Page:Select Essays in Anglo-American Legal History, Volume 1.djvu/693

 19. ZANE: THE FIVE AGES 679 He was in almost every one of the battles ; and after Tow- ton, the bloodiest battle in English history, he went into exile with the Lancastrians. He returned and fought at Tewkes- bury, the last battle of the war, and was taken prisoner. During his exile he had written the work which we call De Laudibus Legum Angliae. The book was written to instil into the young Prince of Wales, Henry VI.'s son, whose education was entrusted to Fortescue, a proper knowledge of Enghsh institutions. The book is invaluable as showing not only a profound appreciation of the free and liberal principles of the common law, but also the condition of the English law at that epoch. Fortescue also wrote a tract in support of the Lancastrian title to the throne, which he based upon the solemn declaration of Parliament and the nation's acceptance. When Fortescue found that the Lan- castrian cause was ruined, he prayed for a pardon from the Yorkist king. There had been little change in the bar or the courts during Fortescue's exile. Fortescue himself had been succeeded by Markham, and Prisot, another avowed Lancastrian, was displaced by Danby; but all the other judges had remained. The courts had gone on in regular fashion during the fierce wars, and the bar was composed of many of the men who had practiced before Fortescue. Billing, a subservient wretch who had succeeded Markham, although one of the first of a long line of the disgraceful judicial tools of Yorkist, Tudor and Stuart kings, kept up the traditional kindliness of the English bar by intervening strongly for Sir John Fortescue, and obtained for him a pardon with the restoration of his estates. But by a curious whim of Edward IV., Fortescue was required to write, in favor of the Yorkist title, a refutation of his book demon- strating the validity of the Lancastrian title to the throne. The two treatises appear in Fortescue's works, and each of them constitutes the best argument for the respective oppos- ing claims. If one were asked to name in English law an equal to Fortescue, he could point to but three names — Bacon, Somers and Mansfield. Just as Bacon and Somers were impeached, and Mansfield bitterly denounced, so we find.