two courses ; and it is likewise expressly declared, that 
soused meat is to count as one of these dishes 8 . It was 
easy to foresee that such ridiculous laws must prove in- 
effectual, and could never be executed. 

The use of the French language in pleadings and 
public deeds was abolished*. It may appear strange 
that the nation should so long have worn this badge of 
conquest ; but the king and nobility seem never to have 
become thoroughly English, or to have forgotten their 
French extraction, till Edward's wars with France gave 
them an antipathy to that nation. Yet still it was long 
before the use of the English tongue came into fashion. 
The first English paper which we meet with in Rymer 
is in the year 1386, during the reign of Richard II. U 
There are Spanish papers in that collection of more an- 
cient date w ; and the use of the Latin and French still 
continued. 

We may judge of the ignorance of this age in geo- 
graphy, from a story told by Robert of Aylesbury. Pope 
Clement YI. having, in 1344, created Lewis of Spain 
prince of the fortunate islands., meaning the Canaries, then 
newly discovered, the English ambassador at Rome, and 
his retinue, were seized with an alarm, that Lewis had 
been created King of England ; and they immediately 
hurried home, in order to convey this important intelli- 
gence. Yet such was the ardour for study at this time, 

P Anderson, vol. i. p. 151. 

Q Ibid. p. 177. r 37 Edw. III. cap. 8, 9, 10, &c. 

10 Edw. III. * 36 Edw. III. cap. 15. 

11 Rymer, vol. vii. p. 526. This paper, by the style, seems to have been drawn 
by the Scots, and was signed by the Avardens of the marches only. 
w Rymer, vol. vi. p. 554. 



EDWARD III. 223 

that Speed, in his Chronicle, informs us there were then CHAP. 
thirty thousand students in the university of Oxford ._ X J L _. 
alone. What was the occupation of all these young 1377 
men ? To learn very bad Latin, and still worse logic. 

In 1364 the Commons petitioned, that, in consideration 
of the preceding pestilence, such persons as possessed 
manors holding of the king in chief, and had let different 
leases without obtaining licenses, might continue to ex- 
ercise the same power, till the country were become 
more populous 3 ". The Commons were sensible that this 
security of possession was a good means for rendering 
the kingdom prosperous and flourishing, yet durst not 
apply all at once for a greater relaxation of their chains. 

There is not a reign among those of the ancient Eng- 
lish monarchs which deserves more to be studied than 
that of Edward III., nor one where the domestic trans- 
actions will better discover the true genius of that kind 
of mixed government which was then established in 
England. The struggles with regard to the validity and 
authority of the great charter were now over : the king 
was acknowledged to lie under some limitations : Ed- 
ward himself was a prince of great capacity, not governed 
by favourites, not led astray by any unruly passion, sen- 
sible that nothing could be more essential to his interest 
than to keep on good terms with his people ; yet, on the 
whole, it appears, that the government at best was only 
a barbarous monarchy, not regulated by any fixed max- 
ims, or bounded by any certain undisputed rights, which 
in practice were regularly observed. The king conducted 
himself by one set of principles ; the barons by another ; 
the Commons by a third ; the clergy by a fourth. All 
these systems of government were opposite and incom- 
patible : each of them prevailed in its turn, as incidents 
were favourable to it : a great prince rendered the mo- 
narchical power predominant : the weakness of a king 
gave reins to the aristocracy : a superstitious age saw the 
clergy triumphant ; the people, for whom chiefly govern- 
ment was instituted, and who chiefly deserve considera- 
tion, were the weakest of the whole. But the Commons, 
little obnoxious to any other order, though they sunk 
under the violence of tempests, silently reared their 

* Cotton, p. 97. 



224 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, head in more peaceable times ; and while the storm was 
XVL _ y brewing, were courted by all sides, and thus received still 
1377 some accession to their privileges, or, at worst, some con- 
firmation of them. 

It has been an established opinion, that gold coin was 
not struck till this reign ; but there has lately been found 
proof that it is as ancient as Henry III7 

y See Observations on the more ancient Statutes, p. 375, 2d edit. 



RICHARD II. 225 



CHAPTEE XVII. 

RICHARD II. 

GOVERNMENT DURING THE MINORITY. INSURRECTION OF THE COMMON PEOPLE. 
DISCONTENTS OF THE BARONS. CIVIL COMMOTIONS. EXPULSION OR EX- 
ECUTION OF THE KING'S MINISTERS. CABALS OF THE DUKE OF GLOUCESTER. 
MURDER OF THE DUKE OF GLOUCESTER. BANISHMENT OF HENRY, DUKE 
OF HEREFORD. RETURN OF HENRY. GENERAL INSURRECTION. DEPOSITION 
OF THE KING. His MURDER His CHARACTER. MISCELLANEOUS TRANS- 
ACTIONS DURING THIS EEIGN. 

THE Parliament which was summoned soon after the CHAP. 
king's accession was both elected and assembled in tran-,_ '_. 
quillity ; and the great change, from a sovereign of con- ^77. 
summate wisdom and experience to a boy of eleven years Govem- 

p . . i f . T p T . i , I 7 i mi ment dur ' 

ot age, was not immediately lelt by the people. 1 he ing the 
habits of order and obedience, which the barons had been minorit y- 
taught during the long reign of Edward, still influenced 
them ; and the authority of the king's three uncles, the 
Dukes of Lancaster, York, and Gloucester, sufficed to 
repress, for a time, the turbulent spirit to which that 
order, in a weak reign, was so often subject. The danger- 
ous ambition too of these princes themselves was checked 
by the plain and undeniable title of Eichard, by the de- 
claration of it made in Parliament, and by the affec- 
tionate regard which the people bore to the memory of 
his father, and which was naturally transferred to the 
young sovereign upon the throne. The different charac- 
ters also of these three princes rendered them a counter- 
poise to each other ; and it was natural to expect, that 
any dangerous designs, which might be formed by one 
brother, would meet with opposition from the others. 
Lancaster, whose age and experience, and authority under 
the late king, gave him the ascendant among them, 
though his integrity seemed not proof against great 
temptations, was neither of an enterprising spirit, nor of 
a popular and engaging temper. York was indolent, 
inactive, and of slender capacity. Gloucester was tur- 
bulent, bold, and popular ; but, being the youngest of 
the family, was restrained by the power and authority of 



226 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, his elder brothers. There appeared, therefore, no circum- 
,_ X ^ I] ^ stance in the domestic situation of England which might 
1377 endanger the public peace, or give any immediate ap- 
prehensions to the lovers of their country. 

But as Edward, though he had fixed the succession to 
the crown, had taken no care to establish a plan of go- 
vernment during the minority of his grandson, it behoved 
the Parliament to supply this defect ; and the House of 
Commons distinguished themselves by taking the lead on 
the occasion. This House, which had been rising to con- 
sideration during the whole course of the late reign, na- 
turally received an accession of power during the mino- 
rity ; and as it was now becoming a scene of business, 
the members chose, for the first time, a speaker, who 
might preserve order in their debates, and maintain those 
forms which are requisite in all numerous assemblies. 
Peter de la Mare was the man pitched on ; the same 
person that had been imprisoned and detained in custody 
by the late king, for his freedom of speech in attacking 
the mistress and the ministers of that prince. But though 
this election discovered a spirit of liberty in the Commons, 
and was followed by farther attacks both on these minis- 
ters and on Alice Pierce*, they were still too sensible of 
their great inferiority, to assume at first any immediate 
share in the administration of government, or the care of 
the king's person. They were content to apply, by peti- 
tion, to the Lords for that purpose, and desire them both 
to appoint a council of nine, who might direct the public 
business, and to choose men of virtuous life and conver- 
sation, who might inspect the conduct and education of 
the young prince. The Lords complied with the first' 
part of this request, and elected the Bishops of London, 
Carlisle, and Salisbury, the Earls of March and Stafford, 
Sir Richard de Stafford, Sir Henry le Scrope, Sir John 
Devereux, and Sir Hugh Segrave, to whom they gave 
authority, for a year, to conduct the ordinary course of 
business b . But as to the regulation of the king's house- 
hold, they declined interposing in an office which, they 
said, both was invidious in itself, and might prove dis- 
agreeable to his majesty. 

The Commons, as they acquired more courage, ven- 

a Walsing. p. 150. b Kymer, vol. vii. p. 161. 



RICHARD II. 227 

tured to proceed a step farther in their applications. They CHAP. 
presented a petition, in which they prayed the king to ^ [_, 
check the prevailing custom among the barons of form- 1377 
ing illegal confederacies, and supporting each other, as 
weljl as men of inferior rank, in the violations of law and 
justice. They received from the throne a general and 
an obliging answer to this petition ; but another part of 
their application, that all the great officers should, dur- 
ing the king's minority, be appointed by Parliament, 
which seemed to require the concurrence of the Com- 
mons, as well as that of the Upper House, in the nomi- 
nation, was not complied with : the Lords alone assumed 
the power of appointing these officers; the Commons 
tacitly acquiesced in the choice : and thought that, for 
the present, they^themselves had proceeded a sufficient 
length, if they but advanced their pretensions, thougn 
rejected, of interposing in these more important matters 
of state. 

On this footing then the government stood. The ad- 
ministration was conducted entirely in the king's name : 
no regency was expressly appointed : the nine counsel- 
lors and the great officers, named by the Peers, did their 
duty, each in his respective department ; and the whole 
system was for some years kept together by the secret 
authority of the king's uncles, especially of the Duke of 
Lancaster, who was in reality the regent. 

The Parliament was dissolved, after the Commons had 
represented the necessity of their being reassembled once 
every year, as appointed by law ; and after having elected 
two citizens as their treasurers, to receive and disburse 
the produce of two fifteenths and tenths, which they had 
voted to the crown. In the other Parliaments called 
during the minority, the Commons still discover a strong 
spirit of freedom, and a sense of their own authority, 
which, without breeding any disturbance, tended to se- 
cure their independence and that of the people . 

Edward had left his grandson involved in many dan- 
gerous wars. The pretensions of the Duke of Lancaster 
to the crown of Castile made that kingdom still persevere 
in hostilities against England. Scotland, whose throne 
was now filled by Eobert Stuart, nephew to David Bruce, 

c See note [K], at the end of the volume. 



228 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and the first prince of that family, maintained such close 
^J ^ connexions with France, that war with one crown almost 

1377 inevitably produced hostilities with the other. The French 
monarch, whose prudent conduct had acquired him the 
surname of Wise, as he had already baffled all the expe- 
rience and valour of the two Edwards, was likely to prove 
a dangerous enemy to a minor king: but his genius, 
which was not naturally enterprising, led him not, at 
present, to give any disturbance to his neighbours ; and 
he laboured besides under many difficulties at home, 
which it was necessary for him to surmount before he 
could think of making conquests in a foreign country. 
England was master of Calais, Bourdeaux, and Bayonne ; 
had lately acquired possession of Cherbourg from the 
9ession of the king of Navarre, and of Brest from that 
of the Duke of Britany d ; and having thus an easy en- 
trance into France from every quarter, was able, even in 
its present situation, to give disturbance to his govern- 
ment. Before Charles could remove the English from 
these important posts, he died in the flower of his age, 
and left his kingdom to a minor son, who bore the name 
of Charles VI. 

1378. Meanwhile the war with France was carried on in a 
manner somewhat languid, and produced no enterprise 
of great lustre or renown. Sir Hugh Calverly, governor 
of Calais, making an inroad into Picardy with a detach- 
ment of the garrison, set fire to Boulogne 6 . The Duke 
of Lancaster conducted an army into Britany, but re- 
turned without being able to perform any thing memor- 

1380. able. In a subsequent year the Duke of Gloucester 
marched out of Calais with a body of two thousand 
cavalry and eight thousand infantry ; and scrupled not, 
with his small army, to enter into the heart of France, 
and to continue his ravages through Picardy, Champagne, 
the Brie, the Beausse, the Gatinois, the Orleanois, till 
he reached his allies in the province of Britany f . The 
Duke of Burgundy, at the head of a more considerable 
army, came within sight of him; but the French were 
so overawed by the former successes of the English, that 
no superiority of numbers could tempt them to venture 

a Rymer, vol. vii. p. 190. e Walsing. p. 209. 

f Froissart, liv. ii. chap. 50, 51. Walsing. p. 239. 



RICHARD II. 229 

a pitched battle with the troops of that nation. As the CHAP. 
Duke of Britany, soon after the arrival of these succours,^ [_, 
formed an accommodation with the court of France, this 1380 
enterprise also proved in the issue unsuccessful, and 
made no durable impression upon the enemy. 

The expenses of these armaments, and the usual want 
of economy attending a minority, much exhausted the 
English treasury, and obliged the Parliament, besides 
making some alterations in the council, to impose a new 
and unusual tax of three groats on every person, male 
and female, above fifteen years of age ; and they ordained 
that, in levying that tax, the opulent should relieve the 
poor by an equitable compensation. This imposition 
produced a mutiny, which was singular in its circum- 
stances. All history abounds with examples where the 
great tyrannize over the meaner sort; but here the 
lowest populace rose against their rulers, committed the 
most cruel ravages upon them, and took vengeance for 
all former oppressions. 1381 - 

The faint dawn of the arts and of good government 
in that age had excited the minds of the populace in 
different states of Europe to wish for a better condition, 
and to murmur against those chains which the laws 
enacted by the haughty nobility and gentry had so long 
imposed upon them. The commotions of the people in 
Flanders, the mutiny of the peasants in France, were the 
natural effects of this growing spirit of independence ; 
and the report of these events being brought into Eng- 
land, where personal slavery, as we learn from Froissart g , 
was more general than in any other country in Europe, 
had prepared the minds of the multitude for an insur- 
rection. One John Ball also, a seditious preacher, who 
affected low popularity, went about the country, and in- 
culcated on his audience the principles of the first origin 
of mankind from one common stock, their equal right to 
liberty and to all the goods of nature, the tyranny of 
artificial distinctions, and the abuses which had arisen 
from the degradation of the more considerable part of 
the species, and the aggrandizement of a few insolent 
rulers h . These doctrines, so agreeable to the populace, 

g Liv. ii. chap. 74. 

ll Froissart, liv. ii. chap. 74. Walsingham, p. 275. 

VOL. ii. 20 



230 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and so conformable to the ideas of primitive equality 
XYIL which are engraven in the hearts of all men, were 

v ~^^"' greedily received by the multitude; and scattered the 
sparks of that sedition which the present tax raised into 
a conflagration 1 . 

The imposition of three groats a head had been farmed 
to tax-gatherers in each county, who levied the 

people, money on the people with rigour; and the clause of 
making the rich ease their poorer neighbours of some 
share of the burden, being so vague 'and indeterminate, 
had, doubtless, occasioned many partialities, and made 
the people more sensible of the unequal lot which for- 
, tune had assigned them in the distribution of her favours. 
The first disorder was raised by a blacksmith in a village 
of Essex. The tax-gatherers came to this man's shop 
while he was at work, and they demanded payment for 
his daughter, whom he asserted to be below the age 
assigned by the statute. One of these fellows offered 
to produce a very indecent proof to the contrary, and at 
the same time laid hold of the maid ; which the father 
resenting, immediately knocked out the ruffian's brains 
with his hammer. The bystanders applauded the action, 
and exclaimed, that it was full time for the people to 
take vengeance on their tyrants, and to vindicate their 
native liberty. They immediately flew to arms : the 
whole neighbourhood joined in the sedition: the flame 
spread in an instant over the county : it soon propagated 
itself into that of Kent, of Hertford, Surrey, Sussex, 
Suffolk, Norfolk, Cambridge, and Lincoln. Before the 
government had the least warning of the danger, the 
disorder had grown beyond control or opposition : the 
populace had shaken off all regard to their former mas- 
ters ; and being headed by the most audacious and cri- 
minal of their associates, who assumed the feigned names 
of Wat Tyler, Jack Straw, Hob Carter, and Tom Miller, 
by which they were fond of denoting their mean origin, 
they committed every where the most outrageous vio- 
lence on such of the gentry or nobility x as had the mis- 
fortune to fall into their hands. 

1 There were tAvo verses at that time in the mouths of all the common people, 
which, in spite of prejudice, one cannot but regard with some degree of approbation : 
When Adam delv'd and Eve span, 
Where was then the gentleman ? 



RICHARD II. 231 

The mutinous populace, amounting to one hundred CHAP. 
thousand men, assembled on Blackheath, under their ^ XVl1 ^ 
leaders Tyler and Straw ; and as the Princess of Wales, 13 7~ 
the king's mother, returning from a pilgrimage to Can- i2th June, 
terbury, passed through the midst of them, they insulted 
her attendants ; and some of the most insolent among 
them, to show their purpose of levelling all mankind, 
forced kisses from her ; but they allowed her to continue 
her journey, without attempting any farther injury k . 
They sent a message to the king, who had taken shelter 
in the Tower ; and they desired a conference with him. 
Richard sailed down the river in a barge for that pur- 
pose ; but on his approaching the shore, he saw such 
symptoms of tumult and insolence, that he put back, and 
returned to that fortress \ The seditious peasants, mean- 
while, favoured by the populace of London, had broken 
into the city ; had burned the Duke of Lancaster's palace 
of the Savoy ; cut off the heads of all the gentlemen 
whom they laid hold of; expressed a particular animosity 
against the lawyers and attorneys ; and pillaged the 
warehouses of the rich merchants 111 . A great body of 
them quartered themselves at Mile-end ; and the king, 
finding no defence in the Tower, which was weakly 
garrisoned, and ill supplied with provisions, was obliged 
to go out to them, and ask their demands. They required 
a general pardon, the abolition of slavery, freedom of 
commerce in market towns without toll or impost, and a 
fixed rent on lands, instead of the services due by villa- 
nage. These requests, which, though extremely reason- 
able in themselves, the nation was not sufficiently pre- 
pared to receive, and which it was dangerous to have ex- 
torted by violence, were however complied with ; charters 
to that purpose were granted them ; and this body im- 
mediately dispersed, and returned to their several homes n . 

During this transaction, another body of the rebels 
had broken into the Tower ; had murdered Simon Sud- 
bury, the primate and chancellor, with Sir Robert Hales, 
the treasurer, and some other persons of distinction ; and 
continued their ravages in the city . The king, passing 

k Proissart, liv. ii. chap. 74. * Ibid. chap. 75. 

m Ibid. chap. 76. Walsingham, p. 248, 249. 

n Proissart, liv. ii. chap. 77. Walsingham, p. 250, 251. 



232 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, along Smithfield, very slenderly guarded, met with Wat 
xvn. Tyler, at the head of these rioters, and entered into a 
"""^ conference with him. Tyler, having ordered his compa- 
nions to retire till he should give them a signal, after 
which they were to murder all the company except the 
king himself, whom they were to detain prisoner, feared 
not to come into the midst of the royal retinue. He 
there behaved himself in such a manner, that Walworth, 
the Mayor of London, not able to bear his insolence, 
drew his sword, and struck him so violent a blow as 
brought him to the ground, where he was instantly de- 
spatched by others of the king's attendants. The muti- 
neers, seeing their leader fall, prepared themselves for 
revenge ; and this whole company, with the king himself, 
had undoubtedly perished on the spot, had it not been 
for an extraordinary presence of mind which Kichard 
discovered on the occasion. He ordered his company to 
stop ; he advanced alone towards the enraged multitude ; 
and accosting them with an affable and intrepid counte- 
nance, he asked them, " What is the meaning of this 
disorder, my good people ? Are ye angry that ye have 
lost your leader ? I am your king : I will be your 
leader." The populace, overawed by his presence, im- 
plicitly followed him : he led them into the fields, to 
prevent any disorder which might have arisen by their 
continuing in the city : being there joined by Sir Robert 
Knolles, and a body of well-armed veteran soldiers, who 
had been secretly drawn together, he strictly prohibited 
that officer from falling on the rioters, and committing 
an undistinguished slaughter upon them ; and he peace- 
ably dismissed them with the same charters which had 
been granted to their fellows p . Soon after, the nobility 
and gentry, hearing of the king's danger, in which they 
were all involved, flocked to London with their adherents 
and retainers ; and Richard took the field at the head of 
an army forty thousand strong* 1 . It then behoved all 
the rebels to submit : the charters of enfranchisement 
and pardon were revoked by Parliament ; the low people 
were reduced to the same slavish condition as before ; 
and several of the ringleaders were severely punished for 

P Froissart, liv. ii. chap. 77. Walsingham, p. 252. Knyghton, p. 2637. 
<i Walsingham, p. 267. 



RICHARD II. 233 

the late disorders. Some were even executed without CHAP. 
process or form of law r . It was pretended that the m-.j^ 11 ^, 
tentions of the mutineers had been to seize the king's 1381 
person, to carry him through England at their head, to 
murder all the nobility, gentry, and lawyers, and even all 
the bishops and priests, except the mendicant friars ; to 
despatch afterwards the king himself; and having thus 
reduced all to a level, to order the kingdom at their plea- / 
sure 8 . It is not impossible but many of them, in the 
delirium of their first success, might have formed such 
projects; but of all the evils incident to human society, 
the insurrections of the populace, when not raised and 
supported by persons of higher quality, are the least to 
be dreaded : the mischiefs consequent to an abolition of 
all rank and distinction become so great, that they are 
immediately felt, and soon bring affairs back to their 
former order and arrangement. 

A youth of sixteen, (which was at this. time the king's 
age,) who had discovered so much courage, presence of 
mind, and address, and had so dexterously eluded the 
violence of this tumult, raised great expectations in the 
nation ; and it was natural to hope, that he would, in 
the course of his life, equal the glories which had so 
uniformly attended his father and his grandfather in all 
their undertakings. But in proportion as Richard ad- isss. 
vanced in years, these hopes vanished ; and his want of 
capacity, at least of solid judgment, appeared in every 
enterprise which he attempted. The Scots, sensible of 
their own deficiency in cavalry, had applied to the re- 
gency of Charles VI.; and John de Vienne, admiral of 
France, had been sent over with a body of one thousand 
five hundred men at arms, to support them in their in- 
cursions against the English. The danger was now deemed 
by the king's uncles somewhat serious ; and a numerous 
army of sixty thousand men was levied, and they marched 
into Scotland, with Richard himself at their head. The 
Scots did not pretend to make resistance against so great 
a force : they abandoned without scruple their country to 
be pillaged and destroyed by the enemy; and when De 
Vienne expressed his surprise at this plan of operations, 

r 5 Rich. II. cap. ult. as quoted in the Observations on ancient Statutes, p. 262. 
3 Walsingham, p. 265. 



234 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, they told him, that all their cattle were driven into the 
xvii. f ores t s anc [ fastnesses ; that their houses and other goods 
^8^^ were of small value; and that they well knew how to 
compensate any losses which they might sustain in that 
respect, by making an incursion into England. Accord- 
ingly, when Eichard entered Scotland by Berwick and 
the east coast, the Scots, to the number of thirty thou- 
sand men, attended by the French, entered the borders 
of England by the west, and carrying their ravages 
through Cumberland, Westmoreland, and Lancashire, 
collected a rich booty, and then returned in tranquillity 
to their own country. Richard meanwhile advanced to- 
wards Edinburgh, and destroyed in his way all the towns 
and villages on each side of him : he reduced that city 
to ashes ; he treated in the same manner, Perth, Dundee, 
and other places in the low countries ; but when he was 
advised to march towards the west coast, to await there 
the return of tfie enemy, and to take revenge on them 
for their devastations, his impatience to return to Eng- 
land, and enjoy his usual pleasures and amusements, out- 
weighed every consideration : and he led back his army 
without effecting any thing by all these mighty prepara- 
tions. The Scots, soon after, finding the heavy bodies of 
French cavalry very useless in that desultory kind of war 
to which they confined themselves, treated their allies so 
ill, that the French returned home, much disgusted with 
the country, and with the manners of its inhabitants*. 
And the English, though they regretted the indolence 
and levity of their king, saw themselves for the future 
secured against any dangerous invasion from that quarter. 
1386. But it was so material an interest of the French court 
to wrest the seaport towns from the hands of the enemy, 
that they resolved to attempt it by some other expedient, 
and found no means so likely as an invasion of England 
itself. They collected a great fleet and army at Sluise ; 
for the Flemings were now in alliance with them : all the 
nobility of France were engaged in this enterprise : the 
English were kept in alarm : great preparations w r ere 
made for the reception of the invaders : and though the 
dispersion of the French ships by a storm, and the taking 

* Froissart, liv. ii. chap. 149, 150, &c. liv. iii. chap. 52. Walsingham, p. 316, 
317. 



RICHARD II. 235 

of many of them by the English, before the embarkation CHAP. 
of the troops, freed the kingdom from the present dan- 
ger, the king and council were fully sensible that this 1386 
perilous situation might every moment return upon 
them u . 

There were two circumstances, chiefly, which engaged 
the French at this time to think of such attempts. The 
one was the absence of the Duke of Lancaster, who head 
carried into Spain the flower of the English military 
force, in prosecution of his vain claim to the crown of 
Castile ; an enterprise in which, after some promising 
success, he was finally disappointed : the other was, the 
violent dissensions and disorders which had taken place 
in the English government. 

The subjection in which Eichard was held by his un- 
cles, particularly by the Duke of Gloucester, a prince of 
ambition and genius, though it was not unsuitable to his 
years and slender capacity, was extremely disagreeable to 
his violent temper ; and he soon attempted to shake off 
the yoke imposed upon him. Robert de Yere, Earl of 
Oxford, a young man of a noble family, of an agreeable 
figure, but of dissolute manners, had acquired an entire 
ascendant over him, and governed him with an absolute 
authority. 

The king set so little bounds to his affection, that he 
first created his favourite Marquis of Dublin, a title be- 
fore unknown in England, then Duke of Ireland ; and 
transferred to him by patent, which was confirmed in 
Parliament, the entire sovereignty for life of that island w . 
He gave him in marriage his cousin-german, the daughter 
of Ingelram de Courci, Earl of Bedford ; but soon after 
he permitted him to repudiate that lady, though of an 
unexceptionable character, and to marry a foreigner, a 
Bohemian, with whom he had become enamoured x . 
These public declarations of attachment turned the at- 
tention of the whole court towards the minion: all fa- 
vours passed through his hands: access to the king 
could only be obtained by his mediation : and Kichard 

u Froissart, liv. iii. chap. 41. 53. Walsingham, p. 322, 323. 

w Cotton, p. 310, 311. Cox's Hist, of Ireland, p. 129. Walsingham, p. 324. 

x Walsingham, p. 328. 



236 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, seemed to take no pleasure in royal authority, but so far 
^J ^ as it enabled him to load with favours and titles and dig- 

1386 nities this object of his affections. 

Discon- The jealousy of power immediately produced an ani- 
i)arons. the mosity between the minion and his creatures on the one 
hand, and the princes of the blood and chief nobility on 
the other ; and the usual complaints against the insolence 
of favourites were loudly echoed, and greedily received, 
in every part of the kingdom. Mowbray, Earl of Not- 
tingham, the mareschal, Fitz-Alan, Earl of Arundel, 
Piercy, Earl of Northumberland, Montacute, Earl of 
Salisbury, Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, were all con- 
nected with each other, and with the princes, by friend- 
ship or alliance, and still more by their common antipathy 
to those who had eclipsed them in the king's favour and 
confidence. No longer kept in awe by the personal 
character of the prince, they scorned to submit to his 
ministers ; and the method which they took to redress 
the grievances complained of, well suited the violence of 
the age, and proves the desperate extremities to which 
every opposition was sure to be instantly carried. 

Michael de la Pole, the present chancellor, and lately 
created Earl of Suffolk, was the son of an eminent mer- 
chant ; but had risen by his abilities and valour during 
the wars of Edward III., had acquired the friendship of 
that monarch, and was esteemed the person of greatest 
experience and capacity among those who were attached 
to the Duke of Ireland and the king's secret council. 
The Duke of Gloucester, who had the House of Commons 
at his devotion, impelled them to exercise that power 
which they seem first to have assumed against Lord La- 
timer, during the declining years of the late king ; and 
an impeachment against the chancellor was carried up 
by them to the House of Peers, which was no less at his 
devotion. The king foresaw the tempest preparing 
against him and his ministers. After attempting in vain 
to rouse the Londoners to his defence, he withdrew from 
Parliament, and retired with his court to Eltham. The 
Parliament sent a deputation, inviting him to return, and 
threatening that, if he persisted in absenting himself, 
they would immediately dissolve, and leave the nation, 



RICHARD II. 237 

though at that time in imminent danger of a French CHAP. 
invasion, without any support or supply for its de-, XVIL 
fence. At the same time a member was encouraged to ^~^7~ 
call for the record containing the parliamentary deposi- 
tion of Edward II. ; a plain intimation of the fate which 
Bichard, if he continued refractory, had reason to expect 
from them. The king finding himself unable to resist, 
was content to stipulate that, except finishing the pre- 
sent impeachment against Suffolk, no attack should be 
made upon any other of his ministers ; and on that con- 
dition he returned to the Parliament 7 . 

Nothing can prove more fully the innocence of Suffolk, 
than the frivolousness of the crimes which his enemies, 
in the present plenitude of their power, thought proper 
to object against him z . It was alleged, that being chan- 
cellor, and obliged by his oath to consult the king's pro- 
fit, he had purchased lands of the crown below their true 
value ; that he had exchanged with the king a perpetual 
annuity of four hundred marks a year, which he inhe- 
rited from his father, and which was assigned upon the 
customs of the port of Hull, for lands of an equal income ; 
that having obtained for his son the priory of St. An- 
thony, which was formerly possessed by a Frenchman, 
an enemy, and a schismatic, and a new prior being at the 
same time named by the pope, he had refused to admit 
this person, whose title was not legal, till he made a com- 
position with his son, and agreed to pay him a hundred 
pounds a year from the income of the benefice ; that he 
had purchased from one Tydeman, of Limborch, an old 
and forfeited annuity of fifty pounds a year upon the 
crown, and had engaged the king to admit that bad debt ; 
and that when created Earl of Suffolk, he had obtained a 
grant of five hundred pounds a year, to support the dignity 
of that title V Even the proof of these articles, frivolous 
as they are, was found very deficient upon the trial : it 
appeared that Suffolk had made no purchase from the 

y See note [L], at the end of the volume. 

z Cotton, p. 315. Knyghton, p. 2683. 

a It is probable that the Earl of Suffolk was not rich, nor able to support the 
dignity without the bounty of the crown ; for his father, Michael de la Pole, though 
a great merchant, had been ruined by lending money to the late king. See Cotton, 
p. 194. We may remark, that the Dukes of Gloucester and York, though vastly 
rich, received, at the same time, each of them a thousand pounds a year, to sup- 
port their dignity. Rymer, vol. vii. p. 481. Cotton, p. 310. 



238 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, crown while lie was chancellor, and that all his bargains 
of that kind were made before he was advanced to that 

lass dignity b . It is almost needless to add, that he was con- 
demned, notwithstanding his defence, and that he was 
deprived of his office. 

Gloucester and his associates observed their stipula- 
tion with the king, and attacked no more of his minis- 
ters ; but they immediately attacked himself and his 
royal dignity, and framed a commission after the model 
of those which had been attempted almost in every reign 
since that of Richard I., and which had always been at- 
tended with extreme confusion 6 . By this commission, 
which was ratified by Parliament, a council of fourteen 
persons was appointed, all of Gloucester's faction, ex- 
cept Nevil; Archbishop of York : the sovereign power 
was transferred to these men for a twelvemonth : the 
king, who had now reached the twenty-first year of his 
age, was in reality dethroned : the aristocracy was ren- 
dered supreme : and though the term of the commission 
was limited, it was easy to foresee that the intentions of 
the party were to render it perpetual, and that power 
would with great difficulty be wrested from those grasp- 
ing hands to which it was once committed. Richard, 
however, was obliged to submit : he signed the commis- 
sion which violence had extorted from him ; he took an 
oath never to infringe it ; and though at the end of the 
session he publicly entered a protest, that the prerogatives 
of the crown, notwithstanding his late concession, should 
still be deemed entire and unimpaired d , the new com- 
missioners, without regarding this declaration, proceeded 
to the exercise of their authority. 

1387. The king, thus dispossessed of royal power, was soon 
motions" 1 sensible of the contempt into which he was fallen. His 
favourites and ministers, who were as yet allowed to 
remain about his person, failed not to aggravate the 
injury, which, without any demerit on his part, had been 
offered to him. And his eager temper was of itself suffi- 
ciently inclined to seek the means, both of recovering 
his authority, and of revenging himself on those who had 

* Cotton, p. 315. 

c Knyghton, p. 2686. Statutes at large, 10 Kich. II. cap. 1. 

d Cotton, p. 318. 



RICHARD II. 2. 

invaded it. As the House of Commons appeared now CHAP.* 
of weight in the constitution, he secretly tried some ex- XML 
pedients for procuring a favourable election : he sounded ^^7~ 
some of the sheriffs, who being at that time both the re- 
turning officers, and magistrates of great power in the 
counties, had naturally considerable influence in elec- 
tions 6 . But as most of them had been appointed 
by his uncles, either during his minority, or during the 
course of the present commission, he found them, in 
general, averse to his enterprise. The sentiments and 
inclinations of the judges were more favourable to him. 
He met at Nottingham Sir Robert Tresilian, chief justice 
of the king's bench, Sir Eobert Belknappe, chief justice 
of the common pleas, Sir John Carey, chief baron of the 
exchequer, Holt, Fulthorpe, and Bourg, inferior justices, 
and Lockton, sergeant at law ; and he proposed to them 
some queries, which these lawyers, either from the in- 
fluence of his authority or of reason, made no scruple of 
answering in the way he desired. They declared that 
the late commission was derogatory to the royalty and 
prerogative of the king ; that those who procured it, or 
advised the king to consent to it, were punishable with 
death ; that those w r ho necessitated and compelled him 
were guilty of treason ; that those were equally criminal 
who should persevere in maintaining it ; that the king 
has the right of dissolving Parliaments at pleasure ; that 
the Parliament, while it sits, must first proceed upon the 
king's business ; and that this assembly cannot, without 
his consent, impeach any of his ministers and judges f . 
Even according to our present strict maxims with regard 
to law and the royal prerogative, all these determinations, 
except the two last, appear justifiable : and as the great 
privileges of the Commons, particularly that of im- 
peachment, were hitherto new, and supported by few 
precedents, there want not plausible reasons to justify 
these opinions of the judges g . They signed therefore 

e In the preamble to 5 Henry IV. cap. 7. it is implied, that the sheriffs in a 
manner appointed the members of the House of Commons, not only in this Parlia- 
ment, but in many others. 

f Knyghton, p. 2694. Ypod. Neust. p. 541. 

s The Parliament, in 1341, exacted of Edward III., that on the third day of 
every session the king should resume all the great offices ; and that the ministers 
should then answer to any accusation that should be brought against them ; which 
plainly implies, that, while ministers, they could not be accused or impeached in 



23& I HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

jwer to the king's queries before the Archbishops 
id Dublin, the Bishops of Durham, Chiehester, 
or, the Duke of Ireland, the Earl of Suffolk, 
and two other counsellors of inferior quality. 

The Duke of Gloucester and his adherents soon got 
intelligence of this secret consultation, and were na- 
turally very much alarmed at it. They saw the king's 
intentions ; and they determined to prevent the execu- 
tion of them. As soon as he came to London, which 
they knew was well disposed to their party, they secretly 
assembled their forces, and appeared in arms at Harm- 
gay park, near Highgate, with a power which Richard 
and his ministers were not able to resist. They sent 
him a message by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and 
the Lords Lovel, Cobham, and Devereux, and demanded 
that the persons who had seduced him by their pernicious 
counsel, and were traitors both to him and to the king- 
dom, should be delivered up to them. A few days after 
they appeared in his presence, armed, and attended with 
armed followers ; and they accused, by name, the Arch- 
bishop of York, the Duke of Ireland, the Earl of Suf- 
folk, Sir Robert Tresilian, and Sir Nicholas Brembre, as 
public and dangerous enemies to the state. They threw 
down their gauntlets before the king, and fiercely offered 
to maintain the truth of their charge by duel. The per- 
sons accused, and all the other obnoxious ministers, had 
withdrawn, or had concealed themselves. 

The Duke of Ireland fled to Cheshire, and levied 
some forces, with which he advanced to relieve the king 
from the violence of the nobles. Gloucester encountered 
him in Oxfordshire with much superior forces, routed 
him, dispersed his followers, and obliged him to fly into 
the Low Countries, where he died in exile a few years 
1388. after. The Lords then appeared at London with an 

3d Feb. 

Parliament. Henry IV. told the Commons, that the usage of Parliament required 
them to go first through the king's business in granting supplies ; which order the 
king intended not to alter. Parl. Hist. vol. ii. p. 65. Upon the whole it must be 
allowed, that, according to ancient practice and principles, there are, at least, 
plausible grounds for all these opinions of the judges. It must be remarked, that 
this affirmation of Henry IV. was given deliberately, after consulting the House 
of Peers, who were much better acquainted with the usage of Parliament than the 
ignorant Commons. And it has the greater authority, because Henry IV. had 
made this very principle a considerable article of charge against his predecessor, 
and that a very few years before. So ill grounded were most of the imputations 
thrown on the unhappy Kichard ! 



ministers. 



RICHARD II. 241 

army of forty thousand men ; and having obliged the CHAP. 
king to summon a Parliament, which was entirely at their 
devotion, they had full power, by observing a few legal ^^~ 
forms, to take vengeance on all their enemies. Five Expulsion 
great peers, men whose combined power was able at any 
time to shake the throne, the Duke of Gloucester, the ^^ 
king's uncle; the Earl of Derby, son of the Duke of 
Lancaster ; the Earl of Arundel ; the Earl of Warwick, 
and the Earl of Nottingham, Mareschal of England, 
entered before the Parliament an accusation or appeal, 
as it was called, against the five counsellors whom they 
had already accused before the king. The Parliament, 
who ought to have been judges, were not ashamed to 
impose an oath on all their members, by which they 
bound themselves to live and die with the lords appel- 
lants, and to defend them against all opposition with 
their lives and fortunes 11 . 

The other proceedings were well suited to the violence 
and iniquity of the times. A charge consisting of thirty- 
nine articles was delivered in by the appellants; and 
as none of the accused counsellors, except Sir Nicholas 
Brembre, was in custody, the rest were cited to appear ; 
and upon their absenting themselves, the House of 
Peers, after a very short interval, without hearing a wit- 
ness, without examining a fact, or deliberating on one 
point of law, declared them guilty of high treason. Sir 
Nicholas Brembre, who was produced in court, had the 
appearance, and but the appearance, of a trial : the Peers, 
though they were not by law his proper judges, pro- 
nounced, in a very summary manner, sentence of death 
upon him, and he was executed, together with Sir Robert 
Tresilian, who had been discovered and taken in the 
interval. 

It would be tedious to recite the whole charge de- 
livered in against the five counsellors ; which is to be 
met with in several collections 1 . It is sufficient to 
observe, in general, that if we reason upon the supposi- 
tion, which is the true one, that the royal prerogative 
was invaded by the commission extorted by the Duke of 

k Cotton, p. 322. 

i Knyghton, p. 2715. Tyrrel, vol. iii. part 2. p. 919, from the Eecords. Pad. 
Hist. vol. i. p. 414. 

VOL. II. 21 



242 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Gloucester and his associates, and that the king's person 
i J^ 11 ^ was afterwards detained in custody by rebels, many of 
1388 the articles will appear, not only to imply no crime in 
the Duke of Ireland and the ministers, but to ascribe to 
them actions which were laudable, and which they were 
bound by their allegiance to perform. The few articles 
impeaching the conduct of these ministers before that 
commission, which subverted the constitution, and an- 
nihilated all justice and legal authority, are vague and 
general; such as their engrossing the king's favour, 
keeping his barons at a distance from him, obtaining un- 
reasonable grants for themselves or their creatures, and 
dissipating the public treasure by useless expenses. No 
violence is objected to them; no particular illegal act k ; 
no breach of any statute ; and their administration may 
therefore be concluded to have been so far innocent and 
inoffensive. All the disorders indeed seem to have pro- 
ceeded, not from any violation of the laws, or any minis- 
terial tyranny, but merely from a rivalship of power, 
which the Duke of Gloucester and the great nobility, 
agreeably to the genius of the times, carried to the ut- 
most extremity against their opponents, without any re- 
gard to reason, justice, or humanity. 

But these were not the only deeds of violence com- 
mitted during the triumph of the party. All the other 
judges, who had signed the extrajudicial opinions at 
Nottingham, were condemned to death, and were, as a 
grace or favour, banished to Ireland; though they pleaded 
the fear of their lives, and the menaces of the king's 
ministers as their excuse. Lord Beauchamp of Holt, 
Sir James Berners, and John Salisbury, were also tried 
and condemned for high treason, merely because they 
had attempted to defeat the late commission ; but the 
life of the latter was spared. The fate of Sir Simon 
Burley was more severe : this gentleman was much be- 
loved for his personal merit, had distinguished himself 
by many honourable actions 1 , was created knight of the 

k See note [M], at the end of the volume. 

1 At least this is the character given of him by Proissart, liv. ii., who knew him 
personally: Walsingham, p. 334, gives a very different character of him; hut he 
is a writer somewhat passionate and partial ; and the choice made of this gentle- 
man by Edward III. and the Black Prince, for the education of Richard, makes the 
character given by Froissart much more probable. 



RICHARD II. 243 

garter, and had been appointed governor to Richard, by CHAP. 
the choice of the late king and of the Black Prince : he 
had attended his master from the earliest infancy of that ^^^T" 
prince, and had ever remained extremely attached to 
him : yet all these considerations could not save him 
from falling a victim to Gloucester's vengeance. This 
execution, more than all the others, made a deep impres- 
sion on the mind of Richard : his queen, too, (for he was 
already married to the sister of the Emperor Winceslaus, 
King of Bohemia,) interested herself in behalf of Burley : 
she remained three hours on her knees before the Duke 
of Gloucester, pleading for that gentleman's life ; but 
though she was become extremely popular by her amiable 
qualities, which had acquired her the appellation of the 
good Queen Anne, her petition was sternly rejected by 
the inexorable tyrant. 

The Parliament concluded this violent scene by a 
declaration that none of the articles, decided on these 
trials to be treason, should ever afterwards be drawn 
into precedent by the judges, who were still to consider 
the statute of the twenty-fifth of Edward as the rule of 
their decisions. The House of Lords seem not, at that 
time, to have known or acknowledged the principle, that 
they themselves were bound, in their judicial capacity, 
to follow the rules which they, in conjunction with the 
king and Commons, had established in their legislative m . 
It was also enacted, that every one should swear to the 
perpetual maintenance and support of the forfeitures and 
attainders, and of all the other acts passed during this 
Parliament The Archbishop of Canterbury added the 
penalty of excommunication, as a farther security to 
these violent transactions. 

It might naturally be expected, that the king being 13 89. 
reduced to such slavery by the combination of the 
princes and chief nobility, and having appeared so unable 
to defend his servants from the cruel effects of their re- 
sentment, would long remain in subjection to them ; and 
never would recover the royal power without the most 
violent struggles and convulsions ; but the event proved 
contrary. In less than a twelvemonth, Richard, who was 
in his twenty-third year, declared in council, that, as he 

m See note [N], at the end of the volume. 



244 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, had now attained the full age which entitled him to 
vj L-' govern by his own authority his kingdom and household, 
1389 he resolved to exercise his right of sovereignty ; and 
when no one ventured to contradict so reasonable an 
intention, he deprived Fitz-Alan, Archbishop of Canter- 
bury, of the dignity of chancellor, and bestowed that 
high office on William of Wickham, Bishop of Winches- 
ter : the Bishop of Hereford was displaced from the 
office of treasurer, the Earl of Arundel from that of 
admiral ; even the Duke of Gloucester and the Earl of 
Warwick were removed for a time from the council ; 
and no opposition was made to these great changes. 
The history of this reign is imperfect, and little to be 
depended on, except where it is supported by public re- 
cords ; and it is not easy for us to assign the reason of 
this unexpected event. Perhaps some secret animosities, 
naturally to be expected in that situation, had crept in 
among the great men, and had enabled the king to re- 
cover his authority. Perhaps the violence of their 
former proceedings had lost them the affections of the 
people, who soon repent of any cruel extremities to which 
they are carried by their leaders. However this may be, 
Richard exercised with moderation the authority which 
he had resumed. He seemed to be entirely reconciled 
to his uncles n , and the other great men, of whom he 
had so much reason to complain : he never attempted to 
recall from banishment the Duke of Ireland, whom he 
found so obnoxious to them ; he confirmed by procla- 
mation, the general pardon which the Parliament had 
passed for all offences ; and he courted the affections of 
the people by voluntarily remitting some subsidies which 
had been granted him ; a remarkable and almost singular 
instance of such generosity. 

After this composure of domestic differences, and this 
restoration of the government to its natural state, there 
passes an interval of eight years, which affords not many 
remarkable events. The Duke of Lancaster returned 
from Spain ; having resigned to his rival all pretensions 
to the crown of Castile, upon payment of a large sum of 
money , and having married his daughter, Philippa, to 

n Dugdale, vol. ii. p. 170. 

o Knyghton, p. 2677. Walsingham, p. 342. 



RICHARD II. 245 

the King of Portugal. The authority of this prince CHAP. 
served to counterbalance that of the Duke of Gloucester,, _ x ^ L ^ 
and secured the power of Richard, who paid great court 1389 
to his eldest uncle, by whom he had never been offended, 
and whom he found more moderate in his temper than 
the younger. He made a cessation to him for life of the 
duchy of Guienne p , which the inclinations and change- 
able humour of the Gascons had restored to the English 
government; but as they remonstrated loudly against 
this deed, it was finally, with the duke's consent, revoked 
by Richard q . There happened an incident, which pro- 
duced a dissension bet ween Lancaster and his two brothers. 
After the death of the Spanish princess, he espoused 
Catherine Swineford, daughter of a private knight of 
Hainault, by whose alliance York and Gloucester thought 
the dignity of their family much injured ; but the king 
gratified his uncle, by passing in Parliament a charter of 
legitimation to the children whom that lady had borne 
him before marriage, and by creating the eldest Earl of 
Somerset r . 

The wars, meanwhile, which Richard had inherited 
with his crown, still continued ; though interrupted by 
frequent truces, according to the practice of that age, and 
conducted with little vigour, by reason of the weakness 
of all parties. The French war was scarcely heard of; 
the tranquillity of the northern borders was only inter- 
rupted by one inroad of the Scots, which proceeded more 
from a rivalship between the two martial families of 
Piercy and Douglas, than from any national quarrel : a 
fierce battle or skirmish was fought at Otterborne 8 , in 
which young Piercy, surnamed Hotspur from his impe- 
tuous valour, was taken prisoner, and Douglas slain ; and 
the victory remained undecided*. Some insurrections 
of the Irish obliged the king to make an expedition into 
that country, which he reduced to obedience ; and he 
recovered in some degree by this enterprise, his character 
of courage, which had suffered a little by the inactivity 
of his reign. At last, the English and French courts 1396. 
began to think in earnest of a lasting peace ; but found 

P Rymer, vol. vii. p. 659. <i Ibid. p. 687. 

r Cotton, p. 365. Walsingham, p. 352. 

s 15th August, 1388. 

t Eroissart, liv. iii. chap. 124, 125, 126. Walsingham, p. 355. 

21* 



246 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, it so difficult to adjust their opposite pretensions, that 

v _/they were content to establish a truce of twenty-five 

1396. years u : Brest and Cherbourg were restored, the former 
to the Duke of Brit any, the latter to the King of Na- 
varre : both parties were left in possession of all the other 
places which they held at the time of concluding the truce : 
and to render the amity between the two crowns more 
durable, Richard, who was now a widower, was affianced 
to Isabella, the daughter of Charles w . This princess was 
only seven years of age ; but the king agreed to so un- 
equal a match, chiefly that he might fortify himself by 
this alliance against the enterprises of his uncles, and 
the incurable turbulence as well as inconstancy of his 
barons. 

The administration of the king, though it was not, in 
this interval, sullied by any unpopular act, except the 
siezing of the charter of London x , which was soon after 
restored, tended not much to corroborate his authority ; 
and his personal character brought him into contempt, 
even while his public government appeared, in a good 
measure, unexceptionable. Indolent, profuse, addicted 
to low pleasures, he spent his whole time in feasting and 
jollity, and dissipated, in idle show, or in bounties to 
favourites of no reputation, that revenue which the peo- 
ple expected to see him employ in enterprises directed 
to public honour and advantage. He forgot his rank by 
admitting all men to his familiarity; and he was not 
sensible that their acquaintance with the qualities of his 
mind was not able to impress them with the respect 
which he neglected to preserve from his birth and 
station. The Earls of Kent and Huntingdon, his 
half-brothers, were his chief confidants and favour- 
ites ; and though he never devoted himself to them with 
so profuse an affection as that with which he had for- 
merly been attached to the Duke of Ireland, it was easy 
for men to see, that every grace passed through their 
hands, and that the king had rendered himself a mere 
cipher in the government. The small regard which the 
public bore to his person disposed them to murmur 
against his administration, and to receive, with greedy ears, 

u Rymer, vol. vii. p. 820. w Ibid. p. 811. 

* Ibid. p. 727. Walsingham, p. 347. 



RICHARD II. 247 

every complaint which the discontented or ambitious CHAP. 
grandees suggested to them. ,_ X ^ IJ ^ 

Gloucester soon perceived the advantages which this 1397 
dissolute conduct gave him ; and finding, that both re- Cabals of 
sentment and jealousy on the part of his nephew still fGk>ucSs- 
prevented him from acquiring any ascendant over that ter. 
prince, he determined to cultivate his popularity with the 
nation, and to revenge himself on those who eclipsed him 
in favour and authority. He seldom appeared at court 
or in council ; he never declared his opinion but in order 
to disapprove of the measures embraced by the king and 
his favourites ; and he courted the friendship of every 
man whom disappointment or private resentment had 
rendered an enemy to the administration. The long 
truce with France was unpopular with the English, who 
breathed nothing but war against that hostile nation; 
and Gloucester took care to encourage all the vulgar 
prejudices which prevailed on this subject. Forgetting 
the misfortunes which attended the English arms during 
the later years of Edward, he made an invidious com- 
parison between the glories of that reign and the inac- 
tivity of the present, and he lamented that Richard 
should have degenerated so much from the heroic virtues 
by which his father and his grandfather were distin- 
guished. The military men were inflamed with a desire 
of war, when they heard him talk of the signal victories 
formerly obtained, and of the easy prey which might be 
made of French riches by the superior valour of the En- 
glish : the populace readily embraced the same senti- 
ments ; and all men exclaimed that this prince, whose 
counsels were so much neglected, was the true support 
of English honour, and alone able to raise the nation to 
its former power and splendour. His great abilities, his 
popular manners, his princely extraction, his immense 
riches, his high office of constable 7 ; all these advantages, 
not a little assisted by his want of couri>favour, gave him 
a mighty authority in the kingdom, and rendered him 
formidable to Richard and his ministers. 

Eroissart 2 , a contemporary writer, and very impartial, 
but whose credit is somewhat impaired by his want of 
exactness in material facts, ascribes to the Duke of Glou- 

y Rymer, vol. vii. p. 152. z Liv. iv. chap. 86. 



248 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, cester more desperate views, and such as were totally in- 
,_ X _; compatible with the government and domestic tranquil- 
1397. lity of the nation. According to that historian, he pro- 
posed to his nephew, Eoger Mortimer, Earl of March, 
whom Eichard had declared his successor, to give him 
immediate possession of the throne, by the deposition of 
a prince so unworthy of power and authority ; and when 
Mortimer declined the project, he resolved to make a 
partition of the kingdom between himself, his two bro- 
thers, and the Earl of Arundel ; and entirely to dispos- 
sess Eichard of the crown. The king, it is said, being 
informed of these designs, saw that either his own ruin, 
or that of Gloucester, was inevitable ; and he resolved, 
by a hasty blow, to prevent the execution of such de- 
structive projects. This is certain, that Gloucester, by 
his own confession, had often affected to speak contemp- 
tuously of the king's person and government ; had deli- 
berated concerning the lawfulness of throwing off alle- 
giance to him ; and had even borne part in a secret con- 
ference, where his deposition was proposed, and talked 
of, and determined a : but it is reasonable to think, that 
his schemes were not so far advanced as to make him 
resolve on putting them immediately in execution. The 
danger, probably, was still too distant to render a des- 
perate remedy entirely necessary for the security of 
government. 

But whatever opinion we may form of the danger 
arising from Gloucester's conspiracies, his aversion to 
the French truce and alliance was public and avowed ; 
and that court, which had now a great influence over 
the king, pushed him to provide for his own safety, by 
punishing the traitorous designs of his uncle. The re- 
sentment against his former acts of violence revived ; 
the sense of his refractory and uncompliant behaviour 
was still recent ; and a man whose ambition had once 
usurped royal authority, and who had murdered all the 
faithful servants of the king, was thought capable, on a 

a Cotton, p. 378. Tyrrel, vol. iii. part 2. p. 972, from the Records. Parlia- 
mentary History, vol. i. p. 473. That this confession was genuine, and obtained 
without violence, may be entirely depended on. Judge Rlckhill, who brought it 
over from Calais, was tried on that account, and acquitted in the first Parliament 
of Henry IV. when Gloucester's party was prevalent. His acquittal, notwithstand- 
ing his innocence, may even appear marvellous, considering the times. See Cotton, 
p. 393. 



RICHARD II. 249 

favourable opportunity, of renewing the same criminal CHAP. 
enterprises. The king's precipitate temper admitted ^J^! 
of no deliberation : he ordered Gloucester to be unex- 1397 
pectedly arrested ; to be hurried on board a ship which 
was lying in the river ; and to be carried over to Calais, 
w r here alone, by reason of his numerous partisans, he 
could safely be detained in custody b . The Earls of 
Arundel and Warwick were seized at the same time : 
the malecontents, so suddenly deprived of their leaders, 
were astonished and overawed : and the concurrence of 
the Dukes of Lancaster and York in those measures, to- 
gether with the Earls of Derby and Rutland, the eldest 
sons of these princes c , bereaved them of all possibility of 
resistance. 

A parliament was immediately summoned at West- i?th Sept. 
minster ; and the king doubted not to find the Peers, 
and still more the Commons, very compliant with his 
will. This House had, in a former Parliament, given 
him very sensible proofs of their attachment d ; and the 
present suppression of Gloucester's party made him still 
more assured of a favourable election. As a farther ex- 
pedient for that purpose, he is also said to have employed 
the influence of the sheriffs ; a practice which, though 
not unusual, gave umbrage, but which the established 
authority of that assembly rendered afterwards still more 
familiar to the nation. Accordingly the Parliament 
passed whatever acts the king was pleased to dictate to 
them e : they annulled for ever the commission which 
usurped upon the royal authority, and they declared it 
treasonable to attempt, in any future period, the revival 
of any similar commission f ; they abrogated all the acts 
which attainted the king's ministers, and which that 
Parliament who passed them, and the whole nation, had 
sworn inviolably to maintain ; and they declared the 
general pardon then granted to be invalid, as extorted 
by force, and never ratified by the free consent of the 
king. Though Richard, after he resumed the govern- 

b Froissart, liv. iv. chap. 90. Walsingham, p. 354. 

c Rymer, vol. viii. p. 7. 

d See note [O], at the end of the volume. 

e The nobles brought numerous retainers with them to give them security, as we 
are told by Walsingham, p. 354. The king had only a few Cheshire men for his 
guard. f Statutes at large, 21 Ilichard II. 



250 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, merit, and lay no longer under constraint, had volun- 
ij^ 11 !^ tarily, by proclamation, confirmed that general indemnity, 
1397 this circumstance seemed not, in their eyes, to merit any 
consideration. Even a particular pardon, granted six 
years after to the Earl of Arundel, was annulled by Par- 
liament, on pretence that it had been procured by sur- 
prise, and that the king was not then fully apprized of 
the degree of guilt incurred by that nobleman. 

The Commons then preferred an impeachment against 
Fitz-Alan, Archbishop of Canterbury, and brother to 
Arundel, and accused him for his concurrence in pro- 
curing the illegal commission, and in attainting the 
king's ministers. The primate pleaded guilty ; but as 
he was protected by the ecclesiastical privileges, the 
king was satisfied with a sentence which banished him 
the kingdom and sequestered his temporalities g . An 
appeal or accusation was presented against the Duke of 
Gloucester, and the Earls of Arundel and Warwick, by 
the Earls of Rutland, Kent, Huntingdon, Somerset, 
Salisbury, and Nottingham, together with the Lords 
Spenser and Scrope, and they were accused of the same 
crimes which had been imputed to the archbishop, as 
well as of their appearance against the king in a hostile 
manner at Haringay park. The Earl of Arundel, who 
was brought to the bar, wisely confined all his defence 
to the pleading of both the general and particular pardon 
of the king ; but his plea being overruled, he was con- 
demned and executed 11 . The Earl of Warwick, who 
was also convicted of high treason, was, on account of 
his submissive behaviour, pardoned as to his life, but 
doomed to perpetual banishment in the Isle of Man. 
No new acts of treason were imputed to either of these 
noblemen. The only crimes for which they were con- 
demned, were the old attempts against the crown, which 
seemed to be obliterated both by the distance of time 
and by repeated pardons 1 . The reasons of this method 
of proceeding it is difficult to conjecture. The recent 
conspiracies of Gloucester seem certain from his own 
confession : but perhaps the king and ministry had not 

g Cotton, p. 368. 

h Ibid. p. 377. Froissart, liv. iv. chap. 90. Walsingham, p. 354. 

i Tyrrel, vol. iii. part 2. p. 968, from the Records. 



RICHARD II. 251 

at that time in their hands any satisfactory proof of their CHAP. 
reality; perhaps it was difficult to convict Arundel and^ [^ 
Warwick of any participation in them ; perhaps an in- 1397 
quiry into these conspiracies would have involved in the 
guilt some of those great noblemen who now concurred 
with the crown, and whom it was necessary to cover 
from all imputation, or perhaps the king, according to 
the genius of the age, was indifferent about maintaining 
even the appearance of law and equity, and was only 
solicitous, by any means, to ensure success in these pro- 
secutions. These points, like many others in ancient 
history, we are obliged to leave altogether undetermined. 

A warrant was issued to the earl mareschal, governor Murder of 
of Calais, to bring over the Duke of Gloucester, in order f e Giou- 6 
to his trial ; but the governor returned for answer, that cester - 
the duke had died suddenly of an apoplexy in that fortress. 
Nothing could be more suspicious, from the time, than 
the circumstances of that prince's death : it became im- 
mediately the general opinion, that he was murdered by 
orders from his nephew : in the subsequent reign, un- 
doubted proofs were produced in Parliament, that he 
had been suffocated with pillows by his keepers k . And 
it appeared that the king, apprehensive lest the public 
trial and execution of so popular a prince, and so near a 
relation, might prove both dangerous and invidious, had 
taken this base method of gratifying, and, as he fancied, 
concealing his revenge upon him. Both parties, in their 
successive triumphs, seem to have had no farther con- 
cern than that of retaliating upon their adversaries ; and 
neither of them were aware, that, by imitating, they in- 
directly justified, as far as it lay in their power, all the 
illegal violence of the opposite party. 

This session concluded with the creation or advance- 
ment of several peers : the Earl of Derby was made 
Duke of Hereford; the Earl of Rutland, Duke of 
Alb e marie ; the Earl of Kent, Duke of Surrey ; the 
Earl of Huntingdon. Duke of Exeter ; the Earl of Not- 
tingham, Duke of Norfolk ; the Earl of Somerset, Mar- 
quis of Dorset ; Lord Spenser, Earl of Gloucester ; Ralph 
Nevil, Earl of Westmoreland; Thomas Piercy, Earl of 
Worcester; William Scrope, Earl of Wiltshire 1 . The ^ 

k Cotton, p. 399, 400. Dugdale, vol. ii. p. 171. l Cotton, p. 370, 371. 



252 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Parliament, after a session of twelve days, was adjourned 
to Shrewsbury. The king, before the departure of the 

1397 members, exacted from them an oath for the perpetual 
maintenance and establishment of all their acts ; an oath 
similar to that which had formerly been required by the 
Duke of Gloucester and his party, and which had already 
proved so vain and fruitless. 

1398. Both the king and Parliament met in the same dispo- 
a ' sitions at Shrewsbury. So anxious was Richard for the 
security of these acts, that he obliged the Lords and 
Commons to swear anew to them on the cross of Can- 
terbury" 1 ; and he soon after procured a bull from the 
pope, by which they were, as he imagined, perpetually 
secured and established 11 . The Parliament, on the other 
hand, conferred on him for life the duties on wool, 
wool-fells, and leather, and granted him, besides, a 
subsidy of one-tenth and a half, and one-fifteenth and 
a half. They also reversed the attainder of Tresilian 
and the other judges, and, with the approbation of the 
present judges, declared the answers, for which these 
magistrates had been impeached, to be just and legal ; 
and they carried so far their retrospect, as to reverse, 
on the petition of Lord Spenser, Earl of Gloucester, 
the attainder pronounced against the two Spensers in the 
reign of Edward II p . The ancient history of England is 
nothing but a catalogue of reversals : every thing is in 
fluctuation and movement: one faction is continually 
undoing what was established by another : and the mul- 
tiplied oaths, which each party exacted for the security 
of the present acts, betray a perpetual consciousness of 
their instability. 

The Parliament, before they were dissolved, elected a 
committee of twelve lords and six commoners' 1 , whom 
they invested with the whole power both of Lords and 
Commons, and endowed with full authority to finish all 
business which had been laid before the Houses, and 

m Cotton, p. 371. n Walsing. p. 355. 

Statutes at large, 21 Rich. II. p Cotton, p. 372. 

1 The names of the commissioners were, the Dukes of Lancaster, York, Albe- 
marle, Surrey, and Exeter ; the Marquis of Dorset ; the Earls of March, Salisbury, 
Northumberland, Gloucester, Winchester, and Wiltshire; John Bussey, Henry 
Green, John Russel, Robert Teyne, Henry Chelmswicke, and John Golofre. It is 
to be remarked, that the Duke of Lancaster always concurred with the rest in all 
their proceedings, even in the banishment of his son, which was afterwards so much 
complained of. 



RICHARD II. 253 

which they had not had leisure to bring to a conclusion r . CHAP. 
This was an unusual concession; and, though it was xvn 
limited in the object, might, either immediately, or 
a precedent, have proved dangerous to the constitution ; 
but the cause of that extraordinary measure was an 
event, singular and unexpected, which engaged the at- 
tention of the Parliament. 

After the destruction of the Duke of Gloucester and 
the heads of that party, a misunderstanding broke out 
among those noblemen who had joined in the prosecu- 
tion ; and the king wanted either authority sufficient to 
appease it, or foresight to prevent it. The Duke of 
Hereford appeared in Parliament, and accused the Duke 
of Norfolk of having spoken to him, in private, many 
slanderous words of the king, and of having imputed to 
that prince an intention of subverting and destroying 
many of his principal nobility 8 . Norfolk denied the 
charge, gave Hereford the lie, and offered to prove his 
own innocence by duel. The challenge was accepted : 
the time and place of combat were appointed : and as 
the event of this important trial by arms might require 
the interposition of legislative authority, the Parliament 
thought it more suitable to delegate their power to a 
committee, than to prolong the session beyond the usual 
time which custom and general convenience had pre- 
scribed to it i . 

The Duke of Hereford was certainly very little de- 
licate in the point of honour, when he revealed a private 
conversation, to the ruin of the person who had intrusted 
him ; and we may thence be more inclined to believe 
the Duke of Norfolk's denial than the other's assevera- 
tion. But Norfolk had in these transactions betrayed 
an equal neglect of honour, which brings him entirely 
on a level with his antagonist. Though he had publicly 
joined with the Duke of Gloucester and his party in all 
the former acts of violence against the king; and his 
name stands among the appellants who accused the Duke 

* Cotton, p. 372. Walsing. p. 355. 

9 Cotton, p. 372. Parliamentary History, vol. i. p. 490. 

* In the first year of Henry VI. when the authority of Parliament was great, 
and when that assembly could least be suspected of lying under violence, a like 
concession was made to the privy council from like motives of convenience. See 
Cotton, p. 564. 

VOL. ii. 22 



254 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of Ireland and the other ministers; yet was he not 
V J^^_ / ashamed publicly to impeach his former associates for 
1398 the very crimes which he had concurred with them in 
committing; and his name increases the list of those 
appellants who brought them to a trial. Such were the 
principles and practices of those ancient knights and 
barons during the prevalence of the aristocratical gov- 
ernment, and the reign of chivalry. 

The lists for this decision of truth and right were ap- 
pointed at Coventry before the king : all the nobility of 
England banded into parties, and adhered either to the 
one duke or the other : the whole nation was held in 
suspense with regard to the event ; but when the two 
champions appeared in the field, accoutred for the com- 
bat, the king interposed, to prevent both the present 
effusion of such noble blood, and the future consequences 
of the quarrel. By the advice and authority v of the par- 
liamentary commissioners he stopped the duel ; and, to 
show his impartiality, he ordered, by the same authority, 
both the combatants to leave the kingdom 11 ; assigning 
one country for the place of Norfolk's exile, which he 
declared perpetual ; another for that of Hereford, which 
he limited to ten years. 

Hereford was a man of great prudence and command 
of temper ; and he behaved himself with so much sub- 
mission in these delicate circumstances, that the king, 
before his departure, promised to shorten the term of his 
exile four years ; and he also granted him letters patent, 
by which he was empowered, in case any inheritance 
should in the interval accrue to him, to enter immedi- 
ately in possession, and to postpone the doing of homage 
till his return. 

Banish- The weakness and fluctuation of Kichard's counsels 
Henryf appear nowhere more evident than in the conduct of this 
Duke of affair. No sooner had Hereford left the kingdom, than 
the king's jealousy of the power and riches of that 
prince's family revived ; and he was sensible that by 
Gloucester's death he had only removed a counterpoise 
to the Lancastrian interest, which was now become formi- 
dable to his crown and kingdom. Being informed that 
Hereford had entered into a treaty of marriage with the 

Cotton, p. 380. Walsingham, p. 356. 



RICHARD II. 25 

daughter of the Duke of Berry, uncle to the French king, CHAP. 
he determined to prevent the finishing of an alliance 
which would so much extend the interest of his cousin ^^^~ 
in foreign countries ; and he sent over the Earl of Salis- 
bury to Paris with a commission for that purpose. The 1399. 
death of the Duke of Lancaster, which happened soon c 
after, called upon him to take new resolutions with re- 
gard to that opulent succession. The present duke, in 
consequence of the king's patent, desired to be put in 
possession of the estate and jurisdictions of his father ; 
but Richard, afraid of strengthening the hands of a man 
whom he had already so much offended, applied to the 
parliamentary commissioners, and persuaded them, that 
this affair was but an appendage to that business which 
the Parliament had delegated to them. By their autho- 
rity he revoked his letters patent, and retained possession 
of the estate of Lancaster ; and by the same authority 
he seized and tried the duke's attorney, who had pro- 
cured and insisted on the letters, and he had him con- 
demned as a traitor for faithfully executing that trust to 
his master w . An extravagant act of power ! even though 
the king changed, in favour of the attorney, the penalty 
of death into that of banishment. 

.Henry, the new Duke of Lancaster, had acquired, by 
his conduct and abilities, the esteem of the public ; and 
having served with distinction against the infidels in 
Lithuania, he had joined to his other praises those of 
piety and valour, virtues which have at all times a great 
influence over mankind, and were, during those ages, the 
qualities chiefly held in estimation x . He was connected 
with most of the principal nobility by blood, alliance, or 
friendship ; and as the injury done him by the king might 
in its consequences affect all of them, he easily brought 
them, by a sense of common interest, to take part in his 
resentment. The people, who must have an object of 
affection, who found nothing in the king's person which 
they could love or revere, and who were even disgusted 
with many parts of his conduct 7 , easily transferred to 

w Tyrrel, vol iii. part 2. p. 991, from the Records. 

* Walsingham, p. 343. 

y He levied fines upon those who had ten years before joined the Duke of Glou- 
cester and his party : they were obliged to pay him money, before he would allow 
them to enjoy the benefit of the indemnity : and in the articles of charge against 



256 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Henry that attachment which the death of the Duke of 
Gloucester had left without any fixed direction. His 
1399 misfortunes were lamented ; the injustice which he had 
suffered was complained of; and all men turned their 
eyes towards him, as the only person that could retrieve 
the lost honour of the nation, or redress the supposed 
abuses in the government. 

Return of While such were the dispositions of the people, 
mry ' Eichard had the imprudence to embark for Ireland, in 
order to revenge the death of his cousin, Roger, Earl of 
March, the presumptive heir of the crown, who had lately 
been slain in a skirmish by the natives ; and he thereby 
left the kingdom of England open to the attempts of his 

4th July, provoked and ambitious enemy. Henry, embarking at 
Nantz with a retinue of sixty persons, among whom were 
the Archbishop of Canterbury and the young Earl of 
Arundel, nephew to that prelate, landed at Eavenspur in 
Yorkshire ; and was immediately joined by the Earls of 
Northumberland and Westmoreland, two of the most 
potent barons in England. Here he took a solemn oath, 
that he had no other purpose in this invasion than to 
recover the duchy of Lancaster, unjustly detained from 
him ; and he invited all his friends in England, and all 
lovers of their country, to second him in this reasonable 
and moderate pretension. Every place was in commo- 
tion : the male contents in all quarters flew to arms : 
London discovered the strongest symptoms of its dis- 
position to mutiny and rebellion : and Henry's army, in- 
creasing on every day's march, soon amounted to the 
number of sixty thousand combatants. 

General The Duke of York was left guardian of the realm ; 

tton 5 a place to which his birth entitled him, but which both 
his slender abilities, and his natural connexions with the 
Duke of Lancaster, rendered him utterly incapable of 
filling in such a dangerous emergency. Such of the 
chief nobility as were attached to the crown, and could 
either have seconded the guardian's good intentions, or 
have overawed his infidelity, had attended the king into 
Ireland ; and the efforts of Eichard's friends were every 

him it is asserted, that the payment of one fine did not suffice. It is indeed 
likely, that his ministers would abuse the power put into then hands ; and this 
grievance extended to Very many people. Historians agree in representing this 
practice as a great oppression. See Otterbourne, p. 199. 



RICHARD II. 257 

where more feeble than those of his enemies. The CHAP. 
Duke of York ; however, appointed the rendezvous of his 
forces at St. Alban's, and soon assembled an army of ^^~ 
forty thousand men ; but found them entirely destitute 
of zeal and attachment to the royal cause, and more in- 
clined to join the party of the rebels. He hearkened, 
therefore, very readily to a message from Henry, who 
entreated him not to oppose a loyal and humble sup- 
plicant in the recovery of his legal patrimony ; and the 
guardian even declared publicly that he would second 
his nephew in so reasonable a request. His army em- 
braced with acclamations the same measures ; and the 
Duke of Lancaster, reinforced by them, was now entirely 
master of the kingdom. He hastened to Bristol, into 
which some of the king's ministers had thrown them- 
selves; and soon obliging that place to surrender, he 
yielded to the popular wishes, and, without giving them 
a trial, ordered the Earl of Wiltshire, Sir John Bussey, 
and Sir Henry Green, whom he there took prisoners, 
to be led to immediate execution. 

The king, receiving intelligence of this invasion and 
insurrection, hastened over from Ireland, and landed in 
Milford Haven with a body of twenty thousand men : 
but even this army, so much inferior to the enemy, was 
either overawed by the general combination of the king- 
dom, or seized with the same spirit of disaffection ; and 
they gradually deserted him, till he found that he had 
not above six thousand men who followed his standard. 
It appeared, therefore, necessary to retire secretly from 
this small body, which served only to expose him to 
danger ; and he fled to the Isle of Anglesea, where he 
purposed to embark either for Ireland or France, and 
there await the favourable opportunities which the re- 
turn of his subjects to a sense of duty, or their future 
discontents against the Duke of Lancaster, would pro- 
bably afford him. Henry, sensible of the danger, sent 
to him the Earl of Northumberland with the strongest 
professions of loyalty and submission ; and that noble- 
man, by treachery and false oaths, made himself master 
of the king's person, and carried him to his enemy at 
Flint Castle. Richard was conducted to London by istSept. 
the Duke of Lancaster, who was there received with 

22* 



258 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the acclamations of the mutinous populace. It is pre- 

,^ ^tended that the recorder met him on the road, and in 

1399 the name of the city entreated him, for the public safety, 

to put Richard to death, with all his adherents who were 

prisoners 2 ; but the duke prudently determined to make 

many others participate in his guilt, before he would 

proceed to those extremities. For this purpose, he issued 

writs of election in the king's name, and appointed the 

immediate meeting of a Parliament at Westminster. 

Such of the peers as were most devoted to the king 
were either fled or imprisoned; and no opponents, even 
among the barons, dared to appear against Henry amidst 
that scene of outrage and violence which commonly 
attends revolutions, especially in England, during those 
turbulent ages. It is also easy to imagine, that a House 
of Commons elected during this universal ferment, and 
this triumph of the Lancastrian party, would be ex- 
tremely attached to that cause, and ready to second 
every suggestion of their leaders. That order, being as 
yet of too little weight to stem the torrent, was always 
carried along with it, and served only to increase the 
violence which the public interest required it should en- 
ofAekiir g ndeavour to control. The Duke of Lancaster, therefore, 
sensible that he should be entirely master, began to 
carry his views to the crown itself; and he deliberated 
with his partisans concerning the most proper means of 
effecting his daring purpose. He first extorted a resig- 
nation from Richard a ; but as he knew that this deed 
would plainly appear the result of force and fear, he 
also purposed, notwithstanding the danger of the pre- 
28th Sept. cedent to himself and his posterity, to have him solemnly 
deposed in Parliament, for his pretended tyranny and 
misconduct. A charge, consisting of thirty-three arti- 
cles, was accordingly drawn up against him, and present- 
ed to that assembly b . 

If we examine these articles, which are expressed 
with extreme acrimony against Richard, we shall find 
that, except some rash speeches which are imputed to 
him , and of whose reality, as they are said to have 

z Walsingham. 

a Knyghton, p. 2744. Otter-bourne, p. 212. 

b Tyrrel, vol. iii. part 2. p. 1008, from the Records. Knyghton, p. 2746. Otter- 
bourne, p. 214. c Art. 16. 26. 



RICHARD II. 259 

passed in private conversation, we may reasonably enter- CHAP. 
tain some doubt, the chief amount of the charge is con- XVIL 
tained in his violent conduct during the two last years 
of his reign, and naturally divides itself into two prin- 
cipal heads. The first and most considerable is the re- 
venge which he took on the princes and great barons, 
who had formerly usurped, and still persevered in con- 
trolling and threatening his authority ; the second is the 
violation of the laws and general privileges of his people. 
But the former, however irregular in many of its circum- 
stances, was fully supported by authority of Parliament, 
and was but a copy of the violence which the princes 
and barons themselves, during their former triumph, had 
exercised against him and his party. The detention of 
Lancaster's estate was, properly speaking, a revocation, 
by parliamentary authority, of a grace which the king 
himself had formerly granted him. The murder of 
Gloucester (for the secret execution, however merited, 
of that prince, certainly deserves this appellation,) was a 
private deed, formed not any precedent, and implied not 
any usurped or arbitrary power of the crown, which * 
could justly give umbrage to the people. It really pro- 
ceeded from a defect of power in the king, rather than 
from his ambition ; and proves that, instead of being 
dangerous to the constitution, he possessed not even the 
authority necessary for the execution of the laws. 

Concerning the second head of accusation, as it mostly 
consists of general facts, was framed by Kichard's in- 
veterate enemies, and was never allowed to be answered 
by him or his friends, it is more difficult to form a judg- 
ment. The greater part of these grievances, imputed to 
Eichard, seems to be the exertion of arbitrary preroga- 
tives ; such as the dispensing power d , levying purvey- 
ance 6 , employing the marshal's court f , extorting loans g , 
granting protections from lawsuits h ; prerogatives which, 
though often complained of, had often been exercised by 
his predecessors, and still continued to be so by his suc- 
cessors. But whether his irregular acts of this kind 1357. 
were more frequent, and injudicious, and violent, than 
usual, or were only laid hold of and exaggerated by the 

d Art. 13. 17, 18. e Art. 22. f Art. 27. 

Art. 14. h Art. 16. 



260 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, factions to which the weakness of his reign had given 
ij 3 ^ 11 ' birth, we are not able, at this distance, to determine with 
1399. certainty. There is, however, one circumstance in which 
his conduct is visibly different from that of his grand- 
father : he is not accused of having imposed one arbi- 
trary tax, without consent of Parliament, during his 
whole reign 1 : scarcely a year passed, during the reign of 
Edward, which was free from complaints with regard to 
this dangerous exertion of authority. But perhaps the 
ascendant which Edward had acquired over the people, 
together with his great prudence, enabled him to make 
a use very advantageous to his subjects of this and other 
arbitrary prerogatives, and rendered them a smaller 
grievance in his hands, than a less absolute authority in 
those of his grandson. This is a point which it would be 
rash for us to decide positively on either side ; but it is 
certain, that a charge drawn up by the Duke of Lancaster, 
and assented to by a Parliament situated in those circum- 
stances, forms no manner of presumption with regard to 
the unusual irregularity or violence of the king's conduct 
1 in this particular 1 ". 

When the charge against Richard was presented to 
the Parliament, though it was liable almost in every 
article to objections, it was not canvassed, nor examined 
nor disputed in either House, and seemed to be received 
with universal approbation. One man alone, the Bishop 
of Carlisle, had the courage, amidst this general disloyalty 
and violence, to appear in defence of his unhappy master, 
and to plead his cause against all the power of the pre- 
vailing party. Though some topics employed by that 
virtuous prelate may seem to favour too much the doc- 
trine of passive obedience, and to make too large a sacri- 
fice of the rights of mankind, he was naturally pushed 
into that extreme by his abhorrence of the present licen- 
tious factions ; and such intrepidity, as well as disinte- 
restedness of behaviour, proves, that, whatever his specu- 

i We learn from Cotton, p. 362, that the king, by his chancellor, told the Com- 
mons, that they were sunderly bound to him, and namely in forbearing to charge them 
ivith dismes and fifteens, the ivhich he meant no more to charge them in his own person. 
These words no more allude to the practice of his predecessors : he had not him- 
self imposed any arbitrary taxes : even the Parliament, in the articles of his de- 
position, though they complain of heavy taxes, affirm not that they were imposed 
illegally or by arbitrary will. 

k See note [P], at the end of the volume. 



RICHARD II. 261 

lative principles were, his heart was elevated far above the CHAP. 
meanness and abject submission of a slave. He repre-^J [_, 
sented to the Parliament, that all the abuses of govern- 1399 
inent which cpuld justly be imputed to Richard, instead 
of amounting to tyranny, were merely the result of error, 
youth, or misguided counsel, and admitted of a remedy 
more easy and salutary than a total subversion of the 
constitution. That even had they been much more vio- 
lent and dangerous than they really were, they had chiefly 
proceeded from former examples of resistance, which, 
making the prince sensible of his precarious situation, 
had obliged him to establish his throne by irregular and 
arbitrary expedients. That a rebellious disposition in 
subjects was the principal cause of tyranny in kings: 
laws could never secure the subject, which did not give 
security to the sovereign : and if the maxim of invio- 
lable loyalty, which formed the basis of the English 
government, were once rejected, the privileges belonging 
to the several orders of the state, instead of being forti- 
fied by that licentiousness, would thereby lose the surest 
foundation of their force and stability. That the par- 
liamentary deposition of Edward II., far from making a 
precedent which could control this maxim, was only an 
example of successful violence ; and it was sufficiently 
to be lamented, that crimes were so often committed in 
the world, without establishing principles which might 
justify and authorize them. That even that precedent, 
false and dangerous as it was, could never warrant the 
present excesses, which were so much greater, and 
which would entail distraction and misery on the nation 
, to the latest posterity. That the succession, at least, of 
the crown was then preserved inviolate ; the lineal heir 
was placed on the throne ; and the people had an oppor- 
tunity, by their legal obedience to him, of making atone- 
ment for the violence which they had committed against 
his predecessor. That a descendant of Lionel, Duke of 
Clarence, the elder brother of the late Duke of Lancaster, 
had been declared in Parliament successor to the crown : 
he had left posterity ; and their title, however it might 
be overpowered by present force and faction, could never 
be obliterated from the minds of the people. That if the 
turbulent disposition alone of the nation had overturned 



262 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the well-established throne of so good a prince as Richard, 
XVIL what bloody commotions must ensue, when the same 
cause was united to the motive of restoring the legal and 
undoubted heir to his authority ! That the new govern- 
ment, intended to be established, would stand on no 
principle ; and would scarcely retain any pretence by 
which it could challenge the obedience of men of sense 
and virtue. That the claim of lineal descent was so 
gross as scarcely to deceive the most ignorant of the 
populace : conquest could never be pleaded by a rebel 
against his sovereign : the consent of the people had no 
authority in a monarchy not derived from consent, but 
established by hereditary right ; and however the nation 
might be justified in deposing the misguided Richard, it 
could never have any reason for setting aside his lawful 
heir and successor, who was plainly innocent. And that 
the Duke of Lancaster would give them but a bad speci- 
men of the legal moderation which might be expected 
from his future government, if he added to the crime of 
his past rebellion, the guilt of excluding the family which, 
both by right of blood and by declaration of Parliament, 
would, in case of Richard's demise or voluntary resigna- 
tion, have been received as the undoubted heirs of the 
monarchy 1 . 

All the circumstances of this event, compared to those 
which attended the late revolution in 1688, show the 
difference between a great and civilized nation, delibe- 
rately vindicating its established privileges, and a turbu- 
lent and barbarous aristocracy plunging headlong from 
the extremes of one faction into those of another. This 
noble freedom of the Bishop of Carlisle, instead of being 
applauded, was not so much as tolerated : he was im- 
mediately arrested by order of the Duke of Lancaster, 
and sent a prisoner to the abbey of St. Alban's. No 
farther debate was attempted : thirty-three long articles 
of charge were, in one meeting, voted against Richard ; 
and voted unanimously by the same peers and prelates 
who, a little before, had voluntarily and unanimously 
authorized those very acts of violence of which they now 
complained. That prince was deposed by the suffrages 
of both Houses ; and the throne being now vacant, the 

1 Sir John Heywarde, p. 101. 



RICHARD II. 263 

Duke of Lancaster stepped forth, and having crossed CHAP. 
himself on the forehead and on the breast, and called upon XVIL 
the name of Christ m , he pronounced these words, which ^^^ 
we shall give in the original language, because of their 
singularity : 

In the name of Fadher, Son, and Holy Ghost, I Henry 
of Lancaster challenge this reivme of Ynglande, and the 
croun, ivith all the membres, and the appurtenances ; als I 
that am descendit ly right line of the bkde, coming fro the 
glide King Henry therde, and throge that right that God 
of his grace hath sent me, with helpe of Ityn, and of my ' 
frendes to recover it ; the which reivme ivas in poynt to be 
ondone ly defaut of governance, and ondoying of the glide 



In order to understand this speech, it must be ob- 
served, that there was a silly story, received among some 
of the lowest vulgar, that Edmond, Earl of Lancaster, 
son of Henry III, was really the elder brother of Edward 
I. ; but that by reason of some deformity in his person, 
he had been postponed in the succession, and his younger 
brother imposed on the nation in his stead. As the pre- 
sent Duke of Lancaster inherited from Edmond by his 
mother, this genealogy made him the true heir of the 
monarchy, and it is therefore insinuated in Henry's 
speech ; but the absurdity was too gross to be openly 
avowed either by him or by the Parliament. The case 
is the same with regard to his right of conquest : he was 
a subject who rebelled against his sovereign : he entered 
the kingdom with a retinue of no more than sixty per- 
sons : he could not therefore be the conqueror of Eng- 
land ; and this right is accordingly insinuated, not avowed. 
Still there is a third claim, derived from his merits in 
saving the nation from tyranny and oppression ; and this 
claim is also insinuated ; but as it seemed, by its nature, 
better calculated as a reason for his being elected king by 
a free choice, than for giving him an immediate right of 
possession, he durst not speak openly even on this head ; 
and to obviate any notion of election, he challenges the 
crown as his due, either by acquisition or inheritance. 

m Cotton, p, 389. n Knyghton, p. 2757. 



264 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. The whole forms such a piece of jargon and nonsense, as 

v _,i g almost without example : no objection, however, was 

1399 made to it in Parliament : the unanimous voice of Lords 
and Commons placed Henry on the throne : he became 
king, nobody could tell how or wherefore : the title of 
the house of March, formerly recognized by Parliament, 
was neither invalidated nor appealed, but passed over in 
total silence : and as a concern for the liberties of the 
people seems to have had no hand in this revolution, 
their right to dispose of the government, as well as all 
their other privileges, was left precisely on the same 
footing as before. But Henry having, when he claimed 
the crown, dropped some obscure hint concerning con- 
quest, which, it was thought, might endanger these pri- 
vileges, he soon after made a public declaration, that he 
did not thereby intend to deprive any one of his fran- 
chises or liberties ; which was the only circumstance 
where we shall find meaning or common sense in all 
these transactions. 

6th Oct. The subsequent events discover the same headlong 
violence of conduct, and the same rude notions of civil 
government. The deposition of Kichard dissolved the 
Parliament : it was necessary to summon a new one ; 
and Henry, in six days after, called together, without any 
new election, the same members ; and this assembly he 
denominated a new Parliament. They were employed 
in the usual task of reversing every deed of the opposite 
party. All the acts of the last Parliament of Kichard, 
which had been confirmed by their oaths, and by a papal 
bull, were abrogated : all the acts which had passed in 
the Parliament where Gloucester prevailed, which had 
also been confirmed by their oaths, but which had been 
abrogated by Kichard, were anew established 5 : the 
answers of Tresilian and the other judges, which a Par- 
liament had annulled, but which a new Parliament and 
new judges had approved, here received a second con- 
demnation. The Peers who had accused Gloucester, 
Arundel, and Warwick, and who had received higher 
titles for that piece of service, were all of them degraded 
from their new dignities : even the practice of prosecuting 
appeals in Parliament, which bore the air of a violent 

o Knyghton, p. 2759. Otterbourne, p. 220. P Cotton, p. 390. 



RICHARD II. 265 

confederacy against an individual, rather than of a legal CHAP. 
indictment, was wholly abolished; and trials were re- xviL 
stored to the course of common law q . The natural effect ^^^ 
of this conduct was to render the people giddy with 
such rapid and perpetual changes, and to make them 
lose all notions of right and wrong in the measures of 
government. 

The Earl of Northumberland made a motion in the 23d Oct. 
House of Peers with regard to the unhappy prince 
whom they had deposed. He asked them what advice 
they would give the king for the future treatment of 
him, since Henry was resolved to spare his life. They 
unanimously replied, that he should be imprisoned under 
a secure guard in some secret place, and should be de- 
prived of all commerce with any of his friends or parti- 
sans. It was easy to foresee, that he would not long re- 
main alive in the hands of such barbarous and sanguinary 
enemies. Historians differ with regard to the manner in 
which he was murdered. It was long the prevailing Murder of 
opinion, that Sir Piers Exton, and others of his guards, th ' 
fell upon him in the castle of Pomfret, where he was 
confined, and despatched him with their halberds. But 
it is more probable, that he was starved to death in 
prison; and, after all sustenance was denied him, he 
prolonged his unhappy life, it is said, for a fortnight, be- 
fore he reached the end of his miseries. This account is 
more consistent with the story, that his body was exposed 
in public, and that no marks of violence were observed 
upon it. He died in the thirty-fourth year of his age, 
and the twenty-third of his reign. He left no posterity, 
either legitimate or illegitimate. 

All the writers who have transmitted to us the history His cha- 
of Richard, lived during the reigns of the Lancastrian 
princes ; and candour requires that we should not give 
entire credit to the reproaches which they have thrown 
upon his memory. But, after making all proper allow- 
ances, he still appears to have been a weak prince, and 
unfit for government, less for want of natural parts and 
capacity, than of solid judgment and a good education. 
He was violent in his temper, profuse in his expense, 
fond of idle show and magnificence, devoted to favourites, 

q Henry IV. cap. 14. 
VOL. II. 23 



racter. 



266 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and addicted to pleasure ; passions, all of them, the most 
^J [^inconsistent with a prudent economy, and consequently 
1399 dangerous in a limited and mixed government. Had he 
possessed the talents of gaining, and still more those of 
overawing, his great barons, he might have escaped all 
the misfortunes of his reign, and been allowed to carry 
much farther his oppressions over the people, if he really 
was guilty of any, without their daring to rebel, or even 
to murmur against him. But when the grandees were 
tempted, by his want of prudence and of vigour, to resist 
his authority, and execute the most violent enterprises 
upon him, he was naturally led to seek an opportunity of 
retaliation : justice was neglected ; the lives of the chief 
nobility were sacrified ; and all these enormities seem 
to have proceeded less from a settled design of establish- 
ing arbitrary power, than from the insolence of victory, 
and the necessities of the king's situation. The manners, 
indeed, of the age were the chief source of such violence : 
laws, which were feebly executed in peaceable times, 
lost all their authority during public convulsions : both 
parties were alike guilty ; or if any difference may be 
remarked between them, we shall find, that the authority 
of the crown, being more legal, was commonly carried, 
when it prevailed, to less desperate extremities than was 
that of the aristocracy. 

On comparing the conduct and events of this reign 
with those of the preceding, we shall find equal reason 
to admire Edward and to blame Eichard; but the cir- 
cumstance of opposition, surely, will not lie in the strict 
regard paid by the former to national privileges, and the 
neglect of them by the latter. On the contrary, the 
prince of small abilities, as he felt his want of power, 
seems to have been more moderate in this respect than 
the other. Every Parliament assembled during the reign 
of Edward remonstrates against the exertion of some 
arbitrary prerogative or other : we hear not any com- 
plaints of that kind during the reign of Eichard, till the 
assembling of his last Parliament, which was summoned 
by his inveterate enemies, which dethroned him, which 
framed their complaints during the time of the most 
furious convulsions, and whose testimony must therefore 
have, on that account, much less authority with every 



RICHARD II. 267 

equitable judge r . Both these princes experienced the CHAP. 
encroachments of the great upon their authority. Ed- ^ J^ 1 ^ 
ward, reduced to necessities, was obliged to make an ex- 1399 
press bargain with his Parliament, and to sell some of his 
prerogatives for present supply ; but as they were ac- 
quainted with his genius and capacity, they ventured not 
to demand any exorbitant concessions, or such as were 
incompatible with regal and sovereign power : the weak- 
ness of Richard tempted the Parliament to extort a 
commission, which, in a manner, dethroned the prince, 
and transferred the sceptre into the hands of the nobi- 
lity. The events of these encroachments were also suit- 
able to the character of each. Edward had no sooner 
gotten the supply than he departed from the engage- 
ments which had induced the Parliament to grant it ; 
he openly told his people, that he had but dissembled 
with them when he seemed to make them these conces- 
sions ; and he resumed and retained all his prerogatives. 
But Richard, because he was detected in consulting and 
deliberating with the judges on the lawfulness of restor- 
ing the constitution, found his barons immediately in 
arms against him ; was deprived of his liberty ; saw his 
favourites, his ministers, his tutor, butchered before his 
face, or banished and attainted ; and was obliged to give 
way to all this violence. There cannot be a more re- 
markable contrast between the fortunes of two princes : 
it were happy for society did this contrast always depend 
on the justice or injustice of the measures which men 
embrace, and not rather on the different degrees of 
prudence and vigour with which those measures are 
supported. 

There was a sensible decay of ecclesiastical authority Misceiia- 
during this period. The disgust which the laity had re- "^Re- 
ceived from the numerous usurpations both of the court tion . s ,. 
of Rome and of their own clergy had very much weaned reign g 
the kingdom from superstition ; and strong symptoms 
appeared, from time to time, of a general desire to shake 
off the bondage of the Romish church. In the com- 
mittee of eighteen, to whom Richard's last Parliament 
delegated their whole power, there is not the name of 

1 Peruse, in this view, the Abridgment of the Records, by Sir Robert Cotton,, 
during these two reigns. 



268 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, one ecclesiastic to be found ; a neglect which is almost 
.J^ 11 ^ without example, while the Catholic religion subsisted 
1399 in England 8 . 

The aversion entertained against the established church 
soon found principles, and tenets, and reasonings, by which 
it could justify and support itself. John Wickliffe, a 
secular priest, educated at Oxford, began in the latter 
end of Edward III. to spread the doctrine of reformation 
by his discourses, sermons, and writings ; and he made 
many disciples among men of all ranks and stations. He 
seems to have been a man of parts and learning ; and has 
the honour of being the first person in Europe that pub- 
licly called in question those principles which had uni- 
versally passed for certain and undisputed during so 
many ages. Wickliffe himself, as well as his disciples, 
who received the name of Wickliffites, or Lollards, was 
distinguished by a great austerity of life and manners ; 
a circumstance common to almost all those who dogma- 
tize in any new way ; both because men who draw to 
them the attention of the public and expose themselves 
to the odium of great multitudes, are obliged to be very 
guarded in their conduct, and because few, who have a 
strong propensity to pleasure or business, will enter upon 
so difficult and laborious an undertaking. The doctrines 
of Wickliffe, being derived from his search into the Scrip- 
tures and into ecclesiastical antiquity, were nearly the 
same with those which were propagated by the reformers 
in the sixteenth century ; he only carried some of them 
farther than was done by the more sober part of these 
reformers. He denied the doctrine of the real presence, 
the supremacy of the church of Rome, the merit of mo- 
nastic vows ; he maintained, that the Scriptures were 
the sole rule of faith ; that the church was dependent on 
the state, and should be reformed by it ; that the clergy 
ought to possess no estates ; that the begging friars were 
a nuisance, and ought not to be supported * ; that the 
numerous ceremonies of the church were hurtful to true 
piety : he asserted, that oaths were unlawful, that do- 
minion was founded in grace, that every thing was sub- 

8 See note [Q], at the end of the volume. 

* Walsingham, p. 191. 208. 283, 284. Spellman, Concil. vol. ii. p. 630. Knygh- 
toii, p. 2657. 



RICHARD II. 269 

ject to fate and destiny, and that all men were pre- CHAP. 
ordained either to eternal salvation or reprobation 11 . From ^ ^ 
the whole of his doctrines, Wickliffe appears to have 1399 
been strongly tinctured with enthusiasm, and to have 
been thereby the better qualified to oppose a church 
whose chief characteristic is superstition. 

The propagation of these principles gave great alarm 
to the clergy ; and a bull was issued by Pope Gregory 
XI. for taking WicklifFe into custody, and examining 
into the scope of his opinions w . Courteney, Bishop of 
London, cited him before his tribunal ; but the reformer 
had now acquired powerful protectors, who screened him 
from the ecclesiastical jurisdiction. The Duke of Lan- 
caster, who then governed the kingdom, encouraged the 
principles of Wickliffe ; and he made no scruple, as well 
as Lord Piercy, the mareschal, to appear openly in court 
with him, in order to give him countenance upon his 
trial : he even insisted that Wickliffe should sit in the 
bishop's presence while his principles were examined : 
Courteney exclaimed against the insult : the Londoners 
thinking their prelate affronted, attacked the duke and 
mareschal, who escaped from their hands with some dif- 
ficulty x ; and the populace, soon after, broke into the 
houses of both these noblemen, threatened their per- 
sons, and plundered their goods. The Bishop of Lon- 
don had the merit of appeasing their fury and resent- 
ment. 

The Duke of Lancaster, however, still continued his 
protection to Wickliffe during the minority of Richard ; 
and the principles of that reformer had so far propagated 
themselves, that when the pope sent to Oxford a new 
bull against these doctrines, the university deliberated 
for some time whether they should receive the bull; 
and they never took any vigorous measures in conse- 
quence of the papal orders 7 . Even the populace of 
London were at length brought to entertain favourable 
sentiments of this reformer : when he w^as cited before a 
synod at Lambeth, they broke into the assembly, and so 
overawed the prelates, who found both the people and 

u Harpsfield, p. 668. 673, 674. Waldens. torn. i. lib. 3. art. 1. cap. 8. 
^ Spellm. Cone. vol. ii. p. 621. Walsingham, p. 201, 202, 203. 
x Harpsfield in Hist. Wickl. p. 683. 
y Wood's Ant. Oxon. lib. i. p. 191, &c. Walsingham, p. 201. 

23* 



270 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the court against them, that they dismissed him without 

^?^ IT L' an y father censure. 

1399 The clergy, we may well believe, were more wanting 
in power than in inclination to punish this new heresy, 
which struck at all their credit, possessions, and authority. 
But there was hitherto no law in England by which the 
secular arm was authorized to support orthodoxy ; and 
the ecclesiastics endeavoured to supply the defect by an 
extraordinary and unwarrantable artifice. In the year 
1381, there was an act passed, requiring sheriffs to ap- 
prehend the preachers of heresy and their abettors ; but 
this statute had been surreptitiously obtained by the 
clergy, and had the formality of an enrolment without 
the consent of the Commons. In the subsequent session, 
the Lower House complained of the fraud; affirmed 
that they had no intention to bind themselves to the 
prelates farther than their ancestors had done before 
them ; and required that the pretended statute should 
be repealed; which was done accordingly 2 . But it is 
remarkable that, notwithstanding this vigilance of the 
Commons, the clergy had so much art and influence, that 
the repeal was suppressed ; and the act, which never had 
any legal authority, remains to this day upon the statute 
book a ; though the clergy still thought proper to keep 
it in reserve, and not proceed to the immediate execu- 
tion of it. 

But besides this defect of power in the church, which 
$aved Wickliife, that reformer himself, notwithstanding 
his enthusiasm, seems not to have been actuated by the 
spirit of martyrdom ; and in all subsequent trials before 
the prelates, he so explained away his doctrine by tor- 
tured meanings, as to render it quite innocent and inof- 
fensive b . Most of his followers imitated his cautious 
disposition, and saved themselves either by recantations 
or explanations. He died of a palsy, in the year 1385, 
,at his rectory of Lutterworth, in the county of Leicester ; 
.and the clergy, mortified that he should have escaped 
their vengeance, took care, besides assuring the people 
of his eternal damnation, to represent his last distemper 

z Cotton's Abridgment, p. 285. 

5 Rich. II. cap. 5. 

b Walsingham, p. 506. Knyghton, p. 2655, 2656. 



RICHARD II. 271 

as a visible judgment of Heaven upon him for his mul- CHAP. 
tiplied heresies and impieties 6 . . ,_ X ^ XI ^ 

The proselytes, however, of Wickliffe's opinions still 1399 
increased in England d : some monkish writers represent 
one-half of the kingdom as infected by those principles : 
they were carried over to Bohemia by some youth of that 
nation, who studied at Oxford: but though the age 
seemed strongly disposed to receive them, affairs were 
not yet fully ripe for this great revolution; and the 
finishing blow to ecclesiastical power was reserved to a 
period of more curiosity, literature, and inclination for 
novelties. 

Meanwhile the English Parliament continued to check 
the clergy and the court of Home by more sober and 
more legal expedients. They enacted anew the statute of 
provisors, and affixed higher penalties to the transgres- 
sion of it, which, in some instances, was even made capi- 
tal 6 . The court of Rome had fallen upon a new device, 
which increased their authority over the prelates: the 
pope, who found that the expedient of arbitrarily de- 
priving them was violent and liable to opposition, attained 
the same end, by transferring such of them as were ob- 
noxious to poorer sees, and even to nominal sees, in par- 
tibus infidelium. It was thus that the Archbishop of 
York, and the Bishops of Durham and Chichester, the 
king's ministers, had been treated after the prevalence 
of Gloucester's faction : the Bishop of Carlisle met with 
the same fate after the accession of Henry IV.; for the 
pope always joined with the prevailing powers when they 
did not thwart his pretensions. The Parliament, in the 
reign of Richard, enacted a law against this abuse ; and 
the king made a general remonstrance to the court of 
Rome against all those usurpations which he calls hor- 
rible excesses of that court f . 

It was usual for the church, that they might elude the 
mortmain act, to make their votaries leave lands in trust 
to certain persons, under whose name the clergy enjoyed 
the benefit of the bequest : the Parliament also stopped 
the progress of this abuse g . In the 17th of the king, 

c Walsingham, p. 312. Ypod. Neust. p. 337. d Knyghton, p. 2663. 
13 Rich. II. cap. 3. 16 Rich. II. cap. 4. f Rymer, vol. vii. p. 672. 

k Knyghton, p. 27. 38. 



272 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the Commons prayed, that remedy migU be had against, 
^ l ^such religions persons as cause their villains to marry free 
1399. w0fc0M inheritable, whereby the estate comes to those reli- 
gions hands by collusion 1 '. This was a new device of the 
clergy. 

The papacy was, at this time, somewhat weakened by 
a schism, which lasted during forty years, and gave great 
scandal to the devoted partisans of the holy see. After 
the pope had resided many years at Avignon, Gregory 
XL was persuaded to return to Home; and upon his 
death, which happened in 1380, the Komans, resolute 
to fix for the future the seat of the papacy in Italy, 
besieged the cardinals in the conclave, and compelled 
them, though they were mostly Frenchmen, to elect 
Urban VI., an Italian, into that high dignity. The 
French cardinals, as soon as they recovered their liberty 
fled from Eome, and protesting against the forced 
election, chose Robert, son of the Count of Geneva, 
who took the name of Clement VII., and resided at 
Avignon. All the kingdoms of Christendom, according 
to their several interests and inclinations, were divided 
between these two pontiffs. The court of France ad- 
hered to Clement, and was followed by its allies, the 
King of Castile and the King of Scotland: England, 
of course, was thrown into the other party, and declared 
for Urban. Thus the appellation of Clementines and 
Urbanists distracted Europe for several years; and 
each party damned the other as schismatics, and as 
rebels to the true vicar of Christ. But this circum- 
stance, though it weakened the papal authority, had 
not so great an effect as might naturally be imagined. 
Though any king could easily at first make his kingdom 
embrace the party of one pope or the other, or even 
keep it some time in suspense between them, he could 
not so easily transfer his obedience at pleasure : the 
people attached themselves to their own party as to a 
religious opinion ; and conceived an extreme abhorrence 
to the opposite party, whom they regarded as little 
better than Saracens or infidels. Crusades were even 
undertaken in this quarrel : and the zealous Bishop of 
Norwich, in particular, led over, in 1382, near sixty 

h Cotton, p. 355. 



RICHARD II. 273 

thousand bigots into Flanders against the Clementines ; CHAP. 
but, after losing a great part of his followers, he returned 
with disgrace into England 1 . Each pope, sensible, 
this prevailing spirit among the people, that the kingdom 
which once embraced his cause would always adhere to 
him, boldly maintained all the pretensions of his see, and 
stood not much more in awe of the temporal sovereigns, 
than if his authority had not been endangered by a 
rival. 

We meet with this preamble to a law enacted at the 
very beginning of this reign : " Whereas divers persons 
of small garrison of land or other possessions do make 
great retinue of people, as well of esquires as of others, 
in many parts of the realm, giving to them hats and 
other livery of one suit by year, taking again towards 
them the value of the same livery, or percase the dou- 
ble value, by such covenant and assurance, that every 
of them shall maintain other in all quarrels, be they 
reasonable or unreasonable, to the great mischief and 
oppression of the people k ," &c. This preamble contains 
a true picture of the state of the kingdom. The laws 
had been so feebly executed, even during the long, ac- 
tive, and vigilant reign of Edward III., that no subject 
could trust to their protection. Men openly associated 
themselves under the patronage of some great baron, 
for their mutual defence. They wore public badges, by 
which their confederacy was distinguished. They sup- 
ported each other in all quarrels, iniquities, extortions, 
murders, robberies, and other crimes. Their chief was 
more their sovereign than the king himself, and their 
own band was more connected with them than their 
country. Hence the perpetual turbulence, disorders, 
factions, and civil wars of those times : hence the small 
regard paid to a character or the opinion of the public : 
hence the large discretionary prerogatives of the crown, 
and the danger which might have ensued from the too 
great limitation of them. If the king had possessed no 
arbitrary powers, while all the nobles assumed and ex- 
ercised them, there must have ensued an absolute anarchy 
in the state. 

i Froissart, liv. ii. chap. 133, 134. Walsingham, p. 298, 299, 300, &c. Knyghton, 
p. 2671. k i Kich. II. cap. 7. 



274 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. One great mischief attending these confederacies was 
^ [^ the extorting from the king pardons for the most enor- 
1399 mous crimes. The Parliament often endeavoured, in 
the last reign, to deprive the prince of this prerogative, 
but in the present they were content with an abridg- 
ment of it. They enacted, that no pardon for rapes or 
for murder from malice prepense should be valid, unless 
the crime were particularly specified in it 1 . There were 

also some other circumstances required for passing any 
pardon of this kind ; an excellent law, but ill observed, 
like most laws that thwart the manners of the people 
and the prevailing customs of the times. 

It is easy to observe, from these voluntary associations 
among the people, that the whole force of the feudal 
system was in a manner dissolved, and that the English 
had nearly returned, in that particular, to the same 
situation in which they stood before the Norman con- 
quest. It was, indeed, impossible that that system could 
long subsist under the perpetual revolutions to which 
landed property is every where subject. When the great 
feudal baronies were first erected, the lord lived in 
opulence in the midst of his vassals : he was in a situation 
to protect and cherish and defend them : the quality of 
patron naturally united itself to that of superior ; and 
these two principles of authority mutually supported 
each other. But when, by the various divisions and 
mixtures of property, a man's superior came to live at a 
distance from him, and could no longer give him shelter 
or countenance, the tie gradually became more fictitious 
than real : new connexions from vicinity or other causes 
were formed : protection was sought by voluntary ser- 
vices and attachment : the appearance of valour, spirit, 
abilities in any great man, extended his interest very 
far : and if the sovereign were deficient in these qualities, 
he was no less, if not more, exposed to the usurpations 
of the aristocracy, than even during the vigour of the 
feudal system. 

The greatest novelty introduced into the civil govern- 
ment during this reign was the creation of peers by 
patent. Lord Beauchamp of Holt was the first peer 
that was advanced to the House of Lords in this man- 

1 13 Rich. II. cap. 1. 



RICHARD II. 275 

ner. The practice of levying benevolences is also first CHAP. 
mentioned in the present reign. 

This prince lived in a more magnificent manner than 
perhaps any of his predecessors or successors. His 
household consisted of ten thousand persons : he had 
three hundred in his kitchen ; and all the other offices 
were furnished in proportion 10 . It must be remarked, 
that this enormous train had tables supplied them at 
the king's expense, according to the mode of that age. 
Such prodigality was probably the source of many ex- 
actions by purveyors, and was one chief reason of the 
public discontents. 

m Harding : this poet says, that he speaks from the authority of a clerk of the 
green cloth. 



276 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAPTEK XVIH. 

HENRY IV. 

TITLE OF THE KING. AN INSURRECTION. AN INSURRECTION IN WALES. 
THE EARL OF NORTHUMBERLAND REBELS. BATTLE OF SHREWSBURY. 
STATE OF SCOTLAND. PARLIAMENTARY TRANSACTIONS. DEATH AND CHA- 
RACTER OF THE KING. 

CHAP. THE English had so long been familiarized to the here- 
jj^_, ditary succession of their monarchs, the instances of de- 
1399. parture from it had always borne such strong symptoms 
thtfkhf ^ i n J us ti ce an ^ violence, and so little of a national choice 
or election, and the returns to the true line had ever 
been deemed such fortunate incidents in their history, 
that Henry was afraid, lest, in resting his title on the 
consent of the people, he should build on a foundation 
to which the people themselves were not accustomed, 
and whose solidity they would with difficulty be brought 
to recognize. The idea too of choice seemed always to 
imply that of conditions, and a right of recalling the con- 
sent upon any supposed violation of them ; an idea which 
was not naturally agreeable to a sovereign, and might, 
in England, be dangerous to the subjects, who lying so 
much under the influence of turbulent nobles, had ever 
paid but an imperfect obedience even to their heredi- 
tary princes. For these reasons, Henry was determined 
never to have recourse to this claim, the only one on 
which his authority could consistently stand : he rather 
chose to patch up his title in the best manner he could 
from other pretensions ; and, in the end, he left himself, 
in the eyes of men of sense, no ground of right but his 
present possession : a very precarious foundation, which, 
by its very nature, was liable to be overthrown by every 
faction of the great, or prejudice of the people. He had 
indeed a present advantage over his competitor : the heir 
of the house of Mortimer, who had been declared in Parlia- 
ment heir to the crown, was a boy of seven years of age a ; 
his friends consulted his safety, by keeping silence with 

Dugdale, vol. i. p. 151. 



HENRY IV. 277 

regard to his title : Henry detained him and his younger CHAP. 
brother in honourable custody at Windsor castle ; but XVIIL 
he had reason to dread, that in proportion as that^~^~~ 
nobleman grew to man's estate, he would draw to him 
the attachment of the people, and make them reflect on 
the fraud, violence, and injustice by which he had been 
excluded from the throne. Many favourable topics 
would occur in his behalf : he was a native of England ; 
possessed an extensive interest from the greatness and 
alliances of his family ; however criminal the deposed 
monarch, this youth was entirely innocent ; he was of 
the same religion, and educated in the same manners 
with the people, and could not be governed by any sepa- 
rate interest : these views would all concur to favour his 
claim : and though the abilities of the present prince 
might ward off any dangerous revolution, it was justly to 
be apprehended that his authority could with difficulty 
be brought to equal that of his predecessors. 

Henry, in his very first Parliament, had reason to see 
the danger attending that station which he had assumed, 
and the obstacles which he would meet with in governing 
an unruly aristocracy, always divided by faction, and at 
present inflamed with the resentments consequent on such 
recent convulsions. The Peers, on their assembling, 
broke out into violent animosities against each other ; 
forty gauntlets, the pledges of furious battle, were thrown 
on the floor of the House by noblemen who gave mutual 
challenges ; and liar and traitor resounded from all quar- 
ters. The king had so much authority with these doughty 
champions, as to prevent all the combats which they 
threatened but he was not able to bring them to a pro- 
per composure, or to an amicable disposition towards 
each other. 

It was not long before these passions broke into action. 140 - 
The Earls of Eutland, Kent, and Huntingdon, and Lord 
Spencer, who were now degraded from the respective 
titles of Albemarle, Surrey, Exeter, and Gloucester, con- 
ferred on them by Richard, entered into a conspiracy, 
together with the Earl of Salisbury and Lord Lumley, 
for raising an insurrection, and for seizing the king's per- 
son at Windsor b ; but the treachery of Rutland gave him 

b Walsingham, p. 362. Otterboume, p. 224. 

VOL. ii. 24 



rection. 



278 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, warning of the danger. He suddenly withdrew to Lon 
^^, don ; and the conspirators, who came to Windsor with 
HOG. a body of five hundred horse, found that they had missed 
this blow, on which all the success of their enterprise 
depended. Henry appeared next day at Kingston-upon- 
Thames, at the head of twenty thousand men, mostly 
drawn from the city ; and his enemies, unable to resist 
his power, dispersed themselves with a view of raising 
their followers in the several counties which were the 
seat of their interest. But the adherents of the king 
were* hot in the pursuit, and every where opposed 
themselves to their progress. The Earls of Kent and 
Salisbury were seized at Cirencester by the citizens, and 
were next day beheaded without farther ceremony, 
according to the custom of the times 6 . The citizens of 
Bristol treated Spencer and Lumley in the same manner. 
The Earl of Huntingdon, Sir Thomas Blount, and Sir 
Benedict Sely, who were also taken prisoners, suffered 
death, with many others, of the conspirators, by orders 
from Henry. And when the quarters of these unhappy 
men were brought to London, no less than eighteen 
bishops and thirty-two mitred abbots joined the populace, 
and met them with the most indecent marks of joy and 
exultation. 

But the spectacle the most shocking to every one who 
retained any sentiment either of honour or humanity still 
remained. The Earl of Eutland appeared, carrying on 
a pole the head of Lord Spencer, his brother-in-law, 
which he presented in triumph to Henry, as a testimony 
of his loyalty. This infamous man, who was soon after 
Duke of York, by the death of his father, and first prince 
of the blood, had been instrumental in the murder of 
his uncle, the Duke of Gloucester d ; had then deserted 
Richard, by whom he was trusted ; had conspired against 
the life of Henry, to whom he had sworn allegiance ; had 
betrayed his associates, whom he had seduced into this 
enterprise ; and now displayed, in the face of the world, 
these badges of his multiplied dishonour. 

Henry was sensible that though the execution of these 
conspirators might seem to give security to his throne, 



c Walsingham, p. 363. Ypod. Neust. p. 556. 
d Dugdale, Yol. ii. p. 171. 



HENRY IV. 279 

the animosities which remain after such bloody scenes CHAP. 
are always dangerous to royal authority ; and he there- 
fore determined not to increase by any hazardous enter- 
prise, those numerous enemies with whom he was every 
where environed. While a subject he was believed to 
have strongly imbibed all the principles of his father, the 
Duke of Lancaster, and to have adopted the prejudices 
which the Lollards inspired against the abuses of the 
established church : but, finding himself possessed of the 
throne by so precarious a title, he thought superstition 
a necessary implement of public authority ; and he re- 
solved, by every expedient, to pay court to the clergy. 
There were hitherto no penal laws enacted against he- 
resy; an indulgence which had proceeded, not from a 
spirit of toleration in the Romish church, but from the 
ignorance and simplicity of the people, which had ren- 
dered them unfit either for starting or receiving any new 
or curious doctrines, and which needed not to be re- 
strained by rigorous penalties. But when the learning 
and genius of Wickliffe had once broken, in some mea- 
sure, the fetters of prejudice, the ecclesiastics called aloud 
for the punishment of his disciples ; and the king, who 
was very little scrupulous in his conduct, was easily in- 
duced to sacrifice his principles to his interest, and to 
acquire the favour of the church by that most effectual 
method, the gratifying of their vengeance against op- 
ponents. He engaged the Parliament to pass a law for 
that purpose : it was enacted, that when any heretic, who 
relapsed, or refused to abjure his opinions, was delivered 
over to the secular arm by the bishop or his commis- 
saries, he should be committed to the flames by the civil 
magistrate before the whole people 6 . This weapon did 
not long remain unemployed in the hands of the clergy : 
William Sautre, rector of St. Osithes in London, had 
been condemned by the convocation of Canterbury ; his 
sentence was ratified by the House of Peers ; the king 
issued his writ for the execution f ; and the unhappy 
man atoned for his erroneous opinions by the penalty of 
fire. This is the first instance of that kind in England ; 
and thus one horror more w r as added to those dismal 

e 2 Henry IV. cap. 7. *" Eymer, vol. viii. p. 178. 



280 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, scenes which at that time were already but too familiar 

J^^ to the people. 

^^~ But the utmost precaution and prudence of Henry 
could not shield him from those numerous inquietudes 
which assailed him from every quarter. The connexions 
of Eichard with the royal family of France made that 
court exert its activity to recover his authority, or re- 
venge his death 8 ; but though the confusions in England 
tempted the French to engage in some enterprise by 
which they might distress their ancient enemy, the 
greater confusions which they experienced at home 
obliged them quickly to accommodate matters ; and 
Charles, content with recovering his daughter from 
Henry's hands, laid aside his preparations, and renewed 
the truce between the kingdoms 11 . The attack of 
Guienne was also an inviting attempt, which the present 
factions that prevailed among the French obliged them 
to neglect. The Gascons, affectionate to the memory 
of Richard, who was born among them, refused to swear 
allegiance to a prince that had dethroned and murdered 
him ; and the appearance of a French army on their 
frontiers would probably have tempted them to change 
masters 1 . But the Earl of Worcester, arriving with some 
English troops, gave countenance to the partisans of 
Henry, and overawed their opponents. Religion too 
was here found a cement to their union with England. 
The Gascons had been engaged, by Richard's authority, 
to acknowledge the Pope of Rome ; and they were sen- 
sible that, if they submitted to France, it would be ne- 
cessary for them to pay obedience to the pope of Avignon, 
whom they had been taught to detest as a schismatic. 
Their principles on this head were too fast rooted to ad- 
mit of any sudden or violent alteration. 

insurrec- The revolution in England proved likewise the occa- 

Waies. sion of an insurrection in Wales. Owen Glendour, or 
Glendourduy, descended from the ancient princes of that 
country, had become obnoxious on account of his attach- 
ment to Richard ; and Regirfald Lord Gray of Ruthyn, 
who was closely connected with the new king, and who 
enjoyed a great fortune in the marches of Wales, thought 

g Rymer, vol. viii. p. 123. t Ibid. p. 142. 152. 219. 

i Ibid. p. 110, 111. 



HENRY IV. 281 

the opportunity favourable for oppressing his neighbour, CHAP. 
and taking possession of his estate k . Glendour, 
yoked at the injustice, and still more at the indignity, 
recovered possession by the sword 1 ; Henry sent assists 
ance to Gray m ; the Welsh took part with Glendour: a 
troublesome and tedious war was kindled, which Glen- 
dour long sustained by his valour and activity, aided by 
the natural strength of the country, and the untamed 
spirit of its inhabitants. 

As Glendour committed devastations promiscuously 
on all the English, he infested the estate of the Earl of 
March ; and Sir Edmund Mortimer, uncle to that noble- 
man, led out the retainers of the family, and gave battle 
to the Welsh chieftain. His troops were routed, and he 
was taken prisoner 11 . At the same time the earl himself, 
who had been allowed to retire to his castle of Wigmore, 
and who, though a mere boy, took the field with his fol- 
lowers, fell also into Glendour's hands, and was carried 
by him into Wales . As Henry dreaded and hated all 
the family of March, he allowed the earl to remain in 
captivity ; and though that young nobleman was nearly 
allied to the Piercies, to whose assistance he himself 
had owed his crown, he refused to the Earl of North- 
umberland permission to treat of his ransom with 
Glendour. 

The uncertainty in which Henry's affairs stood during 
a long time with France, as well as the confusions inci- 
dent to all great changes in government, tempted the 
Scots to make incursions into England : and Henry, de- 
sirous of taking revenge upon them, but afraid of render- 
ing his new government unpopular by requiring great 
supplies from his subjects, summoned at Westminster a 
council of the Peers, without the Commons, and laid be- 
fore them the state of his affairs p . The military part of 
the feudal constitution was now much decayed : there 
remained only so much of that fabric as affected the civil 
rights and properties of men : and the Peers here under- 
took, but voluntarily, to attend the king in an expedition 
against Scotland, each of them at the head of a certain 

* Vita Ric. Sec. p. 171, 172. l Walsingham, p. 364. 

m Vita Ric. Sec. p. 172, 173. * Dugdale, vol. i. p. 150. 

o Ibid. vol. i. p. 151. P Rymer, vol. viii. p. 125, 126. 

24* 



282 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, number of his retainers' 1 . Henry conducted this army 

^VVTTT 

v ^ '_, to Edinburgh, of which he easily made himself master ; 
1401 and he there summoned Robert III. to do homage to him 
for his crown r . But finding that the Scots would nei- 
ther submit nor give him battle, he returned in three 
weeks, after making this useless bravado; and he dis- 
banded his army. 

H02. I n the subsequent season, Archibald, Earl of Douglas, 
at the head of twelve thousand men, and attended by 
many of the principal nobility of Scotland, made an 
irruption into England, and committed devastations on 
the northern counties. On his return home he was over- 
taken by the Pierces at Homeldon, on the borders of 
England, and a fierce battle ensued, where the Scots were 
totally routed. Douglas himself was taken prisoner ; as 
was Mordac, Earl of Fife, son of the Duke of Albany, 
and nephew of the Scottish king, with the Earls of An- 
gus, Murray, and Orkney, and many others of the gen- 
try and nobility 8 . When Henry received intelligence of 
this victory, he sent the Earl of Northumberland orders 
not to ransom his prisoners, which that nobleman re- 
garded as a right by the laws of war received in that 
age. The king intended to detain them, that he might 
be able by their means to make an advantageous peace 
with Scotland ; but by this policy he gave a fresh dis- 
gust to the family of Piercy. 

HOB. The obligations which Henry had owed to North- 
umberland were of a kind the most likely to produce 
ingratitude on the one side, and discontent on the 
other. The sovereign naturally became jealous of that 
power which had advanced him to the throne ; and the 
subject was not easily satisfied in the returns which he 
thought so great a favour had merited. Though Henry, 
on his accession had bestowed the office of constable on 
The Earl Northumberland for life*, and conferred other gifts on 
Smberknd that family, these favours were regarded as their due : 
rebels. the refusal of any other request was deemed an injury. 
The impatient spirit of Harry Piercy, and the factious 
disposition of the Earl of Worcester, younger brother of 

<i Rymer, vol. viii. p. 125. r ibid. p. 155, 156, &c. 

s Walsing. p. 366. Vita Bic. Sec. p. 180. Chron. Otterbourne, p. 237. 
4 Rymer, vol. viii. p. 89. 



HENRY IV. 283 

Northumberland, inflamed the discontents of that noble-. CHAP. 
man : and the precarious title of Henry tempted him to ^^ 
seek revenge, by overturning that throne which he had ^^^ 
at first established. He entered into a correspondence 
with Glendour. He gave liberty to the Earl of Douglas, 
and made an alliance with that martial chief. He roused 
up all his partisans to arms ; and such unlimited autho- 
rity at that time belonged to the great families, that the 
same men, whom a few years before he had conducted 
against Richard, now followed his standard in opposition 
to Henry. When war was ready to break out, North- 
umberland was seized with a sudden illness at Berwick; 
and young Piercy, taking the command of the troops, 
marched towards Shrewsbury, in order to join his forces 
with those of Glendour. The king had happily a small 
army on foot, with which he had intended to act against 
the Scots ; and knowing the importance of celerity in all 
civil wars, he instantly hurried down that he might give 
battle to the rebels. He approached Piercy near Shrews- 
bury, before that nobleman was joined by Glendour ; and 
the policy of one leader, and impatience of the other/ 
ma.de them hasten to a general engagement. 

The evening before the battle, Piercy sent a manifesto 
to Henry, in which he renounced his allegiance, set that 
prince at defiance, and, in the name of his father and 
uncle, as well as his own, enumerated all the grievances 
of which he pretended the nation had reason to complain. 
He upbraided him with the perjury of which he had been 
guilty, when on landing at Ravenspur, he had sworn upon 
the gospels, before the Earl of Northumberland, that he 
had no other intention than to recover the duchy of Lan- 
caster, and that he would ever remain a faithful subject 
to King Richard. He aggravated his guilt in first de- 
throning, then murdering that prince, and in usurping on 
the title of the house of Mortimer, to whom, both by 
lineal succession, and by declarations of Parliament, the 
throne, when vacant by Richard's demise, did of right 
belong. He complained of his cruel policy in allowing 
the young Earl of March, whom he ought to regard as 
his sovereign, to remain a captive in the hands of his 
enemies, and in even refusing to all his friends permis- 
sion to treat of his ransom. He charged him again with 



284 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, perjury in loading the nation with heavy taxes, after 
^ ^having sworn, that, without the utmost necessity, he 
H03. would never levy any impositions upon them. And he 
reproached him with the arts employed in procuring 
favourable elections into Parliament ; arts which he him- 
self had before imputed as a crime to Kichard, and which 
he had made one chief reason of that prince's arraign- 
ment and deposition 11 . This manifesto was well calcu- 
lated to inflame the quarrel between the parties. The 
bravery of the two leaders promised an obstinate engage- 
ment ; and the equality of the armies, being each about 
twelve thousand men r a number which was not un- 
manageable by the commanders, gave reason to expect a 
great effusion of blood on both sides, and a very doubt- 
ful issue to the combat. 
2ist July. w e shall scarcely find any battle in those ages where 

Battle of , , , j. "i i i P TT 

Shrews- the shock was more terrible and more constant. Henry 
bury. exposed his person in the thickest of the fight. His 
gallant son, whose military achievements were afterwards 
so renowned, and who here performed his noviciate in 
'arms, signalized himself on his father's footsteps; and 
even a wound, which he received in the face with an 
arrow, could not oblige him to quit the field w . Piercy 
supported that fame which he had acquired in many a 
bloody combat; and Douglas, his ancient enemy, and 
now his friend, still appeared his rival, amidst the horror 
and confusion of the day. This nobleman performed 
feats of valour which are almost incredible. He seemed 
determined that the King of England should that day 
fall by his arm : he sought him all over the field of battle. 
And as Henry, either to elude the attacks of the enemy 
upon his person, or to encourage his own men by the 
belief of his presence every where, had accoutred several 
captains in the royal garb, the sword of Douglas rendered 
this honour fatal to many x . But while the armies were 
contending in this furious manner, the death of Piercy, 
by an unknown hand, decided the victory, and the royal- 
ists prevailed. There are said to have fallen that day, 
on both sides, nearly two thousand three hundred gentle- 
men ; but the persons of greatest distinction were on the 

Hall, fol. 21, 22, &c. w T. Livii, p. 3. 

* Walsingham, p. 366, 367. Hall, fol. 22. 



HENRY IV. ,285 

king's: the Earl of Stafford, Sir Hugh Shirley, Sir CHAP. 
Nicholas Gausel, Sir Hugh Mortimer, Sir John Massey, v ^ XVIIL , 
Sir John Calveiiey. About six thousand private men^^J""" 
perished, of whom two-thirds were of Piercy's army 7 . 
The Earls of Worcester and Douglas were taken pri- 
soners. The former was beheaded at Shrewsbury : the 
latter was treated with the courtesy due to his rank and 
merit. 

The Earl of Northumberland, having recovered from 
his sickness, had levied a fresh army, and was on his 
march to join his son ; but being opposed by the Earl of 
Westmoreland, and hearing of the defeat at Shrewsbury, 
he dismissed his forces, and came with a small retinue to 
the king at York z . He pretended that his sole inten- 
tion in arming was to mediate between the parties. 
Henry thought proper to accept of the apology, and even 
granted him a pardon for his offence. All the other 
rebels were treated with equal lenity ; and, except the 
Earl of Worcester and Sir Kichard Vernon, who were 
regarded as the chief authors of the insurrection, no 
person engaged in this dangerous enterprise seems to 
have perished by the hands of the executioner a . 

But Northumberland, though he had been pardoned, HOS. 
knew that he never should be trusted, and that he was 
too powerful to be cordially forgiven by a prince, whose 
situation gave him such reasonable grounds of jealousy. 
It was the effect either of Henry's vigilance or good 
fortune, or of the narrow genius of his enemies, that no 
proper concert was ever formed among them : they rose 
in rebellion one after another, and thereby afforded him 
an opportunity of suppressing singly those insurrections, 
which, had they been united, might have proved fatal to 
his authority. The Earl of Nottingham, son of the Duke 
of Norfolk, and the Archbishop of York, brother to the 
Earl of Wiltshire, whom Henry, then Duke of Lancaster, 
had beheaded at Bristol, though they had remained quiet 
while Piercy was in the field, still harboured in their breast 
a violent hatred against the enemy of their families; 
and they determined, in conjunction with the Earl of 
Northumberland, to seek revenge against him. They 

y Chron. Ottcrbourne, p. 224. Ypod. Neust. p. 560. 

z Chron. Otterbourne, p. 225. Kymer, vol. viii. p. 353. 



286 'HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, betook themselves to arms before that powerful noble- 
^ ^man was prepared to join them ; and publishing a mani- 
1405 festo, in which they reproached Henry with his usurpa- 
tion of the crown, and the murder of the late king, they 
required that the right line should be restored, and all 
public grievances be redressed. The Earl of Westmore- 
land, whose power lay in the neighbourhood, approached 
them with an inferior force at Shipton, near York ; and, 
being afraid to hazard an action, he attempted to subdue 
them by a stratagem, which nothing but the greatest 
folly and simplicity on their part could have rendered 
successful. He desired a conference with the archbishop 
and earl between the armies : he heard their grievances 
with great patience : he begged them to propose the re- 
medies : he approved of every expedient which they 
suggested : he granted them all their demands : he also 
engaged that Henry should give them entire satisfaction ; 
and when he saw them pleased with the facility of his 
concessions, he observed to them, that since amity was 
now, in effect, restored between them, it were better on 
both sides to dismiss their forces, which otherwise would 
prove an insupportable burden to the country. The 
archbishop and the Earl of Nottingham immediately 
gave directions to that purpose : their troops disbanded 
upon the field : but Westmoreland, who had secretly 
issued contrary orders to his army, seized the two rebels 
without resistance, and carried them to the king, who 
was advancing with hasty marches to suppress the insur- 
rection 1 '. The trial and punishment of an archbishop 
might have proved a troublesome and dangerous under- 
taking, had Henry proceeded regularly, and allowed time 
for an opposition to form itself against that unusual 
measure : the celerity of the execution alone could here 
render it safe and prudent. Finding that Sir William 
Gascoigne, the chief justice, made some scruple of acting 
on this occasion, he appointed Sir William Fulthorpe for 
judge ; who, without any indictment, trial, or defence, 
pronounced sentence of death upon the prelate, which 
was presently execiited. This was the first instance in 
England of a capital punishment inflicted on a bishop; 
whence the clergy of that rank might learn that their 

J> Walsingham, p. 373. Otterbourne, p. 255. 



HENRY IV. 287 

crimes, more than those of laics, were not to pass with CHAP. 
impunity. The Earl of Nottingham was condemned and ^ V ^ II ^ > 
executed in the same summary manner ; but though \^7"" 
many other persons of condition, such as Lord Falcon- 
berg, Sir Ralph Hastings, Sir John Colville, were engaged 
in this rebellion, no others seem to have fallen victims 
to Henry's severity. 

The Earl of Northumberland, on receiving this intel- 
ligence, fled into Scotland, together with Lord Bardolf c ; 
and the king, without opposition, reduced all the castles 
and fortresses belonging to these noblemen. He thence 
turned his arms against Glendour, over whom his son, the 
Prince of Wales, had obtained some advantages : but that 
enemy, more troublesome than dangerous, still found 
means of defending himself in his fastnesses, and of elu- 
ding, though not resisting, all the force of England. In a 1*07. 
subsequent season, the Earl of Northumberland and Lord 
Bardolf, impatient of their exile, entered the north, in 
hopes of raising the people to arms ; but found the coun- 
try in such a posture as rendered all their attempts un- 
successful. Sir Thomas Rokesby, sheriff of Yorkshire, 
levied some forces, attacked the invaders at Bramham, 
and gained a victory, in which both Northumberland and 
Bardolf were slain d . This prosperous event, joined to 
the death of Glendour, which happened soon after, freed 
Henry from all his domestic enemies ; and this prince, 
who had mounted the throne by such unjustifiable means, 
and held it by such an exceptionable title, had yet, by 
his valour, prudence, and address, accustomed the people 
to the yoke, and had obtained a greater ascendant over 
his haughty barons than the law alone, not supported by 
these active qualities, was ever able to confer. 

About the same time, fortune gave Henry an advan- 
tage over that neighbour, who, by his situation, was most 
enabled to disturb his government. Robert III., King 
of Scots, was a prince, though of slender capacity, ex- 
tremely innocent and inoffensive in his conduct ; but 
Scotland, at that time, was still less fitted than England 
for cherishing, or even enduring, sovereigns of that cha- 
racter. The Duke of Albany, Robert's brother, a prince 
of more abilities, at least of a more boisterous and violent 

c Walsingham, p. 374. a ibid. p. 377. Chron. Otterb. p. 261. 



288 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, disposition, had assumed the government of the state ; 
^ ^and, not satisfied with present authority, he entertained 
U07 the criminal purpose of extirpating his brother's children, 
and of acquiring the crown to his own family. He threw 
into prison David, his eldest nephew, who there perished 
by hunger : James alone, the younger brother of David, 
stood between that tyrant and the throne ; and King 
Robert, sensible of his son's danger, embarked him on 
board a ship, with a view of sending him to France, and 
intrusting him to the protection of that friendly power. 
Unfortunately the vessel was taken by the English ; 
Prince James, a boy about nine years of age, was carried 
to London ; and though there subsisted at that time a 
truce between the kingdoms, Henry refused to restore 
the young prince to his liberty. Robert, worn out with 
cares and infirmities, was unable to bear the shock of 
this last misfortune ; and he soon after died, leaving the 
government in the hands of the Duke of Albany 6 . 
Henry was now more sensible than ever of the impor- 
tance of the acquisition which he had made : while he 
retained such a pledge, he was sure of keeping the Duke 
of Albany in dependence : or, if offended, he could easily, 
by restoring the true heir, take ample revenge upon the 
usurper. But though the king, by detaining James in 
the English court, had shown himself somewhat deficient 
in generosity, he made ample amends by giving that 
prince an excellent education, which afterwards qualified 
him, when he mounted the throne, to reform, in some 
measure, the rude and barbarous manners of his native 
country. 

The hostile dispositions which of late had prevailed 
between France and England were restrained, during 
the greater part of this reign, from appearing in action. 
The jealousies and civil commotions with which both 
nations were disturbed, kept each of them from taking 
advantage of the unhappy situation of its neighbour. 
But as the abilities and good fortune of Henry had 
sooner been able to compose the English factions, this 
prince began, in the latter part of his reign, to look 
abroad, and to foment the animosities between the fa- 
milies of Burgundy and Orleans, by which the govern- 

e Buchanan, lib. 10. 



HENRY IV. 289 

ment of France, was, during that period, so much dis- CHAP. 
tracted. He knew that one great source of the national xvn ^ 
discontent against his predecessor was the inactivity of ^~^~~ 
his reign ; and he hoped, by giving a new direction to 
the restless and unquiet spirits of his people, to prevent 
their breaking out in domestic wars and disorders. That 1*1 1. 
he might unite policy with force, he first entered into 
treaty with the Duke of Burgundy, and sent that prince 
a small body of troops, which supported him against his 
enemies f . Soon after, he hearkened to more advanta- 
geous proposals made him by the Duke of Orleans, and 
despatched a greater body to support that party g . But 1412 - 
the leaders of the opposite factions having made a tem- 
porary accommodation, the interests of the English were 
sacrificed ; and this effort of Henry proved, in the issue, 
entirely vain and fruitless. The declining state of his 
health, and the shortness of his reign, prevented him 
from renewing the attempt, which his more fortunate 
son carried to so great a length against the French 
monarchy. 

Such were the military and foreign transactions of Farlia - 
this reign: the civil and parliamentary are somewhat ansaJJ 
more memorable, and more worthy of our attention. tions - 
During the two last reigns, the elections of the Commons 
had appeared a circumstance of government not to be 
neglected ; and Kichard was even accused of using un- 
warrantable methods for procuring to his partisans a seat 
in that House. This practice formed one considerable 
article of charge against him in his deposition; yet jf 
Henry scrupled not to tread in his footsteps, and to en- 
courage the same abuses in elections. Laws were en- 
acted against such undue influence, and even a sheriff 
was punished for an iniquitous return which he had 
made h : but laws were commonly, at that time, very ill 
executed ; and the liberties of the people, such as they 
were, stood on a surer basis than on laws and parlia- 
mentary elections. Though the House of Commons was 
little able to withstand the violent currents which per- 
petually ran between the monarchy and the aristocracy, 
and though that House might easily be brought, at a, 

f Walsingham, p. 380. g Kymer, vol. viii. p. 715. 738. 

h Cotton, p. 429/ 

VOL. II. 25 



290 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, particular time, to make the most unwarrantable con- 

"V"I7"TTT *- ^ 

^ ^ cessions to either, the general institutions of the state 
1412 still remained invariable ; the interests of the several 
members continued on the same footing ; the sword was 
in the hands of the subject ; and the government, though 
thrown into temporary disorder, soon settled itself on its 
ancient foundations. 

During the greater part of this reign, the king was 
obliged to court popularity ; and the House of Commons, 
sensible of their own importance, began to assume 
powers, which had not usually been exercised by their 
predecessors. In the first year of Henry, they procured 
a law, that no judge, in concurring with any iniquitous 
measure, should be excused by pleading the orders of 
the king, or even the danger of his own life from the 
menaces of the sovereign 1 . In the second year, they 
insisted on maintaining the practice of not granting any 
supply before they received an answer to their petitions ; 
which was a tacit manner of bargaining with the prince k . 
In the fifth year, they desired the king to remove from 
his household four persons who had displeased them, 
among whom was his own confessor ; and Henry, though 
he told them that he knew of no offence which these 
men had committed, yet, in order to gratify them, com- 
plied with their request 1 . In the sixth year, they voted 
the king supplies, but appointed treasurers of their own, 
to see the money disbursed for the purposes intended, 
and required them to deliver in their accounts to the 
House m . In the eighth year they proposed, for the 
regulation of the government and household, thirty im- 
portant articles, which were all agreed to; and they 
even obliged all the members of council, all the judges, 
and all the officers of the household, to swear to the 
observance of them n . The abridger of the records re- 
marks the unusual liberties taken by the speaker and 
the House during this period . But the great authority 
of the Commons was but a temporary advantage, arising 
from the present situation. In a subsequent Parliament, 
when the speaker made his customary application to the 
throne for liberty of speech, the king, having now over- 

* Cotton, p. 364. k Ibid. p. 406. l Ibid. p. 426. 

m Ibid. p. 438. n Ibid. p. 456, 457. Ibid. p. 462. 



HENRY IV. 291 

come all his domestic difficulties, plainly told him, that CHAP. 
he would have no novelties introduced, and would enjoy xvn 
his prerogatives. But on the whole, the limitations of W1A( 
the government seem to have been more sensibly felt, 
and more carefully maintained, by Henry, than by any 
of his predecessors. 

During this reign, when the House of Commons were, 
at any time, brought to make unwary concessions to 
the crown, they also showed their freedom by a speedy 
retraction of them. Henry, though he entertained a 
perpetual and well-grounded jealousy of the family of 
Mortimer, allowed not their name to be once mentioned 
in Parliament ; and as none of the rebels had ventured 
to declare the Earl of March king, he never attempted 
to procure, what would not have been refused him, an 
express declaration against the claim of that nobleman ; 
because he knew that such a declaration, in the present 
circumstances, would have no authority, and would only 
serve to revive the memory of Mortimer's title in the 
minds of the people. He proceeded in his purpose 
after a more artful and covert manner. He procured 
a settlement of the crown on himself and his heirs 
male p ; thereby tacitly excluding the females, and trans- 
ferring the Salic law into the English government. He 
thought, that though the house of Plantagenet had at 
first derived their title from a female, this was a remote 
event, unknown to the generality of the people; and 
if he could once accustom them to the practice of ex- 
cluding women, the title of the Earl of March would 
gradually be forgotten, and neglected by them. But he 
was very unfortunate in this attempt. During the long 
contests with France, the injustice of the Salic law had 
been so much exclaimed against by the nation, that a 
contrary principle had taken deep root in the minds of 
men ; and it was now become impossible to eradicate it. 
The same House of Commons, therefore, in a subse- 
quent session, apprehensive that they had overturned 
the foundations of the English government, and that 
they had opened the door to more civil wars than might 
ensue, even from the irregular elevation of the house of 
Lancaster, applied with such earnestness for a new settle- 

P Cotton, p. 454. 



>92 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ment of the crown, that Henry yielded to their request, 

^and agreed to the succession of the princesses of his 

1412 family q . A certain proof, that nobody was in his heart 

satisfied with the king's title to the crown, or knew on 

what principle to rest it. 

But though the Commons, during this reign, showed 
a laudable zeal for liberty in their transactions with the 
crown, their efforts against the church were still more 
extraordinary, and seemed to anticipate very much the 
spirit which became so general in a little more than a 
century afterwards. I know that the credit of these 
passages rests entirely on one ancient historian r ; but 
that historian was contemporary, was a clergyman, and 
it was contrary to the interests of his order to preserve 
the memory of such transactions, much more to forge 
precedents, which posterity might, some time, be tempted 
to imitate. This is a truth so evident, that the most 
likely way of accounting for the silence of the recqrds on 
this head, is by supposing, that the authority of some 
churchmen was so great as to procure a rasure, with re- 
gard to these circumstances, which the indiscretion of 
one of that order has happily preserved to us. 

In the sixth of Henry, the Commons, who had been 
required to grant supplies, proposed in plain terms to 
the king, that he should seize all the temporalities of the 
church, and employ them as a perpetual fund to serve 
the exigencies of the state. They insisted that the 
clergy possessed a third of the lands of the kingdom ; 
that they contributed nothing to the public burdens; 
and that their riches tended only to disqualify them 
from performing their ministerial functions with proper 
zeal and attention. When this address was presented, 
the Archbishop of Canterbury, who then attended the 
king, objected that the clergy, though they went not in 
person to the wars, sent their vassals and tenants in all 
cases of necessity ; while, at the same time, they them- 
selves, who stayed at home, were employed night and day 
in offering up their prayers for the happiness and pros- 
perity of the state. The speaker smiled and answered, 
without reserve, that he thought the prayers of the 
church but a very slender supply. The Archbishop, how- 

<i Eymer, vol. viii. p. 462. r Walsingham. 



HENRY IV. 293 

ever, prevailed in the dispute : the king discouraged the CHAP. 
application of the Commons : and the Lords rejected the v ^ YI11 ^, 
bill which the Lower House had framed for stripping the \^T~ 
church of her revenues 8 . 

The Commons were not discouraged by this repulse : 
in the eleventh of the king they returned to the charge 
with more zeal than before : they made a calculation of 
all the ecclesiastical revenues, which, by their account, 
amounted to four hundred eighty-five thousand marks 
a year, and contained eighteen thousand four hundred 
ploughs of land. They proposed to divide this property 
among fifteen new earls, fifteen hundred knights, six 
thousand esquires, and a hundred hospitals ; besides 
twenty thousand pounds a year, which the king might 
take for his own use : and they insisted, that the clerical 
functions would be better performed than at present, 
by fifteen thousand parish priests, paid at the rate of 
seven marks a piece of yearly stipend*. This application 
was accompanied with an address for mitigating the 
statutes enacted against the Lollards ; which shows from 
what source the address came. The king gave the 
Commons a severe reply ; and farther to satisfy the 
church, and to prove that he was quite in earnest, he 
ordered a Lollard to be burned before the dissolution of 
the Parliament u . 

We have now related almost all the memorable trans- uis. 
actions of this reign, which was busy and active ; but 
produced few events that deserve to be transmitted to 
posterity. The king was so much employed in defend- 
ing his crown, which he had obtained by unwarrantable 
means, and possessed by a bad title, that he had little 
leisure to look abroad, or perform any action which might 
redound to the honour or advantage of the nation. His 
health declined some months before his death : he was 
subject to fits, which bereaved him, for the time, of his 
senses ; and though he was yet in the flower of his age, 
his end was visibly approaching. He expired at West- 
minster, in the forty-sixth year of his age, and the thir- 
teenth of his reign. 

" ' ^f' 

8 Walsingham, p. 371. Ypod. Neust. p. 563. 

* Walsingham, p. 379. Tit. Livius. 

u Kymer, vol. viii. p. 627. Otterbourne, p. 267. 

25* 



>94 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. The great popularity which Henry enjoyed before he 
[IL , attained the crown, and which had so much aided him 
in the acquisition of it, was entirely lost many years 
before the end of his reign ; and he governed his people 
more by terror than by affection, more by his own policy 
than by their sense of duty or allegiance. When men 
came to reflect, in cool blood, on the crimes which had 
led him to the throne ; the rebellion against his prince ; 
the deposition of a lawful king, guilty sometimes, per- 
haps, of oppression, but more frequently of indiscretion ; 
the exclusion of the true heir ; the murder of his sove- 
reign and near relation : these were such enormities as 
drew on him the hatred of his subjects, sanctified all the 
rebellions against him, and made the executions, though 
not remarkably severe, which he found necessary for the 
maintenance of his authority, appear cruel as well as 
iniquitous to the people. Yet, without pretending to 
apologize for these crimes, which must ever be held in 
detestation, it may be remarked, that he was insensibly 
led into this blamable conduct by a train of incidents, 
which few men possess virtue enough to withstand. The 
injustice with which his predecessor had treated him, in 
first condemning him to banishment, then despoiling him 
of his patrimony, made him naturally think of revenge, 
and of recovering his lost rights ; the headlong zeal of 
the people hurried him into the throne ; the care of his 
own security, as well as his ambition, made him an 
usurper ; and the steps have always been so few between 
the prisons of princes and their graves, that we need not 
wonder that Kichard's fate was no exception to the general 
rule. All these considerations make Henry's situation, 
if he retained any sense of virtue, much to be lamented ; 
and the inquietude with which he possessed his envied 
greatness, and the remorses by which, it is said, he was 
continually haunted, rendered him an object of our pity, 
even when seated upon the throne. But it must be 
owned, that his prudence and vigilance and foresight, in 
maintaining his power, were admirable ; his command 
of temper remarkable ; his courage, both military and 
political, without blemish ; and he possessed many qua- 
lities which fitted him for his high station, and which 
rendered his usurpation of it, though pernicious in after 



HENRY IV. 295 

times, rather salutary during his own reign, to the Eng- .CHAP. 

1-1 , XV 111. 

lish nation. i_ y _> 

Henry was twice married. By his first wife, Mary de 1413 . 
Bohun, daughter and co-heir of the Earl of Hereford, 
he had four sons : Henry, his successor in the throne ; 
Thomas, Duke of Clarence ; John, Duke of Bedford ; 
and Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester; and two daugh- 
ters, Blanche and Philippa ; the former married to the 
Duke of Bavaria, the latter to the King of Denmark. 
His second wife, Jane, whom he married after he was 
king, and who was daughter of the King of Navarre, and 
widow of the Duke of Britany, brought him no issue. 

By an act of the fifth of this reign, it is made felony 
to cut out any person's tongue, or put out his eyes; crimes 
which, the act says, were very frequent. This savage 
spirit of revenge denotes a barbarous people ; though, 
perhaps, it was increased by the prevailing factions and 
civil commotions. 

Commerce was very little understood in this reign, as 
in all the preceding. In particular, a great jealousy pre- 
vailed against merchant strangers, and many restraints 
were, by law, imposed upon them ; namely, that they 
should lay out in English manufactures or commodities 
all the money acquired by the sale of their goods ; that 
they should not buy or sell with one another, and that 
all their goods should be disposed of three months after 
importation w . This last clause was found so inconveni- 
ent, that it was soon after repealed by Parliament. 

It appears that the expense of this king's household 
amounted to the yearly sum of nineteen thousand five 
hundred pounds, money of that age*. 

Guicciardini tells us, that the Flemings, in this cen- 
tury, learned from Italy all the refinements in arts, which 
they taught the rest of Europe. The progress, however, 
of the arts was still very slow and backward in England. 

* 4 Hen. IV. cap. 15, and 5 Hen. IV. cap. 9. 
x Eymer, torn. viii. p. 610. 



296 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



CHAPTER XIX. 
HENRY V. 

THE KING'S FORMER DISORDERS. His REFORMATION. THE LOLLARDS. PUN- 
ISHMENT OF LORD COBHAM. STATE OF ERANCE. INVASION OF THAT KING- 
DOM. BATTLE OF AZINCOUR. STATE OF FRANCE. NEW INVASION OF 
FRANCE. ASSASSINATION OF THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY. TREATY OF TROYE. 
MARRIAGE OF THE KING: His DEATH AND CHARACTER. MISCELLANE- 
OUS TRANSACTIONS DURING THIS REIGN. 



C xix P ' I ^ HE man y jealousies to which Henry IV/s situation 
^~^-^_s naturally exposed him, had so infected his temper, that 
i4i3. he had entertained unreasonable suspicions with regard 
former ng ' s to tne fidelity of his eldest son ; and during the latter 
disorders, years of his life, he had excluded that prince from all 
share in public business, and was even displeased to see 
him at the head of armies, where his martial talents, 
though useful to the support of government, acquired 
him a renown, which, he thought, might prove dangerous 
to his own authority. The active spirit of young Henry, 
restrained from its proper exercise, broke out into ex- 
travagancies of every kind ; and the riot of pleasure, the 
frolic of debauchery, the outrage of wine, filled the va- 
cancies of a mind, better adapted to the pursuits of am- 
bition and the cares of government. This course of life 
threw him among companions, whose disorders, if accom- 
panied with spirit and humour, he indulged and seconded; 
and he was detected in many sallies, which, to severer 
eyes, appeared totally unworthy of his rank and station. 
There even remains a tradition, that, when heated with 
liquor and jollity, he scrupled not to accompany his 
riotous associates in attacking the passengers on the 
streets and highways, and despoiling them of their 
goods; and he found an amusement in the incidents 
which the terror and regret of these defenceless people 
produced on such occasions. This 1 extreme of dissolute- 
ness proved equally disagreeable to his father, as that 
eager application to business which had at first given 
him occasion of jealousy; and he saw in his son's be- 
haviour, the same neglect of decency, the same attach- 



HENRY V. 297 

ment to low company, which had degraded the personal CHAP. 
character of Richard, and which, more than all his errors ^_ ^'_; 
in government, had tended to overturn his throne. But 1413 
the nation, in general, considered the young prince with 
more indulgence ; and observed so many gleams of 
generosity, spirit, and magnanimity, breaking continually 
through the cloud which a wild conduct threw over his 
character, that they never ceased hoping for his amend- 
ment ; and they ascribed all the weeds, which shot up 
in that rich soil, to the want of proper culture and atten- 
tion in the king and his ministers. There happened 
an incident which encouraged these agreeable views, and 
gave much occasion for favourable reflections to all men 
of sense and candour. A riotous companion of the 
prince's had been indicted before Gascoigne, the chief 
justice, for some disorders ; and Henry was not ashamed 
to appear at the bar with the criminal, in order to give 
him countenance and protection. Finding that his pre- 
sence had not overawed the chief justice, he proceeded to 
insult that magistrate on his tribunal ; but Gascoigne, 
mindful of the character which he then bore, and the 
majesty of the sovereign and of the laws which he sus- 
tained, ordered the prince to be carried to prison for his 
rude behaviour a . The spectators were agreeably dis- 
appointed when they saw the heir of the crown submit 
peaceably to this sentence, make reparation for his error 
by acknowledging it, and check his impetuous nature in 
the midst of its extravagant career. 

The memory of this incident, and of many others of a 
like nature, rendered the prospect of the future reign His re- 
nowise disagreeable to the nation, and increased the j O y formatlon - 
which the death of so unpopular a prince as the late king 
naturally occasioned. The first steps taken by the young 
prince confirmed all those prepossessions entertained in 
his favour b . He called together his former companions, 
acquainted them with his intended reformation, exhorted 
them to imitate his example, but strictly inhibited them, 
till they had given proofs of their sincerity in this par- 
ticular, from appearing any more in his presence ; and 
he then dismissed them with liberal presents 6 . The 

a Hall, fol. 33. b Walsingham, p, 382. 

c Hall, fol. 33. Hollingshed, p. 543. Godwin's Life of Henry V. p. 1. 



298 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, wise ministers of his father, who had checked his riots, 
^ rc^ found that they had unknowingly been paying the highest 
1413 court to him ; and were received with all the marks of 
favour and confidence. The chief justice himself, who 
trembled to approach the royal presence, met with praises 
instead of reproaches for his past conduct, and was ex- 
horted to persevere in the same rigorous and impartial 
execution of the laws. The surprise of those who ex- 
pected an opposite behaviour augmented their satis- 
faction; and the character of the young king ap- 
peared brighter than if it had never been shaded by any 
errors. 

But Henry was anxious not only to repair his own 
misconduct, but also to make amends for those iniquities 
into which policy or the necessity of affairs had betrayed 
his father. He expressed the deepest sorrow for the 
fate of the unhappy Eichard, did justice to the memory 
of that unfortunate prince, even performed his funeral 
obsequies with pomp and solemnity, and cherished all 
those who had distinguished themselves by their loyalty 
and attachment towards him d . Instead of continuing 
the restraints which the jealousy of his father had im- 
posed on the Earl of March, he received that young 
nobleman with singular courtesy and favour ; and, by this 
magnanimity, so gained on the gentle and unambitious 
nature of his competitor, that he remained ever after sin- 
cerely attached to him, and gave him no disturbance in 
his future government. The family of Piercy was re- 
stored to its fortune and honours 6 . The king seemed 
ambitious to bury all party distinctions in oblivion : the 
instruments of the preceding reign, who had been ad- 
vanced from their blind zeal for their Lancasterian inte- 
rests, more than from their merits, gave place every 
where to men of more honourable characters: virtue 
seemed now to have an open career, in which it might 
exert itself: the exhortations, as well as example, of the 
prince gave it encouragement : all men were unanimous 
in their attachment to Henry ; and the defects of his 
title were forgotten amidst the personal regard which 
was universally paid to him. 

a Hist. Croyland, contin. Hall, fol. 34. Hollingshed, p. 544. 
Hollingshed, p. 545. 



HENRY V. 299 

There remained among the people only one party dis- CHAP. 
tinction, which was derived from religious differences, XIX> 
and which, as it is of a peculiar, and commonly a very ^^~" 
obstinate nature, the popularity of Henry was not able The LO'I- 
to overcome. The Lollards were every day increasing lards * 
in the kingdom, and were become a formed party, which 
appeared extremely dangerous to the church, and even 
formidable to the civil authority f . The enthusiasm by 
which these sectaries were generally actuated, the great 
alterations which they pretended to introduce, the 
hatred which they expressed against the established 
hierarchy, gave an alarm to Henry ; who, either from 
a sincere attachment to the ancient religion, or from a 
dread of the unknown consequences which attend all 
important changes, was determined to execute the laws 
against such bold innovators. The head of this sect 
was Sir John Oldcastle, (Lord Cobham,) a nobleman 
who had distinguished himself by his valour and his 
military talents, and had, on many occasions, acquired 
the esteem both of the late and of the present king g . 
His high character and his zeal for the new sect pointed 
him out to Arundel, Archbishop of Canterbury, as the 
proper victim of ecclesiastical severity; whose punish- 
ment would strike a terror into the whole party, and 
teach them that they must expect no mercy under the 
present administration. He applied to Henry for a 
permission to indict Lord Cobham h ; but the generous 
nature of the prince was averse to such sanguinary 
methods of conversion. He represented to the primate 
that reason and conviction were the best expedients for 
supporting truth ; that all gentle means ought first to 
be tried in order to reclaim men from error ; and that 
he himself would endeavour, by a conversation with 
Cobham, to reconcile him to the Catholic faith. But 
he found that nobleman obstinate in his opinions, and 
determined not to sacrifice truths of such infinite mo- 
ment to his complaisance for sovereigns 1 . Henry's prin- 
ciples of toleration, or rather his love of the practice, 
could carry him no farther ; and he then gave full reins 

f Walsingham, p. 382. e Ibid. 

h Fox's Acts and Monuments, p. 513. 

1 Rymer, vol. ix. p. 61. Walsingham, p. 383. 



300 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, to ecclesiastical seventy against the inflexible heresiarch. 
^ ^ The primate indicted Cobham ; and with the assistance 
1413 of his three suffragans, the Bishops of London, Winches- 
ter, and St. David's, condemned him to the flames for 
his erroneous opinions. Cobham, who was confined in 
the Tower, made his escape before the day appointed for 
his execution. The bold spirit of the man, provoked by 
persecution and stimulated by zeal, was urged to attempt 
the most criminal enterprises ; and his unlimited autho- 
rity over the new sect proved that he well merited the 
attention of the civil magistrate. He formed in his re- 
treat very violent designs against his enemies ; and, de- 
spatching his emissaries to all quarters, appointed a 
general rendezvous of the party, in order to seize the 
person of the king at Eltham, and put their persecutors 
1414. to the sword k . Henry, apprized of their intention, re- 
moved to Westminster. Cobham was not discouraged 
by this disappointment ; but changed the place of ren- 
dezvous to the field near St. Giles's. The king, having 
shut the gates of the city, to prevent any reinforcement 
to the Lollards from that quarter, came into the field in 
the night-time, seized such of the conspirators as appeared, 
and afterwards laid hold of the several parties who were 
hastening to the place appointed. It appeared that a 
few only were in the secret of the conspiracy : the rest 
implicitly followed their leaders : but upon the trial of 
the prisoners, the treasonable designs of the sect were 
rendered certain, both from evidence, and from the con- 
fession of the criminals themselves 1 . Some were exe- 
mento'f cu ^ e( ^ 5 ^ ne g rea ^er number pardoned. Cobham him- 
Lord self, who made his escape by flight, was not brought to 
Cobham. j us ti ce till four years after, when he was hanged as a 
traitor, and his body was burnt on the gibbet, in execu- 
tion of the sentence pronounced against him as a heretic 11 . 
This criminal design, which was perhaps somewhat aggra- 
vated by the clergy, brought discredit upon the party, 
and checked the progress of that sect, which had embraced 
the speculative doctrines of Wickliffe, and at the same 
time aspired to a reformation of ecclesiastical abuses. 

fc Walsingham, p. 385. 

1 Cotton, p. 554. Hall, fol. 35. Hollingshed, p. 544. 

mEymer, vol. ix. p. 119. 129. 193. 

n Walsingham, p. 400. Otterbourne, p. 280. Hollingshed, p. 561. 



HENRY V. 301 

These two points were the great objects of the Lol- CHAP. 
lards ; but the bulk of the nation was not affected in the ^ * x ;_, 
same degree by both of them. Common sense and ob- 1414 
vious reflection had discovered to the people the advan- 
tages of a reformation in discipline ; but the age was not 
yet so far advanced as to be seized with the spirit of 
controversy, or to enter into those abtruse doctrines, 
which the Lollards endeavoured to propagate throughout 
the kingdom. The very notion of heresy alarmed the 
generality of the people : innovation in fundamental 
principles was suspicious: curiosity was not, as yet, a 
sufficient counterpoise to authority : and even many who 
were the greatest friends to the reformation of abuses, 
were anxious to express their detestation of the specula- 
tive tenets of the Wickliffites, which they feared threw 
disgrace on so good a cause. This turn of thought ap- 
pears evidently in the proceedings of the Parliament 
which was summoned immediately after the detection 
of Cobham's conspiracy. That assembly passed severe 
laws against the new heretics. They enacted, that who- 
ever was convicted of Lollardy before the ordinary, be- 
sides suffering capital punishment, according to the laws 
formerly established, should also forfeit his lands and 
goods to the king ; and that the chancellor, treasurer, 
justices of the two benches, sheriffs, justices of the peace, 
and all the chief magistrates in every city and borough, 
should take an oath to use their utmost endeavours for 
the extirpation of heresy . Yet this very Parliament, 
when the king demanded a supply, renewed the offer 
formerly pressed upon his father, and entreated him to 
seize all the ecclesiastical revenues, and convert them to 
the use of the crown p . The clergy were alarmed : they 
could offer the king no bribe which was equivalent : they 
only agreed to confer on him all the priories alien, which 
depended on capital abbeys in Normandy, and had been 
bequeathed to these abbeys, when that province remained 
united to England : and Chicheley, now Archbishop of 
Canterbury, endeavoured to divert the blow, by giving 
occupation to the king, and by persuading him to under- 
take a war against France, in order to recover his lost 
rights to that kingdom q . 

o 2 Hen. V. cap. 7. P Hall, fol. 35. I Ibid. fol. 35, 36. 

VOL. II. 26 



302 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. It was the dying injunction of the late king to his son, 
not to allow the English to remain long in peace, which 
^^^ was apt to breed intestine commotions ; but to employ 
them in foreign expeditions, by which the prince might 
acquire honour; the nobility, in sharing his dangers, 
might attach themselves to his person ; and all the rest- 
less spirits find occupation for their inquietude. The 
natural disposition of Henry sufficiently inclined him to 
follow this advice, and the civil disorders of France, 
which had been prolonged beyond those of England, 
opened a full career to his ambition. 

stated ^e death f Charles Y., which followed soon after 
France, that of Edward III., and the youth of his son, Charles 
VI., put the two kingdoms for some time in a similar 
situation ; and it was not to be apprehended, that either 
of them, during a minority, would be able to make much 
advantage of the weakness of the other. The jealousies 
also between Charles's three uncles, the Dukes of Anjou, 
Berri, and Burgundy, had distracted the affairs of France, 
rather more than those between the Dukes of Lancaster, 
York, and Gloucester, Richard's three uncles, disordered 
those of England ; and had carried off the attention of 
the French nation from any vigorous enterprise against 
foreign states. But in proportion as Charles advanced 
in years, the factions were composed ; his two uncles, the 
Dukes of Anjou and Burgundy, died : and the king him- 
self, assuming the reins of government, discovered symp- 
toms of genius and spirit, which revived the drooping 
liopes of his country. This promising state of affairs was 
not of long duration. The unhappy prince fell suddenly 
into a fit of frenzy, which rendered him incapable of 
exercising his authority ; and though he recovered from 
this disorder, he was so subject to relapses, that his judg- 
ment was gradually but sensibly impaired, and no steady 
plan of government could be pursued by him. The ad- 
ministration of affairs was disputed between his brother, 
Lewis, Duke of Orleans, and his cousin-german, John, 
Duke of Burgundy. The propinquity to the crown 
pleaded in favour of the former. The latter, who, in 
right of his mother, had inherited the county of Flan- 
ders, which he annexed to his father's extensive domi- 
nions, derived a lustre from his superior power. The 



HENRY V. 303 

people were divided between these contending princes : CHAP. 
and the king, now resuming, now dropping his autho- 
rity, kept the victory undecided, and prevented any^^^* 
regular settlement of the state by the final prevalence of 
either party. 

At length, the Dukes of Orleans and Burgundy 
seemed to be moved by the cries of the nation, and by 
the interposition of common friends, agreed to bury all 
past quarrels in oblivion, and to enter into strict amity. 
They swore before the altar the sincerity of their friend- 
ship ; the priest administered the sacrament to both of 
them ; they gave to each other every pledge which could 
be deemed sacred among men. But all this solemn pre- 
paration was only a cover for the basest treachery, which 
was deliberately premeditated by the Duke of Burgundy. 
He procured his rival to be assassinated in the streets of 
Paris. He endeavoured for some time to conceal the part 
which he took in the crime : but being detected, he em- 
braced a resolution still more criminal and more dangerous 
to society, by openly avowing and justifying it r . The Par- 
liament itself of Paris, the tribunal of justice, heard the 
harangues of the duke's advocate in defence of assassina- 
tion, which he termed tyrannicide ; and that assembly, 
partly influenced by faction, partly overawed by power, 
pronounced no sentence of condemnation against this 
detestable doctrine 8 . The same question was afterwards 
agitated before the council of Constance ; and it was 
with difficulty that a feeble decision, in favour of the 
contrary opinion, was procured from these fathers of the 
church, the ministers of peace and of religion. But the 
mischievous effects of that tenet, had they been before 
anywise doubtful, appeared sufficiently from the present 
incidents. The commission of this crime, which destroyed 
all trust and security, rendered the war implacable be- 
tween the French parties, and cut off every means of 
peace and accommodation. The princes of the blood, 
combining with the young Duke of Orleans and his bro- 
thers, made violent war on the Duke of Burgundy ; and 
the unhappy king, seized sometimes by one party, some- 
times by the other, transferred alternately to each of 

r Le Labouretir, lir. xxvii. chap. 23, 24. 

8 Ibid. liv. xxvii. chap. 27. Monstrelet, chap. 39. 



304 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, them the appearance of legal authority. The provinces 
^ l *'_; were laid waste by mutual depredations : assassinations 
ui5 were every where committed from the animosity of the 
several leaders ; or, what was equally terrible, executions 
were ordered, without any legal or free trial, by pretended 
courts of judicature. The whole kingdom was distin- 
guished into two parties, the Burgundians and the 
Armagnacs ; so the adherents of the young Duke of Or- 
leans were called, from the Count of Armagnac, father- 
in-law to that prince. The city of Paris, distracted be- 
tween them, but inclining more to the Burgundians, was 
a perpetual scene of blood and violence ; the king and 
royal family were often detained captives in the hands 
of the populace ; their faithful ministers were butchered 
or imprisoned before their face ; and it was dangerous 
for any man, amidst these enraged factions, to be distin- 
guished by a strict adherence to the principles of probity 
and honour. 

During this scene of general violence, there rose into 
some consideration a body of men, which usually makes 
no figure in public transactions, even during the most 
peaceful times ; and that was the university of Paris, 
whose opinion was sometimes demanded, and more fre- 
quently offered, in the multiplied disputes between the 
parties. The schism, by which the church was at that 
time divided, and which occasioned frequent controversies 
in the university, had raised the professors to an unusual 
degree of importance ; and this connexion between lite- 
rature and superstition had bestowed on the former a 
weight, to which reason and knowledge are not of them- 
selves, anywise entitled among men. But there was 
another society, whose sentiments were much more deci- 
sive at Paris, the fraternity of butchers, who, under the 
direction of their ringleaders, had declared for the Duke 
of Burgundy, and committed the most violent outrages 
against the opposite party. To counterbalance their 
power, the Armagnacs made interest with the fraternity 
of carpenters ; the populace ranged themselves on one 
side or the other ; and the fate of the capital depended 
on the prevalence of either party. 

The advantage which might be made of these con- 
fusions was easily perceived in England ; and, accord- 



HENRY V. 305 

ing to the maxims which usually prevail among nations, CHAP. 
it was determined to lay hold of the favourable oppor- 
tunity. The late king, who was courted by both 
French parties, fomented the quarrel, by alternately 
sending assistance to each ; but the present sovereign, 
impelled by the vigour of youth, and the ardour of am- 
bition, determined to push his advantages to a greater 
length, and to carry violent war into that distracted 
kingdom. But while he was making preparations for 
this end, he tried to effect his purpose by negotiation ; 
and he sent over ambassadors to Paris, offering a per- 
petual peace and alliance : but demanding Catherine, 
the French king's daughter, in marriage, two millions 
of crowns as her portion, one million six hundred thou- 
sand as the arrears of King John's ransom, and the im- 
mediate possession and full sovereignty of Normandy, 
and of all the other provinces which had been ravished 
from England by the arms of Philip Augustus ; together 
with the superiority of Britany and Flanders*. Such exor- 
bitant demands show that he was sensible of the present 
miserable condition of France ; and the terms offered by 
the French court, though much inferior, discover their 
consciousness of the same melancholy truth. They were 
willing to give him the princess in marriage, to pay him 
eight hundred thousand crowns, to resign the entire 
sovereignty of Guienne, and to annex to that province 
the country of Perigord, Eovergue, Xaintonge, the An- 
goumois, and other territories 11 . As Henry rejected 
these conditions, and scarcely hoped that his own de- 
mands would be complied with, he never intermitted a 
moment his preparations for war ; and having assembled 
a great fleet and army at Southampton, having invited 
all the nobility and military men of the kingdom to 
attend him by the hopes of glory and of conquest, he 
came to the sea-side, with a purpose of embarking on 
his expedition. 

But while Henry was meditating conquests upon his 

* Rymer, vol. ix. p. 208. 

u Ibid. p. 211. It is reported by some historians, (see Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 500,) 
that the dauphin, in derision of Henry's claims and dissolute character, sent him a 
box of tennis balls, intimating that these implements of play were better adapted to 
him than the instruments of war. But this story is by no means credible : the great 
offers made by the court of France show that they had already entertained a just 
idea of Henry's character, as well as of their own situation. 

26* 



306 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, neighbours, he unexpectedly found himself in danger 
^ _,from a conspiracy at home, which was happily detected 
1415 in its infancy. The Earl of Cambridge, second son of 
the late Duke of York, having espoused the sister of 
the Earl of March, had zealously embraced the interests 
of that family; and had held some conferences with 
Lord Scrope, of Masham, and Sir Thomas Grey, of 
Heton, about the means of recovering to that nobleman 
his right to the crown of England. The conspirators, 
as soon as detected, acknowledged their guilt to the 
king w : and Henry proceeded without delay to their 
trial and condemnation. The utmost that could be 
expected of the best king, in those ages, was, that he 
would so far observe the essentials of justice, as not to 
make an innocent person a victim to his severity. But 
as to the formalities of law, which are often as material 
as the essentials themselves, they were sacrificed without 
scruple to the least interest or convenience. A jury 
of commoners was summoned : the three conspirators 
were indicted before them : the constable of Southamp- 
ton castle swore that they had separately confessed their 
guilt to him. Without other evidence, Sir Thomas 
Grey was condemned and executed. But as the Earl 
of Cambridge and Lord Scrope pleaded the privilege of 
their peerage, Henry thought proper to summon a court 
of eighteen barons, in which the Duke of Clarence pre- 
sided. The evidence given before the jury was read to 
them. The prisoners, though one of them was a prince 
of the blood, were not examined, nor produced in court, 
nor heard in their own defence ; but received sentence 
of death upon this proof, which was every way irregular 
and unsatisfactory ; and the sentence was soon after exe- 
cuted. The Earl of March was accused of having given 
his approbation to the conspiracy, and received a general 
pardon from the king*. He was probably either inno- 
cent of the crime imputed to him, or had made repara- 
tion by his early repentance and discovery 7 . 
invasion The successes which the arms of England have, in 
Ice ' different ages, obtained over those of France, have been 
much owing to the favourable situation of the former 

w Rymer, vol. ix. p. 300. T. Livii p. 8. 

x Rymer, vol. ix. p. 303. ? St. Remi, chap. 55. Goodwin, p. 65. 



HENRY V. 3Q7 

kingdom. The English, happily seated in an island, CHAP. 
could make advantage of every misfortune which at-, XIX ' 
tended their neighbours, and were little exposed to 
danger of reprisals. They never left their own coun- 
try but when they were conducted by a king of extra- 
ordinary genius, or found their enemy divided by intes- 
tine factions, or were supported by a powerful alliance 
on the continent ; and as all these circumstances con- 
curred at present to favour their enterprise, they had 
reason to expect from it proportionable success. The 
Duke of Burgundy, expelled France by a combination 
of the princes, had been secretly soliciting the alliance 
of England 2 ; and Henry knew that this prince, though 
he scrupled at first to join the inveterate enemy of his 
country, would willingly, if he saw any probability of 
success, both assist him with his Flemish subjects, and 
draw over to the same side all his numerous partisans 
in France. Trusting therefore to this circumstance, but 
without establishing any concert with the duke, he put 
to sea, and landed near Harfleur, at the head of an army i4th Aug. 
of six thousand men at arms, and twenty-four thousand 
foot, mostly archers. He immediately began the siege 
of that place, which was valiantly defended by D'Es- 
toliteville, and under him by De Guitri, De Gaucourt, 
and others of the French nobility. But as the garrison 
was weak, and the fortifications in bad repair, the gover- 
nor was at last obliged to capitulate ; and he promised 
to surrender the place if he received no succour before 
the eighteenth of September. The day came, and there 
was no appearance of the French army to relieve him. 
Henry, taking possession of the town, placed a garrison 
in it, and expelled ah 1 the French inhabitants, with an 
intention of peopling it anew with English. 

The fatigues of this siege, and the unusual heat of the 
season, had so wasted the English army, that Henry 
could enter on no farther enterprise ; and was obliged to 
think of returning into England. He had dismissed his 
transports, which could not anchor in an open road upon 
the enemy's coasts : and he lay under a necessity of 
marching by land to Calais, before he could reach a place 
of safety. A numerous French army of fourteen thou- 

2 Kymer, vol. ix. p. 137, 138. 



308 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, sand men at arms, and forty thousand foot, was by this 
XIX ' time assembled in Normandy, under the constable D'Al- 
bret ; a force which, if prudently conducted, was suffi- 
cient either to trample down the English in the open 
field, or to harass and reduce to nothing their small 
army, before they could finish so long and difficult a 
march. Henry, therefore, cautiously offered to sacrifice 
his conquest of Harfleur for a safe passage to Calais ; but 
his proposal being rejected, he determined to make his 
way by valour and conduct through all the opposition of 
the enemy a . That he might not discourage his army by 
the appearance of flight, or expose them to those hazards 
which naturally attend precipitate inarches, he made 
slow and deliberate journeys b , till he reached the Somme, 
which he purposed to pass at the ford of Blanquetague, 
the same place where Edward, in a like situation, had 
before escaped from Philip de Valois. But he found 
the ford rendered impassable by the precaution of the 
French general, and guarded by a strong body on the 
opposite bank ; and he was obliged to march higher up 
the river, in order to seek for a safe passage. He was 
continually harassed on his march by flying parties of the 
enemy ; saw bodies of troops on the other side ready to 
oppose e very^ attempt ; his provisions were cut off ; his 
soldiers languished with sickness and fatigue ; and his 
affairs seemed to be reduced to a desperate situation; 
when he was so dexterous or so fortunate as to seize by 
surprise a passage near St. Quintin, which had not been 
sufficiently guarded; and he safely carried over his 
army d . 

Battle of Henry then bent his march northwards to Calais ; but 

r ' he was still exposed to great and imminent danger from 

the enemy, who had also passed the Somme, and threw 

themselves full in his way, with a purpose of intercepting 

25th Oct. his retreat. After he had passed the small river of Ternois, 
at Blangi, he was surprised to observe from the heights 
the whole French army drawn up in the plains of 
Azincour, and so posted, that it was impossible for him 
to proceed on his march without coming to an engage- 
ment. Nothing in appearance could be more unequal 

a Le Laboureur, liv. xxxv. chap. 6. t> T. Livii p. 12. 

c St. Remi, chap. 58. a T. Livii p. 13. 



HENRY V. 309 

than the battle, upon which his safety and all his fortunes CHAP. 
now depended. The English army was little more than 
half the number which had disembarked at Harfleur; 
and they laboured under every discouragement and 
necessity. The enemy was four times more numerous ; 
was headed by the dauphin and all the princes of the 
blood ; and was plentifully supplied with provisions of 
every kind. Henry's situation was exactly similar to 
that of Edward at Crecy, and that of the Black Prince 
at Poictiers, and the memory of these great events, 
inspiring the English with courage, made them hope for 
a like deliverance from their present difficulties. The 
king likewise observed the same prudent conduct which 
had been followed by these great commanders. He drew 
up his army on a narrow ground between two woods, 
which guarded each flank ; and he patiently expected in 
that posture the attack of the enemy 6 . 

Had the French constable been able, either to reason 
justly upon the present circumstances of the two armies, 
or to profit by past experience, he had declined a com- 
bat, and had waited till necessity, obliging the English 
to advance, had made them relinquish the advantages of 
their situation. But the impetuous valour of the nobility, 
and a vain confidence in superior numbers, brought on 
this fatal action, which proved the source of infinite cala- 
mities to their country. The French archers on horse- 
back and their men at arms, crowded in their ranks, 
advanced upon the English archers, who had fixed pali- 
sadoes in their front to break the impression of the enemy, 
and who safely plied them, from behind that defence, 
with a shower of arrows which nothing could resist f . 
The clay soil, moistened by some rain which had lately 
fallen, proved another obstacle to the force of the French 
cavalry : the wounded men and horses discomposed their 
ranks : the narrow compass in which they were pent 
hindered them from recovering any order : the whole 
army was a scene of confusion, terror, and dismay : and 
Henry, perceiving his advantage, ordered the English 
archers, who were light and unincumbered, to advance 
upon the enemy, and seize the moment of victory. They 

e St. Remi, chap. 62. f Walsingham, p. 392. T. Livii p. 19. Le Laboureur, 
liv. xxxv. chap. 7. Monstrelet, chap. 147. 



310 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, fell with their battle-axes upon the French, who, in their 
v_ X * X ^_. present posture, were incapable either of flying or of 
1415 making defence : they hewed them in pieces without 
resistance 8 : and being seconded by the men at arms, 
who also pushed on against the enemy, they covered the 
field with the killed, wounded, dismounted, and over- 
thrown. After all appearance of opposition was over, 
the English had leisure to make prisoners ; and having 
advanced with uninterrupted success to the open plain, 
they there saw the remains of the French rear guard, 
which still maintained the appearance of a line of battle. 
At the same time they heard an alarm from behind : 
some gentlemen of Picardy, having collected about six 
hundred peasants, had fallen upon the English baggage, 
and were doing execution on the unarmed followers of 
the camp, who fled before them. Henry, seeing the 
enemy on all sides of him, began to entertain appre- 
hensions from his prisoners ; and he thought it necessary 
to issue general orders for putting them to death : but 
on discovering the truth, he stopped the slaughter, and 
was still able to save a great number. 

No battle was ever more fatal to France, by the num- 
ber of princes and nobility slain or taken prisoners. 
Among the former were the Constable himself, the Count 
of Nevers, and the Duke of Brabant, brothers to the 
Duke of Burgundy, the Count of Yaudemont, brother 
to the Duke of Lorraine, the Duke of Alen^on, the 
Duke of Barre, the Count of Marie. The most eminent 
prisoners were the Dukes of Orleans and Bourbon, the 
Counts d'Eu, Vendome, and Richemont, and the Mares- 
chal of Boucicaut. An archbishop of Sens also was slain 
in this battle. The killed are computed, on the whole, 
to have amounted to ten thousand men ; and as the 
slaughter fell chiefly upon the cavalry, it is pretended 
that, of these, eight thousand were gentlemen. Henry 
was master of fourteen thousand prisoners. The person 
of chief note who fell among the English, was the Duke 
of York, who perished fighting by the king's side, and 
had an end more honourable than his life. He was suc- 
ceeded in his honours and fortune by his nephew, son of 
the Earl of Cambridge, executed in the beginning of the 

8 Walsingham, p. 393. Ypod. Neust, p. 584. 



HENRY V. 3U 

year. All the English who were slain, exceeded not CHAP. 
forty; though some writers, with greater probability, 
make the number more considerable. 1415 

The three great battles of Crecy, Poicters, and Azin- 
cour, bear a singular resemblance to each other in their 
most considerable circumstances. In all of them, there 
appears the same temerity in the English princes, who, 
without any object of moment, merely for the sake of 
plunder, had ventured so far into the enemy's country as 
to leave themselves no retreat ; and, unless saved by the 
utmost imprudence in the French commanders, were, 
from their very situation, exposed to inevitable destruc- 
tion. But allowance being made for this temerity, which, 
according to the irregular plans of war, followed in those 
ages, seems to have been, in some measure, unavoidable, 
there appears, in the day of action, the same presence of 
mind, dexterity, courage, firmness, and precaution, on the 
part of the English; the same precipitation, confusion, 
and vain confidence, on the part of the French ; and the 
events were such as might have been expected from such 
opposite conduct. The immediate consequences, too, of 
these three great victories were similar : instead of push- 
ing the French with vigour, and taking advantage of their 
consternation, the English princes, after their victory, 
seem rather to have relaxed their efforts, and to have 
allowed the enemy leisure to recover from his losses. 
Henry interrupted not his march a moment after the 
battle of Azincour; he carried his prisoners to Calais, 
thence to England ; he even concluded a truce with the 
enemy ; and it was not till after an interval of two years 
that any body of English troops appeared in France. 

The poverty of all the European princes, and the small 
resources of their kingdoms, were the cause of these con- 
tinual interruptions in their hostilities ; and though the 
maxims of war were in general destructive, their military 
operations were mere incursions, which, without any set- 
tled plan, they carried on against each other. The lustre, 
however, attending the victory of Azincour, procured 
some supplies from the English Parliament, though still 
unequal to the expenses of a campaign. They granted 
Henry an entire fifteenth of moveables ; and they con- 
ferred on him, for life, the duties of tonnage and pound- 



312 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, age, and the subsidies on the exportation of wool and 
^ ^leather. This concession is more considerable than that 
U15. which had been granted to Kichard II. by his last Parlia- 
ment, and which was afterwards, on his deposition, made 
so great an article of charge against him. 

state of But during this interruption of hostilities from Eng- 
land, France was exposed to all the furies of civil war ; 
and the several parties became every day more enraged 
against each other. The Duke of Burgundy, confident 
that the French ministers and generals were entirely dis- 
credited by the misfortune at Azincour, advanced with a 
great army to Paris, and attempted to reinstate himself 
in possession of the government, as well as of the person 
of the king. But his partisans in that city were over- 
awed by the court, and kept in subjection : the duke 
despaired of success; and he retired with his forces, 
which he immediately disbanded in the Low Coun tries h . 
He was soon after invited to make a new attempt, by 
some violent quarrels which broke out in the royal family. 
The queen, Isabella, daughter of the Duke of Bavaria, 
who had been hitherto an inveterate enemy to the Burgun- 
dian faction, had received a great injury from the other 
party, which the implacable spirit of that princess was 
never able to forgive. The public necessities obliged the 
Count of Armagnac (created Constable of France, in the 
place of d'Albret) to seize the great treasures which Isa- 
bella had amassed ; and when she expressed her displea- 
sure at this injury, he inspired into the weak mind of 
the king some jealousies concerning her conduct, and 
pushed him to seize and put to the torture, and after- 
wards throw into the Seine, Bois-Bourdon, her favourite, 
whom he accused of a commerce of gallantry with that 
princess. The queen herself was sent to Tours, and con- 
fined under a guard 1 ; and, after suffering these multi- 
plied insults, she no longer scrupled to enter into a cor- 
respondence with the Duke of Burgundy. As her son, 
the Dauphin Charles, a youth of sixteen, was entirely 
governed by the faction of Armagnac, she extended her 
animosity to him, and sought his destruction with the 
most unrelenting hatred. She had soon an opportunity 

h Le Laboureur, liv. xxxr. chap. 10. 

1 St. Kemi, chap. 74. Monstrelet, chap. 167. 



HENRY V. 313 

of rendering her unnatural purpose effectual. The Duke CHAP. 
of Burgundy, in concert with her, entered France at the,_ x * x "_^ 
head of a great army : he made himself master of Amiens, 1417 
Abbeville, Dourlens, Montreiiil, and other towns in Pi- 
cardy; Senlis, Rheims, Chalons, Troye, and Auxerre, 
declared themselves of his party k . He got possession of 
Beaumont, Pontoise, Yernon, Meulant, Montlheri, towns 
in the neighbourhood of Paris ; and carrying farther his 
progress towards the west, he seized Etampes, Chartres, 
and other fortresses ; and was at last able to deliver the 
queen, who fled to Troye, and openly declared against 
those ministers who, she said, detained her husband in 
captivity 1 . 

Meanwhile the partisans of Burgundy raised a com- 
motion in Paris, which always inclined to that faction. 
Idle-Adam, one of the duke's captains, was received into 
the city in the night-time, and headed the insurrection 
of the people, which in a moment became so impetuous 
that nothing could oppose it. The person of the king 
was seized : the dauphin made his escape with difficulty : 
great numbers of the faction of Armagnac were imme- 
diately butchered : the count himself, and many persons 
of note, were thrown into prison : murders were daily 
committed from private animosity, under pretence of 
faction ; and the populace, not satiated with their fury, 
and deeming the course of public justice too dilatory, 
broke into the prisons, and put to death the Count of 
Armagnac, and all the other nobility who were there 
confined m . 

While France was in such furious combustion, an ^^ ( jf Va " 
was so ill prepared to resist a foreign enemy, Henry, France. 
having collected some treasure, and levied an army, lstAu g- 
landed in Normandy at the head of twenty-five thou- 
sand men, and met with no considerable opposition from 
any quarter. He made himself master of Falaise Evreux HIS. 
and Caen submitted to him; Ponte de 1'Arche opened 
its gates ; and Henry having subdued all the lower Nor- 
mandy, and having received a reinforcement of fifteen 
thousand men from England 11 , formed the siege of 
Rouen, which was defended by a garrison of four thou- 

k St. Rcmi, chap. 79. 1 Ibid. chap. 81. Monstrelet, chap. 178, 179. 

m St. Ecmi, chap. 85, 86. Monstrelet, chap. 118. n Walsingham, p. 400. 

VOL. ii. 27 



314 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, sand men, seconded by the inhabitants, to the number 
XIX - of fifteen thousand . The Cardinal des Ursins here 
^J^^ attempted to incline him towards peace, and to mode- 
rate his pretensions; but the king replied to him in 
such terms as showed that he was fully sensible of 
all his present advantages. "Do you not see," said 
he, " that God has led me hither as by the hand ? 
France has no sovereign: I have just pretensions to 
that kingdom : every thing is here in the utmost con- 
fusion : no one thinks of resisting me. Can I have a 
more sensible proof, that the Being who disposes of em- 
pires has determined to put the crown of France upon 
my head p ?" 

But though Henry had opened his mind to this scheme 
of ambition, he still continued to negotiate with his ene- 
mies, and endeavoured to obtain more secure, though 
less considerable, advantages. He made, at the same 
time, offers of peace to both parties ; to the queen and 
Duke of Burgundy on the one hand, who, having posses- 
sion of the king's person, carried the appearance of legal 
authority* 1 ; and to the dauphin on the other, who, being 
the undoubted heir of the monarchy, was adhered to by 
every one that paid any regard to the true interests of 
their country 1 . These two parties also carried on a con- 
tinual negotiation with each other. The terms proposed 
on all sides were perpetually varying : the events of the 
war, and the intrigues of the cabinet, intermingled with 
each other ; and the fate of France remained long in this 
uncertainty. After many negotiations, Henry offered 
the queen and the Duke of Burgundy to make peace 
with them, to espouse the Princess Catherine, and to 
accept of all the provinces ceded to Edward III. by the 
treaty of Bretigni, with the addition of Normandy, which 
H19. h e was to receive in full and entire sovereignty 8 . These 
terms were submitted to : there remained only some cir- 
cumstances to adjust, in order to the entire completion 
of the treaty : but in this interval the Duke of Burgundy 
secretly finished his treaty with the dauphin ; and these 
two princes agreed to share the royal authority during 

o St. Remi, chap. 91. p Juvenal des Ursins. 

<i Rymer, vol. ix. p. 717. 749. r Ibid. p. 626, &c. 

8 Ibid. p. 762. 



HENRY V. 315 

King Charles's lifetime, and to unite their arms in order CHAP. 
to expel foreign enemies*. 

This alliance, which seemed to cut off from Henry all"^^~ 
hopes of farther success, proved, in the issue, the most 
favourable event that could have happened for his pre- 
tensions. Whether the dauphin and the Duke of Bur- 
gundy were ever sincere in their mutual engagements is 
uncertain ; but very fatal effects resulted from their 
momentary and seeming union. The two princes agreed 
to an interview, in order to concert the means of render- 
ing effectual their common attack on the English ; but 
how both or either of them could with safety venture 
upon this conference, it seemed somewhat difficult to 
contrive. The assassination perpetrated by the Duke of 
Burgundy, and still more his open avowal of the deed, 
and defence of the doctrine, tended to dissolve all the 
bands of civil society ; and even men of honour, who 
detested the example, might deem it just, on a favour- 
able opportunity, to retaliate upon the author. The 
duke, therefore, who neither dared to give, nor could 
pretend to expect, any trust, agreed to all the contriv- 
ances for mutual security which were proposed by the 
ministers of the dauphin. The two princes came to 
Montereau : the duke lodged in the castle the dauphin 
in the town, which was divided from the castle by the 
river Yonne : the bridge between them was chosen for 
the place of interview : two high rails were drawn 
across the bridge : the gates on each side were guarded, 
one by the officers of the dauphin, the other by those of 
the duke : the princes were to enter into the intermediate 
space by the opposite gates, accompanied each by ten 
persons ; and, with all these marks of diffidence, to con- 
ciliate their mutual friendship. But it appeared that no 
precautions are sufficient where laws have no place, and 
where all principles of honour are utterly abandoned. 
Tannegui de Chatel, and others of the dauphin's retainers, 
had been zealous partisans of the late Duke of Orleans ; 
and they determined to seize the opportunity of reveng- 
ing on the assassin the murder of that prince : they no Assassina- 
sooner entered the rails, than they drew their swords and SS^f of 
attacked the Duke of Burgundy : his friends were asto- Burgundy. 

* Eymer, vol. ix. p. 776. St. Remi, chap. 95. 



316 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, nished, and thought not of making any defence ; and all 
^ ^_, of them either shared his fate, or were taken prisoners 
i4i9. by the retinue of the dauphin u . 

The extreme youth of this prince made it doubtful 
whether he had been admitted into the secret of the 
conspiracy : but as the deed was committed under his 
eye, by his most intimate friends, who still retained their 
connexions with him, the blame of the action, which was 
certainly more imprudent than criminal, fell entirely 
upon him. The whole state of affairs was every where 
changed by this unexpected incident. The city of Paris, 
passionately devoted to the family of Burgundy, broke 
out into the highest fury against the dauphin. The 
court of King Charles entered from interest into the 
same views ; and as all the ministers of that monarch 
had owed their preferment to the late duke, and fore- 
saw their downfall if the dauphin should recover posses- 
sion of his father's person, they were concerned to prevent, 
by any means, the success of his enterprise. The queen, 
persevering in her unnatural animosity against her son, 
increased the general flame, and inspired into the king, 
as far as he was susceptible of any sentiment, the same 
prejudices by which she herself had long been actuated. 
But above all, Philip, Count of Charolois, now Duke of 
Burgundy, thought himself bound, by every tie of honour 
and of duty, to revenge the murder of his father, and to 
prosecute the assassin to the utmost extremity. And in 
this general transport of rage, every consideration of 
national and family interest was buried in oblivion by all 
parties : the subjection to a foreign enemy, the expulsion 
of the lawful heir, the slavery of the kingdom, appeared 
but small evils if they led to the gratification of the pre- 
sent passion. 

The King of England had, before the death of the 
Duke of Burgundy, profited extremely by the distrac- 
tions of France, and was daily making a considerable 
progress in Normandy. He had taken Kou'en after an 
obstinate siege w : he had made himself master of Pon- 
toise and Gisors : he even threatened Paris, and, by the 
terror of his arms, had obliged the court to remove 

u St. Remi, chap. 97. Monstrelet, chap. 211. 
w T. Livii p. 69. Monstrelet, chap. 201. 



HENRY V. 317 

to Troye : and in the midst of his successes, he was CHAP. 
agreeably surprised to find his enemies, instead of com-^ ^_, 
bining against him for their mutual defence, disposed to 1420 
rush into his arms, and to make him the instrument of 
their vengeance upon each other. A league was im- 
mediately concluded at Arras between him and the 
Duke of Burgundy. This prince, without stipulating 
any thing for himself, except the prosecution of his 
father's murderer, and the marriage of the Duke of Bed- 
ford with his sister, was willing to sacrifice the kingdom 
to Henry's ambition ; and he agreed to every demand 
made by that monarch. In order to finish this astonish- 
ing treaty, which was to transfer the crown of France to 
a stranger, Henry went to Troye, accompanied by his 
brothers, the Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester, and was 
there met by the Duke of Burgundy. The imbecility 
into which Charles had fallen made him incapable of 
seeing any thing but through the eyes of those who 
attended him ; as they, on their part, saw every thing 
through the medium of their passions. The treaty, being 
already concerted among the parties, was immediately 
drawn, and signed, and ratified : Henry's will seemed to 
be a law throughout the whole negotiation: nothing 
was attended to but his advantages. 

The principal articles of the treaty were, that Henry Treaty of 
should espouse the Princess Catherine : that King roye ' 
Charles, during his lifetime, should enjoy the title and 
dignity of King of France : that Henry should be de- 
clared and acknowledged heir of the monarchy, and be 
intrusted with the present administration of the govern- 
ment : that that kingdom should pass to his heirs general : 
that France and England should for ever be united un- 
der one king ; but should still retain their several usages, 
customs, and privileges: that all the princes, peers, 
vassals, and communities of France should swear, that 
they would both adhere to the future succession of 
Henry, and pay him present obedience as regent : that 
this prince should unite his arms to those of King 
Charles and the Duke of Burgundy, in order to subdue 
the adherents of Charles the pretended dauphin; and 
that these three princes should make no peace or 

27* 



318 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, truce with him but by common consent and agree- 

vJ^L/ mentx - 

""7i2o~* Such was the tenor of this famous treaty ; a treaty 
which, as nothing but the most violent animosity could 
dictate it, so nothing but the power of the sword could 
carry into execution. It is hard to say whether its 
consequences, had it taken effect, would have proved 
more pernicious to England or to France. It must 
have reduced the former kingdom to the rank of a pro- 
vince : it would have entirely disjointed the succession 
of the latter, and have brought on the destruction of 
every descendant of the royal family ; as the houses of 
Orleans, Anjou, Alen^on, Britany, Bourbon, and of 
Burgundy itself, whose titles were preferable to that of 
the English princes, would, on that account, have been 
exposed to perpetual jealousy and persecution from the 
sovereign. There was even a palpable deficiency in 
Henry's claim which no art could palliate. For besides 
the insuperable objections to which Edward Ill's pre- 
tensions were exposed, he was not heir to that monarch : 
if female succession were admitted, the right had de- 
volved on the House of Mortimer : allowing that Richard 
H. was a tyrant, and that Henry IV.'s merits in deposing 
him were so great towards the English as to justify that 
nation in placing him on the throne : Richard had nowise 
offended France, and his rival had merited nothing of 
that kingdom : it could not possibly be pretended that 
the crown of France was become an appendage to that 
of England ; and that a prince who by any means got 
possession of the latter, was, without farther question, 
entitled to the former. So that, on the whole, it must 
be allowed that Henry's claim to France was, if pos- 
sible, still more unintelligible than the title by which 
his father had mounted the throne of England. 

But though all these considerations were overlooked 
amidst the hurry of passion by which the courts of 
France and Burgundy were actuated, they would ne- 
cessarily revive during times of more tranquillity ; and 
it behoved Henry to push his present advantages, and 

Marriage allow men no leisure for reason or reflection. In a 

of the 

.king. x Kymer, vol. ix. p. 895. St. Remi, chap. 101. Monstrelet, chap. 223. 



HENRY V. 319 

few days after, lie espoused the Princess Catherine : he CHAP. 
carried his father-in-law to Paris, and put himself in^; _, 
possession of that capital: he obtained from the Par- 1420 
liament and the three estates a ratification of the treaty 
of Troye : he supported the Duke of Burgundy in pro- 
curing a sentence against the murderers of his father : 
and he immediately turned his arms with success against 
the adherents of the dauphin, who, as soon as he heard 
of the treaty of Troye, took on him the style and au- 
thority of regent, and appealed to God and his sword for 
the maintenance of his title. 

The first place that Henry subdued was Sens, which 
opened its gates after a slight resistance. With the 
same facility he made himself master of Montereau. The 
defence of Melun was more obstinate Barbasan, the 
governor, held out for the space of four months against 
the besiegers ; and it was famine alone which obliged 
him to capitulate. Henry stipulated to spare the lives 
of all the garrison, except such as were accomplices in 
the murder of the Duke of Burgundy ; and as Barbasan 
himself was suspected to be of the number, his punish- 
ment was demanded by Philip ; but the king had the 
generosity to intercede for him, and to prevent his exe- 
cution 7 . 

The necessity of providing supplies, both of men and U2L 
money, obliged Henry to go over to England ; and he 
left the Duke of Exeter, his uncle, governor of Paris 
during his absence. The authority which naturally 
attends success procured from the English Parliament 
a subsidy of a fifteenth ; but if we may judge by the 
scantiness of the supply, the nation was nowise sanguine 
on their king's victories ; and in proportion as the pro- 
spect of their union with France became nearer, they 
began to open their eyes, and to see the dangerous con- 
sequences with whicn that event must necessarily be 
attended. It was fortunate for Henry, that he had other 
resources besides pecuniary supplies from his native sub- 
jects. The provinces which he had already conquered 
maintained his troops ; and the hopes of farther advan- 
tages allured to his standard all men of ambitious spirits 
in England, who desired to signalize themselves by arms. 

y Hollingshed, p. 577. 



320 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. He levied a new army of twenty-four thousand archers and 

^ _,four thousand horsemen 2 , and marched them to Dover, 

1421 the place of rendezvous. Every thing had remained in 

tranquillity at Paris under the Duke of Exeter ; but 

there had happened, in another quarter of the kingdom, 

a misfortune which hastened the king's embarkation. 

The detention of the young King of Scots in England 
had hitherto proved advantageous to Henry; and, by 
keeping the regent in awe, had preserved, during the 
whole course of the French war, the northern frontier in 
tranquillity. But when intelligence arrived in Scotland 
of the progress made by Henry, and the near prospect of 
his succession to the crown of France, the nation was 
alarmed, and foresaw their own inevitable ruin, if the 
subjection of their ally left them to combat alone a vic- 
torious enemy, who was already so much superior in 
power and riches. The regent entered into the same 
views ; and though he declined an open rupture with 
England, he permitted a body of seven thousand Scotch, 
under the command of the Earl of Buchan, his second 
son, to be transported into France for the service of the 
dauphin. To render this aid ineffectual, Henry had, in 
his former expedition, carried over the King of Scots, 
whom he obliged to send orders to his countrymen to 
leave the French service ; but the Scottish general re- 
plied that he would obey no commands which came from 
a king in captivity, and that a prince while in the hands 
of his enemy, was nowise entitled to authority. These 
troops, therefore, continued still to act under the Earl 
of Buchan ; and were employed by the dauphin to op- 
pose the progress of the Duke of Clarence in Anjou. 
The two armies encountered at Bauge : the English were 
defeated ; the duke himself was slain by Sir Allen Swin- 
ton, a Scotch knight, who commanded a company of 
men at arms ; and the Earls of Somerset a , Dorset, and 
Huntingdon, were taken prisoners b . This was the first 
action that turned the tide of success against the Eng- 
lish; and the dauphin, that he might both attach the 

2 Monstrelet, chap. 242. 

a His name was John, and he was afterwards created Duke of Somerset. He was 
grandson of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. The Earl of Dorset was brother 
to Somerset, and succeeded him in that title. 

b St. Eemi, chap. 110. Monstrelet, chap. 239. Hall, fol. 76. 



HENRY V. 321 

Scotch to his service, and reward the valour and conduct CHAP. 
of the Earl of Buchan, honoured that nobleman with the ^J ^ 
office of constable. U21 

But the arrival of the King of England with so con- 
siderable an army was more than sufficient to repair this 
loss. Henry was received at Paris with great expres- 
sions of joy, so obstinate were the prejudices of the people; 
and he immediately conducted his army to Chartres, 
which had long been besieged by the dauphin. That 
prince raised the siege on the approach of the English ; 
and being resolved to decline a battle, he retired with 
his army c . Henry made himself master of Dreux with- 
out a blow : he laid siege to Meaux at the solicitation of 
the Parisians, who were much incommoded by the garrison 
of that place. This enterprise employed the English 
arms during the space of eight months : the bastard of 
Vaurus, governor of Meaux, distinguished himself by an 
obstinate defence, but was at last obliged to surrender 
at discretion. The cruelty of this officer was equal to 
his bravery: he was accustomed to hang, without dis- 
tinction, all the English and Burgundians who fell into 
his hands; and Henry, in revenge of his barbarity, 
ordered him immediately to be hanged on the same 
tree which he had made the instrument of his inhuman 
executions d . 

This success was followed by the surrender of many 
other places in the neighbourhood of Paris, which held 
for the dauphin: that prince was chased beyond the 
Loire, and he almost totally abandoned all the northern 
provinces ; he was even pursued into the south by the 
united arms of the English and Burgundians, and 
threatened with total destruction. Notwithstanding the 
bravery and fidelity of his captains, he saw himself un- 
equal to his enemies in the field ; and found it necessary 
to temporize, and to avoid all hazardous actions, with a 
rival who had gained so much the ascendant over him. 
And to crown all the other prosperities of Henry, his 
queen was delivered of a son, who was called by his 
father's name, and whose birth was celebrated by rejoic- 
ings no less pompous, and no less sincere, at Paris than 

St. Kemi, chap. 3. d Ryraer, vol. x. p. 212. T. Livii p. 92, 93. 

St. Remi, chap. 116. Monstrelet, chap. 260. 



322 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, at London. The infant prince seemed to be universally 
ij ^^ re g ai> ded as the future heir of both monarchies. 
~^~~ But the glory of Henry, when it had nearly reached 
Death, ' the summit, was stopped short by the hand of nature, 
and all his mighty projects vanished into smoke. He 
was seized with a fistula, a malady which the surgeons 
at that time had not skill enough to cure ; and he v as 
at last sensible that his distemper was mortal, and that 
his end was approaching. He sent for his brother the 
Duke of Bedford, the Earl of Warwick, and a few nobl> 
men more, whom he had honoured with his friendship, 
and he delivered to them in great tranquillity, his last 
will with regard to the government of his kingdom and 
family. He entreated them to continue towards his 
infant son the same fidelity and attachment which they 
had always professed to himself during his lifetime, and 
which had been cemented by so many mutual good 
offices. He expressed his indifference on the approach 
of death ; and though he regretted that he must leave 
unfinished a work so happily begun, he declared himself 
confident, that the final acquisition of France would be 
the effect of their prudence and valour. He left the 
regency of that kingdom to his elder brother the Duke 
of Bedford ; that of England to his younger, the Duke 
of Gloucester ; and the care of his son's person to the 
Earl of Warwick. He recommended to all of them a 
great attention to maintain the friendship of the Duke 
of Burgundy ; and advised them never to give liberty to 
the French princes taken at Azincour, till his son were 
of age, and could himself hold the reins of government. 
And he conjured them, if the success of their arms should 
not enable them to place young Henry on the throne 
of France, never, at least, to make peace with that king- 
dom, unless the enemy, by the cession of Normandy, 
and its annexation to the crown of England, made com- 
pensation for all the hazard and expense of his enter- 
prise 6 . 

He next applied himself to his devotions, and ordered 
his chaplain to recite the seven penitential psalms. 
When that passage of the fifty-first psalm was read, Build 
thou the walls of Jerusalem, he interrupted the chaplain, 

Monstrelet, chap. 265. Hall, fol. 80. 



HENRY V. 323 

and declared his serious intention, after he should have CHAP. 
fully subdued France, to conduct a crusade against the ^_ _, 
infidels, and recover possession of the Holy Land f . So ]422 
ingenious are men in deceiving themselves, that Henry 
forgot, in those moments, all the blood spilt by his am- 
bition ; and received comfort from this late and feeble 
resolve, which, as the mode of these enterprises was now 
past, he certainly would never have carried into execu- 
tion. He expired in the thirty-fourth year of his age, 3ist Aug. 
and the tenth of his reign. 

This prince possessed many eminent virtues; and if ^te^of 
we give indulgence to ambition in a monarch, or rank it, the king. 
as the vulgar are inclined to do, among his virtues, they 
were unstained by any considerable blemish. His abili- 
ties appeared equally in the cabinet and in the field : the 
boldness of his enterprises was no less remarkable than 
his personal valour in conducting them. He had the 
talent of attaching his friends by affability, and of gain- 
ing his enemies by address and clemency. The English, 
dazzled by the lustre of his character still more than by 
that of his victories, were reconciled to the defects in his 
title : the French almost forgot that he was an enemy : 
and his care in maintaining justice in his civil adminis- 
tration, and preserving discipline in his armies, made 
some amends to both nations for the calamities insepa- 
rable from those wars in which his short reign was almost 
entirely occupied. That he could forgive the Earl of 
March, who had a better title to the crown than himself, 
is a sure indication of his magnanimity; and that the 
earl relied so entirely on his friendship, is no less a proof 
of his established character for candour and sincerity. 
There remain in history few instances of such mutual 
trust ; and still fewer where neither party found reason 
to repent it. 

The exterior figure of this great prince, as well as his 
deportment, was engaging. His stature was somewhat 
above the middle size ; his countenance beautiful ; his 
limbs genteel and slender, but full of vigour; and he 
excelled in all warlike and manly exercises g . He left, 
by his queen, Catherine of France, only one son, not full 
nine months old; whose misfortunes, in the course of 

f St. Remi, chap. 118. Monstrelefc, chap. 265. g T. Livii p. 4. 



324 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, his life, surpassed all the glories and successes of his 
,J^_, father. 

1422 In less than two months after Henry's death, Charles 
VI. of France, his father-in-law, terminated his unhappy 
life. He had, for several years, possessed only the ap- 
pearance of royal authority ; yet was this mere appear- 
ance of considerable advantage to the English, and divided 
the duty and affections of the French between them and 
the dauphin. This prince was proclaimed and crowned 
King of France at Poictiers, by the name of Charles VII. 
Eheims, the place where this ceremony is usually per- 
formed, was at that time in the hands of his enemies. 

Catherine of France, Henry's widow, married, soon 
after his death, a Welsh gentleman, Sir Owen Tudor, 
said to be descended from the ancient princes of that 
country : she bore him two sons, Edmund and Jasper, 
of whom the eldest was created Earl of Richmond, the 
second Earl of Pembroke. The family of Tudor, first 
raised to distinction by this alliance, mounted afterwards 
the throne of England. 

Misceiia- The long schism, which had divided the Latin church 
transac- for near forty years, was finally terminated in this reign 
tions. by faQ council of Constance, which deposed the pope, 
John XXIII., for his crimes, and elected Martin V. in 
his place, who was acknowledged by almost all the king- 
doms of Europe. This great and unusual act of autho- 
rity in the council gave the Roman pontiffs ever after a 
mortal antipathy to those assemblies. The same jealousy 
which had long prevailed in most European countries, 
between ,the civil aristocracy and monarchy, now also 
took place between these powers in the ecclesiastical 
body. But the great separation of the bishops in the 
several states, and the difficulty of assembling them, 
gave the pope a mighty advantage, and made it more 
easy for him to centre all the powers of the hierarchy in 
his own person. The cruelty and treachery which 
attended the punishment of John Huss and Jerome of 
Prague, the unhappy disciples of Wickliffe, who, in 
violation of a safe-conduct, were burned alive for their 
errors by the council of Constance, prove this melancholy 
truth, that toleration is none of the virtues of priests in 
any form of ecclesiastical government. But as the 



HENRY V. 325 

English nation had little or no concern in these transac- CHAP. 
tions, we are here the more concise in relating them. ^ ^ 

The first commission of array which we meet with was 1422 
issued in this reign h . The military part of the feudal 
system, which was the most essential circumstance of it, 
was entirely dissolved, and could no longer serve for the 
defence of the kingdom. Henry, therefore, when he 
went to France in 141 5, empowered certain commis- 
sioners to take in each county a review of all the free- 
men able to bear arms, to divide them into companies, 
and to keep them in readiness for resisting an enemy. 
This was the era when the feudal militia in England 
gave place to one which was, perhaps, still less orderly 
and regular. 

We have an authentic and exact account of the ordi- 
nary revenue of the crown during this reign ; and it 
amounts only to fifty-five thousand seven hundred and 
fourteen pounds, ten shillings, and ten pence a year 1 . 
This is nearly the same with the revenue of Henry III., 
and the kings of England had neither become much 
richer nor poorer in the course of so many years. The 
ordinary expense of the government amounted to forty- 
two thousand five hundred and seven pounds, sixteen 
shillings, and ten pence ; so that the king had a surplus 
only of thirteen thousand two hundred and six pounds, 
fourteen shillings, for the support of his household, for 
his wardrobe, for the expense of embassies, and other 
articles. This sum was nowise sufficient : he was there- 
fore obliged to have frequent recourse to parliamentary 
supplies, and was thus, even in time of peace, not alto- 
gether independent of his people. But wars were at- 
tended with a great expense, which neither the prince's 
ordinary revenue, nor the extraordinary supplies, were 
able to bear ; and the sovereign was always reduced to 
many miserable shifts, in order to make any tolerable 
figure in them. He commonly borrowed money from 
all quarters ; he pawned his jewels, and sometimes the 
crown itself k ; he ran in arrears to his army; and he 
was often obliged, notwithstanding all these expedients, 
to stop in the midst of his career of victory, and to grant 

h Rymer, vol. ix. p. 254, 255. i Ibid. vol. x. p. 113. 

k Ibid. p. 190. 

VOL. II. 28 



326 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, truces to the enemy. The high pay which was given to 
v*J !^_; soldiers agreed very ill with this low income. All the 
1422 extraordinary supplies granted by Parliament to Henry 
during the course of his reign were only seven tenths 
and fifteenths, about two hundred and three thousand 
pounds 1 . It is easy to compute how soon this money 
must be exhausted by armies of twenty-four thousand 
archers, and six thousand horse ; when each archer had 
sixpence a day m , and each horseman two shillings. The 
most splendid successes proved commonly fruitless, 
when supported by so poor a revenue ; and the debts 
and difficulties which the king thereby incurred made 
him pay dear for his victories. The civil administra- 
tion likewise, even in time of peace, could never be very 
regular, where the government was so ill enabled to sup- 
port itself. Henry, till within a year of his death, owed 
debts which he had contracted when Prince of Wales n . 
It was in vain that the Parliament pretended to restrain 
him from arbitrary practices, when he was reduced to 
such necessities. Though the right of levying purvey- 
ance, for instance, had been expressly guarded against 
by the great charter itself, and was frequently complained 
of by the Commons, it was found absolutely impractica- 
ble to abolish it ; and the Parliament at length, submitting 
to it as a legal prerogative, contented themselves with 
enacting laws to limit and confine it. The Duke of 
Gloucester, in the reign of Eichard II., possessed a re- 
venue of sixty thousand crowns, (about thirty thousand 
pounds a year of our present money,) as we learn from 
Froissart , and was, consequently, richer than the king 
himself, if all circumstances be duly considered. 

It is remarkable that the city of Calais alone was an 
annual expense to the crown of nineteen thousand one 
hundred and nineteen pounds p that is, above one third 
of the common charge of the government in time of 
peace. This fortress was of no use to the defence of 
England, and only gave that kingdom an inlet to annoy 

1 Parliamentary History, vol. ii. p. 168. 

m It appears from many passages of Rymer, particularly vol. ix. p. 258, that 
the king paid twenty marks a year for an archer, which is a good deal above six- 
pence a day. The price had risen, as is natural, by raising the denomination of 
money. n Rymer, vol. x. p. 114. o Liv. iv. chap. 86. 

P Rymer, vol. x. p. 113. 



HENRY V. 327 

France. Ireland cost two thousand pounds a year, over CHAP. 
and above its own revenue, which was certainly very low. 
Every thing conspires to give us a very mean idea of 
the state of Europe in those ages. 

From the most early times, till the reign of Edward 
III., the denomination of money had never been altered : 
a pound sterling was still a pound troy ; that is, about 
three pounds of our present money. That conqueror was 
the first that innovated in this important article. In the 
twentieth of his reign he coined twenty-two shillings from 
a pound troy; in his twenty-seventh year he coined 
twenty five shillings. But Henry V., who was also a 
conqueror, raised still farther the denomination, and 
coined thirty shillings from a pound troy q : his revenue, 
therefore, must have been about one hundred and ten 
thousand pounds of our present money; and, by the 
cheapness of provisions, was equivalent to above three 
hundred and thirty thousand pounds. 

None of the princes of the house of Lancaster ven- 
tured to impose taxes without consent of Parliament : 
their doubtful or bad title became so far of advantage 
to the constitution. The rule was then fixed, and could 
not safely be broken afterwards, even by more absolute 
princes. 

<i Fleetwood's Chronicon Preciosum, p. 52. 



328 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

m 

CHAPTER XX. 
HENRY VI. 

GOVERNMENT DURING THE MINORITY. STATE OF FRANCE. MILITARY OPE- 
RATIONS. BATTLE OF VERNEUIL. SIEGE OF ORLEANS. THE MAID OF 
ORLEANS. THE SIEGE OF ORLEANS RAISED. THE KING OF FRANCE 
CROWNED AT EHEIMS. PRUDENCE OF THE DuKE OF BEDFORD. EXECU- 
TION OF THE MAID OF ORLEANS. DEFECTION OF THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY. 
DEATH OF THE DUKE OF BEDFORD. DECLINE OF THE ENGLISH IN 
FRANCE. TRUCE WITH FRANCE. MARRIAGE OF THE KING WITH MAR- 
GARET OF ANJOU. MURDER OF THE DUKE OF GLOUCESTER. STATE OF 
FRANCE. KENEWAL OF THE WAR WITH FRANCE. THE ENGLISH EXPEL- 
LED FRANCE. 

C xix R DURING the reigns of the Lancastrian princes, the au- 
v^l^^/thority of Parliament seems to have been more con- 
U22. firmed, and the privileges of the people more regarded, 
mentor- ^ an during an j former period ; and the two preceding 
ing the kings, though men of great spirit and abilities, abstained 
minority. f rom suc } 1 exertions of prerogative, as even weak princes, 
whose title was undisputed, were tempted to think they 
might venture upon with impunity. The long minority, 
of which there was now the prospect, encouraged still 
farther the Lords and Commons to extend their in- 
fluence, and, without paying much regard to the verbal 
destination of Henry V., they assumed the power of 
giving a new arrangement to the whole administration. 
They declined altogether the name of Regeiti, with re- 
gard to England : they appointed the Duke of Bedford 
Protector or Guardian of that kingdom, a title which 
they supposed to imply less authority : they invested the 
Duke of Gloucester with the same dignity during the 
absence of his elder brother a : and, in order to limit the 
power of both these princes, they appointed a council, 
without whose advice and approbation no measure of 
importance could be determined b . The person and edu- 
cation of the infant prince were committed to Henry 
Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, his great uncle, and the 
legitimated son of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster ; 
a prelate who, as his family could never have any pre- 

a Rymer, vol. x. p. 261. Cotton, p. 564. t> Cotton, p. 564. 



HENRY VI. 329 

tensions to the crown, might safely, they thought, be in- CHAP. 
trusted with that important charge . The two princes, .^^^ 
the Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester, who seemed in- U29 
jured by this plan of government, yet, being persons of 
great integrity and honour, acquiesced in any appoint- 
ment which tended to give security to the public ; and 
as the wars in France appeared to be the object of 
greatest moment, they avoided every dispute which 
might throw an obstacle in the way of foreign con- 
quests. 

When the state of affairs between the English 
French kings was considered with a superficial eye, every 
advantage seemed to be on the side of the former ; and 
the total expulsion of Charles appeared to be an event 
which might naturally be expected from the superior 
power of his competitor. Though Henry was yet in his 
infancy, the administration was devolved on the Duke of 
Bedford, the most accomplished prince of his age ; whose 
experience, prudence, valour, and generosity, qualified 
him for his high office, and enabled him both to main- 
tain union among his friends, and to gain the confidence 
of his enemies. The whole power of England was at 
his command : he was at the head of armies inured 
to victory : he was seconded by the most renowned 
generals of the age, the Earls of Somerset, Warwick, 
Salisbury, Suffolk, and Arundel, Sir John Talbot, and 
Sir John FastolfFe : and besides Guienne, the ancient 
inheritance of England, he was master of the capital, 
and of almost all the northern provinces, which were 
well enabled to furnish him with supplies both of men 
and money, and to assist and support his English forces. 

But Charles, notwithstanding the present inferiority 
of his power, possessed some advantages, derived partly 
from his situation, partly from his personal character, 
which promised him success, and served first to control, 
then to overbalance, the superior force and opulence of 
his enemies. He was the true and undoubted heir ol 
the monarchy : all Frenchmen, who knew the interests 
or desired the independence of their country, turned 
their eyes towards him as its sole resource : the exclusion 
given him by the imbecility of his father, and the forced 

c Hall, fol. 83. Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 27. 

28* 



330 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, or precipitate consent of the states, had plainly no 
xx ' validity : that spirit of faction which had blinded the 
"^^ people, could not long hold them in so gross a delusion : 
their national and inveterate hatred against the English, 
the authors .of all their calamities, must soon revive, and 
inspire them with indignation at bending their necks 
under the yoke of that hostile people ; great nobles and 
princes, accustomed to maintain an independence against 
their native sovereigns, would never endure a subjection 
to strangers : and though most of the princes of the 
blood were, since the fatal battle of Azincour, detained 
prisoners in England, the inhabitants of their demesnes, 
their friends, their vassals, all declared a zealous attach- 
ment to the king, and exerted themselves in resisting 
the violence of foreign invaders. 

Charles himself, though only in his twentieth year, 
was of a character well calculated to become the object 
of these benevolent sentiments ; and, perhaps, from the 
favour which naturally attends youth, was the more likely, 
on account of his tender age, to acquire the good-will of 
his native subjects. He was a prince of the most friendly 
and benign disposition, of easy and familiar manners, 
and of a just and sound, though not a very vigorous un- 
derstanding. Sincere, generous, affable, he engaged, 
from affection, the services of his followers, even while 
his low fortunes might make it their interest to desert 
him ; and the lenity of his temper could pardon in them 
those sallies of discontent to which princes in his situa- 
tion are so frequently exposed. The love of pleasure 
often seduced him into indolence ; but, amidst all his 
irregularities, the goodness of his heart still shone forth ; 
and, by exerting at intervals his courage and activity, he 
proved, that his general remissness proceeded not from 
the want, either of a just spirit of ambition, or of personal 
valour. 

Though the virtues of this amiable prince lay some time 
in obscurity, the Duke of Bedford knew that his title 
alone made him formidable, and that every foreign assist- 
ance would be requisite, ere an English regent could hope 
to complete the conquest of France ; an enterprise which, 
however it might seem to be much advanced, was 
still exposed to many and great difficulties. The chief 



HENRY VI. 331 

circumstance which had procured to the English all their CHAP. 
present advantages was the resentment of the Duke of^^^ 
Burgundy against Charles, and as that prince seemed ]402 
intent rather on gratifying his passion than consulting his 
interests, it was the more easy for the regent, by demon- 
strations of respect and confidence, to retain him in the 
alliance of England. He bent therefore all his endea- 
vours to that purpose : he gave the duke every proof of 
friendship and regard : he even offered him the regency 
of France, which Philip declined : and that he might 
corroborate national connexions by private ties, he con- 
cluded his own marriage with the Princess of Burgundy, 
which had been stipulated by the treaty of Arras. 

Being sensible, that, next to the alliance of Burgundy, 1423. 
the friendship of the Duke of Britany was of the greatest 
importance towards forwarding the English conquests ; 
and that, as the provinces of France, already subdued, 
lay between the dominions of these two princes, he could 
never hope for any security, without preserving his con- 
nexions with them : he was very intent on strengthening 
himself also from that quarter. The Duke of Britany, 
having received many just reasons of displeasure from 
the ministers of Charles, had already acceded to the 
treaty of Troye, and had, with other vassals of the crown, 
done homage to Henry V. in quality of heir to the 
kingdom : but as the regent knew, that the duke was 
much governed by his brother, the Count of Richemont, 
he endeavoured to fix his friendship by paying court, and 
doing services, to this haughty and ambitious prince. 

Arthur, Count of Richemont, had been taken prisoner 
at the battle of Azincour, had been treated with great 
indulgence by the late king, and had even been per- 
mitted on his parole to take a journey into Britany, 
where the state of affairs required his presence. The 
death of that victorious monarch happened before Riche- 
mont's return; and this prince pretended, that, as his i7th April. 
word was given personally to Henry V., he was not 
bound to fulfil it towards his son and successor ; a chi- 
cane which ,the regent, as he could not force him to 
compliance, deemed it prudent to overlook. An inter- 
view was settled at Amiens between the Dukes of Bed- 
ford, Burgundy, and Britany, at which the Count of 



332 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Richemont was also present d . The alliance was re- 

^ _,newed between these princes: and the regent persuaded 

U23 Philip to give in marriage to Richemont his eldest sister, 

widow of the deceased dauphin, Lewis, the elder brother 

of Charles. Thus Arthur was connected both with the 

regent and the Duke of Burgundy, and seemed engaged 

by interest to prosecute the same object, in forwarding 

the success of the English arms. 

While the vigilance of the Duke of Bedford was em- 
ployed in gaining or confirming these allies, whose 
vicinity rendered them so important, he did not over- 
look the state of more remote countries. The Duke of 
Albany, Regent of Scotland, had died ; and his power 
had devolved on Murdac, his son, a prince of a weak 
understanding and indolent disposition who, far from- 
possessing the talents requisite for the government of 
that fierce people, was not even able to maintain authority 
in his own family, or restrain the petulance and inso- 
lence of his sons. The ardour of the Scots to serve in 
France, where Charles treated them with great honour 
and distinction, and where the regent's brother enjoyed 
the dignity of constable, broke out afresh under this 
feeble administration : new succours daily came over, 
and filled the armies of the French king : the Earl of 
Douglas conducted a reinforcement of five thousand 
men to his assistance : and it was justly to be dreaded 
that the Scots, by commencing open hostilities in the 
north, would occasion a diversion still more considerable 
of the English power, and would ease Charles, in part, 
of that load by which he was at present so grievously 
oppressed. The Duke of Bedford, therefore, persuaded 
the English council to form an alliance with James their 
prisoner ; to free that prince from his long captivity ; 
and to connect him with England by marrying him to 
a daughter of the Earl of Somerset, and cousin of the 
young king 6 . As the Scottish regent, tired of his pre- 
sent dignity, which he was not able to support, was now 
become entirely sincere in his applications for James's 
liberty, the treaty was soon concluded ; a ransom of 
forty thousand pounds was stipulated f ; and the King 

d Hall, fol. 84. Monstrelet, vol. i. p. 4. Stowe, p. 364. 
e Hall, fol. 86. Stowe, p. 364. Grafton, p. 501. 
f Kymer, vol. x. p. 299, 300. 326. 



HENRY VI. 333 

of Scots was restored to the throne of his ancestors, and CHAP. 
proved, in his short reign, one of the most illustrious ^ XX _, 
princes that had ever governed that kingdom. He was^^ 23 
murdered, in 1437, by his traitorous kinsman the Earl 
of Athole. His affections inclined to the side of France ; 
but the English had never reason, during his lifetime, to 
complain of any breach of the neutrality by Scotland. 

But the regent was not so much employed in these Military 
political negotiations as to neglect the operations of^ r s a " 
war, from which alone he could hope to succeed in ex- 
pelling the French monarch. Though the chief seat 
of Charles's power lay in the southern provinces, be- 
yond the Loire, his partisans were possessed of some 
fortresses in the northern, and even in the neighbour- 
hood of Paris ; and it behoved the Duke of Bedford 
first to clear these countries from the enemy, before he 
could think of attempting more distant conquests. The 
castle of Dorsoy was taken, after a siege of six weeks : 
that of Noyelle and the town of Rile, in Picardy, under- 
went the same fate : Pont sur Seine, Yertus, Montaigu, 
were subjected by the British arms : and a more con- 
siderable advantage was soon after gained by the united 
forces of England and Burgundy. John Stuart, Con- 
stable of Scotland, and the Lord of Estissac, had formed 
the siege of Crevant in Burgundy : the Earls of Salis- 
bury and Suffolk, with the Count of Toulongeon, were 
sent to its relief: a fierce and well-disputed action en- 
sued : the Scots and French were defeated : the Con- 
stable of Scotland, and the Count of Yentadour, were 
taken prisoners; and above a thousand men, among 
whom was Sir William Hamilton, were left on the field 
of battle 8 . The taking of Gaillon upon the Seine, and 
of La Charite upon the Loire, was the fruit of this victory : 
and as this latter place opened an entrance into the 
southern provinces, the acquisition of it appeared on that 
account of the greater importance to the Duke of Bed- 
ford, and seemed to promise a successful issue to the war. 

The more Charles was threatened with an invasion in 1424 - 
those provinces which adhered to him, the more necessary 
it became that he should retain possession of every fort- 
ress which he still held within the quarters of the enemy. 

8 Hall, fol. 85. Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 8. Hollingshed, p. 586. Grafton, p. 500. 



334 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. The Duke of Bedford had besieged in person, during the 
space of three months., the town of Yvri in Normandy ; 
^^^ and the brave governor, unable to make any longer de- 
fence, was obliged to capitulate ; and he agreed to sur- 
render the town, if, before a certain term, no relief ar- 
rived. Charles, informed of these conditions, determined 
to make an attempt for saving the place. He collected 
with some difficulty, an army of fourteen thousand men, 
of whom one half were Scots ; and he sent them thither 
under the command of the Earl of Buchan, Constable of 
France ; who was attended by the Earl of Douglas, his 
countryman, the Duke of Alen^on, the Mareschal de la 
Fayette, the Count of Aumale, and the Viscount of Nar- 
bonne. When the constable arrived within a few leagues 
of Yvri, he found that he was come too late, and that 
the place was already surrendered. He immediately 
turned to the left, and sat down before Verneuil, which 
the inhabitants, in spite of the garrison, delivered up to 
him h . Buchan might now have returned in safety, 
and with the glory of making an acquisition no less 
important than the place which he was sent to relieve : 
but hearing of Bedford's approach, he called a council 
of war, in order to deliberate concerning the conduct 
which he should hold in this emergence. The wiser 
part of the council declared for a retreat; and repre- 
sented that all the past misfortunes of the French had 
proceeded from their rashness in giving battle when no 
necessity obliged them ; that this army was the last 
resource of the king, and the only defence of the few 
provinces which remained to him ; and that every reason 
invited him to embrace cautious measures, which might 
leave time for his subjects to return to a sense of their 
duty, and give leisure for discord to arise among his ene- 
mies, who, being united by no common bond of interest 
or motive of alliance, could not long persevere in their 
animosity against him. All these prudential considera- 
tions were overborne by a vain point of honour, not to 
turn their backs to the enemy ; and they resolved to 
await the arrival of the Duke of Bedford. 

Bat g i 27 f ^^ e num ^ ers were nearly equal in this action ; and as 
VerneiUi. the long continuance of war had introduced discipline, 

fc Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 14. Grafton, p. 504. 



HENRY VI. 335 

which, however imperfect, sufficed to maintain some CHAP. 
appearance of order in such small armies, the battle was 
fierce, and well disputed, and attended with bloodshed on ^^~ 
both sides. The constable drew up his forces under the 
walls of Verneuil, and resolved to abide the attack of the 
enemy: but the impatience of the Viscount of Narbonne, 
who advanced precipitately, and obliged the whole line 
to follow him in some hurry and confusion, was the cause 
of the misfortune which ensued. The English arcners, 
fixing their palisadoes before them, according to their 
usual custom, sent a volley of arrows amidst the thickest 
of the French army- and though beaten from their , 

ground, and obliged to take shelter among the baggage, 
they soon rallied, and continued to do great execution 
upon the enemy. The Duke of Bedford, meanwhile, at 
the head of the men at arms, made impression on the 
French, broke their ranks, chased them off the field, and 
rendered the victory entirely complete and decisive 1 . 
The constable himself perished in battle, as well as the 
Earl of Douglas and his son, the Counts of Aumale, 
Tonnerre, and Yentadour, with many other considerable 
nobility. The Duke of Alen^on, the Mareschal de la 
Fayette, the Lords of Gaucour and Mortemar, were taken 
prisoners. There fell about four thousand of the French, 
and sixteen hundred of the English ; a loss esteemed, at 
that time, so unusual on the side of the victors, that Hie 
Duke of Bedford forbad all rejoicings for his success. 
Verneuil was surrendered next day by capitulation 1 ". 

The condition of the King of France now appeared 
very terrible, and almost desperate. He had lost the 
flower of his army, and the bravest of his nobles in this 
fatal action : he had no resource either for recruiting or 
subsisting his troops: he wanted money, even for his 
personal subsistence ; and though all parade of a court 
was banished, it was with difficulty he could keep a table, 
supplied with the plainest necessaries, for himself and 
his few followers : every day brought him intelligence of 
some loss or misfortune : towns which were bravely de- 
fended were obliged, at last, to surrender for want of 

1 Hall, fol. 88, 89, 90. Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 15. Stowe, p. 365. Hollingshed, 
p. 588. 
k Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 15. 



336 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, relief or supply: he saw his partisans entirely chased 
^_ _, from all the provinces which lay north of the Loire : and 
1424 he expected soon to lose, by the united efforts of his ene- 
mies, all the territories of which he had hitherto con- 
tinued master ; when an incident happened which saved 
him on the brink of ruin, and lost the English such an 
opportunity for completing their conquests as they never 
afterwards were able to recall. 

Jaqueline, Countess of Hainault and Holland, and 
heir of these provinces, had espoused John, Duke of 
Brabant, cousin-german to the Duke of Burgundy ; but 
having made this choice from the usual motives of 
princes, she soon found reason to repent of the unequal 
alliance. She was a princess of a masculine spirit and 
uncommon understanding; the Duke of Brabant was 
of a sickly complexion and weak mind : she was in the 
vigour of her age; he had only reached his fifteenth 
year : these causes had inspired her with such contempt 
for her husband, which soon proceeded to antipathy, 
that she determined to dissolve a marriage, where it is 
probable nothing but the ceremony had as yet intervened. 
The court of Rome was commonly very open to applica- 
tions of this nature, when seconded by power and money; 
but as the princess foresaw great opposition from her 
husband's relations, and was impatient to effect her 
purpose, she made her escape into England, and threw 
herself under the protection of the Duke of Gloucester. 
That prince, with many noble qualities, had the defect 
of being governed by an impetuous temper and vehement 
passions; and he was rashly induced, as well by the 
charms of the countess herself, as by the prospect of 
possessing her rich inheritance, to offer himself to her as 
a husband. Without waiting for a papal dispensation, 
without endeavouring to reconcile the Duke of Burgundy 
to the measure, he entered into a contract of marriage 
with Jaqueline, and immediately attempted to put him- 
self in possession of her dominions. Philip was disgusted 
with so precipitate a conduct : he resented the injury 
done to the Duke of Brabant, his near relation: he 
dreaded to have the English established on all sides of 
him : and he foresaw the consequences which must 
attend the extensive and uncontrolled dominion of that 



HENRY VI. 33' 

nation, if, before the full settlement of their power, they CHAP. 
insulted and injured an ally, to whom they had already XXt 
been so much indebted, and who was still so necessary ^^^ 
for supporting them in their farther progress. He en- 
couraged, therefore, the Duke of Brabant to make resis- 
tance : he engaged many of Jaqueline's subjects to ad- 
here to that prince : he himself marched troops to his 
support : and as the Duke of Gloucester still persevered 
in his purpose, a sharp war was suddenly kindled in the 
Low Countries. The quarrel soon became personal as 
well as political. The English prince wrote to the Duke 
of Burgundy, complaining of the opposition made to his 
pretensions ; and though, in the main, he employed ami- 
cable terms in his letter, he took notice of some false- 
hoods into which, he said, Philip had been betrayed 
during the course of these transactions. This un- 
guarded expression was highly resented : the Duke of 
Burgundy insisted that he should retract it : and mutual 
challenges and defiances passed between them on this 



occasion 1 . 



The Duke of Bedford could easily foresee the bad 
effects of so ill-timed and imprudent a quarrel. All the 
succours which he expected from England, and which 
were so necessary in this critical emergence, were inter- 
cepted by his brother, and employed in Holland and 
Hainault : the forces of the Duke of Burgundy, which 
he also depended on, were diverted by the same wars : 
and besides this double loss, he was in imminent danger 
of alienating for ever that confederate, whose friendship 
was of the utmost importance, and whom the late king 
had enjoined him, with his dying breath, to gratify by 
every mark of regard and attachment. He represented 
all these topics to the Duke of Gloucester : he endea- 
voured to mitigate the resentment of the Duke of Bur- 
gundy : he interposed with his good offices between these 
princes ; but was not successful in any of his endeavours ; 
and he found, that the impetuosity of his brother's 
temper was still the chief obstacle to all accommo- 
dation 111 . For this reason, instead of pushing the victory 
gained at Verneuil, he found himself obliged to take 
a journey into England, and to try, by his counsels 

1 Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 19, 20, 21. m Ibid. p. 18. 

VOL. ii. 29 



338 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and authority, to moderate the measures of the Duke of 
Gloucester. 

There had likewise broken out some differences among 
the English ministry, which had proceeded to great ex- 
tremities, and which required the regent's presence to 
compose them n . The Bishop of Winchester, to whom 
the care of the king's person and education had been 
intrusted, was a prelate of great capacity and experience, 
but of an intriguing and dangerous character; and as 
he aspired to the government of affairs, he had continual 
disputes with his nephew, the protector ; and he gained 
frequent advantages over the vehement and impolitic 
temper of that prince. The Duke of Bedford employed 
H25. the authority of Parliament to reconcile them : and these 
rivals were obliged to promise, before that assembly, that 
they would bury all quarrels in oblivion . Time also 
seemed to open expedients for composing the difference 
with the Duke of Burgundy. The credit of that prince 
had procured a bull from the pope ; by which not only 
Jaqueline's contract with the Duke of Gloucester was 
annulled, but it was also declared, that, even in case of 
the Duke of Brabant's death, it should never be lawful 
for her to espouse the English prince. Humphrey, de- 
spairing of success, married another lady of inferior rank, 
who had lived some time with him as his mistress p . 
The Duke of Brabant died; and his widow, before she 
could recover possession of her dominions, was obliged 
to declare the Duke of Burgundy her heir, in case she 
should die without issue, and to promise never to marry 
without his consent. But though the affair was thus 
terminated to the satisfaction of Philip, it left a disagree- 
able impression on his mind : it excited an extreme jea- 
lousy of the English, and opened his eyes to his true in- 
terests : and as nothing but his animosity against Charles 
had engaged him in alliance with them, it counter- 
balanced that passion by another of the same kind, 
which, in the end, became prevalent, and brought him 
back by degrees, to his natural connexions with his 
family and his native country. 

n Stowe, p. 368. Hollingshed, p. 590. 

o Hall, fol. 98, 99. Hollingshed, p. 593, 594. Polydore Vergil, p. 466. Graf- 
ton, p. 512. 519. P Stowe, p. 367. 




HENRY VI. 

About the same time the Duke of Britany began to 
withdraw himself from the English alliance. His bro-, 
ther, the Count of Richemont, though connected by 
marriage with the Dukes of Burgundy and Bedford, 
was extremely attached by inclination to the French 
interest ; and he willingly hearkened to all the advances 
which Charles made him for obtaining his friendship. 
The staff of constable, vacant by the Earl of Buchan's 
death, was offered him ; and as his martial and ambitious 
temper aspired to the command of armies, which he had 
in vain attempted to obtain from the Duke of Bedford, 
he not only accepted that office, but brought over his 
brother to an alliance with the French monarch. The 
new constable,, having made this one change in his mea- 
sures, firmly adhered, ever after, to his engagements with 
France. Though his pride and violence, which would 
admit of no rival in his master's confidence, and even 
prompted him to assassinate his other favourites, had so 
much disgusted Charles, that he once banished him the 
court, and refused to admit him to his presence, he still 
acted with vigour for the service of that monarch, and ob- 
tained at last, by his perseverance, the pardon of all 
past offences. 

In this situation, the Duke of Bedford, on his return, 1426. 
found the affairs of France, after passing eight months in 
England. The Duke of Burgundy was much disgusted. 
The Duke of Britany had entered into engagements with 
Charles, and had done homage to that prince for his 
duchy. The French had been allowed to recover from 
the astonishment into which their frequent disasters had 
thrown them. An incident too had happened, which 
served extremely to raise their courage. The Earl of 
Warwick had besieged Montargis with a small army of 
three thousand men, and the place was reduced to ex- 
tremity, when the bastard of Orleans undertook to throw 
relief into it. This general, who was natural son to the 
prince assassinated by the Duke of Burgundy, and who 
was afterwards created Count of Dunois, conducted a 
body of sixteen hundred men to Montargis ; and made 
an attack on the enemy's trenches with so much valour, 
prudence, and good fortune, that he not only penetrated 
into the place, but gave a severe blow to the English, 



340 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and obliged Warwick to raise the siege q . This was the 
^_^_, first signal action that raised the fame of Dunois, and 
1426. opened him the road to those great honours which he 
afterwards attained. 

But the regent, soon after his arrival, revived the 
reputation of the English arms, by an important enter- 
prise which he happily achieved. He secretly brought 
together, in separate detachments, a considerable army 
to the frontiers of Britany ; and fell so unexpectedly 
upon that province, that the duke, unable to make re- 
sistance, yielded to all the terms required of him : he 
renounced the French alliance ; he engaged to maintain 
the treaty of Troye ; he acknowledged the Duke of Bed- 
ford for regent of France ; and promised to do homage 
for his duchy to King Henry r . And the English prince, 
having thus freed himself from a dangerous enemy who 
lay behind him, resolved on an undertaking which, if 
successful, would, he hoped, cast the balance between 
the two nations, and prepare the way for the final con- 
quest of France. 

1428. The city of Orleans was so situated between the pro- 
Orieans. vinces commanded by Henry, and those possessed by 
Charles, that it opened an easy entrance to either, and 
as the Duke of Bedford intended to make a great effort 
for penetrating into the south of France, it behoved him 
to begin with this place, which, in the present circum- 
stances, was become the most important in the kingdom. 
He committed the conduct of the enterprise to the Earl 
of Salisbury, who had newly brought him a reinforce- 
ment of six thousand men from England, and who had 
much distinguished himself by his abilities during the 
course of the present war. Salisbury, passing the Loire, 
made himself master of several small places, which sur- 
rounded Orleans on that side s ; and as his intentions 
were thereby known, the French king used every expe- 
dient to supply the city with a garrison and provisions, 
and enable it to maintain a long and obstinate siege. 
The Lord of Gaucour, a brave and experienced captain, 
was appointed governor : many officers of distinction 
threw themselves into the place : the troops which 

q Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 32, 33. Hollingshed, p. 597. 

r Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 35, 36. s Ibid. p. 38, 39. Polyd. Verg. p. 468. 



HENRY VI. 34J 

they conducted were inured to war, and were deter- CHAP. 
mined to make the most obstinate resistance ; and xx< 
even the inhabitants, disciplined by the long conti- \^~ 
nuance of hostilities, were well qualified, in their own 
defence, to second the efforts of the most veteran 
forces. The eyes of all Europe were turned towards 
this scene ; where, it was reasonably supposed, the 
French were to make their last stand for maintaining 
the independence of their monarchy and the rights of 
their sovereign. 

The Earl of Salisbury at last approached the place 
with an army, which consisted only of ten thousand 
men ; and not being able, with so small a force, to invest 
so great a city, that commanded a bridge over the Loire, 
he stationed himself on the southern side towards Sologne, 
leaving the other, towards the Beausse, still open to the 
enemy. He there attacked the fortifications which 
guarded the entrance to the bridge ; and, after an obsti- 
nate resistance, he carried several of them; but was 
kimself killed by a cannon-ball as he w r as taking a view 
of the enemy*. The Earl of Suffolk succeeded to the 
command ; and being reinforced with great numbers of 
English and Burgundians, he passed the river with the 
main body of his army, and invested Orleans on the other 
side. As it was now the depth of winter, Suffolk, who 
found it difficult, in that season, to throw up intrench- 
ments all around, contented himself, for the present, with 
erecting redoubts at different distances, where his men 
were lodged in safety, and were ready to intercept the 
supplies which the enemy might attempt to throw into 
the place. Though he had several pieces of artillery in 
his camp, (and this is among the first sieges in Europe 
where cannon were found to be of importance,) the art 
of engineering was hitherto so imperfect, that Suffolk 
trusted more to famine than to force for subduing the 
city ; and he purposed in the spring to render the cir- 
cumvallation more complete by drawing intrenchments 
from one redoubt to another. Numberless feats of valour 
were performed both by the besiegers and besieged dur- 
ing the winter : bold sallies were made, and repulsed 

t Hall, fol. 105. Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 39. Stowe, p. 369. Hollingshed, p. 599. 
Grafton, p. 531. 

29* 



342 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. w ith equal boldness : convoys were sometimes introduced 
s- ^C-!^x and often intercepted : the supplies were still unequal to 

H28. the consumption of the place : and the English seemed 
daily, though slowly, to be advancing towards the com- 
pletion of their enterprise. 

H29. ;g u k while Suffolk lay in this situation, the French 
parties ravaged all the country around; and the be- 
siegers, who were obliged to draw their provisions from 
a distance, were themselves exposed to the danger of 
want and famine. Sir John Fastolffe was bringing up a 
large convoy of every kind of stores, which he escorted 
with a detachment of two thousand five hundred men ; 
when he was attacked by a body of four thousand French, 
under the command of the Counts of Clermont and 
Dunois. Fastolffe drew up his troops behind the waggons; 
but the French generals, afraid of attacking him in that 
posture, planted a battery of cannon against him, which 
threw every thing into confusion, and would have en- 
sured them the victory, had not the impatience of some 
Scottish troops, who broke the line of battle, brought on 
an engagement, in which Fastolffe was victorious. The 
Count of Dunois was wounded, and about five hundred 
French were left on the field of battle. This action, 
which was of great importance in the present conjunc- 
ture, was commonly called the battle of Herrings ; be- 
cause the convoy brought a great quantity of that kind 
of provisions, for the use of the English army during the 
Lent season 11 . 

Charles seemed now to have but one expedient for 
saving this city, which had been so long invested. The 
Duke of Orleans, who was still prisoner in England, pre- 
vailed on the protector and the council to consent that 
all his demesnes should be allowed to preserve a neutra- 
lity during the war, and should be sequestered, for 
greater security, into the hands of the Duke of Burgundy. 
This prince, who was much less cordial in the English 
interests than formerly, went to Paris, and made the 
proposal to the Duke of Bedford ; but the regent coldly 
replied, that he was not of a humour to beat the bushes 
while others ran away with the game : an answer which 

Hall, fol. 106. Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 41, 42. Stowe, p. 369. Hollingshed, 
p. 600. Polyd. Verg. p. 469. Grafton, p. 532. 



HENRY VI. 343 

so disgusted the duke, that he recalled all the troops of CHAP. 
Burgundy that acted in the siege w . The place, however, xx - 
was every day more and more closely invested by the 
English : great scarcity began already to be felt by the 
garrison and inhabitants : Charles, in despair of collect- 
ing an army which should dare to approach the enemy's 
intrenchments, not only gave the city for lost, but began 
to entertain a very dismal prospect with regard to the 
general state of his affairs. He saw that the country; 
in which he had hitherto with great difficulty subsisted, 
would be laid entirely open to the invasion of a powerful 
and victorious enemy; and he already entertained thoughts 
of retiring with the remains of his forces into Languedoc 
and Dauphiny, and defending himself as long as possible 
in those remote provinces. But it was fortunate for 
this good prince, that, as he lay under the dominion of 
the fair, the women, whom he consulted, had the spirit 
to support his sinking resolution in this desperate extre- 
mity. Mary of Anjou, his queen, a princess of great 
merit and prudence, vehemently opposed this measure, 
which, she foresaw, would discourage all his partisans, 
and serve as a general signal for deserting a prince who 
seemed himself to despair of success. His mistress too, 
the fair Agnes Sorel, who lived in entire amity with the 
queen, seconded all her remonstrances, and threatened 
that, if he thus pusillanimously threw away the sceptre 
of France, she would seek in the court of England a 
fortune more correspondent to her wishes. Love was 
able to rouse in the breast of Charles that courage which 
ambition had failed to excite : he resolved to dispute 
every inch of ground with an imperious enemy, and 
rather to perish with honour in the midst of his friends, 
than yield ingloriously to his bad fortune ; when relief 
was unexpectedly brought him by another female of a 
very different character, who gave rise to one of the 
most singular revolutions that is to be met with in 
history. 

In the village of Domremi, near Yaucouleurs, on the The Maid 
borders of Lorraine, there lived a country-girl, of twenty- of rleans< 
seven years of age, called Joan d'Arc, who was servant 
in a small inn, and who in that station had been accus- 

w Hall, fol. 106. Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 42. Stowe, p. 369. Grafton, p. 533. 



344 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, tomed to tend the horses of the guests, to ride them 
without a saddle to the watering-place, and to perform 
other offices, which, in well-frequented inns, commonly 
fall to the share of the men-servants x . This girl was of 
an irreproachable life, and had not hitherto been re- 
marked for any singularity ; whether that she had met 
with no occasion to excite her genius, or that the unskil- 
ful eyes of those who conversed with her had not been 
able to discern her uncommon merit. It is easy to ima- 
gine, that the present situation of France was an inter- 
esting object even to persons of the lowest rank, and 
would become the frequent subject of conversation : a 
young prince expelled his throne by the sedition of 
native subjects, and by the arms of strangers, could not 
fail to move the compassion of all his people, whose 
hearts were uncorrupted by faction; and the peculiar 
character of Charles, so strongly inclined to friendship 
and the tender passions, naturally rendered him the 
hero of that sex whose generous minds know no bounds 
in their affections. The siege of Orleans, the progress of 
the English before that place, the great distress of the 
garrison and inhabitants, the importance of saving this 
city and its brave defenders, had turned thither the 
public eye ; and Joan, inflamed by the general sentiment, 
was seized with a wild desire of bringing relief to her 
sovereign in his present distresses. Her unexperienced 
mind, working day and night on this favourite object, 
mistook the impulses of passion for heavenly inspirations; 
and she fancied that she saw visions, and heard voices, 
exhorting her to re-establish the throne of France, and 
to expel the foreign invaders. An uncommon intre- 
pidity of temper made her overlook all the dangers 
which might attend her in such a path ; and thinking 
herself destined by Heaven to this office, she threw 
aside all that bashfulness and timidity so natural to her 
sex, her years, and her low station. She went to Vau- 
couleurs; procured admission to Baudricourt the governor, 
informed him of her inspirations and intentions, and 
conjured him not to neglect the voice of God, who spoke 
through her, but to second these heavenly revelations 
which impelled her to this glorious enterprise. Baudri- 

* Hall, fol. 107. Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 42. Grafton, p. 534. 



HENRY VI. 345 

court treated her at first with some neglect ; but on her CHAP. 
frequent returns to him, and importunate solicitations,^ 
he began to remark something extraordinary in the U29 
maid, and was inclined, at all hazards, to make so easy 
an experiment. It is uncertain whether this gentleman 
had discernment enough to perceive that great use might 
be made with the vulgar of so uncommon an engine or, 
what is more likely, in that credulous age, was himself 
a convert to this visionary ; but he adopted at last the 
schemes of Joan, and he gave her some attendants, w r ho 
conducted her to the French court, which at that time 
resided at Chinon. 

It is the business of history to distinguish between the 
miraculous and the marvellous ; to reject the first in all 
narrations merely profane and human to doubt the se- 
cond ; and when obliged by unquestionable testimony, as 
in the present case, to admit of something extraordinary, 
to receive as little of it as is consistent with the known 
facts and circumstances. It is pretended, that Joan, 
immediately on her admission, knew the king, though 
she had never seen his face before, and though he pur- 
posely kept himself in the crowd of courtiers, and had 
laid aside every thing in his dress and apparel which 
might distinguish him : that she offered him, in the name 
of the supreme Creator, to raise the siege of Orleans, 
and conduct him to Rheims to be there crowned and 
anointed ; and, on his expressing doubts of her mission, 
revealed to him, before some sworn confidants, a secret, 
which was unknown to all the world beside himself, and 
which nothing but a heavenly inspiration could have dis- 
covered to her : and that she demanded, as the instru- 
ment of her future victories, a particular sword, which 
was kept in the church of St. Catherine of Fierbois, and 
which, though she had never seen it, she described by 
all its marks, and by the place in which it had long lain 
neglected 7 . This is certain, that all these miraculous 
stories were spread abroad in order to captivate the vul- 
gar. The more the king and his ministers were deter- 
mined to give into the illusion, the more scruples they 
pretended. An assembly of grave doctors and theo- 
logians cautiously examined Joan's mission, and pro- 

y Hall, fol. 107. Hollingshed, p. 600. 



346 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, nounced it undoubted and supernatural. She was sent 
i_^J '_yto the Parliament, then residing at Poictiers, and was 
1429t interrogated before that assembly : the presidents, the 
counsellors, who came persuaded of her imposture, went 
away convinced of her inspiration. A ray of hope began 
to break through that despair in which the minds of all 
men were before enveloped. Heaven had now declared 
itself in favour of France, and had laid bare its out- 
stretched arm to take vengeance on her invaders. Few 
could distinguish between the impulse of inclination and 
the force of conviction, and none would submit to the 
trouble of so disagreeable a scrutiny. 

After these artificial precautions and preparations had 
been for some time employed, Joan's requests were at last 
complied with : she was armed cap-a-pie, mounted on 
horseback, and shown in that martial habiliment before 
the whole people. Her dexterity in managing her steed, 
though acquired in her former occupation, was regarded 
as a fresh proof of her mission ; and she was received 
with the loudest acclamations by the spectators. Her 
former occupation was even denied : she was no longer 
the servant of an inn : she was converted into a shep- 
herdess, an employment much more agreeable to the 
imagination. To render her still more interesting, near 
ten years were subtracted from her age ; and all the sen- 
timents of love and of chivalry were thus united to those 
of enthusiasm, in order to inflame the fond fancy of the 
people with prepossessions in her favour. 

When the engine was thus dressed up in full splen- 
dour, it was determined to essay its force against the 
enemy. Joan was sent to Blois, where a large convoy 
was prepared for the supply of Orleans, and an army of 
ten thousand men, under the command of St. Severe, 
assembled to escort it. She ordered all the soldiers to 
confess themselves before they set out on the enterprise : 
she banished from the camp all women of bad fame : 
she displayed in her hands a consecrated banner, where 
the Supreme Being was represented grasping the globe 
of earth, and surrounded with flower-de-luces : and 
she insisted, in right of her prophetic mission, that 
the convoy should enter Orleans by the direct road from 
the side of Beausse ; but the Count of Dunois, unwil- 



HENRY VI. 347 



ling to submit the rules of the military art to her inspi- CHAP. 
rations, ordered it to approach by the other side of the ^ _, 
river, where he knew the weakest part of the English \^"" 
army was stationed. 

Previous to this attempt, the maid had written to the 
regent, and to the English generals before Orleans, com- 
manding them, in the name of the Omnipotent Creator, 
by whom she was commissioned, immediately to raise the 
siege, and to evacuate France ; and menacing them with 
Divine vengeance in case of their disobedience. All the 
English affected to speak with derision of the maid, and 
of her heavenly commission ; and said, that the French 
king was now indeed reduced to a sorry pass when he 
had recourse to such ridiculous expedients; but they 
felt their imagination secretly struck with the vehement 
persuasion which prevailed in all around them ; and they 
waited with anxious expectation, not unmixed with 
horror, for the issue of these extraordinary prepara- 
tions. 

As the convoy approached the river, a sally was made 
by the garrison on the side of Beausse, to prevent the 
English general from sending any detachment to the 
other side: the provisions were peaceably embarked in 29th April, 
boats, which the inhabitants of Orleans had sent to re- 
ceive them : the maid covered with her troops the em- 
barkation : Suffolk did not venture to attack her : and 
the French general carried back the army in safety to 
Blois ; an alteration of affairs, which was already visible 
to all the world, and which had a proportional effect on 
the minds of both parties. 

The maid entered the city of Orleans arrayed in her 
military garb, and displaying her consecrated standard, 
and was received as a celestial deliverer by all the inha- 
bitants. They now believed themselves invincible under 
her influence; and Dunois himself, perceiving such a 
mighty alteration both in friends and foes, consented 
that the next convoy, which was expected in a few days, 
should enter by the side of Beausse. The convoy ap- 4th May. 
proached : no sign of resistance appeared in the be- 
siegers: the waggons and troops passed without inter- 
ruption between the redoubts of the English: a dead 
silence and astonishment reigned among those troops, 



348 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, formerly so elated with victory, and so fierce for the 
xx> combat. 

The Earl of Suffolk was in a situation very unusual 
and extraordinary, and which might well confound the 
man of the greatest capacity and firmest temper. He 
saw his troops overawed, and strongly impressed with 
the idea of a divine influence accompanying the maid. 
Instead of banishing these vain terrors by hurry, and 
action, and war, he waited till the soldiers should recover 
from the panic ; and he thereby gave leisure for -those 
prepossessions to sink still deeper into their minds. The 
military maxims which are prudent in common cases de- 
ceived him in these unaccountable events. The English 
felt their courage daunted and overwhelmed, and thence 
inferred a divine vengeance hanging over them. The 
French drew the same inference from an inactivity so 
new and unexpected. Every circumstance was now 
reversed in the opinions of men, on which all depends : 
the spirit resulting from a long course of uninterrupted 
success was on a sudden transferred from the victors to 
the vanquished. 

The maid called aloud, that the garrison should re- 
main no longer on the defensive ; and she promised her 
followers the assistance of Heaven in attacking those 
redoubts of the enemy which had so long kept them in 
awe, and which they had never hitherto dared to insult. 
The generals seconded her ardour : an attack was made 
on one redoubt, and it proved successful 2 : all the 
English who defended the intrenchments were put 
to the sword, or taken prisoners: and Sir John Talbot 
himself, who had drawn together, from the other re- 
doubts, some troops to bring them relief, durst not ap- 
pear in the open field against so formidable an enemy. 

Nothing, after this success, seemed impossible to the 
maid and her enthusiastic votaries. She urged the ge- 
nerals to attack the main body of the English in their 
intrenchments: but Dunois, still unwilling to hazard 
the fate of France by too great temerity, and sensible 
that the least reverse of fortune would make all the pre- 
sent visions evaporate, and restore every thing to its 
former condition, checked her vehemence, and proposed 

z Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 45. 



HENRY VI. 349 

to her first to expel the enemy from their forts on the CHAP. 
oilier side of the river, and thus lay the communication ^_ __, 
with the country entirely open, before she attempted 1429 
any more hazardous enterprise. Joan was persuaded, 
and these forts were vigorously assailed. In one attack 
the French were repulsed; the maid was left almost 
alone ; she was obliged to retreat, and join the run- 
aways; but displaying her sacred standard, and ani- 
mating them with her countenance, her gestures, her 
exhortations, she led them back to the charge, and over- 
powered the English in their intrenchments. In the 
attack of another fort, she was wounded in the neck 
with an arrow : she retreated a moment behind the as- 
sailants; she pulled out the arrow with her own hands; 
she had the wound quickly dressed ; and she hastened 
back to head the troops, and to plant her victorious 
banner on the ramparts of the enemy. 

By all these successes the English were entirely chased 
from their fortifications on that side: they had lost 
above six thousand men in these different actions ; and, 
what was still more important, their wonted courage and 
confidence was wholly gone, and had given place to' 
amazement and despair. The maid returned triumphant 
over the bridge, and was again received as the guardian 
angel of the city. After performing such miracles, she 
convinced the most obdurate incredulity of her divine 
mission : men felt themselves animated as by a superior 
energy, and thought nothing impossible to that divine 
hand which so visibly conducted them. It was in vain 
even for the English generals to oppose with their soldiers; 
the prevailing opinion of supernatural influence : they 
themselves were probably moved by the same belief: the 
utmost they dared to advance was, that Joan was not an 
instrument of God ; she was only the implement of the 
devil : but as the English had felt, to their sad expe- 
rience, that the devil might be allowed sometimes to 
prevail, they derived not much consolation from the en- 
forcing of ihis opinion. 

It might prove extremely dangerous for Suffolk, with 
such intimidated troops, to remain any longer in the pre- 
sence of so courageous and victorious an enemy;- he 
therefore raised the siege, and retreated with, all the pre- 

VOL. ii. 30 



350 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, caution imaginable. The French resolved to push their 
conquests, and to allow the English no leisure to recover 
^^29^ from their consternation. Charles formed a body of six 
The siege thousand men, and sent them to attack Jergeau, whither 
ra f S eans Suffolk had retired with a detachment of his army. The 
8th May. s i e ge lasted ten days, and the place was obstinately de- 
fended. Joan displayed her wonted intrepidity on the 
occasion. She descended into the fosse* in leading the 
attack, and she there received a blow on the head with 
a stone, by which she was confounded and beaten to the 
ground ; but she soon recovered herself, and in the end 
rendered the assault successful. Suffolk was obliged to 
yield himself prisoner to a Frenchman called Kenaud ; 
but before he submitted, he asked his adversary, whether 
he were a gentleman ? On receiving a satisfactory answer, 
he demanded, whether he were a knight ? Renaud re- 
plied, that he had not yet attained that honour. Then 
I make you one, replied Suffolk : upon which he gave 
him the blow with his sword, which dubbed him into 
that fraternity ; and he immediately surrendered himself 
his prisoner. The remainder of the English army was 
commanded by Fastolffe, Scales, and Talbot, who thought 
of nothing but of making their retreat, as soon as possible, 
into a place of safety ; while the French esteemed the 
overtaking them equivalent to a victory. So much had 
the events which passed before Orleans altered every 
thing between the two nations ! The vanguard of the 
French, under Eichemont and Xantrailles, attacked the 
isth June. rear o f the enemy at the village of Patay. The battle 
lasted not a moment : the English were discomfited, 
and fled : the brave Fastolffe himself showed the example 
of flight to his troops ; and the order of the garter was 
taken from him, as a punishment for this instance of 
cowardice*. Two thousand men were killed in this 
action, and both Talbot and Scales taken prisoners. 

In the account of all these successes, the French 
writers, to magnify the wonder, represent the maid (who 
was now known by the appellation of the Maid of Or- 
leans) as not only active in combat, but as performing 
the office of general; directing the troops, conducting 
the military operations, and swaying the deliberations in 

a Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 46. 



HENRY VI. 351 

all councils of war. It is certain, that the policy of the CHAP. 

French court endeavoured to maintain this appearance^ , 

with the public : but it is much more probable, that 1429 
Dunois and the wiser commanders prompted her in all 
her measures, than that a country girl, without expe- 
rience or education, could, on a sudden, become expert 
in a profession which requires more genius and capacity 
than any other active scene of life. It is sufficient 
praise, that she could distinguish the persons on whose 
judgment she might rely; that she could seize their 
hints and suggestions, and, on a sudden, deliver their 
opinions as her own ; and that she could curb, on occa- 
sion, that visionary and enthusiastic spirit with which 
she was actuated, and could temper it with prudence 
and discretion. 

The raising of the siege of Orleans was one part of the 
maid's promise to Charles: the crowning of him at 
Eheims was the other : and she now vehemently insisted 
that he should forthwith set out on that enterprise. A 
few weeks before, such a proposal would have appeared 
the most extravagant in the world. Eheims lay in a 
distant quarter of the kingdom ; was then in the hands 
of a victorious enemy ; the whole road which led to it 
was occupied by their garrisons : and no man could be 
so sanguine as to imagine, that such an attempt could 
so soon come within the bounds of possibility. But as 
it was extremely the interest of Charles to maintain the 
belief of something extraordinary and divine in these 
events, and to avail himself of the present consternation 
of the English, he resolved to follow the exhortations of 
his warlike prophetess, and to lead his army upon this 
promising adventure. Hitherto he had kept remote 
from the scene of war : as the safety of the state de- 
pended upon his person, he had been persuaded to re- 
strain his military ardour : but observing this prosperous 
turn of affairs, he now determined to appear at the head 
of his armies, and to set the example of valour to all his 
soldiers: and the French nobility saw at once their 
young sovereign assuming a new and more brilliant 
character, seconded by fortune, and conducted by the 
hand of Heaven ; and they caught fresh zeal to exert 



352 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, themselves in replacing him on the throne of his an- 
cestors. 

^^ Charles set out for Rheims at the head of twelve 
thousand men: he passed by Troye, which opened its 
gates to him : Chalons imitated the example : Rheims 
sent him a deputation with its keys, before his approach 
to it : and he scarcely perceived, as he passed along, that 
he was marching through an enemy's country. The 
The King ceremony of his coronation was here performed b ? with 
crow'nedatthe holy oil, which a pigeon had brought to King Clovis 
iiheims. from Heaven on the first establishment of the French 
[uly< monarchy : the Maid of Orleans stood by his side in 
complete armour, and displayed her sacred banner, which 
had so often dissipated and confounded his fiercest ene- 
mies; and the people shouted with the most unfeigned joy 
on viewing such a complication of wonders. After the 
completion of the ceremony, the maid threw herself at 
the king's feet, embraced his knees, and with a flood of 
tears, which pleasure and tenderness extorted from her, 
she congratulated him on this singular and marvellous 
event. 

Charles, thus crowned and anointed, became more 
respectable in the eyes of all his subjects, and seemed in 
a manner to receive anew, from a heavenly commission, 
his title to their allegiance. The inclinations of men 
swaying their belief, no one doubted of the inspirations 
and prophetic spirit of the maid: so many incidents 
which passed all human comprehension, left little room 
to question a superior influence ; and the real and un- 
doubted facts brought credit to every exaggeration, 
which could scarcely be rendered more wonderful. 
Laon, Soissons, Chateau-Thierri, Provins, and many 
other towns and fortresses in that neighbourhood, im- 
mediately after Charles's coronation, submitted to him 
on the first summons; and the whole nation was dis- 
posed to give him the most zealous testimonies of their 
duty and affection. 

Prudence Nothing can impress us with a higher idea of the wis- 
Duke of dom, address, and resolution of the Duke of Bedford, than 
Bedford, j^g b e i n g a k} e to maintain himself in so perilous a situa- 

b Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 48. 



HENRY VI. 353 

tion, and to preserve some footing in France, after the CHAP. 
defection of so many places, and amidst the universal 
inclination of the rest to imitate that contagious e 
ample. This prince seemed present every where by his 
vigilance and foresight: he employed every resource 
which fortune had yet left him : he put all the English 
garrisons in a posture of defence : he kept a watchful 
eye over every attempt among the French towards an 
insurrection : he retained the Parisians in obedience, by 
alternately employing caresses and severity : and know- 
ing that the Duke of Burgundy was already wavering in 
his fidelity, he acted with so much skill and prudence, as 
to renew, in this dangerous crisis, his alliance with that 
prince ; an alliance of the utmost importance to the credit 
and support of the English government. 

The small supplies which he received from England 
set the talents of this great man in a still stronger light. 
The ardour of the English for foreign conquests was 
now extremely abated by time and reflection : the Par- 
liament seems even to have become sensible of the 
danger which might attend their farther progress : no 
supply of money could be obtained by the regent during 
his greatest distresses : and men enlisted slowly under 
his standard, or soon deserted, by reason of the won- 
derful accounts which had reached England, of the 
magic, and sorcery, and diabolical power of the Maid of 
Orleans . It happened fortunately, in this emergency, 
that the Bishop of Winchester, now created a cardinal, 
landed at Calais with a body of five thousand men, 
which he was conducting into Bohemia, on a crusade 
against the Hussites. He was persuaded to lend these 
troops to his nephew during the present difficulties' 1 ; 
and the regent was thereby enabled to take the field, 
and to oppose the French king, who was advancing 
with his army to the gates of Paris. 

The extraordinary capacity of the Duke of Bedford 
appeared also in his military operations. He attempted 
to restore the courage of his troops by boldly advancing 
to the face of the enemy ; but he chose his posts with 
so much caution, as always to decline a combat, and to 
render it impossible for Charles to attack him. He still 

Kymer, vol. x. p. 459. 472. a Ibid. vol. x. p. 421. 

30* 



354 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, attended that prince in all his movements; covered 
^_ __, his own towns and garrisons ; and kept himself in a 
"~~^ posture to reap advantage from every imprudence or 
false step of the enemy. The French army, which 
consisted mostly of volunteers, who served at their own 
expense, soon after retired and was disbanded : Charles 
went to Bourges, the ordinary place of his residence, 
but not till he made himself master of Compeigne, 
Beauvais, Senlis, Sens, Laval, Lagni, St. Denis, and of 
many places in the neighbourhood of Paris, which the 
affections of the people had put into his hands. 

The regent endeavoured to revive the declining state 
of his affairs by bringing over the young King of Eng- 
land, and having him crowned and anointed at Paris 6 . 
All the vassals of the crown who lived within the pro- 
vinces possessed by the English swore new allegiance, 
and did homage to him. But this ceremony was cold 
and insipid, compared with the lustre which had at- 
tended the coronation of Charles at Rheims ; and the 
Duke of Bedford expected more effect from an accident 
which put into his hands the person that had been the 
author of all his calamities. 

The Maid of Orleans, after the coronation of Charles, 
declared to the Count of Dunois, that her wishes were 
now fully gratified, and that she had no farther desire 
than to return to her former condition, and to the oc- 
cupation and course of life which became her sex : but 
that nobleman, sensible of the great advantages which 
might still be reaped from her presence in the army, 
exhorted her to persevere, till by the final expulsion of 
the English, she had brought all her prophecies to their 
full completion. In pursuance of this advice, she threw 
herself into the town of Compeigne, which was at that 
time besieged by the Duke ; of Burgundy, assisted by the 
Earls of Arundel and Suffolk ; and the garrison on her 
appearance, believed themselves thenceforth invincible. 
But their joy was of short duration. The maid, next 
day after her arrival, headed a sally upon the quarters 
of John of Luxembourg ; she twice drove the enemy 
from their intrenchments ; finding their numbers to in- 
crease : every moment, she ordered .a retreat ; when hard 

e Rymer, vol. x. p. 432. 



HENRY VI. 355 

pressed by the pursuers, she turned upon them, and CHAP. 
made them again recoil ; but being here deserted by her 
friends, and surrounded by the enemy, she was at last, s ~^^ N ' 
after exerting the utmost valour, taken prisoner by the 
Burgundians f . The common opinion was, that the 
French officers, finding the merit of every victory as- 
cribed to her, had, in envy to her renown, by which 
they themselves were so much eclipsed, willingly exposed 
her to this fatal accident. 

The envy of her friends, on this occasion, was riot a 
greater proof of her merit than the triumph of her 
enemies. A complete victory would not have given 
more joy to the English and their partisans. The ser- 
vice of Te Dewn, which has so often been profaned by 
princes, was publicly celebrated, on this fortunate event, 
at Paris. The Duke of Bedford fancied, that, by the 
captivity of that extraordinary woman, who had blasted 
all his successes, he should again recover his former as- 
cendant over France ; and to push farther th present 
advantage, he purchased the captive from John of Lux- 
embourg, and formed a prosecution against her, which, 
whether it proceeded from vengeance or policy, was 
equally barbarous and dishonourable. 

There was no possible reason, why Joan should not be 1*31 
regarded as a prisoner of war, and be entitled to all the 
courtesy and good usage which civilized nations practise 
towards enemies on these occasions. She had never, in 
her military capacity, forfeited, by any act of treachery 
or cruelty, her claim to that treatment : she was un- 
stained by any civil crime : even the virtues and the 
very decorums of her sex had ever been rigidly observed 
by her : and though her appearing in war, and leading 
armies to battle, may seem an exception, she had thereby 
performed such signal service to her prince, that she had 
abundantly compensated for this irregularity and was, 
on that very account, the more an object of praise and 
admiration. It was necessary, therefore, for the Duke 
of Bedford to interest religion some way in the prosecu- 
tion ; and to cover, under that cloak, his violation of jus- 
tice and humanity. 

The Bishop of Beauvais, a man wholly devoted to the 

f Stowe, p. 371. 



356 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. English interests, presented a petition against Joan, on 
.pretence that she was taken within the bounds of his 
diocese ; and he desired to have her tried by an ecclesi- 
astical court for sorcery, impiety, idolatry, and magic ; 
the university of Paris was so mean as to join in the same 
request : several prelates, among whom the Cardinal of 
Winchester was the only Englishman, were appointed her 
judges : they held their court in Rouen, where the young 
King of England tljen resided ; and the maid, clothed 
in her former military apparel, but loaded with irons, 
was produced before this tribunal. 

She first desired to be eased of her chains : her judges 
. answered, that she had once already attempted an escape, 
by throwing herself from a tower: she confessed the 
fact, maintained the justice of her intention, and owned 
that, if she could, she would still execute that purpose. 
All her other speeches showed the same firmness and 
intrepidity : though harassed with interrogatories during 
the course of near four months, she never betrayed any 
weakness or womanish submission : and no advantage 
was gained over her. The point which her judges pushed 
most vehemently, was her visions and revelations, and 
intercourse with departed saints ; and they asked her, 
whether she would submit to the church the truth of 
these inspirations ? She replied, that she would submit 
them to God, the fountain of truth. They then ex- 
claimed, that she was a heretic, and denied the authority 
of the church. She appealed to the pope; they rejected 
her appeal. 

They asked her, why she put trust in her standard, 
which had been consecrated by magical incantations? 
She replied, that she put trust in the Supreme Being 
alone, whose image was impressed upon it. They de- 
manded, why she carried in her hand that standard at 
the anointment and coronation of Charles at Rheims ? 
She answered, that the person who had shared the danger 
was entitled to share the glory. When accused of going 
to war, contrary to the decorums of her sex, and of as- 
suming government and command over men, she scrupled 
not to reply, that her sole purpose was to defeat the 
English, and to expel them the kingdom. In the issue, 
she was condemned for all the crimes of which she had 



HENRY VI. 357 

been accused, aggravated by heresy ; her revelations were CHAP. 
declared to be inventions of the devil to delude the peo- ^ ^"_j 
pie ; and she was sentenced to be delivered over to the U31> 
secular arm. 

Joan, so long surrounded by inveterate enemies, who 
treated her with every mark of contumely, brow-beaten 
and overawed by men of superior rank, and men invested 
with the ensigns of a sacred character, which she had 
been accustomed to revere, felt her spirit at last subdued ; 
and those visionary dreams of inspiration, in which she 
had been buoyed up by the triumphs of success, and the 
applauses of her own party, gave way to the terrors of 
that punishment to which she was sentenced. She 
publicly declared herself willing to recant ; she acknow- 
ledged the illusion of those revelations which the church 
had rejected ; and she promised never more to maintain 
them. Her sentence was then mitigated : she was con- 
demned to perpetual imprisonment, and to be fed during 
life on bread and water. 

Enough was now done to fulfil all political views, and 
to convince both the French and the English, that the 
opinion of divine influence, which had so much encou- 
raged the one, and daunted the other, was entirely with- 
out foundation. But the barbarous vengeance of Joan's 
enemies was not satisfied with this victory. Suspecting 
that the female dress, which she had now consented to 
wear, was disagreeable to her, they purposely placed in 
her apartment a suit of men's apparel, and watched for 
the effects of that temptation upon her. On the sight 
of a dress in which she had acquired so much renown, 
and which, she once believed, she wore by the particular 
appointment of Heaven, all her former ideas and passions 
revived ; and she ventured in her solitude to clothe her- 
self again in the forbidden garment. Her insidious 
enemies caught her in that situation : her fault was in- 
terpreted to be no less than a relapse into heresy : no 
recantation would now suffice, and no pardon could be 
granted her. She was condemned to be burned in 
market-place of Rouen, and the infamous sentence was Maid of 
accordingly executed. This admirable heroine, to whom 
the more generous superstition of the ancients would 



358 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, have erected altars, was, on pretence of heresy and 
s , magic, delivered over alive to the flames, and expiated, 

U3i. bj that dreadful punishment, the signal services which 
she had rendered to her prince and to her native 
country. 

1432. The affairs of the English, far from being advanced 
by this execution, went every day more and more to 
decay : the great abilities of the regent were unable to 
resist the strong inclination, which had seized the French, 
to return under the obedience of their rightful sovereign, 
and which that act of cruelty was ill fitted to remove. 
Chartres was surprised by a stratagem of the Count of 
Dunois : a body of the English, under Lord Willoughby, 
was defeated at St. Celerin, upon the Sarte s : the fair 
in the suburbs of Caen, seated in the midst of the Eng- 
lish territories, was pillaged by De Lore, a French 
officer: the Duke of Bedford himself was obliged by 
Dunois to raise the siege of Lagni, with some loss of 
reputation : and all these misfortunes, though light, yet 
being continued and uninterrupted, brought discredit on 
the English, and menaced them with an approaching 
revolution. But the chief detriment which the regent 
sustained was by the death of his duchess, who had 
hitherto preserved some appearance of friendship between 
him and her brother, the Duke of Burgundy h : and his 
marriage soon afterwards with Jaqueline of Luxembourg 
was the beginning of a breach between them 1 . Philip 
complained, that the regent had never had the civility 
to inform him of his intentions, and that so sudden a 
marriage was a slight on his sister's memory. The Car- 
dinal of Winchester mediated a reconciliation between 
these princes, and brought both of them to St. Omer's 
for that purpose. The Duke of Bedford here expected 
the first visit, both as he was son, brother, and uncle to 
a king, and because he had already made such advances 
as to come into the Duke of Burgundy's territories, in 
order to have an interview with him : but Philip, proud 
of his great power and independent dominions, refused 
to pay this compliment to the regent; and the two 

e Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 100. k Ibid. vol. ii. p. 87. 

i Stowe, p. 373. Grafton, p. 554. 



HENRY VI. 359 

princes, unable to adjust the ceremonial, parted without CHAP. 
seeing each other k . A bad prognostic of their cordial ^__ _, 
intentions to renew past amity ! 1432 

Nothing could be more repugnant to the interests of Defection 
the house of Burgundy than to unite the crowns ofj^eof 
France and England on the same head ; an event which, Burgundy. 
had it taken place, would have reduced the duke to the 
rank of a petty prince, and have rendered his situation 
entirely dependent and precarious. The title also to the 
crown of France, which, after the failure of the elder 
branches, might accrue to the duke or his posterity, had 
been sacrificed by the treaty of Troye ; and strangers and 
enemies were thereby irrevocably fixed upon the throne. 
Kevenge alone had carried Philip into these impolitic 
measures, and a point of honour had hitherto induced 
him to maintain them. But as it is the nature of 
passion gradually to decay, while the sense of interest 
maintains a permanent influence and authority, the duke 
had, for some years, appeared sensibly to relent in his 
animosity against Charles, and to hearken willingly to 
the apologies made by. that prince for the murder of 
the late Duke of Burgundy. His extreme youth was 
pleaded in his favour ; his incapacity to judge for him- 
self; the ascendant gained over him by his ministers; 
and his inability to resent a deed which, without his 
knowledge, had been perpetrated by those under whose 
guidance he was then placed. The more to flatter the 
pride of Philip, the King of France had banished from 
his court and presence Tanegui de Chatel, and all those 
who were concerned in that assassination, and had 
offered to make every other atonement which could be 
required of him. The distress which Charles had already 
suffered had tended to gratify the duke's revenge ; the 
miseries, to which France had been so long exposed, 
had begun to move his compassion ; and the cries of all 
Europe admonished him, that his resentment, which 
might hitherto be deemed pious, would, if carried farther, 
be universally condemned as barbarous and unrelenting. 
While the duke was in this disposition, every disgust 
which he received from England made a double impres- 
sion upon him ; the entreaties of the Count of Eiche- 

k Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 90. Grafton, p. 561. 



360 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, mont and the Duke of Bourbon, who had married his 
two sisters, had weight; and he finally determined to 
^^^ unite himself to the royal family of France, from which 
his own was descended. For this purpose, a congress 
was appointed at Arras under the mediation of deputies 
from the pope and the council of Basle : the Duke of 
Burgundy came thither in person : the duke of Bourbon, 
the Count of Kichemont, and other persons of high rank, 
appeared as ambassadors from France : and the English 
having also been invited to attend, the Cardinal of Win- 
chester, the Bishops of Norwich and St. David's, the 
Earls of Huntingdon and Suffolk, with others, received 
from the protector and council a commission for that 
purpose 1 . 

August. The conferences were held in the abbey of St. Yaast ; 
and began with discussing the proposals of the two 
crowns, which were so wide of each other as to admit of 
no hopes of accommodation. France offered to cede 
Normandy with Guienne, but both of them loaded with 
the usual homage and vassalage to the crown. As the 
claims of England upon France were universally unpopular 
in Europe, the mediators declared the offers of Charles 
very reasonable ; and the Cardinal of Winchester, with 
the other English ambassadors, without giving a parti- 
cular detail of their demands, immediately left the con- 
gress. There remained nothing but to discuss the mutual 
pretensions of Charles and Philip. These were easily 
adjusted : the vassal was in a situation to give law to his 
superior; and he exacted conditions, which, had it not 
been for the present necessity, would have been deemed, 
to the last degree, dishonourable and disadvantageous to 
the crown of France. Besides making repeated atone- 
ments and acknowledgments for the murder of the Duke 
of Burgundy, Charles was obliged to cede all the towns 
of Picardy which lay between the Somme and the Low 
Countries; he yielded several other territories; he 
agreed, that these and all the other dominions of Philip 
should be held by him, during his life, without doing 
any homage, or swearing fealty to the present king ; and 
he freed his subjects from all obligations to allegiance, if 
ever he infringed this treaty m . Such were the condi- 

1 Kymer, vol. x. p. 611, 612. m Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 112. Grafton, p. 565. 



HENRY VI. 361 

tions upon which France purchased the friendship of the CHAP. 
Duke of Burgundy. 

The duke sent a herald to England with a letter, in " 
which he notified the conclusion of the treaty of Arras, 
and apologized for his departure from that of Troye. 
The council received the herald with great coldness : 
they even assigned him his lodgings in a shoemaker's 
house, by way of insult : and the populace were so in- 
censed, that if the Duke of Gloucester had not given 
him guards, his life had been exposed to danger when 
he appeared in the streets. The Flemings, and other 
subjects of Philip, were insulted, and some of them 
murdered by the Londoners ; and every thing seemed 
to tend towards a rupture between the two nations 11 . 
These violences were not disagreeable to the Duke of 
Burgundy, as they afforded him a pretence for the far- 
ther measures which he intended to take against the 
English, whom he now regarded as implacable and dan- 
gerous enemies. 

A few days after the Duke of Bedford received m ~ 
telligence of this treaty, so fatal to the interests of Eng- the Duke 
land, he died at Rouen ; a prince of great abilities, and of Bedford - 
of many virtues ; and whose memory, except from the 
barbarous 'execution of the Maid of Orleans, was unsul- 
lied by any considerable blemish. Isabella, Queen of 
France, died a little before him, despised by the English, 
detested by the French, and reduced in her later years 
to regard with an unnatural horror the progress and 
success of her own son in recovering possession of his 
kingdom. This period was also signalized by the death 
of the Earl of Arundel , a great English general, who, 
though he commanded three thousand men, was foiled 
by Xaintrailles at the head of six hundred, and soon after 
expired of the wounds which he received in the action. 

The violent factions which prevailed between the 1436 - 
Duke of Gloucester and the Cardinal of Winchester 
prevented the English from taking the proper measures 
for repairing these multiplied losses, and threw all their 
affairs into confusion. The popularity of the duke, and 
his near relation to the crown, gave him advantages in 

n Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 120. Hollingshed, p. 612. 
o Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 105. Hollingshed, p. 610. 
VOL. II. 31 



362 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the contest which he often lost by his open and un- 
v_^l_, guarded temper, unfit to struggle with the politic and 
1436 interested spirit of his rival. The balance, meanwhile, 
of these parties, kept every thing in suspense : foreign 
affairs were much neglected : and though the Duke of 
York, son to that Earl of Cambridge who was executed 
in the beginning of the last reign, was appointed suc- 
cessor to the Duke of Bedford, it was seven months 
before his commission passed the seals ; and the Eng- 
lish remained so long in an enemy's country without a 
proper head or governor. 

Decline of The new governor, on his arrival, found the capital 
already lost. The Parisians had always been more 
attached to the Burgundian than to the English in- 
terest ; and after the conclusion of the treaty of Arras, 
their affections, without any farther control, universally 
led them to return to their allegiance under their 
native sovereign. The constable, together with Lile- 
Adam, the same person who had before put Paris into 
the hands of the Duke of Burgundy, was introduced in 
the night-time by intelligence with the citizens : Lord 
Willoughby, who commanded only a small garrison of 
one thousand five hundred men, was expelled ; this 
nobleman discovered valour and presence of mind on 
the occasion ; but unable to guard so large a place against 
such multitudes, he retired into the Bastile, and being 
there invested, he delivered up that fortress, and was 
contented to stipulate for the safe retreat of his troops 
into Normandy p . 

In the same season the Duke of Burgundy openly 
took part against England, and commenced hostilities 
by the siege of Calais, the only place which now gave 
the English any sure hold of France, and still rendered 
them dangerous. As he was beloved among his own 
subjects, and had acquired the epithet of Good, from his 
popular qualities, he was able to interest all the inhabi- 
tants of the Low Countries in the success of this enter- 
prise ; and he invested that place with an army, formida- 
ble from its numbers, but without experience, discipline, 
or military spirit q . On the first alarm of this seige, the 

P Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 127. Grafton, p. 568. 

i Moustrelet, vol. ii. p. 126. 130. 132. Hollingshed, p. 613. Grafton, p. 571. 



HENRY VI. 363 

Duke of Gloucester assembled some forces, sent a de- CHAP. 
fiance to Philip, and challenged him to wait the event XX ' 
of a battle, which he promised to give, as soon as the 
wind would permit him to reach Calais. The warlike 
genius of the English had at that time rendered them 
terrible to all the northern parts of Europe, especially to 
the Flemings, who were more expert in manufactures 
than in arms; and the Duke of Burgundy, being already 
foiled in some attempts before Calais, and observing the 
discontent and terror of his own army, thought proper 
to raise the siege, and to retreat before the arrival of the 26th J 
enemy r . 

The English were still masters of many fine provinces 
in France ; but retained possession, more by N the extreme 
weakness of Charles, than by the strength of their own 
garrisons, or the force of their armies. Nothing indeed 
can be more surprising than the feeble efforts made, 
during the course of several years, by these two potent 
nations against each other; while the one struggled for 
independence, and the other aspired to a total conquest 
of its rival. The general want of industry, commerce, 
and police, in that age, had rendered all the European 
nations, and France and England no less than the 
others, unfit for bearing the burdens of war, when it was 
prolonged beyond one season ; and the continuance of 
hostilities had, long ere this time, exhausted the force 
and patience of both kingdoms. Scarcely could the 
appearance of an army be brought into the field on 
either side ; and all the operations consisted in the 
surprisal of places, in the rencounter of detached parties, 
and in incursions upon the open country ; which were 
performed by small bodies, assembled on a sudden from 
the neighbouring garrisons. In this method of conduct- 
ing the war, the French king had much the advantage : 
the affections of the people were entirely on his side : 
intelligence was early brought him of the state and 
motions of the enemy : the inhabitants were ready to 
join in any attempts against the garrisons : and thus 
ground was continually, though slowly, gained upon the 
English. The Duke of York, who was a prince of abili- 
ties, struggled against these difficulties during the course 

r Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 136. Hollingshed, p. 614. 



364 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of five years : and being assisted by the valour of Lord 
^_^*"_j Talbot, soon after created Earl of Shrewsbury, he per- 

1436 formed actions which acquired him honour, but merit 
not the attention of posterity. It would have been well, 
had this feeble war, in sparing the blood of the people, 
prevented likewise all other oppressions ; and had the 
fury of men, which reason and justice cannot restrain, 
thus happily received a check from their impotence and 
inability. But the French and English, though they 
exerted such small force, were, however, stretching 
beyond their resources, which were still smaller ; and 
the troops, destitute of pay, were obliged to subsist by 
plundering and oppressing the country, both of friends 

144 - and enemies. The fields in all the north of France, 
which was the seat of war, were laid waste, and left 
uncultivated 8 . The cities were gradually depopulated, 
not by the blood spilt in battle, but by the more destruc- 
tive pillage of the garrisons* : and both parties, weary 
of hostilities which decided nothing, seemed at last 
desirous of peace, and they set on foot negotiations for 
that purpose. But the proposals of France, and the 
demands of England, were still so wide of each other, 
that all hope of accommodation immediately vanished. 
The English ambassadors demanded restitution of all the 
provinces which had once been annexed to England, 
together with the final cession of Calais and its district ; 
and required the possession of these extensive territories 
without the burden of any fealty or homage on the part 
of their prince : the French offered only part of Guienne, 
part of Normandy, and Calais, loaded with the usual 
burdens. It appeared in vain to continue the negotia- 
tion, while there was so little prospect of agreement. 
The English were still too haughty to stoop from the 
vast hopes which they had formerly entertained, and to 
accept of terms more suitable to the present condition 
of the two kingdoms. 

The D uke of York soon after resigned his government 

Grafton, p. 562. 

4 Fortescue, who soon after this period visited France in the train of Prince 
Henry, speaks of that kingdom as a desert in comparison of England. See his 
treatise De Laudibus Legum Anglice. Though we make allowance for the par- 
tialities of Fortescue, there must have been some foundation for his account ; and 
these destructive wars are the most likely reason to be assigned for the difference 
remarked bv this author. 



HENRY VI. 365 

to the Earl of Warwick, a nobleman of reputation, CHAP. 
whom death prevented from long enjoying this dignity. ^ _, 
The duke ? ,upon the demise of that nobleman, returned 1440 / 
to his charge, and, during his administration, a truce 
was concluded between the King of England and the 
Duke of Burgundy, which had become necessary for the 
commercial interests of .their subjects' 1 . The war with 
France continued in the same languid and feeble state 
as before. 

The captivity of five princes of the blood, taken 
prisoners in the battle of Azincour, was a considerable 
advantage which England long enjoyed over its enemy ; 
but this superiority was now entirely lost. Some of 
these princes had died ; some had been ransomed ; and 
the Duke of Orleans, the most powerful among them, 
was theJLast that remained in the hands of the English. 
He offered the sum of fifty-four thousand nobles w for his 
liberty; and when this proposal was laid before the 
council of England, as every question was there an object 
of faction, the party of the Duke of Gloucester, and that 
of the Cardinal of Winchester, were divided in their 
sentiments w^ith regard to it. The duke reminded the 
council of the dying advice of the late king, that none of 
these prisoners should on any account be released, till his 
son should be of sufficient age to hold himself the reins 
of government. The cardinal insisted on the greatness 
of the sum offered, which in reality was nearly equal to 
two-thirds of all the extraordinary supplies that the 
Parliament, during the course of seven years, granted 
for the support of the war. And he added, that the 
release of this prince was more likely to be advantageous 
than prejudicial to the English interests ; by filling the 
court of France with faction, and giving a head to those 
numerous malecontents whom Charles was at present 
able, with great difficulty, to restrain. The cardinal's 
party, as usual, prevailed : the Duke of Orleans was re- 
leased, after a melancholy captivity of twenty-five years x ; 

u Grafton, p. 573. 

* Eymer, vol. x. p. 764. 776. 782. 795, 796. This sum was equal to thirty-six 
thousand pounds sterling of our present money. A subsidy of a tenth and fifteenth 
was fixed by Edward III. at twenty-nine thousand pounds, which, in the reign of 
Henry VI., made only fifty-eight thousand pounds of our present money. The 
Parliament granted only one subsidy during the course of seven years, from 1437 
to 1444. * Grafton, p. 578. 

31* 



366 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and the Duke of Burgundy, as a pledge of his entire 
reconciliation with the family of Orleans, facilitated to 

1440 that prince the payment of his ransom. It must be con- 
fessed that the princes and nobility, in those ages, went 
to war on very disadvantageous terms. If they were 
taken prisoners, they either remained in captivity during 
life, or purchased their liberty at the price which the 
victors were pleased to impose, and which often reduced 
their families to want and beggary. 

1443. The sentiments of the cardinal some time after, pre- 
vailed in another point of still greater moment. That 
prelate had always encouraged every proposal of accom- 
modation with France ; and had represented the utter 
impossibility, in the present circumstances, of pushing 
farther the conquests in that kingdom, and the great 
difficulty of even maintaining those that were already 
made. He insisted on the extreme reluctance of the 
Parliament to grant supplies ; the disorders in which the 
English affairs in Normandy were involved; the daily 
progress made by the French king ; and the advantage 
of stopping his hand by a temporary accommodation, 
which might leave room for time and accidents to ope- 
rate in favour of the English. The Duke of Gloucester, 
high spirited and haughty, and educated in the lofty 
pretensions which the first successes of his two brothers 
had rendered familiar to him, could not yet be induced 
to relinquish all hopes of prevailing over France ; much 
less could he see, with patience, his own opinion thwarted 
and rejected by the influence of his rival in the English 
council. But notwithstanding his opposition, the Earl 
of Suffolk, a nobleman who adhered to the cardinal's 
party, was despatched to Tours, in order to negotiate 
with the French ministers. It was found impossible to 
adjust the terms of a lasting peace ; but a truce for 
28th May. twenty-two months was concluded, which left every thing 

Truce with , J ,. , ; rru 

France, on the present footing between the parties. The nu- 
merous disorders under which the French government 
laboured, and which time alone could remedy, induced 
Charles to assent to this truce ; and the same motives 
engaged him afterwards to prolong it y . But Suffolk, 
not content with executing this object of his commission, 

y Kymer, vol. xi. p. 101. 108. 206. 214. 



HENRY VI. 367 

proceeded also to finish another business ; which seems CHAP. 
rather to have been implied than expressed in the^_ 
powers that had been granted him z . *~ 

In proportion as Henry advanced in years, his charac- 
ter became fully known in the court, and was no longer 
ambiguous to either faction. Of the most harmless, in- 
offensive, simple manners, but of the most slender capa- 
city, he was fitted both by the softness of his temper, 
and the weakness of his understanding, to be perpetually 
governed by those who surrounded him ; and it was easy 
to foresee that his reign would prove a perpetual mino- 
rity. As he had now reached the twenty-third year of 
his age, it was natural to think of choosing him a queen ; 
and each party was ambitious of having him receive one 
from their hand, as it was probable that this circumstance 
would decide, for ever, the victory between them. The 
Duke of Gloucester proposed a daughter of the Count of 
Armagnac, but had not credit to effect his purpose. The 
cardinal and his friends had cast their eye on Margaret 
of Anjou, daughter of Eegnier, titular King of Sicily, 
Naples, and Jerusalem, descended from the Count of 
Anjou, brother of Charles V., who had left these magni- 
ficent titles, but without any real power or possessions, 
to his posterity. This princess herself was the most 
accomplished of her age both in body and mind ; and 
seemed to possess those qualities which would equally 
qualify her to acquire the ascendant over Henry, and to 
supply all his defects and weaknesses. Of a masculine, 
courageous spirit, of an enterprising temper, endowed 
with solidity as well as vivacity of understanding, she 
had not been able to conceal these great talents even in 
the privacy of her father's family ; and it was reasonable 
to expect, that, when she should mount the throne, they 
would break out with still superior lustre. The Earl of 
Suffolk, therefore, in concert with his associates of the 
English council, made proposals of marriage to Margaret, 
which were accepted. But this nobleman, besides pre- 
occupying the princess's favour, by being the chief 
means of her advancement, endeavoured to ingratiate 
himself with her and her family by very extraordinary 
concessions. Though Margaret brought no dowry with 

z Rymer, vol. xi. p. 53. 



368 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, her, he ventured of himself, without any direct authority 

^_^"_j from the council, but probably with the approbation of 

1443 the cardinal and the ruling members, to engage, by a 

Marriage secret article, that the province of Maine, which was at 

king e w ith that time in the hands of the English, should be ceded 

of Arfou ^ Charles of Anjou, her uncle a , who was prime minister 

DJOU ' and favourite of the French king, and who had already 

received from his master the grant of that province as 

his appanage. 

The treaty of marriage was ratified in England : Suf- 
folk obtained first the title of marquis, then that of duke ; 
and even received the thanks of Parliament for his ser- 
vices in concluding it b . The princess fell immediately 
into close connexions with the cardinal and his party, the 
Dukes of Somerset, Suffolk, and Buckingham ; who, 
fortified by her powerful patronage, resolved on the final 
ruin of the Duke of Gloucester. 

This generous prince, worsted in all court intrigues, 
for which his temper was not suited, but possessing, in a 
high degree, the favour of the public, had already re- 
ceived from his rivals a cruel mortification, which he had 
hitherto borne without violating public peace, but which 
it was impossible that a person of his spirit and huma- 
nity could ever forgive. His duchess, the daughter of 
Keginald, Lord Cobham, had been accused of the crime 
of witchcraft, and it was pretended that there was found 
in her possession a waxen figure of the king, which she 
and her associates, Sir Koger Bolingbroke, a priest, and 
one Margery Jordan of Eye, melted in a magical manner, 
before a slow fire, with an intention of making Henry's 
force and vigour waste away by like insensible degrees. 
The accusation was well calculated to affect the weak 
and credulous mind of the king, and to gain belief in an 
ignorant age ; and the duchess was brought to trial with 
her confederates. The nature of this crime, so opposite 
to all common sense, seems always to exempt the accu- 
sers from observing the rules of common sense in their 
evidence : the prisoners were pronounced guilty ; the 
duchess was condemned to do public penance, and to 
suffer perpetual imprisonment ; the others were exe- 

a Grafton, p. 590. b Cotton, p. 630. 

c Hollingshed, p. 626. 



HENRY VI. 3(39 

cuted d . But as these violent proceedings were ascribed CHAP. 
solely to the malice of the duke's enemies, the people, 
contrary to their usual practice in such marvellous trials, 
acquitted the unhappy sufferers ; and increased their es- 
teem and affection towards a prince who was thus ex- 
posed, without protection, to those mortal injuries. 

These sentiments of the public made the Cardinal of 
Winchester and his party sensible that it was necessary 
to destroy a man whose popularity might become dan- 
gerous, and whose resentment they had so much cause 
to apprehend. In order to effect their purpose, a Par- 
liament was summoned to meet, not at London, which 
was supposed to be too well affected to the duke, but at 
St. Edmondsbury, where they expected that he would 
lie entirely at their mercy. As soon as he appeared, he 
was accused of treason, and thrown into prison. 
was soon after found dead in his bed 6 ; and though it the Duke 
was pretended that his death was natural, and though 
his body, which was exposed to public view, bore no 
marks of outward violence, no one doubted but he had 
fallen a victim to the vengeance of his enemies. An 
artifice, formerly practised in the case of Edward II., 
Kichard II, and Thomas of Woodstock, Duke of Glou- 
cester, could deceive nobody. The reason of this assas- 
sination of the duke seems not that the ruling party ap- 
prehended his acquittal in Parliament on account of his 
innocence, which, in such times, was seldom much re- 
garded, but that they imagined his public trial and exe- 
cution would have been more invidious than his private 
murder, which they pretended to deny. Some gentlemen 
of his retinue were afterwards tried as accomplices in his 
treasons, and were condemned to be hanged, drawn, and 
quartered. They were hanged and cut down ; but just 
as the executioner was proceeding to quarter them, their 
pardon was produced, and they were recovered to life f . 
The most barbarous kind of mercy that can possibly be 
imagined ! 

This prince is said to have received a better education 
than was 'usual in his age, to have founded one of the 
first public libraries in England, and to have been a great 

d Stowe, p. 381. Hollingshed, p. 622. Grafton, p. 587. 
e Grafton, p. 597. f Fabian Chron. anno 1447. 



370 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, patron of learned men. Among other advantages, which 
^ ^he reaped from this turn of mind, it tended much to cure 
1447 him of credulity; of which the following instance is 
given by Sir Thomas More. There was a man, who 
pretended that, though he was born blind, he had reco- 
vered his sight by touching the shrine of St. Alban. The 
duke, happening soon after to pass that way, questioned 
the man, and, seeming to doubt of his sight, asked him 
the colours of several cloaks, worn by persons of his reti- 
nue. The man told them very readily. You are a 
Jmave, cried the prince ; had you been born blind, you 
could not so soon have learned to distinguish colours : and 
immediately ordered him to be set in the stocks as an 
impostor g . 

The Cardinal of Winchester died six weeks after his 
nephew, whose murder was universally ascribed to him 
as well as to the Duke of Suffolk, and which, it is said, 
gave him more remorse in his last moments than could 
naturally be expected from a man hardened, during the 
course of a long life, in falsehood and in politics. What 
share the queen had in this guilt is uncertain ; her usual 
activity and spirit made the public conclude, with some 
reason, that the duke's enemies durst not have ventured 
on such a deed without her privity. But there hap- 
pened, soon after, an event of which she and her favour- 
ite, the Duke of Suffolk, bore incontestably the whole 
odium. 

That article of the marriage treaty, by which the pro- 
vince of Maine was to be ceded to Charles of Anjou, the 
queen's uncle, had probably been hitherto kept secret ; 
and, during the lifetime of the Duke of Gloucester, it 
might have been dangerous to venture on the execution 
of it. But, as the court of France strenuously insisted 
on performance, orders were now despatched, under 
Henry's hand, to Sir Francis Surienne, governor of 
Mans, commanding him to surrender that place to 
Charles of Anjou. Surienne, either questioning the 
authenticity of the order, or regarding his government 
as his sole fortune, refused compliance ; and it became 
necessary for a French army, under the Count of Dunois, 
to lay siege to the city. The governor made as good a 

s Grafton, p. 597. 



HENRY VI. 371 

defence as his situation could permit ; but receiving no CHAP. 

relief from Edmund, Duke of Somerset, who was at^_^ , 

that time governor of Normandy, he was at last obliged U47 
to capitulate, and to surrender not only Mans, but all 
the other fortresses of that province, which was thus 
entirely alienated from the crown of England. 

The bad effects of this measure stopped not here. U48. 
Surienne, at the head of all his garrisons, amounting to 
two thousand five hundred men, retired into Normandy, 
in expectation of being taken into pay, and of being 
quartered in some towns of that province ; but Somerset, 
who had no means of subsisting such a multitude, and 
who w r as probably incensed art Surienne's disobedience, 
refused to admit him ; and this adventurer, not daring 
to commit depredations on the territories either of the 
King of France or of England, marched into Britany, 
seized the town of Fougeres, repaired the fortifications 
of Pontorson and St. James de Beuvron, and subsisted 
his troops by the ravages which he exercised on that 
whole province h . The Duke of Britany complained of 
this violence to the King of France, his liege lord. 
Charles remonstrated with the Duke of Somerset : that 
nobleman replied, that the injury was done without his 
privity, and that he had no authority over Surienne and 
his companions 1 . Though this answer ought to have 
appeared satisfactory to Charles, who had often felt 
severely the licentious, independent spirit of such mer- 
cenary soldiers, he never would admit of the apology. 
He still insisted that these plunderers should be recalled, 
and that reparation should be made to the Duke of Bri- 
tany for all the damages which he had sustained ; and, 
in order to render an accommodation absolutely imprac- 
ticable, he made the estimation of damages amount to 
no less a sum than one million six hundred thousand 
crowns. He was sensible of the superiority which the 
present state of his affairs gave him over England, and 
he determined to take advantage of it. 

No sooner was the truce concluded between the 
kingdoms, than Charles employed himself, with great 
industry and judgment, in repairing those numberless 
ills to which France, from the continuance of wars, both 

h Monstrelet, vol. iii. p. 6. i Ibid. p. 7. Hollingshcd, p. 629. 



372 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, foreign and domestic, had so long been exposed. He 

^ _, restored the course of public justice ; he introduced order 

1448 into the finances ; he established discipline in his troops ; 

he repressed faction in his court ; he revived the languid 

state of agriculture and the arts ; and, in the course of a 

few years, he rendered his kingdom flourishing within 

itself, and formidable to its neighbours. Meanwhile, 

affairs in England had taken a very different turn. The 

court was divided into parties, which were enraged 

against each other : the people were discontented with 

the government : conquests in France, which were an 

object more of glory than of interest, were overlooked 

amidst domestic incidents, which engrossed the attention 

of all men : the governor of Normandy, ill supplied with 

money, was obliged to dismiss the greater part of his 

troops, and to allow the fortifications of the towns and 

castles to become ruinous : and the nobility and people 

of that province had, during the late open communication 

with France, enjoyed frequent opportunities of renewing 

connexions with their ancient master, and of concerting 

the means for expelling the English. The occasion, 

therefore, seemed favourable to Charles for breaking the 

1449. truce. Normandy was at once invaded by four powerful 

o^thTwar arm * es : one commanded by the king himself; a second 

with by the Duke of Britany ; a third by the Duke of Alen- 

France. ^ Qn . an( ^ a f our | ; } 1 ^y ^ e Count of Dunois. The places 

opened their gates almost as soon as the French appeared 
before them: Verneiiil, Nogent, Chateau Gaillard, 
Ponteau de Mer, Gisors, Mante, Vernon, Argentan, 
Lisieux, Fecamp, Coutances, Belesme, Pont de 1'Arche, 
fell in an instant into the hands of the enemy. The 
Duke of Somerset, so far from having an army which 
could take the field, and relieve these places, was not 
able to supply them with the necessary garrisons and 
provisions. He retired, with the few troops of which 
he was master, into Rouen ; and thought it sufficient, if, 
till the arrival of succours from England, he could save 
that capital from the general fate of the province. The 
King of France, at the head of a formidable army, fifty 
thousand strong, presented himself before the gates : the 
dangerous example of revolt had infected the inhabit- 
ants, and they called aloud for a capitulation. Somerset, 



HENRY VI. 373 

unable to resist, at once, both the enemies within and CHAP. 
from without, retired with his garrison into the palace ._ X ^' . 
and castle, which, being places not tenable, he was ob- 1449 
liged to surrender: he purchased a retreat to Harfleur^thKov. 
by the payment of fifty-six thousand crowns, by engaging 
to surrender Arques, Tancarville, Caudebec, Honfleur, and 
other places in the higher Normandy, and by delivering 9 , 
hostages fbr the performance of articles k . The governor 
of Honfleur refused to obey his orders ; upon which the 
Earl of Shrewsbury, who was one of the hostages, was 
detained prisoner ; and the English were thus deprived 
of the only general capable of recovering them from 
their present distressed situation. Harfleur made a 
better defence under Sir Thomas Curson the governor, 
but was finally obliged to open its gates to Dunois. 
Succours at last appeared from England under Sir 1450. 
Thomas Kyriel, and landed at Cherbourg; but these 
came very late, amounted only to four thousand men, 
and were soon after put to rout at Fourmigni, by the 
Count of Clermont 1 . This battle, or rather skirmish, 
was the only action fought by the English for the defence 
of their dominions in France, which they had purchased 
at such an expense of blood and treasure. Somerset, 
shut up in Caen without any prospect of relief, found it 
necessary to capitulate : Falaise opened its gates, on con- 
dition that the Earl of Shrewsbury should be restored 
to liberty : and Cherbourg, the last place of Normandy 
which remained in the hands of the English, being de- 
livered up, the conquest of that important province was 
finished in a twelvemonth by Charles, to the great joy 
of the inhabitants and of his whole kingdom 111 . 

A like rapid success attended the French arms in 
Guienne ; though the inhabitants of that province were, 
from long custom, better inclined to the English go- 
vernment. Dunois was despatched thither, and met 
with no resistance in the field, and very little from the 
towns. Great improvements had been made, during The Eng- 
this age, in the structure and management of artillery, p^iieT" 
and none in fortification ; and the art of defence was by France. 
that means more unequal, than either before or since, 

fc Monstrelet, vol. iii. p. 21. Grafton, p. 643. l Hollingshed, p. 631. 

m Grafton, p. 646. 

VOL. ii. 32 



374 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, to the' art of attack. After all the small places about 
Bourdeaux were reduced, that city agreed to submit, if 
n t relieved by a certain time ; and as no one in Eng- 
land thought seriously of these distant concerns, no 
relief appeared ; the place surrendered ; and Bayonne 
being taken soon after, this whole province, which had 
remained united to England since the accession of 
Henry II., was, after a period of three centuries, finally 
swallowed up in the French monarchy. 

Though no peace or truce was concluded between 
France and England, the war was, in a manner, at an 
end. The English, torn in pieces by the civil dissen- 
sions which ensued, made but one feeble effort more 
for the recovery of Guienne ; and Charles, occupied at 
home in regulating the government, and fencing against 
the intrigues of his factious son, Lewis the dauphin, 
scarcely ever attempted to invade them in their island, 
or to retaliate upon them, by availing himself of their 
intestine confusions. 



HENRY VI. 375 



CHAPTER XXI. 

CLAIM or THE DUKE OF YORK TO THE CROWN. THE EARL OP WARWICK. 
IMPEACHMENT or THE DUKE or SUFFOLK. His BANISHMENT AND DEATH. 
POPULAR INSURRECTION. THE PARTIES OF YORK AND LANCASTER. FIRST 
ARMAMENT OF THE DUKE OF YORK. FIRST BATTLE OF ST. ALBAN'S. BAT- 
TLE OF BLORE-HEATH OF NORTHAMPTON. A PARLIAMENT. BATTLE OF 
WAKEFIELD. DEATH OF THE DUKE OF YORK. BATTLE OF MORTIMER'S 
CROSS. SECOND BATTLE OF ST. ALBAN'S. EDWARD IV. ASSUMES THE 
CROWN. MISCELLANEOUS TRANSACTIONS OF THIS EEIGN. 

A WEAK prince, seated on the throne of England, had 
never failed, how gentle soever and innocent, to be vn- 
fested with faction, discontent, rebellion, and civil com- 1450. 
motions ; and as the incapacity of Henry appeared every 
day in a fuller light, these dangerous consequences 
began, from past experience, to be universally and justly 
apprehended. Men also of unquiet spirits, no longer 
employed in foreign wars, whence they were now ex- 
cluded by the situation of the neighbouring states, were 
the more likely to excite intestine disorders, and, by 
their emulation, rivalship, and animosities, to tear the 
bowels of their native country. But though these causes 
alone were sufficient to breed confusion, there concurred 
another circumstance of the most dangerous nature : a 
pretender to the crown appeared ; the title itself of the 
weak prince, who enjoyed the name of sovereignty, was 
disputed : and the English were now to pay the severe, 
though late, penalty of their turbulence under Richard 
II., and of their levity in violating, without any ne- 
cessity or just reason, the lineal succession of their 
monarchs. 

All the males of the house of Mortimer were extinct ; Claim of 
but Anne, the sister of the last Earl of March, having fYork to 
espoused the Earl of Cambridge, beheaded in the reign the crown - 
of Henry V., had transmitted her latent, but not yet 
forgotten, claim to her son, Richard, Duke of York. 
This prince, thus descended, by his mother, from Phi- 
lippa, only daughter of the Duke of Clarence, second 
son of Edward III., stood plainly in the order of sue- 



376 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, cession before the king, who derived his descent from 

\' \' i O? 

^_~^_j the Duke of Lancaster, third son of that monarch; and 
1450 that claim could not, in many respects, have fallen into 
more dangerous hands than those of the Duke of York. 
Richard was a man of valour and abilities, of a prudent 
conduct and mild disposition : he had enjoyed an op- 
portunity of displaying these virtues in his government 
of France ; and though recalled from that command by 
the intrigues and superior interest of the Duke of 
Somerset, he had been sent to suppress a rebellion in 
Ireland ; had succeeded much better in that enterprise 
than his rival in the defence of Normandy, and had even 
been able to attach to his person and family the whole 
Irish nation, whom he was sent to sub due a . In the 
right of his father he bore the rank of first prince of the 
blood ; and by this station he gave a lustre to his title, 
derived from the family of Mortimer, which, though of 
great nobility, was equalled by other families in the 
kingdom, and had been eclipsed by the royal descent of 
the house of Lancaster. He possessed an immense for- 
tune from the union of so many successions, those of 
Cambridge and York on the one hand, with those of 
Mortimer on the other ; which last inheritance had be- 
fore been augmented by an union of the estates of Cla- 
rence and Ulster with the patrimonial possessions of the 
family of March. The alliances too of Richard, by his 
marrying the daughter of Ralph Nevil, Earl of West- 
moreland, had widely extended his interest among the 
nobility, and had procured him many connexions in that 
formidable order. 

The family of Nevil was, perhaps, at this time the 
most potent, both from their opulent possessions, and 
from the characters of the men, that has ever appeared 
in England. For, besides the Earl of Westmoreland 
and the Lords Latimer, Fauconberg, and Abergavenny, 
the Earls of Salisbury and Warwick were of that family, 
and were of themselves, on many accounts, the greatest 
noblemen in the kingdom. The Earl of Salisbury, bro- 
ther-in-law to the Duke of York, was the eldest son, by 
a second marriage, of the Earl of Westmoreland ; and 
inherited by his wife, daughter and heir of Montacute, 

Stowe, p. 387. 



HENRY VI. 377 

Earl of Salisbury, killed before Orleans, the possessions CHAP. 
and title of that great family. His eldest son, Richard,^ ^ 
had married Anne, the daughter and heir of Beauchamp, 1450 
Earl of Warwick, who died governor of France ; and 
by this alliance he enjoyed the possessions, and had ac- 
quired the title, of that other family, one of the most 
opulent, most ancient, and most illustrious in England. 
The personal qualities also of these two earls, especially 
of Warwick, enhanced the splendour of their nobility, 
and increased their influence over the people. This The Earl 
latter nobleman, commonly known, from the subsequent v ick. ar ~ 
events, by the appellation of the King-matter ', had dis- 
tinguished himself by his gallantry in the field, by the 
hospitality of his table, by the magnificence, and still 
more by the generosity of his expense, and by the spi- 
rited and bold manner which attended him in all his 
actions. The undesigning frankness and openness of 
his character rendered his conquest over men's affections 
the more certain and infallible; his presents were re- 
garded as sure testimonies of esteem and friendship; 
and his professions as the overflowings of his genuine 
sentiments. No less than thirty thousand persons are 
said to have daily lived at his board in the different 
manors and castles which he possessed in England : the 
military men, allured by his munificence and hospitality, 
as well as by his bravery, were zealously attached to his 
interests : the people in general bore him an unlimited 
affection : his numerous retainers were more devoted to 
his will than to the prince or to the laws : and he was 
the greatest, as well as the last, of those mighty barons, 
who formerly overawed the crown, and rendered the 
people incapable of any regular system of civil govern- 
ment. 

But the Duke of York, besides the family of Nevil, 
had many other partisans among the great nobility. 
Courtney, Earl of Devonshire, descended from a very 
noble family of that name in France, was attached to his 
interests: Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk, had from his 
hereditary hatred to the family of Lancaster, embraced 
the same party : and the discontents, which universally 
prevailed among the people, rendered every combination 

32* 



378 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of the great the more dangerous to the established go- 
^J [_, vernment. 

1450 Though the people were never willing to grant the 
supplies necessary for keeping possession of the conquered 
provinces in France, they repined extremely at the loss 
of these boasted acquisitions; and fancied, because a 
sudden irruption could make conquests, that without 
steady counsels and a uniform expense, it was possible to 
maintain them. The voluntary cession of Maine to the 
queen's uncle had made them suspect treachery in the 
loss of Normandy and Guienne. They still considered 
Margaret as a French woman, and a latent enemy of the 
kingdom. And when they saw her father and all her 
relations active in promoting the success of the French, 
they could not be persuaded that she, who was all- 
powerful in the English council, would very zealously 
oppose them in their enterprises. 

But the most fatal blow given to the popularity of the 
crown, and to the interests of the house of Lancaster, 
was by the assassination of the virtuous Duke of Glou- 
cester, whose character, had he been alive, would have 
intimidated the partisans of York ; but whose memory, 
being extremely cherished by the people, served to throw 
an odium on all his murderers. By this crime the reign- 
ing family suffered a double prejudice : it was deprived 
of its firmest support ; and it was loaded with all the 
infamy of that imprudent and barbarous assassination. 

As the Duke of Suffolk was known to have had an 
active hand in the crime, he partook deeply of the ha- 
tred attending it; and the clamours which necessarily 
rose against him, as prime minister, and declared favour- 
ite of the queen, were thereby augmented to a tenfold 
pitch, and became absolutely uncontrollable. The great 
nobility could ill brook to see a subject exalted above 
them ; much more one who was only great grandson 
to a merchant, and who was of a birth so much inferior to 
theirs. The people complained of his arbitrary measures; 
which were, in some degree, a necessary consequence of 
the irregular power then possessed by the prince, but 
which the least disaffection easily magnified into tyranny. 
The great acquisitions which he daily made were the 



HENRY VI. 379 

object of envy ; and as they were gained at the expense CHAP. 
of the crown, which was itself reduced to poverty, they ^J_, 
appeared, on that account, to all indifferent persons, the 1450 
more exceptionable and invidious. 

The revenues of the crown, which had long been dis- 
proportioned to its power and dignity, had been ex- 
tremely dilapidated during the minority of Henry b ; 
both by the rapacity of the courtiers, which the king's 
uncles could not control, and by the necessary expenses 
of the French war, which had always been very ill sup- 
plied by the grants of Parliament. The -royal demesnes 
were dissipated ; and at the same time the king was 
loaded with a debt of three hundred and seventy-two 
thousand pounds, a sum so great, that the Parliament 
could never think of discharging it. This unhappy situa- 
tion forced the ministers upon many arbitrary measures : 
the household itself could not be supported without 
stretching to the utmost the right of purveyance, and 
rendering it a kind of universal robbery upon the people : 
the public clamour rose high upon this occasion, and no 
one had the equity to make allowance for the necessity 
of the king's situation. Suffolk, once become odious, 
bore the blame of the whole ; and every grievance, in 
every part of the administration, was universally imputed 
to his tyranny and injustice. 

This nobleman, sensible of the public hatred under i 



which he laboured, and foreseeing an attack from theSukeV e 
Commons, endeavoured to overawe his enemies by boldly Suffolk. 
presenting himself to the charge, and by insisting upon 
his own innocence, and even upon his merits, and those 
of his family in the public service. He rose in the House 
of Peers ; took notice of the clamours propagated against 
him ; and complained, that after serving the crown in 
thirty-four campaigns ; after living abroad seventeen 
years without once returning to his native country ; after 
losing a father and three brothers in the wars with 
France ; after being himself a prisoner, and purchasing 
his liberty by a great ransom ; it should yet be suspected, 
that he had been debauched from his allegiance by that 
enemy whom he had ever opposed with zeal and forti- 
tude, and that he had betrayed his prince, who had re- 

b Cotton, p. 609. 



380 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, warded his services by the highest honours and greatest 
^J ^ L _, offices that it was in his power to confer . This speech 
1450 did not answer the purpose intended. The Commons, 
rather provoked at his challenge, opened their charge 
against him, and sent up to the Peers an accusation of 
high treason, divided into several articles. They insisted, 
that he had persuaded the French king to invade Eng- 
land with an armed force, in order to depose the king, 
and to place on the throne his own son, John de la Pole, 
whom he intended to marry to Margaret, the only daugh- 
ter of the late John, Duke of Somerset, and to whom, 
he imagined, he would by that means acquire a title to 
the crown : that he had contributed to the release of the 
Duke of Orleans, in hopes that that prince would assist 
King Charles in expelling the English from France, and 
recovering full possession of his kingdom : that he had 
afterwards encouraged that monarch to make open war 
on Normandy and Guienne, and had promoted his con- 
quests by betraying the secrets of England, and obstruct- 
ing the succours intended to be sent to those provinces : 
and that he had, without any powers or commission, pro- 
mised by treaty to cede the province of Maine to Charles 
of Anjou, and had accordingly ceded it ; which proved, 
in the issue, the chief cause of the loss of Normandy d . 

It is evident, from a review of these articles, that 
the Commons adopted, without inquiry, all the popular 
clamours against the Duke of Suffolk, and charged him 
with crimes, of which none but the vulgar could seriously 
believe him guilty. Nothing can be more incredible, 
than that a nobleman, so little eminent by his birth and 
character, could think of acquiring the crown to his 
family, and of deposing Henry by foreign force, and, 
together with him, Margaret, his patron, a princess of 
so much spirit and penetration. Suffolk appealed to 
many noblemen in the House, who knew that he had 
intended to marry his son to one of the co-heirs of the 
Earl of Warwick, and was disappointed in his views 
only by the death of that lady ; and he observed, that 
Margaret of Somerset could bring to her husband no 
title to the crown, because she herself was not so much 

c Cotton, p. 641. 

a Ibid. p. 642. Hall, fol. 157. Hollingshed, p. 631. Grafton, p. 607. 



HENRY VI. 381 

as comprehended in the entail settled by act of Parlia- CHAF. 
ment. It is easy to account for the loss of Normandy ^_ _^ 
and Guienne, from the situation of affairs in the two 1450 
kingdoms, without supposing any treachery in the Eng- 
lish ministers ; and it may safely be affirmed, that greater 
vigour was requisite to defend these provinces from the 
arms of Charles VII. than to conquer them at first from 
his predecessor. It could never be the interest of any 
English minister to betray and abandon such acquisi- 
tions ; much less of one who was so well established in 
his master's favour, who enjoyed such high honours and 
ample possessions in his own country, who had nothing 
to dread but the effects of popular hatred, and who could 
never think, without the most extreme reluctance, of 
becoming a fugitive and exile in a foreign land. The 
only article which carries any face of probability is his 
engagement for the delivery of Maine to the queen's 
uncle : but Suffolk maintained with great appearance of 
truth, that this measure was approved of by several at 
the council table 6 ; and it seems hard to ascribe to it, as 
is done by the Commons, the subsequent loss of Nor- 
mandy, and expulsion of the English. Normandy lay 
open on every side to the invasion of the French : Maine, 
an inland province, must soon after have fallen without 
any attack ; and as the English possessed in other parts 
more fortresses than they could garrison or provide for, 
it seemed no bad policy to contract their force, and to 
render the defence practicable, by reducing it within a 
narrower compass. 

The Commons were probably sensible, that this charge 
of treason against Suffolk would not bear a strict scru- 
tiny ; and they therefore, soon after, sent up against him 
a new charge of misdemeanors, which they also divided 
into several articles. They affirmed, among other impu- 
tations, that he had procured exorbitant grants from the 
crown, had embezzled the public money, had conferred 
offices on improper persons, had perverted justice by 
maintaining iniquitous causes, and had procured pardons 
for notorious offenders f . The articles are mostly gene- 
ral, but are not improbable ; and as Suffolk seems to 
have been a bad man, and a bad minister, it will not be 

e Cotton, p. 643. f Ibid, 



382 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, rash in us to think that he was guilty, and that many 
of these articles could have been proved against him. 
1450 The court was alarmed at the prosecution of a favourite 
minister, who lay under such a load of popular preju- 
dices ; and an expedient was fallen upon to save him 
from present ruin. The king summoned all the Lords, 
spiritual and temporal, to his apartment : the prisoner 
was produced before them, and asked what he could say 
in his own defence ? he denied the charge, but sub- 
mitted to the king's mercy. Henry expressed himself 
not satisfied with regard to the first impeachment for 
treason : but in consideration of the second, for misde- 
meanors, he declared, that, by virtue of Suffolk's own 

ihment sub 88 * 011 ; n t by any judicial authority, he banished 
him the kingdom during five years. The Lords remained 
silent ; but as soon as they returned to their own House, 
they entered a protest, that this sentence should nowise 
infringe their privileges ; and that if Suffolk had insisted 
upon his right, and had not voluntarily submitted to the 
king's commands, he was entitled to a trial by his Peers 
in Parliament. 

It was easy to see that these irregular proceedings 
were meant to favour Suffolk, and that, as he still pos- 
sessed the queen's confidence, he would, on the first 
favourable opportunity, be restored to his country, and 
be reinstated in his former power and credit. A captain 
of a vessel w r as therefore employed by his enemies to in- 
tercept him in his passage to France. He was seized 

and death, near Dover, his head struck off on the side of a long 
boat, and his body thrown into the sea g . No inquiry 
was made after the actors and accomplices in this atro- 
cious deed of violence. 

The Duke of Somerset succeeded to Suffolk's power 
in the ministry, and credit with the queen ; and as he 
was the person under whose government the French 
provinces had been lost, the public, who always judge by 
the event, soon made him equally the object of their 
animosity and hatred. The Duke of York was absent 
in Ireland during all these transactions ; and however it 
might be suspected that his partisans had excited and 

s Hall, fol. 158. Hist. Croyland, contin. p. 525. Stowe, p. 388. Grafton, 
p. 610. 



HENRY VI. 383 

supported the prosecution against Suffolk, no immediate CHAP. 
ground of complaint could, on that account, lie against V _ X ^ L _. 
him. Bat there happened, soon after, an incident which 1450 
roused the jealousy of the court, and discovered to them 
the extreme danger to which they were exposed from the 
pretensions of that popular prince. 

The humours of the people, set afloat by the par- p P u i ar 
liamentary impeachment, and by the fall of so great 
favourite as Suffolk, broke out in various commotions, 
which were soon suppressed ; but there arose one in 
Kent, which was attended with more dangerous con- 
sequences. A man of low condition, one John Cade, a 
native of Ireland, who had been obliged to fly into 
France for crimes, observed, on his return to England, 
the discontents of the people ; and he laid on them the 
foundation of projects which were at first crowned with 
surprising success. He took the name of John Mor- 
timer ; intending, as is supposed, to pass himself for a 
son of that Sir John Mortimer who had been sentenced 
to death by Parliament, and executed in the beginning 
of this reign, without any trial or evidence, merely upon 
an indictment of high-treason given in against him h . 
On the first mention of that popular name, the common 
people of Kent, to the number of twenty thousand, 
flocked to Cade's standard, and he excited their zeal by 
publishing complaints against the numerous abuses in 
government, and demanding a redress of grievances. 
The court, not yet fully sensible of the danger, sent a 
small force against the rioters, under the command of 
Sir Humphrey Stafford, who was defeated and slain in 
an action near Sevenoke i ; and Cade, advancing with 
his followers towards London, encamped on Blackheath. 
Though elated by his victory, he still maintained the 
appearance of moderation ; and sending to the court a 
plausible list of grievances 1 ", he promised, that when 

h Stowe, p. 364. Cotton, p. 564. This author admires, that such a piece of 
injustice should have been committed in peaceable times : he might have added, 
and by such virtuous princes as Bedford and Gloucester. But it is to be presumed 
that Mortimer Avas guilty, though his condemnation was highly irregular and illegal. 
The people had, at this time, a very feeble sense of law and a constitution, and 
power was very imperfectly restrained by these limits. When the proceedings of 
a Parliament were so irregular, it is easy to imagine that those of a king would be 
more so. i Hall, fol. 159. Hollingshed, p. 634. 

k Stowe, p. 388, 389. Hollingshed, p. 633. 



384 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, these should be redressed, and when Lord Say, the trea- 
v^J^ surer, and Cromer, sheriff of Kent, should be punished 
1450 for their malversations, he would immediately lay down 
his arms. The council, who observed that nobody was 
willing to fight against men so reasonable in their pre- 
tensions, carried the king, for present safety, to Kenil- 
worth ; and the city immediately opened its gates to 
Cade, who maintained, during some time, great order 
and discipline among his followers. He always led them 
into the fields during the night-time, and published 
severe edicts against plunder and violence of every kind ; 
but being obliged, in order to gratify their malevolence 
against Say and Cromer, to put these men to death 
without a legal trial 1 , he found that, after the commission 
of this crime, he was no longer master of their riotous 
disposition, and that all his orders were neglected. 
They broke into a rich house, which they plundered ; 
and the citizens, alarmed at this act of violence, shut 
their gates against them ; and being seconded by a 
detachment of soldiers sent them by Lord Scales, gover- 
nor of the Tower, they repulsed the rebels with great 
slaughter 11 . The Kentish men were so discouraged by 
the blow, that upon receiving a general pardon from the 
primate, then chancellor, they retreated towards Koches- 
ter, and there dispersed. The pardon was soon after 
annulled, as extorted by violence ; a price was set on 
Cade's head , who was killed by one Iden, a gentleman 
of Sussex ; and many of his followers were capitally 
punished for their rebellion. 

It was imagined by the court, that the Duke of York 
had secretly instigated Cade to this attempt, in order to 
try, by that experiment, the dispositions of the people 
towards his title and family p ; and as the event had so 
far succeeded to his wish, the ruling party had greater 
reason than ever to apprehend the future consequences 
of his pretensions. At the same time they heard that 
he intended to return from Ireland ; and fearing that he 
meant to bring an armed force along with him, they 
issued orders, in the king's name, for opposing him, and 

l Grafton, p. 612. Hall, fol. 160. 

n Hist. Croyland, contin. p. 526. Kymer, vol. xi. p. 275. 

P Cotton, p. 661. Stowe, p. 391. 



HENRY VI. 385 

for debarring him entrance into England q . But the CHAP. 
duke refuted his enemies, by coming attended with no 
more than his ordinary retinue : the precautions of the 
ministers served only to show him their jealousy and 
malignity against him : he was sensible that his title, by 
being dangerous to the king, was also become dangerous 
to himself: he now saw the impossibility of remaining 
in his present situation, and the necessity of proceeding 
forward in support of his claim. His partisans, there- 
fore, were instructed to maintain, in all companies, his 
right by succession, and by the established laws and con- 
stitution of the kingdom : these questions became every 
day more and more the subject of conversation : the 
minds ,of men were insensibly sharpened against each 
other by disputes, before they came to more dangerous 
extremities ; and various topics were pleaded in support 
of the pretensions of each party. 

The partisans of the house of Lancaster maintained, The par- 
that though the elevation of Henry IV. might at first be Lancaster 
deemed somewhat irregular, and could not be justified and York - 
by any of those principles on which that prince chose to 
rest his title, it was yet founded on general consent, was 
a national act, and was derived from the voluntary appro- 
bation of a free people, who, being loosened from their 
allegiance by the tyranny of the preceding government, 
were moved by gratitude, as well as by a sense of public 
interest, to intrust the sceptre into the hands of their 
deliverer : that, even if that establishment were allowed 
to be at first invalid, it had acquired solidity by time ; 
the only principle which ultimately gives authority to 
government, and removes those scruples which the ir- 
regular steps attending almost all revolutions naturally 
excite in the minds of the people : that the right of 
succession was a rule admitted only for general good, 
and for the maintenance of public order; and could 
never be pleaded to the overthrow of national tranquillity, 
and the subversion of regular establishments : that the 
principles of liberty, no less than the maxims of internal 
peace, were injured by these pretensions of the house 
of York ; and if so many reiterated acts of the legislature, 
by which the crown was entailed on the present family, 

<i Stowe, p. 394. 
VOL. II. 33 



386 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, were now invalidated, the English must be considered, 
^ _,not as a free people, who could dispose of their own 
USD. government, but as a troop of slaves who were im- 
plicitly transmitted by succession from one master to 
another : that the nation was bound to allegiance under 
the house of Lancaster by moral, no less than by po- 
litical duty ; and were they to infringe those numerous 
oaths of fealty which they had sworn to Henry and his 
predecessors, they would thenceforth be thrown loose 
from all principles, and it would be found difficult ever 
after to fix and restrain them : that the Duke of York 
himself had frequently done homage to the king as his 
lawful sovereign, and had thereby, in the most solemn 
manner, made an indirect renunciation of those claims 
with which he now dared to disturb the tranquillity of 
the public : that even though the violation of the rights 
of blood, made on the deposition of Richard, was per- 
haps rash and imprudent, it was too late to remedy the 
mischief; the danger of a disputed succession could no 
longer be obviated ; the people, accustomed to a govern- 
ment, which, in the hands of the late king, had been 
so glorious, and in that of his predecessor so prudent 
and salutary, would still ascribe a right to it ; by causing 
multiplied disorders, and by shedding an inundation of 
blood, the advantage would only be obtained of ex- 
changing one pretender for another ; and the house of 
York itself, if established on the throne, would, on the 
first opportunity, be exposed to those revolutions which 
the giddy spirit excited in the people gave so much 
reason to apprehend : and that though the present king 
enjoyed not the shining talents which had appeared in 
his father and grandfather, he might still have a son 
who should be endowed with them ; he is himself emi- 
nent for the most harmless and inoffensive manners; 
and if active princes were dethroned on pretence of 
tyranny, and indolent ones on the plea of incapacity, 
there would thenceforth remain in the constitution no 
established rule of obedience to any sovereign. 

These strong topics, in favour of the house of Lan- 
caster, were opposed by arguments no less convincing 
on the side of the house of York. The partisans of 
this latter family asserted, that the maintenance of order 



HENEY VI. 387 

in the succession of princes, far from doing injury to CHAP, 
the people, or invalidating their fundamental title to,^ x ^ L _ y 
good government, was established only for the purposes 1450 
of government, and served to prevent those numberless 
confusions which must ensue, if no rule were followed 
but the uncertain and disputed views of present con- 
venience and advantage : that the same maxims which 
ensured public peace were also salutary to national 
liberty ; the privileges of the people could only be main- 
tained by the observance of laws ; and if no account 
were made of the rights of the sovereign, it could less 
be expected that any regard would be paid to the pro- 
perty and freedom of the subject : that it was never too 
late to correct any pernicious precedent ; an unjust es- 
tablishment, the longer it stood, acquired the greater 
sanction and validity ; it could with more appearance of 
reason be pleaded as an authority for a like injustice ; 
and the maintenance of it, instead of favouring public 
tranquillity, tended to disjoint every principle by which 
human society was supported : that usurpers would be 
happy, if their present possession of power, or their 
continuance for a few years, could convert them into 
legal princes ; but nothing would be more miserable than 
the people, if all restraints on violence and ambition 
were thus removed, and a full scope given to the attempts 
of every turbulent innovator : that time, indeed, might 
bestow solidity on a government whose first foundations 
were the most infirm ; but it required both a long course 
of time to produce this effect, and the total extinction 
of those claimants whose title was built on the original 
principles of the constitution: that the deposition of 
Richard II., and the advancement of Henry IV., were 
not deliberate national acts, but the result of the levity 
and violence of the people, and proceeded from those 
very defects in human nature, which the establishment 
of political society, and of an order in succession, was 
calculated to prevent : that the subsequent entails of the 
crown were a continuance of the same violence and 
usurpation ; they were not ratified by the legislature, 
since the consent of the rightful king was still wanting ; 
and the acquiescence, first of the family of Mortimer, 
then of the family of York, proceeded from present 



388 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, necessity, and implied no renunciation of their preten- 
^J ^ sions : that the restoration of the true order of succession 
1450 could not be considered as a change which familiarized 
the people to revolutions, but as the correction of a 
former abuse, which had itself encouraged the giddy 
spirit of innovation, rebellion, and disobedience : and 
that, as the original title of Lancaster stood only in the 
person of Henry IV. on present convenience, even this 
principle, unjustifiable as it was, when not supported by 
laws, and warranted by the constitution, had now en- 
tirely gone over to the other side'; nor was there any 
comparison between a prince utterly unable to sway the 
sceptre, and blindly governed by corrupt ministers, or by 
an imperious queen, engaged in foreign and hostile in- 
terests, and a prince of mature years, of approved wis- 
dom and experience, a native of England, the lineal heir 
of the crown, who, by his restoration, would replace 
every thing on ancient foundations. 

So many plausible arguments could be urged on both 
sides of this interesting question, that the people were 
extremely divided in their sentiments ; and though the 
noblemen of greatest power and influence seem to have 
espoused the party of York, the opposite cause had the 
advantage of being supported by the present laws, and 
by the immediate possession of royal authority. There 
were also many great noblemen in the Lancastrian party 
who balanced the power of their antagonists, and kept 
the nation in suspense between them. The Earl of 
Northumberland adhered to the present government : 
the Earl of Westmoreland, in spite of his connexions 
with the Duke of York, and with the family of Nevil, 
of which he was the head, was brought over to the same 
party ; and the whole north of England, the most war- 
like part of the kingdom, was, by means of these two 
potent noblemen, warmly engaged in the interests of 
Lancaster. Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset, and 
his brother Henry, were great supports of that cause ; 
as were also Henry Holland, Duke of Exeter, Stafford, 
Duke of Buckingham, the Earl of Shrewsbury, the 
Lords Clifford, Dudley, Scales, Audley, and other noble- 
men. 

While the kingdom was in this situation, it might 



HENRY VI. 389 

naturally be expected that so many turbulent barons, CHAP. 
possessed of so much independent authority, would 
immediately have flown to arms, and have decided the ^^50^ 
quarrel, after their usual manner, by war and battle, 
under the standards of the contending princes. But 
there still were many causes which retarded these des- 
perate extremities, and made a long train of faction, 
intrigue, and cabal, precede the military operations. 
By the gradual progress of arts in England, as well as 
in other parts of Europe, the people were now become 
of some importance ; laws were beginning to be respected 
by them ; and it was requisite, by various pretences, pre- 
viously to reconcile their minds to the overthrow of such 
an ancient establishment as that of the house of Lancas- 
ter, ere their concurrence could reasonably be expected. 
The Duke of York himself, the new claimant, was of a 
moderate and cautious character, an enemy to violence, 
and disposed to trust rather to time and policy, than to 
sanguinary measures, for the success of his pretensions. 
The very imbecility itself of Henry tended to keep the 
factions in suspense, and make them stand long in awe 
of each other : it rendered the Lancastrian party unable 
to strike any violent blow against their enemies : it en- 
couraged the Yorkists to hope, that, after banishing the 
king's ministers, and getting possession of his person, 
they might gradually undermine his authority, and be 
able, without the perilous expedient of a civil war, to 
change the succession by parliamentary and legal autho- 
rity. 

The dispositions which appeared in a Parliament as- 1*51. 
sembled soon after the arrival of the Duke of York from 6tl 
Ireland, favoured these expectations of his partisans, and 
both discovered an unusual boldness in the Commons, 
and were a proof of the general discontents which pre- 
vailed against the administration. The Lower House, 
without any previous inquiry or examination, without 
alleging any other ground of complaint than common 
fame, ventured to present a petition against the Duke 
of Somerset, the Duchess of Suffolk, the Bishop of 
Chester, Sir John Sutton, Lord Dudley, and several 
others of inferior rank ; and they prayed the king to 
remove them for ever from his person and councils, and 

33* 



390 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, to prohibit them from approaching within twelve miles 
^J^ of the court r . This was a violent attack, somewhat ar- 
1451 bitrary, and supported but by few precedents, against 
the ministry ; yet the king durst not openly oppose it : 
he replied, that, except the Lords, he would banish all 
the others from court during a year, unless he should 
have occasion for their service in suppressing any rebel- 
lion. At the same time, he rejected a bill which had 
Eassed both Houses, for attainting the late Duke of 
uffolk, and which, in several of its clauses, discovered 
a very general prejudice against the measures of the 
court. 

1452. The Duke of York, trusting to these symptoms, raised 
armament an army of ten thousand men, with which he marched 
Duk 1 e f Cowards London, demanding a reformation of the govern- 
York. ment, and the removal of the Duke of Somerset from 
all power and authority 8 . He unexpectedly found the 
gates of the city shut against him, and on his retreating 
into Kent, he was followed by the king at the head of a 
superior army; in which several of Richard's friends, 
particularly Salisbury and Warwick, appeared ; probably 
with a view of mediating between the parties, and of 
seconding, on occasion, the Duke of York's pretensions. 
A parley ensued ; Richard still insisted upon the removal 
of Somerset, and his submitting to a trial in Parliament : 
the court pretended to comply with his demand ; and 
that nobleman was put in arrest : the Duke of York was 
then persuaded to pay his respects to the king in his 
tent ; and, on repeating his charge against the Duke of 
Somerset, he was surprised to see that minister step 
from behind the curtain, and offer to maintain his inno- 
cence. Richard now found that he had been betrayed ; 
that he was in the hands of his enemies ; and that it was 
become necessary, for his own safety, to lower his pre- 
tensions. No violence, however, was attempted against 
him : the nation was not in a disposition to bear the 
destruction of so popular a prince : he had many friends 
in Henry's camp; and his son, who was not in the 
power of the court, might still be able to revenge his 
death on all his enemies : he was therefore dismissed ; 

r Parliamentary History, vol. ii. p. 263. 
s Stowe, p. 394. 



HENRY VI. 391 

and he retired to his seat of Wigmore, on the borders of CHAP. 
Wales*. v 

While the Duke of York lived in this retreat, there 
happened an incident, which, by increasing the public 
discontents, proved favourable to his pretensions. Se- 
veral Gascon lords, affectionate to the English govern- 
ment, and disgusted at the new dominion of the French, 
came to London, and offered to return to their allegiance 
under Henry u . The Earl of Shrewsbury, with a body 
of eight thousand men, was sent over to support them. 
Bourdeaux opened its gates to him : he made himself 1453. 
master of Fronsac, Castillon, and some other places: 20 
affairs began to wear a favourable aspect : but as Charles 
hastened to resist this dangerous invasion, the fortunes 
of the English were soon reversed : Shrewsbury, a vene- 
rable warrior, above fourscore years of age, fell in battle ; 
his conquests were lost ; Bourdeaux was again obliged 
to submit to the French king w ; and all hopes of reco- 
vering the province of Gascony were for ever extin- 
guished. 

Though the English might deem themselves happy to 
be fairly rid of distant dominions which were of no use 
to them, and which they never could defend against the 
growing power of France, they expressed great discontent 
on the occasion ; and they threw all the blame on the 
ministry, who had not been able to effect impossibilities. 
While they were in this disposition, the queen's delivery 13tl1 Oct. 
of a son, who received the name of Edward, was deemed 
no joyful incident ; and as it removed all hopes of the 
peaceable succession of the Duke of York, who was 
otherwise, in the right of his father, and by the laws 
enacted since the accession of the house of Lancaster, 
next heir to the crown, it had rather a tendency to in- 
flame the quarrel between the parties. But the duke 
was incapable of violent counsels ; and even when no 
visible obstacle lay between him and the throne, he was 
prevented by his own scruples from mounting it. Henry, 
always unfit to exercise the government, fell at this time 
into a distemper, which so far increased his natural im- 
becility, that it rendered him incapable of maintaining 

* Grafton, p. 620. u Hollingshed, p. 640. 

w Polyd. Verg. p. 501. Grafton, p. 623. 



392 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, even the appearance of royalty. The queen and the 
council, destitute of this support, found themselves un- 
^^^ able to resist the York party, and they were obliged to 
yield to the torrent. They sent Somerset to the Tower, 
and appointed Richard lieutenant of the kingdom, with 
powers to open and hold a session of Parliament x . That 
assembly, also, taking into consideration the state of the 
kingdom, created him protector during pleasure. Men 
who thus intrusted sovereign authority to one that had 
such evident and strong pretensions to the crown, were 
not surely averse to his taking immediate and full 
possession of it ; yet the duke, instead of pushing them 
to make farther concessions, appeared somewhat timid 
and irresolute, even in receiving the power which was 
tendered to him. He desired that it might be recorded 
in Parliament, that this authority was conferred on him 
from their own free motion, without any application on 
his part ; he expressed his hopes that they would assist 
him in the exercise of it ; he made it a condition of his 
acceptance, that the other lords, who were appointed to 
be of 1 his council, should also accept of the trust, and 
should exercise it ; and he required that all the powers 
of his office should be specified and defined by act of 

H54. Parliament. This moderation of Richard was certainly 
very unusual and very amiable ; yet was it attended with 
bad consequences in the present juncture, and by giving 
time to the animosities of faction to rise and ferment, it 
proved the source of all those furious wars and commo- 
tions which ensued. 

The enemies of the Duke of York soon found it in 
their power to make advantage of his excessive caution. 
Henry, being so far recovered from his distemper as to 
carry the appearance of exercising the royal power, they 
moved him to resume his authority, to annul the protec- 

1455. torship of the duke, to release Somerset from the Tower 7 , 
and to commit the administration into the hands of that 
nobleman. Richard, sensible of the dangers which might 
attend his former acceptance of the parliamentary com- 
mission, should he submit to the annulling of it, levied 
an army, but still without advancing any pretensions to 

x Rymer, vol. xi. p. 344. 

y Ibid. p. 361. Hollingshed, 642. Grafton, 626. 



HENRY VI. 393 

the crown. He complained only of the king's ministers, CHAP. 
and demanded a reformation of the government. A^ ^^ 
battle was fought at St. Albans, in which the Yorkists 1455 
were superior, and without suffering any material loss, First battle 
slew about five thousand of their enemies ; among whom ban's'. 
were the Duke of Somerset, the Earl of Northumberland, 22d Ma y- 
the Earl of Stafford, eldest son of the Duke of Bucking- 
ham, Lord Clifford, and many other persons of distinc- 
tion z . The king himself fell into the hands of the Duke 
of York, who treated him with great respect and tender- 
ness : he was only obliged (which he regarded as no 
hardship) to commit the whole authority of the crown 
into the hands of his rival. 

This was the first blood spilt in that fatal quarrel, 
which was not finished in less than a course of thirty 
years, which was signalized by twelve pitched battles, 
which opened a scene of extraordinary fierceness and 
cruelty, is computed to have cost the lives of eighty 
princes of the blood, and almost entirely annihilated the 
ancient nobility of England. The strong attachments 
which at that time men of the same kindred bore to 
each other, and the vindictive spirit, which was consi- 
dered as a point of honour, rendered the great families 
implacable in their resentments, and every moment 
widened the breach between the parties. Yet affairs did 
not immediately proceed to the last extremities : the 
nation was kept some time in suspense : the vigour and 
spirit of Queen Margaret, supporting her small power, 
still roved a balance to the great authority of Eichard, 
which was checked by his irresolute temper. A Parlia- 9th Jul ^ 
ment, which was soon after assembled, plainly discovered, 
by the contrariety of their proceedings, the contrariety of 
the motives by which they were actuated. They granted 
the Yorkists a general indemnity ; and they restored the 
protectorship to the duke, who, in accepting it, still per- 
severed in all his former precautions : but at the same 
time they renewed their oaths of fealty to Henry, and 
fixed the continuance of the protectorship to the majo- 
rity of his son Edward, who was vested with the usual 
dignities of Prince of Wales, Duke of Cornwall, and Earl 
of Chester. The only decisive act passed in this Parlia- 

z Stowe, p. 309. Hollingshed, p. 643. 



394 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, rnent was a full resumption of all the grants which had 
made since the death of Henry V., and which had 
reduced the crown to great poverty. 
H56. It was not found difficult to wrest power from hands 
so little tenacious as those of the Duke of York. Mar- 
garet, availing herself of that prince's absence, produced 
her husband before the House of Lords ; and, as his 
state of health permitted him, at that time, to act his 
part with some tolerable decency, he declared his inten- 
tions of resuming the government, and of putting an end 
to Richard's authority. This measure, being unexpected, 
was not opposed by the contrary party : the House of 
Lords, who were, many of them, disgusted with the late 
act of resumption, assented to Henry's proposal : and the 
king was declared to be reinstated in sovereign autho- 
rity. Even the Duke of York acquiesced in this irre- 
gular act of the Peers ; and no disturbance ensued. 
But that prince's claim to the crown was too well known, 
and the steps which he had taken to promote it were 
too evident, ever to allow sincere trust and confidence to 
have place between the parties. The court retired to 
Coventry, and invited the Duke of York and the Earls 
of Salisbury and Warwick to attend the king's person. 

1457. When they were on the road they received intelligence 
that designs were formed against their liberties and lives. 
They immediately separated themselves. Eichard with- 
drew to his castle of Wigmore ; Salisbury to Middle- 
ham in Yorkshire ; and Warwick to his government of 
Calais, which had been committed to him after the 
battle of St. Albans, and which, as it gave him the com- 
mand of the only regular military force maintained by 
England, was of the utmost importance in the present 
juncture. Still men of peaceable dispositions, and 
among the rest, Bourchier, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
thought it not too late to interpose with their good 
offices, in order to prevent that effusion of blood with 
which the kingdom was threatened ; and the awe in 
which each party stood of the other rendered the media- 
tion for some time successful. It was agreed that all the 
great leaders on both sides should meet in London, and 

1458. be solemnly reconciled. The Duke of York and his 
partisans came thither with numerous retinues, and took 



HENRY VI. 395 

up their quarters near each other for mutual security. CHAP. 
The leaders of the Lancastrian party used the same^ _, 
precaution. The mayor, at the head of five thousand U58 
men, kept a strict watch night and day, and was ex- 
tremely vigilant in maintaining peace between them a . 
Terms were adjusted, which removed not the ground of 
difference. An outward reconciliation only was pro- 
cured ; and in order to notify this accord to the whole 
people, a solemn procession to St. Paul's was appointed, 
where the Duke of York led Queen Margaret, and a 
leader of one party marched hand in hand with a leader 
of the opposite. The less real cordiality prevailed, the 
more were the exterior demonstrations of amity redou- 
bled. But it was evident, that a contest for a crown could 
not thus be peaceably accommodated ; that each party 
watched only for an opportunity of subverting the other; 
and that much blood must yet be spilt, ere the nation 
could be restored to perfect tranquillity, or enjoy a set- 
tled and established government. 

Even the smallest accident, without any formed design, 1459. 
was sufficient, in the present disposition of men's minds, 
to dissolve the seeming harmony between the parties ; 
and had the intentions of the leaders been ever so ami- 
cable, they would have found it difficult to restrain the . 
animosity of their followers. One of the king's retinue 
insulted one of the Earl of Warwick's : their companions 
on both sides took part in the quarrel : a fierce combat 
ensued : the earl apprehended his life to be aimed at : he 
fled to his government of Calais ; and both parties, in 
every county of England, openly made preparations for 
deciding the contest by war and arms. 

The Earl of Salisbury, marching to join the Duke of |jj^ e of 
York, was overtaken at Blore-heath, on the borders of heath. 
Staffordshire, by Lord Audley, who commanded much 23d Sept< 
superior forces; and a small rivulet with steep banks 
ran between the armies. Salisbury here supplied his 
defect in numbers by stratagem ; a refinement of which 
there occur few instances in the English civil wars, where 
a headlong courage, more than military conduct, is com- 

a Fabian Chron. anno 1458. The author says, that some lords brought nine 
hundred retainers, some six hundred, none less than four hundred. See also 
Grafton, p. 633. 



396 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, monly to be remarked. He feigned a retreat, and al- 
_ X ^ L _^ lured Audley to follow him with precipitation : but when 

1459. ^ ne van f ^ ne royal army had passed the brook, Salis- 
bury suddenly turned upon them; and partly by the 
surprise, partly by the division, of the enemy's forces, 
put this body to rout. The example of flight was fol- 
lowed by the rest of the army ; and Salisbury, obtaining 
a complete victory, reached the general rendezvous of 
the Yorkists at Ludlow. b 

The Earl of Warwick brought over to this rendezvous 
a choice body of veterans from Calais, on whom it was 
thought the fortune of the war would much depend; 
but this reinforcement occasioned, in the issue, the im- 
mediate ruin of the Duke of York's party. When the 
royal army approached, and a general action was every 
hour expected, Sir Andrew Trollop, who commanded the 
veterans, deserted to the king in the night-time; and 
the Yorkists were so dismayed at this instance of treach- 
ery, which made every man suspicious of his fellow, that 
they separated next day without striking a stroke . 
The duke fled to Ireland : the Earl of Warwick, attended 
by many of the other leaders, escaped to Calais ; where 
his great popularity among all orders of men, particu- 
larly among the military, soon drew to him partisans, 
and rendered his power very formidable. The friends of 
the house of York, in England, kept themselves every 
where in readiness to rise on the first summons from 
their leaders. 

1460. After meeting with some successes at sea, Warwick 
landed in Kent, with the Earl of Salisbury, and the Earl 
of March, eldest son of the Duke of York ; and being 
met by the primate, by Lord Cobham, and other persons 
of distinction, he marched, amidst the acclamations 
of the people, to London. The city immediately opened 
its gates to him; and his troops increasing on every 
day's march, he soon found himself in a condition to 
face the royal army, which hastened from Coventry 

Battle of to attack him. The battle was fought at Northampton ; 
^ rt t ^" n and was soon decided against the royalists by the infi- 
ioth July, delity of Lord Grey of Euthin, who commanding Henry's 

b Hollingshed, p. 649. Grafton, p. 936. 
c Hollingshed, p. 650. Grafton, p. 537. 



HENRY VI. 397 

van, deserted to the enemy during the heat of action, CHAP. 
and spread a consternation through the troops. The 
Duke of Buckingham, the Earl of Shrewsbury, the Lords ^7 6 ^~ 
Beaumont a.nd Egremont, and Sir William Lucie, were 
killed in the action or pursuit : the slaughter fell chiefly 
on the gentry and nobility ; the common people were 
spared by orders of the Earls of Warwick and March d . 
Henry himself, that empty shadow of a king, was again 
taken prisoner ; and as the innocence and simplicity of 
his manners, which bore the appearance of sanctity, had 
procured him the tender regard of the people 6 , the 
Earl of Warwick and the other leaders took care to 
distinguish themselves by their respectful demeanour 
towards him. 

A Parliament was summoned in the king's name, and AFa riia- 
met at Westminster, where the duke soon after appeared nhOct. 
from Ireland. This prince had never hitherto advanced 
openly any claim to the crown : he had only complained 
of ill ministers, and demanded a redress of grievances : 
and even in the present crisis, when the Parliament was 
surrounded by his victorious army, he showed such a re- 
gard to law and liberty, as is unusual during the preva- 
lence of a party in any civil dissensions, and was still less 
to be expected in those violent and licentious times. 
He advanced towards the throne; and being met by 
the Archbishop of Canterbury, who asked him, whether 
he had yet paid his respects to the king ? he replied, that 
he knew of none to whom he owed that title. He then 
stood near the throne f , and addressing himself to the 
House of Peers, he gave them a deduction of his title 
by descent, mentioned the cruelties by which the house 
of Lancaster had paved their way to sovereign power, 
insisted on the calamities which had attended the go- 
vernment of Henry, exhorted them to return into the 
right path, by doing justice to the lineal successor, and 
thus pleaded his cause before them, as his natural and 
legal judges 8 . This cool and moderate manner of de- 
manding a crown intimidated his friends, and encouraged 
his enemies: the Lords remained in suspense 11 ; and no 

d Stowe, p. 409. e Hall, fol. 169. Grafton, p. 195. 

Hollingshed, p. 655. g Cotton, p. 665. Grafton, p. 643. 

11 Hollingshed, p. 657. Grafton, p. 645. 

VOL. ii. 34 



398 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, one ventured to utter a word on the occasion. Richard, 
^J ^who had probably expected that the Peers would have 
1460 invited him to place himself on the throne, was much 
disappointed at their silence ; but desiring them to re- 
flect on what he had proposed to them, he departed the 
House. The Peers took the matter into consideration, 
with as much tranquillity as if it had been a common 
subject of debate : they desired the assistance of some 
considerable members among the Commons in their de- 
liberations : they heard, in several successive days, the 
reasons alleged for the Duke of York : they even ven- 
tured to propose objections to his claim, founded on 
former entails of the crown, and on the oaths of fealty 
sworn to the house of Lancaster 1 : they also observed, 
that, as Richard had all along borne the arms of York, 
not those of Clarence, he could not claim as successor 
to the latter family : and after receiving answers to these 
objections, derived from the violence and power by 
which the house of Lancaster supported their present 
possession of the crown, they proceeded to give a de- 
cision. Their sentence was calculated, as far as possible, 
to please both parties. They declared the title of the 
Duke of York to be certain and indefeasible; but in 
consideration that Henry had enjoyed the crown, without 
dispute or controversy, during the course of thirty-eight 
years, they determined that he should continue to pos- 
sess the title and dignity during the remainder of his 
life ; that the administration of the government, mean- 
Awhile, should remain with Richard; that he should be 
acknowledged the true and lawful heir of the monarchy ; 
that every one should swear to maintain his succession, 
and it should be treason to attempt his life ; and that 
all former settlements of the crown, in this and the two 
last reigns, should be abrogated and rescinded 1 ". The 
duke acquiesced in this decision : Henry himself, being 
a prisoner, could not oppose it : even if he had enjoyed 
his liberty, he would not probably have felt any violent 
reluctance against it: and the act thus passed with 
the unanimous consent of the whole legislative body. 
Though the mildness of this compromise is chiefly to be 
ascribed to the moderation of the Duke of York, it is 

i Cotton, p. 666. k ibid. Grafton, p. 647. 



HENRY VI. 399 

impossible not to observe in those transactions visible CHAP, 
marks of a higher regard to law, and of a more fixed, J*^ 1 ^ 
authority enjoyed by Parliament, than has appeared in U60 
any former period of English history. 

It is probable that the duke, without employing either 
menaces or violence, could have obtained from the Com- 
mons a settlement more consistent and uniform : but as 
many, if not all the members of the Upper House had 
received grants, concessions, or dignities, during the last 
sixty years, when the house of Lancaster was possessed 
of the government, they were afraid of invalidating their 
own titles by too sudden and violent an overthrow of 
that family ; and in thus temporising between the parties, 
they fixed the throne on a basis upon which it could 
not possibly stand. The duke, apprehending his chief 
danger to arise from the genius and spirit of Queen 
Margaret, sought a pretence for banishing her the king- 
dom : he sent her, in the king's name, a summons to 
come immediately to London ; intending, in case of her 
disobedience, to proceed to extremities against her. 
But the queen needed not this menace to excite her ac- 
tivity in defending the rights of her family. After the 
defeat at Northampton, she fled with her infant son to 
Durham, thence to Scotland : but soon returning, she 
applied to the northern barons, and employed every mo- 
tive to procure their assistance. Her affability, insinua- 
tion, and address, qualities in which she excelled, her 
caresses, her promises, wrought a powerful effect on 
every one who approached her : the admiration of her 
great qualities was succeeded by compassion towards her 
helpless condition : the nobility of that quarter, who re- 
garded themselves as the most warlike in the kingdom, 
were moved by indignation to find the southern barons 
pretend to dispose of the crown and settle the govern- 
ment ; and that they might allure the people to their 
standard, they promised them the spoils of all the pro- 
vinces on the other side of the Trent. By these means, 
the queen had collected an army twenty thousand strong, 
with a celerity which was neither expected by her friends, 
nor apprehended by her enemies. 

The Duke of York, informed of her appearance in 
the north, hastened thither with a body of five thousand 



400 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, men, to suppress, as he imagined, the beginnings of an 
, insurrection ; when, on his arrival at Wakefield, he found 
himself so much outnumbered by the enemy. He threw 
himself into Sandal castle, which was situated in the 
neighbourhood ; and he was advised by the Earl of Sa- 
lisbury, and other prudent counsellors, to remain in that 
fortress, till his son, the Earl of March, who was levying 
forces in the borders of Wales, could advance to his 
assistance 1 . But the duke, though deficient in political 
courage, possessed personal bravery in an eminent de- 
gree ; and notwithstanding his wisdom and experience, 
he thought that he should be for ever disgraced, if, by 
taking shelter behind walls, he should for a moment 
w* resign the victory to a woman. He descended into the 

Wakefield. O J 

24th Dec. plain, and ottered battle to the enemy, which was in- 
stantly accepted. The great inequality of numbers was 
sufficient alone to decide the victory ; but the queen, by 
sending a detachment, who fell on the back of the duke's 
army, rendered her advantage still more certain and un- 

Death of disputed. The duke himself was killed in the action ; 
an d as his body was found among the slain, the head 
was cut off by Margaret's orders, and fixed on the gates 
of York, with a paper crown upon it, in derision of his 
pretended title. His son, the Earl of Rutland, a youth 
of seventeen, was brought to Lord Clifford ; and that 
barbarian, in revenge of his father's death, who had 
perished in the battle of St. Alban's, murdered, in cool 
blood, and with his own hands, this innocent prince, 
whose exterior figure, as well as other accomplishments, 
are represented by historians as extremely amiable. The 
Earl of Salisbury was wounded and taken prisoner, and 
immediately beheaded, with several other persons of 
distinction, by martial law, at Pomfret m . There fell 
near three thousand Yorkists in this battle : the duke 
himself was greatly and justly lamented by his own 
party : a prince who merited a better fate, and whose 
errors in conduct proceeded entirely from such qualities, 
as render him the more an object of esteem and affection. 
He perished in the fiftieth year of his age, and left three 
sons, Edward, George, and Eichard, with three daughters, 
Anne, Elizabeth, and Margaret. 

1 Stowe, p. 412. m Polyd. Verg. p. 510. 



HENRY VI. 4Q1 

The queen, after this important victory, divided her CHAP. 
army. She sent the smaller division, under Jasper Tudor, .j^ 1 ^ 
Earl of Pembroke, half-brother to the king, against 1461 
Edward, the new Duke of York. She herself marched 
with the larger division towards London, where the Earl 
of Warwick had been left with the command of the 
Yorkists. Pembroke was defeated by Edward at Mo r- Battle of 
timer's Cross in Herefordshire, with the loss of near four 
thousand men : his army was dispersed ; he himself 
escaped by flight ; but his father, Sir Owen Tudor, was 
taken prisoner, and immediately beheaded by Edward's 
orders. This barbarous practice, being once begun, was 
continued by both parties, from a spirit of revenge, 
which covered itself under the pretence of retaliation 11 . 

Margaret compensated this defeat by a victory which 
she obtained over the Earl of Warwick. That noble- st.Aiban's. 
man, on the approach of the Lancastrians, led out his 
army, reinforced by a strong body of the Londoners, who 
were affectionate to his cause ; and he gave battle to the 
queen at St. Alban's. While the armies were warmly 
engaged, Lovelace, who commanded a considerable body 
of the Yorkists, withdrew from the combat ; and this 
treacherous conduct, of which there are many instances 
in those civil wars, decided the victory in favour of the 
queen. About two thousand three hundred of the van- 
quished perished in the battle and pursuit, and the person 
of the king fell again into the hands of his own party. 
This weak prince was sure to be almost equally a prisoner 
whichever faction had the keeping of him ; and scarcely 
any more decorum was observed by one than by the 
other, in their method of treating him. Lord Bonville, 
to whose care he had been intrusted by the Yorkists, 
remained with him after the defeat, on assurances of 
pardon given him by Henry : but Margaret, regardless 
of her husband's promise, immediately ordered the head 
of that nobleman to be struck off by the executioner . 
Sir Thomas Kyriel, a brave warrior, who had signalized 
himself in the French wars, was treated in the same 
manner. 

The queen made no great advantage of this victory. 
Young Edward advanced upon her from the other side ; 

n Hollingshed, p. 660. Grafton, p. 650. Hollingshed, p. 660. 

34* 



402 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and collecting the remains of Warwick's army, was soon 
^in a condition of giving her battle with superior forces. 
1461 She was sensible of her danger, while she lay between 
the enemy and the city of London ; and she found it 
necessary to retreat with her army to the north p . Ed- 
ward entered the capital amidst the acclamations of the 
citizens, and immediately opened a new scene to his 
party. This prince, in the bloom of youth, remarkable 
for the beauty of his person, for his bravery, his activity, 
his affability, and every popular quality, found himself 
so much possessed of public favour, that, elated with the 
spirit natural to his age, he resolved no longer to confine 
himself within those narrow limits which his father had 
prescribed to himself, and which had been found, by 
experience, so prejudicial to his cause. He determined 
to assume the name and dignity of king ; to insist 
openly on his claim ; and thenceforth to treat the oppo- 
site party as traitors and rebels to his lawful authority. 
But as a national consent, or the appearance of it, still 
seemed, notwithstanding his plausible title, requisite to 
precede this bold measure, and as the assembling of a 
Parliament might occasion too many delays, and be 
attended with other inconveniences, he ventured to pro- 
ceed in a less regular manner, and to put it out of the 
power of his enemies to throw obstacles in the way of 
his elevation. His army was ordered to assemble in St. 
John's Fields ; great numbers of people surrounded 
them ; an harangue was pronounced to this mixed mul- 
titude, setting forth the title of Edward, and inveighing 
against the tyranny and usurpation of the rival family ; 
and the people were then asked, whether they would 
have Henry of Lancaster for king ? They unanimously 
exclaimed against the proposal. It was then demanded, 
, whether they would accept of Edward, eldest son of the 
Edw. iv. late Duke of York ? They expressed their assent by 
the crown, loud and joyful acclamations \ A great number of 
bishops, lords, magistrates, and other persons of distinc- 
tion, were next assembled at Baynard's castle, who rati- 
5th March. ec j ^he popular election; and the new king was, on the 
subsequent day, proclaimed in London, by the title of 
Edward IY. r 

P Grafton, p. 652. <i Stowe, p. 415. Hollingshed, p. 661. * Grafton, p. 653. 



HENRY VI. 403 

In this manner ended the reign of Henry VI., a CHAP. 
monarch who, while in his cradle, had been proclaimed 
king both of France and England, and who began 
life with the most splendid prospects that any prince in 
Europe had ever enjoyed. The revolution was unhappy 
for his people, as it was the source of civil wars ; but 
was almost entirely indifferent to Henry himself, who 
was utterly incapable of exercising his authority, and 
who, provided he personally met with good usage, was 
equally easy, as he was equally enslaved, in the hands 
of his enemies and of his friends. His weakness and 
his disputed title were the chief causes of the public 
calamities; but whether his queen and his ministers 
were not also guilty of some great abuses of power, it 
is not easy for us, at this distance of time, to determine. 
There remain no proofs on record of any considerable 
violation of the laws, except in the assassination of the 
Duke of Gloucester, which was a private crime, formed 
no precedent, and was but too much of a piece with the 
usual ferocity and cruelty of the times. 

The most remarkable law which passed in this reign Misceiia- 
was that for the due election of members of Parliament ^Tsac- 
in counties. After the fall of the feudal system, the tions 
distinction of tenures was in some measure lost; and re i g n. 
every freeholder, as well those who held of mesne lords, 
as the immediate tenants of the crown, were by degrees 
admitted to give their votes at elections. This inno- 
vation (for such it may probably be esteemed) was indi- 
rectly confirmed by a law of Henry IV. 8 , which gave 
right to such a multitude of electors as was the occasion 
of great disorder. In the eighth and tenth of this king, 
therefore, laws were enacted, limiting the electors to 
such as possessed forty shillings a year in land, free 
from all burdens, within the county*. This sum was 
equivalent to near twenty pounds a year of our present 
money ; and it were to be wished, that the spirit as well 
as letter of this law had been maintained. 

The preamble of the statute is remarkable : " Whereas 
the elections of knights have of late, in many coun- 
ties of England, been made by outrages and excessive 

8 Statutes at large, 7 Henry IV. cap. 15. 

t Ibid. 8 Henry VI. cap. 7. 10 Henry VI. cap. 2. 



404 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, numbers of people, many of them of small substance 
and value, yet pretending to a right equal to the best 
"^^ knights and esquires; whereby manslaughters, riots, 
batteries, and divisions among the gentlemen, and other 
people of the same counties, shall very likely rise and 
be, unless due remedy be provided in this behalf," &c. 
We may learn from these expressions, what an im- 
portant matter the election of a member of Parliament 
was now become in England : that assembly was begin- 
ning in this period to assume great authority : the Com- 
mons had it much in their power to enforce the execu- 
tion of the laws ; and if they failed of success in this 
particular, it proceeded less from any exorbitant power 
of the crown, than from the licentious spirit of the aris- 
tocracy, and perhaps from the rude education of the age, 
and their own ignorance of the advantages resulting 
from a regular administration of justice. 

When the Duke of York, the Earls of Salisbury and 
Warwick, fled the kingdom upon the desertion of their 
troops, a Parliament was summoned at Coventry in 1460, 
by which they were all attainted. This Parliament 
seems to have been very irregularly constituted, and 
scarcely deserves the name ; insomuch, that an act passed 
in it, " that all such knights of any county as were re- 
turned by virtue of the king's letters, without any other 
election, should be valid, and that no sheriff should, for 
returning them, incur the penalty of the statute of Henry 
IV." u All the acts of that Parliament were afterwards 
reversed; "because it was unlawfully summoned, and 
the knights and barons not duly chosen w ." 

The Parliaments in this reign, instead of relaxing 
their vigilance against the usurpations of the court of 
Rome, endeavoured to enforce the former statutes 
enacted for that purpose. The Commons petitioned 
that no foreigner should be capable of any church pre- 
ferment, and that the patron might be allowed to pre- 
sent anew upon the non-residence of any incumbent x . 
But the king eluded these petitions. Pope Martin 
wrote him a severe letter against the statute of pro- 
visors; which he calls an abominable law, that would 

u Cotton, p. 664. * Statutes at large, 39 Henry VI. cap. 1. 

* Cotton, p. 585. 



HENRY VI. 405 

infallibly damn every one who observed it y . The Cardi- CHAP. ' 
nal of Winchester was legate ; and as he was also a kind V XXL 
of prime minister, and immensely rich from the profits 
of his clerical dignities, the Parliament became jealous 
lest he should extend the papal power ; and they pro- 
tested that the cardinal should absent himself in all 
affairs and councils of the king, whenever the pope or see 
of Eome was touched upon z . 

Permission was given by Parliament to export corn 
when it was at low prices ; wheat at six shillings and 
eight pence a quarter, money of that age; barley at 
three shillings and four pence a . It appears from these 
prices, that corn still remained at near half its present 
value, though other commodities were much cheaper. 
The inland commerce of corn was also opened in the 
eighteenth of the king, by allowing any collector of the 
customs to grant a licence for carrying it from one 
county to another b . The same year a kind of navigation 
act was proposed with regard to all places within the 
Straits, but the king rejected it c . 

The first instance of debt contracted upon parliamen- 
tary security occurs in this reign d . The commencement 
of this pernicious practice deserves to be noted ; a prac- 
tice the more likely to become pernicious, the more a 
nation advances in opulence and credit. The ruinous 
effects of it are now become apparent, and threaten the 
very existence of the nation. 

y Burnet's Collection of Records, vol. i. p. 99. z Cotton, p. 593. 

a Statutes at large, 15 Henry VI. cap. 2. 23 Henry VI. cap. 6. 

b Cotton, p. 625. c Ibid. p. 626. d Ibid. p. 593. 634. 638. 



406 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



CHAPTER XXII. 
EDWARD IV. 

BATTLE or TOUTON. HENRY ESCAPES INTO SCOTLAND. A PARLIAMENT. 
BATTLE OF HEXHAM. HENRY TAKEN PRISONER, AND CONFINED IN THE 
TOWER. THE KING'S MARRIAGE WITH LADY ELIZABETH GRAY. WAR- 
WICK DISGUSTED. ALLIANCE WITH BURGUNDY. INSURRECTION IN YORK- 
SHIRE. BATTLE OF BANBURY. WARWICK AND CLARENCE BANISHED. 
WARWICK AND CLARENCE RETURN. EDWARD IV. EXPELLED. HENRY VI. 

RESTORED. EDWARD IV. RETURNS. BATTLE OF BARNET, AND DEATH OF 

WARWICK. BATTLE OF TEWKESBURY, AND MURDER OF PRINCE EDWARD. 
DEATH OF HENRY VI. INVASION OF FRANCE. PEACE OF PECQUIGNI. 
TRIAL AND EXECUTION OF THE DUKE OF CLARENCE. DEATH AND CHARAC- 
TER OF EDWARD IV. 

CHAP. YOUNG Edward, now in his twentieth year, was of a 
x ^ IL _ y temper well fitted to make his way through such a scene 
i46i. f war ? navoc ? an d devastation, as must conduct him to 
the full possession of that crown, which he claimed from 
hereditary right, but which he had assumed from the tu- 
multuary election of his own party. He was bold, active, 
enterprising ; and his hardness of heart, and severity of 
character, rendered him impregnable to all those move- 
ments of compassion which might relax his vigour in 
the prosecution of the most bloody revenges upon his 
enemies. The very commencement of his reign gave 
symptoms of his sanguinary disposition. A tradesman 
of London, who kept a shop at the sign of the crown, 
having said that he would make his son heir to the 
crown, this harmless pleasantry was interpreted to be 
spoken in derision of Edward's assumed title, and he was 
condemned and executed for the offence a . Such an act 
of tyranny was a proper prelude to the events which 
ensued. The scaffold, as well as the field, incessantly 
streamed with the noblest blood of England, spilt in the 
quarrel between the two contending families, whose ani- 
mosity was now become implacable. The people, divided 
in their affections, took different symbols of party : the 
partisans of the house of Lancaster chose the red rose 
as their mark of distinction : those of York were deno- 

a Habington in Kennet, p. 431. Graf ton, p. 791. 



EDWARD IV. 4Q7 

minated from the white ; and these civil wars were thus CHAP. 

known, over Europe, by the name of the quarrel between 

the two roses. ^uei^ 

The licence, in which Queen Margaret had been obliged 
to indulge her troops, infused great terror and aversion 
into the city of London, and all the southern parts of the 
kingdom ; and as she there expected an obstinate resist- 
ance, she had prudently retired northwards among her own 
partisans. The same licence, joined to the zeal of faction, 
soon brought great multitudes to her standard ; and she 
was able, in a few days, to assemble an army, sixty thou- 
sand strong, in Yorkshire. The king and the Earl of 
Warwick hastened, with an army of forty thousand men, 
to check her progress ; and when they reached Pomfret, 
they despatched a body of troops, under the command 
of Lord Fitzwalter, to secure the passage of Ferrybridge 
over the river Ay re, which lay between them and the 
enemy. Fitzwalter took possession of the post assigned 
him, but was not able to maintain it against Lord Clif- 
ford, who attacked him with superior numbers. The 
Yorkists were chased back with great slaughter, and 
Lord Fitzwalter himself was slain in the action b . The 
Earl of Warwick, dreading the consequences of this dis- 
aster, at a time when a decisive action was every hour 
expected, immediately ordered his horse to be brought 
him, which he stabbed before the whole army ; and, kiss- 
ing the hilt of his sword, swore that he was determined 
to share the fate of the meanest soldier : and, to show 
the greater security, a proclamation was at the same 
time issued, giving to every one full liberty to retire ; 
but menacing the severest punishment to those who 
should discover any symptoms of cowardice in the ensuing 
battle d . Lord Falconberg was sent to recover the post 
which had been lost : he passed the river some miles 
above Ferrybridge, and falling unexpectedly on Lord Clif- 
ford, revenged the former disaster by the defeat of the | 
party and the death of their leader 6 . 

The hostile armies met at Tout on, and a fierce and Battle of 
bloody battle ensued. While the Yorkists were ad vane- 29^0?' 

March. 

b W. Worcester, p. 489. Hall, fol. 186. Hollingshed, p. 664. 
c Habington, p. 432. <* Hollingshed, p. 664. 

e Hist. Croyl. contin. p. 532. 



408 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ing to the charge, there happened a great fall of snow, 
v _ x ^ IL _ y which, driving full in the faces of their enemies, blinded 
1461 them ; and this advantage was improved by a stratagem 
of Lord Falconberg's. That nobleman ordered some 
infantry to advance before the line, and, after having 
sent a volley of flight arrows, as they were called, amidst 
the enemy, immediately to retire. The Lancastrians, 
imagining that they were gotten within reach of the 
opposite army, discharged all their arrows, which thus fell 
short of the Yorkists f . After the quivers of the enemy 
were emptied, Edward advanced his line, and did execu- 
tion with impunity on the dismayed Lancastrians. The 
bow, however, was soon laid aside, and the sword decided 
the combat, which ended in a total victory on the side 
of the Yorkists. Edward issued orders to give no quar- 
ter g . The routed army was pursued to Tadcaster, with 
great bloodshed and confusion, and above thirty-six 
thousand men are computed to have fallen in the bat- 
tle and pursuit 11 : among these were the Earl of West- 
moreland, and his brother, Sir John Nevil, the Earl of 
Northumberland, the Lords D acres and Welles, and Sir 
Andrew Trollop 1 . The Earl of Devonshire, who was 
now engaged in Henry 's party, was brought a prisoner 
to Edward ; and was soon after beheaded by martial law 
at York. His head was fixed on a pole, erected over a 
gate of that city ; and the head of Duke Richard, and 
that of the Earl of Salisbury, were taken down, and 
buried with their bodies. Henry and Margaret had re- 
mained at York during the action ; but learning the 
defeat of their army, and being sensible that no place in 
England could now afford them shelter, they fled with 
Henry es- great precipitation into Scotland. They were accompa- 
n i e ^ by the Duke of Exeter, who, though he had mar- 
ried Edward's sister, had taken part with the Lancas- 
trians, and by Henry, Duke of Somerset, who had com- 
manded in the unfortunate battle of Touton, and who 
was the son of that nobleman killed in the first battle of 
St. Alban's. 

Notwithstanding the great animosity which prevailed 

t Hall, fol. 186. g Habington, p. 432. 

k Hollingshed, p. 665. Grafton, p. 656. Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 533. 

i Hall, fol. 187. Habington, p. 433. 



EDWARD IV. 409 

between the kingdoms, Scotland had never exerted itself CHAP. 
with vigour to take advantage, either of the wars which, XXJ ^ 
England carried on with France, or of the civil commo- ^""^T" 
tions which arose between the contending families. 
James I, more laudably employed in civilizing his sub- 
jects and taming them to the salutary yoke of law and 
justice, avoided all hostilities with foreign nations ; and 
though he seemed interested to maintain a balance be- 
tween France and England, he gave no farther assistance 
to the former kingdom, in its greatest distresses, than 
permitting, and perhaps encouraging, his subjects to enlist 
in the French service. After the murder of that excel- 
lent prince, the minority of his son and successor, James 
II., and the distractions incident to it, retained the Scots 
in the same state of neutrality ; and the superiority visi- 
bly acquired by France, rendered it then unnecessary for 
her ally to interpose in her defence. But when the 
quarrel commenced between the houses of York and 
Lancaster, and became absolutely incurable, but by the 
total extinction of one party, James, who had now risen 
to man's estate, was tempted to seize the opportunity, 
and he endeavoured to recover those places which the 
English had formerly conquered from his ancestors. He 
laid siege to the castle of Eoxborough in 1460, and had 
provided himself with a small train of artillery for that 
enterprise ; but his cannon were so ill framed, that one 
of them burst as he was firing it, and put an end to his 
life in the flower of his age. His son and successor, 
James III., was also a minor on his accession. The 
usual distractions ensued in the government : the queen- 
dowager, Anne of Gueldres, aspired to the regency : the 
family of Douglas opposed her pretensions : and Queen 
Margaret, when she fled into Scotland, found there a 
people little less divided by faction than those by whom 
she had been expelled. Though she pleaded the con- 
nexions between the royal family of Scotland and the 
house of Lancaster by the young king's grandmother, a 
daughter of the Earl of Somerset, she could engage the 
Scottish council to go no farther than to express their 
good wishes in her favour ; but, on her offer to deliver 
to them immediately the important fortress of Berwick, 
and to contract her son in marriage with a sister of King 
VOL. ii. 35 



410 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. James, she found a better reception ; and the Scots pro- 
^^ [_,mised the assistance of their arms to reinstate her family 
i46i. upon the throne k . But as the danger from that quarter 
seemed not very urgent to Edward, he did not pursue the 
fugitive king and queen into their retreat, but returned 
to London, where a Parliament was summoned for set- 
tling the government. 

4th NOV. On the meeting of this assembly, Edward found the 
ai good effects of his vigorous measure in assuming the 
crown, as well as of his victory at Touton, by which he 
had secured it. The Parliament no longer hesitated 
between the two families, or proposed any of those am- 
biguous decisions, which could only serve to perpetuate 
and inflame the animosities of party. They recognized 
the title of Edward, by hereditary descent through the 
family of Mortimer ; and declared that he was king by 
right from the death of his father, who had also the 
same lawful title, and that he was in possession of the 
crown from the day that he assumed the government, 
tendered to him by the acclamations of the people 1 . 
They expressed their abhorrence of the usurpation and 
intrusion of the house of Lancaster, particularly that of 
the Earl of Derby, otherwise called Henry IV., which, 
they said, had been attended with every kind of dis- 
order, the murder of the sovereign, and the oppression 
of the subject. They annulled every grant which had 
passed in those reigns ; they reinstated the king in all 
the possessions which had belonged to the crown at 
the pretended deposition of Richard II. ; and though 
they confirmed judicial deeds, and the decrees of in- 
ferior courts, they reversed all attainders passed in any 
pretended Parliament ; particularly the attainder of the 
Earl of Cambridge, the king's grandfather, as well as 
that of the Earls of Salisbury and Gloucester, and of 
Lord Lumley, who had been forfeited for adhering to 
Eichard II. m 

Many of these votes were the result of the usual vio- 
lence of party : the common sense of mankind, in more 
peaceable times, repealed them : and the statutes of the 
house of Lancaster, being the deeds of an established 

* Hall, fol. 137. Habington, p. 434. 

i Cotton, p. 670. m ibid. p. 672. Statutes at large, 1 Edw. IV. cap. 1. 



EDWARD IV. 

government, and enacted by princes long possessed of CHAP. 
authority, have always been held as valid and obliga- 
tory. The Parliament, however, in subverting such deep ^^ 
foundations, had still the pretence of replacing the go- 
vernment on its ancient and natural basis ; but, in their 
subsequent measures, they were more guided by revenge, 
at least by the views of convenience, than by the max- 
ims of equity and justice. They passed an act of for- 
feiture and attainder against Henry VI. and Queen Mar- 
garet, and their infant son, Prince Edward. The same 
act was extended to the Dukes of Somerset and Exe- 
ter; to the Earls of Northumberland, Devonshire, Pem- 
broke, Wilts; to the Viscount Beaumont; the Lords 
Koos, Neville, Clifford, Welles, Dacre, Gray of Kuge- 
mont, Hungerford ; to Alexander Hedie, Nicholas Lati- 
mer, Edmond Mountford, John Heron, and many other 
persons of distinction 11 . The Parliament vested the 
estates of all these attainted persons in the crown; 
though their sole crime was the adhering to a prince, 
whom every individual of the Parliament had long re- 
cognized, and whom that very king himself, who was 
now seated on the throne, had acknowledged and obeyed 
as his lawful sovereign. 

The necessity of supporting the government established 
will more fully justify some other acts of violence, though 
the method of conducting them may still appear ex- 
ceptionable. John, Earl of Oxford, and his son, Aubrey 
de Vere, were detected ,in a correspondence with Mar- 
garet, were tried by martial law before the constable, 
were condemned and executed . Sir William Tyrrel, 
Sir Thomas Tudenham, and John Montgomery, were 
convicted in the same arbitrary court, were executed, 
and their estates forfeited. This introduction of martial 
law into civil government was a high strain of preroga- 
tive, which, were it not for the violence of the times, 
would probably have appeared exceptionable to a nation 
so jealous of their liberties as the English were now be- 
come p . It was impossible but such a great and sudden 
revolution must leave the roots of discontent and dis- 

n Cotton, p. 670. W. Wyrcester, p. 490. 

o W. de Wyrcester, p. 492. Hall. fol. 189. Grafton, p. 658. Fabian, fol. 215. 
Fragm. ad finem T. Sprotti. P See note [R], at the end of the volume. 



412 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, satisfaction in the subject, which would require great art, 
^ ^ or, in lieu of it, great violence, to extirpate them. The 
U61 latter was more suitable to the genius of the nation in 
that uncultivated age. 

But the new establishment still seemed precarious and 
uncertain ; not only from the domestic discontents of the 
people, but from the efforts of foreign powers. Lewis, 
the eleventh of the name, had succeeded to his father, 
Charles, in 1460 ; and was led, from the obvious motives 
of national interest, to feed the flames of civil discord 
among such dangerous neighbours, by giving support to 
the weaker party. But the intriguing and politic genius 
of this prince was here checked by itself: having at- 
tempted to subdue the independent spirit of his own vas- 
sals, he had excited such an opposition at home, as pre- 
vented him from making all the advantage which the 
opportunity afforded, of the dissensions among the Eng- 
1462. lish. He sent, however, a small body to Henry's assist- 
ance under Varenne, seneschal of Normandy q , who landed 
in Northumberland, and got possession of the castle of 
Alnewic ; but as the indefatigable Margaret went in 
person to France, where she solicited larger supplies, and 
promised Lewis to deliver up Calais if her family should 
by his means be restored to the throne of England, 
he was induced to send along with her a body of two 
U64. thousand men at arms, which enabled her to take 
the field, and to make an inroad into England. Though 
reinforced by a numerous train of adventurers from 
Scotland, and by many partisans of the family of 
25th April. Lancaster, she received a check at Hedgleymore from 
Lord Montacute, or Montague, brother to the Earl of 
Warwick, and warden of the east marches between 
Scotland and England. Montague was so encouraged 
with this success, that, while a numerous reinforce- 
ment was on their march to join him by orders from 
Edward, he yet ventured, with his own troops alone, 
Hexhain ^ a ^ ac ^ ^ ne Lancastrians at Hexham ; and he obtained 
ISA May. a complete victory over them. The Duke of Somer- 
set, the Lords Roos and Hungerford, were taken in the 
pursuit, and immediately beheaded by martial law at 
Hexham. Summary justice was in like manner exe- 

<i Monstrelet, vol. iii. p. 95. 



EDWARD IV. 413 

cuted at Newcastle on Sir Humphrey Nevil and several CHAP. 
other gentlemen. All those who were spared in the ^ XI1 - 
field suffered on the scaffold; and the utter extermina- \^7~ 
tion of their adversaries was now become the plain ob- 
ject of the York party ; a conduct which received but 
too plausible an apology from the preceding practice of 
the Lancastrians. 

The fate of the unfortunate royal family, after this 
defeat, was singular. Margaret, flying with her son into 
a forest, where she endeavoured to conceal herself, was 
beset, during the darkness of the night, by robbers, who, 
either ignorant or regardless of her quality, despoiled 
her of her rings and jewels, and treated her with the 
utmost indignity. The partition of this rich booty raised 
a quarrel among them ; and while their attention was 
thus engaged, she took the opportunity of making her 
escape with her son into the thickest of the forest, 
where she wandered for some time, overspent with 
hunger and fatigue, and sunk with terror and affliction. 
While in this wretched condition, she saw a robber 
approach with his naked sword ; and finding that she 
had no means of escape, she suddenly embraced the 
resolution of trusting entirely for protection to his faith 
and generosity. She advanced towards him ; and pre- 
senting to him the young prince, called out to him, 
Here, my friend, I commit to your care the safety of your 
Jdng's son. The man, whose humanity and generous 
spirit had been obscured, not entirely lost, by his vicious 
course of life, was struck with the singularity of the 
event, was charmed with the confidence reposed in him ; 
and vowed not only to abstain from all injury against 
the princess, but to devote himself entirely to her ser- 
vice r . By his means she dwelt some time concealed in 
the forest, and was at last conducted to the sea-coast, 
whence she made her escape into Flanders. She passed 
thence into her father's court, where she lived several 
years in privacy and retirement. Her husband was not 
so fortunate or so dexterous in finding the means of 
escape. Some of his friends took him under their pro- 
tection, and conveyed him into Lancashire, where he 
remained concealed during a twelvemonth ; but he was 

r Monstrelet, vol. iii. p. 96. 

35* 



414 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, at last detected, delivered up to Edward, and thrown 
, J J^into the Tower 8 . The safety of his person was owing 
1464 less to the generosity of his enemies, than to the con- 
tempt which they had entertained of his courage and 
his understanding. 

The imprisonment of Henry, the expulsion of Mar- 
garet, the execution and confiscation of all the most 
eminent Lancastrians, seemed to give full security to 
Edward's government ; whose title by blood being now 
recognized by Parliament, and universally submitted to 
by the people, was no longer in danger of being im- 
peached by any antagonist. In this prosperous situation, 
the king delivered himself up, without control, to those 
pleasures which his youth, his high fortune, and his 
natural temper invited him to enjoy ; and the cares of 
royalty were less attended to, than the dissipation of 
amusement or the allurements of passion. The cruel 
and unrelenting spirit of Edward, though inured to the 
ferocity of civil wars, was, at the same time, extremely 
devoted to the softer passions, which, without mitigating 
his severe temper, maintained a great influence over him, 
and shared his attachment with the pursuits of ambition 
and the thirst of military glory. During the present 
interval of peace, he lived in the most familiar and 
sociable manner with his subjects*, particularly with the 
Londoners ; and the beauty of his person, as well as the 
gallantry of his address, which, even unassisted by his 
royal dignity, would have rendered him acceptable to 
the fair, facilitated all his applications for their favour. 
This easy and pleasurable course of life augmented every 
day his popularity among all ranks of men : he was the 
peculiar favourite of the young and gay of both sexes. 
The disposition of the English, little addicted to jea- 
lousy, kept them from taking umbrage at these liberties ; 
and his indulgence in amusements, while it gratified his 
inclination, was thus become, without design, a means 
of supporting and securing his government. But as it 
is difficult to confine the ruling passion within strict rules 
of prudence, the amorous temper of Edward led him 
into a snare, which proved fatal to his repose, and to the 
stability of his throne. 

Hall, fol. 191. Fragm. ad finem Sprotti. i Polyd. Verg. p. 513. Biondi. 



EDWARD IV. 415 

Jaqueline of Luxembourg, Duchess of Bedford, had, CHAP. 
after her husband's death, so far sacrificed her ambition XXII ^ V 
to love, that she espoused in second marriage, Sir Kichard 1464 
Woodeville, a private gentleman, to whom she bore King's 
several children; and among the rest Elizabeth, who with th? 
was remarkable for the grace and beauty of her person, ^dy 
as well as for other amiable accomplishments. This Gray, 
young lady had married Sir John Gray of Groby, by 
whom she had children ; and her husband being slain in 
the second battle of St. Alban's, fighting on the side of 
Lancaster, and his estate being for that reason confis- 
cated, his widow retired to live with her father, at his 
seat of Grafton in Northamptonshire. The king came 
accidentally to the house after a hunting party, in order 
to pay a visit to the Duchess of Bedford; and as the 
occasion seemed favourable for obtaining some grace 
from this gallant monarch, the young widow flung her- 
self at his feet, and, with many tears, entreated him to 
take pity on her impoverished and distressed children. 
The sight of so much beauty in affliction strongly affected 
the amorous Edward ; love stole insensibly into his heart 
under the guise of compassion ; and her sorrow, so be- 
coming a virtuous matron, made his esteem and regard 
quickly correspond to his affection. He raised her from 
the ground with assurances of favour; he found his 
passion increase every moment by the conversation of 
the amiable object; and he was soon reduced, in his 
turn, to the posture and style of a supplicant at the 
feet of Elizabeth. But the lady, either averse to dis- 
honourable love, from a sense of duty, or perceiving that 
the impression which she had made was so deep as to 
give her hopes of obtaining the highest elevation, obsti- 
nately refused to gratify his passion ; and all the endear- 
ments, caresses, and importunities of the young and 
amiable Edward proved fruitless against her rigid and 
inflexible virtue. His passion, irritated by opposition, 
and increased by his veneration for such honourable 
sentiments, carried him, at last, beyond all bounds of 
reason ; and he offered to share his throne, as well as 
his heart, with the woman whose beauty of person and 
dignity of character seemed so well to entitle her to 
both. The marriage was privately celebrated at Graf- 



416 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. ton u . The secret was carefully kept for some time : no 
ij"l' one suspected, that so libertine a prince could sacrifice 
1464 so much to a romantic passion : and there were, in par- 
ticular, strong reasons, which at that time rendered 
this step, to the highest degree, dangerous and impru- 
dent. 

The king, desirous to secure his throne, as well by 
the prospect of issue, as by foreign alliances, had, a little 
before, determined to make application to some neigh- 
bouring princess ; and he had cast his eye on Bona of 
Savoy, sister to the Queen of France, who, he hoped, 
would, by her marriage, ensure him the friendship of 
that power, which was alone both able and inclined to 
give support and assistance to his rival. To render the 
negotiation more successful, the Earl of Warwick had 
been despatched to Paris, where the princess then re- 
sided ; he had demanded Bona in marriage for the king ; 
his proposals had been accepted ; the treaty was fully 
concluded ; and nothing remained but the ratification of 
the terms agreed on, and the bringing over the princess 
to England w . But when the secret of Edward's mar- 
riage broke out, the haughty earl, deeming himself 
affronted, both by being employed in this fruitless nego- 
tiation, and by being kept a stranger to the king's in- 
tentions, who had owed every thing to his friendship, 
immediately returned to England, inflamed with rage 
and indignation. The influence of passion over so young 
a man as Edward, might have served as an excuse for 
his imprudent conduct, had he deigned to acknowledge 
his error, or had pleaded his weakness as an apology; 
but his faulty shame or pride prevented him from so 
Warwick much as mentioning the matter to Warwick ; and that 
' nobleman was allowed to depart the court, full of the 
same ill-humour and discontent which he brought to it. 
use. Every incident now tended to widen the breach be- 
tween the king and this powerful subject. The queen, 
who lost not her influence by marriage, was equally 
solicitous to draw every grace and favour to her own 
friends and kindred, and to exclude those of the earl, 

u Hall, fol. 193. Fabian, fol. 216. 

w Hall, fol. 193. Habington, p. 437. Hollingshed, p. 667. Grafton, p. 665. 
Polyd. Verg. p. 513. 



EDWARD IV. 417 

whom she regarded as her mortal enemy. Her father CHAP. 
was created Earl of Rivers: he was made treasurer in, x:a ^ 
the room of Lord Mountjoy x : he was invested in the 1466 
office of constable for life ; and his son received the sur- 
vivance of that high dignity 7 . The same young noble- 
man was married to the only daughter of Lord Scales, 
enjoyed the great estate of that family, and had the title 
of Scales conferred upon him. Catherine, the queen's 
sister, was married to the young Duke of Buckingham, 
who was a ward of the crown 2 : Mary, another of her 
sisters, espoused William Herbert, created Earl of Hunt- 
ingdon : Anne, a third sister, was given in marriage to 
the son and heir of Gray, Lord Ruthyn, created Earl of 
Kent a . The daughter and heir of the Duke of Exeter, 
who was also the king's niece, was contracted to Sir 
Thomas Gray, one of the queen's sons by her former 
husband ; and as Lord Montague was treating of a 
marriage between his son and this lady, the preference 
given to young Gray was deemed an injury and affront 
to the whole family of Nevil. 

The Earl of Warwick could not ' suffer with patience 
the least diminution of that credit which he had long 
enjoyed, and which, he thought, he had merited by such 
important services. Though he had received so many 
grants from the crown, that the revenue arising from them 
amounted, besides his patrimonial estate, to eighty thou- 
sand crowns a year, according to the computation of 
Philip de Comines b , his ambitious spirit was still dis- 
satisfied, as long as he saw others surpass him in autho- 
rity and influence with the king 6 . Edward, also, jealous 
of that power which had supported him, and which he 
himself had contributed still higher to exalt, was well 
pleased to raise up rivals in credit to the Earl of War- 
wick and he justified, by this political view, his extreme 
partiality to the queen's kindred. But the nobility of 
England, envying the sudden growth of the Woodevilles d , 
were more inclined to take part with Warwick's discon- 
tent, to whose grandeur they were already accustomed, 
and who had reconciled them to his superiority by his 

* W. Wyrcester, p. 506. y Rymer, vol. xi. p. 581. 

z W. Wyrcester, p. 505. a ibid. p. 506. 

b Liv. iii. chap. 4. c p o lyd. Verg. p. 514. 

d Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 539. 



418 



HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



CHAP. 
XXII. 



1466. 



gracious and popular manners. And as Edward ob- 
tained from Parliament a general resumption of all 
grants, which he had made since his accession, and which 
had extremely impoverished the crown, this act, though 
it passed with some exceptions, particularly one in favour 
of the Earl of Warwick, gave a general alarm to the 
nobility, and disgusted many, even zealous partisans of 
the family of York. 

But the most considerable associate that Warwick 
acquired to his party was George, Duke of Clarence, the 
king's second brother. This prince deemed himself no 
less injured than the other grandees, by the uncontrolled 
influence of the queen and her relations ; and as his 
fortunes were still left on a precarious footing, while 
theirs were fully established, this neglect, joined to his 
unquiet and restless spirit, inclined him to give counte- 
nance to all the malecontents f . The favourable oppor- 
tunity of gaining him was espied by the Earl of War- 
wick, who offered him in marriage his eldest daughter, 
and coheir of his immense fortunes ; a settlement which, 
as it was superior to any that the king himself could 
confer upon him, immediately attached him to the party 
of the earl g . Thus an extensive and dangerous combina- 
tion was insensibly formed against Edward and his mi- 
nistry. Though the immediate object of the malecon- 
tents was not to overturn the throne, it was difficult to 
foresee the extremities to which they might be carried : 
and as opposition to government was usually, in those 
ages, prosecuted by force of arms, civil convulsions and 
disorders were likely to be soon the result of these 
intrigues and confederacies. 

While this cloud was gathering at home, Edward 
carried his views abroad, and endeavoured to secure him- 
Burgundy. se ]f a g ams t his factious nobility by entering into foreign 
alliances. The dark and dangerous ambition of Lewis 
XI., the more it was known, the greater alarm it excited 
among his neighbours and vassals ; and as it was sup- 
ported by great abilities, and unrestrained by any prin- 
ciple of faith or humanity, they found no security to 



Alliance 
with the 
Duke of 



e W. Wyrcester, p. 508. f Grafton, p. 673. 

g W. Wyrcester, p. 511. Hall, fol. 200. Habington, p. 439. Hollingshed, 
p. 671. Polyd. Verg. p. 515. 



EDWARD IV. 419 

themselves but by a jealous combination against him. CHAP. 
Philip, Duke of Burgundy, was now dead : his rich and xxn 
extensive dominions were devolved to Charles, his only ^^~ 
son, whose martial disposition acquired him the surname 
of Bold, and whose ambition, more outrageous than that 
of Lewis, but seconded by less power and policy, was 
regarded with a more favourable eye by the other poten- 
tates of Europe. The opposition of interests, and still 
more a natural antipathy of character, produced a de- 
clared animosity between these bad princes ; and Edward 
was thus secure of the sincere attachment of either of 
them, for whom he should choose to declare himself. 
The Duke of Burgundy, being descended by his mother, a 
daughter of Portugal, from John of Gaunt, was naturally 
inclined to favour the ho vise of Lancaster 11 ; but this con- 
sideration was easily overbalanced by political motives ; 
and Charles, perceiving the interests of that house to be 
extremely decayed in England, sent over his natural 
brother, commonly called the Bastard of Burgundy, to 
carry, in his name, proposals of marriage to Margaret, 
the king's sister. The alliance of Burgundy was more 
popular among the English than that of France ; the 
commercial interests of the two nations invited the 
princes to a close union ; their common jealousy of 
Lewis was a natural cement between them ; and Edward, 
pleased with strengthening himself by so potent a con- 
federate, soon concluded the alliance, and bestowed his 
sister upon Charles 1 . A league which Edward at the 1468 - 
same time concluded with the Duke of Britany, seemed 
both to increase his security, and to open to him the pro- 
spect of rivalling his predecessors in those foreign con- 
quests, which, however short-lived and unprofitable, had 
rendered their reigns so popular and illustrious k . 

But whatever ambitious schemes the king might have 1469 - 
built on these alliances, they were soon frustrated by 
intestine commotions, which engrossed all his attention. 
These disorders probably arose not immediately from 
the intrigues of the Earl of Warwick, but from accident, 
aided by the turbulent spirit of the age, by the general 
humour of discontent which that popular nobleman had 

h Comines, liv. iii. chap. 4. 6. 

i Hall, fol. 169. 197. *- W. Worcester, p. 5. Paiiiam. Hist. vol. ii. p. 332. 



420 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, instilled into the nation, and perhaps by some remains 

of attachment to the house of Lancaster. The hospital 

1469 of St. Leonard's, near York, had received, from an an- 

insurrec- cient grant of Kino; Athelstane, a right of levying a 

tion in , i & n i.ij'j.i.1 

Yorkshire, thrave oi corn upon every plough-land in the county ; 
and as these charitable establishments are liable to abuse, 
the country people complained that the revenue of the 
hospital was no longer expended for the relief of the 
poor, but was secreted by the managers, and employed 
to their private purposes. After long repining at the 
contribution, they refused payment. Ecclesiastical and 
civil censures were issued against them ; their goods 
were distrained, and their persons thrown into gaol : till, 
as their ill humour daily increased, they rose in arms ; 
fell upon the officers of the hospital, whom they put to 
the sword ; and proceeded in a body, fifteen thousand 
strong, to the gates of York. Lord Montague, who 
commanded in those parts, opposed himself to their pro- 
gress ; and having been so fortunate in a skirmish as to 
seize Robert Hulderne their leader, he ordered him im- 
mediately to be led to execution, according to the prac- 
tice of the times. The rebels, however, still continued 
in arms ; and being soon headed by men of greater dis- 
tinction, Sir Henry Nevil, son of Lord Latimer, and Sir 
John Corners, they advanced southwards, and began to 
appear formidable to government. Herbert, Earl of 
Pembroke, who had received that title on the forfeiture 
of Jasper Tudor, was ordered by Edward to march 
against them at the head of a body of Welshmen ; and 
he was joined by five thousand archers, under the com- 
mand of Stafford, Earl of Devonshire, who had succeeded 
in that title to the family of Courtney, which had also 
been attainted. But a trivial difference about quarters 
having begotten an animosity between these two noble- 
men, the Earl of Devonshire retired with his archers, 

Battle of and left Pembroke alone to encounter the rebels. The 
)ury< two armies approached each other near Banbury ; and 
Pembroke, having prevailed in a skirmish, and having 
taken Sir Henry Nevil prisoner, ordered him imme- 
diately to be put to death, without any form of process. 
This execution enraged without terrifying the rebels : 

26th July, they attacked the Welsh army, routed them, put them 



EDWARD IV. 421 

to the sword without mercy ; and having seized Pern- CHAP. 
broke, they took immediate revenge upon him for the XX1L 
death of their leader. The king, imputing this misfor- ^^~~ 
tune to the Earl of Devonshire, who had deserted Pem- 
broke, ordered him to be executed in a like summary 
manner. But these speedy executions, or rather open 
murders, did not stop there : the northern rebels, sending 
a party to Grafton, seized the Earl of Rivers and his son 
John ; men who had become obnoxious by their near 
relation to the king, and his partiality towards them ; and 
they were immediately executed by orders from Sir John 
Corners 1 . 

There is no part of English history since the Con- 
quest so obscure, so uncertain, so little authentic or 
consistent, as that of the wars between the two roses : 
historians differ about many material circumstances; 
some events of the utmost consequence, in which they 
almost all agree, are incredible and contradicted by re- 
cords; and it is remarkable, that this profound dark- 
ness falls upon us just on the eve of the restoration 
of letters, and when the art of printing was already 
known in Europe. All we can distinguish with cer- 
tainty through the deep cloud which covers that period, 
is a scene of horror and bloodshed, savage manners, arbi- 
trary executions, and treacherous, dishonourable conduct 
in all parties. There is no possibility, for instance, of 
accounting for the views and intentions of the Earl of 
Warwick at this time. It is agreed that he resided, 
together with his son-in-law, the Duke of Clarence, in 
his government of Calais, during the commencement of 
this rebellion, and that his brother Montague acted with 
vigour against the northern rebels. We may thence 
presume, that the insurrection had not proceeded from 
the secret counsels and instigation of Warwick ; though 
the murder committed by the rebels on the Earl of 
Rivers, his capital enemy, forms, on the other hand, a 
violent presumption against him. He and Clarence 
came over to England, offered their service to Edward, 
were received without any suspicion, were intrusted 
by him in the highest commands 11 , and still perse- 

i Fabian, fol. 217. m See note [S], at the end of the volume, 

n Kymer, vol. xi. p. 647. 649, 650. 

VOL. II. 36 



422 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, vered in their fidelity. Soon after, we find the rebels 
^~ [^quieted and dispersed by a general pardon granted 
H69. by Edward from the advice of the Earl of Warwick : 
but why so courageous a prince, if secure of Warwick's 
fidelity, should have granted a general pardon to men 
who had been guilty of such violent and personal out- 
rages against him, is not intelligible ; nor why that no- 
bleman, if unfaithful, should have endeavoured to appease 
a rebellion, of which he was able to make such advan- 
tages. But it appears that, after this insurrection, there 
was an interval of peace, during which the king loaded 
the family of Nevil with honours and favours of the high- 
est nature : he made Lord Montague a marquis by the 
same name : he created his son George, Duke of Bed- 
ford : he publicly declared his intention of marrying 
that young nobleman to his eldest daughter, Elizabeth, 
who, as he had yet no sons, was presumptive heir of the 
crown : yet we find that soon after, being invited to a 
feast by the Archbishop of York, a younger brother of 
Warwick and Montague, he entertained a sudden suspi- 
cion that they intended to seize his person or to murder 
him ; and he abruptly left the entertainment p . 
147 - Soon after, there broke out another rebellion, which 
is as unaccountable as all the preceding events ; chiefly 
because no sufficient reason is assigned for it, and be- 
cause, so far as it appears, the family of Nevil had no 
hand in exciting and fomenting it. It arose in Lincoln- 
shire, and was headed by Sir Robert Welles, son to the 
lord of that name. The army of the rebels amounted to 
thirty thousand men ; but Lord Welles himself, far from 
giving countenance to them, fled into a sanctuary, in 
order to secure his person against the king's anger or 
suspicions. He was allured from this retreat by a pro- 
mise of safety ; and was soon after, notwithstanding this 
assurance, beheaded along with Sir Thomas Dymoc, by 
isth Mar. orders from Edward q . The king fought a battle with 
the rebels, defeated them, took Sir Robert Welles and 
Sir Thomas Launde prisoners, and ordered them imme- 
diately to be beheaded. 

Edward, during these transactions, had entertained so 

Cotton, p. 702. P Fragm. Edw. IV. ad fin. Sprotti. 

1 Hall, fol. 204. Fabian, fol. 218. Habington, p. 442. Hollingshed, p. 674. 



EDWARD IV. 423 

little jealousy of the Earl of Warwick or Duke of Cla- CHAP. 
rence, that he sent them with commissions of array to ^ ^ 
levy forces against the rebels 1 ": but these malecontents, 1470 
as soon as they left the court, raised troops in their own 
name, issued declarations against the government, and 
complained of grievances, oppressions, and bad ministers. 
The unexpected defeat of Welles disconcerted all their 
measures ; and they retired northwards into Lancashire, 
where they expected to be joined by Lord Stanley, who Warwick 
had married the Earl of Warwick's sister. But as that rence ba- 
nobleman refused all concurrence with them, and as Lord mshed - 
Montague also remained quiet in Yorkshire, they were 
obliged to disband their army, and to fly in to Devonshire, 
where they embarked, and made sail towards Calais 8 . 

The deputy-governor, whom Warwick had left at 
Calais, was one Vaucler, a Gascon, who, seeing the earl 
return in this miserable condition, refused him admit- 
tance ; and would not so much as permit the Duchess of 
Clarence to land, though a few days before she had been 
delivered on ship-board of a son, and was at that time 
extremely disordered by sickness. With difficulty he 
would allow a few flagons of wine to be carried to the 
ship for the use of the ladies : but as he was a man of 
sagacity, and well acquainted with the revolutions to 
which England was subject, he secretly apologized to 
Warwick for this appearance of infidelity, and represented 
it as proceeding entirely from zeal for his service. He 
said, that the fortress was ill supplied with provisions ; 
that he could not depend on the attachment of the gar- 
rison; that the inhabitants, who lived by the English 
commerce, would certainly declare for the established 
government ; that the place was at present unable to 
resist the power of England on the one hand, and that 
of the Duke of Burgundy on the other; and that, by 
seeming to declare for Edward, he would acquire the 
confidence of that prince, and still keep it in his power, 
when it should become safe and prudent, to restore 
Calais to its ancient master*. It is uncertain whether 

r Rymer, vol. xi. p. 652. 

* The king offered by proclamation a reward of one thousand pounds, or one 
hundred pounds a year in land, to any that would seize them. Whence we may 
learn that land was at that time sold for about ten years' purchase. See Rymer, 
vol. xi. p. 654. t Comines, liv. iii. chap. 4. Hall, fol. 205. 



424 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. "Warwick was satisfied with this apology, or suspected a 

double infidelity in Vaucler, but he feigned to be entire- 

1470. Ij convinced by him ; and having seized some Flemish 

vessels, which he found lying off Calais, he immediately 

made sail towards France. 

The King of France, uneasy at the close conjunction 
between Edward and the Duke of Burgundy, received 
with the greatest demonstrations of regard the unfor- 
tunate Warwick 11 , with whom he had formerly main- 
tained a secret correspondence, and whom he hoped still 
to make his instrument in overturning the government 
of England, and re-establishing the house of Lancaster. 
No animosity was ever greater than that which had long 
prevailed between that house and the Earl of Warwick. 
His father had been executed by orders from Margaret : 
he himself had twice reduced Henry to captivity, had 
banished the queen, had put to death all their most 
zealous partisans either in the field or on the scaffold, 
and had occasioned innumerable ills to that unhappy 
family. For this reason, believing that such inveterate 
rancour could never admit of any cordial reconciliation, 
he had not mentioned Henry's name when he took arms 
against Edward ; and he rather endeavoured to prevail 
by means of his own adherents, than revive a party 
which he sincerely hated. But his present distresses 
and the entreaties of Lewis made him hearken to terms 
of accommodation; and Margaret being sent for from 
Angers, where she then resided, an agreement was from 
common interest soon concluded between them. It 
was stipulated, that Warwick should espouse the cause 
of Henry, and endeavour to restore him to liberty, and 
to re-establish him on the throne ; that the administra- 
tion of the government during the minority of young 
Edward, Henry's son, should be intrusted conjointly to 
the Earl of Warwick and the Duke of Clarence ; that 
Prince Edward should marry the Lady Anne, second 
daughter of that nobleman ; and that the crown, in case 
of the failure of male issue in that prince, should descend 
to the Duke of Clarence, to the entire exclusion of King 
Edward and his posterity. Never was confederacy, on 
all sides, less natural, or more evidently the work of 

" Polyd. Verg. p. 519. 



EDWARD IV. 425 

necessity : but Warwick hoped, that all former passions CHAP. 
of the Lancastrians might be lost in present political^ 
views ; and that, at worst, the independent power of his \^7~ 
family, and the affections of the people, would suffice to 
give him security, and enable him to exact the full per- 
formance of all the conditions agreed on. The marriage 
of Prince Edward with the Lady Anne was immediately 
celebrated in France. 

Edward foresaw that it would be easy to dissolve an 
alliance composed of such discordant parts. For this 
purpose, he sent over a lady of great sagacity and address, 
who belonged to the train of the Duchess of Clarence, 
.and who, under colour of attending her mistress, was 
empowered to negotitae with the duke, and to renew 
the connexions of that prince with his own family w . 
She represented to Clarence, that he had unwarily, to 
his own ruin, become the instrument of Warwick's venge- 
ance, and had thrown himself entirely in the power 
of his most inveterate enemies ; that the mortal injuries 
which the one royal family had suffered from the other 
were now past all forgiveness, and no imaginary union 
of interests could ever suffice to obliterate them ; that 
even if the leaders were willing to forget past offences, 
the animosity of their adherents would prevent a sincere 
coalition of parties, and would, in spite of all temporary 
and verbal agreements, preserve an eternal opposition of 
measures between them ; and that a prince who deserted 
his own kindred, and joined the murderers of his father, 
left himself single, without friends, without protection, 
and would not, when misfortunes inevitably fell upon 
him, be so much as entitled to any pity or regard from 
the rest of mankind. Clarence was only one-and-twenty 
years of age, and seems to have possessed but a slender 
capacity ; yet could he easily see the force of these 
reasons ; and upon the promise of forgiveness from his 
brother, he secretly engaged, on a favourable opportunity, 
to desert the Earl of Warwick, and abandon the Lan- 
castrian party. 

During this negotiation, Warwick was secretly carry- 
ing on a correspondence of the same nature with his 
brother the Marquis of Montague, who was entirely 

w Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5. Hall, fol. 207. Hollingshed, p. 675. 

36* 



426 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, trusted by Edward ; and like motives produced a like 
resolution in that nobleman. The marquis also, that he 
1470 might render the projected blow the more deadly and 
incurable, resolved, on his side, to watch a favourable 
opportunity for committing his perfidy, and still to 
maintain the appearance of being a zealous adherent to 
the house of York. 

After these mutual snares were thus carefully laid, 
the decision of the quarrel advanced apace. Lewis pre- 
pared a fleet to escort the Earl of Warwick, and granted 
him a supply of men and money x . The Duke of Bur- 
gundy, on the other hand, enraged at that nobleman for 
his seizure of the Flemish vessels before Calais, and, 
anxious to support the reigning family in England, with 
whom his own interests were now connected, fitted out 
a larger fleet, with which he guarded the channel ; and 
he incessantly warned his brother-in-law of the imminent 
perils to which he was exposed. But Edward, though 
always brave and often active, had little foresight or 
penetration. He was not sensible of his danger : he 
made no suitable preparations against the Earl of War- 
wick 7 : he even said, that the duke might spare himself 
the trouble of guarding the seas, and that he wished for 
nothing more than to see Warwick set foot on English 
ground 2 . A vain confidence in his own prowess, joined 
to the immoderate love of pleasure, had made him inca- 
pable of all sound reason and reflection. 

September. The event soon happened of which Edward seemed 
ando? so Desirous. A storm dispersed the Flemish navy, and 
rencere- left the sea open to Warwick*. That nobleman seized 
the opportunity, and setting sail, quickly landed at 
Dartmouth, with the Duke of Clarence, the Earls of 
Oxford said Pembroke, and a small body of troops ; 
-while the king was in the north, engaged in suppressing 
an insurrection which had been raised by Lord Fitz- 
Hugh, brother-in-law to Warwick. The scene which 
ensues resembles more the fiction of a poem or romance 
than an event in true history. The prodigious popu- 
larity of Warwick b , the zeal of the Lancastrian party, 

x Comines, liv. iii. chap. 4. Hall, fol. 207. 

y Grafton, p. 687. z Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5. Hall, fol. 208. 

a Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5. b Hall, fol. 205. 



EDWARD IV. 427 

the spirit of discontent with which many were infected, CHAP. 
and the general instability of the English nation, occa-.j 1 ^ 
sioned by the late frequent revolutions, drew such mul- 1470 
titudes to his standard, that in a very few days his army 
amounted to sixty thousand men, and was continually 
increasing. Edward hastened southwards to encounter 
him ; and the two armies approached each other near 
Nottingham, where a decisive action was every hour 
expected. The rapidity of Warwick's progress had in- 
capacitated the Duke of Clarence from executing his 
plan of treachery, and the Marquis of Montague had 
here the opportunity of striking the first blow. He com- 
municated the design to his adherents, who promised 
him their concurrence : they took to arms in the night- 
time, and hastened with loud acclamations to Edward's 
quarters : the king was alarmed at the noise, and start- 
ing from Jbed, heard the cry of war usually employed by 
the Lancastrian party. Lord Hastings, his chamberlain, 
informed him of the danger, and urged him to make his 
escape by speedy flight from an army where he had so 
many concealed enemies, and where few seemed zea- 
lously attached to his service. He had just time to get 
on horseback, and to hurry with a small retinue to Lynn 
in Norfolk, where he luckily found some ships ready, on Edward 
board of which he instantly embarked . And after th 
manner, the Earl of Warwick, in no longer space than 
eleven days after his first landing, was left entire master 
of the kingdom. 

But Edward's danger did not end with his embark- 
ation. The Easterlings, or Hanse-towns, were then at 
war both with France and England ; and some ships of 
these people, hovering on the English coast, espied the 
king's vessels, and gave chase to them ; nor was it with- 
out extreme difficulty that he made his escape into the 
port of Alcmaer in Holland. He had fled from Eng- 
land with such precipitation, that he had carried nothing 
of value along with him, and the only reward which he 
could bestow on the captain of the vessel that brought 
him over was a robe lined with sables, promising him an 
ample recompense if fortune should ever become more 
propitious to him d . 

Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5. Hall, fol. 208. d Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5. 



428 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. It is not likely that Edward could be very fond of 
presenting himself in this lamentable plight before the 
^I^Duke of Burgundy; and that having so suddenly, after 
his mighty vaunts, lost all footing in his own kingdom, 
he could be insensible to the ridicule which must at- 
tend him in the eyes of that prince. The duke, on his 
part, was no less embarrassed how he should receive the 
dethroned monarch. As he had ever borne a greater 
affection to the house of Lancaster than to that of York, 
nothing but political views had engaged him to contract 
an alliance with the latter ; and he foresaw, that proba- 
bly the revolution in England would now turn this 
alliance against him, and render the reigning family his 
implacable and jealous enemy. For this reason, when 
the first rumour of that event reached him, attended 
with the circumstance of Edward's death, he seemed 
rather pleased with the catastrophe; and it was no 
agreeable disappointment to find, that he must either un- 
dergo the burden of supporting an exiled prince, or the 
dishonour of abandoning so near a relation. He began 
already to say that his connexions were with the king- 
dom of England, not with the king ; and it was indif- 
ferent to him whether the name of Edward, or that of 
Henry, were employed in the articles of treaty. These 
sentiments were continually strengthened by the subse- 
quent events. Yaucler, the deputy-governor of Calais, 
though he had been confirmed in his command by Ed- 
ward, and had even received a pension from the Duke 
of Burgundy, on account of his fidelity to the crown, no 
sooner saw his old master Warwick reinstated in au- 
thority, than he declared for him, and with great demon- 
strations of zeal and attachment, put the whole garrison 
in his livery. And the intelligence which the duke re- 
ceived every day from England seemed to promise an 
entire and full settlement in the family of Lancaster. 
Henry vi. Immediately after Edward's flight had left the king- 
restored. ^ Qm a j. Warwick's disposal, that nobleman hastened to 
London; and taking Henry from his confinement in 
the Tower, into which he himself had been the chief 
cause of throwing him, he proclaimed him king with 
great solemnity. A Parliament was summoned, in the 
name of that prince, to meet at Westminster ; and as 



EDWARD IV. 429 

this assembly could pretend to no liberty, while sur- CHAP. 
rounded by such enraged and insolent victors, governed 
by such 7 an impetuous spirit as Warwick, their votes ^^" 
were entirely dictated by the ruling faction. The 
treaty with Margaret was here fully executed : Henry 
was recognized as lawful king; but his incapacity for 
government being avowed, the regency was intrusted 
to Warwick and Clarence till the majority of Prince 
Edward ; and in default of that prince's issue, Clarence 
was declared successor to the crown. The usual busi- 
ness also of reversals went on without opposition : every 
statute made during the reign of Edward was repealed ; 
that prince was declared to be an usurper ; he and his 
adherents were attainted; and in particular Richard, 
Duke of Gloucester, his younger brother : all the attain- 
ders of the Lancastrians, the Dukes of Somerset and 
Exeter, the Earls of Richmond, Pembroke, Oxford, and 
Ormond, were reversed ; and every one was restored 
who had lost either honours or fortunes by his former 
adherence to the cause of Henry. 

The ruling party were more sparing in their execu- 
tions than was usual after any revolution during those 
violent times. The only victim of distinction was John 
Tibetot, Earl of Worcester. This accomplished person, 
born in an age and nation where the nobility valued 
themselves on ignorance as their privilege, and left 
learning to monks and schoolmasters, for whom, indeed, 
the spurious erudition that prevailed was best fitted, had 
been struck with the first rays of true science which 
began to penetrate from the south, and had been zealous, 
by his exhortation and example, to propagate the love 
of letters among his unpolished countrymen. It is pre- 
tended, that knowledge had not produced on this noble- 
man himself the effect which naturally attends it, of 
humanizing the temper and softening the heart 6 ; and 
that he had enraged the Lancastrians against him, by 
the severities which he exercised upon them during the 
prevalence of his own party. He endeavoured to con- 
ceal himself after the flight of Edward ; but was caught 
on the top of a tree in the forest of Weybridge, was con- 
ducted to London, tried before the Earl of Oxford, con- 

c Hall, fol. 210. Stowe, p. 422. 



430 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, demned and executed. All the other considerable York- 
v^ L^ i g ^ s Cither fled beyond sea, or took shelter in sanctuaries, 
1470. where the ecclesiastical privileges afforded them protec- 
tion. In London, alone, it is computed that no less than 
two thousand persons saved themselves in this manner f ; 
and among the rest Edward's queen, who was there deli- 
vered of a son, called by his father's name 8 . 

Queen Margaret, the other rival queen, had not yet 
appeared in England ; but, on receiving intelligence of 
Warwick's success, was preparing with Prince Edward 
for her journey. All the banished Lancastrians flocked 
to her; and among the rest the Duke of Somerset, 
son of the duke beheaded after the battle of Hexham. 
This nobleman, who had long been regarded as the 
head of the party, had fled into the Low Countries on 
the discomfiture of his friends ; and as he concealed his 
name and quality, he had there languished in extreme 
indigence. Philip de Comines tells us h , that he himself 
saw him, as well as the Duke of Exeter, in a condition 
no better than that of a common beggar ; till, being dis- 
covered by Philip, Duke of Burgundy, they had small 
pensions allotted them, and were living in silence and 
obscurity, when the success of their party called them 
from their retreat. But both Somerset and Margaret 
were detained by contrary winds from reaching Eng- 
land 1 , till a new revolution in that kingdom, no less sud- 
den and surprising than the former, threw them into 
greater misery than that from which they had just 
emerged. 

Though the Duke of Burgundy, by neglecting Ed- 
ward, and paying court to the established government, 
had endeavoured to conciliate the friendship of the Lan- 
castrians, he found that he had not succeeded to his 
wish ; and the connexions between the King of France 
and the Earl of Warwick still held him in great anxiety k . 
This nobleman, too hastily regarding Charles as a deter- 
mined enemy, had sent over to Calais a body of four 
thousand men, who made inroads into the Low Coun- 
tries 1 ; and the Duke of Burgundy saw himself in dan- 

f Comines, liv. iii. chap. 7. 

s Hall, fol. 210. Stowe, p. 423. Hollingshed, p. 677. Grafton, p. 690. 

h Liv. iii. chap. 4. * Grafton, p. 692. Polyd. Verg. p. 522. 

fc Hall, fol. 205. 1 Comines, liv. iii. chap. 6. 



EDWARD IV. 431 

ger of being overwhelmed by the united arms of Eng- CHAP. 
land and of France. He resolved, therefore, to grant.J 1 ^ 
some assistance to his brother-in-law, but in such a U C Q 
covert manner as should give the least offence possible 
to the English government. He equipped four large 
vessels, in the name of some private merchants, at Ter- 
veer in Zealand ; and causing fourteen ships to be secretly 
hired from the Easterlings, he delivered this small squa- 
dron to Edward, who, receiving also a sum of money from 
the duke, immediately set sail for England. No sooner 
was Charles informed of his departure, than he issued a 
proclamation, inhibiting all his subjects from giving him 
countenance or assistance, an artifice which could not 
deceive the Earl of Warwick, but which might serve 
as a decent pretence, if that nobleman were so disposed, 
for maintaining friendship with the Duke of Burgundy. 

Edward, impatient to take revenge on his enemies, 1471, 
and to recover his lost authority, made an attempt to E<IW. iv. 
land with his forces, which exceeded not two thousand returns. 
men, on the coast of Norfolk ; but being there repulsed, 
he sailed northwards, and disembarked at Kavenspur, 
in Yorkshire. Finding that the new magistrates, who 
had been appointed by the Earl of Warwick, kept the 
people every where from joining him, he pretended, and 
even made oath, that he came not to challenge the 
crown, but only the inheritance of the house of York, 
which of right belonged to him ; and that he did not 
intend to disturb the peace of the kingdom. His par- 
tisans every moment flocked to his standard ; he was 
admitted into the city of York ; and he was soon in 
such a situation as gave him hopes of succeeding in all 
his claims and pretensions. The Marquis of Montague 
commanded in the northern counties ; but from some 
mysterious reasons, which, as well as many other im- 
portant transactions in that age, no historian has cleared 
up, he totally neglected the beginnings of an insurrec- 
tion, which he ought to have esteemed so formidable. 
Warwick assembled an army at Leicester, with an in- 
tention of meeting and of giving battle to the enemy ; 
but Edward, by taking another road, passed him un- 
molested, and presented himself before the gates of Lon- 

m Comines, liv. iii. chap. 6. 



432 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. don. Had lie here been refused admittance, he was 
v_ X ^ totally undone ; but there were many reasons which in- 
i47i. clined the citizens to favour him. His numerous friends, 
issuing from their sanctuaries, were active in his cause ; 
many rich merchants, who had formerly lent him money, 
saw no other chance for their payment but his restora- 
tion ; the city dames, who had been liberal of their 
favours to him, and who still retained an affection for 
this young and gallant prince, swayed their husbands 
and friends in his favour n ; and above all, the Arch- 
bishop of York, Warwick's brother, to whom the care of 
the city was committed, had secretly, from unknown 
reasons, entered into a correspondence with him ; and 
nthAprii.he facilitated Edward's admission into London. The 
most likely cause which can be assigned for those mul- 
tiplied infidelities, even in the family of Nevil itself, is 
the spirit of faction, which, when it becomes inveterate, 
it is very difficult for any man entirely to shake off. 
These persons, who had long distinguished themselves in 
the York party, were unable to act with zeal and cor- 
diality for the support of the Lancastrians ; and they 
were inclined, by any prospect of favour or accommoda- 
tion offered them by Edward, to return to their ancient 
connexions. However this may be, Edward's entrance 
into London made him master not only of that rich and 
powerful city, but also of the person of Henry, who, 
destined to be the perpetual sport of fortune, thus fell 
again into the hands of his enemies . 

It appears not that Warwick, during his short ad- 
ministration, which had continued only six months, had 
been guilty of any unpopular act, or had anywise de- 
served to lose that general favour with which he had so 
lately overwhelmed Edward. But this prince, who was 
formerly on the defensive, was now the aggressor ; and 
having overcome the difficulties which always attend the 
beginnings of an insurrection, possessed many advantages 
above his enemy : his partisans were actuated by that 
zeal and courage which the notion of an attack inspires ; 
his opponents were intimidated for a like reason ; every 
one who had been disappointed in the hopes which he 
had entertained from Warwick's elevation, either be- 

n Comines, liv. iii. chap. 7. Grafton, p. 702. 



EDWARD IV. 433 

came a cool friend or an open enemy to that nobleman ; CHAP. 
and each malecontent, from whatever cause^ proved an^ ^ 
accession to Edward's army. The king, therefore, found 1471 
himself in a condition to face the Earl of Warwick; 
who, being reinforced by his son-in-law, the Duke of 
Clarence, and his brother, the Marquis of Montague, 
took post at Barnet, in the neighbourhood of London. 
The arrival of Queen Margaret was every day expected, 
who would have drawn together all the genuine Lancas- 
trians, arid have brought a great accession to Warwick's 
forces : but this very consideration proved a motive to 
the earl rather to hurry on a decisive action, than to 
share the victory with rivals and ancient enemies, who 
he foresaw would, in case of success, claim the chief 
merit in the enterprise p . But while his jealousy was all 
directed towards that side, he overlooked the dangerous 
infidelity of friends, who lay the nearest to his bosom. 
His brother Montague, who had lately temporized, seems 
now to have remained sincerely attached to the interests 
of his family : but his son-in-law, though bound to him 
by every fie of honour and gratitude, though he shared 
the power of the regency, though he had been invested 
by Warwick in all the honours and patrimony of the 
house of York, resolved to fulfil the secret engagements 
which he had formerly taken with his brother, and to 
support the interests of his own family: he deserted to 
the king in the night-time, and carried over a body of 
twelve thousand men along with him 01 . Warwick was 
now too far advanced to retreat ; and as he rejected with 
disdain all terms of peace offered him by Edward and 
Clarence, he was obliged to hazard a general engage- 
ment. The battle was fought with obstinacy on both i4th April, 
sides: the two armies, in imitation of their leaders, dis-lamet, 
played uncommon valour; and the victory remained *]^y th 
long undecided between them. But an accident threw wick. 
the balance to the side of the Yorkists. Edward's cog- 
nizance was a sun ; that of Warwick a star with rays ; 
and the mistiness of the morning rendering it difficult to 
distinguish them, the Earl of Oxford, who fought on the 
side of the Lancastrians, was by mistake attacked by his 

P Comines, liv. iii. chap. 7. 

<i Grafton, p. 700. Comines, liv. iii. chap. 7. Leland's Collect, vol. ii. p. 505. 
VOL. II. 37 



434 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, friends, and chased off the field of battle r . Warwick, 
contrary to his more usual practice, engaged that day on 
1471 foot, resolving to show his army that he meant to share 
every fortune with them ; and he was slain in the thick- 
est of the engagement 8 : his brother underwent the same 
fate ; and as Edward had issued orders not to give any 
quarter, a great and undistinguished slaughter was made 
in the pursuit*. There Tell about fifteen hundred on 
the side of the victors. 

The same day on which this decisive battle was 
fought u , Queen Margaret and her son, now about eigh- 
teen years of age, and a young prince of great hopes, 
landed at Weymouth, supported by a small body of 
French forces. When this princess received intelligence 
of her husband's captivity, and of the defeat and death 
of the Earl of Warwick, her courage, which had sup- 
ported her under so many disastrous events, here quite 
left her; and she immediately foresaw all the dismal 
consequences of this calamity. At first she took sanc- 
tuary in the abbey of Beaulieu w ; but being encouraged 
by the appearance of Tudor, Earl of Pembroke, and 
Courtney, Earl of Devonshire, of the Lords Wenloc and 
St. John, with other men of rank, who exhorted her 
still to hope for success, she resumed her former spirit, 
and determined to defend to the utmost the ruins of her 
fallen fortunes. She advanced through the counties of 
Devon, Somerset, and Gloucester, increasing her army 
on each day's march ; but was at last overtaken by the 
Battle of rapid and expeditious Edward, at Tewkesbury, on the 
bu 6 r y kei banks of the Severn. The Lancastrians were here totally 
4th May. defeated: the Earl of Devonshire and Lord Wenloc 
were killed in the field: the Duke of Somerset, and 
about twenty other persons of distinction, having taken 
shelter in a church, were surrounded, dragged out, and 
immediately beheaded ; about three thousand of their 
side fell in battle ; and the army was entirely dispersed. 
Queen Margaret and her son were taken prisoners, 
and brought to the king, who asked the prince, after an 
insulting manner, how he dared to invade his dominions ? 

r Habington, p. 449. 

Comines, liv. iii. chap. 7. * Hall, fol. 218. 

u Leland's Collect, vol. ii. p. 505. 

* Hall, fol. 219. Habington, p. 451. Grafton, p. 706. Polyd. Verg. p. 528. 



EDWARD IV. 435 

The young prince, more mindful of his high birth than CHAP. 
of his present fortune, replied, that he came thither to XXIL _; 
claim his just inheritance. The ungenerous Edward, 1471 
insensible to pity, struck him on the face with his gaunt- Murder of 
let; and the Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester, Lord wardj 3 
Hastings, and Sir Thomas Gray, taking the blow as a 21stMa y- 
signal for farther violence, hurried the prince into the 
next apartment, and there despatched him with their 
daggers x . Margaret was thrown into the Tower; King 
Henry expired in that confinement a few days after the Death of 
battle of Tewkesbury, but whether he died a natural Henry VL 
or violent death is uncertain. It is pretended, and was 
generally believed, that the Duke of Gloucester killed 
him with his own hands 7 ; but the universal odium 
which that prince has incurred, inclined perhaps the na- 
tion to aggravate his crimes without any sufficient autho- 
rity. It is certain, however, that Henry's death was 
sudden ; and though he laboured under an ill state of 
health, this circumstance, joined to the general manners 
of the age, gave a natural ground of suspicion, which 
was rather increased than diminished by the exposing of 
his body to public view. That precaution served only to 
recall many similar instances in the English history, and 
to suggest the comparison. 

All the hopes of the house of Lancaster seemed now 
to be utterly extinguished. Every legitimate prince of 
that family was dead : almost every great leader of the 
party had perished in battle or on the scaffold. The 
Earl of Pembroke, who was levying forces in Wales, dis- 
banded his army when he received intelligence of the 
battle of Tewkesbury ; and he fled into Britany with his 
nephew, the young Earl of Richmond 2 . The bastard of 
Falcorberg, who had levied some forces, and had ad- 
vanced to London during Edward's absence, was repulsed; 
his men deserted him ; he was taken prisoner, and im- 
mediately executed a , and peace being now fully restored 6 * Oct> 
to the nation, a Parliament was ^summoned, which rati- 
fied, as usual, all the acts of the victor, and recognized 
his legal authority. 

^ Hall, fol. 221. Habington, p. 453. Hollingshed, p. 688. Polyd. Verg. p. 530. 

y Comities. Hall, fol. 223. Grafton, p. 703. 

z Habington, p. 454. Polyd. Verg. p. 531. 

Hollingshed, p. 689, 69(X 693. Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 554. 



436 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. But this prince, who had been so firm, and active, and 
,^ _, intrepid, during the course of adversity, was still unable 

1472 to resist the allurements of a prosperous fortune ; and 
he wholly devoted himself, as before, to pleasure and 
amusement, after he became entirely master of his king- 
dom, and had no longer any enemy who could give him 
anxiety or alarm. He recovered, however, by this gay 
and inoffensive course of life, and by his easy, familiar 
manners, that popularity which it is natural to imagine 
he had lost by the repeated cruelties exercised upon his 
enemies ; and the example also of his jovial festivity 
served to abate the former acrimony of faction among 
His subjects, and to restore the social disposition which 
had been so long interrupted between the opposite par- 
ties. All men seemed to be fully satisfied with the pre- 
sent government ; and the memory of past calamities 
served only to impress the people more strongly with a 
sense of their allegiance, and with the resolution of never 
incurring any more the hazard of renewing such direful 
scenes. 

1474 - But while the king was thus indulging himself in 
pleasure, he was roused from his lethargy by a prospect 
of foreign conquests, which it is probable his desire of 
popularity, more than the spirit of ambition, had made 
him covet. Though he deemed himself little beholden 
to the Duke of Burgundy for the reception which that 
prince had given him during his exile b , the political in- 
terests of their states maintained still a close connexion 
between them, and they agreed to unite their arms in 
making a powerful invasion on France. A league was 
formed, in which Edward stipulated to pass the seas 
with an army exceeding ten thousand men, and to in- 
vade the French territories. Charles promised to join 
him with all his forces. The king was to challenge the 
crown of France, and to obtain at least the provinces of 
Normandy and Guienne. The duke was to acquire 
Champaigne and some other territories, and to free all 
his dominions from the burden of homage to the crown 
of France ; and neither party was to make peace with- 
out the consent of the other . They were the more 
encouraged to hope for success from this league, as the 

t> Comines, liv. iii. chap. 7. c Kymer, vol. xi. p. 806, 807, 808, &c. 



EDWARD IV. 437 

Count of St. Pol, constable of France, who was master CHAP. 
of St. Quentin, and other towns on the Somme, 
secretly promised to join them; and there were 
hopes of engaging the Duke of Britany to enter into the 
confederacy. 

The prospect of a French war was always a sure means 
of making the Parliament open their purses, as far as 
the habits of that age would permit. They voted the 
king a tenth of rents, or two shillings in the pound, which 
must have been very inaccurately levied, since it produced 
only thirty-one thousand four hundred and sixty pounds ; 
and they added to this supply a whole fifteenth, and 
three quarters of another d . But as the king deemed 
these sums still unequal to the undertaking, he attempted 
to levy money by way of benevolence ; a kind of exaction 
which, except during the reigns of Henry III. and 
Eichard II., had not been much practised in former 
times, and which, though the consent of the parties was 
pretended to be gained, could not be deemed entirely 
voluntary 6 . The clauses annexed to the parliamentary 
grant show sufficiently the spirit of the nation in this 
respect. The money levied by the fifteenth was not to 
be put into the king's hands, but to be kept in religious 
houses ; and if the expedition into France should not 
take place, it was immediately to be refunded to the 
people. After these grants the Parliament was dissolved, 
which had sitten near two years and a half, and had 
undergone several prorogations ; a practice not very usual 
at that time in England. 

The king passed over to Calais with an army of fifteen 147 . 5 - 
hundred men at arms and fifteen thousand archers, O f Fran 
attended by all the chief nobility of England, who, prog- 
nosticating future successes from the past, were eager to 
appear on this great theatre of honour f . But all their 
sanguine hopes were damped when they found, on enter- 
ing the French territories, that neither did the constable 
open his gates to them, nor the Duke of Burgundy bring 

d Cotton, p. 696. 700. Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 558. 

e Hall, fol. 226. Habington, p. 461. Grafton, p. 719. Fabian, fol. 221. 

f Comines, liv. iv. chap. 5. This author says, (chap. 11,) that the king artfully 
brought over some of the richest of his subjects, who he knew would be soon tired 
of the war, and would promote all proposals of peace, which he foresaw would be 
soon necessary. 

37* 



438 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, them the smallest assistance. That prince, transported 
_J^^ by his ardent temper, had carried all his armies to a great 
1475 distance, and had employed them in wars on the frontiers 
of Germany, and against the Duke of Lorraine ; and 
though he came in person to Edward, and endeavoured 
to apologize for this breach of treaty, there was no pro- 
spect that they would be able this campaign to make a 
conjunction with the English. This circumstance gave 
great disgust to the king, and inclined him to hearken 
to those advances which Lewis continually made him 
for an accommodation. 

That monarch, more swayed by political views than by 
the point of honour, deemed no submissions too mean, 
which might free him from enemies who had proved so 
formidable to his predecessors, and who, united to so 
many other enemies, might still shake the well esta- 
blished government of France. It appears from Comines, 
that, discipline was at this time very imperfect among 
the English ; and that their civil wars, though long con- 
tinued, yet, being always decided by hasty battles, had 
still left them ignorant of the improvements which the 
military art was beginning to receive upon the continent^ 
But as Lewis was sensible that the warlike genius of the 
people would soon render them excellent soldiers, he was 
far from despising them for their present want of ex- 
perience, and he employed all his art to detach them 
from the alliance of Burgundy. When Edward sent 
him a herald to claim the crown of France, and to carry 
him a defiance in case of refusal, so far from answering 
to this bravado in like haughty terms, he replied with 
great temper, and even made the herald a considerable 
present h . He took afterwards an opportunity of sending 
a herald to the English camp ; and having given him 
directions to apply to the Lords Stanley and Howard, 
who he heard were friends to peace, he desired the good 
29th Aug. offices of these noblemen in promoting an accommodation 
with their master 1 . As Edward was now fallen into 
like dispositions, a truce was soon concluded on terms 
more advantageous than honourable to Lewis. He 
stipulated to pay Edward immediately seventy-five 

e Comines, liv. iv. chap. 5. * Ibid. Hall, fol. 227. 

1 Comines, liv. iv. chap. 7. 



EDWARD IV. 439 

thousand crowns, on condition that he should withdraw CHAP. 
his army from France, and promised to pay him fifty 
thousand crowns a year during their joint lives. It 
added, that the dauphin, when of age, should marry 
Edward's eldest daughter k . In order to ratify this treaty, Peace of 
the two monarchs agreed to have a personal interview ; Pecqt 
and for that purpose, suitable preparations were made at 
Pecquigni, near Amiens. A close rail was drawn across 
a bridge in that place, with no larger intervals than 
would allow the arm to pass ; a precaution against a 
similar accident to that which befel the Duke of Bur- 
gundy in his conference with the dauphin at Montereau. 
Edward and Lewis came to the opposite sides ; conferred 
privately together ; and having confirmed their friend- 
ship, and interchanged many mutual civilities, they soon 
after parted 1 . 

Lewis was anxious not only to gain the king's friend- 
ship, but also that of the nation, and of all the consider- 
able persons in the English court. He bestowed pen- 
sions, to the amount of sixteen thousand crowns a year, 
on several of the king's favourites ; on Lord Hastings 
two thousand crowns ; on Lord Howard and others in 
proportion ; and these great ministers were not ashamed 
thus to receive wages from a foreign prince m . As the 
two armies, after the conclusion of the truce, remained 
some time in the neighbourhood of each other, the 
English were not only admitted freely into Amiens, 
where Lewis resided, but had also their charges defrayed, 
and had wine and victuals furnished them in every inn, 
without any payment being demanded. They flocked 
thither in such multitudes, that once above nine thou- 
sand of them were in the town, and they might have 
made themselves masters of the king's person; but 
Lewis concluding, from their jovial and dissolute man- 
ner of living, that they had no bad intentions, was care- 
ful not to betray the least sign of fear or jealousy. And 
when Edward, informed of this disorder, desired him to 
shut the gates against them, he replied, that he would 
never agree to exclude the English from the place 
where he resided ; but that Edward, if he pleased, might 

k Rymer, vol. xii. p. 17. 1 Comities, liv. iv. chap. 9. m Hall, fol. 235. 




440 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, recall them, and place his own officers at the gates of 
Amiens to prevent their returning . 

Lewis's desire of confirming a mutual amity with Eng- 
land engaged him even to make imprudent advances, 
which it cost him afterwards some pains to evade. In 
the conference at Pecquigni, he had said to Edward, 
that he wished to have a visit from him at Paris ; that 
he would there endeavour to amuse him with the ladies ; 
and that, in case any offences were then committed, he 
would assign him the Cardinal of Bourbon for confessor, 
who, from fellow-feeling, would not be over and above 
severe in the penances which he would enjoin. This 
hint made deeper impression than Lewis intended. 
Lord Howard, who accompanied him back to Amiens, 
told him, in confidence, that if he were so disposed, it 
would not be impossible to persuade Edward to take a 
journey with him to Paris, where they might make 
merry together. Lewis pretended at first not to hear 
the offer ; but, on Howard's repeating it, he expressed 
his concern that his wars with the Duke of Burgundy 
would not permit him to attend his royal guest, and 
do him the honours he intended. "Edward," said he 
privately to Comines, " is a very handsome and a very 
amorous prince ; some lady at Paris may like him as well 
as he shall do her, and may invite him to return in 
another manner. It is better that the sea be between 
us ." 

This treaty did very little honour to either of these 
monarchs : it discovered the imprudence of Edward, who 
had taken his measures so ill with his allies, as to be 
obliged, after such an expensive armament, to return 
without making any acquisitions adequate to it : it 
showed the want of dignity in Lewis, who, rather than 
run the hazard of a battle, agreed to subject his kingdom 
to a tribute, and thus acknowledge the superiority of a 
neighbouring prince, possessed of less power and terri- 
tory than himself. But, as Lewis made interest the sole 
test of honour, he thought that all the advantages of the 
treaty were on his side, and that he had overreached 

n Comines, liv. iv. chap. 9. Hall, fol. 233. 

Comines, liv. iv. chap. 10. Habington, p. 469. 




EDWARD IV. 441 

Edward, by sending him out of France on such easy CHAP. 
terms. For this reason, he was very solicitous to co 
ceal his triumph; and he strictly enjoined his courtiers 
never to show the English the least sign of mockery or 
derision. But he did not himself very carefully observe 
so prudent a rule : he could not forbear, one day, in the 
joy of his heart, throwing out some raillery on the easy 
simplicity of Edward and his council ; when he per- 
ceived that he was overheard by a Gascon who had set- 
tled in England. He was immediately sensible of his 
indiscretion ; sent a message to the gentleman ; and 
offered him such advantages in his own country, as en- 
gaged him to remain in France. It is hit just, said he, 
that I pay the penalty of my own talkativeness p . 

The most honourable part of Lewis's treaty with Ed- 
ward was the stipulation for the liberty of Queen Mar- 
garet, who, though, after the death of her husband and 
son, she could no longer be formidable to government, 
was still detained in custody by Edward. Lewis paid 
fifty thousand crowns for her ransom ; and that princess, 
who had been so active on the stage of the world, and 
who had experienced such a variety of fortune, passed 
the remainder of her days in tranquillity and privacy, 
till the year 1482, when she died : an admirable princess, 
but more illustrious by her undaunted spirit in adversity, 
than by her moderation in prosperity. She seems nei- 
ther to have enjoyed the virtues, nor been subject to 
the weaknesses of her sex ; and was as much tainted 
with the ferocity as endowed with the courage of that 
barbarous age in which she lived. 

Though Edward had so little reason to be satisfied 
with the conduct of the Duke of Burgundy; he reserved 
to that prince a power of acceding to the treaty of 
Pecquigni : but Charles, when the offer was made him, 
haughtily replied, that he was able to support himself 
without the assistance of England, and that he would 
make no peace with Lewis till three months after Ed- 
ward's return into his own country. This prince pos- 
sessed all the ambition and courage of a conqueror; but 
being defective in policy and prudence, qualities no less 
essential, he was unfortunate in all his enterprises, and 

P Comines, liv. iii. chap. 10. 



442 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, perished at last in battle against the Swiss q ; a people 
^J [^whom he despised, and who, though brave and free, had 
U77 hitherto been, in a manner, overlooked in the general 
system of Europe. This event, which happened in the 
year 1477, produced a great alteration in the views of 
all the princes, and was attended with consequences 
which were felt for many generations. Charles left only 
one daughter, Mary, by his first wife ; and this princess, 
being heir of his opulent and extensive dominions, was 
courted by all the potentates of Christendom, who con- 
tended for the possession of so rich a prize. Lewis, the 
head of her family, might, by a proper application, have 
obtained this match for the dauphin, and have thereby 
united to the crown of France all the provinces of the 
Low Countries, together with Burgundy, Artois, and Pi- 
cardy ; which would at once have rendered his kingdom 
an overmatch for all its neighbours. But a man wholly 
interested is as rare as one entirely endowed with the 
opposite quality ; and Lewis, though impregnable to all 
the sentiments of generosity and friendship, was, on this 
occasion, carried from the road of true policy by the 
passions of animosity and revenge. He had imbibed so 
deep a hatred to the house of Burgundy, that he rather 
chose to subdue the princess by arms, than unite her to 
his family by marriage : he conquered the duchy of Bur- 
gundy, and that part of Picardy, which had been ceded 
to Philip the Good by the treaty of Arras : but he 
thereby forced the states of the Netherlands to bestow 
their sovereign in marriage on Maximilian of Austria, 
son of the Emperor Frederic, from whom they looked 
for protection in their present distresses : and, by these 
means, France lost the opportunity, which she never 
could recall, of making that important acquisition of 
power and territory. 

During this interesting crisis, Edward was no less 
defective in policy, and was no less actuated by private 
passions, unworthy of a sovereign and a statesman. Jea- 
lousy of his brother Clarence had caused him to neglect 
the advances which were made of marrying that prince, 
now a widower, to the heiress of Burgundy 1 ; and he 

a Comines, liv. v. chap. 8. * Polyd. Verg. Hall, fol. 240. Hollingshed, 

p. 703. Habington, p. 474. Grafton, p. 742. 



EDWARD IV. 443 

sent her proposals of espousing Anthony, Earl of Kivers, CHAP. 
brother to his queen, who still retained an entire ascend- 
ant over him. But the match was rejected with disdain 8 ; ^^*~ 
and Edward, resenting this treatment of his brother-in- 
law, permitted France to proceed without interruption 
in her conquests over his defenceless ally. Any pretence 
sufficed him for abandoning himself entirely to indolence 
and pleasure, which were now become his ruling passions. 
The only object which divided his attention was the im- 
proving of the public revenue, which had been dilapi- 
dated by the necessities or negligence of his predeces- 
sors; and some of his expedients for that purpose, 
though unknown to us, were deemed, during the time, 
oppressive to the people *. The detail of private wrongs 
naturally escapes the notice of history ; but an act of 
tyranny, of which Edward was guilty in his own family, 
has been taken notice of by all writers, and has met with 
general and deserved censure. 

The Duke of Clarence, by all his services in deserting Trial and 
Warwick, had never been able to regain the king's of e th? 101 
friendship, which he had forfeited by his former confe- *? uke of 
deracy with that nobleman. He was still regarded at 
court as a man of a dangerous and a fickle character; 
and the imprudent openness and violence of his temper, 
though it rendered him much less dangerous, tended ex- 
tremely to multiply his enemies, and to incense them 
against him. Among others, he had had the misfortune 
to give displeasure to the queen herself, as well as to 
his brother, the Duke of Gloucester, a prince of the 
deepest policy, of the most unrelenting ambition, and 
the least scrupulous in the means which he employed 
for the attainment of his ends. A combination between 
these potent adversaries being secretly formed against 
Clarence, it was determined to begin by attacking his 
friends ; in hopes that, if he patiently endured this in- 
jury, his pusillanimity would dishonour him in the eyes 
of the public ; if he made resistance, and expressed re- 
sentment, his passion would betray him into measures 
which might give them advantages against him. The 
king, hunting one day in the park of Thomas Burdet, of 
Arrow, in Warwickshire, had killed a white buck, which 

s Hall, fol. 240. t ibid. 241. Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 559. 



444 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, was a great favourite of the owner ; and Burdet, vexed 
^ ^at the loss, broke into a passion, and wished the horns 

1477 of the deer in the belly of the person who had advised 
the king to commit that insult upon him. This natural 
expression of resentment, which would have been over- 
looked or forgotten had it fallen from any other person, 
was rendered criminal and capital in that gentleman, by 
the friendship in which he had the misfortune to live 
with the Duke of Clarence : he was tried for his life ; 
the judges and jury were found servile enough to con- 
demn him ; and he was publicly beheaded at Tyburn for 
this pretended offence u . About the same time, one 
John Stacey, an ecclesiastic, much connected with the 
duke, as well as with Burdet, was exposed to a like ini- 
quitous and barbarous prosecution. This clergyman, 
being more learned in mathematics and astronomy than 
was usual in that age, lay under the imputation of ne- 
cromancy with the ignorant vulgar ; and the court laid 
hold of this popular rumour to effect his destruction. 
He was brought to his trial for that imaginary crime ; 
many of the greatest peers countenanced the prosecution 
by their presence ; he was condemned, put to the tor- 
ture, and executed w . 

The Duke of Clarence was alarmed when he found 
these acts of tyranny exercisecl on all around him : he 
reflected on the fate of the good Duke of Gloucester in 
the last reign, who, after seeing the most infamous pre- 
tences employed for the destruction of his nearest connex- 
ions, at last fell himself a victim to the vengeance of his 
enemies. But Clarence, instead of securing his own 
life against the present danger by silence and reserve, 
was open and loud in justifying the innocence of his 
friends, and in exclaiming against the iniquity of their 

U78. prosecutors. The king, highly offended with his freedom, 
or using that pretence against him, committed him to the 
Tower x , summoned a Parliament, and tried him for his 
life before the House of Peers, the supreme tribunal of 
the nation. 

The duke was accused of arraigning public justice, by 
maintaining the innocence of men who had been con- 

u Habington, p. 475. Hollingshed, p. 703. Sir Thomas More in Kcnnet, 
p. 498. * Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 561. x Ibid. p. 562. 



EDWARD IV. 445 

demned in courts of judicature ; and of inveighing against CHAP. 
the iniquity of the king, who had given orders for their XXIL 
prosecution 7 . Many rash expressions were imputed to^^^ 
him, and some, too, reflecting on Edward's legitimacy ; 
but he was not accused of any overt act of treason ; and 
even the truth of these speeches may be doubted of, 
since the liberty of judgment was taken from the court, 
by the king's appearing personally as his brother's ac- 
cuser?, and pleading the cause against him. But a sen- 
tence of condemnation, even when this extraordinary 
circumstance had not place, was a necessary consequence, 
in those times, of any prosecution by the court or the 
prevailing party ; and the Duke of Clarence was pro- 
nounced guilty by the Peers. The House of Commons 
were no less slavish and unjust : they both petitioned 
for the execution of the duke, and afterwards passed a 
bill of attainder against him a . The measures of the Par- 
liament during that age, furnish us with examples of a 
strange contrast of freedom and servility : they scruple 
to grant, and sometimes refuse, to the king the smallest 
supplies, the most necessary for the support of govern- 
ment, even the most necessary for the maintenance of 
wars, for which the nation, as well as the Parliament 
itself, expressed great fondness ; but they never scru- 
ple to concur in the most flagrant act of injustice or 
tyranny, which falls on any individual, however distin- 
guished by birth or merit. These maxims so ungenerous, 
so opposite to all principles of good government, so con- 
trary to the practice of present Parliaments, are very re- 
markable in all the transactions of the English history, 
for more than a century after the period in which we 
are now engaged. 

The only favour which the king granted his brother, 18th Fcb - 
after his condemnation, was to leave him the choice of 
his death ; and he was privately drowned in a butt of 
malmsey in the Tower : a whimsical choice, which implies 
that he had an extraordinary passion for that liquor. 
The duke left two children by the elder daughter of the 
Earl of Warwick ; a son, created an earl by his grand- 
father's title, and a daughter, afterwards Countess of 

y Stowe, p. 430. z Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 562. 

a Stowe, p. 430. Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 562. 
VOL. II. 38 



446 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Salisbury. Both this prince and princess were also 
^J1^ unfortunate in their end, and died a violent death ; 
1478 a fate which for many years attended almost all the 
descendants of the royal blood in England. There pre- 
vails a report, that the chief source of the violent prose- 
cution of the Duke of Clarence, whose name was George, 
was a current prophecy, that the king's son should be 
murdered by one, the initial letter of whose name 
was G b . It is not impossible but, in those ignorant 
times, such a silly reason might have some influence : 
but it is more probable, that the whole story is the in- 
vention of a subsequent period, and founded on the 
murder of these children by the Duke of Gloucester. 
Comines remarks, that, at that time, the English never 
were without some superstitious prophecy or other, by 
which they accounted for every event. 

All the glories of Edward's reign terminated with the 
civil wars, where his laurels too were extremely sullied 
with blood, violence, and cruelty. His spirit seems after- 
wards to have been sunk in indolence and pleasure, or 
his measures were frustrated by imprudence and the want 
of foresight. There was no object on which he was more 
intent than to have all his daughters settled by splendid 
marriages, though most of these princesses were yet in 
their infancy, and though the completion of his views, 
it was obvious, must depend on numberless accidents, 
which were impossible to be foreseen or prevented. His 
H82. eldest daughter, Elizabeth, was contracted to the dau- 
phin ; his second, Cicely, to the eldest son of James III., 
King of Scotland ; his third, Anne, to Philip, only son 
of Maximilian and the Duchess of Burgundy ; his fourth, 
Catherine, to John, son and heir to Ferdinand, King of 
Arragon, and Isabella, Queen of Castile , None of these 
projected marriages took place; and the king himself saw, 
in his lifetime, the rupture of the first, that with the 
dauphin, for which he had always discovered a peculiar 
fondness. Lewis, who paid no regard to treaties or en- 
gagements, found his advantage in contracting the dau- 
phin to the Princess Margaret, daughter of Maximilian ; 
and the king, notwithstanding his indolence, prepared 

b Hall, fol. 239. Hollingshed, p. 703. Grafton, p. 741. Polyd. Verg. p. 537. 
Sir Thomas More in Kennet, p. 497. c Kymer, vol. xi. p. 110. 



EDWARD IV. 447 

to revenge the indignity. The French monarch, eminent CHAP. 
for prudence as well as perfidy, endeavoured to guard xxn - 
against the blow ; and by a proper distribution of presents 
in the court of Scotland, he incited James to make war 
upon England. This prince, who lived on bad terms 
with his own nobility, and whose force was very unequal 
to the enterprise, levied an army ; but when he was ready 
to enter England, the barons, conspiring against his 
favourites, put them to death without trial, and the army 
presently disbanded. The Duke of Gloucester, attended 
by the Duke of Albany, James's brother, who had been 
banished his country, entered Scotland at the head of an 
army, took Berwick, and obliged the Scots to accept of 
a peace, by which they resigned that fortress to Edward. 
This success emboldened the king to think more seriously 
of a French war ; but while he was making preparations 
for that enterprise, he w r as seized with a distemper, of 
which he expired, in the forty-second year of his age, and 9th A P ril - 

A, . -, ' p i . . J . J ! ? -,. -.Death and 

the twenty-third 01 his reign : a prince more splendid character 
and showy, than either prudent or virtuous; brave, 
though cruel ; addicted to pleasure, though capable of 
activity in great emergencies ; and less fitted to prevent 
ills by wise precautions, than to remedy them after they 
took place, by his vigour and enterprise. Besides five 
daughters, this king left two sons ; Edward, Prince of 
Wales, his successor, then in his thirteenth year, and 
Kichard, Duke of York, in his ninth. 



448 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



CHAPTER XXIII. 

EDWARD V. RICHARD III. 

EDWARD V. STATE OF THE COURT. THE EARL OP KIVERS ARRESTED. 
DUKE OF GLOUCESTER PROTECTOR. EXECUTION OF LORD HASTINGS. THE 
PROTECTOR AIMS AT THE CROWN. ASSUMES THE CROWN. MURDER OF 
EDWARD V. AND OF THE DUKE OF YORK. KICHARD III. DUKE OF BUCK- 
INGHAM DISCONTENTED. -THE EARL OF RICHMOND. BUCKINGHAM EXE- 
CUTED. INVASION BY THE EARL OF RICHMOND. BATTLE OF BOSWORTH. 
DEATH AND CHARACTER OF RICHARD III. 

CHAP. DURING the later years of Edward IV., the nation hav- 
^^^, ing, in a great measure, forgotten the bloody feuds be- 
U83. tween the two roses, and peaceably acquiescing in the 
Ae court es ^ a ^lished government, was agitated only by some court 
intrigues, which being restrained by the authority of the 
king, seemed nowise to endanger the public tranquillity. 
These intrigues arose from the perpetual rivalship be- 
tween two parties ; one consisting of the queen and her 
relations, particularly the Earl of Kivers, her brother, and 
the Marquis of Dorset, her son ; the other composed of 
the ancient nobility, who envied the sudden growth and 
unlimited credit of that aspiring family a . At the head 
of this latter party was the Duke of Buckingham, a man 
of very noble birth, of ample possessions, of great 
alliances, of shining parts ; who, though he had married 
the queen's sister, was too haughty to act in subserviency 
to her inclinations, and aimed rather at maintaining an 
independent influence and authority. Lord Hastings, 
the chamberlain, was another leader of the same party ; 
and as this nobleman had by his bravery and activity, 
as well as by his approved fidelity, acquired the confi- 
dence and favour of his master, he had been able, though 
with some difficulty, to support himself against the credit 
of the queen. The Lords Howard and Stanley main- 
tained a connexion with these two noblemen, and 
brought a considerable accession of influence and repu- 
tation to their party. All the other barons, who had no 

a Sir Thomas More, p. 481. 



EDWARD V. 449 

particular dependence on the queen, adhered to the same CHAP. 
interest ; and the people in general, from their natural 
envy against the prevailing power, bore great favour to 
the cause of these noblemen. 

But Edward knew, that, though he himself had been 
able to overawe those rival factions, many disorders might 
arise from their contests during the minority of his son ; 
and he therefore took care, in his last illness, to summon 
together several of the leaders on both sides, and, by 
composing their ancient quarrels, to provide, as far as 
possible, for the future tranquillity of the government. 
After expressing his intentions that his brother, the Duke 
of Gloucester, then absent in the north, should be in- 
trusted with the regency, he recommended to them 
peace and unanimity during the tender years of his son ; 
represented to them the dangers which must attend the 
continuance of their animosities ; and engaged them to 
embrace each other with all the appearance of the most 
cordial reconciliation. But this temporary or feigned 
agreement lasted no longer than the king's' life : he had 
no sooner expired, than the jealousies of the parties 
broke out afresh ; and each of them applied, by separate 
messages, to the Duke of Gloucester, and endeavoured 
to acquire his favour and friendship. 

This prince, during his brother's reign, had endea- 
voured to live on good terms with both parties ; and his 
high birth, his extensive abilities, and his great services, 
had enabled him to support himself without falling into 
a dependence on either. But the new situation of 
affairs, when the supreme power was devolved upon him, 
immediately changed his measures, and he secretly deter 
mined to preserve no longer that neutrality which he had 
hitherto maintained. His exorbitant ambition, unre- 
strained by any principle either of justice or humanity, 
made him carry his views to the possession of the crown 
itself; and as this object could not be attained without 
the ruin of the queen and her family, he fell, without 
hesitation, into concert with the opposite party ; but 
being sensible, that the most profound dissimulation was 
requisite for effecting his criminal purposes, he redoubled 
his professions of zeal and attachment to that princess ; 
and he gained such credit with her, as to influence her 

38* 



450 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, conduct in a point, which, as it was of the utmost im- 
^ Importance, was violently disputed between the opposite 
1483 factions. 

The young king, at the time of his father's death, 
resided in the castle of Ludlow, on the borders of Wales ; 
whither he had been sent, that the influence of his pre- 
sence might overawe the Welsh, and restore the tran- 
quillity of that country, which had been disturbed by 
some late commotions. His person was committed to 
the care of his uncle, the Earl of Kivers, the most ac- 
complished nobleman in England, who, having united an 
uncommon taste for literature b to great abilities in busi- 
ness, and valour in the field, was entitled, by his talents, 
still more than by nearness of blood, to direct the education 
of the young monarch. The queen, anxious to preserve 
that ascendant over her son, which she had long main- 
tained over her husband, wrote to the Earl of Rivers, 
that he should levy a body of forces, in order to escort 
the king to London, to protect him during his coronation, 
and to keep him from falling into the hands of their 
enemies. The opposite faction, sensible that Edward 
was now of an age when great advantages could be made 
of his name and countenance, and was approaching to 
the age when he would be legally entitled to exert in 
person his authority, foresaw, that the tendency of this 
measure was to perpetuate their subjection under their 
rivals ; and they vehemently opposed a resolution which 
they represented as the signal for renewing a civil war 
in the kingdom. Lord Hastings threatened to depart 
instantly to his government of Calais : the other nobles 
seemed resolute to oppose force by force : and as the 
Duke of Gloucester, on pretence of pacifying the quar- 
rel, had declared against all appearance of an armed 
power, which might be dangerous, and was nowise ne- 
cessary, the queen, trusting to the sincerity of his friend- 
ship, and overawed by so violent an opposition, recalled 
her orders to her brother, and desired him to bring up no 
greater retinue than should be necessary to support the 
state and dignity of the young sovereign 11 . 

'' This nobleman first introduced the noble art of printing into England. Caxton 
was recommended by him to the patronage of Edward IV. See Catalogue of Koyal 
and Noble Authors. 

Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 564, 565. * Sir T. More, p. 483. 



EDWARD V. 451 

The Duke of Gloucester, meanwhile, set out from CTTAP, 
York, attended by a numerous train of the northern XXIIJ - 
gentry. When he reached Northampton, he was joined 
by the Duke of Buckingham, who was also attended by 
a splendid retinue ; and as he heard that the king was 
hourly expected on that road, he resolved to await his 
arrival, under colour of conducting him thence in person 
to London. The Earl of Rivers, apprehensive that the 
place would be too narrow to contain so many attend- 
ants, sent his pupil forward by another road to Stony- 
Stratford; and came himself to Northampton, in order 
to apologize for this measure, and to pay his respects to 
the Duke of Gloucester. He was received with the 
greatest appearance of cordiality ; he passed the evening 
in an amicable manner with Gloucester and Bucking- 
ham ; he proceeded on the road with them next day to 
join the king; but as he was entering Stony-Stratford, The Earl 
he was arrested by orders from the Duke of Gloucester 6 : 
Sir Eichard Gray, one of the queen's sons, was at the 
same time put under a guard, together with Sir Thomas 
Yaughan, who possessed a considerable office in the king's 
household ; and all the prisoners were instantly con- 
ducted to Pomfret. Gloucester approached the young 
prince with the greatest demonstrations of respect ; and 
endeavoured to satisfy him with regard to the violence 
committed on his uncle and brother: but Edward, much 
attached to these near relations, by whom he had been 
tenderly educated, was not such a master of dissimula- 
tion as to conceal his displeasured 

The people, however, were extremely rejoiced at this 4thMa y- 
revolution, and the duke was received in London with 
the loudest acclamations ; but the queen no sooner re- 
ceived intelligence of her brother's imprisonment, than 
she foresaw that Gloucester's violence would not stop 
there, and that her own ruin, if not that of all her chil- 
dren, was finally determined. She therefore fled into 
the sanctuary of Westminster, attended by the Marquis 
of Dorset ; and she carried thither the five princesses, 
together with the Duke of York s . She trusted, that 
the ecclesiastical privileges which had formerly, during 

e Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 564, 565. t Sir T. More, p. 484. 

e Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 565. 



452 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, the total ruin of her husband and family, given her pro- 
tection against the fury of the Lancastrian faction, would 
not now be violated by her brother-in-law, while her son 
was on the throne ; and she resolved to await there the 
return of better fortune. But Gloucester, anxious to 
have the Duke of York in his power, proposed to take 
him by force from the sanctuary ; and he represented 
to the privy council, both the indignity put upon the 
government by the queen's ill-grounded apprehensions, 
and the necessity of the young prince's appearance at 
the ensuing coronation of his brother. It was farther 
urged, that ecclesiastical privileges were originally in- 
tended only to give protection to unhappy men perse- 
cuted for their debts or crimes ; and were entirely use- 
less to a person who, by reason of his tender age, could 
lie under the burden of neither, and who, for the same 
reason, was utterly incapable of claiming security from 
any sanctuary. But the two archbishops, Cardinal 
Bourchier, the primate, and Rotherham, Archbishop of 
York, protesting against the sacrilege of this measure, 
it was agreed that they should first endeavour to bring 
the queen to compliance by persuasion, before any vio- 
lence should be employed against her. These prelates 
were persons of known integrity and honour ; and being 
themselves entirely persuaded of the duke's good inten- 
tions, they employed every argument, accompanied with 
earnest entreaties, exhortations, and assurances, to bring 
her over to the same opinion. She long continued 
obstinate, and insisted, that the Duke of York, by living 
in the sanctuary, was not only secure himself, but gave 
security to the king, whose life no one would dare to 
attempt, while his successor and avenger remained in 
safety ; but finding that none supported her in these 
sentiments, and that force, in case of refusal, was threa- 
tened by the council, she at last complied, and produced 
her son to the two prelates. She was here on a sudden 
struck with a kind of presage of his future fate : she 
tenderly embraced him ; she bedewed him with her 
tears ; and bidding him an eternal adieu, delivered him, 
with many expressions of regret and reluctance, into 
their custody h . 

fc Sir T. More, p. 491. 



EDWARD V. 453 

The Duke of Gloucester, being the nearest male of CHAP. 
the royal family capable of exercising the government, 5 L 
seemed entitled, by the customs of the realm, to the \^~" 
office of protector ; and the council, not waiting for the Duke of 
consent of Parliament, made no scruple of investing him 
with that high dignity 1 . The general prejudice enter- 
tained by the nobility against the queen and her kindred, 
occasioned this precipitation and irregularity; and no 
one foresaw any danger to the succession, much less to 
the lives of the young princes, from a measure so obvious 
and so natural. Besides that the duke had hitherto 
been able to cover, by the most profound dissimulation, 
his fierce and savage nature, the numerous issue of Ed- 
ward, together with the two children of Clarence, seemed 
to be an eternal obstacle to his ambition; and it ap- 
peared equally impracticable for him to destroy so many 
persons possessed of a preferable title, and imprudent to 
exclude them. But a man who had abandoned all prin- 
ciples of honour and humanity was soon carried by his 
predominant passion beyond the reach of fear or pre- 
caution ; and Gloucester, having so far succeeded in his 
views, no longer hesitated in removing the other obstruc- 
tions which lay between him and the throne. The death 
of the Earl of Rivers, and of the other prisoners detained 
in Pomfret, was first determined ; and he easily obtained 
the consent of the Duke of Buckingham, as well as of 
Lord Hastings, to this violent and sanguinary measure. 
However easy it was, in those times, to procure a sen- 
tence against the most innocent person, it appeared still 
more easy to dispatch an enemy, without any trial or 
form of process ; and orders were accordingly issued to 
Sir Richard Ratcliffe, a proper instrument in the hands 
of this tyrant, to cut off the heads of the prisoners. The 
protector then assailed the fidelity of Buckingham by 
all the arguments capable of swaying a vicious mind, 
which knew no motive of action but interest and ambi- 
tion. He represented, that the execution of persons so 
nearly related to the king, whom that prince so openly 
professed to love, and whose fate he so much resented, 
would never pass unpunished ; and all the actors in that 
scene were bound in prudence to prevent the effects of 

i Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 566. 



454 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, his future vengeance : that it would be impossible to 
keep the queen for ever at a distance from her son, and 
equally impossible to prevent her from instilling into his 
tender mind the thoughts of retaliating, by like execu- 
tions, the sanguinary insults committed on her family : 
thai: the only method of obviating these mischiefs was to 
put the sceptre in the hands of a man of whose friend- 
ship the duke might be assured, and whose years and 
experience taught him to pay respect to merit, and to 
the rights of ancient nobility : and that the same neces- 
sity which had carried them so far in resisting the usurpa- 
tion of these intruders must justify them in attempting 
farther innovations, and in making, by national consent, 
a new settlement of the succession. To these reasons 
he added the offers of great private advantages to the 
Duke of Buckingham ; and he easily obtained from him 
a promise of supporting him in all his enterprises. 

The Duke of Gloucester, knowing the importance of 
gaining Lord Hastings, sounded at a distance his senti- 
ments, by means of Catesby, a lawyer, who lived in great 
intimacy with that nobleman ; but found him impreg- 
nable in his allegiance and fidelity to the children of 
Edward, who had ever honoured him with his friendship k . 
He saw, therefore, that there were no longer any mea- 
sures to be kept with him ; and he determined to ruin 
utterly the man whom he despaired of engaging to con- 
isth June. cur m his usurpation. On the very day when Rivers, 
Gray, and Vaughan were executed, or rather murdered, 
at Pomfret, by the advice of Hastings, the protector 
summoned a council in the Tower, whither that noble- 
man, suspecting no design against him, repaired without 
hesitation. The Duke of Gloucester was capable of 
committing the most bloody and treacherous murders 
with the utmost coolness and indifference. On taking 
his place at the council-table, he appeared in the easiest 
and most jovial humour imaginable. He seemed to 
indulge himself in familiar conversation with the coun- 
sellors, before they should enter on business ; and having 
paid some compliments to Morton, Bishop of Ely, on the 
good and early strawberries which he raised in his garden 
at Holborn, he begged the favour of having a dish of 

k Sir T. More, p v 493. 



EDWARD V. 455 

them, which that prelate immediately despatched a ser- CHAP. 
vant to bring to him. The protector then left the conn- 
cil, as if called away by some other business; but 
after returning with an angry and inflamed countenance, 
he asked them what punishment those deserved that had 
plotted against his life, who was so nearly related to the 
king, and was intrusted with the administration of govern- 
ment ? Hastings replied, that they merited the punish- 
ment of traitors. These traitors, cried the protector, 
are the sorceress, my brother's wife, and Jane Shore, his 
mistress, tvith others their associates : see to ivhat a con- 
dition they have reduced me by their incantations and 
witchcraft : upon which he laid bare his arm, all shrivelled 
and decayed. But the counsellors, who knew that this 
infirmity had attended him from his birth, looked on each 
other with amazement ; and above all Lord Hastings, 
who, as he had since Edward's death engaged in an 
intrigue with Jane Shore 1 , was naturally anxious con- 
cerning the issue of these extraordinary proceedings. 
Certainly, my lord, said he, if they be guilty of these crimes, 
they deserve the severest punishment. And do you reply 
to me, exclaimed the protector, with your ifs and your 
ands ? You are the chief abettor of that witch Shore : 
you are yourself a traitor : and I sivear by $t. Paul, that 
I ivill not dine before your head be broitgM me. He struck 
the table with his hand : armed men rushed in at the 
signal : the counsellors were thrown into the utmost 
consternation : and one of the guards, as if by accident 
or mistake, aimed a blow with a poll-axe at Lord Stanley, 
who, aware of the danger, slunk under the table ; and 
though he saved his life, received a severe wound in the 
head in the protector's presence. Hastings was seized, Execution 
was hurried away, and instantly beheaded on a timber 
log which lay in the court of the Tower m . Two hours 
after, a proclamation, well penned and fairly written, was 
read to the citizens of London, enumerating his offences, 
and apologizing to them from the suddenness of the dis- 
covery, for the sudden execution of that nobleman, who 
was very popular among them : but the saying of a mer- 
chant was much talked of on the occasion, who remarked, 

1 See note [T], at the end of the volume. 
m Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 566. 



456 . HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, that the proclamation was certainly drawn by the spirit 
prophecy". 

Lord Stanley, the Archbishop of York, the Bishop of 
Ely, and other counsellors, were committed prisoners in 
different chambers of the Tower ; and the protector, in 
order to carry on the farce of his accusations, ordered the 
goods of Jane Shore to be seized ; and he summoned her 
to answer before the council for sorcery and witchcraft. 
But as no proofs which could be received, even in that 
ignorant age, were produced against her, he directed her 
to be tried, in the spiritual court, for her adulteries and 
lewdness ; and she did penance in a white sheet in St. 
Paul's, before the whole people. This lady was born of 
reputable parents, in London, was well educated, and 
married to a substantial citizen ; but, unhappily, views of 
interest, more than the maid's inclinations, had been con- 
sulted in the match, and her mind, though framed for 
virtue, had proved unable to resist the allurements of 
Edward, who solicited her favours. But while seduced 
from her duty by this gay and amorous monarch, she 
still made herself respectable by her other virtues ; and 
the ascendant which her charms and vivacity long main- 
tained over him, was all employed in acts of beneficence 
and humanity. She was still forward to oppose calumny, 
to protect the oppressed, to relieve the indigent ; and her 
good offices, the genuine dictates of her heart, never 
waited the solicitation of presents, nor the hopes of re- 
ciprocal services. But she lived not only to feel the 
bitterness of shame, imposed on her by this tyrant, but 
to experience, in old age and poverty, the ingratitude of 
those courtiers who had long solicited her friendship and 
been protected by her credit. No one, among the great 
multitudes whom she had obliged, had the humanity to 
bring her consolation or relief: she languished out her 
life in solitude and indigence ; and amidst a court inured 
to the most atrocious crimes, the frailties of this woman 
justified all violations of friendship towards her, and all 
neglect of former obligations. 

The pro- These acts of violence, exercised against all the nearest 
connexions of the late king, prognosticated the severest 
fate to his defenceless children ; and after the murder 

a Sir T. More, p. 496. 



EDWARD V. 457 

of Hastings, the protector no longer made a secret of CHAP. 
his intentions to usurp the crown. The licentious life XXIIL 
of Edward, who was not restrained in his pleasures ^~^~ 
either by honour or prudence, afforded a pretence for 
declaring his marriage with the queen invalid, and all 
his posterity illegitimate. It was asserted, that, before 
espousing the Lady Elizabeth Gray, he had paid court 
to the Lady Eleanor Talbot, daughter of the Earl of 
Shrewsbury ; and being repulsed by the virtue of that 
lady, he was obliged, ere he could gratify his desires, to 
consent to a private marriage, without any witnesses, 
by Stillington, Bishop of Bath, who afterwards divulged 
the secret . It was also maintained, that the act of 
attainder passed against the Duke of Clarence had vir- 
tually incapacitated his children from succeeding to the 
crown ; and these two families being set aside, the pro- 
tector remained the only true and legitimate heir of 
the house of York. But as it would be difficult, if not 
impossible, to prove the preceding marriage of the late 
king, and as the rule which excludes the heirs of an 
attainted blood from private successions was never ex- 
tended to the crown, the protector resolved to make 
use of another plea still more shameful and scandalous. 
His partisans were taught to maintain, that both Ed- 
ward IY. and the Duke of Clarence were illegitimate ; 
that the Duchess of York had received different lovers 
into her bed, who were the fathers of these children; 
that their resemblance to those gallants, was a sufficient 
proof of their spurious birth ; and that the Duke of 
Gloucester alone, of all her sons, appeared, by his fea- 
tures and countenance, to be the true offspring of the 
Duke of York. Nothing can be imagined more impu- 
dent than this assertion, which threw so foul an imputa- 
tion on his own mother, a princess of irreproachable 
virtue, and then alive ; yet the place chosen for first 
promulgating it was the pulpit, before a large congre- 
gation, and in the protector's presence. Dr. Shaw was 22d June, 
appointed to preach in St. Paul's ; and having chosen 
this passage for his text, Bastard slips shall not thrive, 
he enlarged on all the topics which could discredit the 
birth of Edward IY., the Duke of Clarence, and of all 

Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 567. Comines. Sir T. More, p. 482. 
VOL. II. 39 



458 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, their children. He then broke out in a panegyric on 
v j^^,the Duke of Gloucester; and exclaimed, "Behold this 
1483 excellent prince, the express image of his noble father, 
the genuine descendant of the house of York ; bearing, 
no less in the virtues of his mind, than in the features 
of his countenance, the character of the gallant Eichard, 
once your hero and favourite : he alone is entitled to 
your allegiance : he must deliver you from the dominion 
of all intruders : he alone can restore the lost glory and 
honour of the nation." It was previously concerted, 
that as the doctor should pronounce these words, the 
Duke of Gloucester should enter the church; and it 
was expected that the audience would cry out. God save 
King Richard! which would immediately have been 
laid hold of as a popular consent, and interpreted to be 
the voice of the nation; but by a ridiculous mistake, 
worthy of the whole scene, the duke did not appear till 
after this exclamation was already recited by the 
preacher. The doctor was therefore obliged to repeat 
his rhetorical figure out of its proper place : the au- 
dience, less from the absurd conduct of the discourse, 
than from their detestation of these proceedings, kept 
a profound silence ; and the protector and his preacher 
were equally abashed at the ill success of their stra- 
tagem. 

But the duke was too far advanced to recede from 
his criminal and ambitious purpose. A new expedient 
was tried to work on the people. The mayor, who was 
brother to Dr. Shaw, and entirely in the protector's 
interests, called an assembly of the citizens ; where the 
Duke of Buckingham, who possessed some talents for 
eloquence, harangued them on the protector's title to 
the crown, and displayed those numerous virtues of 
which, he pretended, that prince was possessed. He 
next asked them, whether they would have the duke 
for king ? and then stopped, in expectation of hearing 
the cry, God save King Richard! He was surprised to 
observe them silent ; and turning about to the mayor, 
asked him the reason. The mayor replied, that perhaps 
they did not understand him. Buckingham then re- 
peated his discourse with some variation ; enforced the 
same topics, asked the same question, and was received 



EDWARD V. 459 

with the same silence. " I now see the cause/' said the CHAP. 
mayor, " the citizens are not accustomed to be harangued XX1IL 
by any but their recorder, and know not how to answer ^7 8 ^~ 
a person of your grace's quality." The recorder, Fitz- 
Williams, was then commanded to repeat the substance of 
the duke's speech ; but the man, who was averse to the 
office, took care, throughout his whole discourse, to have 
it understood that he spoke nothing of himself, and that 
he only conveyed to them the sense of the Duke of 
Buckingham. Still the audience kept a profound silence. 
" This is wonderful obstinacy," cried the duke : " express 
your meaning, my friends, one way or other : when we 
apply to you on this occasion, it is merely from the re- 
gard which we bear to you. The Lords and Common^ 
have sufficient authority, without your consent, to ap- 
point a king ; but I require you here to declare, in plain 
terms, whether or not you will have the Duke of 
Gloucester for your sovereign. After all these efforts, 
some of the meanest apprentices, incited by the protec- 
tor's and Buckingham's servants, raised a feeble cry, 
God save King Richard^ I The sentiments of the nation 
were now sufficiently declared : the voice of the people 
was the voice of God : and Buckingham, with the mayor, 25th June, 
hastened to Baynard's castle, where the protector then 
resided, that they might make him a tender of the 
crown. 

When Richard was told that a great multitude was in 
the court, he refused to appear to them, and pretended 
to be apprehensive for his personal safety : a circumstance 
taken notice of by Buckingham, who observed to the 
citizens, that the prince was ignorant of the whole design. 
At last he was persuaded to step forth, but he still kept 
at some distance ; and he asked the meaning of their in- 
trusion and importunity. Buckingham told him that 
the nation was resolved to have him for king. The pro- 
tector declared his purpose of maintaining his loyalty to 
the present sovereign, and exhorted them to adhere to 
the same resolution. He was told that the people had 
determined to have another prince ; and if he rejected 
their unanimous voice, they must look out for one who 
would be more compliant. This argument was too 

P Sir T. More, p. 496. 



460 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, powerful to be resisted : he was prevailed on to accept 
' of the crown: and he thenceforth acted as legitimate 
^^^ and rightful sovereign. 

The pro- This ridiculous farce was soon after followed by a scene 
gomes die truly tragical, the murder of the two young princes. 
throne. Eichard gave orders to Sir Kobert Brakenbury, constable 

Murder of A . rv? , i i iji-i - 1 

Edw. v. 01 the Tower, to put his nephews to death ; but this 
iMkeVf 16 g en tleman, who had sentiments of honour, refused to 
York. have any hand in the infamous office. The tyrant then 
sent for Sir James Tyrrel, who promised obedience ; and 
he ordered Brakenbury to resign to this gentleman the 
keys and government of the Tower for one night. Tyr- 
rel, choosing three associates, Slater, Dighton, and Forest, 
came in the night-time to the door of the chamber 
where the princes were lodged ; and sending in the as- 
sassins, he bade them execute their commission, while 
he himself stayed without. They found the young princes 
in bed and fallen into a profound sleep. After suffo- 
cating them with the bolster and pillows, they showed 
their naked bodies to Tyrrel, who ordered them to be 
buried at the foot of the stairs, deep in the ground under a 
heap of stones q . These circumstances were all confessed 
by the actors in the following reign ; and they were never 
punished for the crime : probably, because Henry, whose 
maxims of government were extremely arbitrary, desired 
to establish it as a principle, that the commands of the 
reigning sovereign ought to justify every enormity in those 
who paid obedience to them. But there is one circum- 
stance not so easy to be accounted for : it is pretended 
that Richard, displeased with the indecent manner of 
burying his nephews, whom he had murdered, gave his 
chaplain orders to dig up the bodies, and to inter them 
in consecrated ground ; and as the man died soon after, 
the place of their burial remained unknown, and the 
bodies could never be found by any search which Henry 
could make for them. Yet in the reign of Charles II. 
when there was occasion to remove some stones, and to 
dig in the very spot which was mentioned as the place of 
their first interment, the bones of two persons were there 
found, which, by their size, exactly corresponded to the 
age of Edward and his brother: they were concluded 

i Sir T. More, p. 501. 




EDWARD V. 4(31 

with certainty to be the remains of those princes, and CHAP. 
were interred under a marble monument, by orders 
King Charles 1 . Perhaps Richard's chaplain had 
before he found an opportunity of executing his master's 
commands ; and the bodies being supposed to be already 
removed, a diligent search was not made for them by 
Henry in the place where they had been buried. 

* Rennet, p. 551. 

39* 



462 HISTORY OF ENGLAND 



EICHAED III. 

CHAP. The first acts of Eichard's administration were to be- 
ow rewards on those who had assisted him in usurping 
the crown, and to gain, by favours, those who he thought 
were best able to support his future government. Tho- 
mas, Lord Howard, was created Duke of Norfolk ; Sir 
Thomas Howard, his son, Earl of Surrey ; Lord Lovel, a 
viscount, by the same name ; even Lord Stanley was set 
at liberty, and made steward of the household. This 
nobleman had become obnoxious by his first opposition 
to Eichard's views, and also by his marrying the Countess- 
dowager of Eichmond, heir of the Somerset family ; but 
sensible of the necessity of submitting to the present 
government, he feigned such zeal for Eichard's service, 
that he was received into favour, and even found means 
to be intrusted with the most important commands by 
that politic and jealous tyrant. 

But the person who, both from the greatness of his 
services, and the power and splendour of his family, was 
best entitled to favours under the new government, was 
the Duke of Buckingham ; and Eichard seemed deter- 
mined to spare no pains or bounty in securing him to his 
interests. Buckingham was descended from a daughter 
of Thomas Woodstock, Duke of Gloucester, uncle to 
Eichard II., and by this pedigree he not only was allied 
to the royal family, but had claims for dignities as well 
as estates of a very extensive nature. The Duke of Glou- 
cester, and Henry, Earl of Derby, afterwards Henry IV., 
had married the two daughters and co-heirs of Bohun, Earl 
of Hereford, one of the greatest of the ancient barons, 
whose immense property came thus to be divided into two 
shares : one was inherited by the family of Buckingham ; 
the other was united to the crown by the house of Lancas- 
ter, and, after the attainder of that royal line, was seized, 
as legally devolved to them, by the sovereigns of the house 
of York. The Duke of Buckingham laid hold of the 
present opportunity, and claimed the restitution of that 



RICHARD III. 

portion of the Hereford estate which had escheated to CHAP. 
the crown, as well as of the great office of constable, XXIIL 
which had long continued by inheritance in his ancestors ^^T" 
of that family. Richard readily complied with these de- 
mands, which were probably the price stipulated to Buck- 
ingham for his assistance in promoting the usurpation. 
That nobleman was invested with the office of constable ; 
he received a grant of the estate of Hereford 8 ; many 
other dignities and honours were conferred upon him ; 
and the king thought himself sure of preserving the 
fidelity of a man whose interests seemed so closely con- 
nected with those of the present government. 

But it was impossible that friendship could long re- Duke of 
main inviolate between two men of such corrupt minds Smdis?" 
as Richard and the Duke of Buckingham. Historians contented. 
ascribe their first rupture to the king's refusal of making 
restitution of the Hereford estate ; but it is certain, 
from records, that he passed a grant for that purpose, 
and that the full demands of Buckingham were satis- 
fied in this particular. Perhaps Richard was soon sensi- 
ble of the danger which might ensue from conferring 
such an immense property on a man of so turbulent a 
disposition, and afterwards raised difficulties about the 
execution of his own grant: perhaps he refused some 
other demands of Buckingham, whom he found it im- 
possible to gratify for his past services : perhaps he 
resolved, according to the usual maxims of politicians, to 
seize the first opportunity of ruining this powerful sub- 
ject, who had been the principal instrument of his own 
elevation ; and the discovery of this intention begat the 
first discontent in the Duke of Buckingham. However 
this may be, it is certain that the duke, soon after 
Richard's accession, began to form a conspiracy against 
the government, and attempted to overthrow that usur- 
pation which he himself had so zealously contributed to 
establish. 

Never was there in any country an usurpation more 
flagrant than that of Richard, or more repugnant to 
every principle of justice and public interest. His claim 
was entirely founded on impudent allegations, never 
attempted to be proved, some of them incapable of proof, 

s Dugdale's Baron, vol. i. p. 168, 169. 



464 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and all of them implying ~ scandalous reflections on his 
vj~~^owi family, and on the persons with whom he was the 
U83 most nearly connected. His title was never acknow- 
ledged by any national assembly, scarcely even by the 
lowest populace to whom he appealed ; and it had be- 
come prevalent, merely for want of some person of dis- 
tinction who might stand forth against him, and give a 
voice to those sentiments of general detestation which 
arose in every bosom. Were men disposed to pardon 
these violations of public right, the sense of private and 
domestic duty, which is not to be effaced in the most bar- 
barous times, must have begotten an abhorrence against 
him; and have represented the murder of the young 
and innocent princes, his nephews, with whose protec- 
tion he had been intrusted, in the most odious colours 
imaginable. To endure such a bloody usurper seemed 
to draw disgrace upon the nation, and to be attended 
with immediate danger to every individual who was dis- 
tinguished by birth, merit, or services. Such was become 
the general voice of the people ; all parties were united 
in the same sentiments; and the Lancastrians, so long 
oppressed, and of late so much discredited, felt their 
blasted hopes again revive, and anxiously expected the 
consequences of these extraordinary events. The Duke 
of Buckingham, whose family had been devoted to that 
interest, and who, by his mother, a daughter of Edmund, 
Duke of Somerset, was allied to the house of Lancaster, 
was easily induced to espouse the cause of this party, 
and to endeavour the restoring of it to its ancient supe- 
riority. Morton, Bishop of Ely, a zealous Lancastrian, 
whom the king had imprisoned, and had afterwards com- 
mitted to the custody of Buckingham, encouraged these 
sentiments ; and by his exhortations the duke cast his 
eye towards the young Earl of Richmond, as the only 
person who could free the nation from the tyranny of 
the present usurper*. 

of^Rich- 1 Henry, Earl of Richmond, was at this time detained 
mond. in a kind of honourable custody by the Duke of Britany ; 
and his descent, which seemed to give him some preten- 
sions to the crown, had been a great object of jealousy 
both in the late and in the present reign. John, the 

i Hist. Croyl. cont. p. 568. 



RICHARD III. 4(35 

first Duke of Somerset, who was grandson of John of CHAP. 
Gaunt, by a spurious branch, but legitimated by act of ^ [_, 
Parliament, had left only one daughter, Margaret ; and U83 
his younger brother, Edmund, had succeeded him in his 
titles, and in a considerable part of his fortune. Mar- 
garet had espoused Edmund, Earl of Eichmond, half- 
brother of Henry VI, and son of Sir Owen Tudor and 
Catherine of France, relict of Henry V., and she bore 
him only one son, who received the name of Henry, and 
who, after his father's death, inherited the honours and 
fortune of Eichmond. His mother, being a widow, had 
espoused in second marriage Sir Henry Stafford, uncle 
to Buckingham, and after the death of that gentleman 
had married Lord Stanley ; but had no children by 
either of these husbands ; and her son Henry was thus, 
in the event of her death, the sole heir of all her for- 
tunes. But this was not the most considerable advan- 
tage which he had reason to expect from her succession ; 
he would represent the elder branch of the house of 
Somerset ; he would inherit all the title of that family 
to the crown ; and though its claim, while any legiti- 
mate branch subsisted of the house of Lancaster, had 
always been much disregarded, the zeal of faction, after ' 
the death of Henry VI. and the murder of Prince 
Edward, immediately conferred a weight and considera- 
tion upon it. 

Edward IV., finding that all the Lancastrians had 
turned their attention towards the young Earl of Eich- 
mond as the object of their hopes, thought him also 
worthy of his attention, and pursued him into his retreat 
in Britany, whither his uncle, the Earl of Pembroke, 
had carried him after the battle of Tewkesbury, so fatal 
to his party. He applied to Francis II., Duke of Bri- 
tany, who was his ally, a weak but a good prince ; and 
urged him to deliver up this fugitive, who might be the 
source of future disturbances in England : but the duke, 
averse to so dishonourable a proposal, would only consent 
that, for the security of Edward, the young nobleman 
should be detained in custody ; and he received an annual 
pension from England for the safe keeping or the subsist- 
ence of his prisoner. But towards the end of Edward's 
reign, when the kingdom was menaced with a war both 



466 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, from France and Scotland, the anxieties of the English 
^ ^ court with regard to Henry were much increased ; and 
1483 Edward made a new proposal to the duke, which covered, 
under the fairest appearances, the most bloody and trea- 
cherous intentions. He pretended that he was desirous 
of gaining his enemy, and of uniting him to his own 
family by a marriage with his daughter Elizabeth ; and 
he solicited to have him sent over to England, in order 
to execute a scheme which would redound so much to 
his advantage. These pretences seconded, as is supposed, 
by bribes to Peter Landais, a corrupt minister, by whom 
the duke was entirely governed, gained credit with the 
court of Britany : Henry was delivered into the hands 
of the English agents : he was ready to embark : when 
a suspicion of Edward's real design was suggested to the 
duke, who recalled his orders, and thus saved the un- 
happy youth from the imminent danger which hung over 
him. 

These symptoms of continued jealousy in the reigning 
family of England, both seemed to give some authority 
to Henry's pretensions, and made him the object of 
general favour and compassion, on account of the dangers 
and persecutions to which he was exposed. The uni- 
versal detestation of Richard's conduct turned still more 
the attention of the nation towards Henry ; and as all 
the descendants of the house of York were either women 
or minors, he seemed to be the only person from whom 
the nation could expect the expulsion of the odious and 
bloody tyrant. But notwithstanding these circum- 
stances, which were so favourable to him, Buckingham 
and the Bishop of Ely well knew that there would still 
lie many obstacles in his way to the throne ; and that 
though the nation had been much divided between 
Henry VI. and the Duke of York, while present posses- 
sion and hereditary right stood in opposition to each 
other, yet as soon as these titles were united in Edward 
IV. the bulk of the people had come over to the reign- 
ing family ; and the Lancastrians had extremely decayed, 
both in numbers and in authority. It was therefore 
suggested by Morton, and readily assented to by the 
duke, that the only means of overturning the present 
usurpation was to unite the opposite factions, by con- 






RICHARD III. 467 

tracting a marriage between the Earl of Richmond and CHAP. 
the Princess Elizabeth, eldest daughter of King Edward, 
and thereby blending together the opposite pretensions 
of their families, which had so long been the source of 
public disorders and convulsions. They were sensible 
that the people were extremely desirous of repose, after 
so many bloody and destructive commotions ; that both 
Yorkists and Lancastrians, who now lay equally under 
oppression, would embrace this scheme with ardour ; and 
that the prospect of reconciling the two parties, which 
was in itself so desirable an end, would, when added to 
the general hatred against the present government, 
render their cause absolutely invincible. In consequence 
of these views, the prelate, by means of Reginald Bray, 
steward to the Countess of Richmond, first opened the 
project of such an union to that lady; and the plan 
appeared so advantageous for her son, and at the same 
time so likely to succeed, that it admitted not of the 
least hesitation. Dr. Lewis, a Welsh physician, who 
had access to the queen-dowager in her sanctuary, 
carried the proposals to her; and found that revenge 
for the murder of her brother and of her three sons, 
apprehensions for her surviving family, and indignation 
against her confinement, easily overcame all her preju- 
dices against the house of Lancaster, and procured her 
approbation of a marriage, to which the age and birth, 
as well as the present situation of the parties, seemed so 
naturally to invite them. She secretly borrowed a sum 
of money in the city, sent it over to the Earl of Rich- 
mond, required his oath to celebrate the marriage as 
soon as he should arrive in England, advised him to levy 
as many foreign forces as possible, and promised to join 
him, on his first appearance, with all the friends and 
partisans of her family. 

The plan being thus laid upon the solid foundations 
of good sense and sound policy, it was secretly communi- 
cated to the principal persons of both parties in all the 
counties of England ; and a wonderful alacrity appeared 
in every order of men to forward its success and comple- 
tion. But it was impossible that so extensive a conspi- 
racy could be conducted in so secret a manner as en- 
tirely to escape the jealous and vigilant eye of Richard; 



468 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAR and he soon received intelligence that his enemies, 
i^P\ headed by the Duke of Buckingham, were forming some- 
U83. design against his authority. He immediately put him- 
self in a posture of defence, by levying troops in the 
north ; and he summoned the duke to appear at court, 
in such terms as seemed to promise him a renewal of 
their former amity. But that nobleman, well acquainted 
with the barbarity and treachery of Richard, replied only 
by taking arms in Wales, and giving the signal to his 
accomplices for a general insurrection in all parts of Eng- 
October. i an( ] ]3 u t a ^ that ver y ^ me there happened to fall such 
heavy rains, so incessant and continued, as exceeded any 
known in the memory of man ; and the Severn, with the 
other rivers in that neighbourhood, swelled to a height 
which rendered them impassable, and prevented Bucking- 
ham from marching into the heart of England to join his 
associates. The Welshmen, partly moved by superstition 
at this extraordinary event, partly distressed by famine 
in their camp, fell off from him ; and Buckingham, find- 
x ing himself deserted by his followers, put on a disguise, 

and took shelter in the house of Banister, an old servant 
hamlxe ^ ^ s ^ am ^J- But being detected in his retreat, he was 
cuted. brought to the king at Salisbury; and was instantly 
executed, according to the summary method practised 
in that age u . The other conspirators, who took arms in 
four different places, at Exeter, at Salisbury, at New- 
bury, and at Maidstone, hearing of the Duke of Bucking- 
ham's misfortunes, despaired of success, and immediately 
dispersed themselves. 

The Marquis of Dorset and the Bishop of Ely made 
their escape beyond sea : many others were equally for- 
tunate : several fell into Richard's hands, of whom he 
made some examples. His executions seem not to have 
been remarkably severe ; though we are told of one gen- 
tleman, William Collingbourne, who suffered under 
colour of this rebellion, but in reality for a distich of 
quibbling verses, which he had composed against Richard 
and his ministers w . The Earl of Richmond, in concert 

u Hist. Croyl. cont. p. $68. 
w The lines were : 

The Rat, the Cat, and Lovel, that Dog, 
Rule all England under the Hog. 

Alluding to the names of Ratcliffe and Catesby ; and to Richard's arms, which 
were a boar. 



RICHARD III. 

with his friends, had set sail from St. Male's, carrying on CHAP 
board a body of five thousand men, levied in foreign XXIIL 
parts ; but his fleet being at first driven back by a storm, ^^ 
he appeared not on the coast of England till after the 
dispersion of all his friends ; and he found himself obliged 
to return to the court of Britany. 

The king, every where triumphant, and fortified by 1484. 
this unsuccessful attempt to dethrone him, ventured at 
last to summon a Parliament; a measure which his 
crimes and flagrant usurpation had induced him hitherto 
to decline. Though it was natural that the Parliament, 
in a contest of national parties, should always adhere to 
the victor, he seems to have apprehended lest his title, 
founded on no principle, and supported by no party, 
might be rejected by that assembly. But his enemies 
being now at his feet, the Parliament had no choice left 
but to recognize his authority, and acknowledge his right 
to the crown. His only son, Edward, then a youth of 
twelve years of age, was created Prince of Wales : the 
duties of tonnage and poundage were granted to the 
king for life : and Richard, in order to reconcile the na- 
tion to his government, passed some popular laws, par- 
ticularly one against the late practice of extorting money 
on pretence of benevolence. 

All the other measures of the king tended to the 
same object. Sensible, that the only circumstance which 
could give him security was to gain the confidence of 
the Yorkists, he paid court to the queen-dowager with 
such art and address, made such earnest protestations of 
his sincere goodwill and friendship, that this princess, 
tired of confinement, and despairing of any success from 
her former projects, ventured to leave her sanctuary, and 
to put herself and her daughters into the hands of the 
tyrant. But he soon carried farther his views for the 
establishment of his throne. He had married Anne, 
the second daughter of the Earl of Warwick, and widow 
of Edward, Prince of Wales, whom Richard himself had 
murdered ; but this princess having borne him but one 
son, who died about this time, he considered her as an 
invincible obstacle to the settlement of his fortune, and 
he was believed to have carried her off by poison ; a 
crime for which the public could not be supposed to 

VOL. ii. 40 



470 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, have any solid proof, but which the usual tenure of his 
1 1!' con d uc t made it reasonable to suspect. He now thought 
U84 it in his power to remove the chief perils which threat- 
ened his government. The Earl of Richmond, he knew, 
could never be formidable but from his projected marriage 
with the Princess Elizabeth, the true heir of the crown ; 
and he therefore intended, by means of a papal dispen- 
sation, to espouse, himself, this princess, and thus to 
unite in his own family their contending titles. The 
queen-dowager, eager to recover her lost authority, nei- 
ther scrupled this alliance, which was very unusual in 
England, and was regarded as incestuous, nor felt any 
horror at marrying her daughter to the murderer of her 
three sons, and of her brother : she even joined so far 
her interests with those of the usurper, that she wrote 
to all her partisans, and, among the rest, to her son, the 
Marquis of Dorset, desiring them to withdraw from the 
Earl of Richmond; an injury which the earl could never 
afterwards forgive : the court of Rome was applied to for 
a dispensation; Richard thought that he could easily 
defend himself, during the interval, till it arrived; and 
he had afterwards the agreeable prospect of a full and 
secure settlement. He flattered himself that the English 
nation, seeing all danger removed of a disputed succes- 
sion, would then acquiesce under the dominion of a 
prince who was of mature years, of great abilities, and 
of a genius qualified for government; and that they 
would forgive him all the crimes which he had commit- 
ted in paving his way to the throne. 

But the crimes of Richard were so horrid and so 
shocking to humanity, that the natural sentiments of 
men, without any political or public views, were suffi- 
cient to render his government unstable; and every 
person of probity and honour was earnest to prevent 
the sceptre from being any longer polluted by that 
bloody and faithless hand which held it. All the exiles 
flocked to the Earl of Richmond in Britany, and ex- 
horted him to hasten his attempt for a new invasion, and 
to prevent the marriage with the Princess Elizabeth, 
which must prove fatal to all his hopes. The earl, sensi- 
ble of the urgent necessity, but dreading the treachery 
of Peter Landais, who had entered into a negotiation 




RICHARD III. 471 

with Bichard for betraying him, was obliged to attend CHAP. 
only to his present safety ; and he made his escape to 
the court of France. The ministers of Charles VIII, 
who had now succeeded to the throne after the death 
of his father Lewis, gave him countenance and pro- 
tection ; and being desirous of raising disturbance to 
Bichard, they secretly encouraged the earl in the levies 
which he made for the support of his enterprise upon 
England. The Earl of Oxford, whom Bichard's sus- 
picions had thrown into confinement, having made his 
escape, here joined Henry ; and inflamed his ardour for 
the attempt, by the favourable accounts which he brought 
of the dispositions of the English nation, and their uni- 
versal hatred of Bichard's crimes and usurpation. 

The Earl of Bichmond set sail from Harfleur in Nor- 
mandy, with a small army of about two thousand men 
and after a navigation of six days he arrived at Milford- 
haven, in Wales, where he landed without opposition, yth Aug. 
He directed his course to that part of the kingdom, in 
hopes that the Welsh, who regarded him as their coun- 
tryman, and who had been already prepossessed in favour 
of his cause by means of the Duke of Buckingham, would 
join his standard, and enable him to make head against 
the established government. Bichard, who knew not in 
what quarter he might expect the invader, had taken 
post at Nottingham, in the centre of the kingdom ; 
and having given commissions to different persons in the 
several counties, whom he empowered to oppose his 
enemy, he purposed, in person, to fly on the first alarm 
to the place exposed to danger. Sir Bice ap-Thomas 
and Sir Walter Herbert were intrusted with his autho- 
rity in Wales ; but the former immediately deserted to 
Henry ; the second made but feeble opposition to him ; 
and the earl, advancing towards Shrewsbury, received 
every day some reinforcement from his partisans. Sir 
Gilbert Talbot joined him with all the vassals and re- 
tainers of the family of Shrewsbury ; Sir Thomas Bour- 
chier and Sir Walter Hungerford brought their friends 
to share his fortunes ; and the appearance of men of dis- 
tinction in his camp made already his cause wear a 
favourable aspect. & 

But the danger to which Bichard was chiefly exposed, 



472 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, proceeded not so much from the zeal of his open ene- 
mies, as from the infidelity of his pretended friends. 
Scarce any nobleman of distinction was sincerely attached 
to his cause, except the Duke of Norfolk ; and all those 
who feigned the most loyalty were only watching for an 
opportunity to betray and desert him. But the persons 
of whom he entertained the greatest suspicion were Lord 
Stanley and his brother, Sir William ; whose connexions 
with the family of Bichmond, notwithstanding their pro- 
fessions of attachment to his person, were never entirely 
forgotten or overlooked by him. When he empowered 
Lord Stanley to levy forces, he still retained his eldest 
son, Lord Strange, as a pledge for his fidelity ; and that 
nobleman was, on this account, obliged to employ great 
caution and reserve in his proceedings. He raised a 
powerful body of his friends and retainers in Cheshire 
and Lancashire, but without openly declaring himself: 
and though Henry had received secret assurances of his 
friendly intentions, the armies on both sides knew not 
what to infer from his equivocal behaviour. The two 
22d Aug. rivals at last approached each other at Bosworth, near 
Leicester ; Henry at the head of six thousand men, 
Kichard with an army of above double the number ; and 
a decisive action was every hour expected between them. 
Stanley, who commanded above seven thousand men, 
took care to post himself at Atherstone, not far from the 
hostile camps ; and he made such a disposition as enabled 
him on occasion to join either party. Bichard had too 
much sagacity not to discover his intentions from these 
movements ; but he kept the secret from his own men 
for fear of discouraging them ; he took not immediate 
revenge on Stanley's son, as some of his courtiers ad- 
vised him ; because he hoped that so valuable a pledge 
would induce the father to prolong still farther his am- 
biguous conduct ; and he hastened to decide, by arms, 
the quarrel with his competitor ; being certain, that a 
victory over the Earl of Bichmond would enable him 
to take ample revenge on all his enemies, open and 
concealed. 

The van of Bichmond's army, consisting of archers, 
was commanded by the Earl of Oxford ; Sir Gilbert 
Talbot led the right wing ; Sir John Savage the left ; 



RICHARD III. 473 

the earl himself, accompanied by his uncle, the Earl of CHAP. 
Pembroke, placed himself in the main body. Kichard XX1L 
also took post in his main body, and intrusted the com-^^~" 
mand of his van to the Duke of Norfolk : as his wings 
were never engaged, we have not learned the names of 
the several commanders. Soon after the battle began, 
Lord Stanley, whose conduct in this whole affair dis- 
covers great precaution and abilities, appeared in the 
field, and declared for the Earl of Richmond. This 
measure, which was unexpected to the men, though not 
to their leaders, had a proportional effect on both armies : 
it inspired unusual courage into Henry's soldiers: it 
threw Richard's into dismay and confusion. The in- 
trepid tyrant, sensible of his desperate situation, cast his 
eyes around the field, and descrying his rival at no great 
distance, he drove against him with fury, in hopes that 
either Henry's death, or his own, would decide the vic- 
tory between them. He killed with his own hands Sir 
William Brandon, standard-bearer to the earl: he dis- 
mounted Sir John Cheney : he was now within reach of 
Richmond himself, who declined not the combat ; when 
Sir William Stanley, breaking in with his troops, sur- 
rounded Richard, who, fighting bravely to the last mo- 
ment, was overwhelmed by numbers, and perished by a 
fate too mild and honourable for his multiplied and de- Death, 
testable enormities. His men every where sought for 
safety by flight. 

There fell in this battle about four thousand of the 
vanquished; and among these the Duke of Norfolk, 
Lord Ferrars of Chartley, Sir Richard Ratcliffe, Sir 
Robert Piercy, and Sir Robert Brakenbury. The loss 
was inconsiderable on the side of the victors. Sir Wil- 
liam Catesby, a great instrument of Richard's , crimes, 
was taken, and soon after beheaded, with some others, 
at Leicester. The body of Richard was found in the 
field covered with dead enemies, and all besmeared with 
blood: it was thrown carelessly across a horse; was 
carried to Leicester amidst the shouts of the insulting 
spectators ; and was interred in the Gray-Friars' church 
of that place. 

The historians who favour Richard (for even this tyrant ^f 1 ^ 
has met with partizans among the later writers) main- Eich. in. 

40* 



474 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, tain, that he was well qualified for government, had he 
legally obtained it ; and that he committed no crimes 
^^^ but such as were necessary to procure him possession of 
the crown : but this is a poor apology, when it is con- 
fessed, that he was ready to commit the most horrid 
crimes which appeared necessary for that purpose ; and 
it is certain, that all his courage and capacity, qualities 
in which he really seems not to have been deficient, 
would never have made compensation to the people for 
the danger of the precedent, and for the contagious 
example of vice and murder exalted upon the throne. 
This prince was of a small stature, humpbacked, and 
had a harsh disagreeable countenance ; so that his 
body was in every particular no less deformed than 
his mind. 



Thus have we pursued the history of England through 
a series of many barbarous ages, till we have at last 
reached the dawn of civility and science, and have the 
prospect both of greater certainty in our historical nar- 
rations, and of being able to present to the reader a 
spectacle more worthy of his attention. The want of 
certainty, however, and of circumstances, is not alike to 
be complained of throughout every period of this long 
narration. This island possesses many ancient historians 
of good credit, as well as many historical monuments ; 
and it is rare that the annals of so uncultivated a people 
as were the English, as well as the other European na- 
tions, after the decline of Koman learning, have been 
transmitted to posterity so complete, and with so little 
mixture of falsehood and of fable. This advantage we 
owe entirely to the clergy of the church of Rome ; who, 
founding their authority on their superior knowledge, pre- 
served the precious literature of antiqiiity from a total 
extinction x ; and under shelter of their numerous pri- 
vileges and immunities, acquired a security by means of 
the superstition, which they would in vain have claimed 
from the justice and humanity of those turbulent and 
licentious ages. Nor is the spectacle altogether unen- 
tertaining and uninstr active which the history of those 

x See note [U], at the end of the volume. 



RICHARD III. 475 

times presents to us. The view of human manners, in CHAR 
all their variety of appearances, is both profitable and, 5 
agreeable ; and if the aspect in some periods seem horrid 
and deformed, we may thence learn to cherish with the 
greater anxiety that science and civility which has so 
close a connexion with virtue and humanity, and which, 
as it is a sovereign antidote against superstition, is also 
the most effectual remedy against vice and disorders of 
every kind. 

The rise, progress, perfection, and decline of art and 
science, are curious objects of contemplation, and inti- 
mately connected with a narration of civil transactions. 
The events of no particular period can be fully accounted 
for, but by considering the degrees of advancement 
which men have reached in those particulars. 

Those who cast their eye on the general revolutions of 
society will find, that, as almost all improvements of the 
human mind had reached nearly to their state of per- 
fection about the age of Augustus, there was a sensible 
decline from that point or period ; and men thenceforth 
relapsed gradually into ignorance and barbarism. The 
unlimited extent of the Roman empire, and the conse- 
quent despotism of its monarchs, extinguished all emu- 
lation, debased the generous spirits of men, and depressed 
that noble flame by which all the refined arts must be 
cherished and enlivened. The military government which 
soon succeeded rendered even the lives and properties of 
men insecure and precarious ; and proved destructive to 
those vulgar and more necessary arts of agriculture, ma- 
nufactures, and commerce ; and, in the end, to the mili- 
tary art and genius itself by which alone the immense 
fabric of the empire could be supported. The irruption 
of the barbarous nations, which soon followed, over- 
whelmed all human knowledge, which was already far 
in its decline ; and men sunk every age deeper into igno- 
rance, stupidity, and superstition ; till the light of an- 
cient science and history had very nearly suffered a total 
extinction in all the European nations. 

But there is a point of depression, as well as of ex- 
altation, from which human affairs naturally return in a 
contrary direction, and beyond which they seldom pass 
either in their advancement or decline. The period in 



476 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, which the people of Christendom were the lowest sunk 
' in ignorance, and consequently in disorders of every kind, 
may justly be fixed at the eleventh century, about the 
age of William the Conqueror ; and from that era, the 
sun of science beginning to reascend, threw out many 
gleams of light, which preceded the full morning, when 
letters were revived in the fifteenth century. The Danes, 
and other northern people, who had so long infested all 
the coasts, and even the inland parts of Europe, by their 
depredations, having now learned the arts of tillage and 
agriculture, found a certain subsistence at home, and 
were no longer tempted to desert their industry, in order 
to seek a precarious livelihood by rapine and by the 
plunder of their neighbours. The feudal governments 
also, among the more southern nations, were reduced to 
a kind of system ; and though that strange species of 
civil polity was ill fitted to ensure either liberty or tran- 
quillity, it was preferable to the univeral licence and dis- 
order which had every where preceded it. But perhaps 
there was no event which tended farther to the improve- 
ment of the age than one which has not been much re- 
marked, the accidental finding of a copy of Justinian's 
Pandects, about the year 1130, in the town of Amalfi, 
in Italy. 

The ecclesiastics, who had leisure and some inclination 
to study, immediately adopted with zeal this excellent 
system of jurisprudence, and spread the knowledge of it 
throughout every part of Europe. Besides the intrinsic 
merit of the performance, it was recommended to them 
by its original connexion with the imperial city of Eome, 
which, being the seat of their religion, seemed to acquire 
a new lustre and authority by the diffusion of its laws 
over the western world. In less than ten years after the 
discovery of the Pandects, Yacarius, under the protection 
of Theobald, Archbishop of Canterbury, read public lec- 
tures of civil law in the university of Oxford ; and the 
clergy, every where, by their example, as well as exhor- 
tation, were the means of diffusing the highest esteem for 
this new science. That order of men, having large posses- 
sions to defend, was in a manner necessitated to turn 
their studies towards the law ; and their properties being 
often endangered by the violence of the princes and 



RICHARD III. 477 

barons, it became their interest to enforce the observance CHAP. 
of general and equitable rules, from which alone they XXIIL 
could receive protection. As they possessed all the 
knowledge of the age, and were alone acquainted with 
the habits of thinking, the practice as well as science of 
the law fell mostly into their hands; and though the 
close connexion which, without any necessity, they 
formed between the canon and civil law, begat a jeal- 
ousy in the laity of England, and prevented the Koman 
jurisprudence from becoming the municipal law of the 
country, as was the case in many states of Europe, a 
great part of it was secretly transferred into the practice 
of the courts of justice, and the imitation of their neigh- 
bours made the English gradually endeavour to raise 
their own law from its original state of rudeness and im- 
perfection. 

It is easy to see what advantages Europe must have 
reaped by its inheriting at once from the ancients so 
complete an art, which was also so necessary for giving 
security to all other arts, and which, by refining, and still 
more by bestowing solidity on the judgment, served as 
a model to farther improvements. The sensible utility 
of the Roman law, both to public and private interest, 
recommended the study of it, at a time when the more 
exalted and speculative sciences carried no charms with 
them; and thus the last branch of ancient literature 
which remained uncorrupted, was happily the first trans- 
mitted to the modern world ; for it is remarkable, that 
in the decline of Roman learning, when the philosophers 
were universally infected with superstition and sophistry, 
and the poets and historians with barbarism, the lawyers, 
who, in other countries, are seldom models of science or 
politeness, were yet able, by the constant study and close 
imitation of their predecessors, to maintain the same 
good sense in their decisions and reasonings, and the 
same purity in their language and expression. 

What bestowed an additional merit on the civil law, 
was the extreme imperfection of that jurisprudence 
which preceded it among all the European nations, 
especially among the Saxons or ancient English. The 
absurdities which prevailed at that time in the adminis- 
tration of justice may be conceived from the authentic 



478 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, monuments which remain of the ancient Saxon laws; 
xxiii. waere a pecuniary commutation was received for every 
crime, where stated prices were fixed for men's lives 
and members, where private revenges were authorized 
for all injuries, where the use of the ordeal, corsnet, and 
afterwards of the duel, was the received method of proof, 
and where the judges were rustic freeholders, assembled 
of a sudden, and deciding a cause from one debate or 
altercation of the parties. Such a state of society was 
very little advanced beyond the rude state of nature : 
violence universally prevailed, instead of general and 
equitable maxims : the pretended liberty of the times 
was only an incapacity of submitting to government : 
and men, not protected by law in their lives and proper- 
ties, sought shelter by their personal servitude and at- 
tachments under some powerful chieftain, or by volun- 
tary combinations. 

The gradual progress of improvement raised the Euro- 
peans somewhat above this uncultivated state ; and 
affairs, in this island particularly, took early a turn which 
was more favourable to justice and to liberty. Civil 
employments and occupations soon became honourable 
among the English : the situation of that people ren- 
dered not the perpetual attention to wars so necessary as 
among their neighbours, and all regard was not confined 
to the military profession: the gentry, and even the 
nobility, began to deem an acquaintance with the law a 
necessary part of education : they were less diverted 
than afterwards from studies of this kind by other sci- 
ences ; and in the age of Henry VI., as we are told by 
Fortescue, there were in the inns of court about two 
thousand students, most of them men of honourable 
birth, who gave application to this branch of civil know- 
ledge : a circumstance which proves that a considerable 
progress was already made in the science of government, 
and which prognosticated a still greater. 

One chief advantage which resulted from the intro- 
duction and progress of the arts, was the introduction 
and progress of freedom ; and this consequence affected 
men both in their personal and civil capacities. 

If we consider the ancient state of Europe, we fdiall 
find that the far greater part of society were every where 



RICHARD III. 479 

bereaved of their personal liberty, and lived entirely at CHAP. 
the will of their masters. Every one that was not noble ' 
was a slave : the peasants were sold along with the land 5^ 
the few inhabitants of cities were not in a better condi- 
tion : even the gentry themselves were subjected to a 
long train of subordination under the greater barons or 
chief vassals of the crown ; who, though seemingly placed 
in a high state of splendour, yet, having but a slender 
protection from law, were exposed to every tempest of 
the state, and, by the precarious condition in which they 
lived, paid dearly for the power of oppressing and tyran- 
nizing over their inferiors. The first incident which 
broke in upon this violent system of government, was 
the practice, begun in Italy, and imitated in France, of 
erecting communities and corporations, endowed with 
privileges and a separate municipal government, which 
gave them protection against the tyranny of the barons, 
and which the prince himself deemed it prudent to 
respect 7 . The relaxation of the feudal tenures, and an 
execution somewhat stricter of the public law, bestowed 
an independence on vassals which was unknown to their 
forefathers. And even the peasants themselves, though 
later than other orders of the state, made their escape 
from those bonds of villanage or slavery in which they 
had formerly been retained. 

It may appear strange, that the progress of the arts, 
which seems, among the Greeks and Komans, to have 
daily increased the number of slaves, should in later 
times have proved so general a source of liberty; but 
this difference in the events proceeded from a great dif- 
ference in the circumstances which attended those insti- 
tutions. The ancient barons, obliged to maintain them- 
selves continually in a military posture, and little emu- 
lous of elegance or splendour, employed not their villains 
as domestic servants, much less as manufacturers ; but 

y There appeared early symptoms of the jealousy entertained by the barons against 
the progress of the arts as destructive of their licentious power. A law was enacted, 
7 Henry IV. chap. 17, prohibiting any one who did not possess twenty shillings a 
year in land, from binding his sons apprentices to any trade. They found already 
that the cities began to drain the country of the labourers and husbandmen ; and 
did not foresee how much the increase of commerce would increase the value 
of their estates. See farther, Cotton, p. 179. The kings, to encourage the bo- 
roughs, granted them this privilege, that any villain who had lived a twelvemonth 
in any corporation, and had been of the guild, should be thenceforth regarded as 
free. 



480 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, composed their retinue of freemen, whose military spirit 
rendered the chieftain formidable to his neighbours,, and 
were ready to attend him in every warlike enter- 
prise. The villains were entirely occupied in the culti- 
vation of their master's land, and paid their rents, either 
in corn and cattle, and other produce of the farm, or in 
servile offices, which they performed about the baron's 
family, and upon the farms which he retained in his own 
possession. In proportion as agriculture improved, and 
money increased, it was found that these services, though 
extremely burdensome to the villain, were of little ad- 
vantage to the master ; and that the produce of a large 
estate could be much more conveniently disposed of by 
the peasants themselves who raised it, than by the land- 
lord or his bailiff, who were formerly accustomed to 
receive it. A commutation was therefore made of rents 
for services, and of money-rents for those in kind ; and 
as men in a subsequent age discovered that farms were 
better cultivated where the farmer enjoyed a security in 
his possession, the practice of granting leases to the 
peasant began to prevail, which entirely broke the bonds 
of servitude, already much relaxed from the former 
practices. After this manner villanage went gradually 
into disuse throughout the more civilized parts of Europe : 
the interest of the master, as well as that of the slave, 
concurred in this alteration. The latest laws which we 
find in England, for enforcing or regulating this species 
of servitude, were enacted in the reign of Henry VII. ; 
and, though the ancient statutes on this subject remain 
still unrepealed by Parliament, it appears that, before 
the end of Elizabeth, the distinction of villain and free- 
man w T as totally, though insensibly, abolished, and that 
no person remained in the state to whom the former 
laws could be applied. 

Thus personal freedom became almost general in 
Europe ; an advantage which paved the way for the 
increase of political or civil liberty, and which, even where 
it was not attended with this salutary effect, served to 
give the members of the community some of the most 
considerable advantages of it. 

The constitution of the English government, ever 
since the invasion of this island by the Saxons, may 



RICHARD III. 481 

boast of this pre-eminence, that in no age the will of the CHAP. 
monarch was ever entirely absolute and uncontrolled : ^ 
but in other respects the balance of power has extremely 
shifted among the several orders of the state ; and this 
fabric has experienced the same mutability that has at- 
tended all human institutions. 

The ancient Saxons, like the other German nations, 
where each individual was inured to arms, and where 
the independence of men was secured by a great equality 
of possessions, seem to have admitted a considerable 
mixture of democracy into their form of government, 
and to have been one of the freest nations of which 
there remains any account in the records of history. 
After this tribe was settled in England, especially after 
the dissolution of the Heptarchy, the great extent of 
the kingdom produced a great inequality in property ; 
and the balance seems to have inclined to the side of 
aristocracy. The Norman conquest threw more autho- 
rity into the hands of the sovereign, which, however, 
admitted of great control ; though derived less from the 
general forms of the constitution, which were inaccurate 
and irregular, than from the independent power enjoyed 
by each baron in his particular district or province. The 
establishment of the great charter exalted still higher 
the aristocracy, imposed regular limits on royal power, 
and gradually introduced some mixture of democracy 
into the constitution. But even during this period, from 
the accession of Edward I. to the death of Kichard III., 
the condition of the Commons was nowise eligible ; a 
kind of Polish aristocracy prevailed; and though the 
kings were limited, the people were as yet far from being 
free. It required the authority almost absolute of the 
sovereigns, which took place in the subsequent period, to 
pull down those disorderly and licentious tyrants, who 
were equally averse from peace and from freedom, and 
to establish that regular execution of the laws which, in 
a following age, enabled the people to erect a regular 
and equitable plan of liberty. 

In each of these successive alterations, the only rule 
of government which is intelligible, or carries any au- 
thority with it, is the established practice of the age, 
and the maxims of administration, which are at that 

VOL. n. 41 



482 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, time prevalent and universally assented to. Those who, 
[IL from a pretended respect to antiquity, appeal at every 
turn to an original plan of the constitution, only cover 
their turbulent spirit and their private ambition under 
the appearance of venerable forms ; and whatever period 
they pitch on for their model, they may still be carried 
back to a more ancient period, where they will find the 
measures of power entirely different, and where every 
circumstance, by reason of the greater barbarity of the 
times, will appear still less worthy of imitation. Above 
all, a civilized nation, like the English, who have happily 
established the most perfect and most accurate system 
of liberty that ever was found compatible with govern- 
ment, ought to be cautious in appealing to the practice 
of their ancestors, or regarding the maxims of unculti- 
vated ages, as certain rules for their present conduct. 
An acquaintance with the ancient periods of their 
government is chiefly useful, by instructing them to cher- 
ish their present constitution, from a comparison or con- 
trast with the condition of those distant times. And it is 
also curious, by showing them the remote, and commonly 
faint and disfigured originals of the most finished and 
most noble institutions, and by instructing them in the 
great mixture of accident, which commonly concurs with 
a small ingredient of wisdom and foresight in erecting 
the complicated fabric of the most perfect government. 



HENRY VII. 483 

CHAPTER XXIY. 

HENRY VII. 

ACCESSION OF HENRY VII. His TITLE TO THE CROWN. KING'S PREJUDICE 

AGAINST THE HOUSE OP YORK. HlS JOYFUL RECEPTION IN LONDON. HlS 

CORONATION. SWEATING SICKNESS. A PARLIAMENT. ENTAIL OF THE 
CROWN. KING'S MARRIAGE. AN INSURRECTION. DISCONTENTS OF THE 
PEOPLE. LAMBERT SIMNEL. REVOLT OF IRELAND. INTRIGUES OF THE 
DUCHESS OF BURGUNDY. LAMBERT SIMNEL INVADES ENGLAND. BATTLE 
OF STOKE. 

THE victory which the Earl of Richmond gained at 
Bosworth was entirely decisive ; being attended as well 
with the total rout and dispersion of the royal army, as 
with the death of the king himself. Joy for this great Au s- 22 - 
success suddenly prompted the soldiers, in the field of 
battle, to bestow on their victorious general the appel- 
lation of king, which he had not hitherto assumed ; and 
the acclamations of Long live Henry the Seventh! by a Accession 
natural and unpremeditated movement, resounded from 
all quarters. To bestow some appearance of formality 
on this species of military election, Sir William Stanley 
brought a crown of ornament which Richard wore in 
battle, and which had been found among the spoils ; and 
he put it on the head of the victor. Henry himself re- 
mained not in suspense ; but immediately without hesi- 
tation accepted of the magnificent present which was 
tendered him. He was come to the crisis of his for- 
tune : and being obliged suddenly to determine himself, 
amidst great difficulties, which he must have frequently 
revolved in his mind, he chose that part which his am- 
bition suggested to him, and to which he seemed to be 
invited by his present success. 

There were many titles on which Henry could fou^ 
his right to the crown ; but no one of them free from 
great objections, if considered with respect either to 
justice or to policy. 

During some years, Henry had been regarded as heir 
to the house of Lancaster by the party attached to that 
family ; but the title of the house of Lancaster itself was 



484 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, generally thought to be very ill founded. Henry IV., 
vj^^who had first raised it to royal dignity, had never clearly 
1485 defined the foundation of his claim ; and while he plainly 
invaded the order of succession, he had not acknow- 
ledged the election of the people. The Parliament, it 
is true, had often recognized the title of the Lancastrian 
princes ; but these votes had little authority, being con- 
sidered as instances of complaisance towards a family 
in possession of present power : and they had accord- 
ingly been often reversed during the late prevalence of 
the house of York. Prudent men also, who had been 
willing, for the sake of peace, to submit to any esta- 
blished authority, desired not to see the claims of that 
family revived ; claims which must produce many con- 
vulsions at present, and which disjointed for the future 
the whole system of hereditary right. Besides, allow- 
ing the title of the house of Lancaster to be legal, 
Henry himself was not the true heir of that family ; and 
nothing but the obstinacy natural to faction, which 
never without reluctance will submit to an antagonist, 
could have engaged the Lancastrians to adopt the Earl 
of Eichmond as their head. His mother, indeed, Mar- 
garet, Countess of Richmond, was sole daughter and 
heir of the Duke of Somerset, sprung from John of 
Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster : but the descent of the So- 
merset line was itself illegitimate, and even adulterous. 
And though the Duke of Lancaster had obtained the 
legitimation of his natural children by a patent from 
Richard II., confirmed in Parliament, it might justly 
be doubted whether this deed could bestow any title to 
the crown ; since, in the patent itself, all the privileges 
conferred by it are fully enumerated, and the succession 
to the kingdom is expressly excluded*. In all settle- 
ments of the crown made during the reigns of the Lan- 
castrian princes, the line of Somerset had been entirely 
overlooked ; and it was not till the failure of the legiti- 
mate branch, that men had paid any attention to their 
claim. And, to add to the general dissatisfaction against 
Henry's title, his mother, from whom he derived all his 
right, was still alive ; and evidently preceded him in the 
order of succession. 

a Rymer, torn. vii. p. 849. Coke's lust. 4. Inst. part. i. p. 37. 



HENRY VII. 485 

The title of the house of York, both from the plain CHAP. 
reason of the case, and from the late popular govern- XXIV - 
ment of Edward IV., had universally obtained the pre- 
ference in the sentiments of the people ; and Henry 
might ingraft his claim on the rights of that family, by 
his intended marriage with the Princess Elizabeth, the 
heir of it ; a marriage which he had solemnly promised 
to celebrate, and to the expectation of which he had 
chiefly owed all his past successes. But many reasons 
dissuaded Henry from adopting this expedient. Were 
he to receive the crown only in the right of his consort, 
his power, he knew, would be very limited; and he 
must expect rather to enjoy the bare title of king by a 
sort of courtesy, than possess the real authority which 
belongs to it. Should the princess die before him, with- , 
out issue, he must descend from the throne, and give 
place to the next in succession. And even if his bed 
should be blest with offspring, it seemed dangerous to 
expect that filial piety in his children would prevail over 
the ambition of obtaining present possession of regal 
power. An act of Parliament, indeed, might easily be 
procured to settle the crown on him during life ; but 
Henry knew how much superior the claim of succession 
by blood was to the authority of an assembly b , which 
had always been overborne by violence in the shock of 
contending titles, and which had ever been more go- 
verned by the conjunctures of the times, than by any con- 
sideration derived from reason or public interest. 

There was yet a third foundation on which Henry 
might rest his claim, the right of conquest, by his vic- 
tory over Richard, the present possessor of the crown. 
But besides that Richard himself was deemed no better 
than an usurper, the army which fought against him 
consisted chiefly of Englishmen; and a right of con- 
quest over England could never be established by such 
a victory. Nothing also would give greater umbrage 
to the nation than a claim of this nature ; which might 
be construed as an abolition of all their rights and pri- 
vileges, and the establishment of absolute authority in 
the sovereign . William himself, the Norman, though 
at the head of a powerful and victorious army of fo- 

b Bacon in Rennet's Complete History, p. 379. c Bacon, p. 579. 

41* 



486 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, reigners, had at first declined the invidious title of con- 
XXIV> queror ; and it was not till the full establishment of his 

^^^ authority, that he had ventured to advance so violent 
and destructive a pretension. 

But Henry was sensible that there remained another 
foundation of power somewhat resembling the right of 
conquest, namely, present possession ; and that this title, 
guarded by vigour and abilities, would be sufficient to 
secure perpetual possession of the throne. He had be- 
fore him the example of Henry IV., who, supported by 
no better pretension, had subdued many insurrections, 
and had been able to transmit the crown peaceably to 
his posterity. He could perceive that this claim, which 
had been perpetuated through three generations of the 
family of Lancaster, might still have subsisted, notwith- 
standing the preferable title of the house of York, had 
not the sceptre devolved into the hands of Henry VI., 
which were too feeble to sustain it. Instructed by this 
recent experience, Henry was determined to put him- 
self in possession of regal authority; and to show all 
opponents that nothing but force of arms, and a suc- 
cessful war, should be able to expel him. His claim 
as heir to the house of Lancaster he was resolved to 
advance ; and never allowed to be discussed : and he 
hoped that his right, favoured by the partisans of that 
family, and seconded by present power, would secure 
him a perpetual and an independent authority. 

King's These views of Henry are not exposed to much blame ; 

agSniuL because founded on good policy, and even on a species 

iKmseof of necessity: but there entered into all his measures 
and counsels another motive, which admits not of the 
same apology. The violent contentions which, during 
so long a period, had been maintained between the rival 
families, and the many sanguinary revenges which they 
had alternately taken on each other, had inflamed the 
opposite factions to a high pitch of animosity. Henry 
himself, who had seen most of his near friends and re- 
lations perish in battle, or by the executioner, and who 
had been exposed, in his own person, to many hardships 
and dangers, had imbibed a violent antipathy to the 
York party, which no time or experience were ever able 
to efface. Instead of embracing the present happy op- 



HENRY VII. 487 

portunity of abolishing these fatal distinctions, of uniting CHAP. 
his title with that of his consort, and of bestowing favour ,^ XI ^ V 
indiscriminately on the friends of both families ; he car- \^J~ 
ried to the throne all the partialities which belong to 
the head of a faction, and even the passions, which are 
carefully guarded against by every true politician in that 
situation. To exalt the Lancastrian party, to depress the 
adherents of the house of York, were still the favourite 
objects of his pursuit ; and, through the whole course of 
his reign, he never forgot these early prepossessions. 
Incapable, from his natural temper, of a more enlarged 
and more benevolent system of policy, he exposed him- 
self to many present inconveniences, by too anxiously 
guarding against that future possible event, which might 
disjoin his title from that of the princess whom he es- 
poused. And, while he treated the Yorkists as enemies, 
he soon rendered them such, and taught them to discuss 
that right to the crown which he so carefully kept se- 
parate, and to perceive its weakness and invalidity. 

To these passions of Henry, as well as to his suspi- 
cious politics, we are to ascribe the measures which he 
embraced two days after the battle of Bosworth. Ed- 
ward Plantagenet, Earl of Warwick, son of the Duke 
of Clarence, was detained in a kind of confinement at 
Sheriff-Hutton, in Yorkshire, by the jealousy of his 
uncle Eichard ; whose title to the throne was inferior 
to that of the young prince. Warwick had now reason 
to expect better treatment, as he was no obstacle to the 
succession either of Henry or Elizabeth ; and from a youth 
of such tender years no danger could reasonably be ap- 
prehended. But Sir Robert Willoughby was despatched 
by Henry, with orders to take him from Sheriff-Hutton, 
to convey him to the Tower, and to detain him in close 
custody d . The same messenger carried directions that 
the Princess Elizabeth, who had been confined to the 
same place, should be conducted to London, in order to 
meet Henry, and there celebrate her nuptials. 

Henry himself set out for the capital, and advanced by 
slow journeys. Not to rouse the jealousy of the people, 
he took care to avoid all appearance of military triumph ; 
and so to restrain the insolence of victory, that every 

d Bacon, p. 579. Polydore Vergil, p. 565. 



488 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, thing about him bore the appearance of an established 
,^ XIV ^, monarch making a peaceable progress through his do- 
^""^~ minions, rather than of a prince who had opened his 
His joyful way to the throne by force of arms. The acclamations 
. of tne people were every where loud, and no less sincere 
and hearty. Besides that a young and victorious prince, 
on his accession, was naturally the object of popularity, 
the nation promised themselves great felicity from the 
new scene which opened before them. During the 
course of near a whole century, the kingdom had been 
laid waste by domestic wars and convulsions ; and, if 
at any time the noise of arms had ceased, the sound of 
faction and discontent still threatened new disorders. 
Henry, by his marriage with Elizabeth, seemed to ensure 
an union of the contending titles of the two families ; 
and having prevailed over a hated tyrant, who had anew 
disjointed the succession, even of the house of York, 
and had filled his own family with blood and murder, 
he was every where attended with the unfeigned favour 
of the people. Numerous and splendid troops of gentry 
and nobility accompanied his progress. The mayor and 
companies of London received him as he approached the 
city : the crowds of people and citizens were zealous in 
their expressions of satisfaction. But Henry, amidst this 
general effusion of joy, discovered still the stateliness 
and reserve of his temper, which made him scorn to 
court popularity ; he entered London in a close chariot, 
and would not gratify the people with a sight of their 
new sovereign. 

But the king did not so much neglect the favour of 
the people, as to delay giving them assurances of his 
marriage with the Princess Elizabeth, which he knew to 
be so passionately desired by the nation. On his leaving 
Britany, he had artfully dropped some hints, that if he 
should succeed in his enterprise, and obtain the crown of 
England, he would espouse Anne, the heir of that duchy ; 
and the report of this engagement had already reached 
England, and had begotten anxiety in the people, and 
even in Elizabeth herself. Henry took care to dissipate 
these apprehensions, by solemnly renewing, before the 
council and principal nobility, the promise which he had 
already given to celebrate his nuptials with the English 



HENRY VII. 489 

princess. But, though bound, by honour, as well as by CHAP. 
interest, to complete this alliance, he was resolved to,^ 1 ^, 
postpone it till the ceremony of his own coronation 1485 
should be finished, and till his title should be recognized His coro- 
by Parliament. Still anxious to support his personal 110 
and hereditary right to the thrpne, he dreaded lest a pre- 
ceding marriage with the princess should imply a parti- 
cipation of sovereignty in her, and raise doubts of his 
own title by the house of Lancaster. 

There raged, at that time, in London, and other parts Sweating 
of the kingdom, a species of malady, unknown to any 811 
other age or nation, the sweating sickness, which occa- 
sioned the sudden death of great multitudes, though it 
seemed not to be propagated by any contagious infec- 
tion, but arose from the general disposition of the air 
and of the human body. In less than twenty-four hours 
the patient commonly died or recovered ; but when the 
pestilence had exerted its fury for a few weeks, it was 
observed, either from alterations in the air, or from a 
more proper regimen which had been discovered, to be 
considerably abated 6 . Preparations were then made for 
the ceremony of Henry's coronation. In order to heighten 
the splendour of that spectacle, he bestowed the rank of 
knight banneret on twelve persons ; and he conferred 
peerages on three. Jasper, Earl of Pembroke, his uncle, 
was created Duke of Bedford; Thomas, Lord Stanley, 
his father-in-law, Earl of Derby ; and Edward Courteney, 
Earl of Devonshire. At the coronation, likewise, there 30th Oct - 
appeared a new institution, which the king had esta- 
blished for security as well as pomp, a band of fifty 
archers, who were termed yeomen of the guard. But 
lest the people should take umbrage at this unusual 
symptom of jealousy in the prince, as if it implied a 
personal diffidence of his subjects, he declared the insti- 
tution to be perpetual. The ceremony of coronation was 
performed by Cardinal Bourchier, Archbishop of Canter- 
bury. 

The Parliament being assembled at Westminster, the 
majority immediately appeared to be devoted partizans mem. 
of Henry ; all persons of another disposition either de- 
clining to stand in those dangerous times, or being 

c Polydore Vergil, p. 567. 



490 HISTOKY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, obliged to dissemble their principles and inclinations. 
^ [_, The Lancastrian party had every where been successful 
1485 in the elections; and even many had been returned, 
who, during the prevalence of the house of York, had 
been exposed to the rigour of the law, and had been 
condemned by the sentence of attainder and outlawry. 
The right to take seats in the House being questioned, 
the case was referred to all the judges, who assembled in 
the exchequer chamber, in order to deliberate on so 
delicate a subject. The opinion delivered was prudent, 
and contained a just temperament between law and ex- 
pediency^ The judges determined, that the members 
attainted should forbear taking their seats till an act 
were passed for the reversal of their attainder. There 
was no difficulty in obtaining this act ; and in it were 
comprehended a hundred and seven persons of the king's 
party 8 . 

But a scruple was started of a. nature still more im- 
portant. The king himself had been attainted ; and his 
right of succession to the crown might thence be ex- 
posed to some doubt. The judges extricated themselves 
from this dangerous question, by asserting it as a maxim, 
"That the crown takes away all defects and stops in 
blood ; and that from the time the king assumed royal 
authority, the fountain was cleared, and all attainders 
and corruption of blood discharged h ." Besides that the 
case, from its urgent necessity, admitted of no delibera- 
tion ; the judges probably thought, that no sentence of 
a court of judicature had authority sufficient to bar the 
right of succession ; that the heir of the crown was com- 
monly exposed to such jealousy, as might often occasion 
stretches of law and justice against him ; and that a 
prince might even be engaged in unjustifiable measures 
during his predecessor's reign, without meriting on that 
account to be excluded from the throne, which was his 
birthright. 

With a Parliament so obsequious, the king could not 
fail of obtaining whatever act of settlement he was 
pleased to require. He seems only to have entertained 
some doubt within himself on what claim he should 

f Bacon, p. 581. s Rot. Parl. 1 Hen. VII. n. 2, 3, 415. 17. 26. 65. 

k Bacon, p. 581. 



HENRY VII. 491 

found his pretensions. In his speech to the Parliament, CHAP. 
he mentioned his just title by hereditary right; but lest J^^, 
that title should not be esteemed sufficient, he subjoined 1485 
his claim by the judgment of God, who had given him 
victory over his enemies. And again, lest this preten- 
sion should be interpreted as assuming a right of con- 
quest, he ensured to his subjects the full enjoyment of 
their former properties and possessions. 

The entail of the crown was drawn according to the Entail of 
sense of the king, and probably in words dictated by 
him. He made no mention in it of the Princess Eliza- 
beth, nor of any branch of her family ; but in other re- 
spects the act was compiled with sufficient reserve and 
moderation. He did not insist that it should contain a 
declaration or recognition of his preceding right ; as on 
the other hand he avoided the appearance of a new law 
or ordinance. He chose a middle course, which, as 
is generally unavoidable in such cases, was not entirely 
free from uncertainty and obscurity. It was voted, 
" that the inheritance of the crown should rest, remain, 
and abide in the king 1 ;" but whether as rightful heir, 
or only as present possessor, was not determined. In 
like manner, Henry was contented that the succession 
should be secured to the heirs of his body ; but he pre- 
tended not, in case of their failure, to exclude the house 
of York, or to give the preference to that of Lancaster. 
He left that great point ambiguous for the present, and 
trusted that if it should ever become requisite to deter- 
mine it, future incidents would open the way for the 
decision. 

But even after all these precautions, the king was so 
little satisfied with his own title, that in the following 
year he applied to papal authority for a confirmation of 
it ; and as the court of Rome gladly laid hold of all op- 
portunities which the imprudence, weakness, or neces- 
sities of princes afforded it to extend its influence, 
Innocent VIII., the reigning pope, readily granted a 
bull in whatever terms the king was pleased to desire. 
All Henry's titles, by succession, marriage, parliamentary 
choice, even conquest, are there enumerated ; and to the 
whole the sanction of religion is added ; excommunicar 

i Bacon, p. 581. 



492 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, tion is denounced against every one who should either 
disturb him in the present possession, or the heirs of his 
k 0( ty i* 1 the future succession of the crown; and from 
this penalty no criminal, except in the article of death, 
could be absolved but by the pope himself, or his special 
commissioners. It is difficult to imagine that the se- 
curity derived from this bull could be a compensation 
for the defect which it betrayed in Henry's title, and 
for the danger of thus inviting the pope to interpose in 
these concerns. 

It was natural, and even laudable, in Henry to reverse 
the attainders which had passed against the partisans 
of the house of Lancaster ; but the revenges which he 
exercised against the adherents of the York family, to 
which he was so soon to be allied, cannot be considered 
in the same light. Yet the Parliament, at his insti- 
gation, passed an act of attainder against the late king 
himself, against the Duke of Norfolk, the Earl of 
Surrey, Viscount Lovel, the Lords Zouche and Ferrars 
of Chartley, Sir Walter and Sir James Harrington, Sir 
William Berkeley, Sir Humphrey Stafford, Catesby, 
and about twenty other gentlemen, who had fought on 
Kichard's side in the battle of Bosworth. How men 
could be guilty of treason by supporting the king in 
possession against the Earl of Eichmond, who assumed 
not the title of king, it is not easy to conceive ; and no- 
thing but a servile complaisance in the Parliament could 
have engaged them to make this stretch of justice. Nor 
was it a small mortification to the people in general, to 
find that the king, prompted either by avarice or resent- 
ment, could, in the very beginning of his reign, so far 
violate the cordial union which had previously been 
concerted between the parties, and to the expectation 
of which he had plainly owed his succession to the 
throne. 

The king having gained so many points of conse- 
quence from the Parliament, thought it not expedient 
to demand any supply from them, which the profound 
peace enjoyed by the nation, and the late forfeiture of 
Kichard's adherents, seemed to render somewhat super- 
lothDec. fluous. The Parliament, however, conferred on him 
during life the duty of tonnage and poundage, which 



HENRY VII. 493 

had been enjoyed in the same manner by some of his CHAP. 
immediate predecessors; and they added, before they^ [_, 
broke up, other money bills of no great moment. The \^~~" 
king, on his part, made returns of grace and favour to 
his people. He published t^is royal proclamation, offer- 
ing pardon to all such as haa taken arms, or formed any 
attempts against him, provided they submitted them- 
selves to mercy by a certain day, and took the usual oath 
of fealty and allegiance. Upon this proclamation many 
came out of their sanctuaries ; and the minds of men were 
every where much quieted. Henry chose to take wholly 
to himself the merit of an act of grace, so agreeable to 
the nation, rather than communicate it with the Par- 
liament, (as was his first intention,) by passing a bill to 
that purpose. The Earl of Surrey, however, though he 
had submitted, and delivered himself into the king's 
hands, was sent prisoner to the Tower. 

During this Parliament, the king also bestowed fa- 
vours and honours on some particular persons who were 
attached to him. Edward Stafford, eldest son of the 
Duke of Buckingham, attainted in the late reign, was 
restored to the honours of his family as well as to its 
fortune, which was very ample. This generosity, so 
unusual in Henry, was the effect of his gratitude to the 
memory of Buckingham, who had first concerted the 
plan of his elevation, and w r ho, by his own ruin, had 
made way for that great event. Chandos of Britany 
was created Earl of Bath; Sir Giles Daubeny, Lord 
Daubeny; and Sir Kobert Willoughby, Lord Broke. 
These were all the titles of nobility conferred by the 
king during this session of Parliament k . 

But the ministers whom Henry most trusted and 
favoured were not chosen from among the nobility, or 
even from among the laity. John Morton and Eichard 
Fox, two clergymen, persons of industry, vigilance, and 
capacity, were the men to whom he chiefly confided his 
affairs and secret counsels. They had shared with him 
all his former dangers and distresses ; and he now took 
care to make them participate in his good fortune. 
They were both called to the privy council ; Morton was 
restored to the bishopric of Ely, Fox was created bishop 

k Polyd. Vergil, p. 566. 

VOL. ii. 42 



494 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of Exeter. The former, soon after, upon the death of 
was raised to the see of Canterbury. The 
latter was made privy seal; and successively Bishop of 
Bath and Wells, Durham, and Winchester : for Henry, 
as Lord Bacon observes, loved to employ and advance 
prelates, because, having rich bishoprics to bestow, it 
was easy for him to reward their services : and it was 
his maxim to raise them by slow steps, and make them 
first pass through the inferior sees 1 . He probably ex- 
pected, that as they were naturally more dependent on 
him than the nobility, who during that age enjoyed pos- 
sessions and jurisdictions dangerous to royal authority ; 
so the prospect of farther elevation would render them, 
still more active in his service, and more obsequious to 
his commands. 
i486. i n presenting the bill of tonnage and poundage, the 

18th Jan. -,-> ,. * & . r , ,. G ? 

Parliament, anxious to preserve the legal undisputed 
succession to the crown, had petitioned Henry, with de- 
monstrations of the greatest zeal, to espouse the Prin- 
cess Elizabeth ; but they covered their true reason under 
the dutiful pretence of their desire to have heirs of his 
mama e body. He now thought in earnest of satisfying the 
minds of his people in that particular. His marriage 
was celebrated at London, and that with greater ap- 
pearance of universal joy than either his first entry or 
his coronation. Henry remarked with much displea- 
sure, this general favour borne to the house of York. 
The suspicions which arose from it not only disturbed 
his tranquillity during his whole reign, but bred disgust 
towards his consort herself, and poisoned all his domestic 
enjoyments. Though virtuous, amiable, and obsequious, 
to the last degree, she never met with a proper return 
of affection, or even of complaisance, from her husband ; 
and the malignant ideas of faction still, in his sullen 
mind, prevailed over all the sentiments of conjugal 
tenderness. 

The king had been carried along with such a tide of 
success ever since his arrival in England, that he thought 
nothing could withstand the fortune and authority which 
attended him. He now resolved to make a progress 
into the north, where the friends of the house of York, 

1 Bacon, p. 582. 



HENRY VII. 495 

and even the partisans of Richard, were numerous, in CHAP. 
hopes of curing, by his presence and conversation, the XXIV - 
prejudices of the malecontents. When he arrived at v ~^^' 
Nottingham, he heard that Viscount Lovel, with Sir Hum- 
phrey Stafford, and Thomas his brother, had secretly 
withdrawn themselves from their sanctuary at Colchester : 
but this news appeared not to him of such importance as 
to stop his journey, and he proceeded forward to York. 
He there heard, that the Staffbrds had levied an army, An insur- 
and were marching to besiege the city of Worcester ; rection - 
and that Lovel, at the head of three or four thousand 
men, was approaching to attack him in York. Henry 
was not dismayed with this intelligence. His active 
courage, full of resources, immediately prompted him to 
find the proper remedy. Though surrounded with ene- 
mies in these- disaffected counties, he assembled a small 
body of troops in whom he could confide ; and he put 
them under the command of the Duke of Bedford. He 
joined to them all his own attendants ; but he found that 
this hasty armament was more formidable by their spirit 
and their zealous attachment to him, than by the arms 
or military stores with which they were provided. He 
therefore gave Bedford orders not to approach the en- 
emy ; but previously to try every possible expedient to 
disperse them. Bedford published a general promise of 
pardon to the rebels, which had a greater effect on their 
leader than on his followers. Lovel, who had under- 
taken an enterprise that exceeded his courage and capa- 
city, was so terrified with tha fear of desertion among his 
troops, that he suddenly withdrew himself, and after 
lurking some time in Lancashire, he made his escape 
into Flanders, where he was protected by the Duchess of 
Burgundy. His army submitted to the king's clemency ; 
and the other rebels, hearing of this success, raised the 
siege of Worcester and dispersed themselves. The 
Staffbrds took sanctuary in the church of Colnham, a 
village near Abingdon; but as it was found that this 
church had not the privilege of giving protection to 
rebels, they were taken thence : the elder was executed 
at Tyburn ; the younger, pleading that he had been mis- 
led by his brother, obtained a pardon. 

m Polydore Verg. p. 569. 



496 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Henry's joy for this success was followed, some time 

vj? Rafter, by the birth of a prince, to whom he gave the 

1486 name of Arthur, in memory of the famous British king 

2oth Sept. of that name, from whom it was pretended the family 

of Tudor derived its descent. 
Discon- Though Henry had been able to defeat this hasty 

tents of the -i-n- 11 , i T p-n-i -n , t 

people, rebellion, raised by the relics oi Kichard s partisans, his 
government was become in general unpopular. The 
source of public discontent arose chiefly from his preju- 
dices against the house of York, which was generally 
beloved by the nation, and which for that very reason 
became every day more the object of his hatred and 
jealousy. Not only a preference on all occasions, it was 
observed, was given to the Lancastrians, but many of 
the opposite party had been exposed to great severity, 
and had been bereaved of their fortunes by acts of 
attainder. A general resumption likewise had passed 
of all grants made by the princes of the house of York ; 
and though this rigour had been covered under the pre- 
tence that the revenue was become insufficient to sup- 
port the dignity of the crown, and though the grants, 
during the latter years of Henry VI., were resumed by 
the same law, yet the York party, as they were the 
principal sufferers by the resumption, thought it chiefly 
levelled against them. The severity exercised against 
the Earl of Warwick begat compassion for youth and 
innocence exposed to such oppression ; and his confine- 
ment in the Tower, the very place where Edward's chil- 
dren had been murdered by their uncle, made the public 
expect a like catastrophe for him, and led them to make 
a comparison between Henry and that detested tyrant ; 
and when it was remarked, that the queen herself met 
with harsh treatment, and even after the birth of a son 
was not admitted to the honour of a public coronation, 
Henry's prepossessions were then concluded to be in- 
veterate, and men became equally obstinate in their dis- 
gust to his government. Nor was the manner and 
address of the king calculated to cure these prejudices 
contracted against his administration ; but had in every 
thing a tendency to promote fear, or at best reverence, 
rather than goodwill and affection 11 . While the high 

* Bacon, p. 583. 



HENRY VII. 497 

idea entertained of his policy and vigour retained the CHAP. 
nobility and men of character in obedience, the effects^ ^ 
of his unpopular government soon appeared by incidents 1486 
of an extraordinary nature. 

There lived in Oxford one Kichard Simon, a priest, 
who possessed some subtlety, and still more enterprise 
and temerity. This man had entertained the design 
of disturbing Henry's government, by raising a pre- 
tender to his crown ; and for that purpose he cast his Lambert 
eyes on Lambert Simnel, a youth of fifteen years of "" 
age, who was son of a baker, and who, being endowed 
with understanding above his years, and address above 
his condition, seemed well fitted to personate a prince 
of royal extraction. A report had been spread among 
the people, and received with great avidity, that Richard, 
Duke of York, second son of Edward IV., had, by a 
secret escape, saved himself from the cruelty of his 
uncle, and lay somewhere concealed in England. Simon, 
taking advantage of this rumour, had at first instructed 
his pupil to assume that name, which he found to be so 
fondly cherished by the public : but hearing afterwards 
a new report, that Warwick had made his escape from 
the Tower, and observing that this news was attended 
with no less general satisfaction, he changed the plan 
of his imposture, and made Simnel personate that un- 
fortunate prince . Though the youth was qualified by 
nature for the part which he was instructed to act ; yet 
was it remarked, that he was better informed in circum- 
stances relating to the royal family, particularly in the 
adventures of the Earl of Warwick, than he could be 
supposed to have learned from one of Simon's con- 
dition : and it was thence conjectured, that persons of 
higher rank, partisans of the house of York, had laid 
the plan of this conspiracy, and had conveyed proper 
instructions to the actors. The queen-dowager herself 
was exposed to suspicion ; and it was indeed the general 
opinion, however unlikely it might seem, that she had 
secretly given her consent to the imposture. This wo- 
man was of a very restless disposition. Finding that, 
instead of receiving the reward of her services in con- 
tributing to Henry's elevation, she herself was fallen 

o Polydore Vergil, p. 569, 570. 

42* 



498 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, into absolute insignificance, her daughter treated with 
XXIV - severity, and all her friends brought under subjection, 
^"""' she had conceived the most violent animosity against 
him, and had resolved to make him feel the effects of 
her resentment. She knew that the imposture, however 
successful, might easily at last be set aside ; and if a way 
could be found at his risk to subvert the government, 
she hoped that a scene might be opened which, though 
difficult at present exactly to foresee, would gratify her 
revenge, and be on the whole less irksome to her than 
that slavery and contempt to which she was now re- 
duced p . 

But whatever care Simon might take to convey 
instruction to his pupil Simnel, he was sensible that the 
imposture could not bear a close inspection ; and he was 
therefore determined to open the first public scene of 
it in Ireland. That island, which was zealously attached 
to the house of York, and bore an affectionate regard 
to the memory of Clarence, Warwick's father, who had 
been their lieutenant, was improvidently allowed by 
Henry to remain in the same condition in which he 
found it ; and all the counsellors and officers, who had 
been appointed by his predecessors, still retained their 
authority. No sooner did Simnel present himself to 
Thomas Fitzgerald, Earl of Kildare, the deputy, and 
claim his protection as the unfortunate Warwick, than 
that credulous nobleman, not suspecting so bold an im- 
posture, gave attention to him, and began to consult 
some persons of rank with regard to this extraordinary 
incident. These he found even more sanguine in their 
zeal and belief than himself: and in proportion as the 
story diffused itself among those of lower condition, it 
became the object of still greater passion and credulity, 
till the people in Dublin, with one consent, tendered 
their allegiance to Simnel as the true Plantagenet. Fond 
of a novelty, which flattered their natural propension, 
they overlooked the daughters of Edward IV., who 
S ^ OO( ^ before Warwick in the order of succession ; they 
paid the pretended prince attendance as their sovereign, 
lodged him in the castle of Dublin, crowned him with 
a diadem taken from a statue of the Virgin, and pub- 

P Polydore Vergil, p. 570. 



HENRY VII. 499 

licly proclaimed him king, by the appellation of Edward CHAP. 
VI. The whole island followed the example of the : 
capital ; and not a sword was any where drawn in Henry's ^^~ 
quarrel. 

When this intelligence was conveyed to the king, it 
reduced him to some perplexity. Determined always 
to face his enemies in person, he yet scrupled at present 
to leave England, where he suspected the conspiracy 
was first framed, and where he knew many persons of 
condition, and the people in general, were much dis- 
posed to give it countenance. la order to discover the 
secret source of the contrivance, and take measures 
against this open revolt, he held frequent consultations 
with his ministers and counsellors, and laid plans for a 
vigorous defence of his authority, and the suppression of 
his enemies. 

The first event which followed these deliberations gave 
surprise to the public : it was the seizure of the queen- 
dowager, the forfeiture of all her lands and revenue, 
and the close confinement of her person in the nunnery 
of Bermondsey. This act of authority was covered with 
a very thin pretence. It was alleged that, notwith- 
standing the secret agreement to marry her daughter 
to Henry, she had yet yielded to the solicitations and 
menaces of Richard, and had delivered that princess 
and her sisters into the hands of the tyrant. This crime, 
which was now become obsolete, and might admit of 
alleviations, was therefore suspected not to be the real 
cause of the severity with which she was treated ; and 
men believed, that the king, unwilling to accuse so near 
a relation of a conspiracy against him, had cloaked his 
vengeance or precaution under colour of an offence 
known to the whole world q . They were afterwards the 
more confirmed in this suspicion, when they found that 
the unfortunate queen, though she survived this disgrace 
several years, was never treated with any more lenity, 
but was allowed to end her life in poverty, solitude, and 
confinement. 

The next measure of the king's was of a less excep- 
tionable nature. He ordered that Warwick should be 
taken from the Tower, be led in procession through the 

<i Bacon, p. 583. Polydore Vergil, p. 571. 



500 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

x|y- streets of London, be conducted to St. Paul's, and there 
v^^^^ exposed to the view of the whole people. He even 
use. gave directions that some men of rank, attached to the 
house of York, and best acquainted with the person of 
this prince, should approach him and converse with him ; 
and he trusted that these, being convinced of the absurd 
imposture of Simnel, would put a stop to the credulity 
of the populace. The expedient had its effect in Eng- 
land ; but in Ireland the people still persisted in their 
revolt, and zealously retorted on the king the reproach 
of propagating an imposture, and of having shown a 
counterfeit Warwick to the public. 

Henry had soon reason to apprehend, that the design 
against him was not laid on such slight foundations as 
the absurdity of the contrivance seemed to indicate. 
John, Earl of Lincoln, son of John de la Pole, Duke of 
Suffolk, and of Elizabeth, eldest sister to Edward IV., 
was engaged to take part in the conspiracy. This noble- 
man, who possessed capacity and courage, had enter- 
tained very aspiring views; and his ambition was en- 
couraged by the known intentions of his uncle Eichard, 
who had formed a design, in case he himself should die 
without issue, of declaring Lincoln successor to the 
crown. The king's jealousy against all eminent persons 
of the York party, and his rigour towards Warwick, had 
farther- struck Lincoln with apprehensions, and made 
him resolve to seek for safety in the most dangerous 
counsels. Having fixed a secret correspondence with 
Sir Thomas Broughton. a man of great interest in Lan- 
cashire, he retired to Flanders, where Lovel had arrived 
a little before him ; and he lived during some time in 
the court of his aunt the Duchess of Burgundy, by whom 
he had been invited over. 

intrigues Margaret, widow of Charles the Bold, Duke of Bur- 
Duchess of g un( ty? n t having any children of her own, attached 
Burgundy, herself with an entire friendship to her daughter-in-law, 
married to Maximilian, Archduke of Austria ; and after 
the death of that princess, she persevered in her affection 
to Philip and Margaret, her children, and occupied her- 
self in the care of their education and of their persons. 
By her virtuous conduct and demeanour she had ac- 
quired great authority among the Flemings; and lived 




HENRY VII. 501 

with much dignity as well as economy, upon that ample CHAP. 
dowry which she inherited from her husband. The 
sentments of this princess were no less warm than 
friendships ; and that spirit of faction, which it is so diffi- 
cult for a social and sanguine temper to guard against, 
had taken strong possession of her heart, and intrenched 
somewhat on the probity which shone forth in the other 
parts of her character. Hearing of the malignant 
jealousy entertained by Henry against her family, and 
his oppression of all its partisans, she was moved with 
the highest indignation, and she determined to make 
him repent of that enmity to which so many of her 
friends, without any reason or necessity, had fallen vic- 
tims. After consulting with Lincoln and Lovel, she 1487. 
hired a body of two thousand veteran Germans, under 
the command of Martin Swart, a brave and experienced 
officer 1 , and sent them over, together with these two 
noblemen, to join Simnel in Ireland. The countenance Lambert 
given by persons of such high rank, and the accession of f^^ s 
this military force, much raised the courage of the Irish, England, 
and made them entertain the resolution of invading 
England, where they believed the spirit of disaffection 
as prevalent as it appeared to be in Ireland. The 
poverty also under which they laboured made it im- 
possible for them to support any longer their new court 
and army, and inspired them with a strong desire of 
enriching themselves by plunder and preferment in 
England. 

Henry was not ignorant of these intentions of his ene- 
mies, and he prepared himself for defence. He ordered 
troops to be levied in different parts of the kingdom, and 
put them under the command of the Duke of Bedford 
and Earl of Oxford. He confined the Marquis of Dorset, 
who, he suspected, would resent the injuries suffered by 
his mother, the queen-dowager ; and, to gratify the peo- 
ple by an appearance of devotion, he made a pilgrimage 
to our Lady of Walsingham, famous for miracles ; and 
there offered up prayers for success, and for deliverance 
from his enemies. 

Being informed that Simnel was landed at Foudrey in 
Lancashire, he drew together his forces, and advanced 

r Polyd. Verg. p. 572, 573. 



502 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, towards the enemy as far as Coventry. The rebels had 
^ ^entertained hopes that the disaffected counties in the 
1487 north would rise in their favour : but the people in 
general, averse to join Irish and German invaders, con- 
vinced of Lambert's imposture, and kept in awe by the 
king's reputation for success and conduct, either re- 
mained in tranquillity, or gave assistance to the royal 
army. The Earl of Lincoln, therefore, who commanded 
the rebels, finding no hopes but in victory, was deter- 
mined to bring the matter to a speedy decision ; and the 
king, supported by the native courage of his temper, and 
emboldened by a great accession of volunteers, who had 
joined him under the Earl of Shrewsbury arid Lord 
eth June. Strange, declined not the combat. The hostile armies 
f met at Stoke in the county of Nottingham, and fought 
a battle, which was bloody, and more obstinately disputed 
than could have been expected from the inequality of 
their force. All the leaders of the rebels were re- 
solved to conquer or to perish ; and they inspired their 
troops with like resolution. The Germans, also, being 
veteran and experienced soldiers, kept the event long 
doubtful ; and even the Irish, though ill-armed and 
almost defenceless, showed themselves not defective in 
spirit and bravery. The king's victory was purchased 
with loss, but was entirely decisive. Lincoln, Broughton, 
and Swart, perished in the field of battle, with four thou- 
sand of their followers. As Lovel was never more heard 
of, he was believed to have undergone the same fate. 
Simnel, with his tutor Simon, was taken prisoner. Simon 
being a priest, was not tried at law, and was only com- 
mitted to close custody : Simnel was too contemptible to 
be an object either of apprehension or resentment to 
Henry. He was pardoned, and made a scullion in the 
king's kitchen ; whence he was afterwards advanced to 
the rank of a falconer 8 . 

Henry had now leisure to revenge himself on his 
enemies. He made a progress into the northern parts, 
where he gave many proofs of his rigorous disposition. 
A strict inquiry was made after those who had assisted 
or favoured the rebels. The punishments were not all 
sanguinary: the king made his revenge subservient to 

s Bacon, p. 586. Polyd. Verg. p. 574. 



HENRY VII. 503 

his avarice. Heavy fines were levied upon the delin- CHAP. 
quents. The proceedings of the courts, and even the^ ^ 
courts themselves, were arbitrary. Either the criminals 1487 
were tried by commissioners appointed for the purpose, 
or they suffered punishment by sentence of a court- 
martial : and, as a rumour had prevailed before the battle 
of Stoke, that the rebels had gained the victory, that the 
royal army was cut in pieces, and that the king himself 
had escaped by flight, Henry was resolved to interpret 
the belief or propagation of this report as a mark of dis- 
affection; and he punished many for that pretended 
crime. But such in this age was the situation of the 
English government, that the royal prerogative, which 
was but imperfectly restrained during the most peace- 
able periods, was sure, in tumultuous or even suspicious 
times, which frequently recurred, to break all bounds of 
law, and to violate public liberty. 

After the king had gratified his rigour by the punish- 
ment of his enemies, he determined to give contentment 
to the people in a point which, though a mere ceremony, 
was passionately desired by them. The queen had been 
married near two years, but had not yet been crowned ; 
and this affectation of delay had given great discontent to 
the public, and had been one principal source of the dis- 
affection which prevailed. The king, instructed by ex- 25th Nov. 
perience, now finished the ceremony of her coronation ; 
and, to show a disposition still more gracious, he restored 
to liberty the Marquis of Dorset, who had been able to 
clear himself of all the suspicions entertained against 
him. 



504 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

STATE OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS. STATE OF SCOTLAND. OF SPAIN. OF THE 
Low COUNTRIES. OF FRANCE. OF BRITANT. FRENCH INVASION OF 
BRITANT. FRENCH EMBASSY TO ENGLAND. DISSIMULATION OF THE 
FRENCH COURT. AN INSURRECTION IN THE NORTH. SUPPRESSED. KING 
SENDS FORCES INTO BRITANY. ANNEXATION OF BRITANY TO FRANCE. A 
PARLIAMENT. WAR WITH FRANCE. INVASION OF FRANCE. PEACE WITH 
FRANCE. PERKIN WARBECK. His IMPOSTURE. HE is AVOWED BY THE 
DUCHESS OF BURGUNDY, AND BY MANY OF THE ENGLISH NOBILITY. TRIAL 
AND EXECUTION OF STANLEY. A PARLIAMENT. 

CHAP. THE king acquired great reputation throughout Europe 
vigorous and prosperous conduct of his domestic 
affairs: but as some incidents about this time invited 
state of him to look abroad, and exert himself in behalf of his 
affaire!' allies, it will be necessary, in order to give a just account 
of his foreign measures, to explain the situation of the 
neighbouring kingdoms, beginning with Scotland, which 
lies most contiguous. 

^^ e kingdom of Scotland had not yet attained that 
state which distinguishes a civilized monarchy, and which 
enables the government, by the force of its laws and in- 
stitutions alone, without any extraordinary capacity in 
the sovereign, to maintain itself in order and tranquillity. 
James III., who now filled the throne, was a prince of 
little industry and a narrow genius; and though it 
behoved him to yield the reins of government to his minis- 
ters, he hadaiever been able to make any choice which 
could give contentment both to himself and to his peo- 
ple. When he bestowed his confidence on any of the 
principal nobility, he found that they exalted their own 
family to such a height as was dangerous to the prince, 
and gave umbrage to the state. When he conferred 
favour on any person of meaner birth, on whose sub- 
mission he could more depend, the barons of his king- 
dom, enraged at the power of an upstart minion, pro- 
ceeded to the utmost extremities against their sovereign. 
Had Henry - entertained the ambition of conquests, a 
tempting opportunity now offered of reducing that king- 
dom to subjection; but as he was probably sensible, that 



HENRY VII. 505 

a warlike people, though they might be overrun by rea- CHAP. 
son of their domestic divisions, could not be retained in^ ^ 
obedience without a regular military force, which was 1488 
then unknown in England, he rather intended the re- 
newal of the peace with Scotland, and sent an embassy 
to James for that purpose. But the Scots, who never 
desired a durable peace with England, and who deemed 
their security to consist in constantly preserving them- 
selves in a warlike posture, would not agree to more than 
a seven years' truce, which was accordingly concluded a . 

The European states on the continent were then 
hastening fast to the situation in which they have re- 
mained, without any material alteration, for near three 
centuries ; and began to unite themselves into one ex- 
tensive system of policy, which comprehended the chief 
powers of Christendom. Spain, which had hitherto been state of 
almost entirely occupied within herself, now became J 
formidable by the union of Arragon and Castile in the 
persons of Ferdinand and Isabella, who, being princes of 
great capacity, employed their force in enterprises the 
most advantageous to their combined monarchy. The 
conquest of Granada from the Moors was then under- 
taken, and brought near to a happy conclusion. And 
in that expedition the military genius of Spain was re- 
vived ; honour and security were attained ; and her 
princes, no longer kept in awe by a domestic enemy 
so dangerous, began to enter into all the transactions of 
Europe, and made a great figure in every war and ne- 
gotiation. 

Maximilian. Kino; of the Romans, son of the Emperor gf the LOW 

n -i i -i -i i ',1,1 i r > v Countries. 

Frederic, had, by his marriage with the heiress oi .bur- 
gundy, acquired an interest in the Netherlands ; and 
though the death of his consort had weakened his con- 
nexions with that country, he still pretended to the 
government as tutor to his son Philip, and his authority 
had been acknowledged by Brabant, Holland, and several 
of the provinces. But as Flanders and Hainault still 
refused to submit to his regency, and even appointed 
other tutors to Philip, he had been engaged in long 
wars against that obstinate people, and never was able 
thoroughly to subdue their spirit. That he might free 

a Polyd. Verg. p. 575. 
VOL. II. 43 



506 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, himself from the opposition of France, he had concluded 
v J^_; a peace with Lewis XI., and had given his daughter 
H88. Margaret, then an infant, in marriage to the dauphin ; 
together with Artois, Franche Compte, and Charolois, as 
her dowry. But this alliance had not produced the 
desired effect. The dauphin succeeded to the crown 
of France by the appellation of Charles VIII. ; but 
Maximilian still found the mutinies of the Flemings 
fomented by the intrigues of the court of France. 
state of France, during the two preceding reigns, had made 
lce< a mighty increase in power and greatness ; and had not 
other states of Europe at the same time received an 
accession of force, it had been impossible to have re- 
tained her within her ancient boundaries. Most of the 
great fiefs, Normandy, Champagne, Anjou, Dauphiny, 
Guienne, Provence, and Burgundy, had been united to 
the crown ; the English had been expelled from all their 
conquests ; the authority of the prince had been raised 
to such a height as enabled him to maintain law and 
order ; a considerable military force was kept on foot, 
and the finances were able to support it. Lewis XI., 
indeed, from whom many of these advantages were de- 
rived, was dead, and had left his son, in early youth and 
ill educated, to sustain the weight of the monarchy : but 
having intrusted the government to his daughter Anne, 
Lady of Beaujeu, a woman of spirit and capacity, the 
French power suffered no check or decline. On the 
contrary, this princess formed the great project, which 
at last she happily effected, of uniting to the crown 
Britany, the last and most independent fief of the 
monarchy. 

Of Britany. Francis II., Duke of Britany, conscious of his own 
incapacity for government, had resigned himself to the 
direction of Peter Landais, a man of mean birth, more 
remarkable for abilities than for virtue or integrity. 
The nobles of Britany, displeased with the great ad- 
vancement of this favourite, had even proceeded to dis- 
affection against their sovereign ; and after many tumults 
and disorders, they at last united among themselves, and 
in a violent manner seized, tried, and put to death, the 
obnoxious minister. Dreading the resentment of the 
prince for this invasion of his authority, many of them 



HENRY VII. 507 

retired to France ; others, for protection and safety, main- CHAP. 
tained a secret correspondence with the French ministry,, XXVt 
who, observing the great dissensions among the Bretons, \^~~ 
thought the opportunity favourable for invading the 
duchy ; and so much the rather, as they could cover their 
ambition under the specious pretence of providing for 
domestic security. 

Lewis, Duke of Orleans, first prince of the blood, and 
presumptive heir of the monarchy, had disputed the ad- 
ministration with the Lady of Beaujeu ; and though his 
pretensions had been rejected by the states, he still 
maintained cabals with many of the grandees, and laid 
schemes for subverting the authority of that princess. 
Finding his conspiracies detected, he took to arms, and 
fortified himself in Beaugency ; but as his revolt was 
precipitate, before his confederates were ready to join 
him, he had been obliged to submit, and to receive such 
conditions as the French ministry were pleased to impose 
upon him. Actuated however by his ambition, and even 
by his fears, he soon retired out of France, and took shelter 
with the Duke of Britany, who was desirous of strength- 
ening himself against the designs of the Lady of Beaujeu, 
by the friendship and credit of the Duke of Orleans. 
This latter prince, also, perceiving the ascendant which 
he soon acquired over the Duke of Britany, had engaged 
many of his partisans to join him at that court, and had 
formed the design of aggrandizing himself by a marriage 
with Anne, the heir of that opulent duchy. 

The barons of Britany, who saw all favour engrossed 
by the Duke of Orleans and his train, renewed a stricter 
correspondence with France, and even invited the French 
king to make an invasion on their country. Desirous, 
however, of preserving its independency, they had regu- 
lated the number of succours which France was to send 
them, and had stipulated, that no fortified place in Bri- 
tany should remain in possession of that monarchy : a 
vain precaution where revolted subjects treat with a 
power so much superior ! the French invaded Britany French in- 

j.i f it i- JT ii 1*1 vasion ot 

with forces three times more numerous than those which 
they had promised to the barons ; and advancing into 
the heart of the country, laid siege to Ploermel. To 
oppose them, the duke raised a numerous but ill-dis- 



508 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ciplined army, which he put under the command of the 
XXVt Duke of Orleans, the Count of Dunois, and others of the 

^^^ French nobility. The army, discontented with this 
choice, and jealous of their confederates, soon disbanded 
and left their prince with too small a force to keep the 
field against his invaders. He retired to Vannes ; but 
being hotly pursued by the French, who had now made 
themselves masters of Ploermel, he escaped to Nantz ; 
and the enemy, having previously taken and garrisoned 
Vannes, Dinant, and other places, laid close siege to that 
city. The barons of Britany, finding their country me- 
naced with total subjection, began gradually to withdraw 
from the French army, and to make peace with their 
sovereign. 

This desertion, however, of the Bretons discouraged 
not the court of France from pursuing her favourite pro- 
ject of reducing Britany to subjection. The situation of 
Europe appeared favourable to the execution of this de- 
sign. Maximilian was indeed engaged in close alliance 
with the Duke of Britany, and had even opened a treaty 
for marrying his daughter ; but he was on all occasions 
so indigent, and at that time so disquieted by the muti- 
nies of the Flemings, that little effectual assistance could 
be expected from him. Ferdinand was entirely occupied 
in the conquest of Granada ; and it was also known, that 
if France would resign to him Rousillon and Cerdagne, 
to which he had pretensions, she could at any time 
engage him to abandon the interests of Britany. Eng- 
land alone was both enabled by her power, and engaged 
by her interests, to support the independency of that 
duchy ; and the most dangerous opposition was therefore, 
by Anne of Beaujeu, expected from that quarter. In 
order to cover her real designs, no sooner was she in- 
formed of Henry's success against Simnel and his parti- 
sans, than she despatched ambassadors to the court of 
London, and made professions of the greatest trust and 
confidence in that monarch. 

French The ambassadors, after congratulating Henry on his late 

embassy to , T ,. i n T -, 

England, victory, and communicating to him, in the most cordial 
manner, as to an intimate friend, some successes of their 
master against Maximilian, came, in the progress of their 
discourse, to mention the late transactions in Britany. 



HENRY VII. 5Q9 

They told him, that the duke having given protection to CHAP. 
French fugitives and rebels, the king had been necessi- xxv 
tated, contrary to his intention and inclination, to carry "~~^^~ 
war into that duchy : that the honour of the crown was 
interested not to suffer a vassal so far to forget his duty 
to his liege lord ; nor was the security of the government 
less concerned to prevent the consequences of this dan- 
gerous temerity : that the fugitives were no mean or ob- 
scure persons ; but among others, the Duke of Orleans, 
first prince of the blood, who, finding himself obnoxious to 
justice for treasonable practices in France, had fled into 
Britany, where he still persevered in laying schemes of 
rebellion against his sovereign : that the war being thus, 
on the part of the French monarch, entirely defensive, it 
would immediately cease, when the Duke of Britany, by 
returning to his duty, should remove the causes of it : 
that their master was sensible of the obligations which 
the duke, in very critical times, had conferred on Henry; 
but it was known also, that in times still more critical, he 
or his mercenary counsellors had deserted him, and put 
his life in the utmost hazard : that his sole refuge in these 
desperate extremities had been the court of France, 
which not only protected his person, but supplied him , 
with men and money, with which, aided by his own 
valour and conduct, he had been enabled to mount the 
throne of England : that France in this transaction had, 
from friendship to Henry, acted contrary to what, in a 
narrow view, might be esteemed her own interest ; since, 
instead of an odious tyrant, she had contributed to esta- 
blish on a rival throne a prince endowed with such virtue 
and abilities : and that, as both the justice of the cause, 
and the obligations conferred on Henry, thus prepon- 
derated on the side of France, she reasonably expected 
that, if the situation of his affairs did not permit him to 
give her assistance, he would at least preserve a neutral- 
ity between the contending parties b . 

This discourse of the French ambassadors was plausi- 
ble ; and, to give it greater weight, they communicated to 
Henry, as in confidence, their master's intention, after 
he should have settled the differences with Britany, to 
lead an army into Italy, and make good his pretensions 

t> Bacon, p. 589. 



510 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, to the kingdom of Naples : a project which they knew 
would give no umbrage to the court of England. But 
all these artifices were in vain employed against the 
penetration of the king. He clearly saw that France 
had entertained the view of subduing Britany ; but he 
also perceived, that she would meet with great, and, as 
he thought, insuperable difficulties in the execution of 
her project. The native force of that duchy, he knew, 
had always been considerable, and had often, without 
any foreign assistance, resisted the power of France; 
the natural temper of the French nation, he imagined, 
would make them easily abandon any enterprise which 
required perseverance ; and as the heir of the crown 
was confederated with the Duke of Britany, the minis- 
ters would be still more remiss in prosecuting a scheme 
which must draw on them resentment and displeasure. 
Should even these internal obstructions be removed, 
Maximilian, whose enmity to France was well known, 
and who now paid his addresses to the heiress of Britany, 
would be able to make a diversion on the side of 
Flanders ; nor could it be expected that France, if she 
prosecuted such ambitious projects, would be allowed to 
remain in tranquillity by Ferdinand and Isabella. Above 
all, he thought the French court could never expect that 
England, so deeply interested to preserve the indepen- 
dency of Britany, so able by her power and situation to 
give effectual and prompt assistance, would permit such 
an accession of force to her rival. He imagined, there- 
fore, that the ministers of France, convinced of the im- 
practicability of their scheme, would at last embrace 
pacific views, and would abandon an enterprise so obnox- 
ious to all the potentates of Europe. 

This reasoning of Henry was solid, and might .justly 
engage him in dilatory and cautious measures : but 
there entered into his conduct another motive, which 
was apt to draw him beyond the just bounds, because 
founded on a ruling passion. His frugality, which by 
-degrees degenerated into avarice, made him averse to 
all warlike enterprises and distant expeditions, and en- 
gaged him previously to try the expedient of negotiation. 
He despatched Urswic his almoner, a man of address 
and abilities, to make offer of his mediation to the con- 



HENRY VII. 

tending parties : an offer which he thought, if accepted CHAP. 
by France, would soon lead to a composure of all dif- xxv - 
ferences ; if refused or eluded, would at least discover 
the perseverance of that court in her ambitious projects. 
Urswic found the Lady of Beaujeu, now Duchess of 
Bourbon, engaged in the siege of Nantz, and had the 
satisfaction to find that his master's offer of mediation 
was readily embraced, and with many expressions of 
confidence and moderation. That able princess con- 
cluded, that the Duke of Orleans, who governed t 
court of Britany, foreseeing that every accommodation court, 
must be made at his expense, would use all his interest 
to have Henry's proposal rejected ; and would by that 
means make an apology for the French measures, and 
draw on the Bretons the reproach of obstinacy and injus- 
tice. The event justified her prudence. When the 
English ambassador made the same offer to the Duke of 
Britany, he received for answer, in the name of that 
prince, that, having so long acted the part of protector 
and guardian to Henry during his youth and adverse 
fortune, he had expected from a monarch of such vir- 
tue, more effectual assistance in his present distresses, 
than a barren offer of mediation, which suspended not 
the progress of the French arms : that if Henry's grati- 
tude were not sufficient to engage him in such a mea- 
sure, his prudence, as King of England, should discover 
to him the pernicious consequences attending the con- 
quest of Britany, and its annexation to the crown of 
France : that that kingdom, already too powerful, would 
be enabled, by so great an accession of force, to display, 
to the ruin of England, that hostile disposition which 
had always subsisted between those rival nations : that 
Britany, so useful an ally, which, by its situation, gave 
the English an entrance into the heart of France, being 
annexed to that kingdom, would be equally enabled, 
from its situation, to disturb, either by piracies or naval 
armaments, the commerce and peace of England; and 
that, if the duke rejected Henry's mediation, it proceed- 
ed neither from an inclination to a war, which he expe- 
rienced to be ruinous to him, nor from a confidence in 
his own force, which he knew to be much inferior to that 



512 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of the enemy ; but, on the contrary, from a sense of his 
vj ^, present necessities, which must engage the king to act 
1488 the part of his confederate, not that of a mediator. 

When this answer was reported to the king, he aban- 
doned not the plan which he had formed : he only con- 
cluded, that some more time was requisite to quell the 
obstinacy of the Bretons, and make them submit to rea- 
son. And when he learned that the people of Britany, 
anxious for their duke's safety, had formed a tumultuary 
army of sixty thousand men, and had obliged the French 
to raise the siege of Nantz, he fortified himself the more 
in his opinion that the court of France would at last be 
reduced, by multiplied obstacles and difficulties, to aban- 
don the project of reducing Britany to subjection. He 
continued, therefore, his scheme of negotiation, and 
thereby exposed himself to be deceived by the artifices 
of the French ministry ; who, still pretending pacific in- 
tentions, sent Lord Bernard Daubigny, a Scotchman of 
quality, to London, and pressed Henry not to be dis- 
couraged in offering his mediation to the court of Britany. 
The king, on his part, despatched another embassy, con- 
sisting of Urswic, the Abbot of Abingdon, and Sir Eich- 
ard Tonstal, who carried new proposals for an amica- 
ble treaty. No effectual succours, meanwhile, were 
provided for the distressed Bretons. Lord Woodville, 
brother to the queen-dowager, having asked leave to 
raise underhand a body of volunteers, and to transport 
them into Britany, met with a refusal from the king, 
who was desirous of preserving the appearance of a strict 
neutrality. That nobleman, however, still persisted in 
his purpose. He went over to the Isle of Wight, of 
which he was governor ; levied a body of four hundred 
men; and having at last obtained, as is supposed, the 
secret permission of Henry, sailed with them to Britany. 
This enterprise proved fatal to the leader, and brought 
28th July, small relief to the unhappy duke. The Bretons rashly 
engaged in a general action with the French at St. 
Aubin, and were discomfited. Woodville and all the 
English were put to the sword ; together with a body 
of Bretons, who had been accoutred in the garb of 
Englishmen, in order to strike a greater terror into the 



HENRY VII. 513 

French, to whom the martial prowess of that nation was CIIAP. 
always formidable 6 . The Duke of Orleans, the Prince xxv ' 
of Orange, and many other persons of rank, were taken 
prisoners ; and the military force of Britany was totally 
broken. The death of the duke, which followed soon 
after, threw affairs into still greater confusion, and seemed 
to threaten the state with a final subjection. 

Though the king did not prepare against these events, 9th Se pt- 
so hurtful to the interests of England, with sufficient 
vigour and precaution, he had not altogether overlooked 
them. Determined to maintain a pacific conduct, as 
far as the situation of affairs would permit, he yet knew 
the warlike temper of his subjects, and observed that 
their ancient and inveterate animosity to France was 
now revived by the prospect of this great accession to 
her power and grandeur. He resolved, therefore, to 
make advantage of this disposition, and draw some 
supplies from the people, on pretence of giving assist- 
ance to the Duke of Britany. He had summoned a 
Parliament at Westminster 4 ; and he soon persuaded 
them to grant him a considerable subsidy 6 . But this 
supply, though voted by Parliament, involved the king 
in unexpected difficulties. The counties of Durham and 
York, always discontented with Henry's government, 
and farther provoked by the late oppressions under 
which they had laboured, after the suppression of Sim- 
nel's rebellion, resisted the commissioners who were 
appointed to levy the tax. The commissioners, terri- 
fied with this appearance of sedition, made application the north, 
to the Earl of Northumberland, and desired of him 
advice and assistance in the execution of their office. 
That nobleman thought the matter of importance enough 
to consult the king ; who, unwilling to yield to the 
humours of a discontented populace, and foreseeing the 
pernicious consequence of such a precedent, renewed 
his orders for strictly levying the imposition. Northum- 
berland summoned together the justices and chief free- 
holders, and delivered the king's commands in the 
most imperious terms, which, he thought, would enforce 

Argentre, Hist, de Bretagne, liv. xii. d 9th November, 1487. 

e Poly dore. Vergil, p. 579, says, that this imposition was a capitation tax; the 
other historians say, it was a tax of two shillings in the pound. 



514 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, obedience, but which tended only to provoke the people, 
i_^ Y ^ and make them believe him the adviser of those orders 
UBS. which he delivered to them f . They flew to arms, 
attacked Northumberland in his house, and put him to 
death. Having incurred such deep guilt, their muti- 
nous humour prompted them to declare against the king 
himself; and being instigated by John Achamber, a 
seditious fellow, of low birth, they chose Sir John Egre- 
inond their leader, and prepared themselves for a vigo- 
rous resistance. Henry was not dismayed with an insur- 
rection so precipitate and ill-supported. He immediately 
levied a force, which he put under the command of the 
Earl of Surrey, whom he had freed from confinement, 
and received into favour. His intention was to send 
down these troops, in order to check the progress of the 
rebels ; while he himself should follow with a greater 
body, which would absolutely ensure success. But 
, Surrey thought himself strong enough to encounter 
alone a raw and unarmed multitude ; and he succeeded 
suppressea.in the attempt. The rebels were dissipated ; John 
Achamber was taken prisoner, and afterwards executed 
with some of his accomplices; Sir John Egremond fled 
to the Duchess of Burgundy, who gave him protection ; 
the greater number of the rebels received a pardon. 
H89. Henry had probably expected, when he obtained this 
grant from Parliament, that he should be able to termi- 
nate the affair of Britany by negotiation, and that he 
might thereby fill his coffers with the money levied by 
the imposition. But as the distresses of the Bretons still 
multiplied, and became every day more urgent, he found 
himself under the necessity of taking more vigorous 
measures, in order to support them. On the death of 
the duke, the French had revived some antiquated 
claims to the dominion of the duchy ; and as the Duke 
of Orleans was now captive in France, their former pre- 
tence for hostilities could no longer serve as a cover to 
their ambition. The king resolved, therefore, to engage 
as auxiliary to Britany ; and to consult the interests as 
well as desires of his people, by opposing himself to the 
progress of the French power. Besides entering into a 
league with Maximilian, and another with Ferdinand, 

* Bacon, p. 595. 



HENRY VII. 515 

which were distant resources, he levied a body of troops, CHAP. 
to the number of six thousand men, with an intention of XXVl 
transporting them into Britany. Still anxious, however, 
for the repayment of his expenses, he concluded a treaty 
with the young duchess, by which she engaged to deliver 
into his hands . two sea-port towns, there to remain till 
she should entirely refund the charges of the armament 8 . 
Though he engaged for the service of these troops during 
the space of ten months only, yet was the duchess 
obliged, by the necessity of her affairs, to submit to 
such rigid conditions, imposed by an ally so much con- 
cerned in interest to protect her. The forces arrived King sends 
under the command of Lord Willoughby of Broke ; and 
made the Bretons, during some time, masters of the 
field. The French retired into their garrisons; and 
expected, by dilatory measures, to waste the fire of the 
English, and disgust them with the enterprise. The 
scheme was well laid, and met with success. Lord 
Broke found such discord and confusion in the councils 
of Britany, that no measures could be concerted for any 
undertaking; no supply obtained; no provisions, car- 
riages, artillery, or military stores procured. The whole 
court was rent into factions : no one minister had acquired 
the ascendant : and whatever project w^as formed by one 
was sure to be traversed by another. The English, dis- 
concerted in every enterprise by these animosities and 
uncertain counsels, returned home as soon as the time 
of their service was elapsed ; leaving only a small garri- 
son in those towns which had been consigned into their 
hands. During their stay in Britany, they had only 
contributed still farther to waste the country ; and by 
their departure, they left it entirely at the mercy of the 
enemy. So feeble was the succour which Henry in this 
important conjuncture afforded his ally, whom the inva- 
sion of a foreign enemy, concurring with domestic dis- 
sensions, had reduced to the utmost distress. 

The great object of the domestic dissensions in Bri- 
tany was the disposal of the young duchess in marriage. 
The Mareschal Rieux, favoured by Henry, seconded the 
suit of the Lord d'Albret, who led some forces to her 
assistance. The Chancellor Montauban, observing the 

e Du Tillet, Kecueil des Traites. 



516 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, aversion of the duchess to this suitor, insisted that a 

~\"\"\T ^ 

Vj 'j petty prince, such as d'Albret, was unable to support 
1489 Anne in her present extremities ; and he recommended 
some more powerful alliance, particularly that of Maxi- 
1490. milian, King of the Romans. This party at last pre- 
vailed; the marriage with Maximilian was celebrated 
by proxy; and the duchess thenceforth assumed the 
title of Queen of the Eomans. But this magnificent 
appellation was all she gained by her marriage. Maxi- 
milian, destitute of troops and money, and embarrassed 
with the continual revolts of the Flemings, could send 
no succour to his distressed consort; while d'Albret, 
enraged at the preference given to his rival, deserted her 
cause, and received the French into Nantz, the most im- 
portant place in the duchy, both for strength and riches. 
The French court now began to change their scheme 
with regard to the subjection of Britany. Charles had 
formerly been affianced to Margaret, daughter of Maxi- 
milian ; who, though too young for the consummation of 
her marriage, had been sent to Paris to be educated, and 
at this time bore the title of Queen of France. Besides 
the rich dowry which she brought the king, she was, 
after her brother Philip, then in early youth, heir to all 
the dominions of the house of Burgundy; and seemed, 
in many respects, the most proper match that could be 
chosen for the young monarch. These circumstances 
had so blinded both Maximilian and Henry, that they 
never suspected any other intentions in the French 
court ; nor were they able to discover, that engagements 
seemingly so advantageous, and so solemnly entered into, 
could be infringed and set aside. But Charles began 
to perceive that the conquest of Britany, in opposition to 
the natives, and to all the great powers of Christendom, 
would prove a difficult enterprise ; and that, even if he 
should overrun the country, and make himself master of 
the fortresses, it would be impossible for him long to re- 
tain possession of them. The marriage alone of the 
duchess could fully re-annex that fief to the crown ; and 
the present and certain enjoyment of so considerable a 
territory seemed preferable to the prospect of inheriting 
the dominions of the house of Burgundy; a prospect 
which became every day more distant and preca- 



HENRY VII. 51 

tious. Above all, the marriage of Maximilian and Anne CHAP. 
appeared destructive to the grandeur, and even security, XXVt 
of the French monarchy ; while that prince, possessing ^^ 
Flanders on the one hand, and Britany on the other, 
might thus, from both quarters, make inroads into the 
heart of the country. The only remedy for these evils, 
was therefore concluded to be the dissolution of the two 
marriages, which had been celebrated, but not consum- 
mated ; and the espousal of the Duchess of Britany by 
the King of France. 

It was necessary that this expedient, which had not 
been foreseen by any court in Europe, and which they 
were all so much interested to oppose, should be kept a 
profound secret, and should be discovered to the world 
only by the full execution of it. The measures of the 
French ministry in the conduct of this delicate enter- 
prise, were wise and political. While they pressed 
Britany with all the rigours of war, they secretly gained 
the Count of Dunois, who possessed great authority with 
the Bretons ; and having also engaged in their interest 
the Prince of Orange, cousin-german to the duchess, 
they gave him his liberty, and sent him into Britany. 
These partisans, supported by other emissaries of France, 
prepared the minds of men for,the great revolution pro- 
jected, and displayed, though still with many precau- 
tions, all the advantages of an union with the French 
monarchy. They represented to the barons of Britany, 
that their country harassed, during so many years, with 
perpetual war, had need of some repose, and of a solid 
and lasting peace with the only power that was formida- 
ble to them : that their alliance with Maximilian was not 
able to afford them even present protection; and, by 
closely uniting them to a power, which was rival to the 
greatness of France, fixed them in perpetual enmity with 
that potent monarchy : that their vicinity exposed them 
first to the inroads of the enemy ; and the happiest event 
which, in such a situation, could befal them, would be to 
attain a peace, though by a final subjection to France, 
and by the loss of that liberty transmitted to them from 
their ancestors : and that any other expedient, compati- 
ble with the honour of the state, and their duty to their 

VOL. ir. 44 



518 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, sovereign, was preferable to a scene of such disorder and 
J^^ devastation. 

1490 These suggestions had influence with the Bretons : 
but the chief difficulty lay in surmounting the prejudices 
of the young duchess herself. That princess had im- 
bibed a strong prepossession against the French nation, 
particularly against Charles, the author of all the cala- 
mities which, from her earliest infancy, had befallen her 
family. She had also fixed her affections on Maximilian ; 
and, as she now deemed him her husband, she could not, 
she thought, without incurring the greatest guilt, and 
violating the most solemn engagements, contract a mar- 
i49i. riage with any other person. In order to overcome her 
obstinacy, Charles gave the Duke of Orleans his liberty, 
who, though formerly a suitor to the duchess, was now 
contented to ingratiate himself with the king, by em- 
ploying in his favour all the interest which he still pos- 
sessed in Britany. Mareschal Eieux and Chancellor 
Montauban were reconciled by his mediation ; and these 
rival ministers now concurred with the Prince of Orange 
and the Count of Dunois, in pressing the conclusion of 
a marriage with Charles. By their suggestion, Charles 
advanced with a powerful army, and invested Rennes, at 
that time the residence of the duchess ; who, assailed on 
all hands, and finding none to support her in her inflexi- 
bility, at last opened the gates of the city, and agreed to 
Annexa- espouse the King of France. She was married at Lan- 
Britany to gey, in Touraine ; conducted to St. Denis, where she 
France, wag crowned ; thence made her entry into Paris, amidst 
the joyful acclamations of the people, who regarded this 
marriage as the most prosperous event that could have 
befallen the monarchy. 

The triumph and success of Charles was the most sen- 
sible mortification to the King of the Romans. He had 
lost a considerable territory, which he thought he had 
acquired, and an accomplished princess, whom he had 
espoused; he was affronted in the person of his daughter 
Margaret, who was sent back to him after she had been 
treated, during some years, as Queen of France ; he had 
reason to reproach himself with his own supine security, 
in neglecting the consummation of his marriage, which 



HENRY VII. 519 

was easily practicable for him, and which would have CHAP. 
rendered the tie indissoluble : these considerations threw XXV- 
him into the most violent rage, which he vented in 
indecent expressions ; and he threatened France with 
an invasion from the united arms of Austria, Spain, and 
England. 

The King of England had also just reason to reproach 
himself with misconduct in this important transaction ; 
and, though the affair had terminated in a manner which 
he could not precisely foresee, his negligence in leaving 
his most useful ally so long exposed to the invasion of 
superior power, could not but appear, on reflection, the 
result of timid caution and narrow politics. As he 
valued himself on his extensive foresight and profound 
judgment, the ascendant acquired over him by a raw 
youth, such as Charles, could not but give him the highest 
displeasure, and prompt him to seek vengeance, after all 
remedy for his miscarriage was become absolutely im- 
practicable. But he was farther actuated by avarice, a 
motive still more predominant with him than either pride 
or revenge ; and he sought, even from his present dis- 
appointments, the gratification of this ruling passion. 
On pretence of a French war, he issued a commission 
for levying a Benevolence on his people h ; a species of 7th July, 
taxation which had been abolished by a recent law of 
Eichard III. This violence (for such it really was) fell 
chiefly on the commercial part of the nation, who were 
possessed of the ready money. London alone contri- 
buted to the amount of near ten thousand pounds. 
Archbishop Morton, the chancellor, instructed the com- 
missioners to employ a dilemma, in which every one 
might be comprehended : if the persons applied to lived 
frugally, they were told that their parsimony must ne- 
cessarily have enriched them : if their method of living 
were splendid and hospitable, they were concluded to be 
opulent on account of their expenses. This device was, 
by some, called Chancellor Morton's fork, by others his 
crutch. 

So little apprehensive was the king of a Parliament, 
on account of his levying this arbitrary imposition, that 

h Rymer, vol. xii. p. 446. Bacon says, that the benevolence was levied with 
consent of Parliament, which is a mistake. 



520 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, he soon after summoned that assembly to meet at West- 
minster ; and he even expected to enrich himself farther 
1491. by working on their passions and prejudices. He knew 

27th Oct. the displeasure which the English had conceived against 
France, on account of the acquisition of Britany ; and 
he took care to insist on that topic, in the speech which 

APariia- he himself pronounced to the Parliament. He told 
them that France, elated with her late successes, had 
even proceeded to a contempt of England, and had re- 
fused to pay the tribute, which Lewis XI. had stipulated 
to Edward IY. That it became so warlike a nation as 
the English to be roused by this indignity, and not to 
limit their pretensions merely to repelling the present 
injury: that, for his part, he was determined to lay claim 
to the crown itself of France, and to maintain, by force 
of arms, so just a title, transmitted to him by his gallant 
ancestors. That Crecy, Poictiers, and Azincour, were 
sufficient to instruct them in their superiority over the 
enemy ; nor did he despair of adding new names to the 
glorious catalogue : that a king of France had been 
prisoner in London, and a king, of England had been 
crowned at Paris ; events which should animate them 
to an emulation of like glory with that which had been 
enjoyed by their forefathers : that the domestic dissen- 
sions of England had been the sole cause of her losing 
these foreign dominions ; and her present internal union 
would be the effectual means of recovering them : that, 
where such lasting honour was in view, and such an im- 
portant acquisition, it became not brave men to repine 
at the advance of a little treasure : and that, for his part, 
he was determined to make the war maintain itself; and 
hoped, by the invasion of so opulent a kingdom as France, 
to increase, rather than diminish, the riches of the 
nation 1 . 

Notwithstanding these magnificent vaunts of the king, 
all men of penetration concluded, from the personal 
character of the man, and still more from the situation 
of affairs, that he had no serious intention of pushing the 
war to such extremities as he pretended. France was 
not now in the same condition as when such successful 
inroads had been made upon her by former kings of 

i Bacon, p. 601. 



HENRY TIL 521 

England. The great fiefs were united to the crown ; the CHAP. 
princes of the blood were desirous of tranquillity ; the xxv 
nation abounded with able captains and veteran soldiers ; ^7j*" 
and the general aspect of her affairs seemed rather to 
threaten her neighbours, than to promise them any con- 
siderable advantages against her. The levity and vain- 
glory of Maximilian were supported by his pompous 
titles ; but were ill seconded by military power, and still 
less by any revenue proportioned to them. The politic 
Ferdinand, while he made a show of war, was actually 
negotiating for peace ; and, rather than expose himself 
to any hazard, would accept of very moderate conces- 
sions from France. Even England was not free from 
domestic discontents; and in Scotland, the death of 
Henry's friend and ally, James III., who had been mur- 
dered by his rebellious subjects, had made way for the 
succession of his son, James IV., who was devoted to the 
French interest, and would surely be alarmed at any im- 
portant progress of the English arms. But all these 
obvious considerations had no influence on the Parliament. 
Inflamed by the ideas of subduing France, and of en- 
riching themselves by the spoils of that kingdom, they 
gave in to the snare prepared for them, and voted the 
supply which the king demanded. Two-fifteenths were 
granted him ; and the better to enable his vassals and 
nobility to attend him, an act was passed, empowering 
them to sell their estates, without paying any fines for 
alienation. 

The nobility were universally seized with a desire of 
military glory: and having credulously swallowed all 
the boasts of the king, they dreamed of no less than 
carrying their triumphant banners to the gates of Paris, 
and putting the crown of France on the head of their 
sovereign. Many of them borrowed large sums, or sold 
off manors, that they might appear in the field with 
greater splendour, and lead out their followers in more 
complete order. The king crossed the sea, and wrived*^4 A 
at Calais on the sixth of October, with an army of twenty- France. 
five thousand foot, and sixteen hundred horse, which he 
put under the command of the Duke of Bedford and the 
Earl of Oxford : but as some inferred from his opening 
the campaign in so late a season, that peace would soon 

44* 



522 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, be concluded between the crowns, he was desirous of 
XXV ' suggesting a contrary inference. " He had come over," 

^^^ he said, " to make an entire conquest of France, which 
was not the work of one summer. It was, therefore, of 
no consequence at what season he began the invasion ; 
especially as he had Calais ready for winter quarters." 
As if he had seriously intended this enterprise, he in- 

invasion stantly marched into the enemy's country, and laid siege 
France. ^ j> ou ] O g ne . b u t notwithstanding this appearance of 
hostility, there had been secret advances made towards 
peace above three months before ; and commissioners 
had been appointed to treat of the terms. The better 
to reconcile the minds of men to this unexpected measure, 
the king's ambassadors arrived in the camp from the Low 
Countries, and informed him that Maximilian was in no 
readiness to join him ; nor was any assistance to be ex- 
pected from that quarter. Soon after, messengers came 
from Spain, and brought news of a peace concluded 
between that kingdom and France, in which Charles 
had made a cession of the counties of Eousillon and 
Cerdagne to Ferdinand. Though these articles of in- 
telligence were carefully dispersed throughout the army, 
the king w r as still apprehensive lest a sudden peace, after 
such magnificent promises and high expectations, might 
expose him to reproach. In order the more effectually 
to cover the intended measures, he secretly engaged the 
Marquis of Dorset, together with twenty-three per- 
sons of distinction, to present him a petition for agreeing 
to a treaty with France. The pretence was founded on 
the late season of the year, the difficulty of supplying the 
army at Calais during the winter, the obstacles which 
arose in the siege of Boulogne, the desertion of those 
allies whose assistance had been most relied on : events 
which might, all of them, have been foreseen before the 
embarkation of the forces. 

In consequence of these preparatory steps, the Bishop 
of Exeter and Lord Daubeney were sent to confer at 
Estaples with the Mareschal de Cordes, and to put the 
last hand to the treaty. A few days sufficed for that 
purpose ; the demands of Henry were wholly pecuniary : 

3d NOV. anc [ the King of France, who deemed the peaceable pos- 
session of Britany an equivalent for any sum, and who 



HENRY VII. 523 

was all on fire for his projected expedition into Italy, CHAP. 
readily agreed to the proposals made him. He engaged 
to pay Henry seven hundred and forty-five thousand 
crowns, near four hundred- thousand pounds sterling of 
our present money : partly as a reimbursement of the 
sums advanced to Britany, partly as arrears of the pen- 
sion due to Edward IV. And he stipulated a yearly 
pension to Henry and his heirs of twenty-five thousand 
crowns. Thus the king, as remarked by his historian, 
made profit upon his subjects for the war ; and upon his 
enemies for the peace k . And the people agreed that he 
had fulfilled his promise, when he said to the Parliament 
that he would make the war maintain itself. Maximilian 
was, if he pleased, comprehended in Henry's treaty ; but 
he disdained to be in any respect beholden to an ally of 
whom he thought he had reason to complain : he made 
a separate peace with France, and obtained restitution 
of Artois, Franche Compte, and Charolois, which had 
been ceded as the dowry of his daughter when she was 
affianced to the King of France. 

The peace concluded between England and France was 
the more likely to continue, because Charles, full of am- 
bition and youthful hopes, bent all his attention to the 
side of Italy, and soon after undertook the conquest of 
Naples ; an enterprise which Henry regarded with the 
greater indifference, as Naples lay remote from him, and 
France had never in any age been successful in that 
quarter. The king's authority was fully established at 
home ; and every rebellion which had been attempted 
against him had hitherto tended only to confound his 
enemies, and consolidate his power and influence. His 
reputation for policy and conduct was daily augmenting ; 
his treasures had increased even from the most unfavour- 
able events ; the hopes of all pretenders to his throne 
were cut off, as well by his marriage, as by the issue 
which it had brought him. In this prosperous situation, 
the king had reason to flatter himself with the prospect 
of durable peace and tranquillity ; but his inveterate and 
indefatigable enemies, whom he had wantonly provoked, 
raised him an adversary, who long kept him in inquie- 
tude, and sometimes even brought him into danger. 

k Bacon, p. 605. Polyd. Verg. p. 586. 



524 HISTOEY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. The Duchess of Burgundy, full of resentment for the 
vjrc^ depression of her family and its partisans, rather irritated 
1492 than discouraged by the ill success of her past enterprises, 
was determined at least to disturb that government which 
she found it so difficult to subvert. By means of her 
emissaries she propagated a report that her nephew, 
Eichard Plantagenet, Duke of York, had escaped from 
the Tower, when his elder brother was murdered, and 
that he still lay somewhere concealed : and finding this 
rumour, however improbable, to be greedily received by 
the people, she had been looking out for some young 
man proper to personate that unfortunate prince. 
S*j n There was one Osbec, or Warbec, a renegado Jew of 
Tournay, who had been carried by some business to Lon- 
don in the reign of Edward IV., and had there a son 
born to him. Having had opportunities of being known 
to the king, and obtaining his favour, he prevailed with 
that prince, whose manners were very affable, to stand 
godfather to his son, to whom he gave the name of Peter, 
corrupted, after the Flemish manner, into Peterkin, or 
Perkin. It was by some believed that Edward, among 
his amorous adventures, had a secret commerce with 
Warbec's wife ; and people thence accounted for that 
resemblance which was afterwards remarked between 
young Perkin and that monarch 1 . Some years after the 
birth of this child, Warbea returned to Tournay ; where 
Perkin, his son, did not long remain, but by different ac- 
cidents was carried from place to place, and his birth and 
fortunes became thereby unknown, and difficult to be 
traced by the most diligent inquiry. The variety of his 
adventures had happily favoured the natural versatility 
and sagacity of his genius ; and he seemed to be a youth 
perfectly fitted to act any part, or assume any character. 
In this light he had been represented to the Duchess of 
Burgundy, who, struck with the concurrence of so many 
circumstances suited to her purpose, desired to be made 
acquainted with the man on whom she already began to 
His im- ground her hopes of success. She found him to exceed 
ire ' her most sanguine expectations : so comely did he appear 
in his person, so graceful in his air, so courtly in his ad- 
dress, so full of docility and good sense in his behaviour 

l Bacon, p. 606. 



HENRY VII. 525 

and conversation. The lessons necessary to be taught CHAP. 
him in order to his personating the Duke of York, were xxv " 
soon learned by a youth of such quick apprehension ; but 
as the season seemed not then favourable for his enter- 
prise, Margaret, in order the better to conceal him, sent 
him, under the care of Lady Brampton, into Portugal, 
where he remained a year, unknown to all the world. 

The war, which was then ready to break out between 
France and England, seemed to afford a proper oppor- 
tunity for the discovery of this new phenomenon ; and 
Ireland, which still retained its attachments to the house 
of York, was chosen as the proper place for his first ap- 
pearance 111 . He landed at Cork; and immediately as- 
suming the name of Kichard Plantagenet, drew to him 
partisans among that credulous people. He wrote letters 
to the Earls of Desmond and Kildare, inviting them to 
join his party : he dispersed every where the strange in- 
telligence of his escape from the cruelty of his uncle 
Eichard : and men, fond of every thing new and wonder- 
ful, began to make him the general subject of their dis- 
course, and even the object of their favour. 

The news soon reached France ; and Charles, prompted 
by the secret solicitations of the Duchess of Burgundy, 
and the intrigues of one Frion ? a secretary of Henry's, 
who had deserted his service, sent Perkin an invitation 
to repair to him at Paris. He received him with all the 
marks of regard due to the Duke of York ; settled on 
him a handsome pension, assigned him magnificent 
lodgings, and, in order to provide at once for his dignity 
and security, gave him a guard for his person, of which 
Lord Congresal accepted the office of captain. The 
French courtiers readily embraced a fiction which their 
sovereign thought it his interest to adopt : Perkin, both 
by his deportment and personal qualities, supported the 
prepossession which was spread abroad of his royal pedi- 
gree ; and the whole kingdom was full of the accom- 
plishments, as well as the singular adventures and mis- 
fortunes, of the young Plantagenet. Wonders of this 
nature are commonly augmented at a distance. From 
France, the admiration and credulity diffused themselves 
into England : Sir George Nevil, Sir John Taylor, and 

m Polyd. Verg. p. 589. 



526 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, above a hundred gentlemen more, came to Paris, in 
^ Border to offer their services to the supposed Duke of 
1492. York, and to share his fortunes : and the impostor had 
now the appearance of a court attending him, and 
began to entertain hopes of final success in his under- 
takings. 

When peace was concluded between France and 
England at Estaples, Henry applied to have Perkin put 
into his hands; but Charles, resolute not to betray a 
young man, of whatever birth, whom he had invited 
into his kingdom, would agree only to dismiss him. 
The pretended Kichard retired to the Duchess of Bur- 
gundy, and, craving her protection and assistance, offered 
to lay before her all the proofs of that birth to which 
He is h e laid claim. The princess affected ignorance of his 

avowed by ., ,. 

theDuch- pretensions ; even put on the appearance of distrust; 
and having, as she said, been already deceived by Simnel, 
she was determined never again to be seduced by any 
impostor. She desired before all the world to be in- 
structed in his reasons for assuming the name which he 
bore, seemed to examine every circumstance with the 
most scrupulous nicety ; put many particular questions 
to him ; affected astonishment at his answers ; and at 
last, after long and severe scrutiny, burst out into joy 
and admiration at his wonderful deliverance, embraced 
him as her nephew, the true image of Edward, the sole 
heir of the Plantagenets, and the legitimate successor to 
H93. the English throne. She immediately assigned him an 
equipage suited to his pretended birth ; appointed him a 
guard of thirty halberdiers ; enga,ged every one to pay 
court to him ; and on all occasions honoured him with 
the appellation of the White Rose of England. The Fle- 
mings, moved by the authority which Margaret, both 
from her rank and personal character, enjoyed among 
them, readily adopted the fiction of Perkin's royal de- 
scent : no surmise of his true birth was as yet heard of: 
little contradiction was made to the prevailing opinion : 
and the English, from their great communication with 
the Low Countries, were every day more and more pre- 
possessed in favour of the impostor. 

It was not the populace alone of England that gave 
credit to Perkin's pretensions. Men of the highest 



HENRY VII. 527 

birth arid quality, disgusted at Henry's government, by CHAP. 
which they found the nobility depressed, began to turn 
their eyes towards the new claimant ; and some of them ^^^ 
even entered into a correspondence with him. Lord and by' 
Fitzwater, Sir Simon Mountfort, Sir Thomas Thwaites^S^ 
betrayed their inclination towards him : Sir William nobility. 
Stanley himself, lord chamberlain, who had been so 
active in raising Henry to the throne, moved either by 
blind credulity, or a restless ambition, entertained the 
project of a revolt in favour of his enemy n . Sir Kobert 
Clifford and William Barley were still more open in 
their measures : they went over to Flanders, were intro- 
duced by the Duchess of Burgundy to the acquaintance 
of Perkin, and made him a tender of their services. 
Clifford wrote back to England, that he knew perfectly 
the person of Richard, Duke of York, that this young 
man was undoubtedly that prince himself, and that no 
circumstance of his story was exposed to the least diffi- 
culty. Such positive intelligence, conveyed by a person 
of rank and character, was sufficient, with many, to put 
the matter beyond question, and excited the attention 
and wonder even of the most indifferent. The whole 
nation was held in suspense ; a regular conspiracy was 
formed against the king's authority ; and a correspond- 
ence settled between the malecontents in Flanders and 
those in England. 

The king was informed of all these particulars ; but 
agreeably to his character, which was both cautious and 
resolute, he proceeded deliberately, though steadily, in 
counter-working the projects of his enemies. His first 
object was to ascertain the death of the real Duke of 
York, and to confirm the opinion that had always pre- 
vailed with regard to that event. Five persons had been 
employed by Richard in the murder of his nephews, or 
could give evidence with regard to it : Sir James Tyrrel, 
to whom he had committed the government of the 
Tower for that purpose, and who had seen the dead 
princes ; Forest, Dighton, and Slater, who perpetrated 
the crime ; and the priest who buried the bodies. Tyrrel 
and Dighton alone were alive, and they agreed in the 
same story ; bilt as the priest was dead, and as the bodies 

n Bacon, p. 608. 



528 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, were supposed to have been removed by Kichard's orders 

vj! ^Z_/ from the place where they were first interred, and could 

1493 not now be found, it was not in Henry's power to put 

the fact, so much as he wished, beyond all doubt and 

controversy. 

He met at first with more difficulty, but was in the 
end more successful, in detecting who this wonderful 
person was that thus boldly advanced pretensions to his 
crown. He dispersed his spies all over Flanders and 
England; he engaged many to pretend that they had 
embraced Perkin's party ; he directed them to insinuate 
themselves into the confidence of the young man's friends : 
in proportion as they conveyed intelligence of any con- 
spirator, he bribed his retainers, his domestic servants, 
nay, sometimes his confessor, and by these means traced 
up some other confederate. Clifford himself he engaged, 
by the hope of rewards and pardon, to betray the secrets 
committed to him. The more trust he gave to any of 
his spies, the higher resentment did he feign against 
them ; some of them he even caused to be publicly ana- 
thematized, in order the better to procure them the con- 
fidence of his enemies : and, in the issue, the whole 
plan of the conspiracy was clearly laid before him ; and 
the pedigree, adventures, life, and conversation of the 
pretended Duke of York. This latter part of the story 
was immediately published for the satisfaction of the 
nation : the conspirators he reserved for a slower and 
a surer vengeance. 

1494. Meanwhile he remonstrated with the Archduke Phi- 
lip, on account of the countenance and protection which 
was afforded in his dominions to so infamous an impos- 
tor; contrary to treaties subsisting between the sove- 
reigns, and to the mutual amity which had so long been 
maintained by the subjects of both states. Margaret 
had interest enough to get his application rejected, on 
pretence that Philip had no authority over the demesnes 
of the duchess-dowager : and the king, in resentment of 
this injury, cut off all commerce with the Low Countries, 
banished the Flemings, and recalled his own subjects 
from these provinces. Philip retaliated by like edicts ; 
but Henry knew that so mutinous a people as the Fle- 
mings would not long bear, in compliance with the 



HENRY VII. 529 

humours of their prince, to be deprived of the beneficial CHAP. 
branch of commerce which they carried on with England. xxv 

He had it in his power to inflict more effectual punish- ^^oT" 
ment on his domestic enemies ; and when his projects 
were sufficiently matured, he failed not to make them 
feel the effects of his resentment. Almost in the same 
instant he arrested Fitzwater, Mountfort, and Thwaites, 
together with William Daubeney, Robert Ratcliffe, Tho- 
mas Cressenor, and Thomas Astwood. All these were 
arraigned, convicted,, and condemned for high treason, in 
adhering and promising aid to Perkin. Mountfort, Rat- 
cliffe, and Daubeney, were immediately executed ; Fitz- 
water was sent over to Calais, and detained in custody ; 
but being detected in practising on his keeper for an 
escape, he soon after underwent the same fate. The 
rest were pardoned, together with William Worseley, 
Dean of St. Paul's, and some others, who had been ac- 
cused and examined, but not brought to public trial . 

Greater and more solemn preparations were deemed 
requisite for the trial of Stanley, lord chamberlain, whose 
authority in the nation, whose domestic connexions with 
the king, as well as his former services, seemed to secure 
him against any accusation or punishment. Clifford was 
directed to come over privately to England, and to throw 
himself at the king's feet while he sat in council ; craving 
pardon for past offences, and offering to atone for them 
by any services which should be required of him. Henry 
then told him, that the best proof he could give of peni- 
tence, and the only service he could now render him, was 
the full confession of his guilt, and the discovery of all 
his accomplices, however distinguished by rank or charac- 
ter. Encouraged by this exhortation, Clifford accused 
Stanley, then present, as his chief abettor ; and offered to 
lay before the council the full proof of his guilt. Stanley 
himself could not discover more surprise than was affect- 
ed by Henry on the occasion. He received the intelli- 
gence as absolutely false and incredible : that a man to 
w r hom he was in a great measure beholden for his erown, 
and even for his life ; a man to whom, by every honour 
and favour, he had endeavoured to express his gratitude ; 
whose brother, the Earl of Derby, was his own father- 

Polydore Vergil, p. 592. 
VOL. II. 45 



530 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

t CHAP, in-law ; to whom he had even committed the trust of his 
ijrc^v person, by creating him lord chamberlain ; that this man, 
1494 enjoying his full confidence and affection, not actuated 
by any motive of discontent or apprehension, should en- 
gage in a conspiracy against him. Clifford was, there- 
fore, exhorted to weigh well the consequences of his 
accusation; but as he persisted in the same positive 
asseverations, Stanley was committed to custody, and 
was soon after examined before the council p . He de- 
nied not the guilt imputed to him by Clifford ; he did 
not even endeavour much to extenuate it ; whether he 
thought that a frank and open confession would serve 
as an atonement, or trusted to his present connexions 
Trial and and his former services for pardon and security. But 
of Stanley. P rmces are often apt to regard great services as a 
ground of jealousy, especially if accompanied with a 
craving and restless disposition in the person who has 
performed them. The general discontent also, and 
mutinous humour of the people, seemed to require 
some great example of severity. And as Stanley was 
one of the most opulent subjects in the kingdom, 
being possessed of above three thousand pounds a year 
1495. j n i anc i ? anc l forty thousand marks in plate and money, 
besides other property of great value, the prospect of so 
rich a forfeiture was deemed no small motive for Henry's 
i5th Feb. proceeding to extremities against him. After six weeks' 
delay, which was interposed in order to show that the 
king was restrained by doubts and scruples ; the prisoner 
was brought to his trial, condemned, and presently after 
beheaded. Historians are not agreed with regard to the 
crime which was proved against him. The general re- 
port is, that he should have said in confidence to Clifford, 
that if he were sure the young man, who appeared in 
Flanders, was really son to King Edward, he never would 
bear arms against him. The sentiment might disgust 
Henry, as implying a preference of the house of York 
to that of Lancaster ; but could scarcely be the ground, 
even in those arbitrary times, of a sentence of high trea- 
son against Stanley. It is more probable, therefore, as 
is asserted by some historians, that he had expressly 

P Bacon, p. 611. Polyd. Verg. p. 593. 



HENRY VII. 531 

engaged to assist Perkin, and had actually sent him some CHAP. 
supply of money. 

The fate of Stanley made great impression on the v "^^ 
kingdom, and struck all the partisans of Perkin with 
the deepest dismay. From Clifford's desertion they 
found that all their secrets were betrayed ; and as it 
appeared that Stanley, while he seemed to live in the 
greatest confidence with the king, had been continually 
surrounded by spies, who reported and registered every 
action in which he was engaged, nay, every word which 
fell from him, a general distrust took place, and all 
mutual confidence w r as destroyed, even among intimate 
friends and acquaintance. The jealous and severe temper 
of the king, together with his great reputation for 
sagacity and penetration, kept men in awe, and quelled 
not only the movements of sedition, but the very mur- 
murs of faction. Libels, however, crept out against 
Henry's person and administration : and being greedily 
propagated by every secret art, showed that there still 
remained among the people a considerable root of dis- 
content, which wanted only a proper opportunity to dis- 
cover itself. 

But Henry continued more intent on increasing the 
terrors of his people, than on gaining their affections. 
Trusting to the great success which attended him in all 
his enterprises, he gave every day, more and more, a 
loose to his rapacious temper, and employed the arts of 
perverting law and justice in order to exact fines and 
compositions from his people. Sir William Capel, alder- 
man of London, was condemned on some penal statutes 
to pay the sum of two thousand seven hundred and forty- 
three pounds, and was obliged to compound for sixteen 
hundred and fifteen. This was the first noted case of 
the kind ; but it became a precedent, which prepared 
the way for many others. The management, indeed, of 
these arts of chicanery was the great secret of the king's 
administration. While he depressed the nobility, he 
exalted and honoured and caressed the lawyers ; and by 
that means both bestowed authority on the laws, and 
was enabled, whenever he pleased, to pervert them to 
his own advantage. His government was oppressive : 
but it was so much the less burdensome, as, by his ex- 



532 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, tending royal authority, and curbing the nobles, he be- 

^ came in reality the sole oppressor in his kingdom. 
1495 As Perkin found that the king's authority daily 
gained ground among the people, and that his own 
pretensions were becoming obsolete, he resolved to 
attempt something which might revive the hopes and 
expectations of his partisans. Having collected a band 
of outlaws, pirates, robbers, and necessitous persons of 
all nations, to the number of six hundred men, he put 
to sea, with a resolution of making a descent in England, 
and of exciting the common people to arms, since all his 
correspondence with the nobility was cut off by Henry's 
vigilance and severity. Information being brought him 
that the king had made a progress to the north, he cast 
anchor on the coast of Kent, and sent some of his re- 
tainers ashore, who invited the country to join him. 
The gentlemen of Kent assembled some troops to oppose 
him ; but they purposed to do more essential service 
than by repelling the invasion. They carried the sem- 
blance of friendship to Perkin, and invited him to come 
himself ashore, in order to take the command over them. 
But the wary youth, observing that they had more 
order and regularity in their movements than could be 
supposed in new levied forces who had taken arms against 
established authority, refused to intrust himself in their 
hands ; and the Kentish troops, despairing of success in 
their stratagem, fell upon such of his retainers as were 
already landed ; and besides some whom they slew, they 
took a hundred and fifty prisoners. These were tried 
and condemned ; and all of them executed by orders 
from the king, who was resolved to use no lenity towards 
men of such desperate fortunes' 1 . 

APariia- This year a Parliament was summoned in England, 
and another in Ireland ; and some remarkable laws were 
passed in both countries. The English Parliament 
enacted, that no person who should by arms or other- 
wise assist the king for the time being, should ever 
afterwards, either by course of law or act of Parliament, 
be attainted for such an instance of obedience. This 
statute might be exposed to some censure, as favourable 
to usurpers, were there any precise rule which always, 

<i Polydore Verg. p. 595. 



HENRY VII. 533 

even during the most factious times, could determine CHAP. 
the true successor, and render every one inexcusable 
who did not submit to him. But as the titles of princes ^~^7" 
are then the great subject of dispute, and each party 
pleads topics in its own favour, it seems but equitable 
to secure those who act in support of public tranquillity, 
an object at all times of undoubted benefit and import- 
ance. Henry, conscious of his disputed title, promoted 
this law, in order to secure his partisans against all 
events ; but as he had himself observed a contrary prac- 
tice with regard to Richard's adherents, he had reason to 
apprehend, that during the violence which usually ensues 
on public convulsions, his example, rather than his law, 
would, in case of a new revolution, be followed by his 
enemies. And the attempt to bind the legislature 
itself, by prescribing rules to future Parliaments, was 
contradictory to the plainest principles of political gov- 
ernment. 

This Parliament also passed an act, empowering the 
king to levy, by course of law, all the sums which any 
person had agreed to pay by way of benevolence; a 
statute by which that arbitrary method of taxation was 
indirectly authorized and justified. 

The king's authority appeared equally prevalent and 
uncontrolled in Ireland. Sir Edward Poynings had 
been sent over to that country, with an intention of 
quelling the partisans of the house of York, and of 
reducing the natives to subjection. He was not sup- 
ported by forces sufficient for that enterprise : the Irish, 
by flying into their woods, morasses, and mountains, for 
some time eluded his efforts : but Poynings summoned 
a Parliament at Dublin, where he was more successful. 
He passed that memorable statute which still bears his 
name, and which establishes the authority of the English 
government in Ireland. By this statute, all the former 
laws of England were made to be of force in Ireland ; 
and no bill can be introduced into the Irish Parliament, 
unless it previously receive the sanction of the council 
of England. This latter clause seems calculated for 
ensuring the dominion of the English : but was really 
granted at the desire of the Irish Commons, who intended 
by that means to secure themselves from the tyranny of 

45* 



534 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, their lords, particularly of such lieutenants or deputies 

as were of Irish birth r . 

^^*~ While Henry's authority was thus established through- 
out his dominions, and general tranquillity prevailed, 
the whole continent was thrown into combustion by the 
French invasion of Italy, and by the rapid success which 
attended Charles in that rash and ill-concerted enter- 
prise. The Italians, who had entirely lost the use of 
arms, and who, in the midst of continual wars, had be- 
come every day more unwarlike, were astonished to meet 
an enemy that made the field of battle not a pompous 
tournament, but a scene of blood, and sought, at the 
hazard of their own lives, the death of their enemy. 
Their effeminate troops were dispersed every where on 
the approach of the French army. Their best fortified 
cities opened their gates : kingdoms and states were in 
an instant overturned : and through the whole length of 
Italy, which the Fj^ench penetrated without resistance, 
they seemed rather to be taking quarters in their own 
country, than making conquests over an enemy. The 
maxims which the Italians, during that age, followed in 
negotiations, were as ill calculated to support their states, 
as the habits to which they were addicted in war : a 
treacherous, deceitful, and inconsistent system of politics 
prevailed: and even those small remains of fidelity and 
honour, which were preserved in the councils of the 
other European princes, were ridiculed in Italy as proofs 
of ignorance and rusticity. Ludovico, Duke of Milan, 
who invited the French to invade Naples, had never de- 
sired or expected their success, and was the first that 
felt terror from the prosperous issue of those projects 
which he himself had concerted. By his intrigues a 
league was formed among several potentates to oppose 
the progress of Charles's conquests, and secure their own 
independency. This league was composed of Ludovico 
himself, the pope, Maximilian, King of the Komans, 
Ferdinand of Spain, and the republic of Venice. Henry 
too entered into the confederacy ; but was not put to any 
expense or trouble in consequence of his engagements. 
The King of France, terrified by so powerful a combi- 
nation, retired from Naples with the greater part of his 

r Sir John Davis, p. 235. 



HENRY VH. 535 

army, and returned to France. The forces which he CHAP. 
left in his new conquest were, partly by the revolt of the xxv> 
inhabitants, partly by the inyasion of the Spaniards, soon 
after subdued ; and the whole kingdom of Naples sud- 
denly returned to its allegiance under Ferdinand, son 
to Alphonso, who had been suddenly expelled by the 
irruption of the French. Ferdinand died soon after, and 
left his uncle, Frederic, in full possession of the throne. 



536 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



CHAPTEK XXVI. 

PERKIN RETIRES TO SCOTLAND. INSURRECTION IN THE WEST. BATTLE OF 
BLACKHEATH. TRUCE WITH SCOTLAND. PERKIN TAKEN PRISONER. 
PERKIN EXECUTED. THE EARL OF WARWICK EXECUTED. MARRIAGE OF 
PRINCE ARTHUR WITH CATHERINE OF ARRAGON. His DEATH. MARRIAGE 
OF THE PRINCESS MARGARET WITH THE KING OF SCOTLAND. OPPRESSIONS 
OF THE PEOPLE. A PARLIAMENT. ARRIVAL OF THE KING OF CASTILE. 
INTRIGUES OF THE EARL OF SUFFOLK. SICKNESS OF THE KING. His 
DEATH AND CHARACTER. His LAWS. 

CHAP. AFTER Perkin was repulsed from the coast of Kent, he 
v^^^v retired into Flanders; but as he found it impossible to 
1495. procure subsistence for himself and his followers while 
he remained in tranquillity, he soon after made an at- 
tempt upon Ireland, which had always appeared forward 
to join every invader of Henry's authority. But 
Poynings had now put the affairs of that island into so 
good a posture, that Perkin met with little success ; and 
being tired of the savage life which he was obliged to 
lead while skulking among the wild Irish, he bent his 
Perkin course towards Scotland, and presented himself to James 
{Scotland. TV-y wno then governed that kingdom. He had been 
previously recommended to this prince by the King 
of France, who was disgusted at Henry for entering 
into the general league against him ; and this recom- 
mendation was even seconded by Maximilian, who, 
though one of the confederates, was also displeased with 
the king on account of his prohibiting in England all 
commerce with the Low Countries. The countenance 
given to Perkin by these princes, procured him a favour- 
able reception with the King of Scotland, who assured 
him, that, whatever he were, he never should repent put- 
ting himself into his hands a . The insinuating address and 
plausible behaviour of the youth himself seem to have 
gained him credit and authority. James, whom years 
had not yet taught distrust or caution, was seduced to 
believe the story of Perkin's birth and adventures ; and 
he carried his confidence so far, as to give him in niar- 

* Bacon, p. 615. Polyd. Verg. p. 596, 597. 



HENRY VII. 537 

riage the Lady Catherine Gordon, daughter of the Earl CHAP. 
of Huntley, and related to himself; a young lady, too, XXVL 
eminent for virtue as well as beauty. """uotT" 

There subsisted at that time a great jealousy between 
the courts of England and Scotland; and James was 
probably the more forward, on that account, to adopt 
any fiction which he thought might reduce his enemy 
to distress or difficulty. He suddenly resolved to make 
an inroad into England, attended by some of the bor- 
derers ; and he carried Perkin along with him, in hopes 
that the appearance of the pretended prince might raise 
an insurrection in the northern counties. Perkin him- 
self dispersed a manifesto, in which he set forth his own 
story, and craved the assistance of all his subjects in 
expelling the usurper, whose tyranny and maladminis- 
tration, whose depression of the nobility by the elevation 
of mean persons, whose oppression of the people by mul- 
tiplied impositions and vexations, had justly, he said, 
rendered him odious to all men. But Perkin's preten- 
sions, attended with repeated disappointments, were now 
become stale in the eyes even of the populace ; and the 
hostile dispositions which subsisted between the kingdoms 
rendered a prince, supported by the Scots, but an un- 
welcome present to the English nation. The ravages 
also committed by the borderers, accustomed to licence 
and disorder, struck a terror into all men ; and made the 
people prepare rather for repelling the invaders than for 
joining them. Perkin, that he might support his pre- 
tensions to royal birth, feigned great compassion for the 
misery of his plundered subjects ; and publicly remon- 
strated with his ally against the depredations exercised 
by the Scottish army b ; but James told him, that he 
doubted his concern was employed only in behalf of an 
enemy, and that he was anxious to preserve what never 
should belong to him. That prince now began to per- 
ceive that his attempt would be fruitless ; and hearing 
of an army which was on its march to attack him, he 
thought proper to retreat into his own country. 

The king discovered little anxiety to procure either 
reparation or vengeance for this insult committed on 
him by the Scottish nation: his chief concern was to 

*> Polydore Verg. p. 598. 



538 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, draw advantage from it, by the pretence which it might 
J^^ afford him to levy impositions on his own subjects. He 
1496 summoned a Parliament, to whom he made bitter com- 
plaints against the irruption of the Scots, the absurd 
imposture countenanced by that nation, the cruel devas- 
tations committed in the northern counties, and the 
multiplied insults thus offered both to the king and the 
kingdom of England. The Parliament made the ex- 
pected return to this discourse, by granting a subsidy to 
the amount of one hundred and twenty thousand pounds, 
together with two-fifteenths. After making this grant, 
they were dismissed. 

1497. The vote of Parliament for imposing the tax was with- 
out much difficulty procured by the authority of Henry ; 
but he found it not so easy to levy the money upon his 
subjects. The people, who were acquainted with the 
immense treasures which he had amassed, could ill brook 
the new impositions raised on every slight occasion ; and 
it is probable that the flaw, which was universally known 
to be in his title, made his reign the more subject to 
insurrec- insurrections and rebellions. When the subsidy began 
west" 1 1 ie to be levied in Cornwall, the inhabitants, numerous and 
poor, robust and courageous, murmured against a tax 
occasioned by a sudden inroad of the Scots, from which 
they esteemed themselves entirely secure, and which had 
usually been repelled by the force of the northern coun- 
ties. Their ill-humour was farther excited by one 
Michael Joseph, a farrier of Bodmin, a notable prating 
fellow, who, by thrusting himself forward on every occa- 
sion, and being loudest in every complaint against the 
government, had acquired an authority among those 
rude people. Thomas Flammoc, too, a lawyer, who had 
become the oracle of the neighbourhood, encouraged 
the sedition, by informing them that the tax, though 
imposed by Parliament, was entirely illegal; that the 
northern nobility were bound, by their tenures, to de- 
fend the nation against the Scots ; and that, if these new 
impositions were tamely submitted to, the avarice of 
Henry and of his ministers would soon render the burden 
intolerable to the nation. The Cornish, he said, must de- 
liver to the king a petition, seconded by such a force as 
would give it authority ; and in order to procure the con- 



HENRY VII. 539 

currence of the rest of the kingdom, care must be taken, CHAP. 
by their orderly deportment, to show that they had 
nothing in view but the public good, and the redress of ^^*~ 
all those grievances under which the people had so long 
laboured. 

Encouraged by these speeches, the multitude flocked 
together, and armed themselves with axes, bills, bows, 
and such weapons as country people are usually possessed 
of. Flammoc and Joseph were chosen their leaders. 
They soon conducted the Cornish through the county of 
Devon, and reached that of Somerset. At Taunton, the 
rebels killed, in their fury, an officious and eager com- 
missioner of the subsidy, whom they called the Provost 
of Perm. When they reached Wells, they were joined 
by Lord Audley, a nobleman of an ancient family, popu- 
lar in his deportment, but vain, ambitious, and restless 
in his temper. He had from the beginning maintained 
a secret correspondence with the first movers of the in- 
surrection ; and was now joyfully received by them as 
their leader. Proud of the countenance given them by 
so considerable a nobleman, they continued their march, 
breathing destruction to the king's ministers and fa- 
vourites, particularly to Morton, now a cardinal, and 
Sir Reginald Bray, who were deemed the most active 
instruments in all his oppressions. Notwithstanding their 
rage against the administration, they carefully followed 
the directions given them by their leaders ; and as they 
met with no resistance, they committed, during their 
march, no violence or disorder. 

The rebels had been told by Flammoc, that the in- 
habitants of Kent, as they had ever, during all ages, re- 
mained unsubdued, and had even maintained their inde- 
pendence during the Norman conquest, would surely 
embrace their party, and declare themselves for a cause 
which was no other than that of public good and gene- 
ral liberty. But the Kentish people had very lately 
distinguished themselves by repelling Perkin's invasion ; 
and as they had received from the king many gracious 
acknowledgments for this service, their affections were, 
by that means, much conciliated to his government. It 
was easy, therefore, for the Earl of Kent, Lord Aberga- 
venny, and Lord Cobham, who possessed great authority 



540 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, in those parts, to retain the people in obedience ; and 

^ ^ the Cornish rebels, though they pitched their camp near 

U97 Eltharn, at the very gates of London, and invited all 

the people to join them, got reinforcement from no 

quarter. There wanted not discontents every where, 

but no one would take part in so rash and ill-concerted 

an enterprise ; and besides, the situation in which the 

king's affairs then stood, discouraged even the boldest 

and most daring. 

Henry, in order to oppose the Scots, had already 
levied an army, which he put under the command of 
Lord Daubeney, the chamberlain; and as soon as he 
heard of the Cornish insurrection, he ordered it to march 
southwards, and suppress the rebels. Not to leave the 
northern frontier defenceless, he despatched thither the 
Earl of Surrey, who assembled the forces on the borders, 
and made head against the enemy. Henry found here 
the concurrence of the three most fatal incidents that 
can befal a monarchy; a foreign enemy, a domestic 
rebellion, and a pretender to his crown ; but he enjoyed 
great resources in his army and treasure ; and still more 
in the intrepidity and courage of his own temper. He 
did not, however, immediately give full scope to his 
military spirit. On other occasions, he had always 
hastened to a decision ; and it was a usual saying with 
him, that lie desired hit to see his rebels: but as the 
Cornish mutineers behaved in an inoffensive manner, 
and committed no spoil on the country; as they re- 
ceived no accession of force on their march or in their 
encampment; and as such hasty and popular tumults 
might be expected to diminish every moment by delay ; 
he took post in London, and assiduously prepared the 
means of ensuring victory. 

IS f After all his forces were collected, he divided them 
heath. into three bodies, and inarched out to assail the enemy. 
The first body, commanded by the Earl of Oxford, and 
under him by the Earls of Essex and Suffolk, were ap- 
pointed to place themselves behind the hill on which the 
rebels were encamped : the second, and most considerable, 
Henry put under the command of Lord Daubeney, and 
ordered him to attack the enemy in front, and bring on 
the action. The third, he kept as a body of reserve 



HENRY VII. 541 

about his own person, and took post in St. George's CHAP. 
fields ; where he secured the city, and could easily, as ^ 
occasion served, either restore the fight or finish the \^T~ 
victory. To put the enemy off their guard, he had spread 224 June. 
a report that he was not to attack them till some days 
after ; and the better to confirm them in this opinion, he 
began not the action till near the evening. Daubeney 
beat a detachment of the rebels from Deptford bridge ; 
and before the main body could be in order to receive 
him, he had gained the ascent of the hill, and placed 
himself in array before them. They were formidable 
from their numbers, being sixteen thousand strong, and 
were not defective in valour ; but being tumultuary 
troops, ill armed, and not provided with cavalry or ar- 
tillery, they were but an unequal match for the king's 
forces. Daubeney began the attack with courage, and 
even with a contempt for the enemy, which had almost 
proved fatal to him. He rushed into the midst of them, 
and was taken prisoner ; but soon after was released by 
his own troops. After some resistance, the rebels were 
broken and put to flight . Lord Audley, Flammoc, and 
Joseph, their leaders, were taken, and all three executed. 
The latter seemed even to exult in his end, and boasted 
with a preposterous ambition, that he should make a 
figure in history. The rebels, being surrounded on every 
side by the king's troops, were almost all made prisoners, 
and immediately dismissed without farther punishment : 
whether that Henry was satisfied with the victims who 
had fallen in the field, and who amounted to near two 
thousand, or that he pitied the ignorance and simplicity 
of the multitude, or favoured them on account of their 
inoffensive behaviour, or was pleased that they had 
never, during their insurrection, disputed his title, and 
had shown no attachment to the- house of York, the 
highest crime of which, in his eyes, they could have been 
guilty. 

The Scottish king was not idle during these commo- 
tions in England. He levied a considerable army, and 
sat down before the castle of Norham, in Northumber- 
land ; but found that place, by the precaution of Fox, 
Bishop of Durham, so well provided, both with men and 

c Polydore Vergil, p. 601. 

VOL. ii. 46 



542 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ammunition, that he made little or no progress in the 
vj? .L, siege. Hearing that the Earl of Surrey had collected 
1497 some forces, and was advancing upon him, he retreated 
into his own country, and left the frontiers exposed to 
the inroads of the English general, who besieged and 
took Aiton, a small castle lying a few miles beyond Ber- 
wick. These unsuccessful or frivolous attempts on both 
sides, prognosticated a speedy end to the war ; and 
Henry, notwithstanding his superior force, was no less 
desirous than James of terminating the differences be- 
tween the nations. Not to depart, however, from his 
dignity, by making the first advances, he employed in 
this friendly office Peter Hialas, a man of address and 
learning, who had come to him as ambassador from Fer- 
dinand and Isabella, and who was charged with a com- 
mission of negotiating the marriage of the Infanta Ca- 
therine, their daughter, with Arthur, Prince of Wales d . 

Hialas took a journey northwards, and offered his 
mediation between James and Henry, as minister of a 
prince who was in alliance with both potentates. Com- 
missioners were soon appointed to meet, and confer on 
terms of accommodation. The first demand of the 
English was, that Perkin should be put into their hands. 
James replied, that he himself was no judge of the young 
man's pretensions, but having received him as a suppli- 
cant, and promised him protection, he was determined 
not to betray a man who had trusted to his good faith 
and his generosity. The next demand of the English 
met with no better reception : they required reparation 
for the ravages committed by the late inroads into Eng- 
land : the Scottish commissioners replied, that the spoils 
were like water spilt upon the ground, which could 
never be recovered, and that Henry's subjects were better 
able to bear the loss, than their master to repair it. 
Henry's commissioners next proposed, that the two kings 
should have an interview at Newcastle, in order to 
adjust all differences ; but James said, that he meant to 
Truce with treat of a peace, not to go a begging for it. Lest the 
Scotland. con f erenees should break off altogether without effect, a 
truce was concluded for some months ; and James, per- 
ceiving that while Perkin remained in Scotland, he him- 

* Polydore Vergil, p. 603. 



HENRY VII. 543 

self never should enjoy a solid peace with Henry, pri- CHAP. 
vately desired him to depart the kingdom. xxvi. 

Access was now barred Perkin into the Low Countries, \27~ 
his usual retreat in all his disappointments. The Fle- 
mish merchants, who severely felt the loss resulting from 
the interruption of commerce with England, had made 
such interest in the archduke's council, that commis- 
sioners were sent to London in order to treat of an ac- 
commodation. The Flemish court agreed, that all Eng- 
lish rebels should 'be excluded the Low Countries; and, 
in this prohibition, the demesnes of the duchess-dowager 
were expressly comprehended. When this principal 
article was agreed to, all the other terms were easily 
adjusted. A treaty of commerce was finished, which 
was favourable to the Flemings, and to which they long 
gave the appellation of Intercursus magnus, the great 
treaty. And when the English merchants returned to 
their usual abode at Antwerp, they were publicly re- 
ceived, as in procession, with joy and festivity. 

Perkin was a Fleming by descent, though born in 
England ; and it might, therefore, be doubted whether 
he were included in the treaty between the two nations : 
but as he must dismiss all his English retainers, if he 
took shelter in the Low Countries, and as he was sure 
of a cold reception, if not bad usage, among people who 
were determined to keep on terms of friendship with the 
court of England, he thought fit rather to hide himself, 
during some time, in the wilds and fastnesses of Ireland. 
Impatient, however, of a retreat which was both disagree- 
able and dangerous, he held consultations with his fol- 
lowers, Herne, Skelton, and Astley, three broken trades- 
men : by their advice, he resolved to try the affections of 
the Cornish, whose mutinous disposition, notwithstand- 
ing the king's lenity, still subsisted after the suppression 
of their rebellion. No sooner did he appear at Bodmin 
in Cornwall, than the populace, to the number of three 
thousand, flocked to his standard ; and Perkin, elated 
with this appearance of success, took on him, for the 
first time, the appellation of Richard IV., King of Eng- 
land. Not to suffer the expectations of his followers to 
languish, he presented himself before Exeter ; and, by 
many fair promises, invited that city to join him. Find- 



544 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, ing that the inhabitants shut their gates against him, he 
J^I^, laid siege to the place ; but being unprovided with artil- 
1497. l er y> ammunition, and every thing requisite for the at- 
tempt, he made no progress in his undertaking. Messen- 
gers were sent to the king, informing him of this insur- 
rection : the citizens of Exeter, meanwhile, were deter- 
mined to hold out to the last extremity, in expectation 
of receiving succour from the well-known vigilance of 
that monarch. 

When Henry was informed that Perkin was landed 
in England, he expressed great joy, and prepared himself 
with alacrity to attack him, in hopes of being able, at 
length, to put a period to pretensions which had so long 
given him vexation and inquietude. All the courtiers, 
sensible that their activity on this occasion would be the 
most acceptable service which they could render the 
king, displayed their zeal for the enterprise, and for- 
warded his preparations. The Lords Daubeney and 
Broke, with Sir Bice ap-Thomas, hastened forward with 
a small body of troops to the relief of Exeter. The 
Earl of Devonshire, and the most considerable gentlemen 
in the county of that name, took arms of their own 
accord, and marched to join the king's generals. The 
Duke of Buckingham put himself at the head of a troop, 
consisting of young noblemen and gentry, who served as 
volunteers, and who longed for an opportunity of dis- 
playing their courage and their loyalty. The king him- 
self prepared to follow with a considerable army ; and 
thus all England seemed united against a pretender, 
who had at first engaged their attention, and divided 
their affections. 

Perkin, informed of these great preparations, imme- 
diately raised the siege of Exeter, and retired to Taunton. 
Though his followers now amounted to the number of 
near seven thousand, and seemed still resolute to main- 
tain his cause, he himself despaired of success, and 
secretly withdrew to the sanctuary of Beaulieu, in the 
New Forest. The Cornish rebels submitted to the 
king's mercy, and found that it was not yet exhausted 
in their behalf. Except a few persons of desperate for- 
tunes, who were executed, and some others who were 
severely fined, all the rest were dismissed with impunity. 



HENRY VII. 545 

Lady Catherine Gordon, wife to Perkin, fell into the CHAP. 
hands of the victor, and was treated with a generosity XXVL 
which does him honour. He soothed her mind with \^ 98 
many marks of regard, placed her in a respectable station 
about the queen, and assigned her a pension, which she 
enjoyed even under his successor. 

Henry deliberated what course to take with Perkin 
himself. Some counselled him to make the privileges of 
the church yield to reasons of state, to take him by vio- 
lence from the sanctuary, to inflict on him the punish- 
ment due to his temerity, and thus at once put an end 
to an imposture, which had long disturbed the govern- 
ment, and which the credulity of the people, and the 
artifices of malecontents, were still capable of reviving. 
But the king deemed not the matter of such importance 
as to merit so violent a remedy. He employed some 
persons to deal with Perkin and persuade him, under 
promise of pardon, to deliver himself into the king's 
hands 6 . The king conducted him, in a species of mock 
triumph, to London. As Perkin passed along the road, soner. 
and through the streets of the city, men of all ranks 
flocked about him, and the populace treated with the 
highest derision his fallen fortunes. They seemed desi- 
rous of revenging themselves, by their insults, for the 
shame which their former belief of his impostures had 
thrown upon them. Though the eyes of the nation 
were generally opened with regard to Perkin's real 
parentage, Henry required of him a confession of his 
life and adventures ; and he ordered the account of the 
whole to be dispersed, soon after, for the satisfaction of 
the public. But, as his regard to decency made him en- 
tirely suppress the share which the Duchess of Bur- 
gundy had had in contriving arid conducting the impos- 
ture, the people, who knew that she had been the chief 
instrument in the whole affair, were inclined, on account 
of the silence on that head, to pay the less credit to the 
authenticity of the narrative. 

But Perkin, though his life was granted him, was still 
detained in custody; and keepers were appointed to 
guard him. Impatient of confinement, he broke from 
his keepers, and flying to the sanctuary of Shyne, put 

e Polydore Vergil, p. 606. 

46* 



546 



HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 



CHAP, himself into the hands of the prior of that monastery. 
VL The prior had obtained great credit by his character of 

~7499^ sanctity ; and he prevailed on the king again to grant a 
pardon to Perkin. But, in order to reduce him to still 
greater contempt, he was set in the stocks at Westmin- 
ster and Cheapside, and obliged, in both places, to read 
aloud to the people the confession which had formerly 
been published in his name. He was then confined to the 
Tower, where his habits of restless intrigue and enter- 
prise followed him. He insinuated himself into the inti- 
macy of four servants of Sir John Digby, lieutenant of 
the Tower; and by their means opened a correspond- 
ence with the Earl of Warwick, who was confined in the 
same prison. This unfortunate prince, who had, from 
his earliest youth, been shut up from the commerce of 
men, and who was ignorant even of the most common 
affairs of life, had fallen into a simplicity, which made 
him susceptible of any impression. The continued dread 
also of the more violent effects of Henry's tyranny, 
joined to the natural love of liberty, engaged him to 
embrace a project for, his escape, by the murder of the 
lieutenant; and Perkin offered to conduct the whole 
enterprise. The conspiracy escaped not the king's vigi- 
lance : it was even very generally believed, that the 
scheme had been laid by himself, in order to draw War- 
wick and Perkin into the snare : but the subsequent exe- 
cution of two of Digby's servants for the contrivance 
seems to clear the king of that imputation, which was 
indeed founded more on the general idea entertained of 
his character, than on any positive evidence. 

Perkin, by this new attempt, after so many enormities, 
had rendered himself totally unworthy of mercy ; and he 
was accordingly arraigned, condemned, and soon after 
hanged at Tyburn, persisting still in the confession of his 
imposture f . It happened, about that very time, that one 
Wilford, a cordwainer's son, encouraged by the surprising 
credit given to other impostures, had undertaken to per- 
sonate the Earl of Warwick ; and a priest had even ven- 
tured from the pulpit to recommend his. cause to the 
people, who seemed still to retain a propensity to adopt 
it. This incident served Henry as a pretence for his 

f See note [X], at the end of the volume. 



Perkin 
executed. 



HENRY VII. 547 

severity towards that prince. He was brought to trial CHAP. 
and accused, not of contriving his escape, (for as he was 
committed for no crime, the desire of liberty must 
been regarded as natural and innocent,) but of forming 
designs to disturb the government, and raise an insurrec- 
tion among the people. Warwick confessed the .indict- The Earl 
ment, was condemned, and the sentence was executed widlexe- 
upon him. cuted^ 

This violent act of tyranny, the great blemish of 
Henry's reign, by which he destroyed the last remaining 
male of the line of Plantagenet, begat great discontent 
among the people, who saw an unhappy prince, that had 
long been denied all the privileges of his high birth, even 
been cut off from the common benefits of nature, now at 
last deprived of life itself, merely for attempting to shake 
off that oppression under which he laboured. In vain did 
Henry endeavour to alleviate the odium of this guilt, by 
sharing it with his ally, Ferdinand of Arragon, who, he 
said, had scrupled to give his daughter Catherine in mar- 
riage to Arthur, while any male descendant of the house 
of York remained. Men, on the contrary, felt higher 
indignation at seeing a young prince sacrificed, not to 
law and justice, but to the jealous politics of two subtle 
and crafty tyrants. 

But, though these discontents festered in the minds 
of men, they were so checked by Henry's watchful policy 
and steady severity, that they seemed not to weaken his 
government; and foreign princes, deeming his throne 
now entirely secure, paid him rather the greater deference 
and attention. The Archduke Philip, in particular, de- 
sired an interview with him ; and Henry, who had passed 
over to Calais, agreed to meet him in St. Peter's church, 
near that city. The archduke, on his approaching the 
king, made haste to alight, and offered to hold Henry's 
stirrup ; a mark of condescension which that prince would 
not admit of. He called the king, father, patron, pro- 
tector ; and, by his whole behaviour, expressed a strong 
desire of conciliating the friendship of England. The 
Duke of Orleans had succeeded to the crown of France, 
by the appellation of Lewis XII, and having carried his 
arms into Italy, and subdued the duchy of Milan, his 
progress begat jealousy in Maximilian, Philip's father, as 



548 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, well as in Ferdinand, his father-in-law. By the counsel, 

~VV~\7"r / / 

' therefore, of these monarchs, the young prince endea- 
H99. voured by every art to acquire the amity of Henry, whom 
they regarded as the chief counterpoise to the greatness 
of France. No particular plan, however, of alliance 
seems to have been concerted between these two princes 
in their interview : all passed in general professions of 
affection and regard; at least in remote projects of a 
closer union, by the future intermarriages of their chil- 
dren, who were then in a state of infancy. 
1500. The pope, too, Alexander VI., neglected not the friend- 
ship of a monarch, whose reputation was spread over 
Europe. He sent a nuncio into England, who exhorted 
the king to take part in the great alliance projected for 
the recovery of the Holy Land, and to lead in person his 
forces against the infidels. The general frenzy for crusades 
was now entirely exhausted in Europe ; but it was still 
thought a necessary piece of decency to pretend zeal for 
those pious enterprises. Henry regretted to the nuncio 
the distance of his situation, which rendered it incon- 
venient for him to expose his person in defence of the 
Christian cause. He promised, however, his utmost 
assistance by aids and contributions ; and rather than the 
pope should go alone to the holy wars, unaccompanied 
by any monarch, he even promised to overlook all other 
considerations, and to attend him in person. He only 
required as a necessary condition, that all differences 
should previously be adjusted among Christian princes, 
and that some sea-port towns in Italy should be consigned 
to him for his retreat and security. It was easy to con- 
clude, that Henry had determined not to intermeddle in 
any way against the Turk, but as a great name, without 
any real assistance, is sometimes of service, the knights of 
Khodes, who were at that time esteemed the bulwark of 
Christendom, chose the king protector of their order. 

But the prince whose alliance Henry valued the most, 
was Ferdinand of Arragon, whose vigorous and steady 
policy, always attended with success, had rendered him 
in many respects the most considerable monarch in Eu- 
rope. There was also a remarkable similarity of character 
between these two princes : both were full of craft, in- 
trigue, and design ; and though a resemblance of this 



HENRY VII. 549 

nature be a slender foundation for confidence and amity, CHAP. 
where the interests of the parties in the least interfere, XXVL 
such was the situation of Henry and Ferdinand, that no 
jealousy ever on any occasion arose between them. The 
king had now the satisfaction of completing a marriage, 
which had been projected and negotiated during the A . rtlmr 
course of seven years, between Arthur, Prince of Wales, therinc of 
and the Infanta Catherine, fourth daughter of Ferdinand Ar go n - 

j. T- 1* 11 t. x ? 1 ' 1 j. 12th NoV ' 

and Isabella ; he near sixteen years of age, she eighteen. 
But this marriage proved in the issue unprosperous. The ^jj ^ 
young prince a few months after sickened and died, much His death, 
regretted by the nation. Henry, desirous to continue 
his alliance with Spain, and also unwilling to restore 
Catherine's dowry, which was two hundred thousand 
ducats, obliged his second son Henry, whom he created 
Prince of Wales, to be contracted to the infanta. The 
prince made all the opposition of which a youth of twelve 
years of age was capable ; but as the king persisted in 
his resolution, the espousals were at length, by means of 
the pope's dispensation, contracted between the parties : 
an event which was afterwards attended with the most 
important consequences. 

The same year another marriage was celebrated, which J^ age 
was also, in the next age, productive of great events : the Princess 
marriage of Margaret, the king's elder daughter, with^^ fc 
James, King of Scotland. This alliance had been nego-Kingof 
tiated during three years, though interrupted by several Scotland - 
broils ; and Henry hoped, from the completion of it, to 
remove all source of discord with that neighbouring 
kingdom, by whose animosity England had so often been 
infested. When this marriage was deliberated on in the 
English council, some objected that England might, by 
means of that alliance, fall under the dominion of Scot- 
land. " No," replied Henry, " Scotland in that event 
will only become an accession to England." Amidst 
these prosperous incidents the king met with a domestic 
calamity, which made not such impression on him as it 
merited : his queen died in childbed ; and the infant did 
not long survive her. This princess was deservedly a 
favourite of the nation ; and the general affection for 
her increased, on account of the harsh treatment which 
it was thought she met with from her consort. 



550 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. The situation of the king's affairs, both at home and 
^^J^ abroad, was now in every respect very fortunate. All 
1503 the efforts of the European princes, both in war and 
negotiation,, were turned to the side of Italy ; and the 
various events which there arose made Henry's alliance 
be courted by every party, yet interested him so little 
as never to touch him with concern or anxiety. His 
close connexions with Spain and Scotland ensured his 
tranquillity ; and his continued successes over domestic 
enemies, owing to the prudence and vigour of his con- 
duct, had reduced the people to entire submission and 
Oppres- obedience. Uncontrolled, therefore, by apprehension 
or opposition of any kind, he gave full scope to his 
natural propensity ; and avarice, which had ever been 
his ruling passion, being increased by age and encouraged 
by absolute authority, broke all restraints of shame or 
justice. He had found two ministers, Empson and 
Dudley, perfectly qualified to second his rapacious and 
tyrannical inclinations, and to prey upon his defenceless 
people. These instruments of oppression were both 
lawyers ; the first of mean birth, of brutal manners, of 
an unrelenting temper ; the second better born, better 
educated, and better bred, but equally unjust, severe, 
and inflexible. By their knowledge in law these men 
were qualified to pervert the forms of justice, to the op- 
pression of the innocent ; and the formidable authority 
of the king supported them in all their iniquities. 

It was their usual practice at first to observe so far 
the appearance of law as to give indictments to those 
whom they intended to oppress : upon which the per- 
sons were committed to prison, but never brought to 
trial, and were at length obliged, in order to recover 
their liberty, to pay heavy fines and ransoms, w r hich were 
called mitigations and compositions. By degrees the 
very appearance of law was neglected : the two ministers 
sent forth their precepts to attach men, and summon 
them before themselves and some others, at their private 
houses, in a court of commissionj where, in a summary 
manner, without trial or jury, arbitrary decrees were 
issued, both in pleas of the crown, and controversies 
between private parties. Juries themselves, when sum- 
moned, proved but small security to the subject ; being 



HENRY VII. 551 

browbeaten by these oppressors ; nay, fined, imprisoned, CHAP 
and punished, if they gave sentence against the inclina- XXVL 
tion of the ministers. The whole system of the feudal \^~ 
law, which still prevailed, was turned into a scheme of 
oppression. Even the king's wards, after they came of 
age, were not suffered to enter into possession of their 
lands without paying exorbitant fines. Men were also 
harassed 'with informations of intrusion upon scarce 
colourable titles. When an outlawry in a personal ac- 
tion was issued against any man, he was not allowed to 
purchase his charter of pardon, except on the payment 
of a great sum ; and if he refused the composition re- 
quired of him, the strict law, which, in such cases, allows 
forfeiture of goods, was rigorously insisted on. Nay, 
without any colour of law, the half of men's lands and 
rents were seized during two years as a penalty, in case 
of outlawry. But the chief means of oppression em- 
ployed by these ministers were the penal statutes, which, 
without consideration of rank, quality, or services, were 
rigidly put in execution against all men : spies, informers, 
and inquisitors, were rewarded and encouraged in every 
quarter of the kingdom ; and no difference was made 
whether the statute were beneficial or hurtful, recent 
or obsolete, possible or impossible to be executed. The 
sole end of the king and his ministers was to amass 
money, and bring every one under the lash of their 
authority g . 

Through the prevalence of such an arbitrary and ini- 
quitous administration, the English, it may safely be 
affirmed, were considerable losers by their ancient pri- 
vileges, which secured them from all taxations, except 
such as were imposed by their own consent in Parlia- 
ment. Had the king been empowered to levy general 
taxes at pleasure, he would naturally have abstained 
from these oppressive expedients, which destroyed all 
security in private property, and begat an universal dif- 
fidence throughout the nation. In vain did the people 
look for protection from the Parliament, which was 
pretty frequently summoned during this reign. That ^^j^ 
assembly was so overawed, that at this very time, during A Pariia- 
the greatest rage of Henry's oppressions, the Commons ment - 

g Bacon, p. 629, 630. Hollingshed, p. 504. Polyd. Verg. p. 613. 615. 



552 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, chose Dudley their speaker, the very man who was the 
^^ X J\ chief instrument of his iniquities. And though the king 

1504 was known to be immensely opulent, and had no pre- 
tence of wars or expensive enterprises of any kind, they 

1505. granted him the subsidy which he demanded. But so 
insatiable was his avarice, that next year he levied a new 
benevolence, and renewed that arbitrary and oppressive 
method of taxation. By all these arts of accumulation, 
joined to a rigid frugality in his expense, he so filled 
his coffers, that he is said to have possessed in ready 
money the sum of one million eight hundred thousand 
pounds : a treasure almost incredible, if we consider the 
scarcity of money in those times h . 

But while Henry was enriching himself by the spoils 
of his oppressed people, there happened an event abroad 
which engaged his attention, and was even the object of 
his anxiety and concern. Isabella, Queen of Castile, died 
about this time ; and it was foreseen, that by this inci- 
dent the fortunes of Ferdinand, her husband, would be 
much affected. The king was not only attentive to the 
fate of his ally, and watchful lest the general system of 
Europe should be affected by so important an event : he 
also considered the similarity of his own situation with 
that of Ferdinand, and regarded the issue of these trans- 
actions as a precedent for himself. Joan, the daughter 
of Ferdinand by Isabella, was married to the archduke 
Philip, and being, in right of her mother, heir of Castile, 
seemed entitled to dispute with Ferdinand the present 
possession of that kingdom. Henry knew that, notwith- 
standing his own pretensions by the house of Lancaster, 
the greater part of the nation was convinced of the supe- 
riority of his wife's title ; and he dreaded lest the Prince 
of Wales, who was daily advancing towards manhood, 
might be tempted by ambition to lay immediate claim 
to the crown. By his perpetual attention to depress the 
partisans of the York family, he had more closely united 
them into one party, and increased their desire of shaking 

h Silver was, during this reign, at thirty-seven shillings and sixpence a pound, 
which makes Henry's treasure near three millions of our present money. Besides, 
many commodities have become above thrice as dear, by the increase of gold and 
silver in Europe. And what is a circumstance of still greater weight, all other 
states were then very poor in comparison of what they are at present. These cir- 
cumstances make Henry's treasure appear very great, and may lead us to conceive 
the oppressions of his government. 



HENRY VII. 553 

off that yoke under which they had so long laboured, CIIAT*. 
and of taking every advantage which his oppressive go- XXVL 
vernment should give his enemies against him. And as^^~" 
he possessed no independent force, like Ferdinand, and 
governed a kingdom more turbulent and unruly, which 
he himself, by his narrow politics, had confirmed in fac- 
tious prejudices, he apprehended that his situation would 
prove in the issue still more precarious. 

Nothing at first could turn out more contrary to the 
king's wishes than the transactions in Spain. Ferdinand, 
as well as Henry, had become very unpopular, and from 
a like cause, his former exactions and impositions; and 
the states of Castile discovered an evident resolution 
of preferring the title of Philip and Joan. In order to 
take advantage of these favourable dispositions, the arch- 
duke, now King of Castile, attended by his consort, em- 
barked for Spain during the winter season ; but meeting 
with a violent tempest in the Channel, was obliged to 
take shelter in the harbour of Weymouth. Sir John Arrival of 
Trenchard, a gentleman of authority in the county 
Dorset, hearing of a fleet upon the coast, had assembled 
some forces, and being joined by Sir John Cary, who was 
also at the head of an armed body, he came to that town. 
Finding that Philip, in order to relieve his sickness and 
fatigue, was already come ashore, he invited him to his 
house ; and immediately despatched a messenger to in- 
form the court of this important incident. The king 
sent in all haste the Earl of Arundel to compliment 
Philip on his arrival in England, and to inform him, that 
he intended to pay him a visit in person, and to give him 
a suitable reception in his dominions. Philip knew that 
he could not now depart without the king's consent ; and 
therefore, for the sake of despatch, he resolved to anti- 
cipate his visit, and to have an interview with him at 
Windsor. Henry received him with all the magnificence 
possible, and with all seeming cordiality ; but he resolved, 
notwithstanding, to draw some advantage from this in- 
voluntary visit paid him by his royal guest. 

Edmond de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk, nephew to Edward 
IY. and brother to the Earl of Lincoln, slain in the battle O f Suffolk, 
of Stoke, had some years before killed a man in a sudden 
fit of passion, and had been obliged to apply to the king 

VOL. ii. 47 



554 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, for a remission of the crime. The king hacl granted his 
vj^^ request; but being little indulgent to all persons con- 
1506. nected with the house of York, he obliged him to ap- 
pear openly in court and plead his pardon. Suffolk more 
resenting the affront than grateful for the favour, had 
fled into Flanders, and taken shelter with his aunt, the 
Duchess of Burgundy: but being. promised forgiveness 
by the king, he returned to England, and obtained a new 
pardon. Actuated, however, by the natural inquietude 
of his temper, and uneasy from debts which he had con- 
tracted by his great expense at Prince Arthur's wedding, 
he again made an elopement into Flanders. The king, 
well acquainted with the general discontent which pre- 
vailed against his administration, neglected not this in- 
cident, which might become of importance ; and he 
employed his usual artifices to elude the efforts of his 
enemies. He directed Sir Kobert Curson, governor of 
the castle of Hammes, to desert his charge, and to in- 
sinuate himself into the confidence of Suffolk, by making 
him a tender of his services. Upon information secretly 
conveyed by Curson, the king seized William Courtney, 
eldest son to the Earl of Devonshire, and married to the 
Lady Catherine, sister of the queen ; William de la Pole, 
brother to the Earl of Suffolk ; Sir James Tyrrel ; and 
Sir James Windham, with some persons of inferior 
quality; and he committed them to custody. Lord 
Abergavenny and Sir Thomas Green were also appre- 
hended ; but were soon after released from their confine- 
ment. William de la Pole was long detained in prison ; 
Courtney was attainted, and though not executed, he 
recovered not his liberty during the king's lifetime. But 
Henry's chief severity fell upon Sir James Windham 
and Sir James Tyrrel, who were brought to their trial, 
condemned, and executed. The fate of the latter gave 
general satisfaction, on account of his participation in the 
murder of the }^oung princes, sons of Edward IV. Not- 
withstanding these discoveries and executions, Curson 
was still able to maintain his credit with the Earl of 
Suffolk : Henry, in order to remove all suspicion, had 
ordered him to be excommunicated, together with Suf- 
folk himself, for his pretended rebellion. But after that 
traitor had performed all the services expected from him, 



HENRY VII. 555 

he suddenly deserted the earl and came over to England, CHAP. 
where the king received him with unusual marks of 
favour and confidence. Suffolk, astonished at this in-^^^ 
stance of perfidy, finding that even the Duchess of Bur- 
gundy, tired with so many fruitless attempts, had become 
indifferent to his cause, fled secretly into France, thence 
into Germany, and at last returned into the Low Coun- 
tries ; where he was protected, though not countenanced, 
by Philip, then in close alliance with the king. 

Henry neglected not the present opportunity of com- 
plaining to his guest of the reception which Suffolk had 
met with in his dominions. " I really thought," replied 
the King of Castile, " that your greatness and felicity 
had set you far above apprehensions from any person of 
so little consequence : but, to give you satisfaction, I 
shall banish him my state." "I expect that you will 
carry your complaisance farther," said the king ; " I de- 
sire to have Suffolk put into my hands, where alone I 
can depend upon his submission and obedience." " That 
measure," said Philip, " will reflect dishonour upon you 
as well as myself. You will be thought to have treated 
me as a prisoner." "Then the matter is at an end," 
replied the king, " for I will take that dishonour upon 
me ; and so your honour is saved 1 ." The King of Cas- 1507. 
tile found himself under a necessity of complying ; but 
he first exacted Henry's promise that he would spare 
Suffolk's life. That nobleman was invited over to Eng- 
land by Philip ; as if the king would grant him a par- 
don, on the intercession of his friend and ally. Upon 
his appearance he was committed to the Tower ; and the 
King of Castile, having fully satisfied Henry, as well by 
this concession, as by signing a treaty of commerce 
between England and Castile, which was advantageous 
to the former kingdom k , was at last allowed to depart, 
after a stay of three months. He landed in Spain, was 
joyfully received by the Castilians, and put in possession 
of the throne. He died soon after ; and Joan, his 
widow, falling into deep melancholy, Ferdinand was 
again enabled to reinstate himself in authority, and to 
govern till the day of his death the whole Spanish 
monarchy. 

* Bacon, p. 633. k Kymer, vol. xiii. p. 142. 



556 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. The king survived these transactions two years : but 

"W"\7"T 

^^ ^ nothing memorable occurs in the remaining part of his 
1508. reign except his affiancing his second daughter, Mary, 
to the young archduke Charles, son of Philip of Castile. 
He entertained also some intentions of marriage for 
himself, first with the Queen-dowager of Naples, relict 
of Ferdinand; afterwards with the Duchess-dowager of 
Savoy, daughter of Maximilian, and sister of Philip. 

ofthekin ^ u ^ *^ e decline of his health put an end to all such 
'thoughts; and he began to cast his eye towards that 
future existence, which the iniquities and severities of 
his reign rendered a very dismal prospect to him. To 
allay the terrors under which he laboured, he endea- 
voured, by distributing alms and founding religious 
houses, to make atonement for his crimes, and to pur- 
chase, by the sacrifice of part of his ill-gotten treasures, 
a reconciliation with his offended Maker. Eemorse even 
seized him, at intervals, for the abuse of his authority by 
Empson and Dudley; but not sufficient to make him 
stop the rapacious hand of those oppressors. Sir Wil- 
liam Capel was again fined two thousand pounds, under 
some frivolous pretence, and was committed to the Tower 
for daring to murmur against the iniquity. Harris, an 
alderman of London, was indicted, and died of vexation 
before his trial came to an issue. Sir Laurence Ailmer, 
who had been mayor, and his two sheriffs, were con- 
demned in heavy fines, and sent to prison till they made 
payment. The king gave countenance to all these 
oppressions; till death, by its nearer approaches, im- 
pressed new terrors upon him ; and he then ordered, by 
a general clause in his will, that restitution should be 

His death mac ^ e ^ a ^ those whom he had injured. He died of a 

22d April, consumption, at his favourite palace of Richmond, after a 
reign of twenty-three years and eight months, and in the 
fifty-second year of his age 1 . 

racter ha ~ reign of Henry VII. was, in the main, fortunate 

for his people at home, and honourable abroad. He put 
an end to the civil wars with which the nation had long 
been harassed, he maintained peace and order in the 
state, he depressed the former exorbitant power of the 
nobility, and, together with the friendship of some 

1 Dugd. Baronage, II. p. 237. 



HENRY VII. 557 

foreign princes, he acquired the consideration and re- CHAP. 
gard of all. He loved peace without fearing war ; XXVL 
though agitated with continual suspicions of his servants ^309^ 
and ministers, he discovered no timidity, either in the 
conduct of his affairs, or in the day of battle ; and 
though often severe in his punishments, he was com- 
monly less actuated by revenge than by maxims of 
policy. The services which he rendered the people were 
derived from his views of private advantage, rather than 
the motives of public spirit ; and where he deviated 
from interested regards, it was unknown to himself, and 
ever from the malignant prejudices of faction, or the 
mean projects of avarice ; not from the sallies of passion, 
or allurements of pleasure ; still less from the benign 
motives of friendship and generosity. His capacity was 
excellent, but somewhat contracted by the narrowness 
of his heart ; he possessed insinuation and address, but 
never employed these talents except where some great 
point of interest was to be gained ; and while he neg- 
lected to conciliate the affections of his people, he often 
felt the danger of resting his authority on their fear and 
reverence alone. He was always extremely attentive to 
his affairs : but possessed not the faculty of seeing far 
into futurity, and was more expert at providing a remedy 
for his mistakes, than judicious in avoiding them. Ava- 
rice was, on the whole, his ruling passion m ; and he re- 
mains an instance, almost singular, of a man placed in a 
high station, and possessed of talents for great affairs, in 
whom that passion predominated above ambition. Even 
among private persons, avarice is commonly nothing but 
a species of ambition, and is chiefly incited by the pro- 
spect of that regard, distinction, and consideration, which 
attend on riches. 

The power of the kings of England had always been 
somewhat irregular or discretionary ; but was scarcely 
ever so absolute during any former reign, at least after 
the establishment of the great charter, as during that of 

m As a proof of Henry's attention to the smallest profits, Bacon tells us, that he 
had seen a book of accounts kept by Empson, and subscribed in almost every leaf 
by the king's own hand. Among other articles was the following : " Item, Re- 
ceived of such a one, five marks for a pardon, which if it do not pass, the money 
to be repayed, or the party otherwise satisfied." Opposite to the memorandum 
the king had writ with his own hand, " otherwise satisfied." Bacon, p. 630. 

47* 



558 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Henry. Besides the advantages derived from the per- 



character of the man, full of vigour, industry, and 
1509. severity, deliberate in all projects, steady in every pur- 
pose, and attended with caution as well as good fortune 
in every enterprise ; he came to the throne after long 
and bloody civil wars, which had destroyed all the great 
nobility, who alone could resist the encroachments of his 
authority : the people were tired with discord and intes- 
tine convulsions, and willing to submit to usurpations, 
and even to injuries, rather than plunge themselves 
anew into like miseries : the fruitless efforts made against 
him served always, as is usual, to confirm his authority. 
As he ruled by a faction, and the lesser faction, all those 
on whom he conferred offices, sensible that they owed 
every thing to his protection, were willing to support his 
power, though at the expense of justice and national 
privileges. These seem the chief causes, which at this 
time bestowed on the crown so considerable an addition 
of prerogative, and rendered the present reign a kind of 
epoch in the English constitution. 

This prince, though he exalted his prerogative above 
law, 1 is celebrated by his historian for many good laws, 
which he made be enacted for the government of his 
subjects. Several considerable regulations, indeed, are 
found among the statutes of this reign, both with regard 
to the police of the kingdom, and its commerce : but 
the former are generally contrived with much better 
His laws, judgment than the latter. The more simple ideas of 
order and equity are sufficient to guide a legislator in 
every thing that regards the internal administration of 
justice : but the principles of commerce are much more 
complicated, and require long experience and deep 
reflection to be well understood in any state. The real 
consequence of a law or practice is there often contrary 
to first appearances. No wonder that during the reign 
of Henry VII. these matters were frequently mistaken ; 
and it may safely be affirmed, that even in the age of 
Lord Bacon, very imperfect and erroneous ideas were 
formed on that subject. 

Early in Henry's reign, the authority of the star- 
chamber, which was before founded on common law 
and ancient practice, was, in some cases, confirmed by 



HENRY VII. 559 

act of Parliament 11 : Lord Bacon extols the utility of CHAP. 
this court ; but men began, even during the age of that XXVL 
historian, to feel that so arbitrary a jurisdiction was in- s- ]^ 
compatible with liberty ; and in proportion as the spirit 
of independence still rose higher in the nation, the aver- 
sion to it increased, till it was entirely abolished by act 
of Parliament in the reign of Charles I, a little before 
the commencement of the civil wars. 

Laws were passed in this reign, ordaining the king's 
suit for murder to be carried on within a year and a 
day . Formerly, it did not usually commence till after; 
and as the friends of the person murdered often, in the 
interval, compounded matters with the criminal, the 
crime frequently passed unpunished. Suits were given 
to the poor in forma pauperis, as it is called ; that is, 
without paying dues for the writs, or any fees to the 
counsel p : a good law at all times, especially in that age, 
when the people laboured under the oppression of the 
great ; but a law difficult to be carried into execution. 
A law was made against carrying off any woman by 
force q . The benefit of clergy was abridged 1 ; and the 
criminal, on the first offence, was ordered to be burned in 
the hand, with a letter denoting his crime ; after which he 
was punished capitally for any new offence. Sheriffs 
were no longer allowed to fine any person, without pre- 
viously summoning him before their court 8 . It is strange 
that such a practice should ever have prevailed. Attaint 
of juries was granted in cases which exceeded forty 
pounds value * : a law which has an appearance of equity, 
but which was afterwards found inconvenient. Actions 
popular were not allowed to be eluded by fraud or 
covin. If any servant of the king's conspired against 
the life of the steward, treasurer, or comptroller of the 
king's household, this design, though not followed by any 
overt act, was made liable to the punishment of felony u . 
This statute was enacted for the security of Archbishop 
Morton, who found himself exposed to the enmity of 
great numbers. 

There scarcely passed any session during this reign 

n See note [Y], at the end of the volume. 3 H. 7. cap. 1. 

P 11 H. 7. cap. 12. i 3 H. 7. cap. 2. 

r 4 H. 7. cap. 13. an H. 7. cap. 15. 

* Ibid. cap. 24. 19 H. 7. cap. 100. 3 H. 7. cap. 13. 



560 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, without some statute against engaging retainers, and 
xxvi. gi vni g them badges or liveries w ; a practice by which 
^^^ they were, in a manner, enlisted under some great lord, 
and were kept in readiness to assist him in all wars, in- 
surrections, riots, violences, and even in bearing evidence 
for him in courts of justice x . This disorder, which had 
prevailed during many reigns, when the law could give 
little protection to the subject, was then deeply rooted 
in England ; and it required all the vigilance and rigour 
of Henry to extirpate it. There is a story of his severity 
against this abuse ; and it seems to merit praise, though 
it is commonly cited as an instance of his avarice and 
rapacity. The Earl of Oxford, his favourite general, 
in whom he always placed great and deserved confidence, 
having splendidly entertained him at his castle of He- 
ningham, was desirous of making a parade of his mag- 
nificence at the departure of his royal guest; and 
ordered all his retainers, with their liveries and badges, 
to be drawn up in two lines, that their appearance might 
be the more gallant and splendid. "My lord," said 
the king, " I have heard much of your hospitality ; but 
the truth far exceeds the report. These handsome 
gentlemen and yeomen, whom I see on both sides of me, 
are no doubt your menial servants." The earl smiled, 
and confessed that his fortune was too narrow for such 
magnificence. " They are most of them," subjoined he, 
" my retainers, who are come to do me service at this 
time, when they know I am honoured with your ma- 
jesty's presence." The king started a little, and said, 
" By my faith, my lord, I thank you for your good cheer, 
but I must not allow my laws to be broken in my sight. 
My attorney must speak with you." Oxford is said to 
have paid no less than fifteen thousand marks as a com- 
position for his offence. 

The increase of the arts, more effectually than all the 
severities of law, put an end to this pernicious practice. 
The. nobility, instead of vying with each other in the 
number and boldness of their retainers, acquired by 
degrees a more civilized species of emulation, and en- 
deavoured to excel in the splendour and elegance of 

* 3 H. 7. cap. 1 & 12. 11 H. 7. cap. 3. 19 H. 7. cap. 14. 
x 3 H. 7. cap. 12. 11 H. 7. cap. 25. 



HENRY VII. 56 

their equipage, houses, and tables. The common people, CHAP. 
no longer maintained in vicious idleness by their supe- XXVL 
riors, were obliged to learn some calling or industry, ^^ 
and became useful both to themselves and to others. 
And it must be acknowledged, in spite of those who 
declaim so violently against refinement in the arts, or 
what they are pleased to call luxury, that, as much as 
an industrious tradesman is both a better man and a 
better citizen than one of those idle retainers, who 
formerly depended on the great families ; so much is the 
life of a modern nobleman more laudable than that of an 
ancient baron 7 . 

But the most important law in its consequences which 
was enacted during the reign of Henry, was that by 
which the nobility and gentry acquired a power of 
breaking the ancient entails, and of alienating their 
estates 2 . By means of this law, joined to the beginning 
luxury and refinement of the age, the great fortunes of 
the barons were gradually dissipated, and the property 
of the Commons increased in England. It is probable 
that Henry foresaw and intended this consequence ; 
because the constant scheme of his policy consisted in 
depressing the great, and exalting churchmen, lawyers, 
and men of new families, who were more dependent on 
him. 

The king's love of money naturally led him to encou- 
rage commerce, which increased his customs ; but if we 
may judge by most of the laws enacted during his reign, 
trade and industry were rather hurt than promoted by 
the care and attention given to them. Severe laws were 
made against taking interest for money, which was then 
denominated usury a . Even the profits of exchange 
were prohibited as sa vouring of usury b ,w r hich the super- 
stition of the age zealously proscribed. All evasive 
contracts, by which profits could be made from the loan 
of money, were also carefully guarded against 6 . It is 
needless to observe how unreasonable and iniquitous 

y See note [Z], at the end of the volume. 

z 4 H. 7. cap. 24. The practice of breaking entails by means of a fine and re- 
covery was introduced in the reign of Edward the IVth : but it was not, properly 
speaking, law till the statute of Henry the VHth ; which, by correcting some abuses 
that attended that practice, gave indirectly a sanction to it. 

a 3 H. 7. cap. 5. b Ibid. cap. 6. c 7 H. 7. cap. 8. 



562 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, were these laws, how impossible to be executed, and how 

vjrc y ^ hurtful to trade, if they could take place. We may ob- 

1509 serve, however, to the praise of this king, that sometimes, 

in order to promote commerce, he lent to merchants 

sums of money without interest, when he knew that 

their stock was not sufficient for those enterprises which 

they had in view d . 

Laws were made against the exportation of money, 
plate, or bullion 6 : a precaution which serves to no other 
purpose than to make more be exported. But so far 
was the anxiety on this head carried, that merchants 
alien, who imported commodities into the kingdom, were 
obliged to invest in English commodities all the money 
acquired by their sales, in order to prevent their convey- 
ing it away in a clandestine manner f . 

It was prohibited to export horses ; as if that exporta- 
tion did not encourage the breed, and render them more 
plentiful in the kingdom g . In order to promote archery, 
no bows were to be sold at a higher price than six 
shillings and fourpence h , reducing money to the deno- 
mination of our time. The only effect of this regulation 
must be, either that the people would be supplied with 
bad bows, or none at all. Prices were also affixed to 
woollen cloth ', to caps and hats k ; and the wages of 
labourers were regulated by law 1 . It is evident that 
these matters ought always to be left free, and be in- 
trusted to the common course of business and commerce. 
To some, it may appear surprising, that the price of a 
yard of scarlet cloth should be limited to six and twenty 
shillings, money of our age ; that of a yard of coloured 
cloth to eighteen ; higher prices than these commodities 
bear at present ; and that the wages of a tradesman, 
such as a mason, bricklayer, tiler, &c., should be regu- 
lated at near tenpence a day ; which is not much inferior 
to the present wages given in some parts of England. 
Labour and commodities have certainly risen since the 
discovery of the West Indies ; but not so much in every 
particular as is generally imagined. The greater in- 
dustry of the present times has increased the number of 

a Polyd. Verg. e 4 H. 7. cap. 23. 

f 3 H. 7. cap. 8. g 11 H. 7. cap. 13. 

h 3 H. 7. cap. 12. i 4 H. 7. cap. 8. 

* Ibid. cap. 9. 1 11 H. 7. cap. 22. 



HENRY VII. 503 

tradesmen and labourers, so as to keep wages nearer a CHAT. 
par than could be expected from the great increase of ^ 
gold and silver. And the additional art employed in """"^T"" 
the finer manufactures has even made some of these 
commodities fall below their former value. Not to 
mention that merchants and dealers, being contented 
with less profit than formerly, afford the goods cheaper 
to their customers. It appears by a statute of this 
reign m , that goods bought for sixteen pence would 
sometimes be sold by the merchants for three shillings. 
The commodities whose price has chiefly risen, are 
butchers' meat, fowl, and fish, (especially the latter,) 
which cannot be much augmented in quantity by the 
increase of art and industry. The profession which 
then abounded most, and was sometimes embraced by 
persons of the lowest rank, was the church : by a clause 
of a statute, all clerks or students of the university were 
forbidden to beg, without a permission from the vice- 
chancellor 11 . 

One great cause of the low state of industry during 
this period was the restraints put upon it ; and the Par- 
liament, or rather the king, (for he was the prime mover 
in every thing,) enlarged a little some of these limita- 
tions, but not to the degree that was requisite. A law 
had been enacted during the reign of Henry IV . that 
no man could bind his son or daughter to an apprentice- 
ship, unless he were possessed of twenty shillings a year 
in land ; and Henry VII, because the decay of manufac- 
tures was complained of in Norwich from the want of 
hands, exempted that city from the penalties of the 
law p . Afterwards, the whole county of Norfolk ob- 
tained a like exemption with regard to some branches 
of the woollen manufacture q . These absurd limitations 
proceeded from a desire of promoting husbandry, which, 
however, is never more effectually encouraged than by 
the increase of manufactures. For a like reason, the 
law enacted against enclosures, and for the keeping up 
of farm-houses 1 ", scarcely deserves the high praises be- 

n 4 H. 7. cap. 9. n 11 H. 7. cap. 22. 

4 H. 7. cap. 17. P 11 H. 7. cap. 11. 

1 12 H. 7. cap. 1. * 4 H. 7. cap. 19. 



564 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, stowed on it by Lord Bacon. If husbandmen under- 
ij^^; stand agriculture, and have a ready vent for their com- 
1509 modities, we need not dread a diminution of the people 
employed in the country. All methods of supporting 
populousness, except by the interest of the proprietors, 
are violent and ineffectual. During a century and a 
half after this period, there was a frequent renewal of 
laws and edicts against depopulation ; whence we may 
infer that none of them were ever executed. The 
natural course of improvement at last provided a re- 
medy. 

One check to industry in England was the erecting of 
corporations ; an abuse which is not yet entirely corrected. 
A law was enacted, that corporations should not pass 
any by-laws without the consent of three of the chief 
officers of state 8 . They were prohibited from imposing 
tolls at their gates*. The cities of Gloucester and Wor- 
cester had even imposed tolls on the Severn, which were 
abolished u . 

There is a law of this reign w , containing a preamble, 
by which it appears, that the company of merchant 
adventurers in London had, by their own authority, de- 
barred all the other merchants of the kingdom from 
trading to the great marts in the Low Countries, unless 
each trader previously paid them the sum of near seventy 
pounds. It is surprising that such a by-law (if it deserve 
the name) could ever be carried into execution, and that 
the aiithority of Parliament should be requisite to abro- 
gate it. 

It was during this reign, on the second of August, 
1492, a little before sunset, that Christopher Columbus, 
a Genoese, set out from Spain on his memorable voyage 
for the discovery of the western world ; and a few years 
after, Yasquez de Gama, a Portuguese, passed the Cape 
of Good Hope, and opened a new passage to the East 
Indies. These great events were attended with im- 
portant consequences to all the nations of Europe, even 
to such as were not immediately concerned in those 
naval enterprises. The enlargement of commerce and 

s 19 H. 7. cap. 7. * Ibid. cap. 8. 

" Ibid. cap. 18. * 12 H. 7. cap. 6. 



HENRY VII. 5fl 

navigation increased industry and the arts every where : CHAP. 
the nobles dissipated their fortunes in expensive plea- XXVL 
sures : men of an inferior rank both acquired a share ^"^~ 
in the landed property, and created to themselves a 
considerable property of a new kind, in stock, com- 
modities, art, credit, and correspondence. In some 
nations, the privileges of the Commons increased by this 
increase of property : in most nations, the kings, finding 
arms to be dropped by the barons, who could no longer 
endure their former rude manner of life, established 
standing armies, and subdued the liberties of their 
kingdoms : but in all places, the condition of the people, 
from the depression of the petty tyrants by whom they 
had formerly been oppressed rather than governed, re- 
ceived great improvement ; and they acquired, if not 
entire liberty, at least the most considerable advantages 
of it. And as the general course of events thus tended 
to depress the nobles and exalt the people, Henry VII., 
who also embraced that system of policy, has acquired 
more praise than his institutions, strictly speaking, seem 
of themselves to deserve, on account of any profound 
wisdom attending them. 

It was by accident only, that the king had not a con- 
siderable share in those great naval discoveries by which 
the present age was so much distinguished. Columbus, 
after meeting with many repulses from the courts of 
Portugal and Spain, sent his brother, Bartholomew, to 
London, in order to explain his projects to Henry, and 
crave his protection for the execution of them. The 
king invited him over to England ; but his brother, being 
taken by pirates, was detained in his voyage ; and Co- 
lumbus, meanwhile, having obtained the countenance of 
Isabella, was supplied with a small fleet, and happily 
executed his enterprise. Henry was not discouraged by 
this disappointment ; he fitted out Sebastian Cabot, a 
Venetian, settled in Bristol; and sent him westwards, 
in 1498, in search of new countries. Cabot discovered 
the main land of America towards the sixtieth degree 
of northern latitude : he sailed southwards along the 
coast, and discovered Newfoundland, and other coun- 
tries; but returned to England without making any 

VOL. n. 48 



566 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, conquest or settlement. Elliot, and other merchants in 
J^L, Bristol, made a like attempt in 1502 x . The king 
1509 expended fourteen thousand pounds in building one 
ship, called the Great Harry y . She was, properly speak- 
ing, the first ship in the English navy. Before this 
period, when the prince wanted a fleet, he had no other 
expedient than hiring or pressing ships from the mer- 
chants. 

But though this improvement of navigation, and the 
discovery of both the Indies, was the most memorable 
incident that happened during this or any other period, 
it was not the only great event by which the age was dis- 
tinguished. In 1453, Constantinople was taken b^ the 
Turks : and the Greeks, among whom some remains of 
learning were still preserved, being scattered by these 
barbarians, took shelter in Italy, and imported, together 
with their admirable language, a tincture of their science 
and of their refined taste in poetry and eloquence. About 
the same time, the purity of the Latin tongue was re- 
vived, the study of antiquity became fashionable, and 
the esteem for literature gradually propagated itself 
throughout every nation in Europe. The art of printing, 
invented about that time, extremely facilitated the pro- 
gress of all these improvements : the invention of gun- 
powder changed the whole art of war : mighty innova- 
tions were soon after made in religion, such as not only 
affected those states that embraced them, but even those 
I that adhered to the ancient faith and worship : and thus 
a general revolution was made in human affairs through- 
out this part of the world ; and men gradually attained 
that situation with regard to commerce, arts, science, 
government, police, and cultivation, in which they have 
ever since persevered. Here, therefore, commences the 
useful as well as the more agreeable part of modern 
annals ; certainty has place in all the considerable, and 
even most of the minute, parts of historical narration ; 
a great variety of events, preserved by printing, give the 
author the power of selecting, as well as adorning, the 
facts which he relates ; and as each incident Jias a re- 

* Eymer, vol. xiii. p. 37. y Stowe, p. 484. 



HENRY VII. 567 

ference to our present manners and situation, instructive CHAP. 
lessons occur every moment during the course of the^ 
narration. Whoever carries his anxious researches into 1509t 
preceding periods is moved by a curiosity, liberal indeed 
and commendable ; not by any necessity for acquiring 
knowledge of public affairs, or the arts of civil govern- 
ment. 



568 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAPTEK XXVII. 
HENRY VIII. 

POPULARITY OF THE NEW KING. His MINISTERS. PUNISHMENT OF EMPSON 
AND DUDLEY. KING'S MARRIAGE. FOREIGN AFFAIRS. JULIUS II. 
LEAGUE OF CAMBRAY. WAR WITH FRANCE. EXPEDITION TO FONTARA- 
BIA. DECEIT OF FERDINAND. RETURN OF THE ENGLISH. LEO X. A 
PARLIAMENT. WAR WITH SCOTLAND. WOLSEY MINISTER. His CHA- 
RACTER. INVASION OF FRANCE. BATTLE OF GUINEGATE. BATTLE OF 
FLOUDEN. PEACE WITH FRANCE. 



xxvn ^ HE death f Henry VII. had been attended with as 
i_ Y Jyppen and visible a joy among the people as decency 
1509. would permit ; and the accession and coronation of his 
of^new son > Henry VIII, spread universally a declared and un- 
king. feigned satisfaction. Instead of a monarch, jealous, 
severe, and avariciqus, who, in proportion as he advanced 
in years, was sinking still deeper in those unpopular 
vices, a young prince of eighteen had succeeded to the 
throne, who, even in the eyes of men of sense, gave pro- 
mising hopes of his future conduct, much more in those 
of the people, always enchanted with novelty, youth, and 
royal dignity. The beauty and vigour of his person, 
accompanied with dexterity in every manly exercise, was 
farther adorned with a blooming and ruddy countenance, 
with a lively air, with the appearance of spirit and acti- 
vity in all his demeanour a . His father, in order to 
remove him from the knowledge of public business, had 
hitherto occupied him entirely in the pursuits of litera- 
ture ; and the proficiency which he made gave no bad 
prognostic of his parts and capacity 1 *. Even the vices of 
vehemence, ardour, and impatience, to which he was 
subject, and which afterwards degenerated into tyranny, 
were considered only as faults, incident to unguarded 
youth, which would be corrected when time had brought 
. him to greater moderation and maturity. And as the 
contending titles of York and Lancaster were now at 
last fully united in his person, men justly expected 
from a prince, obnoxious to no party, that impartiality 

a T. Mori Lucubr. p. 182. b Father Paul, lib. 1. 



HENRY VIII. 559 

of administration which had long been unknown in CHAP. 
England. XXVIL 

These favourable prepossessions of the public were en- ^^ 
couraged by the measures which Henry embraced in the 
commencement of his reign. His grandmother, the 
Countess of Richmond aaid Derby, was still alive ; and 
as she was a woman much celebrated for prudence and 
virtue, he wisely showed great deference to her opinion 
in the establishment of his new council. The members His mi- 
were Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury and chancellor; 111 ' 
the Earl of Shrewsbury, steward ; Lord Herbert, cham- 
berlain ; Sir Thomas Lovel, master of the wards, and 
constable of the Tower; Sir Edward Poynings, comp- 
troller; Sir Henry Marney, afterwards Lord Marney; 
Sir Thomas Darcy, afterwards Lord Darcy; Thomas 
Kuthal, doctor of laws; and Sir Henry Wyat c . These 
men had long been accustomed to business under the 
late king, and were the least unpopular of all the minis- 
ters employed by that monarch. 

But the chief competitors for favour and authority 
under the new king were the Earl of Surrey, treasurer, 
and Fox, Bishop of Winchester, secretary and privy 
seal. This, prelate, who enjoyed great credit during 
all the former reign, had acquired such habits of caution 
and frugality as he could not easily lay aside ; and he 
still opposed by his remonstrances, those schemes of 
dissipation and expense which the youth and passions of 
Henry rendered agreeable to him. But Surrey was a 
more dexterous courtier ; and though few had borne a 
greater share in the frugal politics of the late king, he 
knew how to conform himself to the humour of his new 
master ; and no one was so forward in promoting that 
liberality, pleasure, and magnificence, which began to 
prevail under the young monarch d . By this policy he 
ingratiated himself with Henry ; he made advantage, as 
well as the other courtiers, of the lavish disposition 
of his master ; and he engaged him in such a course of 
play and idleness as rendered him negligent of affairs, 
and willing to entrust the government of the state en- 
tirely into the hands of his ministers. The great trea- 
sures amassed by the late king were gradually dissipated 

c Herbert. Stowe, p. 486. Hollingshed, p. 799. d Lord Herbert. 

48* 



570 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, in the giddy expenses of Henry. One party of pleasure 
IL succeeded to another : tilts, tournaments, and carousals 
1509 were exhibited with all the magnificence of the age : and 
as the present tranquillity of the public permitted the 
court to indulge itself in every amusement, serious busi- 
ness was but little attended to. Or if the king inter- 
mitted the course of his festivity, he chiefly employed 
himself in an application to music and literature, which 
were his favourite pursuits, and which were well adapted 
to his genius. He had made such proficiency in the 
former art, as even to compose some pieces of church 
music which were sung in his chapel 6 . He was initiated 
in the elegant learning of the ancients. And though 
he was so unfortunate as to be seduced into a study of 
the barren controversies of the schools, which were then 
fashionable, and had chosen Thomas Aquinas for his 
favourite author, he still discovered a capacity fitted for 
more useful and entertaining knowledge. 

The frank and careless humour of the king, as it led 
him to dissipate the treasures amassed by his father, ren- 
dered him negligent in protecting the instruments whom 
that prince had employed in his extortions. A procla- 
mation being issued to encourage complaints, the rage 
of the people was let loose on all informers, who had so 
long exercised an unbounded tyranny over the nation f : 
they were thrown into prison, condemned to the pillory, 
and most of them lost their lives by the violence of the 
Punish- populace. Empson and Dudley, who were most exposed 
Empson ^o public hatred, were immediately .summoned before 
and Dud- the council, in order to answer for their conduct which 
had rendered them so obnoxious. Empson made a 
shrewd apology for himself, as well as for his associate. 
He told the council, that so far from his being justly -ex- 
posed to censure for his past conduct, his enemies them- 
selves grounded their clamour on actions which seemed 
rather to merit reward and approbation : that a strict ex- 
ecution of law was the crime of which he and Dudley 
were accused ; though that law had been established by 
general consent, and though they had acted in obedience 
to the king, to whom the administration of justice was en- 

e Lord Herbert. 

f Herbert. Stowe, p. 486. Hollingshed, p. 799. Polydore Vergil, lib. 27. 



HENRY VIII. 571 

trusted by the constitution : that it belonged not to them, CHAP. 
who were instruments in the hands of supreme power, to xxvn 
determine what laws were recent or obsolete, expedient ^~~^~~ 
or hurtful ; since they were all alike valid, so long as they 
remained unrepealed by the legislature : that it was na- 
tural for a licentious populace to murmur against the 
restraints of authority ; but all wise states had ever made 
their glory consist in the just distribution of rewards and 
punishments, and had annexed the former to the obser- 
vance and enforcement of the laws, the latter to their 
violation and infraction : and that a sudden overthrow of 
all government might be expected where the judges 
were committed to the mercy of the criminals, the rulers 
to that of the subjects g . 

Notwithstanding this defence, Empson and Dudley 
were sent to the Tower ; and soon after brought to their 
trial. The strict execution of laws, however obsolete, 
could never be imputed to them as a crime in a court of 
judicature : and it is likely that, even where they had 
exercised arbitrary power, the king, as they had acted 
by the secret commands of his father, was not willing that 
their conduct should undergo too severe a scrutiny. In 
order, therefore, to gratify the people with the punish- 
ment of these obnoxious ministers, crimes very impro- 
bable, or indeed absolutely impossible, were charged upon 
them ; that they had entered into a conspiracy against 
the sovereign, and had intended, on the death of the late 
king, to have seized by force the administration of go- 
vernment. The jury were so far moved by popular pre- 
judices, joined to court influence, as to .give a verdict 
against them ; which was afterwards confirmed by a bill 
of attainder in Parliament 11 , and, at the earnest desire of 
the people, was executed by warrant from the king. 
Thus, in those arbitrary times, justice was equally vio- 
lated, whether the king sought power and riches, or 
courted popularity. 

s Herbert. Hollingshed, p. 804. 

k This Parliament met on the 21st January, 1510. A law was there enacted, in 
order to prevent some Abuses which had prevailed during the late reign. The for- 
feiture upon the penal statutes was reduced to the term of three years. Costs and 
damages were given against informers upon acquittal of the accused : more severe 
punishments were enacted against perjury : the false inquisitions procured by 
Empson and Dudley were declared null and invalid. Traverses were allowed ; 
and the time of tendering them enlarged. 1 H. 8. c. 8. 10, 11, 12. 



572 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP. Henry, while he punished the instruments of past 
XXVIL tyranny, h ac [ y e sucn a deference to former engagements 
^^^ as to deliberate, immediately after his accession, concern- 
King's ing the celebration of his marriage with the Infanta 
nage ' Catherine, to whom he had been affianced during his 
father's lifetime. Her former marriage with his brother, 
and the inequality of their years, were the chief objec- 
tions urged against his espousing her ; but, on the other 
hand, the advantages of her known virtue, modesty, and 
sweetness of disposition were insisted on ; the affection 
which she bore to the king ; the large dowry to which 
she was entitled as Princess of Wales ; the interest of 
cementing a close alliance with Spain ; the necessity of 
finding some confederate to counterbalance the power of 
France ; the expediency of fulfilling the engagements of 
the late king ; when these considerations were weighed, 
they determined the council, though contrary to the 
opinion of the primate, to give Henry their advice for 
celebrating the marriage. The Countess of Richmond, 
who had concurred in the same sentiments with the 
3d June, council, died soon after the marriage of her grandson. 

The popularity of Henry's government, his undisputed 
title, his extensive authority, his large treasures, the 
tranquillity of his subjects, were circumstances which 
Foreign rendered his domestic administration easy and pros- 
affairs, perous : the situation of foreign affairs was no less happy 
and desirable. Italy continued still, as during the late 
reign, to be the centre of all the wars and negotiations 
of the European princes ; and Henry's alliance was 
courted by all parties ; at the same time, that he was 
not engaged by any immediate interest or necessity to 
take part with any. Lewis XII. of France, after his 
conquest of Milan, was the only great prince that pos- 
sessed any territory in Italy ; and could he have re- 
mained in tranquillity, he was enabled by his situation 
to prescribe laws to all the Italian princes and republics, 
and to hold the balance among them. But the desire 
of making a conquest of Naples, to which he had the 
same title or pretensions with his predecessor, still en- 
gaged him in new enterprises ; and as he foresaw^ oppo- 
sition from Ferdinand, who was connected both by 
treaties and affinity with Frederic of Naples, he endear 



HENRY VIII. 573 

voured, by the offers of interest, to which the ears of CHAP. 
that monarch were ever open, to engage him in an oppo- XXVI1 
site confederacy. He settled with him a plan for the v ^^ 
partition of the kingdom 6f Naples, and the expulsion 
of Frederic : a plan which the politicians of that age 
regarded as the most egregious imprudence in the 
French monarch, and the greatest perfidy in the Spa- 
nish. Frederic, supported only by subjects who were 
either discontented with his government, or indifferent 
about his fortunes, was unable to resist so powerful a 
confederacy, and was deprived of his dominions : but he 
had the satisfaction to see Naples immediately prove the 
source of contention among his enemies. Ferdinand 
gave secret orders to his general, Gonsalvo, whom the 
Spaniards honour with the appellation of the Great Cap- 
tain, to attack the armies of France, and make himself 
master of all the dominions of Naples. Gonsalvo pre- 
vailed in every enterprise, defeated the French in two 
pitched battles, and ensured to his prince the entire pos- 
session of that kingdom. Lewis, unable to procure re- 
dress by force of arms, was obliged to enter into a fruitless 
negotiation with Ferdinand for the recovery of his share 
of the partition ; and all Italy, during some time, was 
held in suspense between these two powerful monarchs. 
There had scarcely been any period, when the balance 
of power was better secured in Europe, and seemed 
more able to maintain itself without any anxious concern 
or attention of the princes. Several great monarchies 
were established ; and no one so far surpassed the rest 
as to give any foundation, or even pretence for jealousy. 
England was united in domestic peace, and by its situa- 
tion happily secured from the invasion of foreigners. 
The coalition of * the several kingdoms of Spain had 
formed one powerful monarchy, which Ferdinand ad- 
ministered with arts, fraudulent indeed and deceitful, 
but full of vigour and ability. Lewis XII., a gallant 
and generous prince, had, by espousing ^.nne of Britany, 
widow to his predecessor, preserved the union with that 
principality, on which the safety of his kingdom so much 
depended. Maximilian, the emperor, besides the here- 
ditary dominions of the Austrian family, maintained 
authority in the empire, and, notwithstanding the levity 



574 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, of his character, was able to unite the German princes 
,^ x j^ y in any great plan of interest, at least of defence. 
1509 Charles, Prince of Castile, grandson to 'Maximilian and 
Ferdinand, had already succeeded to the rich dominions 
of the house of Burgundy ; and, being as yet in early 
youth, the government was intrusted to Margaret of 
Savoy, his aunt, a princess endowed with signal prudence 
and virtue. The internal force of these several powerful 
states, by balancing each other, might long have main- 
tained general tranquillity, had not the active and enter- 
Juiius II. prising genius of Julius II., an ambitious pontiff, first 
excited the flame of war and discord among them. By 
Cambra f *^ s intrigues, a league had been formed at Cambray ', 
' between himself, Maximilian, Lewis, and Ferdinand ; 
and the object of this great confederacy was to over- 
whelm, by their united arms, the commonwealth of 
Venice. Henry, without any motive from interest or 
passion, allowed his name to be inserted in the confede- 
racy. This oppressive and iniquitous league was but too 
successful against the republic. 

The great force and secure situation of the consider- 
able monarchies prevented any one from aspiring to any 
conquest of moment ; and though this consideration 
could not maintain general peace, or remedy the natural 
inquietude of men, it rendered the princes of this age 
more disposed to desert engagements, and change their 
alliances, in which they were retained by humour and 
caprice, rather than by any natural or durable interest. 
151 - Julius had no sooner humbled the Venetian republic, 
than he was inspired with a nobler ambition, that of 
expelling all foreigners from Italy, or, to speak in the 
style affected by the Italians of this age, the freeing of 
that country entirely from the dominion of barbarians k . 
He was determined to make the tempest fall first upon 
Lewis ; and, in order to pave the way for this great 
enterprise, he at once sought for a ground of quarrel 
with that monarch, and courted the alliance of other 
princes. He declared war against the Duke of Ferrara, 
the confederate of Lewis. He solicited the favour of 
England, by sending Henry a sacred rose, perfumed 
with musk, and anointed with chrism 1 . He engaged 

i In 1508. k Guicciard. lib. 8. * Spellman. Concil. vol. ii. p. 725. 



1510. 



HENRY VIII. 575 

in his interests Bambridge, Archbishop of York, and CHAP. 
Henry's ambassador at Rome, whom he soon after XXVIL 
created a cardinal. He drew over Ferdinand to his 
party, though that monarch at first made no declaration 
of his intentions. And what he chiefly valued, he formed 
a treaty with the Swiss cantons, who, enraged by some 
neglects put upon them by Lewis, accompanied with con- 
tumelious expressions, had quitted the alliance of France, 
and waited for an opportunity of revenging themselves 
on that nation. 

While the French monarch repelled the attacks of 1511. 
his enemies, he thought it also requisite to make an 
attempt on the pope himself, and to despoil him, as 
much as possible, of that sacred character, which chiefly 
rendered him formidable. He engaged some cardinals, 
disgusted with the violence of Julius, to desert him ; and 
by their authority, he was determined, in conjunction 
with Maximilian, who still adhered to his alliance, to 
call a general council, which might reform the church, 
and check the exorbitancies of the Roman pontiff. A 
council was summoned at Pisa, which from the beginning 
bore a very inauspicious aspect, and promised little suc- 
cess to its adherents. Except a few French bishops, who 
unwillingly obeyed the king's commands in attending 
the council, all the other prelates kept aloof from an 
assembly which they regarded as the offspring of faction, 
intrigue, and worldly politics. Even Pisa, the place of 
their residence, showed them signs of contempt; which 
engaged them to transfer their session to Milan, a city 
under the dominion of the French monarch. Notwith- 
standing this advantage, they did not experience much 
more respectful treatment from the inhabitants of Milan ; 
and found it necessary to make another remove to Lyons m . 
Lewis himself fortified these violent prejudices in favour 
of papal authority, by the symptoms which he discovered 
of regard, deference, and submission to Julius, whom he 
always spared, even when fortune had thrown into his 
hands the most inviting opportunities of humbling him. 
And as it was known that his consort, who had great 
influence over him, was extremely disquieted in mind 
on account of his dissensions with the holy father, all 

Guicciardini, lib. 10. 



576 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, men prognosticated to Julius final success in this unequal 
^f^, contest. 

1511 The enterprising pontiff knew his advantages, and 
availed himself of them with the utmost temerity and 
insolence. So much had he neglected his sacerdotal 
character, that he acted in person at the siege of Miran- 
dola, visited the trenches, saw some of his attendants 
killed by his side, and, like a young soldier, cheerfully 
bore all the rigours of winter and a severe season, in 
pursuit of military glory n : yet was he still able to throw, 
even on his most moderate opponents, the charge of im- 
piety and profaneness. He summoned a council at the 
Lateran ; he put Pisa under an interdict, and all the 
places which gave shelter to the schismatical council : he 
excommunicated the cardinals and prelates who attended 
it: he even pointed his spiritual thunder against the 
princes who adhered to it : he freed their subjects from 
all oaths of allegiance, and gave their dominions to every 
one who could take possession of them. 

Ferdinand of Arragon, who had acquired the surname 
of Catholic, regarded the cause of the pope and of reli- 
gion only as a cover to his ambition and selfish politics : 
Henry, naturally sincere and sanguine in his temper, and 
the more so on account of his youth and inexperience, 
was moved with a hearty desire of protecting the pope 
from the oppression to which he believed him exposed 
1512. from the ambitious enterprises of Lewis. Hopes had been 
given him by Julius, that the title of Most Christian 
King, which had hitherto been annexed to the crown of 
France, and which was regarded as its most precious or- 
nament, should, in reward of his services, be transferred 
to that of England . Impatient also of acquiring that 
distinction in Europe, to which his power and opulence 
entitled him, he could not long remain neuter amidst 
the noise of arms ; and the natural enmity of the English 
against France, as well as their ancient claims upon that 
kingdom, led Henry to join that alliance, which the pope, 
Spain, and Venice, had formed against the French mon- 
arch. A herald was sent to Paris, to exhort Lewis not 
to wage impious w r ar against the sovereign pontiff.; and 

n Guicciardini, lib. 9. 

o Ibid. lib. 11. P. Daniel, vol. ii. p. 1893. Herbert. Hollingshed, p. 831. 



HENRY VIII. 57-; 

when he returned without success, another was sent to CHAP. 
demand the ancient patrimonial provinces, Anjou, Maine, xxvn 
Guienne, and Normandy. This message was understood ^JTiT^ 
to be a declaration of war ; and a Parliament being sum- War with 
moned, readily granted supplies for a purpose so nuichjj^;. 
favoured by the English nation 5 . 

Buonaviso, an agent of the pope's at London, had 
been corrupted by the court of France, and had pre- 
viously revealed to Lewis all the measures which Henry 
was concerting against him. But this infidelity did the 
king inconsiderable prejudice, in comparison of the treach- 
ery which he experienced from the selfish purposes of the 
ally on whom he chiefly relied for assistance. Ferdinand, 
his father-in-law, had so long persevered in a course of 
crooked politics, that he began even to value himself on 
his dexterity in fraud and artifice ; and he made a boast 
of those shameful successes. Being told one day, that 
Lewis, a prince of a very different character, had com- 
plained of his having once cneated him : " He lies, the 
drunkard ! " said he : "I have cheated him above twenty 
times." This prince considered his close connexions with 
Henry only as the means which enabled him the better 
to take advantage of his want of experience*. He ad- 
vised him not to invade France by the way of Calais, 
where he himself should not have it in his power to 
assist him: he exhorted him rather to send forces toExpedi- 
'Fontarabia, whence he could easily make a conquest of 
Guienne, a province in which, it was imagined, the Eng-bia. 
lish had still some adherents. He promised to assist 
this conquest by the junction of a Spanish army. And 
so forward did he seem to promote the interests of his 
son-in-law, that he even sent vessels to England in order 
to transport over the forces which Henry had levied for 
that purpose. The Marquis of Dorset commanded this 
armament, which consisted of ten thousand men, mostly 
infantry ; Lord Howard, son of the Earl of Surrey, Lord 
Broke, Lord Ferrars, and many others of the young 
gentry and nobility, accompanied him in this service. 
All were on fire to distinguish themselves by military 
achievements, and to make a conquest of importance for 

P Herbert. Hollingshed, p, 811. 

VOL. ii. 49 



578 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, their master. The secret purpose of Ferdinand, in this 
^ ^unexampled generosity, was suspected by nobody. 
1512. The sma ll kingdom of Navarre lies on the frontiers 
between France and Spain : and as John d'Albret the 
sovereign was connected by friendship and alliance with 
Lewis, the opportunity seemed favourable to Ferdinand, 
while the English forces were conjoined with his own, 
and while all adherents to the council of Pisa lay under 
the sentence of excommunication, to put himself in pos- 
session of these dominions. No sooner, therefore, was 
Dorset landed in Guipuscoa, than the Spanish monarch 
declared his readiness to join him with his forces, to make 
with united arms an invasion of France, and to form the 
siege of Bayonne, which opened the way into Guienne q : 
but he remarked to the English general, how dangerous 
it might prove to leave behind them the kingdom of 
Navarre, which, being in close alliance with France, could 
easily give admittance to the enemy, and cut off all com- 
munication between Spain and the combined armies. 
To provide against so dangerous an event, he required, 
that John should stipulate a neutrality in the present 
war ; and when that prince expressed his willingness to 
enter into* any engagement for that purpose, he also re- 
quired, that security should be given for the strict ob- 
servance of it. John having likewise agreed to this con- 
dition, Ferdinand demanded, that he should deliver into 
his hands six of the most considerable places of his do- 
minions, together with his eldest son as a hostage. These 
were not terms to be proposed to a sovereign ; and as the 
Spanish monarch expected a refusal, he gave immediate 
orders to the Duke of Alva, his general, to make an in- 
vasion on Navarre, and to reduce that kingdom. Alva 
soon made himself master of all the smaller towns ; and 
being ready to form the siege of Pampeluna, the capital, 
he summoned the Marquis of Dorset to join him with 
the English army, and concert together all their ope- 
rations. 

Dorset began to suspect that the interests of his 
master were very little regarded in all these transactions ; 
and having no orders to invade the kingdom of Navarre, 
or make war any where but in France, he refused to 

<i Herbert. Hollingshed, p. 813. 



HENRY VIII. 579 

take any part in the enterprise. He remained, there- CHAP. 
fore, in his quarters at Fontarabia ; but so subtle was the xxvn 
contrivance of Ferdinand, that, even while the English ^^i^ 
army lay in that situation, it was almost equally service- Deceit of 
able to his purpose, as if it had acted in conjunction with** 
his own. It kept the French army in awe, and pre- 
vented it from advancing to succour the kingdom of 
Navarre ; so that Alva, having full leisure to conduct 
the siege, made himself master of Pampeluna, and 
obliged John to seek for shelter in France. The Spanish 
general applied again to Dorset, and proposed to con- 
duct with united counsels the operations of the holy 
league, so it was called, against Lewis ; but as he still 
declined forming the siege of Bayonne, and rather in- 
sisted on the invasion of the principality of Bearne, a 
part of the King of Navarre's dominions, which lies 
on the French side of the Pyrenees, Dorset, justly sus- 
picious of his sinister intentions, represented, that, with- 
out new orders from his master, he could not concur in 
such an undertaking. In order to procure these orders, 
Ferdinand despatched Martin de Ampios to London ; 
and persuaded Henry, that by the refractory and scru- 
pulous humour of the English general, the most favour- 
able opportunities were lost, and that it was necessary 
he should, on all occasions, act in concert with the 
Spanish commander, who was best acquainted with the 
situation of the country, and the reasons of every opera- 
tion. But before orders to this purpose reached Spain, 
Dorset had become extremely impatient ; and observing 
that his farther stay served not to promote the main un- 
dertaking, and that his army was daily perishing by 
want and sickness, he demanded shipping from Ferdinand 
to transport them back into England. Ferdinand, who 
was bound by treaty to furnish him with this supply, 
whenever demanded, was at length, after many delays, 
obliged to yield to his importunity ; and Dorset, em- 
barking his troops, prepared himself for the voyage. 
Meanwhile, the messenger arrived with orders from 
Henry, that the troops should remain in Spain ; but the R f et 
soldiers were so discontented with the treatment which English. 
they had met with, that they mutinied, and obliged 
their commanders to set sail for England. Henry was 



580 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, much displeased with the ill-success of this enterprise ; 
,/^ [^ and it was with difficulty that Dorset, by explaining the 
1512 fraudulent conduct of Ferdinand, was at last able to ap- 
pease him. 

There happened this summer an action at sea, which 
brought not any more decisive advantage to the English. 
Sir Thomas Knevet, master of horse, was sent to the 
coast of Britany with a fleet of forty-five sail ; and he 
carried with him Sir Charles Brandon, Sir John Carew, 
and many other young courtiers, who longed for an 
opportunity of displaying their valour. After they had 
committed some depredations, a French fleet of thirty- 
nine sail issued from Brest, under the command of 
Primauget, and began an engagement with the English. 
Fire seized the ship of Primauget, who, finding his de- 
struction inevitable, bore down upon the vessel of the 
English admiral, and, grappling with her, resolved to 
make her share his fate. Both fleets stood some time 
in suspense, as spectators of this dreadful engagement, 
and all men saw with horror the flames which consumed 
both vessels, and heard the cries of fury and despair 
which came from the miserable combatants. At last, 
the French ship blew up ; and at the same time de- 
stroyed the English 1 ". The rest of the French fleet 
made their escape into different harbours. 

The war which England waged against France, though 
it brought no advantage to the former kingdom, was of 
great prejudice to the latter ; and by obliging Lewis to 
withdraw his forces, for the defence of his own dominions, 
lost him that superiority, which his arms, in the begin- 
ning of the campaign, had attained in Italy^ Gaston de 
Foix, his nephew, a young hero, had been entrusted with 
the command of the French forces ; and in a few months 
performed such feats of military art and prowess, as were 
sufficient to render illustrious the life of the oldest 
captain 8 . His career finished with the great battle of 
Eavenna, which, after the most obstinate conflict, he 
gained over the Spanish and papal armies. He perished 
the very moment his victory was complete ; and with 
him perished the fortune of the French arms in Italy. 

r Polydore Vergil, lib. 27. Stowe, p. 490. Lanquet's Epitome of Chronicles, 
fol. 273. s Guicciard. lib. 10. 



HENRY VIII. 

The Swiss, who had rendered themselves extremely CHAP. 
formidable by their bands of disciplined infantry, in- XXVIL 
vaded the Milanese with a numerous army, and raised ^^7^" 
up that inconstant people to a revolt against the do- 
minion of France. Genoa followed the example of the 
duchy ; and thus Lewis, in a few weeks, entirely lost his 
Italian conquests, except some garrisons ; and Maximilian 
Sforza, the son of Ludovic, was reinstated in possession 
of Milan. 

Julius discovered extreme joy on the discomfiture of 1513 - 
the French ; and the more so, as he had been beholden 
for it to the Swiss, a people whose councils, he hoped, 
he should always be able to influence and govern. The 
pontiff survived this success a very little time ; and in 
his place was chosen John de Medicis, who took the2istFeb. 
appellation of Leo X., and proved one of the most illus- LeoXt 
trious princes that ever sat on the papal throne. Humane, 
beneficent, generous, affable; the patron of every art, 
and friend of every virtue * ; he had a soul no less capa- 
ble of forming great designs than his predecessor, but 
was more gentle, pliant, and artful in employing means 
for the execution of them. The sole defect, indeed, of 
his character, was too great finesse and artifice ; a 
fault which, both as a priest and an Italian, it was diffi- 
cult for him to avoid. By the negotiations of Leo, the 
Emperor Maximilian was detached from, the French in- 
terest ; and Henry, notwithstanding his disappointments 
in the former campaign, was still encouraged to prose- 
cute his warlike measures against Lewis. 

Henry had summoned a new session of Parliament" ; AFarlia * 
and obtained a supply for his enterprise. It was a poll- m 
tax, and imposed different sums, according to the station 
and riches of the person. A duke paid ten marks, an earl 
five pounds, a baron four pounds, a knight four marks ; 
every man valued at eight hundred pounds in goods, four 
marks. An imposition was also granted of two-fifteenths 
and four-tenths w . By these supplies, joined to the trea- 
sure which had been left by his father, and which was 
not yet entirely dissipated, he was enabled to levy a 
great army, and render himself formidable to his enemy. 
The English are said to have been much encouraged in 

* Father Paul, lib. 1. u 4th November, 1512. w Stowe. 

49* 



582 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, this enterprise, by the arrival of a vessel in the Thames 
^J^^ under the papal banner. It carried presents of wine and 
1513> hams to the king, and the more eminent courtiers ; and 
such fond devotion was at that time entertained towards 
the court of Kome, that these trivial presents were every 
where received with the greatest triumph and exultation. 
In order to prevent all disturbances from Scotland, 
while Henry's arms should be employed on the conti- 
nent, Dr. West, Dean of Windsor, was despatched on an 
embassy to James, the king's brother-in-law, and instruc- 
tions were given him to accommodate all differences 
between the kingdoms, as well as to discover the inten- 
tions of the court of Scotland x . Some complaints had 
already been made on both sides. One Barton, a Scotch- 
man, having suffered injuries from the Portuguese, for 
. which he could obtain no redress, had procured letters 
of marque against that nation; but he had no sooner 
put to sea, than he was guilty of the grossest abuses, 
committed depredations upon the English, and much 
infested the narrow seas 7 . Lord Howard and Sir Ed- 
ward Howard, admirals, and sons of the Earl of Surrey, 
sailing out against him, fought him in a desperate action, 
where the pirate was killed ; and they brought his ships 
into the Thames. As Henry refused all satisfaction for 
this act of justice, some of the borderers, who wanted 
but a pretence for depredations, entered England under 
the command of Lord Hume, warden of the marches, and 
committed great ravages on that kingdom. Notwith- 
standing these mutual grounds of dissatisfaction, matters 
might easily have been accommodated, had it not been for 
Henry's intended invasion of France, which roused the jea- 
War with lousy of the Scottish nation 2 . The ancient league, which 
U(L subsisted between France and Scotland, was conceived 
to be the strongest band of connexion ; and the Scots 
universally believed, that were it not for the countenance 
which they received from this foreign alliance, they had 
never been able so long to maintain their independence 
^against a people so much superior. James was farther 
incited to take part in the quarrel by the invitations of 
Anne, Queen of France, whose knight he had ever in all 

x Polyd. Vergil, lib. 27. y Stowe, p. 489. Hollingshed, p. 811. 

z Buchanan, lib. 13. Drummond in the Life of James IV. 



HENRY VIII. 533 

tournaments professed himself, and who summoned him, CHAP. 
according to the ideas of romantic gallantry prevalent in ^^J 1 ^ 
that age, to take the field in her defence, and prove him- 151 ^ 
self her true and valorous champion. The remonstrances 
of his consort and of his wisest counsellors were in vain 
opposed to the martial ardour of this prince. He first 
sent a squadron of ships to the assistance of France ; the 
only fleet which Scotland seems ever to have possessed. 
And though he still made professions of maintaining a 
neutrality, the English ambassador easily foresaw, that a 
war would in the end prove inevitable ; and he gave 
warning of the danger to his master, who sent the Earl 
of Surrey to put the borders in a posture of defence, and 
to resist the expected invasion of the enemy. 

Henry, all on fire for military fame, was little discou- 
raged by this appearance of a diversion from the north; 
and so much the less, as he flattered himself with the 
assistance of all the considerable potentates of Europe 
in his invasion of France. The pope still continued to 
thunder out his excommunications against Lewis and all 
the adherents of the schismatical council : the Swiss can- 
tons made professions of violent animosity against France : 
the ambassadors of Ferdinand and Maximilian had 
signed with those of Henry a treaty of alliance against 
that power, and had stipulated the time and place of 
their intended invasion; and though Ferdinand disa- 
vowed his ambassador, and even signed a truce for a 
twelvemonth with the common enemy, Henry was not 
yet fully convinced of his selfish and sinister intentions, 
and still hoped for his concurrence after the expiration 
of that term. He had now got a minister who com- 
plied with all his inclinations, and flattered him in every 
scheme to which his sanguine and impetuous temper was 
inclined. _ 

Thomas Wolsey, Dean of Lincoln, and almoner 
the king, surpassed in favour all his ministers, and was 
fast advancing towards that unrivalled grandeur which 
he afterwards attained. This man was son of a butcher 
at Ipswich; but having got a learned education, and 
being endowed with an excellent capacity, he was ad- 
mitted into the Marquis of Dorset's family, as tutor to 
that nobleman's children, and soon gained the friendship 



584 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and countenance of his patron a . He was recommended 
XXVIL to be chaplain to Henry VII., and being employed by 
"^^ 'that monarch in a secret negotiation, which regarded 
his intended marriage with Margaret of Savoy, Maxi- 
milian's daughter, he acquitted himself to the king's 
satisfaction, and obtained the praise both of diligence 
and dexterity in his conduct b . That prince, having 
given him a commission to Maximilian, who at that 
time resided in Brussels, was surprised in less than three 
days after, to see Wolsey present himself before him ; 
and supposing that he had protracted his departure, he 
began to reprove him for the dilatory execution of his 
orders. Wolsey informed him, that he had just returned 
from Brussels, and had successfully fulfilled all his ma- 
jesty's commands. " But on second thoughts," said the 
king, "I found that somewhat was omitted in your 
orders ; and have sent a messenger after you with fuller 
instructions." "I met the messenger," replied Wolsey, 
u on my return. But as I had reflected on that omission, 
I ventured of myself to execute what I knew must be 
your majesty's intentions." The death of Henry soon 
after this incident, retarded the advancement of Wolsey, 
and prevented his reaping any advantage from the good 
opinion which that monarch had entertained of him : 
but thenceforwards he was looked on at court as a rising 
man ; and Fox ; Bishop of Winchester, cast his eye upon 
him as one who might be serviceable to him in his pre- 
sent situation . This prelate, observing that the Earl 
of Surrey had totally eclipsed him in favour, resolved to 
introduce Wolsey to the young prince's familiarity, and 
hoped that he might rival Surrey in his insinuating arts, 
and yet be content to act in the cabinet a part subordi- 
nate to Fox himself, who had promoted him. In a little 
time Wolsey gained so much on the king, that he sup- 
planted both Surrey in his favour, and Fox in his trust 
and confidence. Being admitted to Henry's parties of 
pleasure, he took the lead in every jovial conversation, 
and promoted all that frolic and entertainment which he 
found suitable to the age and inclination of the young 

a Stowe, p. 997. 

b Cavendish. Fiddes's Life of Wolsey. Stowe. 

c Antiq. Brit. Eccles. p. 309. Polydore Vergil, lib. 27- 



HENRY VIII. 585 

monarch. Neither his own years, which were near forty, CHAP. 
nor his character of a clergyman, were any restraint, ^ VIL 
upon him, or engaged him to check, by any useless \^" 
severity, the gaiety in which Henry, who had small pro- 
pension to debauchery, passed his careless hours. During 
the intervals of amusement he introduced business, and 
insinuated those maxims of conduct which he was de- 
sirous his master should adopt. He observed to him, 
that while he entrusted his affairs into the hands of his 
father's counsellors, he had the advantage indeed of em- 
ploying men of wisdom and experience, but men who 
owed not their promotion to his favour, and who scarcely 
thought themselves accountable to him for the exercise 
of their authority j that by the factions, and cabals, and 
jealousies, which had long prevailed among them, they 
more obstructed the advancement of his affairs, than 
they promoted it by the knowledge which age and prac- 
tice had conferred upon them : that while he thought 
proper to pass his time in those pleasures, to which his 
age and royal fortune invited him, and in those studies, 
which would in time enable him to sway the sceptre 
with absolute authority, his best system of government 
would be, to entrust his authority into the hands of 
some one person, who was the creature of his will, and 
who could entertain no view but that of promoting his 
service: and that if this minister had also the same 
relish for pleasure with himself, and the same taste for , 
science, he could more easily at intervals account to him 
for his whole conduct, and introduce his master gradu- 
ally into the knowledge of public business; and thus, 
without tedious constraint or application, initiate him in 
the science of government d . 

Henry entered into all the views of Wolsey; and 
finding no one so capable of executing this plan of ad- 
ministration as the person who proposed it, he soon ad- 
vanced his favourite, from being the companion of his 
pleasures, to be a member of his council ; and from being 
a member of his council, to be his sole and absolute 
minister. , By this rapid advancement and uncontrolled 
authority, the character and genius of Wolsey had full 
opportunity to display itself. Insatiable in his acquisitions, His cha _ 

ractcr. 
a Cavendish, p. 12. Stowe, p. 499. 



586 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, but still more magnificent in his expense : of extensive 
' capacity, but still more unbounded enterprise : ambi- 
1513 tious of power, but still more desirous of glory : insinuat- 
ing, engaging, persuasive ; and, by turns, lofty, elevated, 
commanding : haughty to his equals, but affable to his 
dependents ; oppressive to the people, but liberal to his 
friends; more generous than grateful; less moved by 
injuries than by contempt ; he was framed to take the 
ascendant in every intercourse with others, but exerted 
this superiority of nature with such ostentation as ex- 
posed him to envy, and made every one willing to 
recall the original inferiority, or rather meanness, of his 
fortune. 

The branch of administration in which Henry most 
exerted himself, while he gave his entire confidence to 
Wolsey, was the military, which, as it suited the natural 
gallantry and bravery of his temper, as well as the ardour 
of his youth, was the principal object of his attention. 
Finding that Lewis had made great preparations both 
by sea and land to resist him, he was no less careful to 
levy a formidable army, and equip a considerable fleet 
for the invasion of France. The command of the fleet 
was entrusted to Sir Edward Howard ; who, after scour- 
ing the channel for some time, presented himself before 
Brest, where the French navy then lay, and he chal- 
lenged them to a combat. The French admiral, who 
expected from the Mediterranean a reinforcement of 
some galleys under the command of Prejeant de Bidoux, 
kept within the harbour, and saw with patience the Eng- 
lish burn and destroy the country in the neighbourhood. 
At last Prejeant arrived with six galleys, and put into 
Conquet, a place within a few leagues of Brest, where 
he secured himself behind some batteries, which he had 
25th April, planted on rocks that lay on each side of him. Howard 
was, notwithstanding, determined to make an attack 
upon him ; and as he had but two galleys, he took him- 
self the command of one, and gave the other to Lord 
Ferrars. He was followed by some row barges, and 
some crayers under the command of Sir Thomas Cheyney, 
Sir William Sidney, and other officers of distinction. 
He immediately fastened on Prejeant's ship, and leaped 
on board of her, attended by one Carroz, a Spanish 



HENRY vni. 587 

cavalier, and seventeen Englishmen. The cable, mean- CHAP. 
while, which fastened his ship to that of the enemy, 
being cut, the admiral was thus left in the hands of 
French ; and as he still continued the combat with great 
gallantry, he was pushed overboard by their pikes 6 . 
Lord Ferrars, seeing the admiral's galley fall off, followed 
with the other small vessels ; and the whole fleet was so 
discouraged by the loss of their commander, that they 
retired from before Brest f . The French navy came out 
of harbour, and even ventured to invade the coast of 
Sussex. They were repulsed, and Prejeant, their com- 
mander, lost an eye by the shot of an arrow. Lord 
Howard, brother to the deceased admiral, succeeded to 
the command of the English fleet ; and little, memorable 
passed at sea during this summer. 

Great preparations had been making at land, during 
the whole winter, for an invasion of France by the way 
of Calais ; but the summer was well advanced before 
every thing was in sufficient readiness for the intended 
enterprise. The long peace which the kingdom had 
enjoyed, had somewhat unfitted the English for military 
expeditions ; and the great change which had lately 
been introduced in the art of war, had rendered it still 
more difficult to inure them to the use of the weapons 
now employed in action. The Swiss, and after them 
the Spaniards, had shown the advantage of a stable in- 
fantry, who fought with pike and sword, and were able 
to repulse even the heavy-armed cavalry, in which the 
great force of the armies formerly consisted. The prac- 
tice of fire-arms was become common : though the caliver, 
which was the weapon now in use, was so inconvenient, 
and attended with so many disadvantages, that it had not 
entirely discredited the bow, a weapon in which the 
English excelled all European nations. A considerable 
part of the forces which Henry levied for the invasion of 
France, consisted of archers ; and as soon as affairs were 
in readiness, the vanguard of the army, amounting to 

e It was a maxim of Howard's that no admiral was good for any thing, that was 
not brave even to a degree of madness. As the sea service requires much less plan 
and contrivance and capacity than the land, this maxim has great plausibility and 
appearance of truth : though the fate of Howard himself may serve as a proof that 
even their courage ought to be tempered with discretion. 

f Stowc, p. 491. Herbert. Hollingshed, p. 816. 



588 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, eight thousand men, under the command of the Earl of 
ij^j 11 ^ Shrewsbury, sailed over to Calais. Shrewsbury was 
1513. accompanied by the Earl of Derby, the Lords Fitzwater, 
Hastings, Cobham, and Sir Rice ap-Thomas, captain of 
the light horse. Another body of six thousand men 
soon after followed under the command of Lord Herbert, 
the chamberlain, attended by the Earls of Northumber- 
land and Kent, the Lords Audley and Delawar, together 
with Carew, Curson, and other gentlemen. 

The king himself prepared to follow with the main 
body and rear of the army ; and he appointed the queen 
regent of the kingdom during his absence. That he 
might secure her administration from all disturbance, 
he ordered Edmond de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk, to be 
beheaded in the Tower, the nobleman who had been 
attainted and imprisoned during the late reign. Henry 
was led to commit this act of violence by the dying 
commands, as is imagined, of his father, who told him, 
that he never would be free from danger, while a man of 
so turbulent a disposition as Suffolk was alive : and as 
Richard de la Pole, brother of Suffolk, had accepted of 
a command in the French service, and foolishly at- 
tempted to revive the York faction, and to instigate 
them against the present government, he probably, by 
that means, drew more suddenly the king's vengeance 
on this unhappy nobleman. 

June so. At last, Henry, attended by the Duke of Bucking- 
of iSnce. ham, and many others of the nobility, arrived at Calais, 
and entered upon his French expedition, from which he 
fondly expected so much success and glory g . Of all 
those allies on whose assistance he relied, the Swiss 
alone fully performed their engagements. Being put 
in motion by a sum of money sent them by Henry, and 
incited by their victories obtained in Italy, and by their 
animosity against France, they were preparing to enter 
that kingdom with an army of twenty-five thousand 
men ; and no equal force could be opposed to their in- 
cursion. Maximilian had received an advance of one 
hundred and twenty thousand crowns from Henry, and 
had promised to reinforce the Swiss with eight thousand 
men ; but failed in his engagements. That he might 

Polyd. Verg. lib. 27. Bellarius, lib. 14. 



HENRY VIII. 559 

make atonement to the king, he himself appeared in the CHAP. 
Low Countries, and joined the English army with some xxvn 
German and Flemish soldiers, who were useful in giving ^"^J^ 
an example of discipline to Henry's new levied forces. 
Observing the disposition of the English monarch to be 
more bent on glory than on interest, he enlisted him- 
self in his service, wore the cross of St. George, and 
received pay, a hundred crowns a day, as one of his 
subjects and captains : but while he exhibited this ex- 
traordinary spectacle, of an emperor of Germany serv- 
ing under a king of England, he was treated with the 
highest respect by Henry, and really directed all the 
operations of the English army. 

Before the arrival of Henry and Maximilian in the 
camp, the Earl of Shrewsbury and Lord Herbert had 
formed the siege of Teroiiane, a town situated on the 
frontiers of Picardy ; and they began to attack the place 
with vigour. Teligni and Crequi commanded in the 
town, and had a garrison not exceeding three thousand 
men ; yet made they such stout resistance as protracted 
the siege a month ; and they at last found themselves 
more in danger from want of provisions and ammuni- 
tion, than from the assaults of the besiegers. Having 
conveyed intelligence of their situation to Lewis, who 
had advanced to Amiens with his army, that prince 
gave orders to throw relief into the place. Fontrailles Aug. IG. 
appeared at the head of eight hundred horsemen, each 
of whom carried a sack of gunpowder behind him, and 
two quarters of bacon. With this small force he made 
a sudden and unexpected irruption into the English 
camp, and surmounting all resistance, advanced to the 
fosse of the town, where each horseman threw down 
his burden. They immediately returned at the gallop, 
and were so fortunate as again to break through the 
English, and to suffer little or no loss in this dangerous 
attempt 11 . 

But the English had, soon after, full revenge for the Battle of 
insult. Henry had received intelligence of the approach G 
of the French horse, who had advanced to protect an- 
other incursion of Fontrailles; and he ordered some 
troops to pass the Lis, in order to oppose them. The 

fc Hist, cle Chev. Bayard, chap. 57. Meinoires de Bellai. 
VOL. II. 50 



590 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, cavalry of France, though they consisted chiefly of gen- 
Clemen who had behaved with great gallantry in many 
desperate actions in Italy, were, on sight of the enemy, 
seized with so unaccountable a panic, that they imme- 
diately took to flight, and were pursued by the English. 
The Duke of Longueville, who commanded the French, 
Bussi d'Amboise, Clermont, Imbercourt, the Chevalier 
Bayard, and many other officers of distinction, were 
made prisoners 1 . This action, or rather rout, is some- 
times called the battle of Guinegate, from the place 
where it was fought; but more commonly the Battle of 
/Spurs, because the French, that day, made more use of 
their spurs than of their swords or military weapons. 

After so considerable an advantage, the king, who 
was at the head of a complete army of above fifty thou- 
sand men, might have made incursions to the gates of 
Paris, and spread confusion and desolation every where. 
It gave Lewis great joy, when he heard that the Eng- 
lish, instead of pushing their victory, and attacking the 
dismayed troops of France, returned to the siege of so 
inconsiderable a place as Teroiiane. The governors were 
obliged, soon after, to capitulate ; and Henry found his 
acquisition of so little moment, though gained at the 
expense of some blood, and what, in his present circum- 
stances, was more important, of much valuable time, that 
he immediately demolished the fortifications. The 
anxieties of the French were again revived with regard 
to the motions of the English. The Swiss, at the same 
time, had entered Burgundy, with a formidable army, 
and laid siege to Dijon, which was in no condition to 
resist them. Ferdinand himself, though he had made a 
truce with Lewis, seemed disposed to lay hold of every 
advantage which fortune should present to him. Scarcely 
ever was the French monarchy in greater danger, or less 
in a condition to defend itself against those powerful 
armies, which on every side assailed or threatened it. 
Even many of the inhabitants of Paris, who believed 
themselves exposed to the rapacity and violence of the 
enemy, began to dislodge, without knowing what place 
could afford them greater security. 

1 Memoires de Bellai, liv. i. Polydore Vergil, liv. xxvii. Hollingshed, p. 822. 
Herbert. 



HENRY VIII. 591 

But Lewis was extricated from his present difficulties CHAP. 
by the manifold blunders of his enemies. The Swiss XXVJI 
allowed themselves to be seduced into a negotiation by 
Tremoille, governor of Burgundy ; and without making 
inquiry whether that nobleman had any powers to treat, 
they accepted of the conditions which he offered them. 
Tremoille, who knew that he should be disavowed by 
his master, stipulated whatever they were pleased to 
demand, and thought himself happy, at the expense of 
some payments and very large promises, to get rid of so 
formidable an enemy k . 

The measures of Henry showed equal ignorance in 
the art of war with that of the Swiss in negotiation. 
Tournay was a great and rich city, which though it lay 
within the frontiers of Flanders, belonged to France, and 
afforded the troops of that kingdom a passage into the 
heart of the Netherlands. Maximilian, who was desirous 
of freeing his grandson from so troublesome a neighbour, 
advised Henry to lay siege to the place ; and the English 
monarch, not considering that such an acquisition nowise 
advanced his conquests in France, was so imprudent as 
to follow this interested counsel. The city of Tournay, 
by its ancient charters, being exempted from the burden 
of a garrison, the burghers, against the remonstrance of 
their sovereign, strenuously insisted on maintaining this 
dangerous privilege ; and they engaged, by themselves, 
to make a vigorous defence against the enemy 1 . Their 
courage failed them when matters came to trial ; and 
after a few days' siege the place was surrendered to the 
English. The Bishop of Tournay was lately dead ; and 24th Sept 
as a new bishop was already elected by the chapter, 
but not installed in his office, the king bestowed the 
administration of the see on his favourite, Wolsey, and 
put him in immediate possession of the revenues, which 
were considerable" 1 . Hearing of the retreat of the Swiss, 
and observing the season to be far advanced, he thought 
proper to return to England, and he carried the greater 
part of his army with him. Success had attended him 
in every enterprise, and his youthful mind was much 

* Memoires du Marcschal de Fleuranges. Bellarius, lib. 14. 

1 Memoires de Fleuranges. 

m Strype's Memorials, vol. i. p. 5, 6. 



592 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, elated with this seeming prosperity ; but all men of 
J^J^L' judgment, comparing the advantages of his situation with 
1513 his progress, his expense with his acquisitions, were con- 
vinced that this campaign, so much vaunted, was, in 
reality, both ruinous and inglorious to him n . 

The success which, during this summer, had attended 
Henry's arms in the north, was much more decisive. 
The King of Scotland had assembled the whole force of 
his kingdom : and having passed the Tweed with a brave 
though a tumultuary army of above fifty thousand men, 
he ravaged those parts of Northumberland which lay 
nearest that river, and he employed himself in taking the 
castles of Norham, Etal, Werke, Ford, and other places 
of small importance. Lady Ford, being taken prisoner 
in her castle, was presented to James, and so gained on 
the affections of the prince, that he wasted in pleasure 
the critical time which, during the absence of his enemy, 
he should have employed in pushing his conquests. His 
troops, lying in a barren country, where they soon con- 
sumed all the provisions, began to be pinched with hun- 
ger ; and as the authority of the prince was feeble, and 
military discipline, during that age, extremely relaxed, 
many of them had stolen from the camp, and retired 
homewards. Meanwhile the Earl of Surrey having col- 
lected a force of twenty-six thousand men, of which five 
thousand had been sent over from the king's army in 
France, marched to the defence of the country, and ap- 
proached the Scots, who lay on some high ground near 
the hills of Cheviot. The river Till ran between the 
armies, and prevented an engagement : Surrey, there- 
fore, sent a herald to the Scottish camp, challenging the 
enemy to descend into the plain of Milfield, which lay 
towards the south ; and there, appointing a day for the 
combat, to try their valour on equal ground. As he 
received no satisfactory answer, he made a feint of march- 
ing towards Berwick ; as if he intended to enter Scot- 
land, to lay waste the borders, and cut off the provisions 
of the enemy. The Scottish army, in order to prevent 
his purpose, put themselves in motion ; and having set 
fire to the huts in which they had quartered, they 
descended from the hills. Surrey, taking advantage of 

n Guicciardini. 



HENRY VIII. 593 

the smoke which was blown towards him, and which con- CHAP. 
cealed his movements, passed the Till with his artillery XXV1L 
and vanguard at the bridge of Twisel, and sent the rest ^Tis^ 
of his army to seek a ford higher up the river. 

An engagement was now become inevitable, and both 9th Sc P t - 
sides prepared for it with tranquillity and order . The 
English divided their army into two lines : Lord Howard 
led the main body of the first line, Sir Edmond Howard 
the right wing, Sir Marmaduke Constable the left. 
The Earl of Surrey himself commanded the main body 
of the second line, Lord Dacres the right wing, Sir Ed- 
ward Stanley the left. The front of the Scots presented Battle of 
three divisions to the enemy : the middle was led by 
the king himself; the right by the Earl of Huntley, as- 
sisted by Lord Hume ; the left by the Earls of Lenox 
and Argyle. A fourth division, under the Earl of Both- 
well, made a body of reserve. Huntley began the bat- 
tle ; and after a sharp conflict, put to flight the left wing 
of the English, and chased them off the field ; but, on 
returning from the pursuit, he found the whole Scottish 
army in great disorder. The division under Lenox and 
Argyle, elated with the success of the other wing, had 
broken their ranks, and, notwithstanding the remon- 
strances and entreaties of La Motte, the French ambas- 
sador, had rushed headlong upon the enemy. Not only 
Sir Edmond Howard, at the head of his division, re- 
ceived them with great valour ; but Dacres, who com- 
manded in the second line, wheeling about during the 
action, fell upon their rear, and put them to the sword 
without resistance. The division under James, and that 
under Both well, animated by the valour of their leaders, 
still made head against the English, and throwing them- 
selves into a circle, protracted the action, till night 
separated the combatants. The victory seemed yet un- 
decided, and the numbers that fell on each side were 
nearly equal, amounting to above five thousand men: 
but the morning discovered where the advantage lay. 
The English had lost only persons of small note ; but 
the flower of the Scottish nobility had fallen in battle, 
and their king himself, after the most diligent inquiry, 

Buchanan, lib. 13. Drummond. Herbert. Polydore Vergil, lib. 27. Stowe, 
p. 493. Paulus Jovius. 

50* 



594 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, could no where be found. In searching the field, the 
XXVIL English met with a dead body which resembled him, and 
1513 was arrayed in a similar habit; and they put it in a 
leaden coffin and sent it to London. During some 
time it was kept unburied ; because James died under 
sentence of excommunication, on account of his con- 
federacy with France, and his opposition to the holy 
see p ; but upon Henry's application, who pretended that 
this prince had, in the instant before his death, discovered 
signs of repentance, absolution was given him, and his 
body was interred. The Scots, however, still asserted 
that it was not James's body which w T as found on the 
field of battle, but that of one Elphinstone, who had 
been arrayed in arms resembling their king's in order to 
divide the attention of the English, and share the dan- 
ger with his master. It was believed that James had 
been seen crossing the Tweed at Kelso ; and some ima- 
gined that he had been killed by the vassals of Lord 
Hume, whom that nobleman had instigated to commit 
so enormous a crime : but the populace entertained the 
opinion that he was still alive, and, having secretly gone 
in pilgrimage to the Holy Land, would soon return and 
take possession of the throne. This fond conceit was 
long entertained among the Scots. 

The King of Scotland and most of his chief nobles 
being slain in the field of Flouden, so this battle was 
called, an inviting opportunity was offered to Henry 
of gaining advantages over that kingdom, perhaps of 
reducing it to subjection. But he discovered, on this 
occasion, a mind truly great and generous. When the 
Queen of Scotland, Margaret, who was created regent 
during the infancy of her son, applied for peace, he 
readily granted it, and took compassion on the helpless 
15U. condition of his sister and nephew. The Earl of Surrey, 
w r ho had gained him so great a victory, was restored to 
the title of Duke of Norfolk, which had been for- 
feited by his father for engaging on the side of Eichard 
III. Lord Howard was honoured with the title of Earl 
of Surrey. Sir Charles Brandon, the king's favourite, 
whom he had before created Viscount Lisle, was now 
raised to the dignity of Duke of Suffolk. Wolsey,who was 

r Buchanan, lib. 13. Herbert. 



HENRY VIII. 59? 

both his favourite and his minister, was created Bishop CHAP. 
of Lincoln. Lord Herbert obtained the title of Earl of XXVIL 
Worcester ; Sir Edward Stanley that of Lord Monteagle. ^^Tu^ 

Though peace with Scotland gave Henry security on 
that side, and enabled him to prosecute in tranquillity 
his enterprise against France, some other incidents had 
happened, which more than counterbalanced this for- 
tunate event, and served to open his eyes with regard 
to the rashness of an undertaking into which his youth 
and high fortune had betrayed him. 

Lewis, fully sensible of the dangerous situation to 
which his kingdom had been reduced during the former 
campaign, was resolved, by every expedient, to prevent 
the return of like perils, and k> break the confederacy 
of his enemies. The pope was nowise disposed to push 
the French to extremity ; and, provided they did not 
return to take possession of Milan, his interest rather 
led him to preserve the balance among the contending 
parties. He accepted, therefore, of Lewis's offer to re- 
nounce the council of Lyons ; and he took off the ex- 
communication which his predecessor and himself had 
fulminated against that king and his kingdom. Fer- 
dinand was now fast declining in years ; and as he enter- 
tained no farther ambition than that of keeping pos- 
session of Navarre, which he had subdued by his arms 
and policy, he readily hearkened to the proposals of 
Lewis for prolonging the truce another year ; and he 
even showed an inclination of forming a more intimate 
connexion with that monarch. Lewis had dropped hints 
of his intention to marry his second daughter, Renee, 
either to Charles, Prince of Spain, or his brother Fer- 
dinand, both of them grandsons of the Spanish monarch ; 
and he declared his resolution of bestowing on her, as 
her portion, his claim to the duchy of Milan. Ferdi- 
nand not only embraced these proposals with joy ; but 
also engaged the emperor, Maximilian, in the same 
views, and procured his accession to a treaty, which 
opened so inviting a prospect of aggrandizing their com- 
mon grandchildren. 

When Henry was informed of Ferdinand's renewal of 
the truce with Lewis, he fell into a violent rage, and 
loudly complained that his father-in-law had first, by high 



596 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, promises and professions, engaged him in enmity with 
France, and afterwards, without giving him the least 
warning, had now again sacrificed his interests to his own 
selfish purposes, and had left him exposed alone to all 
the danger and expense of the war. In proportion to 
his easy credulity, and his unsuspecting reliance on Fer- 
dinand, was the vehemence with which he exclaimed 
against the treatment which he met with ; and he 
threatened revenge for this egregious treachery and breach 
of faith q . But he lost all patience when informed of the 
other negotiation by which Maximilian was also seduced 
from his alliance, and in which proposals had been agreed 
to, for the marriage of the prince of Spain with the 
daughter of France. Charles, during the lifetime of the 
late king, had been affianced to Mary, Henry's younger 
sister ; and as the prince now approached the age of 
puberty, the king had expected the immediate comple- 
tion of the marriage, and the honourable settlement of a 
sister, for whom he had entertained a tender affection. 
Such a complication, therefore, of injuries, gave him the 
highest displeasure, and inspired him with a desire of 
expressing his disdain towards those who had imposed 
on his youth and inexperience, and had abused his too 
great facility. 

The Duke of Longueville, who had been made pri- 
soner at the battle of Guinegate, and who was still de- 
tained in England, was ready to take advantage of all 
these dispositions of Henry, in order to procure a peace 
and even an alliance, which he knew to be passionately 
desired by his master. He represented to the king that 
Anne, Queen of France, being lately dead, a door was 
thereby opened for an affinity which might tend to the 
advantage of both kingdoms, and which would serve to 
terminate honourably all the differences between them : 
that she had left Lewis no male children ; and as he had 
ever entertained a strong desire of having heirs to the 
crown, no marriage seemed more suitable to him than 
that with the princess of England, whose youth and 
beauty afforded the most flattering hopes in that parti- 
cular : that though the marriage of a princess of sixteen 
with a king of fifty-three might seem unsuitable, yet the 

i Petrus de Angleria, Epist. 545, 546. 



HENRY VIII. 597 

other advantages attending the alliance were more than CHAR 
a sufficient compensation for this inequality : and that xxvn 
Henry, in loosening his connexions with Spain, from 
which he had never reaped any advantage, would con- 
tract a close affinity with Lewis, a prince who, through 
his whole life, had invariably maintained the character 
of probity and honour. 

As Henry seemed to hearken to this discourse with 
willing ears, Longueville informed his master of the pro- 
bability, which he discovered, of bringing the matter to 
a happy conclusion ; and he received full powers for ne- 
gotiating the treaty. The articles were easily adjusted | 
between the monarchs. Lewis agreed that Tournay 7th Aug 
should remain in the hands of the English; that Eichard 
de la Pole should be banished to Mentz, there to live on 
a .pension assigned him by Lewis; that Henry should 
receive payment of a million of crowns, being the arrears 
due by treaty to his father and himself; and that the 
Princess Mary should bring four hundred thousand 
crowns as her portion, and enjoy as large a jointure as 
any queen of France, even the former, who was heiress 
of Britany. The two princes also agreed on the succours 
with which they should mutually supply each other, in 
case either of them were attacked by an enemy r . 

In consequence of this treaty, Mary was sent over to 9th Oct. 
France with a splendid retinue, and Lewis met her at 
Abbeville, where the espousals were celebrated. He was 
enchanted with the beauty, grace, and numerous accom- 
plishments of the young princess ; and being naturally of 
an amorous disposition, which his advanced age had not 
entirely cooled, he was seduced into such a course of 
gaiety and pleasure, as proved very unsuitable to his de- 
clining state of health 8 . He died in less than three 
months after the marriage, to the extreme regret of the 
French nation, who, sensible of his tender concern for 
their welfare, gave him, with one voice, the honourable 
appellation of father of his people. 

Francis, Duke of Angouleme, a youth of one and 
twenty, who had married Lewis's eldest daughter, suc- 
ceeded him on the throne, and by his activity, valour, 
generosity, and other virtues, gave prognostics of a happy 

r Du Tillet. Brantome, Eloge de Louis XII. 




598 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

CHAP, and glorious reign. This young monarch had been ex- 
treme lj struck with the charms of the English princess ; 
and even during his predecessor's lifetime, had paid her 
such assiduous court, as made some of his friends appre- 
hend that he had entertained views of gallantry towards 
her. But being warned that, by indulging this passion, 
he might probably exclude himself from the throne, he 
forbore all farther addresses ; and even watched the young 
dowager with a very careful ej^e, during the first months 
of her widowhood. Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, 
was, at that time, in the court of France, the most comely 
personage of his time, and the most accomplished in all 
the exercises which were then thought to befit a courtier 
and a soldier. He was Henry's chief favourite ; and that 
monarch had even once entertained thoughts of marrying 
him to his sister, and had given indulgence to the mutual 
passion which took place between them. The queen 
asked Suffolk whether he had now the courage, without 
farther reflection, to espouse her ? and she told him, that 
her brother would more easily forgive him for not asking 
his consent, than for acting contrary to his orders. 
Suffolk declined not so inviting an offer, and their nup- 
tials were secretly celebrated at Paris. Francis, who was 
pleased with this marriage, as it prevented Henry from 
forming any powerful alliance by means of his sister*, 
interposed his good offices in appeasing him : and even 
Wolsey, having entertained no jealousy of Suffolk, who 
was content to participate in the king's pleasures, and 
had no ambition to engage in public business, was active 
in reconciling the king to his sister and brother-in-law ; 
and he obtained them permission to return to England. 

* Petrus de Angleria, Epist. 544. 



NOTES. 



NOTE [A], p. 18. 

RYMER, vol. ii. p. 216. 845. There cannot be the least question, that the homage 
usually paid by the kings of Scotland was not for their crown, but for some other 
territory. The only question remains, what that territory was ? It was not always 
for the earldom of Huntingdon, nor the honour of Penryth; because we find'it 
sometimes done at a time when these possessions were not in the hands of the kings 
of Scotland. It is probable that the homage was performed in general terms, with- 
out any particular specification of territory ; and this inaccuracy had proceeded 
either from some dispute between the two kings about the territory, and some op- 
posite claims, which were compromised by the general homage, or from the sim- 
plicity of the age, which employed few words in eveiy transaction. To prove this 
we need but look into the letter of King Richard, where he resigns the homage of 
Scotland, reserving the usual homage. His words are, " Saepedictus W. Rex ligius 
homo noster deveniat de omnibus terris de quibus antececsores sui antecessorum 
nostrorum ligii homines fuerunt, et nobis atque haeredibus nostris fidelitatem jura- 
runt." Rymer, vol. i. p. 65. These general terms were probably copied from tho 
usual fcrm of the homage itself. 

It is no proof that the kings of Scotland possessed no lands or baronies in Eng- 
land, because we cannot find them in the imperfect histories and records of that age. 
For instance, it clearly appears, from another passage in this very letter of Richard, 
that the Scottish king held lands both in the county of Huntingdon and elsewhere 
in England, though the earldom of Huntingdon itself was then in the person of his 
brother David ; and we know at present of no other baronies which William held. 
It cannot be expected that we should now be able to specify all his fees which he 
either possessed or claimed in England, when it is probable that the two monarchs 
themselves, and their ministers, would at that very time have differed in the list ; 
the Scottish king might possess some to which his right was disputed, he might 
claim others which he did not possess ; and neither of the two kings was willing to 
resign his pretensions by a particular enumeration. 

A late author of great industry and learning, but full of prejudices, and of no 
penetration, Mr. Carte, has taken advantage of the undefined terms of the Scottish 
homage, and has pretended that it was done for Lothian and Galloway ; that is, all 
the territories of the country now called Scotland, lying south of the Clyde and 
Forth ; but to refute this pretension at once, we need only consider, that if these 
territories were held in fee of the English kings, there would, by the nature of the 
feudal law as established in England, have been continual appeals from them to the 
courts of the lord paramount, contrary to. all the histories and records of that age. 
We find, that as soon as,,Edward really established his superiority, appeals im- 
mediately commenced from* all parts of Scotland ; and that king, in his writ to the 
king's bench, considers them as a necessary consequence of the feudal tenure. 
Such large territories also would have supplied a considerable part of the English 
armies, which never could have escaped all the historians. Not to mention that 
there is not any instance of a Scotch prisoner of war being tried as a rebel, in the 
frequent hostilities between the kingdoms, where the Scottish armies were chiefly 
filled from the southern counties. 

Mr. Carte's notion with regard to Galloway, which comprehends in the language ot 
that age, or rather in that of the preceding, most of the south-west counties of Scot- 
land ; his notion, I say, rests on so slight a foundation, that it scarcely merits being 
refuted. He will have it (and merely because he will have it) that the Cumberland 
yielded by King Edmund to Malcolm I. meant not only the county in England of 
that name, but all the territory northwards to the Clyde. But the case of Lothian 
deserves some more consideration 1 . 

It is certain, that in very ancient language Scotland means only the country 



600 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

north of the friths of Clyde and Forth. I shall not make a parade of literature to 
prove it, because I do not find that this point is disputed by the Scots themselves. 
The southern country Avas divided into Galloway and Lothian, and the latter com- 
prehended all the south-east counties. This territory was certainly a part of the 
ancient kingdom of Northumberland, and was entirely peopled by Saxons, who 
afterwards received a great mixture of Danes among them. It appears from all 
the English histories, that the whole kingdom of Northumberland paid very little 
obedience to the Anglo-Saxon monarchs, who governed after the dissolution of the 
heptarchy ; and the northern and remote parts of it seem to have fallen into a kind 
of anarchy, sometimes pillaged by the Danes, sometimes joining them in their rav- 
ages upon other parts of England. The kings of Scotland, lying nearer them, took 
at last possession of the country, which had scarcely any government ; and we are 
told by Matthew of Westminster, p. 193, that King Edgar made a grant of the terri- 
tory to Kenneth III., that is, he resigned claims which he could not make effectual, 
without bestowing on them more trouble and expense than they were worth ; for 
these are the only grants of provinces made by kings ; and so ambitious and active a 
prince as Edgar would never have made presents of any other kind. Though Mat- 
thew of Westminster's authority may appear small with regard to so remote a trans- 
action ; yet we may admit it in this case, because Ordericus Vitalis, a good author- 
ity, tells us, p. 701, that Malcolm acknowledged to William Rufus, that the Con- 
queror had confirmed to him the former grant of Lothian. But it follows not, 
because Edgar made this species of grant to Kenneth, that therefore he exacted 
homage for that territory. Homage, and all the rites of the feudal law, were very 
little known among the Saxons ; and we may also suppose that the claim of Ed- 
gar was so antiquated and weak, that, in resigning it, he made no very valuable 
concession ; and Kenneth might well refuse to hold, by so precarious a tenure, a 
territory which he at present held by the sword. In short, no author says he did 
homage for it. 

The only colour, indeed, of authority for Mr. Carte's notion is, that Matthew 
Paris, who wrote in the reign of Henry III., before Edward's claim of superiority 
was heard of, says that Alexander III. did homage to Henry III. " pro Laudianb 
et aliis terris." See p. 555. This word seems naturally to be inteqjreted Lo- 
thian. But, in the first place, Matthew Paris's testimony, though considerable, 
will not outweigh that of all the other historians, who say, that the Scotch homage 
was always done for lands in England. Secondly, if the Scotch homage was done 
in general terms, (as has been already proved,) it is no wonder that historians 
should differ in their account of the object of it, since it is probable the parties 
themselves Avere not fully agreed. Thirdly, there is reason to think that Laudianum, 
in Matthew Paris, does not mean the Lothians noAV in Scotland. There appears to 
have been a territory Avhich anciently bore that or a similar name in the north of 
England. For (1.) The Saxon Chronicle, p. 197, says, that Malcolm Kenmure met 
William Rufus in Lodene in England. (2.) It is agreed by all historians that Henry 
II. only reconquered from Scotland the northern counties of Northumberland, Cum- 
berland, and Westmoreland. See NeAvbriggs, p. 383. Wykes, p. 30. Hemingford, 
p. 492. Yet the same country is called by other historians Loidis, comitatus Lo- 
donensis, or some such name. See M. Paris, p. 68. M. West. p. 247. Annal. 
Waverl. p. 159, and Diceto, p. 531. (3.) This last-mentioned author, Avhen he 
speaks of Lothian in Scotland, calls it Loheneis, p. 574, though he had called the 
English territory Loidis. 

I thought this long note necessary, in order to correct Mr. Carte's mistake, an au- 
thor Avhose diligence and industry have given light to many passages of the more 
ancient English history. 

NOTE [BJ, p. 19. 

Rymer/vol. ii. p. 543. It is remarkable that the English chancellor spoke to 
the Scotch Parliament in the* French tongue. This was also the language com- 
monly made use of by all parties on that occasion. Ibid, passim. Some of the 
most considerable among the Scotch, as well as almost all the English barons, 
were of French origin ; they valued themselves upon it, and pretended to despise 
the language and manners of the island. It is difficult to account for the settle- 
ment of so many French families in Scotland, the Bruces, Baliols, St. Clairs, 
Montgomeries, Somervilles, Gordons, Erasers, Cummins, Colvilles, Umfrevilles, 
MoAvbrays, Hays, Maules, Avho Avere not supported there, as in England, by the 
power of the sword. But the superiority of the smallest civility and knowledge 
over total ignorance and barbarism is prodigious. 



NOTES. 601 

NOTE [C], p. 23. 

See Rymer, vol. ii. p. 533, where Edward writes to the king's bench to receive 
appeals from Scotland. He knew the practice to be new and unusual, yet he estab- 
lishes it as an infallible consequence of his superiority. We learn also from the 
same collection, p. 603, that immediately upon receiving the homage, he changed 
the style of his address to the Scotch king, whom he now calls "dilecto et fideli," 
instead of " fratri dilecto et fideli," the appellation which he had always before used 
to him : see p. 109. 124. 168. 280. 1064. This is a certain proof that he himself was 
not deceived, as was scarcely indeed possible, but that he was conscious of his usur- 
pations. Yet he solemnly swore afterwards to the justice of his pretensions, when 
he defended them before Pope Boniface. 

NOTE [D], p. 37. 

Throughout the reign of Edward I. the assent of the Commons is not once ex- 
pressed in any of the enacting clauses ; nor in the reigns ensuing, till the 9 Edw. 
III., nor in any of the enacting clauses of 16 Rich. II. Nay even so low as Hen. 
VI., from the beginning till the 8th of his reign, the assent of the commons is not 
once expressed in any enacting clause. See preface to Ruff head's edition of the 
Statutes, p. 7. If it should be asserted, that the Commons had really given their 
assent to these statutes, though they are not expressly mentioned, this very omission, 
proceeding, if you will, from carelessness, is a proof how little they were respected. 
The Commons were so little accustomed to transact public business, that they had 
no speaker till after the Parliament 6th Edw. III. : see Prynne's Preface to Cot- 
ton's Abridgment : not till the first of Rich. II. in the opinion of most antiquaries. 
The Commons were very unwilling to meddle in any state affairs, and commonly 
either referred themselves to the Lords, or desired a select committee of that House 
to assist them, as appears from Cotton. 5 E. III. n. 5 ; 15 E. III. n. 17 ; 21 E. III. 
n. 5 ; 47 E. III. n. 5 ; 50 E. III. n. 10 ; 51 E. III. n. 18 ; 1 R. II. n. 12 ; 2 R. II. 
n. 12 ; 5 R. II. n. 14 ; 2 Parl. 6 R. II. n. 14 ; Parl. 2. 6 R. II. n. 8, &c. 

NOTE [E], p. 38. 

It was very agreeable to the maxims of all the feudal governments, that every order 
of the state should give their consent to the acts which more immediately concerned 
them ; and as the notion of a political system was not then so well understood, the 
other orders of the state were often not consulted on these occasions. In this reign, 
even the merchants, though no public body, granted the king impositions on merchan- 
dize, because the first payments came out of their pockets. They did the same in the 
reign of Edward III., but the Commons had then observed that the people paid these 
duties, though the merchants advanced them; and they therefore remonstrated 
against this practice. Cotton's Abridg. p. 39. The taxes imposed by the knights 
on the counties were always lighter than those which the burgesses laid on the bor- 
oughs ; a presumption, that in voting those taxes, the knights and burgesses did not 
form the same house. See Chancellor West's Inquiry into the manner of creating 
Peers, p. 8. But there are so many proofs that those two orders of representatives 
were long separate, that it is needless to insist on them. Mr. Carte, who had care- 
fully consulted the rolls of Parliament, affirms, that they never appear to have been 
united till the 16th Edward III. See Hist. vol. ii. p. 451. But it is certain that 
this union was not even then final ; in 1372 the burgesses acted by themselves, and 
voted a tax after the knights were dismissed. See Tyrrel, Hist. vol. iii. p. 734, 
from Rot. Claus. 46 Edw. III. n. 9. In 1376 they were the knights alone who passed 
a vote for the removal of Alice Pierce from the king's person, if we may credit Wal- 
singham, p. 189. There is an instance of a like kind in the reign of Richard II. 
Cotton, p. 1 93. The different taxes voted by those two branches of the Lower Houses 
naturally kept them separate ; but as their petitions had mostly the same object, 
namely, the redress of grievances, and the support of law and justice, both against 
the crown and the barons, this cause as naturally united them, and was the reason 
why they at last joined in one house for the despatch of business. The barons had 
few petitions. Their privileges were of more ancient date. Grievances seldom af- 
fected them. They were themselves the chief oppressors. 

In 1333 the knights by themselves concurred with the bishops and barons in 
advising the king to stay his journey into Ireland. Here was a petition which 
regarded a matter of state, and was supposed to be above the capacity of the bur- 

VOL. II. 51 



602 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

gesscs. The knights, therefore, acted a part in this petition. See Cotton's Abridg. 
p. 13. Chief baron Gilbert thinks, that the reason why taxes always began with 
the Commons or burgesses, was, that they were limited by the instructions of their 
boroughs. See Hist, of the Exchequer, p. 37. 

NOTE [F], p. 39. 

The chief argument from ancient authority, for the opinion that the represen- 
tatives of boroughs preceded the 49th of Henry III. is the famous petition of the 
borough of St. Albans, first taken notice of by Selden, and then by Petyt, Brady, 
Tyrrel, and others. In this petition, presented to the Parliament in the reign of 
Edward II., the town of St. Albans asserts, that though they held in capite of the 
crown, and owed only, for all other service, their attendance in Parliament, yet the 
sheriff had omitted them in his writs ; whereas both in the reign of the king's father, 
and all his predecessors, they had always sent members. Now, say the defenders 
of this opinion, if the commencement of the House of Commons were in Henry 
III.'s reign, this expression could not have been used. But Madox, in his History 
of the Exchequer, p. 522, 523, 524, has endeavoured, and with great reason, to de- 
stroy the authority of this petition for the purpose alleged. He asserts, first, that 
there was no such tenure in England as that of holding by attendance in Parliament, 
instead of all other service. Secondly, that the borough of St. Albans never held 
of the crown at all, but was always demesne land of the abbot. It is no wonder, 
therefore, that a petition which advances two falsehoods should contain one historical 
mistake, Avhich indeed amounts only to an inaccurate and exaggerated expression ; 
no strange matter in ignorant burge*sses of that age. Accordingly, St. Albans con- 
tinued still to belong to the abbot. It never held of the crown till after the disso- 
lution of the monasteries. But the assurance of these petitioners is remarkable. 
They wanted to shake oft' the authority of their abbot, and to hold of the king ; but 
were unwilling to pay any services even to the crown : upon which they framed 
this idle petition, which later writers have made the foundation of so many infer- 
ences and conclusions. From the tenor of the petition it appears, that there was a 
close connexion between holding of the crown, and being represented in Parlia- 



summoned, without distinction, all the considerable boroughs of the kingdom, 
among which there might be some few that did not hold of the crown. Edward 
also found it necessary to impose taxes on all the boroughs in the kingdom without 
distinction. This was a good expedient for augmenting his revenue. We are not 
to imagine, because the House of Commons have since become of great importance, 
that the first summoning of them would form any remarkable and striking epoch, 
and be generally known to the people even seventy or eighty years after. So igno- 
rant were the generality of men in that age, that country burgesses would readily im- 
agine an innovation, seemingly so little material, to have existed fi-om time imme- 
morial, because it was beyond their own memory, and perhaps that of their fathers. 
Even the Parliament in the reign of Henry V. say, that Ireland had, from the begin- 
ning of time, been subject to the crown of England. (See Brady.) And surely if 
any thing interests the people above all others, it is war and conquests, with their 
dates and circumstances. 

NOTE [G], p. 175. 

This story of the six burgesses of Calais, like all other extraordinary stories, is 
somewhat to be suspected; and so much the more, as Avesbury, p. 167, who is 
particular in his narration of the surrender of Calais, says nothing of it ; and, on 
the contrary, extols in general the king's generosity and lenity to the inhabitants. 
The numberless mistakes of Froissart, proceeding either from negligence, credulity, 
or love of the marvellous, invalidate very much his testimony, even though he was 
a contemporary, and though his history was dedicated to Queen Philippa herself. 
It is a mistake to imagine, that the patrons of dedications read the books, much less 
vouch for all the contents of them. It is not a slight testimony that should make 
us give credit to a story so dishonourable to Edward, especially after that proof of 
his humanity, in allowing a free passage to all the women, children, and infirm 
people, at the beginning of the siege ; at least, it is scarcely to be believed, that if 
the story has any foundation, he seriously meant to execute his menaces against 
the six townsmen of Calais. 



NOTES. 603 

NOTE [HJ, p. 179. 

There was a singular instance about this time of the prevalence ot chivalry and 
gallantly in the nations of Europe. A solemn duel of thirty knights against thirty 
was fought between Bembrough, an Englishman, and Beaumanoir, a Breton, of the 
party of Charles ofrBlois. The knights of the two nations came into the field ; and 
before the combat began, Beaumanoir called out, that it would be seen that day 
" Avho had the fairest mistresses." After a bloody combat the Bretons prevailed, 
and gained for their prize full liberty to boast of their mistresses' beauty. It is 
remarkable, that two such famous generals as Sir Robert Knolles and Hugh Clavrr- 
ley drew their swords in this ridiculous contest. See Pere Daniel, vol. ii. p. 536, 
537, &c. The women not only instigated the champions to those rough if not bloody 
frays of tournament, but also frequented the tournaments during all the reign of 
Edward, whose spirit of gallantry encouraged this practice. See Knyghton,p. 2597. 

NOTE [I], p. 197. 

This is a prodigious sum, and probably near the half of what the king received from 
the Parliament during the Avhole course of his reign. It must be remarked, that a tenth 
and fifteenth (which was always thought a high grant) were, in the eighth year of 
his reign, fixed at about twenty-nine thousand pounds : there were said to be near 
thirty thousand sacks of wool exported every year : a sack of wool was, at a medium, 
sold for five pounds. Upon these suppositions it would be easy to compute all the 
parliamentary grants, taking the lists as they stand in Tyrrcl, vol. iii. p. 780 ; 
though somewhat must still be left to conjecture. This king levied more money on 
his subjects than any of his predecessors ; and the Parliament frequently complain 
of the poverty of the people, and the oppressions under which they laboured. But it 
is to be remarked, that a third of the French king's ransom was yet unpaid when 
war broke out anew between the two crowns : his son chose rather to employ his 
money in combating the English, than in enriching them. See Kymer, vol. viii. p. 
315. 

NOTE [K], p. 227. 

In the fifth year of the king, " the Commons complained of the government about 
the king's person, his court, the excessive number of his servants, of the abuses in 
the chancery, king's bench, common pleas, exchequer, and of grievous oppressions 
in the country, by the great multitudes of maintainers of quarrels," (men linked in 
confederacies' together,) " who behaved themselves like kings in the country, so as 
there was very little law or right, and of other things which they said were the 
cause of the late commotions under Wat Tyler." Parl. Hist. vol. i. p. 365. This 
irregular government, which no king and no House of Commons had been able to 
remedy, was the source of the licentiousness of the great, and turbulency of the peo- 
ple, as well as tyranny of the princes. If subjects would enjoy liberty, and kings 
security, the laws must be executed. 

In the ninth of this reign the Commons also discovered an accuracy and a jeal- 
ousy of liberty which we should little expect in those rude times. " It was agreed 
by Parliament," says Cotton, p. 309, " that the subsidy of wools, of wool-fells, and 
skins, granted to the king until the time of midsummer then ensuing, should cease 
from the same time unto the feast of St. Peter ad vincula, for that thereby the king 
should be interrupted for claiming such grant as due." See also Cotton, p. 198. 

NOTE [L], p. 237. 

Knyghton, p. 2715, &c. The same author, p. 2680, tells us, that the king, in 
return to the message, said, that he would not, for their desire, remove the meanest 
scullion from his kitchen. This author also tells us, that the king said to the com- 
missioners, when they harangued him, that he saw his subjects were rebellious, and 
his best way would be to call in the King of France to his aid. But it is plain that 
all these speeches were either intended by Knyghton merely as an ornament to his 
history, or are false. For, (1.) When the five lords accuse the king's ministers n 
the next Parliament, and impute to them every rash act of the king, they speal 
nothino- of these replies which are so obnoxious, were so recent, and are pretende< 
to have been so public. (2.) The king, so far from having any connexions at that 



604 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

time with Erance, was threatened with a dangerous invasion from that kingdom. 
This story seems to have been taken from the reproaches afterwards thrown out 
against him, and to have been transferred by the historians to this time to which 
they cannot be applied. 

NOTE [M], p. 242. 

We must except the 12th article, which accuses Brembre of having cut off the 
heads of twenty-two prisoners, confined for felony or debt, without warrant or 
process of law. But, as it is not conceivable what interest Brembre could have to 
treat these felons and debtors in such a manner, we may presume that the fact is 
either false or misrepresented. It was in these men's power to say any thing 
against the persons accused : no defence or apology was admitted : all was lawless 
will and pleasure. 

They are also accused of designs to murder the lords ; but these accusations 
either are general, or destroy one another. Sometimes, as in article 15th, they 
intend to murder them by means of the mayor and city of London : sometimes, 
as in article 28th, by trial and false inquests : sometimes, as in article 28th, by means 
of the King of France, who was to receive Calais for his pains. 

NOTE [N], p. 243. 

In general, the Parliament in those days never paid a proper regard to Edward's 
statute of treasons, though one of the most advantageous laws for the subject that 
has ever been enacted. In the 17th of the king, "the Dukes of Lancaster and 
Gloucester complain to Richard that Sir Thomas Talbot, with others of his adhe- 
rents, conspired the death of the said dukes in divers parts of Cheshire, as the same 
was confessed and well known ; and praying that the Parliament may judge of the 
fault. Whereupon the king and the lords in the Parliament judged the same fact 
to be open and high treason : and hereupon they award two writs, the one to the 
sheriff of York, and the other to the sheriffs of Derby, to take the body of the said 
Sir Thomas, returnable in the king's bench in the month of Easter then ensuing. 
And open proclamation was made in Westminster-hall, that upon the sheriff's re- 
turn, and at the next coming in of the said Sir Thomas, the said Thomas should 
be convicted of treason, and incur the loss and pain of the same ; and all such as 
should receive him after the proclamation should incur the same loss and pain." 
Cotton, p. 354. It is to be observed, that this extraordinary judgment was passed 
in a time of tranquillity. Though the statute itself of Edward III. reserves a power 
to the Parliament to declare any new species of treason, it is not to be supposed 
that this power was reserved to the House of Lords alone, or that men were to be 
judged by a law ex post facto. At least, if such be the meaning of the clause, it 
may be affirmed that men were at that time very ignorant of the first principles of 
law and justice. 

\ 

NOTE [O], p. 249. 

In the preceding Parliament the Commons had shown a disposition very com- 
plaisant to the king ; yet there happened an incident in their proceedings which is 
curious, and shows us the state of the House during that period. The members 
were either country gentlemen or merchants, who were assembled for a few days, and 
were entirely unacquainted with business ; so that it was easy to lead them astray, 
and draw them into votes and resolutions very different from their intention. 
Some petitions concerning the state of the nation were voted ; in which, among 
other things, the House recommended frugality to the king, and for that purpose 
desired that the court should not be so much frequented as formerly by bishops and 
ladies. The king was displeased with this freedom : the Commons very humbly 
craved pardon : he was not satisfied unless they would name the mover of the peti- 
tions. It happened to be one Haxey, whom the Parliament, in order to make 
atonement, condemned for this offence to die the death of a traitor. But the king, 
at the desire of the Archbishop of Canterbury and the prelates, pardoned him. 
When a Parliament, in those times, not agitated by any faction, and being at entire 
freedom, could be guilty of such monstrous extravagance, it is easy to judge what 
might be expected from them in more trying situations. See Cotton's Abridg. p. 
361, 362. 



NOTES. 605 

NOTE [PI, p. 260. 

To show how little credit is to be given to this charge against Richard, we may 
observe, that a law, in the 13 Edward III., had been enacted a^ain^t the continu- 
ance of sheriffs for more than one year : but the inconvenience of changes havin" 
afterwards appeared from experience, the Commons, in the twentieth of this kin< 
applied by petition that the sheriffs might be continued ; though that petition had 
not been enacted into a statute, by reason of other disagreeable circumstances which 
attended it. See Cotton, p. 361. It was certainly a very moderate exercise of 
the dispensing power in the king to continue the sheriffs after he found that that 
practice would be acceptable to his subjects, and had been applied for by one House 
of Parliament : yet is this made an article of charge against him by the present 
Parliament. See Art. 18. Walsingham, speaking of a period early in llichard's 
minority, says, " But what do acts of Parliament signify, when after they are made 
they take no effect ; since the king, by the advice of the privy-council, takes upon 
him to alter, or wholly set aside, all those things which by general consent had been 
ordained in Parliament ? " If Richard therefore exercised the dispensing power, 
he was warranted by the examples of his uncles and grandfather, and indeed of all 
his predecessors from the time of Henry III. inclusive. 

NOTE [Q], p. 268. 

The following passage in Cotton's Abridgment, p. 196, shows a strange prejudice 
against the church and churchmen. " The Commons afterwards coming into the 
Parliament, and making their protestation, showed, that for want of good redress 
about the king's person, in his household, in all his courts, touching maintainers in 
every county, and purveyors, the Commons were daily pilled, and nothing defended 
against the enemy, and that it should shortly deprive the king, and undo the state. 
Wherefore, in the same government, they entirely require redress. Whereupon the 
king appointed sundry bishops, lords, and nobles, to sit in privy-council about these 
matters ; who, since that they must begin at the head, and go at the request of the 
Commons, they, in the presence of the king, charged his confessor not to come into 
court but upon the four principal festivals." We should little expect that a popish 
privy-council, in order to preserve the king's morals, should order his confessor to 
be kept at a distance from him. This incident happened in the minority of Richard. 
As the popes had for a long time resided at Avignon, and the majority of the sacred 
college were Frenchmen, this circumstance naturally increased the aversion of the 
nation to the papal power ; but the prejudice against the English clergy cannot be 
accounted for from that cause. 

NOTE [R], p. 411. 

That we may judge how arbitrary a court that of the constable of England was, 
we may peruse the patent granted to the Earl of Rivers in this reign, as it is to be 
found in Spellman's Glossary in verb. Constabularies ; as also, more fully in Rymer, 
vol. xi. p. 581. Here is a clause of it. "Et ulterius de uberiori gratia nostra 
eidem Comiti de Rivers plenam potestatem damus ad cognoscendum et prpceden- 
dum, in omnibus et singulis causis et negotiis, de et super crimine lesa? majestatis, 
seu super occasione caeterisque causis, quibuscunque per prajfatum Comitem de 
Rivers, ut constabularium Anglia? qua in curia constabularii Anglia3 ab antiquo, 



sasque r ... 

connexis, audiendum, examinandum, et fine debito terminandum, etiam suinma 
et de piano, sine strepitu et figura justitice, sola facti veritate inspecta, ac etiam manu 
re<na si opportunum vistim fuerit eidem Comiti de Rivers, vices nostras, appella- 
tione remota." The office of constable was perpetual in the monarchy ; its juris- 
diction was not limited to times of war, as appears from this patent, and as 
learn from Spellman : yet its authority was in direct contradiction to Magna Uiarta, 
and it is evident that no regular liberty could subsist with it. It involved a full < 
tatorial power continually subsisting in the state. The only check on the cro 
besides the want of force to support all its prerogatives, was, that the office ol 
was commonlv either hereditary, or during life ; and the person invested with 
was, for that reason, not so proper an instrument of arbitrary power in ti 3 king. 
Accordingly the office was suppressed by Henry VIIL, the most arbitrary oi 



606 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

the English princes. The practice, however, of exercising martial law still sub- 
sisted, and was not abolished till the Petition of Eight under Charles I. This was 
the epoch of true liberty, confirmed by the Eestoration, and enlarged and secured 
by the Ee volution. 

NOTE [S], p. 421. 

"We shall give an instance. Almost all the historians, even Comines, and the 
continuator of the annals of Croyland, assert that Edward was about this time taken 
prisoner by Clarence and Warwick, and was committed to the custody of the Arch- 
bishop of York, brother to the earl ; but being allowed to take the diversion of 
hunting by this prelate, he made his escape, and afterwards chased the rebels out 
of the kingdom. But that all the story is false appears from Eymer, where we find 
that the king, throughout all this period, continually exercised his authority, and 
never was interrupted in his government. On the 7th of March, 1470, he gives a 
commission of array to Clarence, whom he then imagined a good subject ; and on 
the 23rd of the same month, we find him issuing an order for apprehending him. 
Besides, in the king's manifesto against the duke and earl, (Glaus. 10 Edward IV. 
m. 7, 8.) where he enumerates all their treasons, he mentions no such fact : he does 
not so much as accuse them of exciting young Welles's rebellion ; he only says, 
that they exhorted him to continue in his rebellion. We may judge how smaller 
facts will be misrepresented by historians, who can in the most material transactions 
mistake so grossly. There may even some doubt arise with regard to the proposal 
of marriage made to Bona of Savoy, though almost all the historians concur in it, 
and the fact be very likely in itself, for there are no traces in Eymer of any such 
embassy of Warwick's to France. The chief certainty in this and the preceding 
reign arises either from public records, or from the notice taken of certain passages 
by the French historians. On the contrary, for some centuries after the conquest, 
the French history is not complete without the assistance of English authors. We 
may conjecture, that the reason of the scarcity of historians during this period was 
the destruction of the convents which ensued so soon after : copies of the more 
recent historians not being yet sufficiently dispersed, these histories have perished. 

NOTE [T], p. 455. 

Sir Thomas More, who has been followed, or rather transcribed, by all the histo- 
rians of this short reign, says, that Jane Shore had fallen into connexions with Lord 
Hastings : and this account agrees best with the course of the events : but in a procla- 
mation of Eichard's, to be found in Eymer, vol. xii. p. 204, the Marquis of Dorset is 
reproached with these connexions. This reproach, however, might have been in- 
vented by Eichard, or founded only on popular rumour ; and is not sufficient to over- 
balance the authority of Sir Thomas More. The proclamation is remarkable for 
the hypocritical purity of manners affected by Eichard : this bloody and treacherous 
tyrant upbraids the marquis and others with their gallantries and intrigues as the 
most terrible enormities. 

NOTE [U], p. 474. 

Every one that has perused the ancient monkish writers knows, that however bar- 
barous their own style, they are full of allusions to the Latin classics, especially the 
poets. There seems also, in those middle ages, to have remained many ancient 
books that are now lost. Malmesbury, who flourished in the reign of Henry I. and 
King Stephen, quotes Livy's description of Caesar's passage over the Eubicon ; 
Fitz-Stephen, who lived in the reign of Henry II., alludes to a passage in the larger 
history of Sallust. In the collection of letters, which passes under the name of 
Thomas a Becket, we see how familiar all the ancient history and ancient books 
were to the more ingenuous and more dignified churchmen of that time, and conse- 
quently how much that order of men must have surpassed all the other members of 
the society. That prelate and his friends call each other philosophers, in all the 
course of their correspondence, and consider the rest of the world as sunk in total 
ignorance and barbarism. 

NOTE [X], p. 546. 

Stowe, Baker, Speed, Biondini, Hollingshed, Bacon. Some late writers, partic- 
ularly Mr. Carte, have doubted whether Perkin were an impostor, and have even 



NOTES. 607 

asserted him to be the true Plantagenet. But to refute this opinion, we need only 
reflect on the following particulars. (1.) Though the circumstances of the wars 
between the two roses be, in general, involved in great obscurity, yet is there a most 
luminous ray thrown on all the transactions during the usurpation of Richard, and 
the murder of the two young princes, by the narrative of Sir Thomas More, whose 
singular magnanimity, probity, and judgment, make him an evidence beyond all 
exception. No historian, either of ancient or modern times, can possibly have more 
weight : he may also be justly esteemed a contemporary with regard to the murder 
of the two princes : for though he was but five years of age when that event happen- 
ed, he lived and was educated among the chief actors during the period of Richard : 
and it is plain, from his narrative itself, which is often extremely circumstantial, 
that he had the particulars from the eye-witnesses themselves ; his authority, there- 
fore, is irresistible ; and sufficient to overbalance a hundred little doubts and scruples 
and objections. For in reality his narrative is liable to no solid objection, nor is 
there any mistake detected in "it. He says, indeed, that the protector's partisans, 
particularly Dr. Shaw, spread abroad rumours of Edward IV.'s pre-contract with 
Elizabeth Lucy ; whereas it now appears from record, that the Parliament afterwards 
declared the king's children illegitimate, on pretence of his pre-contract with Lady 
Eleanor Talbot. But it must be remarked, that neither of these pre-contracts was 
ever so much as attempted to be proved : and why might not the protector's flatterers 
and partisans have made use sometimes of one false rumour, sometimes of another? 
Sir Thomas More mentions the one rumour as well as the other, and treats them 
both lightly, as they deserved. It is also thought incredible by Mr. Carte, that Dr. 
Shaw should have been encouraged by Richard to calumniate openly his mother 
the Duchess of York, with whom that prince lived on good terms. But if there be 
any difficulty in this supposition, we need only suppose that Dr. Shaw might have 
concerted, in general, his sermon with the protector or his ministers, and yet have 
chosen himself the particular topics, and chosen them very foolishly. This appears, 
indeed, to have been the case, by the disgrace into which he fell afterwards, and by 
the protector's neglect of him. (2.) If Sir Thomas's quality of contemporary be 
disputed with regard to the Duke of Gloucester's protectorate, it cannot possibly be 
disputed with regard to Perkin's imposture : he was then a man, and had a full 
opportunity of knowing and examining and judging of the truth. In asserting that 
the Duke of York was murdered by his uncle, he certainly asserts, in the most ex- 
press terms, that Perkin, who personated him, was an impostor. (3.) There is 
another great genius who has carefully treated this point of history ; so great a 
genius as to be esteemed with justice one of the chief ornaments of the nation, and 
indeed one of the most sublime writers that any age or nation has produced. It is 
Lord Bacon I mean, who has related at full length, and without the least doubt or 
hesitation, all the impostures of Perkin Warbec. It is to be objected, that Lord Ba- 
con was no contemporary, and that we have the same materials as he upon which 
to form our judgment ; it must be remarked, that Lord Bacon plainly composed his 
elaborate and exact history from many records and papers which are now lost, and 
that, consequently, he is always to be cited as an original historian. It were very 
strange, if Mr. Carte's opinion were just, that, among all the papers which Lord Ba- 
con perused, he never found any reason to suspect Perkin to be the true Plantagenet. 
There was at that time no interest in defaming Richard III. Bacon, besides, is a 
very unbiassed historian, nowise partial to Henry : we know the detail of that prince s 
oppressive government from him alone. It may only be thought, that in summing 
up his character, he has laid the colours of blame more faintly than the very facts he 
mentions seem to require. Let me remark, in passing, as a singularity, how much 
Eno-lish history has been beholden to four great men, who have possessed the high- 
est dignity in the law : More, Bacon, Clarendon, and Whitlocke. (4.) But if contem- 
porary evidence be so much sought after, there may in this case be produced the 
strono-est and most undeniable in the world. The queen-dowager, her son the Mar- 
quis of Dorset, a man of excellent understanding, Sir Edward Woodville, her bro- 
ther Sir Thomas St. Leger, who had married the king's sister, Sir John Bourchier, 
Sir Robert Willoughby, Sir Giles Daubeney, Sir Thomas Arundel, the Courtneys, 
the Cheneys, the Talbots, the Stanleys, and, in a word, all the partisans ot the nou 
of York, that is, the men of chief dignity in the nation ; all these great persons wen 
so assured of the murder of the two princes, that they applied to the Larl ot 
mond, the mortal enemy of their party and family ; they projected to set him on lie 
throne, which must have been utter ruin to them if the princes were alive ; an 
stipulated to marry him to the Princess Elizabeth as heir to the crown, who m 
case was no heir at all. Had each of those persons written the memoirs of his <ron 



608 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

times, would he not have said that Richard murdered his nephews ? Or would their 
pen be a better declaration than their actions of their real sentiments'? (5.) But we 
have another contemporary authority still better than even these great persons so 
much interested to know the truth: it is that of Richard himself : he projected to 
marry his niece, a very unusual alliance in England, in order to unite her title with 
his own. He knew, therefore, her title to be good : for as to the declaration of her 
illegitimacy, as it went upon no proof, or even pretence of proof, it was always 
regarded with the utmost contempt by the nation, and was considered as one of those 
parliamentary transactions so frequent in that period, which were scandalous in 
themselves, and had no manner of authority. It was even so much despised as not 
to be reversed by Parliament, after Henry and Elizabeth were on the throne. (6.) 
We have also, as contemporary evidence, the universal established opinion of the age, 
both abroad and at home. This point was regarded as so uncontroverted, that 
when Eichard notified his accession to the court of Erance, that court was struck with 
horror at his abominable parricide, in murdering both his nephews, as Philip de 
Comines tells us ; and this sentiment went to such an unusual height, that, as we learn 
from the same author, the court would not make the least reply to him. (7.) The 
same reasons which convinced that age of the parricide still subsist, and ought to 
carry the most undoubted evidence to us ; namely, the very circumstance of the 
sudden disappearance of the princes from the Tower, and their appearance 
no where else. Every one said, " they have not escaped from their uncle, for he 
makes no search after them : he has not conveyed them elsewhere ; for it is his 
business to declare so, in order to remove the imputation of murder from himself. 
He never would needlessly subject himself to the infamy and danger of being 
esteemed a parricide, without acquiring the security attending that crime. They 
were in his custody : he is answerable for them : if he gives no account of them, as 
he has a plain interest in their death, he must, by every rule of common sense, be 
regarded as the murderer. His flagrant usurpation, as well as his other treacher- 
ous and cruel actions, makes no better be expected from him. He could not say, 
with Cain, that he was not his nephews' keeper." This reasoning, which was 
irrefragable at the very first, became every day stronger, from Richard's continued 
silence, and the general and total ignorance of the place of these princes' abode. 
Richard's reign lasted about two years beyond this period ; and surely he could not 
have found a better expedient for disappointing the Earl of Richmond's projects, 
as well as justifying his own character, than the producing of his nephews. (8.) If 
it were necessary, amidst this blaze of evidence, to produce proofs, which in any 
other case would have been regarded as considerable, and would have earned great 
validity with them, I might mention Dighton and Tyrrel's account of the murder. 
This last gentleman especially was not likely to subject himself to the reproach of 
so great a crime, by an imposture which it appears did not acquire him the favour 
of Henry. (9.) The Duke of York, being a boy of nine years of age, could not 
have made his escape without the assistance of some elder persons. Would it not 
have been their chief concern instantly to convey intelligence of so great an event 
to his mother the queen-dowager, to his aunt the Duchess of Burgundy, and to the 
other friends of the family ? The duchess protected Simnel ; a project which, had 
it been successful, must have ended in the crowning of Warwick, and the exclusion 
of the Duke of York ! This, among many other proofs, evinces that she was 
ignorant of the escape of that prince, which is impossible had it been real. (10.) 
The total silence with regard to the persons who aided him in his escape, as also 
with regard to the place of his abode during more than eight years, is a sufficient 
proof of the imposture. (11.) Perkin's own account of his escape is incredible and 
absurd. He said that murderers were employed by his uncle to kill him and his bro- 
ther : they perpetrated the crime against his brother ; but took compassion on him and 
allowed him to escape. This account is contained in all the historians of that age. 
(12.) Perkin himself made a full confession of his imposture no less than three times ; 
once when he surrendered himself prisoner, a second time when he was set in the 
stocks at Cheapside and Westminster, and a third time, which carries undoubted evi- 
dence, at the foot of the gibbet on which he was hanged. Not the least surmise 
that the confession had ever been procured by torture ; and surely the last time he 
had nothing farther to fear. (13.) Had not Henry been assured that Perkin was a 
ridiculous impostor, disavowed by the whole nation, he never would have allowed 
him to live an hour after he came into his power ; much less would he have twice 
pardoned him. His treatment of the innocent Earl of Wai-wick, who in reality had 
no title to the crown, is a sufficient confirmation of this reasoning. (14.) We know 
with certainty whence the whole imposture came, namely, from the intrigues of the 



NOTES. 609 

Duchess of Burgundy : she had before acknowledged and supported Lambert Shnnel, 
an avowed impostor. It is remarkable that Mr. Carte, in order to preserve tin- weight 
of the duchess's testimony in favour of Perkin, suppresses entirely this material fad : 
a strong effect of party prejudices, and this author's desire of blaekenin- Hcurv 
VII., whose hereditary title to the crown was defective. (15.) There never was n't 
that time any evidence or shadow of evidence produced of Perkin's identity with 
Richard Plantagenet. Richard had disappeared when nine vears of ajre, and IVr- 
kin did not appear till he was a man. Could any one from his aspect pretend then 
to be sure of the identity ? He had got some stories concerning Richard's childhood, 
and the court of England : but all that it was necessary for a boy of nine to remark 
or remember, was easily suggested to him by the Duchess of Burgundy, or Frion, 
Henry's secretary, or by any body that had ever lived at court. It is true, many 
persons of note were at first deceived ; but the discontents against Henry's govern- 
ment, and the general enthusiasm for the house of York, account sufficiently for 
this temporary delusion. Every body's eyes were opened long before Perkin's death. 
(16.) The circumstance of finding the two dead bodies in the reign of Charles II. 
is not surely indifferent. They were found in the very place which More, Bacon, 
and other ancient authors, had assigned as the place of interment of the young 
princes ; the bones corresponded, by their size, to the age of the princes : the secret 
and irregular place of their interment, not being in holy ground, proves that the 
boys had been secretly murdered : and in the Tower no" boys but those who are 
very nearly related to the crown can be exposed to a violent death. If we compare 
all these circumstances, we shall find that the inference is just and strong, that they 
were the bodies of Edward the Fifth and his brother ; the very inference that was 
drawn at the time of the discovery. 

Since the publication of this history, Mr. Walpole has published his historic 
doubts concerning Richard III. Nothing can be a stronger proof how ingenious and 
agreeable that gentleman's pen is, than his being able to make an inquiry concern- 
ing a remote point of English history, an object of general conversation. The 
foregoing note has been enlarged on account of that performance. 

NOTE [Yl, p. 559. 

Rot. Parl. 3 Hen. VII. n. 17. The preamble is remarkable, and shows the state 
of the nation at that time. " The king, our sovereign lord, remembereth how, by 
our unlawful maintenances, giving of liveries, signs, and tokens, retainders by in- 
dentures, promises, oaths, writings, and other embraceries of his subjects, untrue 
demeanings of sheriffs in making pannels, and untrue returns by taking money, by 
juries, &c., the policy of this nation is most subdued." It must indeed be confessed 
that such a state of the country required great discretionary power in the sovereign ; 
nor will the same maxims of government suit such a rude people, that may be 
proper in a more advanced stage of society. The establishment of the star-chamber, 
or the enlargement of its power in the reign of Henry VII. might have been as wise 
as the abolition of it in that of Charles I. 

NOTE [Z], p. 561. 

The Duke of Northumberland has lately printed a household book of an old earl 
of that family who lived at this time ; the author has been favoured with the perusal 
of it and it contains many curious particulars, which mark the manners and way ot 
living in that rude, not to say barbarous, age ; as well as the prices of commodities 
I have extracted a few of them from that piece, which gives a true picture of ancier 
manners, and is one of the most singular monuments that English antiquity affords 
us. For we may be confident, however rude the strokes, that no baron s family 
was on a nobler or more splendid footing. The family consists of one hundred a 
sixtv-six persons, masters and servants; fifty-seven strangers are reckon* 
every day : on the whole two hundred and twenty-three Twopence halfpenny ^are 
supposed to be the daily expense of each for meat, drink, g^.TluwMai 
mike a groat of our present money : supposing provisions Between three and four 
times cheaper, it would be equivalent to fourtcen-pence : no great sum for a -noble- 
man's housekeeping, especially considering, that the chief expense a f a f dmil y at 
that time consisted in meat and drink; for the sum allotted by the earl ^ for his 
whole annual expense is one thousand one hundred and eighteen "" 

shillings, and eight-pence ; meat, drink, and firing cost seven 



610 HISTORY OF ENGLAND. 

six pounds, eleven shillings, and two-pence, more than two-thirds of the whole. In 
a modern family it is not above a third; p. 157, 158, 159. The whole expense of 
the earl's family is managed with an exactness that is very rigid, and, if we make no 
allowance for ancient manners, such as may seem to border on an extreme, inso- 
much, that the number of pieces which must be cut out of every quarter of beef, 
mutton, pork, veal, nay stock-fish and salmon, are determined, and must be entered 
and accounted for by the different clerks appointed for that purpose ; if a servant be 
absent a day, his mess is struck off: if he go on my lord's business, board wages are 
allowed him, eight-pence a day for his journey in winter, five-pence in summer : 
when he stays in any place, two-pence a day are allowed him, beside the maintenance 
of his horse ; somewhat above a quarter of wheat is allowed for every month through- 
out the year, and the wheat is estimated at five shillings and eight-pence a quarter. 
Two hundred and fifty quarters of malt are allowed, at four shillings a quarter : 
two hogsheads are to be made of a quarter ; which amounts to about a bottle and a 
third of beer a day to each person, p. 4, and the beer will not be very strong. 
One hundred and nine fat beeves are to be bought at Allhallow-tide, at thirteen 
shillings and four-pence a-piece : and twenty-four lean beeves to be bought at St. 
Helen's, at eight shillings a-piece. These are to be put into the pastures to feed ; 
and are to serve from Midsummer to Michaelmas ; which is consequently the only 
time that the family eats fresh beef. During all the rest of the year they live on 
salted meat, p. 5. One hundred and sixty gallons of mustard are allowed in a year ; 
which seems indeed requisite for the salt beef, p. 18. Six hundred and forty-seven 
sheep are allowed at twenty-pence a-piece ; and these seem also to be all eat salted, 
except between Lammas and Michaelmas, p. 5. Only twenty-five hogs are allow- 
ed at two shillings a-piece ; twenty-eight veals at twenty-pence : forty lambs at ten- 
pence or a shilling ; p. 7. These seem to be reserved for my lord's table, or that of 
the upper servants, called the knights' table. The other servants, as they eat salted 
meat almost through the whole year, and with few or no vegetables, had a very bad 
and unhealthy diet : so that there cannot be any thing more erroneous than the 
magnificent ideas formed of " the roast beef of old England." We must entertain 
as mean an idea of its cleanliness : only seventy ells of linen, at eight-pence an ell, 
are annually allowed for this great family : no sheets were used : this linen was 
made into eight table-cloths for my lord's table ; and one table-cloth for the knights, 
p. 16. This last, I suppose, was washed only once a month. Only forty shillings 
are allowed for washing throughout the whole year ; and most of it seems expended 
on the linen belonging to the chapel. The drinking, however, was tolerable, name- 
ly, ten tuns and two hogsheads of Gascogny wine, at the rate of four pounds, thir- 
teen shillings, and four-pence a tun, p. 6. Only ninety-one dozen of candles for 
the whole year, p. 14. The family rose at six in the morning, dined at ten, and 
supped at four in the afternoon. The gates were all shut at nine, and no farther 
ingress or egress permitted, p. 314. 318. My lord and lady have set on their 
table for breakfast at seven o'clock in the morning, a quart of beer, as much wine, 
two pieces of salt fish, six red herrings, four white ones, or a dish of sprats. In 
flesh days half a chyne of mutton, or a chyne of beef boiled, p. 73. 75. Mass is 
ordered to be said at six o'clock, in order, says the household-book, that all my lord's 
servants may rise early, p, 170. Only tAventy-four fires are allowed, besides the 
kitchen and hall, and most of these have only a peck of coals a day allowed them, p. 
99. After Lady-day no fires permitted in the rooms, except half-fires in my lord's 
and lady's, and Lord Piercy's and the nursery, p. 101. It is to be observed that my 
lord kept house in Yorkshire, where there is certainly much cold weather after 
Lady-day. Eighty chalders of coals, at four shillings and two-pence a chalder, 
suffices throughout the whole year ; and because coal will not burn without wood, 
says the household-book, sixty-four loads of great wood are also allowed, at twelve- 
pence a load, p. 22. This is a proof that grates were not then used. Here is an 
article. " It is devised, that from henceforth no capons to be bought but only for my 
lord's own mess, and that the said capons shall be bought for two-pence a-piece, 
lean, and fed in the poultry ; and master chamberlain and the stewards be fed with 
capons, if there be strangers sitting with them," p. 102. Pigs are to be bought at 
three-pence or a groat a-piece : geese at the same price : chickens at a halfpenny : 
hens at two-pence, and only at the above mentioned tables. Here is another article. 
" Item, it is thought good that no plovers be bought at no season but only in Christ- 
mas and principal feasts, and my lord to be served therewith, and his board-end, 
and none other, and to be bought for a penny a-piece, or a halfpenny at most/' p. 103. 
"Woodcocks are to be bought at the same price. Partridges at two-pence, p. 104, 105. 
Pheasants a shilling; peacocks the same, p. 106. My lord keeps only twenty-seven 



NOTES. G11 

horses in his stable at his own charge : his upper servants have allowance for 
maintaining their own horses, p. 126. These horses are six gentle horses as they 
are called, at hay and hard meat -throughout the whole year, four palfreys three 
hobbies and nags, three sumpter horses, six horses for those servants to whom my 
' lord furnishes a horse, two sumpter horses more, and three mill horses, two for carrying 
the corn, and one for grinding it; whence we may infer, that mills, either water or 
wind-mills, were then unknown ; at least very rare : besides these, there are seven 
great trotting horses for the chariot or waggon. He allows a peck of oats a day, 
besides loaves made of beans, for his principal horses ; the oats at twenty-pence, the 
beans at two shillings a quarter. The load of hay is at two shillings and eight- 
pence. When my lord is on a journey he carries thirty-six horsemen along with 
him, together with bed and other accommodation, p. 157. The inns, it seems, 
could afford nothing tolerable. My lord passes the year in three country seats, all 
in Yorkshire, Wrysel, Leckenfield, and Topclyffe ; but he has furniture only for 
one. He carries every thing along with him, beds, tables, chairs, kitchen utensils, 
all which we may conclude were so coarse that they could not be spoiled by the car- 
riage. Yet seventeen carts and one waggon suffice for the whole, p. 391. One 
cart suffices for all his kitchen utensils, cooks' beds, &c., p. 388. One remarkable 
circumstance is, that he has eleven priests in his house, besides seventeen persons, 
chanters, musicians, &c. belonging to his chapel. Yet he has only two cooks for a 
family of two hundred and twenty-three persons a , p. 325. Their meals were certainly 
dressed in the slovenly manner of a ship's company. It is amusing to observe the 
pompous and even royal style assumed by this Tartar chief: he does not give any 
orders, though only for the right making of mustard, but it is introduced with this 
preamble, " It seemeth good to us and our council." If we consider the magnificent 
and elegant manner in which the Venetian and other Italian noblemen then lived, 
with the progi'ess made by the Italians in literature and the fine arts, we shall not 
wonder that they considered the ultramontane nations as barbarous. The Flemish 
also seem to have much excelled the English and even the French. Yet the earl is 
sometimes not deficient in generosity. He pays, for instance, an annual pension of 
a groat a year to my lady of Walsingham, for her interest in heaven ; the same 
sum to the holy blood at Hales, p. 337. No mention is any where made of plate ; 
but only of the hiring of pewter vessels. The servants seen! all to have bought 
their own clothes from their wages. 

a In another place mention is made of four cooks, p. 388. But I suppose that 
the two servants, called in p. 325, groom of the larder, and child of the scullery, 
are, in p. 388, comprehended in the number of cooks. 



END OF VOL. II. 




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HUKE, DAVID 



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The history of England 

v.S