Richard Ii 1367-1400

Period of Absolute Monarchy.

But there was nothing to foreshadow the sudden stroke by which in July Richard arrested Gloucester and his chief supporters, the earls of Arundel and Warwick. The others of the five lords appellant, Henry of Boling broke, afterwards King Henry IV., and the earl of Nottingham, now supported the king. Richard's action was apparently in deliberate revenge for the events of 1387-88. Gloucester, after a forced confession, died in prison at Calais, smothered by his nephew's orders. Arundel, in a packed parliament, was condemned and executed ; his brother Thomas archbishop of Canterbury was exiled. The king's friends, including Nottingham and Bolingbroke, made dukes of Norfolk and Hereford, were all promoted in title and estate. Richard himself was rewarded for ten years' patience by the possession of absolute power. He might perhaps have established it if he could have exercised it with moderation. But he declared that the laws of England were in his mouth, and sup ported his court in wanton luxury by arbitrary methods of taxa tion. By the exile of Norfolk and Hereford in Sept. 1398 he seemed to have removed the last persons he need fear. He was so confident that in May 1399 he paid a second visit to Ireland, taking with him all his most trusted adherents.

Rebellion and Deposition.

Thus when Henry landed at Ravenspur in July he found only half-hearted opposition, and when Richard himself returned it was too late. Ultimately Richard surrendered to Henry at Flint on Aug. 19, promising to abdicate if his life was spared. He was taken to London riding behind his rival with indignity. On Sept. 3o, he signed in the Tower a deed of abdication, wherein he owned himself insufficient and useless, reading it first aloud with a cheerful mien and ending with a re quest that his cousin would be good lord to him. The parliament ordered that Richard should be kept close prisoner, and he was sent secretly to Pontefract. There in Feb. 1400 he died : no doubt of the rigour of his winter imprisonment, rather than by actual murder as alleged in the story adopted by Shakespeare. The mystery of Richard's death led to rumours that he had escaped, and an impostor pretending to be Richard lived during many years under the protection of the Scottish government. But no doubt it was the real Richard who was buried without state in 1400 at King's Langley, and honourably reinterred by Henry V. at Westminster in 1413.

Richard II. is a character of strange contradictions. It is difficult to reconcile the precocious boy of 1381 with the wayward and passionate youth of the next few years. Even if it be supposed that he dissembled his real opinions during the period of his con stitutional rule, it is impossible to believe that the apparent in difference which he showed in his fall was the mere acting of a part. His violent outbursts of passion perhaps give the best clue to a mercurial and impulsive nature, easily elated and depressed. He had real ability, and in his Irish policy, and in the preference which he gave to it over continental adventure, showed a states manship in advance of his time. But this, in spite of his lofty theory of kingship, makes it all the more difficult to explain his extravagant bearing in his prosperity. In appearance Richard was tall and handsome, if effeminate. He had some literary tastes, which were shown in fitful patronage of Chaucer, Gower and Froissart. Richard's second queen, Isabella (1389-1409), was born in Paris on Nov. 9, 1389, and was married to the English king at Calais in October, or November, 1396, but on account of the bride's youth the marriage was never consummated.

When Richard lost his crown in 1399 Isabella was captured by Henry IV.'s partisans and sent to Sonning, near Reading, while her father, Charles VI., asked in vain for the restoration of his daughter and of her dowry. In 1401 she was allowed to return to France; in 1406 she became the wife of the poet, Charles, duke of Orleans, and she died on Sept. 13, 2409.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.—The best contemporary authorities are the Chroni con Angliae down to 1388, Walsingham's Historia Anglicana, the Annales Ricardi II., Knighton's Chronicle (all these in the Rolls Series), the Vita Ricardi II. by a Monk of Evesham (ed. T. Hearne) , and the Chronique de la traison et mort (English Hist. Soc.). Froissart wrote from some personal knowledge. A metrical account of Richard's fall, probably written by a French knight called Creton, is printed in Archaeologia, xx. The chief collections of documents are the Rolls of Parliament and the Calendar of Patent Rolls. H. A. Wallon's Richard II. (Paris, 1864) is the fullest life, though now somewhat out of date. For other modern accounts see W. Stubbs, Constitutional History, and C. W. C. Oman, The Political History of England, vol. iv., and The Great Revolt of 1381. (C. L. K.)