Shakespeare's Kings (32 page)

By
this
time
there
could
no
longer
be
any
doubt
that
the
King's mental
balance
was
seriously
disturbed.
He
surrounded
himself
with soothsayers
and
charlatans
who
flattered
him
shamelessly
and
prophesied extraordinary
achievements.
On
feast
days,
we
are
told,
he
would
sit on
a
high
throne
for
hours
at
a
time,
watching
all
who
passed
below him;
any
man
who
caught
his
eye
was
expected
to
fall
to
his
knees. When
he
left
the
palace,
only
his
Cheshire
archers
protected
him
from violence
at
the
hands
of
his
subjects.
Then,
sometime
in
the
spring
of 13
99,
there
came
grave
news
from
Ireland.
Some
nine
months
previously the
King's
Lieutenant
there,
the
Earl
of
March,
had
been
ambushed and
killed;
now
it
was
reported
that
two
of
the
Irish
kings,
O'Neill
and MacMurrough,
heedless
of
their
oaths
of
1394,
had
risen
in
open rebellion,
which
was
spreading
rapidly.
Immediate
action
was
called for
if
the
country
were
not
to
be
abandoned
altogether.
Inevitably,
it would
be
expensive;
but
a
sale
of
John
of
Gaunt's
movable
possessions -
his
gold,
jewels
and
works
of
art,
to
say
nothing
of
the
furniture
from his
many
palaces
and
castles
-
would
pay
for
it
many
times
over.

So
Richard
did
not
hesitate.
His
first
Irish
expedition
had
been
a triumph;
why
should
not
his
second
be
even
more
so?
His
advisers
tried to
point
out
that
his
departure
from
England
at
such
a
time
would
be an
open
invitation
to
his
enemies
—
perhaps
to
the
furious
Bolingbroke himself;
but
he
refused
to
listen.
Surrey
was
appointed
Lieutenant
in place
of
March
and
sent
off
at
once.
The
hopelessly
incompetent Edmund,
Duke
of
York,
was
once
again
appointed
Keeper
of
the Realm,
supported
by
the
three
chief
ministers
of
state
-
the
Chancellor Edmund
Stafford,
Bishop
of
Exeter;
the
Treasurer
the
Earl
of
Wiltshire; and
Richard
Clifford,
Bishop
of
Worcester,
Keeper
of
the
Privy
Seal -
together
with
the
three
prominent
royalists
Sir
John
Bushey,
Sir William
Bagot
and
Sir
Henry
Green.
In
the
last
week
in
May
the
King made
a
hurried
pilgrimage
to
Canterbury
and
held
his
last
Garter
feast at
Windsor.
Then,
accompanied
by
the
Dukes
of
Exeter
and
Albemarle, the
Earls
of
Worcester
and
Salisbury
and
—
prudently
-
the
sons
of
both Bolingbroke
and
the
murdered
Gloucester,
he
himself
set
sail
for
Ireland. It
was
to
prove
the
greatest
mistake
of
his
life.

Henry
Bolingbroke,
now
Duke
of
Lancaster,
had
spent
the
previous nine
months
in
Paris,
where
he
had
been
joined
by
the
young
Earl
of Arundel
-
still
mourning
his
executed
father
-
and
the
latter's
uncle, the
Archbishop.
All
three
were
in
close
touch
with
developments
across the
Channel.
Froissart's
story
that
Archbishop
Arundel
was
a
secret emissary
of
the
malcontents
is
palpably
untrue
-
he
had
been
in
exile for
two
years
already
—
but
his
nephew
may
well
have
been
entrusted with
a
message
that
Bolingbroke
should
lose
no
more
time.
The
Duke, in
any
case,
needed
little
persuading:
his
resentment
now
intensified
by Richard's
disposal
of
his
inheritance
and
recent
intervention
to
prevent his
marriage
to
a
cousin
of
the
French
King,
he
was
even
more
firmly resolved
to
overthrow
him.
He
was
also
aware
that
once
he
were
to raise
his
standard
on
English
soil
he
would
find
no
shortage
of
allies. Towards
the
end
of
June,
therefore,
knowing
that
Richard
was
safely in
Ireland,
he
and
the
Arundels
embarked
at
Boulogne
in
three
small ships
and
with
what
Adam
of
Usk
estimates
as
'scarce
three
hundred followers'.
After
a
brief
halt
at
Pevensey,
they
sailed
north
and
eventually landed
at
Ravenscar,
between
Whitby
and
Scarborough.
Here
in
the Lancastrian
heartland
he
could
be
certain
of
a
warm
welcome;
when he
reached
Doncaster,
on
or
about
Sunday
13
July,
he
was
joined
by Henry
Percy,
Earl
of
Northumberland,
his
son
Harry
Hotspur
and
their cousin
and
rival
magnate
along
the
Scottish
borders,
Ralph
Nevill,
Earl of
Westmorland,
each
of
them
with
a
numerous
following.
From
that moment
on
the
Duke
of
Lancaster
was
no
longer
just
a
nobleman
with
a grievance; he was the leader of a rebellion. Nevertheless, according to a story later spread by the Percys and nowhere else confirmed, he there and then swore a solemn oath that he had come only to claim his rightful inheritance; he had no designs on the throne, which Richard would continue to occupy for the rest of his life.