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The detention of the young king of Scots in England had hitherto proved advantageous to Henry; and by keeping the regent in awe, had preserved, during the whole course of the French war, the northern frontier in tranquillity. But when intelligence arrived in Scotland of the progress made by Henry, and the near prospect of his succession to the crown of France, the nation was alarmed, and foresaw their own inevitable ruin, if the subjection of their ally left them to combat alone a victorious enemy, who was already so much superior in power and riches. The regent entered into the same views; and though he declined an open rupture with England, he permitted a body of seven thousand Scots, under the command of the earl of Buchan, his second son, to be transported into France for the service of the dauphin. To render this aid ineffectual, Henry had, in his former expedition, carried over the king of Scots, whom he obliged to send orders to his countrymen to leave the French service; but the Scottish general replied, that he would obey no commands which came from a king in captivity, and that a prince, while in the hands of his enemy, was nowise entitled to authority. These troops, therefore, continued still to act under the earl of Buchan: and were employed by the dauphin to oppose the progress of the duke of Clarence in Anjou. The two armies encountered at Baug: the English were defeated: the duke himself was slain by Sir Allan Swinton, a Scotch knight, who commanded a company of men at arms: and the earls of Somerset,[*] Dorset, and Huntingdon were taken prisoners.[**] This was the first action that turned the tide of success against the English; and the dauphin, that he might both attach the Scotch to his service, and reward the valor and conduct of the earl of Buchan, honored that nobleman with the office of constable.

     * His name was John, and he was afterwards created duke of
     Somerset. He was grandson of John of Gaunt, duke of
     Lancaster. The earl of Dorset was brother to Somerset, and
     succeeded him in that title.

     ** St. Remi, chap. 110. Monstrelet, chap. 239. Hall, fol.
     76.

But the arrival of the king of England with so considerable an army, was more than sufficient to repair this loss. Henry was received at Paris with great expressions of joy, so obstinate were the prejudices of the people; and he immediately conducted his army to Chartres, which had long been besieged by the dauphin. That prince raised the siege on the approach of the English; and being resolved to decline a battle, he retired with his army.[*] Henry made himself master of Dreux without a blow: he laid siege to Meaux, at the Solicitation of the Parisians, who were much incommoded by the garrison of that place. This enterprise employed the English arms during the space of eight months: the bastard of Vaurus, governor of Meaux, distinguished himself by an obstinate defence; but was at last obliged to surrender at discretion. The cruelty of this officer was equal to his bravery: he was accustomed to hang, without distinction, all the English and Burgundians who fell into his hands: and Henry, in revenge of his barbarity, ordered him immediately to be hanged on the same tree which he had made the instrument of his inhuman executions.[**]

     * St. Remi, chap. 3.

     ** Rymer, vol. x. p. 212 T. Livii, p. 92, 93. St. Remi, chap
     116 Monstrelet, chap. 260.

This success was followed by the surrender of many other places in the neighborhood of Paris, which held for the dauphin: that prince was chased beyond the Loire, and he almost totally abandoned all the northern provinces: he was even pursued into the south by the united arms of the English and Burgundians, and threatened with total destruction. Notwithstanding the bravery and fidelity of his captains, he saw himself unequal to his enemies in the field; and found it necessary to temporize, and to avoid all hazardous actions with a rival who had gained so much the ascendant over him. And to crown all the other prosperities of Henry, his queen was delivered of a son, who was called by his father’s name, and whose birth was celebrated by rejoicings no less pompous, and no less sincere, at Paris than at London. The infant prince seemed to be universally regarded as the future heir of both monarchies.

1422.

But the glory of Henry, when it had nearly reached the summit, was stopped short by the hand of nature; and all his mighty projects vanished into smoke. He was seized with a fistula, a malady which the surgeons at that time had not skill enough to cure; and he was at last sensible that his distemper was mortal, and that his end was approaching He sent for his brother the duke of Bedford, the earl of Warwick, and a few noblemen more, whom he had honored with his friendship; and he delivered to them, in great tranquillity, his last will with regard to the government of his kingdom and family. He entreated them to continue towards his infant son the same fidelity and attachment which they had always professed to himself during his lifetime, and which had been cemented by so many mutual good offices. He expressed his indifference on the approach of death; and though he regretted that he must leave unfinished a work so happily begun, he declared himself confident that the final acquisition of France would be the effect of their prudence and valor. He left the regency of that kingdom to his elder brother, the duke of Bedford; that of England to his younger, the duke of Glocester; and the care of his son’s person to the earl of Warwick. He recommended to all of them a great attention to maintain the friendship of the duke of Burgundy; and advised them never to give liberty to the French princes taken at Azincour, till his son were of age, and could himself hold the reins of government. And he conjured them, if the success of their arms should not enable them to place young Henry on the throne of France, never at least to make peace with that kingdom, unless the enemy, by the cession of Normandy, and its annexation to the crown of England, made compensation for all the hazard and expense of his enterprise.[*]

He next applied himself to his devotions, and ordered his chaplain to recite the seven penitential psalms. When that passage of the fifty-first psalm was read, “build thou the walls of Jerusalem,” he interrupted the chaplain, and declared his serious intention, after he should have fully subdued France, to conduct a crusade against the infidels, and recover possession of the Holy Land.[**] So ingenious are men in deceiving themselves, that Henry forgot, in those moments, all the blood spilt by his ambition; and received comfort from this late and feeble resolve, which, as the mode of these enterprises was now passed, he certainly would never have carried into execution. He expired in the thirty-fourth year of his age and the tenth of his reign.

     * Monstrelet, chap. 265. Hall, fol. 80.

     ** St. Remi, chap. 118, Monstrelet, el ap. 265.

This prince possessed many eminent virtues; and if we give indulgence to ambition in a monarch, or rank it, as the vulgar are inclined to do, among his virtues, they were unstained by any considerable blemish. His abilities appeared equally in the cabinet and in the field: the boldness of his enterprises was no less remarkable than his personal valor in conducting them. He had the talent of attaching his friends by affability, and of gaining his enemies by address and clemency. The English, dazzled by the lustre of his character, still more than by that of his victories, were reconciled to the defects in his title: the French almost forgot that he was an enemy: and his care in maintaining justice in his civil administration, and preserving discipline in his armies, made some amends to both nations for the calamities inseparable from those wars in which his short reign was almost entirely occupied, That he could forgive the earl of Marche, who had a better title to the crown than himself, is a sure indication of his magnanimity; and that the earl relied so entirely on his friendship, is no less a proof of his established character for candor and sincerity. There remain in history few instances of such mutual trust; and still fewer where neither party found reason to repent it.