Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 2.djvu/103

] an order was issued permitting Anne of Brittany a safe-conduct through France to join her husband, Maximilian. Instead of that, the deluded King of the Romans found his own daughter sent back to him, and Anne, his wife, proclaimed the wife of Charles, and Queen of France.

The rage of Maximilian may be imagined. He now cursed his folly in not going himself and consummating his marriage in Brittany. He had lost that province, his daughter had lost the throne of France, and he was duped and insulted in the most egregious manner before all Europe. He made his complaints ring far and wide, but they were only echoed by the laughter of his enemies, and he proceeded to vow revenge by the assistance of Spain and England.

 

was now bent, according to all appearance, on war. He was too clear-sighted not to perceive the immense advantage France had obtained over him in securing Brittany, and how the political foresight and sagacity on which he prided himself had suffered from the paltry promptings of his avarice. Mean as he was, the contempt which his subjects expressed for his neglect of his allies, and of the interests of his country, could not but make a strong impression; and the indignation everywhere felt at his private appropriation of the money which should have succoured Brittany and maintained the national fame, alarmed him lest he should have weakened his means of getting fresh supplies. He therefore put on a most belligerent attitude. He summoned a Parliament at Westminster, and addressed it in the most heroic strain. He commented on the insolence of France, elated with the success of her late perfidy, and on what he no doubt felt more deeply than anything else, her refusal to pay what he called the tribute agreed by Louis XI. to be paid to Edward IV., and hitherto continued to himself.

The address was worthy of the most generous and war-like monarch that ever sat on the throne of England, and wanted only one thing to revive all the ancient enthusiasm of the people—faith in the man who spoke it. To obviate the national fears on the score of expense, he assured them that France was now grown rich, and that he would soon make the war maintain itself.

Those who took a prudent and dispassionate view of affairs, not only distrusted, or rather disbelieved, the promises of the king, but they also recognised in France a far more powerful antagonist than she was formerly. England had lately suffered much from the civil wars; she could not yet be said to be free from widely-spread, if recent, discontent. She had lately seen a claimant of the crown only put down by a severe battle, and the bloodshed of many eminent men. Other clouds were already forming on the horizon, and the relations with Scotland were anything but settled. The turbulent nobles of that country had murdered their king, and his successor, James IV., was said to be strongly attached to the French interests; while France itself was wonderfully invigorated by the constructive policy of her late sovereigns. She had united all the great fiefs to the crown: all those provinces which formerly brought her weakness and even attack, now were united in one union of unprecedented power. We had no longer open highways into the very heart of that kingdom, but one compact and complete frontier, presenting its armed barriers to our approach. And our allies, what were they? Maximilian had already failed us—he was ambitious but poor; and the politic Ferdinand, at the moment he was threatening war, was sure to be found secretly treating for peace.

These were the sentiments of the more reflective portion of the nation; but Parliament and the nobility were roused by the royal claptrap, as though they had been listening, not to a Tudor, but a Plantagenet—to the Fifth, not to the Seventh Henry. Two-fifteenths were at once granted him, and the nobility were on fire with the anticipation of realising all the glories and the plunder of the past ages. To enable them to raise the necessary funds, an Act was passed empowering them to alienate their estates without paying any fines: an Act, in other words, to make ruin easy to the aristocracy for the enrichment of the avaricious king, who had no more idea of going to war than he had of refunding the various taxes raised on similar pretences, and still sleeping in his chests. The barons and knights, led away by the king's empty flourishes of speech, were in all haste to sell and mortgage, flattering themselves with nothing less than marching in triumph to the gates of Paris, placing their boastful monarch on the French throne, and returning laden with wealth, or staying to rule over the towns and provinces of the subjugated country. Henry all the while watched the enthusiasm, and calculated what it would exactly make in current coin.

He availed himself of the paroxysm of the moment, not only to gather in and garner the two-fifteenths newly granted, but the remains of the benevolence voted last session. Whilst the fresh tax fell on the nation generally, this fell on the monied and commercial capitalists. London alone furnished £10,000 of it or £100,000 of our money. The wily old archbishop, Morton, instructed the commissioners to employ this dilemma, which was called Morton's fork. They were to urge upon people who lived in a modest and careful way, that they must be rich in consequence of their parsimony; on those who indulged in expensive abodes and styles of living, that they must be opulent, because they had so much to expend. To afford ample time for harvesting these riches, Henry found perpetual causes for delaying his expedition. The nobles