France. break her contract with Maximilian, and to marry her himself. ' She is com- It was true that at an early age he had been conpelled to marry the tracted to Margaret of Austria, Maximilian's daughter, king of who had been educated in France as his consort, and only waited till she reached the age of puberty to ratify the marriage. But this circumstance, which might have deterred other princes, only supplied Charles with a cloak to conceal his real intention. By promises and bribes he bought the counsellors of the dutchess : but when the proposal was made to her, she rejected it with disdain. Was not Charles her natural enemy? Was he not contracted to Margaret? Was not she herself married to Maximilian? They replied that she ought to sacrifice a feeling of dislike to the interest of her country that the contract between Charles and Margaret was void, because that princess was under age: and that the marriage between herself and Maximilian had not been consummated, and might therefore be dissolved, because Bretagne was a fief of the French crown, and by law an heiress could not marry without the consent of her lord. "These reasons made no impression on the mind of Anne; but they were supported by a French army, which appeared before the gates of Rennes. She was now told that her obstinacy had been punished. There remained no hope of escape. She must be either the wife or the captive of Charles. Subdued at last by importunity and terror, she consented to a treaty, of which the principal articles were that she should marry the French king; that the rights of each should be reciprocally communicated to the other; that the survivor should retain possession of the dutchy; but that, in case she were the survivor, she should; if she remained single, bequeath her dominions to the reigning prince, or, if she chose to marry, marry no one but the actual possessor, or the presumptive heir, of the French crown. She was married to Charles at Langets in Touraine, Dec. 13. and crowned in the abbey church of St. Denis. ' 1 war. July 7 The reader may conceive the feelings of Maximilian Heury prepares for at this double disappointment. By his own inactivity, and the arts of his enemy, he had lost for himself a wife and a principality, for his daughter a husband and a throne. His rage vented itself in threats and imprecations but the exhaustion of his treasury, and the factious temper of his people, forbade him to seek revenge by open hostilities. Henry received the intelligence with the coolness of a philosopher and instead of irritating his mind by reflecting on what he had lost, sate himself down to calculate the chances of deriving pecuniary advantages from the event. During the last year he had repeatedly assumed a warlike attitude : he had ordered troops to be levied, stores to be provided; he had even appointed commissioners to extort money in the different counties under the illegal and vexatious name of « benevolence » 2. In October he acquainted the parliament with his resolution of chastising the perfidy of the French king (though Charles had not then married the princess), and obtained from it a grant of two tenths, and two fifteenths. After Christmas he found both houses still more eager for war : an act was passed in favour of those who should accompany the king, enabling them to alienate their estates Hall, 29. Bacon, 55. Com. Supplem. vi. Daniel, anno 1498-1491. Oct. 17. 1492. Jan. 26. He lands in : without the payment of fines, and to enfeoff lands, that their executors might have funds to fulfil their bequests and laws were made, compelling the captains under pain of imprisonment and forfeiture to pay their men within six days after the money was issued from the treasury, and making it felony for any soldier to leave the army without the permission of his superior officer. ' Still these laws and preparations were but a mask, under which the king sought to conceal his designs from his own subjects as well as the enemy. The former would pay the tenths and fifteenths: the latter might perhaps offer a valuable sum for the purchase of peace. With this view he continually invented reasons for delay. It would be dangerous to leave the May 18. kingdom exposed to the inroads of the Scots: four Oct. 6. Oct. 19. And concludes a peace with Charles. : months were employed in negociating a prolongation of the armistice between the two kingdoms 2. Two more were consumed in forming contracts for the levy of different descriptions of force of men at arms each attended by his custrel and page, of lancers and archers on horseback, and of foot soldiers armed with bows, halberts, and bills 3. These troops were mustered and inspected in June and July; yet week passed after week, and the season for active operations was suffered to elapse, before the king put himself at the head of the army. In the beginning of October he landed at Calais; fortnight later he sate down before Boulogne, with sixteen hundred men at arms, and twenty-five thousand infantry. It was now believed that the war had begun : and was, Oct. 27. the people of England flattered themselves with the anticipation of victory and conquest. Henry had other objects in view. As long back as the month of June he had commissioned the lord d'Aubigny, governor of Calais, to negociate a peace and alliance with Charles; and, if we may judge from appearances, that peace in substance at least, already concluded. On the part of France no preparations were made to repel the invaders : and Henry, instead of acting with vigour, first published a letter from his envoy in the court of Maximilian, and then another from his ambassador with Ferdinand, that the army might know how little was to be expected from either of those princes. Soon afterwards he received from d'Aubigny the rough draft of a treaty, which was immediately submitted to the consideration of twenty-four of his principal officers. In their report to the king they advised him to sign it, alleging the lateness of the season, the sickness of the army, the inactivity of his allies, the strength of Boulogne, and the neighbouring fortresses, and the advantageous offers of his antagonist. Henry had asked their Nov. 3. opinion merely to exonerate himself from the blame : and two treaties, the one public, the other private, were immediately concluded. By the former, peace, alliance, and confederacy, were established between the two crowns, to last during the lives of both kings, and for one year after the death of the survivor: by the latter Charles bound himself to pay to Henry by halfyearly instalments of twenty-five thousand francs, the aggregate sum of one hundred and forty-nine thousand pounds sterling: one hundred and twenty-four thousand of which should be received in lieu of all claims, against Anne of Bretagne, and twenty-five thousand as the arrears of the annuity due to the late king Edward IV. Henry returned to Calais. His favourites, who had received bribes from the French king, applauded the wisdom and good fortune of their master; but the army loudly condemned the dissimulation and avarice of a prince, who, to replenish his own coffers, had not hesitated to disappoint the hopes of the nation, and to lead so many knights and noblemen into ruinous, and at the same time unnecessary expenses. 1 Story of It is now time to introduce to the reader one of the Perkin Warbeck. most mysterious personages recorded in English history. About the time when Henry declared war against France, a merchant vessel from Lisbon cast anchor in the cove of Cork. Among the passengers was a youth, whom no person knew, about twenty years of age, of handsome features and courtly deportment. It was soon rumoured that he was Richard duke of York, the second son of Edward IV.: but how his birth was ascertained, or in what manner he accounted for his escape from the Tower, when Edward V. was murdered, or where he had lived during the last seven years, though questions which must have been asked, are secrets which have never been explained. To such inquiries, however, he gave answers which satisfied the credulity of his friends and, as the English settlers were warmly attached to the house of York, O'Water, the late mayor of Cork, easily induced the citizens to declare in his favour. An attempt was even made to secure the assistance of the earl of Kildare, and of his kinsman the : 'Rym. xii. 490-508. Bacon, 63. Rot. Parl. vi. 507. Even those who assert this adventurer to be the real duke of York, agree that Edward V. was dead, as he never appeared, nor did any one ever take his name. |