Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 17.djvu/45

 at Paris, and even then the youth of the parties compelled a further postponement of their union.

On 7 Feb. 1301 Edward was created Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester at the famous Lincoln parliament (Ann, Wig, p. 548). This step was highly popular throughout Wales (Ann, Edw, I in p. 464), and marked Edward's entrance into more active life. In 1302 he was first summoned to parliament. Henceforth he regularly accompanied his father on his campaigns against Scotland. In the summer of 1301 he led the western wing of the invading army from Carlisle (Chron. de Lanercost, p. 200, Bannatyne Club), but soon joined his father, and spent the winter with him at Linlithgow (ib.; Ann, Wig. 551 ), though he was back early enough to hold, in March 1302, a council for his father at London (Ann, Lond, in ,Chron. Edw. I and II, i.127). In 1303 and 1304 Edward was again in Scotland, and though on one occasion the old king commended his strategy, and always kept him well employed, the entries on his expenses rolls for these years suggest that he had already acquired habits of frivolity and extravagance. He often lost large sums at dice, and sometimes had to borrow from his servants to pay his debts. He was attended on his travels by a lion and by Genoese fiddlers. He had to compensate a fool for the rough practical jokes he had played on him (Cal, Doc, Scotland ii. No. 1413). Among his gambling agents was the Gascon, ], who had already acquired a fatal ascendency over him. Walter Reynolds, perhaps his tutor, and afterwards keeper of his wardrobe, was an almost equally undesirable confidant. Yet the old king spared no pains to instruct him in habits of business as much as in the art of war. Accident has preserved the roll of the prince's letters between November 1304 and November 1305. They are more than seven hundred in number, and yet incomplete, and show conclusively the careful drilling the young prince underwent (Ninth Report of Deputy-Keeper of Records, app. ii. pp. 246-9.) But it was all in vain. In June 1305 he invaded the woods of Bishop Langton, the treasurer, and returned the minister's remonstrances with insult. The king was moved to deep wrath; banished his son from court for six months and ordered him to make full reparation (Chron. Edw. I and II i. xxxix, 138; Abbrev. Plac. i. 257; Ninth Report, p. 247). In August Edward wrote a whining letter to his step-mother, begging her to induce the king to let him have the company of Gilbert de Clare and 'Perot de Gaveston' to alleviate the anguish caused by the stern orders of his father (Ninth Report, p. 248). In October, however, the king allowed Edward to represent him at a great London banquet (Ann. Lond. p. 143).

The revolt of Scotland opened out new prospects. Edward I, declining in years and health, again endeavoured to prepare his unworthy son for the English throne. At Easter 1306 the Prince of Wales received a grant of Gascony (, n. 408). On Whitsunday he was solemnly dubbed knight at Westminster, along with three hundred chosen noble youths. Immediately after the ceremony the new warriors set out for Scotland, solemnly pledged to revenge the murder of Comyn. The prince's particular vow was never to rest twice in one place until full satisfaction was obtained. Edward and the young men preceded the slower movements of his father; but his merciless devastation of the Scottish borders moved the indignation of the old king (, pp. 229-30;, pp. 408, 411). Edward continued engaged on the campaign until in January 1307 his presence at the Carlisle parliament was required (Parl, Writs, i. 81) to meet the Cardinal Peter of Spain, who was commissioned to conclude the long-protracted marriage treaty with the daughter of France. But Edward's demand of Ponthieu, his mother's heritage, for Gaveston provoked a new outbreak of wrath from the old king (, ii. 272).. On 26 Feb. Gaveston was banished, though about a month later Edward was sufficiently restored to favour for the king to make arrangements for his visiting Franco to be married (Fœdera, i. 1012); but on 7 July the death of Edward I removed the last restraint on his son.

In person the new king was almost as striking a man as Edward I. He was tall, handsome, and of exceptional bodily strength ('Et si fust de son corps un des plus fortz hom de soun realme,' Scalachronica, p. 136, Maitland Club). But though well fitted to excel in martial exercises, he never showed any real inclination for a warlike life, or even for the tournament. As soon as he was his own master he avoided fighting as much as he could, and when compelled to take the field his conduct was that of an absolute craven. Lack of earnest purpose blasted his whole character. He had been trained as a warrior, but never became one. He had been drilled in the routine of business, but had only derived from it an absolute incapacity to devote himself to any serious work. His only object in life was to gratify the whim of the moment, reckless of consequences. Much of his folly and levity may be set down to habitual deep