ron of the infant woollen manufactures, and a zealous
champion of the maritime greatness of his island realm, which boasted
that he was "king of the sea". Though his financial exigencies often
led him to sell excessive privileges to alien traders, this policy did
little harm to his subjects, for few of them were ready as yet to
embark in foreign commerce. A true patriot, who declared that his land
of England was "nearer to his heart, more delightful, noble, and
profitable than all other lands," he succeeded in making Englishmen
conscious of their national life as they had never been before; and he
won for his fatherland a foremost place among the kingdoms of the
world. His network of diplomatic alliances was dexterously fashioned,
and enabled him to supplement the resources of his own subjects.

The breadth of Edward's ambitions hindered their complete
accomplishment. Like Edward I., he undertook more than he could carry
through, and, though his panegyrists praise his patience in adversity no
less than his moderation in prosperity, his merely animal courage and
vigour broke down under the weight of misfortune. Thus the glorious
king, who in his youth vied with his grandfather, seemed in his old age
to have nearly approached the fate of his wretched father. In early life
he won the love of his subjects. It was only in the first years of his
reign that the violence and greed of his disorderly household, which
inherited the evil traditions of the previous generation, bore so
heavily upon the people that Englishmen fled at his approach in dread of
the purveyors, who confiscated every man's goods for the royal use.[1]
The somewhat shallow opportunism which abandoned, with little attempt at
resistance, every royal right that stood in the way of his receiving the
full support of his parliament, at least had the merit of keeping Edward
in general touch with his estates. The wanton breaches of good faith, by
which he sometimes strove to win back what he had lightly conceded, were
regarded as efforts to save the sovereign's dignity, rather than as
insidious attempts to restore the prerogative. Unjust as was the very
basis of his French pretensions, they were backed up by a show of legal
claim that satisfied the conscience of king and subject, and to
contemporaries Edward seemed a king regardful of his honour and mindful
of his plighted word. If his generosity verged on extravagance, and his
affectation of popular manners and graci