A LIVING writer, whose opinions are not only entitled to the utmost respect from their intrinsic importance, but who commands far more than ordinary attention from the circumstances of his social position, has recently alluded to the character of Henry the Fifth as one which the historian is called upon to denounce, and hold up to execration:-"Reference has been made already to the Plantagenet Prince (Henry V.), and the Tudor Princess (Elizabeth), so much the theme of admiration with historians for great capacity, crowned with dazzling success. But why could not the diction of Hume and of Robertson

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have been employed for the far more worthy purpose of causing men to despise the intrigues, and execrate the wars, of such rulers? The same events had then studded their page, the same picturesque details given it striking effect, the same graphic colours added life to it, and yet the right feelings of the reader would have been exerted and cherished; nor would the historians have made themselves accomplices with the vulgar in the criminal award of applause and of fame, by which the wicked actions of past times are rewarded, and the repetition of the same offences encouraged.' Without attempting to controvert these opinions in the abstract, we may believe that the remarkable qualities which distinguished "the Plantagenet Prince," and his great-grandfather Edward III., may claim the attention, and even the applause, of the historian and the biographer, without the award being criminal, or the wicked actions of past times encouraged. To adopt the sentiments of a literary friend and colleague, "It is unnecessary in the present day to waste a word on either the injustice or the folly of the enterprise on which Henry threw away the whole of his reign. In estimating his character it is of more importance to remember that the folly and injustice, which are now so evident, were as little perceived at that day by his subjects in general as by himself, and that there can be no doubt whatever that both he and they thought he was, in the assertion of his fancied rights to the crown of France, pursuing both a most important and a most legitimate object. That motives of personal ambition mingled their influence in his views and proceedings must no doubt be admitted; but that is perfectly consistent with honesty of purpose, and a thorough belief in the rightness both of the object sought and the means employed to secure it. In following the bright though misleading idea that had captivated him, he certainly displayed many endowments of the loftiest and most admirable kind-energy, both of body and mind, which no

* Lives of Men of Letters and Science, by Henry, Lord Brougham.

fatigue could quell; the most heroic gallantry; patience and endurance, watchfulness and activity, steadiness, determination, policy, and other moral constituents, as they may be called, of genius, as well as mere military skill and resources.'

Henry, the eldest son of Henry Bolingbroke and Mary Bohun, was born at Monmouth, according to some of the chroniclers, on the 9th of August, 1387. It has been held that he was educated at Oxford, under his uncle Cardinal Beaufort; and although the archives of the university furnish no evidence of the fact, yet tradition has in this case more than common authority. He is said to have lodged in a small room over the ancient gateway of Queen's College; and here, according to Anthony Wood, were rude portraits in stained glass, of his uncle and of himself, with a Latin inscription, which has been thus translated-" To record the fact for ever. The Emperor of Britain, the triumphant Lord of France, the conqueror of his enemies and of himself, Henry V., of this little chamber once the great inhabitant." The term of his scholastic education must, however, have been very brief. He had just completed his eleventh year in 1398, when his father was banished by the tyrannical decree of Richard II.; and it would appear that the king, no doubt from motives of policy, took upon himself the protection, or rather the custody, of the young Henry Bolingbroke. Richard II. sailed for Ireland on the 29th of May, 1399. On the 23rd of June, the vigil of St. John, it is recorded by an eye-witness that Richard "out of true and entire affection, sent for the son of the Duke of Lancaster, a fair, young, and handsome bachelor, and knighted him, saying, 'My fair cousin, henceforth be preux and valiant.'" In less than a fortnight from this time the Duke of Lancaster had landed at Ravenspur. Richard immediately shut up the young Henry in Trym Castle; but within two months the weak king was deposed, Bolingbroke crowned as Henry IV., and the fair young bachelor created Prince

* Penny Cyclopædia, art. Henry V.

of Wales, and declared, by act of parliament, heir-apparent to the throne. In 1401, when he was scarcely fourteen years of age, the young Henry was in command of an army sent against the rebellious Welsh. A despatch from the prince to the council, dated the 15th of May, 1401, contains many of the revolting details which necessarily accompany warfare, at all periods, and under all circumstances. "We caused the whole place to be set on fire-we laid waste a fine and populous country:" -these are the expressions which Henry uses, describing the duties which he performed. The disgust which we naturally feel at the record of such atrocities should not be wholly bestowed upon one who was essentially the child and champion of warfare in an age when war was the great business of existence, but upon those who in a far different state of society, when the business of the world is peace, carry this savagery of civilization into the houses of men that they esteem barbarous, and receive the rewards of riches and honours from applauding senates-ay, even from a nation that cannot spare a few annual thousands to bestow upon the widows and orphans of the poet and the philosopher. In an age of butchery Henry of Monmouth was a merciful conqueror. There is a proclamation extant of Henry IV., dated the 10th of March, 1401, which thus begins, "Of our especial grace, and at the prayer of our dearest first-born son, Henry, Prince of Wales, we have pardoned all treasons, rebellions," &c.

In his sixteenth year Henry was at the battle of Shrewsbury, where, though severely wounded in the face, he fought gallantly to the close of the bloody day. Immediately after this he was sent to Wales in command of the army employed against Glendower, and for some years he was occupied in the contest with that able and active leader, in the course of which he evinced extraordinary military genius, defeating his adversary in a succession of engagements-in one of which, fought at Grosmont in Monmouthshire, in March, 1405, he took his son Griffith prisoner-and driving him from fastness to fastness, till all Wales, except a small part of the