The autumn of the year 1290 was a solemn epoch in this great king’s life. In this autumn died his beloved Eleanor; in this autumn died, also, “the maiden of Norway,” the young queen of Scotland, whose death ushered in so many troubles.

Halcyon skies had for a whole quarter of a century gilded Edward’s course and prospects; but a few weeks sufficed to end the sunshine of his prosperous career. From the battle of Evesham, in 1265, to the death of his queen, and the opening of the Scottish controversy in 1290, his life had been one of great enjoyment, great harmony, and great usefulness. “Held in universal esteem at home,” and “famous throughout the world” for wisdom and valour, his lot might be regarded as one of no common prosperity. But this sad year, 1290, ended all this happiness. Clouds and storms arose, and though brief intervals of calm occurred, we find a king who was “slow to all manner of strife,” compelled in his fifty-seventh year to don his armour and mount his horse, and set forth to meet a Scottish inroad, and from that time forth until his death in 1307, almost in every year we find him, in whom the infirmities of age must have begun to make themselves felt, in harness and in the saddle, sleeping at night by his horse’s side on the bare heath, working with his men in the laborious siege of a fortress, and encountering, all the time, what to such a man was by far more painful—treachery from professed friends, and from his foes, perpetual simulations of submission, followed by constant treasons and breaches of covenant, the moment the sword was lifted from their throat. We open, in this sad year, the second volume of Edward’s reign, but before we close the first, let us glance for a few moments at the past, and try once more to rectify the widespread error, or rather the constant misrepresentation, which shows to us this great king as, by choice, a man of war; when he was, more than most other sovereigns, a man of peace.

One of the ablest, and generally one of the fairest of our modern historians, thus commences his account of Edward’s reign:—“Laying aside his disputes with his neighbours as a French prince, his active and splendid reign may be considered as an attempt to subject the whole island of Great Britain to his sway.”33 And a few pages later we are told that “his ambition tainted all his acts,” and again, that “a conqueror is a perpetual plotter against the safety of all nations.” And another justly-esteemed writer, Mr. Sharon Turner, tells us that “The reign of Edward was that of a prince whose sedate judgment and active talents advanced the civilization and power of his country. It may be considered under four heads—his incorporation of Wales, his wars in Scotland, his foreign treaties, and his internal reforms.”

Thus both these writers, and with them a multitude of smaller note, agree in describing Edward as a man of ambition, a man covetous of his neighbour’s possessions, a conqueror, “perpetually plotting” against the safety of others. Now, our quarrel with this view is not merely that it is inaccurate or imperfect, but that it is diametrically opposed to all the principal facts of the case, calling white black and black white, and representing a sovereign as ambitious and unscrupulous, whose real character was that he was scrupulously conscientious;—“as careful in performing his obligations as in exacting his rights,”34 or, again, to cite the old chronicler,

Such writers as those we have cited place before their readers a king who, from his very accession, coveted and “plotted against” both Wales and Scotland. To this we oppose the indubitable facts, that when Llewellyn withheld his homage, Edward, instead of proceeding to extremities, was patient and forbearing, sent him summons after summons, offered to go to Shrewsbury or to Chester to meet him, and waited, in all, two whole years before he took up arms. And, again, that when Llewellyn was reduced to extremities, and might have been banished and Wales annexed, Edward granted him peace the moment he asked it, replaced him in his seat, attended his marriage, and did all he could to make him his friend. The war which led to Llewellyn’s chance-medley death, and to the annexation, was a war made by Llewellyn and David, not by the English king.

As for Scotland, the conquest of which is placed in the fore-front of Edward’s ambitious designs, it is surely enough to say that he ascended the throne in 1272, and that during more than eighteen years he never stirred one step or moved a finger against the honour and independence of Scotland. In 1290 the Scottish throne became vacant, and he was clamorously besought, for years, by all the chief men in Scotland to interfere. Yet, instead of seizing the opportunity, he stood aloof, went, at last, cautiously into the question, and in November, 1292, adjudged the throne to Baliol.

Four more years elapsed without the slightest move on Edward’s part against Scotland. But in 1296, the twenty-fourth year of Edward’s reign, the Scotch joined with his enemy, the king of France, and invaded England. And then, and not before, being in his fifty-seventh year, did the king enter Scotland, a country which, we are now assured, he had been coveting and “plotting against” for a whole quarter of a century. We say, then, once more, that these constant representations of Edward, which we find in a multitude of historians, great and small, exhibiting him as an ambitious man, a conqueror, a “designing man,” constantly “plotting against the safety of his neighbours,” constitute, on the whole, one of the most extraordinary instances of literary injustice and wrong that is to be found in all British history.

Let us look for a moment at the actual results, the real facts, of these eighteen years. Surely a period of this length, extending from the thirty-third to the fifty-first year of Edward’s life, might be expected to show his real character, the true bent of his mind. A conqueror, an ambitious man, is not likely to waste the whole prime of his life in peaceful inactivity, and only to exhibit his cupidity and unscrupulousness when grey hairs were beginning to show themselves. The victors of CrÉcy and of Agincourt followed no such course. What Edward really was, he showed in these eighteen years. The conquest of Wales, the only interruption of an otherwise peaceful course, was, as we have shown, forced upon him. He had no choice in the matter. The Welsh princes would not have peace. But, with this one exception, what was the character of this protracted period—the whole prime of Edward’s life?

It was that of constant, careful, sedulous improvement. No department of the government was exempt from his thoughtful scrutiny. The revenues of the crown were carefully examined, and their economical employment provided for. In place of “seizures” for the king’s use, we now find “purchases.” The household expenses were placed on a proper footing. The king could exhibit royal splendour when public occasions called for it; but the general rule of his expenditure was that of frugality. A modern writer observes, that “his household as king was both well-regulated and economical. We have a record of his expenses while residing at Langley, Bucks, in Lent, 1290.” This, of course, was not a season of festivity; but we find that “in the first week his expenses were £7 10s. 4½d; in the second, £5 19s. 0½d.; and in the third, £5 12s. 2½d.35 Now, bearing in mind the habits and usages of that time,36 when the regulated price of a lamb was sixpence, and of a goose, fourpence, we shall see at a glance that this expenditure for a king, in retirement during the season of Lent, was both liberal and economical. It contrasts forcibly with the reckless extravagance of his father Henry, and of his still more wasteful son, the second Edward. Henry, after his royal festivities at Bourdeaux and Paris in 1254, returned home burdened with debts, which he himself described as “horrible to think of.” And the younger Edward, when just commencing life, seems to have been accustomed to spend as much daily as we have just seen his father spend weekly! We have a record of his household expenses for three days in 1293, when he was staying in a country residence. On Thursday his expenses amounted to £7 4s. 5d., on Friday, to £6 8s. 1d., and on Saturday, to £6 4s.; being at the rate of about £46 per week. The expenditure of his household in that year amounted to £3,846 7s. 6d., which at the present rate of money would be equal to more than £50,000 per annum. That such habits in youth should lead to a reign of discomfort, closing on dishonour, is not to be wondered at.

Edward I., however, though economical, was no lover of money. On fitting occasions his expenditure was royal. His coronation banquet was one of unusual splendour and liberality. His Round Table celebrations must have been very costly. Fond of hunting, his stables must have occasioned a considerable outlay. His presents were magnificent, his charities were very large. The entries under this head, in his “Wardrobe Accounts,” were numerous, and must have reached an aggregate, in each year, of large amount. One of the chronicles of the day makes this brief allusion to his charities:—

“King Edward, turning aside to the northern parts, celebrated Easter at Newcastle, where he distributed great abundance of oblations in the monasteries, and gave large alms to the people; insomuch that many men not poor did not blush to pretend themselves so, being allured by so great a liberality.”37

On the first anniversary of his consort’s death, besides great and costly solemnities at Westminster, the Black Friars in London, and at Lincoln, we find mention made of many other places—Haverfordwest, Burgh, Haverleigh, Somerton, Lindhurst, Ledes, and Langley—where the day was observed with especial rites, and the distribution of alms. All this was done at the king’s expense, and sums varying from £19 to £30 were given to each place. But £30 in those days was nearly equal to £500 at the present day.

On the second anniversary, besides many other celebrations, alms were distributed to the prisoners in Newgate, to the hospitals of St. Giles, St. James, St. Thomas, St. Mary, and St. Bartholomew, in London, and also to the seven houses of Friars’ mendicants in the same city.

Edward reformed the coin of the realm. He strove to restore purity to the administration of justice. By many stringent regulations he tried to abolish usury, which had grown to be an enormous evil.

It is in his reign that we first find an annual account of the public revenue and expenditure.38 So admirably were the finances of the government administered, that in all these eighteen years, 1272–1290, we find only four applications to the people for an “aid”—a vote of taxes for the expenditure of the crown; and each of these is for a declared and special purpose.

In his fourth year, the second after his coronation, he asked and obtained a fifteenth, to clear off his remaining liabilities on account of his expedition to the Holy Land—a work deemed, in those days, to be a public duty.

In his fifth year, he asked for a twelfth, to provide for the expenses of the anticipated war with Wales.

In his eleventh year, the war in Wales having broken out a second time, he obtained a thirtieth from the laity and a twentieth from the clergy.

And in his eighteenth year, having returned from a prolonged visit to Gascony and other parts, where he had incurred many expenses, he asked and obtained a fifteenth.

These four small levies are all that Edward required during the first eighteen years of his reign. And the termination, for ever, of the destructive warfare on the borders of Wales, which had so long laid waste several counties of England, was far more than an abundant compensation to his people. Had he never been assailed by others, the rest of his reign might have passed over without any further demands upon his subjects. Had not Philip of France endeavoured to deprive him of Gascony, while the Scotch, in reckless violation of their recent oaths, allied themselves to France and invaded England; there is no reason to suppose that any burdens would have been laid upon the people, or that the earls of Norfolk and Hereford would have found any opportunity for their resistance or their “patriotism.”

But the chief glory of his reign was, that he saw and appreciated that great public necessity—the want of good laws, and of a constitutional legislature for their consideration and enactment. We have already cited, but must here repeat, his first avowal, made as early as in the year 1267, of what he deemed to be the true office, the first duty of a king. Speaking in his father’s name, he said,—

“Our lord the king, providing for the better estate of his realm of England, and for the more speedy administration of justice, as belongeth to the office of a king; the more discreet men of the realm being called together, as well of the higher as of the lower degree; it was provided, agreed, and ordained,” etc.

Here we have, before he had ascended the throne, but at a time when he assuredly governed the vessel of the State, a brief but pithy outline of the constitution of England; and that outline it was the effort, the business of his life to fill up. With a vigorous hand he applied himself to the work of establishing a system of wise laws, and of improving the administration of justice. His sagacious and active mind penetrated and pervaded every department. And hence it is, that, in the judgment of all competent historians, the thirteenth century is the starting-point of the history of England. A writer of the Elizabethan age39 repeatedly notices with admiration, “his noble industry,” his “unceasing labours”; and this praise is justified by the recorded facts. In former reigns, foreign contests, and the suppressions of rebellion, or the enjoyment of hunting, filled up the reigns of the Norman kings. But Edward lived for England. In the former reigns, a brief charter had sometimes been extorted from the king; and in Henry’s long reign our Statute-Book commences, with six ordinances, made in the course of fifty-six years. But so soon as Edward ascends the throne, legislation of the highest order at once begins. Crowned in 1274, in 1275 we have the “Statute of Westminster,” “a code, rather than an act of parliament.” In 1276, the statutes on Coroners and on Bigamy. Occupied with Wales for one year, in 1278 we have the “Statute of Gloucester;” in 1279, the great “Statute of Mortmain.” Once more Wales claimed his attention; but in 1283 was passed “the famous statute” de Mercatoribus. In 1284, followed the “Statutes of Wales.” In 1285, the second “Statutes of Westminster;” and subsequently, the “Statute of Winchester.” He was then abroad for three years; but on his return, we have, immediately, the statutes “Quo Warranto,” “Quia Emptores,” and “Westminster III.” Thus it is evident that Edward deemed, most wisely and justly, that the establishment of good and wholesome laws was his primary duty.

A hasty observer might remark that the quantity of this legislation was not large, and that a statute or two in a year might be reckoned a slow rate of production. But the answer to this is obvious. The work of legislation was but newly undertaken, and those who had addressed themselves to it were prudently cautious. Some of these statutes, too, were large and comprehensive measures, well deserving a prolonged and careful consideration. But this brings us to a distinct and separate question—the character and value of Edward’s legislation. And this is the most wonderful feature in the whole case; for the quality of this legislation is probably unparalleled. Who is a higher authority on such matters than Sir Edward Coke?—and he, describing Edward’s laws, says:—

“All the statutes made in the reign of this king may justly be styled establishments; because they are more constant, standing, and durable laws, than have been made ever since. Justly, therefore, may this king be called, our Justinian.”

Fifty years after Sir Edward Coke, lived the great and good Sir Matthew Hale, who, in describing the growth of the common law of England, says of this reign:—

“Never did the laws, in any one age, receive so great and sudden an advancement. Nay, I may safely say, that all the ages since his time have not done so much, in reference to the orderly settling and establishing the distributive justice of this kingdom, as he did in the short compass of his single reign.” He adds: “Upon the whole, it appears, that the very scheme, mould, and model, of the common law, as it was rectified and set in order by this king, so in a great measure it has continued the same, through all succeeding ages to this day. So that the mark or epocha we are to take for the true starting of the law of England, what it is, is to be considered, stated, and estimated, from what this king left it. Before his time it was, in a great measure, rude and unpolished; while, on the other hand, as it was thus polished and ordered by him, so it has remained hitherto, without any great or considerable alteration.”

It would be easy to enlarge on this subject, but we are limiting ourselves to an outline. Sir William Blackstone thus describes this remarkable period of legislation:—

“Edward established, confirmed, and settled the great charter and the charter of forests.

“He gave a mortal wound to the encroachments of the pope and his clergy, by limiting and establishing the bounds of ecclesiastical jurisdiction; and by obliging the ordinary, to whom the goods of intestates at that time belonged, to discharge the debts of the deceased.

“He defined the limits of the several temporal courts of the highest jurisdiction, the king’s-bench, common-pleas, and exchequer, so that they might not interfere with each other’s proper business.

“He settled the boundaries of the inferior courts, in counties, hundred, and manors.

“He secured the property of the subject, by abolishing all arbitrary taxes and talliages levied without consent of parliament.

“He guarded the common justice of the kingdom from abuses, by giving up the royal prerogative of sending mandates to interfere in private causes.

“He settled the forms, solemnities, and effect of fines levied in the court of common-pleas.

“He first established a repository for the public records of the kingdom.

“He improved upon the laws of king Alfred, by that great and orderly method of watch and ward, established by the statute of Winchester.

“He settled and reformed many abuses incident to tenures, by the statute of Quia emptores.

“He instituted a speedier way for the recovery of debts, by granting executions, not only upon goods and chattels, but also upon lands, by writ of elegit; a signal benefit to a trading people.

“He effectually provided for the recovery of advowsons as temporal rights.

“He closed the great gulf in which all the landed property of the kingdom was in danger of being swallowed, by his reiterated statutes of Mortmain.

“I might continue,” adds Sir William, “this catalogue much further; but, upon the whole, we may observe that the very scheme and model of the administration of common justice, between party and party, was entirely settled by this king.”

Legislation, then, and not military aggrandisement, was the work to which Edward gave himself; and to liken him to Justinian does him much less than justice. The Roman emperor lived at the close of a long period, during which Rome had abounded in laws, and in which the laws had grown too complex and voluminous. His merit is, that he collected and arranged them into a code. Edward’s position was wholly different. He was born at a period when England, then rising into the position of a nation, found itself without written laws and without a legislature; and he set himself to work, with clearness of vision and with largeness of heart, to supply both these wants. In the first of these merits he does not stand alone. Other rulers have seen the need of laws, and have set themselves to supply that need. But too often they have wished that the work should be theirs, the power theirs, and the merit theirs also. Now it is Edward’s peculiar glory that, from the very opening of his public life, he seemed to have seen and adopted the great truth which lies at the foundation of all “constitutions,” that “what concerns all should be by all approved,” and that “common perils should be met by remedies prescribed in common.” These words fell from him in 1295, but the sentiment contained in them is discernible in every step of his whole career.

It is this, then, and not any supposed “attempt to subject the whole island to his sway,” which constitutes the chief feature, the principal merit of Edward’s reign. To be a conqueror, although indeed this kind of conquest—the bringing one island under one government—would be the wisest and the best; to be a conqueror would be but an ordinary and very common sort of merit. The organ of “acquisitiveness” is possessed by a great many of the human race. Edward’s true glory lay, not in his desire to take, but in his willingness to give. When he went forth, “mighty in arms,” it was, in every case, because his foes left him no choice,—because to remain at peace would have been dishonour. But his peaceful conquests, his legislative victories, were entirely his own. Here we see his own mind and will. From his first accession to power, until the latest hour of his reign, two great objects were constantly present to his mind. He saw that the realm required, and ought to have, a parliament, consisting not only of prelates and lords, but of “all the commonalty of the realm, thither summoned;” and next, that a chief function and office of this parliament should be to deliberate upon proposals laid before it, which should become, when assented to, statutes of the realm.

It is the enunciation of these two principles which constitutes the real glory of king Edward’s reign. That enunciation was his own voluntary act, and its sincerity was proved by all the measures of his subsequent career. His life was devoted to the working out of this great theory. His first statute, in its preamble, gives a bold and fearless sketch of a free legislature; and, before he died, he had gathered around him, as elected members of that legislature, the representatives of all the most populous towns of his realm of England.

Justly then does the writer whom we have already cited, a contemporary of Spenser and of Shakespeare, describe this king as one “in whom we see the value of wisdom, kingly powers, and noble industry,” one who “was a fatherly king to his people; employing all his life, care, and labour to benefit and nourish the commonwealth”—one, in fine, “in whom the good government and commonwealth of England had their chief foundation.”40