CHAP. I. in the breast of the Earl of Salisbury by the too pointed attentions which the Duke of Burgundy offered to the countess his wife. During a splendid feast held at Paris, and celebrated with banquets, dances, and jousts, at which we are told by Stow, "the Duchess of Bedford was holden for the most gallantest lady of all others, and with her the Countess of Salisbury, a very fayre lady;" the Duke of Burgundy who is described as being particularly handsome, courteous, accomplished in every manly exercise, and surpassing all his countrymen in the tilt and in the dance, became enamoured of the beautiful Englishwoman, and declared his passion in letters and messages which were not unanswered. The Earl of Salisbury being informed of this correspondence, conceived an unextinguishable hatred to the Duke of Burgundy, and lost no opportunity of displaying his just resentment. The date of this feast, 1424, assures us that it was the earl's second wife, to whom his affectionate remembrances in his will sufficiently evince his attachment, who was the object of Burgundy's libertine pursuit. The queen dowager of France was present at the festivities which terminated so unfortunately, and the Duke of Bedford, who never had engaged in the joust before, entered the lists in honour of the occasion, and tilted with other princes and knights.* Upon the authority of Andrews, we learn that Salisbury quitted France in great displeasure after this affront, and could only be induced to return by a command of higher authority, and a considerable increase or pecuniary emolument.

*Monstrelet and Stow.

The earl's brilliant career now drew speedily to CHAP. I. its close. Hall attributes the disastrous attack upon Orleans to this intrepid warrior's urgent advice and solicitation; admirably adapted by his genius and valour for the achievement of extraordinary deeds, no fortress however strong was deemed impregnable by his adventurous spirit, and the success which had attended his most daring actions won the entire confidence of the council and the army; his measures were approved by the one, and eager multitudes crowded to his banner, despite of the difficulties and dangers with which its perilous position might be surrounded. While Salisbury lived to spread confusion and death over a country desolated by his prowess, it was a saying among the exasperated and despairing foe, that "the Almighty had turned English, and the devil would not help France." With the rash hardihood with which in the wars of the middle ages those commanders whose lives were the most valuable to their country rushed into danger, the earl having taken the Tourelles, a fortress erected upon the bridge of the city of Orleans, ventured with some of his captains into the ruins in order to survey the preparations made by the besieged for their defence, and in this exposed situation received a death wound from a cannon ball, fired we are told by Stow, by the son of the master gunner of the city, but in the diary of the siege of Orleans, it is ascribed to a superior hand. "The earl," observes the writer, "was struck by a ball reported to have been fired from a tower called the Tower of our Lady, but never positively known from whence discharged, so that it is said to have been the act of the

CHAP. I. divinity." The mischief wrought by these newly invented engines struck terror into the hearts of soldiers unaccustomed to weapons which were more fearful if not more destructive than those which had preceded them; death by a ball or bullet was deemed peculiarly horrible. Camden informs us that the Earl of Salisbury was "the first English gentleman ever slain thereby ;" and adds, "Albeit now he is thought the most unfortunate, and cursed in his mother's wombe, who dyeth by great shot.” According to Monstrelet, this lamentable fate had previously befallen a young knight, the son of Sir John Cornwall, and cousin german to king Henry V. who was killed by a cannon ball at the siege of Meaux, to the great sorrow of the monarch and his friends.

From the date of the death of the Earl of Salisbury, the prosperity of the English in France declined without intermission.

In military skill he was without an equal, and the courage of Talbot and other brave soldiers availed not after the loss of this experienced leader. Fabian in speaking of the earl's fall, observes, "This, after divers writers was inicium malorii, for, after this myshap the Englyshmen lost rather than won, so that lytell and lytell, they loste all they'r possessions in France, and albeit, some what they got after, yet for one that they wonne, they lost three, as after shall appear.

No will of the fifteenth century however prodigal in charitable bequests, displays more genuine benevolence than that of the Earl of Salisbury; it is also deeply imbued with the opinions of the age respect

ing the efficacy of prayers offered for the dead, and CHAP. I. distinguished by peculiar expressions of tenderness towards the beloved partner of his honours and his wealth. In this interesting record, the earl directs that in whatsoever part of the world he should die, his body should be buried at Bustlesham in England, and that the funeral obsequies should be performed in a simple, unostentatious manner, without any expensive entertainment, "or any large and sumptuous lights for worldly pomp," but that when his corse should be carried through any of the cities or towns of England to its last resting place, four torches only should be lighted at its entrance, and "borne therewith:" he farther directs twenty-four torches to be borne by the same number of poor men, all clothed alike, with four other torches to be placed around his corse on the day of his funeral; also that to every "poor body" coming to these exequies, four-pence a piece should be given by the hands of his executors for the health of his soul; fifty poor people being first chosen out of the whole assembly, to whom his beloved wife should, with her own hands, give twenty-pence each. To the monastery of Bustlesham the earl bequeaths one hundred pounds sterling out of his moveable goods, for the celebration of one mass every day for his soul's repose, to be specially ordained by the prior and the whole convent there, in a peculiar place appointed for the purpose, with this collect, Deus cui proprium, and that two canons of that house immediately after the conclusion of the mass of the blessed virgin, should "forever say" before his tomb, the psalm of de profundis, the Lord's prayer, the angelical

CHAP. I. salutation, and three other prayers which he names. He likewise directs that his most beloved wife should, as soon as possible after his death, cause five thousand masses to be specially celebrated for his soul, and the souls of all the "faithful deceased," besides three other masses to be sung daily for his soul during the term of her life, in such places as she and his executors should think fit, within the realm of England, and if possible to be solemnized in her presence. The earl also charges his wife and his executors "to cause with all good speed," three thousand masses to be celebrated for the souls of all the companions of the order of St. George, "in recompence of those masses which had been by him forgotten."

He desires that his executors should send three poor people every day, if they could be found, to the Lady Alice his wife, in order that she might serve them with her own hands, with "one mess of meat, one loaf, and one quart of drink ;" and that his wife and his executors should within one year of his decease, cause a thousand marks to be distributed amongst poor people, partly in money, and partly in raiment, both linen and woollen. The earl directs that a chantry should be raised to the honour of the blessed Virgin over his monument, which should be divided into three separate compartments, that in the centre half a foot higher than the other two, for his own body; the body of the Lady Alianore, daughter of Thomas Earl of Kent, some time his wife, on the one side, with the body of the Lady Alice, his present wife, then living, on the other, "if she would." This lady, so celebrated for her beauty,