FUNERAL OF RICHARD II.-Froissart MS., British Museum. with funeral pomp to London, there to be interred among the Kings of England. This was done; and after solemn obsequies, the remains of Richard were buried in Westminster Abbey, close by those of his first wife, the "Good Queen Anne," as he himself in his life had desired. A dead king could do no mischief; but it might have been otherwise with a living prince, whose right to the crown had been formerly proclaimed by a powerful party in the state; yet Henry released the Earl of March from the captivity in which he had been kept by his cautious predecessor, and allowed him to enjoy the estates of his father. Not long after, he recalled the son of the gallant Hotspur from his long exile in Scotland, and restored to him the hereditary honours and lands of the Percies. He pursued the same generous course with other individuals, and the effect was seen in the devoted affection of men who had hitherto been most inimical to the house of Lancaster. The first year of the new reign was, however, disturbed by a popular commotion in London. During the sitting of Henry's first parliament, placards were stuck up by night on the church doors of London, stating that there were 100,000 2 Walsingham. Henry attended as chief mourner in the funeral procession of Richard. rest. It is the well-known case of his violation | himself to be led to t CHAPTER II.-CIVIL AND HENRY V., SURNAMED OF MONMOUTH.-A Succession of Henry V.-Popular commencement of his r F Henry of Bolingbroke ha regretted, his successor w: with enthusiastic joy. I' born at Monmouth, A. was therefore twentywhen he ascended the land. From the place of his bi tained in early English history 1 The prophecy was that he should d probable that the visit paid to him, 1 reign, by Manuel Palæologus, Emperor came to implore the aid of the Englis the West, against Bajazet and the I effect of occasionally turning the active the then almost forgotten East. 2 "Few candidates for power have watchfulness with daring strokes nothing necessary to his ambitious not willing to do what was not success. Men were then, however, The measure of state necessity Sich was that there i betray him. e poor Lollards great pains could trial, for, on the 13th em were executed in St. drawn and hanged as traied, gallows and all, as herereliance can be placed on coned from these unhappy men, but ht, as well as the king, seem to ved that the state had been in dancommons, in their address, stated that ards had sought to destroy religion, the the lords, the bishops, the whole body of Cergy, and all manner of good law; and ry echoed these sounding charges in his proation, wherein, moreover, it was stated that the insurgents had meant to divide England into ederal republics, and to appoint Sir John Oldrastle their president. Persecution did not stop > short at the wholesale execution in St. Giles'. Sir Roger Acton, a friend of Oldcastle, was taken, drawn, and hanged on the 10th of February. Arundel, the Archbishop of Canterbury, died on f the 28th of that same month; but his successor, Chicheley, was not a whit more tolerant. It was enacted in parliament that all judges and magistrates should have power to arrest any in vidual suspected of Lollardism; that, besides Palace, suffering capital punishment, every individual bined convicted of that atrocious crime should forfeit sto march his lands, goods, and chattels to the king, as in sly in St. cases of felony; and that the chancellor, treasuthe gaber rer, justices of the two benches, sheriffs, justices The king was, of the peace, and all the chief magistrates, should ons, but now they opened comith the Armagnacs: some priests ity took courage to preach publicly utchers; but it was the rival fraterDenters that humbled their pride. "We see," said Guillaume Cirasse, " whether not as many carpenters as butchers in and as good men!" On the 1st of July, the butchers beheaded the provost of Paris. was the last act of their authority: after asubling in the Place de Grève-the scene of more deplorable tragedies in a later revolutionand making a vain show of resistance, they were driven out of Paris. The power of the Duke of 1 Burgundy fell with that of the butchers: in the r-month of August he quitted Paris and withdrew ame in haste to his states of Flanders. On his de, they parture, the Duke of Orleans became master of ionary the government; all the officers, ministers, and the tur- magistrates were changed, and, notwithstanding es to all solemn promises to the contrary, the Bourthe people guignons were persecuted, imprisoned, or driven white hoods into exile. The white hoods and the colours of Purgundy and the Duke of Burgundy disappeared as if by ing himself-magic, and all Paris, even to the images of the them in sign of saints, wore the white scarf, the device of the the good city of Duke of Orleans. If the queen and her son had ons, the ludicrous agreed in anything, they might have checked that name. Once launched in the disputes that divided the French nation, the Gascons, as might be expected from the impetuosity of their southern temperament, became such active partizans in these disputes, that the name of Orleans soon passed into that of Armagnac; and nothing then came to be talked of in France but the Burgundians and the Armagnacs. Notwithstanding the generality of this distinction, there were no true Armagnacs but those of the south; and these, identifying themselves with a faction more numerous than themselves, forgot, whilst hurried along by its impulses, the cause which had first brought them into this league-the independence of their mother country. That country's interest, which was their sole true policy, they altogether abandoned; they were now no longer free to change their patron or their allies, but blindly adopted all the influences and motives of a foreign faction." men ready to assert their rights by force of arms | warned of the plot, and during the preceding if needful. This announcement was attributed to the religious innovators called Lollards. Their leader, or he on whose strength and talent they most relied, was Sir John Oldcastle, commonly called, in right of his wife, the Lord Cobham. He was "a strong man, and a metely good man of war," and he had been the intimate associate and friend of Henry when Prince of Wales. Arundel, the Archbishop of Canterbury, accused Oldcastle to the king, at the moment, it appears, when he was incensed at the threats of the Lollards. Henry, however, was not in a mind to deliver up a man he esteemed to the tender mercies of an inquisition; he told the archbishop that he himself would talk with Oldcastle and try to bring him to the right way. As Henry had studied at Oxford, he was probably not unacquainted with the divinity of the schools; but his arguments failed to convince his old associate, and then Henry, like other controversialists, grew angry. He began to threaten and to enforce his arguments by references to the statute de heretico comburendo, upon which Sir John withdrew from Windsor to his castle of Cowling, in Kent. Upon this, Henry gave up his old friend to Archbishop Arundel, and issued a severe proclamation against the whole body of the sectarians, listeners as well as preachers, and the archbishop cited Oldcastle to appear in his court. Sir John would not suffer any man to serve the summons upon him, and he derided the authority of the church. Pressed by the clergy, Henry sent out an armed force, to which Oldcastle surrendered. He was carried a prisoner to the Tower, but neither captivity nor the formidable front of his accusers and judges could damp his ardour in the cause of religious reform. Alone and unsupported, he pleaded two whole days in the synod of prelates and abbots, who, however, convicted him of incorrigible heresy. He was delivered over to the secular arm, or, in other words, sentenced to the flames; but the king granted a respite for fifty days, and, before that term elapsed, Sir John contrived, or was permitted to escape from the Tower. It is quite certain, after the lengths to which they had gone against him, that the clergy would never have permitted him to live in peace; and Oldcastle may have relied on the co-operation of those who had embraced the same opinions, and may have hoped to obtain security for property and life by force of arms. It is said that he collected a great host of enthusiasts, and made an attempt to surprise the king at Eltham Palace, and that, failing in this enterprise, he ordered the Lollards from various quarters to march towards London, and assemble suddenly in St. Giles' Fields, "above Holborn," on the day after the Epiphany or Twelfth Day. The king was day, the mayor of London arrested several sus- bind themselves by oath to do their utmost for was mixed up largely with the horrible. They the rooting up of heresy.' When he had been little more than twelve months on the throne of England, Henry suddenly demanded the crown of France, as the representative of Isabella, the wife of the second Edward, in whose right Edward III. had founded his absurd pretensions. But the claims of Henry V. exceeded his in absurdity; for, according to the only admissible construction of that hereditary right on which he rested his claim, the crown of France belonged, not to him, but to Edward Mortimer, the Earl of March. No one, however, acquainted with Henry's love of war, with the spirit of the English people, and with the wretched condition of France, could be much surprised at the project of conquest. The solemn reconciliation between the Dukes of Burgundy and Orleans lasted but a very few months. The father-in-law of the latter prince, the Count of Armagnac, never laid down his arms; and the Duke of Orleans kept away from Paris, where his cousin of Burgundy, who had formed a suitable alliance with the fraternity of butchers in that capital, misgoverned the state. The Dauphin Louis, who was now approaching the age of manhood, quarrelled with the Duke of Burgundy, and increased the general confusion by intrigues of his own, in which neither his unhappy father nor his mother was respected. The origin of the unnatural feeling probably dated from an earlier period, but from this moment the queen-mother betrayed a deadly hatred of her own son. From instruments and subordinate agents, the butchers of Paris soon became masters: they massacred many individuals; they assumed the "white hood," as a revolutionary distinction; they allied themselves with the turbulent men of Ghent; they sent deputies to all the good towns of France, to induce the people to adopt their device; they forced white hoods on the heads of the Dukes of Burgundy and Berri on the dauphin-on the king himself and compelled them all to wear them in sign of their love for the people and the good city of Paris. In all these transactions, the ludicrous 1 Elmham, Vit. Hen. V.; Rymer; Stow. ? See vol. i. p. 458. 3 Amidst this chaotic state of the politics of France, Thierry thus explains how the Orleans party came to be known as the Armagnaca:-"In the early part of the fifteenth century, the Count of Armagnac, who had for some time placed himself at the head of a league formed by all the nobles of Gascony, with a view to maintain their common independence by leaning, as Occasion required, upon the support of France or of England, made alliance with one of the two aristocratical factions of Orleans and Burgundy, which were then contesting the government of France. He thus engaged in a foreign quarrel, and drew into it his confederates-not so much perhaps from political motives as from private interests; for one of his daughters had married the Duke of Orleans, who headed the party of 3 murdered, in prison, the Sire de la Rivière, one of the most accomplished and learned men in France; and every atrocity they committed they said was "for the good of France." The more respectable burghers were soon disgusted with the domination of these butchers, or "Cabochiens," as they were called after one of their chiefs; and their resistance was roused when the Duke of Berri employed the master butchers to levy a tax by force for the expenses of a war against the English and the Armagnacs. The latter faction were committing much greater crimes than those of the butchers in some of the provinces: they had made an alliance with some English adventurers; and the Count of Armagnac publicly wore the red cross of England over his armour. The Parisians had hitherto been warm Bourguignons, but now they opened communications with the Armagnacs: some priests of the university took courage to preach publicly against the butchers; but it was the rival fraternity of carpenters that humbled their pride. "We will soon see," said Guillaume Cirasse, “whether there be not as many carpenters as butchers in Paris, and as good men!" On the 1st of July, 1413, the butchers beheaded the provost of Paris. This was the last act of their authority: after assembling in the Place de Grève the scene of more deplorable tragedies in a later revolution— and making a vain show of resistance, they were driven out of Paris. The power of the Duke of Burgundy fell with that of the butchers: in the month of August he quitted Paris and withdrew in haste to his states of Flanders. On his departure, the Duke of Orleans became master of the government; all the officers, ministers, and magistrates were changed, and, notwithstanding solemn promises to the contrary, the Bourguignons were persecuted, imprisoned, or driven into exile. The white hoods and the colours of the Duke of Burgundy disappeared as if by magic, and all Paris, even to the images of the saints, wore the white scarf, the device of the Duke of Orleans. If the queen and her son had agreed in anything, they might have checked that name. Once launched in the disputes that divided the French nation, the Gascons, as might be expected from the impetuosity of their southern temperament, became such active partizans in these disputes, that the name of Orleans soon passed into that of Armagnac; and nothing then came to be talked of in France but the Burgundians and the Armagnacs. Notwithstanding the generality of this distinction, there were no true Armagnacs but those of the south; and these, identifying themselves with a faction more numerous than themselves, forgot, whilst hurried along by its impulses, the cause which had first brought them into this league-the independence of their mother country. That country's interest, which was their sole true policy, they altogether abandoned; they were now no longer free to change their patron or their allies, but blindly adopted all the influences and motives of a foreign faction." |