before Henry at York, he pretended that his sole intention in arming was to mediate between the two parties; and this, though but a very weak apology, seemed to satisfy the king. Northumberland, therefore, received a pardon; Henry probably thinking that he was sufficiently punished by the loss of his army, and the death of his favourite son. 11. By these means Henry seemed to surmount all his troubles; and the calm which was thus produced was employed by him in endeavours to acquire popularity, which he had lost by the severities exercised during the preceding part of his reign. A.D. 1407. For that reason, he often permitted the House of Commons to assume powers which had not been usually exercised by their predecessors. 12. In the sixth year of his reign, when they voted him the supplies, they appointed treasurers of their own, to see the money disbursed for the purposes intended; and required them to deliver in their accounts to the house. They proposed thirty very important articles for the government of the king's household; and, on the whole, preserved their privileges and freedom more entire during his reign than in that of any of his predecessors. 13. But while the king thus laboured, not without success, to retrieve the reputation he had lost, his son Henry, the prince of Wales, seemed equally bent on incurring the public aversion. He became notorious for all kinds of debauchery, and ever chose to be surrounded by a set of wretches, who took pride in committing the most illegal acts, with the prince at their head. 14. The king was not a little mortified at this degeneracy in his eldest son, who seemed entirely forgetful of his station, although he had already exhibited repeated proofs of his valorous conduct and generosity. Such were the excesses into which he ran, that one of his dissolute companions having been brought to trial before sir William Gascoigne, chief justice of the king's bench, for some misdemeanor, the prince was so exasperated at the issue of the trial, that he struck the judge in open court. 15. The venerable magistrate, who knew the reverence that was due to his station, behaved with a dignity that became his office, and immediately ordered the prince to be committed to prison. When this transaction was reported to the king, who was an excellent judge of mankind, he could not help exclaiming in a transport-" Happy is the king that has a magistrate endowed with courage to execute the laws upon such an offender: still more happy in having a son willing to submit to such a chastisement!" This, in fact, is one of the first great instances we read in the English history of a magistrate doing justice in opposition to power; since, upon many former occasions, we find the judges only ministers of royal caprice. 16. Henry, whose health had for some time been declining, did not long outlive this transaction. He was subject to fits, which bereaved him for the time of his senses; and which at last brought on his death at Westminster, in the forty-sixth year of his age, and the fourteenth of his reign. Questions for Examination. 1. In what situation did Henry find himself on ascending the throne? 2. Who was the most formidable opponent of Henry? 4. For what purpose were the Scots and Welsh to unite their forces? 7. Relate the valorous conduct of the king and prince. 8. What was the fate of Hotspur ? 10. What became of the earl of Northumberland? 12. What at this time were the powers assumed by the House of Com mons? 13. What was the conduct of the prince of Wales? 15. For what offence did the chief justice imprison him? What did the king exclaim when he heard of the prince's committal? 16. What caused the death of the king? EMINENT PERSONS. Thomas Arundel, archbishop of Canterbury. Edward Mortimer. Henry Percy, surnamed Hotspur. Chief Justice Gascoigne. Sir Robert Knowles. Sir Richard Whittington, lord mayor of London. John Gower, and Geoffrey Chaucer. 6 Now terror seemed to make the field its own, Death mows down Gallia's ranks; they fight in vain EGERTON. eldest son of the king of France. He is so called from the province of Dauphiné. Imbecil'ity, s. weakness, feebleness of mind or body. 1. (A.D. 1413.) THE first steps taken by the young king confirmed all those prepossessions entertained in his favour. He called together his former abandoned companions: acquainted them with his intended reformation; exhorted them to follow his example; and thus dismissed them from his presence, allowing them a competency to subsist upon till he saw them worthy of further promotion. 2. The faithful ministers of his father at first began to tremble for their former justice in the administration of their duty; but he soon eased them of their fears, by taking them into his friendship and confidence. Sir William Gascoigne, who thought himself the most obnoxious, met with praise instead of reproaches, and was exhorted to persevere in the same rigorous and impartial execution of justice. 3. About this time the heresy of Wickliffe', or Lollardism, as it was called, began to spread every day more and more; while it received a new lustre from the protection and preaching of sir John Oldcastle, baron of Cobham, who had been one of the king's domestics, and stood high in his favour. The primate, however, indicted this nobleman, and, with the assistance of his suffragans, condemned him as a heretic to be burnt alive. 4. Cobham, however, escaping from the Tower, in which he was confined, the day before his execution, privately went up to London, to take a signal revenge on his enemies. But the king, apprised of his intentions, ordered that the city gates should be shut; and, coming by night with his guards into St. Giles's-fields, seized such of the conspirators as appeared, and afterwards laid hold of several parties that were hastening to the appointed place. 5. Some of these were executed, but the greater number pardoned. Cobham himself found means of escaping for that time, but he was taken about four years after; and never did the cruelty of man invent, or crimes draw down, such torment as he was made to endure. He was hung up with a chain by the middle, and thus, at a slow fire, burned, or rather roasted, alive. 6. Henry, to turn the minds of the people from such hideous scenes, resolved to take advantage of the troubles in which France was at that time engaged; and assembling a great fleet and army at Southampton, landed at Harfleur, at the head of an army of six thousand men-at-arms, and twenty-four thousand foot, mostly archers. But although the enemy made but a feeble resistance, yet the climate seemed to fight against the English, a contagious dysentery carrying off three parts of Henry's army. 7. The English monarch, when it was too late, began to repent of his rash inroad into a country where disease and a powerful army 1 John Wickliffe, a celebrated English divine, was the father of the reformation of the English church from popery. He first opposed the authority of the pope, and, being cited to appear before the bishop of London, it caused great tumult. His tenets were solemnly condemned in an assembly held at Oxford; he, however, escaped the malice of his enemies, and died peaceably at Lutterworth, in 1384. every where threatened destruction; he, therefore, began to think of retiring into Calais. The enemy, however, resolved to intercept his retreat; and, after he had passed the small river of Tertois, at Blangi, he was surprised to observe, from the heights, the whole French army drawn up in the plains of Agincourt?, and so posted, that it was impossible for him to proceed on his march without coming to an engagement. 8. No situation could be more unfavourable than that in which he found himself. His army was wasted with disease; the soldiers' spirits worn down with fatigue, destitute of provisions, and discouraged by their retreat. Their whole body amounted to but nine thousand men ; and these were to sustain the shock of an enemy nearly ten times their number, headed by expert generals, and plentifully supplied with provisions. 9. As the enemy were so much superior, he drew up his army on a narrow ground between two woods, which guarded each flank; and he patiently expected, in that position, the attack of the enemy. The constable of France was at the head of one army; and Henry himself, with Edward, duke of York, commanded the other. 10. For a time both armies, as if afraid to begin, kept silently gazing at each other, neither willing to break their ranks by making the onset; which Henry perceiving, with a cheerful countenance cried out, My friends, since, they will not begin, it is our's to set the example; come on, and the blessed Trinity be our protection!" Upon this the whole army set forward with a shout, while the French still waited their approach with intrepidity. 11. The English archers, who had long been famous for their great skill, first let fly a shower of arrows three feet long, which did great execution. The French cavalry advancing to repel these, two hundred bowmen, who lay till then concealed, rising on a sudden, let fly among them, and produced such a confusion, that the archers threw by their arrows, and, rushing in, fell upon them sword in hand. The French at first repulsed the assailants, who were enfeebled by disease; but they soon made up the defect by their valour; and, resolving to conquer or die, burst in upon the enemy with such impetuosity, that the French were soon obliged to give way. 2 Agincourt is a village in the province of Artois, formerly part of the French Netherlands. |