He rose in the house of peers; took notice of the clamors propagated against him; and complained that after serving the crown in thirty-four campaigns; after living abroad seventeen years, without once returning to his native country; after losing a father and three brothers in the wars with France; after being himself a prisoner, and purchasing his liberty by a great ransom; it should yet be suspected, that he had been debauched from his allegiance by that enemy whom he had ever opposed with such zeal and fortitude, and that he had betrayed his prince, who had rewarded his services by the highest honors and greatest offices that it was in his power to confer.[*] This speech did not answer the purpose intended.

The commons, rather provoked at his challenge, opened their charge against him, and sent up to the peers an accusation of high treason, divided into several articles.

They insisted, that he had persuaded the French king to invade England with an armed force, in order to depose the king, and to place on the throne his own son, John de la Pole, whom he intended to marry to Margaret, the only daughter of the late John, duke of Somerset, and to whom, he imagined, he would by that means acquire a title to the crown: that he had contributed to the release of the duke of Orleans, in hopes that that prince would assist King Charles in expelling the English from France, and recovering full possession of his kingdom: that he had afterwards encouraged that monarch to make open war on Normandy and Guienne, and had promoted his conquests by betraying the secrets of England, and obstructing the succors intended to be sent to those provinces; and that he had, without any powers or commission, promised by treaty to cede the province of Maine to Charles of Anjou, and had accordingly ceded it; which proved in the issue the chief cause of the loss of Normandy.[**] * Cotton, p.

641.
** Cotton, p.642.Hall, fol.157.Holing, p.631.

Grafton, p.