BEFORE THE RESTORATION.

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great odds, by the English armies. Victories indeed theywere of which a nation may justly be proud; for they are to beattributed to the moral superiority of the victors, a superio-rity which was most striking in the lowest ranks. The knightsof England found worthy rivals in the knights of France.Chandos encountered an equal foe in Du Guesclin. ButFrance had no infantry that dared to face the English bowsand bills. A French King was brought prisoner to London.An English King was crowned at Paris. The banner of SaintGeorge was carried far beyond the Pyrenees and the Alps. Onthe south of the Ebro the English won a great battle, whichfor a time decided the fate of Leon and Castile; and the Eng-lish Companies obtained a terrible preeminence among thebands of warriors who let out their weapons for hire to theprinces and commonwealths of Italy.

Nor were the arts of peace neglected by our fathers duringthat stirring period. While France was wasted by war, tillshe at length found in her own desolation a miserable defenceagainst invaders , the English gathered in their harvests,adorned their cities, pleaded, traded, and studied in security.Many of our noblest architectural monuments belong to thatage. Then rose the fair chapels ofNew College and of SaintGeorge, the nave of Winchester and the choir of York, thespire of Salisbury and the majestic towers of Lincoln. A co-pious and forcible language, formed by an infusion of Frenchinto German, was now the common property of the aristocracyand of the people. Nor was it long before genius began toapply that admirable machine to worthy purposes. WhileEnglish battalions, leaving behind them the devastated pro-vinces of France, entered Valladolid in triumph, and spreadterror to the gates of Florence, English poets depicted invivid tints all the wide variety of human manners and fortunes,and English thinkers aspired to know, or dared to doubt,where bigots had been content to wonder and to believe. The

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CHAP.

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