Bolingbroke.
Richard II. (1377-1398).
Henry IV. (1398-1413).
The little King Richard was much fatigued on the 16th of July,
1377; it was found necessary to place him in a litter to bring
him back to the palace, after his coronation. All the former
popularity of his grandfather Edward III., all the affection
which his father the Black Prince had inspired, appeared to have
accumulated upon his head, by reason of the fear and aversion
which were felt towards John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster. The
prelates and barons assembled on the morrow of the coronation,
and selected a council of regency of twelve members. The uncles
of the king did not form part of this body, and John of Gaunt
retired to his castle of Kenilworth; but several members of the
council remained devoted to him, and his influence soon began to
be complained of.
The King of France, Charles V., had lost no time in taking
advantage of the weakness of the English government: his fleets
overran the Channel, fettering commerce and seizing the British
vessels; a descent was even made upon the Isle of Wight. The
Parliament was convoked, and the Earl of Buckingham, the uncle of
the king, was placed at the head of the naval forces; his
expedition against the French fleet miscarried, and his defeat
increased the discontent of the nation. The Parliament was
composed chiefly of the enemies of the Duke of Lancaster, and
when a kind of reconciliation had been effected between the
latter and the House of Commons, that assembly demanded that two
citizens of London should be entrusted to receive the money voted
for the defence of the country. John of Gaunt started for France
with a large army (1378).
{338}
The King of Navarre, still at war with Charles V., held a portion
of Normandy; he had surrendered Cherbourg to the English. The
Duke of Brittany, John de Montfort, being reduced to the last
extremity by the successes of Bertrand du Guesclin, had consigned
Brest to them; but these acquisitions were due to the freewill of
the allies of England, and not to its arms. John of Gaunt was
defeated before St. Malo; and, being pursued by Du Guesclin, was
compelled to return to England, while the Scots, at the
instigation of France, invaded the northern counties and took
possession of Berwick Castle. A Scottish pirate, named John
Mercer, devastated the coast as far as Scarborough. A London
merchant, named John Philpot, on the other hand, armed a small
fleet, and hastening to the encounter of Mercer, recaptured from
him all the vessels which the latter had seized; captured,
besides, fifteen Spanish ships, and returned triumphantly into
the Thames, amid the plaudits of his fellow-citizens, and to the
indignation of the council, which reprimanded the alderman for
the boldness of his undertaking.
The Parliament had assembled at Gloucester, disaffected and
exacting. The Commons asked to examine the accounts, which was
granted to them as a favor. John de Montfort had recently taken
refuge in England, banished from his dominions by King Charles
V., who committed the imprudent act of officially annexing the
duchy of Brittany to France. This declaration immediately rallied
all the different factions against him.
{339}
John de Montfort was recalled; the States-general of Brittany
wrote to the King of France, asking him to authorize them to
retain their independent ruler. At the same time an English army,
under the command of the Earl of Buckingham, landed at Calais and
ravaged the provinces of Artois, Picardy, and Champagne without
ever encountering the necessity of a serious combat. The English
were arriving in Brittany when King Charles V. died (1378), and
the Bretons, reassured by the weakness of the young King Charles
VI., began to look coldly upon their English allies. De Montfort
negotiated with the French council of regency, and Buckingham was
only indebted for his safety to the valor of his troops and to
the provisions which he had brought. He retired in the spring of
1379. Great events were in preparation in England.
For some years a double movement, religious and social, had begun
secretly to agitate the English people. A priest, John Wycliffe,
born towards 1324, in Yorkshire, had attracted attention at the
university of Oxford by his rare faculties, and had commenced, in
the year 1356, to denounce the abuses of the papal authority; he
had then attacked the mendicant monks, accusing the Church in
general of greed and corruption. Summoned to appear before the
Bishop of London, in the last year of the reign of Edward III.,
to answer for his opinions, he had been supported by the Duke of
Lancaster and his friend Lord Percy; both had even insulted the
bishop, which had brought about an insurrection in the city.
Wycliffe had retracted some of his ideas, he had explained
others; and, thanks to his powerful protectors, he had obtained
the living of Lutterworth, in Leicestershire, where he spent the
remainder of his life, surrounded by priests, whom he brought up
in truly apostolic poverty, and who subsequently spread his
opinions among the people.
{340}
Wycliffe is the first of the Reformers, or rather, their
precursor. His doctrines acted more powerfully abroad than in his
own country; it is to his books that were due the first germs of
the Reformation in Bohemia; for England, his greatest work was
the translation of the Bible into the vernacular. The most
important of his ideas was the appeal to the private judgment of
the faithful upon the very text of the Holy Scriptures. Wycliffe
had shaken the traditions of submission to the clergy; he had at
the same time preached a dangerous doctrine. "All possessions,"
he said, "come of grace, and may be forfeited by sin." The poor
serfs, who possessed nothing, might be anxious to profit in their
turn by the grace which insured estates. Wycliffe died peacefully
at Lutterworth in 1384.
Already, for two years past, his illustrious friend, Geoffrey
Chaucer, the first creator of English poetry, had been compelled
to quit England, compromised by his attachment to the new ideas;
he had retired into Hainault, where he lived in peace, protected
by the friendship of the Duke of Lancaster. The first works of
Chaucer, _The Court of Love_, the poem of _Troilus and
Cresseide, The Temple of Fame_, had been published several
years before, and had assured to him a reputation which had
largely contributed to his fortune. The English language at this
time, still largely intermixed with French, and difficult to
understand at the present time, assumed, under the pen of
Chaucer, a native grace to which sometimes succeeds an energy
which prepared the way for Spenser and Shakespeare.
{341}
Chaucer again established himself in England when John of Gaunt
returned from his expedition to Castile; he lived to an advanced
age, and composed in his retreat of Dumington his _Canterbury
Tales_, written in the style of the _Decameron_ of
Boccaccio, and the only one of his books which is still read at
the present day. He died in 1400, the year following the
accession of Henry Bolingbroke, the son of his protector. Like
Wycliffe, he had seen the commencement of the popular agitations.
The poll-tax voted by the Parliament in 1379 was their first
opportunity.
A general movement towards the enfranchisement of the lower
classes manifested itself everywhere in Europe. The insurrection
of the Jacquerie in France; the resistance of the Flemish
citizens and artisans, first, to the conduct of Jacques van
Arteveldt and afterwards to that of Philip, his son, had
testified to the awakening of the serfs, the peasants, and the
artisans, so long reduced to the condition of beasts of burden.
The kings had been in need of money, and the taxes weighing upon
all their subjects, it had been necessary to conciliate them. The
soldiery had acquired a new importance; the English archers, in
particular, nearly all peasants by origin, had played an
important part in the wars. When the tax-collectors began in 1380
to demand payment of the poll-tax, of a people already
impoverished by a long series of exactions, they met with a
resistance which increased with the oppression. The tax, at first
collected with leniency, was let out to some courtiers; they
borrowed in advance of the Lombards and Flemings; repayment
became necessary, and the revenue was exacted with great
severity. The peasants became exasperated; they began to assemble
and confer together; the insurrection broke out in Essex.
{342}
The "Commons of England," as the insurgents styled themselves,
broke into several dwelling-houses in the neighborhood; they
obeyed a seditious priest who assumed the name of Jack Straw. The
contagion rapidly spread into the counties of Kent, Suffolk, and
Norfolk. The tax was payable only in the case of persons above
fourteen years of age. A Kentish collector maintained that the
daughter of a tiler had attained the specified age; her mother
maintained the contrary; the collector insulted the young girl,
and was brained with a hammer by the father. A knight had
reclaimed a serf who thought he was entitled to enfranchisement,
and had imprisoned him in Rochester Castle; the peasants attacked
the castle and compelled the garrison to surrender the prisoner.
The Kentish insurgents marched under the command of a chief named
Wat Tyler (Wat the tiler). On the Monday of Trinity week, in
1381, they entered Canterbury, threatening death to the
archbishop, who was absent. The monks of the chapter-house were
compelled to swear fidelity to King Richard and the commons of
England. Three wealthy burgesses were beheaded, and the crowd
proceeded towards London. It is related that one hundred thousand
men followed close upon the steps of Wat Tyler, when he arrived
on the 11th of June at Blackheath.
The Princess of Wales, the mother of the young king, was
returning from a pilgrimage. The crowd of insurgents surrounded
her retinue. She was popular by reason of her husband's memory
and her ransom cost her only some kisses bestowed on the more
audacious of the leaders, who had not forgotten that she had
formerly been called "the fair maid of Kent;" she passed by
without further difficulty.
{343}
The malcontents thronged round an itinerant preacher whom they
had brought with them, and who displayed to them this text, now
famous:--
"When Adam delved and Eve span,
Where was then the gentleman?"
The doctrine of equality was received with enthusiasm by these
poor people, hitherto trodden under foot. The outskirts of London
were laid waste when the king proceeded down the Thames, on the
12th of June, to receive the petition of the insurgents. Ten
thousand men awaited his arrival at Rotherhithe; but at the sight
of the royal barge they uttered "such cries," says Froissart,
"that one would have thought that all the demons of hell were in
their midst." The noblemen who accompanied Richard became
alarmed, and dragged him with them as far as the Tower. "The
Commons of England," in a state of fury, advanced along the right
bank of the river as far as Lambeth, burnt down the prisons, and
plundered the palace of the Archbishop. On the other side of the
Thames the insurgents marched along the course of the river, and
at length obtaining a passage over London Bridge, they joined
their brothers of Kent. The whole city was in their power; the
population of London had joined them, and the rich citizens, to
please them, had thrown open their cellars to them. Hitherto, the
multitude had behaved with a certain amount of order, but
intoxication being once added to the joy of triumph, they could
no longer be restrained; the palace of the Duke of Lancaster was
invaded and burnt down; plunder was strictly forbidden; the gold
was reduced to powder, and the precious stones were broken. A
peasant had taken a bowl of money; he was thrown into the river
with his booty. The prisons being opened and destroyed brought
fresh reinforcements to the insurgents.
{344}
The Temple was burnt, with all the valuable books which had been
collected by the knights. The priory of St. John of Jerusalem,
recently constructed by Sir Thomas Hales, a prior of the order
and Chancellor of the Kingdom, was also delivered up to the
flames. A thirst for blood began to take possession of the
populace. Every passer-by was challenged. "For whom are you?" was
asked. If the answer was not "For King Richard and the true
commons," the person answering was immediately slaughtered. All
the Flemings fell by the knife or the hatchet; the popular hatred
sought them out even in the churches. Wine and blood flowed in
the streets; the counsellors of the king resolved to try
concessions.
On the morning of the 14th of June a proclamation was spread
throughout London, recommending the crowd which surrounded the
Tower and demanded the heads of the chancellor and treasurer, to
retreat towards Mile End. The king promised there to come to them
and to grant their requests. A portion of the mob obeyed; when
Richard arrived with a weak retinue at the meeting-place (his
brothers, the Earl of Kent and Lord John Holland, had quitted him
on the road), he saw himself surrounded by sixty thousand
peasants. Their tone was respectful, and their requests, which
then appeared monstrous, do not create the same impression at the
present day. They demanded the definitive abolition of servitude;
the power to sell and purchase in all markets; and a general
amnesty for the past. To this they added a strange claim to fix
the amount of rental on lands. The king promised all that they
wished, and immediately caused to be made a large number of
copies of the charter which he had thus granted.
{345}
These were distributed among the insurgents; the men of Essex and
Hertford retired in a body; but the malcontents of Kent had
remained in the capital, and had not appeared at the
meeting-place in Mile End. Scarcely had the king retired when
these dangerous foes attacked the Tower, beheading the
councillors who had taken refuge therein, the Archbishop of
Canterbury, the treasurer, Sir Thomas Hale, and several others.
The Princess of Wales, while yet in bed, saw a furious mob spring
into her chamber. No injury was done to her, and her attendants
were enabled to throw her, fainting with fright, into a little
boat; she was conveyed to a house in the city belonging to the
king, who there came and joined her when he had learnt the sad
news of the massacre at the Tower.
In the morning, Richard issued forth with a small escort, and
advanced fearlessly towards Smithfield. The multitude thronged
the streets and squares. The king drew up at St. Bartholomew's
Priory. "I will go no further," he said, "without having pacified
the insurgents." Wat Tyler had perceived him, and urging his
horse towards him, "There is the king: I go to speak to him," he
cried to his supporters; "do not move a hand or foot unless I
give you the signal." The horse of the popular chief touched
heads with that of the king. "Sir king," said Wat Tyler, "do you
see those men yonder?" "Yes," replied the young prince without
stirring. "They are at my disposal, and ready to do as I bid
them." And he toyed with his dagger, holding the bridle of the
royal courser; then, perceiving behind Richard an esquire who had
displeased him, "Ah, you here?" he said, "give me your sword."
The esquire refused; Wat Tyler made a motion to take possession
of it; the followers of the king were roused.
{346}
The Lord Mayor of London, William Walworth, urged forward his
horse, and advancing towards the rebel, struck him a blow with a
dagger; the horse reared. Tyler endeavored to return to his
followers; an esquire of the king thrust his sword through his
body; he fell, beating the air with his hands. The mob became
agitated. "Our captain is slain," was the cry, and the bowstrings
began to vibrate. Richard advanced alone towards the crowd. "What
do you, my friends?" he exclaimed. "Tyler was a traitor; it is I
who am your captain and your guide." And he drew after him this
irresolute mob, deprived of their chief, and who marched without
knowing whither they were bound. They arrived in the fields near
Islington. The friends of the king had rallied round him. One of
the chiefs of his free bands, Sir Robert Knowles, brought a body
of men-at-arms. The insurgents took alarm, threw down their bows,
and cried "Mercy!" The king would not suffer them to be
slaughtered in a mass, to the great exasperation of Sir Robert
Knowles. "He said that he would be even with them on another
occasion," says Froissart; "in which he did not fail."
The insurrections subsided everywhere. The Bishop of Norwich had
armed his household and his friends, and hastening to throw
himself upon the peasants, he had easily defeated these confused
masses, little accustomed to arms. He had himself drawn up their
indictment and pronounced their sentence; then resuming his
clerical costume, he had exhorted them, received their
confession, absolved them, and finally accompanied them to the
gallows. The king was at the head of a small army, and had
marched against the remainder of the insurgents of Essex. It was
no longer a question of charters; the courts of commission were
everywhere assembling to try the guilty.
[Image]
Death of Wat Tyler.
{347}
The two priests, Jack Straw and John Ball, were hanged. Lester
and Wistbroom, who had assumed the title of "Kings of the
Commons" in the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, suffered the
same fate. About fifteen hundred rioters were executed. It was
found necessary to fix them to the gibbet with iron chains; their
friends came by night to carry off their bodies.
The Parliament had assembled, publicly approving of the abolition
of the concessions granted to the villeins during the struggle.
"We would never have consented to them," said the barons, "even
had we all been compelled to perish on the same day." For the
moment, there was some talk of abolishing servitude; but the
opposition was so strenuous, the proprietors of fiefs declared so
loudly that their serfs belonged to them by right, and that they
could not be deprived of them without their consent, that the
idea was immediately abandoned, and the high treason law was
voted, condemning "riots, disturbances, and other analogous
things," in terms as dangerous as they were vague. The king
demanded money, the commons claimed a complete amnesty; neither
would begin to make concessions. The Parliament at length
yielded; the tax upon wool and leather was prolonged for five
years, and the king proclaimed the amnesty; he was about to wed
Anne of Bohemia, soon known throughout the whole of her kingdom
as "the good queen." The Bishop of Norwich was fighting in
Flanders, in support of the citizens of Ghent hard pressed by
their count, recently a victor at the battle of Rosebecque, where
Philip van Arteveldt had been killed; and the uncles of the king
contended with each other for the authority in England. The Earl
of Cambridge had been made Duke of York, and the Earl of
Buckingham Duke of Gloucester.
{348}
Henry Bolingbroke, son of the Duke of Lancaster, had become Earl
of Derby; at the same time, the king had made Earl of Suffolk and
Duke of Ireland, his favorites Michael de la Pole and Robert de
Vere, obscure persons, whom the Princess of Wales had placed
beside her son, by reason of her jealousy towards his uncles; and
who contributed, by their influence, to the struggles and
disputes of the government. The princess had recently died,
having succumbed beneath the weight of the anxieties caused by
one of her sons, Lord John Holland; he had recently assassinated
one of the servants of the king, and was unable to quit the
church in which he had taken refuge. Plot succeeded
plot--denunciation to denunciation. At length, the Duke of
Lancaster started out for Spain, in order to sustain the
pretensions of his wife to the throne of Castile; and he
contrived, after two campaigns, to marry his eldest daughter to
the heir of Henry of Transtamare, thus assuring the crown to her
children. The Scots had crossed the frontier, and King Richard
entered Scotland. France was preparing a great armament.
Amidst these external preoccupations, the Duke of Gloucester had
seized the reins of government; and, when the young king
threatened to dissolve a Parliament devoted to his uncle, the
Commons brought forward the Act which had deposed Edward II. A
council of barons for a while governed the kingdom, under the
presidency of Gloucester. Blood flowed everywhere; the duke
avenged himself upon the favorites of the king, who were as
odious to him as to the English people. He had impeached them
before the Parliament: the innocent were involved in the ruin of
the guilty.
{349}
Gloucester did not even spare Sir Simon Burley, formerly the
tutor of the king, the friend of Edward III. and the Black
Prince, and who had conducted the negotiations for the marriage
of Richard. The queen in vain threw herself at his feet asking
for mercy; in vain did Henry Bolingbroke, who had seconded his
uncle in all his undertakings, claim as a right the pardon of the
condemned man: Burley was executed, and Bolingbroke became
definitively at variance with Gloucester.
The disorder which prevailed in England did not prevent constant
hostilities upon the frontiers of Scotland; it was on August
15th, 1388, that there took place at Otterbourn, the famous
battle celebrated in the ballads under the name of Chevy Chase,
between the Earl of Douglas and Lord Henry Percy, the Hotspur of
Shakespeare. Douglas was slain, but the English ended by being
repulsed from the battle-field. Hotspur and his brother were
prisoners. The king was beginning to weary of the yoke which he
had so long borne. He was subject to gleams of resolution and
courage, which soon disappeared in a long spell of indolence, and
which took by surprise those who calculated upon his habitual
apathy. A council was being held in the month of May, 1389; the
king suddenly addressed the Duke of Gloucester. "How old do you
suppose I am, uncle?" he asked. "Your highness is in your
twenty-second year," replied the duke, much surprised. "Then,"
replied the king, "I am at an age when I should govern my own
affairs. Nobody in my kingdom has been so long held under
tutelage. I thank you for your services, my lord, but I no longer
require them." And he immediately caused the great seal and the
keys of the treasury to be given up to himself, compelling the
Duke of Gloucester to leave the council, and announcing publicly
to the nation that he had henceforth assumed the direction of the
government. But his fleeting energy had already abandoned him.
The Duke of York and Henry Bolingbroke were his masters, instead
of the Duke of Gloucester.
{350}
John of Gaunt had returned from Castile; he had become reconciled
with his brothers. Concord appeared re-established in the royal
family; a truce had been concluded with France and Scotland. The
King of Scotland, Robert II., had died on the 19th of April,
1390, and his eldest son had assumed the title of Robert III.
Queen Anne had also died, in 1394, and King Richard, who had no
children, married two years later, much against the wishes of his
subjects, the Princess Isabel, daughter of Charles VI., king of
France. She was but seven years old; but the king conceived the
liveliest affection for her, and conducted her everywhere with
him upon his travels. An expedition in Ireland against the
insurgent chiefs had been very successful; but the Duke of
Gloucester protested with all his might against the alliance with
France. "Our Edwards," he said, "caused Paris to tremble even in
its entrails; but, under Richard, we court the French, who make
us tremble within London." The duke had his reasons for
trembling: the king had not forgotten the execution of his
favorites, nor the men who had signed their indictment. The Earl
of Warwick, one of the accomplices of Gloucester, was already
arrested; the Earl of Arundel soon followed. The Duke of
Gloucester had retired to Pleshy Castle, in Essex; his nephew
repaired there in gay company: all the family came forward to
meet the king; but, while the duchess was conversing with him,
Gloucester was arrested by the marshal of England, dragged as far
as the river, thrown into a boat, and from thence a vessel bore
him towards Calais.
{351}
A rumor was thereupon spread that he had been assassinated; the
king published a proclamation declaring that the arrests had been
made with the approval of his uncles of Lancaster and York, as
well as of his cousin, the Earl of Derby. He had even obtained,
by a ruse, their signatures to the impeachment. Lord Arundel was
condemned by the Parliament, and immediately executed; his
brother, the Archbishop of Canterbury, was not even admitted to
plead his cause, for the king dreaded his eloquence; he was
banished for life, and the Earl of Warwick, at first condemned to
death, was imprisoned in the Isle of Man. The House of Lords then
called the Duke of Gloucester for judgment; but the marshal
replied that he could not bring the Lord Duke, who had for
several days been dead at Calais. He was condemned, however, and
all his goods were confiscated; it was said that he had been
suffocated between two mattresses. The judges were not without
uneasiness concerning the application which they had just made of
the high treason law: nearly all had been, at different periods,
compromised in plots or insurrections. They obtained of the king
an amnesty for the past; and, as a reward for present services,
Richard made his cousin the Earl of Derby, Duke of Hereford; the
Earl of Nottingham became Duke of Norfolk, and John Holland, the
murderer, was made Duke of Exeter. The Parliament completed its
work of complaisance by granting to the king, for life, a subsidy
upon woollens, and by forming a commission, entrusted to watch
affairs. King Richard was no longer in a hurry to appeal to his
people, or to convoke the Parliament.
{352}
The conduct of the king towards his uncle the Duke of Gloucester
and his friends, the vengeance which had overtaken, after so many
years, the enemies of the favorites, revealed the character of
the sovereign in a light which caused uneasiness in the country.
Indolent and prodigal, habitually engrossed in the pleasures of
luxury and magnificence, Richard was not only capable of
momentary energy, but he maintained in the bottom of his heart
projects which he shaped to his purposes with patient
perseverance. Once delivered of the Parliament and of the Duke of
Gloucester, the Duke of Lancaster aged and in retirement in his
castle, Richard gave himself up to all his whims, certain, as he
thought, of encountering no serious opposition. "At that time,"
says Froissart, "no one was great enough in England to dare to
speak against the will of the king. He had a council obedient to
his wishes, who begged him to do as he pleased; and he had in his
pay ten thousand archers, who guarded him day and night." The
extravagances of the court were insensate, and the people began
to complain, looking back regretfully upon the government of the
king's uncles, who had shown some consideration, they said, for
the nation, and consulted it in its own affairs.
Two great noblemen alone remained of those who had, in 1386,
seconded the efforts of the Duke of Gloucester against the
favorites of the king; and, notwithstanding the favor shown to
them by Richard, they did not feel secure in their positions. The
Duke of Norfolk, galloping upon the road to Windsor, in the month
of December, 1397, encountered the Duke of Hereford. "We are
ruined," said he to his friend. "Wherefore?" asked Bolingbroke.
"For that affair at Radcot Bridge." [Footnote 5]
[Footnote 5: The Duke of Ireland (Robert de Vere) had been
defeated by Gloucester and his companions, at Radcot
Bridge.]
{353}
"What! after so many pardons and declarations by the Parliament?"
rejoined Bolingbroke. "He will annul all that, and we shall pass
through the ordeal like the others; the world in which we live is
strangely perfidious." The Duke of Norfolk soon had reason to be
convinced of this. Either through thoughtlessness or through
treachery, the conversation was reported to the king; he convoked
the Parliament, and his first care in the month of January, 1398,
was to summon Henry Bolingbroke to render an account of the words
of the Duke of Norfolk. The latter was not present, but upon the
summons of the Parliament, he came to throw down his glove at the
feet of the Duke of Hereford, declaring him a traitor and a
perjurer: the combat was authorized between the two noblemen. "I
shall then at length have peace," muttered the king, while
proceeding to Coventry, on the 16th of September, to be present
at the tournament. But having once confronted the two
antagonists, he became fearful of a victory for one of them, and,
forbidding the ordeal, he submitted the question to a
Parliamentary commission chosen by himself. The Duke of Hereford
was condemned to an exile of ten years. The Duke of Norfolk was
banished forever. He thereupon started for the Holy Land, and
died of grief at Venice. But Henry Bolingbroke did not go far
away; he remained in France, watching the movements of his cousin
Richard, who lavished the riches of England with so thoughtless a
hand, that his treasury was constantly empty. His favorites would
then help him to replenish it by exactions of every kind. The
Duke of Lancaster had died three months after the departure of
his son; his immense property was confiscated, notwithstanding
the protests of Bolingbroke. A decree outlawed seventeen counties
of England, as having been favorable to the enemies of the king;
they were compelled to buy back their rights with enormous fines.
{354}
The disaffection increased, but the king took no heed whatever of
it. He embarked towards the end of May, 1390, for Ireland, where
his cousin and heir-apparent, the Earl of March, had recently
been assassinated. He had just taken the field against the
rebels, when Henry Bolingbroke landed, on the 4th of July, at
Ravenspur, in Yorkshire, having escaped from France under the
pretext of paying a visit to the Duke of Brittany.
Bolingbroke had brought with him a feeble following, the exiled
Archbishop of Canterbury, and his nephew, the Earl of Arundel,
fifteen knights and men-at-arms, and a few servants; but scarcely
had he touched the English soil, when the Earls of Northumberland
and Westmoreland joined him, bringing with them considerable
forces. Henry did not disclose his ulterior projects to anybody;
he came, he said, to claim his right, the inheritance of his
father, which the king had wrongly confiscated, and moreover the
public feeling was so favorable to him, the nation was so weary
of seeing itself ill-governed, that the malcontents rose in all
parts to place themselves under his standard. He was, it is said,
at the head of an army of sixty thousand men when he advanced
towards London. The Duke of York, regent of the kingdom in the
absence of Richard, did not rely upon the burgesses of the City;
he had quitted the capital, and displayed the royal standard at
St. Alban's. Terror began to seize the creatures of the king:
instead of marching against the rebels, they cowardly shut
themselves up in fortified castles. The Duke of York had taken
the western road, pending the return of King Richard; but
Bolingbroke had used diligence, and he arrived at the Severn on
the same day as the regent.
{355}
The latter placed little confidence in his troops; he was aware
of the general discontent, and he retained in the bottom of his
heart a bitter resentment for the murder of his brother
Gloucester. He granted an interview to his nephew Bolingbroke:
the firm, bold and cunning mind of Henry triumphed easily over
the feeble will of the Duke of York; the two armies were
amalgamated, and the regent helped the usurper to take Bristol
Castle. There the members of the commission which had formerly
condemned Bolingbroke had taken refuge; they were executed
without any form of trial, and the Duke of Lancaster marched upon
Chester, leaving his uncle at Bristol.
For three weeks Richard had remained in ignorance of what was
taking place in his kingdom. When he at length learnt the news of
the landing of Henry and his formidable progresses, he exclaimed
bitterly, "Ah! my good uncle of Lancaster, the Lord have mercy on
your soul! If I had believed you, although this man might be your
son, he would never have harmed me. Three times I have forgiven
him; this is his fourth offence." The Earl of Salisbury
immediately set sail to assemble together some troops in England;
he had raised pretty considerable forces in Wales; but the king
delayed, the soldiers murmured and dispersed by degrees; a large
number went and joined the rebels. The king at length disembarked
with his cousin, the Duke of Albemarle, and his two brothers, the
Dukes of Exeter and Surrey. The little army which he had taken to
Ireland followed him: but at the second halting-place, when the
king, having risen very early, looked through the window towards
the camp, where on the previous evening, six thousand soldiers
had slept, he no longer saw but a handful of archers and
men-at-arms: all had deserted during the night.
{356}
The king was advised to take refuge at Bordeaux. "That would be
to abdicate," said his brother, the Duke of Exeter. It was
resolved that they should join the Earl of Salisbury, and the
king, disguised as a priest, took the road to Conway, with his
brothers and a few servants, while the Duke of Albemarle,
following the example of his father, the Duke of York, fled by
night to join the army of he usurper.
The Earl of Salisbury had not a hundred men with him when the
king arrived at Conway. In this deplorable situation, the
brothers of King Richard proposed to go to Henry at Chester, in
order to ascertain his pretensions. The two dukes did not return;
their cousin Bolingbroke received them kindly, but he positively
refused to release them: all his efforts were directed towards
seizing the king in person. The Earl of Northumberland was
entrusted with this mission. By false promises he enticed the
king out of Conway, proposing an interview with Bolingbroke at
Flint. Richard was almost alone, abandoned; he followed the earl
with the friends who remained to him. They galloped along slowly,
when suddenly the king cried, "I am betrayed! Lord in Heaven,
help me! Do you not see banners and pennants flying in the
valley?" Northumberland advanced at the same time. "My lord," the
unhappy monarch said to him abruptly, "if I thought you capable
of betraying me, I could yet retreat." "No," replied the Earl,
who had laid hold of his bridle; "I have promised to conduct you
to the Duke of Lancaster." The soldiers of Northumberland began
to appear; the king yielded to necessity. "Our Saviour was sold
and delivered into the hands of His enemies," he murmured.
{357}
They arrived at Flint. Henry Bolingbroke, in all his armor, came
forward to meet his royal cousin, and bent his knee on
approaching. "Good cousin of Lancaster," said Richard
courteously, "you are welcome." "My lord," replied Henry, "I have
come before my time, but I will tell you the reason: your people
complain that you have governed them harshly for twenty-two
years; if it please God, I will help you rule them better."
"Since it pleases you, it pleases me also," meekly replied the
fallen monarch; and, seated upon a wretched courser, like a
prisoner, King Richard took the road to Chester, side by side
with Henry Bolingbroke. Froissart relates that his very dog
abandoned him to lick the hand of the usurper.
At Lichfield Richard attempted to escape; but he was seized as he
had just issued forth through a window, and thereafter was
narrowly guarded. The people of London received him with yells
and insults. The usurper repaired to St. Paul's, prayed upon the
tomb of his father, and then took possession of the palace. The
king had been led to the Tower.
The Parliament was convoked, and ready to depose Richard II., as
it had formerly deposed his great-grand-father; but Henry
Bolingbroke, with a bitter foresight of the mutability of human
things, wished to secure the personal consent and the voluntary
abdication of the king. He held him narrowly confined within the
Tower. "Why do you cause me to be thus guarded?" Richard angrily
exclaimed one day; "Am I your king or your prisoner?" "You are my
king," replied the duke; "but the council of your kingdom have
seen fit to place a guard beside your person." On the eve of the
opening of Parliament, a deputation of prelates and barons paid a
visit to the unhappy king in the Tower, and asked him to
abdicate. Richard felt himself powerless in the hands of his
enemies; he yielded, "willingly and joyfully," say the acts of
Parliament; and, releasing his subjects from their oath, he
consigned his royal ring to his cousin of Lancaster, saying that
he would choose him for his successor, if he had the right to
designate him.
{358}
These details are open to doubt, but the Parliament held them
good, and on the 30th of September, before the empty throne, in
Westminster Hall, the abdication of Richard was read aloud, all
the members giving their consent to it. The people uttered cries
of joy. The coronation oath was then brought, and, at each
article, proclaimed aloud, the impeachment of King Richard was
drawn up. He was accused of the murder of his uncle Gloucester;
of having revoked the amnesties, and of having squandered the
public money. Nobody raised his voice for the dethroned monarch
until the Bishop of Carlisle, Thomas Merks, rose and publicly
denied the right of the Parliament to depose the king and to
change the order of succession, at the same time defending
Richard against his accusers. Scarcely had he finished his
discourse, when he was arrested. While he was being conducted to
St. Alban's, the Parliament pronounced the deposition of Richard,
and the Lord Chief Justice was instructed to announce his fall to
him. "I care not to court the regal authority," said the deposed
king; "I only hope that my good cousin will be a good master to
me."
His good cousin was not yet legally king; the descendants of
Lionel, the third son of Edward III., were the legitimate heirs
to the throne; no one, however, thought of them. The Duke of
Lancaster had remained in his seat; his surrounders waited in
profound silence. He rose, and, solemnly making the sign of the
cross, said in a very loud voice, "In the name of the Father, of
the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, I, Henry of Lancaster, lay claim
to this kingdom of England and to the crown, as a descendant of
the good King Henry III., and by the right which God has given
me, by granting to me the favor, through the support of my
friends, to come to the assistance of this country, which was
about to perish under bad laws and for want of government."
{359}
This mixture of hereditary pretensions with popular rights was
skilful. The Parliament responded to the appeal of Henry
Bolingbroke; acclamations broke out in all parts; the duke showed
the ring which Richard had consigned to him; the Archbishop of
Canterbury took him by the hand and led him to the foot of the
throne. Henry knelt there for a moment; he then ascended the
steps and seated himself resolutely. The plaudits recommenced
during the discourse of the archbishop. "I thank you, my lord,"
said the new monarch; "and I wish everybody to know that, by
right of conquest, I will disinherit nobody of his rights, but
wish that all may be governed by the good laws of the kingdom,
and may hold what he has by right." The officers of the crown and
the great noblemen also vowed fealty and homage: Henry IV. was
king of England.
In the first days of his reign, the new sovereign was enabled to
believe that public opinion fully confirmed his usurpation. All
the great noblemen were eager to fulfil at his coronation their
hereditary offices; the Earl of Northumberland alone, who had
rendered eminent services to him, marched beside him in the
procession, holding aloft in sight of all the sword worn by
Bolingbroke on landing at Ravenspur. The House of Commons
responded to the slightest wishes of the king, and the greater
number of the unpopular measures of the last reign were withdrawn
by common consent.
{360}
A great uproar arose in the House of Lords: the peers who had
appealed against the Duke of Gloucester were summoned to
exculpate themselves; all took their stand upon the wish of King
Richard, upon the fear which he inspired, and upon the unanimous
vote of the House. Recriminations poured down in every part;
forty gauntlets were thrown upon the ground as challenges to
combat. A weak and timid monarch would have taken alarm in the
midst of this violent confusion: Henry IV. was enabled to calm
the agitation. He divested the "lords appellant," as they were
styled, of the titles which Richard had given to them as rewards;
the Dukes of Albemarle, Surrey and Exeter, the Marquis of Dorset
and the Earl of Gloucester, became once more the Earls of
Rutland, Kent, Huntingdon, and Somerset, and Lord Le Despencer;
but the new king wreaked no other vengeance upon them. The high
treason law was restored to more limited and less vague formulae;
appeals to the Houses in cases of treason were abolished, and the
Parliament was forbidden to delegate its authority to a
commission. The eldest son of the king was declared Prince of
Wales, Duke of Guienne, Lancaster, and Cornwall, as well as heir
presumptive to the throne. Henry was too prudent to again raise
the question of the law of succession which he had so boldly
disregarded: he did not wish his hereditary right to the throne
to be discussed; he well knew that the little Earl of March, so
carefully installed in Windsor Castle, was the real heir to the
throne, as great-grand-son of Lionel, Duke of Clarence, the elder
brother of John of Gaunt. The child was not nine years of age;
the king caused him to be well brought up, as well as his
brother, and neither was destined to recover his liberty during
his lifetime; but their sister, soon afterwards married to the
Earl of Cambridge, had transmitted to the House of York those
rights or those pretensions which condemned England to half a
century of civil war.
{361}
Difficulties abound in the path of usurpers. King Richard had not
protested, he had asked for nothing, but he still lived in the
Tower. Before dissolving the Parliament, King Henry IV.
despatched the Earl of Northumberland to the House of Lords. The
latter asked that the message with which he was entrusted should
be kept secret; he then consulted the House upon the manner in
which the dispossessed king was to be treated; "for my master
Henry," he added, "has resolved, at any cost, to preserve the
life of Richard." The Lords all replied that King Richard should
be secretly led away to some castle, and placed in the hands of
faithful custodians, who should prevent all communication with
his friends. This was the sanction which Henry IV. wished for;
the dispossessed monarch was conducted to Leeds Castle, in Kent,
and then transferred by night from castle to castle, as had been
his great-grandfather, Edward II. In the month of January,
Richard had arrived in Pontefract Castle, in Yorkshire.
The removal of the dethroned king could not suffice to strengthen
the power; conspiracies were already beginning. The lords
appellant had scarcely been punished, but their fears as well as
their resentment urged them to revenge. They had formed the
project of assassinating Henry and of replacing Richard upon the
throne. A tournament was announced at Oxford for the 3rd of
January, and the Earl of Huntingdon, the brother-in-law of the
king, invited the latter to be present thereat. The invitation
was accepted.
{362}
The murder was to be accomplished during the jousts; the king and
his son were to succumb beneath numbers. The day came; the king
had not arrived, and the Earl of Rutland was absent from the
place of meeting. The conspirators saw themselves betrayed; but a
bold stroke might yet save them; they galloped to Windsor, and
took possession of the castle. The king was no longer there:
warned in time, he had taken refuge in London. The arrest
warrants were already issued against the traitors, and, on the
morrow, Henry marched against them, at the head of a considerable
force. They did not await him, and fled to arm their vassals.
Civil war appeared imminent; but public opinion was with King
Henry: it administered justice to the conspirators, without the
king being obliged to interfere. The citizens of the Cirencester
seized the Earls of Kent and Salisbury, and struck off their
heads; Lord Le Despencer was beheaded by the citizens of Bristol;
the Earl of Huntingdon was dismembered at Pleshy by the servants
of the late Duke of Gloucester. The King had only to cause the
trial of a few accomplices of low degree, but the attempt of the
lords appellant probably cost the life of King Richard; it was
learnt, towards the end of January, that he had died at
Pontefract. It was related that he had refused to take any food
since the death of his brothers, the Earls of Kent and
Huntingdon; distrustful people asserted that he had been starved
to death. Others maintained that he had been attacked in his
prison by some assassins, and that, after having valiantly
defended himself, he had been killed by a blow behind the head.
When the body of the unhappy monarch was brought to London,
before being interred at Langley, a portion only of the face was
uncovered. The details of his death were forever unknown, and
many people were resolute in denying it.
{363}
The little Queen Isabel had remained in England during the
lifetime of her husband, notwithstanding her father's wish to see
her return to his side. The death of his son-in-law caused one of
the dreaded attacks of insanity to poor King Charles VI.; but his
uncles were anxious to profit by the indignation which was
manifested at Bordeaux, the birthplace of the deposed monarch;
the Dukes of Burgundy and Bourbon advanced towards Guienne, and
the first movement of the population was favorable to their wish.
"Richard was the best man in his kingdom," it was said at
Bordeaux, "and the people of London have treacherously abandoned
him." But as the French army advanced, the ardor of the Gascons
abated. The French were poor, and annoyed by subsidies and taxes,
which were sometimes reproduced upon two or three occasions
during the year. "We are not accustomed to be treated thus," said
the English subjects, "and it would be too hard upon us. We have
still a king, and he will send his ministers to us to explain
himself. Meanwhile, we have a large commerce with England, in
wine, in wool, and in cloth." The uncles of the king were
compelled to retire without having accomplished anything. Henry
IV. was in no hurry to renew the war with France; he caused a
proposal to be made to marry the little Queen to the Prince of
Wales; but the father and the daughter rejected this alliance.
Charles VI. claimed with Isabel his jewels and the two hundred
thousand livres in gold which King Richard had received upon her
dowry. Henry was poor and the sum considerable; when the young
Queen was at length consigned to her family, in the month of
August, 1401, the ambassadors of England replied to the claims of
the French by a demand for a hundred and fifty thousand crowns of
gold which remained due upon the ransom of King John the Good.
{364}
The question of the dowry of Isabel was no longer mooted, and
peace subsisted between the two countries during the greater part
of the reign of Henry IV., notwithstanding the challenges of the
Duke of Orleans and Wallerand of Luxemboug, Count of Ligny and
St. Pol, which gave rise to slight hostilities upon the coasts.
Good warrior as he was, the King of England had too much to do at
home, and too much trouble to consolidate his throne to seek afar
for hazardous adventures.
At the very outset of his reign, however, and on the morrow of
the conspiracy of the lords appellant, Henry had attempted an
expedition into Scotland. Not daring to ask subsidies of the
Parliament, the king had had recourse to the military service of
the feudal system, and, convoking under his banners all holders
of fiefs, and furnished with the tithe voted by the clergy, he
had advanced as far as Edinburgh, to summon King Robert, the Duke
of Rothsay, his son, and all the great Scottish noblemen to come
and render homage to him. Robert III. was aged, feeble, and
infirm; he had abandoned the power to his brother, the Duke of
Albany, constantly at contention with the heir to the throne, the
Duke of Rothsay, sanguine, thoughtless, and venturesome. The
young duke hastened to Edinburgh, to defend it. Henry was
repulsed; his provisions failed him: he was compelled to withdraw
from Scotland, having reaped no other glory in this campaign than
the humanity towards the peasants, of which he had given proofs,
and the discipline which he had been enabled to maintain in his
army.
{365}
While the King of England was fighting and suffering failure in
Scotland, an unexpected insurrection broke out in Wales. A
lawyer, who had afterwards served as esquire in the house of the
Earl of Arundel, a Welshman,--descending, it was said, from
Llewellyn, the last Welsh prince,--Owen Glendower or Glendwyr,
had seen his little estate encroached upon through the avidity of
a powerful neighbor, Lord Grey de Ruthyn. Owen had appealed to
the Parliament; his complaint had been rejected. The Welshman
resolved to avenge himself by force of arms, and drove from his
lands the servants of Lord Grey. He was thereupon outlawed. His
pretensions grew with his anger; it was no longer a question of a
little field or of a cluster of trees; Owen Glendwyr publicly
proclaimed his illustrious origin, laying claim to the
independent sovereignty of Wales. Fire smouldered under the ashes
among these people, subjected for so many years; the love of
national liberty was not extinguished. From all parts the Welsh
hastened round Owen; students quitted their universities,
laborers their ploughshares, at the call of independence. At the
beginning of the year 1401, King Henry IV. found himself
compelled to proceed to Wales with an army. But Owen was too
shrewd to hazard a pitched battle; he left to the climate and to
famine the task of fighting for him. From the mountains in which
he had taken refuge, he soon saw King Henry compelled to retire.
A second campaign, attempted in 1402, was not more fortunate: the
rain fell in torrents; the rivers became swollen at the approach
of the English soldiers, who left Wales convinced that Glendwyr
was a sorcerer in league with the elements.
{366}
The rumor that King Richard was still living had come once more
to be circulated in Scotland and in the North of England,
restoring a certain amount of courage to the malcontents. In vain
had King Henry severely punished the fomenters of this news;
Richard was expected with the Scottish army, when it entered into
England in the spring of 1402. At the head of the English
opposition was a Scotchman, George, Earl of March. The Duke of
Rothsay was to have married his daughter, but he had rejected
her, to unite himself with the family of the Earl of Douglas, the
hereditary enemy of the Earls of March. The Earl of March had
thereupon renounced his allegiance to the King of Scotland, and
had allied himself with the Percies, all powerful in the county
of Northumberland. It was with his assistance that the Scots were
defeated and repulsed at Nesbit Moor, in June, 1402. Internal
rancors soon brought forward a second army; the Earl of Douglas,
furious at the success of his rival, solicited the assistance of
the Duke of Albany, and, at the head of a considerable force, he
soon overran the two banks of Tyne. Having advanced as far as
Newcastle, he was falling back, loaded with booty, when the Earls
of Northumberland and March cut off his road on the 14th of
September. The Scots covered Homildon Hill, and the English were
stationed opposite upon another elevation. Hotspur Percy had
already commanded the charge of his men-at-arms, when the Earl of
March restrained him by the arm. "Let your archers commence," he
said; "the turn of your horsemen will soon come." Arrows rained
down upon the Scots deployed upon the flank of the hill: Douglas
did not stir; his men were falling in their ranks, when a
Scottish baron, Fordun Swinton, at length cried, "Ah! my brave
comrades, who restrains you to-day, that you should remain there,
like deer or stags, to allow yourselves to be killed, instead of
displaying your former valor by fighting man to man! Let us
descend from here in the name of God!"
{367}
And the Scottish men-at-arms, thereupon moving, caused the
English archers to fall back. The latter, however, continued to
shoot, and Douglas received five wounds; he fell from his horse,
and was made a prisoner. Disorder set in in the Scottish ranks;
the flower of their chivalry had been decimated by the arrows or
had surrendered without striking a blow.
The son of the Duke of Albany, Murdoch Stewart, was among the
number of the prisoners. The English knights had not raised their
lances or drawn their swords; the battle had been won by the
archers of old England. The Earl of Northumberland arrived on the
20th of October at the Parliament convoked at Westminister,
gloriously accompanied by all his prisoners.
The Percies had recently gained a victory for King Henry IV.,
whom they had so powerfully assisted in gaining his throne. They
were about to turn their arms against him. Shakspeare attributes
their discontent to the prohibition which the king put upon their
setting ransoms upon their prisoners, a measure which deprived
them of all the pecuniary advantage of the capture; but this
interdiction had been frequent under the preceding reigns,
particularly under Edward III., and King Henry IV. indemnified
the Earl of Northumberland by granting vast domains to him.
Another cause for anger had recently sprung up. During the lucky
campaigns of Owen Glendwyr the latter had captured his old enemy,
Lord Grey de Ruthyn, and Sir Edmund Mortimer, uncle of the young
Earl of March, the legitimate heir to the throne. The relatives
of Lord Grey had been authorized to redeem him; but the king had
refused the same favor to the family of Sir Edmund.
{368}
Hotspur Percy had married his sister, and, acutely wounded by
this refusal, he began to set on foot a conspiracy to overthrow
the king and place the crown upon the head of the little Earl of
March. He was confirmed in this resolution by the Archbishop of
York, Scrope, brother of the favorite of Richard II.; and the
conspirators did not hesitate to call Owen Glendwyr to their aid.
He gave his daughter in marriage to Mortimer, and promised to
invade England with twelve thousand Welshmen. The Earl of Douglas
was liberated without any ransom, on condition of recrossing the
frontier with a Scottish army. It is even said that Hotspur wrote
to the Duke of Orleans, from whom King Henry had recently
received a warlike challenge on account of the insults offered to
Queen Isabel.
So many movements had not escaped the vigilant eye of King Henry.
Hotspur was marching forward, commanding the rebels in place of
his father, who was ill; and supported by his uncle, the Earl of
Worcester. Henry planted his army corps between the earls and
Owen Glendwyr, with whom they were endeavoring to effect a
junction. The Welshman had made no haste, and when, on arriving
at Shrewsbury, Henry received the challenge of his enemies, it
was conceived only in the name of the Percies. They reproached
the king with his usurpation, the death of Richard, the captivity
of the little Earl of March, his manœuvres in the election of
Parliament, the levying of taxes which had not been voted by the
Commons, &c. At the end appeared the real subject of the quarrel,
the denial of the negotiations relating to Sir Edmund Mortimer.
Henry IV. smiled bitterly and disdained to reply. "The sword
shall decide," he said, "and I am assured that God will give me
victory over perjured traitors." It was on the 20th of July,
1403; on the morrow the two armies found themselves face to face
on Shrewsbury Plain.
{369}
The insurgents numbered about fourteen thousand men; the king had
no more. Before fighting, he despatched the Abbot of Shrewsbury
to his adversaries, with proposals for peace. Hotspur, less
impetuous than Shakespeare has depicted him, hesitated: but the
Earl of Worcester persuaded him to reject the royal overtures.
"Banners to the front, then!" cried Henry, The combat began. "St.
George!" was the cry around the king. "Hope! Percy!" responded
the rebels. The archers were drawing on both sides, and the
knights did not abandon to them, as at Homildon Hill, all the
honor of the combat. Percy and Douglas, rivals in glory, had
precipitated themselves together into the midst of the enemy with
a small following; everything gave way before them; the Prince of
Wales had been wounded in the face. They sought for the king;
but, upon the advice of the Scottish refugee, the Earl of March,
he had laid aside, for that day, all the royal insignia, and he
fought valiantly, without having been recognized. At the moment
when the two chiefs of the insurgents endeavored to retrace their
steps, opening up a way through the crowd of the enemies, Percy
was struck by an arrow in the head, and fell dead. Disorder
immediately set in among his partisans. Douglas had been made a
prisoner; the Earl of Worcester shortly afterwards suffered the
same fate, as well as the Lord of Kinderton and Sir Richard
Vernon. The traitors' punishment awaited the three Englishmen.
Douglas was honorably treated. The field of battle was covered
with dead and dying. The insurgents had fled; they went and
carried to the old Earl of Northumberland the news of the defeat
and death of his son.
{370}
He was marching forward to join him, and he thereupon shut
himself up in his castle at Warkworth. Being summoned to appear
before the king at York, he was detained there in honorable
captivity until the Parliament should have decided upon his fate.
He had not taken part personally in the insurrection, and he
declared that his son had acted without his approval. The Lords
treated him with indulgence; he retired after having sworn
fidelity to the king and the Prince of Wales. Eighteen months had
not elapsed before he was again in arms against Henry.
The conspiracies had not ceased in this interval. A former
chamberlain of King Richard, named Serle, had again spread the
rumor that that monarch was living. He led about with him a poor
idiot who resembled Richard, and a certain number of partisans
had rallied round him. Three princes of the House of Bourbon had
attacked the islands of Jersey and Guernsey, and burnt down the
town of Plymouth; the French vessels had brought reinforcements
to Owen Glendwyr, against whom the young Prince of Wales was at
war; and a woman, Lady Le Despencer, had carried off the young
Earl of March and his brother. She was already approaching the
frontiers of Wales when she was seized, and the prisoners were
brought back to Windsor. She exculpated herself by throwing the
responsibility of the undertaking upon her brother, the Duke of
York, formerly Earl of Rutland. He was arrested, and languished
for several years in prison.
{371}
King Henry had always avoided asking large subsidies of the
Parliament; he was not sufficiently assured of the affection of
his people to ask any sacrifices of them. In 1404, however, he
had come to an end of his resources, and in a Parliament which
has preserved the name of unlearned, because the king had, it was
said, dismissed from it all the lawyers, he made a proposal which
was ardently sustained by the Commons: it forbade the king to
alienate the property of the crown without the authorization of
Parliament, but permitted him to take back all the gifts of land
and the pensions granted by his predecessors; he was even allowed
to seize a certain portion of the property of the clergy. The
Church uttered a cry of terror and rage, which arrested the zeal
of the king and the Commons. Henry hastened to renounce his
project, assuring the Archbishop of Canterbury that it was his
intention to leave the Church in a better position than he had
found it in; but he accomplished his resolutions upon the lands
and pensions given by Edward III. and Richard II. The
disaffection of the barons was great, and the uneasiness of the
clergy was not dispelled.
In 1405, two great councils were convoked by the king: in London
and at St. Alban's. There the bad state of feeling was
manifested; all the demands of the king were rejected, and more
than one baron quitted St. Alban's to join the insurgents, who
were again beginning to form in groups round the Earl of
Northumberland. The Archbishop of York had this time taken up
arms; he was made a prisoner, as well as the Earl of Nottingham,
by Prince John, the second son of the king. In vain did the
archbishop claim ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and the earl that
of his peers; in vain did Chief Justice Gascoyne refuse to
preside at their trial: the king had resolved to make an example.
He found some more complaisant magistrates; the archbishop and
the Earl of Nottingham were beheaded; a fine was imposed upon the
city of York, temporarily deprived of its charters, and the king
marched against Berwick, where the Earl of Northumberland had
taken refuge.
{372}
On the way he caused Lord Hastings and Lord Falconbridge to be
tried, and they were beheaded. Berwick surrendered; but the old
Percy had fled to Edinburgh, and the king did not penetrate into
Scotland; he contented himself with ravaging Northumberland,
taking possession of all the castles which belonged to the
rebels. He then turned his arms in the direction of Wales, where
Prince Henry had valiantly sustained the struggle for nearly two
years. He had triumphed over the Welsh at Grosmont, in
Monmouthshire, in the month of March, 1405; one of the sons of
Owen Glendwyr had been made a prisoner, and the prince had only
been arrested in the course of his successes by the arrival of a
French reinforcement sent by the Duke of Orleans, in defiance of
the truce which still reigned between the two nations. The young
Prince Henry had been compelled to withdraw to Worcester; but the
king soon drove the French into the mountains of Wales, whither
he pursued them. The Welsh arrested his march; but the French
were weary of their reverses, of the poverty of their allies, of
the rough life which they led; they retreated into their vessels
again. The king withdrew in his turn; Prince Henry continued the
war with alternations of successes and reverses, always holding
his ground with a skill and perseverance worthy of his adversary,
and which finally wearied the population. Glendwyr found himself
gradually abandoned, and an invasion attempted in 1409 by his
son-in-law, Scudamore, in Shropshire, completed the ruin of his
cause; the Welsh were repulsed, and the chiefs put to death. The
independent character of Owen Glendwyr allowed him neither to
submit not to despair; he no longer appeared in the regions
occupied by the English, but he still maintained himself in the
mountains, resuming his arms when his enemies pressed him closely
in his haunts; his name, published several times in the amnesty
acts, proves that he was neither dead nor subjugated, even after
the battle of Agincourt.
{373}
The period of his death and the place of his burial are unknown;
the end of his life remains enveloped in mystery, as though he
had really possessed the magic power which his friends and
enemies attributed to him in his lifetime.
King Henry had not been under the necessity of prosecuting his
campaigns in Scotland; he held in his hands the heir to the
throne of that kingdom. The Duke of Rothsay, imprudent and bold,
had entered into a contention with his uncle, the Duke of Albany.
Being accused of rebellion and imprisoned in Falkland Castle, he
had there died of hunger, it was said. The unhappy King Robert
had become alarmed for the life of James, the only son who
remained to him, and he had embarked him upon a ship which was to
take him to France, but the vessel had fallen into the hands of
some English cruisers, who brought the prince in triumph to King
Henry. "I speak French as well as my brother Charles," the king
had said laughingly, "and I am as well adapted as he to bring up
a King of Scotland." The young Prince James therefore remained at
the court of England, closely guarded, but educated with care,
kindly treated, and at liberty to devote himself to his passion
for poetry. The old king Robert had died of grief in 1406, and
the Duke of Albany, who continued to govern Scotland, servilely
submitted to the wishes of the King of England, who, at the least
appearance of insubordination, threatened him with the release of
his nephew. This state of affairs was destined to be prolonged
for a considerable time.
{374}
The most irreconcilable adversary of the king had at length
succumbed. The old Earl of Northumberland, homeless, childless,
and without riches, had wandered for more than two years from
kingdom to kingdom, endeavoring to raise up embarrassments and
enemies against King Henry. At the beginning of 1408, he appeared
in Northumberland with Lord Bardolf, the friend and companion of
his whole life. Rallying a certain number of his old vassals, he
overran the country, took possession of several castles, and had
gathered together a small body of troops, when he was defeated on
the 28th of February, by Sir Thomas Rokeby, upon Branham Heath,
near Tadcaster. He was killed in the combat; Lord Bardolf,
grievously wounded, died shortly afterwards, and their bodies,
cut in pieces, were sent to the towns of Northumberland, where
they had found adherents. It was all over with the Percies.
The commotions in France continued to increase. The poor king,
Charles VI., would pass from furious madness to docile
melancholy; his kingdom, rent asunder by factions, was the scene
of the crimes, debaucheries, and exactions of all parties. The
Duke of Orleans had recently been assassinated in the Rue
Barbette (23rd of November, 1407), by the servants of his cousin,
the Duke of Burgundy, a circumstance which had not prevented the
latter from reappearing at court, without fearing the punishment
of the king for the death of his brother, which he caused to be
publicly justified at the Sorbonne, by Maître Jean Petit, doctor
in theology. From treason to treason, from reconciliation to
reconciliation, the Duke of Burgundy was all powerful in 1409,
when the young Duke of Orleans, who had lost his wife, Isabel of
France, widow of King Richard II., was married for a second time,
to Bonne, the daughter of the wealthy Count of Armagnac.
{375}
The time had at length arrived for prosecuting revenge: supported
by the experience and military talents of the count, the
partisans of the House of Orleans assumed the name of Armagnacs;
the red scarf was put on by the Duke of Berry, the Duke of
Brittany, and the Duke of Alencon; John Sans Peur was driven from
Paris, and the Duke of Orleans, sword in hand, demanded justice
for the death of his father.
Then, for the first time, amidst the factions which had desolated
France for ten years, England was called upon to play a part.
John Sans Peur asked assistance of Henry IV. The latter sent in
the month of October, 1411, a small body of a thousand archers
and eight hundred men-at-arms, with whom the duke marched against
Paris. He re-entered there in force on the 23rd, and drove out
the Armagnacs, who had already begun to make themselves detested.
John Sans Peur followed up his advantages, and hoped to crush his
enemies; but they, in their turn, had negotiated with the King of
England, promising to recognize him as Duke of Aquitaine, and to
assure to him after the death of the present possessors, the
counties of Poitou and Angoulême. As the price of these
concessions, the English army was preparing to invade France,
under the orders of the third son of the king, the Duke of
Clarence, when the Duke of Berry, uncle of Charles VI., filled
with horror at the prospect of the evils which the foreigners
were about to bring down upon France, once more interposed
between the belligerents, and effected one of those
reconciliations which prepared the way for fresh acts of perfidy.
The Dukes of Orleans and Burgundy entered Paris mounted upon the
same horse, and repaired thus to church.
{376}
The people cried "Noël," and thanked God for this hope of peace.
But the Duke of Clarence had landed in Normandy; the news of the
pacification had been powerless to arrest him. Maine and Anjou
had already been ravaged. The Duke of Orleans contrived to
purchase the retreat of the allies whom he himself had summoned;
the English, laden with gold and booty, took the road to Guienne,
traversing France without any obstacle. "We will return hither,"
they said as they passed, "to fight with our King Henry." Eight
thousand Englishmen embarked at Bordeaux towards the close of the
year 1412. King Henry had nearly arrived at the end of his
career. He was ill and sad. His throne had always appeared to him
to be tottering; conspiracies had been so often repeated around
him, that he had ended by suspecting them where they did not
exist. A keen jealousy towards his eldest son troubled him. The
Prince of Wales had given proofs of rare courage; when yet young,
he had been wounded at the battle of Shrewsbury; being afterwards
despatched by his father into Wales, he had there constantly held
in check Owen Glendwyr, over whom he had finally triumphed. It is
related--and, in his admirable tragedy of _Henry IV._,
Shakespeare made use of these accounts, of which the authenticity
is not well proved--that the young prince, besides his budding
greatness, had given other causes for anxiety to his father; it
is said that his debauches and coarse amusements had caused alarm
for the fate of the State which he was one day to govern, so that
a judge before whom he had been brought, without knowing him,
thought it his duty to condemn him like a simple private person.
{377}
Perhaps the jealousy of the father and the restraint which he
claimed to impose upon the son, to whom he left neither power nor
resources, had contributed to plunge a sanguine, energetic young
man, full of life and strength, into those excesses with which he
was reproached. It is affirmed that the king had one day swooned,
in consequence of one of the attacks of his distemper; he was
believed to be dead. The Prince of Wales, entering the apartment,
had carried off the crown, which lay upon a cushion. When Henry
IV. came to himself again, he asked for the crown. The prince was
sent for, "You have no right to it," cried the king. "You know
that your father had none." "Your sword gave it to you, sire, and
my sword will be able to defend it," replied the prince,
exonerating himself as well as he could against the suspicions of
his father. He demanded the punishment of those who accused him
of prematurely claiming the throne, and the king referred him to
the next session of the Parliament. He was weary of reigning and
of living. "You shall do as you please," he said; "I have done
with all these matters. May the Lord have mercy upon my soul!"
But the young Prince Henry suffered in mind from the alienation
of his father; he presented himself before him clad in a blue
satin robe, covered with button-holes, a tag still hanging from
each opening, and, in this strange costume, he threw himself at
the feet of the king, drew a dagger from his bosom, and begged
him to take his life if he had deprived him of his favor. The
father and son became reconciled, it is said, after this scene.
The torments of jealousy, added to the troubles of his conscience
and the cares of power, overwhelmed the monarch. He was not yet
forty-seven years of age, and the proud Bolingbroke, formerly so
handsome, so bold, so adventurous, was bowed down like an old
man.
{378}
He was praying, on the 20th of March, 1413, before the shrine of
Edward the Confessor, in Westminster Abbey, when he fell into a
swoon. He was carried into the apartment of the abbot, and as he
recovered his senses, he asked where he was. "In the Jerusalem
Chamber," was the reply; for such was the name of the chamber to
which he had been carried. He closed his eyes. "I was always told
that I should die at Jerusalem," he muttered, and he expired. He
was interred in Canterbury Cathedral, beside his first wife, Lady
Mary de Bohun, the mother of all his children. His second wife.
Queen Joan of Navarre, had not presented any to him.
Ambitious and inflexible, harsh towards his enemies, skilful and
cunning as well as enterprising, Henry IV. had always contrived
to treat the Parliament with respect, and had never made any
attempt against its authority. The House of Commons, especially,
had seen its privileges confirmed under his reign, and its
influence had been constantly growing. Thus the liberties of
England, formerly conquered by the barons at the price of so much
bloodshed, were gradually developing, profiting by the weakness
as well as the temerity of the sovereigns, until the day when the
religious reform was to raise them to their highest pitch.
Absorbed in the internal struggles consequent upon usurpation,
for ever dreading real or supposed conspiracies, Henry IV. had
not had leisure to think of foreign wars. The wish, however, had
not been wanting; he had everywhere plunged himself into the
intrigues and divisions which desolated France under the unhappy
Charles VI., and he had thus prepared the return of the great
English ambitions, which were destined, for awhile, to raise so
high the glory of Henry V., his son, at the price of so much
bloodshed and so many sorrows for the two nations.