Henry V of France

“ Henry V. has no other brother than his people: let him make it King.
To arrive at this resolution, chimerical though it may seem, one would have to feel the greatness of one's race, not because one was descended from an old stock, but because one was the heir of men through whom France became powerful, enlightened and civilized.
Now, as I have just said, the way to be called upon to set to work on that plan would have been to wheedle the weaknesses of Prague, to raise magpies with the child of the throne like Luynes [51] , to flatter Concini [52] like Richelieu. ”

“ The Ottomans had not yet extended themselves in the East with their full force: something might yet have been effected there; for the King of France and England, who was yet young in years, a great future seemed to be at hand.
Sometimes it seems as though fortune were specially making a mock of man's frailty. In this fulness of power and of expectations, Henry V was attacked by a disease which men did not yet know how to cure and to which he succumbed. His heir was a boy, nine months old. ”

“ Such is the disposition of men's souls that Henry V. would encounter invincible obstacles in the apathy of France within and in the royalties without. He will therefore have to submit, to consent to await events, unless indeed he decided on a part which men would not fail to brand as that of an adventurer. He will have to enter into the sequence of ordinary facts and see the difficulties which surround him, without, however, allowing them to overwhelm him. ”

“ Before he came to the throne he was reported to be France's enemy; and speculations were rife as to the chances of his invading it and imitating the exploits of his ancestor Henry V. It needed no persuasion from Ferdinand to induce him to intervene in favour of Venice. Within a few weeks of his accession he refused to publish the papal bull which cast the halo of crusaders over the bandits of Cambrai. ”

“ Henry V., king of England from 1413 to 1422, son of preceding, born at Monmouth; during the wars of his father's reign he gave evidence of his abilities as a soldier, distinguishing himself specially by his conquest of Wales; on his accession to the throne he renewed the claims put forward by Edward III. to the French crown, and with the support of his people embarked on his great struggle to win the kingdom of France ”

“ But how many Norman nobles were like her in refusing to swear fealty to the former enemies of the kingdom? The example of fidelity to the king was not always set by those of his own family. The Duke of Bourbon, in the name of all the princes of the blood royal, prisoners with him in the hands of the English, proposed to Henry V that they should go and negotiate in France for the cession of Harfleur, promising that if the Royal Council met them with refusal they would acknowledge Henry V to be King of France. ”

“ The Work of Henry II.—The wisest and most powerful ruler can only assist the forces of nature; he cannot work against them. Those who merely glance at a map in which the political divisions of France are marked as they existed in Henry's reign, cannot but wonder that Henry did not make himself master of the (p. 158) small territory which was directly governed, in turn, by Louis VII. and Philip II. A careful study of the political conditions of his reign shows, however, that he was not really strong enough to do anything of the kind. ”

“ France under Francis I. had risen into a state no less imposing than Spain, and Henry began to be stirred with an ambition to take part in the drama of events going on upon the greater stage, across the Channel. The old dream of French conquest returned. Francis I. and Charles V. of Germany had commenced their struggle for supremacy in Europe. Henry's ambition was fostered by their vying with each other to secure his friendship. He was soon launched in a deep game of diplomacy, in which three intriguing Sovereigns were striving each to outwit the others. ”

“ His army was disbanded and all thought of invading China was given up.
Thus passed away one of the greatest conquerors of the Middle Ages. He was a soldier of genius but he cannot be called a truly great man. His vast empire speedily fell to pieces after his death. Since his day there has been no leader like him in that part of Asia.
Page 239 HENRY V KING FROM 1413-1422
I
Of all the kings that England ever had Henry V was perhaps the greatest favorite among the people. They liked him because he was handsome and brave and, above all, because he conquered France. ”

“ He held command for a time at Calais, and took an active part in the French campaigns of Henry V., who created him earl and count of Aumale in Normandy. He had charge of the education of Henry VI., and in 1437 was appointed lieutenant of France and of Normandy. Dying at Rouen in 1439, he left by Isabel, widow of Richard Beauchamp, earl of Worcester, a son, Earl Henry, who was created duke of Warwick, 1445, and is alleged, but without authority, to have been crowned king of the Isle of Wight by Henry VI. He died, the last of his line, in June 1445. ”

“ Without declaring war, he did all possible harm to them by alliances and diplomacy. In Italy he gained the grand duke of Tuscany—marrying his niece Marie de’ Medici in 1600—the duke of Mantua, the republic of Venice and Pope Paul V. The duke of Savoy, who had held back from the treaty of Vervins in 1598, signed the treaty of Lyons in 1601; in exchange for the marquisate of Saluzzo, France acquired Bresse, Bugey, Valromey and the bailliage of Gex. In the Low Countries, Henry sent subsidies to the Dutch in their struggle against Spain. ”

“ He refused to return to Spain, and made alliances wherever he could, with the Pope, with Venice, Milan, and England. The next year saw the ruin of this league in the discomfiture of Clement VII., and the sack of Rome by the German mercenaries under Bourbon, who was killed in the assault. The war went on till 1529, when Francois, having lost two armies in it, and gained nothing but loss and harm, was willing for peace; Charles V., alarmed at the progress of the Turks, was not less willing ”

“ Henry died in 1413, leaving his crown to his son, Henry V, who revived the claim of Edward III to the throne of France in 1415, and invaded that country at the head of 30,000 men. The disjointed councils of the French rendered their country an easy prey; the victory of Agincourt was gained in 1415; and after a second campaign a peace was concluded at Troyes in 1420, by which Henry received the hand of Katherine, daughter of Charles VI, was appointed regent of France during the reign of his father-in-law, and declared heir to the throne on his death. ”

“ He never got the whole of France into his power. He held Paris and the North, whilst the Duke of Burgundy held the East. South of the Loire the Armagnacs were strong, and that part of France stood by the Dauphin, though even here the English possessed a strip of land along the sea-coast in Guienne and Gascony, and at one time drew over some of the lords to admit Henry's feudal supremacy. ”

“ At the date of the death of Claude of Lorraine, Charles V. was the sole survivor of the three remarkable sovereigns who had simultaneously filled the three most important European thrones. With him the Duke and Cardinal now impelled Henry II. into a war, which had for its real object the realisation of a bold and extensive scheme greatly to increase the authority of France in Europe, and at the same time to establish the omnipotence of the Guises in France. ”

“ Money was voted and men were raised, and on October 2, 1492, Henry crossed to Calais to invade France. He (p. 350) was, however, cool enough to discover that both Ferdinand and Maximilian wanted to play their own game at his expense, and as Anne of Beaujeu was ready to meet him half-way, he concluded a treaty with the French king on November 3 at Etaples, receiving large sums of money for abandoning a war in which he had nothing to gain. In 1493 the Spaniards followed Henry's example, and made a peace with France to their own advantage. [39]
10. ”

“ Notwithstanding an article in the agreement of the 9th of April, that during the life of Charles, Henry V. should not assume the title of King of France; yet within ten days he issued a precept from Rouen relative to the Norman coinage, upon one side of which was to be inscribed, "Henricus Francorum Rex." As Henry had not then signed the article of peace at Troyes, it did not perhaps occur to him that he was thus breaking his agreement with France.—Rot. Chart. p. ”

“ Small time, but in that small most greatly liv'd
This star of England: Fortune made his sword,
By which the world's best garden he achiev'd, 7
And of it left his son imperial lord.
Henry the Sixth, in infant bands crown'd King
Of France and England, did this king succeed;
Whose state so many had the managing, 11
That they lost France and made his England bleed:
Which oft our stage hath shown; ”

“ What mightst thou do, that honour would thee do, Were all thy children kinde and naturall: But see, thy fault France hath in thee found out, A nest of hollow bosomes, which he filles With treacherous Crownes, and three corrupted men: One, Richard Earle of Cambridge, and the second Henry Lord Scroope of Masham, and the third Sir Thomas Grey Knight of Northumberland, Haue for the Gilt of France (O guilt indeed) Confirm'd Conspiracy with fearefull France, And by their hands, this grace of Kings must dye. ”

“ Holinshed relates how Henry V on his deathbed admonished the Dukes of Bedford and Gloucester and the Earls of Salisbury and Warwick never to make a treaty with the Dauphin by which any part of France might be relinquished, and how he commanded Bedford as Regent of France 'with fire and sword to persecute the Dolphin, till he had either brought him to reason and obeisance, or else to driue and expell him out of the realme of France.' He adds: 'The noble men present promised to obserue his precepts, and to performe his desires.'
I. i. 170. Eltham. ”

“ Henry VIII should then be crowned King of France, but resign to the Emperor not merely Burgundy but also Provence and Languedoc, and cede to the Duke of Bourbon his old possessions and Dauphiné. The motive he alleges is very extraordinary: the Emperor would marry his daughter and heiress, and would at some future time inherit England and France also and then be monarch of the world. [86] Henry declares himself ready to press on with the utmost zeal, provided he can do it with some security, and himself undertake the conduct of the war in the Netherlands and the support of Bourbon. ”

“ But the mass of the French people, longing for repose, gladly accepted the conversion of the king. One after another the leaders of the League gave in their adhesion to the royal cause. The Duke of Mayenne, however, held out, Paris being still in his possession, and several other important cities and fortresses being garrisoned by his troops. The Pope, at length, having vainly done every thing in his power to rouse France and Catholic Europe to resist Henry, condescended to negotiate. ”

“ To go to Chambord, you cross the Loire, leave it on one side, and strike away through a country in which salient features become less and less numerous, and which at last has no other quality than a look of intense, and peculiar rurality, - the characteristic, even when it is not the charm, of so much of the landscape of France. This is not the appearance of wildness, for it goes with great cultivation; it is simply the presence of the delving, drudging, economizing peasant. But it is a deep, unrelieved rusticity. It is a peasant's landscape ”

“ It would not be possible to find a greater contrast than was presented between France, distracted by factions struggling for the power which a lunatic king dropped from his hands, and England, harmonious and enthusiastic, welcoming back after a brilliant victory its vigorous prince, and united in giving him all the help that he demanded. If the darling scheme of the Plantagenets, the union of the two crowns, had been within the limits of possibility, Henry would certainly have effected it. ”

“ The power of the League party seemed as great as ever; the Duc de Mayenne entered Paris, and declared open war on Henri III., who, after some hesitation, threw himself into the hands of his cousin Henri of Navarre in the spring of 1589. The old Politique party now rallied to the King; the Huguenots were stanch for their old leader; things looked less dark for them since the destruction of the Spanish Armada in the previous summer. The Swiss, aroused by the threats of the Duke of Savoy at Geneva, joined the Germans, who once more entered northeastern France ”

“ The least hint to Francis of any hostile intent towards Henry would, thought Charles, be at once revealed to the English King, and the two would join in making war on himself. War he was determined to avoid, for, apart from the ruin of Flanders, which it would involve, Henry and Francis had long been intriguing with the Lutherans in Germany. A breach might easily precipitate civil strife in the Empire; and, indeed, in June, 1534, Würtemberg was wrested from the Habsburgs by Philip of Hesse with the connivance of France. ”

“ By the assassination of Henry III., Henry of Navarre became the legitimate King of France. The question was, whether he would make good his claim. Had he now been willing to declare himself a Roman Catholic, he would have at once won over the more conservative of the people, for the League was daily becoming more anarchical; the Cardinal of Bourbon, who was by it acknowledged as King Charles X., was but a puppet of Spain; and the Spanish alliance was ever growing more unpopular. ”