Margaret of Anjou Part 22

So great were the number of persons dependent upon the queen, and so urgent were their necessities, that all the funds which the French merchant had furnished her were exhausted on her arrival in France.

She found, moreover, that the three friends, the n.o.blemen whom she had sent to France the summer before, and from whom she had received the letter we have quoted, had left that country and gone to Scotland to seek her. They had provided themselves with a vessel, in which they intended to take the queen away from Scotland and convey her to some place of safety, not knowing that she had herself embarked for France.

They must have pa.s.sed the queen's vessel on the way, unless, indeed, which is very probably the case, they went up the Channel and through the Straits of Dover, thus taking an altogether different route from that chosen by the queen.

[Sidenote: Missed by her friends.]

When they reached Scotland they hovered on the coast a long time, endeavoring to find an opportunity to communicate with her secretly; but at length they learned that she was gone.

[Sidenote: She goes to France.]

In the mean time, Margaret, having arrived in France, borrowed some money of the Duke of Brittany, in whose dominions it would seem she first landed. With this money Margaret supplied the most pressing wants of her party, and also made arrangements for pursuing her journey into the country, to the town in Normandy where her cousin the king was then residing.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Louis XI., Margaret's Cousin.]

[Sidenote: Louis XI.]

It is said that, on arriving at the court of the king and obtaining admission to his majesty's presence, Margaret took the young prince by the hand, and, throwing herself down at her cousin's feet, she implored him, with many tears, to take pity upon her forlorn and wretched condition, and that of her unhappy husband, and to aid her in her efforts to recover his throne.

But the king, with true royal heartlessness, was unmoved by her distress, and manifested no disposition to espouse her cause.

[Sidenote: Negotiations.]

Some negotiations, however, ensued, at the close of which the king promised to loan her a sum of money--for a consideration. The consideration was that she was to convey to him the port and town of Calais, which was still held by the English, and was considered a very important and very valuable possession, or else pay back double the money which she borrowed.

[Sidenote: Mortgage of Calais.]

Thus it was not an absolute sale of Calais, but only a mortgage of it, which the queen executed. But, nevertheless, as soon as this transaction was made known in England, it excited great indignation throughout the country, and seriously injured the cause of the queen.

The people accused her of being ready to alienate the possessions of the crown, possessions which it had cost so much both in blood and treasure to procure.

[Sidenote: Doubtful security.]

Of course, the security which the king obtained for his loan was of a somewhat doubtful character, for Margaret's mortgage deed of Calais, although she gave it in King Henry's name, and was careful to state in it that she was expressly authorized by him to make it, was of no force at all so long as Edward of York reigned in England, and was acknowledged by the people as the rightful king. It was only in the event of Margaret's succeeding in recovering the throne for her husband that the mortgage could take effect. The deed which she executed stipulated that, as soon as King Henry should be restored to his kingdom, he would appoint one of two persons named, in whom the King of France had confidence, as governor of the town, with authority to deliver it up to the King of France in one year in case she did not within that time pay back double the sum of money borrowed.

[Sidenote: Conditions.]

He seemed to think that, considering the great risk he was taking, a hundred per cent per annum was not an exorbitant usury.

CHAPTER XIX.

RETURN TO ENGLAND.

[Sidenote: Margaret finds a friend.]

Margaret found one friend in France, who seems to have espoused her cause from a sentiment of sincere and disinterested attachment to her.

This was a certain knight named Pierre de Breze.[16] He was an officer of high rank in the government of Normandy, and a man of very considerable influence among the distinguished personages of those times.

[Footnote 16: p.r.o.nounced Brezzay.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Map of the Scottish Border.]

[Sidenote: Account of Breze.]

[Sidenote: He enters the queen's service.]

Margaret had known him intimately many years before. He was appointed one of the commissioners on the French side to negotiate, with Suffolk and the others, the terms of Margaret's marriage, and he had taken a very prominent part in the tournaments and other celebrations which took place in honor of the wedding before Margaret left her native land. When he now saw the poor queen coming back to France an exile, bereft of friends, of resources, and almost of hope, the interest which he had felt for her in former years was revived. It is said that he fell in love with her. However this may be, it is certain that Margaret's great beauty must have had a very important influence in deepening the sentiment of compa.s.sion which the misfortunes of the poor fugitive were so well calculated to inspire. At any rate, Breze entered at once into the queen's service with great enthusiasm. He brought with him a force of two thousand men. With this army, and with the money which she had borrowed of King Louis, Margaret resolved to make one more attempt to recover her husband's kingdom.

[Sidenote: Margaret's plans.]

At length, in the month of October, 1462, five months after she arrived in France, she set sail with a small number of vessels, containing the soldiers that Breze had provided for her. Her plan was to land in the north of England, for it was in that part of the country that the friends of the Lancaster line were most numerous and powerful.

[Sidenote: She goes to England.]

King Edward's government knew something of her plans, or, at least, suspected them, and they stationed a fleet to watch for her and intercept her. She, however, contrived to elude them, and reached the sh.o.r.es of England in safety.

[Sidenote: Hurried flight.]

The fleet approached the sh.o.r.e at Tynemouth, but the guns of the forts were pointed against her, and she was forbidden to land. She, however, succeeded, either at that place or at some other point along the coast, in effecting a debarkation; but she was threatened so soon with an attack by a large army which she heard was approaching, under the command of the Earl of Warwick, that the French troops fled precipitately to their ships, leaving Margaret, the prince, Breze, and a few others who remained faithful to her, on sh.o.r.e. Being thus deserted, Margaret and her party were compelled to retreat too. They embarked on board a fisherman's boat, which was the only means of conveyance left to them, and in this manner made their way to Berwick, which town was in the possession of her friends.

[Sidenote: A storm.]

[Sidenote: Ships wrecked.]

[Sidenote: Holy Island.]

They were long in reaching Berwick, being detained by a storm. The storm, however, caused Margaret a much greater injury than mere detention. The ships in which the French soldiers had fled were caught by it off a range of rocky cliffs lying between Tynemouth and Berwick, the most prominent of which is called Bamborough Head. The ships were driven upon the rocks and rocky islands which lay along the sh.o.r.e, and there broken to pieces by the sea which rolled in upon them from the offing. All the stores, and provisions, and munitions of war which Margaret had brought from France, and which const.i.tuted almost her sole reliance for carrying on the war, were lost. Most of the men saved themselves, and made their escape to an island that lay near, called Holy Island. But here they were soon afterward attacked by a body of Yorkist troops and cut to pieces.

[Sidenote: Margaret's escape.]

Margaret reached Berwick in her fishing-boat at last, bearing these terrible tidings to her friends there. One would suppose that the last hope of her being able to retrieve her fallen fortunes would now be extinguished, and that she would sink down in utter and absolute despair.

[Sidenote: Her spirit revives.]

[Sidenote: Battle of Hexham.]

[Sidenote: The king's escape.]

But it was not in Margaret's nature to despair. The more heavily the pressure of calamity and the hostility of her foes weighed upon her, the more fierce and determined was the spirit of resistance which they aroused in her bosom. In this instance, instead of yielding to dejection and despondency, she began at once to take measures for a.s.sembling a new force, and the ardor and energy which she displayed inspired all around her with some portion of her confidence and zeal.

A new army was raised during the winter. Very early in the spring it took the field, and a series of military operations followed, in which towns and castles were taken and retaken, and skirmishes fought all along the Scottish frontier. At length the contending forces were concentrated near a place called Hexham, and a general battle ensued.

The queen's army was defeated. The king, who was in the battle, had a most narrow escape. He fled on horseback--for when he was in good bodily health he was an excellent horseman--but he was so hotly pursued that three of his body-guard were taken.

It is mentioned that one of the men thus taken wore the king's cap of state, which was embroidered with two crowns of gold, one representing the kingdom of England and the other that of France, the t.i.tle to which country the English sovereigns still pretended to claim, in virtue of their former extended possessions there, although pretty much all except the town of Calais was now lost.

Perhaps the pursuers of the king's party were deceived by this royal cap, and took the wearer of it for the king. At any rate, the officer wearing the cap was taken, and the king escaped.

[Sidenote: The queen's danger.]