Henry of Monmouth, Volume 2 | Page 4

he

was crowned, or had taken the customary oath to govern according to
the laws. The King thanked them for their good affections, and
exhorted them in their several places and stations to employ all their
power for the good of the nation. He told them that he began his reign
in pardoning all that had offended him, and with such a desire for his
people's happiness, that he would be crowned on no other condition
than to make use of all his authority to promote it; and prayed God that,
if he foresaw he was like to be any other than a just and good king, he
would please to take him immediately out of the world, rather than seat
him on the throne, to live a public calamity to his country."--Goodwin.
See Stowe. Polyd. Verg. Elmham.]
[Footnote 3: Elmham.]
But he never seems for a day to have been drawn aside by his private
devotions from the full discharge of the practical duties of his new
station. On the Wednesday he issued summonses for a parliament to
meet within three weeks of Easter. On Friday the 7th of April, he was
conducted to the Tower by a large body of men of London, who (p. 005)
went on horseback to attend him. The next day he was accompanied
back to Westminster, with every demonstration of loyalty and
devotedness to his person, by a great concourse of lords and knights,
many of whom he had created on the preceding evening. On the
following morning, being Passion Sunday, April 9th,[4] he was
crowned with much[5] magnificence in Westminster Abbey.[6]
[Footnote 4: Not Palm Sunday, but the fifth Sunday in Lent, was called
Passion Sunday.]
[Footnote 5: "With mickle royalty."--Chron. Lond.]
[Footnote 6: Chroniclers record that the day of his coronation was a day
of storm and tempest, frost and snow, and that various omens of ill
portent arose from the circumstance.]
One of the first acts of a sovereign in England at that time was to
re-appoint the judges who were in office at the demise of his
predecessor, or to constitute new ones in their stead. Among other

changes, we find Hankford appointed as Chief Justice in the room of
Gascoyne, at least within ten days of the King's accession. For any
observation which this fact may suggest, so contrary to those histories
which repeat tales instead of seeking for the truth in ancient records, we
must refer to the chapter in which we have already examined the
credibility of the alleged insult offered by Prince Henry to a Judge on
the bench of justice.[7]
[Footnote 7: Henry had excited feelings of confidence and admiration
in the minds of foreign potentates, as well as in his subjects at home.
Among the embassies, with offers and pledges of friendship and amity,
which hastened to his court on his accession, are numbered those of
John of Portugal, Robert Duke of Albany, Regent of Scotland, John
King of Castile, John Duke of Brittany, Charles King of France, and
Pope John XXIII.]
The first parliament of Henry V. met in the Painted Chamber (p. 006)
at Westminster, on Monday, 15th of May. The King was on his throne;
but the Bishop of Winchester, his uncle, then Chancellor of England,
opened the business of the session. On this, as on many similar
occasions, the chancellor, generally a prelate, addressed the assembled
states in an oration, half speech and half sermon, upon a passage of
Scripture selected as a text. On the opening of this parliament, the
chancellor informed the peers and the commons that the King's purpose
in calling them together as the Great Council of the nation was
threefold:--First, he was desirous of supporting the throne,--"his high
and royal estate;" secondly, he was bent on maintaining the law and
good government within his realm; and thirdly, he desired to cherish
the friends and to resist the enemies of his kingdom. It is remarkable
that no mention is made in this parliament at all on the part of the King,
or his chancellor, of either heresy or Lollardism. The speaker refers to
some tumults, especially at Cirencester, where the populace appear to
have attacked the abbey; complaints also were made against the
conduct of ordinaries, and some strong enactments were passed against
the usurpations of Rome, (p. 007) to which reference will again be
made: but not a word in answer to these complaints would lead to the
inference that the spirit of persecution was then in the ascendant. It was

not till the last day of April 1414, after the affair of St. Giles' Field, that
the statute against the Lollards was passed at Leicester.[8] The
chancellor at that subsequent period speaks of their treasonable designs
to destroy the King having been lately discovered and discomfited;