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 these had married great English heiresses, and began to fight each other for lands and earldoms. The King seemed to be at their mercy. At last, in 1327 a general rising, headed by the wicked French wife of Edward, swept him away and set up his son, aged thirteen, as Edward Ill. Edward II was a bad king; but his deposition and murder was a bad job, because there had been no one great national grievance, only a lot of private ones of certain great nobles. He had wasted his life, and in the end was deposed for nothing in particular.

Edward III (‘the Knight’), by interesting these barons in his French and Scottish wars, where there were lands and money as well as glory to be gained, snuffed out their quarrels for nearly fifty years; but he, too, had several younger sons who quarrelled with each other after his strong hand was gone.

He was a man of many different sides of character. He loved pageants and splendour, but he also loved hard knocks in hard fights by sea and land. He was merchant-king, sailor-king, soldier-king; and Parliament’s king too, for he added greatly to the power of the House of Commons, which, when he died, had obtained a full share in all law-making, could call the King’s ministers to account if it thought they were misbehaving, and, in fact, was almost as powerful as the House of Lords. It was always ready to vote Edward enormous sums of money. Finally, Edward thoroughly understood the needs of English trade, and he founded English manufactures; for it was he who invited Flemings to come from Flanders and settle in Norwich and teach us how to weave fine cloth.

Yet Edward has a bad name in history because he