sovereigns who were engaged in it, it is enough
to say that England made a blundering alliance
with Spain, and got stupidly taken in by that
country ; which made its own terms with France
when it could, and left England in the lurch.
Sir Edward Howard, a bold admiral, son of
the Earl of Surrey, distinguished himself by his
bravery against the French in this business ; but,
unfortunately, he was more brave than wise, for,
skimming into the French harbour of Brest with
only a few row-boats, he attempted (in revenge
for the defeat and death of Sir Thomas
Knyvett, another bold English admiral) to take



some strong French ships, well defended with
batteries of cannon. The upshot was that he
was left on board of one of them (in consequence
of its shooting away from his own boat), with
not more than about a dozen men, and was
thrown into the sea and drowned ; though not
until he had taken from his breast his gold chain
and gold whistle, which were the signs of his
office, and had cast them into the sea to prevent
their being made a boast of by the enemy.
After this defeat — which was a great one, for Sir
Edward Howard was a man of valour and fame
— the King took it into his head to invade
France in person ; first executing that dangerous
Earl of Suffolk whom his father had left in the
Tower, and appointing Queen Catherine to the
charge of his kingdom in his absence. He
sailed to Calais, where he was joined by Maxi-
milian, Emperor of Germany, who pretended to
be his soldier, and who took pay in his service :
with a good deal of nonsense of that sort, flatter-
ing enough to the vanity of a vain blusterer.
The King might be successful enough in sham
fights ; but his idea of real battles, chiefly con-
sisted in pitching silken tents of bright colours
that were ignominiously blown down by the wind,
and in making a vast display of gaudy flags and
golden curtains. Fortune, however, favoured
him better than he deserved ; for, after much
waste of time in tent pitching, Hag flying, gold
curtaining, and other such masquerading, he
gave the French battle at a place called Guine-
gate : where they took such an unaccountable
panic, and fled with such swiftness, that it was
ever afterwards called by the English the Battle
of Spurs. Instead of following up his advantage,
the King, finding that he had had enough of real
lighting, came home again.

The Scottish King, though nearly related to
Henry by marriage, had taken part against him
in this war. The Earl of Surrey, as the English
general, advanced to meet him when he came
out of his own dominions and crossed the river
Tweed. The two armies came up with one
another when the Scottish King had also crossed
the river Till, and was encamped upon the last
of the Cheviot Hills, called the Hill of Flodden.
Along the plain below it, the English, when the
hour of battle came, advanced. The Scottish
army, which had been drawn up in five great
bodies, then came steadily down in perfect
silence. So they, in their turn, advanced to
meet the English army, which came on in one
long line ; and they attacked it with a body of
spearmen, under Lord Home. At first they
had the best of it ; but the English recovered
themselves so bravely, and fought with such



HENRY THE EIGHTH.



valour, that, when the Scottish King had almost
made his way up to the Royal standard, he was
slain, and the whole Scottish power routed. Ten
thousand Scottish men lay dead that day on
Flodden Field ; and among them, numbers of
the nobility and gentry. For a long time after-



wards, the Scottish peasantry used to believe
that their King had not been really killed in
this battle, because no Englishman had found
an iron belt he wore about his body as a penance
for having been an unnatural and undutiful son.
But, whatever became of his belt, the English



77777/57/ /







SIR EDWARD HOWARD.



had his sword and dagger, and the ring from his
finger, and his body too, covered with wounds.
There is no doubt of it ; for it was seen and re-
cognised by English gentlemen who had known
the Scottish King well.

When King Henry was making ready to renew
Child's History of England, 8.



the war in France, the French King was con-
templating peace. His queen, dying at this
time, he proposed, though he was upwards of
fifty years old, to marry King Henry's sister, the
Princess Mary, who, besides being only sixteen,
was betrothed to the Duke of Suffolk. As the

35 1



H4



A CHILD 'S HISTORY OF ENGLAND.



inclinations of young Princesses were not much
considered in such matters, the marriage was
concluded, and the poor girl was escorted to
France, where she was immediately left as the
French King's bride, with only one of all her
English attendants. That one was a pretty
young girl named Anne Boleyn, niece of the
of Surrey, who had been made Duke of
Norfolk, after the victory of Flodden Field.
Anne Boleyn's is a name to be remembered, as
you will presently find.

And new the French King, who was very
proud of his young wife, was preparing for many
of happiness, and she was looking forward,
I dare say. to many years of misery, when he
died within three months, and left her a young
widow. The new French monarch, Francis
the First, seeing how important it was to his
interests that she should take for her second
husband no one but an Englishman, advised her
first lover, the Duke of Suffolk, when King
Henry sent him over to France to fetch her
home, to marry her. The Princess being her-
i fond of that Duke, as to tell him that he
must either do so then, or for ever lose her, they
were wedded ; and Henry afterwards forgave
them. In making interest with the King, the
Duke of Suffolk had addressed his most povver-
vourite and adviser, Thomas Wolsey — a
name very famous in history for its rise and
downfall.

Wolsey was the son of a respectable butcher
at Ipswich, in Suffolk, and received so excellent
an education that he became a tutor to the
family of the Marquis of Dorset, who afterwards
got him appointed one of the late King's chap-
lains. On the accession of Henry the Eighth,
he was promoted and taken into great favour.
He was now Archbishop of York ; the Pope had
made' him a Cardinal besides ; and whoever
wanted influence in England or favour with the
—whether he were a foreign monarch or an
ish nobleman — was obliged to make a friend
of the great Cardinal Wolsey.

He was a gay man, who could dance and

. and sing and drink ; and those were the

to so much, or rather so little, of a heart

as King Henry had. He was wonderfully fond

mp and glitter, and so was the King. He

knew a good deal of the Church learning of

that time ; much of which consisted in finding

artful excuses and pretences for almost any

wrong thing, and in arguing that black was

white, or any other colour. This kind of learning

pleased the King too. For many such reasons,

the Cardinal was high in estimation with the

King ; and, being a man of far greater ability,



knew as well how to manage him, as a clever
keeper may know how to manage a wolf or a
tiger, or any other cruel and uncertain beast,
that may turn upon him and tear him any
Never had there been seen in England such
state as my Lord Cardinal kept. His wealth
v, as enormous ; equal, it was reckoned, to the
riches of the Crown. His palaces were as splen-
did as the King's, and his retinue was eight
hundred strong. He held his Court, dressed
out from top to toe in flaming scarlet ; and his
very shoes were golden, set with precious stones.
His followers rode on blood horses ; while he,
with a wonderful affectation of humility in the
midst of his great splendour, ambled on a mule
with a red velvet saddle and bridle ami golden
stirrups.

Through the influence of this stately priest,. a
grand meeting was arranged to take place be-
tween 'the French and English Kings in France;
but on ground belonging to England. A pro-
digious show of friendship and rejoicing was to
be made on the occasion ; and heralds were
sent to proclaim with brazen trumpets through
all the principal cities of Europe, that, on a cer-
tain day, the Kings of France and England, as
companions and brothers in arms, each attended
by eighteen followers, would hold a tournament
again I ill knights who might choose to come.

Charles, the new Emperor of Germany (the
old one being dead), wanted to prevent too
cordial an alliance between these sover
and came over to England before the King
could repair to the place of meeting ; and, be-
sides making an agreeable impression upon him,
secured Wolsey's interest by promising that his
influence should make him Pope when the next
vacancy occurred. On the day when the Em-
peror left England, the King and all the Court
went over to Calais, and thence to the place of
meeting, between Ardres and Guisnes, com-
monly called the Field of the Cloth of Gold.
Here, all manner of expense ami prodigality
was lavished on the decorations of the show ;
many of the knights and gentlemen being so
My dressed that it was said they carried
whole estates upon their shoulders.

There were sham castles, temporary cha]
fountains running wine, great cellars full of wine
free as water to all comers, silk tents, gold lace
and foil, gilt lions, and such things without end ;
and, in the midst of all, the rich Cardinal out-
shone and out-glittered all the noblemen and
gentlemen assembled. After a treaty made be-
i the two Kings with as much solemnity as
if they had intended to keep it, the lists— nine
hundred feet long, and three hundred and



HENR Y THE EIGHTH.



twenty broad — were opened for the tournament ;
the Queens of France and England looking on
with great array of lords and ladies. Then, for
ten days, the two sovereigns fought five com-
bats every day, and always beat their polite
adversaries ; though they do write that the King
of England, being thrown in a wrestle one day
by the King of France, lost his kingly temper
with his brother in arms, and wanted to make a
quarrel of it. Then, there is a great story be-
longing to this Field of the Cloth of Gold, show-
ing how the English were distrustful of the
French, and the French of the English, until
Francis rode alone one morning to Henry's tent ;
and, going in before he was out of bed, told
him in joke that he was his prisoner; and how
Henry jumped out of bed and embraced Francis;
and how Francis helped Henry to dress, and
warmed his linen for him ; and how Henry gave
Francis a splendid jewelled collar, and how
Francis gave Henry, in return, a costly bracelet.
All this and a great deal more was so written
about, and sung about, and talked about at that
time (and, indeed, since that time too), that the
world has had good cause to be sick of it, for
ever.

Of course, nothing came of all these fine
doings but a speedy renewal of the war between
England and France, in which the two Royal
companions and brothers in arms longed very
earnestly to damage one another. But, before
it broke out again, the Duke of Buckingham was
shamefully executed on Tower Hill, on the evi-
dence of a discharged servant — really for nothing,
except the folly of having believed in a friar of
the name of Hopkins, who had pretended to be
a prophet, and who had mumbled and jumbled
out some nonsense about the Duke's son being
destined to be very great in the land. It was
believed that the unfortunate Duke had given
offence to the great Cardinal by expressing his
mind freely about the expense and absurdity of
the whole business of the Field of the Cloth of
Gold. At any rate, he was beheaded, as I have
said, for nothing. And the people who saw it
done were very angry, and cried out that it was
die work of " the butcher's son ! "

The new war was a short one, though the
Earl of Surrey invaded France again, and did
some injury to that country. It ended in another
treaty of peace between the two kingdoms, and
in the discovery that the Emperor of Germany
was not such a good friend to England in reality,
as he pretended to be. Neither did he keep his
promise to Wolsey to make him Pope, though
the King urged him. Two Popes died in pretty
quick succession ; but the foreign priests were



too much for the Cardinal, and kept him out of
the post. So the Cardinal and King together
found out that the Emperor of Germany was not
a man to keep faith with ; broke off a projected
marriage between the Kings daughter Mary,
Princess of Wales, and that sovereign ; and
began to consider whether it might not be well
to marry the young lady, either to Francis him-
self, or to his eldest son.

There now arose at Wittemberg, in Germany,
the great leader of the mighty change in England
which is called the Reformation, and which set
the people free from their slavery to the priests.
This was a learned Doctor, named Martin
Luther, who knew all about them, for he had
been a priest, and even a monk, himself. The
preaching and writing of Wickliffe had set a
number of men thinking on this subject ; and
Luther, finding one day to his great surprise,
that there really was a book called the New
Testament which the priests did not allow to be
read, and which contained truths that they sup-
pressed, began to be very vigorous against the
whole body, from the Pope downward. It
happened, while he was yet only beginning his
vast work of awakening the nation, that an
impudent fellow named Tetzel, a friar of very
bad character, came into his neighbourhood sell-
ing what were called Indulgences, by wholesale,
to raise money for beautifying the great Cathe-
dral of St. Peter's, at Rome. Whoever bought
an Indulgence of the Pope was supposed to buy
himself off from the punishment of Heaven for
his offences. Luther told the people that these
Indulgences were worthless bits of paper, before
God, and that Tetzel and his masters were a
crew of impostors in selling them.

The King and the Cardinal were mightily
indignant at this presumption ; and the King
(with the help of Sir Thomas More, a wise
man, whom he afterwards repaid by striking off
his head) even wrote a book about it, with
which the Pope was so well pleased that he
gave the King the title of Defender of the
Faith. The King and the Cardinal also issued
flaming warnings to the people not to read
Luther's books, on pain of excommunication.
But they did read them for all that ; and the
rumour of what was in them spread far and
wide.

When this great change was thus going on.
the King began to show himself in his truest
and worst colours. Anne Boleyn, the pretty
little girl who had gone abroad to France with
his sister, was by this time grown up to be very
beautiful, and was one of the ladies in attend-
ance on Queen Catherine. Now, Queen Cathe-



n6



A CHILD 'S HISTOR Y OF ENGLAND.



rine was no longer young or handsome, and it
is likely that she was not particularly good-
tempered ; having been always rather melan-
choly, and having been made more so by the
deaths of four of her children when they were
very young. So, the King fell in love with the
fair Anne Boleyn, and said to himself, " How
can I be best rid of my own troublesome wife
whom I am tired of, and many Anne? "

You recollect that Queen Catherine had been
the wife of Henry's brother. What does the
King do, after thinking it over, but calls his
favourite priests about him, and says, O ! his
mind is in such a dreadful state, and he is so
frightfully uneasy, because he is afraid it was
not lawful for him to marry the Queen ! Not
one of those priests had the courage to hint
that it was rather curious he had never thought
of that before, and that his mind seemed to
have been in a tolerably jolly condition during
a great many years, in which he certainly had
not fretted himself thin ; but, they all said, Ah !
that was very true, and it was a serious busi-
ness ; and perhaps the best way to make it
right, would be for his Majesty to be divorced !
The King replied, Yes, he thought that would
be the best way, certainly; so they all went to
work.

If I were to relate to you the intrigues and
plots that took place in the endeavour to get
this divorce, you would think the History of
England the most tiresome book in the world.
So I shall say no more, than that after a vast
deal of negotiation and evasion, the Pope issued
a commission to Cardinal Wolsey and Car-
dinal Campeggio (whom he sent over from
Italy for the purpose), to try the whole case in
England. It is supposed — and I think with
reason — that Wolsey was the Queen's enemy,
because she had reproved him for his proud
and gorgeous manner of life. But, he did not
at first know that the King wanted to marry
Anne Boleyn ; and when he did know it, he
even went down on his knees, in the endeavour
to dissuade him.

The Cardinals opened their court in the
Convent of the black Friars, near to where the
bridge of that name in London now stands ;
and the King and Queen, that they might be
near it, took up their lodgings at the adjoining
palace of Bridewell, of which nothing now re-
mains but a bad prison. On the opening of the
court, when the King and Queen were called on
to appear, that poor ill-used lady, with a dignity
and firmness and yet with a womanly affection
worthy to be always admired, went and kneeled
at the King's feet, and said that she had come,



a stranger, to his dominions ; that she had been
a good and true wife to him for twenty years :
and that she could acknowledge no power in
those Cardinals to try whether she should be
considered his wife after all that time, or should
be put away. With that, she got up and left
the court, and would never afterwards come
back to it.

The King pretended to be very much over-
come, and said, O ! my lords and gentlemen,
what a good woman she was to be sure, and
how delighted he would be to live with her
unto death, but for that terrible uneasiness in
his mind which was quite wearing him away !
So, the case went on, and there was nothing
but talk for two months. Then Cardinal Cam-
peggio, who, on behalf of the Pope, wanted
nothing so much as delay, adjourned it for two
more months ; and before that time was elapsed,
the Pope himself adjourned it indefinitely, by
requiring the King and Queen to come to
Rome and have it tried there. But by good
luck for the King, word was brought to him by
some of his people, that they had happened to
meet at supper, Thomas Cranmer, a learned
Doctor of Cambridge, who had proposed to
urge the Pope on, by referring the case to all
the learned doctors and bishops, here and there
and everywhere, and getting their opinions that
the King's marriage was unlawful. The King,
who was now in a hurry to marry Anne Boleyn,
thought this such a good idea, that he sent for
Cranmer, post haste, and said to Lord Roch-
fort, Anne Boleyn's father, " Take this learned
Doctor down to your country-house, and there
let him have a good room for a study, and no
end of books out of which to prove that I may
marry your daughter." Lord Rochfort, not at
all reluctant, made the learned Doctor as com-
fortable as he could ; and the learned Doctor
went to work to prove his case. All this time,
the King and Anne Boleyn were writing letters
to one another almost daily, full of impatience
to have the case settled ; and Anne Boleyn was
showing herself (as 1 think) very worthy of the
fate which afterwards befell her.

It was bad for Cardinal Wolsey that he had
left Cranmer to render this help. It was worse
for him that he had tried to dissuade the King
from marrying Anne Boleyn. Such a servant
as he, to such a master as Henry, would pro-
bably have fallen in any case ; but, between
the hatred of the parly of the Queen that was,
and. the hatred of the party of the Queen that
was to be, he fell suddenly and heavily. Going
down one day to the Court of Chancery, where
he now presided, he was waited upon by the



HENRY THE EIGHTH.



Dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk, who told him
that they brought an order to him to resign that
office, and to withdraw quietly to a house he
had at Esher, in Surrey. The Cardinal refus-
ing, they rode off to the King ; and next day
came back with a letter from him, on reading
which, the Cardinal submitted. An inventory
was made out of all the riches in his palace at
York Place (now Whitehall), and he went sor-
rowfully up the river, in his barge, to Putney.
An abject man he was, in spite of his pride ;
for being overtaken, riding out of that place
towards Esher, by one of the King's chamber-
lains who brought him a kind message and a
ring, he alighted from his mule, took off his
cap, and kneeled down in the dirt. His poor
Fool, whom in his prosperous days he had
always kept in his palace to entertain him, cut
a far better figure than he ; for, when the Car-
dinal said to the chamberlain that he had
nothing to send to his lord the King as a pre-
sent, but that jester who was a most excellent
one, it took six strong yeomen to remove the
faithful fool from his master.

The once proud Cardinal was soon further
disgraced, and wrote the most abject letters to
his vile sovereign ; who humbled him one day
and encouraged him the next, according to his
humour, until he was at last ordered to go and
reside in his diocese of York. He said he was
too poor ; but I don't know how he made that
out, for he took a hundred and sixty servants
with him, and seventy-two cart-loads of furniture,
food, and wine. He remained in that part of
the country for the best part of a year, and
showed himself so improved by his misfortunes,
and was so mild and so conciliating, that he
won all hearts. And indeed, even in his proud
days, he had done some magnificent things for
learning and education. At last, he was arrested
for high treason ; and, coming slowly on his
journey towards London, got as far as Leicester.
Arriving at Leicester Abbey after dark, and very
ill, he said — when the monks came out at the
gate with lighted torches to receive him — that
he had come to lay his bones among them. He
had indeed ; for he Avas taken to a bed, from
which he never rose again. His last words
were, " Had I but served God as diligently as I
have served the King, He would not have given
me over, in my grey hairs. Howbeit, this is my
just reward for my pains and diligence, not
regarding my service to God, but only my duty
to my prince." The news of his death was
quickly carried to the King, who was amusing
himself with archery in the garden of the mag-
nificent palace at Hampton Court, which that



very Wolsey had presented to him. The greatest
emotion his royal mind displayed at the loss of
a servant so faithful and so ruined, was a par-
ticular desire to lay hold of fifteen hundred
pounds which the Cardinal was reported to have
hidden somewhere.

The opinions concerning the divorce, of the
learned doctors and bishops and others, being
at last collected, and being generally in the
King's favour, were forwarded to the Pope, with
an entreaty that he would now grant it. The
unfortunate Pope, who was a timid man, was
half distracted between his fear of his authority
being set aside in England if he did not do
as he was asked, and his dread of offending
the Emperor of Germany, who was Queen
Catherine's nephew. In this state of mind he
still evaded and did nothing. Then, Thomas
Cromwell, who had been one of Wolsey's
faithful attendants, and had remained so even
in his decline, advised the King to take the
matter into his own hands, and make himself
the head of the whole Church. This, the King
by various artful means, began to do ; but he
recompensed the clergy by allowing them to
burn as many people as they pleased, for holding
Luther's opinions. You must understand that
Sir Thomas More, the wise man who had helped
the King with his book, had been made Chan-
cellor in Wolsey's place. But, as he was truly
attached to the Church as it was even in its
abuses, he, in this state of things, resigned.

Being now quite resolved to get rid of Queen
Catherine, and to marry Anne Boleyn without
more ado, the King made Cranmer Archbishop
of Canterbury, and directed Queen Catherine to
leave the Court. She obeyed ; but replied that
wherever she went, she was Queen of England
still, and would remain so, to the last. The
King then married Anne Boleyn privately ; and
the new Archbishop of Canterbury, within half
a year, declared his marriage with Queen
Catherine void, and crowned Anne Boleyn
Queen.

She might have known that no good could
ever come from such wrong, and that the corpu-
lent brute who had been so faithless and so
cruel to his first wife, could be more faithless