NOTES.
1 (return)
[ NOTE A, p. 86. Rymer, vol.
ii. p. 26, 845. There cannot be the least question, that the homage
usually paid by the kings of Scotland was not for their crown, but for
some other territory. The only question remains, what that territory was.
It was not always for the earldom of Huntingdon, nor the honor of Penryth;
because we find it sometimes done at a time when these possessions were
not in the hands of the kings of Scotland. It is probable that the homage
was performed in general terms, without any particular specification of
territory; and this inaccuracy had proceeded either from some dispute
between the two kings about the territory and some opposite claims, which
were compromised by the general homage, or from the simplicity of the age,
which employed few words in every transaction. To prove this, we need but
look into the letter of King Richard, where he resigns the homage of
Scotland, reserving the usual homage. His words are, “Sæpedictus W. Rex
ligius homo noster deveniat de omnibus terris de quibus antecessores sui
antecessorum nostrorum ligii homines fuerunt, et nobis atque hæredibus
nostris fidelitatem jurarunt.” Rymer, vol. i. p. 65. These general terms
were probably copied from the usual form of the homage itself.
It is no proof that the kings of Scotland possessed no lands or baronies
in England, because we cannot find them in the imperfect histories and
records of that age. For instance, it clearly appears from another passage
of this very letter of Richard, that the Scottish king held lands both in
the county of Huntingdon and elsewhere in England; though the earldom of
Huntingdon itself was then in the person of his brother David; and we know
at present of no other baronies which William held. It cannot be expected
that we should now be able to specify all his fees which he either
possessed or claimed in England; when it is probable that the two monarchs
themselves and their ministers would at that very time have differed in
the list: the Scottish king might possess some to which his right was
disputed; he might claim others which he did not possess; and neither of
the two kings was willing to resign his pretensions by a particular
enumeration.
A late author of great industry and learning, but
full of prejudices, and of no penetration, Mr. Carte, has taken advantage
of the undefined terms of the Scotch homage, and has pretended that it was
done for Lothian and Galloway: that is, all the territories of the country
now called Scotland, lying south of the Clyde and Forth. But to refute
this pretension at once, we need only consider, that if these territories
were held in fee of the English kings, there would, by the nature of the
feudal law as established in England, have been continual appeals from
them to the courts of the lord paramount; contrary to all the histories
and records of that age. We find that, as soon as Edward really
established his superiority, appeals immediately commenced from all parts
of Scotland: and that king, in his writ to the king’s bench, considers
them as a necessary consequence of the feudal tenure. Such large
territories also would have supplied a considerable part of the English
armies, which never could have escaped all the historians. Not to mention
that there is not any instance of a Scotch prisoner of war being tried as
a rebel, in the frequent hostilities between the kingdoms, where the
Scottish armies were chiefly filled from the southern counties.
Mr. Carte’s notion with regard to Galloway, which comprehends, in the
language of that age, or rather in that of the preceding, most of the
south-west counties of Scotland; his notion, I say, rests on so slight a
foundation, that it scarcely merits being refuted. He will have it, (and
merely because he will have it,) that the Cumberland, yielded by King
Edmund to Malcolm I., meant not only the county in England of that name,
but all the territory northwards to the Clyde. But the case of Lothian
deserves some more consideration.
It is certain that, in very
ancient language, Scotland means only the country north of the Friths of
Clyde and Forth. I shall not make a parade of literature to prove it;
because I do not find that this point is disputed by the Scots themselves.
The southern country was divided into Galloway and Lothian; and the latter
comprehended all the south-east counties. This territory was certainly a
part of the ancient kingdom of Northumberland, and was entirely peopled by
Saxons, who afterwards received a great mixture of Danes among them. It
appears from all the English histories, that the whole kingdom of
Northumberland paid very little obedience to the Anglo-Saxon monarchs, who
governed after the dissolution of the heptarchy; and the northern and
remote parts of it seem to have fallen into a kind of anarchy, sometimes
pillaged by the Danes, sometimes joining them in their ravages upon other
parts of England. The kings of Scotland, lying nearer them, took at last
possession of the country, which had scarcely any government; and we are
told by Matthew of Westminster, (p. 193,) that King Edgar made a grant of
the territory to Kenneth III.; that is, he resigned claims which he could
not make effectual, without bestowing on them more trouble and expense
than they were worth: for these are the only grants of provinces made by
kings; and so ambitious and active a prince as Edgar would never have made
presents of any other kind. Though Matthew of Westminster’s authority may
appear small with regard to so remote a transaction, yet we may admit it
in this case, because Ordericus Vitalis, a good authority, tells us, (p.
701,) that Malcolm acknowledged to William Rufus, that the Conqueror had
confirmed to him the former grant of Lothian. But it follows not, because
Edgar made this species of grant to Kenneth, that therefore he exacted
homage for that territory. Homage, and all the rites of the feudal law,
were very little known among the Saxons; and we may also suppose, that the
gla’n of Edgar was so antiquated and weak, that, in resigning it, he made
no very valuable concession, and Kenneth might well refuse to hold, by so
precarious a tenure, a territory which he at present held by the sword. In
short, no author says he did homage for it.
The only color
indeed of authority for Mr. Carte’s notion is, that Matthew Fans, who
wrote in the reign of Henry III., before Edward’s claim of superiority was
heard of, says that Alexander III. did homage to Henry III. “pro Laudiano
et aliis terris.” See p.555. This word seems naturally to be interpreted
Lothian. But, in the first place, Matthew Paris’s testimony, though
considerable, will not outweigh that of all the other historians, who say
that the Scotch homage was always done for lands in England. Secondly, if
the Scotch homage was done in general terms, (as has been already proved,)
it is no wonder that historians should differ in their account of the
object of it, since it is probable the parties themselves were not fully
agreed. Thirdly, there is reason to think that Laudianum in Matthew Paris
does not mean the Lothians, now in Scotland. There appears to have been a
territory which anciently bore that or a similar name in the north of
England. For (1.) the Saxon Chronicle (p.197) says, that Malcolm Kenmure
met William Rufus in Lodene, in England. (2.) It is agreed by all
historians, that Henry II. only reconquered from Scotland the northern
counties of Northumberland, Cumberland, and Westmoreland. See Newbriggs,
p.383. Wykes, p.30. Hemingford, p.492, Yet the same country is called by
other historians Loidis, comitatus Lodonensis, or some such name. See M.
Paris, p.68. M. Westi p.247. Annal. Wayerl. p.159, and Diceto, p.531. (3.)
This last-mentioned author, when he speaks of Lothian in Scotland, calls
it Loheneis, (p.574,) though he had called the English territory Loidis.
I thought this long note necessary in order to correct Mr.
Carte’s mistake, an author whose diligence and industry has given light to
many passages of the more ancient English history.]
2 (return)
[ NOTE B, p.86. Rymer, vol.
ii. p.543. It is remarkable that the English chancellor spoke to the
Scotch parliament in the French tongue. This was also the language
commonly made use of by all parties on that occasion. I bid, passim. Some
of the most considerable among the Scotch, as well as almost all the
English barons, were of French origin: they valued themselves upon it; and
pretended to despise the language and manners of the island. It is
difficult to account for the settlement of so many French families in
Scotland; the Bruces, Baliols, St. Glairs, Montgomeries, Somervilles,
Gordons, Frasers, Cummins; Colvilles, Umfrevilles, Mowbrays, Hays, Maules,
who were not supported there, as in England, by the power of the sword.
But the superiority of the smallest civility and knowledge over total
ignorance and barbarism, is prodigious.]
3 (return)
[ NOTE C, p.91. See Rymer,
vol. ii. p.533, where Edward writes to the king’s bench to receive appeals
from Scotland. He knew the practice to be new and unusual; yet he
establishes it as an infallible consequence cf his superiority. We learn
also from the same collection, (p. 603,) that immediately upon receiving
the homage, he changed the style of his address to the Scotch king, whom
he now calk “dilecto et fideli,” instead of “fratri dilecto et fideli,”
the appellation which he had always before used to him. See p. 109, 124,
168, 280, 1064. This is a certain proof that he himself was not deceived,
as was scarcely indeed possible, but that he was conscious of his
usurpation. Yet he solemnly swore afterwards to the justice of his
pretensions, when he defended them before Pope Boniface.]
4 (return)
[ NOTE D, p. 104. Throughout
the reign of Edward I., the assent of the commons is not once expressed in
any of the enacting clauses; nor in the reigns ensuing, till the 9 Edward
III., nor in any of the enacting clauses of 16 Richard II. Nay, even so
low as Henry VI., from the beginning till the eighth of his reign, the
assent of the commons is not once expressed in any enacting clause. See
preface to Ruffhead’s edit, of the Statutes, p. 7. If it should be
asserted, that the commons had really given their assent to these
statutes, though they are not expressly mentioned, this very omission,
proceeding, if you will, from carelessness, is a proof how little they
were respected. The commons were so little accustomed to transact public
business, that they had no speaker till after the parliament 6 Edward III.
See Prynne’s preface to Cotton’s Abridg.: not till the first of Richard
II. in the opinion of most antiquaries. The commons were very unwilling to
meddle in any state affairs, and commonly either referred themselves to
the lords, or desired a select committee of that house to assist them, as
appears from Cotton. 5 Edw. III. n. 5; 15 Edw. III. a. 17; 21 Edw. III. n.
5; 47 Edw. III. n. 5; 50 Edw. III. n. 10; 51 Edw. III. n. 18; 1 Rich. II.
n. 12; 2 Rich. II. n. 12; 5 Rich. II. n 14; 2 parl. 6 Rich. II. n. 14;
parl. 2, 6 Rich. II. n. 8, etc.]
5 (return)
[ NOTE E, p. 105. It was very
agreeable to the maxims of all the feudal governments, that every order of
the state should give their consent to the acts which more immediately
concerned them; and as the notion of a political system was not then so
well understood, the other orders of the state were often not consulted on
these occasions. In this reign, even the merchants, though no public body,
granted the king impositions on merchandise, because the first payments
came out of their pockets. They did the same in the reign of Edward III.;
but the commons had then observed that the people paid these duties,
though the merchants advanced them; and they therefore remonstrated
against this practice. Cotton’s Abridg. p. 39. The taxes imposed by the
knights on the counties were always lighter than those which the burgesses
laid on the boroughs; a presumption, that in voting those taxes the
knights and burgesses did not form the same house. See Chancellor West’s
Inquiry into the Manner of creating Peers, p. 8. But there are so many
proofs, that those two orders of representative were long separate, that
it is needless to insist on them. Mr. Carte, who had carefully consulted
the rolls of parliament, affirms, that they never appear to have been
united till the sixteenth of Edward III. See Hist. vol. ii. p,451. But it
is certain that this union was not even then final: in 1372, the burgesses
acted by themselves, and voted a tax after the knights were dismissed. See
Tyrrel, Hist, vol. iii. p. 754, from Rot. Claus. 46 Edward III. n. 9. In
1376, they were the knights alone who passed a vote for the removal of
Alice Pierce from the king’s person, if we may credit Walsingham, p. 189.
There is an instance of a like kind in the reign of Richard II. Cotton,
p.193. The different taxes voted by those two branches of the lower house,
naturally kept them separate; but as their petitions had mostly the same
object, namely, the redress of grievances, and the support of law and
justice both against the crown and the barons, this cause as naturally
united them, and was the reason why they at last joined in one house for
the despatch of business. The barons had few petitions. Their privileges
were of more ancient date. Grievances seldom affected them: they were
themselves the chief oppressors. In 1333, the knights by themselves
concurred with the bishops and barons in advising the king to stay his
journey into Ireland. Here was a petition which regarded a matter of
state, and was supposed to be above the capacity of the burgesses. The
knights, therefore, acted apart in this petition. See Cotton, Abridg. p.
13. Chief baron Gilbert thinks, that the reason why taxes always began
with the commons or burgesses was, that they were limited by the
instructions of their boroughs. See Hist, of the Exchequer, p. 37.]
6 (return)
[ NOTE F, p. 105. The chief
argument from ancient authority, for the opinion that the representatives
of boroughs preceded the forty-ninth of Henry in., is the famous petition
of the borough of St. Albans, first taken notice of by Selden, and then by
Petyt, Brady, Tyrrel, and others. In this petition, presented to the
parliament in the reign of Edward II., take town of St. Albans asserts,
that though they held “in capite” of the crown, and owed only, for all
other service, their attendance in parliament, yet the sheriff had omitted
them in his writs; whereas, both in the reign of the king’s father, and
all his predecessors, they had always sent members. Now, say the defenders
of this opinion, if the commencement of the house of commons were in Henry
III.’ reign, this expression could not have been used. But Hadox, in his
History of the Exchequer, (p. 522, 523, 524,) has endeavored, and with
great reason, to destroy the authority of this petition for the purpose
alleged. He asserts, first, that there was no such tenure in England is
that of holding by attendance in parliament, instead of all other service.
Secondly, that the borough of St. Albans never held of take crown at all,
but was always demesne land of the abbot. It is no wonder, therefore, that
a petition which advances two falsehoods, should contain one historical
mistake, which indeed amounts only to an inaccurate and exaggerated
expression; no strange matter in ignorant burgesses of that age.
Accordingly, St. Albans continued still to belong to the abbot. It never
held of the crown, call after the dissolution of the monasteries. But the
assurance of these petition *ers is remarkable. They wanted to shake off
the authority of their abbot, and to hold of the king; but were unwilling
to pay any services even to the crown; upon which they framed this idle
petition, which later writers have made the foundation of so many
inferences and conclusions. From the tenor of the petition it appears,
that there was a close connection between holding of the crown and being
represented in parliament. The latter had scarcely ever place without the
former; yet we learn from Tyrell’s Append. vol. iv. that there were some
instances to the contrary. It is not improbable that Edward followed the
roll of the earl of Leicester, who had summoned, without distinction, all
the considerable boroughs of the kingdom; among which there might be some
few that did not hold of the crown. Edward also found it necessary to
impose taxes on all the boroughs in the kingdom, without distinction. This
was a good expedient for augmenting his revenue. We are not to imagine,
because the house of commons have since become of great importance, that
the first summoning of them would form any remarkable and striking epoch,
and be generally known to the people even seventy or eighty years after.
So ignorant were the generality of men in that age, that country burgesses
would readily imagine an innovation, seemingly so little material, to have
existed from time immemorial, because it was beyond their own memory, and
perhaps that of their fathers. Even the parliament in the reign of Henry
V. say, that Ireland had, from the beginning of time, been subject to the
crown of England. (See Brady.) And surely if any thing interests the
people above all others, it is war and conquests, with their dates and
circumstances]
7 (return)
[ NOTE G, p. 233. This story
of the six burgesses of Calais, like all other extraordinary stories, is
somewhat to be suspected; and so much the more as Avesbury, (p. 167,) who
is particular in his narration of the surrender of Calais, says nothing of
it; and, on the contrary, extols in general the king’s generosity and
lenity to the inhabitants. The numberless mistakes of Froissard,
proceeding either from negligence, credulity, or love of the marvellous,
invalidate very much his testimony, even though he was a contemporary, and
though his history was dedicated to Queen Philippa herself. It is a
mistake to imagine, that the patrons of dedications read the books, much
less vouch for all the contents of them. It is not a slight testimony that
should make us give credit to a story so dishonorable to Edward,
especially after that proof of his humanity, in allowing a free passage to
all the women, children, and infirm people, at the beginning of the siege:
at least, it is scarcely to be believed, that, if the story has any
foundation, he seriously meant to execute his menaces against the six
townsmen of Calais.]
8 (return)
[ NOTE H, p. 236. There was a
singular instance, About this time, of the prevalence of chivalry and
gallantry in the nations of Europe. A solemn duel of thirty knights
against thirty was fought between Bembrwigh, as Englishman, and
Beaumanoir, a Breton, of the party of Charles of Blois, The knights of the
two nations came into the field; and before the combat began, Beaumanoir
called out, that it would be seen that day who had the fairest mistresses.
After a bloody combat, the Bretons prevailed; and gained for their prize,
full liberty to boast of their mistresses’ beauty. It is remarkable, that
two such famous generals as Sir Robert Knolles and Sir Hugh Calverley drew
their swords in this ridiculous contest. See Pere Daniel, vol. ii. p.536,
537, etc. The women not only instigated the champions to those rough, if
not bloody frays of tournament, but also frequented the tournaments during
all the reign of Edward, whose spirit of gallantry encouraged this
practice. See Knyghton, p. 2597.]
9 (return)
[ NOTE I, p. 253. This is a
prodigious sum, and probably near the half of what the king received from
the parliament during the whole course of his reign. It must be remarked,
that a tenth and fifteenth (which was always thought a high grant) were,
in the eighth year of this reign, fixed at about twenty-nine thousand
pounds; there were said to be near thirty thousand sacks of wool exported
every year. A sack of wool was at a medium sold for five pounds. Upon
these suppositions it would be easy to compute all the parliamentary
grants, taking the list as they stand in Tyrrel, vol. iii. p. 780; though
somewhat must still be left to conjecture. This king levied more money on
his subjects than any of his predecessors; and the parliament frequently
complain of the poverty of the people, and the oppressions under which
they labored. But it is to be remarked, that a third of the French king’s
ransom was yet unpaid when war broke out anew between the two crowns. His
son chose rather to employ his money in combating the English, than in
enriching them. See Rymer, vol. viii. p. 315.]
11 (return)
[ NOTE K, p. 281. In the
fifth year of the king, the commons complained of the government about the
king’s person, his court, the excessive number of his servants, of the
abuses in the chancery, king’s bench, common pleas, exchequer, and of
grievous oppressions in the country, by the great multitudes of
maintainers of quarrels, (men linked in confederacies together,) who
behaved themselves like kings in the country, so as there was very little
law or right, and of other things which they said were the cause of the
late commotions under Wat Tyler. Parl. Hist. vol. i. p. 365. This
irregular government, which no king and no house of commons had been able
to remedy, was the source of the licentiousness of the great, and
turbulency of the people, as well as tyranny of the princes. If subjects
would enjoy liberty, and kings security, the laws must be executed.
In the ninth of this reign, also the commons discovered an accuracy and a
jealousy of liberty, which we should little expect in those rude times.
“It was agreed by parliament,” says Cotton, (p.309), “that the subsidy of
wools, woolfels, and skins, granted to the king until the time of
midsummer then ensuing, should cease from the same time unto the feast of
St. Peter ‘ad vincula’ for that thereby the king should be interrupted for
claiming such grant as due.” See also Cotton, p. 198.]
12 (return)
[ NOTE L, p. 290. Knyghton,
p. 2715, etc. The same author (p. 2680) tells us, that the king, in return
to the message, said, that he would not for their desire remove the
meanest scullion from his kitchen. This author also tells us, that the
king said to the commissioners, when they harangued him, that he saw his
subjects were rebellious, and his best way would be to call in the king of
France to his aid. But it is plain that all these speeches were either
intended by Knyghton merely as an ornament to his history, or are false.
For (1.) when the five lords accuse the king’s ministers in the next
parliament, and impute to them every rash action of the king, they speak
nothing of these replies, which are so obnoxious, were so recent, and are
pretended to have been so public. (2.) The king, so far from having any
connections at that time with France, was threatened with a dangerous
invasion from that kingdom. This story seems to have been taken from the
reproaches afterwards thrown out against him, and to have been transferred
by the historian to this time, to which they cannot be applied.]
13 (return)
[ NOTE M, p. 295. We must
except the twelfth article, which accuses Brembre of having cut off the
heads of twenty-two prisoners confined for felony or debt, without warrant
or process of law; but as it is not conceivable what interest Brembre
could have to treat these felons and debtors in such a manner, we may
presume that the fact is either false or misrepresented. It was in these
men’s power to say any thing against the persons accused. No defence or
apology was admitted; all was lawless will and pleasure.
They
are also accused of designs to murder the lords; but these accusations
either are general, or destroy one another. Sometimes, as in article
fifteenth, they intend to murder them by means of the mayor and city of
London; sometimes, as in article twenty-eighth, by trial and false
inquests; sometimes, as in article twenty-eighth, by means of the king of
France, who was to receive Calais for his pains.]
14 (return)
[ NOTE N, p. 296. In
general, the parliament, in those days, never paid a proper regard to
Edward’s statute of treasons, though one of the most advantageous laws for
the subject that has ever been enacted. In the seventeenth of the king,
the dukes of Lancaster and Glocester complain to Richard, that Sir Thomas
Talbot, with others of his adherents conspired the death of the said dukes
in divers parts of Cheshire, as the same was confessed and well known; and
praying that the parliament may judge of the fault. Whereupon the king and
the lords in the parliament judged the same fact to be open and high
treason; and hereupon they award two writs, the one to the sheriff of
York, and the other to the sheriffs of Derby, to take the body of the said
Sir Thomas, returnable in the king’s bench in the month of Easter then
ensuing. And open proclamation was made in Westminster Hall, that upon the
sheriffs return, and at the next coming in of the said Sir Thomas, the
said Thomas should be convicted of treason, and incur the loss and pain of
the same; and all such as should receive him after the proclamation should
incur the same loss and pain. Cotton, p. 354. It is to be observed, that
this extraordinary judgment was passed in a time of tranquillity. Though
the statute itself of Edward III. reserves a power to the parliament to
declare any new species of treason, it is not to be supposed that this
power was reserved to the house of lords alone, or that men were to be
judged by a law “ex post facto.” At least, if such be the meaning of the
clause, it may be affirmed, that men were at that time very ignorant of
the first principles of law and justice.]
15 (return)
[ NOTE O, p. 301. In the
preceding parliament, the commons had shown a disposition very complaisant
to the king; yet there happened an incident in their proceedings which is
curious, and shows us the state of the house during that period. The
members were either country gentlemen or merchants, who were assembled for
a few days, and were entirely unacquainted with business; so that it was
easy to lead them astray, and draw them into votes and resolutions very
different from their intention. Some petitions concerning the state of the
nation were voted: in which, among other things, the house recommended
frugality to the king; and for that purpose desired that the court should
not be so much frequented as formerly by bishops and ladies. The king was
displeased with this freedom; the commons very humbly craved pardon. He
was not satisfied unless they would name the mover of the petitions. It
happened to be one Haxey, whom the parliament, in order to make atonement,
condemned for this offence to die the death of a traitor. But the king, at
the desire of the archbishop of Canterbury and the prelates, pardoned him.
When a parliament in those times, not agitated by any faction, and being
at entire freedom, could be guilty of such monstrous extravagance, it is
easy to judge what might be expected from them in more trying situations.
See Cotton’s Abridg. p. 361, 362.]
16 (return)
[ NOTE P, p. 312. To show
how little credit is to be given to this charge against Richard, we may
observe, that a law in the 13th Edward III. had been enacted against the
continuance of sheriffs for more than one year. But the inconvenience of
changes having afterwards appeared, from experience, the commons, in the
twentieth of this king, applied; by petition, that the sheriffs might be
continued; though that petition had not been enacted into a statute, by
reason of other disagreeable circumstances which attended it. See Cotton,
p. 361. It was certainly a very moderate exercise of the dispensing power
in the king to continue the sheriffs, after he found that that practice
would be acceptable to his subjects, and had been applied for by one house
of parliament; yet is this made an article of charge against him by the
present parliament. See article 18. Walsingham, speaking of a period early
in Richard’s minority, says, “But what do acts of parliament signify,
when, after they are made, they take no effect, since the king, by the
advice of the privy council, takes upon him to alter, or wholly set aside,
all those things which by general consent had been ordained in
parliament?” If Richard, therefore, exercised the dispensing power, he was
warranted by the examples of his uncles and grandfather, and indeed of all
his predecessors from the time of Henry III., inclusive.]
17 (return)
[ NOTE Q, p. 318. The
following passage in Cotton’s Abridgment (p. 196) shows a strange
prejudice against the church and churchmen. “The commons afterwards coming
into the parliament, and making their protestation, showed, that for want
of good redress about the king’s person in his household, in all his
courts, touching maintainers in every county, and purveyors, the commons
were daily pilled, and nothing defended against the enemy, and that it
should shortly deprive the king and undo the state. Wherefore in the same
government they entirely require redress. Whereupon the king appointed
sundry bishops, lords, and nobles, to sit in privy council about these
matters; who, since that they must begin at the head, and go at the
request of the commons, they, in the presence of the king, charged his
confessor not to come into the court but upon the four principal
festivals.” We should little expect that a popish privy council, in order
to preserve the king’s morals, should order his confessor to be kept at a
distance from him. This incident happened in the minority of Richard. As
the popes had for a long time resided at Avignon, and the majority of the
sacred college were Frenchmen, this circumstance naturally increased the
aversion of the nation to the papal power; but the prejudice against the
English clergy cannot be accounted for from that cause.]
18 (return)
[ NOTE R, p. 450. That we
may judge how arbitrary a court that of the constable of England was, we
may peruse the patent granted to the earl of Rivers in this reign, as it
is to be found in Spellman’s Glossary in verb. Constabularius: as also
more fully in Rymer, vol. xi. p. 581. Here is a clause of it: “Et ulterius
de uberiori gratia nostra eidem comiti de Rivers plenam potestatem damus
ad cognoscendum et procedendum, in omnibus et singulis causis et negotiis,
de et super crimine lesse majestatis, seu super occasione eseterisque
causis quibuscunque per præfatum comitem de Rivers, ut constabularium
Angliæ——quæ in curia constabularii Angliæ ab antique, viz,
tempore dicti domini Gtilielmi Conquætoris, sen aliquo tempore citra,
tractari, audiri examinari, aut decidi consueverant, aut jure debuerant
aut clebeni, causasque et negotia prædicta cum omnibus et singulis
emergentibus, incidentibus et connexis, audiendum, examinandum, et fine
debito terminandum, etiam summarie et de plano, sine strepitu et figura
justitiæ, sola facti veritate inspecta, ac etiam manu regia, si
opportunum visum fuerit eidem comiti de Rivers, vices nostras,
appellatione remots.” The office of constable was perpetual in the
monarchy; its jurisdiction was not limited to times of war, as appears
from this patent, and as we learn from Spellman; yet its authority was in
direct contradiction to Magna Charta; and it is evident, that no regular
liberty could subsist with it. It involved a full dictatorial power,
continually subsisting in the state. The only check on the crown, besides
the want of force to support all its prerogatives, was, that the office of
constable was commonly either hereditary or during life, and the person
invested with it was, for that reason, not so proper an instrument of
arbitrary power in the king. Accordingly the office was suppressed by
Henry VIII., the most arbitrary of all the English princes. The practice,
however, of exercising martial law still subsisted; and was not abolished
till the Petition of Right under Charles I. This was the epoch of true
liberty, confirmed by the restoration, and enlarged and secured by the
revolution.]
19 (return)
[ NOTE S, p. 459. We shall
give an instance. Almost all the historians, even Coraines, and the
continuator of the Annals of Croyland, assert that Edward was about this
time taken prisoner by Clarence and Warwick, and was committed to the
custody of the archbishop of York, brother to the earl; but being allowed
to take the diversion of hunting by this prelate, he made his escape, and
afterwards chased the rebels out of the kingdom. But that all the story is
false, appears from Rymer, where we find that the king, throughout all
this period, continually exercised his authority, and never was
interrupted in his government. On the 7th of March, 1470, he gives a
commission of array to Clarence, whom he then imagined a good subject; and
on the 23d of the same month, we find him issuing an order for
apprehending him, Besides, in the king’s manifesto against the duke and
earl, (Claus. 10. Edward IV. m. 7, 8,) where he enumerates all their
treasons, he mentions no such fact; he does not so much as accuse them of
exciting young Welles’s rebellion; he only says, that they exhorted him to
continue in his rebellion. We may judge how smaller facts will be
misrepresented by historians, who can in the most material transactions
mistake so grossly. There may even some doubt arise with regard to the
proposal of marriage made to Bona of Savoy; though almost all the
historians concur in it, and the fact be very likely in itself; for there
are no traces in Rymer of any such embassy of Warwick’s to France. The
chief certainty in this and the preceding reign arises either from public
records, or from the notice taken of certain passages by the French
historians. On the contrary, for some centuries after the conquest, the
French history is not complete without the assistance of English authors.
We may conjecture, that the reason of the scarcity of historians during
this period, was the destruction of the convents, which ensued so soon
after. Copies of the more recent historians not being yet sufficiently
dispersed, those histories hare perished.]
20 (return)
[ NOTE T, p. 490. Sir
Thomas More, who has been followed, or rather transcribed, by all the
historians of this short reign, says, that Jane Shore had fallen into
connections with Lord Hastings; and this account agrees best with the
course of the events; but in a proclamation of Richard’s, to be found in
Rymer, vol. xii. p. 204, the marquis of Dorset is reproached with these
connections. This reproach, however, might have been invented by Richard,
or founded only on popular rumor; and is not sufficient to overbalance the
authority of Sir Thomas More. The proclamation is remarkable for the
hypocritical purity of manners affected by Richard. This bloody and
treacherous tyrant upbraids the marquis and others with their gallantries
and intrigues as the most terrible enormities.]
21 (return)
[ NOTE U, p., 507. Every
one that has perused the ancient monkish writers know that, however
barbarous their own style, they are full of allusions to the Latin
classics, especially the poets. There seems also in those middle ages to
have remained many ancient books that are now lost. Maimesbury, who
flourished in the reign of Henry I. and King Stephen, quotes Livy’s
description of Caesar’s passage over the Rubicon. Fitz-Stephen, who lived
in the reign of Henry II., alludes to a passage in the larger history of
Sallust. In the collection of letters which passes under the name of
Thomas a Becket, we see how familiar all the ancient history and ancient
books were to the more ingenious and more dignified churchmen of that
time, and consequently how much that order of men must have surpassed all
the other members of the society. That prelate and his friends call each
other philosophers in all the course of their correspondence, and consider
the rest of the world as sunk in total ignorance and barbarism.]
END OF VOL. Ib.