In less than twenty-four hours the patient commonly died or recovered, but when the pestilence had exerted its fury for a few weeks, it was observed, either from alterations in the air, or from a more proper regimen which had been discovered, to be considerably abated.[*] Preparations were then made for the ceremony of Henry's coronation.

In order to heighten the splendor of that spectacle, he bestowed the rank of knight banneret on twelve persons; and he conferred peerages on three.

Jasper, earl of Pembroke, his uncle, was created duke of Bedford; Thomas Lord Stanley, his father-in-law, earl of Derby; and Edward Courtney, earl of Devonshire.

At the coronation, likewise, there appeared a new institution, which the king had established for security as well as pomp, a band of fifty archers, who were termed yeomen of the guard.

But lest the people should take umbrage at this unusual symptom of jealousy in the prince, as if it implied a personal diffidence of his subjects, he declared the institution to be perpetual.