Edward the Second.

REIGNED FROM A.D. 1307 TO A.D. 1327.

THE

SECOND EDWARD rules the realm,

With vice and weakness at the helm;
By Gavestone, his bold favorite, led,

Till that proud Gascon lost his head;
While Robert Bruce, at Bannockburn,1
Gives EDWARD's arms an adverse turn.
The Spencers all his favour shar'd,
Till Civil War its banner rear'd:

The Spencers fell before the storm,
And captive EDWARD's tortur'd form 3

In Berkeley's walls, midst shrieks and tears,
Concludes a reign of twenty years.

1 This battle was fought A.D. 1315.

2 Their chief crime consisted in being favourites.

3

3 Edward was put to a cruel death by Maltravers and Gournay, his keepers, who passed a red-hot iron into his body.

REIGNED FROM A.D. 1327 TO A.D. 1377.

DWARD THE THIRD Succeeds his sire,

EDWA
Ε

A Prince possessed of martial fire; His manly vigour quickly shows,

Subduing French and Scottish foes;1

2

While his immortal son appears

Victor at Cressy 3 and Poictiers,*
His gallant Queen defeats with loss
The Scottish King at Neville's Cross.5
The people well their rights maintain'd,
And settled Parliaments obtain'd.

Prince Edward dies, his sire declines,
And soon at Richmond life resigns.

At the battle of Halidown-hill the Scots were totally defeated, and Berwick annexed to the English crown.

2 Edward the Black Prince.

3 The French lost thirty thousand men.

John King of France taken prisoner and brought to England, where he died in 1364.

5 Near the city of Durham, where David Bruce, King of Scots, was taken prisoner.

In the fifty-first year of his reign.