90 Constitutional History. [chap.
and powers were bestowed on Gilbert TaIbot to receive the
remains of Owen Glendower’s party to pardon ɪ.
Expedition
of 1417.
Supplies
granted.
Bishop
Beaufort's
loans, 1417.
Ships built.
Henry’s success in obtaining money, men, and ships, seems
after the story of the late reign little less than miraculous.
The expedition of 1415 had involved the raising of 11,000 men
and 1300 vessels large and small; the money required had been
raised largely by loans secured on the grants of the parliament.
The expedition of 1417 was to be on a much larger scale: an
army of 25,000 men and a fleet of ɪgoo vessels, of which a
much greater proportion were to be vessels of war, worthy of
an English navy2. Two parliaments sat during the season of
preparation. In March 1416 the commons accelerated the
grant of a tenth and a fifteenth due at Martinmas 3 ; in October
they granted two similar aids, payable in the February and
November following; and empowered the king to raise a
loan on the security thus created 4. The bishop of AVinchester
lent the king 21,000 marks on the security of the customs; the
city of London lent ɪo,ooo on the crown jewels. The clergy of
the two provinces gɪ anted their tenths in proportion to the
liberality of the commons. To the building of ships Henry
devoted himself with special ardour; although a great part of
the naval service was still conducted by pressed ships, the royal
navy was so much increased as to be henceforth a real national
armament. In February 1417 the king possessed six great
ɪ Rymer, ix. 283, 330, 417 ; Ordinances, ii. 221 ; Gesta Hear. p. 81.
2 Sir Harris Nicolas estimates the total number of Henry’s army in
1415, when it started, at 30,000; Battle of Agincourt, p. 48. 11,500
men-at-arms, each v itlɪ his servant, and the persons of higher rank with
two or three servants, might make up this number. A Muster Roll of
1417 is printed in Williams’s notes to the Gesta Henrici V, pp. 265 sq. ;
this contains 8000 men-at-arms and archers ; but forms only one third
of the entire list. The Gesta (p. 109) give 16,400 as the number of men-
at-arms ; the total, calculated on the basis given above, must thus have
reached nearly 50,000.
s Mar. ι6-Apr. 8 ; Rot. Park iv. 71 ; Gesta Henrici, pp. 69, 73∙
4 Dep. Keeper’s Rep. ii. App. ii. p. 187; Rot. Park iv. 95. The par-
liament sat Oct. 19 to Nov. 20 ; Gesta Henr. pp. 105, 107. The convoca-
tion of Canterbury granted two tenths, York one ; AVake, p. 352 ; Wilkins,
Cone. iii. 377, 380. The commissions for loans were issued July 23, 1417 ;
Rymer, ix. 499. The commission for Hertfordshire reported that they
could get no money, Oct. 6 ; ib. p. 500.
XVIII.]
The National Armamente.
9t
ships, eight barges, and ten balingeτs1 ; the ships were built
under his personal superintendence at Southampton and in the
Thames. Following the example of Richard I, he issued or-
dinances for the fleets and armies, which may, far more safely
than earlier fragments of legislation, be regarded as the
basis of the English law of the admiralty, and as no un-
important contribution to international jurisprudence2. Sur-
geons were appointed for the fleet and armys, The minutest
details of victualling went on under the king’s eye. The par- Cessation of
Iiaments forgot to grumble, the earls felt themselves too -weak dangers,
or too safe to make it wise to quarrel; the duke of York, whose
name, rightly or wrongly, had been mixed up with every con-
spiracy of the last reign, had fallen at Agincourt ; Thomas
Beaufqft was made duke of Exeter in the parliament of October,
1416. Even Lollardy was on the wane. No untoward omen
like the plot at Southampton threw a shadow over the second
epoch of the war. Coincidently with the king’s departure
bishop Beaufort resigned the great seal4, and set out by way
of Constance to Palestine. The duke of Bedford stayed at home Bedford
as the king’s lieutenant, with bishop Longley as chancellor. the realm.
The successes of the king in his second expedition, although Iienrv⅛
less startling than those of 1415, were amply sufficient to keep of France,
up the national ardour ; the earl of Huntingdon was victorious ɪ4'7 1"*2°'
at sea, Henry himself secured Normandy by a series of tedious
sieges in 1417 and 1418, gaining however even more from the
miserable discord of his adversaries. Earlyin 1419 Rouen was
taken, and in July Pontoise surrendered, opening the way to
Paris. In August the murder of John of Burgundy by the
dauphin threw the weight of that important but vacillating
power decisively on the side of Henry ; duke Philip determined
to avenge his father and to make common cause with England.
The crime of the dauphin placed France at Henry’s feet. The
unhappy king was brought to terms, and in May 1420, by the
1 Nicolas, Agincourt, App. p. 21 ; Ellis, Original Letters, 3rd Series,
ɪ. ?2 ; 2nd Series, i. 68 ; cf. Ordinances, ii. 202.
2 Nicolas, Agincourt, App. p. 31.
3 Rymer, ix. 363. 4 lb. ix. 472.