THE BATTLE OF SPURS. 109 out England, Scotland, and France; and so far as can at present be seen, it seems to have pertained equally to these three countries. 4. Though men of the name of Robin Hood have existed in England, that of itself would afford no ground for inferring that one of them was the Robin Hood of romantic tradition; but any pretence for such a supposition is taken away by the strong evidence, both Scotch and French, now adduced in support of the opposite view." Robin Hood appears to have become the general name for a chieftain of archers; for in Stow's account of King Henry VIII. going to Shooter's Hill-wood to fetch may, in the year 1511, when "the King, with Queen Catherine his wife, accompanied by many lords and ladies, rode a-maying from Greenwich to the high ground of Shooter's Hill, where, as they passed by the way, they espyed a company of tall yeomen, clothed all in greene, with greene hoods and with bowes and arrowes, to the number of 200. One being the chieftain, was called Robin Hood, who required the King and all his company to stay and see his men shoot; whereunto the King granting, Robin Hood whistled, and all the 200 archers shot off, loosing all at once; and when he whistled againe, they likewise shot againe; their arrowes whistled by craft of the head, so that the noise was strange and loud, which greatly delighted the King and Queen, and their company." Afterwards, Robin Hood invited them to enter the wood, where," in arbours made with boughs and deck't with flowers, they were set and served plentifully with venison and wine." Shooter's Hill, named from its having been a place for the practice of archery from a very early period, became noted for the numerous robberies committed upon it. In the sixth year of Richard an order was issued by the Crown to "cut down the woods on each side the road at Shetor's Held, leading from London to Rochester, which was become very dangerous to travellers, in compliance with the statute of Edward I. for widening roads where there were woods which afforded shelter for thieves." In the reign of Henry VIII. there was a beacon on the summit of the Hill, as appears from several entries in the churchwarden's accounts of Eltham, of sums paid “for watching the beacon on Shuter's Hill." The modern triangular Tower built here is 445 feet above the level of the sea. THE BATTLE OF SPURS. This was the name given to the battle of Courtray, July 11, 1302, the first great engagement between the nobles and the burghers, which, with the subsequent battles of Bannockburn, Crecy, and Poitiers, decided the fate of feudalism. In this encounter the knights and gentlemen of France were entirely overthrown by the citizens of a Flemish manufacturing town. The French nobility rushed forward with loose bridles, and fell headlong, one after another, into an enormous ditch, which lay between them and their enemies. The whole army was annihilated, and when the spoils were gathered, there were found 4000 golden spurs to mark the extent of the knightly slaughter, and give a name to the engagement:— "I beheld the Flemish weavers, with Namur and Juliers bold, Longfellow. The name of the Battle of Spurs was also given to an affair at Guinegate, near Calais, August 18, 1513, in which the English troops under Henry VIII. defeated the French forces. The allusion is said to be to the unusual energy of the beaten party in riding off the field.-Wheeler's Dictionary of the Noted Names of Fiction. A highly intelligent young prisoner, Louis d'Orleans, the Duke of Longueville, &c., was taken at the Battle of Spurs, and sent over to the safe keeping of Queen Catherine, who did not care for the custody of a lively French nobleman, and so recommended that he should be disposed of in the Tower. Nevertheless, he contrived to make himself agreeable, if not to Queen Catherine, certainly to the king and to Wolsey, and he was not slow in turning these advantages to the interest of Louis, and in bringing him to a more promising understanding with Henry. It was reported that Anne of Brittany had died January 9, 1514, and though the report was probably premature, it is certain that some correspondence had been going on between his master and Henry by the means of this adroit Duke of Longueville; and with what object? Whether for the marriage of Louis with Mary, Tudor princess, and the most beautiful woman of her time, cannot at present be ascertained; but the result was, at all events, that Prince Charles, a sickly, melancholy boy of 14, was set aside as a worse alternative than a valetudinarian of 52, and Mary was publicly betrothed to Louis; so that the whole course of her wooing, her love letters, the number of her dresses, her attendants, her reception at Paris, her coronation, and life at the French Court, may be read in the documents appended to Mr. Brewer's Catalogue of the Letters and Papers of the Reign of Henry VIII. THE BATTLE OF THE THIRTY. This celebrated engagement took place at a spot known as Midway Oak, halfway between the castles of Josselin and Ploermel, in France, March 27, 1351. The French General Beaumanoir, commanding the former post, being enraged by depredations committed by Bemborough, the English general occupying the latter position, challenged him to fight. Upon this, it was agreed that thirty knights of each party should meet and decide the contest. The two chiefs presented themselves at the head of their best soldiers, and the battle began in earnest. At the first onset the English were successful; but Bemborough having been killed, the French renewed the struggle with redoubled courage, and won the victory. "This," says Wheeler, "was one of the most heroic exploits of the age, and gained such popularity that, more than a hundred years later, when speaking of a hard contest, it was usually said, "There was never such hard fighting since ‘the Battle of the Thirty.' WHERE WAS THE FIRST PRINCE OF WALES BORN ? The title of Princes of Wales originally distinguished the native Princes of that country; and after the entire conquest of Wales and its union with England, the title was transferred to the heir-apparent of the English crown. Henry III., in the thirty-ninth year of his reign, gave to his son Edward (afterwards Edward I.) the principality of Wales and earldom of Chester, but rather as an office of trust and government than an especial title for the heir-apparent to his crown. When Edward afterwards became King, he conquered, in 1277, Llewelyn and David, the last native Princes of Wales, and united the kingdom of Wales with the crown of England. There is a tradition that Edward, to satisfy the national feelings of the Welsh people, promised to give them a prince without blemish on his honour, a Welshman by birth, and one who could not speak a word of English. In order to fulfil his promise literally, he sent the Queen Eleanor to be confined at Caernarvon Castle; and he invested with the principality her son, Edward of Caernarvon, then an infant, and caused the barons and great men to do him homage. Edward was not at the time the King's eldest son, but on the death of his brother, Alfonso, he became heir-apparent, and from that time the Prince of Wales has ever been the title of the eldest son of the King. The title, however, is not inherited, but conferred by special creation and investiture, and was not always given shortly after the birth of the heir-apparent. Edward's creation of Prince of Wales dates from the year 1301, when he was seventeen years old; his son was ten years old when he was created Prince of Wales. It is not easy to understand what honour can attach to any spot from its being the birth-place of Edward the Second, one of the few kings of England who were deposed by Parliament for their crimes. But Caernarvon rejoices in the honour of being the birthplace of the first Prince of Wales. It is, however, difficult to understand why the inhabitants of the counties and towns of North Wales should rejoice to speak of the son of the conqueror as "the first Prince of Wales," as if they had wholly forgotten their last Llwyelyn, as if there had never been such a prince as Gruffydd, the head and shield and defender of Britons; the warrior whom it needed all the might of Harold himself to overthrow. Still, Caernarvon claims its Castle as the birthplace of the Prince, though this is a strange perversion of the facts of history. When, in April, 1868, the Prince of Wales visited Caernarvon, he was welcomed in the Castle "on this the anniversary of the birth within these walls of the first Prince of Wales," and reference was made to "the period in which the first Prince of Wales was presented to a reluctant population from the gates of this majestic and venerable building." Lastly, "the Prince and Princess of Wales were conducted to the Eagle Tower, the chamber in which, according to tradition, the first Prince of Wales was born." In all these words and deeds there is a flagrant falsification of history. Nothing is more certain than that Edward the Second was not born in the present Caernarvon Castle, least of all in the Eagle Tower which he himself built. And the truth of the matter is per 112 EDWARD II. AND BERKELEY CASTLE. fectly well known, and perfectly well known on the spot. The late Mr. Hartshorne twice, in 1848 and in 1857, lectured to large audiences in the Castle, and explained its history. Mr. Hartshorne's discoveries are not only familiar to all antiquaries, but they are quite familiar at Caernarvon. Edward the Second was undoubtedly born at Caernarvon on St. Mark's Day, 1284; but he was not born in the present castle, which did not then exist. The only passage of any ancient writer which could have given ground for such a belief is the expression of Nicholas Trivet :"Apud castrum de Karnarvan quod nuper Rex Angliæ fortissimum fecerat, natus est Regi filius, ex nomine patris vocatus Edwardus." But "castrum" may just as well mean the town as the castle, and anyhow N. Trivet is wrong in his fact, as the first beginning of fortifications at Caernarvon at all was made in November 1284, seven months after Edward's birth. There is no guess-work in the matter. Mr. Hartshorne made out the date of everything from the Public Records. The first Castle of Caernarvon was begun in November 1284, and was finished in 1291. The town walls were built in 1296. Edward the Second was therefore not born either in a castle or in a fortified town. And the castle which began to be built a few months after his death is not the castle which is now standing. The first castle was destroyed in Madoc's revolt in 1295. Edward the First then began again, but the work was not finished at the time of his death. The work was continued by Edward the Second. The Eagle Tower, in which tradition says that he was born, was built by Edward the Second himself, and was finished in 1317. The gateway of the majestic and venerable building, at which he was presented to a reluctant population, was also built by himself, and was finished in 1320, when he had attained the mature age of thirtysix years. All these are facts, resting on documentary evidence, facts perfectly well known to every decently-informed person."-Saturday Review, May 2, 1868. Nor are these all the strange stories of the Castle. It has been affirmed on authority, that the Castle was built in one year; and that the Eagle Tower was named from a now shapeless figure of an eagle, brought, it is alleged, from the ruins of Segontium; but an eagle was one of Edward's crests. The whole edifice was repaired about twenty years ago, at a cost of upwards of 3000l. The late Marquis of Anglesey was long governor of the fortress. Painful as it may be to contemplate the downfall of such a tradition, historic truth is of greater consequence to establish. The "first Prince of Wales" was certainly born in the town of Caernarvon, and most probably in some building temporarily erected for the accommodation of the royal household. EDWARD II. AND BERKELEY CASTLE. When Horace Walpole, in 1774, visited Matson, near Gloucester, the very mansion where King Charles I. and his two eldest sons lay during the siege; and there are marks of the lad's hacking with his WERE CANNON USED AT CRECY? 113 hanger on a window, he went to Gloucester Cathedral, and on seeing the monument of Edward II. a new historic doubt started, which, writes Walpole to Cole, "I pray you to solve. His Majesty has a longish beard; and such were certainly worn at that time. Who is the first historian that tells the story of his being shaven with cold water from a ditch, and weeping to supply warm, as he was carried to Berkeley Castle? Is not this apocryphal ?" [The incident is narrated by Rapin.] In the neighbourhood Walpole found in a wretched cottage a child in an ancient oaken cradle, exactly in the form of that lately published from the cradle of Edward II. Walpole purchased it for five shillings, but doubted whether he should have fortitude enough to transport it to Strawberry Hill. He was much disappointed with Berkeley Castle, though very entire: he notes: "the room shown for the murder of Edward II., and the shrieks of an agonising king, I verily believe to be genuine. It is a dismal chamber, almost at the top of the house, quite detached, and to be approached only by a kind of footbridge, and from that descends a large flight of steps, that terminate on strong gates; exactly a situation for a corps de garde. In that room they show you a cast of a face, in plaster, and tell you it was taken from Edward's. I was not quite so easy of faith about that; for it is evidently the face of Charles I." WERE CANNON USED AT CRECY? This is a quæstio vexata of long standing. We find it said that in King Edward's army there were a few of those novel engines, and that the good service which they did, conduced most to his victory. On the other hand, many modern writers leave out all mention of them, not deeming the evidence of the fact strong enough. Not only our old Latin chroniclers, but our English historians also, Holinshed and Speed, are wholly silent upon this subject. Such a statement seems to rest on the one-sided authority of French writers-on Mezerai, Larrey, and others; making it a sort of palliation of this extraordinary defeat of their countrymen. The former says, "then these hitherto unknown and formidable engines induced them to believe that they were combating with devils rather than men."-Notes and Queries, No. 264. The Italian writer, Villani, who died in 1348, states that the English used "bombards, which shot out balls of iron with fire, to terrify and destroy the horses of the French," and of their discharges being accompanied with "so great a shaking and noise that it seemed as if the Deity were thundering, and with a great slaying of men and horses." Mr. Sharon Turner states that Froissart says nothing about the use of cannon at this battle; but in a manuscript of Froissart, preserved in the Library of Amiens, it is distinctly stated that cannon were used by the English at Crecy. The passage referred to is quoted by the Emperor Napoleon I., in his work on Artillery, and runs thus, translated: "And the English caused to fire suddenly certain guns which they had in the battle, to astonish (or confound) the Genoese."-Notes and Queries, No. 270 |