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.—Do. 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)