If an author, without being accused of overweening vanity, may be permitted to anticipate that his work will be attended by any particular result, the hope may be expressed that this account of the Battle of Agincourt will tend to remove the absurd impression that that victory must be contemplated with humiliating feelings in France. There is no truth with which the consideration of it has more deeply impressed him than that the bravery of the French character, its exalted patriotism, and chivalrous courage, instead of being tarnished, acquired new lustre on that memorable occasion. The French army was, it is true, almost annihilated by scarcely a tenth of its numbers; but that defeat was the result of a concatenation of circumstances, which left no just stain upon its military fame, beyond that of error in judgment on the part of its leaders.

Lest the author should be charged with eccentricity for the unusual manner in which this volume is paged, it is right to observe that it was produced by the

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total alteration in his plan, for, that which is now but little more than the addenda, was intended to form the body of the work. The border which, though suitable to a small tract, perhaps gives a fantastical appearance to a larger book, arose from the same cause.

This long Preface only requires to be lengthened by one paragraph-that in which the author has to fulfil the gratifying duty of expressing to many of his fellow, but more successful, labourers in historical and antiquarian pursuits, the gratitude with which he is impressed for their constant and most valuable assistance. Among those friends, John Gage of Lincoln's Inn, Esq, F. R. S. F. S. A.; Dr. Meyrick; Michael Jones, Esq. F. S. A.; Frederick Madden, Esq.; and Charles George Young, Esq. York Herald, F. S.A. are pre-eminent; and the studies by which they are respectively distinguished, render it unnecessary to specify the particular instances in which their talents. have benefited the work. To his friend, Sir Thomas Elmsley Croft, Bart., he

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has also to offer his grateful acknowledgments for many essential kindnesses in facilitating his researches.

April 23rd, 1827 to 3

THE

Battle of Agincourt.

ABOUT the middle of the year 1414, Henry the fifth, influenced by the persuasions of Chicheley, Archbishop of Canterbury; by the dying injunction of his royal father not to allow the kingdom to remain long at peace; or more probably by those feelings of ambition which were no less natural to his age and character, than consonant with the manners of the times in which he lived, resolved to assert that claim to the crown of France, which his great grandfather, King Edward the third, had urged with such confidence and success.

The first notice which is recorded of his intention was in July, 1414, when he demanded the French crown, as the heir of Isabella, wife of Edward the

second, and daughter of Philip the IVth. This claim the ministers of the French monarch refused even to discuss, and Henry consequently consented that Charles should continue in the possession of his throne; but he asked other concessions which it would have been impossible to grant without sacrifices on the part of France, that were totally inconsistent with its rank amongst the powers of Europe. He required that the provinces of Normandy, Maine, and Anjou, the territories which formerly composed the dutchy of Acquitaine, and one half of Provence should be ceded to England; that the arrears of the ransom of king John, who was taken at the battle of Poictiers, amounting to twelve hundred crowns, should be faithfully discharged; and that Charles should give

a It is not necessary to comment upon the total want of justice in Edward the third's pretensions to the French crown; but, and as Dr. Lingard, Vol. v. p. 9, has sensibly observed, Henry's claim was still more absurd, for at that time the Earl of March was the heir of Isabella.