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Digitized by the Internet Arciiive in 2009 with funding from Duke University Libraries http://www.archive.org/detaiLs/fortunesofperkinOOshel sStSP PEEFACE The story of Perkiu Warbeck was first suggested to me as a subject for historical detail. On studying it, I became aware of tlie romance wMch his story contains, while, at the same time, I felt that it would be impossible for any narration, that should be confined to the incorporation of facts related by our old Chroniclers, to do it justice. It is not singular that I should entertain a belief that Perkin was, in reality, the lost duke of York. For, in spite of Hume, and the later historians who have followed in his path, no person who has at all studied the subject but arrives at the same con- clusion. Records exist in the Tower, some well known, others with which those who have access to those interesting papers are alone acquainted, which put the question almost beyond a doubt. This is not the place for a discussion of the question. The principal thing that I should wish to be impressed on my reader's mind is, that whether my hero was or was not an impostor, he was believed to be the true man by his contemporaries. The partial pages of Bacon, of Hall, and Holinshed, and others of that date, are replete with proofs of this fact. There are some curious letters, written by Sir John Eamsay, laird of Balmayne, calling himself Lord Bothwell, addressed to Henry the Seventh himself, which, though written by a spy and hireling of that monarch, tend to confirm my belief, and even demonstrate that in his eagerness to get rid of a formidable competitor, Henry did not hesitate to urge midnight assassination. These letters are printed in the Appendix to Pinkerton's " History of Scot- land." The verses which form the motto to these volumes, are 2 a ly PEEFACE. part of a rythmical chronicle, written by two subjects of Bur- gundy, who lived in those days ; it is entitled, " Recollection des Merveilles, advenues en nostre temps, commencee par tres elegant orateur, Messire Georges Chastellan, et continuee par Maistre Jean Molinet." In addition to the unwilling suffrage of his enemies, we may adduce the acts of his friends and allies. Human nature in its leading features is the same in all ages. James the Fourth of Scotland was a man of great talent and discernment : he was proud ; attached, as a Scot, to the prejudices of birth; of punc- tilious honour. No one can believe that he would have bestowed his near kinswoman, nor have induced the earl of Huntley to give his daughter in marriage to one who did not bear evident signs of being of royal blood. The various adventures of this unfortunate prince in many countries, and his alliance with a beautiful and high-born woman, who proved a faithful, loving wife to Tiim, take away the sting from the ignominy which might attach itself to his fate ; and make him, we venture to believe, in spite of the con- tumely later historians have chosen, in the most arbitrary way, to heap upon him, a fitting object of interest — a hero to ennoble the pages of a humble tale. PEEKIN WAEBECK. CHAPTEE I. THE FLIGHT FEOil BOSWOETH PIELD. He seemed breathless, heartless, faint and wan. And all his armour sprinkled was with blood. And soil'd with dirty gore, that no man can Discern the hue thereof. He never stood, But bent his hasty course towards the idle flood. Spenser. After a long series of civil dissension — after many battles, wliose issue involved tlie fate of tlioiisands — after the destruction of nearly all the Enf^lish nobility in the contest between the two Eoses, the decisive battle of Bosworth Pield was fought on the 22nd of Auijust, 1415, whose result was to entwine, as it was called, the white and red symbols of rivalship, and to restore peace to this unhappy country. The day had been sunny and warm : as the evening closed in, a west wind rose, bringing along troops of fleecy clouds, golden at sunset, and then dun and grey, veiling with pervious network the many stars. Three horsemen at this liour passed through the open country between Hinckley and Welford in Leicester- shire. It was broad day when they descended from the elevation on which the former stands, and the villagers crowded to gaze upon the fugitives, and to guess, from the ensigns they bore, to which party they belonged, while the warders from the near castle hastened out to stop them, thus to curry favour with the conqueror ; a design wholly baffled. The good steeds of the knights, for such their golden spurs attested them to be, bore them fast and far along the Eoman road, which still exists in those parts to shame our modern builders. It was dusk when, turning from the direct route to avoid entering Welford, they reached a ford of the Avon. Hitherto silence had prevailed with the party — for until now their anxiety to fly had solely occupied their thoughts. Their appearcince spoke of war, nay, of slaughter. Their cloaks were stained and torn ; their armour was disjointed, and parts of it were wanting ; yet these losses were so arbitrary, B 2 THE FLIGHT FROM that it was plain that tlie pieces had been hacked from their fastenings. The helm of the foremost was deprived of its crest ; another wore the bonnet of a common soldier, which ill accorded with the rest of his accoutrements ; while the third, bareheaded, his hair fallings on his shoulders, lank and matted from heat and exercise, gave more visible tokens of the haste of flight. As the night grew darker, one of them, and then another, seemed willing to relax somewhat in their endeavours : one alone continued, with unmitigated energy, to keep his horse at the same pace they had all maintained during the broad light of day. When they reached the ford, the silence was broken by the hindmost horseman ; he spoke in a petulant voice, saying :— *' Another half mile at this pace, and poor Flceur-de-Luce foun- ders ; if you will not slacken your speed, here we part, my friends. God save you till we meet again ! " "Evil betide the hour that separates us, brother! " said the second fugitive, reining in ; " our cause, our peril, our fate shall be the same. You, my good lord, will consult your own safety." The third cavalier had already entered the stream : he made a dead halt while his friends spoke, and then replied : — " Let us name some rendezvous where, if we escape, we may again meet. I go on an errand of life and death : my success is doubtful, my danger certain. If I succeed in evading it, where shall I rejoin you ? " " Though the event of this day has been fatal to the king," answered the other, " our fortunes are not decided. I propose taking refuge in some sanctuary, till we perceive how far the earl of Richmond is inclined to mercy." " I knew the earl when a mere youth, Sir Humphrey Staf- ford," said the foremost rider, " and heard more of him when I visited Brittany, at the time of King Louis's death, two years ago. When mercy knocks at his heart, suspicion and avarice give her a rough reception. We must fly beyond sea, unless we can make further stand. More of this when we meet again. Where shall that be ? " " I have many friends near Colchester," replied the elder Stafford, " and St. Mary boasts an asylum there which a crowned head would not dare violate. Thence, if all else fail, we can pass with ease to the Low Countries." " In sanctuary at Colchester — I will not fail you. God bless and preserve you the while ! " The noble, as he said these words, put spurs to his horse, and without looking back, crossed the stream, and turning on the skirts of a copse, was soon out of sight of his companions. He rode all night, cheering his steed with hand and voice ; looking angrily at the early dawning east, which soon cast from her B08W0ETH FIELD. 3 cloudless brow the dimness of night. Yet the morning air was grateful to his heated cheeks. It was a perfect summer's morn. The wheat, golden from ripeness, swayed gracefu.ly to the light breeze ; the slender oats shook their small bells in the air with ceaseless motion ; the birds, twittering, alighted from the ftdl-leaved trees, scattering dew-drops from the bra aches. With the earliest dawn, the cavalier entered a forest, traversing its depths with the hesitation of one unacquainted with the country, and looked frequently at the sky, to be directed by the position of the glowing east. A path more worn than the one he had hitherto followed now presented itself, leading into the heart of the wood. He hesitated for a few seconds, and then, with a word of cheer to his horse, pursued bis way into the embowering thicket. After a short space the path narrowed, the meeting branches of the trees impeded him, and the sudden angle it made from the course he wished to follow, served to perplex him still farther ; but as he vented his impatience by hearty Catholic exclamations, a little tinkling bell spoke of a chapel near, and of the early rising of the priest to perform the matin service at its altar. The horse of the fugitive, a noble "war-steed, had long flagged ; and hunger gnawed at the rider's own heart, for he had not tasted food since the morning of the previous day. These sounds, therefore, heard in so fearless a seclusion, bore with them pleasant tidings of refreshment and repose. He crossed himself in thankfulness ; then throwing himself from his horse (and such change was soothing to his stiffened limbs), he led him through the opening glade to where a humble chapel and a near adjoining hut stood in the bosom of the thicket, emblems of peace and security. The cavalier tied his horse to a tree, and entered the chapel. A venerable priest was reading the matin service ; one old woman composed his congregation, and she was diligently employed telling her beads. The bright rays of the newly-risen sun streamed through the eastern window, casting the chequered shadow of its lattice-work on the opposite wall. The chapel was small and rustic ; but it was kept exquisitely clean : the sacred appurtenances of the altar also were richer than was usual, and each shrine was decked with clusters of flowers, chiefly composed of white roses. No high praise, indeed, was due to the rude picture of the Virgin of the Annunciation, or of the Announcing Angel, a representation of whom formed the altar-piece ; but in barbaric England, in those days, piety stood in place of taste, and that which represented Our Lady received honour, however unworthy it might be of the inspiress of Raphael or Correggio. The cavalier took his disornamented casque from his head, placed it on the ground, and knelt reveren- B 2 4 THE FLIGHT FEOM tially on the bare earfcli. He had lately escaped from battle and slaughter, and he surely thought that he had especial motive for thanksgiving ; so that if his lips uttered a mere soldier's " Ave," still it had the merit of fervour and sincerity. Had he been less occupied by his own feelings, he might have remarked the many glances the priest cast on him, who dis- honoured his learning and piety by frequent mistakes of lan- guage, as his thoughts wandered from his breviary, to observe with deep attention his unexpected visitor. At length the service ended : the old dame rose from her knees, and satisfied her curiosity, which she had excited by many a look askance, by a full and long gaze on the cavalier. His hewn armour, torn cloak, and, unseemly for the sacred spot, the dread stains on his gar- ments and hands, were all minutely scanned. Nor did his per- sonal appearance escape remark. His stature was tall, his person well knit, showing him to be a man of about thirty years of age. His features were finely moulded, his grey eyes full of fire, his step had the dignity of rank, and his look expressed chivalrous courage and frankness. The good woman had not been long engaged in surveying the stranger, when her pastor beckoned her to retire, and himself advanced, replying to the soldier's salute with a benedicite, and then hastily inquiring if he came from the field. "Even so, father," said the cavalier ; " I come from the field of the bloody harvest. Has any intelligence of it travelled hither so speedily ? If so, I must have wandered from the right road, and am not so far on my journey as I hoped." " I have only heard that a battle was expected," s.iid the priest, " and your appearance tells me that it is over. The for- tunes, nay, perhaps the life of a dear friend are involved in its issue, and I fear that it is adverse — for you fly from pursuit, and methinks, though stained with dust and blood, that emblem on your breast is the White E-ose." The warrior looked on the old man, whose dignity and language were at variance with his lowly destination ; he looked partly in wonder, and partly to assure himself of his questioner's sin- cerity. "You are weary, Sir Enight," added the monk, whose experienced eyes had glanced to the golden spurs of his visitant ; "come to my hermitage, there to partake of such refreshment as I can bestow. When your repast is ended, I will, by confi- dence on my part, merit yours." This invitation was that of worldly courtesy, rather than the rustic welcome of a recluse monk. The cavalier thanked him cordially, adding, that he must first provide food and water for his horse, and that afterwards he would gratefully accept his host's invitation. The old man entered with the spirit of a soldier into BOSWOETH FIELD. 5 Ill's £^uest's anxiety for his steed, and assisted in purveying to its wants, ino-ratiatinij himself meanwhile with its master, bv dis- covering and praising scientifically its points of beauty. The poor animal showed tokens of over fatigue, yet still he did not refuse his food, and the cavalier marked with joy that his eye grew brighter and his knees firmer after feeding. They then entered the cottage, and the soldier's eye was at- tracted from more sacred emblems by a sword whichwas suspended over a picture of the Virgin : — " You belong to our Chivalry !" he exclaimed, while his countenance lighted up with joyful recognition. "i^ow I belong to the holy order whose badge I wear," the monk replied, pointing to his Benedictine dress. " In former days I followed a brave leader to the field, and, in his service, incurred such guilt, as I now try to expiate by fasting and prayer." The monk's features were convulsed by agitation as he spoke, then crossing his arms on his breast, he was absorbed in thought for a few moments, after which he raised his head and resumed the calm and even serene look that characterized him. '•' Sir Knight," said he, motioning to the table novr spread for the repast, *•'! have but poor fare to ofier, but a soldier will not disdain its meagreness. My wine I may praise, as being the produce of a generous vintage ; I have kept it sealed, to open it on occasions like the present, and rejoice that your strength will be recruited by it." Bread, fruits, cheese, and a flagon of the wine, which merited the giver's eulogium, composed the fugitive's breakfast, whose fatigue required cordial and repose. As he was occupied by his repast, his host eyed him with evident agitation, eager yet fearful to question him on the subject of the battle. At length he again asked, " You come from the field on which the forces of the king and of the earl of Eichmond met ?" "Ido." " You fought for the White Eose, and you fly ?" " I fought for the White Eose till it was struck to the ground. The king has fallen with his chief nobility around him. Eew Yorkists remain to mourn the success of the Lancastrians." Deep grief clouded the old man's countenance, but accustomed to subdue his feelings, as one on whom, being stricken by an overwhelming misery, all subsequent disasters fall blunted, he continued with greater calmness : *' Pardon me, noble gentle- man, if I appear to ask an indiscreet question. You are of lordly bearing, and probably filled a place near the royal person. Did you hear, on the night before last, aught of the arrival of a stranger youth at the king's tent?" 6 THE FLIGHT FBOM The knight eyed the old man with a quick glance, asking, in his turn, "Are you, then, the foster-father of Xing Richard's son ? " "Did you see my boy?" cried the priest. "Did his father acknowledge him ? — Where is he now ? — Did he enter the ranks to fight and fall for his parent ?" ** On the night of which you speak," said the stranger, evading the immediate question, "the king placed his son's hand in mine, as I vowed to protect and guard him if ill befell our party, as it has befallen." " Surely some presentiment of evil haunted the king's mind." " I do believe it ; for his manner was solemn and affecting. He bade the youth remember that he was a Plantagenet, and spoke proudly of the lineage from which he sprung. The young esquire listened intently, looking at his father with such an ingenuous and thoughtful expression, that he won my heart to love him." " JN'ow bless thee, Sir Knight, whoever thou art, for this praise of my poor Edmund. I pray you, hasten to tell me what more passed." The cavalier continued his account ; but his manner was serious, as if the conclusion of his tale would afflict his auditor. He related how, on quitting the royal tent, he had led Edmund Plantagenet to his own, thereto converse with him awhile, the better to learn whether his bearing and speech showed promise of future merit. Xing Eichard had enjoined his son to return to his seclusion early on the following morning ; but as soon as he entered his conductor's tent, he knelt to him and asked a boon, while tears gathered in his eyes, and his voice was broken by the fervour of his desire. The noble was moved by his entreaties, and promised to grant his request, if it did not militate against his honour and allegiance. " It is for honour that I speak," said Plantagenet ; "I am older in years than in seeming, for already I number twenty summers ; and, spite of my boyish look, I am familiar with martial exercises, and the glorious promise of war. Let me draw my sword for my father to-mor- row — let me, at your side, prove myself a worthy descendant of the conquerors of France ! Who will fight for King Richard with greater courage, fidelity, and devotion, than his acknowledged and duteous son?" The cavalier yielded to his noble yearnings. Clothed in armour he entered the ranks, and hovered a protec- ting angel near his parent during the bloody contest. And now, as his venerable guardian watched with trembling eagerness the countenance of his guest while he told his tale, and the stranger, with bitter regret, was about to relate that he had seen Plan- tagenet felled to the ground by a battle-axe, quick steps, and then a knocking, was heard at the cottage door. The stranger BOSWOETH FIELD. 7 started on his feet, and put his hand upon his sword; but a bright smile illuminated the monk's face, as the very youth of whom they spoke, Edmund Plantagenet, rushed into the apart- ment. His soiled garments and heated brow spoke of travel and fatigue, while his countenance wore an expression of wildness and even of horror. He started when he saw the stranger, but quickly recognized him as his new friend. " Thank God !" he cried, " that you, my dear lord, have not fallen into the hands of , the sacrilegious usurper ! It is my father's spirit that has saved you for his son's sake, that I may not be utterly abandoned and an orphan." With milder accost he bent his knee to his holy guardian, and then turned to answer the cavalier's questions of how he had escaped death from the blow he had received, and v, hat new events had occured since he had quitted the field early on the preceding day ? — while the monk chid him for his disobedience to his father's commands, in having mingled with the fray. The eyes of Plantagenet flashed fire at this reproach.— " Could I know that my father's crown and life," he exclaimed impetuously, *' depended on the combat, and not bring to his aid my weak arm ? God of Heaven ! had there been five hundred true as I^, we might all have fallen round him : but never, never, should 1 have seen the sight which last night I saw — nor heard the sounds I last night heard !" The youth covered his face with his hands, and the boiling tears trickled between his fingers. " Tell me," cried the noble, " what has happened ? — and swiftly tell me, for I loiter here too long." Almost suffocated by emotion, Plantagenet related, that when he recovered from the trance into which the fearful blow he had received had thrown him, the earl's camp-followers were busy among the slain : and that he had seen the body of King Eichard — of his father— thrown half-naked across a mule, thus to be borne to be exposed to the pubhc gaze and mockery in Leicester, where, but the day before, he had ridden with the royal crown on his head, the acknowledged sovereign of England. And that crown, base, ill-bartered bauble, having been found in the tent by Lord Stanley, he had brought and placed on Eich- mond's head, while the soldiers, with one acclaim, hailed him Henry the Seventh, King of England. The last words more than the others, for the death of his royal master was already known to him, moved the knight : — "Is this the end of our hopes?'' he cried. "Am I then too late ? Farewell, my friends ! Plantagenet, I shall never forget my oath to the king ; I shall become, I fear, an outcast and a soldier of fortune, even if I escape worse fate j but claim when S TnE FLIGHT FEOM vou will, and it shall be yours, whatever protection I can alFord you." "Yield, then. Lord Lovel," said the youth, "to my first request. You are in peril, let me share it ; permit me to accom- pany you. If you refuse, my plan is alread}^ formed ; I repair to the earl of Lincoln, whom King E-ichard named his successor, and oiFer myself as a soldier in his attempt to discrown the usurping Henry, and to raise again the White Eose to its right- ful supremacy." " To the earl of Lincohi — the successor of Eichard — to him you would repair? It is well — come with me now, and I will present you to that nobleman. If your foster-father consents, bid adieu to this seclusion for a time, and accompany me to Loudon, to new contests — to the combat of right against might — to success and honour, or to defeat and death ! " The sun had risen high when, having taken leave of the vene- rable monk, who would not oppose his pupil's gallant spirit of enterprise, Lord Lovel and young Plantagenet threaded the forest paths, which, by a safer and a shorter route than the highway, took them on their road to London. For a time they led their horses with difficulty through the entangled thicket, when at last reaching the open road, they mounted, and Lord Lovel, who was desirous of estimating the abilities and disposition of his companion, entered into conversation with him. They first con- versed on the sad changes which were the work of the eventful day of battle ; afterwards the cavalier led Edmund to speak of himself, his early life, his acquirements, and his hopes. When Plantagen.et was but ten years old his mother died, and her last request to the father of her boy, founded on a deep knowledge of the world, was, that her son might be educated far from the court, nor be drawn from the occupations and happier scenes of private life, to become a hanger-on of princes and nobles. There was a man, a gentleman and a knight, who had been a partizan of the AVhite Eose, and who had fought and bled for it in various battles between the duke of York and Henry the Sixth. In one of these, the misery of the times, and horrible consecjuences of civil dissension, caused him unwittingly to lift his armed hand against his twin brother, nor did he discover the mistake till, with his dying voice, that brother called on him to assist him against his slayer. A life of seclusion, penance, and prayer, alone blunted his sense of remorse, and quitting the world, he retired to a monastery, where after due noviciate ho took vows, and then shrinking from commerce with his kind, followed by visions that spoke for ever to him of his unnatural crime, he retreated to the forest of Leicestershire, to dwell alono with his grief and his repentance. BOSWOEin FIELD. 9 His retreat was known to many of his friends, and cLanee had brought the duke of Gloucester at one time to visit him ; when the ancient warrior rejoiced with enthusiasm at the exaltation of the party to which he was attached. The death of the mother of Edmund had the effect of softening the duke's heart, of makino^ for a short interval worldly cares and objects distasteful to him, and of filling him with a desire of seclusion and peace. If he was unable to enjoy these himself, he re- solved that at least his child should not be drawn by him into the thorny path of rivalship and ambition. His mother's last injunction strengthened this feeling ; and the duke, visiting a^ain the hermit of the wood, induced him to take charge of Edmund, and bringing him up in ignorance of his real parentage, to bestow such education on him as would enable him to fill with reputation an honourable, if not a distinguished station in society. This order of things was not changed by Richard's exaltation to the crown. On the contrary, the dangers he incurred from his usurpation made him yet more anxious to secure a peaceful existence for his offspring. When, however, his legitimate son, whom he had created prince of Wales, died, paternal affection awoke strong in his heart, and he could not resist his desire of seeing Edmund : a memorable visit for the priest-bred nursling of the forest ! It gave him a link with society, with which before he had felt no connexion : his imagi- nation and curiosity were highly excited. His revered friend, yielding to his eager demands, was easily enticed to recur to the passed scenes of an eventful life. The commencement of the wars of the two Eoses, and their dreadful results, furnished inexhaustible topics of discourse. Plautagenet listened with breathless interest, although it was not till the eve of the battle of Bosworth, that he knew how indissolubly his own fortunes were linked with those of the house of York. The events of the few last days had given him a new exist- ence. For the first time, feeling was the parent of action ; and a foregoing event drove him on to the one subsequent. He was excited to meditate on a thousand schemes, while the unknown future inspired him with an awe that thrilled his young heart with mingled pain and pleasure. He uttered his sentiments with the ingenuousness of one who had never been accustomed to converse with any but a friend ; and as he spoke, his dark and thoughtful eyes beamed with a tempered fire, that showed him capable of deep enthusiasm, though utter want of know- ledge of the world must make him rather a follower than a leader. They rode on meanwhile, the noble cavalier and gentle squire indulging in short repose. The intense fatigue Edmund at first 10 THE FLIGHT FEOM endured, seemed to be subdued by tlie nec::.'ii-y of its. con- tinuance, nor did it prevent liim from conversing with Lord Lovel, He was anxious thoroughly to understand the imme- diate grounds of the earl of Eichmond's invasion, and to ascertain the relative position of the remaining chiefs of the White Eose : " Where," he asked, " are Edward the Fourth's children ? " "The elder of these," Loj-d Lovel replied, "the Lady Eliza- beth, is, by direction of her uncle, at Sheriff Hutton, in York- shire." _ " And where are the princes ? Edward, who was proclaimed king, and his younger brother? " _ " They were long imprisoned in the Tower. Young Edward died there more than a year ago." " And the Duke of York ? " " He is supposed to have died also : they were both sickly boys." Lord Lovel said these words in a grave voice, and suspicion would have been instilled into any but the unsuspecting Ed- mund, of some covert meaning. After a short pause, he continued : — the question of the succession stands thus. Your father, the duke of Gloucester, threw the stigma of illegitimacy on King Edward's children, and thus took from them their right of inheriting the crown. The attainder of the duke of Clarence was considered reason sufficient why his children should be excluded from the throne, and their uncle, in con- sequence, became, by right of birth, king of England : his son he created prince of Wales. We submitted ; for a child like Edward the Fifth could scarcely be supported against an experienced warrior, a man of talent, a sage and just king, but at the expense of much blood. The wounds intiicted by the opposing houses of York and Lancaster were yet, as the late successful rebellion proves, unhealed ; and had the Yorkists contended among themselves, they would yet sooner have lost the supremacy they so hardly acquired: Eichard therefore receiv'ed our oaths of allegiance. When his son died, the question of who was the heir to the crown became agitated ; and the king at first declared the earl of Warwick, the son of the duke of Clarence, to be his successor. It was a dan- gerous step — and the imprudent friends of the young earl made it more so — to name him to succeed, who, if he were permitted at any time to wear the crown, might claim prece- dence of him who possessed it. Poor Warwick paid the penalty of youth and presumption : he is now a prisoner at Sheriff Hutton ; and John de la Poole, carl of Lincoln, son of Eichard's sister, and by the removal of the children of his BOSWOHTH FIELD. 11 elder brothers, liis heir by law was nominated to succeed his uncJe. I am now proceeding to him. I am ignorant of the conduct he will pursue ; whether he will make head against this Lancastrian king, or . Lincoln is a noble cavalier; a man whom bright honour clothes ; he is brave, generous, and good. I shall guide myself by his counsels and resolves ; and you, it appears, will follow my example." ^ After a pause, Lord Lovel continued : " After the death or disappearance of his princely nephews, the king, wishing to confirm his title, was ready to take the stigma thrown on their 'birth from his brother's daughters, and to marry his niece, the Lady Elizabeth. Her mother at first resisted, but the prospect of seeing her children restored to their rights, and herself to her lost dignity, overcame her objections, and the princess yielded a wilHng consent. Meanwhile, the Yorkists, who joined the earl of Richmond, extorted from him a vow that he would make King Edward's daughter his queen ; and even the Lancastrians, thinking thus to secure a king of their own, are eager for this union : yet the earl hates us all so cordially that he was hardly brought to consent. Should he, now that he has declared himself king, evade his promise, the children of Ehzabeth Woodville will suffer the stain of illegitimacy ; but if the marriage has place, and this unhappy race is restored to their honours and rights, our self-named sovereign may find that his own hands have dug the pit into which he will fall." A long silence succeeded to these explanations. The last expression used by Lovel inspired Edmund with wonder and curiosity ; but the noble pressing his horse to a swifter pace, did not hear his observations, or hearing them, replied only by saying, " Three hours' good riding will bring us to London. Courage, Plantagenet ! slacken not your speed, my good boy ; soft ease will follow this hard labour." The young moon in its first quarter was near its setting when they arrived at London. They approached from Edgware : without entering the town, they skirted its northern extremity, till Lord Lovel, cheeking his horse, remarked to his companion, that he judged it fitting to delay approaching the residence of the earl of Lincoln, until the setting of the moon and subsequent darkness secured them from observation. 12 CHAPTEE II. THE CONFEEENCE. Yes, my good Lord, It doth contain a king : King Richard lies Witiiin the limits of yon lime and stone. SlIAKSFEARE. The enrl of Lincoln, declared byHicliard tlie Third, lieir to the crown, did not join the royal forces, nor appear at the battle of Bosworth. This distinguished prince was a man of singular abihties and strength of mind, which chivalrous generosity adorned with a lustre superior even to that which he derived from his high rank. Lord Lovel was possessed of knightly courage, untarnished honour, and gentlemanly accomplishment. To these military and graceful qualities Lincoln added the wis- dom of a statesman and the moral energy resulting from inflexi- ble principle. He felt himself responsible to mankind and to all posterity for his actions. He was brave — that v>'as a vir- tue of the times ; but he was just, in a comprehensive sense of the word, and that exalted him above them. His manly features did not so much wear the stamp of beauty, though, like all the offspring of the House of York, he was handsome, as of the best quality of man, a perception of right, and resolution to achieve that right. Lord Lincoln disapproved decidedly of the usurpation of his uncle, Hichard the Third, over the children of Edward the Fourth. He allowed that the evidence was strong in favour of that king's former marriage, and their consequent illegitimacy ; but he said, that Elizabeth Woodville had so long been held queen of England, and her children heirs to the crown, that it was impossible to eradicate the belief of the English people, that their allegiance was due to him who had been proclaimed even by his uncle, Edward the Fifth. Even if they were put aside, the attainder passed against the duke of Clarence was an insuffi- cient reason to deprive his son of his lawful inheritance. He saw England wasted, and her nobility extirpated by civil con- test; and he perceived the seeds of future strife in the assump- tion of the crown by the duke of Gloucester. When the son of Hichard the Third died, and the earl of Warwick was named his successor, the superior right of the nephew before the reign- ing uncle became so eminent a subject of discussion, that the king was obliged to recall his declaration, and to confine the THE CONFEEENCE, 13 young prince in a castle in Yorkshire. The earl of Liacoln, then seven and twenty years of age, was next named. He re- monstrated vrith his uncle privately ; but fear of dividing the House of York against itself, and a disdain to make common cause with the dowager queen's relations, made him outwardly submit; but his plan was formed, and secretly all his efforts tended towards the restoring the children of Edward to their paternal rights. The boys were sickly. Edward the Fifth, irritated by the extinction of the hopes which the intrigues of his mother had kept alive in his breast, wasted by imprisonment in the Tower, and brooking with untamed pride the change from a regal to a private station, pined and died. Hichard, duke of York, was between ten and eleven ; a sprightly, ingenuous boy, whose lively spirit wore out his frame, and this, added to confinement and attention to his dying brother, brought him also near the grave. It was on the death of Edward, that the earl of Lincoln visited the Tower, and saw young Eichard. The accounts given by the attendants of his more than a child's devotion to his brother, his replies full of sportive fancy, his beauty, though his cheek was faded and his person grown thin, moved the generous noble to deep compassion. He ventured, under the strong influence of this feeling, to remonstrate warmly with his royal uncle, re*- preaching him with needless cruelty, and telhng him how in fact, though not in appearance, he was the murderer of his nephews, and would be so held by all mankind. Kichard's ambi- tion was satisfied by the success of his measures to obtain the crown; but his fears were awake. The duke of Buckingham was in arms against him — the queen and her surviving relatives were perpetually employed in exciting discontents in the kingdom. !Richard feared that if they obtained the person of his nephew, he would be turned into an engine for his overthrow ; while to obtain possession of him was the constant aim of their endea- vours. He earnestly desired to reconcile himself to the queen, and to draw her from the sanctuary in which she had immured herself — she refused all his offers, unless her son was first placed in her hand?. His head, ripe with state plots, now conceived a scheme. He consented that Lincoln should take the duke of York under his charge, if he would first engage to keep his removal from the Tower, and even his existence, a secret from his enemies. Lincoln made the required promise ; the young prince was conveyed to a country seat belonging to the earl, and Eichard, in furtherance of his plan, caused a rumour to go abroad that he also was dead. No one knew with whom this report originated. AYhen, to assure themselves, various nobles visited the Tower, 14 THE CONFERENCE. tlie boy was no longer tliere. The queen gave credit to the tale. At this moment, Richard set on foot a negotiation of marriaG:e with the eldest daughter of Edward the Fourth, the Lady Elizabeth. The partizans of the earl of E-ichmond sought to ensure the success of his enterprise by the same means : and while little Eichard grew in health and happiness in his country retreat, his own nearest and most attached relatives were giving away his inheritance — his uncle unwittingly laid the foundation stone of the reputation of cruelty and murder ever after affixed to him ; and his mother, endeavouring to exalt her daughter, and to restore herself to her lost station in the kingdom, sealed the fatal decree that first deprived her son of his rights, and afterwards of his life. On the evening that Lord Lovel and Edmund Plantagcnet entered London, the earl of Lincoln remained waitmg intelli- gence from the field, in a palace he inhabited not far from Tottenham Court, a secluded habitation, surrounded by a garden and a high wall. This was an irksome situation for a warrior ; but though his uncle loved, he distrusted him : his projected marriage with the Lady Elizabeth would probably cause him again to be father of an heir to the crown, and knowing that Lincoln possessed, in the young duke of York, a dangerous rival, he refused to allow him to take up arms against Richmond. Lord Lincoln was alone, pacing his large and vaulted hall in deep and anxious meditation. He, who with conscience for his rule, takes, or endeavours to take, the reins of fate into his own hands, must experience frequent misgivings ; and often feel that he wheels near the edge of a giddy pre- cipice, down which the tameless steeds he strives to govern may, in an instant, hurl him and all dependent upon his guidance. The simple feeling of compassion, arising from the seeing childhood lose its buoyancy in undue confinement, had first led the princely noble to take charge of his young cousin. Afterwards, when he beheld the boy grow in health and yeava, developing the while extraordinary quickness of intellect, and a sweet, ingenuous disposition, he began to reflect on the station he held, his rights and his injuries ; and then the design was originated on which he was now called to act. If llichard gained the day, all would stand as before. Should he be defeated — and that second sense, that feeling of coming events, which is one of the commonest, though the least acknow- ledged of the secret laws of our nature, whispered the yet unrevealed truth to him — who then would assume England's diadem, and how" could he secure it for its rightful owner, the only surviving son of Edward the Fourth? All these reflections coursed themselves through his brain, while, with the zeal pf a THE CONFEEENCE. 15 partizan, and the fervour of one vredded to the justice of his cause, he revolred every probable change of time and fortune. At this moment a courier vras announced : he brought tidings from the field. As is usual on the eve of a great event, tliej vrere dubious and contradictory. The armies faced each other, and the battle was impending. The doubts entertained on both sides, as to the part that Lord Stanley would take, gave still a greater uncertainty to the anticipations of each. Soon after the arrival of this man, the loud ringing at the outer gate was renewed; and the trampling of horses, as they entered the court, announced a more numerous company. There was something in the movements of his domestics that intimated to the earl that his visitor was of superior rank. Could it be the king, who had fled ; conquered, and a fugitive ? Could such terms be applied to the high-hearted Richard? The doors of the hall were thrown open, and the question answered by the entrance of his visitant : it was a woman ; and her name, " Lady Brampton ! " in a tone of wonder, burst from the noble's lips. " Even I, my good lord," said the lady ; " allow me your private ear; I bring intelligence from Leicestershire. All is lost," she continued, when the closing of the door assured her of privacy; "all is lost, and all is gained — Richard is slain. My emissaries brought swift intelligence of this event to me at Northampton, and I have hastened with it hither, that without loss of time you may act." There was a quickness and a decision in the lady's manner, that checked rather than encouraged her auditor. She con- tinued: " Yesper hour has long passed — it matters not — • London yet is ours. Command instantly that Richard the Fourth be proclaimed king of England." Lord Lincoln started at these words. The death of his uncle and benefactor could not be received by him like tlie loss of a move at chess ; a piece lost, that required the bringing up of other pieces to support a weak place. " The king is slain," were words that rang in his ears : drowning every otlier that the lady uttered with rapidity and agitation. " We will speak of that anon," he replied; and going to the high window of his hall, he threw it open, as if the air oppressed him. The wind sighed in melancholy murmurs among the branches of the elms and limes in the garden : the stars were bright, and the setting moon was leaving the earth to their dim illumination. "Yesternight," thought Lincoln, "he was among us, a part of our conversation, our acts, our lives ; now his glazed eyes behold not these stars. The past is his : with the present and the future he has no participation." 16 THE CONFEEENCE. Lady Erampton's impatience did not permit tlie earl lon 2 36 THE INTERVIEW. aj^ain assume that name : it shall be my care to escort him in this character to Winchester; and at Portsmouth they may embark, ■while you follow your own plans, and take refuge with the friends you mention in these parts." As AYarbeck spoke, Lovel motioned to him to observe his sister, who, unable to sleep, was observinc^ them with attention. " Madeline does not understand our English," said her brother ; *'but it were well that she joined our counsels, which may con- tinue in French. I have your leave, my lord, to disclose your secret to her? Fear her not : she would die rather than injure one hair of that poor child's head," OiiWarbeck's invitation, the lady rose; and he,taking her hand, led her to the low couch of the duke of York. Sleep and gentle dreams spread an irradiation of beauty over him : his glowing cheek, his eyes hardly closed, the masses of rich auburn hair that •clustered on a brow of infantine smoothness and candour, the little hand and arm, which, thrown above his head, gave an air of help- lessness to his attitude, combined to form a picture of childish grace and sweetness, which no woman, and that woman a mother, could look on without emotions of tenderness. "What an angelic child," said the fair sister of Warbeck, as she stooped to kiss his rosy cheek ; " what a noble-looking boy. Who is he ?" "One proscribed," said the cavalier; "one whom he who reigns over England would consign to a dungeon. Were he to fall into the hands of his enemies, they might not, indeed, dare not cut him off violently ; but they would consume and crush him, by denying him all that contributes to health and life." " Can this sweet boy have enemies?" cried the lady : " Ah ! if he have, has he not friends also to guard him from them?" " With our lives !" he replied, emphatically ; " but that is a small sacrifice and a useless one ; for, to preserve him we must preserve ourselves. My life, — such acts deserve no record, — I have, and will again and again expose for him ; but the will to save him is not enough witiiout the power ; and that power you possess, lady, to a far, far greater extent than I." " The will I have most certainly," said the fair one, regarding the boy with anxious tenderness. " Command me, sire chevalier; ray power, small as I must believe it to be, and my will, shall unite to preserve this sweet child." Warbeck disclosed briefly to his sister the secret of young Hichard's birth, and detailed his plan for his safe journey to Winchester ; nay, and after that, for his crossing the sea, and continuing to personate, in Flanders, the nephew of Madeline, if so his royal mother deemed fitting, till the moment should arrive, when the schemes of his partizans being crowned with success, he could be restored to his country and his birthright. The fair THE INTEEVIEW. 37 Fleming joyfully assented to this proposition, and entered cordi- ally into the details. Lovel was profuse of thanks : so suddenly and so easily to be relieved from his worst fears, appeared like the special interposition of some guardian saint. His heart overflowed with gratitude ; and his glistening eyes gave token of greater thanks than even his emphatic words. Madeline felt all the excitement of being actively employed in a deed of benevolence : her calm features were animated with an angelic expression. The discussion of details demanding the coolest prudence and most vigilant observation, long occupied them : and the lady brought a woman's tact and keen penetration to arrange the crude designs of her brother. All was rendered smooth ; every obstacle foreseen and obviated ; every pass of danger reconnoitered and provided for. When, at last, their plans were perfected, the lady again returned to her hard couch to seek repose : for some time the cavalier and the Fleming kept watch, till they also, in such comfortless posture as they might, stretched on the bare ground, yielded to drowsiness ; and grey morning found all the dwellers in the sheepcot sunk in profound sleep. Fear, charity, hope, and love, might colour their dreams ; but quiet slumber possessed them all, driving care and thought from the heart and brain, to steep both in oblivion of all ill. When Madeline awoke in the morning, the first sight that met her eyes was the lovely boy she had promised to protect, playing with her dark-eyed girl, who displayed all the ecstaey of childish glee with her new playmate. Madeline was a blonde Fleming, with light blue eyes and flaxen ringlets — she was about five-and-t^renty years of age ; an expression of angelic goodness animated her features, bestowing on them an appearance of loveliness, which of themselves they did not possess. It could hardly be guessed, that Richard's playmate was the daughter of the fair-haired Fleming : but the husband of Warbeck's sister was a Spaniard, and the child resembled her father in everything except the soft mouth and sweet smile, which was all her mother's : her large full dark eyes gave to her infantine face a look of sen- sibility far beyond her years. The little girl ran to her mother when she awoke ; and Madeline caressed both her and the prince with the greatest tenderness. They stood at the door of the cottage ; the early sun shone brightly on the hoar frost that covered the moor ; the keen air was bracing, though cold ; the morning was cheerful, such as inspires hope and animation, a lively wit to understand, and a roused courage to meet difilculties. Madelme turned from the glittering scene to look on her young charge — his eyes were fixed on her face. " How beautiful and good you look," said the boy. -•* I am glad that you think me good," replied the lady, smihngj 38 ^ THE INTEEVIEW. " you will have less fear in trusting yourself with me : your noble friend has confided your grace to my care, if, indeed, you will condescend to live with me, and be as a son to me. I have just lost a little nephew whom I fonely loved ; will you supply his place, and take his name ? " " Fair cousin," said the prince, caressing his kind friend as he spoke, " I will wait on you, and serve you as no nephew ever served. What name did your lost kinsman bear ? Quickly tell me, that I may know my own, and hereafter call myself by it." *' Perkin Warbeck," said Madeline. " Now you mock me," cried Richard : "that has long been my name ; but I knew not that it gave me a claim to so pretty a relation." " This courtly languao:e," replied the lady, " betrays your grace's princeliness. What will our Flemish boors say, when I present the nursling of royalty as mine? You will shame our homely breeding, Duke Hichard." " I beseech you, fair mistress," said Lovel, who now joined them, "to forget, even in private, such high-sounding titles. It is dangerous to play at majesty, unaided by ten thousand armed asserters of our right. Hemember this noble child only as your loving nephew, Perkin Warbeck : he, who well knows the misery of regal claims unallied to regal authority, will shelter himself gladly and gratefully under the shadow of your louly bower." And now, as the wintry sun rose higher, the travellers pre- pared for their departure. Warbeck first left them to find and to dismiss his domestics, who would have been aware of the decep- tion practised in the person of Richard. He returned in a few hours for his sister. The duke and Lord Lovel then separated. The intervening time had been employed by the noble in school- ing the boy as to his future behaviour, in recounting to him his plans and hopes, and in instructing him how to conduct himself with his mother, if indeed he saw her ; for Lovel was ignorant how Lady Brampton had succeeded at Winchester, and how far it would be possible to bring about an interview between the queen and her son. At length Warbeck returned ; the travellers mounted, and Lord Lovel, watching from the cottage door, beheld with melancholy regret the prince depart : the long habit of intercourse, the uncertain future, his high pretensions, and his present state, had filled the cavalier with moody thoughts, unlike his usual sanguine anticipations, and energetic resolves. " This is womanly," at last he thought, as the reflection that ho was alone, and had, perhaps, seen his belov^ed charge for the last time, filled his eyes with unwonted tears. " To horse ! To my friends ! — There to plan, scheme, devise — and then again to the field ! " THE INTERVIEW. 39 Days and weeks passed, replete M'itli doubt aud anxiety to the queen and her enthusiastic friend at Winchester. Each day, many, many times, Lady Brampton visited the cathedral to observe whether the silver heart was suspended near the altar, which she had ag^reed with Lord Lovel should be the sign of the duke's arrival. The part Elizabeth "VYoodville had to play mean- while was difficult and painful — she lived in constant intercourse with the countess of Richmond ; the wishes and thoughts of all around were occupied by the hope of an heir to the crown, which the young queen would soon bestow on England. The birth of a son, it was prognosticated, would win her husband's affection, and all idea of future disturbance, of further risings and dis- loyalty, through the existence of this joint offspring of the two E-oses, would be for ever at an end. While these hopes and expectations formed, it was supposed, the most flattering and agreeable subject of congratulation for the dowager queen, she remained sleepless and watchful, under the anticipation of seeing her fugitive son, the outcast and discrowned claimant of all that was to become the birthright of the unborn child. At length the unwearied cares of Lady Brampton were rewarded ; a small silver heart, bearing the initials of Richard, duke of York, was suspended near the shrine ; and as she turned to look who placed it there, the soft voice of Madeline uttered the word of recognition agreed upon ; joy filled Lady Brampton's heart, as the brief answers to her hurried questions assured her of Richard's safety. The same evening she visited, in disguise, the abode of Warbeck, and embraced, in a transport of delight, the princely boy, in whose fate she interested herself with all the fervour of her warm heart. She now learnt the design Lord Lovel had of placing Richard in safety under Madeline's care in Flanders, until his friends had prepared for him a triumphant return to England. She concerted with her new friends the best mode of introducing Richard into his mother's presence ; and it was agreed that, early on the following morning, Madeline and the duke should seek one of the small chapels of the cathedral of Winchester, and that Elizabeth should there meet her son. With an overflowing heart, Lady Brampton returned to communicate this intelligence to the royal widow, and to pass with her the intervening hours in oft-renewed conjectures and anticipations concerning the duke of York. To modern and Protestant England, a cathedral or a church may appear a strange place for private assignations and concealed meetings. It was otherwise in the days of our ancestors, when, through similarity of religion, our manners bore a greater resem- blance than they now do to those of foreign countries. The churches stood always open, ready to receive the penitent, who 40 THE INTERVIEW. souglit the stillness of the holy asylum the more entirely to con- centrate his thoughts in prayer. As rank did not exempt its possessors from sin nor sorrow, neither did it from acts of penitence, nor from those visitations of anguish, when the sacred temple was sought, as bringing the votarist into more immediate communication with the Deity. The queen dowager excited, therefore, no suspicion, when, with her rosary formed of the blessed wood of Lebanon encased in gold in her hand, with Lady Brampton for her sole afteudant, she sought at five in the morning the dark aisle of the cathedral of "Winchester, there to perform her religious duties. Two figures already knelt near the altar of the chapel designated as the place of meeting ; Elizabeth's breath came thick, her knees bent under her, she leaned against a buttress, while a fair-haired boy turned at the sound. He first looked timidly on her, and then, encouraged by the smile that visited her quivering lips, he sprung forward, and kneeling at her feet, buried his face in her dress, sobbing, while, bending over him, her own tears fell on his glossy hair. Lady Brampton and Madeline retired up the aisle, leaving the mother and child alone. " Look up, my Eichard," cried the unfortunate widow ; " look up, son of King Edward, — my noble, my outcast boy ! Thou art much grown — much altered since I last saw thee. Thou art more like thy blessed father than thy infancy promised." She parted his curls on his brow, and looked on him with the very soul of maternal tenderness. " Ah ! were I a cottager," she continued, " though bereft of my husband, I should collect my 3'oung ones round me, and forget sorrow. I should toil for them, and they v.ould learn to toil for me. How sweet the food my industry procured for them, how hallowed that winch their maturer strength would bestow on me ! I am the mother of princes. Yain boast ! I am childless ! " The queen, lost in thought, scarcely heard the gentle voice of her son who replied by expressions of endearment, nor felt his caresses ; but collecting her ideas, she called to mind how brief tlie interview must be, and how she was losing many preciout moments in vain exclamations and regrets, llecovering that calm majesty which usually characterized her, she said : " Pvichard, arise ! our minutes are counted, and each must be freighted with the warning and wisdom of years. Thou art young, my son ! but Lady Brampton tells me that thy under- standing is even premature; thy experience indeed must be small, but I will try to adapt my admonitions to that experience. Should you fail to understand me, do not on that account aespise my lessons, but treasure them up till thy increased years reveal their meaning to thee, AYe may never meet again ; for onpo THE INTEEVIEW. 41 separated, ten thousand swords, and twice ten thousand dangers divide us perhaps for ever. I feel even now that it is given to me to bless thee for the last time, and I would fain to the last be the cause of good to thee. I have lived, ah I how long; and suffered, methinks, beyond human suffering ; let the words I now utter live in thy soul for ever ; my soul is in them ! Will not my son respect the sacred yearnings of his mother's heart?' Touched, penetrated by this exordium, the tearful boy pro- mised attention and obedience. Elizabeth sat on a low tomb, Eichard knelt before her ; one kiss she i.-nprinted on his young brow, while endeavouring to still the beating of her heart, and to command the trembling of her voice. She was silent for a few moments. Eichard looked up to her with mingled love and awe ; wisdom seemed to beam from her eyes, and the agitation that quivered on her lips gave solemnity to the tone with which she addressed her young auditor. She spoke of his early prospects, his long imprisonment, and late fortunes. She descanted on the character of Henry Tudor, describing him as wise and crafty, and to be feared. She dwelt on the character of the earl of Lincoln and other chiefs of the house of York, and mentioned how uneasily they bore the downfall of their party. No pains, no artifice, no risk, she said, would be spared by any one of them to elevate an offspring of the AVhite Eose, and to annihilate the pretensions and power of Lancaster. " Still a boy, unmeet for such contest, noble blood will be shed for you, my son," she continued ; " and while you are secluded by those vrho love you from danger, many lives will be spent for your sake. We shall hazard all for you ; and all may prove too little for success. We may fail, and you be thrown upon j^our own guidance, your unformed judgment, and childish indiscretion. Alas ! what will then be your fate ? Your kinsmen and partizans slain — your mother broken-hearted, it may be, dead !— spies will on every side environ you, nets will be spread to ensnare you, daggers sharpened for your destruction. You must oppose pru- dence to craft, nor, until your young hand can wield a man's weapon, dare attempt aught against Henry's power. Never forget that you are a king's son, yet suffer not unquiet ambition to haunt you. Sleep in peace, my love, while others wake for you. The time may come when victory will be granted to our arms. Then we shall meet again, not aa now, like skulking guilt, but in the open sight of day I shall present my son to his loyal subjects. Now we part, my Eichard — again you are lost to me, save in the recollection of this last farewell." Her own words fell like a mournful augury on her ear. With a look of agonized affectioa she opened her arms, and then 42 THE INTEEVIEW. enclosed in tlieir circle the stripling form of lier son. She pressed him passionately to her heart, covering him with her kisses, while the poor boy besought her not to weep ; yet, infected by her sorrow, tears streamed froDi his eyes, and his little heart swelled with insupportable emotion. It was at once a sight of pity and of fear to behold his mother's grief. Lady Brampton and Madeline now drew near, and this effusion of sorrow passed away. The queen collected herself, and rising, taking Hichard's hand in hers, with dignity and grace she led him up to the fair Fleming, saying " A widowed mother commits to your protection her beloved child. If heaven favour our right, we may soon claim him, to fill the exalted station to which he is heir. If disaster and death follow our attempts, be kind to my orphan son, protect him from the treachery of his enemies ; preserve, I beseech you, his young Madeline replied in a tone that showed how deeply she sympathized in the queen's sorrows, while she fervently pro- mised never to desert her charge. " JS^ow depart," said Elizabeth ; "leave me, Hichard, while I have yet courage to say adieu !" Elizabeth stood watching, while the forms of the prince and his protectress disappeared down the dark aisle. They reached the door ; it swung back on its hinges, and the sound, made as it closed again, reverberated through the arched cathedral. The unfortunate mother did not speak ; leaning on her friend's arm she quitted the church by another entrance. They returned to the palace in silence ; and when again they conversed, it was concerning their hopes of the future, the schemes to be devised ; nor did the aching heart of Elizabeth reUeve itself in tears and complaints, till the intelligence, received some weeks afterwards of the safe arrival of the travellers in France, took the most bitter sting from her fears, and allowed her again to breathe freely. 43 CHAPTEE VI. LA 31 BERT SI3I2^EL. Such when as Architnag'o him did view, He weened well to work some uiicouth wile } Eftsoon untwisting: his deceitliil clew, He 'gan to weave a web oi: cunning guile. Spknsee. The birth of Arthur, prince of Wales, which took place in the month of September of this same year, served to confirm Henry Tudor ou the throne, and almost to obliterate the memory of a second and resisting party in the kingdom. That party indeed was overthrown, its chiefs scattered, its hopes few. Most of the principal Yorkists had taken refuge in the court of the duchess of Burgundy ; the earl of Lincoln only ventured to remain, preserving the appearance of the greatest privacy, while his secret hours were entirely occupied by planning a rising in the kingdom, whose success would establish his cousin Richard duke of York, the fugitive Perkiu TV;irbeck, on the throne. The chief obstacle that presented itself was the difficulty of exciting the English to any act of rebellion against the king, without bringing forward the young prince as the principal actor on the scene. The confirmed friendship between the queen and Lady Brampton had produced a greater degree of intercourse between the former and the earl ; but their joint counsels had yet failed to originate a plan of action ; when chance, or rather the unforeseen results of former events, determined their course of action, and brought to a crisis sooner than they expected the wavering purposes of each. E/ichard Simon had quitted Winchester to fulfil his duties as priest in the town of Oxford. No man was better fitted than Simon to act a prominent part in a state-plot. He was brave ; but the priestly garb having wrested the sword from his hand, circumstances had converted that active courage, which might have signahzed him in the field, to a spirit of restless intrigue ; to boldness in encountering difficulties, and address in surmount- ing them. To form plans, to concoct the various parts of a scheme, wedging one into the other j to raise a whirlwind around 44 LA3IBEET SI31NEL. him, and to kno^r, or to fancy that he knew, the direction the ravao^er would take, and wliat would be destroyed and what saved in its course, had been from youth the atmosphere in which he lived. JSFow absent from the queen, he was yet on the alert to further her views, and he looked forward to the exaltation of her son to the throne as the foundation-stone of his own fortunes. In what way could this be brought about ? After infinite deli- beration with himself, Simon conceived the idea of brinoring forward an impostor, who, taking the name of Eichard of York, whose survival, though unattested, was a current belief in the kingdom, might rouse England in his cause. If unsuccessful, the safety of the rightful prince was not endangered ; if tri- umphant, this counterfeit would dolf his mark at once, and the real York come forward in his place. In the true spirit of intrigue, in which Simon was an adept, he resolved to mature his plans and commence his operations before he communicated them to any. He looked round for a likely actor for his new part, and chance brought him in contact with Lambert Simnel, a baker's son at Oxford. There was something in his fair complexion and regular soft features that was akin to York ; his figure was slight, his untaught manners replete with innate grace ; he was clever ; and his beauty having made him a sort of favourite, he had grown indolent and assum- ing. His father died about this time, and he was left a penniless orphan. Simon came forward to protect him, and cautiously to point out the road to fortune without labour. The youth proved an apt scholar. To hear speak of princes, crowns, and kingdoms as objects in which he was to have an interest and a share, dazzled his young eyes. He learnt speedily every lesson the priest taught him, and adopted so readily the new language inculcated, that Simon became more and more enamoured of his scheme, and sanguine as to its results. The next care of Simon was to confirm, in the partizans of the House of York, the suspicion they already entertained of the existence of its noblest scion ; he despatched anonymous letters to the chief nobles, and it became whispered through the country, though none knew the origin of the tale, that the surviving son of Edward the Fourth was about to appear to claim the crown. The peaceful sighed to think that the AYhite and Hed Eoses would again be watered by the best blood of England. The warlike and ambitious, the partizans of Y^'ork, who had languished in obscurity, walked more erect ; they regarded their disused armour with com- placency, for war and tumult was then the favourite pastime of high-born men. It was at this period that, through the intervention of Lady Brampton, Sir Thomas Broughtou, a most zealous Yorkist and LAMBERT SIMKEL. 45 chief friend of Lord Lovel, was introduced to tlie dowager queen's presence, then residing in London. He came full of important intelligence. He had been roused from his usnal repose by one of Simon's anonymous letters, which hinted at the existence of the duke of York, and counselled a drawing together of such forces as would be willing to support him ; Lord Lovel was with him, and at the name of E-ichard at once prepared for action. He was busied in raising adherents in the south, sending Sir Thomas to London, that he might there receive the commands of the prince's mother. Scarcely had he entered the metropolis, when in one of its narrowest alleys he was accosted by Richard Simon, who had earnestly besought him to obtain an audience for Simon himself from the queen ; acknowledging that he was the author of the reports and commotions, and that he had important secrets to disclose. All this inspired the queen with the deepest disquietude. She readily arranged with Sir Thomas the desired interview, which, at Simon's request, was to take place that very night, and agreed that he should enter the palace by a private door. Lady Brampton giving him admittance. Broughton departed ; and Elizabeth, disturbed and agitated, counted the hours impatiently which must intervene before the riddle was explained. Even this interval was full of wonder. A report was circulated, which soon reached the palace, that the earl of Warwick, in endeavouring to escape from the Tower in a boat, had fallen into the river, and was drowned before assistance could be afforded. Such was the current tale ; but many suspected that the king was privy to a more guilty termination of his unhappy prisoner, of whose death none entertained a doubt. This cir- cumstance added to the queen's impatience — life was bound up in the event of the next few hours. The time arrived — all was quiet in the palace (the queen inhabited Tower E-oyal) ; and the royal dowager and her friend prepared for their visitor. At the signal given, the door was opened ; but Simon came not alone ; the earl of Lincoln, Lord Lovel, Sir Thomas Broughton, and an unknown youth — it was Edmund Plantagenet — entered. The tale of the imposture of Lambert Simnel was disclosed, and with it a change of plan, the result of the death of Warwick. Simnel's age and appearance accorded better with this prince than with his younger cousin. It were easy to spread abroad that the report of his death was a fiction contrived by the king ; that he had escaped, in fact, and was in arms. If a more sinister fate had befallen him, guilt would impose silence on his murderer ; if the attempt failed, no evil would occur ; if successful, he would give instant place to the superior claims of the duke of York. 46 THE BATTLE OF NEWARK. Lincoln unfolded tliese Bcliemes with sagacity and deliberation, and the queen eagerly adopted his ideas as he disclosed them. It was also tlie earl's suggestion that Simnel should first appear in Ireland. The duke of Clarence had been lieutenant there, and was much beloved throughout the island. Through neglect and forgetfulness all the counsellors and officers appointed by Clarence had been uuremoved by the new government, and might easily be induced to favour his persecuted son. The duchess of Burgundy was also to be applied to; and counsel was held as to who should be informed of the truth — who deceived in this hazardous attempt. I^ight wore away, while still the conspirators were in delibera- tion ; they separated at last, each full of hope — each teeming with gallant resolution. Henceforth the false smile or ill-con- cealed frown of their enemy was indifferent to them ; tlieir good swords were their sure allies ; the very victory gained by Henry at Bosworth raised their expectations ; one other battle might give them again all that then they lost. CHAPTEE VII. THE BATTLE OF NEWAEE. Within these ten days take a monastery ; A most strict house ; a house where none may whisper, Where no more lig-ht is known but what may make you Believe there is a day ; wiiere no hope dwells. Nor comfort but in tears. Beaujiont and Fletchbr. With the consciousness of this plot weighing on her mind, Elizabeth Woodville continued her usual routine of life, and made a part of the court of Henry the Seventh. She had long been accustomed to pass from one evil to the other, and to find that when one cause for unhappiness died away, it gave instant place to another. She felt, with all the poignancy of a mother's disappointed pride, the situation of her daughter. Neglect was the lightest term that could be applied to the systematized and cold-hearted tyranny of Henry towards his wife. For not only he treated her like an unfavoured child, whose duty it was to obey without a murmur, and to endeavour to please, though sure of being repulsed. At the same time that he refused to THE BATTLE OP NEWARK. 47 raise lier above tbis state of degradation, lie reproached her with the faults of maturity, and stung her womanly feelings with studied barbarity. He taunted her with her attachment, to her family and its partizans ; spoke with triumph of its overthrow; and detailed with malignant pleasure every severe enactment passed by himself against the vanquished Yorkists. Then, again, he accused her of participating in her parent's intrigues ; and though proud of the son she had given him, as the heir of his crown, he divided, as much as possible, the infant from the mother, under the avowed though ridiculous pretence of pre- venting her from inculcating principles of rebellion towards his lieije and father. This last blow sunk deep. She had hitherto borne his harsh- ness meekly, sustained by the hope of overcoming his flinty nature by softness and yielding. She had anticipated that the fresh enmity conceived against her on the event of Lord Lovel's rebellion would be entirely allayed by her pretty Arthur, whose birth was solemnized by many rejoicings. But when she found this last hope fail, every expectation of good died away with it. Among other acts of duty, she had for a long time pursued a system of self-denial, deeming it a breach of duty to complain of her husband, even to her mother. But this mother, acquainted with the secrets of the human heart, and desirous of detaching her entirely from her husband, exerted all the influence that one experienced and firm can exercise over the young and vacil- lating : she brought her to lament her situation, and to complain of each fresh token of the king's disregard. The barrier of self- restraint once broken through, the sympathy and remonstrances of her parent emboldened her to such a change of conduct towards Henr}'', as at first excited his surprise, then his con- tempt. The many rumours afloat concerning the existence of the duke of York served also to rouse his angry mood. If at first he appeared somewhat complaisant towards his mother-in- law, it was from an endeavour to put her off" her guard, and to attract or surprise her confidence on the point which lay nearest his heart ; but when he found that his attacks were vain, his undisguised arrogance and her ill-concealed resentment produced scenes, disgraceful in themselves, and agonizing to the wife and daughter who was their witness. At this moment, when suspicion was abroad — the Lancastrians fearful, the Yorkists erect with renewed hopes — like the bursting of a thunderstorm came the intelligence of the appearance of the earl of Warwick in Dublin, his enthusiastic reception there, the rising of the people in his favour, and the menaces held out by him of his intention to wrench the sceptre of England from the hand of him who held it. 48 THE BALTLE OF NEWAE^. Henry alone heard tliese momentous tidings witli contempt. The earl of Eildare, lord-lieutenant of tlie kingdom, had received the pretender vrith princely honours ; j'et the very circumstance of a false son of Clarence being supported by the Yorkists "was the occasion of satisfaction to him ; his only fear arose from the probable mystery covered by these designs. He was angry at the disloyalty manifested ; but it was in a distant province, and so came not home to him. There appeared no falling off, no disturbance among his English subjects. Still caution and policy were the weapons he best loved to wield ; and he despatched several spies to Ireland, to endeavour to fathom the extent and nature of the rebellion. The chief among them was his own secretary, Frion, a Frenchman — a crafty and experienced implement. He succeeded in bringing back irre- fragable proof that the dowager queen mingled deeply in the plot. Henry hated Elizabeth "Woodville. He considered that it was principally through her restless scheming that he had been forced to marry the portionless (her detested claim to his crown her only dower) daughter of York, instead of forming an union with a foreign princess ; perhaps Mary of Burgundy, or Anne of Britanny, either of whom would have brought gold to his coffers, or extensive domains to his empire. He hated her, because he deeply suspected that she was privy to the existence of a formi- dable rival to his state. He /oieio that the young duke of York had not died in the Tower. In every way she was his enemy ; besides that linked to her ruin was the sweet idea of contisca- tion, one ever entertained with delight by the money-loving king. He assembled a council in his palace at Shene, which stood near where Eichmond now stands. The chiefs of the English nobility were his counsellors. The duke of Buckingham, son of hira who first favoured, and then rose against Hichard the Third. The lords Dawbeny and Broke, who had been raised to tlie peerage for their services in the same cause. Lord and Sir William Stanley, men to whom Henry principally owed his crown. Others there were of high rank and note ; but the king paid most attention to two priests : John Morton, bishop of Ely, and Richard Fox, bishop of Exeter, were his private advi- sors and friends, as well as public counsellors. Morton had watched over his interests while in exile ; he first had excited the duke of Buckingham to revolt, and hatched the plot which placed Richmond on the throne. The council held was long and solemn, and the results brought about more by insinuation than open argument, were different from those expected by most of the persons present. First it THE BATTLE OP NEWARK. 49 was resolved tliat a general pardon sliould be proclaimed to tlie insurgents. No exceptions were to be made ,• those persons then in the very act of setting up his adversary were included ; for as, by the second decree, that the real earl of Warwick should be shown publicly in London, the deception would become mani- fest ; if indeed they were deceived, it was thought more politic to reclaim them by clemency, than by severe measures to drive them to despair. The third and last enactment was levelled against the queen dowager. Many of the council were astonished to hear it pro- posed, that she should forfeit all her goods and lands, and be confined for life in a convent, for having consented to the mar- riage of her daughter and Richard the Third, while the ready acquiescence of the king and his chief advisers made them per- ceive that this measure was no new resolve. These three decrees passed, thecouncil separated, and Henryreturned to Westminster, accompanied by Sir William Stanley. To him he spoke openly of the treason of the queen : he even ventured to say, that he was sure that some mystery lurked beneath ; he commissioned Stanley, therefore, to notify the order of council to her majesty ; but at the same time to show her, that disclosure, and reliance on the king, would obtain her pardon. Sir William Stanley was a courtier m the best sense of the term ; a man of gentle man- ners ; desirous of doing right, easily excited to compassion, but ambitious and timid ; one in truth" than whom none could be more dangerous ; for his desire to please those immediately before Lim.led him to assume every appearance of sincerity, and perpetually to sacrifice the absent to the present. Elizabeth heard, with utter dismay, the sentence passed against her;— courage was restored only when she found that her free- dom could be purchased by the confession of her son's existence, and place of abode. She repelled Stanley's solicitations with dis- dain; answered his entreaties with an appeal to his own feelings, of how far, if such a secret existed, it were possible that she, a mother, should intrust it to the false and cruel king. Stanley speedily found his whole battery of persuasion exhausted; he withdrew in some wonder as to what the real state of things might be, and full of the deepest compassion. She had indeed scarcely veiled the truth to him ; for, calling to mind the fate of the wretched Margaret of Anjou,. she asked him, whether, like her, she should expose the young orphan York to the fate of the Lancastrian Prince Edward. But Stanley shrunk from being privy to such disclosures, and hastily withdrew. Henry had not exhausted all his hopes : glad as he was to wreak his vengeance on the queen, and to secure her possessions to himself, he was not so blind as not to see that the knowledge E 50 THE BATTLE OF NEWARK. of lier secret were a fur greater prize. His next implement was her eldest son, the marquess of Dorset. Lord Dorset had been so active in his opposition to Sichard the Third, and had done such ^ood service to his adversary, that Henry overlooked his near kindred to the queen dowager, regarding him rather as the representative of his father. Sir John Gray, who had fallen in the cause of Lancaster. He became indeed a sort of favourite with the king. Dorset was proud, self-sufficient, and extrava- gant, but his manners were fascinating, his spirit buoyant, and Henry, who was accustomed to find the storms of party lower- ing like winter over his domestic circle, found relief only when Dorset was present. The present occasion, however, called forth other feelings in the haughty noble ; he might be angry with his mother's plotting, but he was more indignant at the severity exercised against her ; and far from furthering Henry's designs, he applauded her resistance, and so irritated the king, that it ended by his sudden arrest, and being committed to the Tower. And now all hope was at an end for the unhappy lady. The various acts of her tragic history were to close in the obscurity and poverty of a convent-prison. Fearful that her despair would lead her to some deed that might at least disturb the quiet and order he loved, Henry had resolved that no delay should have place, but that on the very morrow she should be conveyed to Bermondsey. She was to be torn from her family — her five young daughters, with whom she resided. The heartless tyrant was callous to every pang that he iofiicted, or rejoiced that he had the power to wound so deeply one whom he abhorred. Lady Brampton was with her to the last ; not to sustain and comfort her ; the queen's courage and firmness was far greater than that of her angry friend ; she pointed out the hope, that the cruelties exercised towards her might animate the partisans of York to greater ardour ; and tears forced themselves into her eyes only when she pictured E-ichard, her victorious sovereign and sou, hastening to unbar her prison doors to restore her to liberty and rank. The night was spent in such discourses between the ladies. With early dawn came the fated hour, the guard, the necessity for instant departure. She disdained to show regret before Henry's emissaries ; and with one word only to her friend — "I commit kirn to your guidance," she yielded to her fate ; submitting to be torn from all she loved, and, without an ex- pressed murmur, entered the litter that bore her singly to her living grave. The same sun that rose upon the melancholy progress of Eliza- beth Woodville towards Bermondsey, shone on a procession, more gaudy in appearance, yet, if that were possible, more sad THE BATTLE OF NKWAEK. 51 at heart. This was the visit, ordered by the kingf, of the earl of Warwick to St. Paul's Cathedral; thus to contradict to the eyes of all men the pretender in Ireland. Warwick had spent a year in tlie Tower, in almost solitary imprisonment. Hopeless of freedom, worn in health, dejected from the overthrow of all the wild schemes he had nourished at Sherifi" Hutton, linked with the love he bore his cousin, the Lady Elizabeth, now queen of England, he could hardly be recognized as the same youth who had been her companion during her residence there. He was pale ; he had been wholly neglectful of his person ; carking sor- row had traced lines on his young brow. At first he had con- templated resisting the order of being led out as a show to further his onemies' cause : one futile and vague hope, which could only have sprung up in a lover's heart, made him concede this point. Perhaps the court — the queen would be there. He met several noble friends, commanded by Henry to attend him ; for it was the king's policy to surround him with Yorkists, so to prove that he was no counterfeit. Alas ! '• These cloudy princes, and heart-sorrowing peers," assembled like shadows in the dim abyss, mourning the splendour of the day for ever set. They entered the cathedral, which stood a heavy Grothic pile, on a grassy mound, removed from all minor edifices. There was a vast assemblage of ladies and knights ; all looked compassionately on this son of poor mur- dered Clarence, the luckless flower, brought to bloom for an hour, and then to be cast into perpetual darkness. The solemn religious rites, the pealing organ, the grandeur of the church, and chequered painted light thrown from the windows, for a moment filled with almost childish delight the earl's young heart ; that this scene, adapted to his rank, should be so single and so transient, filled his soul with bitterness. Once or twice he thought to appeal to his noble friends, to call on them to resist the tyrant — Elizabeth's husband. His heart chilled at the idea ; his natural timidity resumed its sway, and he was led back to the prison-fortress, despairing, but unresisting. Yet, at this hour, events were in progress which filled many hearts with hope of such change as he would gladly hail. On the news of the queen's arrest. Lord Lincoln had departed with all speed to Flanders, to his aunt, the duchess of Burgundy, to solicit her aid to attack and overcome the enemy of their van- quished family. The Lady Margaret, sister of Edward the Eourth of England, and wife of Charles the E-ash of Burgundy, was a woman distinguished by her wisdom and her goodness. When Charles fell before Nancv, and his more than princely E 3 52 THE BATTLE OF NEWARK. domains descended into the hands of his only child, a danghter — and the false Louis the Eleventh of France, on one hand, and the turbulent Flemings on the other, coalesced to rend in pieces, and to prey upon, the orphan's inheritance — her mother-in-law, the Lady Margaret, was her sage and intrepid counsellor ; and when this young lady died, leaving two infant children as co- heirs, the dowager duchess entirely loved, and tenderly brought them up, attending to their affairs with maternal solicitude, and governing the countries subject to them with wisdom and justice. This lady was warmly attached to her family : to her the earl of Lincoln and Lord Lovel resorted, revealing the state of things — how her nephew, young Kichard, was concealed in poor disguise in French Flanders, and how they had consented to E-ichard Simon's plots, and hoped that their result would be to restore her brother's son to the throne of their native land. The duchess of Burgundy possessed a proud and high spirit. The abasement in which her niece, the Lady Elizabeth, was held by the earl of Eichmond ; she, the real giver of his crown, not having herself been crowned ; the rigour exercised towards the Yorkist chiefs, many of whom had been her defenders and friends in time of flight and defeat ; the calumnies heaped on the various members of her royal house ; made a prospect of displanting Henry, and of revenge, grateful to her. She acceded to the earl's request, gave him an aid of two thousand Germans, led by Martin Swartz, a man of family and note in Germany, providing them with vessels to take them to Ireland, and blessing their expedition with her best and earnest wishes. On their arrival in Dublin, a gay and brilliant scene was acted, which raised the enthusiasm of the Irish, and spread a glory round the impostor they supported. The exhibition of the real earl of Warwick had produced no effect in Ireland ; Thomas Geraldine, earl of Kildare, asserted that Henry had brouiiht forward a counterfeit, and Lambert Simuel lost no credit among them. He was proclaimed king of England ; he was crowned by the bishop of Meath with a diadem taken from an image of the Blessed Virgin ; a parliament was convoked in his name, and every measure taken to insure his power in Ire- land, and to gather together forces wherewith to invade the sister island. The English lords felt far more anxiety than their allies in the K^sult of this insurrection. Although it had been disregarded hy the Irish, the effect produced in England by the visit of Warwick to St. Paul's was such as Henry had anticipated, and the counterfeit in Ireland found few supporters among the Yorkists. Still it was necessary to end as they had begun : to acknowledge the imposture, so to bring forward the young son THE BATTLE OF NEWAEK. 6S of Edward, would have been to all appearance too barefaced a cheat. Lovel, as a gallant soldier, was ready to spend his blood in any enterprise that promised to advance the White Rose ; but he, as well as the earl of Lincoln, mingling sad memories of the past with careful forethought, looked forward to the result of Eichard Simon's contrivance with well-founded dread. Still they entertained no thought of retreat, but mustered their forces, and counselled with their associates for the furtherance of the cause. On the 4th of June, Lambert Simnel, under the name of Edward the Sixth, with his, so called, cousin De la Poole, Lord Lovel, and their constant attendant young Edmund Plan- tagenet, the Lords Thomas and Maurice Geraldine, with their force of savage scarce-armed L'ish, and Martin Swartz, with his German auxiliaries, landed at the pile of Foudray, in Lancashire, where they were soon after joined by Sir Thomas Broughton, who brought some few English to fight and die for this unhappy conspiracy. Henry was prepared for their arrival : to gain grace in his subjects' eyes, he first made a pilgrimage to Our Lady of Wal- singham, and then, proceeding to the midland counties, held council to know whether it were best to encounter his foes out of hand, or to let them drag on ; so to weary them by delay. A number of nobles and their followers joined the king, and it was agreed among them to press forward, before the enemy should gather force in England. Henry had a further view in this : he could not tell how far the secret of their plot, which he felt assured was the design to advance the young son of Edward, was divulged among the Yorkists, and how far believed ; as yet the enterprise bore no ill guise for him, having at its head a manifest impostor ; so he hastened onward to crush it utterly, before it assumed a more fearful form. The earl of Lincoln, eager to try the fortune of battle, advanced also on his side, and the rival armies drew nigh each other at jSTewark-upon-Trent. The king pitched his tents three miles beyond the town ; and on the same night the earl encamped at Stoke, but a few miles dis- tant. And now, after a reign of two years, as he had forced Xing Hichard to fight for his crown against him, an adventurer and an invader in his realm, did Henry Tudor find himself in his adversary's position, about to risk life and kingdom on one cast of the die against troops as ill-assorted but as desperate and brave as his had been. Henry felt in his heart's core the thrilling pang, which a conviction that all is in the hands of fortune must ever impart to a human being who is her slave. He felt that his crown was but an usurpation, that his anointed and sacred head claimed no reverence from these enemies ; he was degraded in his own eyes from being a sceptred king upheld 54 THE BATTLE OP NEWABK. by the laws, to a vrild adventurer, his f^ood sword his right ; a fierce but disciplined auger filled his heart ; his brows were bent, his voice was attuned to harshness, his thoughts were conversant witli overthrow and death. The hour was come ; he was im- patient for its passing, and he led forth his troops, all well- appointed English soldiery, in such hope as the sight of a noble army might well inspire, in such dread as was the natural offs[)ring of the many chances and changes that had occurred to the sovereigns of England during the late struggles. The earl of Lincoln cherished still mightier fears ; yet there was more of calm and dignity in his meditations than in the impatient misgivings of Henry. His heart sickened at the idea of battle and bloodshed : he felt himself responsible for the lives of all : and, while this nerved his heart to courage, it took rest from his eyes, and planted sorrow deep in his manly breast. The morrow ! oh, the morrow ! hours full of fate ! whoso looks forward and sees in the morrow the crown or ruin of the hopes of many, may well pray the swift-pacing hours to lag, and night to remain for ever as a spell to stop the birth of time. Biit the morrow came ; a day of slaughter and captivity for the Yorkist party. The battle was hard fought ; the German auxiliaries were veteran soldiers, who spared neither blows nor blood ; their leader, Martin Swartz, for valour, for streniith, and for agility of body, was inferior to none among the warlike captains of those times. The Irish, though half-naked and ill- armed, fought with desperate bravery. In vain ; the valour of Henry's soldiers was equal, their discipline and numbers superior. First the noble Lincoln fell, and his comrades were slaughtered around him, avenging his death. The Lords Geraldine, Swartz, and Sir Thomas Broughton, were found among the slain ; Lord Lovel was never heard of more ; the young Ed- mund Plantagenet, struck in the side by a dart, lay for dead upon the ground. Hichard Simon and his false-seeming pupil were among the prisoners. Such was the event of the last attempt of the Yorkists to raise the bruised White E,ose to its old supremacy. All of high rank and power that owned this symbol were gone ; Lincoln, the best column of its fortunes, was destroyed ; nothing re- mained, save the orphan prince, the royal exile, a boy of thirteen years of age, brought up as the child of a Flemish mone3^-lender. To hide himself in safe obscurity was his only wisdom, till time should give strength to his arm, sagacity to his plans, and power to his acts ; happy if he could ^find any concealment sufficiently obscure, to baffle the discernment of Henry, and to save him from the arts of those whom he would employ to discover and seize on him. THE DISCOVER"?. 5S Henry ajrain felt himself secure on liis throne : lie deeply lamented the death of Lincoln, as he had hoped to learn from him the secret of the conspiracy. He found in Lambert Simnel the mere tool of others, and in contempt made him a scullion in his kitchen, so to throw derision on the -attempt whicli had been made to exalt him. He dealt otherwise with Eichard Simon. In the secrecy of his prison, every art was practised to induce him to make a full confession. Simon played a dastardly and a double part, half reveahng, half disguisiufj the truth. Henry became assured that his rival, the duke of York, survived, and he was led in some sort to guess at the place of his abode. He had promised liberty to Simon when the young prince should be in his hands ; meanwhile he was im- prisoned in the monastery in vrhich he was fated to close his existence. CHAPTEE YIII. THE DTSCOVEET. Our king' he kept a false stewarde. Sir Aldingar they him call ; A falser stewarde than he was one. Served not in bower nor hall. Old Ballad. "Whoevee writes concerning the actions of the men of the olden time, must sadden the reader by details of war, descrip- tions of fields of battle, narrations of torture, imprisonment, and death. But here also we find records of high virtues and exalted deeds. It is at first sight strange that men whose trade was murder, who habitually wore offensive weapons, whose chief happiness was derived from the glory they acquired by inflicting misery on others, should be among those who live in our memories as examples of what is most graceful and excellent in human nature. Too great security destroys the spLnt of manhood, while the habit of hazardous enterprise strengthens and exalts it. It was not because they destroyed others, that the warriors of old y>eve famous for honour, courage, 56 THE DISCOVEBY. and fidelity ; bub because, from some motive springinir from the unselfibb part of our nature, they exposed themselves to danger aad to death. It was at times such as these that friendship formed the chief solace of man's life. The thought of his lady-love supported the knight during his wanderings, and rewarded him on his return ; but the society of his brothers in arms shortened the weary hours, and made peril pleasure. Death, the severer of hearts and destroyer of hope, is, in its actual visitation, the great evil of life — the ineffaceable blot, the tarnisher of the imagination's brightest hues ; but if he never came, but only hovered, the anticipation of his advent might be looked upon as the refiner of our nature. To go out under the shadow of his dark banner, hand in hand, to encounter a thousand times his grim likeness ; to travel on through unknown ways, during starless nights, through forests beset with enemies, over moun- tains, whose defiles hid him but to assure his aim ; to meet him arrayed in his full panoply on the field of battle ; to separate in danger ; to meet on the verge of annihilation ; and still, through every change, to reap joy, because every peril was mutual, every emotion shared, was a school for heroic friendship that does not now exist. In those times, also, man was closer linked with nature than now ; and the sublimity of her crea- tions exalted his imagination, and elevated his enthusiasm — dark woods, wild mountains, and the ocean's vast expanse, form a stage on which, when we act our parts, we feel that mightiei? natures than our own witness the scenes we present, and our hearts are subdued by awe to resignation. Edmund Plantagenet, the forest-bred son of Hichard the Third, the late companion of the illustrious Lincoln and gallant Lovel, lay long insensible on the field of battle, surrounded by the dead — he awoke from his swoon to the consciousness that they lay strewed around him dead, whom he had worshipped as heroes, loved as friends. Life became a thankless boon ; willingly w'ould he have closed his eyes, and bid his soul also go on her journey to the unknown land, to which almost all those to whom he had been linked during his past existence had preceded him. He was rescued by a charitable friar from this sad state — his wound was dressed — life, and with it liberty, restored to him. After some reflection, the first use he resolved to make of these gifts was to visit the young duke of York at Tournay. Edmund's mind, without being enterprising, was full of latent energy, and contemplative enthusiasm. The love of virtue reigned paramount in it ; nor could he conceive happiness un- allied to some pursuit, whose origin was duty, whose aim was THE DISCOVEET. 57 the good of others. His father, his ambition and his downfall, were perpetual subjects for reflection ; to atone for the first and redeem the last, in the person of his nephevr, became, in his idea, the only fitting end of his life, Fostering this sentiment, he speedily formed the determination of attaching himself to the exiled "duke of York : first, to devote himself to the pre- serving and educating him during childhood — and secondly, to fight and die for him, when the time was ripe to assert his rights. During his hazardous journey to Flanders, Edmund was sup- ported by that glowing sensation which borrows the hues and sometimes the name of happiness ; it was an ecstatic mood that soared above the meaner cares of life, and exalted him by the grandeur of his own ideas. Self-devotion is, while it can keep true to itself, the best source of human enjoyment : there is small alloy when we wholly banish our own wretched chnging individuality, in our entire sacrifice at the worshipped shrine. Edmund became aware of the value of his own life, as he planned how in future he should be the guardian and protector of his unfriended, peril-encircled orphan cousin. A religious sentiment of filial love also influenced him ; for thus he could in some sort repair the wrongs committed by his father. There was much in Edmund's temperament that might have rendered him a mere dreamer. The baser ends of common men possessed no attractions for him ; but a lofty purpose developed the best points of his character. It was early dawn, when, a month after the battle of Stoke, Plautagenet, in pursuance of his design, arrived at the cottage of Madeline de Earo, where, under the lowly name of Perkin Warbeck, dwelt the noble scion of the house of York. It was a lovely spot — trees embowered the cot, roses bloomed in the garden, and jessamine and woodbine were twined round the porch. The morning breeze and rising sun filled the atmosphere with sweets. Already the cottagers were enjoying its fragrance, and Edmund, as he alighted, beheld the object of his journey — the fair-haired stripling prince and his protectress Madeline. Edmund was one-and-twenty, but his brow was more bent, his eye more thoughtful, his cheek more pale and sunk than befitted his age ; it was only when he smiled that frankness displayed solemnity, and those who conversed with him were ever eager to call forth those smiles, which, like sun- beams that chase the shadows on a green hill-side, made darkness light. Confidence readily springs up between the open-hearted and good ; and Edmund and the inhabitants of the cottage found no impediment to entire reliance on each other. Madeline was overjoyed that her young charge should find manly guardianship in his cousin, and mentioned how often her fears had been 58 THE DISCOVERY. awatened on liis account, and how suspicions Lad got abroad concerning him among the citizens of Tournay. MadeHne, the sister of the Fleming, John Warbeck, was mar- ried to a Spaniard in the service of PortugaL In those days, just p'reyious to the discovery of America by Columbus, while that illustrious man was offering his unesteemed services at Lisbon, the Portuguese were full of the spirit of enterprise and maritime adventure. Each year new yessels were sent south- ward along the unexplored shores of Africa, to discover beyond the torrid zone a route to India. Hernan de Faro was a mariner — it was during one of his yoyages to Holland that he had seen and married Madeline, and he left her in her native country, while he pursued his fortunes down the Golden Coast as iar as the Cape of Good Hope. He had been absent longer than she had anticipated, and each day might bring the wanderer back, when he purposed taking her with him to his native Spain. What, then, must become of Eichard ? Plantagenet saw at once the necessity of visiting the court of Burgundy, and of placing her nephew at the disposition of the Duchess Margaret. The young prince was now fourteen — he had shot up in height beyond his years, beautiful in his boyhood, and of greater promise for the future. His clear blue laughing eyes — his clustering auburn hair — his cheeks, whose rosy hue contrasted with the milk-white of his brow — his tall and slender but agile person, would have introduced him to notice among a crowd of strangers. His very youthful yoice was attuned to sweetness. If Edmund found the Lady Margaret lukewarm, he need only lead the noble boy into her presence to interest her in his favour. Eichard heard with tearful eyes of the imprisonment of his mother, and the slaughter of his kinsmen and friends. His heart for the moment desired yengeance ; he would himself seek his aunt of Burgundy, and aided by her, attack the usurper. With difficulty he permitted his cousin to depart alone ; but he was obliged to yield, and Plantagenet set out for Brussels, promising a speedy return. About a week after Edmund's departure, another yisitor arrived at the cottage of the exile. A violent storm had over- taken Duke Eichard and his constant companion, Madeline's daughter, in one of their wanderings in the fields near Tournay. As they stood for shelter under a half-ruined building, a traveller came to share the asylum. He was a Frenchman — a Provencal by his accent ; for he immediately entered into conversation with them. As he is a man spoken of in the Chronicles, he shall receive his name at once ; this apparently chance-traveller was Frion, Stephen Frion, King Henry's secretary. He had been employed to search out the young prince by such tokens as THE DISCOVEEY. 59 Ki chard Simon had given, and chance had caused him to fall in with Edmund, whom he had before remarked in attendance on the earl of Lincoln. Easily guessing that Edmund's jouruey might have connection with his own, he tracked him toTournay, and then by some untoward chance lost sight of him. The inde- fatigable spy had spent the last week in a particular survey of every spot round the town and in the neighbouring cities, to discover his lost clue. Overtaken by a storm on his return from Lisle, he suddenly found himself under a shed with a youth whose appearance at once excited his strongest curiosity. What Frion loved beyond all other things was power and craft. He had been a subject of the poetical King Rene of Pro- vence ; but, despatched on some occasion to Louis the Eleventh, he entered into the service of that monarch, whose subtlety and faithlessness were a school of wisdom to this man. On one sub- ject did he love to dwell — the contrast between Charles of Bur- gundy and Louis of Erance ; the first commencing his reign by combating and vanquishing the latter, and dying miserably at last by a traitor's hand, his armies cut to pieces, his domains the unresisting prey of his rival ; while Louis, by serpent ways, by words — not deeds — gained every point, won every follower, and established his rule at last over the greater part of the wide territories of the fallen duke. In a minor way Frion aimed at imitating Louis ; but he was naturally more fiery and rash. He had visited Italy also, and studied there the wiles and cruelties of the Italian lords ; crossing back to Marseilles, he had been seized by corsairs and carried to Africa : — here he put in practice some of his lessons, and contrived to make himself a favourite with his Mahometan master, who afterwards crossed to Spain to serve under the Moorish king of Granada. Frion was quickly distinguished for his sagacity in the divided counsels of this dis- tracted kingdom, and became the trusty adviser of him called Boabdil el Chico. When this unfortunate sovereign was taken prisoner by the Spaniards, Frion was a chief mediator between them and the Sultana Ayza. At the court of Ferdinand and Isabella he met several Frenchmen, who awakened in his heart a keen desire to revisit his native country. He took advantage of an embassy thither from the court of Spain, to fulfil his wishes, but arrived at Plessis only in time to witness Louis' death. Two years afterwards he was found in the train of the earl of Eieh- mond — the future secretary, spy, and favourite of Henry the Seventh — now travelling by his order to find, seize, or destroy, the last blossom of the uprooted White Eose. Frion was rather handsome in appearance, with bright black eyes and dark hair, a complexion embrowned by the sun, a look of gaiety — unless when controlled by the will of a superior, he 60 THE DISCOVEET. was alvrays iaughing — a quiet kind of sarcastic laugh ; he looked not the man Csesar would have feared, except that his person was rather inclined to leanness ; but he was active and well versed in martial exercises, though better in clerkly accomplishments. His early youth had been chiefly employed in copying poetry for King liene — he wrote beautifully, and his small white hands were the objects of his own very great admiration. Such was his outward look ; he had stores of science and knowledge within, which he seldom displayed, or, when necessary, let appear with all the modesty of one who deemed such acquirements were of little worth — useful sometimes, but fitter for a servitor than his lord. No words could describe his wiliness, his power of being all things to all men, his flattery, his knowledge of human nature, his unparalleled artifice, which, if it could be described, would not have been the perfect thing it was : it was not silken, it was not glossy, but it wound its way unerringly. Could it fail — the rage and vengeance to follow were as certain as dire, for, next to love of power, vanity ruled this man ; all he did was right and good, other pursuits contemptible and useless. Such was the serpent-spirited man who contrived to partake Eichard's shelter ; he eyed him keenly, he addressed him, and the prince replied to his questions about an asylum for the night, by a courteous invitation to his home. " The boy speaks not like a cotter : his eye beams with nobleness. What a freak of nature, to make one in appearance a king's son, the plodding oifspring of a rude Fleming 1 " As these thoughts passed through Prion's mind, the truth came not across him ; and he even hesi- tated for a moment whether he should not, now the storm had passed, pursue his way : but his garments were wet, the ways miry, night at hand. At a second thought he accepted the invi- tation, and leading his horse, he accompanied the youthful pair to their cottage home. Madeline, unsuspicious of one obviously a Frenchman, received him without fear, and after a fire had dried the visitor's dress, they sat down to a frugal supper. Frion, according to his usual manner, strove to please his hosts. His gay discourse, the laughable, yet interesting accounts he gave of various adventures that had befallen him, made all three — the fair Madeline the ardent princely boy, and the dark-eyed daughter of de Faro — sit in chained attention. When he heard that Madeline was united to a Spaniard, he spoke of Spain, of Granada and the Moorish wars ; Hichard's eyes flashed, and the dark orbs of the girl dilated with wonder and delight. At length he spoke of England, and his words implied that he had lately come thence. "How fares the poor island?" THE DISCOVEEY. 61 asked the youth ; " such stories of its tyrant reach us here, that methinks its fields must be barren, its people few." "Had you been my comrade, younoj master, through merry Kent," said Frion, "you would speak in another strain. Plenty and comfort, thanks to King Harry and the Red Eose, flourish there. The earth is rich in corn, the green fields peopled with fat kine, such as delight yon islanders. ' Give an Englishman beef and mustard,' says our French proverb, 'and he is happy;' they will find dearth of neither, while the sage Henry lives, and is victorious." "Yet we are told here," cried the youth, "that this Welsh earl, whom you call king, grinds the poor people he has van- quished to the dust, making them lament him they named Crook- back, who, though an usurper, was a munificent sovereign." These words from a Fleming or a Frenchman sounded strange to Frion ; the doubt, which he wondered had not before pre- sented itself, now came full-fledged, and changed at its birth to certainty; yet, as the angler plays with the hooked fish, he replied, "I, a stranger in the land, saw its fair broad fields, and thought their cultivators prosperous ; I heard that the king was victorious over his foes, and deemed his subjects happy. Yet, I bethink me, murmurs were abroad, of taxes and impositions. They spoke, with regret, of the White Eose, and scowled when they said that Elizabeth of York was rather a handmaiden in her husband's palace, than queen of fertile England." " iS^ow, were I an English knight, with golden spurs," said the stripling, " I would challenge to mortal combat that recreant Tudor, and force him to raise fair Elizabeth to her fitting elevation : woe the while, all England's good knights are slain, and the noble Lincoln, the last and best of all, has perished ! " " You speak unwisely and unknowingly, of things you wot not of," said Madeline, alarmed at the meaning glance of Frion ; " good nephew Perkin, your eyes see not even the English white cliffs, much less can your mind understand its dangerous policy." " Nay, dear mother," remarked her little daughter, "you have told me that the noble earl and the good Lord Lovel had been kind guardians to my cousin Peterkin : you chid him not when he wept their death, and you may suffer him to reproach their foe." " I know nothing of these lords," said Frion, " whose names are a stumbling-block to a Frenchman's tongue. But methinks it is well for us that they aim at each other's hearts, and make booty of their own provender, no longer desolating the gay fields of France with their iron hoofs." 62 THE DECOY. And no"!r, since that he bad found him "whom he sou.oht, Frion talked again of other matters, and. as before, his smooth and f^ay discourse gained him pleased auditors. At length, the peaceful cottagers retired to rest, and Frion sunk to sleep under their hospitable roof, after he had thought of various plans by which he might possess himself of the prince's person ; — the readiest and safest way was to entice him to accompany him alone some little space, no matter how short: he trusted to his own skill to draw him still further and further on, till he should be put on board the boat that would ferry him to his own revolted England. CHAPTER IX. THE DECOY. Gilderoy was a bonnie boy, Had roses tull his shoone; His stockings were of silken soy, With garters hanging doon. Old Ballad. It was a simple scheme, yet with the simple simplicity succeeds best. A new face and talk of distant lands had excited York beyond his wont. He could not rest during the long night, while the image of his disastrous fortunes haunted him like a ghost. " Were I the son of a falconer or hind," he thought, *' I could don my breastplate, seize my good cross-bow, and away to the fight. Mewed up here with women, the very heart of a Plantagenet will fail, and I shall play the girl at the sight of blood. Wherefore tarries Sir Edmund, our gentle coz ? If he be a true man, he shall lead me to danger and glory, and Eniiland, ere she own her king, shall be proud of her outcast child." To a mind thus tempered — heated like iron in a smith's forge — Frion, on the morrow, played the crafty artisan, fashioning it to his will. He and the prince rose early, and the secretary prepared for immediate departure. As he hastily partook of a slight repast, he renewed the conversation of the preceding night, and like the Sultaness Scheherezade (perhaps he had heard of her device among the Moors), he got into the midst of THE DECOY. 63 the quarrels of El Zagal and El Chico, the kings of Granada, at the moment it \A'as necessary for him to hasten away—" Good youth," said he, " I play the idle prater, w hile mine errand waits for me — lead me to the stable, and help me to saddle my nag ; if you will serve me as a guide to Lisle, you will do a good deed, and I will reward it by finishing the strange history of the Moorish kings." The horse was quickly in order for departure. " I will but say good day to ray kinswoman, and go with you," said Eichard. •'That were idle," replied the secretary, " the sun has hardly peeped out from his eastern window, and dame Madeline and her dark-eyed daughter sleep ; we kept them waking yester- night ; they will scarce have risen ere you return." The duke suffered himself to be persuaded — with his hand on the neck of the horse, he strode beside his tempter, listening to his cunning tales of Moorish ferocity and Christian valour. The walls of Lisle at length appeared — " Here we part," said the duke, who remembered the caution given him, never to enter these border towns, where the English nobles often resided for a space, and the appearance of the gallant stripling, and his close resemblance to other members of the princely house of York, might beget suspicion and danger. *' Wherefore this haste. Sir Perkin ? " saidFrion ; "cooped up under a thatched roof from Lent to Shrovetide, methinks you should be glad to stretch your chain. I remain brief space in yonder walls ; leave me not till I depart." " Who told you I was cooped up ? " said the prince, hastily ; " if I am chained, the key of my fetters is in my own hand." " Put it swiftly in the wards then, and cast away the heavy iron ; come on with me, to where thou shalt ruffle bravely with satin-coated squires." Erion judged his prize already won, and almost threw aside his usual caution. Eichard liked not the -expression his sharp black eye assumed, nor the wrinkling of his brow ; he began to wonder what there had been in this man so to allure him into friendly converse ; now that in a familiar tone he invited him to continue his companion, his haughty spirit revolted. " Good sir," said he, " I now have done a host's duty by you. I saved you from a storm, restored you to your road — yonder path, shaded by poplars, leads at once to the town's gate — farewell ! " " I am but an unmeet comrade for you, gay gentleman," said Erion ; "pardon me if I have said aught unfitting the cottager of Tournay to hear. I now go to the noble kniglit, tlie Sire de Beverem, and I would fain have shown him what striplings these swamps breed ; methought his gilt palace were fitter dwelling than yonder hut for one, who, if his face lie not, aspires to nobler 64 THE DECOY. acts than weeding a garden or opening a drain. Come, my lord, — how tript my tongue ? but your eye is so lordly that the word came of itself — gentle youth, trust yourself with one, who loves to see the fiery youngster amid his mates, the gallant boy looked on with love and favour by the noble and valiant." Prudence whispered to Richard that this was dangerous sport; pride told him that it were unfit, nameless, and ushered thus, to appear before the high-born ; but thoughtless youth urged him on, and even as Frion spoke, at a quick pace they approached the town-gate. The Sire de Beverem too, whom the wily French- man named, had been favoured by Edward the Fourth, and was his guest in London — " Let the worst come, and it were well to have made such a friend. I will bear myself gallantly," thought York, " and win the good knight's smile ; it may profit me here- after. Now I shall see how the world goes, and if any new device or fashion have sprung up among our chivalry, that I may seem not quite untauo^ht when I lead the sons of my father's friends to the field. Be it as you please," he said to his seducer, " before now my hand has grasped a foil, and I will not shame your introduction." Frion went forward conning his part ; he felt that his task was not so easy as he had imagined : the boy was wild as a bird, and so gave in to the lure ; but, like a bird, he might away without warning, and speed back to his nest ere his wings were well limed. It was many miles to the coast : Frion's resolution had been hastily formed. The Lord Fitzwater, a partisan of Henry, ■was then sojourning at Lisle. He had been to Brussels, and on his return towards Calais a sickness had seized hira, which forced him to remain some weeks under the roof of the Sire de Beverem ; he was recovering now, and on the eve of his departure ; without confiding the whole secret to him, the papers and tokens Frion bore must vouch that the king would thank any of his lieges who should aid him in bringing by force or decoy a pretended son of the traitor earl of Lincoln (for thus Frion resolved to name his victim) to the English shores. Yet the decoy er had a difficult part to play ; there was a quickness in the prince's manner which made him fear that, if his intentions changed, his acts would not lag behind ; and though he did not betray suspicion, he was so perfectly alive to everything said and done, that any circumstance of doubt would not fail immediately to strike him. Although they had hitherto discoursed in French, yet it was certain that his native English had not been forgotten by him ; nay, the appearance of the Lord Fitzwater's attendants, their livery, their speech, must awaken the prince's fears, and confound the wiles of his enemy. Frion pondered on. all these obstaeles, as he rode gently through the THE DECOY. 65 narrow streets of Lisle ; at length they reached the abode of the French noble, and here Frion halted ; while the duke, beginning to be ill-satisfied with the part he played, and his promised pre- sentation by such a roan, almost resolved to break from him here and to return ; shame of appearing feeble of purpose alone pre- vented him. At last, passing through the court-yard up a dark and massy staircase, he found himself in a hall, where several men at arms were assembled, some furbishing pieces of armour, others engaged in talk, one or two stretched along the benches asleep : pride awoke in the youth's breast, he had gone too far to retrace his steps, and he resolved to bear himself gallantly towards the noble to whom he was about to be presented : yet, pausing for a moment, " My memory," he thought, " leads me far a-field, or some of these men bear English badges, and their wearers seem grey-eyed Englishmen." Frion meanwhile, selecting with quick tact one of the followers of the Sire de Beverem who chanced to be among these men, requested an instant introduction to Lord Fitz water, using such golden arguments that the man, half afraid of being called on to divide the spoil, motioned him quickly to follow, and, passing through a suite of rooms, as he approached the last, he said, " He is there, I will call his page." " It needs not," said Frion ; " await me here, Sir Perkin," and pushing forward, to the astonishment of the attendant, entered unannounced to the baron's presence : Kichard thought he heard a "By St. Thomas ! " uttered as the door closed hastily; but some Englishman might be with the French noble, and though a momentary wonder crossed him, no doubt of Frion's integrity was awakened. "By Saint Thomas!" exclaimed Lord Fitzwater, as Frion almost burst into his apartment, " what rude varlet is this ? Are serfs so used to enter a baron's chamber in France ?" " Most noble sir," said Frion, "if in three words, or, if you refuse me these, if in one eye-glance, I do not satisfy you, bid your men beat me with staves from the door. I am here in Xing Henry's service." " God save him ! " said the noble, " and you, sir knave, from the fate you name, which will be yours undoubtedly, if you do not give me good reason for your ill-mannered intrusion." Frion looked round. Except the baron there was no one in the room, save a stripling of about sixteen years. The lad, though short in stature, was handsome ; yet there was a look that indicated the early development of qualities, which, even in manhood, detract from beauty. He seemed conversant in the world's least holy ways, vain, reckless, and selfish ; yet the coarser lines drawn by self-indulgence and youthful sensuality, 66 THE DECOY. "were redeemed in part by the merry twinkling of his eye, and the ready laugh that played upon his lips. " My words are for your ears alone, my lord," said Frion, " and be assured they touch your liege nearly." " Go, Bobert," said Fitzwater, " but not further than the ante-chamber." "There is one there," said Frion, anxiously: "he must not quit it — he must not escape, nor learn in whose hands he is." "Your riddles, sir, ill please me," replied the noble. " Look at this paper, my lord, and let it Touch for the heavy import of my business." Lord Fitzwater recognized his royal master's signatiire, and with an altered tone he said, " Leave us, Eobert ; tarry not in the ante-chamber, but bear my greeting to my noble host, and ask him, when I may, at his best leisure, pay my thanks to him and my kind lady. I depart to-morrow at dawn j and mark, speak not to the stranger who waits without." The youth made obeisance, and departed. Apiece of tapestry hung before the door, which, together with the massy boards themselves, prevented any sound from piercing to the other side; the lad was about to proceed on his errand, when curiosity prompted him to look on the stranger, with whom he was com- manded not to parley. Eichard stood in the embrasure of one of the windows, but turned quickly as the folding-door shut with no gentle sound ; his candid brow, his bright blue eyes, his frank-hearted smile, who that had ever seen could forget them ? nor were the traits of the other's countenance less marked, though less attractive. The words burst at the same instant from either—" My Lord of York ! " " Gentle Eobin Clifford." " My prison play-fellow," cried the prince ; " this for me is a dangerous recognition. I pray you be wise, and — as you were ever^kind, and keep my secret close." " Alas ! my lord," said E.obert, "you have opened your hand, and let the winged fool fly unwittingly, if you think it has not been discovered by yonder false loon. Know you where you are?" " Then I am betrayed ! I see it, feel it. Farewell, Hobin, my fleet legs will outrun their slow pursuit." " Nay, an' that were possible," said Clifford ; " but it is not ; let me better advise your highness ; trust me you shall be free ; but hark, they come ; I must not be found here. Show no suspicion ; yield to your fate as if jou knew it not, and conlide in me ; my hand on it, this night you are at liberty." Clifford quitted the apartment by the opposite door, while Frion entered from the other, beckoning the duke to approach. THE DECOY. 67 He took him by the Land, and led him to Lord Fitz water, who started back when he saw him, and was about to exclaim ; but Frion, in French, addressino^ him as the Sire de Beverem, entreated his kind favour for Perkin "Warbeck, the gallant youth before him. The baron evidently was ill-pleased at the part he had consented to play; he said a few words with an ill grace, and bidding Perkin welcome, promised him favour, and permis- sion for the present to remain in his abode. Eichard saw through the flimsy disguise which the Englishman threw over his native speech, though he did not know who his receiver was; but, feeling that it was best to follow his young friend's counsel, he replied, also in French, that, at his guide's invitation, he had eagerly sought an interview with the renowned Sire de Beverem; that the honour done him would be deeply engraven in his heart; that on some future occasion he would gratefully avail himself of Ids offers; but, at the present time, he had left his home without intimating any intention, of a prolonged absence, and that he owed it to a kind kinswoman, not to disquiet her by delaying his return. He prayed the noble to dismiss him there- fore, craving leave only to attend him some other day. " Be it so," said Fitzwater ; " to-morrow at dawn you shall depart hence ; but you must not refuse my proffered hospitality. I shall introduce you to my household as one who ere long will be admitted into it, and show my friend. Sir Lalayne, who is now here, what gentle boors our Flanders breeds." "I can return to-morrow, my good lord," Eichard began ; but the noble not heeding him, added, " Stay till my return ; I now go to hear mass," and passed hastily from the chamber. The prince's first impulse was to reproach Frion's knavery, assert his freedom, and, ere any measures had been taken to secure his person, to quit his new prison. But he did not know how deep-laid the plot might be ; he was inclined to think that all was prepared for his reception and safe custody, so that any open attempt to regain his liberty would be resisted by force ; while, through the assistance of his friend Clifford, he might hope to escape, if, giving in to the stratagem, he took occasion by the curb, and forced it to his purpose. " Are you mad," said Frion, *' my rustic, that you resist the proffers of a high and powerful man of your native land ?" Eichard wondered, when he beheld Frion's sneer and crafty glance, how he had not mistrusted him from the moment he beheld him ; the double meaning of his words, and the familiar tone in which they were uttered, grated him like a personal insult. He repressed the angry reply rising to his lips, and said, " It seems I must submit, yet I should be beholden to you F 2 68 THE DECOY. if you contrived an excuse, and lent me your horse, tliat I might ride back and inform Dame Madeline. To-morrow- I might return." Frioii opposed this intention, and led the prince to a chamber at some distance from any other, at the end of a corridor, saying, ** that it had been assijrned to him ;" and after a short conversa- tion left him. Richard heard the shooting of the bolt as the door closed ; " Son of Eing Edward," he thought, " thy folly disgraces thy parentage ; thus at once to have run into the gin. Yet I am of good cheer, and my heart tells me that I shall relate the merry tale of my escape to Madeline and my sweet coz, and dry this night the tears my disappearance has caused them to shed." It soon appeared, by the long absence of his betrayer, that it was not intended to continue the farce longer ; but that, from the moment he had entered that chamber, he was in treatment as well as in fact a prisoner. After several weary hours had elapsed, his blithe spirit began to sink ; he reflected that Clifford had probably promised more than he could perform ; but courage awoke with the sense of danger ; he resolved to bo true to himself, and to effect his escape singly, if he could gain no assistance. " Men have ears and hearts," he thought, " and I can work on these ; or they may be neglectful while I am on the alert, and I can profit by their carelessness. In all forms my fortune may take, I will not fail to myself; and there is small danger in any change for a true man. With my light spirit and resolved will, I could, I doubt not, persuade an armed band to make way for me, or open prison bolts with charming words, though my witchcraft be only that of gentle courtesy, moulding with skilful hand the wax of soft humanity." Pacing the apartment, he continued these meditations, imagining every circumstance that might and would arise, and how he was to turn all to the best advantage. He framed persuasive speeches, wily answers to ensnaring questions, cautious movements, by which he might withdraw himself from the hands of his enemies; and while he thus occupied himself, his eyes gleamed, and his cheeks glowed, as if the moment of action had come, and his life and libert}^ depended on instant deed. At two hours past noon the door was unclosed, and a servant entered bearing food ; impatient to begin his plans of escape, Richard was about to speak to him, when, in the doorway, he beheld the slight, stunted figure of Clifford, whose forefinger was pressed on his lips, and who, after exchanging one glance with his friend, cast aside his stealthy expression of countenance, entering with a half-swaggering look, and saying, in French, *• My lord, young sir, has sent me on a pleasant embassage, THE DECOY. 69 even that of dining \ritli your pagesLip, say in f^, two boys like us were better and merrier tofrether, than in the great hall v.ith the arrogant serving-men." Eichard felt no great appetite ; but taking the tone from his friend, he thanked him, and they fell to on the viands. " Now, kind Thomas," said Clifford, " of your bounty bring us a stoup of wine ; the day is rainy, and we cannot abroad ; so ray gossip and I will tell long stories over our bottle, and lay some plan of merry mischief which you and your fellows may in good time rue." The domestic obeyed ; nor till the wine was brought, tlie servant fairly dismissed, and the door closed, did Clifford put aside the character he had assumed of a striplmg page, in a noble master's abode, entertaining a stranger visitant of his own years. At length, when they were quite alone, the merry boy put his hands to his sides and indulged in so gay a peal of laughter, that the prince, who at first stared in wonder, at last caught the infection, and laughed too, while tears from super- abundant glee streamed down their cheeks. Once, twice, and thrice did llichard check himself, and turn seriously to inquire the cause of this merriment ; and Clifford strove to answer ; but laughter bubbling up choked his voice, and both again yielded in accord to the overpowering fit. At last gasping, holding their sides, and by degrees commanding their muscles, the duke said, " I would ask you, friend Eobin, what this means H But at the word, lo you ! your very voice is lost. Now, prithee, feel half as weary as I do of this folly, and you will be as grave as tumble- down Dick. Do you remember the simpering fellow we made good sport of in the Tower? " " You have broken the spell, my lord," said Clifford; "that word suffices to make me as grave as Brakenbury himself, when he looked on your brother's corpse. Ah dear, your highness, the name of the Tower is worse than a raven's croak ! God and St. Thomas preserve you from ever getting the other side of its moat ! " " Amen, Eobin, with all my heart," said Eichard ; '* a shudder runs through my limbs down to my finger tips, making the skin on my head creep, when I think there is any chance of my passing long years in those dreary cells, with their narrow deep windows ; the court-yards, which the sun seldom visits ; the massy dark walls, whose black stones seemed to frown angrily if our childs' voices were ever heard in sport." " There your cousin, my lord of "Warwick, pines out his melancholy days," replied Clifford; "and that is your destined abode. J\ly grandfather was slain by Queen Margaret's side, and stained the Eed Eose with a blood-red dye, falling in its 70 THE ESCAPE. cause. Your father and his brothers did many a Clifford much wrong, and woe and mourning possessed my house till the line of Lancaster was restored. I cannot grieve, therefore, for the exaltation of the earl of Richmond ; yet I will not passively see my playmate mewed up in a cage, nor put in danger of having his head laid on that ungentle pillow in Tower Yard. The daughter of Warwick, our Edward's affianced bride, your crook- backed uncle's wife, loved my pranks and nurtured my youth ; and by her good leave, many a mirthful hour I spent in the dark place you name. May neither of us ever see it more ! " " You will, then, assist my escape ? " asked Eichard. *' As faithfully, gossip Dickon, as God his grace shall await me at the last day ! And now I will tell you a merry tale." CHAPTER X. THE ESCAPE. — It is thy merit To make all mortal business ebb and flow By roguery. Homer's Hymn to Mercury. And then, with you, my friends, and the old man. We'll load the hollow depth of our black ship, And row with double strokes from this dread shore. The Cyclops. IToTWiTHSTANDiNG the promise Clifford made of a merry tale, both he and his auditor looked grave as he commenced. Richard expected, with some anxiety, an explanation from his friend, and the other assumed the self-consequence resulting from having achieved a victory. No two beings ever displayed, in their way, a greater contrast than these youths. The prince was many inches taller than his companion, and his slim make promised increase of height. His brow was smooth as infancy, candid as day; his bright blue eyes were lighted up with intelligence, yet there was a liquid lustre in them that betokened tenderness ; nor did his lips, that nest of the heart's best feelings, belie his eyes. THE ESCAPE. 71 Tiiey were full, a little curled, can we say in pride, or by wliat more gentle word can we name a feeling of self-elevation and noble purpose, joined to benevolence and sweetness ? His oval cbeeks were rounded by the dimpled chin, and his golden hair clustered on a throat of marble whiteness, which, as the white embroidered collar thrown back over the doublet, permitted the outline to be seen, sustained his head as the Ionic flute rears its graceful capital. Clifford was shorter, but firm set and more manlike in form, his grey eyes were bright or dull as his soul spoke in them ; his brow slightly scowled, pending over, and even thus early, lines were delved in it, hardly seen when he was in repose, but which, as he spoke, showed deep and distorted ; his smile was tinctured by a sneer, his voice attracted no confi- dence, yet Hichard now hung intently on it as he spoke : " When I returned from doing my lord's bidding, I found him moving about the room, more like a parched pea than a stately noble ; for now he stood still, and then shot off with a quick step, showing every sign of being ill at ease. Now, boy as I am, for I can number but sixteen summers, my lord more than loves me, he trusts me, and not without cause — for when at hazard-— but my story will be too long — enough that ere now I have done him service. Had I not known the cause of his disquiet I should have asked it, but, believing myself fully aware of wha.t this all meant, I went to my post, and busied myself in making some flies for angling, seeming most intent upon my work. My lord stood over me, and twice or thrice fetched a sigh, and then strode away, and came again, saying, "I am a fool, a dolt — the king can mean no ill to this lad — and yet — " I cannot tell you how long this indecision lasted, while I patiently toiled at a fly of green and gold, bright as those which trouts love to snap at in clear streams during May. At length he asked me, ' Eobin, did you mark the boy that stood in the ante-chamber?' * Aye, my good lord ! ' ' And what thought you of him ? ' ' Thought, my lord ? ' I spoke inquiringly, for it suddenly came across me that he did not know you, and it was not for me to betray your secret. * Aye,' he replied, ' thought ? Does he resemble any one you ever knew ? Of what country do you divine him to be ? ' ' These Flemings are sandy-haired,' I said, ' yet he does not look of Flanders. Methinks he seems English born.' " ' You are right,' said he, ' English he is confessedly. This Prion calls him a natural son of De la Poole — of the late Earl of Lincoln. He says that he has knowledge of a secret treasure concealed by his father before this last rebellion, and the king wishes to get him into his hands, thus to secure the gold. The tale is not unlikely, for the Tudor ever loved the glitter — nay, 72 THE ESCAPE. the very dust of the precious metal, — and tlie boy resembles strann^ely the House of York. Yet, I care not for the task put upon me of kidnapping a child, and of betraying him into his enemy's hands — perhaps of delivering him up a prisoner for life, for the sake of Poor fellow ! if he know aught of a concealed treasure, in God's name, let him confess it while on this side the fatal channel that now divides him from tyranny or death.' ' Let me deal with him,' I said, ' let me throw out some toy, such as is this gold and green thread to a silly fish, and learn the truth ; if he discovers the hiding-place of this so coveted coin, we may spare him the trouble of his enforced journey.' ' I know not that,' answered my patron ; * Master Frion is earnest for his safe keeping ; and no one is nearer our liege's inner wishes than this Provengal, who served him in exile, and who followed him in his expedition thence ; and yet there is a noble daring in the boy, a mountain freshness in his cheek, a springy freedom in his gait, that it were a thousand pities to fetter and limit within narrow prison bounds.' Seeing that my lord was thus favour- ably inclined, I used all my poor eloquence to urge him further, and at last brought him to consent that I should converse with you ; learn, if possible, your secret ; inform you of your danger, and advise you to escape. One only difficulty remained : my lord had promised this master secretary that none should be admitted to talk with you ; but when the subtle fiend, the double-dealing Frenchman entered, I told him with a long visage, that our noble host, the Sire de Beverem, had heard that we were carrying ofi* by force a Fleming ; and that, considering his hospitable mansion stained by the act, he had commanded strict watch to be kept on the morrow, that if any of the English suite were unwilling to go, or appeared in durance, Jie should be rescued. It was advisable therefore, that you should be kept in good-humour till fairly beyond the gates of Lisle ; and this my wisdomship offered to do, if admitted to parlance with you. You look grave, sir prince, but had you seen Frion's sage look of hesitation, and heard his many exhortations that I would by no means betray my knowledge of who you really were ; and how I, with a bow, careful as if my curls were white from j-ears, promised discretion, you would laugh as I did, when, the mime over which I played before the servitor, I doffed my page's seeming equality, and in duteous phrase to his highness of York, offer my best services to liberate him." " That seems already done," said Richard ; " usher me to the Lord Fitzwater. I will declare myself to him ; his compassion already excited ■" "Would then be cool as snow at Christmas. Wise young THE ESCAPE. 73 sir, Baron Fitz water wears the blushing Eose ; and for him there is wormwood in the name of York. Now, as a chance offshoot of the white thorn, he only sees in you a harmless boy, whom it were sin to injure; but give yourself a name whose very echo would bring St. Albans, Tewkesbury, Bosworth Field, and a thousand scaffolds streaming with his kinsmen's blood before him, and without remorse he would let Frion have his will of you. Even I, Duke Eichard, I am sprung from those who fell for Lancaster " "Enough," replied the prince, haughtily. "I am content to stand alone, to achieve my freedom singly, or to submit to mv fate." " Not so, my noble, playmate," said the other. " I will not offer you my knee, my oath, my sword, for my allegiance beloDgs to the anointed King of England ; but, I beseech you, suffer E-obin Clifford to assist high-born Plantageuet to escape from a prison or from death ; permit him to pay, if not the duty of a subject, yet that of a loving friend to the former companion of his childish sports." Eichard listened somewhat sullenly to these offers ; he ill brooked the thought that any of English parentage should, knowing who he was, refuse to acknowledge him for his liege : but Clifford would not be refused ; while it was hardly worth while to contend with his light spirit, which appeared incapable of a serious or profound idea. After a shoi't resistance, there- fore, the duke entered willingly into a discussion of the best means of effecting his escape in such a way, that he should have several hours the start of Frion, and be distant from danger before his seducer could discover that he was not still safe in his hands. In the midst of this discussion, Frion suddenly entered. The stake for which he played was too momentous to trust it wholly to the stripling page, and distrust of the wily boy entered also into his calculations ; he broke in, therefore, not only unan- nounced, but with such stealthy quiet as showed that he meant to pounce on his victim unawares. The youths sat, their stools drawn close ; Clifford was leaning forward earnestly propound- ing his schemes, and Eichard listened, his whole soul in his countenance. Frion was close upon them before he was per- ceived by either, his eyes glimmering with their usual suspicious look. The artless Eichard started, and would with a conscious mien have drawn back ; but Clifford, more used to the wiles and watchfulness of others, and his own double mode of action, con- tinued to speak in the same tone the same words, without moving a muscle. The prince wondered, and regained his self-posses- '74 THE ESCAPE. sion ; not from entering into the deceit of his companion, but from the haughty sentiment of his own dignity, which even in dano:er refused to cower. Clifford had been sayiug — "I will hence to the sire: a word to him of whose secretary this Provencal is, and insinuation that he is now on a secret expedition to the Flemish towns, will awaken his curiosity ; he will send for him ; fortunately the good knight speaks so slow that a mass can be said while he is introducing the subject of his inquiries ; as each word expires, he pauses while a requiem might be sung for its death ; our antagonist will writhe and — " and a glance askance informed the speaker that this man was at his side : he continued — " and strive vainly to escape ; the heavy weight will be too much for him, he must submit. Such feints suit well us boys who have not strength nor skill for more declared warfare. To-morrow's dawn I will practise with you in the court of the castle ere you depart. But, indeed, my gossip, you must promise to be at Calais on the sixteenth, when we shall see a combat of good knights fit for royal princesses to look on. And now, fair sir, farewell; here is your friend. The Sire de Beverem com- manded my presence at this hour. If I see you not again to-night, the saints have you in their keeping ! " When Clifford, with his pagelike vivacity, ran from the room singing a gay romance, Frion felt himself embarrassed ; and more so when Hichard said, — " My guest, it is hard, after giving you harbourage last night, that I should be forced, whether I will or not, to tarry here, leaving my kinswoman in dread and doubt. Make you my excuse to the chevalier, and delay me no longer, I beseech you." Frion, without directly replying, said, " Anon I will speak of that; meanwhile, I have news for you." And he entered into a long account of an expected sedition in Flanders, and how the Sire de Beverem had promised to enlist Perkin Warbeck in his particular troop, when with courage and good fortune, he could not fail to rise. While he was talking, one of the men-at-arms of the noble entered, and notified to Frion that his lord desired an instant interview with him. The secretary hastened to obey ; he thought that good fortune itself provided this excuse for him to escape from his victim, and resolved not again to present himself before him. He was scarcely gone when Clifford re- turned. "Now quick," he cried, "down the back staircase! My own steed stands saddled for you ; ride fast and far — but whither — whither do you intend to go ? " " In the first place, to Dame Madeline's cottage." " That were midsummer madness," cried Clifford j " Frion THE ESCAPE. 75 will never rest till he ensnares his bird again ; nay, though I trust he will not discover your escape till to-morrow morning, that part of my scheme may fail ; and his papers from the king are such, that my lord could not refuse to aid him, I pray you set space and cloudy mystery between you." " It shall be so. Probably I shall seek refuge at Brussels ; but I must see my gentle guardian and my sweet cousin, calm their fears, and bid them farewell."' They had descended a narrow winding staircase ; Clifford unlocked a postern, opening on a dark alley. A small light- limbed horse stood without, held by a stout, almost gigantic fellow. *' Here, Bryan," said Clifford, " this is the smuggled article of which I spoke. Convey it in safety to the gate ; once without, the road is known. How now, sweeting ! you sit your steed as if you were used to this gear — in truth thou art a false one — yet take care — fold your cloak thus. Not one kiss ere we part ? " He sportively snatched the prince's hand, and pressing it to his lips, continued, " No weeping, lovely : my merry heart hates tears like verjuice. The blessed Virgin protect you ; I must in. Remember, in every ill, Eobert Clifford is your fast, ' your sworn friend. Look at her, Bryan ; one would swear by her bearing it were a beardless page, and not a long-haired girl ; remember, though gamesome, she is gentle, and respect her on your life." Laughing at his own deceits, the guileful boy re-entered the mansion ; nor could Hichard avoid smiling at the merry and ready subterfuges which his friend had at command on every occasion. Brian demurely held the rein, and hardly hazarded a look or covert joke, as, with a pace that put the pony to a trot, he led the prince through the narrow streets to the western gate. The youth breathed freely when, after having passed the hollow sounding drawbridge, he saw the dark .wall of the town behind him, and before, the green plain. In his haste he scarcely bestowed a benison on his guide ; but snatching the rein from his hand, and with the other throwing some money at his feet, and exclaiming, " Beware of prating, as thou art willing to save thyself from the whipping-post ! " he impatiently struck his unarmed heel against the horse's sides, and bounded swiftly forward. Bryan picked up the angels, and told them slowly, as he said " I meant to have paid myself in other coin ; but, by St. Julian, she rides more like a trooper than a gentle dame — and her speech — Master Robert has before now entrusted a damsel to my guidance, but they ever spoke me lovingly, with ' fair Sir,' and ' sweet Bryan ! ' Forsooth, Flemish girls ruffle more like pranksome pages than soft-cheeked wenches." 76 THE ESCAPE. The thought of his conductor had passed as srviftly from the prince's thoughts, as he made the ground lly from under his horse's hoof. He was aware that he did neither the safest nor best thing in seeking, Hke a hunted hare, the form from which he had been roused in the morning ; but the desire of cahning Madehne's anxiety, and imprinting a farewell kiss on the sweet lips of her daughter, prevented him from altering his first pur- pose. The night was cloudy and very dark, but the road was known to him, and he continued at full speed till a voice, calling aloud, attracted his attention — the words could not be mistaken — his own name, " Perkin Warbeck ! " sounded through the night. His first thought was, that he was pursued, but leflec- tion told him that assuredly his pursuers would not halloo to him, while any sent in search of him by Madeline, might natu- rally so. try to stop him as he rode so fast through the dark. He checked his speed, therefore, and in a few moments a cavalier, a stranger was at his side, mounted on a tall black horse ; his form seemed gigantic, and little else could be discerned ; the stranger spoke to him in French, with a foreign accent. He asked him, " Are you not he they call Perkin Warbeck ? " This address was sufilciently startling ; and the youth haughtily re- plied, " My name imports not to you, while to me this interrup- tion is ur^seasonable." • "Enough ; you go towards the cottage of Madeline de Faro : I follow your highness thither." Richard grasped the small poniard which hung from his belt ; yet how could he, a child, contend with the tall and muscular form beside him? "Whoever thou art," he cried, "and who- ever I may be, follow me not ; I am no serf to be seized and carried back to his suzerain. Depart in God's name, that the fingers of neither may receive an ill stain ! " " Thou art a gallant boy ! " cried the stranger, as placing his hand on the youth's arm, his most gentle touch was felt as an iron vice pressing on his flesh : " Pardon, my lord, the interfer- ence of one unknown to you, though I will not call myself a stranger. I am Hernan de Fero, the husband of Dame Made- line ; now stay not your speed, while we hasten to relieve her thousand fears. I am come in search of you." The heart of Eichard warmed towards iiis new friend ; he felt, that with him on his side, he might defy Frion, Fitzwater, and all their followers ; for there was something in De Faro's mien, which spoke of a thousand combats, and as many victories ; his deep voice out-roared the elements ; his hand might arrest a wild horse in mad career. "When they arrived at the wicket entrance to the cot, he lifted the boy from the saddle, as a child THE ESCAPE. 77 would handle a toy, and sliouted aloud in his own language, " Viva el Duque de Inglatierra j el Marinero, Hernan de JFaro." The dano^ers Eichard had run, and the delight she experienced in seeing him, when again under her roof, stopped all Madeline's reproaches. " Is he not worthy all my fears ? " she said to her husband, who stood eyeing the boy as .he caressed his daughter. De Faro stretched out his hand, saying, " Will you, SeHor Don Ricardo, accept my services, and my vow to protect you till the death, so help me the Blessed Virgin and the Holy Trinity." De Faro was a mariner who had sailed in the service of the king of Portugal, along the unsounded shores of Africa, and sought beyond the equator a route to the spicy Indian land. His dark skin was burnt to a nearly negro die ; his black curled hair, his beard and moustachios of the same dusky hue, half hid his face ; his brow somewhat lowered over eyes dark as night ; but, when he smiled, his soft mouth and pearly teeth, softened the harshness of his physiognomy, and he looked gentle and kind. Every nerve, every muscle, had been worn and hardened by long toilsome navigation; his strong limbs had withstood the tempest, his hands held unmoved the cordage, which the whirlwind strove vainly to tear from his grasp. He was a tower of a man ; yet withal one, to whom the timid and endangered would recur for refuge, secure of his generosity and dauntless nature. He heard the story of [Richard's dangers; his plan was formed swiftly: he said, *•' If you choose, Sir Prince, to await your foes here, I am ready, having put these girls in safety, to barricade the doors, and with arquebus and sword to defend 3'^ou to the last : but there is a safer and better way for us all. I am come to claim my Madeline and our child, and to carry them with me to my native Spain. My vessel now rides off Ostend. I had meant to make greater preparation, and to have laid up some weeks here before we went on our home-bound voyage ; but, as it is, let us depart to-night." The door suddenly opened as he spoke — Madeline shrieked — Hichard sprang upon his feet, while De Faro rose more slowly, Placing himself like a vast buttress of stone before the intruder, t was Clifford. " All is safe for the night," he cried ; *' your grace has a few hours the start, and but a few ; dally not here ! " Again the discussion of whither he should fly was renewed, and the duke spoke of Brussels — of his aunt. " Of poison and pit-falls," cried Robert ; " think you, boy as you are, and, under pardon, no conjuror, that the king will not contrive your de- struction ? " Probably self-interested motives swayed Clifford; but he 78 THE ESCArE. entered warmly into De Faro's idea of liastening to the sea-coast, and of sailiniT direct for Spain. " In a few years you will be a man — in a few years " " Forgotten ! Yes — I may go ; but a few months shall mark my return. I go on one condition ; that you, CliiTord, watch for the return of my cousin, Sir Edmund, and direct him where to find me." " I will not fail. Sir Mariner, whither are you bound ? " " To Malaga." And now, urged and quickened by Cliflford, who promised to attend to all that this sudden resolve left incomplete, the few arrangements for their departure were made. Favoured by night, and the prince's perfect knowledge of the country, tliey were speedily on their way to Ostend. Clifford returned to Lisle, to mark and enjoy Frion's rage and Fitzwater'e confusion, when, on the morrow, the quarry was found to have stolen from its lair. Without a moment's delay, the secretary followed, he hoped, upon his track : he directed his steps to Brussels. A letter meanwhile from Ostend, carefully worded, informed Clif- ford of the arrival and embarkation of his friends ; again he was reminded of Pkntagenet; nor had he long to wait before he fulfilled this last commission. Edmund had found the Lady Margaret glad to receive tidings of her nephew; eager to ensure his safety and careful bringing- Tip, but dispirited by the late overthrow, and deeply grieved by the death of the noble and beloved Lincoln : no attack could now be made ; it would be doubly dangerous to bring forward the young Eichard at this juncture. She commissioned Plau- tagenet to accompany him to Brussels that she might see him ; and then they could confer upon some fitting plan for the privacy and security of his future life, until maturer age fitted him to enter on his destined struggles. Edmund returned with brightened hopes to Tournay, to find the cottage deserted, his friends gone. It may easily be imagined that this unexpected blank was a source of terror, almost of despair to the adventurer. He feared to ask questions, and when he did propound a few, the answers only increased his perplexity and fears. It was not until his third hopeless visit to the empty dwelling, that he met a stripling page, who, with an expression of slyness in his face, spoke the watchword of the friends of York. Edmund gladly exchanged the countersign, and then the boy asked him, whether he called himself cousin to the fugitive duke of York, laughing the while at the consterna- tion his auditor exhibited at the utterance of this hidden and sacred word: "You come to seek your prince," he continued, THE ESCAPE. 79 "and wonder wliither he may be flown, and what corner of the earth's wilderness- affords him an abode. He is now, by my calculations, tossing about in a weather-beaten caravel, com- manded by Hernan de Faro, in the Bay of Biscay ; in another month he may anchor in the port of Malaga ; and the dark-eyed girls of Andalusia will inform you in what nook of their sunny land the fair-haired son of England dwells. The king is defeated, Master Frion balked, and Lord Fitzwater gone on a bootless errand : the White Rose floui'ishes free as those that bloom in our Kentish hedges." Without waiting for a reply, but with his finger on his lip to repel further speech, the youth vaulted on his horse, and was out of sight in a moment. Edmund doubted for some time whether he should act upon this singular communication. He endeavoured to learn who his informant was, and, at last, became assured that it was Robert Clifford, a young esquire in Lord Fitzwater's train. He was the j^ounger son of the Lord Clifford who fell for Lancaster, at the battle of St. Alban's. By birth, by breeding, he was of the Red Rose, yet it was evident that his knowledge was perfect as to the existence of the duke of York ; and the return of Lord Fitzwater and Xing Henry's secretary to Lisle, disappointed and foiled, served to inspire confidence in the information he had bestowed. After much reflection, Plan- tagenet resolved to visit Paris, where he knew that the brother of Madeline, old John A¥arbeck, then sojourned ; and, if he did not gain surer intelligence from him, to proceed by way of Bordeaux to Spain. 80 CHAPTER XI. THE EXILES. A day will come when York shall claim his own ; Then York be still awhile, till time do serve. SnAKSPEARE- The further Edmund journeyed from tlie late abode of his lost cousin, the more he felt displeased at the step he had taken ; but on his arrival in Paris his uncertainty ended. Warbeck had received intimation of the hurried embarkation of his sister, and here also he found Lady Brampton, whose husband Lad taken refuge in Paris after the battle of Stoke. Like the quecn- dovras^er, the fate of Margaret of Anjou's son haunted this lady, and she warmly espoused the idea of bringing the duke of York up in safe obscurity-, until his own judgment might lead him to choose another line of action, or the opposing politics of Europe promised some support to his cause. She agreed to repair herself to Brussels, to take counsel with the duchess, to use all her influence and arts, and, as soon as time was ripe, to proceed herself to Spain to announce it to the prince. Meanwhile, Plantagenet, following his former purpose, would take up his abode with Eichard in Spain ; teach him the science of arms, and the more difficult lessons of courage, self-command, and prudent conduct. In pursuance of this plan, Edmund lost no time in going to Bordeaux, whence he embarked for Malaga, and following his friend's steps, arrived shortly after him at the retreat De Faro had chosen among the foldings of the moun- tains on the borders of Andalusia.* De Faro's was a singular history. In those days, that park of Andalusia which comprised the kingdom of Granada, was the seat of perpetual wars, and even when armies did not meet * I had originally entered more at largre on a description of Andalusia, and the history of the conquest of Granada. The subsequent publication of Mr. Washingr- ton Irvinj^'s very interesting work has superseded the necessity of this deviation from the straigrht path of my story. Events which, in their romantic detail, were before only to be found in old Spanish folios, are now accesi^ible to every English reader, adorned by the elegance of style, and arranged with the exquisite taste, which characterize the very delightful " Chronicle of the Conquest of Gianada." THE EXILES. 81 to deluge its fertile plains and valleys with tlieir blood, troops led by noble cavaliers and illustrious commanders overran its districts in search of plunder and glory. During one of these incursions, in the year 1452, some impulse of rehgion or humanity made a Spanish soldier snatch from a couch in the country-liouse of a noble wealthy Moor, already half cohsumed, an infant hardly a year old ; the band was already in full retreat, and, fortunately, tliis incident took place on the very frontiers of Granada, or the benevolence of the soldier would hardly have been proof against the trouble his little charge occasioned him. ToiHng up the mountains on their return to the kingdom of Jaen, they entered the little town of Alcala-la-Heal, where, on the side of the mountainous road, rose the walls of a monastery. "How better," thought the soldier, ** save the soul of this boy than by giving him to the monks?" It was not, perhaps, the present they would most readily have selected, but compassion and piety forbade them to refuse it: the little Moor became a Christian by the name of Hernan, and was brought up within the sacred precincts of the convent. Though the monks were able to make a zealous Catholic of their nursling, they did not succeed so well in taming his fiery spirit, nor could they induce him to devote himself to the inactive and mortifying life of a priest. Yet he was generous and daring, and thus acquired their affection ; next to being a recluse vowed to God, the vocation of a soldier for the faith, in the eyes of these holy men, was to be selected. Hernan advancing in life, and shooting up into strong and premature manhood, was recommended by the abbot to his cousin, the illustrious Don Eodrigo Ponce de Leon, marquess of Cadiz. He fought several times under his banners, and in the year 1471 entered with him the kingdom of Granada, and was wounded at the taking of Cardela. In this last action it was, that a sudden horror of taking up arms against his countrymen sprung up in Hernan's breast. He quitted Spain in consequence ; and, visiting Lisbon, he was led to embrace a sea-faring life, and entered the marine service of the king of Portugal ; at one time, visiting Holland, where he sought and won the hand of Madeline : and afterwards, with Bartholomew Diaz, he made one of the crew that discovered the Cape of Good Hope. He sailed with three vessels, one of which lost company of the others, and its crew underwent various and dreadful perils at sea, and from the blacks on land : after nine months they again fell in with their companions, three sailors only remaining. One of these was Hernan de Faro ; his skill, valour, and forti- tude, had saved the vessel -, he was exalted to its command, G 82 THE EXILES. and now, in safer voyage over seas more known, lie had frciglited it with the fugitives from Tournay. During all his wanderings, even in the gay and rich Portugal, Hernan turned with fond regret to his mountain home. To its rugged peaks, its deep and silent dells ; its torrents, its verdure, its straggling and precipitous paths ; its prospect over the rich and laughing Vega of Granada. He had promised himself, after weary toils, a long repose in this beloved spot ; and hither he now led his wife, resolving to set up his tent for ever in the land of his childhood, his happy childhood. It was a strange place to choose, bordering on Granada, which at that time was as lists in which Death and Havock sat umpires. But the situation of Alcala-la-Keal preserved it secure, notv. ithstanding its dangerous neighbourhood. It was perched high upon the mountain, over- looking a plain which had been for many years the scene of ruthless carnage and devastation, being in itself an asylum for fugitives— a place of rest for the victor — an eagle's nest, unas- sailable by the vultures of the plain. Here, then, Plantagenet found his cousin ; here, in lovely and romantic Spain. Though defaced and torn by war, Andalusia presented an aspect of rich and various beauty, intoxicating to one whose life had been spent in the plains of England, or the dull flats of Flanders. The purple vineyards ; the olive planta- tions clothing the burning hill-side ; the groves of mulberry, cork, pomegranate, and citron, that diversified the fertile vegas or plains ; the sweet flowing rivers, with their banks adorned by scarlet geranium or odoriferous myrtle, made this spot Nature's own favoured garden — a paradise unequalled upon earth. On such a scene did the mountain-home of the exiles look down. Alcala, too, had beauties of her own. Ilex and pine woods clothed the defiles of the rugged Sierra, which stretched far and wide, torn by winter torrents into vast ravines ; varia- gated by a thousand intersecting lines, formed by the foldings of the hills ; the clouds found a home on the lofty summits ; the wandering mists crept along the abrupt precipices ; alternate light and shadow, rich in purple and golden hues, arrayed each rocky peak or verdant slope in radiance all their own. All this fair land had been under the dominion of the Moors. Now, town by town, stronghold by stronghold, they had lost it ; the riches of the land belonged to the Christians, who still, by military conquest or policy, pressed the realm of the Moorish sovereign into a narrower compass ; while, divided in itself, the unhappy kingdom fell piecemeal into their hands. De Faro was a devout Catholic ; but, with all his intrepidity, more humanity than belonged to that age warmed his manly heart. He remcm- THE EXILES. " 33: bered tliat he was a Moor : whenever he saw a Moslem prisoner in chains, or a cavalgada of hapless women driven from their native towns to slavery, the blood in his veins moved with instinctive horror ; and the idea that among them mi^ht pine and groan his parents, his own relatives, burned like living coal in his breast. He had half forgotten this when he came to Alcala, bringing his wife and child, and resolved to set up here his home ; but when, in the succeeding spring, the Spanish army assembled on the frontiers of Murcia, and swept on towards the south — when deeds of Moorish valour and Moorish suffering reached Alcala — when the triumph of the Chris- tians and their ravages were repeated — the gallant mariner could endure no longer. " It is a fruitless struggle," he said ; " Granada must fall ; and God, who searches hearts, knows that his victory will be dear to me when the cross floats from the towers of the Alhambra. But I cannot behold the dark, blood- staineil advances of the invader. I will go — go where man destroys not his brother, where the wild winds and waves are the armies vs e combat. In a year or two every sword will be sheathed ; the peace of conquest will reign over Andalusia. One other voyage, and I return." He went without fear, for Alcala appeared a safe retreat, and left his family spectators of the war. What a school for Hichard ! Edmund rejoiced that he would be accomplished in knightly exercise in the land of chivalry ; but he was not prepared for the warlike enthusiasm that sprung up in his cousin's heart, and even in his own. It was the cause of God that armed the gentlemen of Spain, that put daring into the politic Ferdinand's heart, and inspired with martial ardour the magnanimous Isabella. The veteran cavaliers had lost many relatives and companions in arms, in various defeats under the rocky castles, or uithin the pathless defiles of Andalusia; and holy zeal possessed them to avenge their deaths, or to deliver those who pined in bondage. The younger knights, under the eye of their sove- reigns, emulated each other in gallantry and glory. They painted war with pomp, and adorned it by their virtues. Not many months before, the earl of Rivers, with a band of Englishmen, aided at the siege of Loxa, and distinguished himself by his undaunted bravery ; his blunt but gay humour ; his eager emulation with the Spanish commanders. The duke of York heard, with a leaping heart, his mother's brother's name. Had he still been there ; but no, he had returned to fall in affray in Britany, the victim of Tudor's heartless desertion — this circumstance had given distinction and honour to the name of Englishmen ; nor did Edmund feel inclined to lower the Q 2, 84 THE EXILES. national character by keeping away from tlie scene of glory. What was to be done ? York was a mere boy ; yet when Plan- tagenet spoke of servinfi: under one of the illustrious Catholic chieftains, York said, " I follow you ; I will be your squire, your pao^e, your stirrup-boy ; but I follow ! " In 1489 the siege of Baza was formed. It was defended with desperate valour by the Moors, while every noble Spaniard capable of bearing arms assembled in Ferdinand's camp, which glittered in silks and gay caparisons ; yet the very luxury of the warriors was ennobled by their valour. The sallies on the part of the besieged were furious ; the repulse they sustained, deter- mined and successful. When closely hemmed in, the Moors relaxed in their desperate efforts. The younger Christian cavaliers used the leisure so afforded them to unite in making incursions in the surrounding country, to cut off supplies, and to surprise the foraging-parties of the enemy. Two youths became conspicuous in these exploits ; both proclaimed their English origin. One bore a knight's golden spurs (Edmund had been knighted on the eve of the battle of Stoke by the earl of Lincoln), and boasted of his royal, though illegitimate, descent ; the other, a beardless, fair-haired, blooming boy, was nameless, save by the Christian appellation of Eicardo, to which was added the further designation of El Muchacho, from his extreme youth. It was a lovely yet an awful sight to behold this pair. The elder, whose dark eyes and dun complexion gave him a greater resem- blance to his southern comrades, never lost sight of his young friend ; side by side, his shield before Eichard's breast, they went to the field. When Edmund would otherwise have pressed forward, he hung back to guard his cousin ; and when the boy was hurried forward in the ardour of fight, still his kinsman's gaze was on him — his sword protecting him in every aspect of danger. If the stripling were attacked, Edmund's eyes flashed fire, and mortal vengeance fell upon his foe. They became the discourse of the camp ; and Plantagenet's modesty, and Eichard's docility in all, save avoiding peril, advanced them still further in the favour of the grave, courteous Spaniards. " Art thou, then, motherless ? " Isabel asked ; " if thou art not, thy gentle parent must pass many wakeful nights for thee ! " At length, in one skirmish, both the youths got surrounded by the foe. Eichard's young arm, wearied by the very sword he bore, gave ineffectual blows. Forgetting that he left himself unguarded, Edmund rushed between him and his assailant ; others came to their assistance ; but Plantagenet was already struck to the ground ; and for many weeks York forgot even the glorious emulation of arms, while watching over his best and dearest friend. Mean- THE EXILES. 86 while Baza surrendered ; and the cousins returned to Alcala, to Madeline and her fair child ; and domestic peace succeeded to the storms of war. Richard loved Madeline as his mother ; her daughter was his sister, his angel sister, whose tenderness and heroism of character commanded deep affection. Monina de Faro was, even in childhood, a being to worship and to love. There was a dreamy sweetness in her countenance, a mystery in the profound sensibility of her nature, that fasci- nated beyond all compare. Her characteristic was not so much the facility of being impressed, as the excess of the emotion pro- duced by every new idea or feeling. Was she gay ? — her large eyes laughed in their own brightness, her lovely countenance became radiant with smiles, her thrilling voice was attuned to lightest mirth, while the gladness that filled her heart over- flowed from her as light does from the sun, imparting to all around a share of its own essence. Did sorrow oppress her ?-— dark night fell upon her mind, clouding her face, oppressing her whole person, which staggered and bent beneath the freight. Had she been susceptible of the stormier passions, her subtle and yielding soul would have been their unresisting victim— but though impetuous — wild — the slave of her own sensations, her soft bosom could harbour no emotion unallied to goodness : and the devouring appetite of her soul, was the desire of benefit- ing all around her. Her countenance was the mirror of her mind. Its outline resembled those we see in Spanish pictures, not being quite oval enough for a northern beauty. It seemed widened at the forehead, to give space for her large, long eyes, and the canopy of the darkly fringed and veined lid :.her hair was not black, but of a rich sunny chesnut, finer than carded silk, and more glossy ; her skin was delicate, somewhat pale, except when emotion suffused it with a deep pink. In person, she was not tall, but softly rounded ; and her taper, rosy-tipped fingers, and little feet, bespoke the delicate proportion that moulded her form to a beauty, whose every motion awakened admiration and love. With these companions Richard passed the winter. The following spring brought war still nearer to the English exiles — • Baza had fallen ; one of tt^e kings of Granada, surnamed El Zagal, the Valiant, had submitted to the Spaniards : and now Ferdinand commanded his former ally, Boabdil el Chico, to deliver up to him proud Granada, the loved city of the Moors. Poor Boabdil, whose misfortunes had been prophesied at his birth, and whose whole career had been such as to affix to him the surname of el Zogoybi, or the Unfortunate, was roused from his state of opprobrious vassalage by this demand, and followed 86 THE EXILES. Tip his refusal by an Inroad into tlie Christian country, near Jaen. Count de Tendilla, a veteran vrarrior of high reputation and brilliant exploits, commanded this district. His head- quarters were in the impregnable fortress of Alcala-la-Eeal itself; and when the cry came, that the Moors had passed his border, he resolved to stoop from his eagle's eyrie, and to pounce upon the insolent foe, as they returned from their incursion. He chose one hundred and fifty men, and lay in ambush for them. Plantagcnet was of the number, and our young warrior also ; though with sage entreaties Edmund, and with tears Madeline, had besought him to stay. The count succeeded to his wish — the Moors fell into his toils — few escaped slaughter or capture.: but while the Christian hero exulted in victory, a messenger, pale with horror, spent with weariness, came to tell that a band of Moors had taken advantage of his absence, to fall upon Alcala. Indignation and fury possessed the noble captain ; he left half his troop to protect his spoil, and with the rest, all weary as they were, he hurried back to Alcala, eager to fall upon the marauders before they should have secured their prey in a neighbouring for- tress. Edmund and Richard were among the foremost ; their rage could only be calmed by the swiftness with which they returned to deliver or avenge their friends. The sun was sinking in the west when they arrived at the foot of the Sierra. At first Tendilladesiredthathis wearied troop should repose; but several stragglers among the enemy, perceiving them, gave the alarm to their comrades, who, laden with booty, were preparing to depart. Harassed as the Christians were, they had no choice, while their position, on the lower ground, rendered their attack very disadvantageous. But nothing could cheek their fury : with loud cries and flashing weapons they fell upon the enemy, who, burthened by their prey and wearied by their very outrages, could ill resist men fighting to avenge their desolated hearths. Still, so accustomed to war, so innately brave was every soldier on either side, that the combat was long and sanguinary. Night, the swift-walking darkness of the nights of the .south, came sud- demy upon the combatants : the casques of one party, and the turbans of the other, were scarce perceptible, to guide the scimitar, or to serve as an aim for the arquebus. The discomfited Moors, leaving their booty, dispersed along the defiles, and, forgetful of their prisoners, availed themselves of the obscurity to make good their flight. Alcala was retaken ; and through the shadows of night, husbands and fathers called aloud on their wives and children to tell them if they were safe, while many a sound of woman's wail arose over the corpse of him who had died to save her. THE EXILES. 87 The troop, diminislied in number, was drawn up the following morning in the square of Alcala. " Where," asked the count, " are my two English soldiers ? I saw the* elder leading five others across a steep mountain-path, so as to fall on the enemy's rear ; it was a sage measure, and succeeded well. Eicardo I beheld contending with two bearded Moors, who held in their fierce grasp a young and fainting girl. I sent Diego to his rescue : Diego, they say, was slain : night prevented me from knowing more : have both these strangers fallen ? I would pay them a Spaniard's thanks for their aid — a knight's praise for their gallantry." Alas ! botli thanks and praise would have visited their ears coldly. They had forgotten Tendilla, his troop, the very Cliris- tian cause, in the overwhelming calamity that had befallen them. Assisted by Diego, who was cut down in the conflict, Eichard had delivered Monina ; and, forcing his way through the enemy, now already scattered, clambered with her in his arms to their mountain abode : he was guided towards it by the glaring light of the flames that destroyed it. Meanwhile, the fight still raged ; York placed Monina in safety, and returned to share its perils. The peace of desolation that came with the morning united the cousins ; and they sought the ruins of their home, and their miserable friend, whose broken and harrowing tale recorded how Madeline had fallen a victim to the savage cruelty of the enemy, as she strove to defend her daughter from impending slavery. This was the result of Moorish wars — death and misery. Eichard's young heart had bounded to the sound of trump and clarion ; and he returned to hear the melancholy bell that tolled for death. Their very home was in ruins ; but it was long before, amidst deeper woe, they remembered to lament the destruction of many papers and hoarded objects, the relics and the testi- monies of Eichard's royal descent. 88 CHAPTER XII. THE CHALLENGE. Ah ! where are they who heard in former hours The voice of song iu these neglected bowers ? They are gone ! Moore. The chain is loos'd, the sails are spread, The living breath is fresh behind ; As with dews and sunrise fed, Comes the laughing morning wind. Shelley. This was a gloomy lesson for these young and affectionate beings ; they consoled one another, and wept as they consoled. At first Monina despaired ; her ceaseless laments and nnassuaged grief appeared to undermine her very life ; but, when she marked the sorrow she communicated, when she heard Eichard exclaim, *' Oh ! for spring and battle, when I may avenge Monina's grief, or die ! Death is a thousand times preferable to the sight of her ■woe !" and felt that the fate and happiness of those about her depended on her fortitude : she forced smiles back to her lips, and again her sweet eyes beamed, undimmed by tears. Spring came at last, and with it busy preparation for the siege of Granada ; troop after troop defiled through Alcala, bearing the various ensigns of the noble commanders ; the Count Tendilla, leaving his mountain nest, united himself to the regal camp before the devoted city ; Isabella joined her royal husband accompanied by her children. "Where women looked on the near face of war, even the timid were inspired to bear arms. The reputation the English warrior youths had gained forbade inglorious ease, even had they not aspired with their whole hearts for renown ; yet Plantagenet looked forward with reluctance to the leading forth his brave, dear cousin to new dangers ; divided between pride in his valour, satisfaction at his thus being schooled to arms, and terror from the perils to which he would be exposed in a war, on the side of the enemy, of despair and fury — his thouirhtful eyes rested on the young prince's glowing cheek, his unsullied youth j if wound or fatal hurt maimed his THE CHAIIEKQB. 89 fair proportion, how should he reply to his widowed mother's agony ? If, snapt like a poor flowret, he fell upon the dealh- strewn Vega, what tale should he report to the ardent Yorkists ? None ! At least he should be pierced only through him, and Edmund's corse would rampart his heart, even when he had died to save him. Thus they again appeared in the Spanish army, and were hailed as among its ornaments. Whatever desperate enterprise kindled the young Spaniards to heroic frenzy, found the English pair among their numbers. At the beginning of the siege, the Moors, few in numbers, and often defeated, cheated victory of its triumph by various challenges to single combat, where many a Spaniard fell : their frays resembled, in the splendour of their armour and their equipments, the stately ceremonial of the tournaments, but they were deadly in the event. Ferdinand, sure of victory, and reluctant to expose the noble youth of his kingdom to needless peril, forbade these duels ; and the Moors enraged, multiplied their insults and their bravadoes, to draw their enemies to the field ; nor lost any opportunity of commit- ing the defence of their beloved city to the risk of battle, rather than the slow progress of famine. One memorable engagement took place on occasion of the visit of Queen Isabella to the ham- let of Zubia, there to obtain a nearer view of beautiful Granada. The Moors seeing the Spanish troops in array before their walls, came out to attack them ; a battle was fought under the very eyes of the queen, wherein it was the good fortune of Eichard to make so gallant a figure, that on the very spot the Count Tendilla conferred on him the honour of knighthood. Proud was the young duke of York, and eager to paint his maiden shield with worthy device ; he was now nearly eighteen, boyish in aspect, yet well-knit in person, and accustomed to the fatigue of arms. He no longer burst on his foes, like an untrained dog, seeking only to slay : there was forethought in his eye, and a most careful selection of worthy and valorous opponents. Edmund still was to be found within a javelin's throw of him ; but he no longer feared his untaught rashness, as before he had done. In July occurred the conflagration of the Christian camp. The day following, Eerdina-nd led forth his troops to make a last ravage among the gardens and orchards, the emerald girdle of Granada. During the fray, it was the young duke's chance to throw his javelin so as to slay on the spoib a veteran Moor, whose turban having fallen off, exposed him thus. His companion in arms, a tall fierce Moslem, rushed forward to fell the insolent youth ; others interposed. Still the Moor kept his eye upon his 90 THE CHALLENGE. boyish foe ; a tliousand times he threw his dart ; twice or thrice he rushed on him with uplifted scimitar : the battle racked among the orchard-paths and flowery hedges of the thickly-planted gardens, and erer some obstruction thwarted the infidel. Plan- tagenet had marked his rage and his purpose ; he watched him keenly, and the fierce Gomelez boiled with impatient indignation, as some impediment for ever baffled his design. His last effort was to fling an arrow, which stuck in the ground quivering at Richard's feet : a label was aflBxed — " Dog and infidel," thus was the cartel worded — "if thou hast courage, meet me at dawn at the Fountain of Myrtles." The following morning, at the hour when Plantagenet was wont to see his cousin, the prince was absent. Noon ap- proached ; the troops reposed after the battle of the day before, or were employed in clearing the dark ruins of the camp : some thoughtless project might occupy the duke : some excursion to the other side of Granada. The shades of evening gathered round the lofty towers, and dimmed the prospect of its Vega : still Richard came not. Sad, anxious night drew near. Edmund roved through the camp, questioning, seeking ; at last, on the morrow he heard the report, that the previous evening a cava- lier had seen Almoradi Gomelez issue from a little wood half a league from the city, and ride towards a postern ; that he was galloping up to him, when he saw the Moor totter in his saddle, and at last fall from his horse ; before succour could come, he died. His last words only spoke of the Fountain of Myrtles ; in agony of spirit, for Gomelez had surely stricken to death his stripling foe, ere he left the place of combat, Edmund hurried to the spot ; the herbage round the fountain was tram- pled and torn, as by horses' hoofs. It was moistened, but not with water ; a bank, thickly overgrown with geraniums, bore the print of a man's form, but none was there. Monina had been left in Alcala-la-Real, a prey to fear, to gaze from the steep summit on the plain, whereon, beyond her sight, was acted the real drama of her life ; to question the wounded, or the messengers that visited Alcala, and to ad- dress prayers to the Virgin, were the sad varieties! of her day. In the midst of this suspense, two unexpected guests visited her abode — her father, and an Irish chieftain ; a Yorkist, who came to lead the duke from his Spanish abode, to where he might combat for his lost crown. De Faro had not heard of the death of Madeline ; and with awe his child beheld the tears that bedewed his rugged checks at this sad termination of his ocean-haunting vision. He embraced his daughter — " Thou wilt not desert me; we will leave this fated spot: and thou, THE CHALLENGE. ' 91 Monina, will sail for ever witli thy father on the less barbarous sea." De Faro's companion vras named Lord Barry. He was baron of Buttevant, in the county of Cort, and allied to the Geraldines, chiefs of that soil. He had fought at Stoke, and been attainted by Henry ; so that he was forced to wander a banished man. Eager to reinstate himself, every Yorkist plot numbered him among its warmest partizans. He had for some time resided either at Paris or at Brussels, where he often held counsel with Lady Brampton. Weary of delay, he at last stole back to Ireland, to see whether his noble kinsmen there would abet and rise in favour of the duke of York. He came away, proud and delighted with his success ; promises of service for the White Eose had been showered on him — his eloquence and enthusiasm conquered even Lady Brampton. War also seemed impending between France and Enofland ; if that were once declared, every objection would be obviated. At any rate, the times seemed so fair, that she agreed with Lord Barry to visit the present home of the young English prince ; and, as if to further their designs. Sir Edward Brampton was at that moment requested by the Archduke Maximilian to undertake a private embassy to Lisbon. Thither they had sailed, and now, leaving this lady in Portugal, Lord Barry had continued his voyage to Andalusia, with the intention of returning again to Lisbon, accompanied by the promise and hope of the house of York. He met De Faro in the port of Malaga: the name was famihar to him. They journeyed together to Alcala-la- Real. Lord Barry was all eagerness that the English prince should immediately join Lady Brampton at Lisbon. It was agreed that they should proceed thither in De Faro's caravel. The mariner abhorred the name of warfare betwen Spaniard and Moor ; and Madeline's death only added poignancy to this sen- sation. He would not look on the siege of Granada. While tlie L*ish noble and Monina proceeded to the camp to prepare the cousins, he returned to Malaga to bring round his vessel to the nearer port of Almeria. Lord Barry and the fair Moor commenced their journey on the morning of a most burning day ; they wound down the steep declivities of the Sierra, and entered upon the bright blooming plain. jSToon with all its heat approached. They rested under a grove of mulberries, reposing by a brook, while Lord Barry's horse. and Monina's mule were tied to the nearest shrubs. Slight accidents are the wires and pullies on which the machinery of our lives hang. Stung by flies, the noble horse grew restive, broke his rein, and galloped 92 THE CHALtENGE. away ; tlirougli the tliick shade his master pursued, till tramp of feet and crackling of branches died on Monina's ear. A quarter of an hour, half an hour passed, when on her solitude came a Moorish voice, an exclamation in the name of Allah, and the approach of several men whom already she painted as enemies. To take to her mule, to ride swiftly through the grove, was the impulse of her fear ; and, when again silence gave her token of security, she found that she had lost her way. It was only after many vain attempts that she extricated herself from the wood, and then perceived that she had wandered from the direct road to Granada, whose high towers were visible at a distance. The burning July noonday sun scorched her. Her mule lagged in his pace. As a last effort, she sought a plantation of elms, not far distant. The grateful murmur of flowing waters saluted her ears as she approached. Por a few minutes more she was expose^ to the glaring sunshine, and then entered the cool umbrage of the trees — the soft twilight of woven leaves and branches ; a fountain rose in the midst, and she hastened to refresh herself by sprinkling herself with cool waters. Thus occupied, she thought she was alone in this sequestered nook, when a crash among the underwood startled her : the mule snorted aloud, and from the brake issued a mare caparisoned with saddle and bridle. She had lost her rider ; vet her dis- tended nostrils, the foam that flaked her sides, the shiver that made her polished skin quiver, spoke of recent contest or flight. She looked on her — could it be ? She called her " Daraxa," and the animal recognized her voice ; while, in answer to the dreadful surmises that awoke in her heart, a low groan was heard from the near bank. Turning, she beheld the form of a man lying on the herbage ; not dead, for he groaned again, and then stirred, as if with returning sense. Quick as light- ning, she was at his side ; she unlaced his helmet, nor did she need to look at his pallid countenance to be assured of what she already knew, that Eichard of England lay there, but for her help, expiring. She filled his helm with water, and sprink- ling it over him, he opened his eyes, and groaning again, strove to clasp his head with his unnerved hand. With light fairy fingers she released him from his coat of mail, and saw on his right sight side a mass of congealed blood, which his faintness had made cease to flow from his wound, bearing that it would bleed again as he revived, she bound it with his scarf and her own veil, and then gave him water to drink ; after which he showed still more certain signs of recovery. It was wonder to him to find himself alive, when already he had believed the bitterness of death to be passed j still greater THE CHALLENGE. 93 wonder was it to behold Lis own sweet Monina, like a spirit of good, hovering over to recover him. He tried to raise himself, and she bent down to support him, resting his head on her gentle heart ; he felt its beating, and blest her with a thousand soft thanks and endearing names. Though the wound in his side was deep, yet now that the blood was staunched, it did not seem dangerous. The immediate cause of his swoon was a stunning blow on his head, which had beat in the iron of his helm, but inflicted no further injury. It was long, however, before he could move ; and the evening shades had made it almost night, before he could sit his horse and slowly quit the wood. Wishing to conduct him to where they might find succour, Monina directed his steps to a village, east of the grove. They had hardly ridden half a mile, when Eichard felt dizzy ; he faintly called her to his side — she received him as he fell, and, support- ing him to a bank, called aloud in agony, in hopes that some wandering soldier or peasant might be near to aid them. It happened to her wish ; several countrymen, who had been carrying fruit to the Christian camp, passed them — she conjured them, in the Virgin's name, to assist a soldier of the faith, a crusader in their cause. Such an appeal was sacred in their ears ; they contrived, with the poles and baskets in which they had carried their fruit, covering them with a part of their habili- ments and the saddle-cloths of the animals, to form a sort of litter, on which they placed Richard. Monina followed on foot, clasping his hand ; the men led the horses : and thus they pro- ceeded up the mountains to a village about two leagues from Granada, where every house was open to them. The prince was permitted to repose in the habitation of the Alcalde, and the deep sleep into which he soon fell was a dear assurance to his friend's anxious heart, of the absence of danger, and a promise of speedy recovery. Yet tiie night that began so well with the patient, wore a less prosperous appearance towards the conclusion. Monina sat beside his couch, and perceived with alarm symptoms of pain and fever. According to the custom of the time, she had acquired some little skill in surgery ; this, when the wound came to be dressed, made her acquainted with its irritated and dangerous appearance. As the heat of the day came on, the prince's sufferings increased. In this little village there was neither physician nor medicaments necessary for the emergency; and the place itself, low-built, hedged in by mountains, and inhabited by peasants only, was ill suited for the patient. She resolved that he should that night be removed to a town on the eastern side of the mountains, overlooking the plain bordering 94 THE CHALLENGE* the sea. A litter was prepared ; and she, fatigued by her journey, and by lonnj and painful solicitude, yet walked beside it, listening to his low breathin^^, catching the smallest sound he made in complaint or questioning. Before she quitted the A'illage, she employed a peasant to seek Plantagenet, and convey to him intelligence of the actual state of his friends. After three days of fear and anxious care, the wound began to heal, and Eiehard became convalescent. Who could tell, during the long hours that composed those days and nights, the varying emotions that agitated poor Monina? That he should die, was a thought in which, in its extent and reality, she never indulged : but an awful fear of what of sufferincj the cominir hours might produce, never for a moment slept within her. She spent long intervals of time kneeling by his couch — her soft fingers on his pulse, counting the rapid vibration — her cool hand alon€ tempered the burning of his brow ; and often, supported by her, he slept, while she remained in the same position, im- movable. The very pain this produced was a pleasure to her, since it was endured for him who was the idol of her innocent and pure thoughts ; she almost lamented Avhen he no longer needed her undivided attention : the hours she gave to repose came like beggars following in a procession of crowned heads ; they were no longer exalted by being devoted to him. After the lapse of three anxious days he grew rapidly better, and at evening-tide enjoyed at the open casement the thrilling sweetness of the mountain air. How transporting and ineffable are the joys of convalescence ! — the calm of mind — the volup- tuous langour — the unrebuked abandonment to mere pleasurable sensation — the delight that every natural object imparts, fill those hours with a dream-like, faint ecstasy, more dear to memory than tumultuous joy. Monina sat near him, and it was dangerous for their young hearts thus to be united and alone in a fairy scene of beauty and seclusion. Monina's ardent spirit was entranced by delight at his recovery : no thought of self mingled with the single idea that he was saved — saved for youth, for happiness, and for his long-lost -rights. Darkness crept around them, the clumps of chesnut trees grew more massy and indistinct — the fire-fly was alive among the defiles of the hills — the bat wheeled round their humble dwelling — the heavy-winged owl swept with huge flapping wings out of the copse. " Are ye here ? " were the first sounds that broke the silence ; it was the voice of Edmund. Monina sprung up, and glad to disburthen her full heart, welcomed with an embrace this beloved friend. *' Guardian angel of our lives," he cried ; ** you are destined at all times to save us ! " Dear, soothing expressions, which then, THE CHALLENGE. 95 formed the joy, long afterwards tlie master-impulse of licr fervent and devoted spirit. Each told their tale ; the one of hazard and mischance, the other of agonizing inquietude. For Eichard, Edmund had feared; but when, wearied, terrified, and in despair, Lord Barry had brought intelligence of Monina's disappearance from the streamlet's side where he had left her, and of a distant view he had caught of Moorish horsemen who took refuge in Granada — heaven seemed at once to empty on him its direst curses, and his fate was sealed with misery for ever. The peasant dispatched by Monina had delayed ; not for three days did he deliver her letter to Plantagenet, who still, trembling in recollection of his past terror, and what might have been the ultimate event of the prince's wound, departed on the moment for . And now farewell to Spain ! to romantic Spain, to Moorish and Christian combat, to the gay fields of the Vega, to the sunny mountains of Andalusia ! De Faro's caravel, true to its appointment, arrived at Almeria. They embarked ; their imme- diate destination was Lisbon ; but their thoughts were fixed on the promised termination of their wanderings. Soon they would. bend their course far away to the islands of the turbid Northern sea, where nature veils herself in clouds, where war assumes a sterner aspect, and the very virtues of the inhabit- ants grow stubborn and harsh from the struggle they make to be enabled to bear the physical ills of existence. Farewell to Spain ! to boyhood's feats, to the light coursing of shadows as he ran a race with the swift-footed hours. A kingdom calls for Pachard ! the trials of life attend him, the hope of victory, the fortitude of well-endured defeat. 96 CHAPTEE XIII. TEMPTATION. To England, if you will. Shakspeare. A THOUSAND recollections and forgotten tliou^jhts revived in Ivichard's bosom when he saw his childhood's friend, the Lady Brampton. He was reminded of his sufferings in the Tower, of his noble cousin Lincoln, of her maternal tenderness, when under her care he quitted the gloomy fortress, his brother Edward's tomb. His mother's last embrace again thrilled through his frame, and Lovel's parting blessing ; what sad changes had chanced since last he saw her ! Sad in all, but that he, then a boy, had sprung up into the riper age of youth- ful prowess. Even with the banished prince we must recur to the state of affairs in the north of Europe. The French king, Charles the Eighth, had directed all his attempts to the subjugation of Britany, w^hich was now under the dominion of the youthful Anne, its orphan duchess. The English nation espoused her cause, watched with jealousy and indignation the progress of the French arms, and clamoured loudly for war in her support. Henry, on the contrary, was obstinately bent upon peace, though he took advantage of his subjects' appetite for war, to foist subsidies upon them, which were no sooner collected than his armaments were disbanded, and an ambassador, sent on a mission of peace, was substituted for the herald ready apparelled for defiance. This could not last for ever. French policy triumphed in the marriage of Charles the Eighth with Anne of Britany ; and that duchy became finally annexed to the crown of France. England was roused to indignation ; thekinij, forced to listen to their murmurs, promised to invade the rival kingdom the following spring ; a benevolence was granted him ; all his acts tended to the formation of an expedition, which was the best hope of York. Lord Barry was urgent against delay, while the English TEMPTATIOlf. 97 partisans wished that E-ichard's landing in Ireland, and Henry's ill France, shoukl be consentaneous. Na}^ they had deeper vie\TS. Ireland, since Simnel's defeat, appeared but a forlorn hope, and they fostered the expectation of being able to make England itself the scene of their first attempt, so soon as its king should be fairly engaged in hostilities on the other side of the Channel. The d.uke himself, eager as he was to begin his career, warmly supported this project; communication with the North was slow meanwhile, and months wore away — not fruit- lessly. Hichard gained in every way by the delay ; his know- ledge of English aflfairs grew clearer; his judgment formed ; his strength, weakened by the events of the summer, was restored during the repose and salubrious coolness of the winter months. Accident furthered their designs ; a visitor arrived from England, who brought with him accounts so encouraging, that hope blossomed into certainty in the hearts of the warm-hearted followers of York. But ere we introduce this new and seemingly important personage, we must return awhile to England, to speak of Henry's suspicions, his fears, his artful policy. All that Frion had achieved through his abortive attempt, had been but to ascertain the existence of the duke of York, and to spread still wider the momentous secret ; so that Henry, sus- picious and irritated, received him on his return with anger, resenting his failure as the result of treachery. Frion had been dismissed ; and now years passed over, without the occurrence of any circumstances that spoke of the orphan heir of the English crown. The king brooded over the secret, but spoke of it to no one. The royal youth grew to his imagination, as in reality he did, passing from boyhood to almost man's estate. Yet, when Henry reflected on the undisturbed state he had enjoyed for years, on the firmness with which he was seated on the throne, and the strong hold he had acquired through the lapse of time on his subjects' minds, he sometimes thought that even !Ri chard's friends would advise him to continue in an obscurity, which was, at least, void of danger. Nevertheless, whenever there had been a question of attacking France, the feeling that his rival was ready to come forward, and that, instead of a war of invasion, he might have to fight for his own crown, increased his unwillingness to enter on the contest. Now rumours were afloat — none knew whence they came, from France or Ireland — of the existence of King Edward's younger son, and that he would speedily appear to claim his suc- cession. Henry, who was accustomed to tamper with spies and informers, was yet the last to hear of a circumstance so nearly H 98 TEMPTATION. affecting liis interests. The name of Lady Brampton at lenoftli reached him, as being abroad on a secret and momentous expedi- tion. This namehadmade a considerable figure in Richard Simon's confessions ; it was connected with Lincoln, Lovel, the dowager queen, all whom the Tudor feared and hated. Yet he paused before he acted ; his smallest movement might rouse a torpid foe ; he only increased his vigilance ; and, from past experience knowing that to be the weak point, he dispatched emissaries to Ireland^ to learn if any commotion was threatened, any tale rife there, that required his interference. As the time approached when it was expected that the English prince would declare himself, the policy of his friends greatly changed ; and, far from maintaining their former mysterious silence, the circumstance of his abode in Spain, and the expectation of his speedy appearance in Ireland, made, during the winter of 1491-92, a principal topic among such of the native nobility as the earl of Desmond had interested in his cause. Henry's spies brought him tidings beyond his fears ; and he saw that the struggle was at hand, unless he could arrest the progress of events. Meanwhile, he continued to defer his war with France ; he felt that that would be the signal for his enemy's attack. As he reflected on these things, a scheme developed itself in his mind, on which he resolved to act. The enemy was distant, obscure, almost unknown ; were it possible to seize upon his person where he then was, to prevent his proposed journey to Ireland, to prepare for him an unsuspected but secure prison — no cloud would remain to mar his prospect; and, as to the boy himself, he could hope for nothing better than his cousin War- wick's fate, unless he had preferred, to the hazardous endeavour of dethroning his rival, a private and innocuous life in the distant clime where chance had thrown him. This was to be thought of no more: already he was preparing for the bound, but ere he made it, he must be crushed for ever. In those times, when recent civil war had exasperated tlie minds of men one against the other, it was no difficult thing for a Lancastrian king to find an instrument willing and fitting to work injury against a Yorkist. During Henry's exile in Brittany, he had become acquainted with a man, who had resorted to him there for the sole purpose of exciting him against Hichard the Third ! he had been a favourite page of Henry the SLxth, he had waited on his son, Edward, prince of Wales, that noble youth whose early years promised every talent and virtue; he had idolized the heroic and unhappy Queen Margaret. Henry died a foul death in the Tower; the gracious Edward was TEMPTATION. ■ 99 stabbed at Tewkesbury ; tbe royal Margaret bad given place to the widow Woodville ; while, through the broad lands of Eng- land, the sons of York rioted in the full possession of her wealth. Meiler Trangmar felt every success of theirs as a poisoned arrow in his flesh — he hated them, as the mother may hate the tiger whose tusks are red with the life-blood of her first-born — he hated them, not with the measured aversion of a warlike foe, but the dark frantic vehemence of a wild beast deprived of its young. He had been the father of three sons ; the first had died at Prince Edward's feet, ere he was taken prisoner ; another lost his head on the scaffold ; the third — the boy had been nurtured in hate, bred amid dire curses and bitter imprecations, all levelled against Edward the Fourth and his brothers — his mind had become distorted by the ill food that nurtured it — he brooded over the crimes of these men, till he believed that he should do a good deed in immolating them to the ghosts of the murdered Lancastrians. He attempted the life of the king — was seized — tortured to discover his accomplices : he was tortured, and the father heard his cries beneath the dread instrument, to which death came as a sweet release. Keal madness for a time possessed the unhappy man, and when reason returned, it was only the dawn of a tempestuous day, which rises on the wrecks of a gallant fleet and its crew, strewn on the dashing waves of a stormy sea. He dedicated himself to revenge ; he had sought Henry in Brittany ; he had fought at Bosworth, and at Stoke. The success of his cause, and the peace that followed, was at first a triumph, at last almost a pain to him. He was haunted by memories which pursued him like the hell-born Eumenides ; often he uttered piercing shrieks, as the scenes, so pregnant with horror, recurred too vividly to his mind. The priests, to whom he had recourse as his soul's physicians, counselled him the church's discipline ; he assumed the Franciscan habit, but found sackcloth and ashes no refuge from the greater torture of his mind. This man, in various ways, had been recalled to Henry's mind, and now he selected him to effect his purpose. To any other he would have feared to intrust the whole secret ; but the knowledge that the destined victim was the son and rightful heir of King Edward, would add to his zealous endeavours to crush him. Besides that Trangmar had a know- ledge of the fact, from having been before employed to extract in his priestly character this secret from a Yorkist, Sir George Nevil, who had been intrusted by Sir Thomas Broughton. Every- thing yielded in this wretch's mind to his hatred of York ; and lie scrupled not to hazard his soul, and betray the secrets of the H 2 100 TEMPTATION. confessional. ]S"eTil fortunately was informed in time of the danger that menaced him, and had fled ; while Trangmar, thunderstruck by the magnitude of his discovery, hastened to reveal it to the king. It were long to detail each act of the crafty sovereign, and his scarcely human tool. By his order, the friar introduced himself to the dowager queen, at Bermondsey, with a plausible tale, to which she, in spite of her caution, was induced to give ear, and intrusted a message by him, as he said that he was on his way to Spain, to seek and exhort to action the dilatory prince. He then departed. Henry had rather to restrain than urge his furious zeal. The scheme projected was, that Richard should be entrapped on board a vessel, and brought with secrecy and speed to England, where he might be immured for life in some obscure castle in Wales. Trangmar promised that either he would accomplish this, or that the boy should find a still more secret prison, whence he could never emerge to disturb the reign of Henry, or put in jeopardy the inheritance of his son. Such was the man who, in the month of April, 1492, following Lady Brampton's steps, arrived at Lisbon, and found to his wish the prince there also, and easy access afibrded him to his most secret counsels. He brought letters from the dowager queen, and some forged ones from other partisans of York, inviting the prince, without application to any foreign sovereigns, or aid from distant provinces, at once to repair to England, and to set up his standard in the midst of his native land, where, so these letters asserted, the earl of Surrey and many other powerful lords anxiously awaited him. All this accorded too well with the wishes of the little conclave not to insure assent ; nay, more, when Trangmar urged the inexpediency of the duke's being accompanied by such notorious Yorkists as Plantagenet and Lady Brampton, it was suddenly agreed that Bichard should embark on board a merchantman, to sail with the next fair wind for England, while his friends dispersed themselves variously for his benefit. De Faro, in his caravel, was to convey Lord Barry to Cork. Plantagenet resolved to visit the duchess of Burgundy, at Brussels. Lady Brampton departed for the court of France, to engage the king at once to admit young Eichard's claim, and aid him to make it good. *' You, sweet, will bear me company;" and Monina, her whole soul — and her eyes expressed that soul's devotion to Eichard's success — remembered, starting, that the result of these consultations was to separate her from her child- hood's companion, perhaps, for ever. As if she had tottered on the brink of a precipice, she shuddered ; but all was well again. It WU3 not to be divided from the prince, to remain with Lady TEMPTATION. 101 Brampton, to proceed to Paris with her ; on his earliest triumph to make a part of it, and to join his court in London. All these words, kin.i^, victory, and court, wove a golden tissue before the ardent girl's eyes ; she had not yet •' Lifted the painted veil which men call life ; " as a child who chases the glories of the west, she knew not that nii^ht was falling upon her, while still she fancied that she advanced towards the ever-retreating splendour of the sky. Lady Brampton and Plantagenet trembled, as they committed their beloved charge to other hands ; they importuned Trangmar with their injunctions — their entreaties, their thousand last words of care and love — the friar heard, and smiled assent to all. Moniua had need of all her courage for the hour, which she knew not that she dreaded till it came. He was going ; the truth flashed suddenly upon her — he, from whom since childhood she had scarcely been absent for a day. So blind had she been to her own sensations, that it was not until he leaped into the boat, and put off from shore, that she became aware of the overwhelming tide of grief, disquiet, almost of despair, that inundated her heart. "Where was her gaiety, her light, ethereal spirit flown ? Why lagged the hours thus ? Why did ceaseless reverie seem her only refuge from intolerable wretchedness ? She had one other solace ; she was still with his friends, whose whole thoughts were spent upon him ; his name enriched their discourse ; the chances of his voyage occupied their atten- tion. Little knew they the strange and tragic drama that was acting on board the skiff that bore afar the idol of their hopes. 102 CHAPTEE XIV. THE TRAITOE PUNISHED. This friar boasteth that he knoweth hell. And God it wot that is but litel wonder ; Friars and fiends ben but litel asonder. Chaucer. EiCHAED meanwliile sailed fearlessly, with treachery for his nearest mate. Trangmar had at once exhibited audacity and prudence in the arrangement of his plan. He had made no great preparation, nor confided to any the real object of bis intents. His only care had been, that the duke should sail on board an English vessel ; and chance had brought into the Tagus one whose captain was inclined to the party of Lancaster. He also contrived to have two hirelings of his own engaged on board as part of the crew, who knew that it was their employer's design to carry to England a prisoner for the king. He was besides provided with a warrant from Henry, empowering him to seize on his rebel subject — the name a blank, for the monk to fill up — alive or dead. The paper ran thus ; so, in case of struggle, to afford warranty for his darker purpose. E,ichard was now a prisoner. The vessel belonging to any country is a portion of that country ; and the deck of this merchantman was virtually a part of the British soil. The prince, not heeding his position, was so far from fearing his enemy's power, that he felt glad to find himself among his countrymen. He looked on the weather-beaten countenances of the honest sailors, and believed that he should find friends and partisans in all. He spoke to Trangmar of his purpose of declaring himself, and gaining them over ; making this tiny offshoot of wide England his first conquest. Trangmar had not anticipated this. He was ignorant of the versatile and active spirit of the youth with whom he had to deal ; nor had he, by putting himself in imagination in the prince's place, become aware how the project of acquiring his own was his sleepless incentive to every action, and how he saw in every event a THE TRATTOE PUNISHED. 103 stepping-stone in the prosecution of his enterprise. He started at the proposal, and in his own heart said, '* I must lose no time ; that which I thought to do next week, were better done to-morrow." With Richard he argued against this measure: he showed how the captain was bound to the present English government by his fortunes ; how far more likely it was that, instead of gaining him and his crew, he would be made a prisoner by them, and delivered up to his enemy. Hichard lent no great credence to this, but he yielded to the authority of the elder and the priest. . It was not in the power of his wily adversary to prevent him from ingratiating himself in the hearts of all around him. Besides his gentleness, his unaflfected sympathy, and noble demeanour, his gay and buoyant spirit was congenial to the reckless sailors, who, during the dead calm that succeeded their first day's sail after quitting the Tagus, were glad of amusement to diversify their monotonous lives. He interceded with their captain when any fault was committed ; he learned their private histories, promised his assistance, and scattered money among them. Sometimes he called them around him to teach him their art, discoursing about the stars, the magnet, the signs of the weather ; he climbed the shrouds, handled the ropes, became an adept in their nautical language. At other times he listened to tales of dreadful shipwrecks and sailors' hardships, and recounted in turn De Faro's adventures. This made them talk of the new African discoveries, and descant on the wild chimeras or sage conclusions of Columbus, who at last, it was said, was to be sent by the sovereigns of Spain in quest of the western passage to India, over the slant and boundless Atlantic. All this time, with flapping sails, they lay but a short distance off the moutli of the Tagus ; and Trangmar, impatient of delay, yet found it prudent to postpone his nefarious purpose. After the calm had continued for nearly a week, signs of bad weather manifested themselves ; squalls assailed the ship, settling at last in a gale, which grew into a tempest. Their little vessel was decked, yet hardly able to resist the lashing waves of the Bay of Biscay. A leak, which had shown itself even during the calm, increased frightfully ; the men were day and night em- ployed at the pumps, exposed to the beating rain, and to the waves, which perpetually washed the deck, drenching their clothes and bedding ; each hour the wind became more furious, dark water-spouts dipping into the boiling sea, and churning it to fury, swept past them, and the steep sides of the mountain- high billows were ready at every moment to overwhelm them. Their tiny bark, which in these days would scarcely receive a 104 THE TBAITOE PUNISHED. more dignified name than a skifF, was borne as a leaf on the stream of the wind, its only safety consistinj^ in yielding to its violence. Often at the worst the men despaired. The captain himself, frightened at the danger — and, strange inconsistency, still more fearful of the ruin that must attend him if his vessel were wrecked — lost all presence of mind. The prince displayed, meanwhile, all his native energy ; he commanded the men, and they obeyed him, looking on him as a superior being ; when, by following his orders, the progress of the leak was checked, and the tossed bark laboured less among the surges. " Sailors have short prayers," he said; "but if they are sincere ones, the saints will not the less intercede for us before God. Join me, my men, in a pious vow. I swear, by our Lady's precious name, to walk barefoot to her nearest shrine the first land we touch, and there to make a gift of incense and candles at her altar. This, if we escape ; if not, here is Father Meiler, a holy Franciscan, to give XLS short shrift; so that, like devout Catholics, we may recom- mend our souls to the mercy of Jesus. And now to the pump, the ropes ; bring me a hatchet — our mast must overboard." Three days and nights they worked unremittingly ; the lull that then succeeded was followed by another tempest, and the exhausted mariners grew desperate. They had been borne far into the Atlantic, and now the wind shifting, drove them with the same fury into the Bay of Biscay. Every moment in expectation of death, the heart of Trangmar softened towards his victim in spite of himself; he was forced to admire his presence of mind, his unvauquishable courage ; his light, yet gentle spirit, which made him bear up under every difficulty, yet pity those who sunk beneath, cheering them with accents at once replete with kindness and fearless submission to the decree of Providence. Feeling the crew bound to him as his natural subjects, he extended towards them a paternal love, and felt called upon to guard and save them. After, for a fortnight, they had thus been the sport of the elements, the gale decreased ; the violent breakers subsided into one long swell, which bore them into a sheltered cove, in the wild coast that surrounds the Bay of Biscay. The men disembarked, the vessel was drawn up ; all hands were employed in unlading and repairing her. " Ye do ill," said Kichard ; " do you not remember our vow ? Doubtless some village is near which contains a shrine where we may pny ID* This piety was in accord with the spirit of the times ; and tlie men, rebuked, revered still more the j^outh who had saved them in danger, and who now in safety paid, with religious zeal, the debt inf^urred towards their heavenly patroness. A little village THE TRAITOE PUNISHED. 105 lay secluded near tlie creek, and above it, on a liigh rock, was a chapel dedicated to Saint Mary of the Ascension, erected by a noble, vrho had vowed such offering on escaping, as the prince of England had, from death on those perilous seas. Bareheaded, barefooted, bearing lights, following the Franciscan who led the way, the crew of the St. George proceeded towards the shrine. Next to the Blessed Virgin, Kichard claimed their gratitude; and after due Aves had been said at the altar, still in the sacred place they gathered round him, oflfering their property and their lives, imploring him to accept from them some pledge of their thank- fulness. The heart of the outcast sovereign swelled within him. " I reign here, in their breasts I reign," was the thought that filled his bright eyes with a dew springing from the fulness of his soul. With a smile of triumph he looked towards Father Meiler, as if to appeal to his judgment, whether now he might not declare himself, and claim these men's allegiance. He was startled by the dark and even ferocious expression of Trangmar's countenance. His coarse brown Franciscan dress, belted in by a rope ; the cowl thrown back, displaying the monkish tonsure ; the naked feet : these were symbols of humility and Christian virtue, in strong contrast with the deep lines of his face, and the glare of his savage eyes. He met the glance of his victim, and became confused, while the prince in wonder hastened to ask what strange thoughts occupied him, painting his visage with every sign of fierce passion. *' I was thinking," said Trangmar, hesitating ; " I was de- liberating, since God has cast us back on the land, whether it were not wiser to continue our journey through France, bidding farewell to the perils of the ocean sea ? " " That will I not," cried the prince. " Father Meiler, I watched you during the storm; you acted no coward's part then ; why do you now ? " " When danger is near, I can meet it as a man of courage," said Trangmar; "when it is far, I can avoid it like a prudent one." "A good clerical distinction, fit for a monk," replied the duke ; " but I, who am a cavalier, father, love rather to meet danger, than to avoid it like a woman or a priest." "Insulting boy ! " cried Meiler; "dare you taunt me with cowardice ? That I was a soldier ere I was a monk, some of your race dearly rued ! " Before these words were fully uttered, Trangmar recollected himself; his voice died away, so that his last expression was inaudible. The duke only beheld his burst of passion and sudden suppression of it, and said gently, " Pardon me, father ; it is my 106 THE TEAITOR PUNISHED. fault that you forgot tlie respect due to me. I forgot the reverence meet from youth to age — most meet from a sinful boy to a holy monk." "I thank your highness," said the friar, "for recalling to my memory a truth that had half escaped it. Henceforth be assured that I -will not forget that you are the undoubted offspring of the earl of March — of Edward of England." Eate thus urged this wicked and miserable man to his fiend- like purpose. Awakened again to deadly vengeance, he resolved to delay no longer ; to trust no more to chance : he saw now all the difficulties of his former scheme of taking his enemy a pri- soner to England ; and this soothed his conscience as he recurred to more fatal designs. During the short delay that intervened before they again put out to sea, he watched an opportunity, but found none. At length they weighed anchor ; and with a favourable wind, bore down the coast of France. The time was come, he surely thought : for during this long voyage he could frame an opportunity ; during some dark night, when the ship sailed cheerily before a fair breeze, he would engage the prince in engrossing talk concerning the conduct he should pursue when in England, taking advantage of his victim's incautious- ness to allure him near the brink, and then push him overboard. His single strength was more than a match for his slight adver- sary ; but to render his scheme doubly sure, he would have the two men in his pay near him, to assist, in the case of struggle, and vouch for his innocence if he were accused of foul play. It is the fortune of those hurried into crime by violent passion, that they can seldom find accomplices as wicked as themselves. Thus was it with Trangmar. The men whose assistance he relied upon, the enthusiasm of their fellow-sailors for their noble pas- senger. After they had again set sail, the wind blowing gently from the south, bore them onwards with a favourable navigation, till, shifting a few points eastward, it began to freshen. It was then that the Franciscan, not wholly betraying his purpose, but hinting that their presence would be necessary, ordered his men to contrive that the rest of the crew should be below, and they near at hand, while he that night should be alone with Eichard upon deck. One of the men replied by stoutly declaring that if any evil was threatened the prince, he would not be a party in it. " You possess Xing Henry's warrant," he said, " to make this Fitzroy a prisoner. I will not oppose his majesty's com- mand. You have him safely ; what would you more ? " The , other apparently yielded an assent to his employer's commands, and then found a speedy opportunity to warn Bichard of his danger A veil fell from the prince's eyes. THE TEAITOE PUNISHED. 107 *' Surely I knew this before," he thought ; *' ever since I was in Saint Mary's Chapel, I must have known that this dastard monk was my enemy. I am indeed betrayed, alone, friendless, on board an English vessel, surrounded by an English crew. Now let the trial be made, whether simple honesty be not of more avail than cruelty and craft. But first let me fathom the full intention of this man, and learn whether he have a worse design than that of delivering me over defenceless to my adver- sary. It cannot be that he would really murder me." The breeze had rather sunk towards sunset, but it arose again with the stars ; the vessel's prow struck against the light waves, and danced gaily on through the sea. One man stood at the helm; another, one of the friar's hirelings, loitered near; the other kept out of the way. Still, beneath the thousand stars of cloudless night, the little bark hurried on, feeling the freshening of the wind ; her larboard beam was deep in the water, and close at the deck's leeward edge, Meiler and his intended victim paced. One thoughtless boy, high among the shrouds, whistled in answer to the winds. There was at once solitude and activity in the scene. " This is the hour," thought Hichard ; " surely if man's sinful heart was ever touched with remorse, this man's may now. God's throne, visible in all its beauty above us — beneath, around, the awful roaring waters, from which we lately so mira- culously escaped." He began to speak of England, of his mother, of the hopes held out to him by his companion ; eager in his desire of winning a traitor to the cause of truth, he half forgot himself, and then started to find that, ever as he walked, his companion got him nearer to the brink of the slant, slippery deck. Seized with horror at this manifestation of the worst designs, yet scarcely daring to credit his suspicions, he suddenly stopped, seizing a rope that swung near, and steadying himself by winding his arm round it, an act that escaped his enemy's observation, for, as he did it, he spoke : " Do you know, Father Meiler, that I suspect and fear you ? I am au inexpe- rienced youth, and if I am wrong, forgive me ; but you have changed towards me of late, from the kind friend you once were. Strange doubts have been whispered : do you reply to them. Are you my friend, or are you a treacherous spy ? — the agent of the noble Yorkists, or Henry Tudor's hireling murderer? " As he spoke, the friar drew still nearer, and the prince recoiled farther from him : he got on the sheer edge of the deck. " Eash boy ! " cried Trangmar, " know that I am no hireling : sacred vengeance pricks me on ! Son of the murderer ! tell me, where is sainted Henry ? where Prince Edward ? where all the noble martyrs of his cause ? where my brave and lost sons ? There, 108 THE TPAITOE PUNISHED. even vrliere tlioii slialt be : quick, look back, thy grave yawns for thee ! " Witli the words he threw liimself furiously on the prince: the stripling sprung back with all the force lent him by the rope he held, and pushed at the same time Trangmar violently from him, as he cried aloud on the sailors, " What, ho ! treason is among us ! " A heavy splash of the falling Meiler answered his call : the strong man was cast down in his very pride ; the waters divided, and sucked him in. In a moment the crew were on deck ; Trangmar's hireling, scared, cried out, *' He is King Henry's prisoner ! seize him ! " thus increasing the confusion. The friar, his garments floating, now appeared struggling among the waves ; a rope was thrown to him ; the vessel sped on mean- while, and it fell far short; Eichard, horror-struck, would have leapt in to save his enemy ; but the time was gone. One loud shriek burst on the ear of night, and all was still ; Trangmar, his misery, his vengeance, and his crimes, lay buried in the ocean's hoary caves. What explanation could follow this tremendous incident? The prince spoke of his life attacked ; the men of the warrant their master had for his seizure : what was his crime none knew. "That willldeclare freely, "'said the royal youth ; "that unhappy man has sealed my truth by his death. In my childhood I was nurtured in a palace, and bore the title of the duke of York. Edward the Fourth was my father, Edward the Eifth my brother." " Why this is foulest treason," cried the trembling captain. " Ay, or fairest loyalty ; speak, my friends ; which of you will lay hands on your liege, on Hichard the Fourth of England ? " The reckless and ignorant sailors, riotously and with one acclaim, swore to die for him ; but their commander shuddered at the peril that beset him : while his men were hanging round their idolized prince, he retired with his mate to lament the ugly chance of Trangmar's death, and to express terror at the very name of York. If the captain was a coward-friend of Tudor, the mate was a sturdy Lancastrian ; he recommended his chief to seize the boy, and convey him a welcome gift to his sovereign ; the clamours of the delighted crew showed that this was vain advice. He had said to them, with all the ingenuousness of youth, " My life is in your hands, and I know that it is safe." Yet, when they spoke of seizing their unwilling commander, and of delivering the vessel in his hands, he said, " My good friends, I will not make lawless acts the stepping-stones to my throne ; it is grief enough for me that my young hands have unwittingly destroyed the life of one who, not as an armed knight, but in T3E TEAITOE PUNISHED. 109 Iloly p;arb set himself against me. I mj'self T^-ill persuade your captain to do me all the service I require." This poor man was willinf^ enough to hear what he called rea- son ; at first he would fain have entreated Richard to suffer himself to be carried a prisoner to England ; and, when he found his discourse vain, he yielded timid obedience to York's wishes, in spite of the lowering brow of his mate : thus, at least, his cargo would be saved, and liis crew preserved from mutiny. Richard simply requested to be set on shore in Cork harbour, suddenly relinquishing every thought of England, now that he saw the treachery that awaited him there, and recurring to the former plans of Lord Barry. In Ireland, in the county of the Desmonds, he should find friends, adherents, almost prepared for his arrival ; and there also, if Barry forgot not his promise, this stanch partisan would speedily join him : the captain gladly assented to any project that did not force him to land this dangerous pretender on the English shores. For one week they ran before the wind ; and Ireland, far and low, was discernible on the horizon ; the dear land of promise to the weary exile, the betrayed, but high-hearted prince : during this short navigation it had required all his fortitude to banish from his mind the image of the friar struggling in the waves, of a man precipitated in the very act of crime " unhouseled, \in- anointed, unannealed," into the life-quenching waters. Besides all other expectations, Eichard longed to get on shore, that in a confessional he might lift this burthen of involuntary guilt from his soul. At length the iron-bound coast was right ahead; the pon- derous rocky jaws of the creek were open, and they sailed up Passage, past beautiful and woody islands, under forest-crowned hills, till they cast anchor before the picturesque and hill-set city of Cork, whose quay was crowded by multitudes, gazing on the newly-arrived vessel. The duke of York stood on the prow of his skiff, reflecting on the first step he ought to take. He knew little of- Ireland, and that little had been gleaned from Lord Barry : he heard from him of its warlike chiefs, its uncivilized septs, and English settlers, scarce less wild, and quite as warlike as its aboriginal inhabitants. He called to mind the names most famihar to him — the earl of Kildare, abettor of Simnel, pardoned by Henry, and continued in his ofiice of Lord Deputy ; the earl of Desmond, whom Lord Barry had particularly interested in his favour, wha affected the state of an Irish chieftain, or rather king, and who, in his remote abode in Munster, disdained to attend the Dubhn parhament, or to make one of the lawful governors of the land, 110 THE TEAITOE PUNISHED. Other names he remembered of less note : Plunket, the lord chief justice, -whom, with infinite rehictance, Henry had pardoned ; Keatinj^, prior of Kilmainham, who had been constable of Dublin Castle, and who, ejected from his office after the battle of Stoke, had saved himself by flight, and was now concealed in an abbey near Buttevant. Much, however, of what he had heard, escaped his memory ; and he stood on tlie threshold of this unknown land, vainly seeking in his recollection for the dim and shadowy forms which were to guide him in the new and unexplored world before him. Another reflection also presented itself: Lord Barry had quitted Ireland the year before, and communication there had been none since then — Was Kildare still deputy ? did incursions of the natives, or turbulence among themselves, occupy the lords of the Pale ? Should he find a band of nobles and their followers ready to assist him, or the motley population of a barbarous wild, whose sole ideas were internal struggles for power, whose watchwords for enterprise were names and things in which he had no portion ? In a hurried manner, York resolved on his plan of action. He had, on their approach to land, arrayed himself in gay and rich apparel. The Spain from which he came was parent of this act: there embroidery, housings inlaid with gold, and arms encrusted with jewels, formed the pride of the high-born cavaliers. He stood prepared to land ; he thanked the captain for his enforced courtesy ; he held out his hand to the crew, who gathered round him with their prayers and blessings. " My own ! " was his first thought as he set his foot on shore : " Hail, realm of my fathers ! Hear the vow of the fugitive who claims your sway ! Justice, mercy, and paternal love, are the gifts with which I will repay your obedience to my call ; your submission to my rule." " Heave the anchor, and away ! " thus spoke the captain of the craft he had left. " For England ; to warn our king of this springal's insolent presumption," said the mate. " To ,'\ny quarter of the wide world, save England," replied the timid captain : " "Would you have me run my neck into the noose for not having clapped under hatches this mercurial spark ? Master mate, learn from an old sailor, that the best you can do with kings and grandees, is to have nought to do with them." Ill CHAPTEE XV. THE LANDING AT COEK. Then Paridell, in whom a kindly pride Of gracious speech, and skill his words to frame Abounded, being glad of so fit tide Him to commend to them, thus spake, of all well eyed. Spensbr Cork was an asylum for civilization in the centre of a savage district. The cautious burghers, made wealthy by trade, and ever in fear of incursions from the surrounding septs, kept the strictest guard upon their city, as if they had a continual siege laid to it. They forbade all intercourse or intermarriage between those within and without the walls, till every citizen became linked together by some sort of kindred. It is true, that the country around was peopled to a great degree by English lords ; but they were the degenerate English, as they were styled, who imitated the state and. independence of the native chiefs. Such was the earl of Desmond, of the family of the Geraldines, who ruled as a king over Munster, and with whom the Barrys, the De Courcys, the Barrets, and the Mac Carthys, Mac Swineys, and other native chiefs, were connected by marriage, or struggling with him for " chieferie " in the mutable chance of war. There was no appearance of timidity in the frank and assured aspect of the unfriended adventurer, as, without entering the city, but merely passing through its suburbs, he proceeded to the cathedral church. It was twelve o'clock on the 24th of June, the feast of Saint John the Baptist ; and high mass was cele- brating. The duke of York entered the church — his soul was filled with pious gratitude for his escape from the dangers of the sea, and the craft of his enemies ; and, as he knelt, he made a vow to his sainted patroness, the Virgin, to erect a church on the height which first met his eyes as he approached shore, and to endow a foundation of Franciscans — partly, because of all monkish orders they chiefly venerate her name, partly to atone for his involuntary crime in the death of Meiler Trangmar, who wore that habit. The appearance of this young, silken-suited, 112 THE lANDING AT COEK. and Laudsome cavalier, drew the eyes of Erin's blue-eyed daughters : — tlie men whispered together that he must be some Spanish grandee or English noble ; but wherefore, unannounced and unattended, he came and knelt in their charch before the shrine of Saint Finbar, was matter of vague conjecture. The congregation passed out ; then, impelled by curiosity, formed a wide semicircle round the gates of the cathedral, watching the motions of the graceful stranger. Master John Lavallan, the mayor, John O'Water, the wealthiest citizen, and former mayor of the town, and other rich burghers, stood close to the Eound Tower within the walls of the Garth, in expectation of being addressed by their distinguished visitor. The duke of York cast a quick glance around ; and then, as the mayor advanced, tlie youth stepped forward to meet him. The citizen, as one habituated to exercise hospitality, bade the knight welcome, beseeching him to honour his abode with his presence, and to command his services. The duke frankly accepted the invitation, and descended with the mayor into the main street, where that officer resided ; and here again Bichard was made welcome to the city of Cork. It was a gala day at the mayor's ; and now, at the dinner hour, twelve o'clock, the long tables groaned under the weight of viands, and round the hospitable board were seated the principal families of the town. No questions were asked the visitor — his golden spurs bespoke his honourable rank ; he was placed at the right hand of Lavallan ; and, while the clatter of knives and trenchers went on, he was only remarked by the younger guests, wjio gazed, even to the injury of their appetites, on his burnished ringlets, his fair open brow, his bright blue eyes, and smile of courteous affability : but time went on ; the dishes were carried away, the goblets placed ; when the mayor, rising, drank welcome to the stranger, and asked, if no reason forbade him to reply, his name and mission. Already Richard had become acquainted with most of the countenances of his entertainers — that is, of those nearest him ; for, far through the long hall, almost out of sight, the table extended, crowded by city retainers, and a few of the mere " Irishry," whose long hair and loose saffron- coloured mantles contrasted with the doublet, hose, and trimmed locks of the townsmen. Those near him bore the latter character, though their vivacious glances and quick gestures were more akin to the inhabitants of the south, among whom he had been accustomed to live, than to the steady, dull demeanour of English traders. When Lavallan drank to the stranger, every eye turned to the object of the toast, Bichard arose— his plumed cap was doffed j THE LANDINa AT CORK. 113 his sliining hair, parted on Lis brow, clustered round his throat ; his sunny countenance was full of confidence and courage — " Sir Mayor," he said, " my most kind entertainer, and you, my friends, men of Cork, may the grateful thanks of the homeless adventurer be as kindly received by you, as they are gladly paid by him. Who am I? you ask. Wherefore do I comeP My name is the best in the land ; my coming is to claim your aid, to elevate it to its rightful place of pride and honour. Were I craven-hearted, or you less generous, I might dread to declare myself ; but fear never entered the heart of a Plantagenet ; and, when, unreservedly, I place my life in your hands, will you betray the trust ? " A murmur quickly hushed, the sound of suppressed emotion, as the winds of thought passed over the minds of those around, for an instant interrupted the speaker — *' Neither is my name nor lineage unknown to you," he con- tinued : " you honour both and have obeyed them ; will you refuse to submit to me, their descendant and representative ? Did you not vow fealty to Riichard duke of York, who, driven from his own England by false Lancaster, found refuge and succour here? Was not Clarence your ruler, and Edward of England monarch of your isle ? In the name of these, in the name of the White E-ose and Mortimer and Plantagenet — I, the son of Edward the Fourth, the victim of my uncle Gloster's treachery, and low-born Tudor's usurpation ; I, named in my childhood duke of York and lord of Ireland, now, if rightly styled, Eichard the Fourth of England, demand my lieges of Cork to acknowledge my rights, to rise in my cause. I, a prince and an outcast, place myself in their hands, through them to be a fugitive for ever, or a king." Had Eichard planted this scene, with deep insight into the dispositions of those with whom he had to deal, he could not have projected a better arrangement. They had learned of his existence from Lord Barry, and were prepossessed in his favour. Their fiery hearts were lighted at the word — his name, with a thousand blessings attached to it, rang through the hall : by means of the servants and followers at the lower end of the table, it reached the outer apartments and avenues of the mansion-house ; while, with a kind of exalted rapture, the mayor and his guests hung over their new-found prince. The citizens began to gather without, and to call aloud for the White Eose of England ; the day was finished in festal tumult ; the mayor led forth his princely visitor — he was hailed lord of Ireland with one acclaim. Some elders, who had known his grandfather, or had been followers of the duke of Clarence, and I 114 THE LAKDINa AT COfiK. others wlio, visiting England, had seen Edward the If JrL^th were struck by tlie likeness he bore to his. progenitors, and entlnisiastieally Touched for his truth. To see and hear the mad exultation of the moment, an uninterested spectator must have thought that a messenger from heaven had arrived, to bestow liberty on the groaning slaves of some blood-nurtured tyrant. The duke was installed in the castle with princely state, a town- guard appointed him, and the night was far advanced, before he was permitted to repose, and wondering to collect his thoughts, and feel himself an acknowledged sovereign in the first town of his alienated dominions in which he had set foot. The morrow brought no diminution to the zeal of his partizans. The first measure of the day was his attending high mass, sur- rounded by the mayor and citizens ; when the holy ceremony was finished, he took oath on the Gospels, that he was the man he had declared himself. The eager people clamoured for him to assume the name of king ; but that he said he would win with his good sword, nor, till he possessed its appanage, assume a barren title: he was the duke of York, until at Westminster he received his paternal crown. Erom the church the mayor and citizens attended liis council at the Castle, and here Eicbard more fully explained to them the projects of Lord Bariy, his hopes from the earl of Desmond, and his wish to attach to his cause the earl of Kildare, Lord Deputy of Ireland. He learned the changes that had taken place but a month or two before : some suspicion having entered Henry's mind, the earl of Kildare had been dismissed from his high oflice, and Walter, archbishop of Dublin, substituted in his room. The baron of Portlester, who had been treasurer for forty years, was obliged to resign in favour of a Butler, heredi- tary and bitter enemies of the G-eraldines, while the exaltation of Plunket, from the ofiice of chief justice to that of chancellor, only proved that he was entirely gained over to the Lancastrians. The acts of this new government tended to mortify the late deputy, who bore ill his own degradation and the triumph of his enemies. On various occasions brawls had ensued ; and when Sir James of Ormond wished to place a creature of his own in a castle over which Kildare claimed seignory, the latter defended it by arms. This turbulent state of things promised fair for the adventurer: and his first deed was to despatch letters to the earls of Kildare and Desmond, sohciting their assistance, setting forth the ready zeal of the city of Cork, and the promises and attachment of Lord Barry, whom he daily expected to see arrive. In all that the English prince did, nothing spoke louder for THE lANDINO AT COEK. 115 him to Lis Irish friends than his fearless confidence, and artless, yet not undignified reliance on their counsels. He had gained a warm friend in the former mayor, O'Water, a man reverenced throughout Munster. In his youth he had served in the army, and his spirit was hardly yet tamed to the pacific habits of a burgher. He was sixty years of age ; but he bore his years lightly, and remembered but as the occurrence of yesterday the time when the duke of York, grandfather of young Kichard, was lord of Ireland. He had attached himself particularly to his person, and followed him to England, return- ing to his own country after his patron's death. He saw in the descendant of his chief, his rightful lord, to refuse obedience to whom was a sin against the laws of God and man. He fervently swore never to desert him, and despatched emissaries on all sides to spread the tidings of his arrival, and excite the partizans of the White Eose to his active assistance. When the letters were written, council held, and a course of conduct determined, on, still the caravel of De Faro did not appear, and Eichard grew weary of his state of indolence. A week passed ; and during the second, at the conclusion of which, the answers from the noble chieftains were expected, the duke of York announced to O'Water his intention of visiting Buttevant, the seat of Lord Barry, where, in the Abbey of Ballybeg, he hoped to find the abbot of Kilmainham ; a man who, in exile and poverty, exercised great influence over the Irish Yorkists. He had been insolent and cruel towards his enemies when in power, but he was endowed with popular qualities for his fol- lowers ; while among his friends, he was valued for his boldness, sagacity, and undaunted courage. His career had been turbulent; he had supported himself against his sovereign by acts of lawless violence, till, obliged at last to yield, he found himself, in his old age, a poor brother in a distant monastery, obliged, for safety's sake, to veil his lofty pretensions in the obscurest guise. Lord Barry had offered him an asylum in the Abbey of Ballybeg ; venerating, with the blind admiration of a soldier, the learning and craft of the priest, conjoined, as it here was, to dauntless courage. O'Water, on the contrary, disliked the subtle prior, and endeavoured to dissuade the prince from the journey ; but he spurned the city laziness, and in spite of his friends' entreaties, and their fears for his safety among the followers of Desmond, Barry, and Macarthy, departed on his intended visit, attended only by Hubert Burgh, the foster-brother of Lord Barry. The way from Cork to Buttevant was not far, but more desolate than Granada during the Moorish .war. Summer and the sun adorned that smiling land, casting a verdurous mantle I 2 116 THE LANDINa AT COEE. over her deep wounds, painting the rude visage of war with brilliant hues. The forests, dark hills, and uncultivated wilds of Munster, showed nakedly the deep traces of the sovereign ill. But lately this neighbourhood had been the seat of war between the earl of Desmond and the chief of the Macarthys : the latter had iallen in battle, but his brother and Tanist had succeeded to him, and was already gathering together his sept for a more desperate struggle. Never in Spain had Kichard seen such wild, strange figures, as crossed his path during this short journey ; whether it were the native kern, wrapt in his mantle, disguised by his glibh, or long shaggy hair, or the adherents of Desmond, who afiected the state of an Irish chieftain, whose leather-quilted jackets, long saflfron-coloured shirts, cloaks and shaggy mustachios, riding without stirrups, bearing spears, formed objects not less uncouth and savage ; the very women bore a similar appearance of incivilization. And as a comment on such text, Burgh told, as they rode, the history of the late wars of Desmond with O 'Carrol, prince of Ely, and with Macarthy ; and, a still more dread tale, the incursion of Murrogh-en-Eanagh, an O'Brien ; who, rising first in Clare, spread through the country, over- running Munster, and bold from success, advanced into eastern Leinster. All these accounts of battle were interwoven with tales of feuds, handed down from father to son, of the natural hatred of the native chiefs to the lords of English origin ; interspersed with such strange wild tales, where the avowedly supernatural was intermingled with deeds of superhuman prowess and barbarity, that the English-born prince, nursling of romantic Spain, felt as if he were transplanted into a new planet, and stopped the speaker at each moment, to obtain some clearer explanation, or to have interpreted words he had never before heard, the names of customs and things found only in this land. Thus entertained, the way to Buttevant, or as the Irish called it, Kilnemullagh, which was about twenty miles, seemed short. One thing was evident in all these details, that it was easy to rouse the English lords in Ireland to any act of turbulence and revolt ; biit that it would be difiicult nevertheless for their ill- armed followers, and undisciplined bands, to compete with the soldiery of England. 117 CHAPTER XVI. NEW FEIENDS. Sisters, I from Ireland came. Coleridge. The duke, immediately on his arrival at the Castle of Buttevant, despatched Hubert Burgh to the prior of Kilmainham, with a message from himself and a token from Lord Barry, announcing his intention of visiting him at the abbey the next day. But Keating feared thus to draw the eyes of some enemy upon him, and appointed a meeting in a secluded dell, near the bank of the Mullagh, or Awbeg, the river which Spenser loves to praise. Early in the morning Eichard repaired alone to this rural presence-chamber, and found Xeating already there. Hearing of the priest's haughty pride, Richard, with a sensation of disgust, had figured a man something like the wretched Trang- mar, strong of limb, and with a ferocious expression of coun- tenance. Keating appeared in his monk's humble guise ; his light eyes were still lively, though his hair and beard were snowy white ; his brow was deeply delved by a thousand lines ; his person short, slender, bent ; his step infirm ; his voice was silver-toned ; he was pale, and his aspect in its lower part sweetly serene. Richard looked with wonder on this white, withered leaf — a comparison suggested by his frail tenuity ; and again he almost quailed before the eager scrutiny of the prior's eye. A merchant at a Moorish mart he had seen thus scan a slave he was about to purchase. At length, with a look of great satisfac- tion, the monk said, " This fits exactly ; our friends will not hesitate to serve so goodly a gentleman. The daughter of York might in sooth mistake thee for a near kinsman. Thou comest from Portugal, yet that could not have been thy native place?" Richard started. This was the first time he had heard an expression of doubt of his veracity. How could he reply ? His word alone must support his honour ; his sword must remain sheathed, for his injurer was a priest. Keating caught his 118 NEW ^IllENDS. haughty glance, and perceived his mistalre. It was with an effort that he altered his manner, for he exchanged with pain a puppet subject to his will, for a man (prince or pretender) who had objects and a state of his own to maintain. " Pardon the obscure vision of an old man," he said ; *' my eyes were indeed dim not to see the true marlrs of a Plantagenet in your appearance. I was but a boy when your princely grandsire fell ; nor has it been my fortune to visit England or to see your royal father. But the duke of Clarence honoured me with his friendship, and your cousin De la Poole ackowledged my zeal in furthering his projects. I am now neither prior nor commander ; but, poor monk as I am become, I beseech your highness to com- mand my services." This swift change of language but ill satisfied the pri.le of Eichard, and in reply, he briefly recounted such facts as estab- lished his right to the name he claimed. The noble artlessness of his tone conquered the priest's lurking suspicions : in a more earnest manner he besought the duke's pardon ; and a cordial intercourse was established between them. The place where they met was secluded and wild ; a bower of trees hid it from the view of the river, and an abrupt rock sheltered it behind. It was apparently accessible by the river only, and it was by its bank that the duke and prior had arrived. Nothing could equal the picturesque solitude around them. The waving of the leafy boughs, the scream of the water-fowl, or the splashing they made as they sprung from among the sedge and darted across the stream, alone interrupted the voiceless calm ; yet, at every moment, in his speech, Keating stopped, as if listening, and cast his keen eyes, which he libelled much in calling dim, up the steep crag, as if among its herbage and shrubs some dreaded spy or expected messenger might appear. Then again he apologized to the duke for having selected this wild spot for their interview. A price, he observed, had been set upon his head, and his only safety lay in perpetual watchfulness and never-sleeping caution. " My zeal in your highness's cause," he added, with a courtier smile, " cannot be deem.ed a strange frenzy, since your success will not only assure my restoration to the dignity of which I have been unjustly deprived, but prevent an old man from perpetually dreaming of the sword of the slayer, or the more frightful executioner's axe." Again the prior fixed his eyes on a fissure in the rock, adding, ** I had oppointed to meet one in this place before your message was communicated to me — and in good time ; for, methinks, the object of your visit may be furthered by the intelligence I hope soon to receive. Your highness must have heard at Cork of the • ' NEW FEIENDS. 119 Trar carried on by the ^reat earl of r>esraond and a native se