[Sidenote: Bury St. Edmund's.]
The Parliament was accordingly summoned to meet at Bury St. Edmund's-a town situated about fifty or sixty miles to the northeast of London, where there was a celebrated abbey.[9] The English Parliament was in those days, as it is, in fact, in theory now, nothing more nor less than a convocation of the leading personages of the realm, called by the king, in order that they might give the monarch their counsel or aid in any emergency that might arise, and he could call them to attend him at any place within the kingdom that he chose to designate.
[Footnote 9: See map.]
While thus, by summoning Parliament to meet at Bury St. Edmund's, the queen's party placed themselves beyond the reach of the friends and adherents of Gloucester, who were very numerous in and around the capital, they took care to have a strong force there on their own side, ready to do whatever might be required of them.
[Sidenote: The abbey.]
[Sidenote: The duke arrested.]
When the appointed day arrived the Parliament assembled. It met in the abbey. The great dining-hall of the abbey, or the refectory, as it was called, the room in which the monks were accustomed to take their meals, was fitted up for their reception. On the first day some ordinary business was transacted, and on the second, suddenly, and without any previous warning, the duke was arrested by the public officer, who was attended and aided in this service by a strong force, and immediately taken away to the Tower.
This event, of course, produced great excitement. The news of it spread rapidly throughout the kingdom, and it awakened universal astonishment and alarm.
[Sidenote: Discontents of the people.]
It was expected that charges would be immediately brought against him, and that he would be at once arraigned for trial. But the excitement which the affair had created was increased to a ten-fold degree by the tidings which were circulated a few days afterward that he was dead. The story was that he was found dead one morning in his prison. People, however, were slow to believe this statement. They thought that he had been poisoned, or put to death in some other violent manner. The officers of the government declared that it was not so; and, in order to convince the people that the duke had died a natural death, they caused the body to be exposed to public view for several days before they allowed it to be interred, in order that all might see that it bore no marks of violence.
The people were, however, not satisfied. They thought that there were many ways by which death might be produced without leaving any outward indications of violence upon the person. They persisted in believing that their favorite had been murdered.
[Sidenote: 1449.]
[Sidenote: Supposed mode of his death.]
One account which was given of the mode of death was that Somerset went to visit him in his prison in the Tower, in order to see whether he could not come to some terms with him but that Gloucester rejected his advances with so much pride and scorn that a furious altercation arose, in the course of which Somerset, with the assistance of men whom he had brought with him, strangled or suffocated the unhappy prisoner on his couch, and then, after arranging his limbs and closing his eyes, so as to give him the appearance of being in a state of slumber, his murderers went away and left him, to be found in that condition by the jailer when he should come to bring him his food.
CHAPTER XI. THE FALL OF SUFFOLK.
[Sidenote: Two years pass away.]
After the death of the Duke of Gloucester, Queen Margaret was plunged in a perfect sea of plots, schemes, manoeuvres, and machinations of all sorts, which it would take a volume fully to unravel. This state of things continued for two years, during which time she became more and more involved in the difficulties and complications which surrounded her, until at last she found herself in very serious trouble. I can only here briefly allude to the more prominent sources of her perplexity.
[Sidenote: Suspicions of the people.]
[Sidenote: Their hearts alienated.]
In the first place, the people of England were very seriously displeased at the treatment which Gloucester had received. They would not believe that he died a natural death, and the impression gained ground very generally that the queen was the cause of his being murdered. They did not suppose that she literally ordered him to be put to death, but that she gave hints or intimations, as royal personages were accustomed to do in such cases in those days, on which some zealous and unscrupulous follower ventured to act, certain of pleasing her. As Gloucester had been a general favorite with the nation, these rumors and suspicions tended greatly to alienate the hearts of the people from the queen. Many began to hate her. They called her the French woman, and vented their ill-will in obscure threats and mutterings.
[Sidenote: Reverses in France.]
[Sidenote: Feeling in England.]
This feeling of hostility to the queen was increased by the very unfortunate turn that things were taking in France about this time. The provinces of Maine and Anjou lay directly to the south of Normandy,[10] which last was the most valuable of the possessions which the English crown held in France, and these two provinces had been given up to the French at the time of Margaret's marriage. It was only on condition that the English would give them up that Lord Suffolk could induce Margaret's father to consent to the match. Suffolk was extremely unwilling to surrender these provinces. He knew that the English nobles and people would be very much dissatisfied as soon as they learned that it was done, and he feared that he might at some future day be called to account for having been concerned in the transaction. But the king was so deeply in love with Margaret that he insisted on Suffolk's complying with the terms which were exacted by her friends, and the provinces were ceded.
[Footnote 10: See map at the commencement of the volume.]
[Sidenote: York regent in France.]
The Duke of York was regent in France at that time, but Margaret felt some uneasiness in respect to his position there. He was the representative and heir of the rival line; and while it was for her interest to give him prominence enough under Henry's government to prevent his growing discontented and desperate, it was not good policy to exalt him to too high a position. She was accordingly somewhat at a loss to decide what to do.
[Sidenote: Somerset.]
Soon after the death of Gloucester, Somerset, finding that he was an object of suspicion, felt himself to be in danger, and he proposed to Margaret that he should retire into Normandy for a time. Margaret suggested that he should take the regency of Normandy in the Duke of York's stead. To this he finally consented. The Duke of York was recalled, and Somerset went to take command of Normandy in his stead.
[Sidenote: Suffolk's intentions.]
[Sidenote: Exposed frontier.]
At the time that Suffolk negotiated the marriage contract between Henry and Margaret, a truce had been made with the King of France, as has already been stated. Suffolk intended and hoped to conclude a permanent peace, but he could not succeed in accomplishing this. The King of France, as soon as the marriage was fairly carried into effect, seemed bent on renewing hostilities, and as he had now the territories of Maine and Anjou in his possession, with all the castles and fortresses which those provinces contained, he could advance to the frontiers of Normandy on that side with great facility, and organize expeditions for invading the country in the most effective manner.
[Sidenote: Pretext for war.]