Though Jeanne had met a martyr's death, her cause continued to prosper. The spell of the invincibility of the English had been broken, and with their inferior numbers they could no longer resist the French assaults, in which nobles, burghers, and peasants now all united with a single heart. It was in vain that Bedford brought over the little ten-year-old Henry VI. from England, and crowned him at Paris (1431). The ceremony was attended by hardly a single Frenchman; even the Burgundian faction in the capital were beginning to doubt and draw apart from their old allies.
Dissensions in the Regency.
Meanwhile in England the continued ill-success of the war was leading to the growth of a peace party, at whose head was Henry Beaufort, the Bishop of Winchester, who had lately become a cardinal. That Beaufort supported any scheme was a sufficient reason for Gloucester to oppose it, and Humphrey made himself the mouthpiece of those who pleaded for perpetual war. The cardinal and the duke quarrelled in and out of Parliament, their followers were always brawling, and the action of the council of regency grew weak and divided.
Peace proposals.—Burgundy joins the French.
At last Beaufort prevailed on the council to submit proposals for peace to the French court. At Arras the ambassadors of Henry VI., Charles VII., and Philip of Burgundy met, and strove to come to terms (1435). But the English still insisted on claiming the pompous style of King of France for their young master, and on retaining Paris and all the North for him. The French were only ready to grant Normandy and Guienne, and insisted on the renunciation of Henry's French title. It cannot be doubted that these terms were quite reasonable, but they were rejected, with the most disastrous results. Philip of Burgundy was now tired of the struggle, and thought that he had sufficiently revenged his father's murder by fifteen years of war with the murderer. On the ground that the English had rejected fair conditions of peace, he broke off his alliance with them, and made terms with Charles of France. He got Picardy and the counties of Macon and Auxerre as the price of his change of alliance.
Death of Bedford.—Fall of Paris.
Just as the Congress of Arras was breaking up, John of Bedford died, worn out before his time by his fourteen years of toilsome government in France. The breach with the Duke of Burgundy and the death of Bedford had the results that might have been expected. With one common accord the last French partisans of England threw off their allegiance to Henry VI. Paris itself opened its gates to the troops of Charles VII., and the English had soon to stand on the defensive in Normandy and Maine, their last foothold in Northern France (1437).
Struggle for Normandy.—Richard, Duke of York.
Nothing is more astonishing than the obstinate way in which the English government clung to the last remnants of the conquests of Henry V. By desperate and unremitting exertions the war was kept up in Normandy for no less than twelve years after Paris fell (1437-49). The heroes of this struggle were the veteran Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, and the young Richard, Duke of York, who had just begun to come to the front. This prince was the son of that Richard Earl of Cambridge, who had paid with his life for his attempt to overturn Henry V. He was Duke of York as successor to his uncle Edmund, who fell at Agincourt, and Earl of March in right of his mother, the sister of the childless Edmund Mortimer, the last male of his house. York was governor in Normandy during the most important years of the struggle for the retention of the duchy, and gained much credit for repeatedly driving back the invasions which the French launched against it. He grew intoxicated with success, and made himself a prominent supporter of the unwise war-policy which Humphrey of Gloucester continued to advocate.
Treaty of Tours.—Marriage of Henry.