province of Flanders was reduced to the authority of CHAP. Maximilian. 125 127 III. HEN. VII. The efforts of Henry to prevent Bretagne from REIGN OF being incorporated with the French monarchy, were less successful. When Charles VIII. with whom Henry had made friendly truces,126 in 1487, pursued his quarrel with this duchy, with the hope of mastering it, Henry endeavored to act as the mediator; and unwilling, as well from gratitude to Charles, as from his wise system of peace with other countries, to plunge into a serious war with France, he discountenanced sir Edward, now lord Woodville, the valiant and chivalric brother of lord Rivers, who attempted, unauthorized, with 400 men, to assist the Breton duke, by whom, in his necessities, he had been so kindly entertained.128 Losing this opportunity of securing the attachment of the Bretons, and of defeating the French project, he left the forces of Bretagne to fight, unsupported by him, an unequal battle with the power of Charles, and to be defeated." The duke dying, Henry perceived his error, and resolved to assist the young duchess, his daughter, now the sovereign of Bretagne, with troops; 130 but not 129 125 Graf. 890. Hall, 452. Pol. V. On Henry's transactions with France and Maximilian, see B. Andreas' contemporary account. MS. Dom. 193-202. For a minute detail of all the circumstances, I would refer the reader to Rapin's History of England; and for a more succinct and correct one, to his Abrégé Historique des Actes Publics, v. 2. p. 516-20. 126 See them in Rymer's Fœd. 12. pp. 277. 281. 344, dated 12 Oct. 1485, and 17 Jan. 1486, and 14 July 1488. The last extended to 17 Jan. 1490. 127 Henry's mediatorial commissions are dated 7 March and 11 December 1488. Rymer, 12. pp. 337. 347. 128 Hall, 439. Þol. Vir. 129 This was the battle of St. Aubin du Cormier, fought 27 July 1488, in which lord Woodville fell. Hall, 441. 130 On 23d December 1488, Henry issued the order to raise troops for her succor, which is in Rymer, v. 12, p. 355; and on 10 Feb. 1489, he cove V. HEN. VII. 1497. BOOK really pledging the force and vigor of England in the effort, he preferred negotiations,131 to defer what REIGN OF he could not prevent; and amid this hesitating defence, the French obtained an ascendency in the country, which they never lost. 132 Charles amused Henry with ambassadors; and the Pope's legate, by attempting a mediation, paralyzed the arm of England. The French king was, in the meantime, bribing the Breton nobility, and paying assiduous attentions to Anne, the heiress of the province.' Maximilian also wooed, and was privately contracted or married to her by proxy; 134 but after some vacillations she decided the competition, by annulling her engagement with Maximilian, and giving her hand, and with that, the duchy, to Charles.135 Henry nanted, by a treaty, to send her 6000 men, for which she was to pay, and to give two towns as a pledge for their payment. She was not to make peace without his consent, nor he to renew a peace with France, without comprising her in it. See the treaty in Rym. p. 362. 133 131 See the commissions and documents on these, during 1490, 1491, in Rymer, v. 12. pp. 449. 453 431. 435. 132 There seems to have been too much anxiety in Henry to be repaid his expenses, and too much caution in the government of Bretagne against him. Before his troops were admitted into Nantz, an oath was exacted from him, that they should go out at the first request, Rym. p. 452; and she agreed to deliver to him Morlaix, but to have its revenues, on paying him 6000 gold crowns a year. p. 488. 133 Graft. 872-6. Hall, 449. 134 This was in November 1489. It was not communicated to Henry till the ensuing February 1491, on which he issued new commissions of negotiation. Rym. 12. p. 435-8. In the last she is called queen of the Romans; so that there was too much Machiavelian politics used on all sides. I suspect, that the Breton government thought Henry wanted to ally the duchy to England, as much as Charles sought to add it to France; while Maximilian wished to annex it to his dominions. All the four parties were finessing with each other, till Charles VIII. won both the golden apple and the Venus. 135 Graft. 885-8. Hall, 451. He married her 16 Dec. 1491. The only effectual means by which Henry could have defeated Charles VIII.'s annexation of Bretagne to France, was by marrying the heiress himself; and Bernard Andreas says, that before he left Bretagne, Frances had often proposed this to him; sepius orando contendisset.'-MSS. Dom. A. 18. p. 168. But on this subject Henry's hand was tied. His nuptials with Elizabeth were the price of his English crown; and the nation called upon him to sacrifice all foreign interest to their domestic policy. III. HEN. VII. · attempted in vain, to prevent its absorption into the CHAP. French monarchy. In 1491 he raised an army, expecting a coinciding force from Maximilian; but this REIGN OF prince was unable to raise one. Disappointed of his concurrence, Henry resolved to make a descent on France himself; and on the 6th of October passed over with his army to Calais, and there encamped. Charles again had recourse to embassies and negotiations. Henry put on a warlike semblance, and besieged Boulogne; but the prize was gone. The marriage of the heiress had united it irrecoverably with the French crown. Nothing could sever them, but battles like those of Poitiers and Agincourt, and campaigns as successful afterwards as those of Henry V.; and what he could accomplish, with the aid of Burgundy, against discontented France, in its then inferior state, was impracticable now, in her palmy state of strength, union, valor, and compact dominion,136 and with the Breton nobility favoring the annexation. Henry, but unfirmly seated for some time on his own throne, felt himself unequal to dissolve an union which he might at one time have prevented; and making a peace with Charles, who agreed to reimburse his expenses, he retired from the contest; leaving France to consolidate its 136 Graft. 890-5. 137 137 One document in Rymer intimates that Charles VIII. was to pay Henry 620,000 gold crowns, which the duchess owed him for his army, and 125,000 for the arrears of the pension of Louis XI. Rym. p. 490. The actual treaty d'Etaples, between Charles and Henry, dated 3 Sept. 1492, does not mention these payments. Its chief articles are, that the peace should last to the death of both the kings; and that it should comprise the king of the Romans and his son. p. 497. But by the conventions of the 3d November and of 10th December, Charles became bound to pay the above sums by 25,000 livres every half year. p. 506. He submitted to be excommunicated, if he failed. p. 509. There are receipts for these payments every half year, till Charles died. Ib. p. 527, &c. There are also receipts for them from Louis XII. up to Henry's death. p. 700, &c. Pope G 3 V. REIGN OF HEN. VII. 1497. BOOK acquisition of a peninsular line of coast from Dol to the Loire, which includes Brest, the greatest station of the French navy, the useful roads of the isles of Ushant, and the convenient ports of St. Malo and L'Orient.138 The maritime results of this incorporation have given a vigor to the power of France, more effective than it derived from the addition of Normandy or Guyenne, which it had wrested before, from the misdirected government of England, under Henry VI. and the Suffolk administration.139 Pope Alexander VI. granted a bull of excommunication against Louis, if he should fail. p. 762. 138 In October 1491, the chancellor's speech, on the opening of Parliament, stated, that the king had cause of war with France, for the dissimulation and dead faith of its government, but thought it right to temporize. Rolls Parl. 6. p. 440. He made a preliminary treaty with this country on 3 November 1492, but it was not finally ratified till Oct. 1495. Ih. 507. 139 The king landed at Dover, on his return from his ineffectual expedition to France, on 17 December 1492. Fab. 529. CHAP. IV. Foreign Alliances of HENRY VII.-His Character; Public 1 2 HEN. VII. HENRY made an alliance with Ferdinand and Isabella, REIGN OF against France; but his intercourse with the court of Spain had little other result than cordial civilities, and a contract of marriage between their daughter Catherine and his eldest son Arthur. He made also alliances with the duke of Milan, the king of Naples, the bishop of Liege, the archduke Philip, whom his father Maximilian had set over the Low Countries, and the duke of Saxony, the governor of Friesland.3 He concluded a perpetual peace with the king of Denmark, and with Portugal: and treaties of commerce with the republic of Florence, and with the Low countries." He also negotiated with the city of Riga, concerning some of its ships, which English cruisers had taken. He was empowered to assist Ladislaus, king of Hungary, with money against the Turks." 4 1 See it in Rymer, p. 417, and the public papers upon it, 410-3. The kingdom of Spain was consolidated by the taking of Granada from the Moors, 25 November 1491. Hall, 453. On 26 Nov. 1504, Ferdinand announced to Henry, that his queen Isabella had died that day, by his letter in Rymer, 13. p. 112; and that she had appointed him the governor of her kingdom of Castile, for their daughter Joan. 2 The marriage is first mentioned in the treaty of 7 May 1489, ratified 20 Sept. 1490. Ib. p. 417, 4 See these in Rymer, 12. pp. 429. 720. 785. 576 ; and 13. p. 120. Rym. 12. pp. 374. 387. Ib. 12. p. 389; and 13. p. 132. pations to fish freely in every place Ib. 12. p. 701. One article allows the fishers of both 7 Ib. 13. p. 4, 5. |