After the conquest of Rouen the English captains were sent with small detachments to clear the country. Salisbury to the north secured Montivilliers, Honfleur, Fécamp, Dieppe, and Eu; Clarence went up the Seine valley taking Vernon and Nantes, and many other smaller towns in the immediate neighbourhood submitted.[306] Gloucester stayed with his royal brother at Rouen, as he had been made captain of the city,[307] and there steps were taken to further organise the administration of Normandy, and to relieve distress in the town itself. At the same time negotiations were being carried on with both French factions. Throughout the recent siege ambassadors had been passing between the various parties, and at one time the Dauphin offered terms,[308] at another the French King, under the influence of Burgundy, sent a portrait of his daughter Catherine, whose name had appeared in most of the negotiations.[309] Conferences at Alençon with Armagnac, or at Pont de l’Arche with Burgundian emissaries, were alike fruitless. Still Henry persevered. Arrangements were made at Rouen for a personal meeting with the Dauphin at Evreux on March 8,[310] but when Henry reached the trysting-place he found that the Dauphin had not kept his word.[311] Nothing daunted, he despatched Warwick on March 28 to arrange an interview with the Burgundian faction for May 15, and Clarence, with Gloucester, took an oath to observe any conditions that might be arranged.[312] But Henry’s diplomacy stretched farther than this. Bedford was given permission to seek a wife among the daughters of Frederick of Nuremberg, or among the daughters of the Duke of Lorraine, or indeed among any of the kindred of the Emperor Sigismund.[313] Gloucester, on the other hand, had a more restricted field for marriage negotiations opened for him. He was given permission on April 1 to treat for the hand of Blanche of Sicily, daughter and heiress of Charles III. of Navarre. Acting on this commission, Gloucester appointed his chamberlains, William Beauchamp and John Stokes ‘Dr. of Laws,’ to care for his interests in that quarter, but his hopes of a wife at that time were to be short-lived.[314] On April 20 Charles de Beaumont, who represented Henry at the court of Navarre, and had recently served under Gloucester in the Côtentin, informed him that negotiations were pending for the marriage of Blanche to Don John of Arragon, asserting that Henry’s delays in stating definitely what lands in Guienne he would give Gloucester on his wedding had so annoyed Charles, that it was unlikely that the English marriage would ever come off.[315] In these suspicions Beaumont was fully justified. We hear no more of Gloucester as a prospective suitor for the hand of Blanche, and soon after she was married to his rival, Don John, who ultimately became John II. of Arragon.

Gloucester had more active work on hand than this somewhat nebulous marriage scheme. He left Evreux early in April, accompanied by the Earl Marshal, John de Mowbray, having been commissioned to take Ivry, which he invested in the customary manner.[316] The town held out with more determination than had been expected, and to save Gloucester’s troops from starvation the King had to despatch orders to the bailiff of Evreux to send all sellers of provisions in his bailiwick to Ivry, to hold a market there twice a week so long as Gloucester remained before the town.[317] The town was not of great strength, and was taken by assault in a few days, but the castle was not only well fortified, but situated so as to be hard to attack. With the usual English tactics Gloucester sat down before the impregnable, knowing that famine would do better work than his guns. Once more it was proved that it was not the cowardice of the French garrisons, but the lethargy and rivalries of the French Princes which gave Normandy to the English King. The first panic after Henry’s landing at Touques once over, the French had held their position stubbornly, but the English were unhampered in their preparations for sieges and unharassed in the country while they attacked the towns. Thus fortresses which might have replenished their provisions had the attention of the besiegers been divided, were compelled by lack of food and other stores to surrender. Harfleur had proved it, Rouen had proved it, and now in due course the castle of Ivry was compelled to come to terms on May 10, and three days later Gloucester entered the fortress and received the oath of fealty from all in the town.[318]

Having settled matters at Ivry, Gloucester marched towards Mantes, where he joined his brother, probably late in May.[319] Henry was preparing, with growing confidence in an amicable adjustment of his claims, to meet Charles VI. and Burgundy at a conference, wherein the French had consented to take the Treaty of Bretigny as a basis of their discussion.[320] The conference was to be held in a meadow near Meulan, where a little stream, called the Viviers, emptied itself into the Seine. Thus guarded on two sides, the rest was surrounded by a bank and a ditch, and had a pavilion in the centre for the shelter of the two parties. Thither on May 30 came Burgundy with Queen Isabel and her daughter Catherine.[321] Charles VI. was too unwell to be present. From Mantes came Henry, accompanied by his two brothers Clarence and Gloucester, Archbishop Chichele, the two Beauforts, Henry Beaufort of Winchester and the Duke of Exeter, and two thousand five hundred well-appointed soldiers. Nothing beyond ceremonial greetings took place on the first day of the conference, which seem to have been chiefly meant for the introduction of Henry to Catherine, for at later meetings the much-treated-of Princess did not appear.[322] At the next meeting on June 1 Clarence, Gloucester, Chichele, Beaufort, and Exeter were officially appointed to treat for peace with France, and for the King’s marriage.[323] Negotiations dragged on, Henry demanding the cession of full sovereignty of the English possessions in France which were assured by the Treaty of Bretigny, the French demanding a renunciation by the English King of his title to the French throne. At the end of a month they were no nearer a settlement than at the beginning, and distrust of each other was becoming evident. Eventually high words passed between Henry and Burgundy, and negotiations were broken off.[324] Even then, Henry does not seem to have lost all hope of an arrangement of these difficulties, for on July 5 we find Chichele and Warwick commissioned to undertake an embassy to the Burgundian party.[325]

Nevertheless, Henry knew that his best argument was force, and as soon as the truce expired on July 31, he sent forward a detachment from Mantes, which surprised and took Pontoise.[326] Henry, with Gloucester and the main body of the army, stayed some little time longer at Mantes,[327] and then followed to Pontoise, where Clarence rejoined him, after having reconnoitred right up to the gates of Paris.[328] Hence the whole army moved on August 18, and taking Vancouvilliers on the way, sat down before Gisors on the 31st, which, after a short but sharp siege, surrendered—the town on September 17, the castle six days later.[329] From Gisors Henry went to Mantes, whence he supervised the siege of Meulan, in which Gloucester took part. This town was so situated that the Seine guarded it on one side, and marshes on the other. However, by the use of rafts and floating castles, the English managed to clear the river of the stakes which the French had planted in its bed, and so to press the town, that it surrendered on October 31.[330] Henry had kept up daily communication with the besiegers, and now he came to Meulan, and on November 6 despatched Gloucester to secure the Seine valley further up towards Paris. Poissy was captured on the 13th, and three days later St. Germain succumbed after no serious resistance. On the same day the neighbouring castle of Montjoye voluntarily submitted.[331]

By the middle of the month Gloucester was back with the King at Mantes, and accompanied him to Rouen, for it had been decided to send him home to replace his brother Bedford as Regent of England.[332] It seems impossible to discover any real reason for this exchange of posts between Bedford and Gloucester, unless the King wanted the help of the brother who had had experience in statecraft in the organisation of his newly acquired Duchy, and thought that Gloucester could be more easily spared than Clarence to go to England. At any rate, on November 21, orders were issued at Rouen for the impressment of forty sailors to convey Gloucester to England, and it is probable that he crossed the Channel within a few days of this provision.[333]

CHAPTER III
THE EVOLUTION OF GLOUCESTER’S POLICY

After landing in England Gloucester had not long to wait before he took up his new duties. On December 30, 1419, his commission to be ‘guardian and lieutenant of England’ in the place of Bedford, who was about to go to France, was sealed at Westminster, and his powers in this office were defined. He was to preside at the meetings of Parliament and Council, and to summon the lords and the commonalty of the kingdom for consultation. The executive power was put into his hands, and he was empowered to do all things necessary for the welfare of the country, with the assent of Parliament and the Council; whilst he was also to exercise the royal prerogative in ecclesiastical matters, giving licences to elect to vacancies, and his assent or veto to these elections when made. The commission concluded with emphatic instructions that the Regent ‘shall carry out all matters of governance with the assent of and after deliberation by the Council, and not otherwise.’[334] Meanwhile, Bedford was in England, and he did not leave for France until the spring,[335] but the control of affairs was in the hands of his brother. This was the first time that Gloucester had been brought into official contact with English politics, though he had been a member of the Council and of Parliament since his elevation to the peerage in 1414. The country was in that state of peace which so often precedes a violent storm. Of internal strife there had been none since Sir John Oldcastle had been captured and executed in December 1417,[336] and the threatening of revolution which had preceded Henry’s first expedition to France had passed away. On the other hand, the war was beginning to outlive its popularity. The steady successes of Henry had none of the glamour of such a victory as Agincourt, which alone could kindle the enthusiasm of the people at home. There were signs that the soldiers themselves were tiring of the successive sieges,[337] while in England men did not grasp with what determination the military genius and the patient diplomacy of Henry were working up to the approaching culmination of the Treaty of Troyes. Moreover, the French prisoners in England, for whom Gloucester now became responsible, had been showing signs of restlessness, and Orleans for one had been discovered in intrigue with the Scotch.[338]

The most notable aspect of England, however, when Gloucester took up the reins of government in 1419, was the development of the power of the great middle class. The dangers which Henry IV. had had to meet amongst the rebellious nobility had driven him to rely on the class which would give him the support he needed, and this increased the importance of the trader and the townsman, whose influence was still further expanded by the absence of almost the whole nobility and a large proportion of the ecclesiastical hierarchy in France. The constitutional aspect of Parliament was becoming more than a name in the days of Gloucester’s first regency, and public opinion was beginning to mirror the interests of the money-making portion of the community. Ever since the days of the Black Death this change had been slowly moving to its completion, and the success of the archers in the French wars announced the fact that the old fixed state of society had come to an end. Now for the first time appeared the ambition of men of one class to raise themselves to the level of the next; now for the first time poverty and incompetence became a disgrace. These all were the outward signs of a great industrial revolution. Till the middle of the fourteenth century England had been a mere producer of raw material; now she was on the high-road to take a definite place as the manufacturer of finished goods in all the chief markets of Europe. A striking instance of this change is to be found in the way the export of wool dropped, whilst its production increased, for the manufacture of broadcloth was no longer confined to the foreign buyers of English wool. This increased production entailed a corresponding increase in the number of traders and carriers of English produce, and it is at this time that such companies as the Merchant Adventurers rose to great power. This change from the production of raw material to the manufacture of the finished article not only gave a new power to the middle classes, but it had its influence also in bringing the English town into greater prominence. ‘Mediæval economy, with its constant regard to the relations of persons, was giving place to the modern economy, which treats the exchange of things as fundamental,’ and this resulted in increased power to those corporate bodies which were favoured by this change. New and substantial town-halls were being built in all parts of England, and the towns themselves were becoming an important factor in English life. The days when a group of nobles enjoyed the whole political influence of the community were at an end, and a foreign observer could declare that the nation ‘consists of churchmen, nobles, and craftsmen, as well as common people.’[339] Moreover, it now came first to be realised that England could have a commercial interest in foreign politics, as well as a purely dynastic one.[340] English merchants now began to have a direct influence on the policy of the crown, and they could make it felt through the immense sums which the Government was compelled to borrow from them.[341]

This then was the state of society which Gloucester found when the government was committed to his care, and he was not slow to realise this change. Some years later a Carthusian monk, when consulted by the Duke of Buckingham on the probability of his succession, declared that his only hope of aggrandisement was ‘to obtain the love of the community of England’;[342] and this was a truth understood earlier by the Duke of Gloucester. We do not know by what means it was done, but Humphrey soon became the darling of the middle classes, and by the time that Henry V. died he had won the enthusiastic support of the London citizens. It will be seen, therefore, that it was to the growing powers in England that he appealed for sympathy and encouragement, to those who were gradually working out the progress of England towards freedom from aristocratic control, to those who were content to ignore the quarrel of prince with prince and noble with noble, whilst they quietly based the future strength of the kingdom on a wealth born of trade and private exertions. It was in the towns that Humphrey found his friends; in the towns where the middle classes were gaining the predominance, and not in the country where the nobility still reigned supreme, and where the science and prosperity of agriculture remained stationary throughout the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The citizen class never failed him. They did not look to the upstart house which had forgotten its origin in the new title of Duke of Suffolk, but throughout his life they supported their ‘Good Duke,’ and genuinely mourned his death. What is called statesmanship in others is dismissed as ‘pandering to the populace’ in Humphrey by those who cannot allow any good to reside in an unsuccessful politician, but it seems a more just estimate of this side of Gloucester’s policy to acknowledge the foresight and wisdom of one who abandoned the effete nobles, and looked for support to those who were soon to prove themselves a power that must be taken into consideration. This citizen support cannot have been welcome to the other members of the governing class, and it is probably due to it that so much opposition was shown to Gloucester in the early days of the reign of Henry VI. In the outward events of the regency there are few signs of the policy which Humphrey pursued, but we shall see its fruits as the story of his life proceeds. It must have been at this time, however, that his line of action was initiated.

The days of Gloucester’s first regency were even more peaceful and uneventful than those of Bedford’s, and he found that his duties did not exceed the ordinary official business of the kingdom, and the representation of the King at ceremonial functions. Thus by right of his position of Regent we find him presiding at a Chapter of the Order of the Garter which was very sparsely attended owing to the large number of knights who were serving abroad. Even Bedford, who had not yet left England, was absent, being fully occupied with his preparations for departure.[343]

During his regency Humphrey was brought into contact with the young King of Scotland, then a prisoner in England. According to a French chronicler it was during the year 1420 that James, the son of David of Scotland, who during his father’s lifetime had been given a safe-conduct by Henry V. to go to Jerusalem, came to England, and was there most graciously received by Gloucester. In the meantime his father died, and the Regent took immediate steps to acquaint his royal brother with the fact of James’s presence in England. Henry promptly ordered him to be detained and sent under escort to the English army before Melun.[344] In the whole story there is only one grain of truth. James had been a captive in England ever since 1406, and his father, Robert (not David), had died on hearing the news of his detention. However, it is true that the unfortunate Scotch king was sent to the siege of Melun, leaving England in July, and for this doubtless Gloucester made the arrangements.[345] All that the story can tell us is that it points to a probable friendship between James and Humphrey who had been boys together at the court of Henry IV.[346]

Meanwhile English history was being made in France. The balance of parties had been changed. Before Gloucester had crossed the Channel the whole world had been shocked by the cold-blooded and treacherous murder of the Duke of Burgundy at the bridge of Montereau.[347] Nothing could have been more impolitic from the Armagnac point of view, for revenge was far sweeter than patriotism to the Frenchmen of the fifteenth century, and the King and Queen of France with that most marketable commodity, their daughter Catherine, were under the influence of Philip, the new Duke of Burgundy. What was more natural than that the negotiations of Meulan should be resumed and brought to a successful issue? Neither the Queen nor St. Pol, the governor of Paris, even waited for the prompting of Philip, but sent envoys to Henry without delay, and by December 25 a treaty was made between the Kings of England and of France.[348] This treaty formed the basis of the more famous one signed on May 21 by both contracting parties at Troyes. Henry was to marry Catherine and to succeed to the French throne, meanwhile acting as regent for the demented Charles VI. Each country was to preserve its own laws and customs, and Henry, Charles, and Burgundy all promised not to undertake any independent negotiations with the Dauphin.[349] The English chroniclers, oblivious of the fact that Gloucester was Regent of England, state that he was present at these negotiations,[350] but this is entirely disproved by a letter written to him by Henry on the day after the treaty was signed. Gloucester and the Council were herein informed of the culmination of Henry’s ambitions, and commanded to proclaim the peace and the King’s betrothal in England. He further instructed them to destroy his seals, and to strike new ones bearing the inscription ‘Henry by the grace of God Kyng of England, Heire and Regent of the Rowne of France, and Lord of Ireland.’[351] On June 14 Gloucester signed the warrant for the proclamation of the good news, and the same day a solemn procession was made in honour of the marriage of the King, during which the proclamation was read at St. Paul’s Cross.[352]

The Treaty of Troyes was the high-water mark of English success in France, and it seemed to crystallise the unhappy principles with which Gloucester had been impressed during the early years of his active life. The only statesmanship that his royal brother could teach him was the mistaken ideal of a self-righteous war. Unfortunately the mobile and impressionable character of Humphrey was only too prone to receive the imprint of this policy. Henceforth he stood by the clauses of the Treaty of Troyes with a constancy worthy of a better cause, and in this particular his line of action was definitely marked out. Though a man of intellect and perception in theoretical matters, he was not endowed with sufficient powers of statesmanship to see the disastrous consequences of a war policy; quick to grasp the details of a scheme, he failed to discern its wider significance, and so his policy was tainted by the false brilliancy of his brother’s successes. Had he been less impressionable and more cool-headed, he would have been able to grasp the essentials, and would not have been blinded by successes which could only be transitory. In all cases Humphrey’s policy was to be formed by his emotions, hard facts had no influence upon him, and at this very time he failed to understand the warning which came from the first Parliament over which he presided, and which he opened on December 2. Two days later all the formalities had been performed, and Roger Hunt had been chosen Speaker and accepted by the Regent.[353]

It was not long before it became amply evident that there was considerable discontent at the King’s prolonged absence. It was now more than three years since he had visited England, and the country was beginning to feel that foreign ambitions were absorbing too much of their ruler’s attention. The Parliaments of 1417 and 1419, which had been called by Bedford, had been marked by no act of constitutional importance. In one Oldcastle had been condemned to death;[354] in both, money was granted.[355] In 1420, however, the aspect of affairs was changed. In the first place no money was asked for, as it was well understood that it would not be granted, for men were beginning to grumble at its scarcity.[356] One of the first acts of this Parliament was to petition Gloucester to use all his influence to induce the King and his Queen to return home as soon as possible, to which request the Regent assented readily.[357] This petition must not be taken as betraying any mistrust of the conduct of the regency government. It simply reflects a growing fear that the kingdom of England would become a mere appanage to the throne of France, and stands as a protest against the conquest of France being the means of depreciating English prestige. The constitutional troubles in this Parliament show a mistrust of Henry’s intentions, but convey no censure on the administration. It was in this spirit therefore that it was enacted that though the Regent’s commission was to terminate on the return of the King, Parliament was not to be considered to be dissolved by that event; that the statute of Edward III. securing English liberties in case the English King required a new title was revived; and that provision was made that petitions should not be engrossed until they had been sent to the King for his assent.[358] Thus the session closed amidst constitutional fears, which for this time at least Gloucester had had no hand in creating.

England had not long to wait for the return of her King, who was anxious to introduce his newly wedded wife to her English subjects. The petition of Parliament was therefore quickly answered, and on Candlemas Day 1421 the royal couple landed at Dover, where the Barons of the Cinque Ports were ready to welcome them. Humphrey was presumably too busy to be present at this greeting, but he probably took part in the reception which London accorded the King on February 14,[359] and in the high festival and gorgeous processions with which a week later the Queen entered the capital. It was a more subdued welcome that Henry now received than that which marked his triumphal return from Agincourt, but every token of respect and affection was offered to the Queen.[360] On Sunday, February 23, Catherine was crowned at Westminster, and immediately afterwards she presided at a banquet held in the ‘greet halle.’ In spite of the Lenten season and the almost total absence of meat, a splendid feast was spread, and the menu with its various ‘soteltes’ has been preserved for us.[361] In the absence of the King, whom etiquette forbade to appear, the Queen presided, with the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Winchester on her right, the King of Scotland, the Duchess of York, and the Countess of Huntingdon on her left. The Earl Marshal and the Earl of March knelt on either side of the Queen, each holding a sceptre, while the Countess of Kent and the Countess Marshal sat at the feet of the Queen ‘under the table.’ Bedford was present as Constable of England, Warwick officiated as Steward in the absence of Clarence, and the Earl of Worcester in the capacity of Earl Marshal—Mowbray being otherwise engaged—rode up and down the hall to keep order. Carver, cupbearer, and butler each performed his appointed duties, and bareheaded before the Queen stood Gloucester as ‘supervisour’[362] of the feast by right of his office of Great Chamberlain. It was in the organisation of pageants such as this that Gloucester was most efficient. All his tastes for ancient learning and his love of display, in which he proved himself a true child of the Renaissance, were given full scope. At any rate, his arrangements so impressed the chroniclers, that they all describe this pageant in unusually elaborate detail.[363]

Soon after the coronation Henry and his bride went off on a royal progress through the country, the ostensible reason being a series of pilgrimages to various shrines, the real one a hope of restoring the confidence of the country in their King, and to encourage fresh sacrifices of men and money for a new campaign.[364] The necessity for renewed effort became still more apparent when, on leaving the shrine of St. John of Beverley, news reached them that Clarence had been defeated and slain at Beaugé in March.[365] Having celebrated the Feast of St. George somewhat later than the appointed day,[366] Henry opened a Parliament on May 2,[367] and immediately began to prepare for another expedition to France. Gloucester, of whom we have heard nothing since the coronation feast, also began to make his preparations for war, but before he left England an event happened which was to have considerable influence on the course of his life during the next few years, and to mould his policy in the near future.

It was fated that England should be interested in the affairs of Hainault and Holland for some time to come, and the whole history of this interest is bound up with the story of Gloucester’s infatuation for Jacqueline, Countess of Holland, Zealand, and Hainault. This lady was daughter and heiress of that Count William who visited England whilst the Emperor Sigismund was in the country.[368] She had lost her father and her first husband John, Dauphin of France, within a few weeks of each other during the spring of the year 1417. With no natural protector, she had been left to face the factions of Hooks and Cods in her patrimony, and between them there was bitter strife; the former being the supporters of her late father, and the latter his bitter opponents.[369] But in the politics of these states of the Low Countries there was a still more potent factor than the internal divisions of party feuds. John, Duke of Burgundy, devoted his life to consolidating his territorial power, as well as in advancing claims to political ascendency in France, and in furtherance of the former ambitions he desired to add the inheritance of Jacqueline to his already extensive possessions. Not only would this acquisition strengthen his hands by increasing his territory, but it would also increase his line of seacoast in Zealand and Holland, and serve to join up his southern and northern possessions. Thus he would be able to show a stronger front to the Emperor, who regarded the increased power of his nominal vassal on the confines of the empire as a threatening danger.

With the direct object of attaining this end, John the Fearless set himself to arrange a marriage between Jacqueline and her neighbour the Duke of Brabant, hoping thereby to bring about a childless match and the acquisition to himself of the coveted territory, which, in the absence of children, he would inherit. In this project he was supported by the Princess’s mother, Margaret, Dowager-Countess of Hainault, who was his sister.[370] John of Brabant was a despicable weakling, much older than his proposed bride, and possessing qualities which would make the life of a young and spirited woman wholly unbearable. However, considerations of policy induced her relatives to force Jacqueline into this undesirable alliance, with the result which might have been expected. John fell entirely into the hands of his Brabançon followers, who induced him to add insult to the neglect with which he treated his young wife, and the culminating-point was reached when in Jacqueline’s absence he arranged for the disposal of her territory for a term of years to John of Bavaria.[371]

Among her few faithful followers the unhappy Countess found one whom the chronicler names ‘Robessart lord of Escaillon,’ who, though a Hainaulter by origin, was English in sympathies.[372] Doubtless he was one of that family of Robsarts of which more than one served in the French wars.[373] It was the Lord of Escallion who befriended Jacqueline when she fled from the insults of her husband to Valenciennes, and it was to him that she confided her intention to turn to England for help. He received the news with joy, and encouraged the idea, painting this land, which was unknown to his liege lady, in the brightest colours, not forgetting to lay emphasis on those brothers of Henry V., who were yet unmarried. At the same time he undertook to arrange her escape thither, so that she might safely reach Calais before any one knew of her intentions, and together they matured their plans.[374]

In thus determining to throw herself on the mercy of Henry, Jacqueline was appealing to a relationship which dated back to Philippa, the wife of Edward III., and it is a sign that she had definitely determined to break with the husband whom she had never wanted to marry, and that she was in earnest in those preparations which she had already made for a divorce. If she had hopes of a third husband from amongst the brothers of Henry V., we must suppose that her past experiences had not taught her wisdom, and it is probably with a knowledge of subsequent events that one chronicler asserts an agreement of marriage with Humphrey before ever she left Valenciennes,[375] though the idea of an English alliance of this kind was quite natural, when we remember that Bedford had been a candidate for her hand in 1418.[376] Be this as it may, Jacqueline and her friend Escallion made their preparations for flight to Calais. Already on March 1, 1421, Henry had granted a passport to herself and her mother to visit her territories in Ponthieu, and this carried with it the right to enter Calais.[377] It was therefore probably in April that she told her mother at Valenciennes that she would leave her for a few days while she paid a visit to Bouchain. She had left the town but a short distance on this proposed journey when Escallion met her with a company of sixty men, and took her under his protection. Together they made for Calais, where they arrived at the end of the second day after leaving Valenciennes, and were courteously received as though their arrival had been expected. From Calais Jacqueline sent messengers to Henry to ask permission to land on the shores of England, and meanwhile spent the interval which must elapse before an answer could be received in quiet repose, mounting the bastions daily, and gazing across to the white cliffs of Dover, dreaming of the land and of the men of whom she had heard such glowing accounts, and welcoming every sail that appeared on the horizon as the bearer of the desired permission to put the truth of these stories to the test. At length a warm welcome was brought from King Henry, and with bright hopes the princess crossed the Channel, to be met at Dover by one of those unmarried brothers of the English King of whom she had been told.[378] For it fell to the lot of Humphrey, as Warden of the Cinque Ports, to meet this distinguished visitor, just as some five years before he had met the Emperor Sigismund. It was a meeting fraught with great consequences for both parties concerned. Little did the light-hearted Humphrey think, when he placed his charge on her palfrey, and escorted her to London, that he had met a woman who would deeply affect his destinies, and earn him the reputation of putting his private ambitions before the public weal.

Henry emphasised his hearty invitation to Jacqueline by the marked graciousness of his reception of her; and though he was on the eve of departure to France, he promised to help her, and made arrangements, completed on July 10, that £100 a month should be allotted to the Countess so long as she remained in England.[379] To Henry belongs the responsibility of bringing her over, and we cannot doubt that he saw the political significance of his action. He knew the state of affairs in the Low Countries, and he looked on the discontented Countess as a valuable asset in his schemes of French conquest; through her he might obtain some hold on his shifty ally Burgundy, who, like his father, looked to inherit the much-desired districts of Zealand, Holland, and Hainault. Whether he had hopes of a divorce for Jacqueline so that she might marry one of his brothers is doubtful—he was too near the end of his career for us to be able to fathom his intentions with regard to her; but that he was responsible for her presence in England, and consequently also partly responsible for the results of this visit, cannot be denied.[380] As for Humphrey, we have nothing to tell us of the growth of his plans, or of his first impressions of Jacqueline. It was probably towards the end of April that he first saw her, and it is unlikely that he had any time for love-making before his departure for France. It is therefore improbable that the project which later took shape in his expedition to Hainault had occurred to him when he left England, for he had probably never met the lady before, though he had known her father, and his attention was at this time concentrated on the French campaign.[381]

As Warden, Humphrey had to see that the Barons of the Cinque Ports provided ships to the number of fifty-seven for the transport of the army;[382] at the same time he was busy collecting his own contingent. He entered into indentures with the King for one hundred lances, with their complement of archers, which would bring the numbers up to about four hundred men according to the usual computation; but he had not a full contingent by the time he left England.[383] However, he received reinforcements from England all through the campaign,[384] and by July his men were in full force.[385] On May 26 his passport was signed,[386] and he probably then went down to Dover to supervise the preparations for embarkation, which were ordered to begin on May 27.[387] Exactly a fortnight later Henry sailed from Dover, and landed the same day at Calais,[388] accompanied by Gloucester and the Earls of March and Warwick, with rather over a thousand men.[389]

The defeat at Beaugé had not been without its effect both in encouraging the French and in distressing the English. It had not been easy to raise men in England, as Gloucester had found, and it was necessary in many cases to resort to impressment. Accordingly Henry took the precaution of sending his ships back to England, for fear that deserters from his army might by their help regain their native land.[390] In Normandy the Earl of Salisbury had done something to restore the prestige of the English arms; but round Paris the French were becoming very dangerous, for the Dauphin was threatening Chartres and an advance on the capital.[391] Under these conditions Henry abandoned the idea of spending some time in Picardy, and the whole army marched down the seacoast to Abbeville. Here the passage of the Somme would have been disputed had it not been for the good offices of the Duke of Burgundy, who had joined the army at Montreuil, and induced the citizens of Abbeville to allow the English to pass.[392] Without any pause Henry pushed on by way of Beauvais to Gisors, where he left the army under the command of Gloucester, and went on to Paris to consult with Exeter.[393] Gloucester took the army to Mantes, where the King rejoined him, and Burgundy, who had left the English at Abbeville, also came up with reinforcements. Henry had hoped to bring the Dauphin to fight a pitched battle, but on his way to Mantes he learned with great regret that the French had raised the siege of Chartres and had retired into Touraine.[394] With a clear field before him Henry determined to besiege Dreux, a strong castle near the Norman border, which had been harassing its neighbours for some time.