England Under the Tudors
by
Arthur D. Innes
Part 1 out of 9
Produced by Karl Hagen, David Moynihan, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
ENGLAND UNDER THE TUDORS
BY ARTHUR D. INNES
SOMETIME SCHOLAR OF ORIEL COLLEGE, OXFORD
FOURTH EDITION
INTRODUCTORY NOTE
BY THE GENERAL EDITOR
In England, as in France and Germany, the main characteristic of the last
twenty years, from the point of view of the student of history, has been
that new material has been accumulating much faster than it can be
assimilated or absorbed. The standard histories of the last generation need
to be revised, or even to be put aside as obsolete, in the light of the new
information that is coming in so rapidly and in such vast bulk. But the
students and researchers of to-day have shown little enthusiasm as yet for
the task of re-writing history on a large scale. We see issuing from the
press hundreds of monographs, biographies, editions of old texts,
selections from correspondence, or collections of statistics, mediaeval and
modern. But the writers who (like the late Bishop Stubbs or Professor
Samuel Gardiner) undertake to tell over again the history of a long period,
with the aid of all the newly discovered material, are few indeed. It is
comparatively easy to write a monograph on the life of an individual or a
short episode of history. But the modern student, knowing well the mass of
material that he has to collate, and dreading lest he may make a slip
through overlooking some obscure or newly discovered source, dislikes to
stir beyond the boundary of the subject, or the short period, on which he
has made himself a specialist.
Meanwhile the general reading public continues to ask for standard
histories, and discovers, only too often, that it can find nothing between
school manuals at one end of the scale and minute monographs at the other.
The series of which this volume forms a part is intended to do something
towards meeting this demand. Historians will not sit down, as once they
were wont, to write twenty-volume works in the style of Hume or Lingard,
embracing a dozen centuries of annals. It is not to be desired that they
should--the writer who is most satisfactory in dealing with Anglo-Saxon
antiquities is not likely to be the one who will best discuss the
antecedents of the Reformation, or the constitutional history of the Stuart
period. But something can be done by judicious co-operation: it is not
necessary that a genuine student should refuse to touch any subject that
embraces an epoch longer than a score of years, nor need history be written
as if it were an encyclopaedia, and cut up into small fragments dealt with
by different hands.
It is hoped that the present series may strike the happy mean, by dividing
up English History into periods that are neither too long to be dealt with
by a single competent specialist, nor so short as to tempt the writer to
indulge in that over-abundance of unimportant detail which repels the
general reader. They are intended to give something more than a mere
outline of our national annals, but they have little space for controversy
or the discussion of sources, save in periods such as the dark age of the
5th and 6th centuries after Christ, where the criticism of authorities is
absolutely necessary if we are to arrive at any sound conclusions as to the
course of history. A number of maps are to be found at the end of each
volume which, as it is hoped, will make it unnecessary for the reader to be
continually referring to large historical atlases--tomes which (as we must
confess with regret) are not to be discovered in every private library.
Genealogies and chronological tables of kings are added where necessary.
C. OMAN
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
THE TUDOR PERIOD, 1485-1603 An era of Revolutions--The Intellectual
Movement--The Reformation and Counter-Reformation--The New World--The
Constitution--Nobility, Clergy, and Gentry--International Relations.
CHAPTER I
HENRY VII (i), 1485-1492-THE NEW DYNASTY 1485. Henry's Title to the Crown--
Measures to strengthen the Title--1486. Marriage--The King and his Advisers
--Henry's enemies--1487. Lambert Simnel--The State of Europe--France and
Brittany--1488. Henry intervenes cautiously--England and Spain--1489.
Preparations for war with France--Spanish treaty of Medina del Campo--The
Allies inert--1490. Object of Henry's Foreign Policy--1491. Apparent Defeat
--1492. Henry's bellicose Attitude--Treaty of Etaples.
CHAPTER II
HENRY VII (ii), 1492-1499-PERKIN WARBECK Ireland; 1485--1487-1492. The Earl
of Kildare--1491. Perkin Warbeck's Appearance--Riddle of his imposture--
1492-5. Perkin and Margaret of Burgundy--Diplomatic Intrigues--Ireland:
Poynings, 1494-6--1495. Survey of the Situation--Perkin attempts Invasion
--Success of Henry's Diplomacy--1496. Perkin and the King of Scots--A
Scottish Incursion--1497. The Cornish rising--Its suppression--Perkin's
final effort and failure--The Scottish Truce--The End of Perkin Warbeck:
1497-9--1498. The situation.
CHAPTER III
HENRY VII (iii), 1498-1509-THE DYNASTY ASSURED Scotland and England--
Henry's Scottish Policy--France and Scotland--Relations in 1498--Marriage
Negotiations; 1498-1503--Marriage of James IV. and Margaret, 1503--Spain
and England; Marriage Negotiations, 1488-1499--France, 1499--Spain;
Marriage Negotiations, 1499-1501--1501; the Spanish Marriage--1502. New
Marriage Schemes--1504. The Papal Dispensation--The Earl of Suffolk;
1499-1505--1505. Henry's Position--Schemes for Re-marriage--1506: The
Archduke Philip in England--Philip's Death--1507-8. Matrimonial Projects
--The League of Cambrai--Wolsey--1509. Death of Henry.
CHAPTER IV
HENRY VII (iv), 1485-1509--ASPECTS OF THE REIGN 1485; Henry's Position
--Studied Legality--Policy of Lenity--Repression of the Nobles--The
Star-Chamber--Henry's Use of Parliament--Financial Exactions--Sources of
Revenue--Henry's Economics--Trade Theories--Commercial Policy--The
Netherlands Trade--The Hansa--The Navigation Acts--Voyages of Discovery--
The Rural Revolution--The Church--Henry and Rome--Learning and Letters--
Appreciation.
CHAPTER V
HENRY VIII (i), 1509-1527--EGO ET REX MEUS Europe in 1509--England's
Position--The New King--Inauguration of the reign--Henry and the Powers--
1512. Dorset's Expedition--Rise of Wolsey--1513. The French War--Scotland
(1499-1513)--The Flodden Campaign--The Battle--Its Effect--Recovery of
English Prestige--1514. Foreign Intrigues--The French Alliance and Marriage
--1515. Francis I.--Marignano--1516-7. European changes--1518-9. Wolsey's
Success--1519. Charles V.--The Imperial Election--1520. Wolsey's Triumph--
Rival Policies--Field of the Cloth of Gold--Wolsey's Aims--Charles V. and
Francis I.--Scotland: 1513-1520--1520-1. Affairs Abroad--1521. Buckingham
--Wolsey's Diplomacy--1522. A Papal Election--War with France--Scotland--
1523. Progress of the War--Election of Clement VII.--1524. Wolsey's
difficulties--Intrigues in Scotland--1525. Pavia--The Amicable Loan--A
Diplomatic struggle--1526-7. Wolsey's success--A new Factor.
CHAPTER VI
HENRY VIII (ii), 1509-1532--BIRTH OF THE REFORMATION _The Reformation in
England_--Its true Character--Religious Decadence--The Scholar-
Reformers--Ecclesiastical Demoralisation--Monastic Corruption--The
Proofs--Corruption of Doctrine--Evidence from Colet and More--Later
Evidence--Dean Colet--His Sermon: 1512--Erasmus--The _Utopia_: 1516--
Exaggerated attacks--Clerical Privileges--Tentative Reforms--The
Educational Movement--Wolsey and the Reformation--_The Lutheran
Revolt_: 1517--Luther's Defiance--The Diet of Worms; 1521--The German
Peasants' Revolt; 1524--Its Effect in England--1525. The Empire and the
Papacy--The Sack of Rome, 1527--Diet of Augsburg, 1530-The Swiss Reformers;
1520-1530--English Heretics Abroad--Contrasted Aims.
CHAPTER VII
HENRY VIII (iii), 1527-1529--THE FALL OF WOLSEY "The King's Affair"--Story
of the Marriage--Anne Boleyn--1527. The King Prepares--Theoretical
Excuses--The Need of an Heir--The Plea of Invalidity--Conjunction of
Incentives--The Orleans Betrothal--Conclusions--The first Plan--The second
Plan--Knight's Mission--Its Failure--The Pope and the Cardinal--1528.
Gardiner's Mission--Wolsey's Critical Position--Campeggio and Wolsey--
Henry's Attitude--1529. The Trial--The Storm Gathers--The Storm Breaks--
Wolsey's fall--1530. Wolsey's Death--His Achievement--Appreciation of
Wolsey.
CHAPTER VIII
HENRY VIII (iv), 1529-1533--THE BREACH WITH ROME 1529. No Revolt Yet--
Growth of Anti-clericalism--Thomas Cranmer--Appeal to the Universities
--The New Parliament--Thomas Cromwell--Pope, Clergy, and King--Double
Campaign Opens--1530. Answer of Universities--Preoccupation of the
Clergy--Menace of Praemunire--1531. "Only Supreme Head"--Proceedings in
Parliament--1532. Parliament--Supplication against the Ordinaries--
Resistance of Clergy--"Submission of the Clergy"--Mortmain, Benefit of
Clergy, and Annates--The Powers and the Divorce--The Turn of the Year--
1533. The Crisis--Restraint of Appeals--Cranmer Archbishop--The Decisive
Breach.
CHAPTER IX
HENRY VIII (v), 1533-1540--MALLEUS MONACHORUM 1533. Ecclesiastical Parties
--Pope or King?--1534. Confirmatory Acts--The Pope's Last Word--The Nun of
Kent--The Act of Succession--The Oath Refused--The "Bishop of Rome"--
Parliament--Treasons Act--1529-1534: The New Policy--Thomas Cromwell--1535.
More and Fisher--Cromwell Vicar--General--The German Lutherans--Overtures--
Visitation of the Monasteries--1536. Suppression of Lesser Houses--The
Evidence--The Black Book--The Consequent Commission--The Policy--Anne
Boleyn Threatened--Her Condemnation and Death--The Succession--Punishment
of Heresy--The Progressive Movement--The Ten Articles--The Lincolnshire
Rising--The Pilgrimage of Grace--Aske Beguiled--1537. Suppression of the
Rising--Turned to Account--Scotland, 1533-6--1536-7. Naval Measures--1537.
An Heir--1538. Diplomatic Moves--The Exeter Conspiracy--1539. Cromwell
Strikes--Menace of Invasion--The King and Lutheranism--The Six Articles--
Final Suppression of Monasteries--Royal Proclamations Act--Anne of Cleves--
1540. The Marriage--Fall of Cromwell.
CHAPTER X
HENRY VIII (vi), 1540-1547--HENRY'S LAST YEARS 1540. Katharine Howard--The
King his own Minister--England and the Powers--Scotland and England; 1541--
Cardinal Beton--1542--Solway Moss--1543. Henry's Scottish Policy--Alliance
with Charles V.--French War--1544. Domestic Affairs--Intrigues in Scotland
--Sack of Edinburgh--French War--Peace of Crepy--1545. Ancram Moor--A
French Armada--1546. Peace concluded--1532-1549. _Europe_--Lutherans
and the Papacy--Conference of Ratisbon-Council of Trent: first stages--
Death of Luther-Charles and the League of Schmalkald--The Jesuit Order--
Calvin--_England_: the Ecclesiastical Revolution--Progressives and
Reactionaries--1543. The King's Book-1546. Surrey--1547. Death of Henry.
CHAPTER XI
HENRY VIII (vii), 1509-1547--ASPECTS OF HENRY'S REIGN _Ireland_:
1509-1520--Surrey in Ireland, 1520--Irish Policy, 1520-1534--Fitzgerald's
Revolt--1535-1540: Lord Leonard Grey--1540: St. Leger--"King of Ireland"--
_England_: Wolsey's work--The Army--The Navy--The New World--
Absolutism--The Parliamentary Sanction--Depression of the Nobles--
Parliament and the Purse--Finance--The Land--Learning and Letters--The
_Utopia_--Surrey and Wyatt--_Appreciation of Henry VIII._: Morals
and Character--Abilities and Achievement--Dominant Personality--
Conclusions.
CHAPTER XII
EDWARD VI (i), 1547-1549--THE PROTECTOR SOMERSET 1547. The New Government--
Relations with France and Scotland--with Charles V.--Somerset's Scottish
Policy--Pinkie--The Advanced Reformers--Benevolent Legislation--
Ecclesiastical Legislation--1548. Progress of the Reformation--Somerset's
Ideas--The French in Scotland--The Augsburg Interim--Parliament--1549. A
New Liturgy--The Treason of the Lord Admiral: 1547-9--1549--Troubles in the
Provinces--The Western Rising--Ket's Insurrection--The Protector's
Attitude--The Council attacks him--His Fall--Ireland: St. Leger and
Bellingham.
CHAPTER XIII
EDWARD VI (ii), 1549-1553--THE DUDLEY ASCENDANCY 1549. Foreign Relations--
State of England--1550. Terms with France--Protestant zeal of Warwick--
Treasons Act--Protestant Fanaticism-1551. The Council and Charles V.--His
Difficulties--Groups among the Reformers--Somerset--His final overthrow--
1552. Execution of Somerset--Pacification of Passau--English Neutrality--
The Reformation: its Limits hitherto--Revision of the Liturgy--
Nonconformity--Parliament--1553. A New Parliament--Northumberland's
Programme--Plot to change the Succession--Adhesion of King and Council--
Death of Edward VI.--Willoughby and Chancellor.
CHAPTER XIV
MARY (i), 1553-1555-THE SPANISH MARRIAGE The Marian Tragedies--1553.
Proclamation of Queen Jane--The People support Mary--Collapse of the Plot--
Mary's Leniency--Cause of the Popular Loyalty--Problems: Marriage and the
Reformation--Possible Claimants--Moderate Reaction--Proposed Spanish Match
--Parliament: Repeal of Edward's Legislation--1554. Wyatt's Rebellion and
the Lady Elizabeth--Subsequent Severities--The Marriage Treaty-Pole,
Renard, and Gardiner--Public Tension--Parliament; Reconciliation with Rome
--Reaction consummated, 1555.
CHAPTER XV
MARY (ii), 1555-1558-THE PERSECUTION Mary's early Policy--The Persecution--
Who was Responsible?--Comparison with other Persecutions--Some
Characteristic Features--1555. The First Martyrs--Trial of Cranmer--Ridley
and Latimer--Fate of Cranmer--His Record and Character--Policy of Philip--
Paul IV.--Mary disappointed of an Heir--A New Parliament--Gardiner's Death
and Character--Mary's Difficulties--1556. The Dudley Conspiracy--Foreign
Complications--1557. War with France--1558. Loss of Calais--National
Depression--Mary's Death and Character.
CHAPTER XVI
ELIZABETH (i), 1558-1561-A PASSAGE PERILOUS
1558. Accession--Mary Stewart's Claim--Strength of Elizabeth's Position--
Sir William Cecil--Finance--Philip II. and Elizabeth's Marriage--The
Religious Question--A Protestant Policy--1559. Parliament: Act of
Supremacy--The Prayer-Book--France and Peace--State of Scotland--Arran and
Elizabeth--The Archduke Charles--Wynter in the Forth--1560. Difficulties of
France--Vacillations of Elizabeth--Siege of Leith--Treaty of Edinburgh--
Elizabeth's Methods--The Dudley Imbroglio--The Huguenots--The Pope--1561.
Return of Mary to Scotland.
CHAPTER XVII
ELIZABETH (ii), 1561-1568-QUEENS AND SUITORS 1561. The Situation--Council
of Trent--France; State of Parties--1561-8. France: Catholics and Huguenots
--The Netherlands: Philip's Policy--Prelude to War--1561. The Queens'
suitors--1562. Mary in Scotland--1562-3. Elizabeth and the Huguenots--The
English Succession-1564. Darnley and Others--1565. The Darnley Marriage--
Mary and Murray--1566. The Murder of Rizzio--1567. Kirk o' Field--The
Bothwell Marriage--Mary at Loch Leven--Murray Regent--1568. Langside, and
the Flight to England--1562-8. Protestantism of Elizabeth's Government--
Religious Parties--1566-7. Parliament and the Queen's Marriage--The Queen
and the Archduke.
CHAPTER XVIII
ELIZABETH (iii), 1568-1572--THE CATHOLIC CHALLENGE 1568. Mary in England--A
Commission of Enquiry--Proceedings at York--Attitude of Philip--The
Commission at Westminster--Comment on the Enquiry--Seizure of Spanish
Treasure--1569. The Incident passed over--The Northern Rebellion--1570.
Murder of Murray--The Bull of Deposition--The Anjou Match--1570-1. The
Ridolfi Plot--1571. Parliament--Collapse of the Anjou Match--The Ridolfi
Plot Develops--1572. Parliament and Mary Stewart--Lepanto--The Netherlands
Revolt--The Alençon Match--St. Bartholomew.
CHAPTER XIX
ELIZABETH (iv), 1572-1578--VARIUM ET MUTABILE Elizabeth's Diplomacy--The
Queen's Subjects--Development of Protestantism--1572. Katharine de Medici
--The Aim of Elizabeth--England and the Massacre--Spain seeks Amity--1573.
A Spanish Alliance--Scotland: End of the Marian Party--The Netherlands,
France, and Spain--The Netherlands, England, and Spain--1574. Amicable
Relations of England and Spain--1575. A Deadlock--1576. Attitude of the
Nation--The Queen evades War--Alençon and the Huguenots--The Netherlands
and Don John--Elizabeth's Attitude--1577. The Political Kaleidoscope--The
Archduke Matthias--1578. Mendoza--Orange and Alençon--Death of Don John--
NOTE: The Portuguese Succession.
CHAPTER XX
ELIZABETH (v), 1558-1578--IRISH AND ENGLISH 1549-58--1558. Shan O'Neill--
The Antrim Scots--1560-1. Shan and the Government--1562. Shan in England--
1563-5. Shan's supremacy in Ulster recognised--1566. Sir Henry Sidney
Deputy--Overthrow of O'Neill--Catholicism in Irish Politics--1568. The
Colonising of Munster--1569. Insurrection in Munster--Ireland and Philip--
Experimental Presidencies--1573-4. Essex in Ulster--1576-8. Sidney's second
Deputyship.
CHAPTER XXI
ELIZABETH (vi), 1578-1583--THE PAPAL ATTACK 1579. The Union of Utrecht--
1578. The Matrimonial Juggle--Alençon's wooing--1579. Popular Hostility to
the Match--Loyalty to Elizabeth--Yea and Nay--The Papal Plan of Campaign--
1580. Philip annexes Portugal--_Ireland_: 1579; the Desmond Rising--
1580: Fire and Sword--Development of the Rebellion--Smerwick: and after--
_Scotland_: 1579-1581--_England_: 1580--The Jesuit Mission--
Walsingham at Work--1581. An Anti-papal Parliament--Alençon redivivus--His
visit to England--1582. Alençon in the Netherlands--1583. Exit
Alençon--Scotland.
CHAPTER XXII
ELIZABETH (vii), 1583-1587-THE END OF QUEEN MARY 1583. Throgmorton's
Conspiracy--Catholics abroad sanguine--Division in their Counsels--The Plot
discovered--1584. Assassination of Orange--The "Association"--1585. Its
Ratification--France: The Holy League--Elizabeth's agreement with the
States--Drake's Cartagena Raid--Elizabeth's Intrigues-1586. Leicester in
the Netherlands--The Trapping of Mary--Babington's Plot--Trial of the
Queen of Scots--Elizabeth and Mary--1587. Execution of Mary.
CHAPTER XXIII
ELIZABETH (viii), 1558-1587-THE SEAMEN The New World--The English Marine
before Elizabeth--The Royal Navy--Privateering--"Piracy"--Reprisal--The
Explorers--Spain in America--John Hawkins, 1562-6--San Juan d'Ulloa, 1567--
Francis Drake--Darien Expedition, 1572--Oxenham, 1575--_Drake's Great
Voyage_: 1577--Drake in the Pacific, 1578--in the North Pacific, 1579--
his Return, 1580--_Various Voyages_: 1576-1587--Raleigh--Humphrey
Gilbert--Virginia.
CHAPTER XXIV
ELIZABETH (ix), 1587-1588-THE ARMADA 1587. Results of Mary's Death--
Attitude of Philip--Attitude of Elizabeth--The situation--Drake's Cadiz
Expedition--Negotiations with Parma--Elizabeth's Diplomacy--French Affairs
--Preparations for the Armada--1588. Plans of Campaign--Forces of the
Antagonists--The New Tactics--Defective Arrangements--The Land Forces--May
to July--The Fleets off Plymouth--The Fight off Portland--The Fight off the
Isle of Wight--Effect on the Fleets--The Armada at Calais--The Battle off
Gravelines--Flight and Ruin of the Armada.
CHAPTER XXV
ELIZABETH (x), 1588-1598-BRITANNIA VICTRIX After the Armada--A new
Phase--Death of Leicester--France, 1588-9--England aggressive--Alternative
Naval Policies--Don Antonio--Plan of the Lisbon Expedition--1589. The
Expedition; Corunna and Peniche--The Lisbon Failure--Policies and Persons--
France, 1589-1593--1590. Death of Walsingham--The Year's Operations--1591.
Grenville's Last Fight--France, 1590-3--Operations, 1592-4--Survey, 1589-94
--Spain and the English Catholics--Scottish Intrigues--Ireland: 1583-1592
--Tyrone, 1592-4--1595. Drake's Last Voyage--1596. The Cadiz Expedition--
Ireland--The Second Armada--1597. The Island Voyage--1598. Condition of
Spain--Death of Philip--Death of Burghley: Appreciation.
CHAPTER XXVI
ELIZABETH (xi), 1598-1603--THE QUEEN'S LAST YEARS A new Generation--1598.
Ireland--The Earl of Essex--1599. Essex in Ireland--His Downfall--Catholic
Factions--Philip III.--1600--Ireland--Succession Intrigues--The End of
Essex--Robert Cecil--1601. Ireland: Rebellion broken--1602. The Succession
--Last Intrigues--1603. Death of Elizabeth.
CHAPTER XXVII
ELIZABETH (xii), 1558-1603--LITERATURE Birth of a National Literature--
_Prose_: before 1579--1579-1589--_Euphues_--Sidney--Hooker--
_Verse_: before 1579--1579-1590--_Drama_: before Elizabeth--
early Elizabethan--_The Younger Generation>_: pervading
Characteristics Displayed in the Drama--and other Fields--Breadth of
view--Patriotism--Normal Types.
CHAPTER XXVIII
ELIZABETH (xiii), 1558-1603--ASPECTS OF THE REIGN Features of the Reign--
_Religion_: State and Church--The State and the Catholics--The Church
and the Puritans--Archbishop Whitgift--The Persecutions--_Economic
Progress_--Retrenchment--Wealth and Poverty--Trade Restrictions and
Development--_Travellers_--Maritime Expansion--_The Constitution--
Elizabeth_: her People--her Ministers--Appreciation.
APPENDICES
APPENDIX A--TABLES
I. CONTEMPORARY RULERS--1475-1542
II. CONTEMPORARY RULERS--1542-1603
III. THE LENNOX STEWARTS
IV. HOWARDS AND BOLEYNS
V. HABSBURGS
VI. VALOIS AND BOURBONS
VII. GUISES
DESCENDANTS OF EDWARD III.
THE PORTUGUESE SUCCESSION
APPENDIX B
CLAIMS TO THE THRONE
APPENDIX C
THE QUEEN OF SCOTS
APPENDIX D
BIBLIOGRAPHY
MAPS
I. THE WORLD: AS KNOWN _circa_ 1485-1603.
II. WESTERN EUROPE: _circa_ 1558
III. ENGLAND AND IRELAND
IV. SPANISH AMERICA: _circa 1580
V. THE LOW COUNTRIES AND THE CHANNEL
THE FLODDEN CAMPAIGN
INDEX
ENGLAND UNDER THE TUDORS
INTRODUCTION
THE TUDOR PERIOD, 1485-1603
[Sidenote: An era of Revolutions]
The historian of the future will, perhaps, affirm that the nineteenth
century, with the last years of the eighteenth, has been a period more
fraught with momentous events in the development of the nations than any
equal period since the Christian era commenced. Yet striking as are the
developments witnessed by the last four generations, the years when England
was ruled by Princes of the House of Tudor have a history hardly if at all
less momentous. For though what we call the Tudor period, from 1485 to
1603, is determined by a merely dynastic title affecting England alone, the
reign of that dynasty happens to coincide in point of time with the
greatest territorial revolution on record, a religious revolution
unparalleled since the rise of Mohammed, and an intellectual activity to
match which we must go back to the great days of Hellas, or forward to the
nineteenth century: revolutions all of them not specifically English, but
affecting immediately every nation in Europe; while one of them extended
itself to every continent on the globe. Moreover, the accompanying social
revolution, though comparatively superficial, was only a little less marked
than the others. Nor was there any country in Europe more influenced by the
general Revolution in any one of its aspects than England.
_Nihil per saltum_ is no doubt as true of historical movements as of
physical evolution. Before Columbus sighted Hispaniola, Portuguese sailors
had told tales of some vast island seen by them far in the west.
Botticelli had passed out of Filippo Lippi's school, and Leonardo was
thirty, before Raphael was born; the printing press had reached England,
and Greek had been re-discovered, in the last years of the previous
"period"; the Byzantine Empire had fallen; the power of the old Baronage in
England and France had been broken before Richard fell on Bosworth
field. There were Lollards at home and Hussites abroad before Luther came
into the world. The changes did not begin in 1485, or in any particular
year. In Italy the intellectual movement had already long been active, and
had indeed produced its best work; outside of Italy, its appearances had
been quite sporadic. At that date, the Ocean movement was in its initial
stages. There had been foreshadowings of the Reformation; and, to speak
metaphorically, the castles which had maintained the power of the nobility,
overshadowing the gentry and the burghers, were already in ruins. But the
fame of every one of the great English names which are landmarks in every
one of these great movements belongs essentially to the years after 1485.
And every one of those movements had definitely and decisively set its mark
on the world before Elizabeth was laid in her grave.
[Sidenote: The Intellectual Movement]
The intellectual movement to which we apply the name Renaissance in its
narrower sense [Footnote: In the more inclusive sense the Renaissance of
course began in the time of Cimabue and Dante, but it was not till the
latter half of the fifteenth century that it became a pervading force
outside of Italy.] has many aspects. Whatever views we may happen to hold
as to schools of painting and architecture, it is indisputable that a
revolution was wrought by the work of Raphael and Leonardo, Michael Angelo
and Titian, and the crowd of lesser great men who learned from them. The
limitations imposed on Art by ecclesiastical conventions were deprived of
their old rigour, and it was no longer sought to confine the painter to
producing altar pieces and glorified or magnified missal-margins. The
immediate tangible and visible results were however hardly to be found
outside of Italy and the Low Countries; and if English domestic
architecture took on a new face, it was the outcome rather of the social
than the artistic change: since men wanted comfortable houses instead of
fortresses to dwell in. The Renaissance in its creative artistic phase
touched England directly hardly at all.
On its literary side, the movement was not creative but scholarly and
critical, though a great creative movement was its outcome. In the earlier
period the name of Ariosto is an exception; but otherwise the greatest of
the men of Letters are perhaps, in their several ways, Erasmus and
Macchiavelli abroad and Thomas More in England. Scholars and students were
doing an admirable work of which the world was much in need; displacing the
schoolmen, overturning mediaeval authorities and conventions, reviving the
knowledge of the mighty Greek Literature which for centuries had been
buried in oblivion, introducing fresh standards of culture, spreading
education, creating an entirely new intellectual atmosphere. An enormous
impulse was given to the new influences by the very active encouragement
which the princes of Europe, lay and ecclesiastical, extended to them, the
nobility following in the wake of the princes. The best literary brains of
the day however were largely absorbed by the religious movement. The great
imaginative writers, unless we except Rabelais, appear in the latter half
of the sixteenth century--Tasso and Camoens and Cervantes, [Footnote:
_Don Quixote_ did not appear till 1605; but Cervantes was then nearly
sixty.] Spenser and Marlowe and Shakespeare, as well as Montaigne. But even
in the first half of the century, Copernicus enunciated the new theory that
the Sun, not the Earth, is the centre of the astronomical system; and
before the end of our period, the new methods had established themselves in
the field of science, to be first formulated early in the new century by
one who had already mastered and applied them, Francis Bacon. Essentially,
the modern Scientific Method was the product of the Tudor Age.
[Sidenote: The Reformation and the Counter-Reformation]
For many centuries, Christendom had in effect been undivided. There had
indeed been a time when it was uncertain whether the Arian heresy might not
prevail over orthodoxy, but that was a thousand years ago. The Byzantine
Church later had separated from the Roman on a subtle point of Theology;
but in spite of various dissensions, and efforts on the part of kings and
of Churches which may be called national to assert a degree of
independence, all Western Europe had acknowledged the supremacy of the
papacy; and though reformers had arisen, the movements they initiated had
either been absorbed by orthodoxy or crushed almost out of sight. The Tudor
period witnessed that vast schism which divided Europe into the two
religious camps, labelled--with the usual inaccuracy of party labels--
Catholic and Protestant: the latter, as time went on, failing into infinite
divisions, still however remaining agreed in their resistance to the common
foe. Roughly--very roughly--in place of the united Christendom of the
Middle Ages, the end of the period found the Northern, Scandinavian, and
Teutonic races ranged on one side, the Southern Latin races on the other;
and in both camps a very much more intelligent conception of religion, a
much more lively appreciation of its relation to morals. The intellectual
revolution had engendered a keen and independent spirit of inquiry, a
disregard of traditional authority, an iconoclastic zeal, a passion for
ascertaining Truth, which, applied to religion, crashed against received
systems and dogmas with a tremendous shock rending Christendom in twain.
But the Reformers were not all on one side; and those who held by the old
faiths and acknowledged still the old mysteries included many of the most
essentially religious spirits of the time. If the Protestants won a new
freedom, the Catholics acquired a new fervour and on the whole a new
spirituality. For both Catholic and Protestant, religion meant something
which had been lacking to latter-day mediaevalism: something for which it
was worth while to fight and to die, and--a much harder matter than dying
--to sever the bonds of friendship and kinship. That these things should
have needed to be done was an evil; that men should have become ready to do
them was altogether good. The Reformation brought not peace but a sword;
Religion was but one of the motives which made men partisans of either
side; yet that it became a motive at all meant that they had realised it as
an essential necessity in their lives.
[Sidenote: The New World]
It is hardly necessary to dwell at length on the magnitude of the
maritime expansion; the Map [Footnote: See Map 1] is more eloquent than
words. In 1485 the coasts that were known to Europeans were those of
Europe, the Levant, and North Africa. Only such rare adventurers as
Marco Polo had penetrated Asia outside the ancient limits of the Roman
Empire. In 1603, the globe had been twice circumnavigated by Englishmen.
Portuguese fleets dominated the Indian waters; there were Portuguese
stations both on the West Coast of India and in the Bay of Bengal;
Portuguese and Spaniards were established in the Spice Islands whence
there was an annual trade round the Cape with the Spanish Peninsula:
the English East India Company was already incorporated, and its first
fleet, commanded by Captain Lancaster, had opened up the same waters
for English trade. Mexico and Peru and the West Indies were Spanish
posses-*
** Two pages missing from original book here
[Sidenote: Nobility, clergy and gentry]
In the business of managing the Estates, the problem was further simplified
to the Tudors because circumstances enabled them arbitrarily to replenish
their treasuries largely from sources which did not wound the
susceptibilities of the Commons. Henry VII. could victimise the nobles by
fines or benevolences, and Henry VIII. could rob the Church, without
arousing the animosity of the classes which were untouched; while neither
the nobility nor the clergy were strong enough for active resentment. In
each case the King made his profit out of privileged classes which got no
sympathy from the rest--who did not grudge the King money so long at least
as they were not asked to provide it themselves, and in fact felt that the
process diminished the necessity for making demands on their own pockets.
The disappearance of the old almost princely power of the greater barons,
completed by the repressive policy of Henry VII., with the redistribution
of the vast monastic estates effected by his son, were the leading factors
which changed the social and political centre of gravity. The old nobility
were almost wiped out by the civil wars; generation after generation, their
representatives had either fallen on the battlefield, or lost their heads
on the scaffold and their lands by attainder. The new nobility were the
creations of the Tudor Kings, lacking the prestige of renowned ancestry and
the means of converting retainers into small armies. With the exception of
the Howards, scarce one of the prominent statesmen of the period belonged
to any of the old powerful families. For more than forty years the chief
ministers were ecclesiastics; after Wolsey's fall, the Cromwells, Seymours,
Dudleys, and Pagets, the Cecils and Walsinghams, and Bacons, the Russels,
Sidneys, Raleighs, and Careys, were of stocks that had hardly been heard of
in Plantagenet times, outside their own localities. It was the Tudor policy
to foster and encourage this class of their subjects, who from the Tudor
times onward provided the country with most of her statesmen and her
captains, and in the aggregate mainly swayed her fortunes. At the same time
the political influence of the Church was reduced to comparative
insignificance by the treatment of the whole hierarchy almost as if it were
a branch, and a rather subordinate branch, of the civil administration; by
the appropriation of its wealth to secular purposes, to the enrichment of
individuals and of the royal treasury; and by the suppression of the
monastic orders. The effect of this last measure, limiting the clerical
ranks to the successors of the secular clergy, was to restrict them much
more generally to their pastoral functions; and at any rate after the death
of Gardiner and Pole, no ecclesiastic appears as indubitably first minister
of the Crown, and few as politicians of the front rank. England had no
Richelieu, and no Mazarin. Lastly while the diminution in the importance of
the ecclesiastical courts increased the influence of the lay lawyers, the
great development in the prosperity of the mercantile classes, due in part
at least to the deliberate policy of the Tudor monarchs, led in turn to
their wealthy burgesses acquiring a new weight in the national counsels
which, however, did not take full effect till a later day.
[Sidenote: International relations]
Finally we have to observe that in this period the whole system of
international relations underwent a complete transformation. At its
commencement, there was no Spanish kingdom; there was no Dutch Republic;
the unification even of France was not completed; England had a chronically
hostile nation on her northern borders; the Moors still held Granada; the
Turk had only very recently established himself in Europe, and his advance
constituted a threat to all Christendom, which still very definitely
recognised one ecclesiastical head in the Pope, and--very much less
definitely--one lay head in the Emperor. Elizabeth's death united England
and Scotland at least for international purposes; France and Spain had each
become a homogeneous state; Holland was on the verge of entering the lists
as a first-class power. The theoretical status of the Emperor in Europe had
vanished, but on the other hand, the co-ordination of the Empire itself as
a Teutonic power had considerably advanced. The Turk was held in check, and
the Moor was crushed: but one half of Christendom was disposed to regard
the other half as little if at all superior to the Turk in point of
Theology. The nations of Western Europe had approximately settled into the
boundaries with which we are familiar; the position of the great Powers had
been, at least comparatively speaking, formulated; and the idea had come
into being which was to dominate international relations for centuries to
come--the political conception of the Balance of Power.
CHAPTER I
HENRY VII (i), 1485-92--THE NEW DYNASTY
[Sidenote: 1485 Henry's title to the Crown]
On August 22nd, 1485, Henry Earl of Richmond overcame and slew King Richard
III., and was hailed as King on the field of victory. But the destruction
of Richard, an indubitable usurper and tyrant, was only the first step in
establishing a title to the throne as disputable as ever a monarch put
forward. To establish that title, however, was the primary necessity not
merely for Henry himself, but in the general interest; which demanded a
secure government after half a century of turmoil.
Henry's hereditary title amounted to nothing more than this, that through
his mother he was the recognised representative of the House of Lancaster
in virtue of his Beaufort descent from John of Gaunt, [Footnote: See
_Front_. and Appendix B. The prior hereditary claims of the royal
Houses of Portugal and Castile and of the Earl of Westmorland were
ignored.] father of Henry IV.; whereas the House of York was descended in
the female line from Lionel of Clarence, John of Gaunt's elder brother, and
in unbroken male line from the younger brother Edmund of York. On the
simple ground of descent therefore, any and every member of the House of
York had a prior title to Henry's; the most complete title lying in
Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Edward IV.; while the young Earl of Warwick,
son of George of Clarence, was the first male representative, and John de
la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, son of Edward's sister, had been named by Richard
as heir presumptive.
But Henry could support his hereditary title, such as it was, by the actual
fact that it was he and not a Yorkist who had challenged and overthrown the
usurper Richard.
[Sidenote 1: Measures to strengthen the title]
[Sidenote 2: 1486 Marriage]
Now the idea that the rivalry of the Houses of York and Lancaster should be
terminated and their union be effected by the marriage of the two
recognised representatives had been mooted long before. But in Henry's
position, it was imperative that he should assert his own personal right to
the throne, not admitting that he occupied it as his wife's consort. His
strongest line was to claim the Crown as his own of right and procure the
endorsement of that claim from Parliament, [Footnote: The intricacies of
descent, and the position of the crowd of hypothetical claimants, are set
forth in detail in Appendix B, and the complete genealogical chart
(_Front_.).] as Henry IV. had done on the deposition of Richard II. He
could then without prejudice to his own title effectively bar other rivals
by taking as his consort Elizabeth of York; since the Yorkists, as a group,
would at any rate hesitate to assert priority of title to hers for either
Warwick or De la Pole (who in fact never himself posed as a claimant for
the throne). In accordance with this plan of operations, the contemplated
marriage with Elizabeth of York was in the first instance postponed as a
matter for later consideration. Henry proceeded forthwith to London,
entering the City _laetanter_, amidst public rejoicings; [Footnote:
Gairdner, _Memorials of Henry VII_., p. xxvi, where a curious
misapprehension is explained for which Bacon is mainly responsible.] writs
for a new Parliament being issued a few days later. The coronation took
place on October 30th; a week afterwards Parliament met, and an Act was
promptly passed, declaring--without giving any reasons, which might have
been disputed--that the "inheritance of the Crowns of England and France
be, rest, remain and abide, in the person of our now Sovereign Lord, King
Harry the Seventh, and in the heirs of his body". This was sufficiently
decisive; but the endorsement of Henry's title in the abstract was
confirmed by further enactments which assumed that he had been King of
right, before the battle of Bosworth (thus repudiating title by conquest),
since they attainted of treason those who had joined Richard in levying war
against him. Thus Henry had affirmed his own inherent right to the throne;
and had hedged that round with an unqualified parliamentary title. In the
meantime he had also disqualified one possible figure-head for the Yorkists
by lodging the young Earl of Warwick in the Tower. It remained for him to
convert the other and principal rival into a prop of his own dignities by
marrying Elizabeth of York. Accordingly he was formally petitioned by
Parliament in December to take the princess to wife, to which petition he
graciously assented, and the union of the red and white roses was
accomplished in January. Any son born of this marriage would in his own
person unite the claims of the House of Lancaster with those of the senior
branch of the House of York.
[Sidenote: The King and his advisers]
It is difficult to think of the first Tudor monarch as a young man; for his
policy and conduct bore at all times the signs of a cautious and
experienced statesmanship. Nevertheless, he was but eight and twenty when
he wrested the kingdom from Richard. His life, however, had been passed in
the midst of perpetual plots and schemes, and in his day men developed
early--whereof an even more striking example was his son's contemporary,
the great Emperor Charles V. Young as Henry was, there was no youthful
hot-headedness in his policy, which was moreover his own. But he selected
his advisers with a skill inherited by his son; and the most notable
members of the new King's Council were Reginald Bray; Morton, Bishop of
Ely, who soon after became Archbishop of Canterbury and was later raised to
the Cardinalate; and Fox, afterwards Bishop of Durham and then of
Winchester, whose services were continued through the early years of the
next reign. Warham, afterwards Archbishop, was another of the great
ecclesiastics whom he promoted, and before his death he had discovered the
abilities of his son's great minister Thomas Wolsey. For two thirds of his
reign, however, Bray and Morton were the men on whom he placed chief
reliance.
[Sidenote: Henry's enemies]
Difficult as it was after Henry's union with Elizabeth to name any
pretender to the throne with even a plausible claim, Bosworth had been
in effect a victory for the Lancastrian party, and many of the Yorkists
were still prepared to seize any pretext for attempting to overthrow
the new dynasty. Not long after the marriage, Henry started on a
progress through his dominions; and while he was in the north, Lord
Lovel and other adherents of the late king attempted a rising which was
however suppressed with little difficulty. A considerable body of
troops was sent against the rebels, while a pardon was proclaimed for
all who forthwith surrendered. Many of the insurgents came in; the
promise to them was kept. Of the rest, one of the leaders was executed,
Lovel escaping; but the affair, though abortive, illustrated the
general atmosphere of insecurity which was to be more seriously
demonstrated by the insurrection in favour of Lambert Simnel in the
following year--some months after the Queen had given birth to a son,
Prince Arthur.
Outside Henry's own dominions, the Dowager Margaret of Burgundy, widow
of Duke Charles the Bold and sister of Edward IV., was implacably
hostile to Henry, and her court was the gathering place of dissatisfied
Yorkist intriguers. Within his realms, Ireland, where the House of York
had always been popular, offered a perpetual field in which to raise
the standard of rebellion, any excuse for getting up a fight being
generally welcomed. In that country the power of the King's government,
such as it was, was practically confined to the limits of the Pale--and
within those limits depended mainly on the attitude of the powerful
Irish noble, Fitzgerald, Earl of Kildare, who held the office of Deputy.
[Sidenote: 1487 Lambert Simnel]
At the close of the fifteenth century accurate information did not travel
rapidly, but vague rumours were readily spread abroad. Rumours were now
rife that one of the princes murdered by Richard III. had really escaped
and was still living; and on the other hand that the boy Warwick was dead
in the Tower. Some one devised the idea of producing a fictitious Richard
of York, or Warwick. A boy of humble birth named Lambert Simnel was taught
to play the part, carried over to Ireland, and produced after some
hesitation as the Earl of Warwick. Presumably the leaders of the Yorkists
intended to use the supposititious earl only until the real one could be
got into their hands; but Lincoln, who certainly knew the facts, espoused
the cause of the pretender, in complicity with Lovel and Margaret of
Burgundy. In Ireland, Simnel was cheerfully and with practical unanimity
accepted as the king, and a band of German mercenaries, under the command
of Martin Swart, was landed in that country to support him; though in
London the genuine Warwick was paraded through the streets to show that he
was really there alive. Lincoln, who had first escaped to Flanders, joined
the pretender; they landed in Lancashire in June. Within a fortnight,
however, the opposing forces met at Stoke, and after a brief but fierce
conflict the rebel army, mainly composed of Irish and of German
mercenaries, was crushed, Lincoln and several leaders were slain, and their
puppet was taken captive. Henry's action was the reverse of vindictive, for
Simnel was merely relegated to a position, appropriate to his origin, in
the royal kitchen, and was subsequently promoted to be one of the King's
falconers. Kildare, [Footnote: The narrative in the _Book of Howth_
gives the impression that Kildare was at Stoke, and was made prisoner; but
this is probably a misinterpretation arising from a lack of dates.] in
spite of his undoubted complicity in the rebellion and the actual
participation therein of his kinsmen, was even retained in the office of
Deputy. Twenty-eight of the rebels, however, were attainted in the new
Parliament which was summoned in November, the Queen's long-deferred
coronation taking place at the same time.
The same Parliament is noteworthy as having given a definitely legal status
to the judicial authority of the Council by the establishment of the Court
thereafter known as the Star Chamber, of which we shall hear later. Besides
this, however, it had the duty of voting supplies for embroilments
threatening on the Continent.
The complexities of foreign affairs form so important a feature in the
history of the next forty years that it is important to open the study of
the period with a clear idea of the position of the Continental powers.
[Sidenote: The state of Europe]
Lewis XI., the craftiest of kings, had died in 1482, leaving a tolerably
organised kingdom to his young son Charles VIII., under the regency of Anne
of Beaujeu. With the exception of the Dukedom of Brittany, which still
claimed a degree of independence, and of Flanders and Artois which, though
fiefs of France, were still ruled by the House of Burgundy, the whole
country was under the royal dominion; which had also absorbed the Duchy of
Burgundy proper. The daughter of Charles the Bold, wife of Maximilian of
Austria, inherited as a diminished domain the Low Countries and the County
of Burgundy or Franche Comté.
East of the Rhine, the kingdoms, principalities, and dukedoms of Germany
owned the somewhat vague authority of the Habsburg Emperor Frederick, but
the idea of German Unity had not yet come into being. On the south-east the
Turks who had captured Constantinople some thirty years before (1453) were
a militant and aggressive danger to the Empire and to Christendom; while
the stoutest opponent of their fleets was Venice. Switzerland was an
independent confederacy of republican States: Italy a collection of
separate States--dukedoms such as Milan, kingdoms such as Naples, Republics
such as Venice and Florence, with the Papal dominions in their midst. In
the Spanish peninsula were the five kingdoms of Navarre, Portugal, the
Moorish Granada, Aragon, and Castile. The last two, however, were already
united, though not yet merged into one, by the marriage of their respective
sovereigns Ferdinand and Isabella. Sardinia and Sicily were attached to
Aragon.
Finally we have to note that Maximilian, son of the Emperor, had married
Mary of Burgundy; but on Mary's death the Netherlanders recognised as their
Duke not Maximilian but his young son Philip--the father exercising only a
very precarious authority as the boy's guardian; while the Dowager
Margaret, the second wife of Charles the Bold, the lady whose hostility to
the House of Lancaster has been already noted, possessed some dower-towns,
and considerable influence. In 1486 Maximilian was elected "King of the
Romans," in other words his father's presumed successor as Emperor.
[Sidenote: France and Brittany]
For the time, then, the consolidation of France was more advanced than that
of any other Power; her desire was to complete the process by the
absorption of Brittany. Spain, i.e., Castile and Aragon, had made
considerable progress in the same direction, but for her the conquest of
Granada was still the prime necessity.
The absorption of Brittany, however, was opposed alike to the interests of
Maximilian, of the Spanish monarchs, and of England. To the former two, any
further acquisition of power by France was a possible menace. To the last,
France was traditionally the enemy, and if Breton ports became French
ports, the strength of France in the Channel would be almost doubled. Henry
personally was under great obligations both to France and to Brittany,
especially to France; but political exigencies evidently compelled him to
favour the maintenance of Breton independence.
During 1487 France had been carrying on active hostilities in Brittany, but
the results had been small and a treaty had been signed. Lewis, Duke of
Orleans, and others of the French nobility who were hostile to the regency
of Anne of Beaujeu, were actively promoting the Breton cause within the
dukedom; there was no longer an active French party there; and now that
Henry in England had suppressed the Simnel rising France became anxious to
secure English neutrality. But, if Henry could not keep clear of the
complication altogether; if once the parties in the contest began appealing
to him; he was liable to find himself forced to take part with one side or
the other. Hence the necessity for calling upon Parliament to vote money
for armaments.
[Sidenote: 1488 Henry intervenes cautiously]
Thus in the opening months of 1488 we find Henry on the one hand fitting
out ships, and on the other offering friendly mediation both to France and
to Brittany: while his policy was not simplified by the unauthorised
interposition of his queen's uncle Edward Woodville, who secretly sailed
with a band of adventurers to support the Bretons. Henry repudiated
Woodville's action, and extended the existing treaty of peace with France
to January, 1490. In the same month (July, 1488) the Bretons suffered a
complete defeat, and the Duke was obliged to sign a treaty on ignominious
terms. Within a fortnight, however, the Duke was dead, and his daughter
Anne, a girl of twelve, succeeded him.
The result was the renewal of war; since Anne of Beaujeu and the Breton
Marshal de Rieux both claimed the wardship of the young Duchess, for whose
hand the widower Maximilian was already a prominent suitor. Now up to this
point Henry had refused to adopt a hostile attitude towards France, and had
treated overtures from Maximilian with frigidity. But in six months' time
he was concluding alliances both with Brittany and with Maximilian.
[Sidenote: England and Spain]
The determining factor in this change of attitude, practically involving a
French war, is probably to be found in Henry's relations with Spain. It was
of vital importance to him to get his dynasty recognised in an emphatic
form by foreign Powers. In Spain under its very able rulers he saw the most
valuable of allies, and during the first half of 1488 he had made it his
primary concern to procure the betrothal of his own infant son Arthur to
their infant daughter Katharine. And virtually his hostility to France was
the price they demanded. The preliminaries were settled in July, 1488; the
treaty was not definitively signed till March of the next year; and as the
essential nature of the Spanish requirements became more apparent, Henry
found himself compelled to accept active antagonism to France as part of
the bargain. With his subjects, a French war was always secure of a certain
popularity, though the provision of funds for it would entail a degree of
opposition. Moreover, though foreign wars might give extreme malcontents
their opportunity, it is a commonplace of politics that they distract
attention from domestic grievances. Thus it is easy to perceive how the
benefits of the Spanish alliance would very definitely turn the scale. And
we shall still find that Henry had no intention of expending an ounce of
either blood or treasure which might be saved consistently with the
ostensible fulfilment of the Spanish Compact.
[Sidenote 1: 1489 Preparations for war with France]
[Sidenote 2: Spanish treaty of Medina del Campo]
So in December, 1488, Henry was sending friendly embassies to all the
Powers, but while that to France was merely offering mediation, the envoy
to Brittany was offering military assistance--on terms. In January a new
Parliament was asked for, and after considerable debate granted, £100,000.
In February the embassy to Maximilian concluded an alliance for mutual
defence; while that to Brittany pledged Henry to defend the young Duchess,
but exacted in return the occupation by the English of sundry military
positions in the duchy, and the right to forbid any marriage or alliance
except with Maximilian or Spain. Then in March the Spanish treaty was
completed: whereof the terms were very significant. The children were to be
betrothed. If Spain declared war on France, England was to support her.
Spain might retire independently if she recovered the small districts of
Roussillon and Cerdagne, which had been surrendered (though only in pledge)
to Lewis XI.; England might similarly withdraw if she got back Guienne--a
very much more visionary prospect. Otherwise, one was not to retire without
the other being equally satisfied. If England attacked France, Spain was to
help; but occupied as she was with Granada the amount of aid likely to be
forthcoming was problematical. In brief, Henry was prepared to pay for the
marriage, and Spain could exact a high price.
France then was occupied in the west with the contest in Brittany, and in
the north she was supporting the Flemings in their normal resistance to
Maximilian. The English could use Calais as a base for operations on this
side, and also began to throw troops into Brittany. Incidentally there was
a rising in the north of England headed by Sir John Egremont, of which the
pretext was resistance to the levying of taxes; this, however, did not take
very long to suppress, nor was any one of importance involved in it. Still
the hostilities with France were carried on in a very half-hearted fashion;
being confined to defensive operations in Brittany which were supposed to
be no violation of the peace recently prolonged to January, 1490.
[Sidenote: The allies inert]
Henry was satisfied to make a show of fighting, and Spain made no haste to
help him, England not being formally at war. As early as July, Maximilian,
shiftiest and most impecunious of princes, concluded at Frankfort an
independent treaty with France; who agreed to give up the places she
occupied in Brittany if Henry were compelled to withdraw his garrisons;
while there were signs that she might cede Roussillon and thus deprive
Henry of his claim to Spanish support. Within the duchy itself, the Marshal
de Rieux and his ward were in a state of antagonism; since he wished her to
marry the Sieur D'Albret, a powerful Gascon noble who was not too
submissive to the French monarchy; while the Duchess declared she would
rather enter a convent. Anne at last announced her adhesion to the treaty
of Frankfort; but as Henry had no intention of evacuating his forts,
nothing particular resulted. The English King could not afford simply to
drop the contest, and when the New Year came in, he demanded and obtained
from Parliament fresh supplies for carrying on the war.
[Sidenote: 1490 Object of Henry's foreign policy]
The game Henry had to play in 1490 was a sufficiently difficult one: and he
played it with consummate skill. He meant to hold his position in Brittany
until he received adequate indemnities; he had to satisfy his own subjects
that he was not going to draw back before the power of France; and he had
to carry out the letter of his obligations to Spain under the treaty of the
previous March, On the other hand, he had in fact no ambitious military
projects, and while Spain abstained from sending active assistance in
force, she could not complain if he merely stood on the defensive. The
Duchess, finding herself no better off for accepting the Frankfort treaty,
adopted the alternative policy of throwing herself on his protection. So he
welcomed a mediatorial embassy from the Pope and showed no unwillingness to
negotiate, but continued to strengthen his own position; while he could
exhibit a sound reason for abstaining from aggressive action and still
accumulate war-funds.
By Midsummer France had enlarged her demands since the treaty of Frankfort,
requiring the withdrawal of the English from Brittany as a preliminary not
to her own withdrawal but to arbitration on her claims. In September the
shifty King of the Romans reverted to an alliance with Henry for mutual
defence; and the scheme of his marriage with the Duchess Anne was pressed
on. Marshal de Rieux had by this time become reconciled to the Duchess,
thrown over D'Albret, and come into agreement with Henry. At this time,
moreover, Henry ratified publicly the Spanish treaty which had been
accepted by Ferdinand and Isabella eighteen months before; but he also
submitted an alternative treaty [Footnote: Busch, _England under the
Tudors_. pp. 59, 330; and Gairdner's note, p. 438.] (which Spain
rejected) modifying the portions which placed the contracting Powers on an
unequal footing. By this step he forced the Spanish monarchs to resign any
pretence of having treated him generously or having placed him under an
obligation; and the step itself was significant of the increased confidence
he had acquired in the stability of his own position. In December
Maximilian was married by proxy to Anne--whom he had never seen--and not
long afterwards she assumed the style of Queen of the Romans.
[Sidenote: Apparent defeat of Henry's policy]
Ostensibly, the object of Henry's diplomacy had failed. Spain had rejected
his proposals: and the direct results of Anne's marriage were that the
activity of France was renewed; Spain, with the pretext of the Moorish war
to plead, was less inclined than ever to render assistance; Maximilian as a
matter of course proved a broken reed; D'Albret, his pretensions being
finally shattered, surrendered Nantes to the French by arrangement. England
was apparently to bear the entire brunt of the war. Henry was justified in
appealing to his subjects for every penny that could be raised, and
resorted to "benevolences"--an insidious method of extortion which had been
declared illegal in the previous reign, but under the existing abnormal
conditions could hardly be resisted. A great demonstration of warlike
ardour was made, on the strength of which Spain was urged to pledge herself
to throw herself into the war next year with more energy and on more
reasonable terms than the existing treaty of Medina del Campo provided for.
But in the meantime the French were reducing Brittany, and held the Duchess
besieged in Rennes. The French King, Charles VIII., proposed that the
marriage with a husband whom she had never seen should be annulled, and the
dispute be terminated by his wedding her himself. Resistance seemed
hopeless; Anne assented; the necessary dispensations were secured from
Rome, and Anne of Brittany became Queen of France.
[Sidenote: 1492 Henry's bellicose attitude]
Now the defence of Brittany had been the primary ground of England's
quarrel with the French; with Henry himself, however, this object had been
secondary to the matrimonial alliance with Spain, from which the latter was
now not likely to withdraw. Henry, moreover, had made use of the whole
affair to acquire a full money-chest; and since it was of vital importance
that this should be done without turning his subjects against him, it had
been necessary to lend the war as popular a colour as possible. Hence it
was part of his policy to emphasise at home as his ultimate end the
recovery of the English rights in the French Crown, so successfully
utilised by his predecessor Henry V. in the first quarter of the century.
It would have been manifestly dangerous for him in establishing his dynasty
to recede from a claim which both Yorkists and Lancastrians had maintained.
Incidentally also, there was the matter of indemnities owing to him by Anne
of Brittany for which Maximilian had been made responsible.
[Sidenote 1: France makes peace]
[Sidenote 2: Treaty of Etaples (Dec.)]
Since then it was impracticable simply to retire, the alternative course
was to demonstrate; and Henry spent the greater part of 1492 in making the
greatest possible display of preparation for war on a great scale--with a
view to obtaining satisfying terms of peace. The one real piece of military
work taken in hand was the siege and capture of Sluys in Flanders (in
conjunction with Albert of Saxony, on behalf of Maximilian); from which
port much injury of a piratical order had been wrought upon English
merchants. Meantime negotiations had been carried on, but with no
appearance of success. At last in October the King actually crossed the
Channel to take command of the army of invasion; and sat down before
Boulogne. Then on a sudden the air cleared. Charles in fact did not want a
serious English war, out of which he could make nothing. But he had
developed a very keen ambition to enter Italy and win the Crown of Naples.
Henry by himself, or even in conjunction with the much offended Maximilian,
was hardly likely to penetrate very far into France, if the forces of that
kingdom were arrayed against him; but while he threatened, Charles could
not move on Italy; moreover, his presence was an encouragement to those of
the nobility whose allegiance was doubtful. So the French King resolved to
buy off the English King at his own price. Lewis XI., threatened by Edward
IV., had agreed to pay what Edward called a tribute, in return for which he
held his claim to the French throne in abeyance. Henry need have no qualms
about following his Yorkist predecessor's example. Beyond that, Charles was
prepared to pay off the Brittany indemnities. Thus Henry secured Peace with
Honour and a solid cash equivalent for his expenditure; besides being able
to silence the complaints of the warlike by emphasising the gravity of
embarking on a great campaign with winter coming on. He threw over
Maximilian, but the faithlessness of the King of the Romans was so palpable
and notorious that at the worst Henry was only paying him back in his own
coin. As to Spain, Henry knew that the monarchs had been endeavouring to
negotiate a separate peace, and they had never carried out their part of
the contract. So far as he was breaking engagements with his allies, their
own conduct had given him ample warrant. The event had justified Henry's
management of a very difficult situation. The Peace of Etaples was ratified
in December; and Henry emerged from the war with England's continental
prestige restored to a respectable position, a full treasury, and his
throne in England infinitely more secure than it had been three years
before. He was never again driven to enter upon a foreign war; and now the
appearance of Perkin Warbeck on the scene, though it kept England in a
state of uneasiness for some years, was incomparably less dangerous than it
would have proved at an earlier stage.
CHAPTER II
HENRY VII (ii), 1492-99--PERKIN WARBECK
[Sidenote: Ireland, 1485]
Before entering upon the career of Perkin Warbeck, we must give somewhat
closer attention to the affairs of the sister island, to which reference
has already been made in connexion with the Simnel revolt. Ireland had
never been really brought under English dominion. Within the district known
as the English Pale, there was some sort of control, extending even less
effectively over the province of Leinster, and beyond that practically
ceasing altogether, except in a few coast towns; the Norman barons who had
settled there having so to speak turned Irish, and even in some cases
having translated their names into Celtic forms. The most powerful of the
nobles at this time were the Geraldines, at whose head were the Earls of
Kildare and of Desmond, and the Butlers whose chief was the Earl of
Ormonde. But the primacy belonged to Kildare, who moreover had stood high
in favour with the House of York. It had been the practice for the English
kings to appoint a nominal absentee governor, whose functions were
discharged by a Deputy; and Kildare was Deputy under both Edward IV. and
Richard.
[Sidenote: 1487-92 The Earl of Kildare]
Henry, on his accession, had seen that the one chance of keeping the
country in any degree quiet lay in securing Kildare's allegiance and
support; and proposals for his continuation in the office of Deputy had
been under discussion when Lambert Simnel was hailed as King and crowned,
with the open support not only of Kildare but of nearly all the barons and
bishops. It did not suit Henry's policy to attempt punishment under these
conditions; he preferred conciliation; and after Stoke, Kildare was
retained as Deputy, when he and Simuel's principal adherents had sworn
loyalty. In 1490 Henry had found it necessary to reprimand Kildare for
sundry breaches of the law, commanding his presence in England within ten
months. Kildare made no move, but at the end of the ten months wrote to say
that he could not possibly come over, as the state of the country made his
presence there imperative. The letter was written in the name of the
Council, and signed by fifteen of its members. This was backed by another
letter from Desmond and other nobles in the south-west, declaring that they
had persuaded the Deputy that the peace of Ireland quite forbade his
departure.
Probably it was much about this period--that is, some time in 1491--that a
new claimant to Henry's throne (Perkin Warbeck) appeared in the south-west
of Ireland, declaring himself to be that Richard Duke of York who was
reported to have been murdered in the Tower along with his brother Edward
V. Desmond espoused his cause, while Kildare and others coquetted with him.
Agents from Desmond and the pretender visited the court of the young King
of Scots James IV., in March, 1492, and in the summer Charles VIII., whose
territories Henry was then ostentatiously preparing to invade, invited the
young man over to France where he was received as the rightful King of
England. The conclusion of peace, however, at the end of the year, made it
necessary for the French King to withdraw his countenance from Henry's
enemies; and the pretender retired to the congenial atmosphere of the court
of Margaret of Burgundy. In the meantime Kildare, whose complicity with
Desmond it had become impossible entirely to ignore, had been deprived of
his office, and a new Deputy appointed.
[Sidenote 1: 1491 Perkin Warbeck's appearance]
[Sidenote 2: Riddle of his imposture]
The self-styled Richard of York is known to history as Perkin Warbeck. The
account of his early career subsequently given to the world in his own
confession is generally accepted as genuine. The son of a Tournai boatman,
he served during his boyhood under half a dozen different masters in three
or four Netherland cities and in Lisbon. At the age of seventeen he took
service with one Prégent Meno, a Breton merchant, and incidentally appeared
at Cork where he paraded in costly array. Such was the effect of his
appearance and bearing that the citizens of Cork declared he must be a
Plantagenet. Taxed with being in reality either the Earl of Warwick or an
illegitimate son of Richard III., he swore he was nothing of the kind; but
his admirers declared that in that case he could only be Richard of York,
who had somehow been saved from sharing his brother's fate in the Tower.
Perkin found himself unable to resist such importunity, accepted the
dignity thrust upon him, and set himself to learn his part. The partisans
of the White Rose had shown in the case of Lambert Simnel their preference
for even a palpable impostor bearing their badge, as compared with the
objectionable Tudor; and a genuine Duke of York would have the advantage of
a claim stronger even than that of his sister Elizabeth, Henry's queen.
Perkin, however, must have acted up to his part with no little skill to
have maintained himself as a plausible impostor up to the time when
Margaret of Burgundy received him--even though he met no one in whose
interest it was to pose him with inconvenient questions. So apt a pupil
would then have had little difficulty in assimilating the instructions of
Margaret; and, after a couple of years' training with her, in at least
supporting his role with plausibility. That Perkin himself told this story
is not very conclusive, since the confession was produced under
circumstances quite compatible with the whole thing having been dictated to
him; yet difficult as it is to believe, it is less incredible than the
alternative--that he was the real duke, who had been smuggled out of the
Tower eight years before he was produced, and kept in concealment all
through the interval, even while the Yorkist leaders had been reduced to
setting up a supposititious Earl of Warwick for a figurehead.
[Sidenote: 1492-95 Perkin and Margaret of Burgundy]
It certainly does not seem that on Perkin's appearance in Ireland he had
any active supporters outside that country, or that he caused any
perturbation in Henry's mind. Foreign princes, whether they regarded him as
genuine or as an impostor, would certainly not espouse his cause unless
they were at enmity with Henry. Even Charles VIII. made no haste to lend
him countenance until it seemed almost certain that there was to be a war
with England on a great scale; and he had no hesitation in dismissing the
pretender when peace was concluded; while the Spanish sovereigns, though
quite ready to intrigue against their Tudor ally, had no intention of
committing themselves to an open breach with him. The peace, however, which
dismissed Perkin from France, gave him a zealous adherent in the person of
Maximilian, who was now filled with a righteous animosity to Henry; and the
young lord of the Netherlands, his son Philip, Duke of Burgundy, declared
that he had no power to control the Dowager Margaret, dwelling on her own
estates. So Perkin made her court his head-quarters--a useful tool for the
weaving of Yorkist intrigues. Henry might, if he would, have legitimately
founded a _casus belli_ on this attitude, but he preferred to
institute a commercial war; from which, however, the English merchants
suffered little less than the Flemings.
In 1493 the Emperor died, and was in effect succeeded by the King of the
Romans, though his election to the Imperial throne did not take place for
some years. Maximilian, however, remained impecunious and inefficient;
Charles VIII. was giving his entire attention to his Italian projects; the
whole affair of Perkin Warbeck was carried on mainly below the surface on
both sides, by a process of mining and counter-mining. Henry was well
served by Sir Robert Clifford and others, who wormed themselves into the
confidence of the Yorkist plotters, revealing what they learnt to the King.
When the time was ripe (January, 1495), Henry's hand fell suddenly on the
unsuspecting conspirators in England; whose chiefs, including Sir William
Stanley, who was supposed to be one of the King's most trusted supporters,
were sent to the block. It was this same Sir William Stanley who, striking
in at Bosworth on the side of Henry, had been mainly instrumental in
deciding the fortunes of the day; and he had been rewarded with the office
of Chamberlain.
[Sidenote: Diplomatic intrigues]
During the two years following the Treaty of Etaples Charles VIII. had
early made his peace also with Spain by the treaty of Barcelona and with
Maximilian by that of Senlis. The desired provinces, Roussillon and
Cerdagne, were restored to Ferdinand and Isabella, who adopted a distant
attitude to Henry. The French King, free to follow his own devices, entered
Italy towards the close of 1494, marched south without opposition, and was
crowned at Naples in February, 1495, the reigning family fleeing before
him. So early and important an accession of strength to the French Crown
had hardly been anticipated, and the European sovereigns made haste to form
a League against France. Spain was desirous of bringing England into the
league; but the wayward Maximilian was still determined to support Perkin
Warbeck, apparently thinking that by substituting a Yorkist prince for
Henry he would secure a more amenable ally.
[Sidenote: 1492-95 Ireland]
Meanwhile, Ireland also had been undergoing judicious treatment. Kildare,
removed from the Deputy-ship in 1492, came over to England to give an
account of himself in the following year. Here he was detained until, in
the autumn of 1494, the King appointed a new three-year-old Governor in the
person of his second son Henry, whom he also created Duke of York, making
Sir Edward Poynings Deputy. Poynings was an experienced and capable
soldier, who had been in command before Sluys in the recent campaign; and
on his departure for Ireland Kildare went with him. Both the ex-Deputy and
the Earl of Ormonde promised to render loyal service; but it was no very
long time before Kildare was sent back to England under accusations of
treason. We may here anticipate matters by observing that this was the last
case of misbehaviour on his part. He won his way once more into the royal
favour, and when Poynings left Ireland in 1496 Kildare yet again went back
as Deputy, which office he retained for the remainder of Henry's reign, and
a portion of his son's also.
It is curious to observe in the turbulent Deputy traits of that audacious
humour which we are wont to regard as peculiarly Irish: a characteristic
fully appreciated by the English King. When taken to task for burning the
Cathedral at Cashel, he is reported to have said that he would not have
done so, only the bishop was inside. His casual announcement on a previous
occasion that he could not obey the royal summons to England because the
country could not get on without him was paralleled either in 1493 or 1495
--it is uncertain which--by his defence against the Bishop of Meath's
charges. He said he must be represented by Counsel; the King replied that
he might have whom he would. "Give me your hand," quoth the Earl. "Here it
is," said the King. "Well," said Kildare, "I can see no better man than
you, and by St. Bride I will choose none other." Said the Bishop, "You see
what manner of man he is. All Ireland cannot rule him." "Then," said the
King, "he must be the man to rule all Ireland."
[Sidenote: Poynings in Ireland 1494-96]
The government of Poynings was not prolonged, but it was very much to the
point. "Poynings' Law," passed by the Parliament assembled at Drogheda in
December, 1494, fixed Constitutional procedure for a very long time. Irish
Parliaments were to be summoned only with the approval of the King's
Council in England, and only after it had also approved the measures which
were to be submitted to them by the Irish Deputy and Council. In effect,
however, these legislative functions at this time were hardly more limited
than those of English Parliaments, which were summoned at the King's
pleasure, and only had what might be called "Government Bills" submitted to
them. The royal Council was practically in the position of a Cabinet
holding office as representing not the parliamentary majority but the
King's personal views. The Parliament might discuss and accept or reject,
but had not as yet acquired a practical initiative itself. At the same time
that this law was passed, a declaratory Act abolished the theory which had
grown up at an early stage of the conflict between the White and Red Roses,
of regarding Ireland as a country where a rebel in England was a free man:
a notion which had greatly facilitated the intrigues of both Lambert Simnel
and Perkin Warbeck on Irish soil. Further, besides some enactments for
checking feudal customs which tended to disorder, it was ordained that the
principal castles should always be under the command of Englishmen.
Poynings also endeavoured, by bestowing pensions (on terms) on some of the
principal chiefs outside the Pale--such as O'Neill in Ulster and O'Brien in
the west--to convert their position into one of semi-official
responsibility to the official Government. A basis for the maintenance of
law and order having thus been provided, the Irish difficulty was solved
for the time when "the man to rule all Ireland," benevolently disposed to a
King who had shown that he knew the right way to take him, was restored to
the office of Deputy.
[Sidenote: 1495 Survey of the situation]
In the early spring, then, of 1495, this was the position of affairs.
Perkin Warbeck lay at the court of Margaret of Burgundy; but his plans had
been upset by Clifford's information and the punishment of the ringleaders
in England. Poynings was in Ireland, and the prospect of keeping that
country in reasonable order was unusually promising. Charles VIII. had just
made himself master of Naples; and the Spanish sovereigns (who had
completed the destruction of the Moorish dominion in Granada some three
years earlier) were now occupied in forming with the Pope, Venice, Milan,
and Maximilian the Holy League against French aggression; into which they
were anxious to draw Henry, whose weight if thrown into the other scale
would be of considerable value to France. For the last two years, since the
treaty of Barcelona, they had evaded the recognition or reconstruction of
any compact with England; but under the changed conditions, while they
would not admit that the old engagements were binding, they offered to
frame new treaties for Henry's inclusion in the League, at the same time
confirming the project of the marriage between their daughter Katharine and
the Prince of Wales. Henry, however, was now in a much stronger position at
home; and though he desired the Spanish alliance, he had no intention of
allowing that bait to seduce him into making himself a cat's-paw. France
was offering a counter-inducement in the shape of a marriage with the
daughter of the Duke of Bourbon; Henry indicated that while Maximilian was
fostering the pretensions of the impostor Warbeck, it was not serious
politics to talk of being associated with him in the League. Spain might
make promises on Maximilian's behalf, but could not ensure that he would
keep them.
[Sidenote: 1495 Warbeck attempts invasion]
Time was working in Henry's favour. In July (1495) an expedition sailed
from Flanders to place Perkin on the English throne. Maximilian's hopes
were high: he bragged to the Venetians that the "Duke of York" would
immediately unseat the Tudor, and when he was on the throne, England would
be at the beck of the League. The Emperor's impracticability was
sufficiently shown by his having procured from Perkin his own recognition
as heir, if the pretender should die without issue. The expedition
attempted to land at Deal, but the men of Kent assembled in arms, and drove
it off with ignominious ease. For once Henry was severe, and put to death
no fewer than 150 of Warbeck's followers, who had been taken prisoners.
Warbeck himself did not even set foot on the realm he claimed, but made for
Ireland where he had first been so warmly welcomed. Here his old supporter
Desmond took up his cause again, and Waterford was attacked by sea and
land; but there was no general rising, and Poynings had no difficulty in
raising the siege. Foiled both in England and Ireland, Perkin now betook
himself to Scotland to obtain the help of the young King, James IV.
[Sidenote: Success of Henry's diplomacy]
The affair showed conclusively how small was the danger in England of a
Yorkist rising in favour of the pretender--a fact very fully recognised by
Ferdinand and Isabella, though Maximilian clung pertinaciously to his
protégé. Moreover, the position of the League was somewhat precarious,
since both Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, and the Venetians, were
suspected with justice of readiness to make their own terms with France. It
was more than ever necessary to bring Henry into the combination; and
Henry, still diplomatically suave, was less than ever prepared to accept
conditions which would fetter him inconveniently. He would not commit
himself to make war on France except at his own time; and Maximilian must
definitely and conclusively repudiate Warbeck. At last in July, 1496, the
new League was concluded. Henry's diplomacy achieved a distinct triumph.
His alliance had been won, but only on his own terms; all he wished to
secure had been secured. The Spanish sovereigns were so far from feeling
that they could make a tool of him that they were in considerable
trepidation lest he should still throw them over if a tolerably legitimate
excuse offered, and were anxious to do all they could to conciliate him
without betraying the full extent of their fears. Henry had already, in
February, terminated the commercial war with the Flemings by the treaty
with Philip known as the _Intercursus Magnus_, which included a
proviso against the admission into Philip's territories of rebels against
the English King.
[Sidenote: 1496 Warbeck and the King of Scots]
When Perkin Warbeck made his way to Scotland the young King of that country
was already fully informed as to the nature of his claims. James, when a
boy of sixteen, had taken part in the rebellion headed by Douglas Earl of
Angus, in which his father the late King had been overthrown at Sauchie
Burn and murdered after the battle. He was now twenty-four years of age, of
brilliant parts, no mean scholar, an admirable athlete, and ambitious to
raise the name of Scotland among the nations. His weakness lay mainly in a
boyish impulsiveness, which often caused him to mar well-laid plans on the
spur of the moment, and in an exaggerated fondness for chivalric ideas more
appropriate to a knight-errant than to a king or a leader of armies. Perkin
appealed to him as early as 1492; and before the pretender's expedition
sailed, Tyrconnel, chief of the O'Donnells of the north-west of Ireland,
presented himself in Scotland to renew the appeal. The antagonism of
Scottish feeling to the ruling powers in England was chronic. There was a
treaty of peace between England and Scotland, but the unfailing turbulence
of the borders kept each country constantly provided with a tolerable
excuse for accusing the other of having broken its engagements. James was
well within his rights in receiving the claimant; of the justice of whose
title he evidently persuaded himself, since he bestowed a kinswoman of his
own upon him in marriage, Lady Katharine Gordon. In the summer of 1496 he
was making active preparations for an incursion into England on Warbeck's
behalf; largely influenced no doubt by the promise that, should it prove
successful, Berwick, which had been finally ceded to England fourteen years
before, was to be once more surrendered to the Scots. The astute Henry
turned all this to account, by impressing on the Spanish and Venetian
agents the urgent necessity laid on him to abstain from military operations
against France while Scotland was so threatening.
[Sidenote 1: A Scottish incursion (Sept.)]
[Sidenote 2: 1497]
James did in fact raid the North of England in September; but the incursion
was a raid and nothing more. Perkin, to the surprise and even contempt both
of Scots and English, protested against the sanguinary methods of border
warfare, on behalf of the people whom he aspired to rule over. But the
people themselves would have none of him. The expedition withdrew without
having produced even the semblance of a Yorkist rising. After that, James
no longer felt eager to plunge into a war on behalf of the pretender: but
was inclined to retain him as a political asset. When, in the following
year (1497), Charles VIII.--with a precisely similar object in view--
offered him a considerable sum if he would send his guest over to France,
the Scots King declined. In July, however, Perkin sailed from Scotland,
apparently with intent to try Ireland again, where Kildare was once more
Deputy. Henry had utilised the raid to obtain the recommendation of a large
grant and loans from the Great Council forthwith; Parliament, which was
called for January (1497), ratifying the grant as a subsidy. The raising of
the loans had, however, been proceeded with, without waiting.
[Sidenote: The Cornish rising]
The defence of England against invading Scots was a matter of much
importance to the northern counties, but lacked personal interest in
Cornwall. Year after year the King had been receiving subsidies to arm for
impending wars, borrowing, and levying benevolences. When a hostile France
was the excuse, the population might murmur but was quite as willing to pay
as could reasonably be expected. But the Scots had never invaded Cornwall,
and the Cornishmen felt that it was time to protest. They would march to
London--peaceably, of course--to demand according to custom the removal of
the King's evil counsellors; Morton and Bray, to wit, who probably used
their influence in reality to mitigate rather than intensify the royal
demands. The insurgent leaders were a blacksmith, Joseph, and a lawyer,
Flamock--appropriate chiefs for working men trying honestly enough to
formulate what they had been led to regard as a grievance of what we should
now call an unconstitutional character. With bills and bows, some thousands
of them started on their march; preserving their peaceable character, till
at Taunton the appearance of a commissioner for collecting the tax proved
too much for their self-restraint, and the man was killed. A little later
they were joined by Lord Audley, who became their leader. They expected the
men of Kent, who of old had risen under Wat Tyler and again under Jack
Cade, to take up the cause: but Kent did not recognise the similarity of
the present conditions and gave them no welcome.
[Sidenote: The suppression (June)]
Meantime, Henry had not been idle; but he saw that the insurgents were not
rousing the country as they progressed, and therefore he judged that the
further they were drawn away from their own country the better. Except for
a slight skirmish at Guildford, the Cornishmen were not actively interfered
with till they encamped on Blackheath. Then, on June 17th, the royal forces
proceeded to envelop them. Some two thousand were slain on the field.
Audley, the lawyer, and the blacksmith, were put to death as traitors; the
rest were pardoned, as having been not so much rebels as victims of
demagogic arts.
[Sidenote: Warbeck's final failure (Sept.)]
The policy of leniency was not entirely successful, for the Cornishmen
imagined it merely meant that the King recognised the impossibility of
dealing sternly with every one who thought as they did. Warbeck, now in
Ireland, where he was not finding the sympathy for which he had hoped,
received messages to the effect that if he came to Cornwall he would find
plenty of supporters. He came promptly, with a scanty following enough; but
only a few thousand men joined him. He marched on Exeter, but that loyal
town stoutly refused to admit him, and his attempts to carry gates and
walls failed completely. Royal troops were on the march: the gentlemen of
Devon, headed by the Earl, were up for the King. Perkin marched to Taunton,
and then fled by night to take sanctuary at Beaulieu in Hampshire, where he
was surrounded, and very soon submitted himself to the King's clemency.
[Sidenote: The Scottish truce]
In the meantime the Scottish King, though his sentiments towards Perkin had
sensibly cooled, had no intention of leaving him in the lurch, and had
advanced on Norham Castle very shortly after his protégé had sailed for
Ireland. The Earl of Surrey, however, who commanded in the north, was well
prepared, and very soon took the field with twenty thousand men. James was
obliged to withdraw, and though he challenged the Earl to single combat
with Berwick as the stake, Surrey replied that Berwick was not his property
but his master's, and he must regretfully decline the proposed method of
arbitrament. He advanced over the border, making some captures and doing
considerable damage; but after a week, commissariat difficulties made him
retire in turn. In September Perkin's Cornish rising collapsed, and a seven
years' treaty was entered upon between the two countries.
[Sidenote: The end of Perkin Warbeck 1497-99]
Towards the pretender and his followers, the King behaved with his usual
leniency. A few leaders only were put to death; other penalties were
reserved. Warbeck was compelled publicly to read at Exeter and later in
London a confession of the true story of his own origin and that of the
conspiracy; and was then relegated to not very strict confinement under
surveillance. His supporters were allowed to purchase their pardon by heavy
fines, which satisfactorily aided in the replenishment of the royal
treasury.
The end of the pretender's story may be told in anticipation. It was
ignominious and less creditable in its accompanying circumstances to Henry.
In the summer of the next year, 1498, Perkin tried to escape, was promptly
recaptured, set in the stocks, and required to read his confession publicly
both in Westminster and London. He was then placed in strict confinement in
the Tower, where the luckless Warwick had been kept a prisoner for thirteen
years. The son of Clarence, still little more than a boy, was the only
figure-head left for Yorkist malcontents. Another attempt to impersonate
him by a youth named Ralph Wilford was nipped in the bud at the beginning
of 1499; but Henry's nerve seems to have been seriously shaken by it, and
probably he now began to make up his mind to get rid of his kinsman. Then
some kind of conspiracy was concocted, in which both Warbeck and Warwick
were involved; on 23rd November, 1499, Perkin was hanged, and five days
later Warwick was beheaded, dying as he had lived a victim to his name;
suffering for no treason or wrong-doing of his own, but simply because he
was the nephew of Edward IV.
[Sidenote: 1498 The situation]
When the year 1497 closed, the preliminaries of a Scottish peace had been
agreed upon; Perkin Warbeck was a prisoner: and the French King had already
found his position in Italy untenable, and agreed to evacuate Naples and
surrender the crown. His death and the accession of the Duke of Orleans as
Lewis XII. in April of the next year further altered the face of
international politics, already changing with the final collapse of Warbeck
and his disappearance as a pawn in the game.
CHAPTER III
HENRY VII (iii), 1498-1509-THE DYNASTY ASSURED
[Sidenote: Scotland and England]
From time immemorial almost, it might be said that Scotland had been a
perpetual menace to her southern neighbour. Since the days of Bruce she
had, it is true, been torn by ceaseless dissensions; a succession of long
royal minorities with intrigues over the regency, family feuds between the
great barons, strong kings who found themselves warring on a turbulent
nobility, weak ones who could exercise no control, had not given the
country much chance of consolidation; but the one binding sentiment that
could be relied on in a crisis was antagonism to England. To settle the
question by conquest had been proved impossible. Scotland might be
over-run, but she could not be held in subjection. If England's eyes were
bent on France, she must still manage to keep a watch on the north: but so
long as dissensions were raging, there was not much fear of anything more
serious than raiding expeditions.
[Sidenote: Henry's Scottish policy]
To keep Scotland innocuous was a primary object with the Tudor King. At the
time when he grasped the sceptre of England, the King of Scots, James III.,
was a feeble ruler surrounded by unpopular favourites, with a baronage
preparing to rise against him, and there was little danger to be
apprehended. He was over-thrown and murdered in 1488. But James IV, who
succeeded to the throne was of a different type. He was only a boy,
however, and Henry was not long in initiating a policy, more fully
developed by his descendants, of purchasing the support of leading nobles,
notably at this time and for forty years to come, the Earls of Angus-with
whom there was a compact as early as 1491. James, however, soon proved
himself a popular and vigorous monarch, of a type which attracted the
loyalty of his subjects, with a strong disposition to make his country a
serious factor in the politics of the time, and by no means devoid of
political sagacity despite his unfortunate impulsiveness and want of
balance. To block Scotland out of the field by the simple process of
keeping her thoroughly occupied with internal factions was not practicable
under these conditions, and the attitude of James in the affair of Perkin
Warbeck showed that he must be taken into serious account. Henry's
political acuteness recognised in alliance with Scotland a more hopeful
solution of the national problem than in eternal strife. The idea of a
matrimonial connexion had indeed once before, since the days of Edward I.,
taken shape in the union of James I. to Jane Beaufort; but with little
practical effect. This idea Henry revived in a form destined ultimately to
revolutionise the relations of the two kingdoms. His own eldest daughter
Margaret was but eighteen years younger than the King of Scots--quite near
enough for compatibility. From the time of the peace entered upon after
Warbeck's capture, Henry began to work with this marriage as one of his
objects. His foresight and sagacity is marked by the fact that he
recognised--and did not shrink from the possibility--that a Scottish
monarch might thus one day find himself heir to the throne of England.
[Sidenote 1: France and England]
[Sidenote 2: 1498]
The peace-policy towards Scotland was facilitated by the development of
friendly relations with France, especially after the accession of Lewis
XII.: for the traditional "auld alliance," between France and Scotland, had
proved times out of mind too strong to be over-ridden by English treaties.
If France wanted Scottish help, or Scotland wanted French help, there was
always some excuse for rendering it; the plain truth being that no treaties
could restrain the forays and counter-forays of the border clans on both
sides of the Tweed, whether the Wardens of the Marches winked at them or
not; so that there was, in either country, a standing pretext for declaring
that the other had broken truce. An instance of these border difficulties
occurred within a few months of the truce of December, 1497. A small party
of Scots crossed the border, and appeared in the neighbourhood of Norham.
They were challenged, and replied--with insolence or with proper spirit,
according to the point of view. Thereupon they were attacked by superior
numbers; some were slain; in the pursuit, damage was done on the north side
of the border. The Scots King felt that he had been outraged, and was on
the verge of breaking off all negotiations with his brother of England. It
required all the diplomatic skill of Fox (at this time Bishop of Durham),
and the mediatorial efforts of the Spaniard Ayala to prevent a serious
breach from resulting.
[Sidenote: Marriage negotiations, 1498-1503]
The opportunity, however, was seized by Fox to emphasise his master's
pacific intentions by bringing forward the proposal for the marriage of
James with Margaret. Nevertheless, for the next twelve months, Henry
displayed no eagerness in the matter. Margaret was only in her eighth year,
so that in any case the marriage could not be completed for some time; but
apart from that, there was already existing a project of marriage between
James and one of the Spanish princesses--which Spain had no real wish to
carry out, while James was disposed to push it. It would appear, therefore,
that Henry meant to give effect to his own scheme, but did not intend Spain
to feel free of the complication while it could be used as a means of
pressure.
[Sidenote: Marriage of James IV, and Margaret 1503]
At last, however, in July, 1499, a fresh treaty of peace was concluded with
Scotland, but it was not till January, 1502, that the marriage treaty was
finally ratified; the marriage to take place in September, 1503 (when
Margaret would be nearly thirteen), and the two Kings to render each other
mutual aid in case either of them was attacked. James, however, declined to
bind himself permanently to refuse renewal of the French alliance. There
was much characteristic haggling over dower and jointure, matters in which
the Tudors always drove the hardest bargain they could. The ceremony was
performed by proxy, after the fashion of the times, the day after the
treaty was ratified; and the actual marriage took place at the time fixed,
in the autumn of 1503--a momentous event, since it brought the Stuarts into
the direct line of succession, next to descendants of Henry in the male
line; and--inasmuch as one of Henry's sons had no children, and the other
no grandchildren--ultimately united on one head the Crowns of England and
Scotland, exactly one hundred years after the marriage.
[Sidenote: Spain and England: marriage negotiations, 1488-99]
In the meantime the other and much older project for the union between the
Prince of Wales and a daughter of Spain had been carried out. Originally,
Henry's prime motive in this matter had been to secure a decisive
recognition of his dynasty by the sovereigns, whom he regarded as the
greatest political force in Europe. By this time, however, (1498), the
stability of his throne and of the succession was no longer in peril; but
Spain was still the Power whose alliance would give the best guarantees
against hostile combinations. Neither Spain nor England wished to be
involved in war with France; but neither country could view her
aggrandisement with complete equanimity. At the same time, while her
ambitions were chiefly directed to Italy both could afford for the most
part to abstain from active hostilities. On the other hand, times had
changed since Henry had been ready to go almost cap-in-hand to Ferdinand
and Isabella for their support. The Spanish sovereigns were now quite as
much afraid of his joining France as he was of any step that they could
take. So the marriage treaty was ratified in 1497 on terms satisfactory
enough to Henry; and both in 1498 and 1499 proxy ceremonies took place. In
the latter year, clauses left somewhat vague in the earlier treaties were
given a clearer definition in a sense favourable to Henry.
[Sidenote: 1499 Lewis XII]
The accession of Lewis XII. in 1497 affected French policy. Lewis required
in the first place, to gain the friendship of the Pope Alexander VI., in
order to obtain a divorce from his wife and a dispensation to marry
Charles's widow, Anne of Brittany, so as to retain the duchy. In the second
place, he claimed Milan as his own in right of his descent from Valentina
Visconti (not as an appanage of the French Crown). He was anxious then to
conciliate both Spain and England, and ready to make concessions to both in
order to hold them neutral. His first steps, therefore, aimed at satisfying
them, and at detaching the Archduke Philip from his father Maximilian; all
of which objects were rapidly accomplished, England obtaining the renewal
of the treaty of Etaples, with additional undertakings in the matter of
harbouring rebels. Lewis made separate treaties with Spain and with Philip;
but the former remained none the less anxious on the score of a possible
further _rapprochement_ between France and England.
[Sidenote: The Spanish marriage negotiation, 1499-1501]
So long as Perkin Warbeck had been able to pose as Richard of York, he was
necessarily, to all who believed in him, the legitimate King of England.
Setting him aside, it was still possible to argue for the Earl of Warwick
as against his cousin Elizabeth, Henry's queen. But when Perkin and Warwick
were both put to death at the end of 1499, there was no arguable case for
any one outside Henry's own domestic circle. Even if it were held that
Henry's title was invalid, and that a woman could not herself reign in her
own right, Elizabeth's son had indisputably a title prior to any other
possible claimant. It was stated, though the truth of the statement is
doubtful, that the Spanish sovereigns had never felt at ease as to the
stability of the Tudor dynasty till November, 1499; but, at any rate, after
that date they could not even for diplomatic purposes pretend to feel any
serious apprehensions. The year 1500 presents the somewhat curious
spectacle of Henry on one side and Ferdinand and Isabella on the other,
each quite determined to carry through the marriage of Arthur and
Katharine, but each also determined to make a favour of it. In this
diplomatic contest, Henry proved the more skilful bargainer, though the
Spaniards were adepts. He frightened them not a little by crossing the
Channel and holding a conference with the Archduke Philip, which was
suspected of having for its object the negotiation of another marriage for
the Prince of Wales with Philip's sister (Maximilian's daughter) Margaret,
who was already a widow. [Footnote: Margaret had been married to Don John,
son of Ferdinand and Isabella; while Philip married their second daughter
Joanna. Their eldest daughter married the Portuguese Infant.] In fact,
there was no such intention; but an agreement was actually made that Prince
Henry should many Philip's daughter, while the youngest Tudor princess,
Mary, should be betrothed to Philip's infant son Charles, then a babe of
four months, in after years the great Emperor Charles V.
[Sidenote: Marriage of Prince Arthur and Katharine 1501]
So the marriage treaty was once more ratified. But it was not till the
summer of the next year (1501) that Katharine sailed from Spain; and in
November the actual marriage took place with no little display. It is
probable, however, that Arthur and Katharine were still husband and wife in
name only when, six months later, the Prince of Wales was stricken with
mortal illness and died; leaving his brother Henry heir to the throne, and
a fresh crop of matrimonial schemes to be matured.
[Sidenote 1: 1502 New marriage schemes]
[Sidenote 2: 1504 Dispensation granted]
The truth was that Ferdinand of Aragon and Henry of England were men of
very much the same type. Both were crafty diplomatists, cautious and
long-headed, not to be inveigled into rash schemes, keenly suspicious,
masters of the art of committing themselves irrevocably to nothing; both
had a keen appreciation of the value of money, and were experts at striking
a bargain; while each wanted the political support of the other. Each had
been working up to the matrimonial alliance which was now nullified by
Arthur's death. Ferdinand had already paid over half his daughter's dower;
he now declared that the Princess and her dower ought to be returned to
Spain. Henry argued on the other side that the balance of the dower should
be paid over. The Spaniards then proposed that the young widow should be
betrothed to the still younger prince, Henry; but at a comparatively early
stage in the negotiations over the new project, Henry's own queen died
(February, 1503), and it was no long time before the English King began to
contemplate a new marriage for himself. He is even said [Footnote:
Gairdner, _Henry VII._ (_Twelve English Statesmen_), p. 190. The
rumour was current, but it is doubtful whether it was more than a rumour;
_cf._ Busch, p. 378.] to have thought of proposing that he should take
his own son's widow to wife. Logically, of course, as a mere question of
affinity, the idea was not more inadmissible than that of Katharine's
marriage with Henry Prince of Wales; but it was infinitely more repellent,
and Isabella was horrified at the suggestion. At any rate, nothing came of
it, and an agreement for the marriage of Katharine with the younger Henry
was ratified in the course of the year [Footnote: It was in the August of
this same year (1503) that the other marriage, between James of Scotland
and Henry's elder daughter Margaret, was finally concluded.]--subject, of
course, to a papal dispensation. This was obtained, during 1504, from the
successor of Alexander VI., Pope Julius II., and Isabella had the
satisfaction of seeing it before her death. Political exigencies had only
recently been accepted by Pope Alexander as justifying a dispensation for
the divorce of Lewis XII. from his wife, to enable him to marry Anne of
Brittany; but this dispensation of Pope Julius was destined to an immense
importance in history--to be the hinge whereon swung open the gates of the
English Reformation.
[Sidenote: 1499-1506 Affairs on the Continent]
The years from 1498 to 1503 had not been without importance in Franco-
Spanish relations, more particularly with reference to the position of the
two Powers in Italy. Lewis had made himself master of Milan in 1499; but
the kingdom of Naples presented a more difficult problem; since, after
disposing of the reigning family, the French King would still find a rival
claimant in Ferdinand of Spain. In 1500 these two monarchs agreed to a
partition; but French and Spaniards quarrelled, war broke out, the Spanish
captain Gonsalvo de Cordova expelled the French; and in 1508 Naples was
annexed to Aragon. A renewed attempt of France upon Naples in the following
year proved a complete failure.
In 1503 died the Borgia Pope, Alexander VI.--poisoned, as it was believed,
by the cup he had intended for another. The personal wickedness of
Alexander and his relatives was the climax of papal iniquity, the
_reductio ad absurdum_ of the claim of the Roman Pontiff to be the
representative of Christ on earth. His immediate successor hardly survived
election to the Holy See; and was followed by Julius II., an energetic and
militant Pope, who was bent on forming the Papal States into an effective
temporal principality.
In the next year Isabella of Castile died, and by her death the European
situation was again materially affected. While she lived she worked in
complete accord with her husband, Ferdinand of Aragon; her name stands high
among the ablest of European sovereigns. But with her death the Crowns of
Castile and Aragon were no longer united. Ferdinand was not King of
Castile; the sceptre descended to the dead Queen's daughter Joanna,
[Footnote: The elder sister was already dead, as well as the one brother.]
and in effect to her husband, the Archduke Philip, Maximilian's son, and
after her to their son Charles. At the most, Ferdinand could hope only to
exercise a dominant influence (converted after Philip's death in 1506 into
practical sovereignty as Regent), with a perpetual risk of Maximilian
turning his flighty ambitions towards asserting himself as a rival.
[Sidenote: The Earl of Suffolk 1499-1505]
Although both Warbeck and Warwick had been removed in 1499, Henry had not
been altogether free from Yorkist troubles in the succeeding years. Edmund
de la Pole, Earl of Suffolk, was brother of that Earl of Lincoln who had
fallen at the battle of Stoke, and son of a sister of Edward IV. The Earl
had not hitherto come forward as a claimant to the throne; but in 1499 he
developed a personal grievance against the King, and betook himself to the
Continent, where a certain Sir Robert Curzon espoused his cause with
Maximilian. At the time, nothing came of the matter; Henry was not afraid
of Suffolk, whom he induced to return to England with a pardon. In 1501,
however, the Earl again betook himself to the Continent and made a direct
appeal to Maximilian for assistance. But Henry was now on particularly good
terms with the Archduke Philip, and Maximilian was inclining to revert to
friendly relations with England. He was in his normal condition of
impecuniosity, and Henry was prepared to provide a loan to help him in a
Turkish war if his own rebellious subjects were handed over. The issue of
these negotiations, towards the end of 1502, was a loan from Henry of fifty
thousands crowns, and a promise from Maximilian to eject Suffolk and his
supporters. In the meantime several of Suffolk's accomplices were executed
in England, including James Tyrrel who had abetted Richard III. in the
murder of the Princes in the Tower; and [Footnote: See genealogical table
(_Front_.).] William de la Pole and William Courtenay (son of the Earl
of Devonshire) were imprisoned on suspicion of complicity. Suffolk,
however, remained at Aix la Chapelle, Maximilian making him many promises
and providing inadequate supplies, while with equal lightness of heart--
having got his loan--he left his pledges to Henry unfulfilled by anything
more substantial than professions that he was doing his best to carry them
out. In 1504 the migratory Earl had the misfortune to fall into the hands
of the Duke of Gueldres, who detained him for use as circumstances might
dictate--to the annoyance of the Kings of France and Scotland, both of whom
wished him to be handed over to the King of England.
[Sidenote: 1505 Henry's position]
In 1505 then Henry's relations with all foreign Powers were satisfactory:
that is, none of them were hostile and most of them were anxious for his
friendship. In these later years, however, of Henry's reign he appears
consistently in a more definitely unamiable light than before. The two
counsellors who, however thoroughly they endorsed his policy, had probably
exercised a moderating and refining influence--Cardinal Morton and Reginald
Bray--were now both dead, and there is no doubt that Elizabeth of York,
popular herself, had been a very judicious helpmeet to her husband.
Moreover, though he was still by no means an old man, Henry was becoming
worn out; yet he could never escape from dynastic anxieties, the younger
Henry being now his only son. Marriage schemes had always been prominent
features in his policy, and the marriage schemes for himself which he
evolved one after the other in the closing years of his reign show him in a
singularly unattractive light, at the same time that his financial methods
were growing increasingly mean, and his evasions of honourable obligations
increasingly unscrupulous.
Now the Duke of Gueldres was in conflict with the Archduke Philip--at this
time not only lord of the Burgundian domains, but also in right of his wife
King of Castile and not on the best of terms with his father-in-law of
Aragon. In 1505 Philip got possession in his turn of the person of Suffolk,
by capturing the town where the Duke of Gueldres held him. Therefore during
this year Henry became particularly anxious to make friends with Philip,
and lent him money; having got which, Philip preferred placing his hostage
again in the hands of the Duke of Gueldres, who had submitted to him.
[Sidenote: Schemes for his marriage]
Out of these conditions rose another futile suggestion of a marriage for
Henry: who had already considered and dismissed the idea of marrying the
younger of the two living ex-Queens of Naples--both named Joanna--a niece
of Ferdinand of Aragon. The wife now proposed was Philip's sister,
Margaret, who on her first widowhood had been spoken of as a possible
alternative to Katharine for Arthur of Wales. Since then, she had become
Margaret of Savoy, the name by which she is generally known; but had been
widowed a second time. This proposal probably came from Philip, but was
resolutely resisted by Margaret herself.
[Sidenote: 1506 Philip in England]
In 1506 fortune favoured Henry. Philip sailed from the Netherlands in
January to take possession of the throne of Castile: but was driven on to
the English shores by stress of weather. The English King received him
royally, but while the utmost show of friendliness prevailed, Philip found
that he had no alternative to acceptance of Henry's suggestions. Before the
King of Castile departed, he had not only entered on a treaty for mutual
defence against any aggressor, but had actually delivered over the person
of the unhappy Suffolk [Footnote: So Busch. Gairdner is doubtful.] to his
sovereign, though under promise that he should not be put to death. The
prisoner, however, was committed to the Tower, and though Henry kept his
word, he is reported to have advised his son that the promise would not be
binding on him. At any rate Suffolk was executed, apparently without
further trial, early in the next reign. His brother Richard, known as the
"White Rose," who had abetted him, remained abroad, and was ultimately
killed in the service of Francis I. at the battle of Pavia in 1525, leaving
no children.
Philip had hardly departed from England when a new commercial treaty which
he had authorised was signed with the Netherlands, terminating the war of
tariffs which had again become active in recent years. This treaty, it is
not surprising to remark, was so favourable to England that in
contradistinction to the older _Intercursus Magnus_ the Flemings
entitled it the _Intercursus Malus_.
[Sidenote: Death of Philip]
The few remaining months of Philip's life were troubled. The position in
Castile was difficult enough, and in his absence the Duke of Gueldres again
revolted, with some assistance from France. Henry interfered, as he was
bound to do by the recent treaty, not without some effect. But Philip's
death in September left his wife Joanna Queen of Castile, with her father
Ferdinand as Regent, and her young son Charles Lord of the Netherlands,
with Margaret of Savoy at the head of the Council of Regency. Under these
new conditions Henry agreed to modifications in the new commercial treaty,
which indeed, as it stood, was almost impossible of fulfilment; probably in
the hope that his project of marriage with Margaret of Savoy might still be
carried out, the dowry she would bring being very much more satisfactory
than that of Joanna of Naples.
[Sidenote: 1507-8 Matrimonial projects]
In a very short time, however, Margaret had another rival, at least for the
purposes of diplomacy. This was Joanna of Castile, Philip's widow, whom
Henry had seen in the spring of 1506. That her sanity was already very much
in question seems to have made very little difference. Throughout the
greater part of 1507 and 1508 the English King was making overtures to
Margaret herself, and for Joanna to Ferdinand, blowing hot and cold in the
matter of his son Henry and Katharine, and pushing on the betrothal of his
younger daughter Mary with the boy Charles--a proposal brought forward,
when the latter was but four months old, in 1500, but not at that time
sedulously pressed. In part, at least, the explanation of all this
diplomatic play lies in Henry's relations with Ferdinand. The King of
Aragon, having lost his wife Isabella, wished to retain control of Castile;
at the same time he was in difficulties about paying up the balance of
Katharine's dowry, without which Henry would not allow her marriage with
his son to go forward, while the luckless princess was kept scandalously
short of supplies. Henry certainly wished to put all the pressure possible
on Ferdinand to get the dowry; perhaps he seriously contemplated marriage
with Joanna as a means of himself depriving Ferdinand of control in
Castile; the marriage of Charles to his daughter Mary would have a similar
advantage. On the other hand, if he married Margaret of Savoy he would get
control of the Netherlands, and still grasp at the control of Castile
through Charles, while playing off the boy's two grandfathers, Maximilian
and Ferdinand, against each other. Henry was in fact paying Ferdinand back
in his own coin; but the picture is an unedifying one, of craft against
craft, working by sordid methods for ends which had very little to do with
patriotism and no connexion with justice.
[Sidenote: 1508 The League of Cambrai]
If, however, it was now Henry's primary object to isolate Ferdinand so that
he could impose his own terms on him, the object was not attained.
Maximilian had just taken up a new idea--the dismemberment of Venice; an
object which appealed both to Lewis of France and to Pope Julius.
Ferdinand could generally reckon that if he joined a league he would manage
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