Henry of Monmouth, Volume 1 / Or, Memoirs of the Life and Character of Henry the Fifth, as Prince of Wales and King of England

by James Endell Tyler

APPENDIX, No. II.

LYDGATE.

Extracts from the Dedication to Henry of Monmouth of his poem, "The Death of Hector:"

"For through the world it is known to every one,
And flying Fame reports it far and wide,
That thou, by natural condition,
In things begun wilt constantly abide;
And for the time dost wholly set aside
All rest; and never carest what thou dost spend
Till thou hast brought thy purpose to an end.
And that thou art most circumspect and wise,
And dost effect all things with providence,
As Joshua did by counsel and advice,
Against whose sword there is none can make defence:
And wisdom hast by heavenly influence
With Solomon to judge and to discern
Men's causes, and thy people to govern.
For mercy mixt with thy magnificence,
Doth make thee pity all that are opprest;
And to withstand the force and violence
Of those that right and equity detest.
With David thou to piety art prest;
And like to Julius Cæsar valorous,
That in his time was most victorious.
And in thine hand (like worthy Prince) dost hold
Thy sword, to see that of thy subjects none
Against thee should presume with courage bold
And pride of heart to raise rebellion;
And in the other, sceptre to maintain
True justice while among us thou dost reign.
More than good heart none can, whatsoe'er he be,
Present nor give to God nor unto man,
Which for my part I wholly give to thee,
And ever shall as far forth as I can;
Wherewith I will (as I at first began)
Continually, not ceasing night nor day,
With sincere mind for thine estate thus pray.

"The time when I this work had fully done
By computation just, was in the year
One thousand and four hundred twenty-one
Of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour dear;
And in the eighth year complete of the reign
Of our most noble lord and sovereign
King Henry the Fifth.

"In honour great, for by his puissant might
He conquered all Normandy again,
And valiantly, for all the power of France;
And won from them his own inheritance,
And forced them his title to renew
To all the realm of France, which doth belong
To him, and to his lawful heirs by true
Descent, (the which they held from him by wrong
And false pretence,) and, to confirm the same,
Hath given him the honour and the name
Of Regent of the land for Charles his life;
And after his decease they have agreed,
Thereby to end all bloody war and strife,
That he, as heir, shall lawfully succeed
Therein, and reign as King of France by right,
As by records, which extant are to light,
It doth appear.
And I will never cease, both night and day,
With all my heart unto the Lord to pray

"For Him, by whose commandment I tooke
On me (though far unfit to do the same)
To translate into English verse this booke,
Which Guido wrote in Latin, and doth name
'The Siege of Troy;' and for HIS sake alone,
I must confess that I the same begun,
When Henry, whom men Fourth by name did call,
My Prince's father, lived, and possest
The crown. And though I be but rustical,
I have therein not spared to do my best
To please my Prince's humour."

This poem, "The Life and Death of Hector," was published after the marriage of Henry with Katharine, and before her arrival in England. Among its closing sentiments are the following, intended probably as an honest warning to his royal master, that in the midst of life we are in death, and that the messenger from heaven knocks at the palace of the conquering monarch with no less suddenness than at the cottage of his humblest subject. How appropriate was the warning! Henry did not survive the publication of this poem more than a single year.

"For by Troy's fall it plainly doth appear
That neither king nor emperor hath here

"A permanent estate to trust unto.
Therefore to Him that died upon the rood
(And was content and willing so to do,
And for mankind did shed his precious blood,)
Lift up your minds, and pray with humble heart
That He his aid unto you will impart.
For, though you be of extreme force and might,
Without his help it will you nought avail;
And He doth give man victory in fight,
And with a few is able to prevail,
And overcome an army huge and strong:
And by his grace makes kings and princes long

"To reign here on the earth in happiness;
And tyrants, that to men do offer wrong
And violence, doth suddenly suppress,
Although their power be ne'er so great and strong.
And in his hand his blessings all reserveth
For to reward each one as he deserveth.

"To whom I pray with humble mind and heart,
And so I hope all you will do no less,
That of his grace He would vouchsafe to impart
And send all joy, welfare, and happiness,
Health, victory, tranquillity, and honour,
Unto the high and mighty conqueror.

"King Henry the Fifth, that his great name
May here on earth be extolled and magnified
While life doth last; and when he yields the same
Into his hands, he may be glorified
In heaven among the saints and angels bright,
There to serve the God of power and might.

"At whose request this work I undertook,
As I have said.
God He knows when I this work began,
I did it not for praise of any man,

"But for to please the humour and the hest
Of my good lord and princely patron,
Who [dis]dained not to me to make request
To write the same, lest that oblivion
By tract of time, and time's swift passing by,
Such valiant act should cause obscured to be;

"As also 'cause his princely high degree
Provokes him study ancient histories,
Where, as in mirror, he may plainly see
How valiant knights have won the masteries
In battles fierce by prowess and by might,
To run like race, and prove a worthy knight.

"And as they sought to climb to honour's seat,
So doth my Lord seek therein to excel,
That, as his name, so may his fame be great,
And thereby likewise idleness expel;
For so he doth to virtue bend his mind,
That hard it is his equal now to find.

"To write his princely virtues, and declare
His valour, high renown, and majesty,
His brave exploits and martial acts, that are
Most rare, and worthy his great dignity,
My barren head cannot devise by wit
To extol his fame by words and phrases fit.

"This worthy Prince, whom I so much commend,
(Yet not so much as well deserves his fame,)
By royal blood doth lineally descend
From Henry King of England, Fourth by name,
His eldest son, and heir to the crown,
And, by his virtues, Prince of high renown.

"For by the graft the fruit men easily know,
Encreasing the honour of his pedigree;
His name Lord Henry, as our stories show,
And by his title Prince of Wales is he.
Who with good right, his father being dead,
Shall wear the crown of Britain on his head.

"This mighty Prince hath made me undertake
To write the siege of Troy, the ancient town,
And of their wars a true discourse to make;
From point to point as Guido set it down,
Who long since wrote the same in Latin verse,
Which in the English now I will rehearse."

In the poem called the "Siege of Troy," written in different metre, Lydgate, addressing Henry, "O most worthy Prince! of Knighthood source and well!" thus proceeds to state the circumstances under which he wrote his work:

"God I take highly to witness
That I this work of heartily low humbless
Took upon me of intention,
Devoid of pride and presumption,
For to obey without variance
My Lord's bidding fully and pleasance;
Which hath desire, soothly for to sayn,
Of very knighthood to remember again
The wortheness (if I shall not lie)
And the prowess of old chivalry,
Because he hath joy and great dainty
To read in books of antiquity
To find only virtue to sow
By example of them, and also to eschew
The cursed vice of sloth and idleness;
So he enjoyeth in virtuous business,
In all that longeth to manhood, dare I sayn,
He busyeth ever. And thereto is so fain
To haunt his body in plays martial,
Through exercise to exclude sloth at all,
(After the doctrine of Vigetius.)
Thus is he both manful and virtuous,
More passingly than I can of him write;
I want cunning his high renown to indite,
So much of manhood men may in him seen.
And for to wit whom I would mean,
The eldest son of the noble King
Henry the Fourth; of knighthood well and spring;
In whom is showed of what stock that he grew,
The root is virtue;
Called Henry eke, the worthy Prince of Wales,
Which me commanded the dreary piteous tale
Of them of Troy in English to translate;
The siege, also, and the destruction,
Like as the Latin maketh mention,
For to complete, and after Guido make,
So I could, and write it for his sake;
Because he would that to high and low
The noble story openly were knowe
In our tongue, about in every age,
And written as well in our language
As in Latin and French it is;
That of the story the truth we not miss,
No more than doth each other nation;
This was the fine of his intention.
The which emprise anon I 'gin shall
In his worship for a memorial.
And of the time to make mention,
When I began on this translation,
It was the year, soothly to sayn,
Fourteen complete of his Father's reign."

Though this Preface was written when Henry was still Prince of Wales, the work was not finished till he had ascended the throne; when the poet sent it into the world with this charge, which he calls "L'Envoy:"

"Go forth, my book! veiled with the princely grace
Of him that is extolled for excellence
Throughout the world, but do not show thy face
Without support of his magnificence."

TESTIMONY OF OCCLEVE.

The interesting circumstances under which the poet represents the following dialogue to have taken place are detailed in the body of the work.[351] The old man addresses Occleve as his son, and the poet calls his aged monitor father.

Father. "My Lord the Prince,—knoweth he thee not?
If that thou stood in his benevolence,
He may be salve unto thine indigence."
Son. "No man better: next his father,—our Lord the Liege
His father,—he is my good gracious Lord."
F. "Well, Son! then will I me oblige,
And God of heaven vouch I to record,
That, if thou wilt be fully of mine accord,
Thou shalt no cause have more thus to muse,
But heaviness void, and it refuse.
Since he thy good Lord is, I am full sure
His grace shall not to thee be denied.
Thou wotst well he benign is and demure
To sue unto: not is his ghost maistried[352]
With danger; but his heart is full applied
To grant, and not the needy to warn his grace.
To him pursue, and thy relief purchase.
What shall I call thee—what is thy name?"
S. "Occlive[353] (Father mine), men callen me."
F. "Occlive? Son!"—S. "Yes, Father, the same."
F. "Thou wert acquainted with Chaucer 'pardie?"
S. "God save his soul! best of any wight."
F. "Syn thou mayst not be paid in the Exchequer,
Unto my Lord the Prince make instance
That thy patent unto the Hanaper
May changed be."—S. "Father, by your sufferance,
It may not so: because of the ordinance,
Long after this shall no grant chargeable
Over pass. Father mine, this is no fable."
F. "An equal charge, my Son, in sooth
Is no charge, I wot it well indeed.
What! Son mine! Good heart take unto thee.
Men sayen, 'Whoso of every grass hath dread,
Let him beware to walk in any mead.'
Assay! assay! thou simple-hearted ghost;
What grace is shapen thee, thou not wost.
—--Now, syn me thou toldest
My Lord the Prince is good Lord thee to;
No maistery is to thee, if thou woldest
To be relieved, wost thee what to do.
Write to him a goodly tale or two,
On which he may disport him by night,
And his free grace shall on thee light.
Sharp thy pen, and write on lustily;
Let see, my Son, make it fresh and gay,
Utter thine art if thou canst craftily;
His high prudence hath insight very
To judge if it be well made or nay.
Wherefore, Son, it is unto thee need
Unto thy work take thee greater heed.
But of one thing be well ware in all wise,
On flattery that thou thee not found,
For thereof (Son) Solomon the Wise,
As that I have in his Proverbs found,
Saith thus: 'They that in feigned speech abound,
And glossingly unto their friends talk,
Spreaden a net before them, where they walk.'
This false treason common is and rife;
Better were it thou wert at Jerusalem
Now, than thou wert therein defective.
Syn my Lord the Prince is (God hold his life!)
To thee good Lord, good servant thou thee quit
To him and true, and it shall thee profit.
Write him nothing that sowneth to vice,
Kyth[354] thy love in matter of sadness.
Look if thou find canst any treatise
Grounded on his estate's wholesomeness;
Which thing translate, and unto his highness,
As humbly as thou canst, it thou present.
Do thus, my Son."—S. "Father! I assent,
With heart as trembling as the leaf of asp."[355]

END OF VOLUME I.

LONDON:
PRINTED BY SAMUEL BENTLEY,
Dorset Street, Fleet Street.

Footnote 1: Thucydides. [(back)]

Footnote 2: Monomothi in Wallia natus v. Id. Aug.—Pauli Jov. Ang. Reg. Chron.; William of Worcester, &c. [(back)]

Footnote 3: At the foot of the Wardrobe Account of Henry Earl of Derby from 30th September 1387 to 30th September 1388, (and unfortunately no account of the Duke of Lancaster's expenses is as yet found extant before that very year,) an item occurs of 341l. 12s. 5d., paid 24th September 1386, for the household expenses of the Earl and his family at Monmouth. This proves that his father made the castle of Monmouth his residence within less than a year of the date assigned for Henry's birth. [(back)]

Footnote 4: His wife's sister, Matilda, married to William, Duke of Holland and Zealand, dying without issue, John of Gaunt succeeded to the undivided estates and honours of the late duke. [(back)]

Footnote 5: Froissart reports that Henry Bolinbroke was a handsome young man; and declares that he never saw two such noble dames, nor ever should were he to live a thousand years, so good, liberal, and courteous, as his mother the Lady Blanche, and "the late Queen of England," Philippa of Hainault, wife of Edward the Third. These were the mother, and the consort of John of Gaunt. [(back)]

Footnote 6: For this fact and the several items by which it is substantiated, the Author is indebted to the kindness and antiquarian researches of William Hardy, Esq. of the Duchy of Lancaster office. These accounts begin to date from September 30th 1381.[(back)]

Footnote 7: In 1387 the Duke of Lancaster, accompanied by Constance and a numerous retinue, went to Spain to claim his wife's rights; and he succeeded in obtaining from the King of Spain very large sums in hand, and hostages for the payment of 10,000l. annually to himself and his duchess for life. Wals. Neust. 544.[(back)]

Footnote 8: There is an order, dated June 6th, 1372, to lodge two pipes of good wine in Kenilworth Priory, and to hasten with all speed Dame Ilote, the midwife, to the Queen Constance at Hertford on horse or in carriage as should be best for her ease. The same person attended the late Duchess Blanche.

The Author has lately discovered on the Pell Rolls a payment, dated 21st February 1373, which refers to the birth of a daughter, and at the same time informs us that his future wife was then probably a member of his household. "To Catherine Swynford twenty marks for announcing to the King (Richard the Second) the birth of a daughter of the Queen of Spain, consort of John, King of Castile and Leon, and Duke of Lancaster."

The marriage of John of Gaunt with Catherine Swynford took place only the second year after the death of Constance, and seems to have excited among the nobility equal surprise and disgust. "The great ladies of England, (as Stowe reports,) as the Duchess of Gloucester, &c. disdained that she should be matched with the Duke of Lancaster, and by that means accounted second person in the realm, and be preferred in room before them."

King Richard however made her a handsome present of a ring, at the same time that he presented one to Henry, Earl of Derby, (Henry IV.) and another to Lady Beauchamp. Pell Rolls. [(back)]

Footnote 9: In this same year Bolinbroke's life was put into imminent peril during the insurrection headed by Wat Tiler. The rebels broke into the Tower of London, though it was defended by some brave knights and soldiers; seized and murdered the Archbishop and others; and, carrying the heads of their victims on pikes, proceeded in a state of fury to John of Gaunt's palace at the Savoy, which they utterly destroyed and burnt to the ground. Gaunt himself was in the North: but his son Bolinbroke was in the Tower of London, and owed his life to the interposition of one John Ferrour of Southwark. This is a fact not generally known to historians; and since the document which records it, bears testimony to Bolinbroke's spirit of gratitude, it will not be thought out of place to allude to it here. This same John Ferrour, with Sir Thomas Blount and others, was tried in the Castle of Oxford for high treason, in the first year of Henry IV. Blount and the others were condemned and executed; but to John Ferrour a free pardon, dated Monday after the Epiphany, was given, "our Lord the King remembering that in the reign of Richard the Second, during the insurrection of the Counties of Essex and Kent, the said John saved the King's life in the midst of that commonalty, in a wonderful and kind manner, whence the King happily remains alive unto this day. For since every good whatever naturally and of right requires another good in return, the King of his especial grace freely pardons the said John." Plac. Cor. in Cast. Oxon.[(back)]

Footnote 10: Thus, in a warrant, dated 6th March 1381, an order is given by the Duke for payment to a Goldsmith in London, of 10l. 18s. for a present made by our dear daughter Philippa, to our very dear daughter Mary, Countess of Derby, on the day of her marriage; and also "40 shillings for as many pence put upon the book on the day of the espousals of our much beloved son, the Earl of Derby." Eight marks are ordered to be paid for "a ruby given by us to our very dear daughter Mary:" 13s. 4d. for the offering at the mass. Ten marks from us to the King's minstrels being there on the same day; and ten marks to four minstrels of our brother the Earl of Cambridge being there; and fifty marks to the officers of our cousin, the Countess of Hereford! On the 31st of January following, the Duke lays himself under a bond to pay to "Dame Bohun, Countess of Hereford, her mother, the sum of one hundred marks annually, for the charge and cost of his daughter-in-law, Mary, Countess of Derby, until the said Mary shall attain the full age of fourteen years."[(back)]

Footnote 11: Between 30th Sept. 1387 and 1st Oct. 1388. [(back)]

Footnote 12: An item of five yards of cloth for the bed of the nurse of Thomas at Kenilworth; and an ell of canvass for his cradle.[(back)]

Footnote 13: This is one of those incidents, occurring now and then, the discovery of which repays the antiquary or the biographer for wading, with toilsome search, through a confused mass of uninteresting details, and often encourages him to persevere when he begins to feel weary and disappointed. [(back)]

Footnote 14: "Thomæ Rothwell informanti Humfridum filium Domini Regis pro salario suo de termino Paschæ, 13s. 4d."—1 Hen. IV.[(back)]

Footnote 15: The treasurer's account, during the Earl's absence, contains some items which remove all doubt from this statement: among others, 20l. to Lancaster the herald, on Nov. 5, going toward England; and in the same month, to three "persuivantes," being with the Earl, eight nobles; and to a certain English sailor, carrying the news of the birth of Humfrey, son of my lord, 13s. 4d.[(back)]

Footnote 16: King Richard II, the Duke of Lancaster, and his son, Henry of Bolinbroke, became widowers in the same year. [(back)]

Footnote 17: That Henry cherished the memory of his mother with filial tenderness, may be inferred from the circumstance that only two months after he succeeded to the throne, and had the means and the opportunity of testifying his grateful remembrance of her, we find money paid "in advance to William Goodyere for newly devising and making an image in likeness of the Mother of the present lord the King, ornamented with diverse arms of the kings of England, and placed over the tomb of the said king's mother, within the King's College at Leicester, where she is buried and entombed."—Pell Rolls, May 20, 1413. [(back)]

Footnote 18: The portiphorium was a breviary, containing directions as to the services of the church. [(back)]

Footnote 19: He bequeaths also, in the same will, "to Joan, Countess of Hereford, our dear grandmother, a gold cyphus." This lady, however, died before Henry. In the Pell Rolls we find the payment of "442l. 17s. 5d. to Robert Darcy and others, executors of Joan de Bohun, late Countess of Hereford, on account of live and dead stock belonging to her, February 27, 1421." [(back)]

Footnote 20: Soon after Henry IV's accession, the Pell Rolls, May 8, 1401, record the payment of "10l. to Bertolf Vander Eure, who fenced with the present lord the King with the long sword, and was hurt in the neck by the said lord the King." The Chronicle of London for 1386 says "there were joustes at Smithfield. There bare him well Sir Harry of Derby, the Duke's son of Lancaster."[(back)]

Footnote 21: The Author would gladly have presented to the reader a different portrait of the religious and moral character of "Old John of Gaunt, time-honoured Lancaster;" but a careful examination of the testimony of his enemies and of his eulogists, as well as of the authentic documents of his own household, seems to leave no other alternative, short of the sacrifice of truth. Godwin, in his Life of Chaucer, has undertaken his defence, but on such unsound principles of morality as must be reprobated by every true lover of Religion and Virtue. The same domestic register of the Duchy which records the wages paid to the adulteress, and the duke's losses by gambling, proves (as many other family accounts would prove) that no fortune however princely can supply the unbounded demands of profligacy and dissipation. Even John of Gaunt, with his immense possessions, was driven to borrow money. This fact is accompanied in the record by the curious circumstance, that an order is given for the employment of three or four stout yeomen, because of the danger of the road, to guard the bearers of a loan made by the Earl of Arundel to the Duke, and sent from Shrewsbury to London. [(back)]

Footnote 22: Fuller in his Church History, having informed us that Henry's chamber over the College gate was then inhabited by the historian's friend Thomas Barlow, adds "His picture remaineth there to this day in brass." [(back)]

Footnote 23: Those who were designed for the military profession were compelled to bear arms, and go to the field at the age of fifteen: consequently the little education they received was confined to their boyhood.[(back)]

Footnote 24: "Admodum parvo." [(back)]

Footnote 25: On the 29th of the preceding September 1397, Richard II. "with the consent of the prelates, lords and commons in parliament assembled," created Bolinbroke, then Earl of Derby, Duke of Hereford, with a royal gift of forty marks by the year, to him and his heirs for ever. Pell Rolls. Pasc. 22 R. II. April 15.[(back)]

Footnote 26: The Lincoln register (for a copy of which the Author is indebted to the present Bishop) dates the commencement of the year of Henry Beaufort's consecration from July 14, 1398. [(back)]

Footnote 27: It is a curious fact, not generally known, that Henry IV. in the first year of his reign took possession of all the property of the Provost and Fellows of Queen's College (on the ground of mismanagement), and appointed the Chancellor, the Chief Justice, the Master of the Rolls, and others, guardians of the College. This is scarcely consistent with the supposition of his son being resident there at the time, or of his selecting that college for him afterwards. [(back)]

Footnote 28: The Author trusts to be pardoned, if he suffers these conjectures on Henry's studies in Oxford to tempt him to digress in this note further than the strict rules of unity might approve. They brought a lively image to his mind of the occupations and confessions of one of the earliest known sons of Alma Mater. Perhaps Ingulphus is the first upon record who, having laid the foundation of his learning at Westminster, proceeded for its further cultivation to Oxford. From the biographical sketch of his own life, we learn that he was born of English parents and a native of the fair city of London. Whilst a schoolboy at Westminster, he was so happy as to have interested in his behalf Egitha, daughter of Earl Godwin, and queen of Edward the Confessor. He describes his patroness as a lady of great beauty, well versed in literature, of most pure chastity and exalted moral feeling, together with pious humbleness of mind, tainted by no spot of her father's or her brother's barbarism, but mild and modest, honest and faithful, and the enemy of no human being. In confirmation of his estimate of her excellence, he quotes a Latin verse current in his day, not very complimentary to her sire: "As a thorn is the parent of the rose, so was Godwin of Egitha." I have often seen her (he continues) when I have been visiting my father in the palace. Many a time, as she met me on my return from school, would she examine me in my scholarship and verses; and turning with the most perfect familiarity from the solidity of grammar to the playfulness of logic, in which she was well skilled, when she had caught me and held me fast by some subtle chain, she would always direct her maid to give me three or four pieces of money, and sending me off to the royal refectory would dismiss me after my refreshment." It is possible that many of our fair countrywomen in the highest ranks now, are not aware that, more than eight hundred years ago, their fair and noble predecessors could play with a Westminster scholar in grammar, verses, and logic. Egitha left behind her an example of high religious, moral, and literary worth, by imitating which, not perhaps in its literal application, but certainly in its spirit, the noble born among us will best uphold and adorn their high station. Ingulphus (in the very front of whose work the Author thinks he sees the stamp of raciness and originality, though he cannot here enter into the question of its genuineness) tells us then, how he made proficiency beyond many of his equals in mastering the doctrines of Aristotle, and covered himself to the very ankles in Cicero's Rhetoric. But, alas, for the vanity of human nature! His confession here might well suggest reflections of practical wisdom to many a young man who may be tempted, as was Ingulphus, in the university or the wide world, to neglect and despise his father's roof and his father's person, after success in the world may have raised him in society above the humble station of his birth,—a station from which perhaps the very struggles and privations of that parent himself may have enabled him to emerge. "Growing up a young man (he says) I felt a sort of disdainful loathing at the straitened and lowly circumstances of my parents, and desired to leave my paternal hearth, hankering after the halls of kings and of the great, and daily longing more and more to array myself in the gayest and most luxurious costume." Ingulphus lived to repent, and to be ashamed of his weakness and folly.[(back)]

Footnote 29: John Carpenter. This learned and good man could not have been much, if at all, Henry's senior. He was made Bishop of Worcester (not as Goodwin says by Henry V. but) in the year 1443. He died in 1476; so that if he was in Oxford when we suppose Henry to have studied there and to have been only his equal in age, he would have been nearly ninety when he died. Thomas Rodman was an eminent astronomer as well as a learned divine, of Merton College. He was not promoted to a bishopric till two years after Henry's death.

Among other learned and pious men who were much esteemed by Henry, we find especially mentioned Robert Mascall, confessor to his father, and Stephen Partington. The latter was a very popular preacher, whom some of the nobility invited to court. Henry, delighted with his eloquence, treated him with favour and affectionate regard, and advanced him to the see of St. David's. Robert Mascall was of the order of Friars Carmelites. In 1402 he was ordered to be continually about the King's person, for the advantage and health of his soul. Two years afterwards he was advanced to the see of Hereford. Pell Rolls.[(back)]

Footnote 30: Many ancient documents (of the existence of which in past years, often not very remote, there can be no doubt,) now, unhappily for those who would bring the truth to light, are in a state of abeyance or of perdition. To mention only one example; the work of Peter Basset, who was chamberlain to Henry V. and attended him in his wars, referred to by Goodwin, and reported to be in the library of the College of Arms, is no longer in existence; at least it has disappeared and not a trace of it can be found there.[(back)]

Footnote 31: Rot. Parl. 21 Rich. II. & Rot. Cart. [(back)]

Footnote 32: It is curious to find that when Henry V. met his intended bride Katharine of France, the tent prepared for him by her mother the Queen, was composed of blue and green velvet, and embroidered with the figures of antelopes.[(back)]

Footnote 33: The Duke of Hereford's armour was exceedingly costly and splendid. He had sent to Italy to procure it on purpose for that day; he spared no expense in its preparation; and it was forwarded to him by the Duke of Milan.[(back)]

Footnote 34: "Rex proclamari fecit quod Dux Herefordiæ debitum suum honorificè adimplesset."—Wals. 356. [(back)]

Footnote 35: The "Chronicle of London" asserts that Richard sought and obtained from the Pope of Rome a confirmation of his statutes and ordinances made at this time. [(back)]

Footnote 36: See the Remains of Thomas Gascoyne, a contemporary writer. Brit. Mus. 2 I. d. p. 530. [(back)]

Footnote 37: John of Gaunt died on the 3rd of February 1399, at the house of the Bishop of Ely in Holborn. Will. Worc. [(back)]

Footnote 38: Two candelabra which belonged to Henry Duke of Lancaster, were presented by Richard to the abbot and convent of Westminster, 30th June 1399.—Pell Rolls. He also granted to Catherine Swynford, the late duke's widow, some of the possessions which she had enjoyed before, but which had fallen into the king's hands by the confiscation of the present duke's property.—Pat. 22 Ric. II. Froissart expressly says, that Richard confiscated Bolinbroke's estates, and divided them among his own favourites. He acquaints us, moreover, with an act of cruel persecution and enmity on the part of Richard, which must have rendered Bolinbroke's exile far more galling, and have exasperated him far more bitterly against his persecutor. Richard, says Froissart, sent Lord Salisbury over to France on express purpose to break off the contemplated marriage between Bolinbroke and the daughter of the Duke of Berry, in the presence of the French court calling him a false and wicked traitor. Ed. 1574. Vol. iv. p. 290.[(back)]

Footnote 39: The chroniclers give us an idea of expense in Richard both about his person, his houses, and his presents, which exceeds belief. Both the Monk of Evesham and the author of the Sloane Manuscript speak of a single robe which cost thirty thousand marks.[(back)]

Footnote 40: Froissart tells us that Bolinbroke was much beloved in London. He represents also his reception in France to have been most cordial; every city opening its gates to welcome him.—See Froissart, vol. iv. p. 280.[(back)]

Footnote 41: Froissart says that Richard sent expressly both to Northumberland and Hotspur, requiring their attendance in his expedition to Ireland; that they both refused; and that he banished them the realm. Vol. iv. p. 295.[(back)]

Footnote 42: March 5, 1399, the Pell Rolls record the payment of "10l. to Henry, son of the Duke of Hereford, in part payment of 500l. yearly, which our present lord the King has granted to be paid him at the Exchequer during pleasure." Twenty pounds also were paid to him on the 21st of the preceding February. [(back)]

Footnote 43: Whether as a measure of security, or on a principle of kind considerateness for Henry of Monmouth, when Richard left England he took with him Henry Beaufort, (Pat. p. 3. 22 Ric. II, n. 11.): though it is curious to remark that when on his return to England he left Henry of Monmouth in Trym Castle, we find Henry Beaufort in the company of Richard. [(back)]

Footnote 44: In 1379, his grandfather John of Gaunt required aid of his tenants towards making his eldest son, Henry of Bolinbroke, a knight.[(back)]

Footnote 45: M. Creton's Metrical History is translated from a beautifully illuminated copy, in the British Museum, by the Rev. John Webb, who has enriched it with many valuable notes and dissertations, historical, biographical, &c. It forms part of the twentieth volume of the Archæologia. M. Creton confesses himself to have been thrown into a terrible panic on the approach of danger, more than once: and probably he was in higher esteem in the hall among the guests for his minstrelsy and song, than in the battle-field for his prowess. [(back)]

Footnote 46: The sons of this Irish chief, Macmore, or Macmorgh, or Mac Murchard, were hostages in England, May 3, 1399.—Pell Rolls.[(back)]

Footnote 47: The term bachelor signified, in the language of chivalry, a young gentleman not yet knighted. [(back)]

Footnote 48: Fuller, in his Church History, thus speaks of him, mingling with his description, however, the verification of the proverb, "An ill youth may make a good man," a maxim far less true (though far more popular) than one of at least equally remote origin, "Like sapling, like oak." He was "one of a strong and active body, neither shrinking in cold nor slothful in heat, going commonly with his head uncovered; the wearing of armour was no more cumbersome to him than a cloak. He never shrunk at a wound, nor turned away his nose for ill savour, nor closed his eyes for smoke or dust; in diet, none less dainty or more moderate; his sleep very short, but sound; fortunate in fight, and commendable in all his actions." [(back)]

Footnote 49: M. Creton, the author of the Metrical History, acceded to the earnest request of the Earl of Salisbury to accompany him, for the sake of his minstrelsy and song. From the day of his departure from Dublin his knowledge of public affairs, as far as they are immediately connected with Henry of Monmouth, ceases almost, if not altogether. He must no longer be followed implicitly; whatever he relates of the intervening circumstances till Richard himself came to Conway, he must have derived from hearsay. In one circumstance too afterwards he must have been mistaken, when he says the Duke of Lancaster committed Richard at Chester to the safe keeping of the son of the Duke of Gloucester and the son of the Earl of Arundel, at least if Humfrey be the young man he means. Stow and others follow him here, but, as it should seem, unadvisedly. [(back)]

Footnote 50: The castle of Trym, though described by Walsingham as a strong fort, was in so dilapidated a state, that, in 1402, the council, in taking the King's pleasure about its repairs, represent it as on the point of falling into ruins. [(back)]

Footnote 51: M. Creton expressly states that Henry IV. made Henry of Monmouth Prince of Wales on the day of his election to the throne, the first Wednesday in October; but in this he is not borne out by authority.[(back)]

Footnote 52: 1401, March 5, "To Henry Dryhurst of West Chester, payment for the freightage of a ship to Dublin: also for sailing to the same place and back again, to conduct the lord the Prince, the King's son, from Ireland to England; together with the furniture of a chapel and ornaments of the same, which belonged to King Richard."[(back)]

Footnote 53: Her death took place on the 3rd October 1399, four days after the accession of Henry IV. On the 6th of the preceding May the Pell Rolls record payment of the residue of 155l. 11s. 8d. to Alianore de Bohun, Duchess of Gloucester, for the maintenance of a master, twelve chaplains, and eight clerks, appointed to perform divine service in the College of Plecy. [(back)]

Footnote 54: Socrates, in his Defence before his Judges. [(back)]

Footnote 55: May 2nd & 6th, 1399, payments are recorded to both these boys of different sums to purchase dresses, and coat-armour, &c. preparatory to their voyage to Ireland in company with the King.[(back)]

Footnote 56: Perhaps the sentiments of this afflicted noble lady's will may be little more than words of course; but, coming from her as they did a few days only before the news of her son's death paralyzed her whole frame, they appear peculiarly appropriate: "Observing and considering the mischances and uncertainties of this changeable and transitory world." The will bears date August 9, 1399.[(back)]

Footnote 57: Froissart relates, in a very lively manner, how the English nobility amused themselves in devising the probable schemes by which Bolinbroke might dispose of himself during his exile. "He is young, said they, and he has already travelled enough, in Prussia, and to the Holy Sepulchre, and St. Katharine: he will now take other journeys to cheat the time. Go where he will, he will be at home; he has friends in every country."

The same author tells us that forty thousand persons accompanied him on his exile, not with music and song, but with sighs and tears and lamentations; and that on Gaunt's death the people of England "spoke much and loudly of Derby's return,—especially the Londoners, who loved him a hundred times more than they did the King. The Earl, he says, heard of the death of his father, even before the King of France, though Richard had posted off the event to that monarch as joyful tidings. He put himself and his household in deep mourning, and caused the funeral obsequies to be solemnized with much grandeur. The King, the Duke of Orleans, and very many nobles and prelates were present at the solemnity, for the Earl was much beloved by them all, and they deeply sympathized with his grief, for he was an agreeable knight, well-bred, courteous, and gentle to every one." [(back)]

Footnote 58: Froissart gives also a very animated description of the manner in which Bolinbroke was received by the King of France on his first arrival, and by the Dukes of Orleans, Brittany, Burgundy, and Bourbon. The meeting, he says, was joyous on both sides, and they entered Paris in brilliant array: but Henry was nevertheless very melancholy, being separated from his family,—four sons and two daughters.

The author translated by Laboureur, states that Richard no sooner heard of the welcome which Bolinbroke met with in France than he sent over a messenger, praying that court not to countenance his traitors. He adds, that as soon as Lancaster was dead, Richard regarded his written engagements with no greater scruple than he had before observed his promises by word of mouth. [(back)]

Footnote 59: Leland says that the Archbishop sojourned, during his exile, at Utrecht (Trajecti). Froissart is certainly mistaken in relating that the Londoners sent the Archbishop in a boat down the Thames with a message to Bolinbroke. It is very probable that they sent a messenger to the Archbishop, and through him communicated with their favourite. [(back)]

Footnote 60: Officers were appointed, 16th October 1397, to seize all lands of Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Duke of Gloucester, and other lords.—Pell Rolls. Pat. 1 Hen. IV. m. 8, the Archbishop's property is restored. [(back)]

Footnote 61: Froissart, who seems to have obtained very correct information of Bolinbroke's proceedings up to the time of his embarking on the French coast for England, but from that hour to have been altogether misled as to his plans and circumstances, relates that he left Paris under colour of paying a visit to the Duke of Brittany; that he went by the way of D'Estamps (one Guy de Baigneux acting as his guide); that he stayed at Blois eight days, where he received a most kind answer in reply to his message to the Duke, who gave him a cordial meeting at Nantes. The Duke promised him a supply of vessels and men to protect him in crossing the seas, and forwarded him with all kind sympathy from one of his ports: "and," continues Froissart, "I have heard that it was Vennes." It might have been, perhaps, during this visit that Henry formed, or renewed, an acquaintance with the Duchess, to whom, after the Duke's death, in 1402, he made an offer of his hand, and was accepted. [(back)]

Footnote 62: See Archæologia, vol. xx. p. 61, note 'h.' [(back)]

Footnote 63: Sir James Mackintosh seems to have been mistaken in supposing that Bolinbroke visited London on his first march southward. "His march from London against the few advisers of Richard, who had forfeited the hope of mercy, was a triumphant procession."[(back)]

Footnote 64: Monk of Evesham.[(back)]

Footnote 65: He had many castles of his own in that part of the country, as Monmouth, Grosmont, Skenfrith, White Castle, &c. [(back)]

Footnote 66: Some think the castle then taken was Beeston. [(back)]

Footnote 67: Over this estuary is now thrown a beautiful suspension-bridge, one of the ornaments of North Wales. [(back)]

Footnote 68: The author of the Metrical History has certainly made a mistake here. He says, Duke Henry started from Chester on Tuesday, August the 22nd; but in 1399 the 22nd day of August was on a Friday.[(back)]

Footnote 69: Great confusion and unnumbered deeds of injustice and cruelty prevailed through the kingdom between the landing of Bolinbroke and his accession to the throne; some of these outrages were, doubtless, of a political character, between the partisans of Richard and the Duke, many others the result of private revenge and rapine. To put a stop to these enormities, Richard was advised (perhaps the more meet expression would be 'compelled') to sign two proclamations, one dated Chester, August 20; the other Lichfield, August 24. In these he calls Bolinbroke his very dear relative.[(back)]

Footnote 70: The Metrical History says, Richard's keepers were the son of the Duke of Gloucester, and the son of the Earl of Arundel. The reasons for doubting this have been already assigned. Humphrey was probably at that time no longer numbered among the living.[(back)]

Footnote 71: The question naturally offers itself here, Might not this delay have been occasioned by Lancaster's desire not to start before Henry of Monmouth had returned from Ireland, and joined him?[(back)]

Footnote 72: Hardyng's testimony must, on every subject, be received with much caution. Confessedly he was a sad example of a time-server; and was skilled in giving facts a different colouring, just as they would be the more welcome to those for whose inspection he was writing. His version of the same events, when presented to members of the house of York, varies much from the original work, edited when a Lancastrian was in the ascendant.[(back)]

Footnote 73: M. Creton says (and in this he is followed by others) that the King, on the very day of his accession, created his eldest son Prince of Wales, who in that character stood on the right hand of the King at the coronation, holding in his hand a sword without any point, the emblem of peace and mercy. But in this he seems to have been partially mistaken. Henry was not created Prince of Wales till after his father's coronation, and he bore in right of the Duchy of Lancaster, and by command of the King, the blunted sword called Curtana, which belonged to Edward the Confessor.—Rot. Serv.[(back)]

Footnote 74: In the same Parliament he was invested also with the titles of Duke of Acquitaine and Duke of Lancaster. [(back)]

Footnote 75: The Parliament had no voice in the creation of a dignity. The Lords and Commons were consulted on this occasion only out of courtesy by the King.[(back)]

Footnote 76: The proposal, of which Froissart has left a graphic description, that Isabella, the widow (if that be the proper designation of the child who was the espoused wife) of Richard II, should remain in England and be married to the Prince of Wales, was not made till after Richard's death. [(back)]

Footnote 77: Minutes of Privy Council, vol. ii. p. 42. [(back)]

Footnote 78: "Ses chapelles." Under this word were included not only the place of prayer, but the books, and vestments, and furniture, together with the priests, and whatever else was necessary for divine worship. Indeed, the word has often a still wider signification. We shall see hereafter that Henry was always attended by his chapel during his campaigns in France. [(back)]

Footnote 79: Some chroniclers say, that the conspiracy was made known to the Mayor of London, who forthwith hastened to the King at Windsor, and urged him to save himself and his children. The same pages tell us that John Holland Earl of Huntingdon was seized and beheaded in Essex by the Dowager Countess of Hereford.—Sloane MS.[(back)]

Footnote 80: Pat. p. 3, 22 Ric. II. [(back)]

Footnote 81: The Pell Rolls contain several interesting entries connected with this subject. Payment for a thousand masses to be said for the soul of Richard, "whose body is buried in Langley." (20th March, 1400.) Payment also for carrying the body from Pomfret to London, &c.[(back)]

Footnote 82: See Henry's answer to the Duke of Orleans, as recorded by Monstrellet, in which he solemnly appeals to God for the vindication of the truth.[(back)]

Footnote 83: Sir Harris Nicolas. "Proceedings and Ordinances of the Privy Council of England."[(back)]

Footnote 84: Mr. Tytler, in his History of Scotland, maintains with much ingenuity the paradoxical position, that Richard escaped from Pontefract, made his way in disguise to the Western Isles, was there recognised, and was conducted to the Regent; that, taken into the safe keeping of the government, and sick of the world and its disappointments, he lived for many years in Stirling Castle; and that he there died, and there was buried. It falls not within the province of these Memoirs to examine the facts and reasonings by which that writer supports his theory, or to weigh the value of the objections which have been alleged against it. The Author, however, in confessing that the result of his own inquiries is opposed to the hypothesis of Richard's escape, and that he acquiesces in the general tradition that he died in Pontefract, cannot refrain from making one remark. Whilst he is persuaded that Glyndowr, and many others, believed that Richard was alive in Scotland, yet he thinks it almost capable of demonstration that Henry IV, with his sons and his court, in England; and Charles VI, with his court and clergy, and Isabella herself, and her second husband, had no doubt whatever as to Richard's death. If they had, if they were not fully assured that he was no longer among the living, it is difficult to understand Henry IV.'s proposals to Charles VI. for a marriage between Isabella and one of his sons; or how, on any other hypothesis than the conviction of his death, the Earl of Angouleme, afterwards Duke of Orleans, would have sought her in marriage; how her father and his clergy could have consented to her nuptials; or how she could for a moment have entertained the thought of becoming a bride again. She had not only been betrothed to Richard, but had been with all solemnity married to him by the Archbishop of Canterbury in the face of the church; and she had been crowned queen. Yet she was married to Angouleme in 1406, and died in childbed in 1409. Had she believed Richard to be still alive, she would have been more inclined to follow the bidding which Shakspeare puts into her husband's mouth at their last farewell, than to have given her hand before the altar to another:

"Hie thee to France,
And cloister thee in some religious house."

Froissart says expressly that the French resolved to wage war with the English as long as they knew Richard to be alive; but when certain news of his death reached them, they were bent on the restoration of Isabella.[(back)]

Footnote 85: It is painful to hear the Church historian, without any qualifying expression of doubt or hope, call Henry IV. "the murderer of Richard."—Milner, cent. xv. [(back)]

Footnote 86: Froissart expressly says, that, though often urged to it, Henry would never consent to have Richard put to death. [(back)]

Footnote 87: See Archæologia, xx. 290. [(back)]

Footnote 88: M. Creton. [(back)]

Footnote 89: Froissart asserts that the corpse was exposed in the street of Cheap to public inspection for two hours, at the least.[(back)]

Footnote 90: A manuscript in the French King's library (No. 8448) states that Sir Piers d'Exton and seven other assassins entered the room to kill him; but that Richard, pushing down the table, darted into the midst of them, and, snatching a battleaxe from one, laid four of them dead at his feet, when Exton felled him with a blow at the back of his head, and, as he was crying to God for mercy, with another blow despatched him. This account is supposed to be entirely disproved by the fact that, when Richard's tomb was accidentally laid open a few years ago in Westminster Abbey, the head was carefully examined, and no marks of violence whatever appeared on it. (See Archæologia, vol. vi. p. 316, and vol. xx. p. 284.) On the other hand, it is equally obvious to remark, that, if Henry IV. did exhibit to the people the body of another person for that of Richard, it was the substituted body which was buried, first at Langley and afterwards at Westminster. The absence, consequently, of all marks of violence on that body, till its identity with the corpse of Richard is established, proves nothing. But surely there is no reason to believe that any deception was practised. There could have been no motive for such fraud, and the strongest reasons must have existed to dissuade Henry from adopting it. The only object wished to be secured by the exposure of Richard's corpse, (and it was exposed at all the chief places between Pontefract and London,—at night after the offices for the dead, in the morning after mass,) was the removal of all doubt as to his being really dead. The false rumours were, not that he was murdered, but that he was alive. Among the thousands who flocked to see him were doubtless numbers of his friends and wellwishers, familiarly acquainted with his features, many of whom, it is thought, must have detected any imposture, and some of whom would surely have been bold enough to publish it. Still, on the other hand, it is suggested that a very short lapse of time after dissolution effects so material a change in a corpse, that the most intimate of a man's friends would often not be able to recognise a single feature in his countenance. And certainly many of Richard's friends remained unconvinced.[(back)]

Footnote 91: Chroniclers give an account of an extraordinary instrument of death laid in Henry's bed by some secret plotter against his life. The Sloane Manuscript describes it as a machine like the engine called the Caltrappe; and the Monk of Evesham says that it was reported to have been laid for Henry by one of Isabella's household.[(back)]

Footnote 92: Modern writers have erroneously referred to this year Monstrelet's account of Henry of Monmouth's expedition to Scotland.[(back)]

Footnote 93: A curious item in the Pell Rolls (14 December 1401) intimates that Henry IV. amused himself with the sports of the field, and at the same time tells us that such amusements were by no means unexpensive in those days: "Sixteen pounds paid by the King to Sir Thomas Erpyngham as the price of a sparrow-hawk." [(back)]

Footnote 94: June 14, he wrote to his council from Clipstone in Nottinghamshire: July 4th, he was at York.—Min. Council. [(back)]

Footnote 95: "By our liege Lord his commandment, and by yours." [(back)]

Footnote 96: The name of this extraordinary man is very variously spelt. His Christian name is either Owyain, or Owen, or Owyn. On his surname the original documents, as well as subsequent writers, ring many changes: the etymology of the name is undoubtedly The Glen of the waters of the Dee, or, Of the black waters. The name consequently is sometimes spelt Glyndwffrduy, and Glyndwrdu. In general, however, it assumes the form in English documents of Glendor, or Glyndowr: in Henry of Monmouth's first letter it is Oweyn de Glyndourdy. In these Memoirs the form generally adhered to is Owyn Glyndowr. In the record of the Scrope and Grosvenor controversy, Owyn's name is spelt Glendore, whilst his brother Tuder's, who was examined the same day, is written Glyndore.[(back)]

Footnote 97: The proceedings of the Welsh, in detail, at this time, are not found in any contemporary documents, on the authenticity of which we may rely. As to the general facts, however, whether we draw them from the traditions of the Welsh or the English chroniclers, no reasonable doubt can be entertained. But the Author cannot take upon himself the responsibility of vouching for the truth of the biographical particulars recorded of Owyn's early life and adventures, or the measures which he adopted previously to his breaking out into open revolt, any more than he can undertake to establish by proof the genealogy of that chieftain, and trace him through Llewellin ap Jorwarth to Bleddyn ap Cynfyn, or the third of the five royal tribes. [(back)]

Footnote 98: It is curious, in point of history, to observe for how very long a time rumours that Richard was still alive were industriously spread, and as greedily received. The royal proclamations again and again denounced the authors of such false rumours. In the rebellion of the Percies it was asserted that Richard was still alive in the Castle of Chester. In 1406 the Earl of Northumberland (though he had charged Henry with the murder of Richard), in his letter to the Duke of Orleans states the alternative of his being still alive. And even Sir John Oldcastle, in 1418, when before the Parliament, protested that he never would acknowledge that court so long as his liege lord, Richard, was alive in Scotland.—See Archæologia, vol. xx. p. 220.[(back)]

Footnote 99: Owyn and his brother Tudor were both examined at Chester, September 3, 1386, during the controversy between the families of Scrope and Grosvenor as to the arms of the latter; and it appears from their own evidence that Owyn was born before Sept. 3, 1359, and that his brother Tudor (who was slain in the battle of Grosmont, or Mynydd Pwl Melin) was three years younger. The record of this controversy assigns to Owyn himself this honourable title "Oweyn Sire [Lord] de Glendore del age XXVII ans et pluis."[(back)]

Footnote 100: Strange wonders, says Walsingham, happened, as men reported, at the birth of this man; for, the same night he was born, all his father's horses were found to stand in blood up to their bellies. It is curious to find both the Sloane MS. and the Monk of Evesham pointing to the fulfilment of this prophetic prodigy during the battle in which Edmund Mortimer was taken, when the bodies of the slain lay between the horses feet rolling in blood.[(back)]

Footnote 101: Leland records the expressions of contempt and insult with which the dismissal of Owyn's petition was accompanied, and the advice of the Bishop of St. Asaph scorned. "They said they cared not for barefooted blackguards:"—"se de scurris nudipedibus non curare." We cannot wonder if their national pride was wounded by such contumely. [(back)]

Footnote 102: Sir Henry Ellis, to whom we are deeply indebted for his succinct and clear statement of the events of these times, appears, in his introductory remarks on Lord Grey's letter, to have overlooked the date of Henry IV.'s departure for Scotland. He says: "Upon Henry's return, the Welsh were rising in arms, and Lord Grey was ordered to go against them. It seems to have been at this point of time that the letter was penned. It was apparently written in the month of June 1400." But the King did not leave London till towards Midsummer, and we have a letter from him (on his march northward) dated York, July 4, 1400, commanding the mayor and authorities of London to provide corn, wine, &c. for the King's use in Scotland, and as much money as they could raise on his jewels. The writ in consequence of this letter was issued July 12. Walsingham, indeed, says that they seized the opportunity of the King's absence, and rose under their leader Owyn. The King, on his return from Scotland, was at Newcastle upon Tyne on the 3rd of September. [(back)]

Footnote 103: At the back of this letter of Lord Grey to Prince Henry we now find another, pasted, sent by David ap Gruffyth to Lord Grey, probably the very epistle which the Earl says he had received "from the greatest thief in Wales;" the few last sentences of which, apparently written in a sort of jingling rhyme, indicate the character of its author and the spirit of the times. "We hope we shall do thee a privy thing: a rope, a ladder, and a ring, high on a gallows for to heng; and thus shall be your ending; and he that made thee be there to helpyng, and we on our behalf shall be well willing." The conclusion of another letter from the same pen, in defiance of Lord Grey's power, breathes the feelings with which the Welsh entered upon this rebellion. "And it was told me that ye been in perpose for to make your men burn and slay in whatsoever country I be and am seisened in (have property). Withouten doubt as many men that ye slay, and as many housen that ye burn for my sake, as many will I burn and slay for your sake; and doubt not I will have bread and ale of the best that is in your lordship. I can no more. But God keep your worshipful state in prosperity. Written in great haste, at the Park of Brinkiffe, the xi day of June.—Gruffuth ap David ap Gruffuth."[(back)]

Footnote 104: At as early a date as April 19, 1401, the Pell Rolls record the payment to him of "200l. for continuing at his own cost the siege of Conway Castle immediately after the rebels had taken it, without the assistance of any one except the people of the country."[(back)]

Footnote 105: The observations of Sir Harris Nicolas, to whom we are indebted for the publication of these letters, are very just: "Much information respecting the state of affairs in Wales is afforded by the correspondence of Sir Henry Percy, the celebrated Hotspur; five letters from whom are now for the first time brought to light. Besides their historical value, these letters derive great interest from being the only relics of Hotspur which are known to be preserved, from throwing some light on the cause of his discontent and subsequent rebellion, and still more from being in strict accordance with the supposed haughty, captious, and uncompromising character of that eminent soldier."—Preface, vol. i. p. xxxviii.[(back)]

Footnote 106: King Richard II. Act v. scene 3.

Boling.—"Can no man tell of my unthrifty son?"
Percy.—"My Lord, some two days since I saw the Prince," &c. [(back)]

Footnote 107: The commons at the same time, of their own free will, offered to pay as much as they had formerly paid to King Richard.[(back)]

Footnote 108: An exception by name is made of Owyn Glyndowr, and also of Rees ap Tudor, and William ap Tudor. These two brothers, however, surrendered the Castle of Conway, and William with thirty-one more received the royal pardon, dated 8th July 1401. Pardons in the same terms had been granted on the 6th May to the rebels of Chirk; on the 10th, to those of Bromfield and Oswestry; on the 16th, to those of Ellesmere; and, upon June 15th, to the rebels of Whityngton.[(back)]

Footnote 109: The original, in French, is preserved in the British Museum.—Cotton, Cleop. viii. fol. 117 b. [(back)]

Footnote 110: The original is here imperfect. [(back)]

Footnote 111: See Ellis's Original Letters, second series, vol. i. p. 8.[(back)]

Footnote 112: Lingard places the site of Owyn's victory over Lord Grey on the banks of the "Vurnway." [(back)]

Footnote 113: The Monk of Evesham reports that Lord Grey was released about the year 1404, having first paid to Owyn five thousand marks for his ransom, and leaving his two sons as pledges for the payment of five thousand more. The same authority informs us that Edmund Mortimer espoused the daughter of Owyn with great solemnity. The Pell Rolls (1 Henry V. June 27) leave us in no doubt as to the fact of that marriage. [(back)]

Footnote 114: This nobleman, John Charlton, Lord Powis, died on the 19th of October following, and was succeeded by his son Edward, who, on the 5th of August, (probably in 1402 or 1403,) applied to the council for a reinforcement.—Min. of Coun. [(back)]

Footnote 115: Many of our own historians have, either in ignorance or design, very much misled their readers on the subject.[(back)]

Footnote 116: It is not generally understood, (indeed, some of our historians have not only been ignorant of the fact, but have asserted the contrary,) that this princess was the elder sister of Katharine of Valois, married thirteen years after Isabella's death to Henry of Monmouth. Katharine was not born till after Isabella's restoration from England to her father's home. Isabella was born November 9, 1389; was solemnly married by the Archbishop of Canterbury to Richard II. in Calais, November 4, 1397 (not quite nine years old); was crowned at Westminster on the 8th of January following; was married to her second husband, 29th June 1406; and died at Blois, 13th September 1409.—Anselme, vol. i. p. 114.[(back)]

Footnote 117: One of these, Wm. ap Tudor, with thirty-one others, was pardoned July 8. In his petition he suggests that in all disputes between the burgesses and themselves, there ought to be a fair inquest, half Welsh and half English. This is supposed to have been the usual law; but probably in these turbulent times it might too often have been dispensed with for a less impartial mode of trial. Besides, among the many severe enactments against the Welsh, the King, in 1400, had assented to an ordinance proposed by the Commons, to remain in force for three years, that no Englishman should have judgment against him at the suit of a Welshman, except at the hands of judges and a jury entirely English.[(back)]

Footnote 118: The castles in Wales were at this time very scantily garrisoned; indeed, the smallness of the number of the men by whom some of them were defended is scarcely credible. And yet, in the exhausted state of the treasury of the King, of the Prince, of Henry Percy and others, those castles, even in the miserably limited extent of their establishments, could with difficulty be retained. When besieged, the garrison could never venture upon a sally. For example, Conway had only fifteen men-at-arms and sixty archers, kept at an expense of 714l. 15s. 10d. annually: Caernarvon had twenty men-at-arms and eighty archers: Harlech had ten men-at-arms and thirty archers.—See Sir H. Ellis's Original Letters. [(back)]

Footnote 119: The Monk of Evesham states expressly that, towards the end of this year, the King, intending to hasten to Wales for the third time, came to Evesham on Michaelmas-day, September 29, but not with so large a force as before; and on the third day, after breakfast, he proceeded to Worcester, whence, after the ninth day, with the advice of his council, he returned through Alcester to London.[(back)]

Footnote 120: On Monday, October 16, 1402, the Commons "thank the King for his great labour in body and mind, especially in his journey to Scotland; and because, on his return, when he heard at Northampton of the rebellion in Wales, he had at that time, and three times since, with a great army (as well the King as my lord the Prince) laboured in divers parts." When Owyn is represented by Shakspeare as recounting the various successful struggles in which he had tried his strength with Bolinbroke, the poet had solid ground on which to build the boastings of the Welsh chieftain:

"Three times hath Henry Bolinbroke made head
Against my power: thrice from the banks of Wye
And sandy-bottom'd Severn have I sent him
Bootless home, and weather-beaten back." [(back)]

Footnote 121: The regular appointment bears date 31st March 1402.[(back)]

Footnote 122: The Pell Rolls contain many items of payment about this time to the Prince of Wales; one of which specifies the sum "of 400l. for one hundred men-at-arms, each 12d. per day, and four hundred archers at 6d. per day, for one month, who were sent with despatch to Harlech Castle to remove the besiegers." Probably they had been sent some considerable time before the date of this payment, Dec. 14, 1401. [(back)]

Footnote 123: The whole of Anglesey was granted to Hotspur for life. 1 Hen. IV, 12th October 1399.—MS. Donat. 4596. [(back)]

Footnote 124: He was present in the Castle of Berkhamsted on the 14th of May, at the sealing of the marriage contract of his sister Philippa with King Eric.—Fœd. viii. 259, 260. [(back)]

Footnote 125: Our history supplies very scanty information as to the family of this royal lady. In the year 1412 a safe conduct is given to Giles of Brittany, son of the Queen, to come to England, to tarry and to return, with twenty men and horses.—Rymer, May 20, 1412.[(back)]

Footnote 126: Otterbourne. [(back)]

Footnote 127: "By sorcerye and nygrammancie." [(back)]

Footnote 128: The Pell Rolls (27th Sept. 1418) leave us in no doubt that John Randolf's goods were forfeited, a circumstance strongly confirming the report of his conspiracy. Payment is also made to certain persons for carrying (Feb. 8, 1420) John Randolf, of the order of Friars Minor, Shrewsbury, from Normandy to the Tower.[(back)]

Footnote 129: No doubt can remain as to the accuracy of the London Chronicle in this particular: several payments are on record, expressly declared to have been made out of the lands and property of this unhappy woman. Thus, the issue of a thousand marks to the Abbess of Syon (9th May 1421) is made from "the monies issuing from the possessions of Joanna, Queen of England."[(back)]

Footnote 130: See Acts of Privy Council, vol. i. p. 185. The Editor quotes Lobinau's Histoire de Brétagne, tom. ii. pp. 874, 878; and Morice's Histoire Ecclésiastique et Civile de Brétagne, tom. i. p. 433.[(back)]

Footnote 131: At the opening of the year 1402 (January 18), one hundred marks were paid by the treasury to the Bishop of Bangor, whose lands had been in great part destroyed.—Pell Rolls. This prelate was Richard Young, who was translated to Rochester in 1404.[(back)]

Footnote 132: To the present day the vestiges of two temporary encampments (army against army) are visible; and there are barrows in the neighbourhood, which, according to the tradition of the country, cover the bones of those who fell in this battle, not less, they say, than three thousand men. The remains of Owyn Glyndowr's camp are found at a place called Monachdy, in the parish of Blethvaugh; and about two miles below, in the parish of Whittow, is the earthwork supposed to have been thrown up by Sir Edmund Mortimer. Half-way between is a hill called Brynglas, where the battle is said to have been fought. In the valley of the Lug are two large tumuli, which are believed to cover the slain.[(back)]

Footnote 133: A general mistake has prevailed among historians with regard to this prisoner of Owyn's. Walsingham, Stowe, Hall, Rapin, Hume, Sharon Turner, with others, have uniformly represented Edmund Earl of March to have been the notable warrior then captured by Glyndowr; whereas he was only ten years of age, and a prisoner of the King. Dr. Griffin, a Monmouthshire antiquary, pointed out the mistake many years ago. [(back)]

Footnote 134: On the 14th of July the council issue commands to the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Norwich to array their clergy for the defence of the realm; a measure seldom resorted to, and only on occasions of great emergence and alarm. A fortnight before this order (30th June), the King had written from Harborough to his council, acquainting them with the victory gained for him over the Scots at Nisbet Moor by the Scotch Earl of March, and commanding them to protect the marches. [(back)]

Footnote 135: The Monk of Evesham says that in this year, about August 29, (Festum Decollationis Johannis Bapt.) the King went again with a great force into Wales, and after twenty days returned with disgrace.[(back)]

Footnote 136: An order, dated Ravensdale, is made on the sheriff of Lincoln to be ready, notwithstanding the last order, to go towards the marches of Scotland; and, if the Scots should not come, then to be at Shrewsbury on the 1st of September. [(back)]

Footnote 137: Walsingham's words would seem to apply more fitly to this second and more important expedition of 1402 than the preceding one in July: "Tantus armorum strepitus." [(back)]

Footnote 138: On 20th October 1402, a commission issued to receive into their allegiance and amnesty the rebels of Usk, Caerleon, and Trellech, in Monmouthshire. [(back)]

Footnote 139: Leland, in his Collectanea, quotes a passage from another chronicler, which records the very words of Percy and the King on this occasion. Percy asked the King's permission for Mortimer to be ransomed, to whom the King replied that he would not strengthen his enemies against himself by the money of the realm. Percy then said, "Ought any man so to expose himself to danger for you and your kingdom, and you not succour him in his danger?" The King answered in wrath, "You are a traitor; do you wish me to succour the enemies of myself and of my kingdom?"—"I am no traitor," rejoined Percy; "but a faithful man, and as a faithful man I speak." The King drew his rapier against him. "Not here," said Percy, "but in the field;" and withdrew. [(back)]

Footnote 140: Circa festum Sancti Andreæ. [(back)]

Footnote 141: Cott. Cleop. F. iii. fol. 122, b. [(back)]

Footnote 142: On the 1st of April 1403, the King most earnestly requests loans from bishops, abbots, knights, and others, in the sums severally affixed to their names, to enable him to proceed against the Welsh and the Scots. [(back)]

Footnote 143: The Pell Rolls (July 17, 1403) record the appointment of the Prince as the King's deputy in Wales, to see justice done on all rebels, and the payment of a sum amounting to 8108l. 2s. 0d. for the wages of four barons and bannerets, twenty knights, four hundred and seventy-six esquires, and two thousand five hundred archers. [(back)]

Footnote 144: On the next day, July 11, the King issued a proclamation against selling horses, or armour and weapons, to the Welsh.[(back)]

Footnote 145: Astonishing confusion pervades almost all our historians as to the circumstances under which Henry IV. first became acquainted with the defection of the Percies, and then hastened to resist their hostilities; and most absurd inferences as to the national interest taken in the ensuing struggle have in consequence been drawn. The King is almost universally represented as having left London, accompanied by all the forces he could, after much preparation, command, for the express purpose of quelling the rebellion of the Percies; whereas he left London for the express purpose of joining his forces to those of the Percies, and to proceed, in conjunction with them, against the Scots; and he had never heard of their defection till he reached Burton-upon-Trent. The news came upon him with the suddenness of an unexpected thunderstorm. [(back)]

Footnote 146: Minutes of Privy Council. [(back)]

Footnote 147: The date of this letter is not ascertained; it probably was in the July of 1402. It could scarcely have been in 1401, in which year he was certainly in Wales in June, and was appointed a commissioner for negociating a peace with Scotland on the 1st of September. In the beginning of July 1403 he was in Wales, or on its borders, negociating perhaps with Owyn Glyndowr's representatives, and in Cheshire exciting the people to rebellion.[(back)]

Footnote 148: The fact is, that in the years immediately preceding their defection, the Issue Rolls of the Exchequer abound with items of payment, some to a very large amount, to the Earl of Northumberland and his son. The names of both the father and the son, sometimes separately, often jointly, recur so constantly that they can scarcely escape the observation even of a cursory glance over the Rolls. Generally the payment is for the protection of the East March and Berwick; in some instances, for defending the castle of Beaumaris, and the island of Anglesea. On the 17th July 1403, payment is recorded of precisely the same sum to the two Percies for their services in the North March, and to the Prince for the protection of Wales; in each case, no doubt, falling far short of the requisite amount, but in each case probably as much as the Exchequer could afford to supply. [(back)]

Footnote 149: Preface to Sir H. Nicolas's Privy Council of England, p. 4.[(back)]

Footnote 150: That this chronicle was not compiled by one of Henry V.'s chaplains, is shown in the Appendix. [(back)]

Footnote 151: This date cannot have been earlier than February 1404, nor later than 1405. If we interpret the words of the MS. to mean the regnal year of Henry IV, the date will be the first of those two years; if it was the February subsequent to the election of Pope Innocent, October 1404, immediately after noticing which the MS. records this treaty, it will be the latter. The copy of this manuscript agrees in all points with the Sloane, except that it refers it to the 18th instead of the 28th of February.[(back)]

Footnote 152: Nevertheless, it should be remembered that many ancient accounts mention the Earl of Northumberland's visit to Glyndowr subsequently to his return from the flight into Scotland, and that the French auxiliaries invaded England under Glyndowr's standard long after the battle of Shrewsbury. It was on the last day of February 1408, that Rokeby, Sheriff of Yorkshire, compelled Northumberland and Lord Bardolf to engage with him in the field of Bramham Moor, when the Earl fell in battle, and Lord Bardolf died of his wounds. The Earl's head, covered with the snows of age, was exposed on London Bridge. The people lamented his fate when they recalled to mind his former magnificence and glory. Many (says Walsingham) applied to him the lines of Lucan:

Sed nos nec sanguis, nec tantum vulnera nostri
Afficere senis, quantum gestata per urbem
Ora ducis, quæ transfixo deformia pilo
Vidimus. [(back)]

Footnote 153: Hall says, "Because no chronicle save one makes mention what was the cause and occasion of this bloody battle, in the which on both parts were more than forty thousand men assembled, I word for word, according to my copy, do here rehearse." He then gives the heads of the manifesto, from which Hume has drawn his account.[(back)]

Footnote 154: The fact is, that Hardyng's character is assailable, especially on the point of forging documents. "Several writers have considered Hardyng a most dexterous and notable forger, who manufactured the deed for which he sought reward."[154-a] The first manuscript, the Lansdown, containing no allusion to this said manifesto, comes down to 1436. The Harleian copy, which contains it, comes down to the flight of Henry VI. for Scotland. In the Lansdown copy not one word is said about the oath sworn on Bolinbroke's landing, nor about the manifesto. [(back)]

Footnote 154-a: See Sir H. Ellis's Introduction to his edition of Hardyng.[(back)]

Footnote 155: Adhuc. [(back)]

Footnote 156: Acts of Council, vol. i. p. 185. [(back)]

Footnote 157: Monk of Evesham and Sloane, 1776.—In the passage relating to Mortimer's marriage in Walsingham's history, the word "obiit" is evidently an interpolation by mistake. It does not occur in the corresponding passage in his Ypodig. Neust. [(back)]

Footnote 158: Acts of Council, vol. i. p. 207. [(back)]

Footnote 159: Original Letters, Second Series. [(back)]

Footnote 160: Those documents, with the Author's remarks and reasonings upon them, will be found in the Appendix. [(back)]

Footnote 161: Quoted by Scott in his Notes on Marmion from a poem by the Rev. G. Warrington, called "The Spirit's Blasted Tree." [(back)]

Footnote 162: Hardyng represents the variance between Henry IV. and the Percies to have originated in three causes:—in their own refusal to give up certain prisoners of rank who had been taken at the battle of Homildon; in the King's refusal to let Sir Edmund Mortimer pay a ransom; and in the displeasure which the King had felt in consequence of an interview between Hotspur and Glyndowr, which had excited his suspicions. A commission was issued on the 14th March 1403, at the instance of the Earl of Westmoreland, to inquire about the prisoners taken at Homildon or "Humbledon."—Rym. Fœd. The Pell Rolls acquaint us with the great importance attached by Henry and the nation to this victory, by recording the pension assigned to the first bringer of the welcome news: "To Nicholas Merbury 40l. yearly for other good services, as also because the same Nicholas was the first person who reported for a certainty to the said lord the King the good, agreeable, and acceptable news of the success of the late expedition at Homeldon, near Wollor, in Northumberland, by Henry, late Earl of Northumberland. Four earls, many barons and bannerets, with a great multitude of knights and esquires, as well Scotch as French, were taken; and also a great multitude slain, and drowned in the river Tweed." This act of gratitude was somewhat late, if the entry in the Roll records the first payment. It is dated Nov. 3, 1405. At the date of this payment Percy is called the late Earl, because he had forfeited his title. [(back)]

Footnote 163: Walsingham records that the Earl of Dunbar, urging Henry to strike an immediate blow, quoted Lucan. He probably uttered the sentiment,—the quotation being supplied by the chronicler:

"Tolle moras; nocuit semper differre paratis,
Dum trepidant nullo firmatæ robore partes." [(back)]

Footnote 164: Mr. Pennant, in his interesting account of Owyn Glyndowr's life, (though he appears to have been very diligent in collecting traditionary materials for the work,) represents King Henry to have "made an expeditious march to Burton on Trent, on his way against the northern rebels," the Percies; when, on hearing of Hotspur having come southward, he turned to meet him. [(back)]

Footnote 165: That the battle was fought in Hateley Field is proved by a document containing a grant by patent (10 Hen. IV.) of two acres of land for ever to Richard Huse (Hussey), Esquire, for two chaplains to chant mass for the prosperity of the King during his life, and for his soul afterwards, and for all his progenitors, and for the souls of them who died in that battle and were there interred, and for the souls of all Christians, in a new chapel to be built on the ground. See Sir Harris Nicolas' preface to vol. i. p. 53. [(back)]

Footnote 166: The story that Henry adopted the unchivalrous expedient of fighting in disguise, arraying several persons, especially the Earl of Stafford and Sir Walter Blount, in royal armour, seems altogether fabulous. [(back)]

Footnote 167: The Scots fled, the Welshmen ran, the traitors were overcome; then neither woods letted, nor hills stopped, the fearful hearts of them that were vanquished.—Hall. [(back)]

Footnote 168: Hume says, most unadvisedly, "the persons of greatest distinction who fell on that day were on the King's side." [(back)]

Footnote 169: The Pell Rolls, so called from the pells, or skins, on rolls of which accounts of the royal receipts and expenditure used to be kept, are preserved both in the Chapter House of Westminster, and also in duplicate at the Exchequer Office in Whitehall. The Author had every facility afforded him of examining them at his leisure; and doubtless these documents contain much valuable information, throwing light as well on the national affairs of the times to which they belong, as on the more private history of monarchs and people. This is evident to every one on inspecting the records of any one year. But at the same time they read a lesson, clear and sound, on the indispensable necessity of constant care, and circumspection, and sifting scrutiny, before reliance be placed on them as evidence conclusive, and beyond appeal. The Author of these Memoirs entered upon an examination of the original documents, fully aware that the date of payment with reference to any fact could never be adduced in evidence that the event took place at the time the entry was made, but only that it had taken place before that time. Thus, a debt due to the Prince, or one in command under him, at the siege of a castle in Wales, or to tradesmen and merchants for supplying the forces with provisions, or to messengers sent with all speed bearing despatches to the castle during the siege, might remain unpaid for several years. He was, however, at the same time under an impression that the sum was recorded on the day of payment; at all events, that payments with reference to any insulated fact could not have been recorded as having been made before that fact had transpired. In both these points, however, he was mistaken. Payments were registered not only long after the day on which they were made, but absolutely before the event had taken place to which they refer, and which could not have been anticipated by any human foresight. Thus, not only is payment recorded as having been made to Hotspur nearly five months after his death, and to the Earl of Worcester, twelve weeks after he was beheaded, for expenses incurred by him in bringing the King's consort from Brittany to England in the January preceding, but absolutely the payment of messengers sent throughout the kingdom to announce Henry Percy's death and the defeat of the rebels near Shrewsbury, and to order all ferries and passages to be watched to prevent the escape of the rebels, is recorded as having been made on the 17th of July 1403, FOUR DAYS BEFORE THE BATTLE TOOK PLACE, and the very day on which the King wrote to his council, informing them of the rebellion, before he could himself possibly have anticipated the place or time of any engagement, much less the successful issue of such a struggle with the rebels. The fact is, these accounts were not kept with the regularity of a modern banking-house; and the entries of what may have been omitted were made at the audits, from rough minutes and account-books. Thus mistakes as to the date of actual payment probably were not rare. The Pell Rolls are useful assistants; they must not be followed implicitly as guides. [(back)]

Footnote 170: Sir Harris Nicolas, in his very valuable preface to the first volume of the Acts of the Privy Council, has fallen into the most extraordinary mistake of stating that the King, after the battle of Shrewsbury, "remained in or near Wales until November." He was certainly absent through six full weeks on his northern expedition. The same Editor more than once affirms that the battle of Shrewsbury was fought on the 23rd of July. [(back)]

Footnote 171: MS. Donat. 4597. [(back)]

Footnote 172: Mr. Morritt of Rokeby, in a letter to Sir Walter Scott, (Life of Scott, vol. ii. p. 387,) says, "In the time of Henry IV. the High Sheriff of Yorkshire who overthrew Northumberland, and drove him to Scotland after the battle of Shrewsbury, was a Rokeby. Tradition says that this Sheriff was before an adherent of the Percies, and was the identical knight who dissuaded Hotspur from the enterprise, on whose letter the angry warrior comments so freely in Shakspeare." [(back)]

Footnote 173: His friends and retainers spread strange reports throughout the north, of the King's death; and, assembling in great force, held the castles of Berwick, Alnwick, and Warkworth against the royal authority. The Earl of Westmoreland, Warden of the West March, therefore requested to be supplied with cannon and other means of assault to reduce these fortresses. The proceedings are given in detail among the Acts of the Privy Council, but do not call for a minute examination here. [(back)]

Footnote 174: Walsingham says expressly, it was on the morrow of St. Lawrence, August 11th. [(back)]

Footnote 175: On the 15th, he issues a proclamation for an array, to meet him at Worcester, on the 3rd of September at the latest, to proceed against Owyn. [(back)]

Footnote 176: It was on his return towards Wales that the military recommended Henry (then much in need of money) to take from the bishops their horses and gold, and send the prelates home on foot. The Archbishop resisted the outrage in a manly speech; and the King prayed a benevolence, which the clergy granted. [(back)]

Footnote 177: The King, speaking of the death of Hotspur, merely says, "He hath gone the way of all flesh."—Rot. Pat. 4 Hen. IV. p. 2. [(back)]

Footnote 178: Sir Harris Nicolas. [(back)]

Footnote 179: On the 12th, he had issued a proclamation from Hereford for his lieges to meet him there forthwith. [(back)]

Footnote 180: Caermarthen suffered very seriously in this war: the Pell Rolls, June 26, 1406, record the payment of a sum to the Burgesses and Goodmen of Caermarthen, in mitigation of the losses they had sustained. On this occasion the King arrived there on the 25th and stayed till the 29th. [(back)]

Footnote 181: On the 2nd of October, the King issued a proclamation against Owyn. He seems to have returned through Gloucester to London, immediately after the 17th October; on which day a warrant to Robert Waterton, to arrest Elizabeth wife of the late Henry Percy, is dated Gloucester.

On the 8th of October, those four persons whom Henry had left in charge of Caermarthen, implore the council by letter to send the Duke of York, or some other general, to take charge of the King's interests in that district, and to furnish troops to succeed those whom the King had left in trust there, since they had expressed their determined resolution not to remain beyond their month. [(back)]

Footnote 182: On the 1st of December the King acknowledges that the people of Kedwelly had repaired their walls which Owyn had injured; and, on the 19th, the castle of Llanstaffan is given to the custody of David Howell, who undertook to defend it with ten men-at-arms and twenty archers at his own expense, the late captain having been taken by Owyn. [(back)]

Footnote 183: On the 26th of October, the King commissions the Earl of Devon, with the Courtenays and others, to press as many men as might be necessary wherever they were to be found, and to proceed forthwith by sea to rescue the castle of Caerdiff, then in great peril. [(back)]

Footnote 184: Measures had been taken, in expectation, as it should appear, of these sieges. January 31, 1404, money is paid to the Prince to purchase sixty-six pipes of honey (to make mead), twelve casks of wine, four casks of sour wine, fifty casks of wheat-flour, and eighty quarters of salt, for victualling Caernarvon, Harlech, Llanpadarn, and Cardigan. [(back)]

Footnote 185: From this expression, Sir Harris Nicolas is induced to refer the letter (which is dated April 21st) to the year 1403, the Prince having been appointed Lieutenant of Wales on the 7th of March preceding. But the mention of the French auxiliaries, who appear not to have visited those parts till the year following, seems to fix the date of this document to the year 1404. [(back)]

Footnote 186: Owyn does not, however, seem to have exercised the princely prerogative of coining money. Indeed, no Welsh coin of any date is known to have been ever in existence. Thomas Thomas, the Welsh antiquary, says that a coin (or Dr. Stukeley's impression from a coin) of King Bleiddyd is now in the Cotton museum, of a date above nine hundred years before Christ; and that there are others of Monagan about the year one hundred and thirty before the Christian era. A search for them, it is presumed, would be fruitless. [(back)]

Footnote 187: The words in italics are in the original "erga nos et subditos nostros." "Illustris et metuendissimi domini nostri Owini Principis Walliarum."—See Rymer. [(back)]

Footnote 188: Irchonfeld, now called Archenfield, contains some of the most fertile land in Herefordshire. The inhabitants of Whitchurch, in that district, used to say, before modern luxury had taught us to reckon foreign productions among the necessaries of life, that, excepting salt, their parish supplied whatever was needed for their subsistence in comfort. [(back)]

Footnote 189: This was William Beauchamp, to whom the King had given, in the first year of his reign, the castles[189-a] of Pembroke, Tenby, Kilgarran, with others, by patent, 29th November, 1 Henry IV; and who was very closely besieged in the spring of 1401, and the summer of 1404, in the castle of Abergavenny.[(back)]

Footnote 189-a: MS. Donat. 4596.[(back)]

Footnote 190: At Doncaster, June 9th. [(back)]

Footnote 191: The Author leaves this sentence as he wrote it, before he had read the late account of the Field of Agincourt: in that work Henry of Monmouth is in these days, for the first time, accused of hypocrisy; with what justice the reader will decide after reading the charge, and the arguments by which it is now presumed to have been destroyed root and branch. They will be found in the second volume. [(back)]

Footnote 192: About this time, the King's treasury was in a deplorable state. The minutes of council suggest the payment of 1000 marks in part of the debts of the household, incurred in the time of Atterbury: and the allowance of a sum "for the time past, and to avoid the clamour of the people."—Minutes of Council, vol. ii. p. 37. [(back)]

Footnote 193: August 26, 1404, a thousand marks were assigned to the Prince for the safekeeping of Denbigh and other castles.—MS. Donat. 4597. [(back)]

Footnote 194: The ruins of Coity Castle are still interesting. They are near Bridgend, in Glamorganshire. [(back)]

Footnote 195: MS. Donat. 4597. [(back)]

Footnote 196: A few days before Christmas, some French effected a landing in the Isle of Wight, and boasted that, with the King's leave or without it, they would keep their Christmas there: but they were routed. The French demanded a tribute in the name of Richard and Isabella. [(back)]

Footnote 197: These letters are the tenth, eleventh, twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth, in Sir Henry Ellis' Second Series. He does not assign them to any date positively. "They were probably written," he says, "about 1404." It is here presumed, that they were not written till the opening of the year 1405. They all bear date between the 7th of January and the 20th of February. [(back)]

Footnote 198: The sow was an engine of the nature of the Roman Vinea, which, by protecting the assailants from the missiles of the besieged, enabled them to undermine the wall of a town or castle. [(back)]

Footnote 199: The parliament called Indoctum, or Lacklearning. It was in this parliament that the confiscation of the property of the bishops was proposed. [(back)]

Footnote 200: At this time Owyn Glyndowr confirms his league with the King of France by deed, dated and signed "in our Castle of Llanpadarn, the 12th of January 1405, and of our principality the sixth." [(back)]

Footnote 201: All the writers who have copied this letter, from Rymer downwards, have fallen into a ludicrous mistake here. Reading an n instead of a v in the words J'envoia (I sent), they have translated the passage, "within your lordship of Monmouth and Jennoia." Sir Harris Nicolas first supplied the true reading. The mistake led persons well acquainted with Monmouthshire (among others, the Author of these Memoirs,) to make different inquiries as to the lordship of Jennoia: they will now no longer wonder at the unfruitful issue of their search. [(back)]

Footnote 202: The author published under the name of Otterbourne says, that Owyn's son was made prisoner at Usk on the 25th of March, and one thousand five hundred of his men were taken or slain; and that, after the Feast of St. Dunstan, his chancellor was taken. There is reason to doubt whether that chronicler has not mistaken the place and time of the battle to which he refers; though it is not impossible that another battle (of which, however, we have no authentic record,) was fought at Usk a fortnight after the rebels were defeated at Grosmont: Grosmont is about twenty miles distant from Usk. [(back)]

Footnote 203: A review of this "aged Earl's" behaviour, from the first occasion on which he is introduced to our notice in these Memoirs to the day of his death, supplies only a melancholy succession of acts of broken faith. On the 7th of February 1404, before the assembled estates of the realm, on receiving the King's pardon for the past, he most solemnly swore upon the cross of Canterbury to be true and faithful to his sovereign Henry IV: he "swore also, on the peril of his soul, that he knew of no evil intentions on the part of the Duke of York, or of the Archbishop; and that the King might place full trust and confidence in them as his liege subjects." [(back)]

Footnote 204: Gascoyne does not appear to have been even suspended from his office in consequence of his refusal to sentence the Archbishop; he continued Chief Justice till after the King's death. [(back)]

Footnote 205: Sloane, 1776. [(back)]

Footnote 206: This is extracted from the Preface of Sir Harris Nicolas, p. 56. [(back)]

Footnote 207: The Acts of the Privy Council. [(back)]

Footnote 208: The extraordinary distress of the King from the want of pecuniary means cannot be questioned: though (independently of taxes and subsidies) large sums must have been flowing into the royal treasury, as well from the immense possessions belonging to the Duchy of Lancaster, as from the forfeited estates of the rebels. Still the King's coffers were drained. [(back)]

Footnote 209: Rymer's Fœd. [(back)]

Footnote 210: In the Minutes of a previous Council, probably in the spring of 1405, Lord Grey is directed to take charge of Brecon with forty lances and two hundred archers, and of Radnor with thirty lances and one hundred and fifty archers. [(back)]

Footnote 211: The council inform the King that the council of his Duchy had made an exception of the lordship of Monmouth, which should bear the most substantial of all the assignments. [(back)]

Footnote 212: On the 3rd of March 1406, the Commons speak of those castles in Wales "which, with God's blessing, might be hereafter reduced." [(back)]

Footnote 213: MS. Donat. 4596. [(back)]

Footnote 214: The Minutes of Council, at the end of March or the beginning of April, record a recommendation that the fines of the rebels as well as the rents and issues from their land, be expended on the wars in Wales: and John Bodenham was appointed comptroller of these fines. [(back)]

Footnote 215: St. Martin in the winter. [(back)]

Footnote 216: The French about this time made a sort of piratical attack on the Isle of Wight. [(back)]

Footnote 217: The Author must now add with regret, that even hypocrisy has been within these few last years laid to Henry's charge most unsparingly; with what degree of justice will be shewn in a subsequent chapter. [(back)]

Footnote 218: Stowe relates, that the King about this time, in crossing from Queenborough to Essex, was very nearly taken prisoner by some French vessels. He avoided London because the plague was raging there, in which thirty thousand persons died. [(back)]

Footnote 219: This dissatisfaction had been expressed in no very gentle language by the Commons in Parliament on the 7th of the preceding June, the very day on which they speak in such strong terms of the good and amiable qualities of the Prince. Indeed, we can scarcely avoid suspecting that the Commons intended to reflect, by a sort of side-wind, on the want in the King of an adequate estimate of his son's worth; with somewhat perhaps of an implied contrast between his excellences and the defects of his father, whose unsatisfactory proceedings seem at this time to have been gradually alienating the public respect, and transferring his popularity to his son. [(back)]

Footnote 220: In 8 Henry IV, (that is, between September 30, 1406, and September 29, 1407,) a licence is recorded (Pat. 8 Hen. IV. p. i. m. 17.), by which the King permits "his dearest son Henry, Prince of Wales, to grant the advowson of the church of Frodyngham, Lincolnshire,—which was his own possession—to the abbot and convent of Renesly for ever." Long subsequently to this, we find no immediate traces of any coolness between Henry and his father. [(back)]

Footnote 221: The Prince was present, 23rd January 1407, when his father received from the Bishop of Durham the great seal of England, and delivered it to Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury, then made Chancellor. (Claus 8 Hen. IV. m. 23, d.) [(back)]

Footnote 222: John of Bridlington.—John of Bridlington had been very recently admitted among the saints of the Roman calendar: probably he was the very last then canonized. Letters addressed to all nations of safe conduct to John Gisbourne, Canon of the Priory of Bridlington, who was then going to Rome to negociate in the matter of the canonization of John, the late Prior, were given by Henry IV. as recently as October 4, 1400. And Walsingham records that in 1404, by command of the Pope, the body of St. John, formerly Prior of the Canons of Bridlington, since miracles evidently attended it, was translated by the hands of the Archbishop of York and the Bishops of Durham and Carlisle. [(back)]

Footnote 223: This, we infer, must have been in the summer of 1409. Vide infra. [(back)]

Footnote 224: "Hen. Principi Walliæ retento 12^o die Maii anno 8vo de assensu consilii Regis moraturo penes ipsum Dominum Regem." [(back)]

Footnote 225: The Pell Rolls record payment (16th November 1407) to the Prince, by the hand of John Strange, his treasurer of war, for one hundred and twenty men-at-arms and three hundred and sixty archers, then remaining at the abbey of Stratfleure, to reduce the rebels, and give battle in North and South Wales. [(back)]

Footnote 226: The reason assigned by Henry IV. for convening this Parliament at Gloucester, must not be overlooked.—He believed that the nearer he himself, and his nobles, and his court, were to "his dear son, then commissioned to reduce the rebels in Wales," the greater probability there was of a successful issue of the Prince's campaign. [(back)]

Footnote 227: By the Author published as Otterbourne, we are told, that the Lady Le Despenser charged the Duke of York with having been the author of the plot for stealing away the sons of the Earl of March, and also for attempting the King's life. On the Pell Roll, beginning Friday, October 3rd, 1407, payment is recorded to divers messengers sent to seize for the King's use all the goods and chattels of Edward, Duke of York, and Lord Le Despenser: and, subsequently, payment to one Leget, for the safe conveyance of Lord Le Despenser from London to the castle of "Killynworth." The year before this, Edward, Duke of York, was the King's Lieutenant of South Wales. [(back)]

Footnote 228: Rolls of Parliament, 8 Hen. IV. [(back)]

Footnote 229: A minute of council (20th of February) states the bare fact that Owyn, late secretary to Glyndowr, had been committed to the custody of Lord Grey, from November 4, 1406, and had remained in ward four hundred and seventy-three days; and that Gryffyth of Glyndowrdy, (Owyn Glyndowr's son,) whom the Constable of the Tower had delivered to the same lord on the 8th of June, had been in custody two hundred and fifty days. [(back)]

Footnote 230: The custody of the Earl of March and his brother was given to the Prince of Wales on February 1st, 1409; and, since he had received nothing for their sustentation, an assignment of five hundred marks a year was made to him from the duties of skins and wool. On the 3rd of July, the King granted to him "the manors belonging to Edmund, son and heir of Roger Mortimer, Earl of March," during the young man's minority. The Prince's revenues seem to have been scanty in the extreme, and his father had recourse to many of the various modes of raising money usually adopted in those days. [(back)]

Footnote 231: On the 23rd of September, Henry executed a deed by which of especial grace he gave "for the term of life to William Malbon, our valet de chambre, the office of Raglore [Qu: Regulator?] of the commotes of Glenerglyn and Hannynyok in our county of Cardigan. Given under our seal in our castle of Caermarthen, in the ninth year of the reign of our lord and father." [(back)]

Footnote 232: The same commission is sent to the Duke of York, Lords Arundel, Warwick, Reginald Grey of Ruthyn, Richard Grey of Codnor, Constance, wife of the late Thomas Le Despenser, William Beauchamp, and others. [(back)]

Footnote 233: This prelate was John Trevaur, who was consecrated in 1395, and deposed in 1402. Much doubt hangs over the appointment of his immediate successor. Some say David, the second of that name, was appointed to the see in 1402. Robert de Lancaster was consecrated in 1411. A similar doubt exists as to the successor of Richard Young, Bishop of Bangor. Whether a prelate named Lewis immediately followed him on his translation to Rochester in 1404, or not, is very uncertain. [(back)]

Footnote 234: Sir Henry Ellis, having represented the mischief done to Wales by Owyn to have been incalculable, enumerates a few instances of the misery he caused: Montgomery deflourished, (as Leland expresses himself,) Radnor partly destroyed,—"and the voice is there, that when he won the castle he took threescore men that had the guard, and beheaded them on the brink of the castle yard." "The people about Dinas did burn the castle there, that Owyn should not keep it for his fortress." The Haye, Abergavenny, Grosmont, Usk, Pool, the Bishop's castle and the Archdeacon's house at Llandaff, with the cathedrals of Bangor and St. Asaph, were all either in part or wholly victims of his rage. The list might be much augmented. At Cardiff, he burnt the whole town, except the street in which the Franciscan monks dwelt. These brethren were reported to have contributed large sums to support Glyndowr's cause, and to enable him to invade England. [(back)]

Footnote 235: Some documents by mistake represent Lord Talbot and the Lord Furnivale as two distinct individuals. [(back)]

Footnote 236: MS. Donat. 4599. [(back)]

Footnote 237: "Jam raro insurgentium." [(back)]

Footnote 238: 24th February 1416. [(back)]

Footnote 239: This is a fact, as the Author believes, new in history; which, however, is placed beyond all doubt by the Issue Rolls of the Pell Office. 1 Henry V. 27th June, money is paid to John Weele for the expenses of the wife of Owen Glendourdi, of the wife of Edmund Mortimer, and of others, their sons and daughters: "et aliorum filiorum et filiarum suarum." On the 21st of March, also 1411, Lord Grey of Codnor is authorised, as we have already stated, by warrant to deliver Gryffuth ap Owyn Glyndourdy, (that is, Owyn's son Griffith,) and Owyn ap Griffith ap Rycard, to the constable of the Tower, till further orders.—MS. Donat. 4599.

This son, however, of Owyn had been a prisoner for a long time before the date of this warrant. Lord Grey had payment made for the expenses of Griffin, son of Owyn Glyndowr, as early as June 1, 1407.—Pell Rolls. [(back)]

Footnote 240: It does not appear, whether Owyn had ever sworn allegiance to Henry IV. [(back)]

Footnote 241: Pennant says he caused himself, in 1402, to be acknowledged Prince of Wales by his countrymen, and to be crowned also. [(back)]

Footnote 242: How beautifully does the poet express this same thought in the words of Harry Percy's widow:

"Had my sweet Harry had but half their numbers,
To-day might I, hanging on Hotspur's neck,
Have talked of Monmouth's grave."

Second Part of Henry IV. act ii.

This lady, Elizabeth Percy, had probably either said or done something to excite the suspicion of the King; for he issued a warrant for her apprehension on the 8th of October, after the battle of Shrewsbury. [(back)]

Footnote 243: The Welsh historians tell of various traditions relating both to the place and the time of his death, adding many a romantic tale of his wanderings among the mountains, and in caves and dens of the earth. But, unable to trace any grounds of preference for one tradition above another, the Author of these Memoirs leaves the question (in itself of no great importance), without expressing any opinion beyond what he has offered in the text. He must, however, add, that the traditions of his having passed many of his last days at the houses of Scudamore and Monnington, of his having been some time concealed in a cavern called to this day Owyn's Cave, on the coast of Merioneth, and of his having been buried in Monnington churchyard, are by no means improbable. The story of his corpse resting under a stone in the churchyard of Bangor is evidently a mistake; whilst the legend which would identify him with John of Kent seems altogether fabulous. [(back)]

Footnote 244: The Author takes the translation from the Appendix to Williams' Monmouthshire. [(back)]

Footnote 245: Vol. xxv. [(back)]

Footnote 246: MS. Donat. 4599. [(back)]

Footnote 247: The payments prove nothing as to the dates of the debts incurred. [(back)]

Footnote 248: These insulated facts may be thought to prove little of themselves; but they throw light (it is presumed) both on Henry of Monmouth's occupations, through these years of his life, and especially on the point of any rupture existing between himself and the King his father. [(back)]

Footnote 249: Parl. Rolls, 1410. [(back)]

Footnote 250: Rym. Fœd. vol. vii. [(back)]

Footnote 251: Stowe's London, ii. 206. [(back)]

Footnote 252: Rymer's Fœd. [(back)]

Footnote 253: Acts of Council. [(back)]

Footnote 254: That is, that they should ask the King's pardon. [(back)]

Footnote 255: On the 7th of September the King commissions his very dear son the Prince, or his lieutenant, to punish the rebels of Wales. [(back)]

Footnote 256: The Earl died on Palm Sunday, 16th of March 1410; immediately on whose demise the Prince was appointed captain. Minutes of Council, 16th June 1410. [(back)]

Footnote 257: There are many curious items of expenditure in the minutes of this council; one which few perhaps would have expected: "Item, to John Rys, for the lions in his custody per annum 120l." [(back)]

Footnote 258: In a minute of the council, about April this year, we find an item of expense which proves that Wales still required the presence of a considerable force: "Item, to my lord the Prince, for the wages of three hundred men-at-arms and six hundred archers who have lived and will live for the safeguard of the Welsh parts, from the 9th day of July 1410, to the 7th day of April then next ensuing, 8000l."

In this month the King implores the Archbishops of Canterbury and York to pray for him, and to urge all their clergy to supplicate God's help and protection of himself, his children, and his realm. And many prayers, and processions, and masses are ordered; and all in so urgent a manner as would lead us to think that there was some especial cause of anxiety and alarm, or some severe affliction present or feared.—Rymer.

On the 18th of August, a warrant is issued for the liberation of Llewellyn ap David Whyht, and Yon ap Griffith ap Lli, from the Tower.—MS. Donat. 4599.

In the parliament, at the close of this year, grievous complaints are made by the Border counties against the violence and ravages and extortions of the Welsh; and an order is sought "to arrest the cousins of all rebels and evil-doers of the Welsh, until the malefactors yield themselves up; for by such kinsmen only are they supported."

The cruelties of the Welsh are described in very strong colours by the petitioners; but it is not evident what was the result of their prayer. The rebels and robbers, they say, carry the English off into woods and deserts, and tie them to trees, and keep them, as in prison, for three or four months, till they are ransomed at the utmost value of their goods; and yet these malefactors were pardoned by the lords of the marches. The petitioners pray for more summary justice. Rolls of Parl. [(back)]

Footnote 259: Turner's Hist. Eng. [(back)]

Footnote 260: The character of the manuscript, on the authority of which this and another charge against Henry of Monmouth have been grounded, will be examined at length, as to its genuineness and authenticity in the Appendix. [(back)]

Footnote 261: Monstrelet says distinctly, that the Duke of Burgundy left Paris, at midnight, on the 9th of November. [(back)]

Footnote 262: "Transmissi sunt ergo;" without the slightest intimation of any interference on the part of the Prince. [(back)]

Footnote 263: These chroniclers show clearly the general opinion in their day to have been that there was for a time an alienation of affection between Henry and his father, brought about by envious calumniators; but that they were soon cordially reconciled: "Non obstante quorundam detractatione et accusatione multiplici, ipse, invidis renitentibus, suæ piissimæ benignitatis mediis, &c". Elmham, thus ascribes the cause of the temporary interruption of cordiality to the malice of detractors, and its final and lasting restoration to Henry's filial and affectionate kindness. [(back)]

Footnote 264: "Etsi nonnullorum detrectationibus in hoc aliquantisper fama sua læsa fuerit." Some writers have built very unadvisedly on this expression. It is at best obscure, and capable of a very different interpretation; and, even at the most, it only implies that the Prince was then the object of calumny at the hand of some persons who could not effect any lasting wound on his fame. [(back)]

Footnote 265: The testimony of these later authors is only valuable so far as they are believed to have been faithful in copying the accounts, or extracting from the statements, of preceding writings, the works of many of whom have not come down to our times. [(back)]

Footnote 266: The King had issued a proclamation at Canterbury, addressed to all sheriffs, and to the Captain also of Calais, forbidding his subjects of any condition or degree whatsoever to interfere in this foreign quarrel. April 10, 1412. [(back)]

Footnote 267: Rymer Fœd. [(back)]

Footnote 268: On February 9th, in the third year of his pontificate (1413), Pope John recommends John Bremor to the kind offices of the Prince; and, on the kalends of March (1st of March), the same pontiff sent Dr. Richard Derham with a message to him by word of mouth. [(back)]

Footnote 269: M. Petitot. [(back)]

Footnote 270: Jean Le Fevre, Morice, Lobineau. [(back)]

Footnote 271: Monstrelet. [(back)]

Footnote 272: Laboureur. [(back)]

Footnote 273: Hardyng has thus recorded this gratifying exhibition of generous feeling and noble resolve on the part of the English:

"He commanded then eche capitayn
His prisoners to kill them in certayn.
To which, Gilbert Umfreuile, Erle of Kyme,
Answered for all his fellowes and their men,
They should all die together at a tyme
Ere theyr prisoners so shulde be slayn then;
And, with that, took the field as folk did ken,
With all theyr men and all theyr prysoners,
To die with them, as worship it requires.
He said they were not come thyther as bouchers
To kyll the folke in market or in feire,
Nor them to sell; but, as arms requires,
Them to gouern without any dispeyre."
Hardyng's Chron.[(back)]

Footnote 274: There is some discrepancy in the accounts of the time of Clarence's departure. The Chronicle of London puts it nearly a month earlier than Walsingham: "And then rode Thomas, the King's son, Duke of Clarence, and with him the Duke of York, and Beauford, then Earl of Dorset, towards [South] Hampton with a great retinue of people; and on Tuesday rode the Earl's brother of Oxenford, and on the Wednesday rode the Earl of Oxenford; and they all lay at Hampton, and abode in the wynde till on the Thursday, the 1st day of August. The which Thursday, Friday, and Saturday they passed out of the haven XIIII ships,—were driven back on Sunday,—and after landed at St. Fasters, near Hagges, in Normandy." [(back)]

Footnote 275: In the "Additional Charters," now in the British Museum, purchased of the Baron de Joursanvault, we find letters patent from Charles VI, reciting that, by his permission, a treaty had been made with the Duke of Clarence and other English, who agreed to evacuate the country without making war; the Duke of Orleans giving to them the Earl of Angouleme as a hostage, for whose ransom the Duke was put to vast charges. Letters also are preserved from the Duke to his chancellor, reciting that a large sum was to be paid to the English, and in particular a hundred crowns of gold were to be paid to John Seurmaistre, chancellor of the Duke of Clarence, who was going to Rome on the affairs of the Duke of Clarence. This bears date, Blois, Nov. 20, 1412. His mission to Rome was, no doubt, to negociate for the dispensation necessary to enable the Duke to marry his uncle's widow. In the March of the next year, the same document acquaints us with the present of a head-dress from the Duke of Orleans to that lady, then Duchess of Clarence. [(back)]

Footnote 276: The Prince's appointment (when he took charge of the town) is dated March 18, 1410, which was the Tuesday before Easter; at which time there was due a debt, incurred before Henry had anything whatever to do with Calais, of not less than 9000l.—Minutes of Council, 30th July 1410. [(back)]

Footnote 277: Within a year of the Prince's accession to the throne, the Pell Rolls, January 27, 1414, record the payment of 826l. 13s. 4d. to the Bishop of Winchester, lent to the King when he was Prince of Wales. [(back)]

Footnote 278: Pell Rolls, 9 Hen. IV. 17th July, &c. [(back)]

Footnote 279: Turner's History. [(back)]

Footnote 280: This resolution of the King is embodied in his letter to the Burgomasters of Ghent, &c. dated May 16, 1412; in which he tells them that the Dukes of Berry, Orleans, and Bourbon had offered to surrender to him such lands of his as they held in the Duchy of Guienne, and to assist him in recovering the remainder. He prays the Burgomasters not to impede him in his designs. [(back)]

Footnote 281: On the 18th of April 1412, a warrant was issued to press sailors for the King's intended voyage. [(back)]

Footnote 282: Sir Robert Cotton, in his Abridgement of the Rolls of Parliament, seems to think (though without assigning any reason) that the "thanks were for well employing the treasure granted in the last parliament." [(back)]

Footnote 283: Elmham. [(back)]

Footnote 284: It may, moreover, be very fairly conjectured that the presence of the Prince at home was regarded by the people as far too important at this time to admit of his leaving the kingdom on such an expedition. It will be remembered that one of the first requests made by the parliament on the accession of his father was, that the Prince's life, and the welfare of the nation, might not be hazarded by his departure out of the kingdom; and subsequently, on his own accession, one of the first recommendations of his council was that he would remain in or near London. It is very probable that a similar wish might have interposed, had he, and not his brother, been commissioned to conduct the expedition to Guienne. Calais was so identified with the kingdom of England that his residence there is no exception to the rule. [(back)]

Footnote 285: In the Sloane manuscript, indeed, we are told that on a pecuniary dispute arising between Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Winchester, and Thomas Duke of Clarence, with reference to the will of the late Duke of Exeter, brother of the Bishop, who was his executor, and whose widow the Duke of Clarence had married, the Prince took part with the Bishop, and so the Duke of Clarence failed of obtaining his full demand. [(back)]

Footnote 286: A passage which the Author has lately discovered in the Pell Roll, 18th February 1412, will not admit of any other interpretation than that the Prince, at the date of payment, had ceased to be of the King's especial council. Members of that board (as appears by various entries) were paid for their attendance. In the Easter Roll, for example, of the previous year, payment on that ground "to the King's brother, the Bishop of Winchester," is recorded. The payment to the Prince is thus registered: "To Henry Prince of Wales 1000 marks,—666l. 13s. 4d.—ordered by the King to be paid in consideration of the labours, costs, and charges sustained by him at the time when he was of the council of our lord himself the King,"—"tempore quo fuit de consilio ipsius Domini Regis." [(back)]

Footnote 287: Perhaps more importance than the reality would warrant has been attached to the circumstance that the King on this occasion went to Rotherhithe, as though he withdrew from his son for safety to so unwonted and retired a place. It was not unusual for Henry IV. to hold his council at Rotherhithe. A year before this muster of the Prince's friends, the instructions given to the Earl of Arundel and others on their embassy to treat with the Duke of Burgundy for a marriage between his daughter and the Prince were signed by the King at Rotherhithe. In these instructions the Prince is mentioned throughout as though he and his father were inseparably united in the issue of the proceeding. "Till the report be made to the King and his very dear son the Prince." "Our lord the King is well disposed, and his very dear son my lord the Prince, to send aid." And Hugh Mortimer, one of the ambassadors, was chamberlain to the Prince. [(back)]

Footnote 288: Who were the inferior agents in this ungracious and mischievous proceeding we have not discovered. Perhaps, however, the Author would not be justified in suppressing a suspicion which has forced itself on his mind, that, among those who entertained no kind feeling towards the Prince, was Richard Kyngeston, then late Archdeacon of Hereford, for a long time employed in the King's household, and through whose administration the expenses seem to have swollen very much; to control which was one of the principal causes for the appointment of the Prince, the Bishop of Winchester, and others, to be members of the especial council of the King. This suspicion was first suggested by the absence of all allusion to the Prince in the Archdeacon's letters to the King from Hereford in the early years of the Welsh rebellion, though Henry was close at hand; and the very ambiguous expression, "Trust ye nought to no lieutenant," when the Prince himself was virtually, if not already by indenture, Lieutenant of Wales. [(back)]

Footnote 289: We have already seen that in the month of May the Prince in his own person (with his brothers) ratifies the league entered into between the King and the Dukes of Orleans, Berry, and Bourbon. Jean le Fevre dates it May 8th, 1412. [(back)]

Footnote 290: Among the conjectures which may suggest themselves as to the possible origin of the manuscripts' charge, that the Prince sought to obtain from his father a resignation of his crown, it might not be unreasonably surmised, nor would the supposition reflect unfavourably at all on Henry's character, that, finding his father to be in the hands of unworthy persons, preying upon his fortune, misdirecting his counsels, rendering the monarch personally unpopular, and bringing the monarchy itself into disrepute, (of all which evils there is strong evidence,) the Prince might have urged on his father the necessity of again intrusting the management of the public weal (which disease had incapacitated him from conducting himself) to the hands of the same counsellors who had before served him and the realm to the acknowledged profit and honour of both. The Prince might, influenced only by the most honest, and upright, and affectionate motives, have professed his willingness to undertake the duties again from which he had (with his colleagues) been as it should seem causelessly discharged. And such a proceeding on his part might easily have been so misrepresented as to constitute the charge contained in the manuscript. The representations of Elmham, to which we have already briefly referred, and which are confirmed by other early writers, are so express with reference to these points, that they seem to require something more than a mere reference in this place. "When his father was suffering under the torture of a grievous sickness, the Prince endeavoured with filial devotedness to meet his wishes in every possible way; and notwithstanding the biting detraction and manifold accusations of some, which (according to the prevalence of common opinion) made efforts to diminish the kind feeling of the father towards his son, the Prince himself, by means of his own most affectionate kindness, succeeded finally in securing with his father favour, grace, and blessing, though those envious persons still resisted it."—Cum idem pater gravissimis ægritudinis incommodis torqueretur, eidem juxta omnem possibilitatem, totis conatibus, filiali obsequio obedivit, et non obstante quorundam detractatione mordaci et accusatione multiplici quæ (prout vulgaris opinio cecinit) paterni favoris in filium moliebantur decrementa, ipse invidis renitentibus, suæ piissimæ benignitatis mediis, apud patrem, favorem, gratiam et benedictionem finaliter consequi merebatur. [(back)]

Footnote 291: Stowe's Annals. [(back)]

Footnote 292: How far we ought to believe the strange story about the Prince visiting his father in a mountebank's disguise, and praying the King to stab him with a dagger which he presented to him, is very problematical. There is much about it, and its circumstances, which gives it the air of great incredibility. Stowe here assumes, without good ground, that the suspicions of the King were excited by Henry's excesses. [(back)]

Footnote 293: Monstrelet, viii. [(back)]

Footnote 294: Anglia Sacra, vol. ii. p. 371. [(back)]

Footnote 295: Archæologia. [(back)]

Footnote 296: The story of the Chief Justice, &c. will be examined separately and at length. The charge from Calais of peculation (we have already seen) brought with it its own refutation: whilst the evidence on which alone the charge against him of undutiful conduct towards his father rests is proved to be altogether devoid of credit. [(back)]

Footnote 297: Milner, Church History, Cent. XV. [(back)]

Footnote 298: Turner, History of England, book ii. ch. x. [(back)]

Footnote 299: Rapin, who follows Hall, and gives no better authority, tells us that Prince Henry's court was the receptacle of libertines, debauchees, buffoons, parasites, and the like. The question naturally suggests itself, "Ought not such a writer as Rapin to have sought for some evidence to support this assertion?" Had he sought diligently, and reported honestly, such a sentence as this could never have fallen from his pen. Carte gives a very different view of Henry of Monmouth's court; and a view, as many believe, far nearer the truth. "It was crowded," he says, "by the nobles and great men of the land, when his father's court was comparatively deserted." [(back)]

Footnote 300: The Author has searched in vain for any contemporary manuscript of Walsingham's "Ypodigma Neustriæ." There is a copy in the British Museum, written up to a certain point on vellum; the latter part, containing these sentences, is on paper, and of comparatively a very recent date, transcribed, as the Author thinks, not from a previous MS. of the Ypodigma, but from a copy of the History. His ground for this inference is the circumstance that the interpolation in the History, as to Edmund Mortimer's death, which is not found in the printed editions of the Ypodigma, occurs in this MS. The MS. on vellum, preserved in the Heralds' College, is a copy of the History, transcribed, as the Author conceives, by a very ignorant copyist. The same interpolation of "Obiit" occurs here also; and, instead of calling the person spoken of Edmund Mortimer, it has "Edmundus mortifer." The Author was very desirous of comparing the original copy of Walsingham's Ypodigma, as dedicated to Henry V, with subsequent transcripts or versions. He entertains a strong suspicion that the sentences here commented upon were not in the original; but, in the absence of the means of ascertaining the matter of fact, he reasons upon them as though they were actually submitted to the eye of Henry himself. [(back)]

Footnote 301: "Quo die fuit tempestas nivis maxima, cunctis admirantibus de temporis asperitate; quibusdam novelli Regis fatis impingentibus aeris turbulentiam, velut ipse futurus esset in agendis frigidus, in regimine regnoque severus. Aliis mitiùs de personâ Regis sapientibus, et hanc aeris intemperiem interpretantibus omen optimum, quòd ipse videlicet nives et frigora vitiorum faceret in regno cadere, et serenos virtutum fructus emergere; ut posset effectualiter à suis dici subditis, 'Jam enim hyems transiit, imber abiit et recessit.' Qui reverâ, mox ut initiatus est regni infulis, repente mutatus est in virum alterum, honestati, modestiæ, ac gravitati studens, nullum virtutum genus omittens quod non cuperet exercere. Cujus mores et gestus omni conditioni, tàm religiosorum quàm laicorum, in exempla fuere." [(back)]

Footnote 302: Hardyng uses this expression:
"A new man made in all good regimence."[(back)]

Footnote 303: The Author having heard of a reported arrest of the Prince at Coventry for a riot, with his two brothers, in 1412, took great pains to investigate the authenticity of the record. It is found in a manuscript of a date not earlier than James I; whilst the more ancient writings of the place are entirely silent on the subject. The best local antiquaries, after having carefully examined the question, have reported the whole story to the Author as apocryphal. [(back)]

Footnote 304: It is not within the province of these Memoirs to record the Will of Henry IV, or to comment upon its provisions. There is, however, one sentence in it, a reference to which cannot be out of place here. In the year 1408, 21st January, a Will, which to the day of his death he never revoked, contains this sentence written in English: "And for to execute this testament well and truly, for the great trust that I have of my son the Prince, I ordain and make him my executor of my testament aforesaid, calling to him such as him thinketh in his discretion that can and will labour to the soonest speed of my will comprehended in this my testament. And to fulfil all things aforesaid truly, I charge my aforesaid son on my blessing." It may deserve consideration whether this clause in a father's last Will, never revoked, be consistent with the idea of his having expelled the son of whom he thus speaks from his council, and banished him his presence; and whether it may not fairly be put in the opposite scale against the vague and unsubstantial assertions of the Prince's recklessness, and his father's alienation from him. It must at the same time be borne in mind that the Will was made before the time usually selected as the period of their estrangement. The Will, nevertheless, was not revoked nor altered in this particular. [(back)]

Footnote 305: In a fragment of the records of a council, 6 May 1421, among other former debts not provided for, such as "ancient debts for Harfleur and Calais," occurs one item, "Debts of Henry IV;" and another, "Debts of the King, whilst he was Prince." We have seen that he was more than once compelled to borrow money on his plate and jewels to pay the King's soldiers. [(back)]

Footnote 306: Turner. [(back)]

Footnote 307: Second Part of Henry IV, act ii. sc 4. [(back)]

Footnote 308: Pell Rolls, 7 Hen. V. 28th Oct.—D^o. 22nd Nov. [(back)]

Footnote 309: Pell Rolls, 8 Hen. V. (2nd Oct. 1420.) For the price of harps for the King and Queen, 8l. 13s. 4d. A subsequent item (Sept. 4, 1421), records payment of 2l. 6s. 8d. for a harp purchased at his command and sent to him in France. [(back)]

Footnote 310: Thomas Occleve, or Hoccleve, was Clerk of the Privy Seal to Henry IV; many small payments to him in that character are recorded in the Pell Rolls. He was probably born in the year 1370, and lived to be eighty years of age. [(back)]

Footnote 311: Henry seems to have supplied himself with books on various other subjects of interest to him. He was, we are told, fond of the chase; and we find payment in the Pell Rolls of 12l. 8s. to John Robart for writing twelve books on hunting for the use of the King (21 Nov. 1421). Payment is also made for a variety of books to the executors of Joan de Bohun, late Countess of Hereford, his grandmother, 24th May, 1420. Two petitions, presented after his death to the council of his infant son, contribute also incidentally their testimony to the same view of his character. The first prays that the books in the possession of the late King, which belonged to the Countess of Westmoreland, "The Chronicle of Jerusalem," and "The Journey of Godfrey Baylion," might be restored. The other petition is, that "a large book containing all the works of St. Gregory the Pope," left to the Church of Canterbury by Archbishop Arundell, and lent to Henry V. by Gilbert Umfraville, one of the executors of the Archbishop's will, and which was directed in the last will of the King to be restored, might be delivered up by the Convent of Shene, where it had been kept, to the Prior of Canterbury.—Rymer. Fœd. 11 Hen. IV. [(back)]

Footnote 312: It is quite curious and painful, but at the same time instructive, to observe how differently the same acts may be interpreted, accordingly as they are viewed by persons under the influence of various prejudices and peculiar associations. In the case of Henry of Monmouth, the confession of his own unworthiness is adduced in evidence only of his former habits of dissoluteness and dissipation. The same confession in his contemporary, Lord Cobham, is hailed only as an indication of the work of grace in his soul.—See Milner, Cent. XV. ch. i. [(back)]

Footnote 313: Mr. Turner. [(back)]

Footnote 314: Preface to his Poetical Works. [(back)]

Footnote 315: Reference is here made to the creation of Henry as Prince of Wales, not in anywise for the purpose of insinuating that he would not have been raised to that honour by his father, had he been the "desperate gallant" which the poet delineates, but solely to show that the King's lamentation cannot be historically correct. The poet, having fastened on the general tradition as to Henry's wildness, gives rein to his fancy, and would fain carry his readers along with him in the belief that Henry had absented himself for full three months from his paternal roof, and revelled in abandoned profligacy; whilst the facts with which the poet has connected it, fix the outbreaking of the Prince to a time when the real Henry was not twelve years and a half old. Shakspeare's poetry is not inconsistent with itself, but it is with historical verity. [(back)]

Footnote 316: There are, however, other circumstances deserving our attention, which took place, some undoubtedly, and others most probably, within the three months preceding this very time. In the first place, the Commons, who had at the coronation sworn the same fealty to the Prince as to the King, on the 3rd of November petition that the creation of Henry as Prince of Wales might be entered on the record of Parliament; and on the same day they pray the King that the Prince might not pass forth from this realm, (in consequence of the movements of the Scots,) "forasmuch as he is of tender age." In the course of that same month of November 1399, a negociation was set on foot to bring about the espousals for a future union of the Prince with one of the daughters of the King of France. And about the same time (probably within a month of the scene of Shakspeare which we are examining,) the Prince makes a direct appeal to the council to fulfil the expressed wishes of his royal father as to his establishment, seeing that he was destitute of a suitable house and furniture; whilst not a hint occurs in allusion to any extravagance, or folly, or precocious dissipation, in any single document of the time. [(back)]

Footnote 317: See Collins' Peerage by Brydges, vol. ii. p. 267. [(back)]

Footnote 318: The same authorities record that he was knighted at the coronation of Richard II, July 16, 1377. [(back)]

Footnote 319: "Le Count de Northumberland del age de XLV ans; armez de XXX ans."

"Mons. Henr' de Percy del age de vynt ans, armez premierement, quant la chastell de Berwick etait pris par les Escoces, et quant le rescous fuist fait." [(back)]

Footnote 320: We cannot read the document on which these observations are founded without being reminded at how early an age in those times the youth of our country were expected to take up arms, and follow some experienced captain, or even themselves lead their warriors to the field. When Hotspur accompanied his father to the rescue of Berwick, he was only in his thirteenth year; his father had borne arms from the age of fifteen; and Henry of Monmouth (accompanied we know by a tutor or guardian, as probably Hotspur was at Berwick) was certainly in Wales, "chastising the rebels," soon after he had completed his thirteenth year. Another reflection, forced upon the mind by a familiar acquaintance with the political and the domestic history of those times, is on the very low average of human life at that period of the English monarchy. Few reached what is now called old age; and persons are spoken of as old, who would now be scarcely considered to have passed the meridian of life. It would form a subject of an interesting, and perhaps a very useful inquiry, were a philosophical antiquary (who would found his conclusions on a wide induction of facts, and not seek for evidence in support of any previously adopted theory,) to trace the existence, and operation, and extent of those causes, physical and moral, which exercise doubtless important influences over human life, and, under Providence, contract or lengthen the number of our days here. Unquestionably, such an investigator would immediately find many changes adopted in the present day conducive to longevity, in the structure of our habitations, the nature of our clothing, our habits of cleanliness, our food, comparative moderation in the use of inebriating liquors, with many other causes of health now believed to exist among us. To two causes of the average shortness of life, in operation through that range of years to which these Memoirs chiefly refer, the Author's mind has been especially drawn in the course of his researches: one of a political character,—in itself far more obvious, and chiefly affecting men; the other arising from habits of domestic life with regard to one of our institutions of all the most universally comprehensive,—a cause chiefly, but far from exclusively, affecting the life of females. The first cause, awful and appalling, is seen in the precarious tenure of human life, during the violence of those political struggles which deluged the whole land with blood. Those families seem to have been rare exceptions, of which no member forfeited his life on the scaffold or in the field; those houses were few which the scourge of civil or foreign wars passed over without leaving one dead. The second cause is traced to the very early age at which marriages were then solemnized. The day of Nature's trial came before the constitution had gained strength for the struggle, and an awful proportion of females was thus prematurely hurried to the grave; whilst the offspring also shared in the weakness of the parent. Comparatively a small minority sunk by gradual and calm decay; in the case of very few could the comparison of Job's reprover be applied with truth, "Thou shalt come to the grave in full age, as a shock of corn cometh in his season." [(back)]

Footnote 321: See these facts stated historically in previous chapters of this volume. [(back)]

Footnote 322: I Hen. IV. act iii. scene 1. [(back)]

Footnote 323: It is curious to contrast this description of his habits and pursuits, written by the Prince of tragedians a century and a half after Henry's death, with the advice represented to have been given by an old man to a young aspiring poet during his very lifetime. The Author is conscious of the tautology of which he is guilty in again recommending the reader not to pass over unread the extracts in the Appendix from Occleve and Lydgate.

"Write to him a goodly tale or two,
On which he may disport him at night.
His high prudence hath insight very
To judge if it be well made or nay.
Write him nothing that soweneth to vice.
Look if find thou canst any treatise
Grounded on his estate's wholesomeness."—Occleve.

"Because he hathe joy and great dainty
To read in books of antiquity,
To find only virtue to sow,
By example of them; and also to eschew
The cursed vice of sloth and idleness:
So he enjoyed in virtuous business,
In all that longeth to manhood
He busyeth ever."—Lydgate. [(back)]

Footnote 324: See these facts stated historically in former pages of this volume. [(back)]

Footnote 325: Hume is no authority on any disputed point. An anecdote, of the accuracy of which the Author has no doubt, throws a strong suspicion on the work of that writer, and marks it as a history on which the student can place no dependence. Hume made application at one of the public offices of State Records for permission to examine its treasures. Not only was leave granted, but every facility was afforded, and the documents bearing upon the subject immediately in hand were selected and placed in a room for his exclusive use. He never came. Shortly after his work appeared: and, on one of the officers expressing his surprise and regret that he had not paid his promised visit, Hume said, "I find it far more easy to consult printed works, than to spend my time on manuscripts." No wonder Hume's England is a work of no authority. [(back)]

Footnote 326: Pleas of the crown. [(back)]

Footnote 327: Shakspeare represents Henry as having given the Chief Justice the blow some time before the expedition against the Archbishop of York.—2 Hen. IV. act i. [(back)]

Footnote 328: The Chronicle of London, twice within a very brief space, records such a disturbance as the Chief Justice in Shakspeare is represented to have hastened "to stint;" but in each case, by adding the names of the King's sons, rescues Henry from all share in the affray.

"In this year (the 11th, 1410,) was a fray made in East-Cheap by the King's sons, Thomas and John, with the men of the town."

"This year, (the 12th, 1411,) on St. Peter's even, (June 28,) was a great debate in Bridge Street, between the Lord Thomas's men and the men of London." [(back)]

Footnote 329: The name of John Fastolfe, Esq. occurs in the muster rolls of Henry on his first expedition to France. But it must be remembered that not Falstaff, but Sir John Oldcastle, was made the buffoon on the stage at first, and continued so for many years, till the offence which it gave led to the substitution of Falstaff. "Stage poets," says Fuller, "have themselves been very bold with, and others very merry at, the memory of Sir John Oldcastle; whom they have fancied a boon companion, a jovial roister, and yet a coward to boot, contrary to the credit of all chronicles, owning him a martial man of merit. The best is, Sir John Falstaff hath relieved the memory of Sir John Oldcastle, and of late is substituted buffoon in his place.—Church History, iv. 38." [(back)]

Footnote 330: See Pell Rolls (Issue), 8 Henry V, March 11; 9 Henry V, April 1. See also Acts of Privy Council, vol. ii. pp. 5, 344, &c.] [(back)]

Footnote 331: There is so much of fable mingled with the traditionary biography of this "Devonshire worthy," that most persons probably will dismiss the claim altogether. He became weary of his life, and, being determined to rid himself from the direful apprehensions of dangerous approaching evils, he adopted this strange mode of suicide: having given strict orders to his keeper to shoot any person at night who would not stand when challenged, he threw himself into the keeper's way, and was shot dead upon the spot. "This story (says the author) is authenticated by several writers, and the constant tradition of the neighbourhood; and I myself have been shown the rotten stump of an old oak under which he is said to have fallen." But as to the cause which drove him to this rash act the same writers vary, and tradition is strangely diversified. One author says, that "on the deposition of Richard II, who had made him a judge, he was so terrified by the sight of infinite executions and bloody assassinations, which caused him continual agonies, that, upon apprehension what his own fate might be, he fell into that melancholy which hastened his end." His re-appointment to the office on September 30, 1401, by Henry IV, would have relieved him from these apprehensions. Others say, that, "having committed the Prince to prison in his younger days, he was afraid that, on the sceptre of justice falling into his hands, that royal culprit would take a too severe revenge thereof; and this filled him with such insuperable melancholy, that he was driven to the desperate act of self-murder." But his appointment to succeed Gascoyne as Chief Justice of the King's Bench, March 29, 1413, must have conquered that melancholy; and he discharged that office through the whole of Henry V.'s reign, and through one year of Henry VI, after which he died, December 20, 1422. [(back)]

Footnote 332: In a manuscript, a copy of which was shown to a gentleman who gave the Author the information, belonging to the Markhams, an ancient family of Nottinghamshire, of about the date of Queen Elizabeth, the honour is claimed for Markham: and in an old play, which turns the whole into broad farce, (probably anterior to Shakspeare,) the Judge is made to commit the Prince to the Fleet. [(back)]

Footnote 333: Or even if he died, as some say, on St. Sylvester's Day, (December 30,) 1409. [(back)]

Footnote 334: Pat. 2 Henry IV. p. 1. m. 28. [(back)]

Footnote 335: How far the high esteem in which the memory of Judge Gascoyne has been held may be owing to the tradition concerning Henry of Monmouth, we need not inquire. His name has constantly been held in great honour. Judge Denison, by his own especial desire, was buried close to the grave of Gascoyne. [(back)]

Footnote 336: The Magazine is followed in its erroneous views by subsequent writers. [(back)]

Footnote 337: Dugdale is unquestionably mistaken, and the many authors who follow him, in fixing Hankford's appointment to January 29, 1 Hen. V. 1414. He refers for his authority to "Patent 1 Hen. V. m. 33;" but no entry of the kind is found there. [(back)]

Footnote 338: It must be regarded as a very curious coincidence connected with this argument, that the 17th of December should have fallen on a Sunday, both in the year MCCCCXIII, and in MCCCCXIX, but in no other year between 1402 and 1421. [(back)]

Footnote 339: The mention in the body of the Will of the names of his former wife, and of his second wife then alive, and the record of the Will of that second wife, who states herself the widow of William Gascoyne, late Chief Justice, preserved in the same register, fix the identity of the testator beyond dispute. The Author was first indebted for a knowledge of the existence of this document to the volume called Testamenta Eboracensia, published by the Surtees Society; though he cannot suppress the surprise with which he read the comment of the editors, the chief mistake of which was discovered in time to be rectified in an "erratum" after the work had been printed. [(back)]

Footnote 340: For this fact, and many others, as well as for most valuable suggestions, and assistance of various kinds, the Author is indebted to T. Duffus Hardy, Esq. of the Record Office in the Tower,—a gentleman who, with a mind admirably stored with antiquarian knowledge, possesses also the faculty of applying his stores to the best advantage in the developement of whatever subject he undertakes, and the principle also of employing his knowledge and abilities in the cause of truth. [(back)]

Footnote 341: Gascoyne had been Chief Justice of the King's Bench more than twelve years,—a portion of life considerably beyond the average duration of their office in those high functionaries. Reckoning either from Hanlow, 1258, in the reign of Henry III, or from Gascoyne, in 1401, in the reign of Henry IV, to the present time, the average number of years through which the Chief Justices of the King's Bench have retained their seats is below nine. Through the last century, however, (reckoning from Lord Hardwick's appointment, in 1733, to Lord Tenterden's death, in 1832,) the average has risen to above fourteen years. [(back)]

Footnote 342: He was in a condition to lend the King money when the exigencies of the state pressed him hard. Among other creditors, the Pell Rolls (14th May 1420) record the repayment of a loan to the executors of William Gascoyne, which was within half a year of his death. [(back)]

Footnote 343: By the kind assistance of those to whom the state of the records of our courts of justice is most familiar, the Author has been enabled to assure himself satisfactorily that they offer nothing which can throw any light whatever on the question examined in these pages. [(back)]

Footnote 344: See Ellis. [(back)]

Footnote 345: This ecclesiastic was much in the royal confidence. By a commission dated June 16, 1404, he, as Archdeacon of Hereford, is authorized to receive the subsidy in the counties of Hereford, Gloucester, and Warwick, and to dispose of it in the support of men-at-arms and archers to resist the Welsh.[345-a] And sums, three years afterwards, were paid to him out of the exchequer for the maintenance of soldiers remaining with him in the parts of Wales for the safeguard of the same. He seems to have been not only the dispenser of the money, but the captain of the men. The debt, however, had probably been due from the crown for a long time. He was for many years Master of the Wardrobe to Henry IV; and during his time the expences of the court appear to have become more extravagant, and to have led to that remonstrance and interference of the council and parliament, to which reference has been made in the body of this work. Pell Rolls, Issue, 5 May 1407.—Do. Michs. 1409. [(back)]

Footnote 345-a: MS. Donat. 4597. [(back)]

Footnote 346: This letter is the more valuable, because, though the year is not annexed in words, the information that he wrote it on Sunday, July 8, fixes the date to 1403: the next year to which this date would apply being 1408, four years after Kyngeston had ceased to be Archdeacon of Hereford; and far too late for any such apprehension of great mischief from Glyndowr. [(back)]

Footnote 347: The custody of Carreg Kennen (Karekenny) was granted to John Skydmore, 2 May 1402. [(back)]

Footnote 348: Ellis. [(back)]

Footnote 349: This letter was probably written on Saturday, July 7, 1403,—that is, on the Translation of St. Thomas the Martyr. [(back)]

Footnote 350: This partisan of Owyn, who is here said to have gone to share with him in the spoil of Carmarthen, partook even in greater bitterness of his cup of affliction. He was taken prisoner and beheaded. The Chronicle of London asserts that his quarters were salted, and sent to different parts of the kingdom; but this assertion, in an affair of little importance, shows how small reliance can be placed on anonymous records. The King, by writ of privy seal, 29 May 1412, commands Rees Duy's body, then in the custody of his officers, to be buried in some consecrated cemetery. It had perhaps been exposed for some time. MS. Donat. 4599, p. 128. [(back)]

Footnote 351: See page 331. [(back)]

Footnote 352: The Author has not formed any satisfactory opinion as to the meaning of the phrase "his ghost maistried with danger." Perhaps it implies that the spirit of the Prince was not under the control of such passions as would render it a service of danger to prefer a suit to him. [(back)]

Footnote 353: In some MSS. it is "Hoccleve." [(back)]

Footnote 354: "Kyth thy love," means "make thy love known." Our word "kith," in the proverb "kith and kin," means persons of our acquaintance. [(back)]

Footnote 355: Bib. Reg. 17. D. 6. p. 34. [(back)]