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

CHAPTER XV.

shakspeare. — the author's reluctance to test the scenes of the poet's dramas by matters of fact. — necessity of so doing. — hotspur in shakspeare the first to bear evidence to henry's reckless profligacy. — the hotspur of history the first who testifies to his character for valour, and mercy, and faithfulness in his duties. — anachronisms of shakspeare. — hotspur's age. — the capture of mortimer. — battle of homildon. — field of shrewsbury. — archbishop scrope's death.

The Author has already intimated in his Preface the reluctance with which he undertook to examine the descriptions of the Prince of dramatic poets with a direct reference to the test of historical truth; and he cannot enter upon that inquiry in this place without repeating his regret, nor without alleging some of the reasons which seem to make the investigation an imperative duty in these Memoirs.

In our endeavours to ascertain the real character and conduct of Henry V, it is not enough that we close the volume of Shakspeare's dramas, determining to allow it no weight in the scale of evidence. If nothing more be done, Shakspeare's representations will have weight, despite of our resolution. Were Shakspeare any ordinary writer, or were the parts of his remains which bear on our subject few, unimportant, and uninteresting, the biographer, without endangering the truth, might lay him aside with a passing caution against admitting for evidence the poet's views of facts and character. But the large majority of readers in England, who know anything of those times, have formed their estimate of Henry from the scenic descriptions of Shakspeare, or from modern historians who have been indebted for their information to no earlier or more authentic source than his plays. Even writers of a higher character, and to whom the English student is much indebted, would tempt us to rest satisfied with the general inferences to be drawn from the scenes of Shakspeare, though they willingly allow that much of the detail was the fruit only of his fertile imagination. A modern author[313] opens his chapter on the reign of Henry V. with a passage, a counterpart to which we find expressed, or at least conveyed by implication, in many other writers, to whose views, however, the searcher after truth and fact cannot possibly accede. "With the traditionary irregularities of the youth of Henry V. we are early familiarized by the magical pen of Shakspeare, never more fascinating than in portraying the associates and frolics of this illustrious Prince. But the personifications of the poet must not be expected to be found in the chroniclers who have annalised this reign."—"The general facts of his irregularities, and their amendment, have never been forgotten; but no historical Hogarth has painted the individual adventures of the princely rake."

It is not because we would palliate Henry's vices, if such there be on record, or disguise his follies, or wish his irregularities to be forgotten in the vivid recollections of his conquests, that we would try "our immortal bard" by the test of rigid fact. We do so, because he is the authority on which the estimate of Henry's character, as generally entertained, is mainly founded. Mr. Southey,[314] indeed, is speaking only of his own boyhood when he says, "I had learned all I knew of English history from Shakspeare." But very many pass through life without laying aside or correcting those impressions which they caught at the first opening of their minds; and never have any other knowledge of the times of which his dramas speak, than what they have learned from his representations. The great Duke of Marlborough is known to have confessed that all his acquaintance with English history was derived from Shakspeare: whilst not unfrequently persons of literary pursuits, who have studied our histories for themselves, are to the last under the practical influence of their earliest associations: unknown to their own minds the poet is still their instructor and guide. And this influence Shakspeare exercises over the historical literature of his country, though he was born more than one hundred and sixty years after the historical date of that scene in which he first speaks of the "royal rake's" strayings and unthriftiness; and though many new sources, not of vague tradition, but of original and undoubted record, which were closed to him, have been opened to students of the present day. It has indeed been alleged that he might have had means of information no longer available by us; that manuscripts are forgotten, or lost, which bore testimony to Henry's career of wantonness. But surely such a suggestion only renders it still more imperative to examine with strict and exact scrutiny into the poet's descriptions. If these are at all countenanced by a coincidence with ascertained historical facts, we must admit them as evidence, secondary indeed, but still the best within our reach. But if they prove to be wholly untenable when tested by facts, and irreconcileable with what history places beyond doubt, we have solid grounds for rejecting them as legitimate testimonies. We must consider them either as the fascinating but aëry visions of a poet who lived after the intervention of more than a century and a half, or as inferences built by him on documents false and misleading.

It may be said that the poet, in his delineation of the manners of the time, and in his vivid representations of the sallies and excesses of a prince notorious for his wildness and profligate habits, must not be shackled by the rigid and cold bands of historical verity, any more than we would require of him, in his description of a battle, the accuracy of a general's bulletin. But if a master poet should so describe the battle as to involve on the part of the commander the absence of military skill, and of clear conceptions of a soldier's duty, or ignorance of the enemy's position and strength, and of his own resources, or a suspicion of faintheartedness and ungallant bearing, truth would require us to analyse the description, and either to restore the fair fame of the commander, or to be convinced that he had justly lost his military character. On this principle we must refer Shakspeare's representations to a more unbending standard than a poet's fantasy.

The first occasion on which reference is found to the habits and character of Henry, occurs in the tragedy of Richard II, act v. scene 3, in which his father is represented as making inquiries, of "Percy and other lords," in such terms as these:

"Can no man tell of my unthrifty son?
'Tis full THREE MONTHS since I did see him last:
If any plague hang over us, 'tis he.
I would to Heaven, my lords, he might be found!
Inquire at London 'mongst the taverns there,
For there, they say, he daily doth frequent,
With unrestrained loose companions;
Even such, they say, as stand in narrow lanes,
And beat our watch, and rob our passengers;
While he, young, wanton, and effeminate boy,
Takes on the point of honour to support
So dissolute a crew."

To this inquiry Percy is made to answer,

"My lord! some two days since I saw the Prince,
And told him of these triumphs held at Oxford."
Bolinbroke.—"And what said the gallant?"
Percy.—"His answer was—he would unto the stews,
And from the common'st creature pluck a glove,
And wear it as a favour; and, with that,
He would unhorse the lustiest challenger."
Bolinbroke.—"As dissolute as desperate: yet, through both,
I see some sparkles of a better hope,
Which elder days may happily bring forth."

To understand what degree of reliance should be placed upon this passage as a channel of biographical information, it is only necessary to recal to mind two points established beyond doubt from history: first, that the Prince was then not twelve years and a half old; and secondly, that the circumstance, previously to which this lamentation must be fixed, took place not three months after the coronation, subsequently to which the King created this his "unthrifty son," "this gallant, dissolute as desperate," Prince of Wales.[315] The scene is placed by Shakspeare at Windsor; and the conversation between Henry IV. inquiring about his son, and Percy, so unkindly fanning his suspicions, is ended abruptly by the breathless haste of Lord Albemarle, who breaks in upon the court to denounce the conspiracy against the King's life. This could not have been later than January 4, 1400; for on that day the conspirators entered Windsor, after Henry IV, having been apprised of their plot, had left that place for London. The coronation was celebrated on the 13th of the preceding October, and the Prince of Wales was born August 9, 1387. The whole year before his father's coronation he was in the safe-keeping of Richard II, through some months of it in Ireland; and, on Richard's return to England, he was left a prisoner in Trym Castle. How many days before the coronation he was brought from Ireland to his father, does not appear; probably messengers were sent for him immediately after Richard fell into the hands of Henry IV. The certainty is, that "full three months could not have passed" since they last saw each other; the strong probability is, that both father and son had kept the feast of Christmas together at Windsor. That a boy of not twelve years and a half old, just returned from a year's safe-keeping in the hand of his father's enemy and whom his father, not three months before, had created Prince of Wales with all the honours and expressions of regard ever shown on similar occasions, should have been the leader and supporter of a dissolute crew of unrestrained loose companions, the frequenter of those sinks of sin and profligacy which then disgraced the metropolis (as they do now), is an improbability so gross, that nothing but the excellence of Shakspeare's pen could have rendered an exposure of it necessary.[316]

The second introduction of the same subject occurs in the scene in the court of London, the very day after the news arrived of Mortimer being taken by Owyn Glyndowr.

Westmoreland.—"But yesternight; when all athwart there came
A post from Wales loaden with heavy news;
Whose worst was that the noble Mortimer,
Leading the Herefordshire men to fight
Against the irregular and wild Glyndower,
Was by the rude hands of that Welshman taken."

The anachronism of Shakspeare, in making the two reports, of Mortimer's capture and of the battle of Homildon, reach London on the same day, though there was an interval of more than three months between them, only tends to show that we must not look to him as a channel of historical accuracy. How utterly inappropriate is the desponding lamentation of Henry IV, the bare reference to actual dates is alone needed to show.

Westmoreland.—"Faith! 'tis a conquest for a prince to boast of."
K. Henry.—"Yea: there thou makest me sad, and makest me sin
In envy that my Lord Northumberland
Should be the father of so blest a son;
Whilst I, by looking on the praise of him,
See riot and dishonour stain the brow
Of my young Harry. O that it could be proved
That some night-tripping fairy had exchanged
In cradle-clothes our children where they lay,
And called mine Percy, his Plantagenet;
Then I would have his Harry, and he mine!
But let him from my thoughts."

In this glowing page of Shakspeare is preserved one of those exquisite, fascinating illusions which are scattered up and down throughout his never-dying remains, and which, arresting us everywhere, hold the willing imagination spell-bound, till, after reflection, Truth rises upon the mind, and with one gleam of her soft but omnipotent light varies the charm, and contrasts the satisfaction of reality with the pleasures of fiction. The poet's imagery paints to our mind's eye Harry Hotspur and Harry of Monmouth lying each in his "cradle-clothes" on some one and the same night, when the powers of Fairy-land might have exchanged the boys, and called Percy, Plantagenet. To effect such a change, however, of the first-born sons of Northumberland and Bolinbroke, an extent of power and skill must have been in requisition far beyond what their warmest advocates are wont to assign to those "night-tripping" personages. Hotspur was at least one-and-twenty years old when Henry of Monmouth "lay in his cradle-clothes." The pencil also of the painter has lent its aid to confirm and propagate the same delusion as to the relative ages of these two warriors. In the representation (for example) of the Battle-field of Shrewsbury, Hotspur and Henry, the heroes in the fore-ground, are models of two gallant youths, equal in age, struggling for the mastery: and in the chamber-scene, whilst Henry is represented in all the freshness of a beardless youth, his father shows the worn-out veteran; his brow and cheeks deeply furrowed, his whole frame borne down towards the grave by length of days as much as by infirmities, though when he died his age did not exceed his forty-seventh year.

The time of Hotspur's birth has generally been considered matter only for conjecture; but whether we draw our inferences from undisputed facts, and the clearest deductions of sound argument, or rest only on the direct evidence now for the first time, it is presumed, brought forward, we cannot regard Hotspur at the very lowest calculation as a single year younger than Henry of Monmouth's father, the very Bolinbroke whom the poet makes to utter such a lamentation and such a wish. Bolinbroke's birth-day cannot be assigned (as we have seen) to an earlier date than April 6, 1366; and the Annals of the Peerage[317] refer Hotspur's birth to May 20, 1364.[318] The Author, however, is disposed to think that the Annals have antedated his birth by more than a year at least. In the Scrope and Grosvenor controversy,[319] the record of which supplied us with the ages of Glyndowr and his brother, the commissioners examined both Hotspur and his father. The father, usually called the "aged Earl," gave his testimony on the 19th November 1386, as "the Earl of Northumberland, of the age of forty-five years, having borne arms thirty years." Hotspur, who was examined on the 30th of the preceding October, that is, in the year before Henry of Monmouth was born, gave his testimony as "Sir Henry Percy, of the age of twenty years." Hotspur must, therefore, have been born between the end of October 1365 and the end of October 1366. And if the annalists are right in fixing upon the day of the year on which he was born, his birth-day was in the month next following the birth-day of Bolinbroke. On the most probable calculation, he might have been five months older than Bolinbroke; he could not have been seven months younger. It is a curious and interesting circumstance, that, instead of specifying the number of years through which he had borne arms, Hotspur referred the commissioners to the first occasion of his having seen and shared the real service of battle: "First armed when the castle of Berwick was taken by the Scots, and when the rescue was made." The surprise of Berwick by the Scots took place on the Thursday before St. Andrew's day in the year 1378, (which fell on November 25,) so that Hotspur passed his noviciate in the field of battle when he was only just past his twelfth year, and almost nine years before Henry of Monmouth was born. In 1388, when Henry was only one year old, Hotspur was taken prisoner by the Scots. His eldest son, whom Henry with so much generosity restored to his honours and estates, was born February 3, 1393.[320]

Though these facts prove that Shakspeare has spread through the world a most erroneous opinion of the relative ages and circumstances of Bolinbroke, Hotspur, and Henry of Monmouth,—a circumstance, indeed, in itself of no great importance,—the question on which we are engaged will be more immediately and strongly affected if it can be shown precisely, that at the very time when (according to the poet's representation) Henry IV. uttered this lamentation, expressive of deep present sorrow at the reckless misdoings of his son, and of anticipations of worse, that very son was doing his duty valiantly and mercifully in Wales.

On the lowest calculation, a full month before Mortimer's capture, the young royal warrior had scoured the whole country of Glyndwrdy in person, and had burnt two of Owyn's mansions; whilst the strong probability is, that he had headed his troops on that expedition more than a year before.

It is very remarkable (though Shakspeare doubtless never became acquainted with the circumstance) that the identical Percy whom he makes Henry IV. desire to have been his son, instead of his own Henry, bears ample testimony, at least a full year previously, to the valour and kind-heartedness of him on whose brow the poet makes his father lament "the stain of riot and dishonour."

Sir Edmund Mortimer was taken by Glyndowr at Melienydd in Radnor, June 12th, 1402; and, as early as the 3rd of May 1401, Percy wrote from Caernarvon to the council that North Wales was obedient to the law, except the rebels of Conway and Rees Castles, who were in the mountains, whom he expresses his expectation that the Prince of Wales would subdue. "These will be right well chastened," said he, "if God please, by the force and governance which my lord the Prince has sent against them, as well of his council as of his retinue." In the same letter Hotspur informs the King's council that the commons of the counties of Caernarvon and Merioneth (who had come before him in the sessions which he was then holding as Chief Justice of North Wales) had humbly expressed their thanks to the Prince for the great pains of his kind good-will in endeavouring to obtain their pardon."[321] Henry Prince of Wales, whom the poet makes his father thus to disparage at the mere mention of Henry Percy's victory, would lose nothing in point of prowess, and generosity, and high-minded bearing, at this very early period of his youth, by a comparison either with Percy himself, or with any other of his contemporaries, whose names are recorded in history.

The next passage of our historical dramatist which requires to be examined, occurs in that very affecting interview between Henry and his father on the news of Percy's rebellion, and the resolution declared to take the field at Shrewsbury.[322]

"I know not whether God will have it so,
For some displeasing service I have done,
That, in his secret, doom out of my blood
He breeds revengement and a scourge for me.
But thou dost, in thy passages of life,
Make me believe that thou art only marked
For the hot vengeance and the rod of heaven,
To punish my mistreadings. Tell me else,
Could such inordinate and low desires,
Such barren, base, such lewd, such mean attempts,
Such barren pleasures, rude society,[323]
As thou art matched withal and grafted to,
Accompany the greatness of thy blood,
And hold their level with thy princely heart?
Thy place in council thou hast rudely lost,
Which by thy younger brother is supplied;
And art almost an alien to the hearts
Of all the court, and princes of my blood."

The battle of Shrewsbury was fought July 21, 1403. The tragedian represents Henry the Prince as at this period in the full career of his unbridled extravagances; his father bewailing his sad degeneracy, himself pleading nothing in excuse, praying for pardon, and promising amendment. It must appear passing strange to those who have drawn their estimate of those years of Prince Henry's youth from Shakspeare, to find the real truth to be this. Not only was he not then in London the profligate debauchee, the reckless madcap, the creature of "vassal fear and base inclination," "the nearest and dearest of his father's foes;" not only was he acting valiantly in defence of his father's throne; but that very father's own pen is the instrument to bear chief testimony to his valour and noble merits at that very hour. It is as though history were designed on set purpose, and by especial commission, to counteract the bewitching fictions of the poet. Henry IV. was on his road to assist Hotspur and the Earl of Northumberland, in utter ignorance of their rebellion. Arrived at Higham Ferrers, he wrote to his council, informing them that he had received, as well by his son Henry's own letters, as by the report of his messengers, most satisfactory accounts of this very dear and well-beloved son the Prince, which gave him very great pleasure.[324] He then directs them to send the Prince 1000l. to enable him to keep his forces together. This letter is dated July 10, 1403, just eleven days before the battle of Shrewsbury. The King heard of Hotspur's rebellion on his arrival at Burton on Trent, from which place he dates his proclamation. Henry of Monmouth was appointed Lieutenant of Wales on the 4th of March 1403; and he was with his men-at-arms and archers there, discharging the duties of a faithful son and valiant young warrior, when Hotspur revolted; and he left his charge in Wales, not to revel in London, but only to join his own to his father's forces, and fight for their kingdom on the field of Shrewsbury.

The extraordinary confusion of place and time, pervading the "Second Part of King Henry IV," is only equalled by the mistaken view which the writer gives of the character of Henry of Monmouth. News of the overthrow of Archbishop Scrope is brought to London on the very day on which Henry IV. sickens and dies; whereas that King was himself in person in the north, and insisted upon the execution of the Archbishop, just eight years before. The Archbishop was beheaded on Whitmonday (June 8) in the year 1405. Henry IV. died March 20, 1413. And instead of Henry, the Prince, being either at Windsor hunting, or in London "with Poins and other his continual followers," when his father was depressed and perplexed by the rebellion in the north, he was doing his duty well, gallantly, and to the entire satisfaction of his father. We have a letter, dated Berkhemstead, March 13, 1405, written by the King to his council, with a copy of his son Henry's letter announcing the victory over the Welsh rebels at Grosmont in Monmouthshire, which was won on Wednesday the 11th of that month. The King writes with great joy and exultation, bidding his council to convey the glad tidings to the mayor and citizens of London, that "they (he says) may rejoice with us, and join in praises to our Creator."

Thus does history prove that, in every instance of Shakspeare's fascinating representations of Henry of Monmouth's practices, the poet was guided by his imagination, which, working only on the vague tradition of a sudden change for the better in the Prince immediately on his accession, and magnifying that change into something almost miraculous, has drawn a picture which can never be seen without being admired for its life, and boldness, and colouring; but which, as an historical portrait, is not only unlike the original, but misleading and unjust in essential points of character.

It has been said, and perhaps with truth, to what extent soever we may believe Shakspeare to have made "Europe ring from side to side" with the vices and follies, the riots and extravagances, of the young Prince, yet that he had spread his fame and glory far more widely, and excited an incomparably greater interest in his character, than history itself, however full, and however true in recording his merits, could have done. The admirer therefore of the Prince's character, who reflects on Shakspeare, is held to be ungrateful to Henry's best benefactor; and, as far as his influence reaches, tends to check the interest excited for the hero of his choice. But, whilst he recalls with grateful reminiscence the enjoyment which he has often drawn himself freely from the same well-head, the Author, in attempting to distinguish between truth and fiction, would on no account damp the ardour with which his countrymen will still derive pleasure from these scenes of "Nature's child;" and he trusts that, whilst he has supplied solid and substantial ground for Englishmen still retaining Henry of Monmouth in their affections, among their favourite princes and kings, his work has no tendency to close against a single individual those sources of intellectual delight, which will be open wide to all, whilst literature itself shall have a place on earth.