Great
council on
the war,
August,
1401.
ɪn τ402
Edmund
Mortimer
joins Owen
Glendower.
36 Constitutional History. [chap.
very large number of knights and esquires severally summoned
by letters of privy seal. In this assembly the king is said to
have resolved on going to war with France and Scotland. In
the winter the king ordered the collection of an aid on the
marriage of his daughter Blanche to the count palatine Lewis,
son of the king of the Romans1.
Henry’s popularity was on the wane ; he had not been suc-
cessful in Wales ; the exactions of his purveyors were a bitter
source of complaint among the people2 ; an exaction on the sale
of cloth produced loud complaints and riots in Somersetshire,
where the king was regarded as having broken his promise
about taxation3 ; an attempt was made upon his life. The
next year, 1402, was one of still worse omen. In Lent the
lord Grey of Ruthyn was captured by Owen Glendower. In
June, Edmund Mortimer, the brother of the late earl Roger of
March who had been declared heir-presumptive by Richard, fell
into the hands of the rebel chief, and after a short imprisonment
married his daughter, proclaimed himself his ally, and declared
that he was in arms to maintain the right of his nephew to the
throne4. The king’s invasion of Wales, now become an annual
event, was more than ever unsuccessful and calamitous ; it
lasted for three weeks, during which the army was nearly
starved and nearly drownedn, nothing being done against the
foe. As Henry’s failures lessened his popularity, a mysterious
1 The letters for collecting the aid were issued Dec. ɪ, 1401, and Feb.
16, 1402 ; Rymer, viii. 232, 242 ; Dep. Keeper’s Rep. π. App. ɪɪ. ρ. ι8x ;
the amount was 20s. on the knight’s fee held immediately of the king,
and the same on every twenty pounds rental of land held of the king in
socage, according to Stat. 25 Edw. III. But the grant of the aid was not
yet made ; it was to be discussed in a great council in January 1402. See
p. 37, note 4j below.
2 Ann. Henr. p. 337 ; Eulog. iii. 387 ; Rot. Parl. iii. 473.
3 Adam of Usk, p. 61.
i Ord. i. 185 ; Chron. Henr. ed. Giles, pp. 27, 30. In a letter to hia
tenants dated Dec. 13, 1402, Mortimer announces that he has joined
Glendower in a scheme to restore Richard if he is alive, or if he is dead
to place the earl of March on the throne ; Ellis, Original Letters, 2nd
series, i. 24 ; Tyler, Henry of Monmouth, i. 135. On the 28th of Feb. 1405
is dated the agreement between Glendower, Mortimer, and Northumber-
land, for a division of England and Wales between the three ; ib.'p. 150 ∙
Chron. Henr. ed. Giles, pp. 39 sq. ; Hall, p. 28.
5 Ann. Henr. p. 343.
χvjιι.] Parliament of j402. 37
reaction in favour of Richard began to set in. It was currently 1Jum°Vr, .
reported that he was alive in Scotland. Franciscan friars went is alive, 1402.
up and down the country organising conspiracy. In May
Henry had to charge the bishop of Carlisle and the earl of
Northumberland to arrest all who were spreading the false
news1; and a number of executions followed2, showing that
the king’s patience was exhausted and his temper embittered.
Walter Baldock, an Augustinian canon, and another priest who Executions,
had engaged in conspiracy, were hanged. Eight Franciscans
underwent the same fate, without any show of ecclesiastical re-
monstrance. Sir Roger Clarendon, a son of the Black Prince,
•with his esquire and page, perished in the same way and for the
same cause. A popular rising was expected in London ; Owen
Glendower and the Scots were believed to hold the strings
of a secret league, and the sorceries of the friars were supposed
to be the causes of the ill success of the king3. In one quarter
only there was light. The earl of Northumberland and Hot-Battieof
spur defeated the Scots at Homildon in September, and in that нт,
victory crowned the series of their services to Henry with a I4o2.
success which seems to have led to a final breach with him.
The victory of Homildon was the one piece of good news which
could be reported to the next parliament.
308. The last instalment of the tenth and fifteenth granted Pariia-
, t mentary
in March 1401 was due in the following November, and, as Iiistoryof
1402.
a renewal of the grant would be immediately required, the
parliament was summoned for January 30, 1402 ; but if such
an assembly was ever held it left no traces whatever of its
action4; there are no statutes, no rolls of proceedings, no
' Rymer, viii. 255; cf. pp. 261, 262, 268.
‘ Ann. Henr. pp. 309, 340 ; Wals. ii. 249 ; Eulog. iii. 389-394 ; Clir.
Giles, p. 28.
3 ‘Arte magiea,’ Otterb. p. 236; ‘mala arte fratrum nιinorum/ Ann.
Henr. p. 343 ! Wals. ɪɪ. 251. ‘ All men trowed witches it were that made
that ɛtounde ; ’ Hardyng, p. 360.
4 The writs for such a parliament at Westminster were issued on the
2nd of December ; Lords’ Report, iv. 77b 1 all(l for convocation to be held
the first Monday in Lent ; ib. p. 778. The Rolls OfParliament contain a
few petitions of the rhird year of Henry which might be referred to such a
parliament if it were really held ; but one of them speaks of the parliament
as sitting at Coventry, so that probably they belong to ι4o4. The bishop