"The King, in tears, answered:-"Madam, I grant you all your desire.' "Then the good Queen made the sign of the cross upon her, and commended the King her husband to God, and her youngest son Thomas, who was then beside her; and, in fervent prayer, gave up her spirit, which, I surely believe, was caught by holy angels and carried with joy up into heaven, for, both in thought and deed, she was a holy and virtuous lady."

Thus died the good Philippa of Hainault, on the fifteenth of August, 1369. The news of her death filled the land with mourning; and when the sad tidings was conveyed to the English army at Tourneham," every creature was greatly afflicted and sorely sorrowful." In compliance with her desire, she was interred with magnificent funeral rites in Westminster Abbey. The King and her two youngest sons followed her to her grave, which is not, as she had wished, by the side of her husband's, but at his feet. The beautiful altar-tomb of black marble, with delicate alabaster tabernacles, formerly enclosing eight angels, and which still points out in the Confessor's Chapel where the remains of Queen Philippa repose, was sculptured by John Orchard, stone-mason of London; and the effigy which surmounts the tomb, and which, as a work of art, is considered to rank high, was the work of Hawkin Liege, a Flemish sculptor, who was paid two hundred marks for it. On a tablet near to the tomb are some Latin verses, with the following translation made by Skelton :

"Faire Philippa, William Hainault's child
And younger daughter deare,
Of roseate hue and beauty bright,
In tomb lies hilled here.

Edward III., through mother's will
And nobles' good consent,

Took her to wife, and joyfully
With her his time he spent.
Her brother John, a martial man,

And eke a valiant knight,

Did link this woman to this king,
In bonds of marriage tight.

This match and marriage thus in blood
Did bind the Flemings sure
To Englishmen, by which they did
The Frenchmen's wracke procure.
This Philippa flowered in gifts full rare,
And treasures of the mind,

In beauty bright, religious faith,
To all and each most kind.
A fruitful mother Philippa was,
Full many a son she bred,
And brought forth many a worthy knight,
Hardy and full of dread.
A careful nurse to students all,
Queen's College,* and Dame Pallas' school,
That did her fame resound.
Learn to live!"

At Oxford she did found

Philippa was the mother of twelve children, and of these, five sons and four daughters attained to maturity. Although tall, stalwart, and well-propor tioned, scarcely one of Philippa's sons lived to old age. Edward, named from the colour of his armour the Black Prince, was created Prince of Wales, Duke of Aquitaine and Cornwall, and Earl of Chester. He was also Earl of Kent in right of his wife, the fair Joanna, daughter of Edmund, Earl of Kent, brother to Edward the Second. Joanna had been twice previously married, first to the Earl of Salisbury, from whom she was divorced, and next to the Lord Thomas Holland, who, dying, left her a widow. By the Black Prince she had two sons: Edward, who died in his seventh year, and Richard, who, on the death of Edward the Third, ascended the throne of England. The Black Prince died at Canterbury, on the eighth of June, 1376, and was buried in the cathedral, where his tomb may still be seen.

Lionel of Hatfield, Duke of Clarence, ended his days in Italy, and left only a daughter named Philippa, by his first wife, Elizabeth de Burgh. Like all the sons of Queen Philippa, he was a famous warrior.

John of Gaunt, the renowned Duke of Lancaster, was three times married. By his first wife, Blanch, daughter of Henry, Duke of Lancaster, he had a son Henry, who became King of England, under the title of Henry the Fourth, and two daughters: Philippa, wife of John the First, King of Portugal, and Elizabeth, married to the Earl of Huntingdon. His second wife,

*This is an error: Queen's College, Oxford, was founded not by Philippa, but by her worthy chaplain, Robert de Eglesfield, who modestly placed it under her protection, and named it the College of the Queen.

Constance of Castile, brought him a daughter named Catherine. This daughter was married to John of Portugal's son, Henry the Third, who, in her right, became King of Castile and Leon. By his third wife, Catherine, daughter of Payn Roet, a Gascon, whose younger daughter was married to the Poet-laureate, Geoffrey Chaucer, he had John, Earl of Somerset, Thomas, Duke of Exeter, Henry, Bishop of Winchester, and a daughter christened Joanna.

Edmund of Langley was created Earl of Cambridge by the king his father, and afterwards Duke of York, in the reign of Richard the Second, his nephew. He married Isabella of Castile, by whom he had a son, Richard Plantagenet, Duke of York.

Thomas of Woodstock was made Duke of Buckingham by Richard the Second, and afterwards Duke of Gloucester. Although passionate, self-willed, and petulant, he was valiant, accomplished, and highly intelligent. He was the great patron of the poet Gower; and his work on the Laws of Battle is remarkable for perspicuousness, power, and brilliancy of style. In right of his wife, Eleonora, daughter and heiress of Humphrey de Bohun, he obtained the Earldoms of Essex and Northampton, and the constableship of England. His wife made him father of a son, Humphrey, Earl of Buckingham, and two daughters-Ann and Joanna.

The Princess Isabella, married to Lord de Courcy, in 1365, became the mother of two daughters: Mary, married to Henry of Barre, and Philippa, the wife of Robert de Vere, Earl of Oxford. Isabella died in 1397, and was buried at the head of the tomb of Queen Margaret, Edward the First's second wife, in Christ Church, Aldgate.

The Princess Joanna died, as has been previously mentioned, on her journey to Castile. Mary lived but thirty weeks after her marriage with the Duke of Britanny, which was solemnized at Woodstock, in 1361, when she was but seventeen years of age; and Queen Philippa's youngest daughter, Margaret, was married, in 1359, to the Earl of Hastings, and died two years afterwards

without issue, and at the girlish age of sixteen.

With the life of the amiable Philippa of Hainault, the sun of Edward's happiness and greatness set for ever. In 1370, the brave Sir John Chandos was killed in France. In the following year, Edward's valued friend, Sir Walter Mauny, died; and when, in person, he directed a fleet to the scene of his former triumphs, a storm arose, scattered the vessels, and compelled him to return unsuccessful. At home, only misfortune and disaffection seemed to reign. On the death of the Black Prince, John of Gaunt was suspected of aiming at the crown. The court was embroiled with factions; and, although King Edward had expressed the greatest sorrow at the loss of his beloved consort, and cheerfully complied with her dying requests, her remains were scarcely laid underground, when he made the worthless Alice Perrers-a married woman, of distinguished wit and beauty, who had been one of her ladies of the bed-chamber-her successor in his affections. This infamous woman acquired such an ascendancy over the mind of the doting old king, that she obtained a grant of her deceased mistress's jewels, tutored the king in his answers, sat by him at the bed's head, dispensed the royal favours; and, on one occasion, appeared at a tournament in Cheapside, in splendid apparel, and on a cream-coloured palfrey, as lady of the sun, and mistress of the day.

From this time Edward sunk into a state of debility of body and mind, from which he never recovered. Abandoned to the care, or rather cruel mercy, of Alice Perrers, he lived in obscurity at Eltham, and when his end was approaching, was removed to Sheen, now Richmond, where he expired on the twenty-first of June, 1377. On the morning of his death, and whilst he lay speechless, Alice Perrers took the rings from his fingers, and fled. The other domestics had gone to plunder the palace, and but for the kindness of a priest who chanced to be passing by, and heard his dying groans, the mighty Edward would have breathed his last without a soul to

LTHOUGH when Richard the Second ascended the throne he was a boy in the eleventh year of his age, his council, two years afterwards, entered into negociations for his marriage with a daughter of the Duke of Milan; but this project failed; and in the subsequent year an effort was made to obtain for him the hand of a daughter of the late Emperor Lewis, but with no better success. The council next proposed an alliance with Anne of Bohemia, and her uncle, the Emperor Wencalaus, lent a willing ear to the suit.

The Princess Anne entered the world at Prague, in Bohemia, about the year 1367. Her father, Charles the Fourth, King of Bohemia, and Emperor of Germany, a monarch remarkable for duplicity and avarice-was the son of the

blind King of Bohemia, who fell at the battle of Cressy, whilst bravely fighting in the cause of France. Her mother, Elizabeth, daughter of Bogislaus, Duke of Stetten, and grand-daughter to Casimir the Third, King of Poland, was the fourth wife of the Emperor Charles; and being a princess of great parts and virtue, she educated her family with the utmost care; and to this is the kind, gentle disposition of the amiable Anne greatly to be attributed.

Anne of Bohemia possessed few or no personal charms. Several of our chroniclers call her the beauteous queen; but they certainly have erred in so doing, as her figure was short, square, and undignified, her forehead and chin narrow and peaky, her cheeks high and bony, her complexion sallow and muddy, and her face vacant and inexpressive. This lack of beauty, however, was more than counterbalanced by a rightly-directed, wellinformed mind, and a tender, sympa

thising heart, which rendered her an endearing wife, and a Queen so gracious and beneficent, that after her death she was long remembered by the people under the appellation of the "Good Queen Anne."

John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, wished the King to marry one of his daughters, but the alliance was objected to, and the choice of the council fell upon Anne of Bohemia. Sir Simon Burly was deputed to go to Germany and negociate the marriage; and on his reaching Prague, and opening the business, the Empress despatched to the Court of England Duke Primislaus, of Saxony, whose report being favourable both the Emperor and Richard appointed procurators to treat of the marriage; and shortly afterwards, Aune, of her own free will, nominated procurators on her own part.

In their subsequent proceedings, the procurators stipulated that Anne should be married and crowned within a given time, and have conferred on her all the honours and income usually enjoyed by the Queens of England; and the preliminaries were concluded by Anne herself writing a letter to the English council, declaring that she accepted King Richard of her own free will and choice. Preparations were next commenced for the marriage, but ere they were brought to a conclusion the formidable Wat Tyler insurrection happened in England, and absorbed the whole attention of the King and his advisers.

These troubles quelled, the arrangements of the marriage were proceeded with, and towards the close of the year 1381, the Princess Anne set out for England, accompanied by the Duke and Duchess of Saxony, and a large retinue. From Bohemia she proceeded through her uncle's Duchy of Brabant to Brussels, where, detained by a fear of being captured, she tarried for about a month, it being reported that the French King intended to carry her off, and that, for this purpose, twelve large Norman warships were coasting between Calais and Holland. Her uncle sent envoys to King Charles of France, who, for the love he bore to his cousin Anne, granted

passports for her and her suite,—an act of condescension which greatly pleased the royal bride and all concerned.

From Brussels Anne and her train were escorted by one hundred spears through Ghent and Bruges to Gravelines, where she was met by the Earls of Devonshire and Salisbury, who, with an escort of five hundred spears, and the same number of archers, conducted her in safety to Calais, where an English embassy awaited her arrival. From Calais she sailed without delay, and landed at Dover just in time to escape the destructive effects of a violent ground swell, which before her very face rent into pieces the ship in which she had voyaged, and tossed and greatly injured the rest of the fleet. After tarrying two days at Dover to repose herself, she proceeded on her journey to Canterbury, whence the King's uncle, Thomas, conducted her with great pomp to London. On approaching the metropolis she was met by the Mayor, aldermen, and commons, in grand procession, and welcomed to the City with an enthusiasm which she remembered with pleasure to the day of her death. On this occasion all the mysteries of the City were arrayed in vestures of red and black, each mystery wearing its own conuzance thereon. The most splendid of these were the goldsmiths, who, on the red of their dresses, wore bars of silver-work and powders of trefoils and silver, and each man of the same mystery, to the number of seven score, had upon the black part fine knots of gold and silk, and upon their heads they wore hats covered with red, and powdered with trefoils. They also hired and richly apparelled seven minstrels to do honour to the Cæsar's sister, as they called the imperial bride, at an expense of four pounds sixteen shillings and a penny; whilst, at their own cost, was erected, at the upper end of Cheapside, a castle with four towers, on two sides of which ran fountains of wine. From these towers beautiful damsels with white vestures blew towards the King and Queen small shreds of gold leaf, and showered upon them counterfeit florins. This, the most striking of the several pageants, was