o agree to another Government of the
kingdom, under a commission of fourteen nobles, for a year. His uncle of
Gloucester was at the head of this commission, and, in fact, appointed
everybody composing it.

Having done all this, the King declared as soon as he saw an opportunity
that he had never meant to do it, and that it was all illegal; and he got
the judges secretly to sign a declaration to that effect. The secret
oozed out directly, and was carried to the Duke of Gloucester. The Duke
of Gloucester, at the head of forty thousand men, met the King on his
entering into London to enforce his authority; the King was helpless
against him; his favourites and ministers were impeached and were
mercilessly executed. Among them were two men whom the people regarded
with very different feelings; one, Robert Tresilian, Chief Justice, who
was hated for having made what was called 'the bloody circuit' to try the
rioters; the other, Sir Simon Burley, an honourable knight, who had been
the dear friend of the Black Prince, and the governor and guardian of the
King. For this gentleman's life the good Queen even begged of Gloucester
on her knees; but Gloucester (with or without reason) feared and hated
him, and replied, that if she valued her husband's crown, she had better
beg no more. All this was done under what was called by some the
wonderful--and by others, with better reason, the merciless--Parliament.

But Gloucester's power was not to last for ever. He held it for only a
year longer; in which year the famous battle of Otterbourne, sung in the
old ballad of Chevy Chase, was fought. When the year was out, the King,
turning suddenly to Gloucester, in the midst of a great council said,
'Uncle, how old am I?' 'Your highness,' returned the Duke, 'is in your
twenty-second year.' 'Am I so much?' said the King; 'then I will manage
my own affairs! I am much obliged to you, my good lords, for your past
services, but I need them no more.' He followed this up, by appointing a
new Chancellor and a new Treasurer, and announced to the people that he
had resumed the Government. He held it for eight years without
opposition. Through all that time, he kept his determination to revenge
himself some day upon his uncle Gloucester, in his own breast.

At last the good Queen died, and then the King, desiring to take a second
wife, proposed to his council that he should marry Isabella, of France,
the daughter of Charles the Sixth: who,