Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 7.djvu/245

ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS. 167 had been constituted Captain-General of all France, nominates a procurcnt' general. It does not appear whether any special occasion had caused him to quit the scene of the important functions of that office. At no long interval after the date of the authority delegated to " Jehan Declay," treasurer of his household, the Duke of York was despatched by Henry VI. to another post of urgent moment, being sent to Ireland, then in a state of tumult, and constituted Lieutenant. (Pat. 26 Hen. VI.) In the interesting letters relating to a subsequent period, for which we are indebted to the scrutinising researches of Mrs. Green, a sad picture is presented to us of the discord and adversity which had thrown a dark cloud over merry England and every class of the community. The bitterness of civil war had filled the land with calamity and disunion ; the most noble and the most talented were driven to crave from the hospitality of other lands the shelter or repose which they sought in vain in the country of their birth. The violence of factious irritation had been aggravated by succes- sive and sanguinary contests, and the best of English blood had been wantonly shed on the fields of St. Alban's, Wakefield, and Ludlow. After the fatal fight of Towton on Palm Sunday, 1461, Queen Margaret and Prince Edward took refuge in France, and many of the faithful partisans of Henry were scattered as exiles. It is to the period of their subsequent wanderings in foreign parts, that the following letters of the Prince and the venejable Lancasterian, Sir John Fortescue, Lord Chief Justice of England, have been assigned. He had been attainted of high treason in the Parliament held in November, 1 Edw. IV., 1461, with many others, amongst whom was '• John Ormond, Knt.," here designated by the title of Earl of Ormond, whose brother, the fifth Earl, was attainted and beheaded for his adherence to the cause of Henry VI. It may be supposed that stress of weather, or eagerness to escape from England, had led Ormond to land in Portugal : had he been despatched thither as an envoy by Queen Margaret, he would doubtless have taken his credentials with him ; but, being in that country, the Queen hoped to take advantage of the opportunity by interesting the King of Portugal in the cause of her ill-fated husband. In reply, therefore, to a request from the Earl for a safe-conduct which would enable him to pass through France, and rejoin the exiled Queen, Margaret wrote him a letter, requesting him to use his influence with the Portuguese monarch, to obtain some assistance for the failing Lancasterian cause. With this letter was sent one from her son, the young Prince of Wales, to the King of Portugal ; another from him to the Earl of Ormond, which is printed, the third, in the following collection ; a paper of formal instructions from the Queen to the Earl ; and a letter to him from Sir Joliu Fortescue, also printed. The packet seems to have been intercepted and detained by the King of France, as the papers are now found in the same collection with others addressed to that monarch. The letter of the Prince of Wales to the Portuguese King is in Latin, recommending the Earl of Ormond, dilating upon the military prowess of the King, which he (the Prince) hoped to emulate in maturer years, and detail- ing the virtues and misfortunes of the House of Lancaster. It is signed thus, " Wallise Princeps, vester ad vota paratissimus consanguineus, Edwahdus." The paper bears the endorsement in a somewhat later hand, — 1461. It must have been the expedition of Alphonso V., King of Portugal, against the Moors, in 1459, which excited the chivalrous emulation of the VOL. vir. z