until the next October. In the meanwhile the damages of the bishops were 'ascertained, and the Interdict taken off on the 29th of June.

July 27,

1214

A.D.

4. The war on the Continent occupied men's minds a good deal. Philip won the battle of Bouvines over the forces of Flanders, Germany, and England, on the 27th of July; and John did nothing in Poictou to make the north country barons regret their determination not to follow him. The great confederacy against Philip which Richard had planned, and which John had been labouring to bring to bear on his adversary, was defeated, and Philip stood forth for the moment as the mightiest king in Europe.

5. Disappointed and ashamed, John returned, resolved to master the barons, and found them not only resolved but prepared, and organized to resist him, perhaps even encouraged by his ill success. They had found in Stephen Langton a leader worthy of the cause, and able to exalt and inform the defenders of it. Among those defenders were men of very various sorts: some who had personal aims merely; some who were fitted, by education, accomplishments, and patriotic sympathies, for national champions; some who were carried away by the general ardour. general they may be divided into three classes: (1) those northern barons who had begun the quarrel; (2) the constitutional party, who joined the others in a great meeting held at St. Edmunds, in November 1214; and (3) those who adhered later to the cause, when they saw that the king was helpless.

In

6. It was the two former bodies that presented to him their demands a few weeks after he returned from France. He at once refused all, and began to 'manœuvre to divide the consolidated 'phalanx. First he tried to disable them by demanding the renewal of the homages throughout the country and the surrender of the castles. He next tried

to detach the clergy by granting a charter to secure the freedom of election to bishoprics; he tried to make terms with individual barons; he delayed meeting them from time to time; he took the cross, so that if any hand was raised against him it might be 'paralyzed by the cry of 'sacrilege; he wrote urgently to the Pope to get him to condemn the propositions, and 'excommunicate the persons, of the barons. They likewise presented their complaints at Rome, resisted all John's 'blandishments, and déclined to relax one of their demands, or to give up one of their *precautions.

7. Negotiations ceased, and preparations for war began about Easter 1215. The confederates met at Stamford,

then marched to Brackley, Northampton, Bedford, 1215 Ware, and so to London, where they were received A.D. on the 24th of May. The news of their entry into London determined the action of those who still seemed to adhere to the king, and they joined them, leaving him almost destitute of forces, attended by a few advisers whose hearts were with the insurgents, and a body of personal adherents who had little or no political weight beside their own unpopularity.

8. Then John saw himself compelled to yield, and he yielded he consented to bind himself with promises in which there was nothing sincere but the

June 15,

1215

A. D.

'reluctance with which he conceded them. Magna Carta, the embodiment of the claims which the archbishop and barons had based on the charter of Henry I., was granted at Runnymede7 on June 15, 1215.

9. Magna Carta was a treaty of peace between the king and his people, and so is a complete national act. It is the first act of the kind, for it differs from the charters issued by Henry I., Stephen, and Henry II., not only in its greater fulness and 'perspicuity, but by having a distinct machinery provided to carry it out. Twenty-five barons

were nominated to compel the king to fulfil his part. It was not, as has been sometimes said, a selfish attempt on the part of the barons and bishops to secure their own privileges; it provided that the commons of the realm should have the benefit of every advantage which the two elder estates had won for themselves, and it bound the barons to treat their own 'dependants as it bound the king to treat the barons.

10. Of its sixty-three articles, some provided securities for personal freedom: no man was to be taken, imprisoned, or damaged in person or estate, but by the judgment of his peers and by the law of the land. Others fixed the rate of payments due by the vassal to his lord. Others pre

sented rules for national taxation and for the organization of a national council, without the consent of which the king could not tax. Others decreed the banishment of the 'alien servants of John. Although it is not the foundation of English liberty, it is the first, the clearest, the most united, and historically the most important of all the great 'enunciations of it; and it was a revelation of the possibility of freedom to the medieval world. The maintenance of the Charter becomes from henceforth the watchword of English freedom.

alien, foreign.

as-cer-tained', learned; found out.

cham-pi-ons, heroes.

de-pen-dants, vassals; retainers.
em-bod-i-ment, sum and substance;

essence.

e-nun-ci-a-tions, statements; proc

blan-dish-ments, winning words.

lamations.

con-sol-i-dat-ed, framed firmly.

con-fed-er-a-cy, league.

[church.

ex-com-mu-ni-cate, exclude from the

[Edward the Black Prince was the eldest son of Edward III., who succeeded his father, Edward II., in 1327. In 1339 Edward claimed the crown of France, in right of his mother Isabella, and in opposition to Philip VI. Philip III. of France had had two sons. Isabella was the daughter of the elder of these; while Philip VI. was the son of the younger. This was the ground of Edward's claim. But the claim was unwarrantable for two reasons: first, because at the time of her marriage Isabella had abandoned her claim to the French crown; secondly, because a descendant of Isabella's eldest brother was still living, and of course had a better right to the crown than either Edward III. or Philip VI. After the war had languished for six years, Edward, in 1346, prepared for a decisive blow. He set sail from Southampton with a large army, intending to invade France on the south-west; but a storm drove him to the coast of Normandy, and he landed at La Hogue and then marched on Paris.]

1

1. The two great events of Edward the Black Prince's life, and those which made him famous in war, were the two great battles of Crecy and Poitiers.2 The war, of which these two battles formed the turning-points, was undertaken by Edward III. to gain the crown of France, -a claim, through his mother, which he had solemnly *relinquished, but which he now resumed.

2. I shall not undertake to describe the whole fight of Crecy, but will call your attention briefly to the questions which every one ought to ask himself, if he wishes to understand anything about any battle whatever. First,

Where was it fought? Secondly, Why was it fought? Thirdly, How was it won? And fourthly, What was the result of it? And to this I must add, in the present instance, What part was taken in it by the Prince, now following his father as a young knight, in his first great 'campaign?

3. The first of these questions involves the second also. If we make out where a battle was fought, this usually

tells us why it was fought. And this is one of the many proofs of the use of learning geography together with history. Each helps us to understand the other. Edward had ravaged Normandy, and reached the very gates of Paris, and was retreating towards Flanders, when he was overtaken by the French King, Philip, who, with an immense army, had determined to cut him off entirely, and so put an end to the war.

4. With difficulty, and by the happy accident of a low