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in reading the disgraceful account then made Maud, the duke prodigally released his 2000 of the English name, it will be manifest.

Who by a fatal dart in vast New Forest slain. His death by an infortunate loosing at a deer, out of one Walter Tirrel's hand in New Forest, bis brother Richard being blasted there with infection, and Richard, duke Robert's son, having his neck broken there in a bough's twist catching him from his horse, have been thought as divine revenges on William the first, who destroyed in Hantshire thirty-six parish churches to make dens for wild beasts; although it is probable enough, that it was for security of landing new forces there, if the wheel of Fortune, or change of Mars, should have dispossest him of the English crown. Our stories will of these things better instruct you: but, if you seek Matthew Paris for it, amend the absurdity of both the London and Tigurin prints in An. 1086. and for Rex magnificus & bonæ indolis adolescens, read Rich. magnificus &c. for Richard brother to this Red William.

Was by that cruel king deprived of his sight. Thus did the conqueror's posterity unquietly possess their father's inheritance. William bad much to do with his brother Robert, justly grudging at his usurping the crown from right of primogeniture; but so much the less, in that Robert, with divers other German and French princes, left all private respects for the holy war, which after the cross undertaken (as those times used) had most fortunate success in recovery of Palestine. Robert had no more but the dutchy of Normandy, nor that without swords often drawn, before his holy expedition about which (having first offer of, but refusing the kingdom of Jerusalem) after he had some five years been absent, he returned into England, finding his younger brother (Henry exalted into his hereditary throne. For, although it were undoubtedly agreed that Robert was eldest son of the Conqueror; yet the pretence which gave Henry the crown (beside the means of his working favourites) was, that he was the only issue born after his father was a king: upon which point a great question is dispute among civiliaus (o). Robert was no sooner returned into Normandy, but presently (first animated by Randal bishop of Durham, a great disturber of the common peace betwixt the prince and subject by intolerable exactions and unlimited injustice under William II. whose chief justice (p) it seems he was, newly escaped out of prison (whither for those state-misdemeanors he was committed by Henry) he dispatches and intercharges intelligence with most of the baronage, claiming his primogeniture-right, and thereby the kingdom. Having thus gained to bim most of the English nobility, he lands with forces at Portsmouth, thence marching towards Winchester: but before any encounter the two Brothers were persuaded to a peace; covenant was made and confirmed by oath of twelve barons. on both parts, that Henry should pay him yearly 2000 pounds of silver, and that the survivor of them should inherit, the other dying without issue. This peace, upon denial of payment (which had the better colour, because, at request of queen

(o) Hottom. illust quæst. 2.

(p) Placitator & exactor totius regni Flor. Wig. & monarchorum turba

pounds the next year after the covenant) was soon broken. The king (to prevent what mischief might follow a second arrival of his brother) assisted by the greatest favours of Normandy and Anjou, besieged duke Robert in one of his castles, took him, brought him home captive, and at length using that course (next secure to death) so often read of in Choniates, Cantacuzen, and other oriental stories, put out his eyes, being all this time imprisoned in Cardiff Castle, in Glamorgan, where he miserably breathed his last. It is by Polydore added, out of some authority, that king Henry after a few years' imprisonment released him, and commanded that within forty days and twelve hours (these hours have in them time of two floods, or a flood and an ebb) he should, abjuring England and Normandy, pass the seas as in perpetual exile; and that in the mean time, upon new treasons attempted by him, he was secondly committed, and endured his punishment and death, as the common monks relate. I find no warrantable authority that makes me believe it: yet, obsolete law of abjuration (which it seems had its because it gives some ind of example of our beginning from one of the statutes published under

name of the Confessor) a word or two of the time prescribed here for his passage: which being examined upon Bracton's credit, makes the report therein faulty. For he seems confident that the forty days in abjuration, were afterward induced upon the statute of Clarindom (9), which gave the accused of felony or treason, although quitted by the ordel (that is, judgment by water or fire, but the statute published, speaks only of water, being the common trial of meaner (r) persons) forty days to pass out of the realm with his substance, which the coroner, he affirms not grantable; although to other felons taking sanctuary and confessing to John le Breton is against him, giving this liberty of time, accounted after the abjuration to be spent in the sanctuary, for provision of their voyage necessaries, after which complete, no man, on pain of life and member, is to supply any of their wants. I know it a point very intri-, cate to determine, observing these opposite authors and no express resolution. Since them, the oath of abjuration published among our manual statutes nearly agrees with this of duke Robert, but with neither of those old lawyers. In it, after the felon confesses, and abjures, and hath his port appointed; "I will (proceeds the oath) diligently endeavour to pass over at that port, and will not delay time there above a flood and an ebb, if I may have passage in that space; if not, I will every day go into the sea up to the knees, assaying to go over, and unless I may do this within forty confelon of our lord the king; so God me help," &c. tinual days, I will return to the sanctuary, as a So here the forty days are to be spent about the passage, and not in the sanctuary: compare this with other authorities (s), and you shall find all

(9) Hen. 2. ap. Rog. Hoved. fol. 314.

(7) Glanvil. lib. 14. cap. 1. cæterum, si placet, adeas Janum nostrum lib. 2. §. 67.

(s) Itin. North. 3. Ed. 3. Coron. 313. Lectur. ap. Br. tit. Coron. 181. V. Stamfordum lib. 2. cap. 40. qui de his gravitèr & modestè, sed IPERTIRNS.

To dissonant, that reconciliation is impossible, resolution very difficult. I only offer to their consideration, which can here judge, why Hubert de Burch (earl of Kent, and chief justice of England, under Henry III.) having incurred the king's high displeasure, and grievously persecuted by great enemies, taking sanctuary, was, after his being violently drawn out, restored, yet that the sheriffs of Hereford and Essex were commanded to ward him there, and prevent all sustenance to be brought him, which they did, decernentes ibi XL dierum excubiis observare (1): And whether also the same reason (now unknown to us) bred this forty days for expectation of embarkment out of the kingdom, which gave it in another kind for return as in care of disseisin, the law hath beenthat the disseisor could not re-enter without action (u), unless he had as it were made a present and continual claim, yet if he had been out of the kingdom in single pilgrimage (that is, not in general voyages to the holy land) or in the king's service in France, or so, he had allowance of forty days, two floods, and one ebb, to come home in, and fifteen days, and four days, after his return; and if the tenant had been so beyond sea, he might have been essoigned de ultra mare, and for a year and a day, after which he had forty days, one flood, and one ebb (which is easily understood as the other for two floods) to come into England. This is certain, that the space of forty days (as a year and a day) hath had with us divers applications, as in what before, the assise of Freshforce in cities and boroughs, and the widow's quarentine, which seems to have had beginning either of a deliberative time granted to her, to think of her conveniency in taking letters of administration, as in another country(x) the reason of the like is given or else from the forty days in the essoign of child birth allowed by the Norman customs. But you mislike the digression. It is reported, that when William the Conqueror in his death-bed left Normandy to Robert, and England to William the Red, this Henry asked him what he would give him? "Iɔɔ. pounds of silver (said he) and be contented, my son; for, in time, thou shalt have all which I possess, and be greater than either of thy brethren."

:

they should denounce England under an interdict. The bishops tell king John as much, who suddenly, moved with imperious affection and scorn of papal usurpation, swears, By God's truth, if they or any other, with unadvised attempt, subject his kingdom to an interdict, he would presently drive every prelate and priest of England to the pope, and confiscate all their substance, and of all the Romans amongst them, he would first pull out their eyes, and cut off their noses, and then send them all packing," with other like threatening terms, which notwithstanding were not able to cause them to desist; but within little time following in public denunciation they performed their authority; and the king, in some sort, his threatenings; committing all abbeys and priories to laymen's custody, and compelling every priest's concubine to a grievous fine Thus for a while continued the realm without divine sacraments or exercise, excepted only confession, extreme unction, and baptism, the king being also excommunicat ed, and burials allowed only in high-ways and ditches without ecclesiastic ceremony, and (but only by indulgence procured by archbishop Langton, who purchased favour that in all the monasteries, excepting of White-friars, might be divine service once a week) had no change for some four or five years, when the pope in a solemn council of cardinals, according to his pretended plenary power, deposed king John, and immediately by his legate Pandulph offered to Philip II. of France the kingdom of England. This, with suspicion of the subjects' hearts at home, and another cause then more esteemed than either of these, that is, the prophecy of one Peter, an hermit in Yorkshire, foretelling to his face, "that before holy Thursday following he should be no king," altered his stiff and resolute, but too disturbed affections; and persuaded him by oath of himself and sixteen

more of his barons, to make submission to the church of Rome, and condescend to give for satisfaction, Iɔɔ. clɔ. clɔ. ciɔ. pounds sterling (that name of sterling began (y), as I am instructed, in time of Henry II. and had its original of name from some Esterling, making that kind of money, which hath its essence in particular weight and fineness, not of the starling bird, as some, nor His sacrilegious hands upon the churches laid. of Sterling, in Scotland, under Edward I. as others The great controversy about electing the arch-absurdly; for in records (2) much more ancient, bishop of Canterbury (the king, as his right bade him, commanding that John bishop of Norwich should have the prelacy, the pope, being Innocent III. for his own gain, aided with some disloyal monks of Canterbury, desiring, and at last consecrating Stephen of Langton, a cardinal) was first cause of it. For king John would by no means endure this Stephen, nor permit him the dignity after his unjust election at Rome, but banished the monks, and stoutly menaces the pope. He presently makes delegation to William bishop of London, Eustace of Ely, and Malgere of Worcester, that they should, with monitory advice, offer persuasion to the king of conformity to the Romish behest; if he persisted in constancy,

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the express name Sterlingorum I have read) to the clergy, and subject all his dominions to the pope (a); and so had absolution, and after four years, release of the interdict (4). I was the willinger to insert it all, because you might see what injurious opposition, by papal usurpation, he endured, and then conjecture that his violent dealings against the church were not without intolerable provocation, which madded rather than amended his troubled spirits. Easily you shall not find a prince more beneficial to the holy cause than he, if you take his former part of reign, before this ambitious Stephen of Langton's elec

(y) Jo. Stou. in Notit. Londini, pag. 52. Vid.

Camd. in Scot. Buchan. alios.

(z) Polydor. Hist. 16.

(a) Norff. 6. Rich. I. fin. rot. 13. & alibi in eisdem archivis V.

(b) Ante alios de his consulendus sit Math. Paris.

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sorious exauthorizing the prince, then assisting and moving forward his proneness, to faithless abrogation, by pretence of an interceding universal authority.

The general charter seiz'd

The last note somewhat instructs you in what you are to remember, that is, the grand charters granted and (as matter of fact was) repealed by

tion exasperated desire of revenge. Most kind habitude then was betwixt him and the pope, and for alms towards Jerusalem's aid, he gave the fortieth part of his revenue, and caused his baronage to second his example. Although therefore he be no ways excusable of many of those faults, both in government and religion which are laid on him, yet it much extenuates the ill of his action, that he was so besieged with continual and undigestable incentives of the clergy with traitor-king John; his son Henry III. of some nine years' ous confidence striking at his crown, and in such sort, as humanity must have exceeded itself, to have endured it with any mixture of patience. Nor ever shall I impute that his wicked attempt of sending ambassadors, Thomas Hardington, Ralph Fitz-Nicholas, and Robert of London, to Amiramully, king of Morocco, for the Mahometan religion, so much to his own will and nature, as to the persecuting bulls, interdicts, excommunications, deposings, and such like, published and acted by them, which counterfeiting the vain name of pastors, shearing, and not feeding their sheep, made this poor king (for they brought him so poor, that he was called Johannes (c) sine terra) even as a phrenetic, commit what posterity receives now among the worst actions (and in themselves they are so) of princes.

age (under protection first of William Marshal, earl of Pembroke, after the earl's death, Peter de Roches, bishop of Winchester) in the ninth year of his reign, in a parliament held at Westminster, desired of the baronage (by mouth of Hubert de Burch proposing it) a fifteenth: whereto upon deliberation, they gave answer, quod legis petitionibus gratantèr adquiescerent, si illis diù petitas libertates concedere voluisset. The king agreed to the condition, and presently under the great seal delivered charters of them into every county of England, speaking as those of king John (saith Paris) ita quod chartæ utrorúmque regum in nullo inveniuntur dissimiles. Yet those which we have, published want of that which is in king John's, wherein you have a special chapter that, if a Jew's debtor die, and leave his heir within age subject to payment, the usury during the nonage should cease, which explains the meaning of the statute of Merton, chap. v. otherwise but ill interpreted in some of our year books(ƒ): after this, follows further, that no aid, except to redeem the king's person out of captivity (example of that was in Richard I. whose ransom out of the hands of Leopold, duke of Austria, was near ccclɔɔɔ. pounds of silver, collected from the sub

His baronage were forc'd defensive arms to raise. No sooner had Pandulph transacted with the king, and Stephen of Langton was quietly possest of his archbishopric, but he presently, in a council of both orders at Paul's, stirs up the hearts of the barons against John, by producing the old charter of liberties granted by Henry I. comprehending an instauration of saint Edward's laws, as they were amended by the conqueror, and pro-ject) make his eldest son knight, or marry his Toking them to challenge observation thereof as an absolute duty to subjects of free state. He was easily heard, and his thoughts seconded with rebellions designs: and after denials of this purposed request, armies were mustered to extort these liberties. But at length by treaty in Runingmede, near Stanes, he gave them two charters; the one, of liberties general, the other of the forest: both which were not very different from our grand charter and that of the forest. The pope at his request confirmed all but the same year, discontentment (through too much favour and respect given by the king to divers strangers, whom since the composition with the legate, he had too frequently, and in too high esteem entertained) renewing among the barons, ambassadors were sent to advertise the pope what injury the see of Rome had by this late exaction of such liberties out of the kingdom, in which it had such great interest (for king John had been very prodigal to it, of his best and most majestical titles) and with what commotion the barons had rebelled against him, soon obtained a bull cursing in thunder all such as stood for any longer main tenance of those granted charters. This (as how could it be otherwise?) bred new, but almost incurable broils in the state betwixt king and subject: but in whom more, than in the pope and his archbishop, was cause of this dissention? Both, as wicked, boutefens, applying themselves to both parts; sometimes animating the subject by cen

(c) John Hadland.

eldest daughter, should be levied of the subject, but by parliament. Yet, reason why these are omitted in Henry III, his charter, it seems, easily may be given; seeing ten years before time of Edward Longshank's exemplification (which is that whercon we now rely, and only have) all Jews were banished the kingdom: and among the petitions and grievances of the commons at time of his instaturation of this charter to them, one was thus consented to; Nullum tallagium vel auxilium, per nos vel hæredes nostros de cætero in regno nostro imponatur seu levetur sine voluntate & consensu communi arciepiscoporum, episcoporum, abbatum & aliorum prælatorum, comitum, baronum, militum, burgensium, & aliorum liberorum hominum (g): which although compared with that of aids by tenure, be no law, yet I conjecture that upon this article was that chapter of aids omitted. But I return to Henry: be, within some three years, summons a parliament to Oxford, and declares his full age, refusing any longer Peter de Roches his protection; but taking all upon his personal government, by pretence of past nonage, caused all the charters of the forest to be cancelled, and repealed the rest, (for so I take it, although my author speak chiefly of that of the forest) and made the subject with price of great sums, rated by his chief justice Hugh de

()35 Hen. 6. fol. 61. & 3. Eliz. Plowd. 1. fol. 236. atque vid. Bract. lib. 2. cap. 26. §. 2. (g) Thom. de Walsingham in 26. Ed. 1. Pelyd, Hist. 17.

Burch, renew their liberties, affirming that his | Vor to amendi that lond as the erle of Glocetre, grant of them was in his minority, and therefore Sir Richard, and sir Simond erle of Leicetre so defeasible: which, with its like (in disinherit- And sir John le Fiz-Geffry and other barons inowe, ing and seizing on his subjects' possessions, with- So that at last the king thereto hii drowe, out judicial course, beginning with those two great To remue the Frenss men to libbe (q), beyonde se potentates Richard earl of Cornwal his brother, Bi hor fonds her and ther and ne come noght and William le Marshal earl of Pembroke) bred age (r). (also most intestine trouble betwixt him and his barons, And to granti god (s) lawes and the Old Charter although sometime discontinued, yet not extin- That so ofte was igranted er, and so ofte undo. guished even till his declining days of enthroned Hereof was the chartre imade and aseled vast there felicity. Observe among this, that where our Of the king and of other heye men that there were, historians and chronologers talk of a desire by Tho nome tende tapers (1) the bishops in hor hond the baronage, to have the constitutions of Oxford And the king himself and other heye men of the restored, you must understand those charters canlond, celled at Oxford; where after many rebellious, but provoked oppositions, the king at last, by oath of himself and his son Edward, in full parliament (h) (having nevertheless oft times before made show of as much) granted again their desired freedom: which in his spacious reign was not so much impeached by himself, as through ill counsel of alien caterpillars crawling about him, being as scourges then sent over into this kingdom. But Robert of Gloucester shall summarily tell you this, and give your palate variety.

The meste wo that here vel bi king Henry's day
In this lond, icholle beginne to tell yuf ich may.
He adde thre brethren that is modre's sons were (i).
And the king of Almaine the verthe that to heie
them here (k),
[thereto,
Ac sir William de Valence and sir Eimer (1)
Elit of Wincetre and sir Guy de Lisewi also
Thoru hom and thoru the quene (m) was so much
frenss folc ibrought

That of English men me told as right nought,
And the king hom let her will that each was as
king

And nome poure men god, and ne paiede nothing:
To eni of this brethren yuf ther pleinide eny wight
Hii sede, yuf we doth ou wrong, wo shall ou do
right:

vaste,

As wo seith we beth kings, ur wille we mowe do,
And many Engliss alas hulde mid hom also.
So that thorou Godes grace the erles at last,
And the bishops of the lond, and barons bespeake
[caste,
That the kind Englismen of Londe hii wolde out
And that long bring adoun, yuf her poer laste.
Thereof hii nome (n) conseil, and to the king hii
send,
[amend.
To abbe (a) pite of his londand suiche manners
So ther at laste hii brought him therto
To make a purveiance ainendment to do,
And made it was at Oxenford, that lond vor to
seyte,

The bishops amansed (u) all that there agon were
And ever eft undude the lawes that loked were
there,

Mid berninge taperes; and such as laste,
The king and others seid Anen and the tapers
adoun caste.

If particulars of the story, with precedents and consequents be desired, above all I send you to Matthew Paris, and William Rishanger, and end in adding, that these so controverted charters had not their settled surety until Edward I. since whom they have been more than thirty times in parliament confirmed.

The

The seat on which her kings inaugurated were. Which is the chair and stone at Westminster, whereon our sovereigns are inaugurated, Scottish (w) stories (on whose credit, in the first part hereof I importune you not to rely) affirin that the stone was first in Gallicia, of Spain, at Brigantia (whether that be Compostella, as Francis Tarapha wills, or Corunna, as Florian del Campo conjectures, or Betansos, according to king of Scots there, sat on it as his throne: thence Mariana, I cannot determine) where Gathel, king of Scots, transplanted into that isle about was it brought into Ireland by Simon Brech, first 700 years before Christ; out of Ireland king Ferguse (in him, by some, is the beginning of the now continuing Scottish reign) about 370 years neth, some 850 of the incarnation, placed it at afterwards, brought it into Scotland, king Kenthe abbey of Scone (in the sheriffdom of Perth) where the coronation of his successors was usual, the Saxon times at Kingston upon Thames. This as of our monarchs now at Westminster, and in Kenneth, some say, caused that distich to be engraven on it,

Ni fallat fatum, Scoti, quocunque locatum, Invenient lapidem, regnare tenentur ibidem. [eyghte,(Whereupon it is called fatale marmor in Hect. Boetius) and enclosed it in a wooden chair. It is now at Westminster, and on it are the coronations of our sovereign; thither first brought + (as the author here speaks) among infinite other spoils, by Edward Longshanks, after his wars and victories against king John Baliol,

Twelf hundred as in yer of grace and fifty and
Right aboute missomer fourtene night it laste
The erles and the barons were well stude vaste (p)

(h) 42 Hen. 3.

(i) Guy of Lusignan, William of Valence, and Athelmar, his half brothers, sons of Isabel, king John's dowager, daughter to Aimar, earl of Engolisme, married to Hugh Brown, earl of March, in Poiters.

(k) Richard, earl of Cornwal, son to king John. (1) Athelmarus.

(m) Elianor, daughter to Raymund earl of Pro

vence.

Their women to inherit

So they commonly affirm: but that denial of Sovereignty to their women cost the lives of many

(") They took. (0) Have, (p) Stedfast.rer.

(2) Live. (7) Again. (s) Good. (1) Kindled tapers. (u) Cursed. (r) Hector Boeth. Hist. 1. 10. & 14. Buchan. Scotic. 6. & 8. ↑ 1297. 24 Ed. I.

and divers others of the French, as it were as ancient as the original of the name, and in these words, De terra salica nulla portio hereditatis mulieri veniat, sed ad virilem sexum tota terræ hereditas perveniat; and in substance, as referred to the person of the king's heir female; so much is remembered by that great civilian Baldus (d), and divers others, but rather as custom than any particular law, as one(ƒ) of that kingdom also hath expressly and newly written; Ce n'est point une loy écritte, mais nee avec nous, que nous n'avons point inventce, mais l'avons puisse de la nature même, qui le nous a ainsi apris & donné cet instinct: But why the same author dares affirm that king Edward yielded upon this point to the French Philip de Valois, I wonder, seeing all story and carriage of state in those times is so manifestly opposite. Becanus under takes a conjecture of the first cause, which excluded gynecocracy among them, guessing it to be upon their observation of the misfortune in war, which their neighbours the Bructerans (a people about the now Over-Yssel, in the Nether

thousands of their men, ooth under this victorious | by Claude de Seissell, bishop of Marseilles, Bodin, Edward, and his son the Black Prince, and others of his successors. His case stood briefly thus: Philip IV. surnamed the Fair, had issue three sons, Lewis the Contentious (r), Philip the Long, and Charles the Fair, (all these successively reigned after him, and died without issue inheritable :) he had likewise a daughter Isabel (I purposely omit the other, being out of the present matter,) married to Edward II, and so was mother to Edward III. The issue made of Philip the Fair thus failing, Philip, son and heir of Charles earl of Valois, Beaumont, Alenson, &c. (which was brother to Philip the Fair,) challenged the crown of France as next heir male against this Edward, who answered to the objections of the Salic law, that (admitting it as their assertion was, yet) he was heir male, although descended of a daughter: and in a public assembly of the states first about protectorship of the womb, (for queen Joan, dowager of the Fair Charles, was left with child, but afterward delivered of a daughter, Blanch, afterwards dutchess of Orleans) was this had in a solemn disputation by lawyers on both sides, and applied at length also to the direct point of in-lands, from near whom he, as many other, first heriting the crown. What followed upon judgment given against his right, the valiant and famous deeds of him and his English, recorded in Walsingham, Froissart, Emilius, and the multitude of later collected stories make manifest. But for the law itself every mouth speaks of it; few, I think, understand at all why they name it. The opinions are, that it being part of the ancient laws made among the Salians (the same with Franks) under king Pharamond, about 1200 years since, had thence denomination; and Goropius (that fetches all out of Dutch, and more tolerably perhaps this than many other of his etymologies) deriving the Salians' name from Sal, which in contraction he makes from Sadel (y)* (inventors whereof the Franks, saith he, were) interprets them as it were horsemen, a name fitly applied to the warlike and most noble of any nation, as Chivalers (*) in French, and Equites in Latin allows likewise. So that, upon collection, the Salic law by him is as much as a chivalrous law, and Salic land, quæ ad equestris ordinis dignitatem & in capite summo, & in cæteris membris conservandum pertinebat: which very well agrees with a sentence (4) given in the parliament at Bourdeaux upon an ancient testament, devising all the testator's Salic lands, which was, in point of judgment interpreted fief (b). And who knows not that fiefs were originally military gifts? But then, if so, how comes Salic to extend to the crown, which is merely without tenure? Therefore Ego scio (c) (saith a later lawyer) legem privato salicam agere de patrimonio tantum. composed (not this alone, but with others as they say) by Wisogast, Bodogast, Salogast, and Windogast, wise counsellors about that Pharamond's reign. The text of it in this part is offered us

(x) Hunting.

It was

(y) Francic. lib. 2.

As our word saddle. (*) Knights. (a) Bodin. de Repub. 6. cap. 5. vid. Barth. Chassan. Cons. Burgund. Rubric. 3. §. 5. num. 70.

(b) Knights' fees, or lands held.

Paul Merul. Cosmog. part. 2. 1. 3. cap. 17.

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derive the Franks) endured in time of Vespasian, under the conduct and empire of one Velleda (g), a lady even of divine esteem amongst them. But howsoever the law be in truth, or interpretable, (for it might ill beseem me to offer determination in matter of this kind) it is certain, that to this day, they have au use of ancient time (k), which commits to the care of some of the greatest peers, that they, when the queen is in child-birth, be present, and warily observe, lest the ladies privily should counterfeit the inheritable sex, by supposing some other made when the true birth is female, or, by any such means, wrong their ancient custom royal, as of the birth of this present Lewis the XIIIth, on the last of September in 1601, is, after other such remembered.

Of these two factions styl'd, of York and Lan

caster.

Briefly their beginning was thus: Edward the IIId had seven sons, Edward the Black Prince, William of Hatfield +, Lionel, duke of Clarence, John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, Edmund of Langley, duke of York, Thomas of Woodstock, and William of Windsor; in prerogative of birth as I name them. The Black Prince died in life of his father, leaving Richard of Bourdeaux (afterward the Ild). William of Hatfield died without issue; Henry, duke of Lancaster (son to John of Gaunt the fourth brother) deposed Richard the Ild. and to the Vth and VIth of his name, left the kingdom descending in right line of the family of Lancaster. On the other side Lionel, duke of Clarence, the third brother, had only issue Philip a daughter, married to Edmund Mortimer, earl of March, (who, upon this title, was designed heir apparent to Richard IId), Edmund, by her had

(d) Ad 1. ff. de Senatorib.

(f) Hierome Bignon. de l'excel. des Roies, Livre 3.

(g) V. Tacit. Hist. 4.

(h) Rodulph. Boter. Commentar. 8.

+ Ex Archiv. Parl. 1. Ed. 4. in lucem ed. 9. Ed. 4. fol. 9.

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