thinking, assumed an air of regret, and said, "It was a thousand pities—it would have been a most charming thing, but, unfortunately, he was afraid it would be very long before it could take place, for he must now proceed to the frontiers to prosecute the necessary resistance to the Duke of Burgundy."
The treaty being signed, Gloucester, and some other of the chief nobility who were averse to the peace, and therefore would not attend the meeting of the kings, now rode into Amiens to pay their court to him, and Louis received them with that air of pleasure which he could so easily put on, entertained them luxuriously, and presented them with rich gifts of plate and horses.
Thus was this singular treaty concluded, and each monarch thought most advantageously to himself. Edward had paid off the Duke of Burgundy for his neglecting to fulfil his agreement as to the campaign, and he now sent the duke word, patronisingly, that if he wished, he would get a similar truce for him; to which Burgundy sent an indignant answer. Edward had, moreover, got a good round sum of money to pay his army, and a yearly income of 50,000 crowns for life. Like Charles II. afterwards, he did not trouble himself about the disgrace and disadvantage of having made himself a pensioner on France. Besides this, he had arranged to set his eldest daughter on the French throne after Louis's decease.
Louis, on his part, was so transported with his management of the affair, that, spite of his habitual caution, he could not avoid laughing and chuckling over it amongst his courtiers. True, he had spent some money, and made some promises. As to the promises, their nature was proverbial; and as to the money, it did not amount to a tithe of what he must have spent in the war, to say nothing of the evil chances which might follow a contention with the English again, and with a king always victorious. That money had cleared France of the English army, broken up the alliance with Burgundy and Brittany, left those princes now very much at his mercy, and, more than all, had tied the hands of the pleasure-loving King of England for life. To make sure work of it, Louis had not only bribed the monarch, but all the influential courtiers round him. He had agreed to pay yearly 16,000 crowns to some of the chief nobility of England. Lord Edward Hastings, Edward's great favourite, was to receive 2,000 crowns annually; the Chancellor 2,000, and the Marquis of Dorset, the Lords Howard and Cheney, Sir Thomas Montgomery, Sir Thomas St. Leger, and a few others, divided amongst them the remaining 12,000 of this really treasonable bounty money. So well aware were they of the odious nature of the payment, that Lord Hastings, though he received it as greedily as the rest, never would commit himself by signing a receipt. Well might that strange monarch, the despicable, truckling, tricky, but cunning Louis, express in private his unbounded contempt of both Edward and his courtiers. He strictly enjoined his own courtiers, however they might laugh at the English dupes in private, they must be careful never to let them perceive any signs of their mockery and derision; and perceiving on one occasion, when his exultation had made him talk too freely, that a boastful Gascon was present, he immediately gave him most advantageous preferment, to bind secrecy, saying, "It is but just that I should pay the penalty of my talkativeness."
The people were very much of the French king's opinion, that their own monarch had been sadly over-reached. The army, which on its return was disbanded, promoted this feeling everywhere. The soldiers camp back disappointed of the plunder of France, and accordingly vented their chagrin on the king and his courtiers, who for their private emolument had sold, they said, the honour of the nation. As to the general terms of the peace, the people had good cause to be satisfied. It was much better for the nation to be left at liberty to pursue its profitable trade, than to be year after year drained of its substance to carry on a useless war. But the real cause of discontent was the annual bribe, which bound the king and his court to wink at any proceedings of France on the Continent, against our allies and commercial connections, and even to suffer intrusions on our own trade and interests, rather than incur the danger of losing the pay of the French king.
Edward endeavoured to silence these murmurs by severity. He sent amongst the people agents who reported any offensive language, and he punished offenders without mercy. At the same time, he extended an equally stern hand towards all disturbers of the peace; the disbanded soldiers having collected into hordes, and spread murder and rapine through several of the counties. Seeing, however, that such was the general discontent, that should some Wat Tyler or Jack Cade arise, the consequences might be terrible, he determined to ease the burdens of the people at the expense of the higher classes. He therefore ordered a rigorous exaction of the customs; laid frequent tenths on the clergy; resumed many of the estates of the crown; and compelled the holders of estates to compound by heavy fines for the omission of any of their duties as feudal tenants. He moreover entered boldly into trade. Instead of permitting his ships to lie rotting in port, as he had no occasion for them as transport vessels, he sent out in them wool, tin, cloth, and other merchandise, and brought back from the ports of the Levant their products. By all these means Edward became the most wealthy monarch of Europe, and while he grew very soon popular with the people, who felt the weight of taxation annually decreasing, he became equally formidable to those who had more reason to complain.
But however generally prosperous was the remainder of Edward's reign, it was to himself filled with the deepest causes of grief and remorse. The part which his brother Clarence had taken, his allying himself to Warwick, with the design to depose Edward and secure the crown to himself, could never be forgotten. He had been named the successor to the Prince of Wales, the son of Henry VI., and, should anything happen to Edward, might assert that claim to the prejudice of his own son. Still further, Clarence had given mortal offence to the queen. Her father and her brother had been put to death in Clarence's name. Her brother Antony, afterwards, had narrowly escaped the same fate from the orders of Clarence. He had been forward in the charge of sorcery against her mother, the Duchess Jacquetta. Scarcely less had he incensed his brother Richard of Gloucester, the vindictive and never-forgiving, by
