Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 1.djvu/495

TO A.D. 1399.] according to Chaucer, legerdemain must have reached considerable perfection, for ho says the tragetours could make people believe they saw a boat come swimming into a hall; a lion walk in; flowers spring up as in a meadow; ripe grapes, red and white, appear on imaginary vines; castles, looking solid limo and stone, appear, and then vanish again.

Such is a picture of England in the fourteenth century, la arms she had won eternal and unequalled fame; in poetry, literature, and art, she had made brilliant advances. Her churches were piles of glorious poetry in stone; and in poetry itself she had a Chaucer; in architecture, a Wykeham; in philosophy, Bacon and Grosteste; a number of learned historians; Wycliffe had made the Bible common property, and given religion new -wings, sending it to the cottage and the dwelling of the industrious citizen. In the constitution, the Great Charter had been confirmed, and many excellent statutes passed, restraining the royal and baronial power, and extending that of the people. Gunpowder and cannon were come to change all warfare, and make strong castles useless. Manufactures had been introduced by the noble Queen Philippa of Hainault. Gardens of culinary vegetables, of medicinal herbs, and of flowers, as well as pomaria, or orchards, were becoming general, though vineyards were fast dying out; and, altogether, it must be pronounced a distinguished and progressive era, which did its duty to the common country, and to posterity—except it were in the two important domains of morals and of humanity. 

CHAPTER LXIX.

Henry IV.

reign of Henry IV. dates from the 30th of September, 1399, when he was placed on the throne of England by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, in the presence of the assembled Parliament. Having, as we have stated, made his claim to the throne in a speech 