also affirms that there was before the battle an offer by the English to pay all the damage done in their invasion, as well as to restore all the places they had taken, provided they were allowed freely to return to England. He is far from being partial to the French. He charges their cowardice as the cause of their losses-describing the general contempt into which their chivalry had fallen :-" Milicia Gallicana cunctis alienigenis facta est in derisum et sibilum, et versa est in eorum cantilena tota die." (ch. 6.) The folly of the French in attacking at Agincourt, and not following "sound and discreet counsel," is the subject of ch. 9-" in aggressû præcipiti et confuso, ac ignominiosâ fugâ." He states the killing of the prisoners as having been ordered by Henry in consequence of a mistake that some thirty gendarmes who were flying, were about to renew the attack (ch. 8). According to him the King and the nobles purchased from the soldiers, artisans, and common people the prisoners they had made, for the purpose of gaining by their ransom (ch. 10).

NOTE XXXVII. p. 121.

J. le Maingre, Maréchal de Boucicault, who was second in command at Agincourt, was a distinguished person in that age, as appears from the history of him, by a contemporary unknown, which Theod. Godefroy published in 1620, entitled "Le Livre des Faicts du bon Messire Jean le Maingre, dit Bouçicaut, Mareschal de France." It only comes down to 1408. He died a prisoner in England in 1421. He had served in Hungary against the Turks; then in Guyenne; afterwards under the Emperor of Constantinople against the Turks; and he was then chosen Governor of Genoa when under the French.

NOTE XXXVIII.—p. 124.

66

In the French king's library there is a MS. containing the proceedings in a suit of Gaucourt against Destoutville. Gaucourt had been taken prisoner at Harfleur, and was retained in order to obtain ransom from him, the ordinary course of proceeding in those predatory wars. Many of us," he says, "being prisoners, Henry allowed us to remain at large on promise of joining him at Calais at Martinmas. Afterwards I came from thence to England, and endeavoured to obtain my release, and return to France. I was suffered to go on account of my illness." Henry complained of having lost several of his jewels at Agincourt, and promised to release all the prisoners if Gaucourt could find the jewels. The crown of England was among them, and the cross, with a piece of the true cross, and the Chancery seal. He says he made sure of recovering all the property, though its being dispersed in different hands made it difficult. He returned after making search, and told Henry that he doubted not ultimately succeeding. He offered to bring them all over, with two casks of Beaune wine (Burgundy), together with 120 to 140 English prisoners, if Henry would release him as he had promised. But the King proved too crafty for him. "Come to London," said he, "and I will consider your release." Gaucourt consulted his friends, and all thought that his only chance was bringing over the jewels and prisoners at once. He accordingly bought clothing for the prisoners at his own cost, hired a ship, and conveyed all-jewels, prisoners, and wine; and all were landed safe at the Tower. After this Henry never would once see him, nor give him a farthing of money. He afterwards found that Henry had ransomed the prisoners at prices fixed by himself. Gaucourt's claim against Destoutville is for his moiety of 14,000 crowns, which the English king's conduct had cost him, and for which loss he contended Destoutville was answerable with him.

NOTE XXXIX.—p. 130.

The exaggerations of some, as T. Walsingham, in describing the expedition from Harfleur, and of most writers, but not T. Walsingham, in their accounts of the sea fight, expose and contradict themselves. Thus T. Walsingham, p. 441, says there were 15,000 French and only 1500 English in the Harfleur battle, and he describes the attack as begun by Armagnac, while all others state the plundering expedition of Exeter as giving rise to the engagement. He very slightly mentions the sea fight, and only says that the French vessels having molested our coasts for some time, it became necessary to oppose them by the king's brother, who took eight, of which the three largest escaped. Hardynge, c. 216, gives 20,000 as the number of French killed or taken prisoners-it is hard to say which, for he uses both expressions within seven lines, if indeed "taken" be not an error for "slain." But after their utter destruction he makes the French avail themselves of a calm to attack the English fleet night and day with "wilde fyre." Holinshed (iii. 85) describes the whole French navy as either sunk or captured in the engagement, but he also mentions the resistance made next day by "certain French gallies" to the English entering and victualling the town. T. Liv. (p. 26) only relates the victory as having put the enemy's ships to flight, and not as having taken or sunk above three or four. T. Elm. (p. 82) does not widely differ from this account. Stow (iii. 52) gives no account of Bedford's expedition at all; but in relating Huntington's the year after, he confounds it with Bedford's so far as to make its object the relief of Harfleur, and to represent Henry as at one time intending to command it. Monst. (c. clxv.) says that 800 English were slain in Exeter's (Dorset's) predatory inroad. The Polychron. (cccxxx.) only states the number of the French fleet at 57, and that three were taken, one destroyed, and the rest fled. Mr. Hume has neither mentioned Exeter's expedition nor his repulse and subsequent success, nor the siege of

Harfleur and its relief by Bedford's naval victory. He is, however, quite correct in his remarks on Henry's invasion, and in his comparison of the three victories, Crécy, Poictiers, and Agincourt; all these inroads he truly describes as mere predatory incursions, and the victories to which the English owed their escape from apparently inevitable destruction as only occasioned by the gross errors of the French captains. In fact, Henry's success two years after was owing not to his first invasion, but to the accidents which had arisen to increase the distractions of the French court:

NOTE XL.-p. 133.

There were, of course, many loans contracted by former kings; but these were chiefly on their own personal security, or by pledges of their property or the property of the crown, as we have seen that Henry pawned the crown jewels and even the crown itself. The necessities of war had also put the Parliament, as well as the King, upon many shifts. Thus in 14 Ed. III. money was borrowed by the King upon the 20,000 bags of wool granted to him by Parliament (Rot. Par. ii. 119-121). In the 20 Ed. III. a subsidy was granted, the merchants having advanced money upon it; the entry is made on the roll that the grant could not be repealed without the consent of Parliament, meaning that the merchants could not be deprived of their security by the Crown giving up the subsidy (Rot. Par. ii. 161). But this does not amount to a parliamentary pledging or mortgaging of the revenue granted. In 50 Ed. III. Latymer was impeached for borrowing 20,000 marks for the King and binding him to repay 30,000, and also for having shared in the enormous profit (ib. 325). Merchants were in the same reign allowed to export the wool duty free, until thus repaid the money lent by them (ib. 444). In 5 Rich. II. one of the causes assigned in the speech for assembling the Parliament is, that the merchants being applied to for a loan, refused to advance their money

without parliamentary security (Rot. Par. iii. 121). But the first regular mortgaging of a subsidy which I can find is that referred to in the text, 4 Henry V. The entry on the roll (Rot. Par. iv. 95, 96) purports to bind the King, and his three brothers in case of his decease, in the presence of the prelates, peers, and commoners whose names are underwritten for more solemnity. The security of the lenders was to be by writs under the Great Seal made for the several sums advanced, whether by abbeys, princes, bishops, towns, or individuals.

There is considerable obscurity and some uncertainty respecting the nature of tenths and fifteenths. The other fractions, as nones or 9ths, sometimes 20ths, sometimes 8ths, and once 14ths, soon sunk in the regular 10ths and 15ths. It seems to be thought by some that 10ths were of landed rents and profits, 15ths of personal property; but for this supposition there is not any foundation. In fact, R. Hoveden (vi. 42), when relating the first assessment of the kind in Henry II.'s time, expressly states it to be "de mobilibus." Then, if both 10ths and 15ths are assessments on moveables, why should they be granted together? It is possible that they were originally granted on different kinds of property, and afterwards continued in conjunction when granted on the same kinds of property, instead of one grant of 1-6th; but this is not very likely. I take the fact to be this :-We find that they were given originally, the one on country owners or inhabitants, the other on city or borough inhabitants. The former were rated at 1-15th of their personal property, the latter at 1-10th, perhaps because of the feudal services of the country folk, afterwards commuted for scutage. Of these there were exempted all whose personal property was under 10s., of the town folk all whose property was under 6s. For many years the terms of the grant kept up the distinction: thus in 8 Ed. III., 1-10th is expressly granted on persons within cities and boroughs, and 1-15th on those in the country (Rot. Par. ii. 447). So 2-10ths and 2-15ths were granted in the same way in 1 Rich. II. (Rot. Par. iii. 7). But afterwards the Rolls of Parliament only mention 10ths and 15ths indiscriminately, and the first instance