THE WARS OF THE ROSES
The Wars of the Roses were in more ways than one the outcome of the
great French war. Formally they were an appeal to arms to decide a
disputed succession to the crown: substantially they were a revolt
against a weak and discredited government, of whose incompetence the
unsuccessful conduct of the war in France had been the most conspicuous
evidence. Henry VI., or those who bore rule in his name, had neither
the sagacity to make peace and save some portion of the French
territory at the price of abandoning claim to the whole, nor the energy
to carry on the conflict vigorously. The absurdly scanty numbers of
the English troops in France during the last fifteen or twenty years
of the war testify alike to the feebleness of the government at home,
and to the respect which English military skill and prowess inspired
abroad. The marriage of Henry VI. was arranged in the hope of propping
up his failing cause in France. And the personality of Margaret of
Anjou is on the whole the most important in the Wars of the Roses.
On the one hand her energy and daring alone sustained the cause of
Lancaster, which without her would have collapsed; on the other hand
her extreme unpopularity helped the cause of York. The accident that
she was eight years a wife before becoming a mother contributed to
the same end. The duke of York had so long been in the position of
next in succession to the crown,[40] that when a direct heir was born
to Henry VI. the disappointed partisans of York began to say that
in strict hereditary right he ought to take precedence of the boy.
They could not bear to see the predominance of the hated French queen
assured, and her offspring barring for ever the hopes of their leader
and themselves. This was perfectly natural under the circumstances, but
it does not therefore follow that the claim of York was sound. Those
disaffected to an actual king naturally look for a rival claimant,
the support of whom may serve to disguise rebellion. There can be no
doubt that, on the principles of succession now legally established,
the next heir to Richard II. was the young earl of March, or that his
claim passed eventually to the duke of York. On the other hand it is
equally certain that in the fifteenth century there was no established
law of succession, and that the substitution of Henry of Lancaster for
his cousin was in accordance with the traditional rule of election.
If Henry V. had lived to old age, nothing would ever have been heard
of the pretensions of the house of York. Those pretensions were in
accordance with the legitimist ideas which were then gaining ground
elsewhere, as the natural corollary of absolutism, but which have never
been really accepted in England except by Jacobite fanatics.
When the war at length broke out, ample material for the armies was
supplied by the soldiers whose occupation in France was gone, by the
overplus of a population not industrially prospering, and most of
all by the personal following of the nobles. Though on the whole the
cause of York was favoured by the towns, by the merchants, by the most
prosperous and civilised elements of the nation, while the backward
regions of the north and west supported Lancaster, yet the differences
were not deep enough to affect the conduct of the war. Both sides
were equipped and fought after the same fashion; both used cannon
more or less; both knew the deadly effect of the cloth-yard arrow,
and therefore sought to come to close quarters; both fought with the
obstinacy of their race, and often with the special fury which civil
war is apt to engender. Hence there is much similarity between the
battles, and not much interest, in spite of the remarkable vicissitudes
of fortune, except in the three great battles won by Edward IV. in
person. To what extent Edward deserves the credit of Towton, the first
and greatest of them, cannot be determined; he had the co-operation of
the earl of Warwick, and he was still very young. Barnet and Tewkesbury
were clearly his own.
Late in 1460, as the result of a Yorkist victory at Northampton, a
compromise was arranged by which Henry VI. was to retain the crown for
his life, and Richard duke of York was recognised as his successor.
Queen Margaret, however, would not surrender the rights of her son
without a struggle: the nobles of the north rose in arms again, and the
duke of York was obliged to march against them. On December 30 he was
defeated and slain at Wakefield; his second son, and his brother-in-law
the earl of Salisbury, Warwick's father, perished with him. The victory
cost the Lancastrians dear: the barbarity of decapitating York's dead
body, and placing the head, crowned in mockery with a paper diadem,
over the gate of York, strengthened the feeling of hatred and contempt
for the north-countrymen, as little better than savages, already
growing in the south. Moreover, York, who had displayed no particular
capacity, was replaced by his son Edward, who, with all his faults,
proved the best soldier of the war. Warwick also, who was an abler man
than his father, and who already held the great inheritance of the
Beauchamps through marriage with the heiress, succeeded to his father's
wide domains, and so concentrated in his own hands by far the greatest
independent power ever possessed by an English subject. Margaret
advanced southwards, won a battle at St. Albans, but found London
unassailable, and was obliged to return to Yorkshire, her soldiers
plundering and destroying on the way in a manner ruinous to her cause.
Meanwhile the young duke of York, after crushing the Lancastrians of
the Welsh border at Mortimer's Cross, had reached London, and had been
proclaimed king as Edward IV. Without delay he and Warwick marched
northwards to bring the contest to a decisive issue, and fought on Palm
Sunday 1461 the greatest battle, in respect of the numbers engaged,
ever fought on English soil.[41]
The great north road, dating back to Roman times, crosses the river
Aire at Ferrybridge, and the Wharfe at Tadcaster, twelve or thirteen
miles further north, and nine miles from York. The Lancastrians
intended to defend the passage of the Aire, and encamped near Towton,
between the two rivers, but fully nine miles from the Aire. They were
apparently in complete ignorance of the rapid advance of the Yorkists,
who seized the important bridge unopposed. Somerset, who commanded the
Lancastrian army, if any one can be said to have had supreme command,
sent forward Lord Clifford to attempt to regain Ferrybridge. The
Yorkists still more inexcusably were in their turn surprised and cut to
pieces. Again Somerset blundered, and left Clifford unsupported. The
Yorkist vanguard, under Lord Falconbridge, was sent up the Aire, and
crossed it unopposed by the ford, difficult and dangerous in spring
when the rivers are full, three miles up at Castleford. Clifford, in
danger of being cut off, retreated on the main army, the enemy making
no attempt to pursue him: but within little more than a mile of the
camp his force was surprised and annihilated by Falconbridge. When we
remember that English armies had been fighting in France down to 1453,
under conditions which ought to have developed the utmost care in never
neglecting a precaution or an opportunity, and that they had been
fighting at home almost ever since, it seems scarcely credible that
such a series of astonishing blunders should have been committed by
both sides.
[Illustration:
_Map VII_
_Battle of Towton_
(_29^{th}. M^{ch}. 1461._)]
The Yorkists, marching by the two roads from Ferrybridge and
Castleford, which unite at the village of Towton, halted on the evening
of Saturday March 28, a couple of miles from the Lancastrian position.
The one thing which every Englishman who pretended to be a general in
that age understood, was how to take up a position tactically strong
for standing on the defensive. Somerset's army was however far too
large for his capacity: he drew up his 60,000 men on a front of a mile,
thereby throwing away his advantage in numbers. For a third of his
force, awaiting an attack from a fairly equal enemy, the position
would have been excellently chosen, assuming that he was not going to
be forced to retreat. The Lancastrian army was posted facing south on
a plateau, their right resting on a little stream, the Cock, which in
summer is a mere thread of water, but was at that season in flood,
and quite impassable. In rear of their left was Towton village, to
which the great road ran at the bottom of a tolerably steep slope of
from 50 to 80 feet from the edge of the plateau: the slope down to the
Cock on the other flank was impracticably steep. In front was a slight
depression known as Towton Dale, from which the ground rose again on
the south to a similar plateau. Thus the right was perfectly secure;
if the enemy attempted to turn the left they would have to attack
up a steep ascent: even in front they would have the ground against
them. Somerset had only to place some of the useless thousands that
overcrowded his line of battle in observation on the plain east of the
high-road, ready to strike at the enemy's flank, and he could hardly
have been assailed successfully. The weak point of the position was
that the Cock bends round the rear of it, a serious obstacle in its
flooded state to retreat in case of need, the more so as the old road
from Towton descended very steeply to the only bridge. The country
being at that date all open, retreat was possible north-eastwards,
in rear of the left, without crossing the Cock, more or less in the
direction of the modern road, which only crosses the Cock close to its
junction with the Wharfe, very near Tadcaster. Obviously, however,
should the enemy turn or defeat the left of the army, this resource
would be cut off, and defeat would mean destruction.
Warwick and Edward advanced at dawn on the Sunday morning, though their
rearguard, under the duke of Norfolk, delayed by the crossing of the
Aire, was still some miles off. Their numbers, though far inferior to
those of the enemy,[42] were amply sufficient for covering a front of a
mile.
The Lancastrians, having chosen their ground, naturally did not
oppose the Yorkists' advance. The latter climbed the southern slope,
and marched across the plateau, a fall of snow preventing either party
seeing the other until they faced each other at a distance of a quarter
of a mile across Towton Dale. From this time, if not before, the snow
was driving in the faces of the Lancastrians, and Falconbridge utilised
this advantage very cleverly. He ordered his archers to advance and
begin shooting at the enemy, whom they could dimly see: as soon as the
Lancastrians, annoyed by the arrows which they could not see coming,
began to reply, he withdrew his men a short distance, and let the
enemy waste their shafts on the open ground. Presently the hail of
Lancastrian arrows slackened, as the supply ran short, and Falconbridge
once more sent his archers forward, and so galled the defenceless enemy
that they advanced to come to close quarters. The Lancastrians had thus
to attack up-hill through the blinding snow, instead of compelling
their antagonists to assail them at a disadvantage. A hand-to-hand
conflict all along the line followed. Both sides fought stubbornly:
orders had been given on both sides, so the chronicler says, to give no
quarter. How long this continued it is hard to say: the armies may very
well have been face to face by seven in the morning, though one account
names nine o'clock. The losses on the victorious side, enormous for
a hand-to-hand battle, in which the front lines only can fall, prove
that it must have lasted a long while. About noon Norfolk, coming up
at length from Ferrybridge by the great road, took the Lancastrians in
flank. Still it was only gradually that they gave way: the battle had
lasted for ten hours before the Lancastrians finally broke and fled by
the only way open to them, towards the narrow bridge over the Cock.
The swollen stream was scarcely fordable, the bridge was soon blocked,
thousands were trampled down in the water, till the latest fugitives
escaped over a causeway of their comrades' bodies. In modern times
many thousands of the defeated army would have been taken prisoners, as
happened at Blenheim when Marlborough pinned the French right against
the Danube. The fury of civil war in the fifteenth century allowed very
few prisoners to be made. Over 30,000 corpses are said to have been
buried near Towton, of whom about a quarter were Yorkists. How many
more found their last resting-place in the river cannot be guessed; all
we know is that the Lancastrian army was to all intents and purposes
annihilated.
After the battle of Towton the Lancastrians would never again have
been able to shake Edward's throne, had he continued on good terms
with his great supporter Warwick. It would be irrelevant to discuss
the causes of the quarrel between them: it suffices to say that the
breach ultimately became irreparable, and that Warwick determined
to restore Henry VI. Before the vast power of the house of Neville,
in alliance with the Lancastrian party, and strengthened by others
whom Edward's conduct had offended, the king was helpless, and fled
the country without striking a blow. For some months Warwick reigned
in the name of the imbecile Henry VI.; but in March 1471 Edward was
enabled by his brother-in-law, the duke of Burgundy, to land with
a small force at the mouth of the Humber. He deliberately perjured
himself by solemnly swearing in York Minster that he would never
again claim the crown, and that he only came to claim his ancestral
lands, and then marched southwards to try his luck. He conducted his
enterprise with great skill and audacity, but his enemies also played
completely into his hands. Northumberland, perhaps out of jealousy
of the Nevilles, made no attempt to move southwards with the forces
he raised in the extreme north. Montagu, Warwick's brother, who held
Pontefract, apparently did not deem himself strong enough to attack
Edward without Northumberland's co-operation. The earl of Oxford moved
from the eastern counties upon Newark, but shrunk back in alarm when
Edward turned to attack him. Somerset was far away in the south-west.
Warwick was doing his best to gather an army in the midlands, and was
at Coventry when Edward, who had by this time accumulated a respectable
army, moved from Leicester. As he knew that Montagu was following
Edward from the north, and Oxford threatening him from the east, as he
was every day expecting his son-in-law the duke of Clarence to join him
from the west, Warwick chose to play a cautious game, and let Edward
pass Coventry without fighting. The next news that Warwick heard was
that Clarence had joined Edward: without principle to keep him true to
any cause, without judgment to discern his own best interest, Clarence
was always ready to plunge into a new treason. Edward now deemed
himself strong enough to march on London, where his cause had always
been popular, and on April 11 took possession of the capital without a
blow. Hearing that Warwick was approaching, he moved out on the 13th
to meet him, and on that night the two armies bivouacked opposite each
other north of the little town of Barnet. Warwick had been joined not
only by Montagu and Oxford, but also by Somerset: Edward had drawn
considerable reinforcements from Essex. Of the numbers on each side
very conflicting accounts are given, but from the narrative of the
battle it would seem that there was no very great disparity, though
probably Warwick had some little superiority; neither side can well
have had 20,000 men, possibly much less.
The contemporary narratives are not more valuable than most mediæval
chronicles in determining topography with precision, and the
battle-field of Barnet has now been so much enclosed and built over
that little can be discovered from examination of the ground. In the
fifteenth century Gladsmuir Heath, as it was then called, was open
ground, as the name implies: nor is there any trace in the narratives
of the battle having extended over the rough broken ground which
lies east of the great north road towards Monk's Hadley. The only
topographical point made in the official Yorkist narrative is that
Warwick, who was first on the field, arranged his men more than
half-a-mile north of Barnet "under an hedge-side." There can nowhere
have been a great length of hedge, sufficient to protect even a large
part of Warwick's front; but he may well have taken up a line of which
the southern boundary of Wrotham Park would form nearly the centre.[43]
Nothing however turns on the exact shape of the ground: the battle
was, like most others of the age, a straightforward engagement all
along the line. Edward was anxious to make sure of fighting on the
morrow: he had nothing to gain by delay, and might lose much, for
Lancastrian forces were gathering in Kent. He therefore under cover
of the darkness moved up so near to Warwick's line, that it would be
impossible for either party to retire without engaging. So near did he
venture that Warwick's guns, which were kept firing during the night,
sent their shot harmlessly over the heads of the Yorkists. When day
dawned on Easter Sunday, April 14, Gladsmuir Heath was enveloped in
so thick a mist that neither party discovered at first that each army
outflanked the other on the right.[44] The battle began in the usual
way with an ineffective cannonade and some flights of arrows, and then
they came to close quarters. As might be expected, Montagu and Oxford
on the Lancastrian right defeated Edward's left, which fled through
Barnet, pursued by Oxford, though Montagu seems not to have quitted
the line of battle. In the centre the king in person engaged in an
obstinate struggle with Somerset, and slowly gained some advantage.
Warwick on the left was partially outflanked by Gloucester, but held
his ground fairly well, though he was gradually forced back on the
centre. In the thick fog nothing could be seen a few hundred yards off:
thus Warwick remained ignorant of the success of Oxford, who, in his
turn, was so completely bewildered by the fog that when he turned back,
after driving his own immediate opponents through Barnet, he lost his
way completely, and instead of taking Edward in rear as he presumably
aimed at doing, went past the contending lines, and came upon the
reserve of his own side. Here occurred the fatal mistake which ruined
Warwick's chance of victory. In the mist the silver star of the De
Veres was mistaken for Edward's cognizance, a sun with rays: Oxford's
men were received with a volley of arrows. Instantly the notion
of treachery arose: the jealousy between the old Lancastrians and
Warwick's supporters blazed out. Oxford fled at once: Somerset followed
his example. Some of the old Lancastrians turned their arms against the
Nevilles, and Montagu, it would seem, was killed by his own friends.
Warwick saw that all was lost: but in determining to fight on foot, in
his heavy armour, he had made flight impossible, and he was beaten down
and killed, apparently unrecognised. When Edward saw that the victory
was gained, his one anxiety was to know whether Warwick had fallen. The
corpses of Warwick and Montagu were found, and exposed for three days
in St. Paul's Cathedral, in order that there might be no doubt about
the great earl being really dead. Edward was quite right: the cause of
Henry VI. was bound up with Warwick's life. Unlike as Warwick was in
personal character to the typical feudal noble, he was in a very real
sense "the last of the Barons." The quasi-despotic monarchy of the
Tudors and Stuarts was founded on the field of Barnet.
On the day of the battle of Barnet, queen Margaret with her son landed
at Weymouth. She soon learned the fatal news, and was joined by
Somerset and other fugitives. The Beauforts and Courtenays, strong in
their hereditary influence in the west, were far from believing that
their cause was ruined: and the fact that Edward waited at Windsor
till he was sure that they were not moving eastwards towards London,
implies that he at least thought them not too weak to attempt it. The
ultimate and undoubtedly more prudent resolution of the Lancastrian
leaders was to make for Gloucester, and form a junction with the earl
of Pembroke, who was raising forces in Wales; but their purpose was not
certainly apparent until they left Bath, and instead of seeking battle
with the king, who was by this time at Cirencester, moved on Bristol.
Still it was not quite certain that they were avoiding battle. On May
2, Edward, who was well served by his scouts, was informed that the
enemy were in position at Sodbury, some dozen miles north of Bristol.
He hastily moved towards them, but on reaching Sodbury towards evening
found no trace of the enemy. The Lancastrians marched all night, and on
the forenoon of May 3 approached Gloucester, hoping to occupy the town
and there cross the Severn. The governor of Gloucester was however a
Yorkist, and refused them admission, and the wearied Lancastrians had
to continue their march, for they knew that Edward was not far off.
There was no bridge over the Severn nearer than Worcester: but if the
Avon could be crossed at Tewkesbury they might hope to reach Worcester
unattacked, or even to pass the Severn by boats at some nearer point.
Accordingly they struggled on ten miles further to Tewkesbury, and
there halted for the night, utterly overcome by fatigue, after marching
forty-four miles since the preceding morning. All day Edward had been
marching along the Cotswolds on a line parallel to that followed by
the Lancastrians, but some distance in rear, though gradually gaining
on them. Towards evening, in passing through Cheltenham, he heard
positively that the enemy were in Tewkesbury; and he also halted for
the night about three miles off.
The author of the _Arrivall of King Edward_, who obviously accompanied
his master to Tewkesbury, takes great pains to describe what he saw.
Like many other writers, he has no names but "hill" and "valley"
for trifling inequalities of ground, but otherwise he writes with
unusual precision, and there is no reason whatever for distrusting his
authority. The Lancaster position, he says, was "in a close, even at
the towne's end, the towne and abbey at their backs, afore them, and
upon every hand of them, fowle lanes and depe dikes with hills and
valleys, a ryght evill place to approache." Their leaders doubtless
deemed it impossible to escape across the Avon without fighting, and
as they were certainly not seriously outmatched in numbers,[45] they
had no reason to avoid a battle. As usual in that age they took up a
position well chosen for fighting on the defensive; but it had a muddy
brook between them and Tewkesbury, and the Avon beyond the town, so
that defeat involved total destruction. Sir John Ramsay[46] gives a
very good map, which shows all the ancient lanes, as well as the modern
road and other things which have materially altered the ground. It is
of course impossible to discover exactly which enclosures are ancient,
and there are now no "depe dikes." The small numbers engaged could
not have covered nearly the length of front possible according to the
topography; but the left flank must have been near the easternmost of
the ancient lanes, for the author of the _Arrivall_ speaks of Somerset
having "passyd a lane" in his attempted turning movement in the
battle, which can have been no other. Whatever the exact position of
the Lancastrian line, king Edward brought his own troops up opposite
to them, except that he posted two hundred spears "near a quarter of
a myle from the fielde," to watch a wood by means of which he thought
his right flank might be threatened. The battle began with some
cannonading and "shott of arrows," in both of which the Yorkists had
rather the advantage. The position was however very difficult to assail
at close quarters, and the Lancastrians might apparently have held
it successfully, had not Somerset attempted a counter-stroke. He, we
are told, "somewhat asydehand the king's vaward, and by certain paths
and ways therefore afore purveyed, and to the king's party unknown,
departed out of the fielde, passyd a lane, and came into a faire place
or close even afore the king where he was embattailed, and from the
hill that was in that one of the closes, he set right fiercely upon
the end of the king's battaile." There must have been a gap between
the king's division in the centre and the vaward, or right, for this
to be possible. However the centre and right united in pushing back
this attack, and the two hundred spears above-mentioned, falling
unexpectedly on Somerset's flank, completed his defeat. The king was
then able to advance, attack in flank the Lancastrian centre, and so
rout the whole army, which broke and fled in all directions. The only
local name that survives as a memorial of the battle is the "Bloody
Meadow" by the Avon below Tewkesbury: this may well mark a place where
many fugitives of the right wing, cut off from the only escape into
the town, were slaughtered by the victors. Prince Edward, the last
heir of Lancaster, was killed in the battle or the pursuit—there
seems no foundation for the story which Shakespeare used, that he was
taken prisoner and killed in cold blood. Somerset, Devon, nearly all
the remaining Lancastrians of note were killed, or were executed after
the battle. Except for the Tudor interest in Wales, the Lancastrian
party was annihilated. It required the early death of Edward IV., and
the murder of his nephews by Richard of Gloucester, before Henry of
Richmond could resuscitate it.
* * * * *
INTERMEDIATE NOTE
GUNPOWDER
The invention of gunpowder was slower in making itself felt than most
of the other great discoveries which have turned the course of history.
There is no intrinsic impossibility in the statement of a contemporary
Italian writer, that Edward III. had cannon at Crecy, though in the
absence of any other testimony it is not generally believed. He had
them at the siege of Calais immediately afterwards, though they were
of little use. The earliest firearms were of very clumsy make, slow
and difficult to load, short in range and allowing no accuracy of aim.
From the nature of the case, cannon[47] were made practically useful
earlier than hand weapons. As soon as ever gun-carriages of a tolerably
movable form were devised, it was possible at least to use them on
the battle-field, though a very long time had still to elapse before
they became important; in the battles of the English civil war of the
seventeenth century artillery plays a very minor part. Naturally they
were much more effective in sieges, where mobility was not required,
and the slowness of fire less important. By the end of the fifteenth
century, if not sooner, it was perceived that gunpowder had effected
a revolution in this branch of warfare. In the early middle ages a
well-walled town or castle was proof against such modes of battering
as were then in use. Unless escalading proved possible, the besiegers
could only reduce the place by starvation. With that inevitable
reservation the defence was stronger than the attack. Hence a feudal
noble, possessed of a well-situated castle, could defy the crown,
for a time at least; hence in Italy the cities could make themselves
independent. With the introduction of cannon all this was changed. The
crown, and as a rule the crown only, could afford to maintain artillery
that could be used against a fortified city or castle, and with its aid
could reduce with certainty every place which had walls of the mediæval
type. To fortify in a fashion that would give a reasonable chance
against cannon was out of the power of most nobles. Thus artillery
contributed largely, perhaps more than any other single agency, to
the great political change which marks the close of the middle ages,
by which the crown becomes, at least as against the nobles, virtually
absolute.
Firearms to be used by hand were far slower in their development, as
was natural, owing to their greater complication. The earliest were
mere tubes, elevated on a stand, miniature cannon in fact. For a very
long while they could not be fired from the shoulder, but required to
be supported on iron rests fixed into the ground, which added seriously
to the weight to be carried. Musketeers, if one may apply the term to
the soldiers who bore the earlier firearms before the musket properly
so called was invented, were quite incapable of standing alone. They
might fire one volley at charging cavalry, but long before they could
be ready for a second, the horsemen would be cutting down their
defenceless ranks. Hence pikemen, who should do the defensive part of
the work, were a necessary adjunct to musketeers: obviously also the
pikemen alone could come to close quarters in attacking. It was not
until the invention of the bayonet enabled the musketeer to be, so to
speak, his own pikeman, that infantry equipped with firearms could
become the real backbone of an army.
It is doubtful whether a musket bullet[48] was ever so deadly a
missile as the clothyard arrow, all points taken into account. If
a bullet struck armour obliquely, it would penetrate, instead of
glancing, at a greater angle than an arrow point.[49] And it would
also be likely to make worse wounds, by driving in bits of the metal.
On the other hand the arrow was noiseless and smokeless, merits which
are reckoned important by modern authorities who are seeking after
smokeless powder. It had greater range than the musket bullet, admitted
of much greater accuracy of aim, and had probably at least equal direct
penetrating power, except at very short distances. England however was
the only country in the latter middle ages which used a missile weapon
that would bear comparison even with the clumsiest firearms. Naturally
musketeers, with their pikemen, were developed rather on the continent
than in England, though everywhere the development was slow, and the
process of superseding armour and hand-to-hand weapons very gradual.
The ultimate political tendency of the invention of gunpowder was
obvious. By rendering discipline more necessary for the efficiency
of the soldier, it threw power into the hands of the state, which
alone could maintain and organise bodies of trained men, as against
individuals. By making infantry the one indispensable arm, it tended
to make oppression less easy: the class which furnishes the fighting
strength of a nation will in the long run have at least its full share
of political power. It may be only a coincidence, but it is at any rate
symbolical, that England, the country in which, thanks to the long-bow,
infantry became earliest of paramount importance in war, is also the
country in which aristocratic privileges in the strict sense of the
word, as distinguished from aristocratic influences, were of least
extent and soonest reduced to insignificance. It is also the country in
which the nation as a whole earliest felt its strength, and taught its
kings to respect the national will.