This unseemly custom continued common till the middle of the last century, if not later. Cromwell obtained much of his intelligence, during the civil wars, from the mean men with whom he slept. —Malone.
After the battle of Dreux, 1562, the Prince of Condé slept in the same bed with the Duke of Guise; an anecdote frequently cited, to show the magnanimity of the latter, who slept soundly, though so near his greatest enemy, then his prisoner. —Nares.
([B]) For me,—the gold of France did not seduce;] Holinshed observes, “that Richard, Earl of Cambridge, did not conspire with the Lord Scroop and Thomas Grey, for the murdering of King Henry to please the French king, but only to the intent to exalt to the crown his brother-in-law Edmund, Earl of March, as heir to Lionel, Duke of Clarence; after the death of which Earl of March, for divers secret impediments not able to have issue, the Earl of Cambridge was sure that the crown should come to him by his wife, and to his children of her begotten; and therefore (as was thought), he rather confessed himself for need of money to be corrupted by the French king, than he would declare his inward mind, &c., which if it were espied, he saw plainly that the Earl of March should have tasted of the same cup that he had drunk, and what should have come to his own children he merely doubted, &c.”
A million of gold is stated to have been given by France to the conspirators.
Historians have, however, generally expressed their utter inability to explain upon what grounds the conspirators built their expectation of success; and unless they had been promised powerful assistance from France, the design seems to have been one of the most absurd and hopeless upon record. The confession of the Earl of Cambridge, and his supplication for mercy in his own hand writing, is in the British Museum.
([C]) Touching our person, seek we no revenge;] This speech is taken from Holinshed:—
“Revenge herein touching my person, though I seek not; yet for the safeguard of my dear friends, and for due preservation of all sorts, I am by office to cause example to be showed: Get ye hence, therefore, you poor miserable wretches, to the receiving of your just reward, wherein God’s majesty give you grace of his mercy, and repentance of your heinous offences.”
([D]) Cheerly to sea; the signs of war advance:] “The king went from his castle of Porchester in a small vessel to the sea, and embarking on board his ship, called The Trinity, between the ports of Southampton and Portsmouth, he immediately ordered that the sail should be set, to signify his readiness to depart.” “There were about fifteen hundred vessels, including about a hundred which were left behind. After having passed the Isle of Wight, swans were seen swimming in the midst of the fleet, which, in the opinion of all, were said to be happy auspices of the undertaking. On the next day, the king entered the mouth of the Seine, and cast anchor before a place called Kidecaus, about three miles from Harfleur, where he proposed landing.” —Nicolas’s History of Agincourt.
The departure of Henry’s army on this occasion, and the separation between those who composed it and their relatives and friends, is thus described by Drayton, who was born in 1563, and died in 1631:—
There might a man have seen in every street,