of his doings in the world, and so wrote, as it were, in
blood for our learning. King Henry produced strife, King Richard induced
strife, and King John deduced it. King Henry died cursing and accursed;
King Richard forgiving and forgiven; King John blaspheming, and not held
worthy of reproof. The first did evil, meaning evilly; the second evil,
meaning well; the third was evil. So the first was wretched in death,
the second pitiful, the third shameful. The first loved a few, the
second loved one, the third none. So the death of the first was gain to
a few, that of the second to one, that of the third to none; for he that
loves not, neither can he hate: he is negligible in the end. But observe
now, the chief woe of these kings of the House of Anjou was that they
hurt whom they loved more than whom they hated.

'King Henry was a great prince, who did evil to many both in his life
and death. My dear master, lord, and friend might have been a greater,
had not his head gone counter to his heart, his generosity not been
tripped up by his pride. So generous as he was, all the world might have
loved him, as one loved him; and yet so arrogant of mind that the very
largess he bestowed had a sting beneath it, as though he scorned to give
less to creatures that lacked so much. All his faults and most of his
griefs sprang from this rending apart of his nature. His heart cried
Yea! to a noble motion. Then came his haughty head to suggest trickery,
and bid him say Nay! to the heart's urgency.

'He was a religious man, a pious man, the hottest fighter with the
coolest judgment of any I have ever known; a great lover of one woman.
He might have been a happy man if she had been let have her way. But he
thwarted her, he played with her whole-heart love, blew hot and cold;
neither let her alone nor clove to her through all. So she had to pay.
And of him, my friend and king howsoever, I say from the bottom of my
soul, if his death did not benefit poor Jehane, then it is a happy thing
for a woman to go bleeding in the side. But I know that she was
fortunate in his death, and believe that he was also. For he had space
for reparation, died with his lovers about him, having been saved in
time from a great disgrace. And it is a very wise man who reports: _Illi
Mors gravis incubat, qui notus nimis omnibus, ignotus moritur sibi_. But
King Richard knew himself in those last keen hours, and (as we believe)
won forgiveness of God.

'God be good to