younger Henry fled into France.
Lewis entered |
Normandy with a vast army. The barons of
Bretagne under Geoffrey, and those of Guienne
under Richard, rose in arms; the king of Scot-
land pierced into England; and the earl of Lei-
cester, at the head of fourteen thousand Flemings,
landed in Suffolk.

It was on this trying occasion, that Henry displayed a greatness independent of all fortune. For, beset by all the neighbouring powers, opposed by his own children, betrayed by his wife, abandoned by one part of his subjects, uncertain of the rest, every part of his state rotten and suspicious, his magnanimity grew beneath the danger; and when all the ordinary resources failed, he found superiour resources in his own courage, wisdom, and activity. There were at that time dispersed over Europe bodies of mercenary troops, called Brabançons, composed of fugitives from different nations; men, who were detached from any country, and who, by making war a perpetual trade, and passing from service to service, had acquired an experience and military knowledge uncommon in those days. Henry took twenty thousand of these mercenaries into his service, and as he paid them punctually, and kept them always in action, they served him with fidelity. A. D. 1173. The papal authority, so often subservient, so often prejudicial, to his designs, he called to his assistance in a cause, which did not misbecome it; the cause of a father attacked by his children. This took off the ill impression left by Becket's death, and kept the bishops firm in their allegiance. Having taken his measures with judgment, he pursued the war in Normandy with vigour. In this war his mercenaries had a great and visible advantage over the feudal armies of France; the latter not so useful, while they remained in the field, entered it late in the summer, and commonly left it in forty days. The king of France was forced to raise the siege of Verneuil, to evacuate Normandy, and agree to a truce. Then at the head of his victorious Brabançons, Henry marched into Britanny with an incredible expedition. The rebellious army, astonished as much by the celerity of his march, as the fury of his attack, was totally routed. The principal towns and castles were reduced soon after. The custody of the conquered country being lodged in faithful hands, he flew to the relief of England. There his natural son Geoffrey, bishop elect of Ely, faithful during the rebellion of all his legitimate offspring, steadily maintained his cause, though with forces much inferiour to his zeal. The king, before he entered into action, thought A. D. 1174. it expedient to perform his expiation at the tomb of Becket. Hardly had he finished this ceremony, when the news arrived, that the Scotch army was totally defeated, and their king made prisoner. This victory was universally attributed to the prayers of Becket; and whilst it established the credit of the new saint, it established Henry in the minds of his people; they no longer looked upon their king as an object of the

Divine vengeance, but as a penitent reconciled to Heaven, and under the special protection of the martyr he had made. The Flemish army, after several severe checks, capitulated to evacuate the kingdom. The rebellious barons submitted soon after. All was quiet in England; but the king of France renewed hostilities in Normandy, and laid siege to Rouen. Henry recruited his army with a body of auxiliary Welsh, arrived at Rouen with his usual expedition, raised the siege, and drove the king of France quite out of Normandy. It was then that he agreed to an accommodation, and in the terms of peace, which he dictated in the midst of victory to his sons, his subjects, and his enemies, there was seen on one hand the tenderness of a father, and on the other the moderation of a wise man, not insensible of the mutability of fortune.

The war, which threatened his ruin, being so happily ended, the greatness of the danger served only to enhance his glory; whilst he saw the king of France humbled, the Flemings defeated, the king of Scotland a prisoner, and his sons and subjects reduced to the bounds of their duty. He employed this interval of peace to secure its continuance, and to prevent a return of the like evils; for which reason he made many reforms in the laws and polity of his dominions. He instituted itinerant justices, to weaken the power of the great barons, and even of the sheriffs, who were hardly more obedient; an institution, which, with great publick advantages, has remained to our times. In the spirit of the same policy he armed the whole body of the people; the English commonalty had been in a manner disarmed ever since the Conquest. In this regulation we may probably trace the origin of the militia, which, being under the orders of the Crown rather in a political than a feudal respect, were judged more to be relied on than the soldiers of tenure, to whose pride and power they might prove a sort of counterpoise. Amidst these changes the affairs of A. D. 1176 the clergy remained untouched. The king had experienced how dangerous it was to attempt removing foundations so deeply laid both in strength and opinion. He therefore wisely aimed at acquiring the favour of that body, and turning to his own advantage a power he should in vain attempt to overthrow, but which he might set up against another power, which it was equally his interest to reduce.

Though these measures were taken with the greatest judgment, and seemed to promise a peaceful evening to his reign, the seeds of rebellion remained still at home, and the dispositions that nourished them were rather encreased abroad. The parental authority, respectable at all times, ought to have the greatest force in times when the manners are rude, and the laws imperfect. At that time Europe had not emerged out of barbarism, yet this great natural bond of society was extremely weak. The number of foreign obligations and duties almost dissolved the family obligations. From the moment a young man was

in marriage the lady Avisa, sole heiress of the great house of Gloucester; but as he gave him no share in the regency, he encreased his power, and left him discontented in a kingdom committed to the care of new men, who had merited their places by their money.

Richard arrived in Palestine some time after the king of France; his arrival gave new vigour to the operations of the Croises. He reduced Acre to surrender at discretion, which had been in vain besieged for two years, and in the siege of which an infinite number of Christians had perished; and so much did he distinguish himself on this and on all occasions, that the whole expedition seemed to rest on his single valour. The king of France, seeing him fully engaged, had all that he desired. The climate was disagreeable to his constitution, and the war, in which he acted but a second part, to his pride. He therefore hastened home to execute his projects against Richard, amusing him with oaths made to be violated; leaving indeed a part of his forces under the duke of Burgundy, but with private orders to give him underhand all possible obstruction. Notwithstanding the desertion of his ally, Richard continued the war with uncommon alacrity. With very unequal numbers he engaged and defeated the whole army of Saladine, and slew 40,000 of his best troops. He obliged him to evacuate all the towns on the sea-coast; and spread the renown and terrour of his arms over all Asia. A thousand great exploits did not however enable him to extend his conquests to the inland country. Jealousy, envy, cabals, and a total want of discipline, reigned in the army of the Croises. The climate, and their intemperance more than the climate, wasted them with a swift decay. The vow, which brought them to the Holy Land, was generally for a limited time, at the conclusion of which they were always impatient to depart. Their armies broke up at the most critical conjunctures; as it was not the necessity of the

It will be proper to take a view of the condition of the Holy Land at the time, when this third crusade was set on foot to repair the faults committed in the two former. The conquests of the Croises, extending over Palestine and a part of Syria, had been erected into a sovereignty under the name of the kingdom of Jerusalem. This kingdom, ill ordered within, surrounded on all sides by powerful enemies, subsisted by a strength not its own for near ninety years. But dissensions arising about the succession to the Crown between Guy of Lusignan, and Raymond earl of Tripoli, Guy, either because he thought the assistance of the European princes too distant, or that he feared their decision, called in the aid of Saladine, sultan of Egypt. This able prince immediately entered Palestine. As the whole strength of the Christians in Palestine depended upon foreign succour, he first made himself master of the maritime towns, and then Jerusalem fell an easy prey to his arms; whilst the competitors contended with the utmost violence for a kingdom, which no longer existed for either of them. All Europe was alarmed at this revolution. The banished patriarch of Jerusalem filled every place with the distresses of the Eastern Christians. The pope ordered a solemn fast to be for ever kept for this loss; and then exerting all his influence, excited a new crusade, in which vast numbers engaged with an ardour unabated by their former misfortunes; but want-service, but the extent of their vows, which held ing a proper subordination rather than a sufficient force, they made but a slow progress, when Richard and Philip at the head of more than 100,000 chosen men, the one from Marseilles, the other from Genoa, set sail to their assist

A. D. 1190.

A. D. 1191.

ance.

them together. As soon therefore as they had habituated themselves to the country, and attained some experience, they were gone; and new men supplied their places, to acquire experience by the same misfortunes, and to lose the benefit of it by the same inconstancy. Thus the war could never In his voyage to the Holy Land be carried on with steadiness and uniformity. On accident presented Richard with an the other side, Saladine continually repaired his unexpected conquest. A vessel of his fleet was losses; his resources were at hand; and this great driven by a storm to take shelter in the Isle of captain very judiciously kept possession of that Cyprus. That island was governed by a prince mountainous country, which, formed by a pernamed Isaac, of the imperial family of the Com-petual ridge of Libanus, in a manner walls in the neni, who not only refused all relief to the sufferers, but plundered them of the little remains of their substance. Richard resenting this inhospitable treatment, aggravated by the insolence of the tyrant, turned his force upon Cyprus, vanquished Isaac in the field, took the capital city, and was solemnly crowned king of that island. But deeming it as glorious to give as to acquire a crown, he soon after resigned it to Lusignan, to satisfy him for his claim on Jerusalem; in whose descendants it continued for several generations, until passing by marriage into the family of Cornaro, a Venetian nobleman, it was acquired to that state, the only state in Europe which had any real benefit by all the blood and treasure lavished in the holy war.

sea-coast of Palestine. There he hung, like a continual tempest, ready to burst over the Christian army. On his rear was the strong city of Jerusalem, which secured a communication with the countries of Chaldea and Mesopotamia, from whence he was well supplied with every thing. If the Christians attempted to improve their successes by penetrating to Jerusalem, they had a city powerfully garrisoned in their front, a country wasted and destitute of forage to act in, and Saladine, with a vast army on their rear, advantageously posted to cut off their convoys and reinforcements.

Richard was labouring to get over these disadvantages, when he was informed by repeated expresses of the disorder of his affairs in Europe;

disorders, which arose from the ill dispositions he had made at his departure. The heads of his regency had abused their power; they quarrelled with each other, and the nobility with them. A sort of a civil war had arisen, in which they were deposed. Prince John was the mainspring of these dissensions; he engaged in a close communication of councils with the king of France, who had seized upon several places in Normandy. It was with regret, that Richard found himself obliged to leave a theatre, on which he had planned such an illustrious scene of action. A constant emulation in courtesy and politeness, as well as in military exploits, had been kept up between him and Saladine. He now concluded a truce with that generous enemy; and on his departure sent a messenger to assure him, that on its expiration he would not fail to be again in Palestine. Saladine | replied, that, if he must lose his kingdom, he would choose to lose it to the king of England. Thus Richard returned, leaving JeruA. D. 1192. salem in the hands of the Saracens ; and this end had an enterprise, in which two of the most powerful monarchs in Europe were personally engaged, an army of upwards of 100,000 men employed, and to furnish which the whole Christian world had been vexed and exhausted. It is a melancholy reflection, that the spirit of great designs can seldom be inspired, but where the reason of mankind is so uncultivated, that they can be turned to little advantage. With this war ended the fortune of Richard, who found the Saracens less dangerous than his Christian allies. It is not well known what motive induced him to land at Aquileia, at the bottom of the gulf of Venice, in order to take his route by Germany; but he pursued his journey through the territories of the duke of Austria, whom he had personally affronted at the siege of Acre. And now, neither keeping himself out of the power of that prince, nor rousing his generosity by seeming to confide in it, he attempted to get through his dominions in disguise. Sovereigns do not easily assume the private character; their pride seldom suffers their disguise to be complete; besides, Richard had made himself but too well known. The duke, transported with the opportunity of base revenge, discovered him, seized him, and threw him into prison; from whence he was only released to be thrown into another. The emperour claimed him; and, without regarding, in this unfortunate captive, the common dignity of sovereigns, or his great actions in the common cause of Europe, treated him with yet greater cruelty.

triously spreading a report of his brother's death, publickly laid claim to the crown, as lawful successour. All his endeavours, however, served only to excite the indignation of the people, and to attach them the more firmly to their unfortunate prince. Eleanor, the queen dowager, as good a mother as she had been a bad wife, acted with the utmost vigour and prudence to retain them in their duty, and omitted no means to procure the liberty of her son. The nation seconded her with a zeal, in their circumstances, uncommon. No tyrant ever imposed so severe a tax upon his people as the affection of the people of England, already exhausted, levied upon themselves. The most favoured religious orders were charged on this occasion. The church-plate was sold. The ornaments of the most holy relicks were not spared. And, indeed, nothing serves more to demonstrate the poverty of the kingdom, reduced by internal dissensions and remote wars, at that time, than the extreme difficulty of collecting the king's ransom, which amounted to no more than 100,000 marks of silver, Cologne weight. For raising this sum the first taxation, the most heavy and general that was ever known in England, proved altogether insufficient. Another taxation was set on foot. It was levied with the same rigour as the former, and still fell short. Ambassadours were sent into Germany with all that could be raised, and with hostages for the payment of whatever remained. The king met these ambassadours as he was carried in chains to plead his cause before the diet of the empire. The ambassadours burst into tears at this affecting sight, and wept aloud; but Richard, though touched no less with the affectionate loyalty of his subjects than with his own fallen condition, preserved his dignity entire in his misfortunes, and with a cheerful air enquired of the state of his dominions, the behaviour of the king of Scotland, and the fidelity of his brother, the count John. At the diet, no longer protected by the character of a sovereign, he was supported by his personal abilities. He had a ready wit, and great natural eloquence; and his high reputation, and the weight of his cause, pleading for him more strongly, the diet at last interested itself in his favour, and prevailed on the emperour to accept an excessive ransom for dismissing a prisoner, whom he detained without the least colour of justice. Philip moved heaven and earth to prevent his enlargement; he negociated, he promised, he flattered, he threatened, he outbid his extravagant ransom. The emperour, in his own nature more inclined to the bribe, which tempted him to be base, hesitated a long time between these offers. To give a colour of justice to his violence, he But as the payment of the ransom was more cerproposed to accuse Richard at the diet of the em- tain than Philip's promises, and as the instances of pire upon certain articles relative to his conduct the diet, and the menaces of the pope, who proin the Holy Land. The news of the king's capti-tected Richard, as a prince serving under the cross, vity caused the greatest consternation in all his good subjects; but it revived the hopes and machinations of Prince John, who bound himself by closer ties than ever to the king of France, seized upon some strong holds in England, and, indus

A. D. 1193.

were of more immediate consequence than his threats, Richard was at length released; and though it is said the emperour endeavoured to seize him again, to extort another ransom, he escaped safely into England.