with which Charles's original seizure had been sigñalised, and which occasionally recurred until his imbecility was confirmed. 1425. 1428. Henry's mother, Catherine of France, had a short time after his father's death married a subject, Owen Tudor, and the care of the infant's person had very properly been transferred first to the Lady Boteler, and then to the Earl of Warwick: he complained of flatterers having in the young king's eleventh year instilled into his mind notions of his rank and station inconsistent with a due submission to the tutor's authority, and required from the Council a power of naming all the household, and preventing access of others to his royal pupil. The request was complied with. But flatterers can no more be excluded from the palace by closing its doors than any other pestilence engendered by corruption within its walls: they again found their way to Henry, and in his fourteenth year he repeated his claim of being allowed to attend the meetings of his Council. They answered, that "although God had endowed him with as great an understanding as they had ever seen in any prince or in any person of his years," yet that it was safer for both himself and the kingdom that he should be wholly guided either by the Parliament or by themselves.' It was a striking and an affecting circumstance, showing the amiable nature of Henry, that he mainly desired to interfere Rot. Parl., iv. 438. 1434. 1437. in mitigation of the punishments inflicted by the law ; and when some years after he renewed his claim, the Council satisfied him by a resolution that he should exercise the power of pardoning and of collating to benefices. He was also to decide when the Council happened to differ, and did not come to a determination by a majority of more than two-thirds. The divisions under the factious conflicts between the Cardinal and Gloster would have sufficed to ruin all chance of retaining the French conquests, if that had not been already desperate, independently of English affairs for, instead of the unity and vigour which the conduct of such a war peculiarly required, the Council wavered continually between the two parties, the Cardinal's being wisely bent upon peace at any reasonable price, the Duke's upon continuing the war at all hazards; and though in general Beaufort, while he could attend in person, had the advantage, from his prudence, his long-sighted sagacity, his command of temper, and his thorough knowledge of men as well as his long experience in dealing with them, he was yet obliged more than once to absent himself from England when the clamours against him, from accidental circumstances, aided the violence of his nephew, who on other occasions also obtained a temporary ascendancy. So that whether the war should be prosecuted with vigour or suffered to languish depended less upon the wise counsels and fixed determination of the Regent, who was carrying it on, than upon the balance of parties and the accidents that : might from day to day vary it, among those who, in his unavoidable absence, had the government in their hands. But the fate of the war had been virtually decided with the termination of the Burgundian alliance, of which so many circumstances indicated the approach, even before his Duchess's death, and of which that event, and the fixing of negotiations for a general peace, left no longer any possible doubt. Upon these negotiations all men's hopes rested; they were the object of intense anxiety in every part of Europe, long since worn out by the cruelties and devastations of the war, and now weary of a contest of which the mischiefs remained, while the interest had died away as its active operations ceased. Aug. 5, At length the Congress met. It was attended by the ambassadors of the Emperor Sigismund, the Kings of Arragon, Castile, Navarre, Portugal, Denmark, Poland, Sicily, Naples, the Dukes of Milan and Brittany, and four Legates from the Pope, the mediating power. Philip appeared in person, attended by many of his nobles and knights. The English Embassy was composed of 200 Lords and Knights under the Archbishop of York and Earl of Suffolk; it was afterwards joined by the Cardinal himself. The Regent remained at Rouen, confined to his bed by severe illness, and appears to have taken no part in any of the proceedings. The Embassy from Charles consisted of above 400 persons, some of high rank, with the Constable Bourbon at their head. There were brought together from all parts upwards of 10,000 strangers, and more than 500 personages of dignity and importance. Philip had frankly apprised the English Council of the previous negotiations at Nevers, adding that the Pope had released him from the oath which fifteen years before he had taken to abide by the Treaty of Troyes. Henry had upon this intimation addressed his inquiries to Rome, and received for answer that no dispensation from any lawful obligation was ever given; an answer which seemed to leave no doubt of the Burgundian's assertion being cor rect. Interrupted only by the tournaments and other festivities which in that age attended all gatherings of the people for what purpose soever, the negotiations lasted seven weeks. The offers made by Charles to the English were such as in the posture of their affairs they had no right to expect-the cession in perpetuity of both Normandy and Aquitaine, as well as Calais; and this was refused. The Cardinal and his colleagues, having before their eyes the dread of the war party in the Council and in the country, headed by Gloster, would listen to nothing but the uti possidetis, which would have left England in possession of Paris and the Isle de France. But they also objected to a peace, and proposed a long truce, and the marriage of Henry to a daughter of Charles, as if to insult the French with the recollection of the ruin and the dishonour which had accompanied the last nuptials in the royal house. These propositions were indignantly rejected; and the Embassy left Arras some weeks before the Congress broke up. Every one plainly perceived that the English were the cause of the negotiation failing; and as their whole conduct from the beginning of the invasion had been universally disapproved, the reprobation that fell upon them was now mightily increased. The Burgundian, on the other hand, won general favour. His unfeigned reluctance to break with his ally by a final separation, could with great difficulty be overcome by the pressing entreaties of the mediators, and the other ambassadors. He still had scruples respecting his oath; and various doctors, Roman, French, and English, learned in the civil and canon law and skilled in casuistry, were consulted by him, most of whom declared that he was not bound. But he was apprehensive that the Papal dispensation, which the Legates had plenary powers to renew in the amplest form, might not satisfy the exigencies of his duty as a knight; and though the French and Roman doctors gave a clear opinion that he was released, those of England held him still bound. While he remained in a state of hesitation, his doubts were ended by the intelligence arriving that Bedford had breathed his last; and on the 21st of Septem- Sept. 14, ber he signed the Treaty, considering the last tie which bound him to England against his duty towards himself and his own people as severed by his brother-in-law's decease, and soothing his irritation 1435, |