peaceable possession of Brittany an equivalent
for any sum, and who was all on fire for his projected expedition into
Italy, readily agreed to the proposals made him. He engaged to pay Henry
seven hundred and forty-five thousand crowns, near four hundred thousand
pounds sterling of our present money; partly as a reimbursement of
the sums advanced to Brittany, partly as arrears of the pension due to
Edward IV. And he stipulated a yearly pension to Henry and his heirs
of twenty-five thousand crowns. Thus the king, as remarked by his
historian, made profit upon his subjects for the war, and upon his
enemies for the peace.[*] And the people agreed that he had fulfilled
his promise, when he said to the parliament that he would make the war
maintain itself. Maximilian was, if he pleased, comprehended in Henry's
treaty; but he disdained to be in any respect beholden to an ally, of
whom, he thought, he had reason to complain: he made a separate peace
with France, and obtained restitution of Artois, Franche Compte, and
Charolois, which had been ceded as the dowry of his daughter when she
was affianced to the king of France.

* Bacon, p. 605. Polyd Virg. p. 586.

The peace concluded between England and France was the more likely to
continue, because Charles, full of ambition and youthful hopes, bent
all his attention to the side of Italy, and soon after undertook the
conquest of Naples; an enterprise which Henry regarded with the greater
indifference, as Naples lay remote from him, and France had never, in
any age, been successful in that quarter. The king's authority was
fully established at home; and every rebellion which had been attempted
against him, had hitherto tended only to confound his enemies, and
consolidate his power and influence. His reputation for policy and
conduct was daily augmenting; his treasures had increased even from the
most unfavorable events; the hopes of all pretenders to his throne were
cut off, as well by his marriage as by the issue which it had brought
him. In this prosperous situation, the king had reason to flatter
himself with the prospect of durable peace and tranquillity; but his
inveterate and indefatigable enemies, whom he had wantonly provoked,
raised him an adversary, who long kept him in inquietude, and sometimes
even brought him into danger.

The duchess of Burgundy, full of resentment for the depression of her
family and its partisans, rather irritated than discouraged by the ill