ich worked so much ill for
France in the earlier part of the next century. The rule of the uncles
was disastrous for France; no good government seemed even possible for
that unhappy land.

An obscure strife went on until 1404, when Duke Philip of Burgundy died,
leaving his vast inheritance to John the Fearless, the deadly foe of
Louis d'Orleans. Paris was with him, as with his father before him; the
Duke entered the capital in 1405, and issued a popular proclamation
against the ill-government of the Queen-regent and Orleans. Much
profession of a desire for better things was made, with small results. So
things went on until 1407, when, after the Duc de Berri, who tried to
play the part of a mediator, had brought the two Princes together, the
Duc d'Orleans was foully assassinated by a Burgundian partisan. The Duke
of Burgundy, though he at first withdrew from Paris, speedily returned,
avowed the act, and was received with plaudits by the mob. For a few
years the strife continued, obscure and bad; a great league of French
princes and nobles was made to stem the success of the Burgundians; and
it was about this time that the Armagnac name became common. Paris,
however, dominated by the "Cabochians," the butchers' party, the party of
the "marrowbones and cleavers," and entirely devoted to the Burgundians,
enabled John the Fearless to hold his own in France; the King himself
seemed favourable to the same party. In 1412 the princes were obliged to
come to terms, and the Burgundian triumph seemed complete. In 1413 the
wheel went round, and we find the Armagnacs in Paris, rudely sweeping
away all the Cabochians with their professions of good civic rule. The
Duc de Berri was made captain of Paris, and for a while all went against
the Burgundians, until, in 1414, Duke John was fain to make the first
Peace of Arras, and to confess himself worsted in the strife. The young
Dauphin Louis took the nominal lead of the national party, and ruled
supreme in Paris in great ease and self-indulgence.

The year before, Henry V. had succeeded to the throne of England,--a
bright and vigorous young man, eager to be stirring in the world, brave
and fearless, with a stern grasp of things beneath all,--a very
sheet-anchor of firmness and determined character. Almost at the very
opening of his reign, the moment he had secured his throne, he began a
negotiation with France which boded no good. He offered to marry
Catharine, the King's third daughter,