READING HALL DOORS OF WISDOM

DOORS OF WISDOM

ENGLAND UNDER THE TUDORS. KING HENRY VII(1485-1509).

CHAPTER I.

EARLY HISTORY OF HENRY VII.

John of Gaunt, the ancestor of the House of Lancaster, had a son, John Beaufort, born out of wedlock; his mother was Katharine Swynford. As Katharine was afterwards raised to the position of lawful wife, a later Act of Parliament, under Richard II, recognised the legitimacy of the Beaufort family; but Henry IV, with obvious intention, caused to be inserted into this Act a clause, not legally valid, excluding the Beauforts from any claim on the throne. The daughter of the younger son of John Beaufort was Buckingham’s mother, while the daughter of the elder was Margaret, the mother of Henry Tudor.

Henry was at this time living as a fugitive in Brittany. He was born on the 28th of January, 1457, in Wales, at Pembroke Castle, the property of Jasper, Earl of Pembroke, his uncle on the father’s side. His father, Edmund, whom Henry VI had created Earl of Richmond, had died three months before. The uncle provided for Henry’s education. Andreas Scotus, and Haseley, Dean of Warwick, are mentioned as his tutors, and Scotus is said to have spoken in high terms of his pupil. Jasper also introduced the boy to Henry VI. To escape the persecutions of Edward IV, he fled with him to France; but, being driven on shore in Brittany, they were hospitably received by Duke Francis II. The duke, after some hesitation, refused Edward’s summons to give Henry up, as well as a like demand on the part of Louis XI of France, who was anxious to hold in his own hands a valuable hostage against England. He kept, however, his protégés under strict supervision till Edward’s death.

Buckingham entered into communications with Henry. Evidently Henry had no knowledge of the formal legitimation of his House, and Buckingham, who knew of it, kept his knowledge to himself, not wishing to play out for Richmond’s benefit all the trumps he held in his hand, when about to start the conspiracy in his favour. It was quite overlooked that, not Henry himself, but his mother Margaret, who had married as her third husband Thomas, Lord Stanley, was the nearest heir to the throne.

The whole scheme, especially the idea of bringing over Richmond, was due, not to Buckingham, but to John Morton, Bishop of Ely, then under his patronage. Before this, Henry’s mother had applied to the duke to intercede for her with the king, and, as a means of drawing closer to the House of York, had proposed Henry’s marriage with a daughter of King Edward. Buckingham now took up this idea in his interviews with John Morton, in order to strengthen Henry’s claims as opposed to Richard, by a union of the rival royal Houses. Meanwhile Margaret, on her own account, had, through her physician, communicated the proposed marriage to Queen Elizabeth, then in sanctuary at Westminster. On gaining Elizabeth’s consent, she was about to send word to her son in Brittany, by Christopher Urswick, when her servant, Reginald Bray, summoned by Morton, brought her news of Buckingham’s intentions. Provided with money, Hugh Conway now went to Richmond, in order to arrange a simultaneous move. Other messengers followed. On the 24th of September, 1483, Buckingham wrote himself to the earl that on the 18th of October operations should begin.

At that time the exile enjoyed greater liberty, and while Duke Francis of Brittany sought to stand well with Richard, who had made overtures to him, he yet gave support to Henry. There were even rumours of a plan for the marriage of Henry with Anne, the duke’s eldest daughter and heiress. Thus the undertaking seemed to be in good train, when Fortune again showed herself on Richard III’s side. In Kent the rising broke out too early. The king soon learnt who was the leader of the conspiracy, and a proclamation of October 23, 1483, placed a high price on the head of Buckingham and of his supporters, Strange to say, Richmond’s name was not mentioned. The elements, too, came to Richard’s assistance; a violent thunderstorm prevented Buckingham from advancing at the right moment. He turned to fly, but was captured and beheaded on the 2nd of November, on the market-place at Salisbury.

Henry’s fleet, which on the 12th of October had put to sea with fifteen vessels and five thousand men, was dispersed by the storm, and when he arrived off the English coast, near Plymouth, in Devonshire, he had only two vessels with him. In vain the royal troops tried to entice him to land. When no friendly ship was to be seen, he put about, and landed in Normandy. Thence, with the permission of the French Government, he betook himself, before October was over, through France into Brittany.

There he learnt the fate of the whole conspiracy. Many of the participators had happily escaped, Bishop Morton was in Flanders, and now a considerable number of fugitives gathered round Henry, on whom Duke Francis bestowed a new mark of favour in the shape of a subsidy of ten thousand crowns. The idea of a matrimonial alliance, however, was dropped, and on Christmas Day, 1483, Henry took a solemn oath in church, in the presence of his confederates, to marry King Edward’s daughter Elizabeth as soon as he had attained to the throne, whereupon they tendered him an oath of faithful allegiance. Henry led them to Duke Francis, who renewed his promise of helping him to return to his native land.

After his victory Richard acted without delay. The Parliament, which met in January, 1484, pronounced sentence of outlawry on Henry and a great number of his adherents. Margaret also was attainted, but, out of consideration for Thomas, Lord Stanley, she was not hardly treated; her property was adjudged to her husband, who was also ordered to keep a strict watch over her. These sentences were followed by many striking acts of clemency, such as the pardon of Bishop Morton.

Above all, the king tried to upset his opponent’s matrimonial designs. The Princess Elizabeth was with her mother safe in the Sanctuary of Westminster. Richard swore by his royal word, and on the sacred Gospels, before the Lords spiritual and temporal, before the mayor and aldermen of London to protect the Queen and her daughters. Elizabeth trusted the murderer of her sons, deserted Henry’s cause, after the failure of his first attempt, and, to escape from an unbearable position in which she was little better than a captive, gave herself up to the king, who was plotting nothing less against Richmond than to win his chosen bride for himself. The only obstacle to this was removed by the sudden death of Richard’s consort, Anne. Nevertheless Richard hesitated to carry out this well-considered plan, and meantime the end of his reign was approaching.

Henry’s anxieties, however, still continued, and new difficulties were also pressing on him. Richard, after his first unsuccessful overtures to Duke Francis, in the summer of 1483, had not relaxed his endeavours to induce him to deliver up the rebels. The duke himself continued friendly to Henry; but he was in failing health, and often lapsed for a time into a state of complete mental incapacity, while in his favourite, the Treasurer Peter Landois, Richard’s emissaries found a more willing listener. Fortunately for Henry, Morton heard from England of these intrigues, and was able to give him, through Christopher Urswick, timely warning of the new danger.

A new place of refuge had already been found, and a new friend, who promised the exile more lasting assistance than the Duke of Brittany. This powerful ally was France. The Pretender became thus mixed up in the quarrels of these two countries, a circumstance which was hereafter to involve him, as king, in the first serious foreign complications of his reign. Ever since the time of Louis XI, French policy had striven to break down the independence of this last great feudatory province, which stood in the way of a homogeneous state under the crown of France. If Duke Francis and his advisers had assisted Henry and Buckingham, it was in the hope that, should they be successful, the new king of England would prove a grateful friend, and aid Brittany in frustrating such designs. With a similar motive Landois turned to Richard III again, when the latter had been successful in maintaining his power. A truce was even brought about, and as early as June, 1484, a detachment of English troops was sent to oppose possible French attacks.

It was therefore quite intelligible that France should willingly extend a hand to Henry when he was deserted by the rulers of Brittany. The relations of France with the royal House of York had been somewhat strained, even as far back as under Louis XI, and so they had remained after his death in 1483, under the regency, during the minority of Charles VIII. Henry therefore was allowed to travel unmolested through France in October, 1483; indeed, at that time Duke Francis even received a promise of help against any powerful enemies, an evident allusion to a possible act of revenge on the part of Richard. The French Government, however, kept its hand free, and a general proposition of alliance from Richard in March, 1484, was answered in August by an offer of sending envoys to negotiate peace and friendship. In spite of this the regency still kept in touch with the English exile in Brittany, and all thought of an alliance with Richard fell to the ground when the change in Brittany’s policy drove Henry entirely over to the side of France.

Henry, who had received through Christopher Urswick the assurance of French support, together with more detailed instructions, made preparations secretly to escape from Brittany. But few friends were taken into his confidence, so that the others were greatly surprised when they heard that he had secretly fled in disguise to France. It is related that he only escaped with the greatest difficulty from the troopers sent in pursuit by Peter Landois. This took place towards the end of September, 1484.

The French regency had given orders that he should be hospitably received, and conducted to Chartres; Duke Francis too, who was again recovering, did not approve of Landois’ proceedings against Henry, He sent after him his friends who had remained behind, well provided with money, and in France also, Henry received for them a considerable sum and materials for their equipment. New fugitives joined them; the Earl of Oxford, one of the most faithful adherents of the House of Lancaster, who had been detained by Edward IV at Hammes, near Calais, gained over the commander of the castle; they made the fortress capable of defence and hastened to join Henry, who at once sent Oxford back again with reinforcements. They failed, indeed, to hold Hammes, against the attacks of the Calais garrison, but were allowed to pass out free.

In spite of the increase in his adherents, and in spite of French protection, Henry’s condition was a precarious one, as his fate was affected by the difficulties which beset the Regent’s government in France. The Regency was in the hands of the still youthful but clever and energetic Anne, elder sister of King Charles VIII, who had been given in marriage by her father Louis XI to Peter of Beaujeu, brother and heir-presumptive to the powerful Duke of Bourbon. The leaders of the opposition were the queen-mother, and more particularly Duke Louis of Orleans, the husband of Anne’s younger sister, who himself stood near to the throne, which he ascended subsequently, as Louis XII. These rivalries at home became mixed up with complications abroad; if the Regent helped the Tudor leader, the Orleans party took part with Richard, and the possibility of an English attack on France was even contemplated; if the Orleans party allied with the rulers of Brittany, Anne granted protection to Breton nobles. These, under the command of the Marshal de Rieux, sought her assistance after an unsuccessful attempt against Landois, but the high price they had to pay for this was the formal recognition, at Montargis, October, 1484, of Charles VIII as successor to their duke, should the latter die without heirs male. Finally, to the negotiations of Orleans with the Archduke Maximilian, Anne retorted by an alliance with the Flemish towns, then in revolt against the Hapsburger.

In spite of the remarkable skill with which Anne managed to keep in power, Henry’s future remained uncertain, and before long he had to cope with the open desertion of many of his friends. Queen Elizabeth, faithless herself, induced the Marquis of Dorset, her son by her first marriage, then in company with Henry, to take flight secretly, and Cheney, who hastened after him, had some difficulty in persuading him to return. Such incidents as this, together with the general position of affairs, urged the conspirators to prompt action; it was better to risk something by boldness, rather than to spoil all by hesitation. It was then probably that a notification was sent by Henry to his friends in England, to the effect that his action would depend on their readiness to support him. A small subsidy was supplied by the French Government, and in return for this advance, Henry had to leave behind as hostages, John Bourchier and the still wavering Dorset. Whilst he remained at Rouen, a squadron was assembling in the mouth of the Seine, far smaller than the fleet with which he had set out the year before.

His eyes were now turned to Wales, the home of his race. When the disquieting intelligence reached him that Richard had definitely resolved on marrying Elizabeth of York himself, Henry made use of the freedom this seemed to give him to offer his hand to a sister of Walter Herbert, a Welshman of good position. By this offer he hoped to gain the Welsh, whose attitude throughout had caused him some anxiety, and continued to do so after he had landed. But as his messengers did not even succeed in getting into the country, no more thought was given to this plan, which could hardly ever have been seriously contemplated. With about two thousand men, amongst whom was a company of Frenchmen, Henry put to sea from Harfleur on August 1, 1485, and after a seven days’ voyage, landed without opposition at Milford Haven, near the place of his birth.

Richard had long been prepared for a forward movement on the part of his adversary. Whilst safe in France with “the king’s old enemy” Charles, Henry was beyond the reach of his power, and Richard had to content himself with an angry proclamation, in which he appealed to the national pride of England to oppose a pretender who had bought the help of the hereditary foe against his native country. But this appeal fell flat. Henry landed on English soil and marched forwards. Serious resistance he met with nowhere; he even received some not inconsiderable reinforcements. Still, as was natural, the attitude of most men was doubtful and hesitating; they were anxious before they joined him to have some security as to the turn affairs were likely to take. This was obvious at once in a certain section of the Welsh; one of the most powerful of them, however, Rice ap Thomas, about whom at first disquieting rumours had been received, joined Henry in Shrewsbury with a considerable number of men; thither too came good news from the messengers sent to his mother, the Stanleys, and other friends.

Above all, the attitude assumed at that time by his stepfather, Thomas, Lord Stanley, with his brother, Sir William, was of importance. Lord Stanley had always been a favourite with Richard; now, however, on account of the family connection between Stanley and Henry, he considered it prudent to keep in his hands a surety in the person of George, Lord Strange, Stanley’s son. While Sir William Stanley had a short conference in Stafford with Henry, who had advanced thither by way of Newport, Lord Stanley, who had remained at Lichfield with a considerable body of troops, withdrew as soon as he heard of Richmond’s approach to Atherstone. There, apparently, Richmond had a secret interview with the brothers, which is said to have been very friendly, though it remains uncertain how far he secured their support. He was reassured, however, in some degree by other more numerous accessions. Gilbert Talbot joined him in Newport, Walter Hungerford and Thomas Bourchier on the march to Tamworth; many others followed.

With every mile that Henry advanced, Richard’s partisans fell away. This was a circumstance which, with all his anxiety, Richard had not foreseen. It must have filled him with rage to see men whom he had specially trusted open a free passage to his rival. As soon as he had collected sufficient troops, he started for Leicester, and prepared to do battle with Henry, then in the neighbourhood, at Tamworth. The moment for a decisive engagement had arrived.

Near the market town of Bosworth Richard fixed his camp, a stream separating him from Henry. On the 22nd of August,1485, a Monday, the king led his troops to battle. In numbers he was far superior to his adversary, whose fighting force was estimated at about five thousand men. To the last the Stanleys maintained a suspiciously neutral attitude. Lord Stanley, when called upon by both parties, responded to neither, and even his brother William, who had been outlawed by Richard, remained with his men in a state of inaction, in the rear of the king’s position to the north. Not till the battle was raging furiously, and when Henry himself was in danger and his troops were losing courage, did William Stanley rush in with his three thousand men. His onslaught was successful, and this decided the fortune of the day. Despairing of victory, Richard plunged into the mellée, and was slain, fighting heroically. Of his faithful followers, the Duke of Norfolk, leader of the advanced guard, Walter, Lord Ferrers, Sir Robert Brackenbury, Sir Richard Ratcliff, had fallen with him; Norfolk’s son, the Earl of Surrey, and the Earl of Northumberland, were taken prisoners. Lord Lovell and the two Staffords sought refuge in a sanctuary. They met their fate soon afterwards in a rising against the new monarch.

The regal circlet of gold which Richard had worn on his helmet, was found in the midst of the slain, and placed by Lord Stanley on Henry’s head, while the bystanders joyfully hailed him as king. Men saw the body of his fallen rival thrown naked by a trooper across the back of his horse, with head and legs hanging down on either side, and borne away. Thus carried to Leicester, it was exposed to view for two days in the church of the Franciscans, and then buried by the friars. The Tudor prince was now king of England.

Henry was in his twenty-ninth year when he gained for himself throne and kingdom at Bosworth. A task awaited him, which might well have daunted a more experienced man; but from the first he showed himself equal to it; from the first he displayed a faculty for seizing with clear judgment and firm grasp on that which lay nearest to his hand, and never made the mistake of taking what should be the second step before the first. After what England had but just passed through, everything depended on whether Henry would succeed in fixing firmly on his head the crown he had gained, in preparing the ground for a new dynasty, and thus securing for the still tottering throne a position of power and dignity in the State.

Henry’s ideas and those of his partisans did not now quite coincide; The latter wished to conciliate and gain over the House of York by uniting the claims of both parties through Henry’s marriage with Elizabeth of York. This, too, had once been Henry’s idea; but the oath to marry the princess, which he had taken long before in Brittany, had been a concession wrung from him by necessity; for, before all things, he desired to acquire and retain his kingdom by his own right alone.

Definite constitutional views on the order of the succession to the crown did not then exist in England. An attentive Italian observer says that an hereditary monarchy was indeed recognised in England, but if no immediate offspring were forthcoming, or the succession to the throne happened to be controverted, then the question was settled by force of arms, and “who lost the day lost the kingdom.” It was the destructive war waged by Edward IV and Richard III against other members of their royal House which really prepared the way for the Tudor king. The flourishing race of the Plantagenets had been almost exterminated. In spite of this, Henry’s claim was certainly doubtful; especially must it have appeared so to himself, as he probably was still unaware of the legitimation of the Beaufort family. In fact were succession in the female line once admitted, the younger branch of York would come before the older Lancastrian branch as heir to the line from John of Gaunt’s elder brother, Lionel, the male issue in which had early become extinct. One male representative of the male line of York was still living—Edward, Earl of Warwick, son of George, Duke of Clarence, who had fallen a victim to his brother, Edward IV. Richard III had provisionally chosen the earl as heir, after the death of his son, but subsequently had set him aside for a sister’s son, John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln. Warwick, too, belonged to a branch of the family, which had lost its rights by attainder.

It was only in this prevailing uncertainty as to what constituted a right to succession, that Henry was able to come forward with his independent hereditary claim in the face of other existing claims, and for his still doubtful partisans, his union with a daughter of Edward IV sufficed as a compromise for setting aside Warwick’s right. But to carry out his personal claim as the real Lancastrian heir was only made possible for Henry by the recognised right of war. So, even at Bosworth, he regarded himself as rightful king, and at once exercised his royal prerogative by knighting eleven of his faithful followers on the battlefield. He passed over the Earl of Warwick, as Richard had done, caused the young prince, a boy of fifteen, to be brought from Sheriff Hutton, where he had been kept in confinement, to London, and shut up in the Tower. The Princess Elizabeth, too, was removed from Sheriff Hutton to London, and there handed over to her mother. Of the promised marriage, there was for the present no mention.

Henry himself proceeded from Bosworth to the capital. On the 27th of August, five days after his victory, he was received in London with great pomp, escorted by the Lord Mayor and aldermen, and joyfully greeted by a closely packed crowd of citizens. He rode through the town to St. Paul’s Church, where he hung up the three banners under which he had gained his victory, and for several days processions were formed to the various churches in the town to offer up thanksgiving.

On the 15th of September, 1485, he summoned a Parliament for the 7th of November, “to discuss pressing and weighty measures for the government and defence of the kingdom and Church of England.” He rewarded his partisans—amongst them the Stanleys, Rice ap Thomas, Sir Richard Edgecombe, Hugh Conway, Christopher Urswick, and especially the Earl of Oxford—with dignities, offices, and pensions. The revenues of the “rebels,” Richard’s adherents, were handed over by Henry to his own friends; important offices, such as those of the judges, and the attorney-general, were filled with new men, and a number of enactments were made. In order to give a feeling of security after the recent revolution, a general, and, with but few exceptions, unlimited pardon was issued on the 24th of September, 1485, and was widely circulated through the counties.

At this moment a grievous misfortune befell England, full of gloomy foreboding for the new ruler. Towards the end of September a hitherto unknown disease broke out in London, spread through and ravaged the country, scattering fear and horror far and wide. Over the bodies of those attacked by this disease, there broke out a copious sweat, emitting an unpleasant odour; tortured by fever, most of them threw off their clothes and swallowed cold drinks, but they succumbed to the malady just as soon as those who by warmer covering increased heat and perspiration; not till a later return of the epidemic was it discovered that to let it run its course without interference was the wisest treatment. Being extremely infectious, it spread rapidly, to disappear again after a short but virulent career.

On this its first appearance, according to one account, doubtless exaggerated, but nevertheless significant, only one in a hundred of those attacked recovered. Further, it was remarkable that the disease at that time was entirely confined to England, and spared even Ireland and Scotland; hence it received the name of the “English sweating sickness.” Towards the middle of October the disease died out in London; two mayors and many aldermen had fallen victims to it; in the country it lasted on into the next month.

Meanwhile, before Parliament had even assembled, Henry made arrangements for his coronation—the solemn act by which he should be publicly recognised as king. It was fixed for the 30th of October. On the three preceding days, the king dined at Lambeth as the guest of the Archbishop of Canterbury; then rode with a splendid escort over London Bridge to the Tower, and was welcomed again by the Lord Mayor with the aldermen and city guilds. On this occasion it was remarked that his escort rode, after the French fashion, two together on one horse. The next day he distributed some fresh honours to his followers; his uncle Pembroke was raised to the rank of Duke of Bedford, Lord Stanley was made Earl of Derby, and Sir Edward Courtenay, Earl of Devonshire. The king summoned to his Council, amongst others, his uncle, Bedford, the Earls of Oxford and Derby, and his principal political counsellors throughout his reign, Bishop John Morton, Reginald Bray, and Richard Fox. Special attention was excited by a measure, which was quite in opposition to all English tradition and bore witness early to Henry’s views on the position of the monarch: for the greater exclusiveness and dignity of his royal person, he surrounded himself with a small body-guard, the model of which he had seen in France.

On the 7th day of November, after the king’s coronation had taken place with great pomp and ceremony, the Estates of the realm assembled round him. Parliament was opened at Westminster in presence of the king, who, sitting on the royal throne, listened to an ornate speech from the Lord Chancellor Thomas Alcock, Bishop of Worcester. Two days afterwards the Commons presented as their speaker, Thomas Lovell, a member of the King’s Privy Council. He was accepted by Henry, who then expounded in a few words the views he held and had long since made known by his deeds, that his right to the crown rested on hereditary succession, and the decision of God by the sword. He once again announced to all his subjects, excepting for those who had “offended his sovereign majesty,” protection for their possessions and rights.

The Commons responded to this promise of protection on the part of the king by a very important grant: the duties comprised under the name of tonnage and poundage were promised to the king at fixed rates “during his lifetime, for the defence of the realm and especially the safeguard and keeping of the sea.” To these first really important words of the Commons to the king, after the presentation of the speaker, the following equally important supplementary clause was added, “that these be not taken in ensample to the kings of England in time to come.” Parliament also enacted that the revenues of the Crown should be brought into the same condition in which they were in 1455, and, as the property of the outlawed enemies of Henry now fell in to the Crown, the king had been so generously treated by his first Parliament that no need remained for further demands for money.

These last-named enactments had been preceded by the important decision by which Parliament took up its position with regard to the rights of the dynasty. In this confirmatory Act of Parliament no mention was made of the legal rehabilitation of the Beauforts, nor yet of any proof or grounds of Henry’s claims, the existing state of things was simply accepted and recognised: “To the pleasure of Almighty God, the wealth, prosperity, and surety of this realm of England, to the singular comfort of all the king’s subjects of the same, and in avoiding of all ambiguities and questions, be it ordained, stablished and enacted, by the authority of this present Parliament, that the inheritance of the crowns of the realms of England and of France, ... be, rest, remain and abide in the most royal person of our now sovereign lord King Harry the VII, and in the heirs of his body lawfully coming, perpetually with the grace of God so to endure, and in none other.” This declaration was made with the following formalities: the Commons brought forward the motion, to which the Lords gave their assent, then followed the declaration: “Le Roy le voet en toutz pointz.”

Those sentences of outlawry which had been pronounced under Richard III, “in fact but not of right King of England,” were revoked with the proviso that the persons concerned, amongst whom were Henry’s mother Margaret, the son of the Duke of Buckingham who had been executed, and the Duke of Bedford, should not enter upon the enjoyment of their reacquired rights until after the expiration of the parliamentary session. The difficulty had already arisen that many of the persons summoned to Parliament, even Henry himself, were under sentence of outlawry; so it was decided by the judges that the proscribed persons should not take part in the sittings till after the sentence of the outlawry had been annulled ; the king. alone was at once to be considered as freed “by reason of the fact that he has taken upon him the supreme authority, and is king.”

By the side of conciliatory mercy stood revengeful retribu­tion upon those nearest adherents of his fallen opponent, who had already been excepted from the general pardon. In order to be able with legal formality to pass sentence on these, Henry’s reign was supposed to begin on the 21st of August, so that all who on the 22nd had borne arms against him at Bosworth, had offended against the king’s majesty, and were found guilty of high treason; their property naturally fell to the Crown. Besides Richard himself, the following were attainted: the Duke of Norfolk, his son Thomas, Earl of Surrey, the Lords Lovell, Ferrers, and Zouche, and some twenty knights and squires. Henry only succeeded in passing this penal Act in the face of much opposition; “there was many gentlemen against it, but it would not be, for it was the king’s pleasure.”

But having promised peace and security to his subjects, he exacted a like promise to keep the peace from the Estates of his realm. Every man on his part was to put a stop to those causes which were likely to bring back the lawless condition of recent times; no one should keep followers wearing the special badge of their master, nor, as a rule, take any man into his service by indenture or oath; no one should favour unlawful assemblies, nor interfere by bribery or force with the regular course of justice, nor hinder those charged with the office from carrying out the king’s command, nor grant protection to fugitive criminals. On the 19th of November the knights and esquires of the Royal Household and of the Lower House had to swear to these articles; after they had been dismissed, the assembled lords—thirty spiritual and eighteen temporal—took the same oath, after a solemn address from the Chancellor. It was certain that all this was not directed against the Commons, but against the great lords, who favoured illegal conduct, exercised club law with their armed followers, oppressed the weak, and impeded the action of law and justice. They had to swear to respect the despised law before a higher power, that is, the king, and no doubt they acquiesced none too willingly in the changed order of things which this implied. We find in a private letter, written shortly before the prorogation of Parliament: “There is much runyng (murmuring) amongst the Lords, but no man wot what it is ; it is said it is not well amongst them.” It was the beginning of the destruction of the splendour of the nobility under the Tudor monarchy.

Many other important laws, dealing with trade, foreign commerce, and navigation, were passed in the course of a two-months’ session by this first Parliament of Henry’s; above all, the ratification of his right to the throne had been clearly and definitely pronounced. It was now simply an act of prudence on the part of the king not to lay aside altogether the question of his promised marriage with the Yorkist heiress. When, on the 10th of December, 1485, both Houses met together for a solemn final sitting in the presence of the king, the Commons of England appealed “to his royal highness in a humble petition by their Speaker,” that, whereas by the resolve of Parliament the crowns of England and France were settled on Henry and his heirs, he would now take to wife Elizabeth of York. The Lords joined in this desire of the Commons, but there was no reference to Henry’s original promise. Henry answered shortly, that he was already prepared to act according to their wish. With a caution to remember their oath, and to preserve peace and quietness, the Lord Chancellor announced the prorogation of Parliament till the 23rd of January, 1486.

When the new year began, the tendency of the king’s policy became clearly evident; the opinion of Parliament had indeed been asked on all important measures, and these, being issued as Acts of Parliament, carried with them the weight of its consent; but the new dynasty was to stand in its own strength, and the preservation of peace, of justice, and of law had been announced as its supreme aim and object. For this very reason, murmurs and discontent were rife in the ranks of the Lords, but we possess an opposite and trustworthy opinion from a more impartial quarter. John de Giglis, collector of the Papal dues, called “Peter's pence,” wrote, a few days before the prorogation of Parliament, to the Pope Innocent VIII: “The king shows himself very prudent and clement; all things appear disposed towards peace, if only the minds of men would remain constant. Nothing has done this realm so much harm as ambition and covetous desire, and if God will only deliver us from these, then the kingdom will be at peace.”

One thing still was expected of Henry, and had not been carried out—his marriage with Elizabeth. No reason for further delay existed, and perhaps it was to meet the last wish expressed by Parliament that, before it reassembled, he hurried on the matter, and did not even wait for the dispensation from the Pope necessary for this marriage between two persons, who were relatives, though certainly somewhat distant. A dispensation from the papal legate, James, Bishop of Imola, was made to suffice for the time being. On the 18th of January, 1486, the wedding took place with great pomp, and, according to the report of Bernard Andre, Henry’s historiographer royal, amid general rejoicing. The papal bull was dated the 6th of March; in it, at Henry’s express desire, the previous action of the legate in granting the dispensation was specially commended. Soon afterwards, Innocent also gave the formal papal recognition of Henry’s sovereign rights. The bull of the 27th of March, 1486, which threatened with excommunication any who should rebel against Henry, asserts it was issued by the Pope spontaneously and without prompting from the king; but it is at once obvious from its wording who must have suggested it to the Pope. It also reflects clearly the king’s own point of view—that in order to set aside any still-existing scruples as to the rights of his dynasty, the acknowledgment by the people through Parliament had been added to the right of war, and to an undoubted hereditary claim; nevertheless, with a view to settling the old dispute between York and Lancaster, Henry had resolved on a marriage with Elizabeth, with the proviso that, on Elizabeth’s death, his children from any other marriage should still possess unrestricted hereditary right to the crown. It is just these points, so essential for Henry, which were specially emphasized in that version, of the bull which was distributed throughout the country. The great importance of this marriage for the security of his throne was no secret to Henry, and he never contemplated abandoning it; but in the manner of its final settlement he kept most unmistakably to his own point of view.

No one could expect that with the new reign peace and order would at once be restored all over England. Already in the autumn the king had been threatened with an attack from Scotland, the old border enemy in the north, and this danger was not to be underrated, because the enemy from without was able to unite himself with foes within. But as a prompt summons to arms from Henry showed him to be prepared for defence, the Scottish king, James III, desisted from his undertaking, and after a few negotiations a suspension of hostilities was agreed to on the 30th of January, 1486, and peace soon followed. It was in the north especially that the feeling of the population was unsafe, and full of menace for Henry. An evidence of this was given him by the conduct of York, the northern capital of England, which, in the case of official elections, acted expressly in direct contradiction to the king’s wishes. Henry was anxious, therefore, after the close of the parliamentary session, to look into the matter himself; a loan from the city of London, which, however, did not reach the amount of his demands, had to furnish him the means of appearing with an armed escort.

It was soon evident that cause for apprehension existed. In Lincoln, at Easter, Henry learnt that some fugitive partisans of King Richard—Francis, Viscount against Lovell, with the brothers Thomas and Humphrey Stafford, had left the sanctuary at Colchester, and Lovell and that no one knew where they were in hiding. It was not till he had proceeded further that the news came that Lovell was waylaying him with a body of armed men, and that the Staffords were trying to incite the population of Worcester to insurrection. Whilst Henry’s uncle, Bedford, with a few thousand men, who had been hastily collected, advanced to meet the rebels, the king devised the clever plan of promising, in a public proclamation, exemption from punishment to those who should at once tender their submission. These two things worked together; the confederates of the insurgents gave themselves up to the king, the leaders fled. Lovell remained in hiding in Lancashire. In May he turned towards Ely, either with the idea of escaping to the sea, or of seeking safety in a sanctuary. What he exactly did we do not know; anyhow, he succeeded in joining a fresh conspiracy against Henry in England, before he fled from the country in January, 1487. The Stafford brothers had again sought a sanctuary at Abingdon, but were taken out and brought to the Tower. When Humphrey, before the Court of King’s Bench, appealed to the ancient right of asylum granted to the place by a king of Mercia, this right itself, and especially its validity in such a case of high treason, was disputed by the judges. Humphrey died the death by torture of a traitor; the younger brother Thomas was pardoned, because he was considered to have been led astray by the elder.

The threatening cloud had been quickly dispersed. Again a victor, Henry entered York on the 22nd of April, 1486, where a triumphal welcome had this time been prepared for him. After staying there some weeks, he returned through Worcester, Hereford, Gloucester, and Bristol, to London, where he arrived in June. This year, which had threatened to be so unquiet, was now to be a joyful one to the king. Eight months after her marriage, Elizabeth gave birth at Winchester to a son, who received the name of Arthur, after the hero of tradition. The first offspring of the united houses of York and Lan­caster! The blind poet André celebrated the happy event in verse and prose, and tells us he sang of it in a hundred poems. In truth, the birth of an heir was the greatest happi­ness which could befall the founder of a rising dynasty. But at the same time a new danger, more threatening than the last, was gathering over Henry’s head.

The year 1486 had not closed before sinister rumours were afloat. In a private letter written towards the end of November, it is stated that people had not been saying much about the imprisoned Earl of Warwick, but that there would be more talk of him presently; and towards the beginning of 1487 Henry heard that in Ireland a rival had risen up against him, who gave himself out to be Warwick. At the same time the king knew that the impulse to this new movement came from two centres, Ireland and the Flemish Court of Margaret, widow of Charles the Bold of Burgundy, and sister of Edward IV. This lady of the house of York was destined to cause the Tudor king many an anxious hour. Every Yorkist rising found in her a devoted ally. Her widow’s court afforded a safe place of refuge for fugitive insurgents from England.

The soul of the new conspiracy was her sister’s son, John, de La Pole, Earl of Lincoln, the same who had been chosen as heir to the throne by Richard III. He, as well as his father, the Duke of Suffolk, who was still living, had experienced no ill-treatment from Henry, but rather, had been entrusted with posts of confidence. It is possible that the prospect he had once had of the crown may have kept alive the ambition of the earl, About the end of the year 1486 he devised with friends in England some treasonable plans, in which his chief confederate was Francis, Viscount Lovell, who had been fortunate enough to escape the snares prepared for him. Made wiser by the failure of the last enterprise, they resolved not to take England itself as their centre of action, but to carry on their preparations for the attempt in safe quarters outside the country. Lincoln still considered himself secure, but Lovell fled away to Margaret in January, 1487. Though the plans were laid in England and the preparations made in Flanders, the decisive attack was to be carried out from another quarter, and by special means—by setting up a Yorkist pretender in Ireland.

In Henry’s time the English kings had for three hundred years borne the title of “Lord of Ireland.” But since the first attempt at a conquest of Ireland under Henry II, this lordship had been not much more than a name. It comprehended still in the reign of Henry VII only the so-called Pale, the English boundary—the counties of Louth, Meath, Kildare, and Dublin—not really much more than the strip of coast from Dublin to Dundalk, stretching thirty English miles inland. Within this territory, which was protected by fortresses against “wild Ireland,” a miniature copy of English political institutions had been created; outside this, the Anglo-Irish barons, descendants of the Norman invaders, who in name and character had become Irishmen, continued to live among the Keltic aborigines, a rough undisciplined life of robbery and strife. Here the great chiefs were the veritable lords of the land, and the most important quarrel among them, the race enmity between the Butlers and Geraldines, had in these latter times been associated with the quarrel between the Yorkists and Lancastrians in England. The Yorkists had, on account of their landed property, some influence in Ireland; the head of the Geraldines, the Earl of Kildare, held, under Edward IV, the office of Lord Deputy, and on his death it was handed down to his son, who retained it also under Richard III. The titular dignity of Lord Lieutenant proper was borne under Edward and Richard by the Duke of Clarence and the Earl of Lincoln, but the power remained in the hands of the chieftain of the most prominent Irish party, with the title of Lord Deputy, and he was a partisan of the Yorkists.

Henry, who had come forward as a Lancastrian, had a difficult position with regard to him. If at the beginning of his reign he had attempted to change the existing condition of things by force, he might have destroyed the slender hold which the English rule at that time kept in Ireland. So he wisely remained in the background, and only, as was reasonable, restored to their rights the outlawed Butlers, who had been loyal to the Lancastrian cause. He also appointed their chief, Thomas, Earl of Ormond, then living in England, to be chamberlain to the queen, with a fixed yearly salary, and received him into his Privy Council. At the same time he left Kildare unmolested; setting up his uncle Bedford as lord-lieutenant, he confirmed the earl in his dignities, and wisely waited a few years before interfering in the affairs of Ireland. This the Irish themselves made necessary, when they took part as confederates and allies in the new Yorkist conspiracy.

About the turn of the year 1486-87 there appeared amongst them a young priest of eight and twenty, named Richard Simons, who brought with him a handsome youth of Lambert of humble origin, Lambert Simnel, the son of an organ-builder. This boy was to undertake the part of the Yorkist pretender, only who he should impersonate was not yet decided. Rumour, ever ready, hinted that the unhappy sons of Edward IV had not been murdered, and so Lambert was at first chosen for one of them. Then, however reports were spread about young Warwick; finally, it was said that he had been killed, or that his murder had been planned. Possibly, for this reason, the leaders of the under taking were induced to give out that Simnel was the imprisoned earl. But as Lincoln must have been accurately informed 0f the real circumstances, this plan appears almost incredible in its folly; for Henry could at any moment bring forward the true Warwick and unmask the deception; unless, indeed, the conspirators meditated using Simnel merely as a puppet, ant substituting the true Yorkist prince for him, if things turned out successfully. There is no hint as to how far such at intention could fall in with Lincoln’s private ambition designs. Ireland, the scene of action, was sufficiently remote from London, and it was thought something might be expected from the credulity of the warm-blooded Kelts. The project succeeded. How Simons acted with regard to individual leaders we do not know; the Geraldines wert gained over, Thomas Fitzgerald, Chancellor of Ireland brother of the Earl of Kildare, and the earl himself, joined the conspiracy, and easily drew after them the credulous populace. Simnel was acknowledged as the true heir to the throne. Though some important towns, such as Waterford, kept aloof, in spite of all Kildare’s threats, still this affair of the pretender grew in a short time into a popular rising among the Irish, which was full of danger for Henry.

The king continued to bide his time; he is said indeed to have been informed of Lovell and his new intrigues, even while he was still in England. Towards the beginning of February single rebels were proclaimed, but not till Candlemas (February 2nd) did the Privy Council meet at Sheen, the modern Richmond, in order to decide what definite steps to take. The Earl of Lincoln was present at these sittings. Again a timely proclamation of pardon, as in the last insurrection, was to lead back to the king those who repented at once. It was ordered that the captive Warwick should be publicly shown to the people. But what excited the most attention were the sharp measures taken against Henry’s mother-in-law, the widowed Queen Elizabeth. Her widow’s jointure was withdrawn from her “for various considerations,” and she herself was removed to the convent at Bermondsey, and a yearly income of 400 marks assigned to her, which was subsequently raised.

There must have been some well-grounded reason for these harsh and severe measures, and although none is mentioned, we are naturally led to seek one in the Yorkist rising, concerning which, especially, the council had met together. Once already had Elizabeth changed sides, when she gave Henry up for the murderer of her sons. Why should not the new prospect for her husband’s House fill her with new hopes, though she would thereby be working for her nephew and not for her own daughter? Elizabeth had never shown herself a woman of firm and clear resolve. It is peculiar, certainly, that nowhere should there be any explanation as to the reason for this sentence; the mistaken idea that it was a case of mere arbitrary harshness against an innocent member of the House of York was contradicted by Henry, when he handed over the whole property to her daughter, his wife. Nor could it be a deep-seated grudge on account of that first desertion to Richard, for Henry had before expressly reinstated the queen in all her rights by an Act of Parliament, and had endowed her with an ample income. The cause was a repetition of her former defection. All the threads were not yet in Henry’s hand, otherwise the head of the conspiracy, the Earl of Lincoln, could hardly have taken part as a spy in the sittings of the council and remained to the end, before he followed his friend Lovell to Flanders.

The king betook himself to London, and caused the true Warwick to be shown through the streets of the city, without, however, any effect penetrating to Ireland. The conspirators were arming in the Low Countries—mainly with the money granted by Margaret—two thousand German mercenaries under an experienced captain, Martin Schwarz, with whom they landed in Ireland on the 5th of May, 1487. On the 24th Lambert was borne through the streets of Dublin, amidst great general rejoicing, and crowned king of Ireland with a crown taken from an image of the Virgin. Then he started to take possession of his own special kingdom of England, accompanied, besides the mercenaries, by crowds of poorly clothed and badly armed Irish, under Thomas Fitzgerald.

In consequence of Lincoln’s escape, Henry ordered the east coast to be closely watched, since a descent would surely be made on that side from the Netherlands. At the end of March he left Sheen, went by way of Colchester to Norwich, where he kept the Easter festival, and made a pilgrimage to Walsingham. Through Lord Howth he received news of the events in Ireland; and at the end of April he moved westwards from Cambridge to Coventry, and marched, apparently undecidedly, hither and thither, till he fixed his headquarters, on the 8th of May, at Kenilworth. The nobles from the neighbouring counties assembled at his summons in great numbers, with their dependents; the Duke of Bedford and the Earl of Oxford were given the chief command. When the troops of horse sent out to reconnoitre announced that the enemy had landed on the 4th of June on the coast of Lancashire, Henry set out. More reinforcements fell in on the way. Both parties seemed disposed to vie with each other in trying to gain the favour of the people, for when Henry issued severe regulations for the protection of the inhabitants, Lincoln sought on his side to prevent all plundering. Hoping for reinforcements, Lincoln advanced slowly; but his hopes were in vain ; still he did not lose courage, but marched southwards on Newark, and encountered the troops of the king at Stoke on the 16th of June, 1487.

The Germans and the half-naked Irish fought with infuriated bravery, but after three hours, the victory declared for Henry. The leaders, Lincoln, Schwarz, Fitzgerald, were slain; Lord Lovell disappeared after the battle; Simnel and his teacher, Simons, were taken prisoners, and the latter, whom rumour designated as the real originator of the insurrection, was condemned to imprisonment for life, whilst Simnel was treated with great indulgence. Henry considered his whole participation in the affair as a joke, and assigned to the mock king a place in his kitchen as scullion. When he showed himself skilful, he was promoted and given a post among the king’s falconers. Henry abode for a while in Kenilworth, then travelled slowly through the northern part of his kingdom, where many suspected persons suffered punishment. The citizens in the loyal town of Waterford received in the autumn authority to seize Kildare and his companions where they could, and to confiscate their property. The Pope, too, again lent his aid to Henry; a bull limited the much-abused right of asylum in England, especially in the case of those guilty of high treason. Those who had been excommunicated on account of the insurrection might be absolved by the Archbishop of Canterbury; a special inquiry was instituted against many Irish bishops by the Pope, and he insisted especially that even ecclesiastics should conform to the obligation of loyalty to the king. Alexander VI. renewed, later on, the power of absolution for the Primate, and extended it to all bishops, adding, as a condition, that they should act in the matter exclusively according to the king’s wish.

Henry did not return to London till the 4th of November, where a rumour of his defeat had been maliciously circulated. It was just at this time, after the youthful Tudor monarchy had held out firmly against two Yorkist insurrections, that Henry conceded to his Yorkist wife the supreme dignity which till then had been withheld from her. On the 25th of November, 1487, her solemn coronation took place.

The Estates of the realm had already been called together on the 9th of November for the second Parliament under Henry VII. They had to ratify the Bill of Attainder against those who had taken part in the last conspiracy, by which twenty-eight persons were affected; strange to say, Lovell was not mentioned. For another reason also this Parliament was an important one for Henry’s reign. At the opening of it John Morton appears for the first time as Lord Chancellor, the principal official in the kingdom; he had already been promoted to this new dignity, and to be Archbishop of Canterbury in Bourchier’s place the year before, whilst Ely had been given to Alcock, who had to resign the Chancellorship in Morton’s favour. Morton was thus raised to the public position which befitted his importance for Henry’s reign, and he remained till his death the first counsellor of the king.

It was this Parliament which placed in Henry’s hand a most effective weapon for his struggle with the aristocracy, and, at the same time, one of the most important means of furthering his monarchical policy. This was the institution of the Star Chamber, whereby the judicial powers of the King’s Privy Council were legally confirmed, and a court of justice established, which was immediately under the control of the Crown, and always at its disposal. 

Henry now made a demand of his second Parliament, to which it consented, and thereby signified its acquiescence in a new departure in the royal policy—Henry’s first appearance in the conflict between the foreign Powers on the Continent. At the very beginning of the session, Parliament granted two fifteenths and tenths of the movable property of the lay population of the kingdom, and a graduated poll-tax on foreign traders in England “ for the immediate and necessary defence of the realm.” Scarcely had the new king conquered his position and maintained it against repeated hostile attacks within his kingdom, when the further necessity was laid upon him of defending himself outside it. Henry was drawn into that struggle which had already affected him when a refugee—the struggle for the independence of Brittany.

CHAPTER II.

FOREIGN COMPLICATIONS: FRANCE, BRITTANY, AND SPAIN.