to Canterbury, to visit the shrine of Thomas A'Becket, On their way they each tell a story, or legend.

In the prologue to this poem, Chaucer describes the various characters of the company; giving a most vivid picture of the times he lived in, full of humour and imagination. Chaucer died about 1384. Another contemporary poet, John Gower, deserves to be remembered along with him. English literature thus early took a high position.

The learning of the Plantagenet times was monopolised by the clergy. As yet few laymen could read, and fewer still could write. Yet in this age very many of the colleges which form the two English universities were founded; and it is said that when Wycliffe preached at Oxford, there were nearly thirty thousand students there. This is, no doubt, an exaggeration; but we know that about that time Oxford had attained great celebrity as a seat of learning. The chief kind of learning however, was the scholastic philosophy which then ruled supreme over Europe, and had degenerated in many instances to painful trifling about matters of not the slightest moment.

Though other arts and sciences were in a rude and imperfect state, that of architecture, which had become the handmaid of religious zeal, was cultivated with extraordinary success. Many of the noblest architectural monuments which still adorn our country belong to this age. The cathedrals of York, Lincoln, and Salisbury, some of the colleges and chapels at Oxford, and numerous other erections, still remain to testify to the patient labour and skill of our early English builders. Towards the close of the period, the square gloomy Norman keeps

began to yield to structures of a less forbidding and more ornamental character. In Edward the Third's reign, Windsor Castle, one of the best specimens of the class, was built.

The art of the period found exercise in the ornamen→ tation of the armour of the knights and barons, which was ofttimes curiously inlaid and wrought with grotesque figures and devices.

The social life of the higher classes during the latter part of this period assumed a great degree of splendour. The spirit of chivalry, then in full perfection, delighted in great spectacles. The most favourite of these was the tournament, or mimic fight; which, however, often ended in a serious engagement.

Edward and his son, the Black Prince, were regarded in their day as models of knighthood, from whose sword it was the highest privilege to receive that honour. Edward the Third instituted the since illustrious Order of the Garter.

The national industry during the reigns of the Plantagenets was chiefly confined to agriculture and the exportation of wool. So important was this last production, that the kings had their revenues calculated by so many packs of wool being granted. This wool was exported mainly to Flanders, which was then the chief manufacturing country in the north of Europe. Many absurd statutes were passed during this period, the object of which was to regulate the import and export of articles of manufacture or consumption, to fix the price of provisions, and the price of labour.

Little cloth was made in England, and that only of

the coarsest description, till, in 1330, Edward the Third invited weavers, dyers, and fullers to come over from Flanders and settle in England, assuring them of his protection and favour. A considerable number availed themselves of this invitation, and established woollen manufactures in London, Norwich, and other places.

The merchants and tradesmen of England, and of other countries, at this period were accustomed to unite themselves together in guilds or corporations, for the protection of the interests of their particular crafts. These received charters from the Crown, and many of them, especially in London, became rich and powerful; and kings and nobles did not disdain to be enrolled as their honorary members.

CHAP. XVII.

HENRY IV. 1399-1413.

HENRY THE FOURTH, the first monarch of the House of Lancaster, was crowned in 1399. The deposed King Richard was removed from Westminster to Pontefract Castle, in Yorkshire. It was evidently the interest of Henry, that Richard should be got rid of, in case the affection of the people for him should revive; so, when it was told that Richard had died in prison, most men believed that his death was due to the orders of Henry.

One story

But his fate is shrouded in great mystery. is, that assassins entered his chamber in Pontefract Castle, to kill him, and that Richard, after a resistance in which some of his murderers were killed, was at last dispatched. Another story, more extraordinary, is—that Richard escaped to Scotland, and lived there for many years, supported by the Scottish king's bounty.

As Richard left no children, the crown, by right of birth, devolved on the Earl of March, a descendant of the Duke of Clarence, third son of Edward the Third. But Henry took no steps hostile to pretensions founded only on hereditary right, as he was secure in the election of Parliament, and the support of the nobles and people.

Several however of the great lords were discontented with his government, and his strength lay chiefly among the Commons, who attained under the House of Lancaster to greater power than ever they had before. In 1400, a formidable revolt of the discontented nobles broke out, headed by the Earls of Huntingdon and Gloucester, and encouraged by the King of Scotland. They set up a priest, who resembled Richard in features, as the escaped king; and Henry, to dispel the illusion, was compelled to exhibit the body of Richard to public view.

Next year, when Henry was absent in Scotland, a formidable revolt burst forth in Wales, headed by Owen Glendower, who boasted of himself as the descendant of Llewellyn, Prince of Wales, who died, as will be remembered, at the time of the conquest by Edward the First. The Welsh flocked to his standard, and though

G 4

Henry and his son, the future conqueror of Agincourt, penetrated Wales with an army in every direction, the Welsh did not lay down their arms, but kept up a guerilla warfare amongst the mountains.

A more formidable enemy at the same time troubled the king, in the north. This was Hotspur, Earl Percy, son of the Duke of Northumberland, an ambitious and warlike man, and the head of the powerful family of the Percys, who, as Lords of the Scottish marches, possessed great power, and commanded a numerous array of well-trained vassals in the northern counties.

The ostensible reason of revolt was, the conduct of Henry, after the battle of Homildon Hill, fought in 1402, where Percy had defeated, and taken prisoner, Earl Douglas, his Scottish rival. In accordance with the custom of the time, the ransom of a prisoner belonged to his captor: but Henry ordered Percy not to accept a ransom for Earl Douglas, but to keep him a prisoner for the king. This interference with what he considered his rights excited the Earl to revolt; and setting his captive at liberty, he marched south, with an army of Scots and English to join Owen Glendower, in Wales. Henry and his son met him at the battle of Shrewsbury, and in a fiercely contested battle the royal troops were victorious. Hotspur and Douglas were slain. After this battle, the war in Wales gradually ceased, and the Welsh returned to their allegiance.

In 1405, Prince James (afterwards James the First of Scotland), when on his voyage to the French court, was captured by an English vessel, and brought to. London, where Henry ungenerously detained him in captivity for nineteen years.