Volume I Part 1 (1/2)
Henry of Monmouth.
Volume 1.
by J. Endell Tyler.
PREFACE.
Memoirs such as these of Henry of Monmouth might doubtless be made more attractive and entertaining were their Author to supply the deficiencies of authentic records by the inventions of his fancy, and adorn the result of careful inquiry into matters of fact by the descriptive imagery and colourings of fiction. To a writer, also, who could at once handle the pen of the biographer and of the poet, few names would offer a more ample field for the excursive range of historical romance than the life of Henry of Monmouth. From the day of his first compulsory visit to Ireland, abounding as that time does with deeply interesting incidents, to his last hour in the now-ruined castle of Vincennes;--or rather, from his mother's espousals to the interment of his earthly remains within the sacred precincts of Westminster, every period teems with animating suggestions. So far, however, from possessing such advent.i.tious recommendations, the point on which (rather perhaps than any other) an apology might be expected for this work, is, that it has freely tested by the standard of (p. vi) truth those delineations of Henry's character which have contributed to immortalize our great historical dramatist. The Author, indeed, is willing to confess that he would gladly have withdrawn from the task of a.s.saying the substantial accuracy and soundness of Shakspeare's historical and biographical views, could he have done so safely and without a compromise of principle. He would have avoided such an inquiry, not only in deference to the acknowledged rule which does not suffer a poet to be fettered by the rigid shackles of unbending facts; but from a disinclination also to interfere, even in appearance, with the full and free enjoyment of those exquisite scenes of humour, wit, and nature, in which Henry is the hero, and his ”riotous, reckless companions” are subordinate in dramatical excellence only to himself.
The Author may also not unwillingly grant, that (with the majority of those who give a tone to the ”form and pressure” of the age) Shakspeare has done more to invest the character of Henry with a never-dying interest beyond the lot of ordinary monarchs, than the bare records of historical verity could ever have effected. Still he feels that he had no alternative. He must either have ascertained the historical worth of those scenic representations, or have suffered to remain in their full force the deep and prevalent impressions, as to Henry's principles and conduct, which owe, if not their origin, yet, at least, much of their universality and vividness, to Shakspeare. (p. vii) The poet is dear, and our early a.s.sociations are dear; and pleasures often tasted without satiety are dear: but to every rightly balanced mind Truth will be dearer than all.
It must nevertheless be here intimated, that these volumes are neither exclusively, nor yet especially, designed for the antiquarian student.
The Author has indeed sought for genuine information at every fountain-head accessible to him; but he has prepared the result of his researches for the use (he would trust, for the improvement as well as the gratification,) of the general reader. And whilst he has not consciously omitted any essential reference, he has guarded against interrupting the course of his narrative by an unnecessary acc.u.mulation of authorities. He is, however, compelled to confess that he rises from this very limited sphere of inquiry under an impression, which grew stronger and deeper as his work advanced, that, before a history of our country can be produced worthy of a place among the records of mankind, the still hidden treasures of the metropolis and of our universities, together with the stores which are known to exist in foreign libraries, must be studied with far more of devoted care and zealous perseverance than have hitherto been bestowed upon them. That the honest and able student, however unwearied in zeal and industry, may be supplied with the indispensable means of verifying what (p. viii) tradition has delivered down, enucleating difficulties, rectifying mistakes, reconciling apparent inconsistencies, clearing up doubts, and removing that ma.s.s of confusion and error under which the truth often now lies buried,--our national history must be made a subject of national interest. It is a maxim of our law, and the constant practice of our courts of justice, never to admit evidence unless it be the best which under the circ.u.mstances can be obtained. Were this principle of jurisprudence recognised and adopted in historical criticism, the student would carefully ascend to the first witnesses of every period, on whom modern writers (however eloquent or sagacious) must depend for their information. How lamentably devoid of authority and credit is the work of the most popular and celebrated of our modern English historians in consequence of his unhappy neglect of this fundamental principle, will be made palpably evident by the instances which could not be left unnoticed even within the narrow range of these Memoirs.
And the Author is generally persuaded that, without a far more comprehensive and intimate acquaintance with original doc.u.ments than our writers have possessed, or apparently have thought it their duty to cultivate, error will continue to be propagated as heretofore; and our annals will abound with surmises and misrepresentations, instead of being the guardian depositories of historical verity. Only by the acknowledgment and application of the principle here advocated will (p. ix) England be supplied with those monuments of our race, those ”POSSESSIONS FOR EVER,” as the Prince of Historians[1] once named them, which may instruct the world in the philosophy of moral cause and effect, exhibit honestly and clearly the natural workings of the human heart, and diffuse through the ma.s.s of our fellow-creatures a practical a.s.surance that piety, justice, and charity form the only sure groundwork of a people's glory and happiness; while religious and moral depravity in a nation, no less than in an individual, leads, (tardily it may be and remotely, but by ultimate and inevitable consequence,) to failure and degradation.
[Footnote 1: Thucydides.]
In those portions of his work which have a more immediate bearing upon religious principles and conduct, the Author has not adopted the most exciting mode of discussing the various subjects which have naturally fallen under his review. Party spirit, though it seldom fails to engender a more absorbing interest for the time, and often clothes a subject with an importance not its own, will find in these pages no response to its sentiments, under whatever character it may give utterance to them. In these departments of his inquiry, to himself far the most interesting, (and many such there are, especially in the second volume,) the Author trusts that he has been guided by the Apostolical maxim of ”SPEAKING THE TRUTH IN LOVE.” He has not willingly advanced a single sentiment which should unnecessarily (p. x) cause pain to any individual or to any cla.s.s of men; he has not been tempted by morbid delicacy or fear to suppress or disguise his view of the very TRUTH.
The reader will readily perceive that, with reference to the foreign and domestic policy of our country,--the advances of civilization,--the manners of private life, as well in the higher as in the more humble grades of society,--the state of literature,--the progress of the English const.i.tution,--the condition and discipline of the army, which Henry greatly improved,--and the rise and progress of the royal navy, of which he was virtually the founder, many topics are either purposely avoided, or only incidentally and cursorily noticed. To one point especially (a subject in itself most animating and uplifting, and intimately interwoven with the period embraced by these Memoirs,) he would have rejoiced to devote a far greater portion of his book, had it been compatible with the immediate design of his undertaking;--THE PROMISE AND THE DAWN OF THE REFORMATION.
However the value of his labours may be ultimately appreciated, the Author confidently trusts that their publication can do no disservice to the cause of truth, of sound morality, and of pure religion. He would hope, indeed, that in one point at least the power of an (p. xi) example of pernicious tendency might be weakened by the issue of his investigation. If the results of these inquiries be acquiesced in as sound and just, no young man can be encouraged by Henry's example (as it is feared many, especially in the higher cla.s.ses, have been encouraged,) in early habits of moral delinquency, with the intention of extricating himself in time from the dominion of his pa.s.sions, and of becoming, like Henry, in after-life a pattern of religion and virtue, ”the mirror of every grace and excellence.” The divine, the moralist, and the historian know that authenticated instances of such sudden moral revolutions in character are very rare,--exceptions to the general rule; and among those exceptions we cannot be justified in numbering Henry of Monmouth.
He was bold and merciful and kind, but he was no libertine, in his youth; he was brave and generous and just, but he was no persecutor, in his manhood. On the throne he upheld the royal authority with mingled energy and mildness, and he approved himself to his subjects as a wise and beneficent King; in his private individual capacity he was a bountiful and considerate, though strict and firm master, a warm and sincere friend, a faithful and loving husband. He pa.s.sed through life under the habitual sense of an overruling Providence; and, in his premature death, he left us the example of a Christian's patient and pious resignation to the Divine Will. As long as he lived, he was (p. xii) an object of the most ardent and enthusiastic admiration, confidence, and love; and, whilst the English monarchy shall remain among the unforgotten things on earth, his memory will be honoured, and his name will be enrolled among the n.o.bLE and the GOOD.
MEMOIRS OF HENRY OF MONMOUTH.
CHAPTER I.
HENRY OF MONMOUTH'S PARENTS. -- TIME AND PLACE OF HIS BIRTH. -- JOHN OF GAUNT AND BLANCHE OF LANCASTER. -- HENRY BOLINBROKE. -- MONMOUTH CASTLE. -- HENRY'S INFANCY AND CHILDHOOD. -- HIS EDUCATION. -- RESIDENCE IN OXFORD. -- BOLINBROKE'S BANISHMENT.
1387-1398.
Henry the Fifth was the son of Henry of Bolinbroke and Mary daughter of Humfrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford. No direct and positive evidence has yet been discovered to fix with unerring accuracy the day or the place of his birth. If however we a.s.sume the statement of the chroniclers[2] to be true, that he was born at Monmouth on the ninth day of August in the year 1387,[3] history supplies many ascertained facts not only consistent with that hypothesis, but in (p. 002) confirmation of it; whilst none are found to throw upon it the faintest shade of improbability. At first sight it might perhaps appear strange that the exact time of the birth as well of Henry of Monmouth, as of his father, two successive kings of England, should even yet remain the subject of conjecture, tradition, and inference; whilst the day and place of the birth of Henry VI. is matter of historical record. A single reflection, however, on the circ.u.mstances of their respective births, renders the absence of all precise testimony in the one case natural; whilst it would have been altogether unintelligible in the other. When Henry of Bolinbroke and Henry of Monmouth were born, their fathers were subjects, and nothing of national interest was at the time a.s.sociated with their appearance in the world; at Henry of Windsor's birth he was the acknowledged heir to the throne both of England and of France.
[Footnote 2: Monomothi in Wallia natus v. Id.
Aug.--Pauli Jov. Ang. Reg. Chron.; William of Worcester, &c.]
[Footnote 3: At the foot of the Wardrobe Account of Henry Earl of Derby from 30th September 1387 to 30th September 1388, (and unfortunately no account of the Duke of Lancaster's expenses is as yet found extant before that very year,) an item occurs of 341_l._ 12_s._ 5_d._, paid 24th September 1386, for the household expenses of the Earl and his family at Monmouth. This proves that his father made the castle of Monmouth his residence within less than a year of the date a.s.signed for Henry's birth.]
To what extent Henry of Monmouth's future character and conduct were, under Providence, affected by the circ.u.mstances of his family and its several members, it would perhaps be less philosophical than presumptuous to define. But, that those circ.u.mstances were (p. 003) peculiarly calculated to influence him in his principles and views and actions, will be acknowledged by every one who becomes acquainted with them, and who is at the same time in the least degree conversant with the growth and workings of the human mind. It must, therefore, fall within the province of the inquiry inst.i.tuted in these pages, to take a brief review of the domestic history of Henry's family through the years of his childhood and early youth.
John, surnamed ”of Gaunt,” from Ghent or Gand in Flanders, the place of his birth, was the fourth son of King Edward the Third. At a very early age he married Blanche, daughter and heiress of Henry Plantagenet, Duke of Lancaster, great-grandson of Henry the Third.[4]
The time of his marriage with Blanche,[5] though recorded with sufficient precision, is indeed comparatively of little consequence; whilst the date of their son Henry's birth, from the influence which the age of a father may have on the destinies of his child, becomes matter of much importance to those who take any interest in the (p. 004) history of their grandson, Henry of Monmouth. On this point it has been already intimated that no conclusive evidence is directly upon record. The princ.i.p.al facts, however, which enable us to draw an inference of high probability, are a.s.sociated with so pleasing and so exemplary a custom, though now indeed fallen into great desuetude among us, that to review them compensates for any disappointment which might be felt from the want of absolute certainty in the issue of our research. It was Henry of Bolinbroke's custom[6] every year on the Feast of the Lord's Supper, that is, on the Thursday before Easter, to clothe as many poor persons as equalled the number of years which he had completed on the preceding birthday; and by examining the accounts still preserved in the archives of the Duchy of Lancaster, the details of which would be altogether uninteresting in this place, we are led to infer that Henry Bolinbroke was born on the 4th of April 1366.
Blanche, his mother, survived the birth of Bolinbroke probably not more than three years. Whether this lady found in John of Gaunt a faithful and loving husband, or whether his libertinism caused her to pa.s.s her short life in disappointment and sorrow, no authentic doc.u.ment enables us to p.r.o.nounce. It is, however, impossible to close our eyes against the painful fact, that Catherine Swynford, who (p. 005) was the partner of his guilt during the life of his second wife, Constance, had been an inmate of his family, as the confidential attendant on his wife Blanche, and the governess of her daughters, Philippa and Elizabeth of Lancaster. That he afterwards, by a life of abandoned profligacy, disgraced the religion which he professed, is, unhappily, put beyond conjecture or vague rumour. Though we cannot infer from any expenses about her funeral and her memory, that Blanche was the sole object of his affections, (the most lavish costliness at the tomb of the departed too often being only in proportion to the unkindness shown to the living,) yet it may be worth observing, that in 1372 we find an entry in the account, of 20_l._ paid to two chaplains (together with the expenses of the altar) to say ma.s.ses for her soul. He was then already[7] married to his second wife, Constance, daughter of Peter the Cruel, King of Castile. By this lady, whom he often calls ”the Queen,” he appears to have had only one child, married, it is said, to Henry III. King of Castile.[8]