men, and set them at the foot of London Bridge and other places, without any intention to do any bodily harm to the Duke of Gloucester, but merely for his own safety and defence, being informed by several creditable persons that the Duke had proposed bodily harm to him, and gathered together a company of citizens for that end." P The Commons having expressed their "much dislike" to the dissensions between these great men, and moved for their reconcilement, the farther examination of the charges and answers was devolved by the two Houses upon a select committee of peers and bishops,- both parties having agreed, by formal instruments, to submit to what should be awarded. The Duke of Bedford, who presided in the court of arbitration, reported in open parliament "that the Chancellor was innocent of the charge alleged against him, of having procured a person to murder the late King when he was Prince, and having advised the Prince to depose Henry IV., his father; but pronounced judgment, that in respect of the incivilities that had passed between them, he should, in a submissive manner, ask pardon of the Duke of Gloucester; that the Duke of Gloucester should freely forgive him; and, in token of a thorough reconciliation, each should take the other by the hand, so that they should be firm friends for the future." They accordingly shook hands, and parted with all outward signs of perfect love and concord, "which yielded a mighty satisfaction to all people, both of the clergy and laity ;" and by the advice of the Council, a magnificent feast was given, in the name of the King, in honour of this supposed reconciliation. It is not stated by historians that it was part of this arrangement that Beaufort should give up his office of Chancellor, the better to preserve the equilibrium between him and his rival; but it may be fairly presumed that he would not have voluntarily parted with such a source of power and of profit. However this may be, we find him immediately petitioning parliament to be discharged of the Great Seal, which, by common consent, was granted. He delivered it to the Duke of Bedford,—who himself sealed some letters patent with it in the presence of the King's Council, but soon went through the form of putting it into the hands of the infant King,—and, on the 18th of March, it was given, in full parliament, to JOHN KEMPE, Bishop of London, as Lord Chancellor." P 1 Parl. Hist. 357. "The Bishop of Winton, for sundry sauses, prayed to be discharged from the office of the Great Seal, and he was consequently discharged."-Rot. Parl. 4 Hen. 6. Rot. Cl. 4 Hen. 6, m. 8. r Rot. Cl. 4 Hen. 6, m. 8. Beaufort never resumed the Great Seal, and we can only give a slight sketch of his subsequent history. On his resignation he went abroad, and was declared Cardinal priest of St. Eusebius. Then he was first regularly raised to the purple ;although we have occasionally called him Cardinal, the title by which he is best known. At the same time he was appointed by the Pope Captain-General of the Crusaders, destined to oppose the Hussites, in Bohemia. On his return to England, he obtained leave to raise an army of 500 lancers and 5000 archers for the expedition; but for a bribe of 1000 marks, he consented that the men whom he had raised for the crusade should be led against the King's enemies in France. He was constantly on the watch for an opportunity to regain his political influence, and in 1429 he succeeded in humbling Gloucester, by having the young king crowned, and inducing the parliament to declare on the occasion that the office of Protector was at an end. Gloucester was thus reduced to his rank as a peer, and the Cardinal from this time to his death bore chief sway. In 1431 he again went abroad, and at Rouen he assisted at the trial of Joan of Arc, the Maid of Orleans, and joined in the sentence that she should be burnt alive for heresy and witchcraft. He was the only Englishman who was concerned in this atrocity, and our neighbours the French, when they so eagerly impute it to us as a national disgrace, should remember that the Bishop of Beauvais and all her other judges were Frenchmen; and that she was brought to trial under an arrêt of the parliament of Paris. The Duke of Gloucester, though no longer Protector, was still formidable, and from time to time seemed on the point of recovering his authority. He accused the Cardinal of having incurred the penalties of a præmunire, by accepting papal bulls,-of having amassed immense wealth by dishonest means, of having usurped the functions of sovereignty by appointing embassies and releasing prisoners of his own authority, and of estranging all but his own creatures from the person of the young King. The Cardinal caused an accusation to be brought against the Duke's wife, to whom he was much attached, that she was guilty of witchcraft, by melting, in a magical manner, before a slow fire, a waxen figure of the King, with the intention of making the King's force and vigour waste away by like insensible degrees. The Duchess was condemned to do public penance, and to suffer perpetual imprisonment. But this pro ceeding was ascribed solely to the malice of the Duke's enemies, and the people increased their esteem and affection towards a Prince who was thus exposed without protection to such mortal injuries. The manifestation of these sentiments made the Cardinal sensible that it was necessary to destroy a man whose popularity might soon become dangerous, and from whose resentment everything was to be apprehended, if he should ever be in a situation to gratify it. To effect this purpose, a parliament was called to assemble, -not at London, which was supposed to be too well Feb. 1447. affected to the Duke,-but at Bury St. Edmund's, where he would be helpless. As soon as he appeared, he was thrown into prison on a charge of treason. Soon after he was found dead in his bed; and though it was pretended that his death was natural, no one doubted that he had fallen a victim to the vengeance of his arch-enemy. The Cardinal himself died six weeks after the murder of his nephew, which, it is said, gave him more remorse in his last moments than could naturally have been expected to be felt by a man hardened, during the course of a long life of violence, in falsehood and in religious hypocrisy. His death-bed is described in harrowing terms by our great dramatic bard :— "Lord Cardinal, if thou think'st on Heaven's bliss, Hold up thy hand, make signal of thy hope! And the agony of his despair is, if possible, made more dreadful by the lofty conception and successful execution of the scene in the masterpiece of Reynolds. But volumes have been written to prove that his life was innocent and his end pious, by arguments which may carry conviction to the mind of those who believe that Richard III. was a remarkably straight and handsome man, with a very tender heart. The Cardinal's enormous wealth was applied, according to his will, in founding oratories for priests to pray for his soul, and these may account for the attempts which have been made to vindicate his memory." * Cardinal Beaufort is not only a favourite with ignorant chroniclers, but with the enlightened Dr. Lingard, who says that we owe to the imagination of Shakspeare the fiction of his dying agonies. But it is well known that Shakspeare, in his historical plays, most strictly followed history or tradition, and embodied the belief of his time. Dr. Lingard himself quotes a passage from Hall, stating "that the Cardinal lamented on his death-bed that money could not purchase life, and that death should cut him off when he hoped, now his nephew Gloucester was gone, to procure the purple tiara,"-which the historian tries to discredit merely on the ground of improbability, because the Cardinal was so old CHAPTER XXI. CHANCELLORS DURING THE REIGN OF HENRY VI. FROM THE APPOINT MENT OF CARDINAL KEMPE TILL THE DEATH OF LORD CHANCELLOR WAYNFLETE. t 1426. We have had a succession of Chancellors of high birth, some of them nearly allied to the Crown. Cardinal Beaufort's March 16, successor was one of that other class who have won their way in this country to high distinction from an obscure origin. He was born in Kent, of parents in a very low condition of life, and educated as a poor scholar at Merton College, in Oxford. Here, amidst all the evils of penury, he applied himself with ardour to study, and made particular proficiency in the civil and canon law. In due time he took the degree of Doctor in both faculties, after disputations which attracted the notice of the whole university, and were talked of all over England. After practising for some time as an advocate in the ecclesiastical courts,-on account of his high reputation as a jurist he was made Dean of the Arches and Vicar-general to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Rising rapidly in the church, he was consecrated Bishop of Rochester; whence he was translated to Chichester, and thence to London, the see he filled when he was appointed Lord Chancellor finally, he was promoted to the Archbishopric of York, and a cardinal's hat was bestowed upon him. : Soon after his high civil appointment, he was called upon to take a decisive part in checking the arrogance of the Duke o. Gloucester, who having for a time got rid of Cardinal Beaufort, and infirm, and had his funeral rehearsed while he was yet alive. Dr. Lingard even denies his avarice, because he did not receive interest on his loans to the crown, and only looked to be benefited by the forfeiture of the pledges which he took by way of security, and being paid back in gold coin the sums he seems to have advanced in silver. He thus demanded "that paement be maad in golde of the coigne of England of just weighte, elles I not to be bounde to delyver ayene the seide weddes (pledges). though the seide paiement were offered to be maad in silver." A usurer avowed his purpose to rule in an arbitrary manner, although the Duke of Bedford had not yet returned to France, exclaiming, "Let my brother govern as him lusteth, whiles he is in this land; after his going over into France, I woll govern as me seemeth good." The Chancellor and the other members of the Council made a representation on the subject to the Duke of Bedford, and both brothers being present, the Chancellor delivered an address, stating "that the young Prince was the rightful King of England, and entitled to the obedience of all his subjects, of whatever rank they might be; that, young as he was, he yet possessed by law all the authority which would belong to him at a more mature age; that as, during his infancy, he could not exercise such authority, it was vested in the Lords spiritual and temporal assembled in parliament, or in the great council, and at other times in the Lords appointed to form the continual council," and that this council, representing the King's person, had a right to exercise the powers of government, withouten that any one person may or ought to ascribe to himself the said rule and government." 66 " u KEMPE's first Chancellorship lasted six years. During this time several parliaments were held, which he opened with suitable speeches, except that held in January, 1431, when, on account of his sickness, the Duke of Gloucester, sitting in the chair of state in the Painted Chamber, commanded William Linewood, Doctor of Laws, to explain the cause of the summons,* which was done with infinite divisions and subdivisions; but the only important business transacted at these parliaments, was passing the famous statute which regulates county elections, and enacts that no freeholder shall vote who cannot spend from his freehold at least 40s. a year,”—all freeholders having before voted for knights of the shire, as they still may for coroners. A change in the office of Chancellor now took place, the u Rot. Par. v. 409, 411. Acts of Coun. iii. 231, 242. * There is a curious entry of this in the Parliament Roll, showing a great anxiety to preserve the Chancellor's right to address the two Houses on the opening of parliament. After stating the meeting of Lords and Commons under the Duke of Gloucester, Custos Angliæ, it proceeds, "Pro eo quod Venerabilis Pater Johannes Archiepiscopus Ebor. Cancellarius Anglie, cui ratione officii sui secundum consuetudinem laudabilem in Regno Anglie antiquitus usitatam pertinuit cau sam summonitionis parliamenti predicti pronunciare et declarare, tali et tanta detenebatur infirmitate quod circa declarationem et pronunciationem predictas adtunc intendere non valebat, Reverendus vir Magister Willielmus Lynwoode, Legum Doctor, causam summonitionis ejusdem parliamenti de mandato prefati custodis egregie decla ravit."-Vol. iv. 367. So in 31 & 32 Hen. 6, the Bishop of Lincoln stated causes of summons. "Johanne Arch. Cant. Cancellaria Angliæ tunc absente."-Roll. v. 227. y 10 Hen. 6. |