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73, 74) who were captured at Agincourt, "Charles Duke of Orleans, nephew to the king," was discovered by an English esquire, Richard Waller, under a heap of slain, showing but faint signs of life; and after a captivity of twenty-five years in England, he was released on payment of eighty thousand crowns, in part of the sum fixed for his ransom, April, 1440. He lightened the rigour of his prison, the Tower of London, by composing several poems, which possess great merit. He died in 1465, and his son (by his third wife) became King of France in 1498, as Louis XII., in succession to Charles VIII.

DUKE OF BOURBON. This prince, John Duke of Bourbon, succeeded his father, Louis the Good, in 1410. He served at Agincourt in the van, under the Constable D'Albret, and being taken prisoner was conveyed to England, where he died in 1433, and was succeeded as Duke of Bourbon by his son, Charles Count of Clermont. He was buried at Christ Church, Newgate Street, where so many illustrious persons of royal and noble rank were interred. Among the great persons buried at Christ Church were four queens, and Stow records the interment of the French prince, "John, Duke of Burbon and Angue, Earl of Claremond, Montpencier, and Baron Beaugen, who was taken prisoner at Agencourt, kept prisoner eighteene yeeres and deceased in 1433."

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THE CONSTABLE OF FRAnce. This personage, called in the play (iv. 8. 90) “ Charles Delabreth, high constable of France," was a natural son of Charles le Mauvais, King of Navarre, and consequently half-brother to Henry the Fifth's step-mother, Queen Joan, whom he had

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accompanied to England in 1402 when she came over from Britany to be married to Henry IV. By virtue of his office the Constable D'Albret had the supreme command of the French army at Agincourt, and led the he was wounded, and died the day after the

van; battle.

van.

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RAMBURES AND GRANDPRÉ, French Lords.. The former of these leaders, "The master of the crossbows, Lord Rambures " (iv. 8. 92), held a high command in the He is no doubt the person alluded to (by Rymer in his Fœdera) as " David, Seigneur de Ramouxes nostre Cambellain and Maister de Arbalestriers de France," in a treaty between Charles VI. and Henry V., dated at Paris, Aug. 22, 1413.

"The Lord Grandpré" (iii. 7. 125) was a leader in the main body with the Dukes of Bar and Alençon. Both the French lords fell in the battle. The Count of GrandPré is named as one of the Twelve Great Peers of France assembled in Parliament at Paris, held in 1223; and Froissart mentions a "lord of Rambures as commanding the French infantry, about 1381, in the war between Charles VI. and Philip von Arteveldt.

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GOVERNOR OF HARFLeur. Jean Lord D'Estouteville held the chief command at Harfleur when it was first invested by the English; but a reinforcement of three hundred lances having been thrown in under Raoul Sieur de Gaucourt, that leader seems thereupon to have assumed the direction of the defence. Thus Lydgate

speaks of him as governor,

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"The Lord Gaucourt certyenly,

For he was capteyn in that place."

Gaucourt was the principal spokesman, for his side, in the parleys with the English lords appointed to treat for the surrender of the town, after a siege of thirty-six days, Sept. 22, 1415. D'Estouteville and Gaucourt were both sent as prisoners to England; the latter wrote a narrative of the siege. A Robert D'Estouteville was appointed by Louis XI. to the command of a force in Artois to oppose the landing of Edward IV. when he meditated the conquest of France.

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AMBASSADORS to the King of England. Several embassies were sent from France to Henry IV., but the personages on the present occasion were Louis Earl of Vendôme, Monsieur William Bouratin the Archbishop of Bourges, the Bishop of Lisieux, the Lords of Ivry and Braquemont, with Jean Andrée and Master Gualtier Cole the king's secretaries. Grafton gives at much length the addresses of the ambassadors, of whom the archbishop was the chief speaker, telling Henry V. with great boldness that his master, the King of France, did not consider him even to have any right to the crown of England, since it belonged to the true heir of the late King Richard. In the Famous Victories it is stated that "the Archbishop of Bourges and Monsieur le Cole" have been sent on the embassage; but only the prelate appears on the scene.

MONTJOY, a French Herald. The principal king-atarms was taken prisoner at Agincourt, and it was from him that Henry V. learned that he had gained the field, and also the name of the place, as stated in the play (iv. 7. 83, 86). Mont-joie was the battle-cry of the French, as "Saint George" was of the English; and

66

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in the Famous Victories the former are represented as crying, "Saint Dennis Mont-joye, Saint Dennis!"

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ISABEL, Queen of France. Owing to her husband's malady, Isabeau of Bavaria took an active part in state affairs, although the Dukes of Burgundy, John the Fearless, and his son Philip the Good, by turns ruled or distracted the kingdom. The queen died Sept. 24, 1435, three days after the ratification of the "peace of Troyes (the second treaty of that name), to which she was mainly instrumental. Miss Strickland speaks of her as "the wicked queen Isabeau," and calls her "a vile woman, who neglected her children when they were young." Mr. Hallam styles her "the most infamous of women.' French writers differ in opinion of her, for whereas M. Villaret condemns Isabel's conduct, M. de Sismondi thinks more favourably of her character.

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KATHARINE, daughter of Charles and Isabel. This princess was born in Paris, Oct. 27, 1401. After her betrothal at Troyes, May 21, 1420, Henry V. committed the safe keeping of his bride to his favourite knight, Sir Louis Robsert, who fought at Agincourt, for which service he was made a K. G.; he was also the escort of the widowed Katharine during the long ceremony of her great husband's funeral, being always one mile in the rear of the stately procession.

Queen Katharine married, secondly, Owen Tudor, a highly-descended but poor Welsh gentleman, who is said to have been one of Davy Gam's retinue at Agincourt, and to have saved the life of Henry V., who certainly made him one of his " esquires of the body," an office which he afterwards held to the infant king, Henry VI.,

on whom he attended at Windsor, and thus was brought to the notice of the young queen-mother. This second marriage, for a long time kept secret, is supposed to have taken place in 1428. The children of Owen Tudor and Queen Katharine were three sons and a daughter. The eldest son, Edmund Tudor, created by his half-brother, Henry VI., in 1452, Earl of Richmond, obtained the hand of the great heiress of the Dukes of Somerset, Margaret Beaufort; and their only child sat on the throne as Henry VII.

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The widow of the warlike Henry V. passed the latter part of her life in great obscurity, her second marriage having given much offence to the proud princes of both nations, and she died in Bermondsey Abbey, Jan. 3, 1437. Henry VI. took very little notice of his stepfather, who never attained any dignity or title, and who is simply styled "Owen ap Tyder, Esquire," in a charter of Queen Katharine, dated 1434. The only reward or office which appears to have been bestowed upon him was in the year before his death, when he was appointed keeper of some royal parks in the county of Denbigh. He fought for the Lancastrian cause in the War of the Roses, under his able son Jaspar Tudor, at Mortimer's Cross, and being taken prisoner, was beheaded by order of the Duke of York, afterwards Edward IV.; this battle was fought on Candlemas Eve, Feb. 1, 1461.

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