Comic History of England Part 10

CHAPTER XV.

MORE SANGUINARY TRIUMPHS: ONWARD MARCH OF CIVILIZATION GRAPHICALLY DELINEATED WITH THE HISTORIAN'S USUAL COMPLETENESS.

The Plantagenet period saw the establishment of the House of Commons, and cut off the power of the king to levy taxes without the consent of Parliament. It also exchanged the judicial rough-and-tumble on horseback for the trial by jury. Serfdom continued, and a good horse would bring more in market than a man.

Agriculture was still in its infancy, and the farmer refused to adopt a new and attractive plough because it did not permit the ploughman to walk near enough to his team, that he might twist the tail of the patient bullock.

The costumes of the period seem odd, as we look back upon them, for the men wore pointed shoes with toes tied to the girdle, and trousers and coat each of different colors: for instance, sometimes one sleeve was black and the other white, while the ladies wore tall hats, sometimes two feet high, and long trains. They also carried two swords in the girdle, doubtless to protect them from the n.o.bility.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SLAVES WERE BOUGHT AND SOLD AT THE FAIRS.]

Each house of any size had a "pleasance," and the "herberie," or physic garden, which was the pioneer of the pie-plant bed, was connected with the monasteries.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ASTROLOGY WAS THE FAVORITE STUDY OF THOSE TIMES.]

Roger Bacon was thrown into prison for having too good an education.

Scientists in those days always ran the risk of being surprised, and more than one discoverer wound up by discovering himself in jail.

Astrology was a favorite amus.e.m.e.nt, especially among the young people.

Henry IV., son of John of Gaunt, fourth son of Edward III., became king in 1399, though Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, and great-grandson of Lionel, the third son of Edward III., was the rightful heir. This boy was detained in Windsor Castle by Henry's orders.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HENRY PROTECTS THE CHURCH FROM HERESY.]

Henry succeeded in catching a heretic, in 1401, and burned him at the stake. This was the first person put to death in England for his religious belief, and the occasion was the origin of the epitaph, "Well done, good and faithful servant."

Conspiracies were quite common in those days, one of them being organized by Harry Percy, called "Hotspur" because of his irritability.

The ballad of Chevy Chase was founded upon his exploits at the battle of Otterburn, in 1388. The Percys favored Mortimer, and so united with the Welsh and Scots.

A large fight occurred at Shrewsbury in 1403. The rebels were defeated and Percy slain. Northumberland was pardoned, and tried it again, a.s.sisted by the Archbishop of York, two years later. The archbishop was executed in 1405. Northumberland made another effort, but was defeated and slain.

In 1413 Henry died, leaving behind him the record of a fraudulent sovereign who was parsimonious, sour, and superst.i.tious, without virtue or religion.

He was succeeded by his successor, which was customary at that time.

Henry V. was his son, a youth who was wild and reckless. He had been in jail for insulting the chief-justice, as a result of a drunken frolic and fine. He was real wild and bad, and had no more respect for his ancestry than a chicken born in an incubator. Yet he reformed on taking the throne.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HENRY V. HAD ON ONE OCCASION BEEN COMMITTED TO PRISON.]

Henry now went over to France with a view to securing the throne, but did not get it, as it was occupied at the time. So he returned; but at Agincourt was surprised by the French army, four times as large as his own, and with a loss of forty only, he slew ten thousand of the French and captured fourteen thousand. What the French were doing while this slaughter was going on the modern historian has great difficulty in figuring out. This battle occurred in 1415, and two years after Henry returned to France, hoping to do equally well. He made a treaty at Troyes with the celebrated idiot Charles VI., and promised to marry his daughter Catherine, who was to succeed Charles upon his death, and try to do better. Henry became Regent of France by this ruse, but died in 1422, and left his son Henry, less than a year old. The king's death was a sad blow to England, for he was an improvement on the general run of kings. Henry V. left a brother, the Duke of Bedford, who became Protector and Regent of France; but when Charles the Imbecile died, his son, Charles VII., rose to the occasion, and a war of some years began.

After some time, Bedford invaded southern France and besieged Orleans.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HENRY, PROCLAIMED REGENT OF FRANCE, ENTERED PARIS IN TRIUMPH.]

Joan of Arc had been told of a prophecy to the effect that France could only be delivered from the English by a virgin, and so she, though only a peasant girl, yet full of a strange, eager heroism which was almost inspiration, applied to the king for a commission.

[Ill.u.s.tration: JOAN OF ARC INDUCES THE KING TO BELIEVE THE TRUTH OF HER MISSION.]

Inspired by her perfect faith and G.o.dlike heroism, the French fought like tigers, and, in 1429, the besiegers went home. She induced the king to be crowned in due form at Rheims, and asked for an honorable discharge; but she was detained, and the English, who afterwards captured her, burned her to death at Rouen, in 1431, on the charge of sorcery. Those who did this afterwards regretted it and felt mortified.

Her death did the invaders no good; but above her ashes, and moistened by her tears,--if such a feat were possible,--liberty arose once more, and, in 1437, Charles was permitted to enter Paris and enjoy the town for the first time in twenty years. In 1444 a truce of six years was established.

Henry was a disappointment, and, as Bedford was dead, the Duke of Gloucester, the king's uncle, and Cardinal Beaufort, his guardian, had, up to his majority, been the powers behind the throne.

Henry married Margaret of Anjou, a very beautiful and able lady, who possessed the qualities so lacking in the king. They were married in 1445, and, if living, this would be the four hundred and fifty-first anniversary of their wedding. It is, anyway. (1896.)

The provinces of Maine and Anjou were given by the king in return for Margaret. Henry continued to show more and more signs of fatty degeneration of the cerebrator, and Gloucester, who had opposed the marriage, was found dead in his prison bed, whither he had been sent at Margaret's request. The Duke of York, the queen's favorite, succeeded him, and Somerset, another favorite, succeeded York. In 1451 it was found that the English had lost all their French possessions except Calais.

Things went from bad to worse, and, in 1450, Jack Cade headed an outbreak; but he was slain, and the king showing renewed signs of intellectual f.a.g, Richard, Duke of York, was talked of as the people's choice on account of his descent from Edward III. He was for a few days Protector, but the queen was too strongly opposed to him, and he resigned.

[Ill.u.s.tration: RICHARD AND HIS ADHERENTS RAISING AN ARMY FOR THE REDRESS OF GRIEVANCES.]

He then raised an army, and in a battle at St. Albans, in 1455, defeated the royalists, capturing the king. This was the opening of the War of the Roses,--so called because as badges the Lancastrians wore a red rose and the Yorkists a white rose. This war lasted over thirty years, and killed off the n.o.bility like sheep. They were, it is said, virtually annihilated, and thus a better cla.s.s of n.o.bility was subst.i.tuted.

The king was restored; but in 1460 there occurred the battle of Northampton, in which he was defeated and again taken prisoner by the Earl of Warwick.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BY REQUEST OF MARGARET, HIS HEAD WAS REMOVED FROM HIS BODY TO THE GATES OF YORK.]

Margaret was a woman of great spirit, and when the Duke of York was given the throne she went to Scotland, and in the battle of Wakefield her army defeated and captured the duke. At her request he was beheaded, and his head, ornamented with a paper crown, placed on the gates of York, as shown in the rather life-like--or death-like--etching on the preceding page.

The queen was for a time successful, and her army earned a slight reputation for cruelty also; but Edward, son of the late Duke of York, embittered somewhat by the flippant death of his father, was soon victorious over the Lancastrians, and, in 1461, was crowned King of England at a good salary, with the use of a large palace and a good well of water and barn.

CHAPTER XVI.

UNPLEASANT CAPRICES OF ROYALTY: INTRODUCTION OF PRINTING AS A SUBSIDIARY AID IN THE PROGRESS OF EMANc.i.p.aTION.

Henry VI. left no royal record worth remembering save the establishment of Eton and King's Colleges. Edward IV., who began his reign in 1461, was bold and active. Queen Margaret's army of sixty thousand men which attacked him was defeated and half her forces slaughtered, no quarter being given.

His t.i.tle was now confirmed, and Margaret fled to Scotland. Three years later she attempted again to secure the throne through the aid of Louis XI., but failed. Henry, who had been in concealment, was now confined in the Tower, as shown in the engraving on the following page.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HENRY VI. IMPRESSED IN THE TOWER.]

Edward's marriage was not satisfactory, and, as he bestowed all the offices on his wife's relatives, Warwick deserted him and espoused the cause of Queen Margaret.

He had no trouble in raising an army and compelling Edward to flee.

Henry was taken from the Tower and crowned, his rights having been recognized by Parliament. Warwick and his son-in-law, the Duke of Clarence, brother to Edward IV., were made regents, therefore, in 1471.

Before the year was out, however, the tables were again turned, and Henry found himself once more in his old quarters in the Tower. Warwick was soon defeated and slain, and on the same day Margaret and her son Edward landed in England. She and Edward were defeated and taken prisoners at Tewkesbury, and the young prince cruelly put to death by the Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester, brothers of Edward IV. Margaret was placed in the Tower, and a day or two after Henry died mysteriously there, it is presumed at the hands of Gloucester, who was socially an unpleasant man to meet after dark.

Margaret died in France, in 1482, and the Lancastrians gave up all hope.

Edward, feeling again secure, at the instigation of his younger brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, caused Clarence, the other brother, to be put to death, and then began to give his entire attention to vice, never allowing his reign to get into his rum or interfere with it.

He was a very handsome man, but died, in 1483, of what the historian calls a distemper. Some say he died of heart-failure while sleeping off an attack of coma. Anyway, he turned up his comatose, as one might say, and pa.s.sed on from a spirituous life to a spiritual one, such as it may be. He was a counterfeit sovereign.

In 1474 the first book was printed in England, and more attention was then paid to spelling. William Caxton printed this book,--a work on chess. The form of the types came from Germany, and was used till James I. introduced the Roman type. James I. took a great interest in plain and ornamental job printing, and while trying to pick a calling card out of the jaws of a crude job-press in the early years of his reign, contributed a royal thumb to this restless emblem of progress and civilization. (See next page.)