duced all Normandy, was declared regent of France, and acknowledged heir to the crown. But death soon put an end

to his career of victory.

9. Henry V. was one of the most heroic of the English sovereigns, eminent as a warrior, beloved and adored by mili tary men; and his short reign is one of the most brilliant in English history for military achievement. But his conquests were of little benefit to his people.

10. Henry VI. succeeded to the throne when an infant only nine months old, and was proclaimed king both of England and France. His education was intrusted to Cardinal Beau fort, brother of his grandfather, Henry IV.; and his uncles the Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester, were appointed protectors or guardians of his dominions, the former for France, and the latter for England.

11. Charles VII., the Dauphin of France, being supported by the French people, recovered the kingdom by degrees; and the English, being compelled by that extraordinary heroine, Joan of Arc, to raise the siege of Orleans, were afterwards stripped of all their conquests in that country, except Calais and Guienne.

12. Henry, on coming of age, proved himself to be mild and inoffensive, but totally incapable of managing the reins of government: "he would have adorned a cloister, though he disgraced a crown." He married Margaret of Anjou, a woman whose distinguished talents, ambition, and heroism well fitted her to supply the defects of her husband in the wars which distracted his reign; but her intriguing disposition and cruelty multiplied the number of her enemies.

13. Discontents prevailing among the people, an insurrec tion broke out, headed by Jack Cade, who assumed the name of John Mortimer, and collected an army of 20,000 rebels; but he was defeated and slain.

14. The Duke of Gloucester, a favorite of the nation, the chief pillar of the house of Lancaster, and presumptive heir to the crown [that is, heir in case the king should die without issue], had opposed the marriage of Henry with Margaret. From this circumstance, he became odious to the queen, and his death soon after took place in a suspicious manner. This event, added to the imbecility of the king, encouraged the Duke of York to assert his claim to the crown.

15. The houses of York and Lancaster were both descended from Edward III.; that of York from his third son, and that of Lancaster from his fourth: the rightful title was, of course, on the side of the former. Each party was distinguished by a particular badge or symbol; that of the house of York was a

white rose, and that of Lancaster a red one; hence the civil contests were styled the wars of the Two Roses.

16. This fatal quarrel, which now (1455) broke out into open hostilities, lasted 30 years, was signalized by 12 sangui nary pitched battles, and marked by the most unrelenting bar barity. During the contest, more than 100,000 of the bravest men of the nation, including 80 princes of the blood, fell on the field, or were executed on the scaffold.

17. In the battles of St. Alban's and Northampton, the Lancastrians were defeated, and the king was taken prisoner; but Queen Margaret, having collected a large army, gained the battle of Wakefield (1460), in which the Duke of York was defeated and slain. But his son and successor, at the head of a numerous army, entered London, amidst the shouts of the citizens, and was proclaimed king, by the title of Edward IV.

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SECTION VI.

BRANCH OF YORK:- · Edward IV.; Edward V.; Richard III. - From A. D. 1461 to 1485.

1. The new king was not permitted to enjoy the crown in peace. The heroic Margaret again collected an army of 60,000 men, which was met by the Yorkists, to the number of upwards of 40,000, under the command of Edward and the Earl of Warwick. A tremendous battle was fought (1461) at Towton, in which Edward obtained a decisive victory, and upwards of 36,000 Englishmen, slain by one another's hands, were left dead on the field. — Henry, having been taken pris. oner, was confined in the Tower, and there, after being liberated, and a second time imprisoned, was finally murdered (1471), as was supposed, by the Duke of Gloucester, afterwards Richard III.

2. The unfortunate queen, accompanied by her son, a boy eight years old, while flying from her enemies, was benighted In Hexham forest, and fell into the hands of ruffians, who stripped her of her jewels, and treated her with great indignity. After she was liberated from them, being overcome with fatigue and terror, she sunk in despair; but was suddenly roused by the approach of a robber, with a drawn sword. Seeing no way to escape, she rose and presented to him her child: "My friend," said she, "here is your king's son, whom I commit to your protection." The man, pleased with this unexpected con fidence reposed in him, afforded every assistance in his power

and conducted the mother and son, through numerous perils, ta a small seaport, whence they sailed to Flanders.

3. The House of York had been hitherto supported by the important assistance of Nevil, Earl of Warwick, the most powerful baron in England, and the greatest general of his time. But Edward having given offence to his benefactor, Warwick was induced to abandon him, and to support the Lancastrians. By his exertions, Edward was deposed, and Henry, after having been a prisoner six years in the Tower, was released, and again proclaimed king. Thus Warwick, having restored Henry, whom he had deposed, and pulled down Edward, whom he had placed on the throne, obtained the title of king-maker.

4. But in the bloody battle of Barnet, Edward prevailed, and the brave Warwick was slain. The intrepid Margaret, having returned to England, made a last effort for the crown, in the desperate battle of Tewkesbury (1471), which proved fatal to her hopes. Her son was slain, and she herself was taken prisoner; but was afterwards ransomed by the King of France, and in that country she passed the remainder of her life in obscurity and neglect.

5. Edward, being now secured on the throne, gave himself up to unrestrained indulgence in acts of tyranny, cruelty, and debauchery. His brother, the Duke of Clarence, who had assisted him in gaining the crown, he caused, with the concur rence of his other brother, the Duke of Gloucester, to be impeached and condemned; and he is said to have been drowned in a butt of Malmsey wine. Edward was possessed of talents, and was reputed the handsomest and most accomplished an of his time in England. The love of pleasure was his raling passion. "His character," says an elegant writer," is easily summed up: - his good qualities were cour age and beauty; his bad qualities, every vice." It was in this reign that the art of printing was introduced (1471) into England by William Caxton.

6. Edward IV. left two sons, the eldest of whom being only 13 years of age, was proclaimed king, by the title of Edward V. Richard, Duke of Gloucester, brother to Edward IV., being appointed protector, caused Lord Hastings, and other distinguished persons, to be executed without trial; seized the crown, on the pretence that his nephew, Edward V., and his brother, the Duke of York, were illegitimate; and procured himself to be proclaimed king, by the title of Richard III. After two months, the young princes disappeared, and are said to have been smothered in the Tower, by order of Richard.

7. The multiplied and detestable crimes of Richard III. who waded to the throne through the blood of his nearest re lations, found an avenger in the Earl of Richmond, the only surviving heir of the house of Lancaster. The armies of the two rivals met at Bosworth (1485), where a desperate battle was fought, which, by reason of Lord Stanley's going over to Richmond, proved fatal to Richard, who was defeated and slain; and his rival was crowned on the field by the title of Henry VII. This battle terminated the long and bloody con. flicts between the two houses of York and Lancaster, which had reduced the kingdom to a state of almost savage barbarity, laws, arts, and commerce being entirely neglected for the prac tice of arms.

8. Richard, who was a man of talents and courage, could conceal the most bloody projects under the mask of affection and friendship; and his insatiable ambition led him to perpetrate the most atrocious crimes. He had a harsh and disa greeable countenance, was crook backed, splay-footed, and had his left arm withered; so that the deformity of his body corresponded to that of his mind.

SECTION VII.

THE TUDOR FAMILY: - Henry VII.; Henry VIII.; Edward VI.; Mary; Elizabeth. From A. D. 1485 to 1603.

1. The hereditary right of Henry VII. to the crown was very defective; but he strengthened his claim by marrying Elizabeth, daughter of Edward IV.; and in this way the two houses of York and Lancaster were united. Henry was the son of Margaret, great-granddaughter of John of Gaunt, and of Edmund Tudor. The sovereigns of the house of Tudor were arbitrary in their principles and character; but their reign, though disturbed by conflicts, both domestic and foreign, was, notwithstanding, less convulsed by war than that of any other family of English kings.

2. The policy of Henry was pacific, and his reign was comparatively tranquil; yet it was disturbed by several plots and conspiracies, two of which were of a singular character. One of these was the attempt of Lambert Simnel, the son of a baker, to counterfeit the person of the Earl of Warwick; tne other was a similar attempt of Perkin Warbeck to counterfeit the Duke of York, who is said to have been smothered in the Tower, by the order of Richard III. By the earlier English

historians, Warbeck is uniformly represented to have been an impostor, but several later writers maintain that he was the real son of Edward IV.

3. Both of the adventurers aspired to the crown, and met with considerable support from the people. Simnel, after being proclaimed King of England and Ireland, at Dublin, was taken prisoner, and, instead of being executed, was made a scullion in the king's kitchen, and afterwards promoted to be falconer. Perkin Warbeck, who maintained his cause by force of arms for five years, was supported by many of the nobility, and acknowledged by the Kings of France and Scotland; but, being at last taken prisoner, he was executed as a traitor; and near the same time, the real Earl of Warwick, the son of the Duke of Clarence, and nephew of Edward IV., the last male of the Plantagenets, who had been imprisoned from his child hood, for no other crime than his birth, was condemned and executed on a charge of treason.

4. Henry VII. was more deficient in the feelings of the heart than in the qualities of the mind; and, though much respected, was little beloved. He was wholly devoted to business; prudent and sagacious; little susceptible of the social and generous affections; serious and reserved in his manners, suspicious in his temper, despotic in his government, and avaricious in his disposition, the love of money being his ruling passion. He was capable of descending to the meanest artifices, and of employing the most unprincipled agents in extorting money from his subjects, to fill his own coffers. Empson and Dudley, two lawyers, gained an infamous notoriety as instruments of his rapacity and oppression. By his frugality and arbitrary exactions, he accumulated immense wealth, and is said to have left, at his death, in ready money, the sum of £1,800,000, - an enormous amount of specie for that age, equivalent to £10,000,000, or, according to some, to £16,000,000, at present.

5. His reign was prosperous at home, and respected abroad; and, though not a popular sovereign, he was, perhaps, next to Alfred, the most useful prince that had hitherto sat on the throne of England. He enacted many wise and salutary laws, promoted industry; encouraged commerce; reduced to subordination a factious and insolent aristocracy; and taught the peaceful arts of civilized life to a warlike and turbulent people.

6. By permitting the nobles to alienate their lands, he weakened their power, raised the respectability of the lower orders, and gave a mortal wound to the feudal system. He expended £14,000 in building one ship, named "the Great Harry,' which may be considered as the beginning of the