is
probable that the flaw which was universally known to be in his title,
made his reign the more subject to insurrections and rebellions. When
the subsidy began to be levied in Cornwall, the inhabitants, numerous
and poor, robust and courageous, murmured against a tax occasioned by a
sudden inroad of the Scots, from which they esteemed themselves entirely
secure, and which had usually been repelled by the force of the northern
counties. Their ill humor was further incited by one Michael Joseph, a
farrier of Bodmin, a notable prating fellow, who, by thrusting himself
forward on every occasion, and being loudest in every complaint against
the government, had acquired an authority among those rude people.
Thomas Flammoc, too, a lawyer, who had become the oracle of the
neighborhood, encouraged the sedition, by informing them that the tax,
though imposed by parliament, was entirely illegal; that the northern
nobility were bound by their tenures to defend the nation against the
Scots; and that if these new impositions were tamely submitted to,
the avarice of Henry and of his ministers would soon render the burden
intolerable to the nation. The Cornish, he said, must deliver to the
king a petition, seconded by such a force as would give it authority;
and in order to procure the concurrence of the rest of the kingdom,
care must be taken, by their orderly deportment, to show that they
had nothing in view but the public good, and the redress of all those
grievances under which the people had so long labored.

Encouraged by these speeches, the multitude flocked together, and armed
themselves with axes, bills, bows, and such weapons as country people
are usually possessed of. Flammoc and Joseph were chosen their leaders.
They soon conducted the Cornish through the county of Devon, and reached
that of Somerset. At Taunton, the rebels killed, in their fury, an
officious and eager commissioner of the subsidy, whom they called the
provost of Perin. When they reached Wells, they were joined by Lord
Audley, a nobleman of an ancient family, popular in his deportment, but
vain, ambitious and restless in his temper. He had from the beginning
maintained a secret correspondence with the first movers of the
insurrection, and was now joyfully received by them as their leader.
Proud of the countenance given them by so considerable a nobleman, they
continued their march, breathing destruction to the king's ministers
and favorites, particularly