THE SCOTTISH FAILURE.
The expedition of Edward to Flanders lost its best chance of success
through the events which retarded its despatch. While the English king
was wrangling with his barons, the French king was active. On the news
of the alliance of Count Guy with the English, Robert of Artois was
summoned from Gascony to the north. While Philip besieged Lille, and
finally took it, Robert of Artois gained a brilliant victory over the
Flemings at Furnes on August 20. Meanwhile John of Avesnes, Count of
Hainault, was closely co-operating with the French, and kept Edward's
son-in-law and ally, John, Duke of Brabant, from sending effective help
to the Flemings. Moreover, the Flemish townsmen, in their dislike of
their count, were largely on the side of the French. Edward's little
army could do nothing to redress a balance that already inclined so
heavily on the other side. The Flemings were disappointed at the scanty
numbers of the English men-at-arms, and stared with wonder and contempt
at the bare-legged Welsh archers and lancemen, with their uncouth garb,
strange habits of eating and fighting, and propensity to pillage and
disorder, though they recognised their hardihood and the effectiveness
of their missiles.[1] The same disorderly spirit that had marred the
Rioms campaign still prevailed among the English engaged on foreign
service. No sooner were the troops landed at Sluys on August 28, than
the mariners of the Cinque Ports renewed their old feud with the men of
Yarmouth, and many ships were destroyed and lives lost in this untimely
conflict. Edward advanced to Bruges, where he was joined by the Count of
Flanders, but the disloyalty of the townsmen and the approach of King
Philip forced the king and the earl to take shelter behind the stronger
walls of Ghent. Immediately on their retreat, Philip occupied Bruges and
Damme, thus cutting off the English from the direct road to the sea. The
Anglo-Flemish army was afraid to attack the powerful force of the French
king. But the French had learnt by experience a wholesome fear of the
English and Welsh archers, and did not venture to approach Ghent too
closely. The ridiculous result followed that the Kings of France and
England avoided every opportunity of fighting out their quarrel, and
lay, wasting time and money, idly watching each other's movements.
[1] See for Flemish criticisms of the Welsh, L. van Velthem,
_Spiegel Historiaal_, pp. 215-16, ed. Le Long, partly
translated by Funck Brentano in his edition of _Annales
Qandenses_, p. 7, a work giving full details of these
struggles.
The only dignified way of putting an end to this impossible situation
lay in negotiation. Edward's faithful servant, William of Hotham, the
Dominican friar whom the pope had appointed Archbishop of Dublin, was
in the English camp. Hotham, who had enjoyed Philip's personal
friendship while teaching theology in the Paris schools, was an
acceptable mediator between the two kings. A short truce was signed at
Vyve-Saint-Bavon on the Lys on October 7. This allowed time for more
elaborate negotiations to be carried on at Courtrai and Tournai, and on
January 31, 1298, a truce, in which the allies of both kings were
included, was signed at Tournai, to last until January 6, 1300. It was
agreed to refer all questions in dispute to the arbitration of Boniface
VIII, "not as pope but as a private person, as Benedict Gaetano". Both
kings despatched their envoys to Rome, where with marvellous celerity
Boniface issued, on June 30, 1298, a preliminary award. It suggested
the possibility of a settlement on the basis of each belligerent
retaining the possessions which he had held at the beginning of the
struggle, and entering into an alliance strengthened by a double
marriage. Edward was to marry the French king's sister Margaret, while
Edward of Carnarvon was to be betrothed to Philip's infant daughter
Isabella. The latter match involved the repudiation of the betrothal of
Edward of Carnarvon with the daughter of the Count of Flanders. But all
through the award there was no mention of the allies of either party.
Boniface was too eager for peace to be over-scrupulous as to the
honourable obligations of the two kings who sought his mediation.
The English regency, which grappled so courageously with the baronial
opposition, showed an equal energy in protecting the northern counties
from the Scots. About the time of the confirmation of the charters,
Wallace crossed the border and spread desolation and ruin from Carlisle
to Hexham. Warenne and Henry Percy, who had attended the October
parliament at London, were soon back in the north. By December the
largest army which was ever assembled during Edward I.'s reign[1]
was collected together on the borders, and preparations were made for a
winter campaign after the fashion which had proved so effective in
Wales. But all that Warenne was able to accomplish was the relief of
Roxburgh. The quality of the troops was not equal to their quantity,
and all his misfortunes had not taught him wisdom. Early in Lent Edward
stopped active campaigning by announcing that no great operations were
to be attempted until his return. Thereupon Warenne sent the bulk of
the troops home, and remained at Berwick, awaiting the king's arrival.
[1] Morris, _Welsh Wars of Edward I._, pp. 284-86.
Edward landed at Sandwich on March 14, 1298, and at once set about
preparing to avenge Stirling Bridge. He met his parliament on
Whitsunday, May 25, at York. The Scots barons were summoned to this
assembly, but as they neither attended nor sent proxies, their absence
was deemed to be proof of contumacy. A month later a large army was
concentrated at Roxburgh. The earls and barons with their retinues
mustered to the number of 1,100 horse, while 1,300 men-at-arms served
under the king's banners for pay. Though Gascony was still in Philip's
hands, the good relations that prevailed between England and France
allowed the presence in Edward's host of a magnificent troop of Gascon
lords, headed by the lord of Albret and the Captal de Buch, and
conspicuous for the splendour of their armour and the costliness and
beauty of their chargers. On this occasion Edward set little store on
infantry, and was content to accept the services of those who came of
their own free will. Yet even under these conditions some 12,000 foot
were assembled, more than 10,000 of whom came from Wales and its march.
The leaders of the opposition were present in Edward's host. On the eve
of the invasion, the impatient king was kept back by the declaration of
Hereford and Norfolk that they would not cross the frontier, until
definite assurances were given that the king would carry out the
confirmation of the charters which he had informally ratified on
foreign soil. Etiquette or pride prevented Edward himself satisfying
their demand, but the Bishop of Durham and three loyal earls pledged
themselves that the king would fulfil all his promises on his return.
Then the two earls suffered the expedition to proceed; and on July 6
the army left Roxburgh, proceeding by moderate marches to Kirkliston on
the Almond, where it encamped on the 15th. Here there was a few days'
delay, while Bishop Bek captured some of the East Lothian castles which
were threatening the English rear. Already there was a difficulty in
obtaining supplies from the devastated country-side, and northerly
winds prevented the provision ships from sailing from Berwick to the
Forth. The worst hardships fell upon the Welsh infantry, who began to
mutiny and talked of joining the Scots. Matters grew worse on the
arrival of a wine ship, for such ample rations of wine were distributed
to the Welsh that very many of them became drunk. So threatening was
the state of affairs that Edward thought of retreating to Edinburgh. On
July 21, however, the news was brought that Wallace and his followers
were assembled in great force at Falkirk, some seventeen miles to the
west. The prospect of battle at once restored the courage and
discipline of the army, and Edward ordered an advance. That night the
host bivouacked on the moors east of Linlithgow, "with shields for
pillows and armour for beds". During the night the king, who was
sleeping in the open field like the meanest trooper, received a kick
from his horse which broke two of his ribs. Yet the early morning of
July 22, the feast of St. Mary Magdalen, saw him riding at the head of
his troops through the streets of Linlithgow. At last the Scots lances
were descried on the slopes of a hill near Falkirk, and the English
rested while the bishop and king heard mass. Then the army, which had
eaten nothing since the preceding day, advanced to the battle.
Wallace had a large following of infantry, but a mere handful of
mounted men-at-arms. He ordered the latter to occupy the rear, and
grouped his pikemen, the flower of his army, into four great circles,
or "schiltrons," which, with the front ranks kneeling or sitting and
the rear ranks standing, presented to the enemy four living castles,
each with a bristling hedge of pikes, dense enough, it was hoped, to
break the fierce shock of a cavalry charge. The spaces between the four
schiltrons were occupied by the archers, the best of whom came from
Ettrick Forest. The front was further protected by a morass, and
perhaps also by a row of stout posts sunk into the ground and fastened
together by ropes.
Edward ordered the Welsh archers to prepare the way with their missiles
for the advance of the men-at-arms. But the Welsh refused to move, so
that Edward was forced to proceed by a direct cavalry charge. For this
purpose he divided his men-at-arms into four "battles". The first of
these was commanded by the Earl of Lincoln, with whom were the
constable and marshal, who at last had an opportunity of serving the
king in battle in the offices which belonged to them by hereditary
right. On approaching the morass this first line was thrown into some
confusion, and paused in its advance. Behind it the second battle,
under command of the Bishop of Durham, who, perhaps, knew the ground
better, wheeled to the east and took the Scots on their left flank. But
Bek's followers disobeyed his orders to wait until the rest of the army
came up, and they suffered heavy losses in attacking the left
schiltron. Before long, however, Lincoln found a way round the morass
westwards to the enemy's right, while the two rearmost battles, headed
by the king and Earl Warenne, also advanced to the front. The combat
thus became general. The Scots cavalry fled without striking a blow,
and some of the English thought that Wallace himself rode off the field
with them. The archers between the schiltrons were easily trampled
down, so that the only effective resistance came from the circles of
pikemen. The yeomanry of Scotland steadily held their own against the
fierce charges of the mail-clad knights, and it looked for a time as if
the day was theirs. But the despised infantry at last made their way to
the front and poured in showers of arrows that broke down the Scottish
ranks. Friend and foe were at such close quarters that the English who
had no bows threw stones against the Scottish circles. When the way was
thus prepared, the horsemen easily penetrated through the gaps made in
the circles, and before long the Scottish pikemen were a crowd of
panic-stricken fugitives. Edward's brilliant victory was won with
comparatively little loss.
It was years before the Scots again ventured to meet the English in the
open field. Yet the king's victory was not followed by any real conquest
even of southern Scotland. Edward advanced to Stirling, where he rested
until he had recovered from his accident, while detachments of his
troops penetrated as far as Perth and St. Andrews. Meanwhile the
south-west rose in revolt, under Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, whose
father had fought at Falkirk. Late in August, Edward made his way to Ayr
and occupied it, while Bruce fled before him. Provisions were still
scarce, and the army was weary of fighting. The Durham contingent
deserted in a body,[1] and the earls were so lukewarm that Edward was
fain to return by way of Carlisle, capturing Lochmaben, Bruce's
Annandale stronghold, on the way. On September 8 the king reached
Carlisle, where the constable and marshal declared that they had lost so
many men and horses that they could no longer continue the campaign.
Edward tried to stem the tide of desertion by promises of Scottish lands
to those who would remain with his banners. But the distribution of
these rewards proved only a fresh source of discontent. At last Edward
was forced to dismiss the greater part of his forces. He lingered in the
north until the end of the year, but there was no more real fighting;
with the beginning of 1299 he returned to the south, convinced that the
disloyalty of his barons had neutralised his triumphs in the field. The
few castles which still upheld the English cause in Scotland were soon
closely besieged.
[1] Lapsley, _County Palatine of Durham_, p. 128.
During the whole of 1299 Edward was prevented by other work from
prosecuting the war against the Scots. Even the borderers were sick of
fighting, and Bishop Bek, who had hitherto afforded him an unswerving
support with all the forces of his palatinate, was forced to desist
from warlike operations by the refusal of his tenants to serve any
longer beyond the bounds of the lands of St. Cuthbert. While the men of
Durham abandoned the war, there was little reason to wonder at the
indifference of the south country as to the progress of the Scots. In
the Lenten parliament at London, the Earls of Hereford and Norfolk
pressed Edward once more to fulfil his promise to carry out the
confirmation of the charters. The king would not yield to their demand
yet dared not refuse it. In his perplexity he had recourse to evasions
which further embittered his relations with them. He promised that he
would give an answer the next day, but when the morrow came, he
secretly withdrew from the city. The angry barons followed him to his
retreat and reminded him of his broken promise. Edward coolly replied
that he left London because his health was suffering from the corrupt
air of the town, and bade the barons return, as his council had his
reply ready. The barons obeyed the king's orders, but their indignation
passed all bounds when they found that the king's promised confirmation
of the charters was vitiated by a new clause saving all the rights of
the crown, and that nothing was said as to the promised perambulation
of the forests. In bitter wrath the parliament broke up, and the
Londoners, who shared the anger of the barons, threatened a revolt.
After Easter these stormy scenes were repeated in a new parliament, and
Edward was at last forced to yield a grudging assent to all the demands
of the opposition, and even to appoint a commission for the
perambulation of the forests. By the time the summer was at hand, the
progress of the negotiations with France occupied Edward so fully that
he had abundant excuse for not precipitating a new rupture with his
barons, by insisting upon a fresh campaign against the Scots.
A papal legate presided over a congress of English and French
ambassadors at Montreuil-sur-mer, which belonged to Edward by right of
the late queen, Eleanor as Countess of Ponthieu. The outcome of these
deliberations was the treaty of Montreuil, concluded on June 19, 1299.
It was not the final pacification which had been hoped for. Edward
indeed abandoned his Flemish allies, but Philip would not relax his
hold upon Gascony, and without that a definitive peace was impossible.
The treaty of Montreuil was simply a marriage treaty. Edward was
forthwith to marry Margaret, and his son was to be betrothed to
Isabella of France. Neither the prolongation of the truce nor the
affairs of the Flemings were mentioned in it, while all that Philip did
for the Scots was to provide for the liberation of the deposed King
John from his English prison. As soon as the ratifications were
exchanged the king, who was then sixty years of age, and his youthful
bride were married on September 9 at Canterbury by Archbishop
Winchelsea.
Edward's willingness to marry the sister of the king who still kept him
out of Gascony can best be explained by his overmastering desire to
renew operations in Scotland. Shortly after his marriage, he again
busied himself with preparations for the long-delayed Scots campaign.
It was high time that he took action. The English garrisons were
surrendering one by one, and the Scottish magnates were deserting the
English cause. Their conversion to patriotic principles was made easier
by the decay of Wallace's power consequent on his defeat at Falkirk.
After stormy scenes with his aristocratic rivals, Wallace withdrew from
Scotland and went to the continent, where he implored the help of the
King of France. Philip proved true to his new brother-in-law, and put
Wallace in prison, only releasing him that he might go to Rome and
enlist the sympathy of Boniface VIII. Meanwhile the Scots chose a new
regency at the head of which was the younger John Comyn of Badenoch.
Under these changed conditions the Scottish earls rapidly rallied round
the national cause. Stirling, Edward's chief stronghold in central
Scotland, was so hardly pressed that the men-at-arms were forced to eat
their chargers. Yet when the English barons assembled about the
beginning of winter, in obedience to Edward's summons, they stubbornly
declared that they would not endure the hardships of a winter campaign
until the king had fulfilled his pledges as regards the charters. Thus
left to their own resources, the sorely tried garrison of Stirling
surrendered to the Scots.
In March, 1300, Edward met his parliament at Westminster. Despite the
straits to which he was reduced, he was still unwilling to make a
complete surrender. He avoided a formal re-issue of the charters by
giving his sanction to a long series of articles, drawn up apparently by
the barons. These articles provided for the better publication of the
charters, and the appointment in every shire of a commission to punish
all offences against them which were not already provided for by the
common law; together with numerous technical clauses "for the relief of
the grievances that the people have had by reason of the wars that have
been, and for the amendment of their estate, and that they may be more
ready in the king's service and more willing to aid him when he has need
of them ". This document was known as _Articuli super cartas_.[1] At the
same time the forest perambulation, which had long been ordered, was
directed to be proceeded with at once. For this reason a chronicler
calls this assembly "the parliament of the perambulation".[2] The
reconciliation between the king and his subjects was attested by a grant
of a twentieth.
[1] It is published in Bémont's _Chartes_, pp. 99-108, with
valuable comments; another draft analysed in _Hist. MSS.
Comm._, 6th Report, i., p. 344.
[2] Langtoft, ii, 320.
Edward's concessions once more enabled him to face the Scots, and the
summer saw a gallant army mustered at Carlisle, though some of the
earls, including Roger Bigod, still held aloof. A two months' campaign
was fought in south-western Scotland in July and August. But the
peasants drove their cattle to the hills, and rainy weather impeded the
king's movements. The chief exploit of the campaign was the capture of
Carlaverock castle, though even in the glowing verse of the herald, who
has commemorated the taking of this stronghold,[1] the military
insignificance of the achievement cannot be concealed. Edward returned
to the same district in October, but he effected so little that he was
glad to agree to a truce with the Scots, which Philip the Fair urged him
to accept. The armistice was to last until Whitsuntide, and Edward
immediately returned to England. He had not yet satisfied his subjects,
and was again forced to meet his estates.
[1] _The Siege of Carlaverock_, ed. Nicolas (1828).
A full parliament assembled on January 20, 1301, at Lincoln. The
special business was to receive the report of the forest perambulation;
and the first anticipation of the later custom of continuing the same
parliament from one session to another can be discerned in the
direction to the sheriffs that they should return the same
representatives of the shires and boroughs as had attended the Lenten
parliament of 1300, and only hold fresh elections in the case of such
members as had died or become incapacitated. During the ten days that
the commons were in session stormy scenes occurred. Edward would only
promise to agree to the disafforestments recommended by the
perambulators, if the estates would assure him that he could do so,
without violating his coronation oath or disinheriting his crown. The
estates refused to undertake this grave responsibility, and a long
catalogue of their grievances was presented to Edward by Henry of
Keighley, knight of the shire for Lancashire, and one of the first
members of the third estate of whose individual action history has
preserved any trace. The commons demanded a fresh confirmation of the
charters; the punishment of the royal ministers who had infringed them,
or the _Articuli super cartas_ of the previous session, and the
completion of the proposed disafforestments. In addition, the prelates
declared that they could not assent to any tax being imposed upon the
clergy contrary to the papal prohibition. Among the ministers specially
signalled out for attack was the treasurer, Bishop Walter Langton, and
in this Edward discerned the influence of Winchelsea, for he was
Langton's personal enemy. The king's disgust at the primate's action
was the more complete since Bishop Bek now arrayed himself on the side
of the opposition. Edward showed his ill-will by consigning Henry of
Keighley to prison. But the coalition was too formidable to be
withstood. The king agreed to all the secular demands of the estates,
accepted the hated disafforestments and directed the re-issue of a
further confirmation of the charters, but refused his assent to the
demand of the prelates. A grant of a fifteenth was then made, and
Edward dismissed the popular representatives on January 30, retaining
the prelates and nobles for further business. On February 14, the last
confirmation of the charters concluded the long chapter of history,
which had begun at Runnymede.
Edward strove to separate his baronial and his clerical enemies, and
found an opportunity, which he was not slow to use, in the
uncompromising papalism of Winchelsea. Boniface VIII. had no sooner
settled the relations of England and France than he threw himself with
ardour into an attempt to establish peace between England and Scotland.
Scottish emissaries, including perhaps Wallace himself, gave Boniface
their version of the ancient relations of the two crowns. On June 27,
1299, the pope issued the letter _Scimus, fili_, in which he claimed
that Scotland specially belonged to the apostolic see, on the ground
that it was converted through the relics of St. Andrew. He denied all
feudal dependence of Scotland on Edward, and explained away the
submissions of 1291 as arising from such momentary fear as might fall
upon the most steadfast. If Edward persisted in his claims, he was to
submit them to the judgment of the Roman _curia_ within the next six
months. In 1300 Winchelsea, who fully accepted the new papal doctrine,
sought out Edward in the midst of the Carlaverock campaign and presented
him with Boniface's letter. Edward's hot temper fired up at the
archbishop's ill-timed intervention, and subsequent military failures
had not smoothed over the situation. His wrath reached its climax when
Winchelsea once more stirred up opposition in the Lincoln parliament,
and his refusal of a demand, which the primate had astutely added to the
commons' requests, showed that he was prepared for war to the knife.
Edward laid the papal letter before the earls and barons that still
tarried with him at Lincoln. His appeal to their patriotism was not
unsuccessful. A letter was drawn up, which was sealed, then and
subsequently, by more than a hundred secular magnates, in which Boniface
was roundly told that the King of England was in no wise bound to answer
in the pope's court as to his rights over the realm of Scotland or as to
any other temporal matter, and that the papal claim was unprecedented,
and prejudicial to Edward's sovereignly. A longer historical statement
was composed by the king's order in answer to Boniface. It is not
certain that the two documents ever reached the pope, but they had great
effect in influencing English opinion and in breaking down the alliance
between the baronage and the ecclesiastical party.[1] Winchelsea's
influence was fatally weakened, and the period of his overthrow was at
hand.
[1] See, on the barons' letter, the _Ancestor_, for July and
October, 1903, and Jan., 1904.
The triumph over Winchelsea made Edward's position stronger than it had
been during the first days of the Lincoln parliament. That assembly
ended amidst the festivities which attended the creation of Edward of
Carnarvon as Prince of Wales, Earl of Chester, and Count of Ponthieu.
The new prince, already seventeen years of age, had made his first
campaign in the previous year. But all the pains that Edward took in
training his son in warfare and in politics bore little fruit, and
Edward of Carnarvon's introduction to active life was only to add
another trouble to the many that beset the king.
When the truce with Scotland expired, in the summer of 1301, Edward
again led an army over the border, in which the Prince of Wales
appeared, at the head of a large Welsh contingent. Little of military
importance happened. Edward remained in Scotland over the cold season,
and kept his Christmas court at Linlithgow. Men and horses perished
amidst the rigours of the northern winter, and, before the end of
January, 1302, the king was glad to accept a truce, suggested by Philip
of France, to last until the end of November. Immediately afterwards he
was called to the south by the negotiations for a permanent peace with
France, which still hung fire despite his marriage to the French king's
sister. The earlier stages of the negotiation were transacted at Rome,
but it was soon clear to Edward that no good would come to him from the
intervention of the _curia_. The fundamental difficulty still lay in the
refusal of Philip to relax his grasp on Gascony. Not even the
exaltation, consequent on the success of the famous jubilee of 1300,
blinded Boniface to the patent fact that he dared not order the
restitution of Gascony. "We cannot give you an award," declared the pope
to the English envoys in 1300. "If we pronounced in your favour, the
French would not abide by it, and could not be compelled, for they would
make light of any penalty." "What the French once lay hold of," he said
again, "they never let go, and to have to do with the French is to have
to do with the devil."[1] A year later Boniface could do no more than
appeal to the crusading zeal of Edward not to allow his claim on a patch
of French soil to stand between him and his vow. With such commonplaces
the papal mediation died away.
[1] See the remarkable report of the Bishop of Winchester to
Edward printed in _Engl. Hist. Review_, xvii. (1902), pp.
518-27.
Two events in 1302 indirectly contributed towards the establishment of
a permanent peace. These were the successful revolt of Flanders from
French domination, and the renewed quarrel between Philip and Boniface.
On May 18, the Flemings, in the "matins of Bruges," cruelly avenged
themselves for the oppressions which they had endured from Philip's
officials, and on July 11 the revolted townsfolk won the battle of
Courtrai, in which their heavy armed infantry defeated the feudal
cavalry of France, a victory of the same kind as that Wallace had
vainly hoped to gain at Falkirk. Even before the Flemish rising, the
reassertion of high sacerdotal doctrine in the bull _Ausculta, fili_
had renewed the strife between Boniface and the French king. A few
months later the bull _Unam sanctam_ laid down with emphasis the
doctrine that those who denied that the temporal sword belongs to St.
Peter were heretics, unmindful of the teachings of Christ. Thus began
the famous difference that went on with ever-increasing fury until the
outrage at Anagni, on September 7, 1303, brought about the fall of
Boniface and the overthrow of the Hildebrandine papacy. Meanwhile
Philip was devoting his best energies to constant, and not altogether
vain, attempts to avenge the defeat of Courtrai, and re-establish his
hold on Flanders. With these two affairs on his hands, it was useless
for him to persevere in his attempt to hold Gascony.
In the earlier stages of his quarrel with Philip, Boniface built great
hopes on Edward's support, and strongly urged him to fight for holy
Church against the impious French king. But Edward had suffered too
much from Boniface to fall into so obvious a trap. His hold over his
own clergy was so firm that Winchelsea himself had no chance of taking
up the papal call to battle. Thus it was that _Unam sanctam_ produced
no such clerical revolt in England as _Clericis laicos_ had done. It
was Edward's policy to make use of Philip's necessities to win back
Gascony, and cut off all hope of French support from the Scottish
patriots. Philip himself was the more disposed to agree with his
brother-in-law's wishes, because about Christmas, 1302, Bordeaux threw
off the French yoke and called in the English. The best way to save
French dignity was by timely concession. Accordingly, on May 20, 1303,
the definitive treaty of Paris was sealed, by which the two kings were
pledged to "perpetual peace and friendship". Gascony was restored, and
Edward agreed that he, or his son, should perform liege homage for it.
With the discharge of this duty by the younger Edward at Amiens, in
1304, the last stage of the pacification was accomplished. For the rest
of the reign, England and France remained on cordial terms. Neither
Edward nor Philip had resources adequate to the accomplishment of great
schemes of foreign conquest. Though Edward got back Gascony, he owed
it, not to his own power, but to the embarrassment of his rival.
While completing his pacification with Philip the Fair, Edward was
busily engaged in establishing his power at home, at the expense of the
clerical and baronial opposition, which had stood for so many years in
the way of the conquest of Scotland. Since the parliament of Lincoln,
Winchelsea was no longer dangerous. He failed even to get Boniface on
his side in a scandalous attack which he instigated on Bishop Langton.
His constant efforts to enlarge his jurisdiction raised up enemies all
over his diocese and province, and the mob of his cathedral city broke
open his palace, while he was in residence there. His inability to
introduce into England even a pale reflection of the struggle of Philip
and the pope showed how clearly he had lost influence since the days of
_Clericis laicos_. A more recent convert to higher clerical pretensions
also failed. Bishop Bek of Durham lost all his power, and was deprived
of his temporalities by the king in 1302. Two years later the
insignificant Archbishop of York also incurred the royal displeasure,
and was punished in the same fashion. With Durham, Norhamshire, and
Hexhamshire all in the royal hands, the road into Scotland was
completely open.
The heavy hand of Edward fell upon earls as well as upon bishops. Even
in the early days of his reign when none, save Gilbert of Gloucester,
dared uplift the standard of opposition, Edward had not spared the
greatest barons in his efforts to eliminate the idea of tenure from
English political life. A subtle extension of his earlier policy began
to emphasise the dependence of the landed dignitaries on his pleasure.
The extinction of several important baronial houses made this the
easier, and Edward took care to retain escheats in his own hands, or at
least to entrust them only to persons of approved confidence. The old
leaders of opposition were dead or powerless. Ralph of Monthermer, the
simple north-country knight who had won the hand of Joan of Acre, ruled
over the Gloutester-Glamorgan inheritance on behalf of his wife and
Edward's little grandson, Gilbert of Clare. The Earl of Hereford died
in 1299, and in 1302 his son and successor, another Humphrey Bohun, was
bribed by a marriage with the king's daughter, Elizabeth, the widowed
Countess of Holland, to surrender his lands to the crown and receive
them back, like the Earl of Gloucester in 1290, entailed on the issue
of himself and his consort. In the same year the childless earl
marshal, Roger Bigod, conscious of his inability to continue any longer
his struggle against royal assumptions and at variance with his brother
and heir, made a similar surrender of his estates, which was the more
humiliating since the estate in tail, with which he was reinvested, was
bound to terminate with his life. In 1306, on the marshal's death, the
Bigod inheritance lapsed to the crown. Much earlier than that, in 1293,
Edward had extorted on her deathbed from the great heiress, Isabella of
Fors, Countess of Albemarle and Devon, the bequest of the Isle of Wight
and the adjacent castle of Christchurch. In 1300, on the death of the
king's childless cousin, Earl Edmund, the wealthy earldom of Cornwall
escheated to the crown. To Edward's contemporaries the acquisition of
the earldoms of Norfolk and Cornwall seemed worthy to be put alongside
the conquests of Wales and Scotland.[1]
[1] See John of London, _Commendatio lamentabilis_ in _Chron.
of Edw. I. and Edw. II._, ii., 8-9. See for the earldoms my
_Earldoms under Edward I._ in _Transactions of the Royal
Historical Society, new ser._, viii. (1894), 129-155.
Even more important as adding to Edward's resources than these direct
additions to the royal domains, was the increasing dependence of the
remaining earls upon the crown. His sons-in-law of Gloucester and
Hereford were entirely under his sway. In 1304 the aged Earl Warenne
had died, and in 1306 his grandson and successor was bound closely to
the royal policy by his marriage with Joan of Bar, Edward's
grand-daughter. In the same way Edward's young nephew, Thomas of
Lancaster, ruled over the three earldoms of Lancaster, Derby, and
Leicester, and by his marriage to the daughter and heiress of Henry
Lacy, was destined to add to his immense estates the additional
earldoms of Lincoln and Salisbury. Edward of Carnarvon was learning the
art of government in Wales, Cheshire, and Ponthieu. The policy of
concentrating the higher baronial dignities in the royal family was no
novelty, but Edward carried it out more systematically and successfully
than any of his predecessors. He reaped the immediate advantages of his
dexterity in the extinction of baronial opposition and in the zeal of
the baronial levies against the Scots during the concluding years of
his reign. Yet the later history of the Middle Ages bears witness to
the grievous dangers to the wielder of the royal power which lurked
beneath a system so attractive in appearance.
The truce with the Scots ended in November, 1302, and Edward despatched
a strong force to the north under John Segrave. On February 24, 1303,
Segrave, attacked unexpectedly by the enemy at Roslin, near Edinburgh,
suffered a severe defeat. The conclusion of the treaty of Paris gave
Edward the opportunity for avenging the disaster. He summoned his
levies to assemble at Roxburgh for Whitsuntide and, a fortnight before
that time, appeared in person in Tweeddale. After seven weary years of
waiting and failure, he was at last in a position to wear down the
obstinate Scots by the same systematic and deliberate policy that had
won for him the principality of Wales. The invasion of Scotland was
henceforth to continue as long as the Scottish resistance. Adequate
resources were procured to enable the royal armies to hold the field,
and a politic negotiation with the foreign merchants resulted in a
_carta mercatoria_ by which additional customs were imposed upon
English exports. These imposts, known as the "new and small customs,"
as opposed to the "old and great customs" established in 1275, were not
sanctioned by parliamentary grant: but for the moment they provoked no
opposition. Thus Edward was equipped both with men and money for his
undertaking. At last the true conquest of Scotland began.
No attempt was made in the Lothians to stop Edward's advance, but the
Scots, under the regent, John Comyn of Badenoch, made a vigorous effort
to hold the line of the Forth against him. Their plan seemed to promise
well, for Stirling castle was still in Scottish hands. Edward crossed
the river by a ford, and all organised efforts to oppose him at once
ceased. Prudently leaving Stirling to itself for the present, he
hurried to Perth. After spending most of June and July at Perth, he led
his army northwards, nearly following the line of his advance in 1296,
through Perth, Brechin, and Aberdeen, to Banff and Elgin. The most
remote point reached was Kinloss, a few miles west of Elgin, in which
neighbourhood he spent much of September. Then he slowly retraced his
steps and took up his winter quarters at Dunfermline. In all this long
progress, the only energetic resistance which Edward encountered was at
Brechin. Flushed with his triumph, he ordered Stirling to be besieged,
and from April, 1304, directed the operations himself. The garrison
held out with the utmost gallantry, but at last a breach was effected
in the walls, and on July 24 the defenders laid down their arms. Long
before the Scots people despaired of withstanding the invader, the
nobles grew cold in the defence of their country. In February, 1304,
the regent and many of the earls made their submission. It was more
than suspected that this result was brought about by the threat of
Edward to divide their lands among his English followers. But on Comyn
and his friends showing a desire to yield, the king readily promised
them their lives and estates. Believing that his task was over, Edward
returned to England in August after an absence of nearly fifteen
months. He crossed the Humber early in December, kept his Christmas
court at Lincoln, and reached London late in February. As a sign of the
completion of the conquest, he ordered that the law courts, which since
1297 had been established at York, should resume their sessions in
London.
A few heroes still upheld the independence of Scotland. Foremost among
them was Sir William Wallace, who, since his mission to France in 1298,
had disappeared from history. The submission of the barons to Edward
gave him another chance. He took a strenuous part in the struggle of
1303-4, and he was specially exempted from the easy pardons with which
Edward purchased the submission of the greater nobles. It was the
daring and skill of Wallace that prolonged the Scots' struggle until
the spring of 1305. But he was then once more an outlaw and a fugitive,
only formidable by his hold over the people, and by the possibility
that the smallest spark of resistance might at any time be blown into a
flame. At last he was captured through the zeal, or treachery, of a
Scot in Edward's service. In August, Wallace was despatched to London
to stand a public trial for treason, sedition, sacrilege, and murder.
He denied that he had ever become Edward's subject, but did not escape
conviction. With his execution, the last stage of Edward's triumph in
Scotland was accomplished. Though the full measure of Wallace's fame
belongs to a later age rather than his own, yet it was a sure instinct
that made the Scottish people celebrate him as the popular hero of
their struggle for independence. His courage, persistency, and daring
stands in marked contrast to the self-seeking opportunism of the great
nobles, who afterwards appropriated the results of his endeavours. Yet
we can hardly blame Edward for making an example of him, when he fell
into his power. Even if Wallace had successfully evaded the oath of
fealty to Edward, it is scarcely reasonable to expect that the king
would consider this technical plea as availing against his doctrine
that all Scots were necessarily his subjects since the submission of
1296. It was Wallace's glory that he fought his fight and paid the
penalty of it.
A full parliament of the three estates sat with the king at Westminster
from February 28 to March 21, 1305. The proceedings of this assembly are
known with a fulness exceeding that of the record of any of the other
parliaments of the reign.[1] Among the matters enumerated in the writs
as specially demanding attention was the "establishment of our realm of
Scotland". Three Scottish magnates, Robert Wishart, Bishop of Glasgow,
Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, and John Mowbray were particularly called
upon to give their advice as to how Scotland was to be represented in a
later parliament, in which the plans for its future government were to
be drawn up. They informed the king that two bishops, two abbots, two
barons, and two representatives of the commons, one from the south of
the Forth and the other from the north thereof, would be sufficient for
this purpose. This further "parliament" assembled on September 15, three
weeks after the execution of Wallace. It consisted simply of twenty
councillors of Edward, and the ten Scottish delegates. From the joint
deliberations of these thirty sprang the "ordinance made by the lord
king for the establishment of the land of Scotland".
[1] See _Memoranda, de parliamento_ (1305), ed. F.W. Maitland
(Rolls Series).
Following the general lines of the settlement of the principality of
Wales, the ordinance combined Edward's direct lordship over Scotland
with a legal and administrative system separate from that of England.
John of Brittany, Earl of Richmond, the king's sister's son, was made
Edward's lieutenant and warden of Scotland, and under him were a
chancellor, a chamberlain, and a controller. Scotland was to be split
up for judicial purposes into districts corresponding to its racial and
political divisions. Four pairs of justices were appointed for each of
these regions, two for Lothian, two for Galloway and the south-west,
two for the lands "between Forth and the mountains," that is the
Lowland districts of the north-east, and two for the lands "beyond the
mountains," that is for the Highlands and islands. Sheriffs "natives
either of England or Scotland" were nominated for each of the shires,
and it was significant that the great majority of them were Scots and
that the hereditary sheriffdoms of the older system were still
continued. The "custom of the Scots and the Welsh," that is the Celtic
laws of the Highlanders and the Strathclyde Welsh, was "henceforth
prohibited and disused". John of Brittany was to "assemble the good
people of Scotland in a convenient place" where "the laws of King David
and the amendments by other kings" were to be rehearsed, and such of
these laws as are "plainly against God and reason" were to be reformed,
all doubtful matters being referred to the judgment of Edward. The
king's lieutenant was bidden to "remove such persons as might disturb
the peace" to the south of the Trent, but their deportation was to be
in "courteous fashion" and after taking the advice of the "good people
of Scotland". Care for the preservation of the peace, and for
administrative reform, is seen in the oath imposed upon officials and
in the pains taken to secure the custody of the castles. The Scots
parliament was to be retained, and recent precedents also suggested the
probability of Scottish representation in the parliament of England. If
Scotland were to be ruled by Edward at all, it would have been
difficult to devise a wiser scheme for its administration. Yet the
Scottish love of independence was not to be bartered away for better
government. Within six months the new constitution was overthrown, and
the chief part in its destruction was taken by the Scots by whose
advice Edward had drawn it up.
Edward at last felt himself in a position to take his long deferred
revenge on Winchelsea. The primate still kept aloof from the councils of
the king, and his spirit was as irreconcilable as ever. He gained his
last victory in the Lenten parliament of 1305, when he prevented the
promulgation of a statute, passed on the petition of the laity, but
agreed to by all the estates, which forbade taxes on ecclesiastical
property involving the exportation of money out of the country.[1] At
this moment the long vacancy of the papacy, which followed the
pontificate of Benedict XI., Boniface VIII.'s short-lived successor, had
not yet come to an end. Soon, however, Winchelsea's zeal on behalf of
papal taxation was to be ill requited. On June 5, 1305, Bertrand de
Goth, a Gascon nobleman who since 1299 had been archbishop of Bordeaux,
was elected to the papacy as Clement V., through the management of
Philip the Fair. A dependant of the King of France and a subject of the
King of England, the new pope showed a complaisance towards kings which
stood in strong contrast to the ultramontane austerity of his
predecessors. He refused to visit Italy, received the papal crown at
Lyons, and spent the first years of his pontificate in Poitou and
Gascony. Ultimately establishing himself at Avignon, he began that
seventy years of Babylonish captivity of the apostolic see which greatly
degraded the papacy. Though Clement's main concern was to fulfil the
exacting conditions which, as it was believed, Philip had imposed upon
him, he was almost as subservient to Edward as to the King of France.
His deference to his natural lord enabled Edward to renounce the most
irksome of the obligations which he had incurred to his subjects, to
punish Winchelsea, and to restrain Roman authority by laws which
anticipate the legislation of the age of Edward III.
[1] _Memoranda de parliamento_, preface, p. li. The statement
in the text is an inference suggested by Professor Maitland's
account of the statute _De asportis religiosorum_. For the last
struggle of Edward and Winchelsea, see Stubbs's preface to
_Chron. of Edw. I. and Edw. II._, i., xcix.-cxiii.
At Clement V.'s coronation at Lyons, in November, England was
represented by Winchelsea's old enemy, Bishop Walter Langton, and by
the Earl of Lincoln. The first result of their work was the
promulgation, on December 29, of the bull _Regalis devotionis_, by
which the pope annulled the additions made to the charters in 1297 and
succeeding years, and dispensed Edward from the oath which he had taken
to observe them, on the ground that it was in conflict with his
coronation vows. Next year Edward took advantage of this bull to revoke
the disafforestments made by the parliament of Lincoln in 1301. It may
be a sign either of the moderation, or of the well-grounded fears of
the king, that he made no further use of the papal absolution. But,
like his father and grandfather, he used the papal authority to set
aside his plighted word, and his conduct in this respect suggests that
it was well for England that the renewal of the Scottish troubles
reduced for the rest of the reign the temptation, which the bull held
out to him, to play fast and loose with the liberties of his subjects.
The standards of contemporary morality were not, however, infringed by
Edward's action, dishonourable and undignified as it seems to us of
later times.
Winchelsea's turn was at last come. On February 12, 1306,
Clement suspended him from his office, and summoned him to appear
before the _curia_. On March 25 the archbishop humbled himself before
Edward and begged for his protection. But the king overwhelmed him with
reproaches and refused to show him any mercy. Within two months, the
primate took ship for France and made his way to the papal court, which
was then established at Bordeaux. He remained in exile, though in the
English king's dominions, for the rest of Edward's life. A less harsh
punishment was meted out to the Bishop of Durham, who then came back
from the court of Clement with the magnificent title of Patriarch of
Jerusalem. For a second time Edward laid violent hands upon the rich
temporalities of the see, and Bek, like Winchelsea, remained under a
cloud for the remainder of the reign.
Clement expected to be paid for yielding so much to the king. A papal
agent, William de Testa, was sent to England, and to him Edward gave
the administration of the temporalities of Canterbury. William's energy
in collecting first-fruits aroused a storm of opposition from the
clergy. The laity, disgusted to find that the king was negotiating for
the transference of a crusading tenth to himself, associated themselves
with their protest. Clement thereupon despatched the Cardinal Peter of
Spain to England, that he might attempt to arrange a general
pacification, and complete the marriage of the Prince of Wales to
Isabella of France, which had been agreed upon in 1303. Before the
cardinal's arrival, Edward's last parliament met in January, 1307, at
Carlisle. The renewed disturbances in Scotland necessitated a meeting
on the border, but the main transactions of the estates bore upon
matters ecclesiastical. The lords and commons joined in demanding from
the king a remedy against the oppressions of the apostolic see. A
spirited and strongly worded protest was addressed to the pope. Nor
were the estates contented with mere remonstrances. The statute of
Carlisle renewed the abortive measure of 1305 _De asportis
religiosorum_, by prohibiting tallages of religious houses being sent
out of the realm. Had the petition of the estates been drafted into a
statute, the parliament of Carlisle would have anticipated the statute
of _Praemunire_ and many other anti-papal enactments. But Peter of
Spain arrived, and Edward thought it injudicious to provoke a contest
with the papacy. Even the petition actually approved was left in
suspense to await further negotiations between the king and the
cardinal. Before any decision was come to, Edward died, and this
anti-Roman movement, like so many which had preceded it, resulted in
little more than brave words. When, two generations later, a more
resolute temper seized upon king and estates, they fell back upon the
petitions and proceedings of the parliament of Carlisle for precedents
for resisting the papal authority. With all its pitiful conclusion,
Edward's ecclesiastical policy at least marks a step in advance upon
the dependent attitude of Henry III.
In the period of peace after the conquest of Scotland, Edward busied
himself with strengthening the administration of his own kingdom and
with enforcing the laws against violence and outrage. Under the
strongest of medieval kings, the state of society was very disorderly,
and even a ruler like Edward had often to be contented with holding up
in his legislation an ideal of conduct which he was powerless to
enforce in detail. Complaints had long been made that the greater
nobles encroached upon poor men's inheritances, that gangs of marauders
ranged over the country, wreaking every sort of violence and outrage,
and that the law courts would give no redress to the sufferers from
such outrageous deeds, since judges and juries were alike terrorised by
overmighty offenders and dared not administer equal justice.
Accordingly in the Lenten parliament of 1305 was drawn up the ordinance
of Trailbaston, by which the king was empowered to issue writs of
inquiry, addressed to special justices in the various shires, and
authorising them to take vigorous action against these _trailbastons_,
or men with clubs, whose outrages had become so grievous. It was not so
much a new law as an administrative act; but it formed a precedent for
later times, and the energy of the justices of trailbaston effected a
real, if temporary, improvement in the condition of the country. So
important was the measure that a chronicler calls the year in which
this was enacted the "year of trailbaston".[1]
[1] _Liber de antiquis legibus_, p. 250.
Never did Edward's prospects seem brighter than in the early days of
1306. Scotland was obedient; the French alliance was firmly cemented;
the pope was complacent; the Archbishop of Canterbury was in exile and
the Bishop of Durham in disgrace; the commons were grateful for the
better order secured by the commissions of trailbaston, and the king
had in the papal absolution a weapon in reserve, which he could always
use against a renewal of baronial opposition, though, for the moment,
neither nobles nor commons seemed likely to give trouble. Once more
there was some talk of Edward leading a crusade, and the French lawyer,
Peter Dubois, at this time dedicated to him the first draft of his
remarkable treatise on the recovery of the Holy Land.[1] Nor did the
project seem altogether impracticable. Though Edward was sixty-seven
years of age, he remained slim, vigorous and straight as a palm tree.
He could mount his horse and ride to the hunt or the field with the
activity of youth. His eyes were not dimmed with age and his teeth were
still firm in his jaws.[2] The worst trouble which immediately beset him,
was the undutiful conduct of the young Prince of Wales, who foolishly
quarrelled with Bishop Langton, and preferred to amuse himself with
unworthy favourites rather than submit himself to the severe training
in arms and affairs to which Edward had long striven to inure him. When
all thus seemed favourable, a sudden storm burst in Scotland which
plunged the old king into renewed troubles.
[1] _De recuperatione terre sancte_, ed. C.V. Langlois (1891).
[2] John of London, _Commendatio lamentabilis_, pp. 5-6.
In 1304 Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, became by his father's death the
head of his house. Though he had long adhered to the regency which had
governed Scotland in Balliol's name, he had now made terms with Edward,
and had taken a conspicuous part in bringing about the pacification of
Scotland under its new constitution. But the double policy, which had
involved him in the shifts and tergiversations of his earlier career,
still dominated the mind of the ambitious earl. At the moment of his
submission to Edward, he entered into an intimate alliance with Bishop
Lamberton of St. Andrews, the old partisan of Wallace. Lamberton was
then, like Bruce, on Edward's side, and as John of Brittany had not yet
personally taken up his new charge, the blind confidence of Edward
entrusted him with the foremost place among the commissioners who acted
as wardens of Scotland during the king's lieutenant's absence. Bruce,
still remembering his grandfather's claim on the throne, welcomed the
definitive setting aside of Balliol. While Edward believed that
Scotland was quietening down under its new constitution, Bruce was
secretly conspiring with the Scottish magnates, with a view to making
himself king. His chief difficulty was with the late regent, John Comyn
the Red, lord of Badenoch. The Bruces and the Comyns had long been at
variance, and the Red Comyn, who was the nephew of the deposed King
John, regarded himself as the representative of the Balliol claim to
the throne, and was not unmindful how his father had withdrawn his
pretensions in 1291 rather than divide the Balliol interest. Meanwhile
the antagonism of the two houses was the best safeguard for the
continuance of Edward's rule.
Bruce was violent as well as able and ambitious. He invited Comyn to a
conference for January 10, 1306, in the Franciscan friary at Dumfries.
On that day the king's justices were holding the assizes in the castle,
and Brace and Comyn, with a few followers, met in the cloister of the
convent. Hot words were exchanged, and Bruce drew his sword and wounded
Comyn. The lord of Badenoch took refuge in the church, and some of
Bruce's friends followed him and slew him on the steps of the high
altar. This cruel murder involved a violent breach between Bruce and
the king. The earl took to the hills, declared himself the champion of
national independence, and renewed his claim to the crown. He was
joined by a great multitude of the people and by a certain number of
the magnates. Conspicuous among the latter was Bishop Wishart of
Glasgow, who broke his sixth oath of fealty, using the timber given him
by Edward for building the steeple of his cathedral in constructing
military engines to besiege the castles which were still held for the
English king. Before long Bishop Lamberton, the chief of the Edwardian
government, also went over. The support of the two bishops enabled
Bruce to be crowned on March 25 at Scone. All Scotland was soon in
revolt, and only the garrisons and a few magnates remained faithful to
Edward.
News of the death of Comyn and the revolt of Bruce reached Edward,
while engaged in hunting in Dorset and Wiltshire. He at once called
upon Church and State to unite against the sacreligious murderer and
traitor. Clement V. excommunicated the Earl of Carrick, and deprived
Lamberton and Wishart of their bishoprics. The warlike zeal of the
English barons was stimulated by liberal grants of the forfeited
estates of Bruce and his partisans. Feeling the infirmities of age
coming upon him, Edward saw that his best chance of success was to
inspire his son with something of his spirit. The Prince of Wales
accordingly received a grant of Gascony, and on Whitsunday, May 22, was
dubbed knight at Westminster along with over two hundred other
aspirants to arms. A magnificent feast in Westminster Hall succeeded
the ceremony. Two swans, adorned with golden chains, were brought in,
and the old king set to all the revellers the example of vowing on the
swans to revenge the murder of Comyn. Edward swore that when he had
expiated this wrong to Holy Church, he would never more bear arms
against Christian man, but would immediately turn his steps towards the
Holy Land to redeem the Holy Sepulchre. The Prince of Wales' vow was
never to rest two nights in the same spot until he had reached Scotland
to assist his father in his purpose. Then all the young knights were
despatched northwards to overthrow the Scottish pretender.
A liberal grant from the estates facilitated the military preparations.
But since the beginning of the year, Edward's strength had rapidly
broken. He was no longer able to ride, and his movements were
consequently very tedious. His army gathered together with more than
the usual slowness, and Aymer of Valence, Earl of Pembroke, the king's
cousin, was sent forward as warden of Scotland to meet Bruce with such
forces as were ready. On June 26 Aymer fell upon Bruce at Methven, near
Perth, and inflicted a severe defeat upon him. The power of the
pretender died away as rapidly as it had arisen. The Bishops of St.
Andrews and Glasgow were made prisoners, and Bruce's brothers, wife,
and daughter fell into the enemy's hands. The brothers were promptly
beheaded, though one of them was an ecclesiastic, and the ladies were
confined in English nunneries. Bruce himself fled to Kintyre, and
thence to Rathlin island, off the coast of Antrim.
Edward went north in July, and, after a long stay in Northumberland,
took up his quarters early in October with the Austin canons of
Lanercost, near Carlisle. There he remained for above five months. In
January, 1307, the parliament, whose anti-clerical policy has already
been recounted, assembled at Carlisle, and remained in session until
March. With the spring, Brace crossed over from Ireland, and
re-appeared in his own lands in the south-west. In May he revenged the
rout of Methven by inflicting a bloody check on Aymer of Valence near
Ayr, and within three days gained another victory over Edward's
son-in-law, Earl Ralph of Gloucester. These blows only spurred on
Edward to increased efforts. The levies were summoned to meet at
Carlisle and, regardless of his infirmities, the old king resolved to
lead his troops in person. On July 3 he once more mounted his horse and
started for the border. But his constitution could not respond to the
demands made on it by his unbroken spirit. After a journey of two miles
he was forced to rest for the night. Next day he could only traverse a
similar distance, and his exertions so fatigued him that he was
compelled to remain at his lodgings all the following day. This repose
enabled him to make his way, on July 6, to Burgh-on-Sands, less than
seven miles from Carlisle, where he spent the night. On July 7, as he
was being raised in his bed by his attendants to take his morning meal,
he fell back in their arms and expired.