THE SIXTH was not out of his long frocks when he came to the throne,

for he had not yet completed the ninth month of his little existence.

Though he succeeded peacefully to the crown, he was in arms from the

first hour of his reign; and though he was not born literally with a

silver spoon in his mouth, he had one there on his accession to the

throne, for he was being fed at the very moment that the news of

his father's death was announced in the royal nursery. It is easy

to conceive the interesting proceedings that took place on its being

proclaimed that the child, then in the act of having its food, had

become the king of England. A clean bib was instantly brought, and he

was apostrophised as a little "Kingsey Pingsey," a "Monarchy Ponarchy,"

and was addressed by many other of those titles of affectionate loyalty

which are to be found nowhere but in the nursery dialect. A Parliament

was summoned to meet in November, 1422, and, the regency being a good

thing, there commenced a desperate struggle as to who should be allowed

to have and to hold the baby. The Duke of Gloucester claimed the post

of nurse, in the absence of his elder brother, the Duke of Bedford. The

lords named the latter President of the Council, but while he was away

the former was permitted to act as his deputy, and, what was more to

Gloucester's purpose, he was allowed to receive the salary of £5333

per annum. Having got the money and the power, Gloucester was not

particularly anxious to have the charge of the royal baby, who was

accordingly handed over to the Earl of Warwick, jointly with Henry

Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, a half-brother of Henry the Fourth, who

had also a high seat--convenient, by-the-way, for the infant king--in

the council.

This Beaufort was the second son of John of Gaunt, and founder of the

illustrious family of the Beauforts, who derive their original

nobility from an ancestor who was _beau_ and _fort_--strong as well as

good-looking. If aristocracy in these days were derivable from the same

source, the handsome and brawny drayman might take his seat in the House

of Lords, while ticket-porters, coalheavers, railway navigators, and

other representatives of the physical force party would constitute an

extensive peerage, of what dramatic authors, when they write for the

gallery, are in the habit of apostrophising as "Nature's noblemen." The

Beauforts, besides the good looks and strength of their founder, had

collateral claims to muscular eminence. The uncle of the first Beaufort

was called John of Gaunt, from his gaunt or gigantic stature; and one of

the family had been, in 1397, created Duke of Somerset, most likely on

account of the somersets he was able to turn by sheer force of sinew.

We beg pardon for this slight digression, but as there are many who take

a deep and reverential interest in everything appertaining to rank, it

may be gratifying to them to know the precise origin of some of our most

ancient and most aristocratic families.

Let us then resume the thread of our history. Bedford was still in

France, and, in the month of October, King Charles the Sixth expired

at Paris. The dauphin was at Auvergne, with a set of six or seven

seedy followers, who could not muster the means of proclaiming him in

a respectable manner. They hurried off altogether to a little roadside

chapel, and having one banner among the whole lot, with the French arms

upon it, they raised it amid feeble shouts of "Long live the king,"

aided by a few "hurrahs" from some urchins on the exterior of the

building. This farce having been performed, and the title given to it

of "The proclamation of Charles the Seventh," the party repaired to

luncheon at the king's lodgings. Having come into a little money by the

death of his father, he went with a few friends to Poictiers, where

a coronation, upon a limited scale, was performed, at an expense

exceedingly moderate.

While this contemptible affair was going on in a French province, the

Duke of Bedford was busy, in Paris, getting up a demonstration in

favour of the infant Henry. Fealty was sworn towards the British baby

in various great towns of France; and Bedford, anxious to cement the

alliance with Burgundy, married the duke's sister, Anne; though it seems

strange that he should have calculated upon a marriage as a source

of harmony. He must have had a strong faith in wedded life, to have

anticipated a good understanding as the effect of that which so

frequently opens the door to perpetual discord.

While Bedford was making strenuous exertions to promote the ascendency

of the English in France, the nominal king of that country, Charles the

Seventh, had given himself up to selfish indulgences. His energies were

diluted in drink; but a few vigorous men, who were about him, forced

him occasionally into the field, from which he always sneaked out on the

first opportunity. He was compelled to engage in two or three actions,

and was defeated in all, though he had the benefit of about seven

thousand Scotch, under the command of the Earl of Buchan; and threatened

to cure his enemies of their hostility by administering a few doses of

Buchan's domestic medicine. After two or three reverses, Charles thought

his army strong enough to attempt to relieve the town of Ivry, which, in

the summer of 1424, was besieged by the Duke of Bedford.

Charles's force consisted of a strange mixture of Scotchmen, Italians,

and Frenchmen, who were all continually giving way to their national

prejudices, and quarrelling in broken French, broken Italian, or broken

Scotch,--which is a dialect something between a sneeze, a snore, and a

howl, spiced with a dash of gutturalism, and mixed together in a

whine of surpassing mournfulness. The French declared the Scotch were

mercenaries, who had an "itching palm;" but the Scotch savagely replied,

that "they came to the scratch with a true itch for glory."

While the three parties were engaged in a vigorous self-assertion, and

were loud in praise of their own valour, they caught a glimpse of the

English force--and, halting in dismay, retreated without drawing a

sword. The garrison of Ivry, which had been waiting the approach of its

friends, who were to do such wonders, and had been watching the scene

with intense anxiety from the battlements, could only murmur out the

words "pitiful humbugs," and surrender at discretion.

By some lucky chance--or, as other historians have it, by the revolt of

the inhabitants--Charles and his mongrel army had got possession of the

town of Vemeuil, which was a very strong position. They had scarcely got

snugly in, when the Duke of Bedford presented himself before the walls,

and a council was instantly held, to consider how they should get

out again. Everybody talked at once, and a mixed jargon of Scotch and

French, flavoured occasionally with a little Italian sauce, was the only

result of the deliberation of the gallant army. At length, by common

consent, they ran away, preferring to fight in an open field, if they

must fight at all--for there would then be more margin for escape, or

latitude for bolting, in the event of their getting the worst of it.

So rapid was their desertion of the town, that they left behind them all

their luggage, which was perhaps a wise precaution, for they were thus

enabled to run the faster, in case of having to execute a retreat,

which was one of the military manouvres in which they had had the most

experience.

The two armies were now in presence of each other, and on both sides the

feeling was like that of the young lady who "wondered when them figures

was a-going to move," at an exhibition of wax-work. The Earl of Douglas,

with Scotch caution, wanted to wait, but the Count of Narbonne, with

French impetuosity, was for making a beginning, and rushed forward,

shouting "Mountjoye St. Denis!"--which was synonymous, in those days,

with "Go it!" in ours. The whole line followed, helter-skelter and

pell-mell, so that when they got up to the stakes the English had run

into the ground--to show, perhaps, they had a stake in the country--the

French were out of breath, out of sorts, and out of order. They were

miserably panting, but not panting for glory, and the punches in the

ribs they got from the English, made them roar out like so many paviours

in full work--as they always are--down Fleet Street. Their temporary

want of wind was soon changed into permanent breathlessness, and thus,

in spite of all their boasting, there was a miserable end to their

puffing.

The battle was very severe, for they had been "at it" for three hours.

Douglas, it being before the time when "the blood of Douglas could

protect itself," was slain. Buchan, who had been taunted by his allies

with being nothing better than a buccaneer, also fell, and the French

lost a countless number of counts, as well as a host of miscellaneous

soldiers. The Italians, who had boastingly called themselves the Italian

cream of the army, turned out to be the merest milksops, and kept as

much out of harm's way as possible. The Duke of Bedford ordered the

heads of several prisoners to be cut off, and the Bedford executions

were so numerous, that the heads-man's axe got the name of "the Bedford

level."

The battle of Vemeuil had been fought on the 17th of August, 1424, and

Charles the Seventh seemed on the eve of bankruptcy; both in cash and

credit. His money was all gone, and his friends had--of course--gone

after it. Fortune, however, favoured him, at the expense of his enemies,

for they began to disagree with each other. To say that there was a

quarrel is equivalent to saying that there was a woman in the case,

and the woman was--upon this occasion--the celebrated Jacqueline of

Hainault. This prize specimen of a virago was the daughter of the

Count of Hainault, and the niece of John the Merciless, from whom she

inherited all that coarse unwomanly bluster, which, in one of the fair

sex, is called by courtesy "a proper spirit." She had been married to

a little bit of a boy of fifteen, her cousin-german and her godson,--an

urchin commonly known as John Duke of Brabant. Jacqueline, who was

beautiful and bold, was no match--or, rather, was more than a match--for

a stripling not half way through his teens at the time of his marriage.

The puny lad had got into bad company, and was surrounded by a set of

low favourites. The masculine Jacqueline was not exactly the woman

to submit tamely to any injury, and taking offence at one of her

boy-husband's friends, she had him murdered.

This stamped her as that most objectionable of characters, an

acknowledged heroine, and she became "a woman of strong mind" in all

the chronicles of the period. Her liliputian husband was persuaded to

retaliate by dismissing all his wife's ladies-in-waiting, upon which

Jacqueline became a greater vixen than ever.

After a powerful scene of domestic pantomime, in which she alternately

tore her hair and that of her husband, she declared her determination

to leave him. "A thplendid riddanthe," lisped the aggravating boy; upon

which Jacqueline, making another rush at his hair, and taking a large

lock of it in her hands--not, however, to be preserved as a pledge of

affection--she hurried off to Valenciennes, and thence to Calais.

The runaway next made for England, where she remained on a visit

with Henry's queen, Catherine, at Windsor Castle. Here she soon began

flirting with the king's brother, the Duke of Gloucester, and though the

poor man was not deeply in love with her, he was persuaded to agree to a

marriage.

Jacqueline being already the wife of another, was compelled to seek a

dispensation from Pope Martin V., but he looked at the matter with an

unfavourable eye, when Jacqueline, making a coarse allusion to her own

eye and a female branch of the Martin family, despatched a messenger to

the opposition pope, the thirteenth Benedict. Being a Benedict he could

not consistently oppose a marriage, and he granted the dispensation

immediately.

Gloucester, who had determined on making his new wife profitable, if

she could not be pleasant, claimed without delay her possessions in

Hainault, Holland, and elsewhere, which she had inherited. It was a few

weeks after the battle of Vemeuil, which we have recently described,

that Gloucester and his considerably better-half--in quantity if not in

quality--started off with a large army to take possession of Hainault.

They soon frightened the inhabitants of the capital, of which they made

themselves master and mistress, without any previous warning. Philip,

Duke of Burgundy, the uncle of the boy-Duke of Brabant, was very angry

at the lad's wife coming to cheat the boy, as it were, out of his

property. After a good deal of hard struggling to keep his position at

Hainault, Gloucester came to the determination that his wife was not

worth the bother she occasioned him, and he accordingly went home,

leaving her to defend herself as well as she could, when she was

instantly besieged, given up to the Duke of Burgundy, by the inhabitants

of Mons, and sent to Ghent in close imprisonment.

Neither bolts nor bars could restrain the impetuosity of this tremendous

woman, who burst from her prison, ana putting on male attire, which

became her much better than her own, she escaped into Holland. It was

not to be expected that a fighting woman would remain very long without

followers, and the "Hainault Slasher"--as Jacqueline might justly be

called--soon mustered a strong party in her favour. The novelty of

going to battle with a woman for a leader told well at first, but as

the attraction wore off her soldiers dwindled away by degrees, until

her forces became utterly insignificant. Even her chosen Gloucester

took advantage of her absence to treat his marriage as a nullity, and

to unite himself with Miss Eleanor, the daughter of Lord Cobham. The

desertion of the husband she preferred was in some degree compensated

by the death of the husband she hated, for the boy-Duke of Brabant lived

only until April, 1427, and thus, by the abandonment of one, and the

decease of the other, she became doubly dowagered. Still she continued

to struggle with the Duke of Burgundy, but she was now advancing in

years, and her efforts became perfectly old-womanish.

The summer of 1428 was the means of bringing her to her senses, for she

was severely drubbed by the duke, and finally quelled in a career as

unbecoming to her age and sex as it was inimical to her interest. She

agreed to recognise Burgundy as direct heir, at her death, to all she

possessed, and he made her hand over everything at once, which was a

capital plan for making sure of his inheritance.

We have, however, devoted to the Hainault vixen more time and space than

she is perhaps worth, but we have thought it better to dispose of her

off-hand, to prevent so disagreeable a person from again intruding

herself on the pages of our history.

From the time the English took possession of Paris, Orleans, like a ripe

and tempting Orleans plum, had been the object of their desires. The

French knew the importance of the place, and had concentrated within it

ammunition, eatables, and stores of every description. Barrels of beef,

and barrels of gunpowder--hams and jams--wine for the garrison and

grape for the foe--preserves for themselves and destructives for their

enemies, were laid up in abundance in the city of Orleans. In addition

to all these articles, enormous supplies of corn had been poured into

the place, which contained something superior even to the corn, for it

held all the flower of the French nobility. Regardless of these

facts, the Earl of Salisbury began to attack the city, and the English

commenced an attempt to scale the walls, but having some missiles thrown

at them from above, those engaged in the scale soon lost their balance.

Salisbury, nevertheless, persevered by attacking some other point; but

the garrison determined to pay him off, and having recourse to their

shells, they shelled out with such effect as to kill the English leader.

Salisbury was succeeded by the Earl of Suffolk, who employed the winter

of 1428 in cutting trenches round the city, and throwing up redoubts,

which rendered him very redoubtable.

Orleans was thus cut off from the chance of further supplies, and the

awful words, "When that's all gone you'll have no more," began to be

whispered into the ears of the inhabitants. Charles himself was for

surrendering, and several mealy-mouthed courtiers, who feared they

should soon be without a meal for their mouths, seconded the king in his

pusillanimous project. Others were for holding out instead of giving

in, and Charles's fortune seemed to be at the lowest ebb, when a letter

arrived from one of the posts to announce the prospect of an early

delivery. This early delivery was not, however, to be looked for by the

mail, but by that illustrious female, Joan of Arc, familiarly known as

the Maid of Orleans.

Charles, who had little faith in the power of a female to get one out of

a scrape, and who believed the tendency of the interference of the sex

to be a good deal the other way, burst out into a fit of immoderate

laughter at hearing the news that had been brought to him. "Never

laughed so much in my life," occasionally ejaculated the French king,

as the tears rolled down his cheeks, in double-distilled drops of the

extract of merriment. He, nevertheless, granted her permission to

give him a look-in when she was coming that way; but it was more from

curiosity, or to have another hearty laugh at the Maid's expense, that

he consented to an interview. Joan arrived, with her squires and four

servants; but even this retinue, small as it was, must have been larger

than her narrow circumstances could have fairly warranted. The two

squires could have got in the service of two knights a certain sum per

day, and the four servants, at a time when war was being waged, might

have obtained better wages than a poor and friendless girl would

possibly have paid to them. These, or similar reflections, occurred to

some of the people about the court of Charles, who, considering that

Joan must be an impostor, advised his majesty to have nothing to do

with her. At all events, it was deemed as well that her previous history

should be known; and as the reader may wish for the character of the

Maid, before permitting her to engage even his attention, we will, at

once, say what we know concerning her.

Joan was the child of a brace of peasants, in a wild and hilly district

of Lorraine, on the borders of Champagne, a country of which she

seems in a great degree to have imbibed the qualities. Living in the

neighbourhood of the sparkling and effervescing Champagne, her head

became turned, or, at least, began to be filled with those bold

aspirations which the _genius loci_ might have had some share in

engendering. It is undeniable that when a mere child, she delighted

to roam about for the purpose of drinking at the great fountain of

inspiration, which Champagne so abundantly supplies, and she would often

go on until she heard voices--or a sort of singing in her ears--which

told her she was destined for great achievements. Her birth-place was

a short distance from the town of Vaucouleurs, at a little hamlet called

Domremy, into which faction and dissatisfaction had so far forced their

way, that the children used to pelt the children of the next village

with mud and stones, on account of their political differences. Joan's

attachment to her native soil caused her to be among the foremost of

those who took up earth by handfulls, and threw each other's birthplace

in each other's faces. Being in the habit of holding horses at

a watering-house on the Lorraine road, she frequently heard the

conversation of the waggoners, and, amid their "Gee-wos!" the woes of

France were sometimes spoken of. Invisible voices now began to tell

her that she was destined to set everything to rights, and to be her

country's deliverer.

Though her father called it "all stuff and nonsense," she had talked

over an old uncle, a cartwright at Vaucouleurs, whom she persuaded

of her fitness to repair the common weal, and the honest cartwright

promised to assist her in putting a spoke into it. The brace of peasants

were annoyed at the very high-flown notions of their offspring, and when

she talked of going to King Charles, they asked her where the money was

to come from for the purposes of her journey. Joan immediately had a

convenient dream, appointing the governor of Vaucouleurs, one Sire de

Baudricourt, her banker on this occasion.

Under the guidance of her uncle, she visited the Sire, and told him the

high honour her visions had awarded him, in naming him treasurer to her

contemplated expedition. The Sire, not at all eager to become a banker

on such unprofitable terms, refused at first to hear her story, or

indeed to allow her to open an account, so that the first check she

received was somewhat discouraging. He suggested that she should be sent

home to her father with a strong recommendation to him to take a rod and

whip all the rhodomontade completely out of her. Joan, however, cared

little for what might be in pickle for herself while she was bent on

preserving her country. She went constantly to the house of the Sire

de Baudricourt, but he never allowed her to be let in, for he verily

believed it would only have been opening the door to imposition.

At length, more out of pity to his hall-porter than from any other

motive, the Governor agreed to see that troublesome young woman who

had given no peace to his bell since the first day of her arrival at

Vaucouleurs. After the interview, Baudricourt came to the conclusion

that Joan was crazed; but she declared she would walk herself literally

off her legs, until they were worn down to the stump, if the Sire

refused to stump up for the expenses of the journey. Some of the people

beginning to believe the maid's story, she was enabled to get credit in

Vaucouleurs for a few trappings as well as for a horse, and at the

same time six donkeys, in the shape of two squires and four servants,

consented to follow her.

On the 15th of February, 1429, the Maid began her journey, in the course

of which her companions frequently came to the conclusion that she was

a humbug, and on arriving at a precipice they often threatened to throw

her over. At length, all difficulties being surmounted, she arrived at

Chinon, near Orleans, where Charles was residing. "I won't see her,"

cried the king, upon hearing she had come; "I am not going to be bored to

death by a female fanatic. A man who believes himself to be inspired

is bad enough, but there is not a greater plague on earth than a

woman-prophet." At length, after being pestered for three days, he

consented to grant an interview to Joan, who stood unabashed by the

sneers of the courtiers. Every word that flowed from her lips had the

effect of curling fluid on the lips of those who listened. Some would

have coughed her down, others began to crow over her, and the scene was

a good deal like the House of Commons during the speech of an unpopular

member, when Charles, who was a good deal struck by the assurance of the

Maid, took her aside to have a little quiet talk with her.

"Well, my good woman," he observed, "what is all this? Let me know your

views as briefly as possible." Joan explained that her views

consisted of magnificent visions, but Charles declared them to be

mere jack-o'-lanterns of the brain, which were not worth attending to.

Nevertheless, the earnestness of her manner had its effect, and the king

sent her to Poictiers, where there was a learned university, and, though

Joan was rather averse to the fellows, she allowed them to question her.

Some of them began to assail her with their ponderous learning, but she

cut them short by acknowledging that she did not know a great A or a

little a from a bouncing B. She declared herself, however, ready to

fight, and the learned men, who were not anxious for a contest with

the Maid in her own style, pronounced a favourable opinion on her

pretensions. To raise the siege of Orleans, and take the dauphin to be

crowned at Rheims, were the feats she undertook to perform. As one

trial would prove the fact, Charles consented to grant it. The soldiers,

however, refused to follow her until they had seen how she would manage

a horse, and they consequently all stood round her while she went

through a few scenes in the circle. One of them, who acted as a kind

of clown in the ring, put a lance into her hand, which she wielded with

great dexterity, while she was still in the performance of her rapid act

of horsemanship.

Joan having passed her examination with success, was invested with the

rank of a general officer. In spite of her masculine undertaking, there

was still enough of the woman in her disposition to induce her to be

very particular in ordering her own armour and accoutrements. She had

herself measured for an entirely new suit of polished metal, her banner

was white, picked out with gold, and her horse was as white as milk

when properly chalked for metropolitan consumption. The Maid looked

exceedingly well when made up, and people flocked round her with intense

curiosity; for if even the man in brass at the Lord Mayor's Show will

attract a mob, a woman regularly blocked in by block tin was a novelty

that everyone would be sure to run after. Full of enthusiasm, she

started off to the relief of Orleans, and the garrison, encouraged

by her approach, sallied out upon the besiegers with unusual vigour,

exclaiming "The Maid is come!" and the result realised the old saying

that "where there's a will, there's a way," or in the Latin proverb,

_possunt_ (they can) _qui_ (who) _videntur_ (seem) _posse_ (to be able).

With the aid of the _posse comitatus_ the object was achieved, and it

may, perhaps, have happened that the superstitious fears of the English

had much to do with the result of the battle. They declared that she

was a witch, and some of them pretended to have seen her looking at them

with great saucer eyes, which was, in those days, a test of sorcery.

The sentinels at night got so nervous, that they used to be startled by

their own shadows in the moon, and would run away, declaring that they

were pursued by black figures stretched on the ground, from which there

was no escaping. Others declared the stars were all out of order, and

that they heard the band of Orion playing, out of tune, at midnight.

Some declared they had seen a horse galloping along the Milky Way, and

they inferred that Joan of Arc sent her steed along it at full speed to

keep up his milky whiteness.

The English army had been completely panic-struck by the successes of

Joan, which were owing nearly equally to the zeal she inspired in her

friends and to the superstition of her enemies. She caused a letter to

be written to the latter, in her name, strongly advising them to "give

it up," and now she determined to give them a bit of a speech from the

ramparts of Orleans. Taking her place on the top of a ladder resting

against a high wall, she advised them to "be off;" "that it was no

use;" they were "only wasting their time there;" and recommended that,

if they had business elsewhere, they had better go and attend to it. Sir

William Gladesdale, an English leader, rose to reply amid cries of

"Down, down!" "Off, off!" "Hear him!" "Oh, oh!" and the usual

ejaculations which a difference of opinion in a crowd has always

elicited. As soon as Sir William could obtain a hearing, he was

understood to advise the Maid to "go home and take care of her cows;"

upon which Joan cleverly replied, that if "a calf were an object of care

as well as a cow, he (Sir William Gladesdale) ought to be placed at once

in safe keeping." The knight, finding the laugh against him, sat down

without another word, and Joan became more popular than ever after this

little incident.

It was part of the plan of the Maid to work upon the imagination of the

foe, and an amanuensis was employed to write another threatening letter,

in her name, to the English soldiers. The communication was thrown

into the midst of them, and Joan, being anxious to know what effect

it produced, stood on the ramparts to overhear what they said to it.

"Listeners never hear any good of themselves," and the Maid had the

mortification of listening to some fearful abuse of herself, which,

perhaps, served her right, for her behaviour was, to say the least

of it, exceedingly unladylike. Vanity became one of her most powerful

incentives, and she took upon herself to disagree with the Governor of

Orleans, the great captains, and all the military authorities, on points

of military tactics. Joan was, in fact, a very impracticable person, but

it was necessary to let her have her way to a considerable extent, on

account of her immense popularity with the soldiers. She insisted on

making an attack which was considered very premature, and, while leading

it in person, she got knocked over into a ditch by a dart, which set her

off crying very bitterly. A valiant knight picked her up and placed her

in the rear, consoling her by saying, "There, there I you're not a great

deal hurt. Come, come--dry your eyes. Don't cry, there's a good girl,"

and other words of encouragement. Joan, feeling that it would not do for

a heroine to be found roaring and whimpering at the first scratch she

received, soon recovered her self-possession, and was soon at the ditch

again, but on this occasion it was less for the purpose of fighting

herself than of urging on others to battle.

The English, though they did not know whether Joan was a witch or a

what, were nevertheless ready to fight her on a fair field, if she would

give them the opportunity. Her voices had not, however, given her the

word of command, and she found it advisable to put a poultice on her

neck, which rendered it necessary that she should keep for some days

as quiet as possible. Her voices were often exceedingly considerate in

refraining from advising her to go to battle when she might have got the

worst of it. In this instance they were accommodating enough to give her

the opportunity of nursing her neck for at least a limited period. The

English waited a little time for the Maid, expecting that she would

prove herself a "maid-of-all-work" by venturing to go single-handed

into a very difficult place, but, as she did not make the attempt, they

retired with flying colours. These colours, had they been warranted not

to run, might never have left Orleans, but on the 8th of May, 1429, the

siege was raised, and the reputation of the English army considerably

lowered.

On the strength of this event, Joan went to meet King Charles, who

received her very affably, and the courtiers proposed inviting her to

a public dinner. This honour she politely declined, for--like the

celebrated Drummond--she was "averse to humbug of any description" but

that which she had made for her own use, and after-dinner speeches were

matters she held in utter abhorrence. She objected strongly to that

festive foolery which induces people who never met before to express

hopes that they may often meet again, and which is the source of

at least twenty proudest moments of about as many existences. Joan,

therefore, urged her previous engagements as an excuse for going

out nowhere, for she felt assured that if she encouraged a spirit of

jolly-doeism among the troops, they would soon become neglectful of all

their duties.

Charles, urged by the example of Joan, determined to do a little

soldiering himself, and had his armour taken out of his box, the rust

rubbed off, the shoulder-straps lengthened, the leggings let down, the

breastplate let out, and other alterations made, to adapt it to the

change in his figure since he had last worn his martial trappings.

Though he took the field, it was in the capacity of an amateur, for his

modesty--or some other feeling--kept him constantly in the background,

and after the battle of Patay, which was fought and won by the French,

the cries of "Where is Charles? What's become of the king?" were loud

and general. The Maid found him reposing on his laurels, or, rather,

under them, for he had concealed himself in a thick hedge of evergreens,

from which he declined to emerge until his question of "Is it all

right?" had received from Joan's lips a satisfactory answer. The

object of her visit was to persuade him to accompany her to Rheims, to

celebrate his coronation in the cathedral of that city. "It's not a bad

idea," said Charles, "but premature, I'm afraid, and so at present we

will not think of it." Joan would, however, take no refusal. On the 15th

of July, 1429, the French king made his solemn entrance into that city.

He was crowned two days after, and, though not one of the peers of

France were present at the ceremony, it went off with quite as much

spirit as anyone might venture to anticipate.

Philip, the Duke of Burgundy, declined an invitation from the Maid, who

pointed out to him the folly of fighting against his own king, when,

if he wanted war, the Turks were always ready to fight or be fought,

to have their heads cut off, or oblige anyone else by making the thing

reciprocal. The Duke of Burgundy still kept aloof, but Joan continued

to be successful without his assistance, and took several towns, chiefly

from the readiness with which they were given up to her. Many of the

people looked upon her as something preternatural, and they even fancied

her white banner was always surrounded by butterflies, though truth

compels us to state that these fancied butterflies were probably

harvest-bugs, which, at about the period of the year when the phenomenon

was supposed to have been seen, were most likely to be fluttering

blindly and blunderingly about the Maid's standard. Many of the French

officers, jealous of her success, attempted to malign her character.

No tiger could have stood up for his respectability more furiously than

Joan defended her reputation; and, indeed, she made so much fuss,

to vindicate her fair fame, that we might have suspected her of

impropriety, had not all the historians agreed in coming to an opposite

conclusion. It was evident that Joan, having made one or two lucky hits,

was anxious to back out before she damaged her reputation by failure.

When asked what she would do if allowed to retire, she declared she

would return and tend her sheep; nor did the cruel sarcasm of "Oh, yes,

with a hook!"--which some courtier would throw in--divert her at all

from her humble purpose. Having the rank of a general, she might perhaps

have claimed the right to sell out or retire on half-pay, but she was

anxious to return to her lowing herds, which caused Charles to say that

for her to go and herd with anything so low, would be indeed ridiculous.

Her voices, however, began to confuse her, and perhaps to talk more than

one at a time, as well as to say different things; for on one day she

would speak of resuming her humble occupations, and on another day would

make preparations for smashing the English.

Fortune seemed to have deserted the English in France, and Bedford, the

regent--like others of his countrymen, when they found their numbers

inferior to those of the foe--had the coolness to propose settling the

dispute by single combat. This ingenious device is like that of the

gamester who has but a single pound, which he proposes to stake against

the pound of him who has a hundred more, with the understanding that if

the party who makes the proposition shall win, he shall walk off with

all that belongs to his antagonist. Charles was rude enough, to make no

reply to this offer, but about the middle of August, 1429, the English

and French armies found themselves very unexpectedly in sight of each

other, near Senlis. How they came to such close quarters no one seemed

to know; but it is agreed on all hands, that both sides would have been

very glad to get back again. Neither would venture to begin, and Charles

requested to know what Joan of Arc's voices had to say upon such an

important occasion. The Maid had unfortunately lost whatever voice she

might have had, and could find nothing at all to say for herself. The

king was eager to know whether his army might commence the attack, but

Joan's voices said not a word, and as their silence was not of the sort

which Charles considered capable of giving consent, he did not permit

any assault to be begun by his soldiers. After looking at each other

during three entire days, each army marched off the field by its

own road, and nothing had taken place beyond the interchange of an

occasional "Now then, stupid--what are you staring at?" between the

advanced guards of either army.

Though our business, as an historian, has taken us a good deal abroad,

we must now return home, lest, in our absence, the thread of our

narrative should have got into such a state of entanglement, as to

cause ourselves and our readers difficulty in the necessary process

of unravelling it. The 6th of November, 1429, was set apart for the

coronation of the baby king, at Westminster; and, in a spirit worthy of

the rising generation of the present day, his infant majesty insisted on

the abolition of the protectorship. The notion that he could take care

of himself had got possession of the royal mind; but the sequel of his

reign afforded bitter proof of the extent of the fallacy. In 1430, he

embarked for France, but the privy purse was again in such a disgraceful

state, that the king had not the means of paying for his journey. The

usual humiliating step was taken of sending the crown to the pawnbroker.

We may here take occasion to remark, that though we frequently hear of

the crown being put in pledge, we have no record of its being ever taken

regularly and honestly out again. There can be little doubt that the

people were unscrupulously taxed to rescue the regal diadem, which was

no sooner redeemed than royal extravagance, or necessity, placed it

again in its humiliating position. Had the same crown been transmitted

regularly from hand to hand--or, rather, from head to head--it would

have been perforated through and through by the multiplicity of tickets

that from time to time have been pinned on to it.

On this occasion, the jewels went to the pawnbroker's, as well as the

crown, so that the regalia were huddled together as if they had been

no better than a set of fire-irons. It is surprising, under all the

circumstances, that the sceptre never figured in the catalogue of a sale

of unredeemed pledges, and we cannot wonder that some of our sovereigns

have chosen to rule with a rod of iron, as a cheap and durable, but a

most disagreeable substitute. In addition to the means already alluded

to, for filling his purse, the young king hit upon another mode of

making money. Every one who was worth forty pounds a year, was forced

to take up the honour of knighthood, and made to pay exorbitant fees

for the undesired privilege. In this manner, many persons were dubbed

knights, for the express purpose of making them dub up; and there is

every reason to believe that the word "dub" has taken its meaning in

relation to pecuniary affairs, from the arbitrary practice we have

mentioned. Those illustrious families who trace their genealogy up to

some knight who flourished in the time of Henry the Sixth, will not,

perhaps, after this disclosure, be so very proud of their origin.

We have had in our own day one or two who have been dignified with

knighthood by mistake, instead of somebody else, but those who had

greatness thrust upon them only for the sake of the fees, were scarcely

less contemptible.

CHAPTER THE FOURTH. HENRY THE SIXTH, SURNAMED OF WINDSOR (CONTINUED).

[Illustration: 292]

BEDFORD had for some time been struggling in France under the extreme

disadvantage of shortness of cash, for the council being engaged in

continual quarrelling at home, had become very irregular in sending

remittances. He had gone week after week without his own salary, but he

never grumbled at that until he found his army, from getting short

of cash, beginning to fail in allegiance. Often, while reviewing the

troops, if he complained of awkwardness in the evolutions, he would

hear murmurs of "Why don't you pay us?" and on one occasion an insolent

fellow, who had been bungling over the easy manouvre of standing at

ease, cried out, "It's all very well to say 'Stand at ease,' but how

is a man to stand at when he never receives his salary?" Upon another

occasion, Bedford had given the word to "Charge!" when a suppressed

titter ran through the ranks, and, on his demanding an explanation,

he was told respectfully by one of his aides-de-camp that the troops

thought it an irresistible joke to call upon them to "charge," when, if

they charged ever so much, there was no prospect of their demand being

satisfied. Bedford used to rush regularly every morning to the outpost,

in the hope of finding a letter containing the means of liquidating some

of the arrears of pay into which he had fallen with his soldiers. He

was, however, always doomed to disappointment, for there was either no

communication for him at all, or an intimation that "next week"--which

never comes--would bring him the cash he was so eagerly waiting for. His

repeated visits to the outpost usually ended in a shake of the head from

the officer on duty, whose "No, sir; there's nothing for you," had in it

a mixture of compassion and contempt, which are not always incompatible.

Bedford, the regent, having left Paris, Charles thought that, the

cat being away, the mice might be at play, and that the city would be

unprepared if an attack should be made upon it. Beauvais and St. Denis

opened their gates, but the Parisians were not so complaisant, and

Charles, unwilling to resort to force, tried the effect of flummery. He

issued proclamations, full of the most brilliant promises to his

"good and loyal city," but the inhabitants replied by hanging out an

allegorical banner, representing an individual in the act of offering

some chaff to an old bird, who was refusing to be caught by it. Stung by

this sarcasm, Charles determined to make an attack, and on the 12th of

September he commenced an assault on the Faubourg St. Honoré.

Joan threw herself against the wall, but could make no impression upon

it, and she could only lament that among the French artillery there was

no mortar to be brought to bear upon the bricks of the city. She then

resorted to other steps--or, rather, to a ladder--and had reached every

successive round amid successive rounds of applause from her followers,

when she was stopped by a wound, which fairly knocked her over. A

friendly ditch received the disabled Joan, who went into it with a

splash, which caused all her companions to basely run away, lest they

should participate in the consequences of her downfall. Drenched and

disheartened, sobbing, and in a perfect sop, the Maid crawled out of the

ditch and lay down for a little while; but suddenly rising, and giving

herself a shake, she made another rush at the battlements. A few better

spirits, ashamed of seeing the weakest thus a second time going to the

wall, joined her in her advance, but, meeting with resistance, they

rolled back like a wave of the sea, almost swamping the Maid, and

carrying her violently away with them.

[Illustration: 294]

Joan's influence had now begun to decline, for, though a heroine is

popular as long as she succeeds, a woman who fails in her performance

of the part is always ridiculous. She had also lost the favour of the

soldiers by attacking them behind their backs, for she had flogged

them with the flat of her sword till she broke the blade over their

shoulders. They openly called her an impostor, a humbug, and a do; so

that, hurt in her feelings as well as in her neck, wounded alike in

mind and body, she resolved to quit the army. She even went to the Abbey

church, and, fixing up a clothes-line, hung her white armour before the

shrine of St. Denis. Charles supposed the articles had been put there to

dry after the soaking the Maid had experienced in the ditch, but when he

heard that Joan, as well as her coat of mail, was on the high ropes,

he determined to take her down a peg as gently as possible. She was

persuaded to prolong her stay, or, rather, to renew her engagement; and

though, even after her military _début_ at the siege of Orleans, she

had wished it to be her "positively last appearance on any ramparts,"

Charles had the satisfaction of announcing that she had in the

handsomest manner consented to remain in his company. A constant renewal

of an engagement will dim the attraction of the brightest star, and Joan

was evidently on the wane as a popular favourite.

In the beginning of 1430 there was a blight cessation of hostilities,

and Charles remained at Bourges, where he was suffering under a severe

exhaustion of his means and a general sinking in all his pockets. At

this juncture, Joan met with a rival in the shape of an opposition

prophetess, for it is always the fate of merit and success to become the

subject of base and paltry imitation. Catherine of La Rochelle was

the name of the female counterfeit who adapted her inspiration to the

exigencies of the time, and, knowing the king to be short of cash,

she pretended to have fits of financial foresight. She was, in fact, a

visionary Chancellor of the Exchequer, running about with an imaginary

budget, and transforming Charles's real deficiency into an ideal

surplus. She affected to hear voices and to see visions; but the former

were rude shouts of I.O.U., and the latter represented to her certain

hidden treasure, which was hidden so well that it has never been found

from that time to the present. She had the art of extracting money for

the king's use from those who had any money to give, and a single speech

from her mouth was sufficient to fill with coin any soup-plate or saucer

that might be handed round to the audience. She boasted that she could

talk every penny out of the purses of her hearers, and whenever she

appeared, there was a general cry of "Take care of your pockets!"

Joan called her an impostor, and was called "another" in return; but

it was said by a quaint writer of the period that, whatever the Maid of

Orleans might have done with the sword, the tongue of Catherine would

give an antagonist a more complete licking than the most formidable

weapon. Charles was attracted by the financial fanatic, but, still

wishing to propitiate Joan, he ennobled her family, and declared that

her native village of Domremy should for ever be exempt from taxes. It

thus became one of the greatest rights of this place to forget the whole

of its duties.

At the opening of the spring, the French king advanced again towards

Paris with two prophetesses in his suite, but, as two of a trade never

agree--particularly if they happen to be of the gentler sex--the two

young ladies were constantly quarrelling. It is probable that the

presence of Catherine was the cause of putting Joan upon her mettle, for

she marched to the relief of Compiegne with all her accustomed spirit.

She had made up her mind to a repetition of the hit she had made at

Orleans, but Victory did not answer her call or show any disposition to

wait upon her. Joan fought with valour, but her soldiers had no sooner

met the foe than they agreed that the chances were against them, and

that the only way to bring themselves round was to turn immediately

back, a manouvre which was performed by one simultaneous movement. Joan

tried to rally them, but they were too far gone, and while she kept her

face to the enemy, her old disaster befell her, for she backed into one

of those ditches in which all her military exploits seemed doomed to

ter-minate. There being no humane member of society, or member of the

Humane Society, to give her the benefit of a drag from the water in

which she was immersed, she was soon surrounded by her enemies. Her own

companions had fled into the city and shut the gates upon her, against

which she had not the strength to knock, when, mournfully murmuring

out, "Alas! I am not worth a rap," she surrendered to her opponents. The

sensation created by the capture of Joan of Arc was actually prodigious.

The captains ran out of their positions, and the men left their ranks to

have a peep at her. Duke Philip paid her a visit at her lodgings, in the

presence of old Monstrelet, who was either so deaf, or so stupid, or so

thunderstruck, that he could not relate what passed at the interview.

The ungrateful French made no effort to release the Maid, and, indeed,

there seemed to be a feeling of satisfaction at having got rid of her.

Her captors showed a strong disposition to make much of her by turning

the celebrated prophetess to a profit, and the person to whom she had

surrendered--the Bastard of Vendôme--sold her out and out to John of

Luxembourgh. Friar Martin pretended to have a lien upon her; but John,

refusing to have the lot put up again, and resold--in accordance with

the usual practice in cases of dispute--cleared her off to a strong

castle of his own in Picardy. Another pretended mortgagee of the Maid

then started up in the person of the Bishop of Beauvais, who claimed her

on behalf of the University of Paris. John of Luxembourgh disposed

of her to his holiness for ten thousand francs, rather than have any

further trouble.

Poor Joan was committed to prison on the charge of witchcraft, and as

a kind of preliminary to the proceedings in her own case, a woman who

believed in the Maid was burned, _pour encourager les autres_ who might

put faith in her inspiration. The fate of Joan was for some time very

uncertain; but the learned doctors of the University of Paris, and other

high authorities, recommended her being burned at once, which would save

the trouble and expense of a previous trial. The Bishop of Beauvais,

who had become the proprietor, by purchase, of the illustrious captive,

recommended the adoption of regular legal proceedings. Priests and

lawyers and lettered men were summoned from far and near; many of the

legal gentlemen being specially retained, and all being practised in

the art of cross-examination, to which Joan was subjected by those who

conducted the case for the prosecution. Her trial was, throughout,

a disgraceful exhibition of forensic chicanery, for her opponents

attempted to puzzle her with hard words, which, in spite of her being

charged with magic spells, she had not the power of spelling. The

pleadings were shamefully complicated; but she defended herself with

spirit, and occasionally confounded the doctors, who were confounded

knaves, for they tried to take every advantage of her unfortunate

position. Sixteen days were consumed in taking the evidence, and Joan

sometimes made a point in her own favour, when the Bishop of Beauvais,

sinking the dignity of the judge in the temporary office of usher, began

to call lustily for silence; and, according to the modern practice of

the officer of the court, making more noise than everyone else by the

loudness of his vociferations.

The bishop shouted and resorted to other ungentlemanly expedients,

during the entire day, to damage the cause of Joan, who, nevertheless,

proceeded as if in the midst of that silence which the usher in

Westminster Hall is continually disturbing by loudly calling for. It was

contended, on the part of the prosecution, that there was magic in her

banner; but Joan, who had served the other side with notice to produce

the banner, declared there was nothing particular in any part of it.

The pole belonging to it was as plain as any other pike-staff, and the

banner itself was formed of a cheap material, which Joan declared was

all stuff; so that the banner was, of necessity, waived by her enemies.

Her judges, nevertheless, declared there was sufficient evidence to

support a charge of heresy, and began to deliberate on the manner of her

punishment. While some recommended fire, others threw cold water upon

it, and French, as well as English writers, have laboured to prove, that

their countrymen, at least, were averse to a proceeding from which

the term "burning shame" no doubt took the signification it bears at

present. Having already found her guilty, her persecutors tried their

utmost to urge her to acknowledge her guilt, for in the absence of

proof, it was thought advisable to get at least a confession.

At length, on the 24th of May, 1431, the Maid was brought up to hear

her sentence, and the Bishop of Beauvais, taking out a pile of papers,

endorsed _re_ Joan of Arc, declared himself ready to deliver his

judgment. An opportunity was, however, allowed her to stay execution, on

giving a _cognovit_, or acknowledgment of every charge brought against

her; and such a document being drawn up, she reluctantly permitted Joan

of Arc, X, her mark--for she could not write--to be affixed to it. Her

punishment was commuted to perpetual imprisonment, with "the bread of

sorrow and the water of affliction," which consisted of a stale loaf and

a pull at the pump once a day, as her only nourishment.

She found very few crumbs of comfort in her daily crust, and when the

water was brought to her, she declared it to be very hard, which

was certainly better than soft for drinking. It was a portion of her

punishment to resume her female attire, which caused her considerable

annoyance, and a soldier's dress having been left in her prison, she was

one morning discovered wearing it. Her jailer, on entering, charged her

with "trying it on," but added that it was anything but fitting, and

told her that she would certainly be overhauled when he reported that he

had seen her in a pair of military overalls.

[Illustration: 297]

The circumstance was instantly turned against her, and the putting on of

male attire, which she had worn before, was declared to be a revival

of the old suit, to which she had been liable. Her re-appearance in the

soldier's dress was looked upon as a proof of uniform opposition to

the authorities; and her offence was described as "relapsed heresy," or

double guilt, like the "one cold caught on the top of t'other" by the

boy who had been suffering under several layers of those disagreeable

visitors. Judgment was now finally entered up against the ill-used Maid,

who, on the 30th of May, 1431, was brought in a cart to the market-place

and burned at Rouen.

We would gladly draw a veil over the fate of poor Joan; but we are

unwilling to spare those who were accessory to it, from the odium which

increases whenever the facts are repeated. Cardinal Beaufort and some of

the bishops who had been instrumental to the murder of the Maid, began

to whimper when the ceremony commenced, and to find it more than their

susceptible natures could bear to witness. They had ordered the atrocity

that was about to take place; but conscience had made them such arrant

cowards, that they had not the courage to witness the carrying out of

their own savage suggestions. If persons so hard-hearted as themselves

could feel so much affected by the sacrifice they had ordered, we may

imagine what opinion ought to be entertained of them for commanding an

act of atrocity which they dared not remain to contemplate.

The conduct of Charles in not interfering on Joan's behalf, is even more

cruel and despicable than that of her avowed enemies. The French

king finding the Maid of no further use, came practically to a free

translation of _Non eget arcu_ (there is no want of a Joan of Arc), and

left her to the fate that awaited her. It would have been nothing but

policy to have insured her life, which he might easily have done,

even when she was threatened with burning, and her case became doubly

hazardous.

The English were very anxious to get up a sensation in France by way

of diverting the public mind from the fate of the Maid of Orleans. A

coronation, which is always one of the best cards to play, being good

for a king or queen at the least, was thought of and resolved upon. The

affair was intended to eclipse the ceremony of which Charles had been

the hero and Joan of Arc the heroine. Young Henry, who had been crowned

already at Westminster, and had therefore rehearsed the part he would

be called upon to play, was brought over to Paris with all the scenery,

machinery, dresses and decorations, properties and appointments, that

had been used before, so that the coronation being in the _répertoire_

of costly spectacles, the expense of its revival was moderate. The

performance took place in November, 1431; but though the getting-up was

very complete, the applause was scanty, and the attendance was by no

means numerous. Cardinal Beaufort occupied a stall, and there was a

fair sprinkling of people in the galleries; but' the principal character

being a spiritless and most unpromising boy of nine, the spectacle

excited very little interest.

Things remaining in France in a very unsatisfactory state, Charles and

Philip of Burgundy came to the resolution that it was folly to go

on cutting one another's throats, and they consequently effected a

compromise. Philip got the best of the bargain, which was solemnised

by a great deal of swearing and unswearing; for as the parties had

previously exchanged oaths of hostility toward each other, it was

necessary to take the sponge and wipe out former affidavits, as well as

to supply the blank with new oaths of an opposite character. There was

a mutual interchange of perjury; and posterity, on looking at the

respective culpabilities of the two parties, can only come to the

conclusion, that they were _beaucoup d'un beaucoup_, or much of a

muchness.

The Duke of Bedford did not live long after this treaty, but died of

indigestion, and considering that he had eaten an enormous quantity of

his own words, the result is by no means marvellous. He finished up his

existence at Rouen, on the 14th of September, 1435, having swallowed a

parcel of his own oaths, some of which are supposed to have stuck in his

throat, and caused his dissolution. The English in France soon felt the

fatal consequences of being without a chief, for the columns of an army,

like the columns of a journal, are incomplete without a leader. Deprived

of Bedford, the English soldiers could no longer hold Paris--or, rather,

Paris could no longer hold them--and they were consequently forced to

surrender. The Duke of York succeeded to the command in France--if

he can be said to have succeeded who failed in almost everything. A

succession of reverses was the only thing approaching to success which

he experienced; and a supersedeas was soon issued to overturn his

commission.

Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, did something towards restoring the English

ascendency in France; but Philip of Burgundy thought he would try his

hand at a siege, and fixed upon Calais as being the most convenient. The

Duke of Gloucester, hearing he had a tremendous army assembled in front

of the town, sent over to Philip an offer to fight him. "Only stop there

till I get at you," were Gloucester's words; to which Burgundy replied,

that he should be happy to wait the English duke's convenience. Four

days, however, before the latter landed, the former was seized with

a panic--and, taking suddenly to his heels, his thirty thousand men

scampered wildly after him. Philip, who had set the example, and

must have been flighty to have commenced such an insane flight, was

completely run off his legs by the ruck of fugitives in his rear; and

he was swept into the very heart of Flanders, before he could ascertain

what his soldiers were driving at. Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, did

something towards retrieving the failing fortunes of the English; but,

as both parties were getting into a nervous state--running away through

sheer panics, crying out before they were hurt, and flying before they

were pursued--a truce was agreed upon. It was for two years, to expire

on the 1st of April, 1446,--and there could not have been a more

appropriate day than that devoted to All Fools, to renew hostilities

which were injurious to all parties.

Henry, of Windsor, was now twenty-four; but, though a man in years,

he was still an infant in intellect. He was physically full-grown, but

mentally a dwarf; and what had been in childhood the gentleness of

the lamb, became in manhood downright sheepishness. His conversational

powers would not have allowed him to say "bo to a goose," had it

been necessary for him to address to that foolish bird that unmeaning

monosyllable. Even his mother had turned her back upon him, as a noodle

she could make nothing of, and had married Owen Tudor, Esquire, an

obscure gentleman of Wales, who boasted, nevertheless, a royal descent,

or at least maintained that the Tudors were so called from being not

above Two-doors off from such illustrious lineage. The Queen-mother had

died, but had left a lot of little Tudors, under the care of O. T., her

_bourgeois gentilhomme_ of a husband.

Henry being a mere nonentity, it was resolved to try and make something

of him by finding him a wife of spirit; as if small beer could be turned

into stout by mixing a quantity of gin with it. Margaret of Anjou was

selected for the formation of this deleterious compound. She was one

of those intolerable nuisances--a fine woman, with a great deal of

decision, which means that she was decidedly disagreeable. Her

father was a nominal king of Sicily and Jerusalem; but he had no real

dominions, and only rented, as it were, a brass plate, or had his name

up over the door of the countries specified. He was as poor as a cup of

tea after the fifth water, and ruled over about as much land as he could

cram into a few flower-pots which adorned the window of his lodging. He

kept a minister who answered the bell and the purpose at the same

time, and was accustomed to wait at table. His majesty's apartment was

furnished with a sort of dresser covered with green baize, which formed

a board of green cloth; and he had several sticks-in-waiting in his

umbrella stand. His _robe de matin_ was his robe of state; he had a

green silk privy purse, and an ormolu cabinet. He had a keeper of the

great seal which hung to his watch; and his bureau comprised a secretary

for the home department, in which he kept all his washing-bills. He

dispensed with a master of the horse by keeping no horse of his own, and

he always had plenty of gentlemen-in-waiting, in the shape of creditors.

He saved the expense of a paymaster by paying nobody; and though he

issued Exchequer Bills, they were not only at very long dates, but

wholly unworthy of anyone's acceptance. He was his own Chancellor of his

own Exchequer, for he used to declare, with much apparent integrity that

his government should never be degraded by useless sinecures. "Whenever

there is nothing to do," he would philosophically exclaim, "I consider

it my duty to do it." He usually resided in Sicily when he was at home,

but he kept in his court--at the back of his lodging--a few Jerusalem

artichokes, to represent the interests of his other kingdom of

Jerusalem. He used to make a financial statement every now and then, for

the sake of clearing himself of his debts, which were the subject of

an annual act of which he alone got the benefit. He used upon these

occasions to profess a considerable anxiety to rub off as he went on,

but his goings on and rubbings off were equally to his own advantage,

and the cost of those who had trusted him. Never was political economy

carried to such perfection as by the father of Margaret, the king of

Sicily and Jerusalem.

[Illustration: 303]

It was hopeless to ask for a dower with the daughter of a man who had

what is vulgarly termed "a sight of money," which means that he could

have put the whole of his income into his eye without any detriment to

his vision. Instead of asking anything from a sovereign more fitted to

be upon the parish than upon the throne, a trifling settlement was made

upon him, that the king of England might not be said to have married the

daughter of an absolute monarch and an absolute beggar. Anjou and Maine,

which had been taken from him by main force, were restored to him, and

a little money was advanced to him on account of his first quarter's

revenue, to enable him to cut a respectable figure at his daughter's

wedding.

Suffolk brought home the bride to England, where she was, of course,

severely criticised. For many she was too tall, and her height was an

objection that could not be overlooked very easily. The friends of the

Duke of Gloucester--known as the good Duke Humphrey--declared he would

have found a better queen; and Duke Humphrey paid her no attention, for

he never even asked her to a family dinner, an omission which gave rise

to a saying * that is still current.

* Dining with Duke Humphrey is a process that needs no

explanation.

The good Duke Humphrey, though he gave no one a dinner, was anxious

to let everyone have his desert, which made his royal highness very

unpopular. His enemies began by charging his wife with necromancy,

because she was in the habit of consulting the dregs of her teacup when

turned out in her saucer--an act that was stigmatised as sorcery. She

was also proved to have in her possession a large wax doll, resembling

the king, which she was in the habit of placing before the fire for the

purpose, it was said, of sweating her sovereign. This was interpreted

into a desire to see him waste away, and she was accordingly sentenced

to perpetual imprisonment. Had she been able to melt the king himself as

she melted his effigy, she might have been pardoned; but though the wax

image was soft enough, he only waxed wroth when an appeal in her

behalf was made to him. Her husband now became personally an object of

persecution, and was arrested on a charge of treason, on the 11th

of February, 1447, when he went to take his seat at the opening of

Parliament. On the 28th of the same month, he was found dead in his bed,

and of course the conclusion was that he had been murdered, though there

were no signs of violence. There were various rumours as to the cause

of Duke Humphrey's death, and despair, dyspepsia, apoplexy, and

unhappy perplexity, or a broken heart, were equally spoken of as having

occasioned his dissolution. It is strange that inanition was never

thought of as a probable mode of accounting for the decease of Duke

Humphrey, whose stinted diet has given to his dinners an unenviable

notoriety.

The old rival and uncle of the good Duke Humphrey did not long survive

his nephew, for the grasping prelate died on the 11th of April, 1447,

at Winchester, where he had retired to his see, from which he was to the

last straining his eyes towards the popedom.

Under the ministry of Suffolk the glory of England rapidly declined, and

its possessions in France were daily diminishing. Parliament began to

take the matter seriously up, and not a day passed without some awkward

motion being made to embarrass the Government. At length, in January,

1450, Suffolk became so exasperated that he challenged his enemies to

the proof of their accusations, which was equivalent to asking for a

vote of confidence. The Commons replied by requesting the Lords to send

him to the Tower, which they declared themselves most happy to do, if

the Lower House would only send up a specific charge on which he might

be committed. The Commons acceded with the utmost pleasure to the

demand, and cooked up an accusation very promptly, for in those days

such things were kept almost ready made, to be used at the shortest

notice, for the purpose of knocking the head from off the shoulders of

a minister. It was laid in the indictment against Suffolk, that he

had been furnishing a castle with military stores; or, in other words,

ordering a quantity of gunpowder to be sent in for the purpose of

assisting France against England. Though the accusation was wretchedly

vague, it was sufficient foundation for a warrant, upon which Suffolk

was seized by the scruff of the neck, and hurried to the Tower.

Fearing that one bill of impeachment might be insufficient, his enemies

published a series of supplements.

In his defence he noticed only the first set of charges, which accused

him of a desire to put the crown on the head of his son; a freak that

Suffolk never had the smallest idea of practising. On the 13th of March,

1460, he was brought to the bar of the House of Lords, and went down

upon his knees like a horse--or rather like an ass--on the wooden

pavement. He denied, ridiculed, and repudiated some of the articles

in the impeachment, and accused the lords themselves of being his

accomplices in some others. A proceeding which we can only characterise

as a general row immediately took place, and the House of Lords became a

perfect piece of ursine horticulture, or regular bear-garden.

Suffolk, though warmly defended by the court, was furiously attacked by

the Commons, who declared they would not vote a penny of the supplies

while the minister remained unpunished. The king, as long as it did not

affect his pockets, was tolerably staunch towards his friend, but when

no money came in, and the royal outgoings continued to be large, it was

found expedient to throw the favourite over. Every fresh bill that was

placed on the unpaid file at the palace shook the royal resolution; and

when the eye of the king glanced over his huge accumulation of unsettled

accounts, he began to think seriously whether it was not too great a

sacrifice to lose his supplies for the sake of saving Suffolk.

The favourite was gradually getting out of favour, and was sent for by

the king to a private interview, in the course of which it was intimated

to the duke that he must be dropped, but that he should be "let down" as

easily as possible. This private intimation kept Suffolk in a state of

suspense considerably worse than certainty; for it is a well-established

fact, given on the authority of those who have tried both, that a bold

leap into the fire is preferable to a constant grill on the gridiron, or

a perpetual ferment in the frying-pan.

On the 17th of March Suffolk was again brought up in presence of the

king, at a sort of judicial "at home," given by hiss majesty. It

took place, according to some authorities, in the sovereign's private

apartments; but the chroniclers are mute as to which room--whether

the two-pair back, the one-pair front, the _salle à manger_, or the

_salon_--was the scene of the important interview. Suffolk threw himself

once more at the feet of the king, who, it is to be hoped, had no corns;

but Henry must have felt hurt at receiving a minister on such a footing.

Suffolk, still at his master's feet, endeavoured to hit upon Henry's

tender points, but the sovereign was on this occasion influenced by

the impression made upon his understanding. He ordered Suffolk into

banishment for five years, and gave him till the 1st of May to pack up

for his departure.

[Illustration: 306]

The people were determined not to let the traitor off so easily, and

no less than two thousand assembled to take his life, which he wisely

abstained from placing at their disposal. He gave a farewell banquet

at one of his country seats to his relatives and friends, and, upon his

health being duly proposed as the toast of the evening, he swore, of

course, that he was perfectly innocent. Finding it necessary to dodge

the popular indignation, he started off to Ipswich, when he embarked

for the Continent.

On the 2nd of May, as he was sailing between Dover and Calais, his

convoy--consisting of a smack and punt for self and retinue--was hailed

by a great hulking man-of-war from the hulks, which bore the name of

_Nicholas_ of the Tower. This was a sad blow to the little smack, which

would have gladly gone off had it not been most vigorously brought-to

by the larger vessel. The duke was ordered on board the _Nicholas_, and

after the ship had stood off and on for three days, it turned out

that the vessel was only waiting to take in an axe, a block, and an

executioner. This dismal addition to the freight having at last

arrived, it was immediately put in requisition, and, as Suffolk was very

unpopular, nobody took the trouble to inquire what had become of him.

The only account that could ever be given of him was that he had been

taken away by the crew of the _Nicholas_, which was a very old ship, and

the announcement that Suffolk had gone to Old Nick was all that was ever

said concerning him.

We are soon about to enter upon those Wars of the Roses which planted

so many thorns in the bosom of fair England. It is strange that out

of _couleur de rose_ should have emanated some of the most sombre and

melancholy hues that ever darkened the pages of our history. "Coming

events cast their shadows before," and the shade in this instance was

one Cade, familiarly called Jack Cade by various authorities. This

celebrated individual was a native of Ireland, who had served in

France in the English army, so that he may be called a kind of

Anglo-Irish-Frenchman, a combination that reminds us of the celebrated

poly-politician, who, being desirous of being thought "open to all

parties," with the vow of being ultimately influenced by one,

gave himself out as a conservative-whig-radical. Jack Cade was a

jack-of-all-trades, or, at all events, a jack of two, for he had been

a doctor first and a soldier afterwards. Some have ironically contended

that the change from a medical to a military life was only an extension

of the same business, and that, in resigning the bolus for the bullet,

the powders for the gunpowder, and the lancet for the sword, he was only

enlarging the sphere of his practice. With that remarkable deference

for the aristocracy they pretend to despise, which is only too common

amongst demagogues, Cade tried to claim relationship even with royalty,

and, giving himself out as a relation of the Duke of York, he assumed

the name of Mortimer.

That Cade was a decayed scion of an illustrious stock may be doubted,

and some, who have not been ashamed of an anachronism for the sake of a

sneer, have gone so far as to say that the Cades were the earliest cads

of which there are any records.

It has been well remarked somewhere, by somebody, that the men of Kent,

though living near the water, were always very inflammable, and the

Kentish fire is to this day proverbial for its intensity. Cade threw

himself among these men, who made him their captain, and inarched with

him to Blackheath, from which he commenced a long correspondence with

the Londoners. The Government, alarmed at an assembly of fifteen or

twenty thousand men at a place where large assemblies were unusual, sent

to enquire the reason of the good men of Kent having quitted their

homes in such large numbers. Cade, who among his other restless habits,

appears to have been troubled with a _cacoethes scribendi,_ took

upon himself to answer for the whole, and embodied their reasons in a

document called the "Complaint of the Commons of Kent," which was of a

somewhat discursive character. It commenced by alluding to a report that

Kent was to be turned into a hunting forest, and remonstrated against

the people being made game of in such a fearful manner; it then

proceeded to abuse the Government in general terms, which have since

been the stereotyped phraseology of nearly all the friends of the

people; it complained of others fattening on the royal revenue, which

forced the king to supply the deficiency by robbing his subjects, and

to take their provisions wholesale as well as retail, without paying

a penny for them. Allusion was then made to the lowness of the company

admitted to court, though this seems to have been rather over-nice on

the part of Jack and his followers. The document then came to the point,

by intimating that the men of Kent had been subjected to extortion

and treated with contempt, so that they had been, at the same time,

overtaxed and under-rated.

When the court received this elaborate catalogue of ills, it was

intimated to Cade and his companions, that it would take some time to

prepare the answer; but the authorities thinking that powder and shot

would answer better than pen and ink, set to work to collect troops and

ammunition in London. Cade could not resist his propensity to scribble,

and sent in a second paper, headed "The Requests, by the captain of the

great assembly in Kent." In his new manifesto Jack required an entire

re-arrangement of the royal household even down to the minutest domestic

arrangements; and it was even said, that not a pie came to the king's

table without Jack wishing to have a finger in it.

The court was now prepared with an answer in the shape of a large army,

which advanced upon Blackheath, and caused Cade to be taken so regularly

aback, that he jibbed as far as Sevenoaks. Here he halted, and waited

the attack of the royal army, a detachment of which came up and went

down like a pack of cards, though as they had lost all heart there is

something defective in the comparison. When the main army at Blackheath

heard the fate of the detachment at Sevenoaks, the soldiers suddenly

began to object to fighting against their own countrymen. The Court then

found it time to make concession, and commenced by sending a few of its

own party to the Tower, in order to propitiate the malcontents. Lord

Say, an obnoxious minister, who was not merely a say, but a tremendous

do, was at once locked up with some others who had rendered themselves

unpopular.

Cade now made himself master of the right bank of the Thames from

Greenwich to Lambeth, both inclusive, and made the celebrated incision

into the latter, which retained the name of the New Cut to a very

distant period. Cade took up his own quarters in Southwark, but went

into London every morning, where he and his followers behaved very

quietly for a few days, returning home regularly every evening to their

lodgings in the Borough. Their first act of violence was to insist

on the trial of Say, who was not allowed to have his say in his

own defence, but was hurried off to Cheapside and beheaded. As too

frequently happens with the promoters of the public good, Cade's

followers could not keep their hands off private property, and a little

pillage was perpetrated. Even Jack himself, who sometimes set a good

example to his followers, was tempted to plunder the house at which

he usually dined; and the citizens, feeling that as the spoons were

beginning to go, their turn would probably be next, became indignant

at the outrage. They consequently refused admission to Cade the next

morning when he came to transact his city business as usual.

It was next determined by the court to delude the rebels by an offer

of a pardon; and Cade caught at the bait with a simplicity less

characteristic of a Jack than of a gudgeon. In two days, however, he

altered his mind, and refused to lay down his arms or walk off his legs,

until Government gave a guarantee for the fulfilment of its promises.

With the customary hatred of each other, which too often prevails among

the lovers of their country, the patriots commenced quarrelling. Cade

began to fear that some disinterested friend of freedom would sell him

for the thousand marks that were offered for his head; and Jack, from

the idea of being apprehended, was thrown into a constant state of

apprehension. Sneaking quietly downstairs in the night, he found his way

to the stable, where he mounted a clever hack, and using what spurs he

could to the animal's exertion, put him along at a slapping pace towards

the coast of Sussex. He had not proceeded very far, when turning to look

back on what he had gone through, he saw at his heels Alexander Iden,

Esq. Jack had scarcely got out the words, "Is that you, Alick?" when

a lick from Iden's sword revealed the purpose of his mission. "No, you

don't!" cried Cade, parrying an attempt to plant a second blow, and

putting in a slight poke with his battle-axe very efficiently. Were we

to borrow the graphic style of the sporting chroniclers, in describing

a fight, we should say that Iden came up smiling, and evidently meaning

business, which he transacted by enumerating one, two, three, in rapid

succession on Jack's chest, followed up by four, five, six, on the

face, and seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, in the stomach. Cade

endeavoured to rally, but every effort failed; and Alexander Iden, Esq.,

claimed the thousand marks that had been advertised. The amount was

large for a head with very little in it; but the tail, consisting of the

riff-raff led on by Cade, formed the real value of the article.

A dispute now commenced between persons of higher degree; or, rather, it

is to be suspected that Cade and his men had been used as the tools of

some more exalted malcontent. It very frequently happens that

political agitators in an humble rank of life are either cunningly or

unconsciously playing the game of a political schemer of more exalted

station; and while they are supposed to be working for the overthrow of

one tyrant, they are preparing the way for the establishment of another.

The Duke of York was the individual who, endeavouring to profit by the

recent revolt, left Ireland, of which he had been Lieutenant, and forced

himself into the king's presence. "Now then, what is it?" cried Henry,

annoyed at the sudden intrusion; when York replied he had come to

extract something from the mouth of the sovereign. "A tooth, perchance?"

ironically remarked the king; but his majesty was informed that a

promise to summon a Parliament was the utmost that York required. This

was acceded to, and, when Parliament met, one of the members proposed

declaring the Duke of York heir apparent to the throne, but the proposer

was indignantly coughed down, unceremoniously pulled out, and promptly

committed to the Tower. The duke, discouraged at having a minority of

one, which imprisonment had reduced to none, in his favour, repaired to

his castle at Ludlow, where he collected a large army; but, by way of

proving that he had no evil intentions towards the king, he took, every

now and then, the oath of allegiance. This periodical perjury had very

little effect, for York was better known than trusted, and an army was

sent against him. As the forces went one way to meet him, he came up to

London by another road, but the gates of the City were slammed in his

face just as he came up to them. "Well, I'm sure!" was the indignant

murmur of York, to which, according to an Irish chronicler who came from

Ireland in the duke's suite, "You can't come in," was the only echo.

Foiled in this attempt, he went to Kent, expecting Jack Cade's followers

would rally round him, but beyond some half-dozen seedy scamps,

belonging to the class excluded from kitchens under the general order of

"No followers allowed," there were no adherents to York's banner. When

Henry came up with him at Dartford, both of them, like two little boys

who have met to fight and don't know how to begin, were anxious to

negotiate. This was agreed to, and the duke having disbanded his army,

by which, as the papers say when a theatre closes prematurely, "an

immense number of persons were thrown out of employ," he went to Henry's

tent for a personal interview.

[Illustration: 311]

The meeting was very unpleasant, for Somerset happening to be seated

there, had the bad taste to assail York with a volley of vulgar abuse,

which the latter repaid with interest. "You're a felon and a traitor,

sir!" cried Somerset, as York came in, which elicited, by way of reply,

"You're an old humbug," and other taunts, among which "Who embezzled

the taxes?" was rather conspicuous. As the duke was about to depart, a

tipstaff tripped up to him, and, begging his pardon, intimated that he

was in custody. Somerset would have applied for speedy execution, but

York compromised the affair by a little more perjury, for he swore

a good batch--sufficient to last him a whole year--of truth and

allegiance. He then retired to his castle, where he may have amused

himself with playing at "Beggar my Neighbour" with his porter, as far

as we can tell, for his employment while in seclusion at Wigmore is not

recorded in history.

Henry's utter incapacity to hold the reins, which were literally

dropping out of his hands, began to give great uneasiness to the

Parliament. York was wanted back, and Somerset was sent to the Tower,

for the two rivals were like the two figures in the toy for indicating

the weather. What brought one out sent the other in, and a storm was the

signal for the entrance of York, while political sunshine was favourable

to

Somerset. On the 14th of February, 1454, York opened Parliament as

commissioner for the king, who was personally visited at Windsor by a

deputation of peers, desirous of ascertaining his exact condition. They

found Henry perfectly imbecile, and incapable of understanding a word

or uttering a syllable. The deputation conceiving it possible that his

majesty might be merely muddled, retired to give him time to come to,

but on their return they found him in the same state as before, and

_ditto_ repeated on a third visit. The deputation, resolving unanimously

that "this sort of thing would never do," reported the facts to

Parliament, and Richard, Duke of York, was elected "Protector and

Defender of the realm of England." In about nine months Henry was

declared to have recovered his senses, such as they were, and the court

claimed for him the return of the reins, which had been taken out of

his hands by reason of his incapacity. York was instantly put down, and

Somerset again taken up to occupy the box-seat as heretofore.

The ex-protector retired to Ludlow as before, but got together some

troops, and poor Henry was put, or carried, or propped up, at the head

of an opposing army. The duke having no fear of a force under such a

tumble-down leader, met him near the capital, and sent a message, full

of loyalty, to the king, but insisting on Somerset being sent back by

return, to be dealt with in the most rigorous manner. An answer was

returned in the king's name, declaring his determination to perish

rather than betray his friend; but it was the friend himself who

assigned to his majesty this very disinterested preference. The

sovereign was indeed so imbecile that he knew not what he said, and

understood nothing of what was said for him, so that when he asked if

he would not rather die in battle than hand Somerset over to the foe, an

unmeaning grin was the only reply of the royal idiot. A fight of course

ensued, and York got the best of it. Somerset was among the slain, and

the poor king, who was as innocent of the use of a sword as a child in

arms, got a wound in the neck, which sent him howling and reeling away

till he took refuge in a tan-yard. York found him hiding among the

hides, and pulling him out with gentleness, conducted him to the Abbey

of St. Alban's. Every care was taken of the wounded monarch, whose neck

was duly poulticed, and whose feet were put in hot water, though indeed

they were seldom out of it.

When Parliament met after this affair, theoretical allegiance was sworn

to the king and prince, but practical contempt of their position was

exercised. York was declared protector until Edward, the heir to the

throne, attained his majority; but Henry was superannuated at once, for

he was liable, like a hare in the month of March, to fits of insanity.

He was sometimes sensible enough, but no one could elucidate the date of

his lucid intervals; and as the sceptre is little better than a red-hot

poker in a madman's hands, he was very properly deprived of that

powerful instrument.

Things had been thus arranged, when, on the meeting of Parliament, in

1456, after the Christmas recess, Henry, to the surprise of everyone,

rushed in, exclaiming--"I'll trouble you for that crown!" and "Oblige me

with a catch of that ball!"--alluding to the orb which forms part of the

regalia. No one disputed his restoration to sanity, and York resigned

the protectorate, looking unutterable things, as if he had just been

engaged in a speculation by which he had made a profit of eightpence and

incurred the loss of a shilling.

The king now endeavoured to effect a reconciliation between the rival

parties, who affected to make it up, but started at once to their

respective castles, for the purpose of looking up materials and men for

the renewal of hostilities. York sent his sword to the grinder's, his

armour to the tin-plate-worker's, to be let out, pieced, and otherwise

repaired--while the Lancastrian chiefs were, on their side, resorting

to similar arrangements. At length they came to a battle, in September,

1459, and the Yorkists were in the better position, when Sir Andrew

Trollop--either from blockheadism, or bribery, or both--deserted, with

all his veterans, to the standard of Henry. York, taking a series of

hops, skips and jumps over the Welsh mountains, fled into Ireland. He

ran so fast, that the muscles of his leg were contracted; and it was

said at the time, that the York hams had as much as they could do to

keep ahead of the Bath chaps, many of whom were engaged in the battle,

from having lived not far from the neighbourhood. Warwick escaped to

Calais, where he was exceedingly popular, and he soon collected forces

enough to admit of his landing in Kent, where he stuck up his banner

with the view of collecting a crowd, and then touting for followers. The

project was successful, and by the time he reached Blackheath he had got

thirty thousand men at his heels, according to the old chroniclers, who,

it is only fair to say, have a peculiar multiplication table of their

own, and who, whatever may be their aptitude at facts, certainly present

to us some of the very oddest figures.

Warwick's reception was very enthusiastic. The archbishop ran out of

Canterbury to meet him and shake him by the hand, Lord Cobham clapped

him amicably on the shoulders, and five bishops, taking off their

mitres, waved them as he passed in token of welcome. Warwick made at

once for the midland counties, carrying with him the young heir of York,

and meeting the Lancastrians at Northampton, a battle was fought which

ended in the defeat of the latter. Henry was taken prisoner; but his

wife Margaret of Anjou escaped with her son Edward, and encountered one

of those adventures which season with a spice of romance the sometimes

insipid dish of history. The story we are about to relate is offered

with a caution to our readers, but it is too good to be omitted, and

we are, moreover, afraid that were we to leave it out for the sake of

correctness, we should be blamed for the omission. Use is second

nature in literature as well as in anything else; and the public, being

accustomed to falsehood, would regard the absence of even the most

flagrant hoax as a curtailment of the fair proportions of history.

It is, however, only under protest that we can lend ourselves to the

gratification of this very morbid appetite, and we therefore advise

the following story on the authority of _De Moleville_, to be taken

not merely _cum grano salis_, but with an entire cellar of that very

wholesome condiment.

The anecdote runs as follows: Margaret fled with her son into the

recesses of a forest, like one of those which we see on the stage,

where cut woods, canvas banks, and trees growing downwards from the

sky-boarders, furnish an umbrageous recess of the most sombre character.

We fancy we see her advancing to slow music, laying her child on a

canvas bank, and listening to the rattle of peas accompanied by the

shaking of sheet iron, which form the rain and thunder of theatrical

life, when suddenly a whistle is heard, and two figures enter whose

long black worsted hair, wash-leather gauntlets, drawn broadswords, and

yellow ochre countenances, bespeak that they are robbers of the worst

complexion. The queen has, of course, all her jewels blazing about her,

which the two men proceed to appropriate, and while they are quarrelling

about the division of her booty, she contrives to escape.

This brings us to another part of the same forest, where the scenery is

not quite so elaborate, but where Margaret, leading on her infant son,

stumbles upon a sentimental robber with a drawn sword in his hand, a

tear of sensibility in his eye, and in his mouth a claptrap. She appeals

to his generosity in favour of a "female in distress;" he replies with

some cutting allusions to the "man who--" compares himself to a melon,

or a cocoa-nut, or anything else with a rough exterior, but with some

sweetness or milk of human kindness within, and by way of climax, she

exclaims, "Here, my friend, I commit to your care the safety of the

king's son."

[Illustration: 314]

The honest fellow--by whom we mean, of course, the professional thief

and casual cut-throat--goes down upon one knee in a fit of loyalty,

and according to the scholastic versions of this little incident he is

"recalled to virtue by the flattering confidence reposed in him." * He

went also a step further, and at once devoted himself to the service

of the queen, magnanimously offering to share her fortunes, which

considering the desperate nature of his own, was a proposition equally

indicative of self-love and loyalty. Her majesty accepted the offer, and

embarked for Flanders, of course paying all the expenses of her friend

the sentimental robber, who became the companion of her flight, and a

pensioner on her pocket.

* Sec Pinnock'a edition of Goldsmith's History of England,

p. 143 of the thirty-second edition.

Fighting between the adherents of York on one side, and of Lancaster

on the other, continued with unabated fury, until York having gained a

victory at Northampton, called a Parliament, and walked straight up to

the throne. He took hold of the hammer-cloth, as if to mount, and

looked round as much as to say, "Shall I?" but no "hears," "cheers,"

or "bravoes," encouraged him to proceed. Another battle was fought soon

after at Wakefield Bridge, when Richard, Duke of York, was killed, and

his son Edward succeeded to the title, which was very shortly afterwards

exchanged for that of king, at a packed meeting of citizens. The

question was put whether Henry was fit to reign, and the "Noes" had it

as a matter of course, when a motion that Edward of York should ascend

the throne, was carried by a large majority.

Thus he who was not yet of age, and who had been recently nothing more

than Earl March, was in early March, 1461, voted to the sovereignty

by the acclamation of the people. Rushing into the House of Lords, he

vaulted in a true spirit of vaulting ambition on to the throne, from

which he delivered a discourse on hereditary right, making out every

other right to be wrong, and maintaining his own right to be the only

genuine article.

Poor Margaret made a futile attempt to rouse the loyalty of the citizens

of London in a letter which she addressed to them, * but the style is so

exceedingly vague, that we do not wonder at the document having proved

ineffectual. As far as it is possible to collect the meaning of the

epistle to which we have referred, it trounces the Duke of York in a

style of truly female earnestness. It calls him an "untrue, unsad, and

unadvised person," who is "of pure malice, disposed to continue in

his cruelness, to the utterest undoing, if he might," of the fair

letter-writer and her offspring. Poor Margaret's state of mind may

have accounted for the tremendous topsy-turviness--to use a familiar

expression--of her sentences. The bursting heart cannot trammel itself

by those fetters which grammarians and rhetoricians have forged to

restrain language within its proper limits. That Margaret of Anjou was

a woman of business is evident from a copy of one of her wardrobe books

now, in a state of perfect preservation, in the office of the Duchy of

Lancaster. This private ledger of the royal lady would be a model for

the accounts of modern housekeepers.

* This letter, which is to be found in the Harleian MSS.,

No. 543, Fol. 147, is also given in Mary Anne Wood's

interesting collection of _Letters of Royal and Illustrious

Ladies of Great Britain_. The letter of Margaret of Anjou

forms the thirty-eighth in the first volume of the work

alluded to.

It comprises a journal of payments even down to the accuracy of pence;

and her gardener's wages, put down at a hundred shillings a year, may be

considered a fair criterion of the average scale of her expenditure. She

laid out little in clothes, though she kept twenty-seven valets as

well as a number of ladies-in-waiting, and "ten little damsels," whose

salaries and persons were no doubt equally diminutive. That her economy

must have been wonderful, is evident from the fact that she did it all

for seven pounds a day, which she regularly paid to the treasurer of the

king's household.

It has not often been our lot to begin with a new sovereign until we

have finished with the old; but in the present instance we must drop

Henry the Sixth before his death, according to the example set us by his

ungrateful people. We have, perhaps, lingered too long over the downfall

of Henry, and we are warned by a sort of mental shout of "Edward the

Fourth stops the way," that we must drive on with our history.

CHAPTER THE FIFTH. EDWARD THE FOURTH.

[Illustration: 316]

EDWARD, like the individual who having got such a thing as a crown about

him, fully intended keeping it, lost no time in going into the provinces

to enforce his claims. After killing twenty-eight thousand Lancastrians,

and threatening a lesson on the Lancastrian system to anyone who might

continue to oppress him, he returned to town, and was crowned on the

29th of June, 1461, in the usual style of magnificence.

Poor Henry, the deposed sovereign, was carried about at the head of his

adherents, to give them something to rally round; but they might just as

well have had a maypole, or any other inanimate object, for the ex-king

was utterly imbecile. He could only be compared to a guy in the hands of

the boys on the 5th of November; and sometimes, when his adherents were

forced to run for it, they set him down to escape as he could, by which

he was occasionally on the point of being taken prisoner.