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continued, the subsisting relations between Great Britain and her Transatlantic provinces would remain unchanged, and the responsibilities of the former practically undiminished. For with a long land frontier line swarming with marauders-with points of possible dispute bristling on all sides-with the risk of a fleet of armed American schooners covering the Canadian lakes, when the six months' notice already given of determining our treaty engagements in this behalf shall have expired-with the San Juan question still in abeyance-with the north-west boundaries of Canada still undefined-with the vast region which lies between the Red River and the Rocky Mountains left without any government at all, unless that of the irresponsible agents of the Hudson's Bay Company, at Fort Garry, be deserving of the name-with all these elements of political difficulty hanging over our Transatlantic dependencies, this is not precisely the moment when, whatever form of government they may choose, our implied engagements for some share at least of their military defence can be abruptly terminated.

The policy of retaliation, by which it was once supposed that, in the event of an invasion of Canada, we had only to bombard an American sea-port, for every inland town in our colonies that might be sacked, is, on the report of our own military engineers, now happily impracticable. At this very time it would cost, we are informed, half a million sterling to put the citadel and works of Quebec in a complete state of defence, and recent reports ordered by the Government on the North American frontier forts prove that a much larger expenditure may be necessary. In addition to these charges an armament may be required on the Lakes. It is time, therefore, to inquire by whom these expenses are to be borne? If further fortifications are deemed requisite for the protection of our North American colonists from attacks which they, it seems, do not apprehend, they may perhaps be manned, in case of necessity, by their own. militia and volunteers; but whatever progress they may make in self-defence, it can scarcely be expected that, in a country so thinly peopled, and hitherto so thriftily disposed in military matters, a sudden jump from one-seventh of the total cost of their defence, which is all they now defray, to an assumption of the whole, is very likely to take place. Nor is it probable that if any prince of the blood-royal became to-morrow the adopted sovereign of British North America, any material reduction in the Imperial garrisons in those colonies would be immediately effected. But it is not in the spirit of the economist who desires to get rid, on the best possible terms, of a profitless estate, that the Government and Parliament of Eng

land will approach this important question. They have accepted, at the instance of enlightened colonial reformers at home, a fair responsibility for the defence of their dependencies abroad from perils arising from the consequences of Imperial policy. Of that responsibility they are prepared honourably to acquit themselves, until the time shall arrive when all perils traceable to that policy shall cease to threaten the distant provinces of the British Empire.

But while voluntarily accepting the burdens inseparable from their costly and now profitless inheritance, the statesmen of England, aiming no longer, as of old, to retain in helpless minority those communities of her empire which combine the powers and qualifications of free states, hail with no feelings of apprehension or regret each symptom of nascent independence as it may disclose itself. By our past colonial policy, we have surrendered the prerogatives not less absolutely than the emoluments of empire, and their relinquishment has been based on a deliberate consideration of the best interests, both of the mother-country and her provinces. The people of England have no desire to snap asunder abruptly the slender links which still unite them with their Transatlantic fellow-subjects, or to shorten by a single hour the duration of their common citizenship. On the contrary, by strengthening the ties which still remain, they would convert into a dignified alliance an undignified, because unreal, subserviency. History has warned them that it is not by futile attempts to retain in an inglorious subjection its scattered satrapies, that the real greatness of a nation can be advanced, but rather by an attitude of watchfulness for the dawning of that inevitable day, when the years of their apprenticeship shall have been passed, and 'nature shall have pronounced them free.' By all the tokens of rapidly increasing material prosperity, by the still more important evidences of intellectual and political development, as manifested in the records of the recent Conference at Quebec, we are led irresistibly to the inference that this stage has been well-nigh reached in the history of our Transatlantic provinces. Hence it comes to pass that we accept, not with fear and trembling, but with unmixed joy and satisfaction, a voluntary proclamation, which, though couched in the accents of loyalty, and proffering an enduring allegiance to our Queen, falls yet more welcome on our ears as the harbinger of the future and complete independence of British North America.

ART. VIII.-1. Memorials of King Henry VII.
JAMES GAIRDNER. London: 1858.

Edited by

2. Letters and Papers illustrative of the Reigns of Richard III. and Henry VII. Edited by JAMES GAIRDNER. 2 vols. London: 1861-1863.

Or the volumes before us, the Memorials' were published

in 1858, and the two volumes of the Letters in 1861 and 1863. Divines, historians, and novelists are in the habit of discounting their literary reputation, if not of anticipating their more mature judgments, by publishing their works in instalments; but we could have wished Mr. Gairdner had abstained from this inconvenient practice. As the case stands, we have the benefit of some supplementary information from him in the shape of a Preface added rather than prefixed to the work; but a different scheme of publication might have admitted of a more convenient arrangement of the various contents of his volumes.

Mr. Gairdner's object has been to collect such fragments of historical documents as bear upon English history during the reigns of Richard III. and Henry VII. As yet the result can scarcely be considered as great; and although we have to thank him for placing in an accessible form many valuable papers, the reader must not look to his volumes for the same continuous series of historic documents which gives so great an interest to Mr. Bergenroth's Calendar of the Spanish State Papers, or to Mr. Stevenson's Calendar of the Foreign State Papers of the time of Elizabeth. It is indeed remarkable how rapidly after the accession of Henry VII. public correspondence and other historic memorials appear to have multiplied, and we would only notice as an illustration Mr. Stevenson's volume of 592 pages, containing the correspondence of scarcely two years, when contrasted with the documents contained in Mr. Gairdner's volumes.

So far as the reign of Richard is concerned those documents, though few in number, are of considerable interest. It will be remembered that, in the account of this reign given by historians, little information is forthcoming as to the foreign relations of England; but we come now on the traces of important negotiations which, had Richard's reign been prolonged, might probably have led to great results. These documents confirm the opinion of the political ability of the monarch,

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which we expressed in a recent Number of this Journal. Richard had scarcely mounted the throne before he took measures to induce the Duke of Brittany to secure the Earl of Richmond, then a fugitive in that country; and Mr. Gairdner* gives us the instructions addressed to Thomas Hatton, the agent employed in the negotiation. The necessity was pressing, for, in the words of Grafton, the Duke of Brittany not only refused to keep the Earl of Richmond a prisoner, but also was ready to aid and succour him with men and money, and all things necessary for his transport into England.' Evidence of pecuniary assistance thus given to Richmond is presented by Mr. Gairdner † in the shape of a warrant for an advance to him of 10,000 crowns of gold, due provision being taken that the Treasurer should require a receipt for the same. The equivocal nature of a transaction in these times did not relieve it of its formal character, and an amusing instance of these practices may be given in the words of the Lord Great Chamberlain when pressed to give a receipt for a French bribe. 'This gift,' said the dignitary, 'proceedeth of the king your 'master's liberality, not of my request: if it please you that I shall receive it, put it here in my sleeve, and other letter or ' testimonial get you none of me.'

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The Duke of Brittany did not, however, feel secure in the course he was taking, and in August, 1483, he sent George de Mainbier to inform Richard that Louis XI. of France was urging him to make Richmond over to his keeping, and that as the proposal was declined he threatened war on Brittany. To meet this danger he prayed succours from Richard; but the latter had other means of securing his ends so far as Richmond was concerned; for we learn from the pages of Grafton the particulars of the secret intrigues by which he made Brittany an unsafe residence for Richmond, who consulted his own safety by a flight into France.

Richard's true relations with Louis XI. derive a new light from Mr. Gairdner's pages. According to Commines—

Immediately after King Edward's death Louis received letters. from the Duke of Gloucester, who had usurped the Crown of England. . . . This king Richard sought the King's friendship, and was desirous, as I suppose, to have the pension paid to him. But the King would make no answer to his letters, neither gave his messenger audience, but esteemed him a wicked and cruel tyrant.' (P.210.) But Mr. Gairdner publishes a letter (July 21, 1483)‡ from

*Letters, vol. i. p. 22.
‡ Ibid., p. 25.

† Ibid., p. 54.

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Louis to Richard, stating Si je vous puis fair quelque service je le feray de tresbon cueur, car je vueil bien avoir vostre amytié; and Richard's reply (Aug. 18)*, stating, Je nentens point rompre telles trèves comme cydevant estoient conclutes.' The relations between the two sovereigns were, therefore, friendly, but we shall see presently that inducements were soon to be offered with a view to induce Richard to adopt a different line.

For whilst the above communications were in progress, Richard had opened negotiations with Ferdinand and Isabella of Arragon and Castille. His instructions to his agent Bernard de la Forse are given by Mr. Gairdner †, as well as the instructions which were in consequence addressed by Isabella to De Sasiola, an agent whom she sent to England in 1483. From these papers it appears that Richard's desire for amity was reciprocal-that Isabella was prepared to confirm former treaties -and, lastly, that the agent was empowered to enter into arrangements with Richard by which the Spanish sovereigns would undertake to assist him in a war with France for the recovery of the territories formerly attached to the British Crown. But De Sasiola was also instructed to inform Richard that 'the Queen of Castille was turned in her heart from England in time past for the unkindness the which she took against the King last deceased, whom God pardon, for his refusing her and taking to his wife a widow of England. For the which cause also was mortal war betwixt him and the Earl of Warwick, the which took ever her part to the time of his 'death.' But now that Edward was dead, she stated her wish to follow her own inclinations in the shape of friendly relations with England.

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The document we have quoted appears to have been unknown to Mr. Prescott, when, writing of Isabella's suitors, he stated § that among them was a brother of Edward IV., not improbably Richard Duke of Gloucester;' and then proceeded to speculate on the amount of crime which might have been avoided had Gloucester's marriage with Isabella taken place. The cause, however, which Isabella ascribed for Warwick's hostility towards Edward does not affect Mr. Kirk's argument that the originating cause was the failure of Warwick's schemes for a French alliance, which was the result of the Woodville marriage.

* Letters, vol. i. p. 34.

† Ibid., p. 23.

§ Ferdinand and Isabella, vol. i. p. 173. (1854.) Life of Charles the Bold, vol. ii. p. 15.

Ibid., p. 31.

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