The Chancellor, although he had not opposed the recall of the Spensers, whose banishment had taken place under an arbitrary ordinance of the Barons, in which neither the Prelates nor the Commons had concurred, strenuously resisted the influence they were now acquiring, and their illegal acts in the King's name. Finding his resistance ineffectual, he resolved to retire from political life, and his resignation was hastened by a severe recurrence of his former malady. He finally resigned the Great Seal on the 5th of June, 1323. He died on the 6th of July, 1325, without having violated his purpose to spend the rest of his days in retirement. He is chiefly celebrated by his biographers for having built the hall and chapel of the episcopal palace at Norwich, and for having settled a maintenance for four priests there to pray for the pardon of

his sins.

The Spensers now for a time carried every thing their own way without the slightest check to their authority, and they appointed for Chancellor one on whose fidelity, pliancy, and zeal they entirely relied, ROBERT DE BALDOCK, Archdeacon of Middlesex.

A.D. 1323.

Dreadful storms were impending, but such tranquillity prevailed for a brief space as allowed the usual amusements of the King to proceed. It is related that the Court being at Windsor, and field sports going on in which the new Chancellor did not take much delight, he obtained leave from the King to return home for more suitable_recreation. Impatient to escape, he delivered the Great Seal to the King, while his Majesty was engaged in hunting; and when the chase was over, it was placed in the custody of William de Ayremynne, then Keeper of the Privy Seal.' From the 16th of November till the 12th of December the Chancellor was absent on a journey to York to treat with the Scots, during which time the Great Seal was in the keeping of Richard de Ayremynne, who had succeeded his brother William as Master of the Rolls."

Soon after his return the troubles began which terminated fatally for him as well as his royal master. Those troubles were mainly caused by the misconduct of Lord Chancellor Baldock, who seems to have been a very profligate man, and to have been unscrupulous in perverting the rules of justice, regardless of public opinion, and reckless as to consequences, so long as he gratified the royal favourites. It was his malad.

Rot. Cl. 17 Ed. 2, m. 39. VOL. I.

Rot. Cl. 18 Ed. 2, m. 38.

a Rot. Cl. 18 Ed 2, m. 26. N

ministration which made the nation blind to the enormity of the conduct of the Queen, now combined with Mortimer, her paramour, against the King her husband.

A.D. 1326.

When she landed in Suffolk with her small army from Holland, three princes of the blood, the Earls of Kent, Norfolk, and Leicester, joined her, with all their followers. Three Prelates, the Bishops of Ely, Lincoln, and Hereford, brought her both the force of their vassals, and the authority of their character. She rallied all ranks round her standard by the declaration "that the sole purpose of her enterprise was to free the King and kingdom from the tyranny of the Spensers, and above all of their creature Lord Chancellor Baldock!"

Edward, after ineffectually trying to rouse the citizens of London to some sense of duty, having departed for the West, where he vainly hoped to meet with a better reception, the rage of the populace broke out without control against him and his ministers. Having seized the Bishop of Exeter, a loyal prelate, as he was passing through the streets,-beheaded him, and thrown his body into the river Thames,— they made themselves masters of the Tower, in the hope of there finding the Chancellor, whom they threatened with a similar fate; but he had fled to the King, carrying the Great Seal along with him.

Before long Edward was a prisoner in Kenilworth Castle, and the two Spensers and Lord Chancellor Baldock Dec. 1326. fell into the hands of the insurgents. Spenser, the father, without form of trial, was immediately condemned to death by the rebellious Barons and hanged on a gibbet, his head being afterwards set on a pole, and exposed to the insults of the populace. The younger Spenser, the great favourite of the King and patron of Baldock, was arraigned before Sir William Trussel, a special Justiciar, and, without witness or proof of any sort, sentence of death was instantly pronounced upon him. The learned Judge's address to this prisoner is equally bitter against the Chancellor, and shows how he would have been dealt with had he been a layman::

66

'Hugh, your father, Robert Baldock, and other false traitors your adherents, taking upon you royal power, you caused the King to withdraw himself, and carried him out of the realm, to the danger of his body and dishonour to him and his people, feloniously taking with you the treasure of the realm, contrary to the Great Charter. Hugh, all the good people of the kingdom, great and small rich and poor, by common

assent do award that you are found as a thief, and therefore shall be hanged, and are found as a traitor, and therefore shall be drawn and quartered; and for that you have been outlawed by the King and by common consent, and returned to the Court without warrant, you shall be beheaded; and for that you abetted and procured discord between King and Queen, and others of the realm, you shall be embowelled and your bowels burnt; and so go to your judgment, attainted, wicked traitor! "b

Baldock being a priest, he could not with safety be so suddenly despatched; but he was sent to the Bishop of Hereford's palace in London, and the populace were informed of his arrival, and reminded of his misdeeds. As his relentless enemies foresaw, the palace was broken open by a riotous mob, -he was seized, and, after many indignities, thrown into Newgate, where he soon after expired from the cruel usage he had sustained. There seems a considerable resemblance between his fate and that of his successor, Lord Chancellor Jeffreys, at a distance of 360 years; but, though not chargeable with the same degree of cruelty, his systematic perversion of justice had excited a still greater degree of resentment against him, or the rage of the people would have given way to their reverence for the sacerdotal character. He had reached no higher dignity in the Church than Archdeacon of Middlesex. When he received the Great Seal a few months before, he no doubt confidently expected that he should long hold it, and that it would lead to the primacy.

On the 20th of October, 1326, the King having gone away with Hugh le Despenser to Ireland, and left the realm without any government, the prelates, earls, barons, and knights assembled at Bristol, and chose Edward, the King's son, Custos of the kingdom whilst his father continued absent. On the same day the Prince assumed the government, and issued the necessary legal proceedings under his privy seal, "because he had no other seal for the purpose."

When the King returned from Ireland he found himself already dethroned. The Queen was now in the enjoyment of supreme power. She kept her husband in close confinement, hypocritically pretending to lament his misfortunes. She pretended to associate the Prince her son with herself in the government; and she contrived to get the Great Seal into her possession, which considerably facilitated her proceedings, for less respect was paid by the multitude to the privy seal, which she had hitherto used.

b 1 St. Tr. 36.

A.D. 1326.

The Bishop of Hereford was sent to the King at Kenilworth, with a deceitful message, to request that Le would give such directions respecting the Great Seal as were necessary for the conservation of the peace, and the due administration of justice. The King, without friend or adviser, said he would send the Seal to his Queen and son, not only for these purposes, but likewise for matters of grace. He then handed the Great Seal to Sir William le Blount, who, on the 30th of November, delivered it to the Queen and the Prince; but the Queen had the uncontrolled dominion over it. She pretended to hand it over to Ayremynne, the Master of the Rolls, as Keeper, and she employed it to summon a parliament at Westminster, in her husband's name, for the purpose of deposing him. According to the tenor of the writs under the Great Seal, the parliament was to be held before the King, if he should be present; and if not, before Isabel, the Queen-consort, and Edward, the King's son.

The sympathies of the people beginning to be excited in favour of the King, and her scandalous commerce with Mortimer being published to the world, she was under some apprehension of a counter-revolution; but she uttered a proclamation setting forth the misgovernment of the Spensers and the late Lord Chancellor Baldock, to the great injury of Holy Church and the dishonour of the King and his heirs, and she gathered a strong army round her to overawe the metropolis.

At the parliament which met on the 7th of January, 1327, no Chancellor was present. Adam de Orleton, Bishop of Hereford, acted as Prolocutor, and put the memorable question to the assembled Lords and Commons,- "Whether King Edward the father, or his son Edward, should reign over them?"

The articles against the King contained no specific charge of misrule to give any colour to the proposed deposition, and no proof was adduced in support of them. Nevertheless, no one ventured to raise a voice in his behalf; and a deputation sent to Kenilworth extorted from him a resignation of the Crown. Then Sir William Trussel, of whose oratory we have had a specimen, in the name of the whole Parliament, renounced their allegiance in the following form: :

A.D. 1327.

"I, William Trussel, procurator of the prelates, earls, and barons, and other people in my procuracy named, having for this fuli and sufficient power, do surrender and deliver up to you, Edward, heretofore King of England, the homage and fealty of the

persons in my procuracy named, &c.; and do make this protestation in the name of all those that will not, for the future, be in your fealty or allegiance, nor claim to hold any thing of you as King, but account you as a private person, without any manner of royal dignity."

On the 20th of January, 1327, the deposition of Edward II. being completed, Edward III., then a youth of fourteen years of age, was proclaimed King, and was supposed to begin his reign, although it was not till the 21st of September following that, in Berkeley Castle, were heard the agonising shrieks caused by the horrid deed of Gournay and Montravers. Without any formal appointment as Chancellor, after the death of Baldock, ADAM DE ORLETON, Bishop of Hereford, must be considered as having acted in that capacity under the Queen. He is famous not only for having conducted the proceedings in parliament on the deposition of Edward, but for being supposed to have counselled his murder by the equivocal line which he composed and sent to his keepers,

"Edwardum occidere nolite timere ;-bonum est."

although he contended that his words, by a proper punctuation or pause, conveyed a strong injunction against regicide.c

e

No important change was introduced into the law during the reign of Edward II., but the institutions of his father were steadily maintained by his successive Chancellors, and, having stood the shock of such convulsions, might now be considered permanently established for the administration of justice in England. It has been suggested that the office of Master of the Rolls, so nearly connected with that of Chancellor, was now created, and that William de Ayremynne was the first who bore that title; but John de Langton had been called "Custos Rotulorum Cancellariæ Domini Regis." Adam de Osgodebey is expressly stated to have filled the office in the same reign; and as there were clerks in the Chancery from the most remote antiquity to assist the Chancellor, who were afterwards denominated "Masters in Chancery," I have little doubt that the senior or chief of them had for ages before had the particular care of the records of the Court, and being so often intrusted with the custody of the Seal in the Chancellor's absence, had gradually been permitted to act as his deputy.

• Edwardum occidere nolite; -timere bonum est.

d Reeve's Hist. of the Law, vol. ii. p. 362.

e See Discourse on Office of M. R.