yet he honestly gives the Limoges massacre with fulness, and strongly reprobates it.

We cannot easily avoid noting, though assuredly no proof was required of it, Mr. Hume's carelessness in giving facts and referring to authorities which often do not bear him out. One instance occurs in the portion of his History to which we have been adverting. He places the march of Lancaster through France too early. He it was says 66 some time after Knollys's expedition." It was three years after; Knollys's being in 1370, Lancaster's in 1373. He says the Duke had 25,000 men with him, and he cites Froissart, who says 3000 horse and 10,000 archers (tom. i. fol. ccliv.). He also cites Walsingham, who says 30,000 horse (283), which is manifestly impossible; if he were right, there must have been many more than 30,000 men, which number Barnes (857) appears to have taken from T. Walsingham, though he only refers to Froissart, who gives 13,000. Barnes confounds Lancaster's expedition with Knollys's in p. 800; for he says Knollys had 30,000 according to Mezeray, and only 12,000 according to Holinshed, and that he prefers the former authority. But Mezeray gives no number as to Knollys (i. 882), and as to Lancaster he gives not 30,000 but 40,000 (ib. 889). Hume gives Knollys 30,000, and refers to Walsingham and Froissart, neither of whom gives that amount. T. Walsingham (179) gives no number, and Froissart (i. fol. ccxxxi) gives only 5500 and 4000 Welsh. The Troubadour Chronicler of Bernard du Guesclin says 20,000 (ii. 131, ed. 1839). Dr. Lingard gives no particulars of either of these remarkable expeditions, despatching each in a single sentence (iii. 103-4); but nothing can be more praiseworthy than the honest indignation which he expresses at the conduct of the Black Prince on the sacking of Limoges.

NOTE LII. p. 238.

The privilege of Parliament is sometimes said to have been extended by Henry VI. after Henry V. had resisted the claims

and refused the prayer of the Commons. But this is not correct, both because Henry VI. can hardly be said to have extended the privilege, and because it was in 5 Henry IV. that the prayer referred to was refused. R. Chedder, Esquire, a servant (magneal) of T. Broke, Knight of the shire for Somerset, had been grievously assaulted and maimed, having come with him to Parliament; and the Commons prayed that it might be declared treason to slay a knight so come to Parliament, and mayhem with loss of the hand to wound him, and fine and ransom to assault him; and that the King would not pardon any such offender unless he made accord with the party aggrieved. The King refused this prayer; but as to the case of Chedder and Broke, and as to all future cases of the same kind, ordered that proclamation should be made in the town where the offence was committed (that is evidently in the town where the Parliament was sitting), and if the party charged did not appear within a quarter of a year before the Justice to take his trial, then he should be held attainted of the offence, pay double damages to the party aggrieved, and make fine and ransom to the King; and if he did appear, he should take his trial, and on conviction suffer the same punishment (Rot. Par. iii. 542; Stat. 5 Henry IV. c. 6). In 11 Henry VI. an assault and affray having been committed, but against a knight of the shire, and the Commons referring to the former statute, desired to have it re-enacted and applied to knights, citizens, and burgesses. The Act made on this extended also to Lords Spiritual and Temporal come to attend Parliament, and to Councillors come to attend the King's Council by his summons (Rot. Par. iv. 562; Stat. 11 Henry VI. c. 11). It is hard to see what better protection this act gave than the common law afforded, though it enables them to profit by the injury sustained; for it merely re-enacts the Stat. 5 Henry IV. c. 6 as to all members of both Houses attending Parliament, and Privy Councillors. It certainly does not come within the description given of it by Dr. Lingard (iii. 498) of "a law for the personal security of all members of Parliament while attending their duty," the granting of which he says "former

sovereigns had refused or eluded." Indeed the Stat. of Henry IV. protected the servants of members at least from mayhem, and it is not easy to see how the members should, during the interval between the 5 Henry IV. and 11 Henry VI., have been without that protection at common law which their servants had by statute; though certainly the member has the protection, such as it is, from assault, when the servant only has it from mayhem. In 5 Henry IV. (Rot. Par. iii. 541) the Commons complained of their servants being arrested for debt, and required protection against this proceeding by treble damages being given. The King answered that they had their remedy by law, which seems more than doubtful (Rot. Par. iii. 541).

Nothing can more clearly show the tendency of all usages, and of the people's habits in those times to consider everything with a view to pecuniary gain, than these proceedings. The law severely punished the offence of maiming (mayhem) whether committed against a member of Parliament or any other person. But much benefit was thought to be acquired by members when they were enabled to recover double or treble damages for having been wounded. So when the Commons ask to have punishment inflicted on persons guilty of slaying or of maiming members, they desire, further, that no pardon be granted unless accord be made, that is compensation given to the party aggrieved. The whole of the barbarous warfare carried on in that age was tainted with the same sordid feeling: prisoners were only made to be ransomed; those who could not pay were put to death; those who could were detained without exchange, and probably after war had ceased. The pecuniary commutation of all punishments at a somewhat earlier period proceeded on the same principle.

NOTE LIII. p. 238.

The Parliament of Leicester met 30th April, 1414, little more than a year after Henry's accession. The Petition of the Commons (Rot. Par. iv. 22) is very remarkable. It sets forth their

ight as having ever been a branch of the Parliament, and that no law could ever be made without their assent, and beseeches that henceforth whether they should make any complaint or ask any remedy by mouth of their speaker, or by petition in writing, no law be made thereafter changing the meaning and purport of what is asked by addition, diminution, or otherwise, without their consent, adding, however, that they do not mean, if they should ask several things, that the King may not grant some and refuse others. The answer is that "of his especial grace the King grants that from henceforth nothing be enacted to be petitions of his Commons that be contrary to their asking whereby they should be bound without their assent, saving his royal prerogative to grant and deny what him list of their petitions and askings."

Upon this arises first, the observation that the Lords are not named, nor, indeed, was any Statute made. Next, that the grant only is of security against altering any Bill sent up by the Commons without their assent to the change, so that there would be no infringement of the right thus bestowed, or recognized, if a Statute were made by the King and Lords alone. The Commons, it is true, get all they ask in their petition; but the claim in the preamble goes further, and asserts the general right, and of this claim no notice is taken in the answer.

Henry IV.'s first Parliament met at Westminster 6th October, 1399; and on the 27th, the interval having been occupied by the resignation and deposition of Richard, an act (or rather a judgment) was passed condemning him to perpetual imprisonment, but the consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal alone is stated (Rot. Par. iii. 426). On the 3rd of November, only two private Bills having passed in the mean time, the Commons state that they are no parties to any judgments in Parliament, these belonging to the King and the Lords only, unless so far as such judgments may from grace and favour be communicated to them, and, therefore, they claim not to be bound by any judgments given or to be given. Such at least seems to be the meaning of the claim "that no record be made

in Parliament against 'les dite communes qu'ils sont ou seront parties ad ascunes juggements donnez ou a donner en apres en Parlement.""

The King's answer by the Archbishop of Canterbury is that their prayer be granted, and that the King and the Lords ever had and will have the right of giving judgments in Parliament as the Commons had set forth; but that in Statutes to be made, or any grants and subsidies, or in such things as are made for the common profit of the realm, the King desires to have specially their advice and consent (Rot. Par. iii. 427, art. 79).

In Henry IV.'s second Parliament, holden 20th January, 1401, he was far less courteous to the Commons, his authority being now established. They asked that his answers to their petitions should henceforth be given before they had made their grants; but he answered that he should consult the Lords and be guided by their advice, which having done he said he saw no reason to change the established usage of the grants preceding the answers (Rot. Par. iii. 458).

NOTE LIV. p. 243.

The dates of the congés d'élire show that the Pope's nomination was required. Thus, that for Winchester is dated 25th March, 1419; but the restitution of the temporalities to the former bishop bears date 18th October, 1419, and to the latter 17th March, 1420—a delay in the one case of five, and in the other of seven months.

Some of the circulars to the bishops and chapters in Normandy require that all persons having benefices shall reside, without the reference which other circulars make to the absentees not having taken the oaths. Indeed, some of them are before the Treaty of Troyes, as one 24th April, 1419, from the exigency of which an excuse is afterwards granted to students at Paris University, holding Norman livings (Rym. ix. 739, 808). To the Chapter of Evreux (13th January, 1419) he severely forbids the "quam plurima intolerabilia," which he hears they intend to commit