The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D. — Volume 10: Historical WritingsSwift, Jonathan
History
The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D. — Volume 10: Historical Writings
Swift, Jonathan
Anne, Queen of Great Britain, 1665-1714; Great Britain -- History -- Anne, 1702-1714; Spanish Succession, War of, 1701-1714
While the King was thus employed at home, intelligence came that his
brother Geoffrey was endeavouring by force to possess himself of the
Earldom of Anjou, to which he had fair pretensions; for their father
considering what vast dominions would fall to his eldest son, bequeathed
that earldom to the second in his last sickness, and commanded his
nobles then about him, to take an oath that they would not suffer his
body to be buried until Henry (who was then absent) should swear to
observe his will. The Duke of Normandy, when he came to assist at his
father's obsequies, and found that without his compliance he must draw
upon himself the scandal of keeping a father unburied, took the oath
that was exacted for observance of his will, though very much against
his own. But after he was in possession of England, whether it were that
his ambition enlarged with his dominions, or that from the beginning he
had never intended to observe what he had sworn, he prevailed with Pope
Adrian (of English birth) to dispense with his oath, and in the second
year of his reign went over into Normandy, drove his brother entirely
out of Anjou, and forced him to accept a pension for his maintenance.
But the young prince, through the resentment of this unnatural dealing,
in a short time died of grief.
Nor was his treatment more favourable to the King of Scots, whom, upon a
slight pretence, he took occasion to dispossess of Carlisle, Newcastle,
and other places granted by the Empress to that prince's father, for his
services and assistance in her quarrel against Stephen.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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