
 
 
 
 <* 
 
 
 y 4 o 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 3 o 
 
 
 
 
 
 <• ' 
 
 
 ^ s i^ "- <°//**v* %, 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 -y S 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
V 
 
 or * 
 
 
 : 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ** 
 
 ,-p 
 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 v 
 s 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 . 
 
 ■'-'- 
 
 
 
 v* 
 
 ^ v. 
 
 
 
 
 
 %& 
 
 & % 
 
 
 jo 
 
 - 
 
 ,0 0. 
 
 
 
 
 .^ 
 
 
 
 

 
Ifotefirnj 
 
 iwJrAfrJrott, 
 
 KrtuKrrk 
 
 Sinclair's Mi. M a 
 
HISTORY 
 
 KING RICHARD THE THIRD 
 
 ENGLAND. 
 
 I 
 
 BY JACOB ABBOTT 
 
 OTCti) Knavabftifls. 
 
 ^ 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 //HARPER & B K.OMJ E F?, ^ ysafiR ^ ^ 
 
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand eight 
 hundred and fifty-eight, by 
 
 HARPER & BROTHERS, 
 
 in the Clerk's Ofiice of the District Court of the Southern District of 
 New York. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 King Eichard the Third, known com- 
 monly in history as Eichard the Usurper, was 
 perhaps as bad a man as the principle of hered- 
 itary sovereignty ever raised to the throne, or 
 perhaps it should rather be said, as the principle 
 of hereditary sovereignty ever made. There 
 is no evidence that his natural disposition was 
 marked with any peculiar depravity. He was 
 made reckless, unscrupulous, and cruel by the 
 influences which surrounded him, and the cir- 
 cumstances in which he lived, and by being 
 habituated to believe, from his earliest child- 
 hood, that the family to which he belonged 
 were born to live in luxury and splendor, and 
 to reign, while the millions that formed the 
 great mass of the community were created only 
 to toil and to obey. The manner in which the 
 principles of pride, ambition, and desperate love 
 of power, which were instilled into his mind in 
 his earliest years, brought forth in the end their 
 legitimate fruits, is clearly seen by the following 
 narrative. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Chapter Page 
 
 i. Richard's mother 13 
 
 ii. Richard's father 33 
 
 iii. the childhood of richard 57 
 
 iv. accession of edward iv., richard's elder 
 
 BROTHER 67 
 
 V WARWICK, THE KING-MAKER 89 
 
 VI. THE DOWNFALL OF YORK 118 
 
 VII. THE DOWNFALL OF LANCASTER 137 
 
 vni. Richard's marriage 165 
 
 IX. END OF THE REIGN OF EDWARD 182 
 
 X. RICHARD AND EDWARD V 208 
 
 XI. TAKING SANCTUARY 22 1 
 
 XII. RICHARD LORD PROTECTOR 236 
 
 XIII. PROCLAIMED KING 258 
 
 XIV. THE CORONATION 279 
 
 XV. FATE OF THE PRINCES 291 
 
 XVI. DOMESTIC TROUBLES 301 
 
 XVII. THE FIELD OF BOSWORTH . - - 320 
 
ENGRAVINGS. 
 
 Page 
 THE ROYAL CHAMPION . Frontispiece. 
 
 SCENES OF CIVIL WAR 15 
 
 LUDLOW CASTLE 26 
 
 CASTLE AND PARK OF THE MIDDLE AGES 29 
 
 HENRY VI. IN HIS CHILDHOOD 38 
 
 QUEEN MARGARET OF ANJOU, WIFE OF HENRY VI... 40 
 
 WALLS OF YORK.. 49 
 
 LAST HOURS OF KING RICHARD'S FATHER 54 
 
 CASTLE AND GROUNDS BELONGING TO THE HOUSE OF 
 
 YORK 62 
 
 the old quintaine . 84 
 
 playing ball 86 
 
 battle-door and shuttle-cock 87 
 
 Richard's signature 88 
 
 edward iv 102 
 
 queen elizabeth woodville 103 
 
 westminster in times of public celebrations. 106 
 warwick in the presence of the french king 112 
 
 the sanctuary 133 
 
 death of warwick on the field of barnet. . . 148 
 
 street leading to the tower 151 
 
 church at tewkesbury . 155 
 
xii Engravings. 
 
 Page 
 QUEEN MARGARET BROUGHT IN PRISONER AT COV- 
 ENTRY 160 
 
 TOMB OF HENRY VI 163 
 
 RICHARD III . 176 
 
 QUEEN ANNE 177 
 
 MIDDLEHAM CASTLE 180 
 
 LOUIS XI. OF FRANCE 184 
 
 THE MURDERERS COMING FOR CLARENCE 200 
 
 JANE SHORE 203 
 
 THE ATTEMPTED RECONCILIATION 211 
 
 ANCIENT PORTRAIT OF EDWARD V 219 
 
 ANCIENT VIEW OF WESTMINSTER 228 
 
 THE PEOPLE IN THE STREETS 235 
 
 CLARENCE^ CHILDREN HEARING OF THEIR FATHER'S 
 
 DEATH 237 
 
 the council in the tower _ 244 
 
 pomfret castle 248 
 
 baynard's castle 273 
 
 the king on his throne 276 
 
 the bloody tower 283 
 
 queen elizabeth at the grave 304 
 
 portrait of the princess elizabeth 318 
 
 the castle at tamworth 325 
 
 king henry vii 332 
 
 the monastery at bermondsey 335 
 
KING RICHARD III. 
 
 Chapter I. 
 Eichabd's Mother. 
 
 The great quarrel between the houses of York and Lancaster. 
 
 THE mother of King Kichard the Third was 
 a beautiful, and, in many respects, a noble- 
 minded woman, though she lived in very rude, 
 turbulent, and trying times. She was born, so 
 to speak, into one of the most widely-extended, 
 the most bitter, and the most fatal of the family 
 quarrels which have darkened the annals of the 
 great in the whole history of mankind, namely, 
 that long-protracted and bitter contest which 
 was waged for so many years between the two 
 great branches of the family of Edward the 
 Third — the houses of York and Lancaster — for 
 the possession of the kingdom of England. 
 This dreadful quarrel lasted for more than a 
 hundred years. It led to wars and commo- 
 tions, to the sacking and burning of towns, to 
 the ravaging of fruitful countries, and to atro- 
 cious deeds of violence of every sort, almost 
 without number. The internal peace of hund- 
 
14 King Eichard III. 
 
 Terrible results of the quarrel. Origin of it. 
 
 reds of thousands of families all over the land 
 was destroyed by it for many generations. Hus- 
 bands were alienated from wives, and parents 
 from children by it. Murders and assassina- 
 tions innumerable grew out of it. And what 
 was it all about ? you will ask. It arose from 
 the fact that the descendants of a certain king 
 had married and intermarried among each oth- 
 er in such a complicated manner that for sev- 
 eral generations nobody could tell which of 
 two different lines of candidates was fairly en- 
 titled to the throne. The question was settled 
 at last by a prince who inherited the claim on 
 one side marrying a princess who was the heir 
 on the other. Thus the conflicting interests of 
 the two houses were combined, and the quarrel 
 was ended. 
 
 But, while the question was pending, it kept 
 the country in a state of perpetual commotion, 
 with feuds, and quarrels, and combats innumer- 
 able, and all the other countless and indescrib- 
 able horrors of civil war. 
 
 The two branches of the royal family which 
 were engaged in this quarrel were called the 
 houses of York and Lancaster, from the fact 
 that those were the titles of the fathers and 
 heads of the two lines respectively. The Lan- 
 caster party were the descendants of John of 
 

Richard's Mother. 17 
 
 Intricate questions of genealogy and descent. 
 
 Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and the York party 
 were the successors and heirs of his brother Ed- 
 mund, Duke of York. These men were both 
 sons of Edward the Third, the King of England 
 who reigned immediately before Richard the 
 Second. A full account of the family is given 
 in our history of Richard the Second. Of course, 
 they being brothers, their children were cousins, 
 and they ought to have lived together in peace 
 and harmony. And then, besides being relat- 
 ed to each other through their fathers, the two 
 branches of the family intermarried together, so 
 as to make the relationships in the following 
 generations so close and so complicated that it 
 was almost impossible to disentangle them. In 
 reading the history of those times, we find dukes 
 or princes fighting each other in the field, or 
 laying plans to assassinate each other, or striv- 
 ing to see which should make the other a cap- 
 tive, and shut him up in a dungeon for the rest 
 of his days ; and yet these enemies, so exasper- 
 ated and implacable, are very near relations — 
 cousins, perhaps, if the relationship is reckoned 
 in one way, and uncle and nephew if it is reck- 
 oned in another. During the period of this 
 struggle, all the great personages of the court, 
 and all, or nearly all, the private families of the 
 kingdom, and all the towns and the villages, 
 
18 King Eichard III. 
 
 Lady Cecily Neville. bhe becomes Duchess of York. 
 
 were divided and distracted by the dreadful 
 fend. 
 
 Kichard's mother, whose name, before she was 
 married, was Lady Cecily Neville, was born into 
 one side of this quarrel, and then afterward mar- 
 ried into the other side of it. This is a speci- 
 men of the way in which the contest became 
 complicated in multitudes of cases. Lady Ceci- 
 ly was descended from the Duke of Lancaster, 
 but she married the Duke of York, in the third 
 generation from the time when the quarrel 
 began. 
 
 Of course, upon her marriage, Lady Cecily 
 Neville became the Duchess of York. Her 
 husband was a man of great political import- 
 ance in his day, and, like the. other nobles of 
 the land, was employed continually in wars 
 and in expeditions of various kinds, in the 
 course of which he was continually changing 
 his residence from castle to castle all over En- 
 gland, and sometimes making excursions into 
 Ireland, Scotland, and France. His wife ac- 
 companied him in many of these wanderings, 
 and she led, of course, so far as external cir- 
 cumstances were concerned, a wild and adven- 
 turous life. She was, however, very quiet and 
 domestic in her tastes, though proud and am- 
 bitious in her aspirations, and she occupied her- 
 
Kichard's Mothee. 19 
 
 Her mode of life. Extract from the ancient annals. 
 
 self, wherever she was, in regulating her hus- 
 band's household, teaching and training her 
 children, and in attending with great regularity 
 and faithfulness to her religious duty, as relig- 
 ious duty was understood in those days. 
 
 The following is an account, copied from an 
 ancient record, of the manner in which she spent 
 her days at one of the castles where she was 
 residing. 
 
 " She useth to arise at seven of the clock, 
 and hath readye her chapleyne to say with her 
 mattins of the daye (that is, morning prayers), 
 and when she is fully readye, she hath a lowe 
 mass in her chamber. After mass she taketh 
 something to recreate nature, and soe goeth to 
 the chapelle, hearinge the divine service and two 
 lowe masses. From thence to dynner, during 
 the tyme of whih she hath a lecture of holy mat- 
 ter (that is, reading from a religious book), either 
 Hilton of Contemplative and Active Life, or 
 some other spiritual and instructive work. After 
 dynner she giveth audyence to all such as hath 
 any matter to shrive unto her, by the space of 
 one hower, and then sleepeth one quarter of an 
 hower, and after she hath slept she contynueth 
 in prayer until the first peale of even songe. 
 
 " In the tyme of supper she reciteth the lee- 
 
20 King Richard III. 
 
 Lady Cecily's family. Names of the children. 
 
 ture that was had at dynner to those that be in 
 her presence. After supper she disposeth her- 
 self to be famyliare with her gentlewomen to 
 the seasoning of honest myrthe, and one hower 
 before her going to bed she taketh a cup of 
 wine, and after that goeth to her pry vie closette, 
 and taketh her leave of God for all nighte, mak- 
 inge end of her prayers for that claye, and by 
 eighte of the clocke is in bedde." 
 
 The going to bed at eight o'clock was in keep- 
 ing with the other arrangements of the day, for 
 we find by a record of the rules and orders of 
 the duchess's household that the dinner-hour 
 was eleven, and the supper was at four. 
 
 This lady, Richard's mother, during her mar- 
 ried life, had no less than twelve children. 
 Their names were Anne, Henry, Edward, Ed- 
 mund, Elizabeth, Margaret, William, John, 
 George, Thomas, Richard, and Ursula. Thus 
 Richard, the subject of this volume, was the 
 eleventh, that is, the last but one. A great 
 many of these, Richard's brothers and sisters, 
 died while they were children. All the boys 
 died thus except four, namely, Edward, Ed- 
 mund, George, and Richard. Of course, it is 
 only with those four that we have any thing to 
 do in the present narrative. 
 
Kic hard's Mother. 21 
 
 The boys' situation and mode of life. Their letters. 
 
 Several of the other children, however, be- 
 sides these three, lived for some time. They 
 resided generally with their mother while they 
 were young, but as they grew up they were 
 often separated both from her and from their 
 father — the duke, their father, being often called 
 away from home, in the course of the various 
 wars in which he was engaged, and his wife fre- 
 quently accompanied him. On such occasions 
 the boys were left at some castle or other, under 
 the care of persons employed to take charge of 
 their education. They used to write letters to 
 their father from time to time, and it is curious 
 that these letters are the earliest examples of 
 letters from children to parents which have been 
 preserved in history. Two of the boys were at 
 one time under the charge of a man named 
 Richard Croft, and the boys thought that he 
 was too strict with them. One of the letters, 
 which has been preserved, was written to com- 
 plain of this strictness, or, as the boy expressed 
 it, "the odieux rule and demeaning" of their 
 tutor, and also to ask for some "fyne bonnets," 
 which the writer wished to have sent for him- 
 self and for his little brother. There is another 
 long letter extant which was written at nearly 
 the same time. This letter was written, or at 
 least signed, by two of the boys, Edward and 
 
22 King Eichakd III. 
 
 Letter written by Edward and Edmund. 
 
 Edmund, and was addressed to their father on 
 the occasion of some of his victories. But, 
 though signed by the boys' names, I suspect, 
 from the lofty language in which it is express- 
 ed, and from the many high-flown expressions 
 of duty which it contains, that it was really 
 written for the boys by their mother or by one 
 of their teachers. Of this, however, the reader 
 can judge for himself on perusing the letter. 
 In this copy the spelling is modernized so as to 
 make it more intelligible, but the language is 
 transcribed exactly from the original. 
 
 " Right high and mighty prince, our most 
 worshipful and greatly redoubted lord and fa- 
 ther : 
 
 "In as lowly a wise as any sons can or may, 
 we recommend us unto your good lordship, and 
 please it to your highness to wit, that we have 
 received your worshipful letters yesterday by 
 your servant William Clinton, bearing date at 
 York, the 29th day of May * 
 
 " By the which William, and by the relation 
 of John Milewater, we conceive your worship- 
 ful and victorious speed against your enemies, 
 
 * There were no postal arrangements in those days, and 
 all letters were sent by private, and generally by special mes- 
 sengers. 
 
Eichard's Mother. 23 
 
 The boys congratulate their father on his victories. 
 
 to their great shame, and to us the most comfort- 
 able things that we desire to hear. Whereof 
 we thank Almighty Grod of his gifts, beseech- 
 ing him heartily to give you that good and co- 
 tidian* fortune hereafter to know your enemies, 
 and to have the victory over them. 
 
 " And if it please your highness to know of 
 our welfare, at the making of this letter we were 
 in good health of body, thanked be Grod, be- 
 seeching your good and gracious fatherhood for 
 our daily blessing. 
 
 "And whereas you command us by your 
 said letters to attend specially to our learning 
 in our young age, that should cause us to grow 
 to honor and worship in our old age, please it 
 your highness to wit, that we have attended to 
 our learning since we came hither, and shall 
 hereafter, by the which we trust to God your 
 gracious lordship and good fatherhood shall be 
 pleased. 
 
 " Also we beseech your good lordship that 
 it may please you to send us Harry Lovedeyne, 
 groom of your kitchen, whose service is to us 
 right agreeable ; and we will send you John 
 Boyes to wait upon your lordship. 
 
 "Eight high and mighty prince, our most 
 worshipful and greatly redoubted lord and fa- 
 
 * Daily. 
 
24 King Richard III. 
 
 Farther particulars about the boys. 
 
 ther, we beseech Almighty God to give you as 
 good life and long as your own princely heart 
 can best desire. 
 
 " Written at your Castle of Ludlow, the 3d 
 of June. 
 
 " Your humble sons, 
 
 "E. Marche. 
 "E. Rutland." 
 
 The subscriptions E. March and E. Rutland 
 stand for Edward, Earl of March, and Edmund, 
 Earl of Rutland ; for, though these boys were 
 then only eleven and twelve years of age re- 
 spectively, they were both earls. One of them, 
 afterward, when he was about seventeen years 
 old, was cruelly killed on the field of battle, 
 where he had been fighting with his father, as 
 we shall see in another chapter. The other, 
 Edward, became King of England. He came 
 immediately before Richard the Third in the 
 line. 
 
 The letter which the boys wrote was super- 
 scribed as follows : 
 
 " To the right high and mighty prince, our 
 most worshipful and greatly redoubted lord and 
 father, the Duke of York, Protector and De- 
 fender of England." 
 
Richard's Mother. 27 
 
 The Castle of Ludlow. Character of Richard's mother. 
 
 The castle of Ludlow, where the boys were 
 residing when this letter was written, was a 
 strong fortress built upon a rock in the western 
 part of England, not far from Shrewsbury. The 
 engraving is a correct representation of it, as it 
 appeared at the period when those boys were 
 there, and it gives a very good idea of the sort 
 of place where kings and princes were accus- 
 tomed to send their families for safety in those 
 stormy times. Soon after the period of which 
 we are speaking, Ludlow Castle was sacked and 
 destroyed. The ruins of it, however, remain to 
 the present day, and they are visited with much 
 interest by great numbers of modern travelers. 
 
 Lady Cecily, as we have already seen, was in 
 many respects a noble woman, and a most faith- 
 ful and devoted wife and mother ; she was, 
 however, of a very lofty and ambitious spirit, 
 and extremely proud of her rank and station. 
 Almost all her brothers and sisters — and the 
 family was very large — were peers and peer- 
 esses, and when she married Prince Richard 
 Plantagenet, her heart beat high with exultation 
 and joy to think that she was about to become 
 a queen. She believed that Prince Richard 
 was fully entitled to the throne at that time, 
 for reasons which will be fully explained in the 
 next chapter, and that, even if his claims should 
 
28 King Richard III. 
 
 Spirit of aristocracy. Relative condition of the nobles and the people. 
 
 not be recognized until the death of the king 
 who was then reigning, they certainly would be 
 so recognized then, and she would become an 
 acknowledged queen, as she thought she was 
 already one by right. So she felt greatly ex- 
 alted in spirit, and moved and acted among all 
 who surrounded her with an air of stately re- 
 serve of the most grand and aristocratic char- 
 acter. 
 
 In fact, there has, perhaps, no time and place 
 been known in the history of the world in 
 which the spirit of aristocracy was more lofty 
 and overbearing in its character than in En- 
 gland during the period when the Plantagenet 
 family were in prosperity and power. The no- 
 bles formed then, far more strikingly than they 
 do now, an entirely distinct and exalted class, 
 that looked down upon all other ranks and gra- 
 dations of society as infinitely beneath them. 
 Their only occupation was war, and they re- 
 garded all those who were engaged in any em- 
 ployments whatever, that were connected with 
 art or industry, with utter disdain. These last 
 were crowded together in villages and towns 
 which were formed of dark and narrow streets, 
 and rude and comfortless dwellings. The no- 
 bles lived in grand castles scattered here and 
 there over the country, with extensive parks 
 

Richard's Mother. 31 
 
 Character of Richard's mother. The governess. 
 
 and pleasure-grounds around them, where they 
 loved to marshal their followers, and inaugu- 
 rate marauding expeditions against their rivals 
 or their enemies. They were engaged in con- 
 stant wars and contentions with each other, 
 each thirsting for more power and more splen- 
 dor than he at present enjoyed, and treating all 
 beneath him with the utmost haughtiness and 
 disdain. Richard's mother exhibited this aris- 
 tocratic loftiness of spirit in a very high de- 
 gree, and it was undoubtedly in a great manner 
 through the influence which she exerted over 
 her children that they were inspired with those 
 sentiments of ambition and love of glory to 
 which the crimes and miseries into which sev- 
 eral of them fell in their subsequent career were 
 owing. 
 
 To assist her in the early education of her 
 children, Richard's mother appointed one of the 
 ladies of the court their governess. This gov- 
 erness was a personage of very high rank, be- 
 ing descended from the royal line. With the 
 ideas which Lady Cecily entertained of the ex- 
 alted position of her family, and of the future 
 destiny of her children, none but a lady of high 
 rank would be thought worthy of being in- 
 trusted with such a charge. The name of the 
 governess was Lady Mortimer. 
 
32 King Richard III. 
 
 Sir Richard Croft, the boys' governor. 
 
 The boys, as they grew older, were placed 
 under the charge of a governor. His name was 
 Sir Richard Croft. It is this Sir Richard that 
 they allude to in their letter. He, too, was a 
 person of high rank and of great military dis- 
 tinction. The boys, however, thought him too 
 strict and severe with them ; at least so it would 
 seem, from the manner in which they speak of 
 him in the letter. 
 
 The governor and the governess appear to 
 have liked each other very well, for after a time 
 Sir Richard offered himself to Lady Mortimer, 
 and they were married. 
 
 Besides Ludlow Castle, Prince Richard had 
 several other strongholds, where his wife from 
 time to time resided. Richard, who was one 
 of the youngest of the children, was born at 
 one of these, called Fotheringay Castle ; but, 
 before coming to the event of his birth, I must 
 give some account of the history and fortunes 
 of his father. 
 
Eichard's Father. 83 
 
 Genealogy of Richard Plantagenet. Family of Edward III. 
 
 Chapter II. 
 Eichaed's Father. 
 
 EICHAED'S father was a prince of the house 
 of York. In the course of his life he was 
 declared heir to the crown, but he died before 
 he attained possession of it, thus leaving it for 
 his children. The nature of his claim to the 
 crown, and, indeed, the general relation of the 
 various branches of the family to each other, 
 will be seen by the genealogical table on the 
 next page but one. 
 
 Edward the Third, who reigned more than 
 one hundred years before Eichard the Third, 
 and his queen Philippa, left at their decease four 
 sons, as appears by the table.* They had other 
 children besides these, but it was only these 
 four, namely, Edward, Lionel, John, and Ed- 
 mund, whose descendants were involved in the 
 quarrels for the succession. The others either 
 died young, or else, if they arrived at maturity, 
 the lines descending from them soon became 
 extinct. 
 
 Of the four that survived, the oldest was Ed- 
 
 * See page 35. 
 
 c 
 
84 King Eichard III. [A.D.1415. 
 
 Succession of heirs in the family of Edward III. 
 
 ward, called in history the Black Prince. A 
 full account of his life and adventures is given 
 in our history of Kichard the Second. He died 
 before his father, and so did not attain to the 
 crown. He, however, left his son Eichard his 
 heir, and at Edward's death Eichard became 
 king. Eichard reigned twenty years, and then, 
 in consequence of his numerous vices and 
 crimes, and of his general mismanagement, he 
 was deposed, and Henry, the son of John of 
 Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, Edward's third son, 
 ascended the throne in his stead. 
 
 Now, as appears by the table, John of Gaunt 
 was the third of the four sons, Lionel, Duke of 
 Clarence, being the second. The descendants 
 of Lionel would properly have come before 
 those of John in the succession, but it happen- 
 ed that the only descendants of Lionel were 
 Philippa, a daughter, and Eoger, a grandchild, 
 who was at this time an infant. Neither of 
 these were able to assert their claims, although 
 in theory their claims were acknowledged to 
 be prior to those of the descendants of John. 
 The people of England, however, were so desir- 
 ous to be rid of Eichard, that they were will- 
 ing to submit to the reign of any member of 
 the royal family who should prove strong 
 enough to dispossess him. So they accepted 
 
Kichard's Father. 
 
 35 
 
 Genealogical table of the houses of York and Lancaster. 
 
 o 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 H 
 
 
 § 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 -3 
 
 53 1 B 
 
 H 
 
 
 
 
 ~ 
 
 
 
 a 
 
 
 5 
 
 
 
 
 tt 
 
 | 
 
 
 W 
 
 8-* 
 
 [Zj 
 
 
 
 
 d-S 
 
 z 
 
 
 
 J-C O 03 
 
 B 
 
 
 
 S" 
 
 1\ 6 
 
 5 s 
 
 2S? 
 
 
 8 
 
 
 O 
 
 o 
 
 
 
 I* 
 
 < 1h 
 
 H O 
 5>i 
 
 
 
 03 ° 
 
 w 
 
 H 
 
 o 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 
 -h- 
 
 d 
 
 Q 
 
 
 ** 03 
 
 as 
 
 m ^ 
 
 
 
 ■i 
 
 > 
 
 jiff 
 
 S.9 
 
 So 0> § 
 
 g ai -h 
 
 _, 03 CP 
 
 H 
 :o 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 p 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 — S3 
 
 < 
 
 
 •S S a 
 J3^ 
 
 i— 1 
 Q 
 
 ! 
 
 W 
 
 3 
 
 P 
 
 m 
 
 
 
 e3 
 
 Pm 
 II 
 
 P 
 
 05 
 O 
 
 05 
 
 >J 
 
 O 03 _ 
 
 
 
 d 
 3 
 
 -t* — 
 
 i 
 
 
 In 
 
 d 
 
 •2 
 
 Oh 
 
 c3 <u +^ 
 
 ^ "3 
 
 5 t« a> 
 
 -W "^ 
 
 1— I CO 
 
 <C — 
 P 
 
 O 
 
 a 
 
 
 ^3 
 
 © ^ 5 
 
 s 
 
 w 
 
 P 
 
 O 
 
 w 
 
 w 
 
 'a? 
 
 -d 
 
 63 • 
 
 W '3' 
 
 £1 
 
 s 
 
 V 
 
 ^3 1) 
 
 •-T3 rg 
 
 e3 * rH 03 
 
 P=H 
 
 
 
 a 
 
 H 
 
 
 i 
 
 II 
 
 < 
 
 — 3 — 
 
 2-d 
 US 
 C3 03 
 
 
 
 « 1 
 
 -3 s 
 
 S S3 
 S-o 03 
 
 C -F5 
 
 
 
 
 h3 © 
 03 
 
 P 
 
 S 
 
 
 03 03 ^ 
 II -S 03 
 
 H 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 s^i 
 
 «i 
 
 
 
 * ,-A. 
 
 
 
 
 2 * *" 
 
 
 
 1—4 
 
 
 
 O 
 
 HH 
 
 
 
 03 03 ^2 
 
 O 
 
 |_3 
 
 
 
 
 p 
 
 
 
 ° 2 fl 
 
 3 
 
 
 
 "S3" 
 
 — OS 
 
 
 
 2 ^S ^3 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 03 
 
 (3 
 
 
 
 
 2 S 
 .9 
 
36 King Richard III. [A.D.1415. 
 
 Union of the houses of Clarence and York. 
 
 Henry of Lancaster, who ascended the throne 
 as Henry the Fourth, and he and his successors 
 in the Lancastrian line, Henry the Fifth and 
 Henry the Sixth, held the throne for many 
 years. 
 
 Still, though the people of England general- 
 ly acquiesced in this, the families of the other 
 brothers, namely, of Lionel and Edmund, called 
 generally the houses of Clarence and of York, 
 were not satisfied. They combined together, 
 and formed a great many plots and conspira- 
 cies against the house of Lancaster, and many 
 insurrections and wars, and many cruel deeds 
 of violence and murder grew out of the quar- 
 rel. At length, to strengthen their alliance 
 more fully, Richard, the second son of Edmund 
 of York, married Anne, a descendant of the 
 Clarence line. The other children, who came 
 before these, in the two lines, soon afterward 
 died, leaving the inheritance of both to this pair. 
 Their son was Richard, the father of Richard 
 the Third. He is called Richard Plantagenet, 
 Duke of York. On the death of his father and 
 mother, he, of course, became the heir not only 
 of the immense estates and baronial rights of 
 both the lines from which he had descended, 
 but also of the claims of the older line to the 
 crown of England. 
 
A.D.1415.] Kichard's Father. 37 
 
 Richard Tlantagenet a prisoner. King Henry VI. 
 
 The successive generations of these three 
 lines, clown to the period of the union of the 
 second and fourth, cutting off the third, is 
 shown clearly in the table. 
 
 Of course, the Lancaster line were much 
 alarmed at the combination of the claims of 
 their rivals. King Henry the Fifth was at that 
 period on the throne, and, by the time that 
 Eicharcl Plantagenet was three years old, un- 
 der pretense of protecting him from danger, he 
 caused him to be shut up in a castle, and kept 
 a close prisoner there. 
 
 Time rolled on. King Henry the Fifth died, 
 and Henry the Sixth succeeded him. Eichard 
 Plantagenet was still watched and guarded ; but 
 at length, by the time that Kichard was thir- 
 teen years old, the power and influence of his 
 branch of the royal family, or rather those of 
 the two branches from which, combined, he 
 was descended, were found to be increasing, 
 while that of the house of Lancaster was de- 
 clining. After a time he was brought out from 
 his imprisonment, and restored to his rank and 
 station. King Henry the Sixth was a man of 
 a very weak and timid mind. He was quite 
 young too, being, in fact, a mere child when 
 he began to reign, and every thing went wrong 
 with his government. While he was young, he 
 
38 
 
 King Richard III. [A.D.1425. 
 
 His gentle and quiet character. 
 
 Portrait. 
 
 could, of course, do nothing, and when he grew 
 older he was too gentle and forbearing to con- 
 trol the rough and turbulent spirits around him. 
 He had no taste for war and bloodshed, but 
 loved retirement and seclusion, and, as he ad- 
 vanced in years, he fell into the habit of spend- 
 ing a great deal of his time in acts of piety and 
 devotion, performed according to the ideas and 
 customs of the times. The annexed engraving, 
 representing him as he appeared when he was 
 
 HENRY VI. IN HIS CHILDHOOD. 
 
AD.1425.] Eichaed's Father. 39 
 
 Discontent of the people. Arrangements made for the succession. 
 
 a boy, is copied from the ancient portraits, and 
 well expresses the mild and gentle traits which 
 marked his disposition and character. 
 
 Such being the disposition and character of 
 Henry, every thing during his reign went 
 wrong, and this state of things, growing worse 
 and worse as he advanced in life, greatly en- 
 couraged and strengthened the house of York 
 in the effort which they were inclined to make 
 to bring their own branch of the family to the 
 throne. 
 
 " See," said they, "what we come to by al- 
 lowing a line of usurpers to reign. These Hen- 
 rys of Lancaster are all descended from a young- 
 er son, while the heirs of the older are living, 
 and have a right to the throne. Kichard Plan- 
 tagenet is the true and proper heir. He is 
 a man of energy. Let us make him king." 
 
 But the people of England, though they grad- 
 ually came to desire the change, were not will- 
 ing yet to plunge the country again into a state 
 of civil war for the purpose of making it. They 
 would not disturb Henry, they said, while he 
 continued to live ; but there was nobody to suc- 
 ceed him, and, when he died, Kichard Plantag- 
 enet should be king. 
 
 Henry was married at this time, but he had 
 no children. The name of his wife was Mar- 
 
40 
 
 King Eichard III. [A.D.1425. 
 
 Character of Margaret of Anjou. 
 
 garet of Anjou. She was a very extraordinary 
 and celebrated woman. Though very beauti- 
 ful in person, she was as energetic and mascu- 
 line in character as her poor husband was ef- 
 feminate and weak, and she took every thing 
 
 QUEEN MARGARET OF ANJOC, WIFE OF HENRY VI. 
 
 into her own hands. This, however, made mat- 
 ters worse instead of better, and the whole coun- 
 
A.D.1454.] Richard's Father. 41 
 
 No children. Feeble and failing capacity of the king. 
 
 try seemed to rejoice that she had no children, 
 for thus, on the death of Henry, the line would 
 become extinct, and Richard Plantagenet and 
 his descendants would succeed, as a matter of 
 course, in a quiet and peaceful manner. As 
 Henry and Margaret had now been married 
 eight or nine years without any children, it was 
 supposed that they never would have any. 
 
 Accordingly, Richard Plantagenet was uni- 
 versally looked upon as Henry's successor, 
 and the time seemed to be drawing nigh when 
 the change of dynasty was to take place. Hen- 
 ry's health was very feeble. He seemed to be 
 rapidly declining. His mind was affected, too, 
 quite seriously, and he sometimes sank into a 
 species of torpor from which nothing could 
 arouse him. 
 
 Indeed, it became difficult to carry on the 
 government in his name, for the king sank at 
 last into such a state of imbecility that it was 
 impossible to obtain from him the least sign or 
 token that would serve, even for form's sake, as 
 an assent on his part to the royal decrees. At 
 one time Parliament appointed a commission to 
 visit him in his chamber, for the purpose of as- 
 certaining the state that he was in, and to see 
 also whether they could not get some token 
 from him which they could consider as his as- 
 
42 King Eichard III. 
 
 Richard Plantagenet formally declared the heir. 
 
 sent to certain measures which it was deemed 
 important to take ; but they could not get from 
 the king any answer or sign of any kind, not- 
 withstanding all that they could do or say. 
 They retired for a time, and afterward came 
 back again to make a second attempt, and then, 
 as an ancient narrative records the story, "they 
 moved and stirred him by all the ways and 
 means that they could think of to have an an- 
 swer of the said matter, but they could have no 
 answer, word nor sign, and therefore, with sor- 
 rowful hearts, came away." 
 
 This being the state of things, Parliament 
 thought it time to make some definite arrange- 
 ments for the succession. Accordingly, they 
 passed a formal and solemn enactment declar- 
 ing Eichard Plantagenet heir presumptive of 
 the crown, and investing him with the rank and 
 privileges pertaining to that position. They 
 also appointed him, for the present, Protector 
 and defender of the realm. 
 
 Eichard, the subject of this volume, was at 
 this time an infant two years old. The other 
 ten children had been born at various periods 
 before. 
 
 It was now, of course, expected that Henry 
 would soon die, and that then Eichard Plan- 
 tagenet would at once ascend the throne, ac- 
 
Richard's Father. 43 
 
 Unexpected birth of a prince. Suspicions. 
 
 knowledged by the whole realm as the sole and 
 rightful heir. But these expectations were sud- 
 denly disturbed, and the whole kingdom was 
 thrown into a state of great excitement and 
 alarm by the news of a very unexpected and 
 important event which occurred at this time, 
 namely, the birth of a child to Margaret, the 
 queen. This event awakened all the latent 
 fires of civil dissension and discord anew. The 
 Lancastrian party, of course, at once rallied 
 around the infant prince, who, they claimed, 
 was the rightful heir to the crown. They be- 
 gan at once to reconstruct and strengthen their 
 plans, and to shape their measures with a view 
 to retain the kingdom in the Lancaster line. 
 On the other hand, the friends of the combined 
 houses of Clarence and York declared that they 
 would not acknowledge the new-comer as the 
 rightful heir. They did not believe that he was 
 the son of the king, for he, as they said, had 
 been for a long time as good as dead. Some 
 said that they did not even believe that the 
 child was Margaret's son. There was a story 
 that she had had a child, but that he was very 
 weak and puny, and that he had died soon aft- 
 er his birth, and that Margaret had cunningly 
 substituted another child in his place, in order 
 to retain her position and power by having a 
 
44 King Eichakd III. 
 
 Various plans and speculations. Richard's hopes. 
 
 supposed son of hers reign as king after her hus- 
 band should die. Margaret was a woman of so 
 ambitious and unscrupulous a character, that 
 she was generally believed capable of adopting 
 any measures, however criminal and bold, to 
 accomplish her ends. 
 
 But, notwithstanding these rumors, Parlia- 
 ment acknowledged the infant as his father's 
 son and heir. He was named Edward, and cre- 
 ated at once Prince of Wales, which act was a 
 solemn acknowledgment of his right to the suc- 
 cession. Prince Kichard made no open oppo- 
 sition to this ; for, although he and his friends 
 maintained that he had a right to the crown, 
 they thought that the time had not yet come 
 for openly advancing their claim, so for the pres- 
 ent they determined to be quiet. The child 
 might not survive, and his father, the king, be- 
 ing in so helpless and precarious a condition, 
 might cease to live at any time ; and if it should 
 so happen that both the father and the child 
 should die, Eichard would, of course, succeed at 
 once, without any question. He accordingly 
 thought it best to wait a little while, and see 
 what turn things would take. 
 
 He soon found that things were taking the 
 wrong turn. The child lived, and appeared 
 likely to continue to live, and, what was per- 
 
A.D.1459.] Richard's Father. 45 
 
 Progress of the formation of parties. 
 
 haps worse for him, the king, instead of declin- 
 ing more and more, began to revive. In a short 
 time he was able to attend to business again, at 
 least so far as to express his assent to measures 
 prepared for him by his ministers. Prince Rich- 
 ard was accordingly called upon to resign his 
 protectorate. He thought it best to yield to this 
 proposal, and he did so, and thus the govern- 
 ment was once more in Henry's hands. 
 
 Things went on in this way for two or three 
 years, but the breach between the two great 
 parties was all the time widening. Difficulties 
 multiplied in number and increased in magni- 
 tude. The country took sides. Armed forces 
 were organized on one side and on the other, 
 and at length Prince Kichard openly claimed 
 the crown as his right. This led to a long and 
 violent discussion in Parliament. The result 
 was, that a majority was obtained to vote in fa- 
 vor of Prince Richard's right. The Parliament 
 decreed, however, that the existing state of 
 things should not be disturbed so long as Hen- 
 ry continued to live, but that at Henry's death 
 the crown should descend, not to little Edward 
 his son, the infant Prince of Wales, but to 
 Prince Richard Plantagenet and his descend- 
 ants forever. 
 
 Queen Margaret was at this time at a castle 
 
46 King Eichaed III. [A.D.1460. 
 
 Queen Margaret's resolution and energy. 
 
 in Wales, where she had gone with the child, 
 in order to keep him in a place of safety while 
 these stormy discussions were pending. When 
 she heard that Parliament had passed a law set- 
 ting aside the claims of her child, she declared 
 that she would never submit to it. She imme- 
 diately sent messengers all over the northern 
 part of the kingdom, summoning the faithful 
 followers of the king every where to arm them- 
 selves and assemble near the frontier. She her- 
 self went to Scotland to ask for aid. The King 
 of Scotland at that time was a child, but he was 
 related to the Lancastrian family, his grand- 
 mother having been a descendant of John of 
 Graunt, the head of the Lancaster line. He was 
 too young to take any part in the war, but his 
 mother, who was acting as regent, furnished 
 Margaret with troops. Margaret, putting her- 
 self at the head of these forces, marched across 
 the frontier into England, and joined herself 
 there to the other forces which had assembled 
 in answer to her summons. 
 
 In the mean time, Prince Richard had assem- 
 bled his adherents too, and had commenced his 
 march to the northward to meet his enemies. 
 He took his two oldest sons with him, the two 
 that wrote the letter quoted in the last chapter. 
 One of these you will recollect was Edward, 
 
A.D.146L] Richard's Father. 47 
 
 Richard's two brothers, Edward and Edmund. 
 
 Earl of Marche, and the second was Edmund, 
 Earl of Rutland. Edward was now about eight- 
 een years of age, and his brother Edmund 
 about seventeen. One would have said that -at 
 this period of life they were altogether too 
 young to be exposed to the hardships, fatigues, 
 and dangers of a martial campaign ; but it was 
 the custom in those times for princes and no- 
 bles to be taken with their fathers to fields of 
 battle at a very early age. And these youthful 
 warriors were really of great service too, for 
 the interest which they inspired among all ranks 
 of the army was so great, especially when their 
 rank was very high, that they were often the 
 means of greatly increasing the numbers and 
 the enthusiasm of their fathers' followers. 
 
 Edward, indeed, was in this instance deemed 
 old enough to be sent off on an independent 
 service, and so, while the prince moved forward 
 with the main body of his army toward the 
 north, he dispatched Edward, accompanied by 
 a suitable escort, to the westward, toward the 
 frontiers of Wales, to assemble all the armed 
 men that he could find in that part of the king- 
 dom who were disposed to espouse his cause. 
 Edmund, who was a year younger than Ed- 
 ward, went with his father. 
 
 The prince proceeded to the city of York, 
 
48 King Richard III. [A.D.1461. 
 
 The walls of York. Prince Richard at York. 
 
 which was then a fortified rxLace of great strength. 
 The engraving gives a very good idea of the 
 appearance of the walls in those times. These 
 walls remain, indeed, almost entire at the pres- 
 ent day, and they are visited, a great deal by 
 tourists and travelers, being regarded with much 
 interest as furnishing a very complete and well- 
 preserved specimen of the mural fortifications 
 of the Middle Ages. Such walls, however, 
 would be almost entirely useless now as means 
 of defense, since they would not stand at all 
 against an attack from modern artillery. 
 
 The great church seen over the walls, in the 
 heart of the city, is the famous York minster, 
 one of the grandest Cathedral churches in En- 
 gland. It was a hundred and fifty years in 
 building, and it was completed about two cen- 
 turies before Richard's day. 
 
 When Prince Richard reached York, he en- 
 tered the town, and established himself there, 
 with a view of waiting till his son should ar- 
 rive with the re-enforcements which he had 
 been sent to seek in the western part of England. 
 
 While he was there, and before the re-enforce- 
 ments came, the queen, at the head of her army 
 from Scotland, which was strengthened, more- 
 over, by the troops which she had obtained in 
 the north of England, came marching on down 
 
D 
 
AD.1461.] Richard's Father. 51 
 
 Boldness of the queen. The advice of Richard' a counselors 
 
 the country in great force. When she came 
 into the neighborhood of York, she encamped, 
 and then sent messengers to Prince Richard, 
 taunting and deriding him for having shut him- 
 self up within fortified walls, and daring him to 
 come out into the open field and fight her. 
 
 The prince's counselors advised him to do no 
 such thing. One of them in particular, a cer- 
 tain Sir Davy Hall, who was an old and faith- 
 ful officer in the prince's service, urged him to 
 pay no attention to Queen Margaret's taunts. 
 
 "We are not strong enough yet," said he, 
 " to meet the army which she has assembled. 
 We must wait till our re-enforcements come. 
 By going out now we shall put our cause in 
 great peril, and all to no purpose whatever." 
 
 "Ah! Davy, Davy," said the prince, "hast 
 thou loved me so long, and now wouldst thou 
 have me dishonored? When I was regent in 
 Normandy, thou never sawest me keep fortress, 
 even when the dauphin himself, with all his 
 power, came to besiege me* I always, like a 
 man, came forth to meet him, instead of remain- 
 ing within my walls, like a bird shut up in a 
 
 * In former years Prince Richard had acted as viceroy of 
 the English possessions in France, under King Henry, and 
 while there he had been engaged in wars with the King of 
 France, and with the dauphin, his son. 
 
52 King Richard III. [A.D.1461. 
 
 Richard' 8 reply. The battle. Richard defeated. 
 
 cage. Now if I did not then keep myself shut 
 up for fear of a great, strong prince, do you 
 think I will now, for dread of a scolding woman, 
 whose weapons are only her tongue and her 
 nails, and thus give people occasion to say that 
 I turned dastard before a woman, when no man 
 had ever been able to make me fear? No, 
 I will never submit to such disgrace. I would 
 rather die in honor than live in shame; and 
 so the great numbers of our enemies do not de- 
 ter me in the least ; they rather encourage me ; 
 therefore, in the name of God and St. George, 
 advance my banner, for I am determined that I 
 will go out and fight them, if I go alone." 
 
 So Prince Richard came forth from the gates 
 of York at the head of his columns, and rode on 
 toward the queen's camp. Edmund went with 
 him. Edmund was under the care of his tutor, 
 Robert Aspell, who was charged to keep close 
 to his side, and to watch over him in the most 
 vigilant manner. The army of the queen was 
 at some distance from York, at a place called 
 Wakefield. Both parties, as is usual in civil 
 wars, were extremely exasperated against each 
 other, and the battle was desperately fought. 
 It was very brief, however, and Richard's troops 
 were defeated. Richard himself was taken pris- 
 oner. Edmund endeavored to escape. Hi? 
 
A.D.1461.] Richard's Father. 55 
 
 Death of Ed mund. Death of Richard. 
 
 tutor endeavored to hurry him off the field, but 
 he was stopped on the way by a certain noble- 
 man of the queen's party, named Lord Clifford. 
 The poor boy begged hard for mercy, but Clif- 
 ford killed him on the spot. 
 
 The prince's army, when they found that the 
 battle had gone against them, and that their 
 captain was a prisoner, fled in all directions over 
 the surrounding country, leaving great numbers 
 dead upon the field. The prince himself, as 
 soon as he was taken, was disarmed on the field, 
 and all the leaders of the queen's army, includ- 
 ing, as the most authentic accounts relate, the 
 queen herself, gathered around him in wild ex- 
 ultation. They carried him to a mound form- 
 ed by an ant-hill, which they said, in mockery, 
 should be his throne. They placed him upon 
 it with taunts and derision. They made a 
 crown for him of knotted grass, and put it upon 
 his head, and then made mock obeisances be- 
 fore him, saying, "Hail! king without a king- 
 dom. Hail ! prince, without a people." 
 
 After having satisfied themselves with their 
 taunts and revilings, the party killed their pris- 
 oner and cut off his head. They set his head 
 upon the point of a lance, and in this way pre- 
 sented it to Queen Margaret. The queen or- 
 dered the head to be decorated with a paper 
 
56 King Kichard 111. [A.D. 1461. 
 
 The head set upon a pole at York. 
 
 crown, and then to be carried to York, and set 
 up at the gates of that city upon a tall pole. 
 
 Thus was little Kichard, the subject of this 
 narrative, left fatherless. He was at this period 
 between eight and nine years old. 
 
Childhood. 57 
 
 Condition of young Richard in his childhood. 
 
 Chapter III. 
 The Childhood of Kichard III. 
 
 YOUNG Richard, as was said at the close of 
 the last chapter, was of a very tender age 
 when his father and his brother Edmund were 
 killed at the battle of Wakefield. He was at 
 that time only about eight years old. It is very 
 evident too, from what has been already related 
 of the history of his father and mother, that 
 during the whole period of his childhood and 
 youth he must have passed through very stormy 
 times. It is only a small portion of the life of 
 excitement, conflict, and alarm which was led 
 by his father that there is space to describe in 
 this volume. So unsettled and wandering a 
 life did his father and mother lead, that it is not 
 quite certain in which of the various towns and 
 castles that from time to time they made their 
 residence, he was born. It is supposed, how- 
 ever, that he was born in the Castle of Fother- 
 ingay, in the year 1452. His father was killed 
 in 1461, which would make Richard, as has al- 
 ready been said, about eight or nine years old 
 at that time. 
 
58 King Eichard III. 
 
 Strange tales in respect to his birth. 
 
 There were a great many strange tales re- 
 lated in subsequent years in respect to Eich- 
 ard's birth. He became such a monster, mor- 
 ally, when he grew to be a man, that the people 
 believed that he was born a monster in person. 
 The story was that he came into the world very 
 ugly in face and distorted in form, and that his 
 hair and his teeth were already grown. These 
 were considered as portents of the ferociousness 
 of temper and character which he was subse- 
 quently to manifest, and of the unnatural and 
 cruel crimes which he would live to commit. 
 It is very doubtful, however, whether any of 
 these stories are true. It is most probable that 
 at his birth he looked like any other child. 
 
 There were a great many periods of intense 
 excitement and terror in the family history be- 
 fore the great final calamity at Wakefield when 
 Eichard's father and his brother Edmund were 
 killed. At these times the sole reliance of the 
 prince in respect to the care of the younger 
 children was upon Lady Cecily, their mother. 
 The older sons went with their father on the 
 various martial expeditions in which he was en- 
 gaged. They shared with him the hardships 
 and dangers of his conflicts, and the triumph 
 and exultations of his victories. The younger 
 children, however, remained in seclusion with 
 
Childhood. 59 
 
 Dangers to which Richard was exposed in his childhood. 
 
 their mother, sometimes in one place and some- 
 times in another, wherever there was, for the 
 time being, the greatest promise of security. 
 
 Indeed, during the early childhood of Eich- 
 ard, the changes and vicissitudes through which 
 the family passed were so sudden and violent 
 in their character as sometimes to surpass the 
 most romantic tales of fiction. At one time, 
 while Lady Cecily was residing at the Castle of 
 Ludlow with Eichard and some of the younger 
 children, a party of her husband's enemies, the 
 Lancastrians, appeared suddenly at the gates of 
 the town, and, before Prince Eichard's party 
 had time to take any efficient measures for de- 
 fense, the town and the castle were both taken. 
 The Lancastrians had expected to find Prince 
 Eichard himself in the castle, but he was not 
 there. They were exasperated by their disap- 
 pointment, and in their fury they proceeded to 
 ransack all the rooms, and to destroy every 
 thing that came into their hands. In some of 
 the inner and more private apartments they 
 found Lady Cecily and her children. They 
 immediately seized them all, made them pris- 
 oners, and carried them away. By King Hen- 
 ry's orders, they were placed in close custody 
 in another castle in the southern part of En- 
 gland, and all the property, both of the prince 
 
60 King Eichard III. 
 
 Extraordinary vicissitudes in the life of his mother. 
 
 and of Lady Cecily, was confiscated. While 
 the mother and the younger children were thus 
 closely shut up and reduced to helpless destitu- 
 tion, the father and the older sons were obliged 
 to fly from the country to save their lives. In 
 less than three- months after this time these 
 same exiled and apparently ruined fugitives 
 were marching triumphantly through the coun- 
 try, at the head of victorious troops, carrying 
 all before them. Lady Cecily and her children 
 were set at liberty, and restored to their prop- 
 erty and their rights, while King Henry him- 
 self, whose captives they had been, was himself 
 made captive, and brought in durance to Lon- 
 don, and Queen Margaret and her son were in 
 their turn compelled to fly from the realm to 
 save their lives. 
 
 This last change in the condition of public 
 affairs took place only a short time before the 
 great final contest between Prince Eichard of 
 York, King Eichard's father, and the family of 
 Henry, when the prince lost his life at Wake- 
 field, as described in the last chapter. 
 
 Of course, young Eichard, being brought up 
 amid these scenes of wild commotion, and ac- 
 customed from childhood to witness the most 
 cruel and remorseless conflicts between branch- 
 es of the same family, was trained bv them to 
 
Childhood. 63 
 
 The castles and palacea belonging to the house of York. 
 
 be ambitious, daring, and unscrupulous in re- 
 spect to the means to be used in circumventing 
 or destroying an enemy. The seed thus sown 
 produced in subsequent years most dreadful 
 fruit, as will be seen more fully in the sequel 
 of his history. 
 
 There were a great many hereditary castles 
 belonging to the family of York, many of which 
 had descended from father to son for many gen- 
 erations. Some of these castles were strong for- 
 tresses, built in wild and inaccessible retreats, 
 and intended to be used as places of temporary 
 refuge, or as the rallying-points and rendez- 
 vous of bodies of armed men. Others were 
 better adapted for the purposes of a private res- 
 idence, being built with some degree of refer- 
 ence to the comfort of the inmates, and sur- 
 rounded with gardens and grounds, where the 
 ladies and the children who were left in them 
 could find recreation and amusement adapted 
 to their age and sex. 
 
 It was in such a castle as this, near London, 
 that Lady Cecily and her younger children were 
 residing when her husband went to the north- 
 ward to meet the forces of the queen, as related 
 in the last chapter. Here Lady Cecily lived in 
 great state, for she thought the time was draw- - 
 ing nigh when her husband would be raised to 
 
64: King Richard III. 
 
 Situation of Lady Cecily at the time of her husband's death. 
 
 the throne. Indeed, she considered him as al- 
 ready the true and rightful sovereign of the 
 realm, and she believed that the hour would 
 very soon come when his claims would be uni- 
 versally acknowledged, and when she herself 
 would be Queen of England, and her boys royal 
 princes, and, as such, the objects of universal at- 
 tention and regard. She instilled these ideas 
 continually into the minds of the children, and 
 she exacted the utmost degree of subserviency 
 and submission toward herself and toward them 
 on the part of all around her. 
 
 While she was thus situated in her palace 
 near London, awaiting every day the arrival of 
 a messenger from the north announcing the 
 final victory of her husband over all his foes, 
 she was one day thunderstruck, and overwhelm- 
 ed with grief and despair, by the tidings that 
 her husband had been defeated, and that he 
 himself, and the dear son who had accompa- 
 nied him, and was just arriving at maturity, 
 had been ignominiously slain. The queen, 
 too, her most bitter foe, now exultant and vic- 
 torious, was advancing triumphantly toward 
 London. 
 
 Not a moment was to be lost. Lady Cecily 
 had with her, at this time, her two youngest 
 sons, George and Richard. She made immedi- 
 
Childhood. 65 
 
 Lady Cecily sends the children to the Continent. 
 
 ate arrangements for her flight. It happened 
 that the Earl of Warwick, who was at this time 
 the Lord High Admiral, and who, of course, had 
 command of the seas between England and the 
 Continent, was a relative and friend of Lady 
 Cecily's. He was at this time in London. Lady 
 Cecily applied to him to assist her in making 
 her escape. He consented, and, with his aid, 
 she herself, with her two children and a small 
 number of attendants, escaped secretly from 
 London, and made their way to the southern 
 coast. There Lady Cecily put the children and 
 the attendants on board a vessel, by which they 
 were conveyed to the coast of Holland. On 
 landing there, they were received by the prince 
 of the country, who was a friend of Lady Ceci- 
 ly, and to whose care she commended them. 
 The prince received them with great kindness, 
 and sent them to the city of Utrecht, where he 
 established them safely in one of his palaces, 
 and appointed suitable tutors and governors 
 to superintend their education. Here it was 
 expected that they would remain for several 
 years. 
 
 Their mother did not go with them to Hol- 
 land. Her fears in respect to remaining in 
 England were not for herself, but only for her 
 helpless children. For herself, her only im- 
 E 
 
66 King Eichard III. 
 
 Situation of Lady Cecily and of her oldest son. 
 
 pulse was to face and brave the dangers which 
 threatened her, and triumph over them. So 
 she went boldly back to London, to await there 
 whatever might occur. 
 
 Besides, her oldest son was still in England, 
 and she could not forsake him. You will rec- 
 ollect that, when his father went north to meet 
 the forces of Queen Margaret, he sent his oldest 
 son, Edward, Earl of Marche, to the western part 
 of England, to obtain re-enforcements. Edward 
 was at Gloucester when the tidings came to him 
 of his father's death. Gloucester is on the west- 
 ern confines of England, near the southeastern 
 borders of Wales. Now, of course, since her 
 husband was dead, all Lady Cecily's ambition, 
 and all her hopes of revenge were concentrated 
 in him. She wished to be at hand to counsel 
 him, and to co-operate with him by all the 
 means in her power. How she succeeded in 
 these plans, and how, by means of them, he soon 
 became King of England, will appear in the 
 next chapter. 
 
AD. 1461.] Edward IV. 67 
 
 Edward now becomes heir to the crown. 
 
 Chapter IV. 
 
 Accession of Edward IV., Kich- 
 ard's elder Brother. 
 
 EICHAKD'S brother Edward, as has already 
 been remarked, was at Gloucester when 
 he heard the news of his father death. This 
 news, of course, made a great change in his 
 condition. To his mother, the event was pure- 
 ly and simply a calamity, and it could awaken 
 no feelings in her heart but those of sorrow and 
 chagrin. In Edward's mind, on the other hand, 
 the first emotions of astonishment and grief 
 were followed immediately by a burst of ex- 
 ultation and pride. He, of course, as now the 
 oldest surviving son, succeeded at once to all 
 the rights and titles which his father had en- 
 joyed, and among these, according to the ideas 
 which his mother had instilled into his mind, 
 was the right to the crown. His heart, there- 
 fore, when the first feeling of grief for the loss 
 of his father had subsided, bounded with joy as 
 he exclaimed, 
 
 " So now /am the King of England." 
 
 The enthusiasm which he felt extended itself 
 
68 King Richard III. 
 
 His energy and decision. He marches to intercept Margaret. 
 
 at once to all around him. He immediately 
 made preparations to put himself at the head of 
 his troops, and march to the eastward, so as to 
 intercept Queen Margaret on her way to London, 
 for he knew that she would, of course, now press 
 forward toward the capital as fast as possible. 
 
 He accordingly set out at once upon his 
 march, and, as he went on, he found that the 
 number of his followers increased very rapidly. 
 The truth was, that the queen's party, by their 
 murder of Richard, and of young Edmund his 
 son, had gone altogether too far for the good of 
 their own cause. The people, when they heard 
 the tidings, were indignant at such cruelty. 
 Those who belonged to the party of the house 
 of York, instead of being intimidated by the se- 
 verity of the measure, were exasperated at the 
 brutality of it, and they were all eager to join 
 the young duke, Edward, and help him to 
 avenge his father's and his brother's death. 
 Those who had been before on the side of the 
 house of Lancaster were discouraged and re- 
 pelled, while those who had been doubtful were 
 now ready to declare against the queen. 
 
 It is in this way that all excesses in the hour 
 of victory defeat the very ends they were in- 
 tended to subserve. They weaken the perpe- 
 trators, and not the subjects of them. 
 
Edward IV. 
 
 Warwick. Battle with the queen. Warwick defeated. 
 
 In the mean time, while young Edward, at 
 the head of his army, was marching on from 
 the westward toward London to intercept the 
 queen, the Earl of Warwick, who has already 
 been mentioned as a friend of Lady Cecily, had 
 also assembled a large force near London, and 
 he was now advancing toward the northward. 
 The poor king was with him. Nominally, the 
 king was in command of the expedition, and 
 every thing was done in his name, but really 
 he was a forlorn and helpless prisoner, forced 
 wholly against his will — so far as the feeble de- 
 gree of intellect which remained to him enabled 
 him to exercise a will — to seem to head an en- 
 terprise directed against his' own wife, and his 
 best and strongest friend. 
 
 The armies of the queen and of the Earl of 
 Warwick advanced toward each other, until 
 they met at last at a short distance north of 
 London. A desperate battle was fought, and 
 the queen's party were completely victorious. 
 When night came on, the Earl of Warwick 
 found that he was beaten at every point, and 
 that his troops had fled in all directions, leaving 
 thousands of the dead and dying all along the 
 road sides. The camp had been abandoned, and 
 there was no time to save any thing ; even the 
 poor king was left behind, and the officers of 
 
70 King Kichard III. 
 
 Margaret regains possession of her husband. 
 
 the queen's army found him in a tent, with only 
 one attendant. Of course, the queen was over- 
 joyed at recovering possession of her husband, 
 not merely on his own account personally, but 
 also because she could now act again directly 
 in his name. So she prepared a proclamation, 
 by which the king revoked all that he had 
 done while in the hands of Warwick, on the 
 ground that he had been in durance, and had 
 not acted of his own free will, and also declared 
 Edward a traitor, and offered a large reward for 
 his apprehension. 
 
 The queen was now once more filled with 
 exultation and joy. Her joy would have been 
 complete were it not that Edward himself was 
 still to be met, for he was all this time advanc- 
 ing from the westward ; she, however, thought 
 that there was not much to be feared jrom such 
 a boy, Edward being at this time only about 
 nineteen years of age. So the queen moved on 
 toward London, flushed with the victory, and 
 exasperated with the opposition which she had 
 met with. Her soldiers were under very little 
 control, and they committed great excesses. 
 They ravaged the country, and plundered with- 
 out mercy all those whom they considered as 
 belonging to the opposite party ; they commit- 
 ted, too, many atrocious acts of cruelty. It is 
 
AD. 1461.] Edward IV. 71 
 
 Excesses committed by the queen's troops. 
 
 always thus in civil war. In foreign wars, arm- 
 ies are much more easily kept under control. 
 Troops march through a foreign territory, feel- 
 ing no personal spite or hatred against the in- 
 habitants of it, for they think it is a matter of 
 course,.that the people should defend their coun- 
 try and resist invaders. But in a civil war, the 
 men of each party feel a special personal hate 
 against every individual that does not belong 
 to their side, and in periods of actual conflict 
 this hatred becomes a rage that is perfectly un- 
 controllable. 
 
 Accordingly, as the queen and her troops ad- 
 vanced, they robbed and murdered all who came 
 in their way, and they filled the whole country 
 with terror. They even seized and plundered 
 a convent, which was a species of sacrilege. 
 This greatly increased the general alarm. ' ' The 
 wretches !" exclaimed the people, when they 
 heard the tidings, "nothing is sacred in their 
 eyes." The people of London were particu- 
 larly alarmed. They thought there was danger 
 that the city itself would be given up to plun- 
 der if the queen's troops gained admission. So 
 they all turned against her. She sent one day 
 into the town for a supply of provisions, and 
 the authorities, perhaps thinking themselves 
 bound by their official duty to obey orders of 
 
72 King Richard III. 
 
 I'd ward advances. He enters Loudon. His welcome. 
 
 this kind coming in the king's name, loaded up 
 some wagons and sent them forth, but the peo- 
 ple raised a mob, and stopped the wagons at 
 the gates, refusing to let them go on. 
 
 In the mean time, Edward, growing every 
 hour stronger as he advanced, came rapidly on 
 toward London. He was joined at length by 
 the Earl of Warwick and the remnant of the 
 force which remained to the earl after the bat- 
 tle which he had fought with the queen. The 
 queen, now finding that Edward's strength was 
 becoming formidable, did not dare to meet him ; 
 so she retreated toward the north again. Ed- 
 ward, instead of pursuing her, advanced direct- 
 ly toward London. The people threw open the 
 gates to him, and welcomed him as their deliv- 
 erer. They thronged the streets to look upon 
 him as he passed, and made the air ring with 
 their loud and long acclamations. 
 
 There was, indeed, every thing in the circum- 
 stances of the case to awaken excitement and 
 emotion. Here was a boy not yet out of his 
 teens, extremely handsome in appearance and 
 agreeable in manners, who had taken the field 
 in command of a very large force to avenge the 
 cruel death of his father and brother, and was 
 now coming boldly, at the head of his troops, 
 into the very capital of the king and queen un- 
 
AD. 1461.] Edward IY. 73 
 
 Excitement in London. Measures taken by Edward. 
 
 der whose authority his father and brother had 
 been killed. 
 
 The most extraordinary circumstance con- 
 nected with these proceedings was, that during 
 all this time Henry was still acknowledged by 
 every one as the actual king. Edward and his 
 friends maintained, indeed, that he, Edward, 
 was entitled to reign, but no one pretended that 
 any thing had yet been done which could have 
 the legal effect of putting him upon the throne. 
 There was, however, now a general expectation 
 that the time for the formal deposition of Hen- 
 ry was near, and in and around London all was 
 excitement and confusion. The people from 
 the surrounding towns nocked every day into 
 the city to see what they could see, and to hear 
 what they could hear. They thronged the 
 streets whenever Edward appeared in public, 
 eager to obtain a glimpse of him. 
 
 At length, a few days after Edward entered 
 the city, his counselors and friends deemed that 
 the time had come for action. Accordingly, 
 they made arrangements for a grand review in 
 a large open field. Their design was by this 
 review to call together a great concourse of 
 spectators. A vast assembly convened accord- 
 ing to their expectations. In the midst of the 
 ceremonies, two noblemen appeared before the 
 
74 King Richard III. [A.D.1461. 
 
 Voice of the people. They declare in favor of Edward. 
 
 multitude to make addresses to them. One of 
 them made a speech in respect to Henry, de- 
 nouncing the crimes, and the acts of treachery 
 and of oppression which his government had 
 committed. He dilated long on the feebleness 
 and incapacity of the king, and his total inabil- 
 ity to exercise any control in the management 
 of public affairs. After he had finished, he 
 called out to the people in a loud voice to de- 
 clare whether they would submit any longer to 
 have such a man for king. 
 
 The people answered " Nay, Nay, Nay," 
 with loud and long acclamations. 
 
 Then the other speaker made an address in 
 favor of Edward. He explained at length the 
 nature of his title to the crown, showing it to 
 be altogether superior in point of right to that 
 of Henry. He also spoke long and eloquently 
 in praise of Edward's personal qualifications, 
 describing his courage, his activity, and energy, 
 and the various graces and accomplishments for 
 which he was distinguished, in the most glow- 
 ing terms. He ended by demanding of the peo- 
 ple whether they would have Edward for king. 
 
 The people answered " Yea, Yea, Yea ; 
 King Edward forever! King Edward for- 
 ever!" with acclamations as long and loud as 
 before. 
 
Edward IV. 75 
 
 Edward is formally enthroned. Various ceremonies. 
 
 Of course there could be no legal validity in 
 such proceedings as these, for, even if England 
 had at that time been an elective monarchy, the 
 acclamations of an accidental assembly drawn 
 together to witness a review could on no ac- 
 count have been deemed a valid vote. This 
 ceremony was only meant as a very public an- 
 nouncement of the intention of Edward imme- 
 diately to assume the throne. 
 
 The next day, accordingly, a grand council 
 was held of all the great barons, and nobles, 
 and officers of state. By this council a decree 
 was passed that King Henry, by his late pro- 
 ceedings, had forfeited the crown, and Edward 
 was solemnly declared king in his stead. Im- 
 mediately afterward, Edward rode at the head 
 of a royal procession, which was arranged for 
 the purpose, to Westminster, and there, in the 
 presence of a vast assembly, he took his seat 
 upon the throne. While there seated, he made 
 a speech to the audience, in which he explained 
 the nature of his hereditary rights, and declared 
 his intention to maintain his rights thenceforth 
 in the most determined manner. 
 
 The king now proceeded to Westminster Ab- 
 bey, where he performed the same ceremonies 
 a second time. He was also publicly proclaimed 
 king on the same day in various parts of London. 
 
76 King Richard III. 
 
 Edward marches to the northward. A battle. 
 
 Edward was now full of ardor and enthusi- 
 asm, and his first impulse was to set off, at the 
 head of his army, toward the north, in pursuit 
 of the queen and the old king. The king and 
 queen had gone to York. The queen had not 
 only the king under her care, but also her son, 
 the little Prince of Wales, who was now about 
 eight years old. This young prince was the 
 heir to the crown on the Lancastrian side, and 
 Edward was, of course, very desirous of getting 
 him, as well as the king and queen, into his 
 hands ; so he put himself at the head of his 
 troops, and began to move forward as fast as he 
 could go. The body of troops under his com- 
 mand consisted of fifty thousand men. In the 
 queen's army, which was encamped in the neigh- 
 borhood of York, there were about sixty thou- 
 sand. 
 
 Both parties were extremely exasperated 
 against each other, and were eager for the fight. 
 Edward gave orders to his troops to grant no 
 quarter, but, in the event of victory, to massa- 
 cre without mercy every man that they could 
 bring within their reach. The armies came to- 
 gether at a place called Towton. The combat 
 was begun in the midst of a snow-storm. The 
 armies fought from nine o'clock in the morn- 
 ning till three in the afternoon, and by that 
 
Edwakd IV. 77 
 
 Edward enters York in triumph. He inters his father's body. 
 
 time the queen's troops were every where driv- 
 en from the field. Edward's men pursued them 
 along the roads, slaughtering them without mer- 
 cy as fast as they could overtake them, until at 
 length nearly forty thousand men were left dead 
 upon the ground. 
 
 The queen fled toward the north, taking with 
 her her husband and child. Edward entered 
 York in triumph. At the gates he found the 
 head of his father and that of his brother still 
 remaining upon the poles where the queen had 
 put them. He took them reverently down, and 
 then put other heads in their places, which he 
 cut off for the purpose from some of his prison- 
 ers. He was in such a state of fury, that I sup- 
 pose, if he could have caught the king and queen, 
 he would have cut off their heads, and put them 
 on the poles in the place of his father's and his 
 brother's ; but he could not catch them. They 
 fled to the north, toward the frontiers of Scot- 
 land, and so escaped from his hands. 
 
 Edward determined not to pursue the fugi- 
 tives any farther at that time, as there were 
 many important affairs to be attended to in 
 London, and so he concluded to be satisfied at 
 present with the victory which he had obtain- 
 ed, and with the dispersion of his enemies, and 
 to return to the capital. He first, however, 
 
78 King Kichakd III. 
 
 He returns to London. Grief of his mother. 
 
 gathered together the remains of his father and 
 brother, and caused them to be buried with sol- 
 emn funeral ceremonies in one of his castles 
 near York. This was, however, only a tempo- 
 rary arrangement, for, as soon as his affairs were 
 fully settled, the remains were disinterred, and 
 conveyed, with great funeral pomp and parade, 
 to their final resting-place in the southern part 
 of the kingdom. 
 
 As soon as Edward reached London, one of 
 the first things that he did was to send for his 
 two brothers, George and Kichard, who, as will 
 be recollected, had been removed by their moth- 
 er to Holland, and were now in Utrecht pursu- 
 ing their education. These two boys were all the 
 brothers of Edward that remained now alive. 
 They came back to London. Their widowed 
 mother's heart was filled with a melancholy 
 sort of joy in seeing her children once more to- 
 gether, safe in their native land ; but her spirit, 
 after reviving for a moment, sank again, over- 
 whelmed with the bitter and irreparable loss 
 which she had sustained in the death of her 
 husband. His death was, of course, a fatal blow 
 to all those ambitious plans and aspirations 
 which she had cherished for herself. Though 
 the mother of a king, she could now never be- 
 come herself a queen ; and, disappointed and un- 
 
Edward IV. 79 
 
 Situation of George and Richard. Richard's person. 
 
 happy, she retired to one of the family castles 
 in the neighborhood of London, and lived there 
 comparatively alone and in great seclusion. 
 
 The boys, on the other hand, were brought 
 forward very conspicuously into public life. In 
 the autumn of the same year in which Edward 
 took possession of the crown, they were made 
 royal dukes, with great parade and ceremony, 
 and were endowed with immense estates to en- 
 able them to support the dignity of their rank 
 and position. George was made Duke of Clar- 
 ence; Kichard, Duke of Gloucester ; and from 
 this time the two boys were almost always des- 
 ignated by these names. 
 
 Suitable persons, too, were appointed to take 
 charge of the boys, for the purpose of conduct- 
 ing their education, and also to manage their 
 estates until they should become of age. 
 
 There have been a great many disputes in re- 
 spect to Richard's appearance and character at 
 this time. For a long period after his death, 
 people generally believed that he was, from his 
 very childhood, an ugly little monster, that no- 
 body could look upon without fear ; and, in 
 fact, he was very repulsive in his personal ap- 
 pearance when he grew up, but at this time of 
 his life the historians and biographers who saw 
 and knew him say that he was quite a pretty 
 
80 King Richard III. 
 
 Description of the armor worn in those days. 
 
 boy, though puny and weak. His face was 
 handsome enough, though his form was frail, 
 and not perfectly symmetrical. Those who had 
 charge of him tried to strengthen his constitu- 
 tion by training him to the martial exercises 
 and usages which were practiced in those days, 
 and especially by accustoming him to wear the 
 ponderous armor which was then in use. 
 
 This armor was made of iron or steel. It 
 consisted of a great number of separate pieces, 
 which, when they were all put on, incased al- 
 most the whole body, so as to defend it against 
 blows coming from any quarter. First, there 
 was the helmet, or cap of steel, with large oval 
 pieces coming down to protect the ears. Next 
 came the gorget, as it was called, which was a 
 sort of collar to cover the neck. Then there 
 were elbow pieces to guard the elbows, and 
 shoulder-plates for the shoulders, and a breast- 
 plate or buckler for the front, and greaves for 
 the legs and thighs. These things were neces- 
 sary in those days, or at least they were advan- 
 tageous, for they afforded pretty effectual pro- 
 tection against all the ordinary weapons which 
 were then in use. But they made the warriors 
 themselves so heavy and unwieldy as very 
 greatly to interfere with the freedom of their 
 movements when engaged in battle. There 
 
A.D.1461.] Edward IV. 81 
 
 Necessity of being trained to use this armor. 
 
 was, indeed, a certain advantage in this weight, 
 as it made the shock with which the knight on 
 horseback encountered his enemy in the charge 
 so much the more heavy and overpowering; 
 but if he were by any accident to lose his seat 
 and fall to the ground, he was generally so en- 
 cumbered by his armor that he could only par- 
 tially raise himself therefrom. He was thus 
 compelled to lie almost helpless until his ene- 
 my came to kill him, or his squire or some 
 other friend came to help him up.* 
 
 Of course, to be able to manage one's self at 
 all in these habiliments of iron and steel, there 
 was required not only native strength of con- 
 stitution, but long and careful training, and it 
 was a very important part of the education of 
 young men of rank in Eichard's days to famil- 
 iarize them with the use of this armor, and in- 
 ure them to the weight of it. Suits of it were 
 made for boys, the size and weight of each suit 
 being fitted to the form and strength of the 
 wearer. Many of these suits of boys' armor 
 are still preserved in England. There are sev- 
 eral specimens to be seen in the Tower of Lon- 
 don. They are in the apartment called the 
 Horse Armory, which is a vast hall with effi- 
 gies of horses, and of men mounted upon them, 
 
 * See engraving on page 148. 
 
 F 
 
82 King Eichard III. 
 
 The armor costly. Substitutes for it. Exercises. 
 
 all completely armed with the veritable suits 
 of steel which the men and the horses that the}^ 
 represent actually wore when they were alive. 
 The horses are arranged along the sides of the 
 room in regular order from the earliest ages 
 down to the time when steel armor of this kind 
 ceased to be worn. 
 
 These suits of armor were very costly, and 
 the boys for whom they were made were, of 
 course, filled with feelings of exultation and 
 pride when they put them on ; and, heavy and 
 uncomfortable as such clothing must have been, 
 they were willing to wear it, and to practice the 
 required exercises in it. "When actually made 
 of steel, the armor was very expensive, and such 
 could only be afforded for young princes and 
 nobles of very high rank ; for other young 
 men, various substitutes were provided ; but all 
 were trained, either in the use of actual armor, 
 or of substitutes, to perform a great number 
 and variety of exercises. They were taught, 
 when they were old enough, to spring upon a 
 horse with as much armor upon them and in 
 their hands as possible ; to run races ; to see how 
 long they could continue to strike heavy blows 
 in quick succession with a battle-axe or club, 
 as if they were beating an enemy lying upon 
 the ground, and trying to break his armor to 
 
Edward IV. 85 
 
 Feats to be performed. Account of the quintaiae. 
 
 pieces ; to dance and throw summersets ; to 
 mount upon a horse behind another person by 
 leaping from the ground, and assisting them- 
 selves only by one hand, and other similar 
 things. One feat which they practiced was to 
 climb up between two partition walls built pret- 
 ty near together, by bracing their back against 
 one wall, and working with their knees and 
 hands against the other. Another feat was to 
 climb up a ladder on the under side by means 
 of the hands alone. 
 
 Another famous exercise, or perhaps rather 
 game, was performed with what was called the 
 quintaine. The quintaine consisted of a stout 
 post set in the ground, and rising about ten or 
 twelve feet above the surface. Across the top 
 was a strong bar, which turned on a pivot made 
 in the top of the post, so that it would go round 
 and round. To one end of this cross-bar there 
 was fixed a square board for a target ; to the 
 other end was hung a heavy club. The cross- 
 bar was so poised upon the central pivot that 
 it would move very easily. In playing the 
 game, the competitors, mounted on horseback, 
 were to ride, one after another, under the tar- 
 get-end of the cross-bar, and hurl their spears 
 at it with all their force. The blow from the 
 spear would knock the target-end of the cross- 
 
86 King Eichaed III. 
 
 Other exercises and sports. Maying ball. 
 
 bar away, and so bring round the other end, 
 with its heavy club, to strike a blow on the 
 horseman's head if he did not get instantly out 
 of the way. It was as if he were to strike one 
 enemy in front in battle, while there was an- 
 other enemy ready on the instant to strike him 
 from behind. 
 
 There is one of these ancient quintaines now 
 standing on the green in the village of Off- 
 ham, in Kent. 
 
 Such exercises as these were, of course, only 
 fitted for men, or at least for boys who had 
 nearly attained to their full size and strength. 
 There were other games and exercises intended 
 for smaller boys. There are many rude pic- 
 tures in ancient books illustrating these old 
 games. In one they are playing ball ; in an- 
 other they are playing shuttle-cock. The bat- 
 tle-doors that they use are very rude. 
 
 PLAYING BALL. 
 
 These pictures show how ancient these com- 
 mon games are. In another picture the boys 
 
Edward IV. 
 
 87 
 
 Jumping through a hoop. 
 
 The two brothers companions. 
 
 & 
 
 BATTLE-DOOR AND SHUTTLE-COCK. 
 
 are playing with a hoop. Two of them are 
 holding the hoop up between them, and the 
 third is preparing to jump through it, head 
 foremost. His plan is to come down on the 
 other side upon his hands, and so turn a sum- 
 merset, and come up on his feet beyond. 
 
 In these exercises and amusements, and, in- 
 deed, in all his occupations, Eichard had his 
 brother Greorge, the Duke of Clarence, for his 
 playmate and companion. George was not 
 only older than Eichard, but he was also much 
 more healthy and athletic; and some persons 
 have thought that Eichard injured himself, and 
 perhaps, in some degree, increased the deformity 
 which he seems to have suffered from in later 
 years, or perhaps brought it on entirely, by 
 
88 King Eichaed III. [A.D.1461. 
 
 Richard's intellectual education. 
 
 overloading himself, in his attempts to keep 
 pace with his brother in these exercises, with 
 burdens of armor, or by straining himself in 
 athletic exertions which were beyond his pow- 
 ers. 
 
 The intellectual education of the boys was 
 not entirely neglected. They learned to read 
 and write, though they could not write much, 
 or very well. Their names are still found, as 
 they signed them to ancient documents, several 
 of which remain to the present day. The fol- 
 lowing is a fac-simile of Eichard's signature, 
 copied exactly from one of those documents. 
 
 4 
 
 c&Jlch\{^ 
 
 riohard's signature. 
 
 Eichard continued in this state of pupilage 
 in some of the castles belonging to the family 
 from the time that his brother began to reign 
 until he was about fourteen years of age. Ed- 
 ward, the king, was then twenty -four, and Clar- 
 ence about seventeen. 
 
A.D.146L] Warwick. 89 
 
 Situation of Richard under the reign of his brother. 
 
 Chapter V. 
 Warwick, the King-Maker. 
 
 EICHAED'S brother, Edward the Fourth, 
 began to reign when Eichard was about 
 eight or nine years of age. His reign contin- 
 ued — with a brief interruption, which will be 
 hereafter explained — for twenty years ; so that, 
 for a very important period of his life, after 
 he arrived at some degree of maturity, name- 
 ly, from the time that he was fourteen to the 
 time that he was thirty, Eichard was one of his 
 brother's subjects. He was a prince, it is true, 
 and a prince of the very highest rank — the 
 next person but one, in fact, in the line of suc- 
 cession to the crown. His brother George, the 
 Duke of Clarence, of course, being older than 
 he, came before him ; but both the young men, 
 though princes, were subjects. They were un- 
 der their brother Edward's authority, and bound 
 to serve and obey him as their rightful sover- 
 eign ; next to him, however, they were the 
 highest personages in the realm. George was, 
 from this time, generally called Clarence, and 
 Eichard, Gloucester. 
 
90 King Richard III. 
 
 Strange vicissitudes in the life of Margaret. 
 
 The reader may perhaps feel some interest 
 and curiosity in learning what became of Queen 
 Margaret and old King Henry after they were 
 driven out of the country toward the north, at 
 the time of Edward's accession. Their pros- 
 pects seemed, at the time, to be hopelessly ruin- 
 ed, but their case was destined to furnish an- 
 other very striking instance of the extraordi- 
 nary reverses of fortune which marked the his- 
 tory of nearly all the great families during the 
 whole course of this York and Lancaster quar- 
 rel. In about ten years from the time when 
 Henry and Margaret were driven away, appar- 
 ently into hopeless exile, they came back in tri- 
 umph, and were restored to power, and Edward 
 himself, in his turn, was ignominiously expelled 
 from the kingdom. The narrative of the cir- 
 cumstances through which these events were 
 brought about forms quite a romantic story. 
 
 In order, however, that this story may be 
 more clearly understood, I will first enumerate 
 the principal personages that take a part in it, 
 and briefly remind the reader of the position 
 which they respectively occupied, and the rela- 
 tions which they sustained to each other. 
 
 First, there is the family of King Henry, con- 
 sisting of himself and his wife, Queen Margaret, 
 and his little son Edward, who had received the 
 
Warwick. 91 
 
 Representatives of the house of York. Margaret. 
 
 title of Prince of Wales. This boy was about 
 eight years old at the time his father and moth- 
 er were driven away. We left them, in the last 
 chapter, flying toward the frontiers of Scotland 
 to save their lives, leaving to Edward and his 
 troops the full possession of the kingdom. 
 
 Henry and his little son, the Prince of Wales, 
 of course represent the house of Lancaster in 
 the dispute for the succession. 
 
 The house of York was represented by Ed- 
 ward, whose title, as king, was Edward the 
 Fourth, and his two brothers, George and Eich- 
 ard, or, as they were now generally called, Clar- 
 ence and Gloucester. In case Edward should 
 be married and have a son, his son would suc- 
 ceed him, and Greorge and Kichard would be ex- 
 cluded ; if, however, he should die without is- 
 sue, then Greorge would become king ; and if 
 Greorge should die without issue, and Eichard 
 should survive him, then Eichard would suc- 
 ceed. Thus, as matters now stood, George and 
 Eichard were presumptive heirs to the crown, 
 and it was natural that they should wish that 
 their brother Edward should never be married. 
 
 Besides these two brothers, who were the 
 only ones of all his brothers that were now 
 living, Edward had a sister named Margaret. 
 Margaret was four years younger than Edward 
 
92 King Eichard III. 
 
 Valne of a marriageable young lady. Warwick. 
 
 the king, and about six years older than Rich- 
 ard. She was now about seventeen. A young 
 lady of that age in the family of a king in 
 those days was quite a treasure, as the king 
 was enabled to promote his political schemes 
 sometimes very effectually by bestowing her 
 in marriage upon this great prince or that, as 
 would best further the interests which he had 
 in view in foreign courts. 
 
 This young lady, Edward's sister, being of 
 the same name — Margaret — with the queen of 
 old King Henry, was distinguished from her by 
 being called Margaret of York, as she belonged 
 to the York family. The queen was generally 
 known as Margaret of Anjou. Anjou was the 
 place of her nativity. 
 
 The next great personage to be named is the 
 Earl of Warwick. He was the man, as you 
 will doubtless recollect, who was in command 
 of the sea between England and the Continent 
 at the time when Lady Cecily wished to send 
 her children, George and Richard, away after 
 their father's death, and who assisted in arrang- 
 ing their flight. He was a man of great power 
 and influence, and of such an age and charac- 
 ter that he exerted a vast ascendency over all 
 within his influence. Without him, Edward 
 never would have conquered the Lancaster 
 
Warwick. 93 
 
 Warwick becomes Edward' s prime minister. 
 
 party, and he knew very well that if Warwick, 
 and all those whom Warwick would carry with 
 him, were to desert him, he should not be able 
 to retain his kingdom. Indeed, Warwick re 
 ceived the surname of King-maker from the 
 fact that, in repeated instances during this quar- 
 rel, he put down one dynasty and raised up the 
 other, just as he pleased. He belonged to a 
 great and powerful family named Neville. As 
 soon as Edward was established on his throne, 
 Warwick, almost as a matter of course, became 
 prime minister. One of his brothers was made 
 chancellor, and a great number of other posts 
 of distinction and honor were distributed among 
 the members of the Neville family. Indeed, al- 
 though Edward was nominally king, it might 
 have been considered in some degree a question 
 whether it was the house of York or the house 
 of Neville that actually reigned in England. 
 
 The Earl of Warwick had two daughters. 
 Their names were Isabella and Anne. These 
 two young ladies the earl reckoned, as Ed- 
 ward did his sister Margaret, among the most 
 important of his political resources. By mar- 
 rying them to persons of very high position, 
 he could strengthen his alliances and increase 
 his power. There was even a possibility, he 
 thought, of marrying one of them to the King 
 
94 King Kichard III. [A.D.1461. 
 
 The three great parties. The fortunes of Margaret of Anjou. 
 
 of England, or to a prince who would become 
 king. 
 
 Thus we have for the three great parties to 
 the transactions now to be described, first, the 
 representatives of the house of Lancaster, the 
 feeble Henry, the energetic and strong-minded 
 Margaret of Anjou, and their little son, the 
 Prince of Wales ; secondly, the representatives 
 of the house of York, King Edward the Fourth, 
 the two young men his brothers, George, Duke 
 of Clarence, and Richard, Duke of Gloucester, 
 and his sister Margaret ; and, thirdly, between 
 these two parties, as it were, the Earl of War- 
 wick and his two daughters, Isabella and Anne, 
 standing at the head of a vast family influence, 
 which ramified to every part of the kingdom, 
 and was powerful enough to give the ascend- 
 ency to either side, in favor of which they might 
 declare. 
 
 We are now prepared to follow Queen Mar- 
 garet in her flight toward the north with her 
 husband and her son, at the time when Edward 
 the Fourth overcame her armies and ascended 
 the throne. She pressed on as rapidly as pos- 
 sible, taking the king and the little prince with 
 her, and accompanied and assisted in her flight 
 by a few attendants, till she had crossed the 
 frontier and was safe in Scotland. The Scots 
 
A J). 1462.] Warwick. 95 
 
 She escapes to France. A new expedition planned. 
 
 espoused her cause, and assisted her to raise 
 fresh troops, with which she made one or two 
 short incursions into England ; but she soon 
 found that she could do nothing effectual in 
 this way, and so, after wasting some time in 
 fruitless attempts, she left Scotland with the 
 king and the prince, and went to France. 
 
 Here she entered into negotiations with the 
 King of France, and with other princes and po- 
 tentates on the Continent, with a view of rais- 
 ing men and money for a new invasion of En- 
 gland. At first these powers declined to assist 
 her. They said that their treasuries were ex- 
 hausted, and that they had no men. At last, 
 however, Margaret promised to the King of 
 France that if he would furnish her with a fleet 
 and an army, by which she could recover the 
 kingdom of her husband, she would cede to him 
 the town of Calais, which, though situated on 
 the coast of France, was at that time an English 
 possession. This was a very tempting offer, 
 for Calais was a fortress of the first class, and a 
 military post either for England or France of a 
 very important character. 
 
 The king consented to this proposal. He 
 equipped a fleet and raised an army, and Mar- 
 garet set sail for England, taking the king and 
 the prince with her. Her plan was to land in 
 
96 King Kichakd III. [AD. 1462. 
 
 Margaret is defeated and compelled to fly. 
 
 the northern part of the island, near the fron- 
 tiers of Scotland, where she expected to find the 
 country more friendly to the Lancastrian line 
 than the people were toward the south. As 
 soon as she landed she was joined by many of 
 the people, and she succeeded in capturing some 
 castles and small towns. But the Earl of War- 
 wick, who was, as has been already said, the 
 prime minister under Edward, immediately 
 raised an army of twenty thousand men, and 
 marched to the northward to meet her. Mar- 
 garet's French army was wholly unprepared to 
 encounter such a force as this, so they fled to 
 their ships. All but about five hundred of the 
 men succeeded in reaching the ships. The five 
 hundred were cut to pieees. Margaret herself 
 was detained in making arrangements for the 
 king and the prince. She concluded not to 
 take them to sea again, but to send them secret- 
 ly into Wales, while she herself went back to 
 France to see if she could not procure re-en- 
 forcements. She barely had time, at last, to 
 reach the ships herself, so close at hand were 
 her enemies. As soon as the queen had em- 
 barked, the fleet set sail. The queen had saved 
 nearly all the money and all the stores which 
 she had brought with her from France, and she 
 hoped still to preserve them for another at- 
 
Warwick. 97 
 
 She encounters great dangers at sea. The king concealed. 
 
 tempt. But the fleet had scarcely got off from 
 the shore when a terrible storm arose, and the 
 ships were all driven upon the rocks and dash- 
 ed to pieces. The money and the stores were 
 all lost; a large portion of the men were drown- 
 ed; Margaret herself and the captain of the 
 fleet saved themselves, and, as soon as the storm 
 was over, they succeeded in making their escape 
 back to Berwick in an old fishing-boat which 
 they obtained on the shore. 
 
 Soon after this, Margaret, with the captain of 
 the fleet and a very small number of faithful 
 followers who still adhered to her, sailed back 
 again to France. 
 
 The disturbances, however, which her land- 
 ing had occasioned, did not cease immediately 
 on her departure. The Lancastrian party all 
 over England were excited and moved to ac- 
 tion by the news of her coming, and for two 
 years insurrections were continually taking 
 place, and many battles were fought, and great 
 numbers of people were killed. King Henry 
 was all this time kept in close concealment, 
 sometimes in Wales, and sometimes among the 
 lakes and mountains in Westmoreland. He 
 was conveyed from place to place by his ad- 
 herents in the most secret manner, the knowl- 
 edge in respect to his situation being confined 
 (1 
 
98 King Kichard III. [AD. 1464. 
 
 The king is made prisoner, and sent to the Tower. 
 
 to the smallest possible number of persons. 
 This continued for two or three years. At last, 
 however, while the friends of the king were at- 
 tempting secretly to convey him to a certain 
 castle in Yorkshire, he was seen and recognized 
 by one of his enemies. A plan was immediate- 
 ly formed to make him prisoner. The plan 
 succeeded. The king was surprised by an 
 overwhelming force, which broke into the cas- 
 tle and seized him while he sat at dinner. His 
 captors, and those who were lying in wait to 
 assist them, galloped off at once with their pris- 
 oner to London. King Edward shut him up 
 in the Tower, and he remained there, closely 
 confined and strongly guarded, for a long time. 
 Thus King Henry's life was saved, but of 
 those who espoused his cause, and made at- 
 tempts to restore him, great numbers were 
 seized and beheaded in the most cruel manner. 
 It was Edward's policy to slay all the leaders. 
 It was said that after a battle he would ride 
 with a company of men over the ground, and 
 kill every wounded or exhausted man of rank 
 that still remained alive, though he would spare 
 the common soldiers. Sometimes, when he got 
 men that were specially obnoxious to him into 
 his hands, he would put them to death in the 
 most cruel and ignominious manner. One dis- 
 
Warwick. 99 
 
 Brutal punishments. Great exasperation of the comhatants. 
 
 tinguished knight, that had been taken prisoner 
 by Warwick, was brought to King Edward, 
 who, at that time, as it happened, was sick, and 
 by Edward's orders was treated most brutally. 
 He was first taken out into a public place, and 
 his spurs were struck off from his feet by a 
 cook. This was one of the greatest indignities 
 that a knight could suffer. Then his coat of 
 arms was torn off from him, and another coat, 
 inside out, was put upon him. Then he was 
 made to walk barefoot to the end of the town, 
 and there was laid down upon his back on a 
 sort of drag, and so drawn to the place of exe- 
 cution, where his head was cut off on a block 
 with a broad-axe. 
 
 Such facts as these show what a state of ex- 
 asperation the two great parties of York and 
 Lancaster were in toward each other through- 
 out the kingdom. It is necessary to under- 
 stand this, in order fully to appreciate the im- 
 port and consequences of the very extraordi- 
 nary transaction which is now to be related. 
 
 It seems there was a certain knight named 
 Sir John Gray, a Lancastrian, who had been 
 killed at one of the great battles which had 
 been fought during the war. He had also been 
 attainted, as it was called — that is, sentence had 
 been pronounced against him on a charge of 
 
100 King Eichard III. 
 
 Account of Elizabeth Woodville. Edward 1 s first interview with her. 
 
 high treason, by which his estates were forfeit- 
 ed, and his wife and children, of course, re- 
 duced to poverty. The name of his wife was 
 Elizabeth Woodville. She was the daughter 
 of a noble knight named Sir Eichard Wood- 
 ville. Her mother's name was Jacquetta. On 
 the death and attainder of her husband, being 
 reduced to great poverty and distress, she went 
 home to the house of her father and mother, at 
 a beautiful manor which they possessed at Graf- 
 ton. She was quite young, and very beautiful. 
 It happened that by some means or other 
 Edward paid a visit one day to the Lady Jac- 
 quetta, at her manor, as he was passing through 
 the country. Whether this visit was accident- 
 al, or whether it was contrived by Jacquetta, 
 does not appear. However this may be, the 
 beautiful widow came into the presence of the 
 king, and, throwing herself at his feet, begged 
 and implored him to revoke the attainder of 
 her husband for the sake of her innocent and 
 helpless children. The king was much moved 
 by her beauty and by her distress. From pity- 
 ing her he soon began to love her. And yet 
 it seemed impossible that he should marry her. 
 Her rank, in the first place, was far below his, 
 and then, what was worse, she belonged to the 
 Lancastrian party, the king's implacable one- 
 
Warwick. 101 
 
 The secret marriage. The marriage gradually revealed. 
 
 mies. The king knew very well that all his 
 own partisans would be made furious at the 
 idea of such a match, and that, if they knew 
 that it was in contemplation, they would resist 
 it to the utmost of their power. For a time he 
 did not know what he should do. At length, 
 however, his love for the beautiful widow, as 
 might easily be foreseen, triumphed over all 
 considerations of prudence, and he was secretly 
 married to her. The marriage took place in 
 the morning, in a very private manner, in the 
 month of May, in 1464. 
 
 The king kept the marriage secret nearly all 
 summer. He thought it best to break the sub- 
 ject to his lords and nobles gradually, as he 
 had opportunity to communicate it to them 
 one by one. In this way it at length became 
 known, without producing, at any one time, any 
 special sensation, and toward the fall prepara- 
 tions were made for openly acknowledging the 
 union. 
 
 Although the knowledge of the king's mar- 
 riage produced no sudden outbreak of opposi- 
 tion, it awakened a great deal of secret indig- 
 nation and rage, and gave occasion to many 
 suppressed mutterings and curses. Of course, 
 every leading family of the realm, that had been 
 on Edward's side in the civil wars, which con- 
 
102 
 
 King Kichaed III. 
 
 Ancient portrait of Edward IV. 
 
 KING EDWARD IV. 
 
 This engraving is a portrait of King Edward as he ap- 
 peared at this time. It is copied from an ancient painting, 
 and doubtless represents correctly the character and expres- 
 sion of his countenance, and one form, at least, of dress which 
 he was accustomed to wear. He was, at the time of his 
 marriage, about twenty-two years of age. Elizabeth was 
 ten years older. 
 
Warwick. 103 
 
 Portrait of Queen Elizabeth Woodville. 
 
 QUEEN ELIZABETH WOODVILLE. 
 
 This engraving represents the queen. It. is taken, like 
 the other, from an ancient portrait, and no doubt corresponds 
 closely to the original. 
 
 tainecl a marriageable daughter, had been form- 
 ing hopes and laying plans to secnre this mag- 
 nificent match for themselves. Those who had 
 
104 King Richaed III. 
 
 Indignation of the Earl of Warwick. George and Richard. 
 
 no marriageable daughters of their own join- 
 ed their nearest relatives and friends in their 
 schemes, or formed plans for some foreign alli- 
 ance with a princess of France, or Burgundy, 
 or Holland, whichever would best harmonize 
 with the political schemes that they wished to 
 promote. The Earl of Warwick seems to have 
 belonged to the former class. He had two 
 daughters, as has already been stated. It would 
 very naturally be his desire that the king, if he 
 were to take for his wife any English subject 
 at all, should make choice of one of these. Of 
 course, he was more than all the rest irritated 
 and vexed at what the king had done. He 
 communicated his feelings to Clarence, but con- 
 cealed them from the king. Clarence was, of 
 course, ready to sympathize with the earl. He 
 was ready enough to take offense at any thing 
 connected with the king's marriage on very 
 slight grounds, for it was very much for his in- 
 terest, as the next heir, that his brother should 
 not be married at all. 
 
 The earl and Clarence, however, thought it 
 best for the time to suppress and conceal their 
 opposition to the marriage ; so they joined very 
 readily in the ceremonies connected with the 
 public acknowledgment of the queen. A vast 
 assemblage of nobles, prelates, and other grand 
 
A.D.1465.] Warwick. 107 
 
 The queen is publicly acknowledged. 
 
 dignitaries was convened, and Elizabeth was 
 brought forward before them and formally pre- 
 sented. The Earl of Warwick and Clarence ap- 
 peared in the foremost rank among her friends 
 on this occasion. They took her by the hand, 
 and, leading her forward, presented her to the 
 assembled multitude of lords and ladies, who 
 welcomed her with long and loud acclamations. 
 
 Soon after this a grand council was con- 
 vened, and a handsome income was settled 
 upon the queen, to enable her properly to main- 
 tain the dignity of her station. 
 
 Early in the next year preparations were 
 made for a grand coronation of the queen. For- 
 eign princes were invited to attend the cere- 
 mony, and many came, accompanied by large 
 bodies of knights and squires, to do honor to 
 the occasion. The coronation took place in 
 May. The queen was conveyed in procession 
 through the streets of London on a sort of open 
 palanquin, borne by horses most magnificently 
 caparisoned. Yast crowds of people assembled 
 along the streets to look at the procession as it 
 passed. The next day the coronation itself 
 took place in Westminster, and it was followed 
 by games, feasts, tournaments, and public re- 
 joicings of every kind, which lasted many 
 days. 
 
108 King Eichaed III. [A.D.1465. 
 
 Various difficulties and entanglements resulting from this marriage. 
 
 Thus far every thing on the surface, at least, 
 had gone well ; but it was not long after the 
 coronation before the troubles which were to 
 be expected from such a match began to devel- 
 op themselves in great force. The new queen 
 was ambitious, and she was naturally desirous 
 of bringing her friends forward into places of 
 influence and honor. The king was, of course, 
 ready to listen to her recommendations; but 
 then all her friends were Lancastrians. They 
 were willing enough, it is true, to change their 
 politics and to become Yorkists for the sake 
 of the rewards and honors which they could 
 obtain by the change, but the old friends of the 
 king were greatly exasperated to find the im- 
 portant posts, one after another, taken away 
 from them, and given to their hated enemies. 
 
 Then, besides the quarrel for the political of- 
 fices, there were a great many of the cherish- 
 ed matrimonial plans and schemes of the old 
 families interfered with and broken up by the 
 queen's family thus coming into power. It 
 happened that the queen had five unmarried 
 sisters. She began to form plans for securing 
 for them men of the highest rank and position 
 in the realm. This, of course, thwarted the 
 plans and disappointed the hopes of all those 
 families who had been scheming to gain these 
 
A.D.1465.] Warwick. 109 
 
 Jealousy against the queen's family and relations. 
 
 husbands for their own daughters. To see five 
 great heirs of dukes and barons thus withdrawn 
 from the matrimonial market, and employed to 
 increase the power and prestige of their ancient 
 and implacable foes, filled the souls of the old 
 Yorkist families with indignation. Parties were 
 formed. The queen and her family and friends 
 — the Woodvilles and Grays — with all their ad- 
 herents, were on one side ; the Neville family, 
 with the Earl of Warwick at their head, and 
 most of the old Yorkist noblemen, were on the 
 other ; Clarence joined the Earl of Warwick ; 
 Eichard, on the other hand, or Gloucester, as 
 he was now called, adhered to the king. 
 
 Things went on pretty much in this way for 
 two years. There was no open quarrel, though 
 there was a vast deal of secret animosity and 
 bickering. The great world at court was di- 
 vided into two sets, or cliques, that hated each 
 other very cordially, though both, for the pres- 
 ent, pretended to support King Edward as the 
 rightful sovereign of the country. The strug- 
 gle was for the honors and offices under him. 
 The families who still adhered to the old Lan- 
 castrian party, and to the rights of Henry and 
 of the little Prince of Wales, withdrew, of course, 
 altogether from the court, and, retiring to their 
 castles, brooded moodily there over their fallen 
 
110 King Eichard III. [A.D.1467. 
 
 Situation of Henry and his family. Margaret of York. 
 
 fortunes, and waited in expectation of better 
 times. Henry was imprisoned in the Tower; 
 Margaret and the Prince of Wales were on the 
 Continent. They and their friends were, of 
 course, watching the progress of the quarrel be- 
 tween the party of the Earl of Warwick and 
 that of the king, hoping that it might at last 
 lead to an open rupture, in which case the Lan- 
 castrians might hope for Warwick's aid to bring 
 them again into power. 
 
 And now another circumstance occurred 
 which widened this breach very much indeed. 
 It arose from a difference of opinion between 
 King Edward and the Earl of Warwick in re- 
 spect to the marriage of the king's sister Mar- 
 garet, known, as has already been said, as Mar- 
 garet of York. There was upon the Continent 
 a certain Count Charles, the son and heir of the 
 Duke of Burgundy, who demanded her hand. 
 The count's family had been enemies of the 
 house of York, and had done every thing in 
 their power to promote Queen Margaret's plans, 
 so long as there was any hope for her; but 
 when they found that King Edward was firm- 
 ly established on the throne, they came over to 
 his side, and now the count demanded the hand 
 of the Princess Margaret in marriage ; but the 
 stern old Earl of Warwick did not like such 
 
WABWICK IN THE itRESEKCE OF THE FRENCH KING. 
 
Warwick. 118 
 
 Plans and manoeuvres in respect to Margaret's marriage. 
 
 friendship as this, so he recommended that the 
 count should be refused, and that Margaret 
 should have for her husband one of the princes 
 of France. 
 
 Now King Edward himself preferred Count 
 Charles for the husband of Margaret, and this 
 chiefly because the queen, his wife, preferred 
 him on account of the old friendship which had 
 subsisted between his family and the Lancas- 
 trians. Besides this, however, Flanders, the 
 country over which the count was to reign on 
 the death of his father, was at that time so sit- 
 uated that an alliance with it would be of great- 
 er advantage to Edward's political plans than 
 an alliance with France. But, notwithstanding 
 this, the earl was so earnest in urging his opin- 
 ion, that finally Edward yielded, and the earl 
 was dispatched to France to negotiate the mar- 
 riage with the French prince. 
 
 The earl set off on this embassy in great mag- 
 nificence. He landed in Normandy with a vast 
 train of attendants, and proceeded in almost 
 royal state toward Paris. The King of France, 
 to honor his coming and the occasion, came 
 forth to meet him. The meeting took place at 
 Rouen. The proposals were well received by 
 the French king. The negotiations were con- 
 tinued for eight or ten days, and at last every 
 H ° 
 
114 King Richard III. 
 
 Count Charles carries the day. Vexation of Warwick. 
 
 thing was arranged. For the final closing of 
 the contract, it was necessary that a messenger 
 from the King of France should proceed to 
 London. The king appointed an archbishop 
 and some other dignitaries to perform the serv- 
 ice. The earl then returned to England, and 
 was soon followed by the French embassadors, 
 expecting that every thing essential was set- 
 tled, and that nothing but a few formalities re- 
 mained. 
 
 But, in the mean time, while all this had been 
 going on in France, Count Charles had quietly 
 sent an embassador to England to press his 
 claim to the princess's hand. This messenger 
 managed this business very skillfully, so as not 
 to attract any public attention to what he was 
 doing ; and besides, the earl being away, the 
 queen, Elizabeth, could exert all her influence 
 over her husband's mind unimpeded. Edward 
 was finally persuaded to promise Margaret's 
 hand to the count, and the contracts were made ; 
 so that, when the earl and the French embassa- 
 dors arrived, they found, to their astonishment 
 and dismay, that a rival and enemy had stepped 
 in during their absence and secured the prize. 
 
 The Earl of Warwick was furious when he 
 learned how he had been deceived. He had 
 been insulted, he said, and disgraced. Edward 
 
A.D.1468.] Warwick. 115 
 
 Progress of the quarrel. A temporary reconciliation. 
 
 made no attempt to pacify him; indeed, any 
 attempt that he could have made would prob- 
 ably have been fruitless. The earl withdrew 
 from the court, went off to one of his castles, 
 and shut himself up there in great displeasure. 
 
 The quarrel now began to assume a very se- 
 rious air. Edward suspected that the earl was 
 forming plots and conspiracies against him. 
 He feared that he was secretly designing to 
 take measures for restoring the Lancastrian line 
 to the throne. He was alarmed for his personal 
 safety. He expelled all Warwick's family and 
 friends from the court, and, whenever he went 
 out in public, he took care to be always attend- 
 ed by a strong body-guard, as if he thought 
 there was danger of an attempt upon his life. 
 
 At length one of the earl's brothers, the 
 youngest of the family, who was at that time 
 Archbishop of York, interposed to effect a rec- 
 onciliation. We have not space here to give a 
 full account of the negotiations ; but the result 
 was, a sort of temporary peace was made, by 
 which the earl again returned to court, and was 
 restored apparently to his former position. But 
 there was no cordial good- will between him and 
 the king. Edward dreaded the earl's power, 
 and hated the stern severity of his character, 
 while the earl, by the commanding influence 
 
116 King Richard III. [A.D.1468. 
 
 A new marriage scheme. Edward displeased. 
 
 which he exerted in the realm, was continually 
 thwarting both Edward and Elizabeth in their 
 plans. 
 
 Edward and Elizabeth had now been mar- 
 ried some time, but they had no son, and, of 
 course, no heir, for daughters in those days did 
 not inherit the English, crown. Of course, Clar- 
 ence, Edward's second brother, was the next 
 heir. This increased the jealousy which the 
 two brothers felt toward each other, and tended 
 very much to drive Clarence away from Ed- 
 ward, and to increase the intimacy between Clar- 
 ence and Warwick. At length, in 1468, it was 
 announced that a marriage was in contempla- 
 tion between Clarence and Isabella, the Earl 
 of Warwick's oldest daughter. Edward and 
 Queen Elizabeth were very much displeased 
 and very much alarmed when they heard of 
 this plan. If carried into effect, it would bind 
 Clarence and the Warwick influence together 
 in indissoluble bonds, and make their power 
 much more formidable than ever before. Ev- 
 ery body would say when the marriage was 
 concluded, 
 
 " Now, in case Edward should die, which 
 event may happen at any time, the earl's daugh- 
 ter will be queen, and then the earl will have a 
 greater influence than ever in the disposition 
 
Warwick. 117 
 
 He fails of preventing the marriage. The ceremony performed at Calais. 
 
 of offices and honors. It behooves us, there- 
 fore, to make friends with him in season, so as 
 to secure his good- will in advance, before he 
 comes into power." 
 
 King Edward and his queen, seeing how much 
 this match was likely at once to increase the 
 earl's importance, did every thing in their pow- 
 er to prevent it. But they could not succeed. 
 The earl was determined that Clarence and his 
 daughter should be married. The opposition 
 was, however, so strong at court that the mar- 
 riage could not be celebrated at London ; so 
 the ceremony was performed at Calais, which 
 city was at that time under the earl's special 
 command. The king and queen remained at 
 London, and made no attempt to conceal their 
 vexation and chagrin. 
 
118 King Eichard III. 
 
 Insurrections. The king goes to meet the rehels. 
 
 Chapter VI. 
 The Downfall of York. 
 
 IT^DWARD'S apprehension and anxiety in 
 -^ respect to the danger that Warwick might 
 be concocting schemes to restore the Lancas- 
 trian line to the throne were greatly increased 
 by the sudden breaking out of insurrections irf 
 the northern part of the island, while Warwick 
 and Clarence were absent in Calais, on the oc- 
 casion of Clarence's marriage to Isabella. The 
 insurgents did not demand the restoration of 
 the Lancastrian line, but only the removal of 
 the queen's family and relations from the coun- 
 cil. The king raised an armed force, and march- 
 ed to the northward to meet the rebels. But 
 his army was disaffected, and he could do noth- 
 ing. They fled before the advancing army of 
 insurgents, and Edward went with them to Not- 
 tingham Castle, where he shut himself up, and 
 wrote urgently to Warwick and Clarence to 
 come to his aid. 
 
 Warwick made no haste to obey this com- 
 mand. After some delay, however, he left Ca- 
 lais in command of one of his lieutenants and 
 
A.D.1469.] Downfall of York. 119 
 
 Rebellion suppressed. A grand reconciliation. 
 
 repaired to Nottingham, where he soon released 
 the king from his dangerous situation. He 
 quelled the rebellion too, but not until the in- 
 surgents had seized the father and one of the 
 brothers of the queen, and cut off their heads. 
 
 In the mean time, the Lancastrians them- 
 selves, thinking that this was a favorable time 
 for them, began to put themselves in motion. 
 Warwick was the only person who was capable 
 of meeting them and putting them down. This 
 he did, taking the king with him in his train, 
 in a condition more like that of a prisoner than 
 a sovereign. At length, however, the rebel- 
 lions were suppressed, and all parties returned 
 to London. 
 
 There now took place what purported to be 
 a grand reconciliation. Treaties were drawn 
 up and signed between "Warwick and Clarence 
 on one side, and the king on the other, by which 
 both parties bound themselves to forgive and 
 forget all that had passed, and thenceforth to 
 be good friends ; but, notwithstanding all the 
 solemn signings and sealings with which these 
 covenants were secured, the actual condition of 
 the parties in respect to each other remained 
 entirely unchanged, and neither of the three 
 felt a whit more confidence in the others after 
 the execution of these treaties than before. 
 
120 King Richard III. 
 
 The king frightened. The quarrel renewed. 
 
 At last the secret distrust which they felt to- 
 ward each other broke out openly. Warwick's 
 brother, the Archbishop of York, made an en- 
 tertainment at one of his manors for a party of 
 guests, in which were included the king, the 
 Duke of Clarence, and the Earl of "Warwick. 
 It was about three months after the treaties 
 were signed that this entertainment was made, 
 and the feast was intended to celebrate and ce- 
 ment the good understanding which it was now 
 agreed was henceforth to prevail. The king 
 arrived at the manor, and, while he was in his 
 room making his toilet for the supper, which 
 was all ready to be served, an attendant came 
 to him and whispered in his ear, 
 
 ' ' Your maj esty is in danger. There is a band 
 of armed men in ambush near the house." 
 
 The king was greatly alarmed at hearing 
 this. He immediately stole out of the house, 
 mounted his horse, and, with two or three fol- 
 lowers, rode away as fast as he could ride. He 
 continued his journey all night, and in the 
 morning arrived at Windsor Castle. 
 
 Then followed new negotiations between 
 Warwick and the king, with mutual reproach- 
 es, criminations, and recriminations without 
 number. Edward insisted that treachery was 
 intended at the house to which he had been in- 
 
A.D.1469.] Downfall of York. 121 
 
 New reconciliations. New rebellions. 
 
 vited, and that he had barely escaped, by his 
 sudden flight, from falling into the snare. But 
 Warwick and his friends denied this entirely, 
 and attributed the flight of the king to a whol- 
 ly unreasonable alarm, caused by his jealous 
 and suspicious temper. At last Edward suf- 
 fered himself to be reassured, and then came 
 new treaties and a new reconciliation. 
 
 This peace was made in the fall of 1469, 
 and in the spring of 1470 a new insurrection 
 broke out. The king believed that Warwick 
 himself, and Clarence, were really at the bottom 
 of these disturbances, but still he was forced to 
 send them with bodies of troops to subdue the 
 rebels ; he, however, immediately raised a large 
 army for himself, and proceeded to the seat of 
 war. He reached the spot before Warwick and 
 Clarence arrived there. He gave battle to the 
 insurgents, and defeated them. He took a great 
 many prisoners, and beheaded them. He found, 
 or pretended to find, proof that Warwick and 
 Clarence, instead of intending to fight the in- 
 surgents, had made their arrangements for join- 
 ing them on the following day, and that he 
 had been just in time to defeat their treachery. 
 Whether he really found evidence of these in- 
 tentions on the part of Warwick and Clarence 
 or not, or whether he was flushed by the ex- 
 
122 King Bichard III. 
 
 Warwick comes to open war with the king. 
 
 citement of victory, and resolved to seize the 
 occasion to cut loose at once and forever from 
 the entanglement in which he had been bound, 
 is somewhat uncertain. At all events, he now 
 declared open war against Warwick and Clar- 
 ence, and set off immediately on his march to 
 meet them, at the head of a force much superi- 
 or to theirs. 
 
 Warwick and Clarence marched and coun- 
 termarched, and made many manoeuvres to es- 
 cape a battle, and during all this time their 
 strength was rapidly diminishing. As long as 
 they were nominally on the king's side, how- 
 ever really hostile to him, they had plenty of 
 followers ; but, now that they were in open war 
 against him, their forces began to melt away. 
 In this emergency, Warwick suddenly changed 
 all his plans. He disbanded his army, and then 
 taking all his family with him, including Clar- 
 ence and Isabella, and accompanied by an in- 
 considerable number of faithful friends, he 
 marched at the head of a small force which he 
 retained as an escort to the sea-port of Dart- 
 mouth, and then embarked for Calais. 
 
 The vessels employed to transport the party 
 formed quite a little fleet, so numerous were the 
 servants and attendants that accompanied the 
 fugitives. They embarked without delay on 
 
Downfall of York. 123 
 
 Warwick and his party not allowed to land at Calais. 
 
 reaching the coast, as they were in haste to 
 make the passage and arrive at Calais, for Isa- 
 bella, Clarence's wife, was about to become a 
 mother, and at Calais they thought that they 
 should all be, as it were, at home. 
 
 It will be remembered that the Earl of War- 
 wick was the governor of Calais, and that when 
 he left it he had appointed a lieutenant to take 
 command of it during his absence. Before his 
 ship arrived off the port this lieutenant had re- 
 ceived dispatches from Edward, which had been 
 hurried to him by a special messenger, inform- 
 ing him that Warwick was in rebellion against 
 his sovereign, and forbidding the lieutenant to 
 allow him or his party to enter the town. 
 
 Accordingly, when Warwick's fleet arrived 
 off the port, they found the guns of the batter- 
 ies pointed at them, and sentinels on the piers 
 warning them not to attempt to land. 
 
 Warwick was thunderstruck. To be thus 
 refused admission to his own fortress by his 
 own lieutenant was something amazing, as well 
 as outrageous. The earl was at first complete- 
 ly bewildered ; but, on demanding an explana- 
 tion, the lieutenant sent him word that the re- 
 fusal to land was owing to the people of the 
 town. They, he said, having learned that he 
 and the king had come to open war, insisted 
 
12-rL King Kichard III. 
 
 The party in great straits. They land at Harfleur. 
 
 that the fortress should be reserved for their 
 sovereign. Warwick then explained the situ- 
 ation that his daughter was in ; but the lieuten- 
 ant was firm. The determination of the peo- 
 ple was so strong, he said, that he could not 
 control it. Finally, the child was born on board 
 the ship, as it lay at anchor off the port, and all 
 the aid or comfort which the party could get 
 from the shore consisted of two flagons of wine, 
 which the lieutenant, with great hesitation and 
 reluctance, allowed to be sent on board. The 
 child was a son. His birth was an event of 
 great importance, for he was, of course, as Clar- 
 ence's son, a prince in the direct line of succes- 
 sion to the English crown. 
 
 At length, finding that he could not land at 
 Calais, Warwick sailed away with his fleet along 
 the coast of France till he reached the French 
 port of Harfleur. Here his ships were admit- 
 ted, and the whole party were allowed to land. 
 
 Then followed various intrigues, manoeuvres, 
 and arrangements, which we have not time here 
 fully to unravel ; but the end of all was, that in 
 a few weeks after the Earl of Warwick's land- 
 ing in France, he repaired to a castle where 
 Margaret of Anjou and her son, the Prince of 
 Wales, were residing, and there, in the course 
 of a short time, he made arrangements to es- 
 
A.D. 1470.] Downfall of York. 125 
 
 Strange compact between Warwick and Queen Margaret. 
 
 pouse her cause, and assist in restoring her hus- 
 band to the English throne, on condition that 
 her son, the Prince of Wales, should marry his 
 second daughter Anne. It is said that Queen 
 Margaret for a long time refused to consent to 
 this arrangement. She was extremely unwill- 
 ing that her son, the heir to the English crown, 
 should take for a wife the daughter of the hated 
 enemy to whom the downfall of her family, 
 and all the terrible calamities which had be- 
 fallen them, had been mainly owing. She was, 
 however, at length induced to yield. Her am- 
 bition gained the victory over her hate, and 
 she consented to the alliance on a solemn oath 
 being taken by Warwick that thenceforth he 
 would be on her side, and do all in his power to 
 restore her family to the throne. 
 
 This arrangement was accordingly carried 
 into effect, and thus the earl had one of his 
 daughters married to the next heir to the En- 
 glish crown in the line of York, and the other 
 to the next heir in the line of Lancaster. He 
 had now only to choose to which dynasty he 
 would secure the throne. Of course, the oath 
 which he had taken, like other political oaths 
 taken in those days, was only to be kept so long 
 as he should deem it for his interest to keep it. 
 
 He could not at once openly declare in favor 
 
126 King Richard III. [A.D.1470. 
 
 Attempt to entice Clarence away from Warwick. 
 
 of King Henry, for fear of alienating Clarence 
 from him. But Clarence was soon drawn away. 
 King Edward, when he heard of the marriage 
 of Warwick's daughter with the Prince of 
 Wales, immediately formed a plan for sending 
 a messenger to negotiate with Clarence. He 
 could not do this openly, for he knew very well 
 that Warwick would not allow any avowed 
 messenger from Edward to land ; so he sent a 
 lady. The lady was a particular friend of Isa- 
 bella, Clarence's wife. She traveled privately 
 by the way of Calais. On the way she said 
 nothing about the object of her journey, but 
 gave out simply that she was going to join her 
 mistress, the Princess Isabella. On her arrival 
 she managed the affair with great discretion. 
 She easily • obtained private interviews with 
 Clarence, and represented to him that Warwick, 
 now that his daughter was married to the heir 
 on the Lancastrian side, would undoubtedly lay 
 all his plans forthwith for putting that family 
 on the throne, and that thus Clarence would 
 lose all. 
 
 "And therefore," said she, "how much bet- 
 ter it will be for you to leave him and return 
 to your brother Edward, who is ready to for- 
 give and forget all the past, and receive you 
 again as his friend." 
 
Downfall of Yoek. 127 
 
 Edward does not fear. The Duke of Burgundy. 
 
 Clarence was convinced by these representa- 
 tions, and soon afterward, watching his oppor- 
 tunity, he made his way to England, and there 
 espoused his brother's cause, and was received 
 again into his service. 
 
 In the mean time, tidings were continually 
 coming to King Edward from his friends on 
 the Continent, warning him of Warwick's plans, 
 and bidding him to be upon his guard. But 
 Edward had no fear. He said he wished that 
 Warwick would come. 
 
 " All I ask of my friends on the other side 
 of the Channel," said he, " is that, when he does 
 come, they will not let him get away again be- 
 fore I catch him — as he did before." 
 
 Edward's great friend across the Channel was 
 his brother-in-law, the Duke of Burgundy, the 
 same who, when Count Charles, had married 
 the Princess Margaret of York, as related in a 
 former chapter. The Duke of Burgundy pre- 
 pared and equipped a fleet, and had it all in 
 readiness to intercept the earl in case he should 
 attempt to sail for England. 
 
 In the mean time, Queen Margaret and the 
 earl went on with their preparations. The 
 King of France furnished them with men, arms, 
 and money. When every thing was ready, the 
 earl sent word to the north of England, to some 
 
128 King Richard III. 
 
 Queen Margaret crosses the Channel. 
 
 of his friends and partisans there, to make a 
 sort of false insurrection, in order to entice away 
 Edward and his army from the capital. This 
 plan succeeded. Edward heard of the rising, 
 and, collecting all the troops which were at hand, 
 he marched to the northward to put it down. 
 Just at this time a sudden storm arose and dis- 
 persed the Duke of Burgundy's fleet. The earl 
 then immediately put to sea, taking with him 
 Margaret of Anjou and her son, the Prince of 
 Wales, with his wife, the Earl of Warwick's 
 daughter. The Prince of Wales was now about 
 eighteen years old. The father, King Henry, 
 Margaret's husband, was not joined with the 
 party. He was all this time, as you will recol- 
 lect, a prisoner in the Tower, where Warwick 
 himself had shut him up when he deposed him 
 in order to place Edward upon the throne. 
 
 All Europe looked on with astonishment at 
 these proceedings, and watched the result with 
 intense interest. Here was a man who, having, 
 by a desperate and bloody war, deposed a king, 
 and shut him up in prison, and compelled his 
 queen and the prince his son, the heir, to fly 
 from the country to save their lives, had now 
 sought the exiles in their banishment, had mar- 
 ried his own daughter to the prince, and was 
 setting forth on an expedition for the purpose 
 
Downfall of York. 129 
 
 Landing of the expedition. Reception of it. 
 
 of liberating the father again, and restoring him 
 to the throne. 
 
 The earl's fleet crossed the Channel safely, 
 and landed on the coast of Devonshire, in the 
 southwestern part of the island. The landing 
 of the expedition was the signal for great num- 
 bers of the nobles and high families throughout 
 the realm to prepare for changing sides ; for 
 it was the fact, throughout the whole course of 
 these wars between the houses of York and 
 Lancaster, that a large proportion of the nobil- 
 ity and gentry, and great numbers of other ad- 
 venturers, who lived in various ways on the 
 public, stood always ready at once to change 
 sides whenever there was a prospect that an- 
 other side was coming into power. Then there 
 were, in such a case as this, great numbers who 
 were secretly in favor of the Lancaster line, but 
 who were prevented from manifesting their 
 preference while the house of York was in full 
 possession of power. All these persons were 
 aroused and excited by the landing of War- 
 wick. King Edward found that his calls upon 
 his friends to rally to his standard were not 
 promptly obeyed. His friends were beginning 
 to feel some doubt whether it would be best to 
 continue his friends. A certain preacher in 
 Tendon had the courage to prav in public for 
 I 
 
130 King Eichaed III. 
 
 Edward's friends and followers forsake him. 
 
 the "king in the Tower," and the manner in 
 which this allusion was received by the popu- 
 lace, and the excitement which it produced, 
 showed how ready the city of London was to 
 espouse Henry's cause. 
 
 These, and other such indications, alarmed 
 Edward very much. He turned to the south- 
 ward again when he learned that Warwick had 
 landed. Eichard, who had, during all this pe- 
 riod, adhered faithfully to Edward's cause, was 
 with him, in command of a division of the army. 
 As Warwick himself was rapidly advancing to- 
 ward the north at this time, the two armies soon 
 began to approach each other. As the time of 
 trial drew nigh, Edward found that his friends 
 and supporters were rapidly abandoning him. 
 At length, one day, while he was at dinner, a 
 messenger came in and told him that one of 
 the leading officers of the army, with the whole 
 division under his command, were waving their 
 caps and cheering for "King Harry." He saw 
 at once that all was lost, and he immediately 
 prepared to fly. 
 
 He was not far from the eastern coast at this 
 time, and there was a small vessel there under 
 his orders, which had been employed in bring- 
 ing provisions from the Thames to supply his 
 armv. There were also two Dutch vessels there. 
 
Downfall of York. 131 
 
 Edward flies from the country. Difficulties and dangers. 
 
 The king took possession of these vessels, with 
 Kichard, and the few other followers that went 
 with him, and put at once to sea. Nobody 
 knew where they were going. 
 
 Yery soon after they had put to sea they 
 were attacked by pirates. They escaped only 
 by running their vessel on shore on the coast 
 of Finland. Here the king found himself in a 
 state of almost absolute destitution, so that he 
 had to pawn his clothing to satisfy the most 
 urgent demands. At length, after meeting with 
 various strange adventures, he found his way to 
 the Hague, where he was, for the time, in com- 
 parative safety. 
 
 As soon as Warwick ascertained that Ed- 
 ward had fled, he turned toward London, with 
 nothing now to impede his progress. He en- 
 tered London in triumph. Clarence j oined him, 
 and entered London in his train ; for Clarence, 
 though he had gone to England with the inten- 
 tion of making common cause with his brother, 
 had not been able yet to decide positively 
 whether it would, on the whole, be for his in- 
 terest to do so, and had, accordingly, kept him- 
 self in some degree uncommitted, and now he 
 turned at once again to Warwick's side. 
 
 The queen — Elizabeth Woodville — with her 
 mother Jacquetta, were residing at the Tower 
 
132 King Eichaed III. 
 
 His mother makes her escape to sanctuary. 
 
 at this time, where they had King Henry in 
 their keeping ; for the Tower was an extended 
 group of buildings, in which palace and prison 
 were combined in one. As soon as the queen 
 learned that Edward was defeated, and that 
 Warwick and Clarence were coming in triumph 
 to London, she took her mother and three of 
 her daughters — Elizabeth, Mary, and Cecily — 
 who were with her at that time, and also a lady 
 attendant, and hurried down the Tower stairs 
 to a barge which was always in waiting there. 
 She embarked on board the barge, and ordered 
 the men to row her up to Westminster. 
 
 Westminster is at the upper end of London, 
 as the Tower is at the lower. On arriving at 
 Westminster, the whole party fled for refuge to 
 a sanctuary there. This sanctuary was a por- 
 tion of the sacred precincts of a church, from 
 which a refugee could not be taken, according 
 to the ideas of those times, without committing 
 the dreadful crime of sacrilege. A part of the 
 building remained standing for three hundred 
 years after this time, as represented in the oppo- 
 site engraving. It was a gloomy old edifice, and 
 it must have been a cheerless residence for prin- 
 cesses and a queen. 
 
 In this sanctuary, the queen, away from her 
 husband, and deprived of almost every comfort. 
 
A.D. 1470.J Downfall of York. 135 
 
 Birth of Edward's son and heir. 
 
 gave birth to her first son. Some persons liv- 
 ing near took compassion upon her forlorn and 
 desolate condition, and rendered her such aid 
 as was absolutely necessary, out of charity. 
 The abbot of the monastery connected with the 
 church sent in various conveniences, and a 
 good woman named Mother Cobb, who lived 
 near by, came in and acted as nurse for the 
 mother and the child. 
 
 The child was baptized in the sanctuary a 
 few days after he was born. He was named 
 Edward, after his father. Of course, the birth 
 of this son of King Edward cut off Clarence 
 and his son from the succession on the York 
 side. This little Edward was now the heir, 
 and, about thirteen years after this, as we shall 
 see in the sequel, he became King of England. 
 
 As soon as the Earl of Warwick reached 
 London, he proceeded at once to the Tower to 
 release old King Henry from his confinement. 
 He found the poor king in a wretched plight. 
 His apartment was gloomy and comfortless, his 
 clothing was ragged, and his person squalid and 
 dirty. The earl brought him forth from his 
 prison, and, after causing his personal wants to 
 be properly attended to, clothed him once more 
 in royal robes, and conveyed him in state 
 through London to the palace in Westminster, 
 
13(3 King Richard III. [A.D.1470. 
 
 King Henry is fully restored to the throne. 
 
 and established him there nominally as King 
 of England, thongh Warwick was to all intents 
 and purposes the real king. A Parliament was 
 called, and all necessary laws were passed to 
 sanction and confirm the dynasty. Queen Mar- 
 garet, who, however, had not yet arrived from 
 the Continent, was restored to her former rank, 
 and the young Prince of Wales, now about 
 eighteen years old, was the object of universal 
 interest throughout the kingdom, as now the 
 unquestioned and only heir to the crown. 
 
A.D.1470.] Fall of Lancaster. 187 
 
 Position of Richard. The Duke of Burgundy. 
 
 Chapter YII. 
 The Downfall of Lancaster. 
 
 IT was in the month of October, 1470, that 
 old King Henry and his family were re- 
 stored to the throne. Clarence, as we have 
 seen, being allied to Warwick by being mar- 
 ried to his daughter, was induced to go over 
 with him to the Lancastrian side ; but Glouces- 
 ter — that is, Kichard — remained true to his own 
 line, and followed the fortunes of his brother, 
 in adverse as well as in prosperous times, with 
 unchanging fidelity. He was now with Ed- 
 ward in the dominions of the Duke of Burgun- 
 dy, who, you will recollect, married Margaret, 
 Edward's sister, and who was now very natu- 
 rally inclined to espouse Edward's cause. 
 
 The Duke of Burgundy did not, however, 
 dare to espouse Edward's cause too openly, for 
 fear of the King of France, who took the side 
 of Henry and Queen Margaret. He, however, 
 did all in his power secretly to befriend him. 
 Edward and Eichard began immediately to 
 form schemes for going back to England and 
 recovering possession of the kingdom. The 
 
13$ King .Richard III. 
 
 His cunning. Secret communication with Clarence. 
 
 Duke of Burgundy issued a public proclama- 
 tion, in which it was forbidden that any of his 
 subjects should join Edward, or that any expe- 
 dition to promote his designs should be fitted 
 out in any part of his dominions. This procla- 
 mation was for the sake of the King of France. 
 At the same time that he issued these orders 
 publicly, he secretly sent Edward a large sum 
 of money, furnished him with a fleet of fifteen 
 or twenty ships, and assisted him in collecting 
 a force of twelve hundred men. 
 
 "While he was making these arrangements 
 and preparations on the Continent, Edward and 
 his friends had also opened a secret communi- 
 cation with Clarence in England. It would, of 
 course, very much weaken the cause of Edward 
 and Eichard to have Clarence against them; 
 so Margaret, the wife of the Duke of Burgundy, 
 interested herself in endeavoring to win him 
 back again to their side. She had herself great 
 influence over him, and she was assisted in her 
 efforts by their mother, the Lady Cecily, who 
 was still living in the neighborhood of London, 
 and who was greatly grieved at Clarence's hav- 
 ing turned against his brothers. The tie which 
 bound Clarence to the Earl of Warwick was, 
 of course, derived chiefly from his being mar- 
 ried to Warwick's daughter. Warwick, how- 
 
Eall of Lancaster. 139 
 
 Warwick's plans to secure Clarence. 
 
 ever, did not trust wholly to this. As soon as 
 he had restored Henry to the throne, he con- 
 trived a cunning plan which he thought would 
 tend to bind Clarence still more strongly to 
 himself, and to alienate him completely from 
 Edward. This plan was to induce the Parlia- 
 ment to confiscate all Edward's estates and con- 
 fer them upon Clarence. 
 
 "Now," said Warwick to himself, when this 
 measure had been accomplished, "Clarence will 
 be sure to oppose Edward's return to England, 
 for he knows very well that if he should return 
 and be restored to the throne, he would, of 
 course, take all these estates back again." 
 
 But, while Edward was forming his plans on 
 the Continent for a fresh invasion of England, 
 Margaret sent messengers to Clarence, and their 
 persuasions, united to those of his mother, in- 
 duced Clarence to change his mind. He was 
 governed by no principle whatever in what he 
 did, but only looked to see what would most 
 speedily and most fully gratify his ambition 
 and increase his wealth. So, when they argued 
 that it would be much better for him to be on 
 the side of his brothers, and assist in restoring 
 his own branch of the family to the throne, than 
 to continue his unnatural connection with War- 
 wick and the house of Lancaster, he allowed 
 
140 King Richard III. 
 
 Edward and Richard sail for England. 
 
 himself to be easily persuaded, and lie prom- 
 ised that though, for the present, he should re- 
 main ostensibly a friend of Warwick, still, if 
 Edward and Eichard would raise an expedition 
 and come to England, he would forsake War- 
 wick and the Lancasters, and join them. 
 
 Accordingly, in the spring, when the fleet 
 and the forces were ready, Edward and Richard 
 set sail from the Low Country to cross the Chan- 
 nel. It was early in March. They intended 
 to proceed to the north of England and land 
 there. They had a very stormy passage, and 
 in the end the fleet was dispersed, and Edward 
 and Richard with great difficulty succeeded in 
 reaching the land. The two brothers were in 
 different ships, and they landed in different 
 places, a few miles ajiart from each other. 
 Their situation was now extremely critical, for 
 all England was in the power of Warwick and 
 the Lancastrians, and Edward and Richard were 
 almost entirely without men. 
 
 They, however, after a time, got together a 
 small force, consisting chiefly of the troops who 
 had come with them, and who had succeeded 
 at last in making their way to the land. At 
 the head of this force they advanced into the 
 country toward the city of York. Edward gave 
 out everv where that he had not come with anv 
 
A.D.1471.] Fall of Lancaster. 141 
 
 Stratagems of war. Reception of Edward at York. 
 
 view of attempting to regain possession of the 
 throne, but only to recover his own private and 
 family estates, which had been unjustly confis- 
 cated, he said, and conferred upon his brother. 
 He acquiesced entirely, he said, in the restora- 
 tion of Henry to the throne, and acknowledged 
 him as king, and solemnly declared that he 
 would not do any thing to disturb the peace of 
 the country. 
 
 All this was treacherous and false ; but Ed- 
 ward and Kichard thought that they were not 
 yet strong enough to announce openly their 
 real designs, and, in the mean time, the uttering 
 of any false declarations which they might deem 
 it good policy to make was to be considered as 
 a stratagem justified by usage, as one of the le- 
 gitimate resources of war. 
 
 So they went on, nobody opposing them. 
 They reached, at length, the city of York. 
 Here Edward met the mayor and aldermen of 
 the city, and renewed his declaration, which 
 he confirmed by a solemn oath, that he never 
 would lay any claim to the throne of England, 
 or do any thing to disturb King Henry in his 
 possession of it. He cried out, in a loud voice, 
 in the hearing of the people, " Long live King 
 Henry, and Prince Edward his son I" He wore 
 an ostrich feather, too, in his armor, which was 
 
142 King Richard III. 
 
 The roses. Public opinion. Warwick. 
 
 the badge of Prince Edward. The people of 
 York were satisfied with these protestations, 
 and allowed him to proceed. 
 
 His force was continually increasing as he 
 advanced, and at length, on crossing the River 
 Trent, he came to a part of the country where 
 almost the whole population had been on the 
 side of York during all the previous wars. 
 He began now to throw off his disguise, and to 
 avow more openly that his object was again to 
 obtain possession of the throne for the house of 
 York. His troops now began to exhibit the 
 white rose, which for many generations had 
 been the badge of the house of York, as the 
 red rose had been that of Lancaster.* In a 
 word, the country was every where aroused and 
 excited by the idea that another revolution was 
 impending, and all those whose ruling principle 
 it was to be always with the party that was up- 
 permost began to make preparations for com- 
 ing over to Edward's side. 
 
 In the mean time, however, Warwick, alarm- 
 ed, had come from the northward to London to 
 meet the invaders at the head of a strong force. 
 
 * It was in consequence of this use of the roses, as the 
 badges of the two parties respectively, that the civil wars 
 between these two great families are often called in history 
 the Wars of the Roses. 
 
Fall of Lancastek. 143 
 
 Position of Clarence. His double dealing. 
 
 Clarence was in command of one great division 
 of this force, and Warwick himself of the other. 
 The two bodies of troops marched at some lit- 
 tle distance from each other. Edward shaped 
 his course so as to approach that commanded 
 by Clarence. Warwick did all he could to pre- 
 vent this, being, apparently, somewhat suspi- 
 cious that Clarence was not fully to be relied on. 
 But Edward succeeded, by dint of skillful ma- 
 noeuvring, in accomplishing his object, and thus 
 he and Clarence came into the neighborhood of 
 each other. The respective encampments were 
 only three miles apart. It seems, however, that 
 there were still some closing negotiations to be 
 made before Clarence was fully prepared to 
 take the momentous step that was now before 
 him. Richard was the agent of these negotia- 
 tions. He went back and forth between the 
 two camps, conveying the proposals and coun- 
 ter-proposals from one party to the other, and 
 doing all in his power to remove obstacles from 
 the way, and to bring his brothers to an agree- 
 ment. At last every thing was arranged. Clar- 
 ence ordered his men to display the white rose 
 upon their armor, and then, with trumpets 
 sounding and banners flying, he marched forth 
 to meet Edward, and to submit himself to his 
 command. 
 
144 King Eicharu III. 
 
 Clarence goes over to Edward's side. 
 
 When the column which he led arrived near 
 to Edward's camp, it halted, and Clarence him- 
 self, with a small body of attendants, advanced 
 to meet his brother ; Edward, at the same time, 
 leaving his encampment, in company with Kich- 
 ard and several noblemen, came forward too. 
 Thus Edward and Clarence met, as the old chron- 
 icle expresses it, " betwixt both hosts, where 
 was right kind and loving language betwixt 
 them two. And then, in like wise, spoke to- 
 gether the two Dukes of Clarence and Glouces- 
 ter, and afterward the other noblemen that were 
 there with them; whereof all the people that 
 were there that loved them were right glad and 
 joyous, and thanked Grod highly for that joyous 
 meeting, unity and concord, hoping that there- 
 by should grow unto them prosperous fortune 
 in all that they should after that have to do." 
 
 Warwick was, of course, in a dreadful rage 
 when he learned that Clarence had betrayed 
 him and gone over to the enemy. He could 
 do nothing, however, to repair the mischief, and 
 he was altogether too weak to resist the two 
 armies now combined against him ; so he drew 
 back, leaving the way clear, and Edward, at the 
 head now of an overwhelming force, and ac- 
 companied by both his brothers, advanced di- 
 rect! v to London. 
 
Fall of Lancaster. 145 
 
 Edward triumphant. Henry again sent to the Tower. 
 
 He was received at the capital with great 
 favor. Whoever was uppermost for the time 
 being was always received with favor in En- 
 gland in those days, both in the capital and 
 throughout the country at large. It was said, 
 however, that the interest in Edward's fortunes, 
 and in the succession of his branch of the fam- 
 ily to the throne, was greatly increased at this 
 time by the birth of his son, which had taken 
 place in the sanctuary, as related in the last 
 chapter, soon after Queen Elizabeth sought ref- 
 uge there, at the time of Edward's expulsion 
 from the kingdom. Of course, the first thing 
 which Edward did after making his public en- 
 try into London was to proceed to the sanctu- 
 ary to rejoin his wife, and deliver her from her 
 duress, and also to see his new-born son. 
 
 Queen Margaret was out of the kingdom at 
 this time, being on a visit to the Continent. 
 She had her son, the Prince of Wales, with her ; 
 but Henry, the king, was in London. He, of 
 course, fell into Edward's hands, and was im- 
 mediately sent back a prisoner to the Tower. 
 
 Edward remained only a day or two in Lon- 
 don, and then set off again, at the head of all 
 his troops, to meet Warwick. He brought out 
 King Henry from the Tower, and took him 
 with the army as a prisoner. 
 K 
 
14(5 King .Richard 111. 
 
 "Warwick refuses to yield. Preparations for a battle. 
 
 Warwick had now strengthened himself so 
 far that he was prepared for battle. The two 
 armies approached each other not many miles 
 from London. Before commencing hostilities, 
 Clarence wished for an opportunity to attempt 
 a reconciliation ; he, of course, felt a strong de- 
 sire to make peace, if possible, for his situation, 
 in case of battle, would be painful in the ex- 
 treme — his brothers on one side, and his father- 
 in-law on the other, and he himself compelled 
 to fight against the cause which he had aban- 
 doned and betrayed. So he sent a messenger 
 to the earl, offering to act as mediator between 
 him and his brother, in hopes of finding some 
 mode of arranging the quarrel ; but the earl, 
 instead of accepting the mediation, sent back 
 only invectives and defiance. 
 
 " Gro tell your master," he said to the messen- 
 ger, "that Warwick is not the man to follow 
 the example of faithlessness and treason which 
 the false, perjured Clarence has set him. Un- 
 like him, I stand true to my oath, and this quar- 
 rel can only be settled by the sword." 
 
 Of course, nothing now remained but to fight 
 the battle, and a most desperate and bloody 
 battle it was. It was fought upon a plain at a 
 place called Barnet. It lasted from four in the 
 morning 1 till ten. 
 

 . 
 
Fall of Lancaster. M9 
 
 Edward victorious. Warwick slain. 
 
 Kichard came forward in the fight in a very 
 conspicuous and prominent manner. He was 
 now about eighteen years of age, and this was 
 the first serious battle in which he had been ac- 
 tually engaged. He evinced a great deal of 
 heroism, and won great praise by the ardor in 
 which he rushed into the thickest of the fight, 
 and by the manner in which he conducted him- 
 self there. The squires who attended him were 
 both killed, but Eichard himself remained un- 
 hurt. * 
 
 In the end, Edward was victorious. The 
 quarrel was thus decided by the sword, as War- 
 wick had said, and decided, so far as the earl 
 was concerned, terribly and irrevocably, for He 
 himself was unhorsed upon the field, and slain. 
 Many thousands of soldiers fell on each side, 
 and great numbers o.f the leading nobles. The 
 bodies were buried in one common trench, 
 which was dug for the purpose on the plain, 
 and a chapel was afterward erected over them, 
 to mark and consecrate the spot. 
 
 It is said in respect to King Henry, who had 
 been taken from the Tower and made to ac- 
 company the army to the field, that Edward 
 placed him in the midst of the fight at Barnet, 
 in the hope that he might in this way be slain, 
 either by accident or design. This plan, how- 
 
150 King Richard III. [A.D.1471. 
 
 King Henry. Margaret and the Prince of Wales. 
 
 ever, if it were formed, did not succeed, for 
 Henry escaped unharmed, and, after the battle, 
 was taken back to London, and again conveyed 
 through the gloomy streets of the lower city to 
 his solitary prison in the Tower. The streets 
 were filled, after he had passed, with groups of 
 men of all ranks and stations, discussing the 
 strange and mournful vicissitudes in the life of 
 this hapless monarch, now for the second time 
 cut off from all his friends, and immured hope- 
 lessly in a dismal dungeon. 
 
 On the very day of the battle of Barnet, 
 Queen Margaret, who had hastened her return 
 to England on hearing of Edward's invasion, 
 landed at Plymouth, in the southwestern part 
 of England. The young Prince of Wales, her 
 son, was with her. When she heard the terri- 
 ble tidings of the loss of the battle of Barnet 
 and the death of Warwick, she was struck with 
 consternation, and immediately fled to an ab- 
 bey in the neighborhood of the place where 
 she had landed, and took sanctuary there. She 
 soon, however, recovered from this panic, and 
 came forth again. She put herself, with her 
 son, at the head of the French troops which she 
 had brought with her, and collected also as 
 many more as she could induce to join her, and 
 then, marching- slowly toward the northward . 
 
BTR'KET LEADING TO THE TOWER. 
 
Fall of Lancaster. 153 
 
 Meeting of the armies. Two boys to command. 
 
 finally took a strong position on the Eiver Sev- 
 ern, near the town of Tewkesbury. Tewkes- 
 bury is in the western part of England, near 
 the frontiers of Wales. 
 
 Edward, having received intelligence of her 
 movements, collected his forces also, and, ac- 
 companied by Clarence and Gloucester, went 
 forth to meet her. The two armies met about 
 three weeks after the battle of Barnet, in which 
 Warwick was killed. All the flower of the 
 English nobility were there, on one side or on 
 the other. 
 
 Queen Margaret's son, the Prince of Wales, 
 was now about eighteen years of age, and his 
 mother placed him in command — nominally at 
 the head of the army. Edward, on his side, as- 
 signed the same position to Eichard, who was 
 almost precisely of the same age with the Prince 
 of Wales. Thus the great and terrible battle 
 which ensued was fought, as it were, by two 
 boys, cousins to each other, and neither of 
 them out of their teens. 
 
 The operations were, however, really direct- 
 ed by older and more experienced men. The 
 chief counselor on Margaret's side was the 
 Duke of Somerset. Edward's army attempted, 
 by means of certain evolutions, to entice the 
 queen's army out of their camp. Somerset 
 
15-1 King Richard III. 
 
 The killing of Lord Wenlock. End of the battle. 
 
 wished to go, and he commanded the men to 
 follow. Some followed, but others remained 
 behind. Among those that remained behind 
 was a body of men under the command of a 
 certain Lord Wenlock. Somerset was angry 
 because they did not follow him, and he sus- 
 pected, moreover, that Lord Wenlock was in- 
 tending to betray the queen and go over to the 
 other side ; so he turned back in a rage, and, 
 coming up to Lord Wenlock, struck him a 
 dreadful blow upon his helmet with his battle- 
 axe, and killed him on the spot. 
 
 In the midst of the confusion which this af- 
 fair produced, Richard, at the head of his broth- 
 er's troops, came forcing his way into the in- 
 trenchments, bearing down all before him. 
 The queen's army was thrown into confusion, 
 and put to flight. Thousands upon thousands 
 were killed. As many as could save them- 
 selves from being slaughtered upon the spot 
 fled into the country toward the north, pursued 
 by detached parties of their enemies. 
 
 The young Prince of Wales was taken pris- 
 oner. The queen fled, and for a time it was 
 not known what had become of her. She fled 
 to the church in Tewkesbury, and took refuge 
 there. 
 
 As for the Prince of Wales, the account of 
 
Fall of Lancaster. 157 
 
 Murder of the Prince of Wales. 
 
 his fate which was given at the time, and has 
 generally been believed since, is this : As soon 
 as the battle was over, he was brought, disarm- 
 ed and helpless, into King Edward's tent, and 
 there Edward, Clarence, Gloucester, and oth- 
 ers gathered around to triumph over him, and 
 taunt him with his downfall. Edward came up 
 to him, and, after gazing upon him a moment 
 in a fierce and defiant manner, demanded of 
 him, in a furious tone, " What brought him to 
 England?" 
 
 "My father's crown and my own inherit- 
 ance," replied the prince. 
 
 Edward uttered some exclamation of anger, 
 and then struck the prince upon the mouth 
 with his gauntlet.* 
 
 At this signal, Gloucester, and the others 
 who were standing by, fell upon the poor help- 
 less boy, and killed him on the spot. The 
 prince cried to Clarence, who was his brother- 
 in-law, to save him, but in vain ; Clarence did 
 not interfere. 
 
 Some of the modern defenders of Kichard's 
 character attempt to show that there is no suf- 
 ficient evidence that this story is true, and they 
 
 * The gauntlet was a sort of iron glove, the fingers of 
 which were made flexible by joints formed with scales slid- 
 ing over each other. 
 
158 King Eichard III. 
 
 The queen' s refuge. Edward in the church. 
 
 maintain that the prince was slain upon the 
 field, after the battle, and that Eichard was in- 
 nocent of his death. The evidence, however, 
 seems strongly against this last supposition. 
 
 Soon after the battle, it was found that the 
 queen, with her attendants, as has already been 
 stated, had taken refuge in a church at Tewkes- 
 bury, and in other sacred structures near. 
 
 Edward proceeded directly to the church, 
 with the intention of hunting out his enemies 
 wherever he could find them. He broke into 
 the sacred precincts, sword in hand, attended 
 by a number of reckless and desperate follow- 
 ers, and would have slain those that had taken 
 refuge there, on the spot, had not the abbot 
 himself come forward and interposed to protect 
 them. He came dressed in his sacerdotal robes, 
 and bearing the sacred emblems in his hands. 
 These emblems he held up before the infuriated 
 Edward as a token of the sanctity of the place. 
 By these means the king's hand was stayed, 
 and, before allowing him to go away, the abbot 
 exacted from him a promise that he would mo- 
 lest the refugees no more. 
 
 This promise was, however, not made to be 
 kept. Two days afterward Edward appointed 
 a court-martial, and sent Eichard, with an armed 
 force, to the church, to take all the men that 
 
Fall of Lancaster. 161 
 
 Margaret taken. Conducted a prisoner to London. 
 
 had sought refuge there, and bring them out for 
 trial. The trial was conducted with very little 
 ceremony, and the men were all beheaded on 
 the green, in Tewkesbury, that very day. 
 
 Queen Margaret and the ladies who attend- 
 ed her were not with them. They had sought 
 refuge in another place. They were, however, 
 found after a few days, and were all brought 
 prisoners to Edward's camp at Coventry ; for, 
 after the battle, Edward had begun to move on 
 with his army across the country. 
 
 The king's first idea was to send Margaret 
 immediately to London and put her in the Tow- 
 er ; but, before he did this, a change in his plans 
 took place, which led him to decide to go to 
 London himself. So he took Queen Margaret 
 with him, a captive in his train. On the arri- 
 val of the party in London, the queen was con- 
 veyed at once to the Tower. 
 
 Here she remained a close prisoner for five 
 long and weary years, and was then ransomed 
 by the King of France and taken to the Con- 
 tinent. She lived after this in comparative ob- 
 scurity for about ten years, and then died. 
 
 As for her husband, his earthly troubles were 
 
 brought to an end much sooner. The cause of 
 
 the change of plan above referred to, which led 
 
 Edward to go directly to London soon after 
 
 L 
 
162 King Richard III. [A.D.1471. 
 
 Henry is put to death in the Tower. 
 
 the battle of Tewkesbury, was the news that a 
 relative of Warwick, whom that nobleman, dur- 
 ing his life-time, had put in command in the 
 southeastern part of England, had raised an in- 
 surrection there, with a view of marching to 
 London, rescuing Henry from the Tower, and 
 putting him upon the throne. This movement 
 was soon put down, and Edward returned from 
 the expedition triumphant to London. He and 
 his brothers spent the night after their arrival 
 in the Tower. The next morning King Henry 
 was found dead in his bed. 
 
 The universal belief was then, and has been 
 since, that he was put to death by Edward's or- 
 ders, and it has been the general opinion that 
 Richard was the murderer. 
 
 The body of the king was put upon a bier 
 that same day, and conveyed to St. Paul's 
 Church in London, and there exhibited to the 
 public for a long time, with guards and torch- 
 bearers surrounding it. An immense concourse 
 of people came to view his remains. The ob- 
 ject of this exposition of the body of the king 
 was to make sure the fact of his death in the 
 public mind, and prevent the possibility of the 
 circulation of rumors, subsequently, by the par- 
 tisans of his house, that he was still alive ; for 
 such rumors would greatly have increased the 
 
A.D.1471.] Fall of Lancaster. 163 
 
 Burial of Henry VI. 
 
 danger of any insurrectionary plans which 
 might be formed against Edward's authority. 
 
 In due time the body was interred at Wind- 
 sor, and a sculptured monument, adorned with 
 various arms and emblems, was erected over 
 the tomb. 
 
 TOMB OF HKNRY VI 
 
164 King Richard III. [A.D.U71. 
 
 The Lancastrian party completely subdued. 
 
 The remaining leaders on the Lancaster side 
 were disposed of in a very effectual manner, to 
 prevent the possibility of their again acquiring 
 power. Some were banished. Others were 
 shut up in various castles as hopeless prisoners. 
 The country was thus wholly subdued, and Ed- 
 ward was once more established firmly on his 
 throne. 
 
Eichard's Marriage. 165 
 
 Characters of Clarence and Kichard. 
 
 Chapter VIII. 
 Eichard's Marriage. 
 
 WHEN the affairs of the kingdom were 
 settled, after the return of King Edward 
 to the throne, Eichard, Duke of Gloucester, the 
 subject of the present volume, was found occu- 
 pying a very exalted and brilliant position. It 
 is true, he was yet very young, being only about 
 nineteen years of age, and by birth he was sec- 
 ond to Clarence, Clarence being his older broth- 
 er. But Clarence had been so wavering and 
 vacillating, having changed sides so often in 
 the great quarrels, that no confidence was 
 placed in him now on either side. Eichard, 
 on the other hand, had steadily adhered to his 
 brother Edward's cause. He had shared all 
 his brother's reverses, and he had rendered him 
 most valuable and efficient aid in all the battles 
 which he had fought, and had contributed es- 
 sentially to his success in all the victories which 
 he had gained. Of course, now, Edward and 
 his friends had great confidence in Eichard, 
 while Clarence was looked upon with suspicion 
 and distrust. 
 
166 King Eichard III. [A.D.1471. 
 
 Embarrassing situation in which Clarence was placed. 
 
 Clarence, it is true, had one excuse for his 
 instability, which Eichard had not ; for Clar- 
 ence, having married the Earl of Warwick's 
 daughter, was, of course, brought into very 
 close connection with the earl, and was subject- 
 ed greatly to his influence. Accordingly, what- 
 ever course Warwick decided to take, it was 
 extremely difficult for Clarence to avoid join- 
 ing him in it ; and when at length Warwick 
 arranged the marriage of his daughter. Anne 
 with the Prince of Wales, King • Henry's son, 
 and so joined himself to the Lancaster party, 
 Clarence was placed between two strong and 
 contrary attractions — his attachment to his 
 brother, and his natural interest in the advance- 
 ment of his own family being on one side, and 
 his love for his wife, and the great influence 
 and ascendency exerted over his mind by his 
 father-in-law being on the other. 
 
 Eichard was hi no such strait. There was 
 nothing to entice him away from his fidelity to 
 his brother, so he remained true. 
 
 He had been so brave and efficient, too, in 
 the military operations connected with Edward's 
 recovery of the throne, that he had acquired 
 great renown as a soldier throughout the king- 
 dom. The fame of his exploits was the more 
 brilliant on account of his youth. It was con- 
 
A.D.1471.] Richard's Marriage. 167 
 
 Richard made Lord High Admiral of England. 
 
 sidered remarkable that a young man not yet 
 out of his teens should show so much skill, 
 and act with so much resolution and energy in 
 times so trying, and the country resounded 
 with his praises. 
 
 As soon as Edward was established on the 
 throne, he raised Richard to what was in those 
 days, perhaps, the highest office under the 
 crown, that of Lord High Admiral of England. 
 This was the office which the Earl of Warwick 
 had held, and to which a great portion of the 
 power and influence which he exercised was 
 owing. The Lord High Admiral had command 
 of the navy, and of the principal ports on both 
 sides of the English Channel, so long as any 
 ports on the French side remained in English 
 hands. The reader will recollect, perhaps, that 
 while Richard was quite a small boy, his moth- 
 er was compelled to fly with him and his little 
 brother George to France, to escape from the 
 enemies of the family, at the time of his father's 
 death, and that it was through the Earl of War- 
 wick's co-operation that she was enabled to ac- 
 complish this flight. Now it was in conse- 
 quence of Warwick's being at that time Lord 
 High Admiral of England, and his having com- 
 mand of Calais, and the waters between Calais 
 and England, that he could make arrangements 
 
168 King Kichard III. 
 
 His real character. Requisites of a good soldier. 
 
 to assist Lady Cecily so effectually on that oc- 
 casion. 
 
 Still, Bichard, though universally applauded 
 for his military courage and energy, was known 
 to all who had opportunities of becoming per- 
 sonally acquainted with him to be a bad man. 
 He was unprincipled, hard-hearted, and reck- 
 less. This, however, did not detract from his 
 military fame. Indeed, depravity of private 
 character seldom diminishes much the applause 
 which a nation bestows upon those who acquire 
 military renown in their service. It is not to 
 be expected that it should. Military exploits 
 have been, in fact, generally, in the history of 
 the world, gigantic crimes, committed by reck- 
 less and remorseless men for the benefit of oth- 
 ers, who, though they would be deterred by 
 their scruples of conscience or their moral sen- 
 sibilities from perpetrating such deeds them- 
 selves, are ready to repay, with the most ex- 
 travagant honors and rewards, those who are 
 ferocious and unscrupulous enough to perpe- 
 trate them in their stead. Were it not for some 
 very few and rare exceptions to the general 
 rule, which have from time to time appeared, 
 the history of mankind would show that, to be 
 a good soldier, it is almost absolutely essential to 
 be a bad man. 
 
Kichard's Marriage. 169 
 
 Young Edward formally acknowledged heir to the crown. 
 
 The child, Prince Edward, the son of Edward 
 the Fourth, who was born, as is related in a 
 preceding chapter, in the sanctuary at West- 
 minster, whither his mother had fled at the time 
 when Edward was expelled from the kingdom, 
 was, of course, King Edward's heir. He was 
 now less than a year old, and, in order to place 
 his title to the crown beyond dispute, a solemn 
 oath was required from all the leading nobles 
 and officers of Edward's government, that in 
 case he survived his father they would acknowl- 
 edge him as king. The following is the form 
 of the oath which was taken : 
 
 £ acfcnotoletia.e, tafce, anti repute sou, lEtitoarti, prince 
 of (Scales, IBufte of ©omtoagll, anti 3Erl of <&!)estre, 
 furste befloterc son of oure soberefjjne lorti, as to tije co= 
 rones anti reames of SBnfllanti anti of prance, anti loro* 
 slnn of KrelantJ ; anti promette aUO stocre t&at in case 
 hereafter ft tjappen gou bg CKotitifs tifsposftfon tro out* 
 Ifbe our soberefflne lorti, £ sfjall tfjen tafce anti accept gou 
 for true, berag anti rfpjteous Bfnfl of 2Enalanti, anti of 
 jfrance, anti of firelanti ; anti feftf) anti trout!) to gou 
 sfjall were, anti gn all ttjgugs truelg anti feftfjfullg be= 
 fjabe me totoarties sou anti goure fjegres, as a true anti 
 f eft!) fill subject otoett) to oefiabe fifm to fifs sobereffliie lorti 
 anti rfsijtffjs B.fng of IBnglauti, if ranee, anti Krelanti ; 
 so fielp me ^Koti, anti ^olftiome, anti tfifs ijoln 2Ebano,e* 
 Ifst. 
 
 Richard took this oath with the rest. How 
 he kept it will hereafter appear. 
 
170 King Kichard III. 
 
 Forlorn condition of Lady Anne. 
 
 The Lady Anne, the second daughter of the 
 Earl of Warwick, who had been betrothed to 
 the Prince of Wales, King Henry's son, was 
 left, by the fall of the house of Lancaster and 
 the re-establishment of King Edward the Fourth 
 upon the throne, in a most forlorn and pitiable 
 condition. Her father, the earl, was dead, hav- 
 ing been killed in battle. Her betrothed hus- 
 band, too, the Prince of Wales, with whom she 
 had fondly hoped one day to sit on the throne 
 of England, had been cruelly assassinated. 
 Queen Margaret, the mother of the prince, who 
 might have been expected to take an interest 
 in her fate, was a helpless prisoner in the Tow- 
 er. And if the fallen queen had been at liber- 
 ty, it is very probable that all her interest in 
 Anne would prove to have been extinguished 
 by the death of her son ; for Queen Margaret 
 had never felt any personal preference for Anne, 
 and had only consented to the marriage very 
 reluctantly, and from political considerations 
 alone. The friends and connections of her fa- 
 ther's family, a short time since so exalted in 
 station and so powerful, were now scattered 
 and destroyed. Some had been killed in bat- 
 tle, others beheaded by executioners, others 
 banished from the realm. The rest were roam- 
 ing about England in terror and distress, house- 
 
A.D.1471.] Kichard's Marriage. 171 
 
 Her sister Isabella. Clarence's views in respect to the property. 
 
 less, homeless, friendless, and only intent to find 
 some hiding-place where they might screen 
 themselves from Edward's power and venge- 
 ance. 
 
 There was one exception, indeed, the Lady 
 Isabella, Clarence's wife, who, as the reader will 
 recollect, was Warwick's oldest daughter, and, 
 of course, the sister of Lady Anne. She and 
 Clarence, her husband, it might be supposed, 
 would take an interest in Lady Anne's fate. 
 Indeed, Clarence did take an interest in it, but, 
 unfortunately, the interest was of the wrong 
 kind. 
 
 The Earl of "Warwick had been immensely 
 wealthy. Besides the ancient stronghold of the 
 family, Warwick Castle, one of the most re- 
 nowned old feudal fortresses in England, he 
 owned many other castles, and many large es- 
 tates, and rights of property of various kinds 
 all over the kingdom. Now Clarence, after 
 Warwick's death, had taken most of this prop- 
 erty into his own hands as the husband of the 
 earl's oldest daughter, and he wished to keep 
 it. This he could easily do while Anne re- 
 mained in her present friendless and helpless 
 condition. But he knew very well that if she 
 were to be married to any person of rank and 
 influence on the York side, her husband would 
 
172 King Eichaed III. 
 
 Richard's plan. His early acquaintance with Anne. 
 
 insist on a division of the property. Now lie 
 suspected that his brother Kichard had con- 
 ceived the design of marrying her. He accord- 
 ingly set himself at work earnestly to thwart 
 this design. 
 
 It was true that Kichard had conceived the 
 idea of making Anne his wife, from the mo- 
 tive, however, solely, as it would seem, to ob- 
 tain her share of her father's property. 
 
 Eichard had been acquainted with Anne from 
 her childhood. Indeed, he was related to the 
 family of the Earl of Warwick on his mother's 
 side. His mother, Lady Cecily Neville, belong- 
 ed to the same great family of Neville from 
 which the Warwicks sprung. Warwick had 
 been a great friend of Lady Cecily in former 
 years, and it is even supposed that when Eich- 
 ard and his brother George were brought back 
 from the Continent, at the time when Edward 
 first obtained possession of the kingdom, they 
 lived for a time in Warwick's family at Mid- 
 dleham Castle.* This is not quite certainly 
 known, but it is at any rate known that Eich- 
 ard and Anne knew each other well when they 
 were children, and were often together. 
 
 There is an account of a grand entertainment 
 
 * For a view of this castle, and the grounds pertaining to 
 it, see page 180. 
 
Richard's Marriage. 173 
 
 The banquet at the archbishop' s. 
 
 which was given by the Warwick family at 
 York, some years before, on the occasion of 
 the enthroning of the earl's brother George as 
 Archbishop of York, at which Richard was 
 present. Richard, being a prince of the blood 
 royal, was, of course, a very highly honored 
 guest, notwithstanding that he was but a child. 
 So they prepared for him and some few oth- 
 er great personages a raised platform, called a 
 dais, at one end of the banquet-hall, with a roy- 
 al canopy over it. The table for the distin- 
 guished personages was upon this dais, while 
 those for the other guests extended up and 
 down the hall below. Richard was seated at 
 the centre of the table of honor, with a countess 
 on one side of him and a duchess on the other. 
 Opposite to him, at the same table, were seated 
 Isabella and Anne. Anne was at this time 
 about twelve years old. 
 
 Now it is supposed that Isabella and Anne 
 were placed at this table to please Richard, for 
 their mother, who was, of course, entitled to 
 take precedence of them, had her seat at one of 
 the large tables below. 
 
 From this and some other similar indica- 
 tions, it is supposed that Richard took a fancy 
 to Anne while they were quite young, as Clar- 
 ence did to Isabella. Indeed, one of the ancient 
 
174 King Richard III. 
 
 Clarence conceals Lady Anne. 
 
 writers says that Richard wished, at this early 
 period, to choose her for his wife, but that she 
 did not like him. 
 
 At any rate, now, after the re-establishment 
 of his brother upon the throne, and his own ex- 
 altation to such high office under him, he de- 
 termined that he would marry Anne. Clar- 
 ence, on the other hand, determined that he 
 should not marry her. So Clarence, with the 
 pretense of taking her under his protection, 
 seized her, and carried her away to a place of 
 concealment, where he kept her closely shut 
 up. Anne consented to this, for she wished to 
 keep out of Richard's way. Richard's person 
 was disagreeable to her, and his character was 
 hateful. She seems to have considered him, as 
 he is generally represented by the writers of 
 those times, as a rude, hard-hearted, and un- 
 scrupulous man ; and she had also a special rea- 
 son for shrinking from him with horror, as the 
 mortal enemy of her father, and the reputed 
 murderer of the husband to whom she had been 
 betrothed. 
 
 Clarence kept her for some time in obscure 
 places of concealment, changing the place from 
 time to time to elude the vigilance of Richard, 
 who was continually making search for her. 
 The poor princess had recourse to all manner 
 
A.D.1471.] Richard's Marriage. 175 
 
 Rich ard finds her at la st, His marriage. 
 
 of contrivances, and assumed the most humble 
 disguises to keep herself concealed, and was at 
 last reduced to a very forlorn and destitute con- 
 dition, through the desperate shifts that she re- 
 sorted to, in her endeavors to escape Richard's 
 persecutions. All was, however, in vain. Rich- 
 ard discovered her at last in a mean house in 
 London, where she was living in the disguise 
 of a servant. He immediately seized her, and 
 conveyed her to a place of security which was 
 under his control. 
 
 Soon after this she was taken away from this 
 place and conveyed to York, and placed, for 
 the time, under the protection of the archbishop 
 — the same archbishop at whose enthronement, 
 eight or ten years before, she had sat at the 
 same table with Richard, under the royal can- 
 opy. But she was not left at peace here. Rich- 
 ard insisted on her marrying him. She insist- 
 ed on her refusal. Her friends — the few that 
 she had left — turned against her, and urged her 
 to consent to the union ; but she could not en- 
 dure the thought of it. 
 
 Richard, however, persisted in his determina- 
 tion, and Anne was finally overcome. It is said 
 she resisted to the last, and that the ceremony 
 was performed by compulsion, Anne continuing 
 to refuse her consent to the end. It was fore- 
 
176 
 
 King Richard III. 
 
 Measures for securing the property. 
 
 RICHARD III. 
 
 seen that, as soon as any change of circum- 
 stances should enable her to resume active re- 
 sistance to the union, she would repudiate the 
 marriage altogether, as void for want of her 
 consent, or else obtain a divorce. To guard 
 against this danger, Eichard procured the pas- 
 sage of an act of Parliament, by which he was 
 empowered to continue in the full possession 
 and enjoyment of Anne's property, even if she 
 
Richard's Marriage. 
 
 177 
 
 Difficulty about the division of the property. 
 
 QUEEN ANNE. 
 
 were to divorce him, provided that he did his best 
 to be reconciled to her, and was willing to be 
 re-married to her, with her consent, whenever 
 she was willing to grant it. 
 
 As for Kichard himself, his object was fully 
 attained by the accomplishment of a marriage 
 so far acknowledged as to entitle him to the 
 possession of the property of his wife. There 
 was still some difficulty, however, arising from 
 a disagreement between Richard and Clarence 
 in respect to the division. Clarence, when he 
 M 
 
178 King Richard III. [A.D.1474. 
 
 The quarrel becomes serious. It is at last settled by the king. 
 
 found that Richard would marry Anne, in spite 
 of all that he could do to prevent it, declared, 
 with an oath, that, even if Richard did marry 
 her, he, Clarence, would never "part the liveli- 
 hood," that is, divide the property with him. 
 
 So fixed was Clarence in this resolution to 
 retain all the property himself, and so resolute 
 was Richard, on the other hand, in his determ- 
 ination to have his share, that the quarrel very 
 soon assumed a very serious character. The 
 lords and nobles of the court took part in the 
 controversy on one side and on the other, un- 
 til, at length, there was imminent danger of 
 open war. Finally Edward himself interposed, 
 and summoned the brothers to appear before 
 him in open council, when, after a full hearing 
 of the dispute, he said that he himself would 
 decide the question. Accordingly, the two 
 brothers appeared before the king, and each 
 strenuously argued his own cause. The king, 
 after hearing them, decided how the property 
 should be divided. He gave to Richard and 
 Anne a large share, but not all that Richard 
 claimed. Richard was, however, compelled to 
 submit. 
 
 When the marriage was thus consummated, 
 and Richard had been put in possession of his 
 portion of the property, Anne seems to have 
 
A.D.1474.] Eichard's Marriage. 181 
 
 Richard's child is horn. A-nne becomes more contented. 
 
 submitted to her fate, and she went with Eich- 
 ard to Middleham Castle, in the north of En- 
 gland. This castle was one which had belong- 
 ed to the Warwick family, and it now came 
 into Eichard's possession. Eichard did not, 
 however, remain long here with his wife. He 
 went away on various military expeditions, 
 leaving Anne most of the time alone. She 
 was well contented to be thus left, for nothing 
 could be so welcome to her now as to be re- 
 lieved as much as possible from the presence of 
 her hateful husband. 
 
 This state of things continued, without much 
 change, until the end of about a year after her 
 marriage, when Anne gave birth to a son. The 
 boy was named Edward. The possession of 
 this treasure awakened in the breast of Anne 
 a new interest in life, and repaid her, in some 
 measure, for the sorrows and sufferings which 
 she had so long endured. 
 
 Her love for her babe, in fact, awakened in 
 her heart something like a tie to bind her to 
 her husband. It is hard for a mother to con- 
 tinue long to hate the father of her child. 
 
182 King Richard III. 
 
 Richard's high position. His character. 
 
 Chapter IX. 
 End of the Reign of Edward. 
 
 KING EDWARD reigned, after this time, 
 for about eight } r ears. During this pe- 
 riod, Richard continued to occupy a very high 
 official position, and a very conspicuous place 
 in the public mind. He was generally consid- 
 ered as personally a very bad man, and, when- 
 ever any great public crime was committed, in 
 which the government were implicated at all, 
 it was Richard, usually, who was supposed to 
 be chiefly instrumental in the perpetration of 
 it ; but, notwithstanding this, his fame, and the 
 general consideration in which he was held, 
 were very high. This was owing, in a consid- 
 erable degree, to his military renown, and the 
 straightforward energy and decision which char- 
 acterized all his doings. 
 
 He generally co-operated very faithfully in 
 all Edward's plans and schemes, though some- 
 times, when he thought them calculated to im- 
 pede rather than promote the interests of the 
 kingdom and the aggrandizement of the family, 
 he made no secret of opposing them. As to 
 
1475.] Edward's Keign Ends. 183 
 
 Edward' s plan for the invasion of France. 
 
 Clarence, no one placed any trust or confidence 
 in him whatever. For a time, he and Edward 
 were ostensibly on friendly terms with each 
 other, but there was no cordial good-will be- 
 tween them. Each watched the other with 
 continual suspicion and distrust. 
 
 About the year 1475, Edward formed a grand 
 scheme for the invasion of France, in order to 
 recover from the French king certain posses- 
 sions which Edward claimed, on the ground of 
 their having formerly belonged to his ances- 
 tors. This plan, as, indeed, almost all plans of 
 war and conquest were in those days, was very 
 popular in England, and arrangements were 
 made on an immense scale for fitting out an 
 expedition. The Duke of Burgundy, who, as 
 will be recollected, had married Edward's sis- 
 ter, promised to join the English in this pro- 
 posed war. When all was ready, the English 
 army set sail, and crossed over to Calais. Ed- 
 ward went with the army as commander-in- 
 chief. He was accompanied by Clarence and 
 Gloucester. Thus far every thing had gone 
 on well, and all Europe was watching with 
 great interest for the result of the expedition ; 
 but, very soon after landing, great difficulties 
 arose. The Duke of Burgundy and Edward 
 disagreed, and this disagreement caused great 
 
184 King Richard III. [A.D.U75. 
 
 Character of King Louis. 
 
 delays. The army advanced slowly toward 
 the French frontier, but for two months noth- 
 ing effectual was done. 
 
 In the mean time, Louis, the King of France. 
 
 who was a very shrewd and wily man, conclu- 
 ded that it would be better for him to buy off 
 his enemies than to light them. So he contin- 
 ually sent messengers and negotiators to Ed- 
 ward's camp with proposals of various sorts, 
 made to gain time, in order to enable him, by 
 
Edward's Reign Ends. 185 
 
 Louis's wily management. Treaty proposed. 
 
 means of presents and bribes, to buy up all the 
 prominent leaders and counselors of the expe- 
 dition. He gave secretly to all the men who 
 he supposed held an influence over Edward's 
 mind, large sums of money. He offered, too, to 
 make a treaty with Edward, by which, under 
 one pretext or another, he was to pay him a 
 great deal of money. One of these proposed 
 payments was that of a large sum for the ran- 
 som of Queen Margaret, as mentioned in a pre- 
 ceding chapter. The amount of the ransom 
 money which he proposed was fifty thousand 
 crowns. 
 
 Besides these promises to pay money in case 
 the treaty was concluded, Louis made many 
 rich and valuable presents at once. One day, 
 while the negotiations were pending, he sent 
 over to the English camp, as a gift to the king, 
 three hundred cart-loads of wine, the best that 
 could be procured in the kingdom. 
 
 At one time, near the beginning of the affair, 
 when a herald was sent to Louis from Edward 
 with a very defiant and insolent message, Lou- 
 is, instead of resenting the message as an affront, 
 entertained the herald with great politeness, 
 held a long and friendly conversation with him, 
 and finally sent him away with three hundred 
 crowns in his purse, and a promise of a thou- 
 
186 King Eichakd III. 
 
 Arrangements made for a personal interview. 
 
 sand more as soon as a peace should be con- 
 cluded. He also made him a present of a piece 
 of crimson velvet "thirty ells long." Such a 
 gift as this of the crimson velvet was calculated, 
 perhaps, in those days of military foppery, to 
 please the herald even more than the money. 
 
 These things, of course, put Edward and 
 nearly all his followers in excellent humor, and 
 disposed them to listen very favorably to any 
 propositions for settling the quarrel which Lou- 
 is might be disposed to make. At last, after 
 various and long protracted negotiations, a 
 treaty was agreed upon, and Louis proposed 
 that at the final execution of it he and Edward 
 should have a personal interview. 
 
 Edward acceded to this on certain conditions, 
 and the circumstances under which the inter- 
 view took place, and the arrangements which 
 were adopted on the occasion, make it one of 
 the most curious transactions of the whole reign. 
 
 It seems that Edward could not place the 
 least trust in Louis's professions of friendship, 
 and did not dare to meet him without requir- 
 ing beforehand most extraordinary precautions 
 to guard against the possibility of treachery. 
 So it was agreed that the meeting should take 
 place upon a bridge, Louis and his friends to 
 come in upon one side of the bridge, and Ed- 
 
Edward's Reign Ends. 187 
 
 The grating on the bridge. 
 
 ward, with his party, on the other. In order 
 to prevent either party from seizing and carry- 
 ing off the other, there was a strong barricade 
 of wood built across the bridge in the middle 
 of it, and the arrangement was for the King of 
 France to come up to this barricade on one side, 
 and the King of England on the other, and so 
 shake hands and communicate with each other 
 through the bars of the barricade. 
 
 The place where this most extraordinary roy- 
 al meeting was held was called Picquigny, and 
 the treaty which was made there is known in 
 history as the Treaty of Picquigny. The town 
 is on the River Somme, near the city of Ami- 
 ens. Amiens was at that time very near the 
 French frontier. 
 
 The day appointed for the meeting was the 
 29th of August, 1475. The barricade was pre- 
 pared. It was made of strong bars, crossing 
 each other so as to form a grating, such as was 
 used in those days to make the cages of bears, 
 and lions, and other wild beasts. The spaces 
 between the bars were only large enough to al- 
 low a man's arm to pass through. 
 
 The King of France went first to the grating, 
 advancing, of course, from the French side. He 
 was accompanied by ten or twelve attendants, 
 all men of high rank and station. He was very 
 
188 King Eichard III. 
 
 Meeting of the kings at the grating. 
 
 splendidly dressed for the occasion. The dress 
 was made of cloth of gold, with a large fleur de 
 lis — which was at that time the emblem of the 
 French sovereignty — magnificently worked 
 upon it in precious stones. 
 
 When Louis and his party had reached the 
 barricade, Edward, attended likewise by his 
 friends, approached on the other side. When 
 they came to the barricade, the two kings greet- 
 ed each other with many bows and other saluta- 
 tions, and they also shook hands with each other 
 by reaching through the grating. The King 
 of France addressed Edward in a very polite 
 and courteous manner. " Cousin," said he, 
 " you are right welcome. There is no person 
 living that I have been so ambitious of seeing 
 as you, and Grod be thanked that our interview 
 now is on so happy an occasion." 
 
 After these preliminary salutations and cere- 
 monies had been concluded, a prayer-book, or 
 missal, as it was called, and a crucifix, were 
 brought forward, and held at the grating where 
 both kings could touch them. Each of the 
 kings then put his hands upon them — one hand 
 on the crucifix and the other on the missal — 
 and they both took a solemn oath by these 
 sacred emblems that they would faithfully keep 
 the treaty which thev had made. 
 
Edward's Eeign Ends. 189 
 
 Jocose conversation of the two kings. 
 
 After thus transacting the business which had 
 brought them together, the two kings conversed 
 with each other in a gay and merry manner for 
 some time. The King of France invited Ed- 
 ward to come to Paris and make him a visit. 
 This, of course, was a joke, for Edward would 
 as soon think of accepting an invitation from a 
 lion to come and visit him in his den, as of put- 
 ting himself in Louis's power by going to Paris. 
 Both monarchs and all the attendants laughed 
 merrily at this jest. Louis assured Edward 
 that he would have a very pleasant time at 
 Paris in amusing himself with the gay ladies, 
 and in other dissipations. "And then here is 
 the cardinal," he added, turning to the Cardinal 
 of Bourbon, an ecclesiastic of very high rank, 
 but of very loose character, who was among his 
 attendants, " who will grant you a very easy 
 absolution for any sins you may take a fancy 
 to commit while you are there." 
 
 Edward and his friends were much amused 
 with this sportive conversation of Louis's, and 
 Edward made many smart replies, especially 
 joking the cardinal, who, he knew, " was a gay 
 man with the ladies, and a boon companion over 
 his wine." 
 
 This sort of conversation continued for some 
 time, and at length the kings, after again shak- 
 
190 King Richard III. 
 
 Terms of the treaty. Marriage agreed upon. 
 
 ing hands through the grating, departed each 
 his own way, and thus this most extraordinary 
 conference of sovereigns was terminated. 
 
 The treaty which was thus made at the bridge 
 of Picquigny contained several very important 
 articles. The principal of them were the fol- 
 lowing : 
 
 1. Louis was to pay fifty thousand crowns 
 as a ransom for Queen Margaret, and Edward 
 was to release her from the Tower and send her 
 to France as soon as he arrived in England. 
 
 2. Louis was to pay to Edward in cash, on 
 the spot, seventy -live thousand crowns, and an 
 annuity of fifty thousand crowns. 
 
 3. He was to marry his son, the dauphin, to 
 Edward's oldest daughter, Elizabeth, and, in 
 case of her death, then to his next daughter, 
 Mary. These parties were all children at this 
 time, and so the actual marriage was postponed 
 for a time ; but it was stipulated solemnly that 
 it should be performed as soon as the prince 
 and princess attained to a proper age. It is 
 important to remember this part of the treaty, 
 as a great and serious difficulty grew out of it 
 when the time for the execution of it arrived. 
 
 4. By the last article, the two kings bound 
 themselves to a truce for seven years, during 
 which time hostilities were to be entirely sus- 
 
1475.] Edward's Eeign Ends. 191 
 
 Clarence and Gloucester. The people of England discontented. 
 
 pended, and free trade between the two coun- 
 tries was to be allowed. 
 
 Clarence was with the king at the time of 
 making this treaty, and he joined with the oth- 
 er courtiers in giving it his approval, but Kich- 
 ard would have nothing to do with it. He very 
 much preferred to go on with the war, and was 
 indignant that his brother should allow himself 
 to be bought off, as it were, by presents and 
 payments of money, and induced to consent to 
 what seemed to him an ignominious peace. He 
 did not give any open expression to his discon- 
 tent, but he refused to be present at the confer- 
 ence on the bridge, and, when Edward and the 
 arnry, after the peace was concluded, went back 
 to England, he went with them, but in very bad 
 humor. 
 
 The people of England were in very bad 
 humor too. You will observe that the induce- 
 ments which Louis employed in procuring the 
 treaty were gifts and sums of money granted 
 to Edward himself, and to his great courtiers 
 personally for their own private uses. There 
 was nothing in his concessions which tended 
 at all to the aggrandizement or to the benefit 
 of the English realm, or to promote the interest 
 of the people at large. They thought, there- 
 fore, that Edward and his counselors had been 
 
192 King Kichakd III. 
 
 Renewal of the quarrel between Edward and Clarence. 
 
 induced to sacrifice the rights and honor of the 
 crown and the kingdom to their own personal 
 advantage bj a system of gross and open brib- 
 ery, and they were very much displeased. 
 
 The next great event which marks the his- 
 tory of the reign of Edward, after the conclu- 
 sion of this war, was the breaking out anew of 
 the old feud between Edward and Clarence, and 
 the dreadful crisis to which the quarrel finally 
 reached. The renewal of the quarrel began in 
 Edward's dispossessing Clarence of a portion of 
 his property. Edward was very much embar- 
 rassed for money after his return from the 
 French expedition. He had incurred great 
 debts in fitting out the expedition, and these 
 debts the Parliament and people of England 
 were very unwilling to pay, on account of their 
 being so much displeased with the peace which 
 had been made. Edward, consequently, not- 
 withstanding the bribes which he had received 
 from Louis, was very much in want of money. 
 At last he caused a law to be passed by Parlia- 
 ment enacting that all the patrimony of the 
 royal family, which had hitherto been divided 
 among the three brothers, should be resumed, 
 and applied to the service of the crown. This 
 made Clarence very angry. True, he was ex- 
 
1476.] Edward's Eeign Ends. 193 
 
 Clarence retires from court. Belief in witchcraft. 
 
 tremely rich, through the property which he 
 had received by his wife from the Warwick 
 estates, but this did not make him any more 
 willing to submit patiently to be robbed by his 
 brother. He expressed his anger very openly, 
 and the ill feeling which the affair occasioned 
 led to a great many scenes of dispute and crim- 
 ination between the two brothers, until at last 
 Clarence could no longer endure to have any 
 thing to do with Edward, and he went away, 
 with Isabella his wife, to a castle which he pos- 
 sessed near Tewkesbury, and there remained, 
 in angry and sullen seclusion. So great was 
 the animosity that prevailed at this time be- 
 tween the brothers and their respective parti- 
 sans, that almost every one who took an active 
 part in the quarrel lived in continual anxiet}^ 
 from fear of being poisoned, or of being destroy- 
 ed by incantations or witchcraft. 
 
 Every body believed in witchcraft in these 
 days. There was one peculiar species of nec- 
 romancy which was held in great dread. It 
 was supposed that certain persons had the pow- 
 er secretly to destroy any one against whom 
 they conceived a feeling of ill will in the fol- 
 lowing manner : They would first make an ef- 
 figy of their intended victim out of wax and 
 other similar materials. This image was made 
 N 
 
194 King Eichard III. [AD. 1477. 
 
 Birth of Clarence's second son. 
 
 the representation of the person to be destroy- 
 ed by means of certain sorceries *and incanta- 
 tions, and then it was by slow degrees, from day 
 to day, melted away and gradually destroyed. 
 While the image was thus melting, the inno- 
 cent and unconscious victim of the witchcraft 
 would pine away, and at last, when the image 
 was fairly gone, would die. 
 
 Not very long after Clarence left the court 
 and went to Tewkesbury, his wife gave birth to 
 a child. It was the second son. The child was 
 named Eichard, and is known in history as 
 Eichard of Clarence. Isabella did not recover 
 her health and strength after the birth of her 
 child. She pined away in a slow and linger- 
 ing manner for two or three months, and then 
 died. 
 
 Clarence was convinced that she did not die 
 a natural death. He believed that her life had 
 been destroyed by some process of witchcraft, 
 such as has been described, or by poison, and 
 he openly charged the queen with having in- 
 stigated the murder by having employed some 
 sorcerer or assassin to accomplish it. After a 
 time he satisfied himself that a certain woman 
 named Ankaret Twynhyo was the person 
 whom the queen had employed to commit this 
 crime, and watching an opportunity when this 
 
Edward's Keign Ends. 195 
 
 New quarrels. The rich heiress. 
 
 woman was at her own residence, away from 
 all who could protect her, he sent a body of 
 armed men from among his retainers, who went 
 secretly to the place, and, breaking in suddenly, 
 seized the woman and bore her off to Warwick 
 Castle. There Clarence subjected her to what 
 he called a trial, and she was condemned to 
 death, and executed at once. The charge 
 against her was that she administered poison to 
 the duchess in a cup of ale. So summary were 
 these proceedings, that the poor woman was 
 dead in three hours from the time that she ar- 
 rived at the castle gates. 
 
 These proceedings, of course, greatly exas- 
 perated Edward and the queen, and made them 
 hate Clarence more than ever. 
 
 Yery soon after this, Charles, the Duke of 
 Burgundy, who married Margaret, Edward and 
 Clarence's sister, and who had been Edward's 
 ally in so many of his wars, was killed in bat- 
 tle. He left a daughter named Mary, of whom 
 Margaret was the step-mother; for Mary was 
 the child of the duke by a former marriage. 
 Now, as Charles was possessed of immense es- 
 tates, Mary, by his death, became a great heir- 
 ess, and Clarence, now that his wife was dead, 
 conceived the idea of making her his second 
 wife. He immediately commenced negotia- 
 
196 King Richard III. [A.D.1478. 
 
 Edward and Clarence quarrel about the heiress. 
 
 tions to this end. Margaret favored the plan, 
 but Edward and Elizabeth, the queen, as soon 
 as they heard of it, set themselves at work in 
 the most earnest manner to thwart and circum- 
 vent it. 
 
 Their motives for opposing this match arose 
 partly from their enmity to Clarence, and part- 
 ly from designs of their own which they had 
 formed in respect to the marriage of Mary. 
 The queen wished to secure the young heiress 
 for one of her brothers. Edward had another 
 plan, which was to marry Mary to a certain 
 Duke Maximilian. Edward's plan, in the end, 
 was carried out, and Clarence was defeated. 
 When Clarence found at length that the bride, 
 with all the immense wealth and vastly in- 
 creased importance which his marriage with her 
 was to bring, were lost to him through Edward's 
 interference, and conferred upon his hated rival 
 Maximilian, he was terribly enraged. He ex- 
 pressed his resentment and anger against the 
 king in the most violent terms. 
 
 About this time a certain nobleman, one of 
 the king's friends, died. The king accused a 
 priest, who was in Clarence's service, of having 
 killed him by sorcery. The priest was seized 
 and put to the torture to compel him to confess 
 his crime and to reveal his confederates. The 
 
Edward's Keign Ends. 197 
 
 Clarence becomes furious. He is sent to the Tower. 
 
 priest at length confessed, and named as his 
 accomplice one of Clarence's household named 
 Burdett, a gentleman who lived in very inti- 
 mate and confidential relations with Clarence 
 himself. 
 
 The confession was taken as proof of guilt, 
 and the priest and Burdett were both imme- 
 diately executed. 
 
 Clarence was now perfectly frantic with rage. 
 He could restrain himself no longer. He forced 
 his way into the king's council-chamber, and 
 there uttered to the lords who were assembled 
 the most violent and angry denunciation of the 
 king. He accused him of injustice and cruelty, 
 and upbraided him, and all who counseled and 
 aided him, in the severest terms. 
 
 When the king, who was not himself present 
 on this occasion, heard what Clarence had done, 
 he said that such proceedings were subversive 
 of the laws of the realm, and destructive to all 
 good government, and he commanded that Clar- 
 ence should be arrested and sent to the Tower. 
 
 After a short time the king summoned a Par- 
 liament, and when the assembly was convened, 
 he brought his brother out from his prison in 
 the Tower, and arraigned him at the bar of the 
 House of Lords on charges of the most extraor- 
 dinary character, which he himself personally 
 
198 King Richard III. 
 
 Clarence is accused of high treason. 
 
 preferred against him. In these charges Clar- 
 ence was accused of having formed treasonable 
 conspiracies to depose the king, disinherit the 
 king's children, and raise himself to the throne, 
 and with this view of having slandered the 
 king, and endeavored, by bribes and false rep- 
 resentations, to entice away his subjects from 
 their allegiance ; of having joined himself with 
 the Lancastrian faction so far as to promise to 
 restore them their estates which had been con- 
 fiscated, provided that they would assist him in 
 usurping the throne ; and of having secretly or- 
 ganized an armed force, which was all ready, 
 and waiting only for 'the proper occasion to 
 strike the blow. 
 
 Clarence denied all these charges in the most 
 earnest and solemn manner. The king insisted 
 upon the truth of them, and brought forward 
 many witnesses to prove them. Of course, 
 whether the charges were true or false, there 
 could be no difficulty in finding plenty of wit- 
 nesses to give the required testimony. The 
 lords listened to the charges and the defense 
 with a sort of solemn awe. Indeed, all England, 
 as it were, stood by, silenced and appalled at the 
 progress of this dreadful fraternal quarrel, and 
 at the prospect of the terrible termination of it, 
 which all could foresee must come. 
 
Edward's Eeign Ends. 201 
 
 He is sentenced to death. He is assassinated. 
 
 Whatever the members of Parliament may 
 have thought of the truth or falsehood of the 
 charges, there was only one way in which it 
 was prudent or even safe for them to vote, and 
 Clarence was condemned to death. 
 
 Sentence being passed, the prisoner was re- 
 manded to the Tower. 
 
 Edward seems, after all, to have shrunk from 
 the open and public execution of the sentence 
 which he had caused to be pronounced against 
 his brother. No public execution took place, 
 but in a short time it was announced that Clar- 
 ence had died in prison. It was understood 
 that assassins were employed to go privately 
 into the room where he was confined and put 
 him to death; and it is universally believed, 
 though there is no positive proof of the fact, 
 that Eichard was the person who made the ar- 
 rangements for the performance of this deed.* 
 
 After Clarence was dead, and the excitement 
 and anger of the quarrel had subsided in Ed- 
 ward's mind, he was overwhelmed with remorse 
 and anguish at what he had done. He attempt- 
 
 * There was a strange story in respect to the manner of 
 Clarence's death, which was very current at the time, name- 
 ly, that he was drowned by his brothers in a butt of Malm- 
 sey wine. But there is no evidence whatever that this story 
 was true. 
 
202 King Richard III. [A.D.1480. 
 
 Dissipation and wickedness of Edward. Jane Shore. 
 
 ed to drown these painful thoughts by dissipa- 
 tion and vice. He neglected the affairs of his 
 government, and his duties to his wife and fam- 
 ily, and spent his time in gay pleasures with 
 the ladies of his court, and in guilty carousings 
 with wicked men. In these pleasures he spent 
 large sums of money, wasting his patrimony 
 and all his resources in extravagance and folly. 
 Among other amusements, he used to form 
 hunting-parties, in which the ladies of his court 
 were accustomed to join, and he used to set up 
 gay silken tents for their accommodation on 
 the hunting-ground. He spent vast sums, too, 
 upon his dress, being very vain of his personal 
 attractions, and of the favor in which he was 
 held by the ladies around him. 
 
 The most conspicuous of his various female 
 favorites was the celebrated Jane Shore. She 
 was the wife of a respectable citizen of London. 
 Edward enticed her away from her husband, 
 and induced her to come and live at court with 
 him. The opposite engraving, which is taken 
 from an ancient portrait, gives undoubtedly a 
 correct representation both of her features and 
 of her dress. We shall hear more of this per- 
 son in the sequel. 
 
 Things went on in this way for about two 
 years, when at length war broke out on the 
 
Edward's Reign Ends. 
 
 203 
 
 Edward sends liichard to war. 
 
 JAKE SltOKE. 
 
 frontiers of Scotland. Edward was too much 
 engrossed with his gallantries and pleasures to 
 march himself to meet the enemy, and so he 
 commissioned Richard to go. Richard was 
 very well pleased that his brother Edward 
 should remain at home, and waste away in ef- 
 feminacy and vice his character and his influ- 
 
204 King Richard III. 
 
 Difficulties in Scotland. Edward falls sick. 
 
 ence in the kingdom, while he went forth in 
 command of the army, to accpire, by the vigor 
 and success of his military career, that ascend- 
 ency that Edward was losing. So he took the 
 command of the army and went forth to the war. 
 
 The war was protracted for several years. 
 The King of Scotland had a brother, the Duke 
 of Albany, who was attempting to dethrone 
 him, in order that he might reign in his stead; 
 that is, he was doing exactly that which Ed- 
 ward had charged upon his brother Clarence, 
 and for which he had caused Clarence to be 
 killed ; and yet, with strange inconsistency, 
 Edward espoused the cause of this Clarence of 
 Scotland, and laid deep plans for enabling him 
 to depose and supplant his brother. 
 
 In the midst of the measures which Richard 
 was taking for the execution of these plans, 
 they, as well as all Edward's other earthly 
 schemes and hopes, were suddenly destroyed by 
 the hand of death. Edward's health had be- 
 come much impaired by the dissolute life which 
 he had led, and at last he fell seriously sick. 
 While he was sick, an affair occurred which 
 vexed and worried his mind beyond endurance. 
 
 The reader will recollect that, at the treaty 
 which Edward made with Louis of France 
 at the barricade on the bridge of Picquigny, 
 
Edward's Reign Ends. 205 
 
 His anger against the King of France. 
 
 a marriage contract was concluded between 
 Louis's oldest son, the Dauphin of France, and 
 Edward's daughter Mary, and it was agreed 
 that, as soon as the children were grown up, 
 and were old enough, they should be married. 
 Louis took a solemn oath upon the prayer-book 
 and crucifix that he would not fail to keep this 
 agreement. 
 
 But now some years had passed away, and 
 circumstances had changed so much that Louis 
 did not wish to keep this promise. Edward's 
 great ally, the Duke of Burgundy, was dead. 
 His daughter Mary, who became the Duchess 
 Mary on the death of her father, and who, so 
 greatly to Clarence's disappointment, had mar- 
 ried Maximilian, had succeeded to the estates 
 and possessions of her father. These posses- 
 sions the King of France desired very much to 
 join to his dominions, as they lay contiguous 
 to them, and the fear of Edward, which had 
 prompted him to make the marriage contract 
 with him in the first instance, had now passed 
 away, on account of Edward's having become 
 so much weakened by his vices and his effemi- 
 nacy. He now, therefore, became desirous of 
 allying his .family to that of Burgundy rather 
 than that of England. 
 
 The Duchess Marv had three children, all 
 
206 King Richard III. 
 
 Death of the Duchess Mary. Louis's treachery. 
 
 very young. The oldest, Philip, was only 
 about three years old. 
 
 Now it happened that just at this time, while 
 the Duchess Mary was out with a small party, 
 hawking, near the city of Bruges, as they wei-e 
 flying the hawks at some herons, the company 
 galloping on over the fields in order to keep 
 up with the birds, the duchess's horse, in tak- 
 ing a leap, burst the girths of the saddle, and 
 the duchess was thrown off against the trunk 
 of a tree. She was immediately taken up and 
 borne into a house, but she was so much in- 
 jured that she almost immediately died. 
 
 Of course, her titles and estates would now 
 descend to her children. The second of the 
 children was a girl. Her name was Margaret. 
 She was about two years old. Louis immedi- 
 ately resolved to give up the match between 
 the dauphin and Edward's daughter Mary, and 
 contract another alliance for him with this little 
 Margaret. He met with considerable difficulty 
 and delay in bringing this about, but he suc- 
 ceeded at last. While the negotiations were 
 pending, Edward, who suspected what was go- 
 ing on, was assured that nothing of the kind 
 was intended, and various false tales and pre- 
 tenses were advanced by Louis to quiet his 
 mind. 
 
1483.] Edward's Eeign Ends. 207 
 
 Vexation and rage of Edward. His death. 
 
 At length, when all was settled, the new plan 
 was openly proclaimed, and great celebrations 
 and parades were held in Paris in honor of the 
 event. Edward was overwhelmed with vexa- 
 tion and rage when he received the tidings. 
 He was, however, completely helpless. He lay 
 tossing restlessly on his sick-bed, cursing, on 
 the one hand, Louis's faithlessness and treach- 
 ery, and, on the other, his own miserable weak- 
 ness and pain, which made it so utterly impos- 
 sible that he should do any thing to resent the 
 affront. 
 
 His vexation and rage so disturbed and wor- 
 ried him that they hastened his death. When 
 he found that his last hour was drawing near, 
 a new source of agitation and anguish was open- 
 ed in his mind by the remorse which now be- 
 gan to overwhelm him for his vices and crimes. 
 Long-forgotten deeds of injustice, of violence, 
 and of every species of wickedness rose before 
 his mind, and terrified him with awful premo- 
 nition of the anger of God and of the judgment 
 to come. In his distress, he tried to make rep- 
 aration for some of the grossest of the wrongs 
 which he had committed, but it was too late. 
 After lingering a week or two in this condition 
 of distress and suffering, his spirit passed away. 
 
208 King Richard III. 
 
 Effect of the tidings of Edward's death. 
 
 Chapter X. 
 Richard and Edward V. 
 
 AS the tidings of Edward's death spread 
 throughout England, they were received 
 every where with a sentiment of anxiety and 
 suspense, for no one knew what the conse- 
 quences would be. Edward left two sons. Ed- 
 ward, the oldest of the two, the Prince of Wales, 
 was about thirteen years of age. The young- 
 est, whose name was Richard, was eleven. Of 
 course, Edward was the rightful heir to the 
 crown. Next to him in the line of succession 
 came his brother, and next to them came Rich- 
 ard, Duke of Gloucester, their uncle. But it 
 was universally known that the Duke of Glou- 
 cester was a reckless and unscrupulous man, and 
 the question in every one's mind was whether 
 he would recognize the rights of his young- 
 nephews at all, or whether he would seize the 
 crown at once for himself. 
 
 Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was in the north- 
 ern part of England at this time, at the head of 
 his army. The great power'which the posses- 
 sion of this army gave him made people all the 
 
1483.] Eichakd and Edward V. 209 
 
 Anxiety of Queen Elizabeth Woodville. 
 
 more fearful that he might attempt to usurp the 
 throne. 
 
 The person who was most anxious in respect 
 to the result was the widowed Queen Elizabeth, 
 the mother of the two princes. She was very 
 much alarmed. The boys themselves were not 
 old enough to realize very fully the danger that 
 they were in, or to render their mother much 
 aid in her attempts to save them. The person 
 on whom she chiefly relied was her brother, the 
 Earl of Kivers. Edward, her oldest son, was 
 under this uncle Eivers's care. The uncle and 
 the nephew were residing together at this time 
 at the castle of Ludlow.* Queen Elizabeth was 
 in London with her second son. 
 
 Immediately on the death of the king, a coun- 
 cil was called to deliberate upon the measures 
 proper to be taken. The council decreed that 
 the Prince of Wales should be proclaimed king, 
 and they fixed upon the 4th of May for the day 
 of his coronation. They also made arrange- 
 ments for sending orders to the Earl of Kivers 
 to come at once with the young king to London, 
 in order that the coronation might take place. 
 
 Queen Elizabeth was present at this council, 
 and she desired that her brother might be or- 
 dered to come attended by as large an armed 
 
 * For a view of this castle, see page 26. 
 O 
 
210 King Eichard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 Attempt made by Edward to effect a reconciliation. 
 
 force as he could raise, for the protection of the 
 prince on the way. 
 
 Now it happened that there were great dis- 
 sensions among the officers and nobles of the 
 court at this time. The queen, with the rela- 
 tives and connections of her family, formed one 
 party, and the other nobles and peers of En- 
 gland another party, and great was the animos- 
 ity and hatred that prevailed. The English 
 nobles had never been satisfied with Edward's 
 marriage, and they were very jealous of the in- 
 fluence of the queen's family and relations. 
 This feud had been kept down in some degree 
 while Edward lived, and Edward had made a 
 great final effort to heal it entirely in his last 
 sickness. He called together the leading nobles 
 on -each side, that had taken part in this quar- 
 rel, and then, by great exertion, went in among 
 them, and urged them to forget their dissen- 
 sions and become reconciled to each other. The 
 effort for the time seemed to be successful, and 
 both parties agreed to a compromise of the 
 quarrel, and took a solemn oath that they would 
 thenceforth live together in peace. But now, 
 on the death of the king, the dissension broke 
 out afresh. The other nobles were very jeal- 
 ous and suspicious of every measure which 
 Elizabeth proposed, especially if it tended to 
 
TIIK AITr.UI'TI.ii r.Kc'ONCILIATION. 
 
.Richard and Edward V. 213 
 
 Plans for bringing the young prince to London. 
 
 continue the possession of power and influence 
 in the hands of her family. Accordingly, when 
 she proposed in the council to send for the earl, 
 and to require him to raise a large escort to 
 bring the young Prince Edward to London, 
 they objected to it. 
 
 " Against whom," demanded one of the coun- 
 cilors, "is the young prince to be defended? 
 Who are his enemies ? He has none, and the 
 real motive and design of raising this force is 
 not to protect the prince, but only to secure to 
 the Woodville family the means of increasing 
 and perpetuating their own importance and 
 power." 
 
 The speaker upbraided the queen, too, with 
 having, by this proposal, and by the attempt to 
 promote the aggrandizement of the Woodville 
 party which was concealed in it, been guilty of 
 violating the oath of reconciliation which had 
 been taken during the last sickness of the late 
 king. So the council refused to authorize the 
 armed escort, and the queen, with tears of dis- 
 appointment and vexation, gave up the plan. 
 At least she gave it up ostensibly, but she nev- 
 ertheless contrived to come to some secret un- 
 derstanding with the earl, in consequence of 
 which he set out from the castle with the young 
 prince at the head of quite a large force. Some 
 
214 King Kichard III. [A.D.1488. 
 
 Richard's movements. His letter to the queen. 
 
 of the authorities state that he had with him 
 two thousand men. 
 
 In the mean time, Eichard of Gloucester, as 
 soon as he heard of Edward's death, arranged 
 his affairs at once, and made preparations to 
 set out for London too. He put his army in 
 mourning for the death of the king, and he 
 wrote a most respectful and feeling letter of 
 condolence to the queen. In this letter he 
 made a solemn profession of homage and fealty 
 to her son, the Prince of Wales, whom he ac- 
 knowledged as rightfully entitled to the crown, 
 and promised to be faithful in his allegiance to 
 him, and to all the duties which he owed him. 
 
 Queen Elizabeth's mind was much relieved 
 by this letter. She began to think that she 
 was going to find in Richard an efficient friend 
 to sustain her cause and that of her family 
 against her enemies. 
 
 When Richard reached York, he made a sol- 
 emn entry into that town, attended by six hund- 
 red knights all dressed in deep mourning. At 
 the head of this funeral procession he proceed- 
 ed to the Cathedral, and there caused the obse- 
 quies of the king to be celebrated with great 
 pomp, and with very impressive and apparently 
 sincere exhibitions of the grief which he him- 
 self personally felt for the loss of his brother. 
 
1483.] Richard and Edward V. 215 
 
 He arrives at Northampto n. The king at Stony Stratford. 
 
 After a brief delay in York, Richard resumed 
 his march to the southward. He arranged it 
 so as to overtake the party of the prince and 
 the Earl of Rivers on the way. 
 
 He arrived at the town of Northampton on 
 the same day that the prince, with the Earl of 
 Rivers and his escort, reached the town of Stony 
 Stratford, which was only a few miles from it, 
 "When the earl heard that Gloucester was so 
 near, he took with him another nobleman, named 
 Lord Gray, and a small body of attendants, and 
 rode back to Northampton to pay his respects 
 to Gloucester on the part of the young king; 
 for they considered that Edward became at 
 once, by the death of his father, King of En- 
 gland, under the style and title of Edward the 
 Fifth. 
 
 Gloucester received his visitors in a very 
 courteous and friendly manner. He invited 
 them to sup with him, and he made quite an 
 entertainment for them, and for some other 
 friends whom he invited to join them. The 
 party spent the evening together in a very 
 agreeable manner. 
 
 They sat so long over their wine that it was 
 too late for the earl and Lord Gray to return 
 that night to Stony Stratford, and Richard ac- 
 cordingly made arrangements for them to re- 
 
216 King Eichard III. 
 
 Movements and manoeuvres at Northampton. 
 
 main in Northampton. He assigned quarters 
 to them in the town, and secretly set a guard 
 over them, to prevent their making their escape. 
 The next morning, when they arose, they were 
 astonished to find themselves under guard, and 
 to perceive too, as they did, that all the avenues 
 of the town were occupied with troops. They 
 suspected treachery, but they thought it not 
 prudent to express their suspicions. Eichard, 
 when he met them again in the morning, treat- 
 ed them in the same friendly manner as on the 
 evening before, and proposed to accompany 
 them to Stony Stratford, in order that he might 
 there see and pay his respects to the king. 
 This was agreed to, and they all set out to- 
 gether. 
 
 In company with Eichard was one of his 
 friends and confederates, the Duke of Bucking- 
 ham. This Duke of Buckingham had been 
 one of the leaders of the party at court that 
 were opposed to the family of the queen. These 
 two, together with the Earl of Eivers and Lord 
 Gray, rode on in a very friendly manner to- 
 ward Stratford. They went in advance of Eich- 
 ard's troops, which were ordered to follow pret- 
 ty closely behind. In this manner they went 
 on till they began to draw near to the town. 
 
 Eichard now at once threw off his disguise. 
 
ElCHAKD AND EDWARD V. 217 
 
 The noblemen taken into custody. Seizure of the king. 
 
 He told the Earl of Eivers and Lord Gray that 
 the influence which they were exerting over 
 the mind of the king was evil, and that he felt 
 it his duty to take the king from their charge. 
 
 Then, at a signal given, armed men came up 
 and took the two noblemen in custody. Eich- 
 ard, with the Duke of Buckingham and their 
 attendants, drove on with all speed into the 
 town. It seems that the persons who had been 
 left with Edward had, in some way or other, 
 obtained intelligence of what was going on, for 
 they were just upon the eve of making their 
 escape with him when Eichard and his party 
 arrived. The horse was saddled, and the young 
 king was all ready to mount. 
 
 Eichard, when he came up to the place, as- 
 sumed the command at once. He made no 
 obeisance to his nephew, nor did he in any oth- 
 er way seem to recognize or acknowledge him 
 as his sovereign. He simply said that he would 
 take care of his safety. 
 
 " The persons that have been about you," 
 said he, "have been conspiring against your 
 life, but I will protect you." 
 
 He then ordered several of the principal of 
 Edward's attendants to be arrested ; the rest he 
 commanded to disperse. What became of the 
 large body of men which the Earl of Eivers is 
 
218 Kixg Richard III. 
 
 The little king is very much frightened. 
 
 said to have had under his command does not 
 appear. Whether they dispersed in obedience 
 to Richard's commands, or whether they aban- 
 doned the earl and came over to Richard's side, 
 is uncertain. At any rate, nobody resisted him. 
 The Earl of Rivers, Lord Gray, and the others 
 were secured, with a view of being sent off pris- 
 oners to the northward. Edward himself was 
 to be taken with Richard back to Northampton. 
 
 The little king himself scarcely knew what 
 to make of these proceedings. He was fright- 
 ened ; and when he saw that all those personal 
 friends and attendants who had had the charge 
 of him so long, and to whom he was strongly 
 attached, were seized and sent away, and oth- 
 ers, strangers to him, put in their place, he could 
 not refrain from tears. King as he was, how- 
 ever, and sovereign ruler over millions of men, 
 he was utterly helpless in his uncle's hands, and 
 obliged to }deld himself passively to the dispo- 
 sition which his uncle thought best to make of 
 him. 
 
 All the accounts of Edward represent him as 
 a kind-hearted and affectionate boy, of a gentle 
 spirit, and of a fair and prepossessing counte- 
 nance. The ancient portraits of him which re- 
 main confirm these accounts of his personal 
 appearance and of his character. 
 
ElCHARD AND EDWARD V. 219 
 Richard' s explanations of his proceedings. 
 
 ANCIENT PORTRAIT OF EDWARD V. 
 
 After having taken these necessary steps, 
 and thus secured the power in his own hands, 
 Richard vouchsafed an explanation of what he 
 had done to the young king. He told him that 
 Earl Rivers, and Lord Gray, and other persons 
 belonging to their party, "had conspired to- 
 gether to rule the kynge and the realme, to 
 
220 King Richard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 Edward's astonishment. He is helpless in Richard's hands. 
 
 sette variance among the states, and to subdue 
 and destroy the noble blood of the realme," 
 and that he, Richard, had interposed to save 
 Edward from their snares. He told him, more- 
 over, that Lord Dorset, who was Edward's half 
 brother, being the son of the queen by her first 
 husband, and who had for some time held the 
 office of Chancellor of the Tower, had taken out 
 the king's treasure from that castle, and had 
 sent much of it away beyond the sea. 
 
 Edward, astonished and bewildered, did not 
 know at first what to reply to his uncle. He 
 said, however, at last, that he never heard of 
 any such designs on the part of his mother's 
 relatives, and he could not believe that the 
 charges were true. But Richard assured him 
 that they were true, and that " his kindred had 
 kepte their dealings from the knowledge of his 
 grace." Satisfied or not, Edward was silenced ; 
 and he submitted, since it was hopeless for him 
 to attempt to resist, to be taken back in his un- 
 cle's custody to Northampton. 
 
Taking Sanctuary. 221 
 
 Alarm of the queen on hearing the news. 
 
 Chapter XL 
 Taking Sanctuary. 
 
 WHEN the news reached London that the 
 king had been seized on the way to the 
 capital, and was in Gloucester's custody, it pro- 
 duced a universal commotion. Queen Elizabeth 
 was thrown at once into a state of great anxie- 
 ty and alarm. The tidings reached her at mid- 
 night. She' was in the palace at Westminster 
 at the time. She rose immediately in the great- 
 est terror, and began to make preparations for 
 fleeing to sanctuary with the Duke of York, 
 her second son. All her friends in the neigh- 
 borhood were aroused and summoned to her 
 aid. The palace soon became a scene of uni- 
 versal confusion. Every body was busy pack- 
 ing up clothing and other necessaries in trunks 
 and boxes, and securing jewels and valuables 
 of various kinds, and removing them to places 
 of safety. In the midst of this scene, the queen 
 herself sat upon the rushes which covered the 
 floor, half dressed, and her long and beautiful 
 locks of hair streaming over her shoulders, the 
 picture of despair. 
 
222 King Eiohabd III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 Visit of the archbishop. Hastings's message. 
 
 There was a certain nobleman, named Lord 
 Hastings, who had been a very prominent and 
 devoted friend to Edward the Fourth during 
 his life, and had consequently been upon very 
 intimate and friendly terms with the queen. It 
 was he, however, that had objected in the coun- 
 cil to the employment of a large force to con- 
 duct the young king to London, and, by so do- 
 ing, had displeased the queen. Toward morn- 
 ing, while the queen was in the depths of her 
 distress and terror, making her preparations for 
 flight, a cheering message from Hastings was 
 brought to her, telling her not to be alarmed. 
 The message was brought to her by a certain 
 archbishop who had been chancellor, that is, 
 had had the custody of the great seal, an im- 
 pression from which was necessary to the valid- 
 ity of any royal decree. He came to deliver 
 up the seal to the queen, and also to bring Lord 
 Hastings's message. 
 
 "Ah, woe worth him !" said the queen, when 
 the archbishop informed her that Lord Hastings 
 bid her not fear. " It is he that is the cause of 
 all my sorrows ; he goeth about to destroy me 
 and my blood." 
 
 "Madam," said the archbishop, "be of good 
 comfort. I assure you that, if they crown any 
 other king than your eldest son, whom thev 
 
A.D.1483.] Taking Sanctuary. 223 
 
 The queen is in great distress. 
 
 have with them, we will, on the morrow, crown 
 his brother, whom you have with you here. 
 And here is the great seal, which, in like wise 
 as your noble husband gave it to me, so I de- 
 liver it to you for the use of your son." So the 
 archbishop delivered the great seal into the 
 queen's hands, and went away. This was just 
 before the dawn. 
 
 The words which the archbishop spoke to the 
 queen did not give her much comfort. Indeed, 
 her fears were not so much for her children, or 
 for the right of the eldest to succeed to the 
 throne, as for herself and her own personal and 
 family ascendency under the reign of her son. 
 She had contrived, during the lifetime of her 
 husband, to keep pretty nearly all the influence 
 and patronage of the government in her own 
 hands and in that of her family connections, the 
 Woodvilles. You will recollect how much dif- 
 ficulty that had made, and how strong a party 
 had been formed against her coterie. And now, 
 her husband being dead, what she feared was 
 not that Gloucester, in taking the young king 
 away from the custody of her relatives, and 
 sending those relatives off as prisoners to the 
 north, meant any hostility to the young king, 
 but only against her and the whole Woodville 
 interest, of which she was the head. She snp- 
 
224 King Richard III. 
 
 Uncertainty in respect to Gloucester's designs. 
 
 posed that Gloucester would now put the power 
 of the government in the hands of other fami- 
 lies, and banish hers, and that perhaps he would 
 even bring her to trial and punishment for acts 
 of maladministration, or other political crimes 
 which he would charge against her. It was 
 fear of this, rather than any rebellion against 
 the right of Edward the Fifth to reign, which 
 made her in such haste to flee to sanctuary. 
 
 It was, however, somewhat uncertain what 
 Gloucester intended to do. His professions 
 were all very fair in respect to his allegiance to 
 the young king. He sent a messenger to Lon- 
 don, immediately after seizing the king, to ex- 
 plain his views and motives in the act, and in 
 this communication he stated distinctly that his 
 only object was to prevent the king's falling 
 into the hands of the "Woodville family, and 
 not at all to oppose his coronation. 
 
 " It neyther is reason," said he in his letter, 
 k{ nor in any wise to be suffered that the young 
 kynge, our master and kinsman, should be in 
 the hands of custody of his mother's kindred, 
 sequestered in great measure from our compa- 
 nie and attendance, the which is neither honor- 
 able to hys majestie nor unto us." 
 
 Thus the pretense of Richard in seizing the 
 king was simply that he might prevent the gov- 
 
Taking Sanctuary. 225 
 
 Arrest of the leading men in the Woodville party. 
 
 ernment under him from falling into the hands 
 of his mother's party. But the very decisive 
 measures he took in respect to the leading mem- 
 bers of the Woodville family led many to sus- 
 pect that he was secretly meditating a deeper 
 design. All those who were with the king at 
 the time of his seizure were made prisoners and 
 sent off to a castle in the north, as we have 
 already said ; and, in order to prevent those 
 who were in and near London from making 
 their escape, Eichard sent down immediately 
 from Northampton ordering their arrest, and 
 appointing guards to prevent any of them from 
 flying to sanctuary. When the archbishop, 
 who had called to see the queen at the palace, 
 went away, he saw through the window, al- 
 though it was yet before the dawn, a number 
 of boats stationed on the Thames ready to in- 
 tercept any who might be coming up the river 
 with this intent from the Tower, for several in- 
 fluential members of the family resided at this 
 time at the Tower. 
 
 The queen herself, however, as it happened, 
 was at Westminster Palace, and she had accord- 
 ingly but little way to go to make her escape 
 to the Abbey. 
 
 The space which was inclosed by the conse- 
 crated limits, from within which prisoners could 
 P 
 
226 King Eichard III. 
 
 The queen " on the rushes." Ker daughters. 
 
 not be taken, was somewhat extensive. It in- 
 cluded not only the church of the Abbey, but 
 also the Abbey garden, the cemetery, the palace 
 of the abbot, the cloisters, and various other 
 buildings and grounds included within the in- 
 closure. As soon as the queen entered these 
 precincts, she sank down upon the floor of the 
 hall, " alone on the rushes, all desolate and dis- 
 mayed." It was in the month of May, and 
 the great fire-place of the hall was filled with 
 branches of trees and flowers, while the floor, 
 according to the custom of the time, was strew- 
 ed with green rushes. For a time the queen 
 was so overwhelmed with her sorrow and cha- 
 grin that she was scarcely conscious where she 
 was. But she was soon aroused from her de- 
 spondency by the necessity of making proper 
 arrangements for herself and her family in her 
 new abode. She had two daughters with her, 
 Elizabeth and Cecily — beautiful girls, seven- 
 teen and fifteen years of age ; Eichard, Duke 
 of York, her second son, and several younger 
 children. The youngest of these children, 
 Bridget, was only three years old. Elizabeth, 
 the oldest, afterward became a queen, and little 
 Bridget a nun. 
 
 The rooms which the queen and her family 
 occupied in the sanctuary are somewhat partic- 
 
Taking Sanctuary. 229 
 
 Description of the sanctuary. Apartments. 
 
 ularly described by one of the writers of those 
 days. The fire-place, where the trees and flow- 
 ers were placed, was in the centre of the hall, 
 and there was an opening in the roof above, 
 called a louvre, to allow of the escape of the 
 smoke. This hearth still remains on the floor 
 of the hall, and the louvre is still to be seen in 
 the roof above.* The end of the hall was form- 
 ed of oak panneling, with lattice- work above, 
 the use of which will presently appear. A part 
 of this panneling was formed of doors, which 
 led by winding stairs up to a curious congeries 
 of small rooms formed among the spaces be- 
 tween the walls and towers, and under the arch- 
 es above. Some of these rooms were for pri- 
 vate apartments, and others were used for the 
 offices of buttery, kitchen, laundry, and the like. 
 At the end of this range of apartments was the 
 private sitting-room and study of the abbot. 
 The windows of the abbot's room looked down 
 upon a pretty flower-garden, and there was a 
 passage from it which led by a corridor back 
 to the lattices over the doors in the hall, through 
 which the abbot could look down into the hall 
 at any time without being observed, and see 
 what the monks were doing there. 
 
 * The room is now the college hall, so called, of West- 
 minster school. 
 
230 Kino Eichakd III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 The Jerusalem chamber. Richard's plans in respect to the coronation. 
 
 Besides these there were other large apart- 
 ments, called state apartments, which were used 
 'chiefly on great public occasions. These rooms 
 were larger, loftier, and more richly decorated 
 than the others. They were ornamented with 
 oak carvings and fluting, painted windows, and 
 other such decorations. There was one in par- 
 ticular, which was called the Jerusalem cham- 
 ber. This was the grand receiving-room of the 
 abbot. It had a great Gothic window of paint- 
 ed glass, and the walls were hung with curious 
 tapestry. This room, with the window, the 
 tapestry, and all the other ornaments, remains 
 to this day. 
 
 It was on the night of the third of May that 
 the queen and her family " took sanctuary." 
 The very next day, the fourth, was the day that 
 the council had appointed for the coronation. 
 But Richard, instead of coming at once to Lon- 
 don, after taking the king under his charge, so 
 as to be ready for the coronation at the appoint- 
 ed day, delayed his journey so as not to enter 
 London until that day. He wished to prevent 
 the coronation from taking place, having prob- 
 ably other plans of his own in view instead. 
 
 It is not, however, absolutely certain that 
 Richard intended, at this time, to claim the 
 crown for himself, for in entering London he 
 
Taking Sanctuary. 231 
 
 Reception of Richard's party at London. 
 
 formed a grand procession, giving the young 
 king the place of honor in it, and doing hom- 
 age to him as king. Richard himself and all 
 his retinue were in mourning. Edward was 
 dressed in a royal mantle of purple velvet, and 
 rode conspicuously as the chief personage of 
 the procession. A short distance from the city 
 the cavalcade was met by a procession of the 
 civic authorities of London and five hundred 
 citizens, all sumptuously appareled, who had 
 come out to receive and welcome their sover- 
 eign, and to conduct him through the gates into 
 the city. In entering the city Richard rode im- 
 mediately before the king, with his head uncov- 
 ered. He held his cap in his hand, and bowed 
 continually very low before the king, designa- 
 ting him in this way to the citizens as the ob- 
 ject of their homage. He called out also, from 
 time to time, to the crowds that thronged the 
 waysides to see, " Behold your prince and sov- 
 ereign." 
 
 There were two places to which it might 
 have been considered not improbable that Rich- 
 ard would take the king on his arrival at the 
 capital — one the palace of Westminster, at the 
 upper end of London, and the other the Tower, 
 at the lower end. The Tower, though often 
 used as a prison, was really, at that time, a 
 
232 King Eichard III. 
 
 Richard establishes his court. Dorset. 
 
 castle, where the kings and the members of the 
 royal family often resided. Kichard, however, 
 did not go to either of these places at first, but 
 proceeded instead to the bishop's palace at St. 
 Paul's, in the heart of the city. Here a sort of 
 court was established, a grand council of nobles 
 and officers of state was called, and for some 
 days the laws were administered and the gov- 
 ernment was carried on from this place, all, 
 however, in Edward's name. Money was coin- 
 ed, also, with his effigy and inscription, and, in 
 fine, so far as all essential forms and technicali- 
 ties were concerned, the young Edward was 
 really a reigning king; but, of course, in respect 
 to substantial power, every thing was in Kich- 
 ard's hands. 
 
 The reason why Kichard did not proceed at 
 once to the Tower was probably because Dor- 
 set, the queen's son, was in command there, 
 and he, as of course he was identified with the 
 Woodville party, might perhaps have made 
 Kichard some trouble. But Dorset, as soon as 
 he heard that Richard was coming, abandoned 
 the Tower, and fled to the sanctuary to join his 
 mother. Accordingly, after waiting a few days 
 at the bishop's palace until the proper arrange- 
 ments could be made, the king, with the whole 
 party in attendance upon him. removed to the 
 
Taking Sanctuaky. 238 
 
 The queen' 3 frienda dismiaaed. Menard' a titles. 
 
 Tower, and took up their residence there. The 
 king was nominally in his castle, with Richard 
 and the other nobles and their retinue in at- 
 tendance upon him as his guards. Really he 
 was in a prison, and his uncle, with the people 
 around him who were under his uncle's com- 
 mand, were his keepers. 
 
 A meeting of the lords was convened, and 
 various political arrangements were made to 
 suit Richard's views. The principal members 
 of the Woodville family were dismissed from 
 the offices which they held, and other nobles, 
 who were in Richard's interest, were appointed 
 in their place. A new day was appointed for 
 the coronation, namely, the 22d of June. The 
 council of lords decreed also that, as the king 
 was yet too young to conduct the government 
 himself personally, his uncle Gloucester was, 
 for the present, to have charge of the adminis- 
 tration of public affairs, under the title of Lord 
 Protector. The title in full, which Richard 
 thenceforth assumed under this decree, was, 
 Richard, Duke of Gloucester, brother and uncle 
 of the king, Protector and Defender, Great 
 Chamberlain, Constable, and Lord High Ad- 
 miral of England. 
 
 During all this time the city of London, and, 
 indeed, the whole realm of England, as far as 
 
234 King Richard III. [A.D.U83. 
 
 Anxiety of the people of England. 
 
 the tidings of what was going on at the capital 
 spread into the interior, had been in a state of 
 the greatest excitement. The nobles, and the 
 courtiers of all ranks, were constantly on the 
 alert, full of anxiety and solicitude, not know- 
 ing which side to take or what sentiments to 
 avow. They did not know what turn things 
 would finally take, and, of course, could not tell 
 what they were to do in order to be found, in 
 the end, on the side that was uppermost. The 
 common people in the streets, with anxious 
 looks and many fearful forebodings, discussed 
 the reports and rumors that they had heard. 
 They all felt a sentiment of loyal and affection- 
 ate regard for the king — a sentiment which was 
 increased and strengthened by his youth, his 
 gentle disposition, and the critical and helpless 
 situation that he was in; while, on the other 
 hand, the character of Gloucester inspired them 
 with a species of awe which silenced and sub- 
 dued them. Edward, in his ' ' protector's" hands, 
 seemed to them like a lamb in the custody of 
 a tiger. 
 
 The queen, all this time, remained shut up 
 in the sanctuary, in a state of extreme suspense 
 and anxiety, clinging to the children whom she 
 had with her, and especially to her youngest 
 son, the little Puke of York, as the next heir to 
 
A.D.1483.] Taking Sanctuary. 235 
 
 Forlorn situation of the queen. 
 
 THE PEOPLE IN THE STREETS. 
 
 the crown, and her only stay and hope, in case, 
 throngh Eichard's violence or treachery, any 
 calamity should befall the king. 
 
236 King Richard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 Richard forms plans for seizing the crown. 
 
 Chapter XII. 
 Richard Lord Protector. 
 
 WHAT sort of protection Richard afforded 
 to the young wards who were commit- 
 ted to his charge will appear by events narra- 
 ted in this chapter. 
 
 It was now June, and the day, the twenty- 
 second, which had been fixed upon for the cor- 
 onation, was drawing nigh. By the ancient 
 usages of the realm of England, the office of Pro- 
 tector, to which Richard had been appointed, 
 would expire on. the coronation of the king. 
 Of course, Richard perceived at once that if 
 he wished to prolong his power he must act 
 promptly. 
 
 He began to revolve in his mind the possibility 
 of assuming the crown himself, and displacing 
 the children of his older brothers ; for Clarence 
 left children at his decease as well as Edward. 
 Of course, these children of Clarence, as well as 
 those of Edward, would take precedence of him 
 in the line of succession, being descended from 
 an older brother. Richard therefore, in order 
 to establish any claim to the crown for himself. 
 
I 
 
 Richard Lord Protector. 237 
 
 Hi8 plan for disposing of Edward's children. 
 
 clarence's children hearing of their father's heath. 
 
 must find some pretext for setting aside both 
 these branches of the family. The pretexts 
 which he found were these. 
 
 In respect to the children of Edward, his plan 
 was to pretend to have discovered proof of Ed- 
 ward's having been privately married to an- 
 other lady before his marriage with Elizabeth 
 
238 King Eichard III. 
 
 Clarence's children. Lady Cecily. Baynard's Castle. 
 
 Woodville. This would, of course, render the 
 marriage with Elizabeth Woodville null, and 
 destroy the rights of the children to any inherit- 
 ance from their father. 
 
 In respect to the children of Clarence, he was 
 to maintain that they were cut off by the at- 
 tainder which had been passed against their 
 father. A bill of attainder, according to the 
 laws and usages of those times, not only doom- 
 ed the criminal himself to death, but cut off his 
 children from all rights of inheritance. It was 
 intended to destroy the family as well as the 
 man. 
 
 Eichard, however, did not at once reveal his 
 plans, but proceeded cautiously to take the prop- 
 er measures for putting them into execution. 
 
 In the first place, there was his mother to be 
 conciliated, the Lady Cecily Neville, known, 
 however, more generally by the title of the 
 Duchess of York. She lived at this time in an 
 old family residence called Baynard's Castle, 
 which stood on the banks of the Thames.* As 
 soon as Eichard arrived in London he went to 
 see his mother at this place, and afterward he 
 often visited her there. How far he explained 
 his plans to her, and how far she encouraged or 
 disapproved of them, is not known. If she was 
 
 * For a view of this castle, see engraving on page 273. 
 
Richard Lord Protector. 239 
 
 Situation of the queen's friends at Pomfret Castle. 
 
 required to act at all in the case, it must have 
 been very hard for her, in such a question of 
 life and death, to decide between her youngest 
 son alive and the children of her first-born in 
 his grave. Mothers can best judge to which 
 side, in such an alternative, her maternal sym- 
 pathies would naturally incline her. 
 
 As for the immediate members of the Wood- 
 ville family, they were already pretty well taken 
 care of. The queen herself, with her children, 
 were shut up in the sanctuary. Her brothers, 
 and the other influential men who were most 
 prominent on her side, had been made prison- 
 ers, and sent to Pomfret Castle in the north. 
 Here they were held under the custody of men 
 devoted to Richard's interest. But to prevent 
 the possibility of his having any farther trouble 
 with them, Richard resolved to order them to 
 be beheaded. This resolution was soon carried 
 into effect, as we shall presently see. 
 
 There remained the party of nobles and 
 courtiers that were likely to be hostile to the 
 permanent continuance of the power of Rich- 
 ard, and inclined to espouse the cause of the 
 young king. The nobles had not yet distinctly 
 taken ground on this question. There were, 
 however, some who were friendly to Richard. 
 Others seemed more inclined to form a party 
 
240 King Richard III. 
 
 Lord Hastings. Richard's councils. The Tower. 
 
 against him. The prominent man among this 
 last-named set was Lord Hastings. There were 
 several others besides, and Richard knew very 
 well who they were. In order to circumvent 
 and defeat any plans which they might be dis- 
 posed to form, and to keep the power fully in 
 his own hands, he convened his councils of state 
 at different places, sometimes at Westminster, 
 sometimes at the Tower, where the king was 
 kept, and sometimes at his own residence, which 
 was in the heart of London. He transferred 
 the public business more and more to his own 
 residence, assembling the councilors there at 
 all times, late and early, and thus withdrawing 
 them from attendance at the Tower. Very 
 soon Richard's residence in London became the 
 acknowledged head-quarters of influence and 
 power, and all who had petitions to present or 
 favors to obtain gathered there, while the king 
 in the Tower was neglected, and left compara- 
 tively alone. 
 
 Still the form of holding a council from time 
 to time at the Tower was continued, and, of 
 course, the nobles who assembled there were 
 those most inclined to stand by and defend the 
 cause of the king. 
 
 Such was the state of things on the 13th of 
 June, nine days before the time appointed for 
 
Richard Lord Protector. 241 
 
 Nobles in council at the Tower. 
 
 the coronation. Richard then, having carefully 
 laid his plans, was prepared to take decisive 
 measures to break up the party who were dis- 
 posed to gather around the king at the Tower 
 and espouse his cause. 
 
 On that day, while these nobles were holding 
 a council in the Tower, suddenly, and greatly 
 to their surprise, Richard walked in among 
 them. He assumed a very good-natured and 
 even merry air as he entered and took his seat, 
 and began to talk with those present in a very 
 friendly and familiar tone. This was for the 
 purpose of lulling any suspicions which they 
 might have felt on seeing him appear among 
 them, and prevent them from divining the 
 dreadful intentions with which he had come. 
 
 " My lord," said he, turning to a bishop who 
 sat near him, and who was one of those that he 
 was about to arrest, " you have some excellent 
 strawberries in your garden, I understand. I 
 wish you would let me have a plateful of 
 them." 
 
 It was about the middle of June, you will 
 recollect, which was the time for strawberries 
 to be ripe. 
 
 The bishop was very much pleased to find 
 the great Protector taking such an interest in 
 his strawberries, and he immediately called a 
 
 Q 
 
242 King Kichard III. [AD. 1483. 
 
 Richard's proceedings at the council. 
 
 servant and sent him away at once to bring 
 some of the fruit. 
 
 After having greeted the other nobles at the 
 board in a somewhat similar style to this, with 
 jocose and playful remarks, which had the ef- 
 fect of entirely diverting from their minds every 
 thing like suspicion, he said that he must go 
 away for a short time, but that he would pres- 
 ently return. In the mean time, they might 
 proceed, he said, with their deliberations on the 
 public business. 
 
 So he went out. He proceeded at once to 
 make the preparations necessary for the accom- 
 plishment of the desperate measures which he 
 had determined to adopt. He stationed armed 
 men at the doors and the passages of the part 
 of the Tower where the council was assembled, 
 and gave them instructions as to what they 
 were to do, and agreed with them in respect to 
 the signals which he was to give. 
 
 In about an hour he returned, but his whole 
 air and manner were now totally changed. He 
 came in with a frowning and angry counte- 
 nance, knitting his brows and setting his teeth, 
 as if something had occurred to put him in a 
 great rage. He advanced to the council table, 
 and there accosting Lord Hastings in a very 
 excited and angry manner, he demanded, 
 
Richard Lord Protector. 243 
 
 Kichard's proceedings at the council. 
 
 "What punishment do you think men de- 
 serve who form plots and schemes for my de- 
 struction ?" 
 
 Lord Hastings was amazed at this sudden ap- 
 pearance of displeasure, and he replied to the 
 Protector that such men, if there were any such, 
 most certainly deserved death, whoever they 
 might be. 
 
 " It is that sorceress, my brother's wife," said 
 Eichard, "and that other vile sorceress, worse 
 than she, Jane Shore. See !" 
 
 This allusion to Jane Shore was somewhat 
 ominous for Hastings, as it was generally un- 
 derstood that since the king's death Lord Hast- 
 ings had taken Jane Shore under his protection, 
 and had lived in great intimacy with her. 
 
 As Richard said this, he pulled up the sleeve 
 of his doublet to the elbow, to let the company 
 look at his arm. This arm had always been 
 weak, and smaller than the other. 
 
 " See," said he, "what they are doing to me." 
 
 He meant that by the power of necromancy 
 they had made an image of wax as an effigy of 
 him, according to the mode explained in a pre- 
 vious chapter, and were now melting it away 
 by slow degrees in order to destroy his life, and 
 that his arm was beginning to pine and wither 
 away in consequence. 
 
2U 
 
 King Richard III. 
 
 £cene in the council chamber at the Tower. 
 
 The lords knew very well that the state in 
 which they saw Richard's arm was its natural 
 condition, and that, consequently, his charge 
 against the queen and Jane Shore was only a 
 pretense, which was to be the prelude and ex- 
 cuse for some violent measures that he was 
 about to take. They scarcely knew what to 
 say. At last Lord Hastings replied, 
 
 " Certainly, my lord, if they have committed 
 so heinous an offense as this, they deserve a 
 very heinous punishment." 
 
 "If!" repeated the Protector, in a voice of 
 
Kichakd Lord Protector. 245 
 
 He makes signals for the armed men to come in. 
 
 thunder. " And thou servest me, then, it seems, 
 with ifs and ands. I tell thee that they have 
 so done — and I will make what I say good 
 upon thy body, traitor!" 
 
 He emphasized and confirmed this threat by 
 bringing down his fist with a furious blow upon 
 the table. 
 
 This was one of the signals which he had 
 agreed upon with the people that he had sta- 
 tioned without at the door of the council hall. 
 A voice was immediately heard in the ante- 
 chamber calling out Treason. This was again 
 another signal. It was a call to a band of arm- 
 ed men whom Kichard had stationed in a con- 
 venient place near by, and who were to rush in 
 at this call. Accordingly, a sudden noise was 
 heard of the rushing of men and the clanking 
 of iron, and before the councilors could recover 
 from their consternation the table was sur- 
 rounded with soldiery, all " in harness," that is, 
 completely armed, and as fast as the foremost 
 came in and gathered around the table, others 
 pressed in after them, until the room was com- 
 pletely full. 
 
 Richard, designating Hastings with a gesture, 
 said suddenly, "I arrest thee, traitor." 
 
 "What! me, my lord?" exclaimed Hastings, 
 in terror. 
 
246 King Eichard III. 
 
 Hastings is executed. Orders sent to the north. 
 
 " Yes, thee, traitor." 
 
 Two or three of the soldiers immediately 
 seized Hastings and prepared to lead him 
 away. Other soldiers laid hands upon several 
 of the other nobles, such as Eichard had desig- 
 nated to them beforehand. These, of course, 
 were the leading and prominent men of the 
 party opposed to Eichard's permanent ascend- 
 ency. Most of these men were taken away and 
 secured as prisoners in various parts of the 
 Tower. As for Hastings, Eichard, in a stern 
 and angry manner, advised him to lose no time 
 in saying his prayers, "for, by the Lord," said 
 he, "I will not to dinner to-day till I see thy 
 head off." 
 
 Then, after a brief delay, to allow the wretch- 
 ed man a few minutes to say his prayers, Eich- 
 ard nodded to the soldiers to signify to them 
 that they were to proceed to their work. They 
 immediately took their victim out to a green 
 by the side of the Tower, and, laying him down 
 with his neck across a log which they found 
 there, they cut off his head with a broad-axe. 
 
 The same day Eichard sent off a dispatch to 
 the north, directed to the men who had in 
 charge the Earl Elvers, and the other friends of 
 the king who had been made prisoners when 
 the kins- was seized at Stonv Stratford, order- 
 
xm 
 
Richard Lord Protector. 249 
 
 Execution of the prisoners at Pomfret Castle. 
 
 ing them all to be beheaded. The order was 
 immediately obeyed. 
 
 The person who had charge of the execution 
 of this order was a stern and ruffian-like officer 
 named Sir Eichard Katcliffe. This man is quite 
 noted in the history of the times as one of the 
 most unscrupulous of Richard's adherents. He 
 was a merciless man, short and rude in speech, 
 and reckless in action, destitute alike of all pity 
 for man and of all fear of God. 
 
 The place where the prisoners had been con- 
 fined was Pomfret Castle.* On receiving the 
 orders from Richard, RatclifTe led them out to 
 an open place without the castle wall to be be- 
 headed. The executioners brought a log and 
 an axe, and the victims were slaughtered one 
 after another, without any ceremony, and with- 
 out being allowed to say a word in self-defense. 
 
 The whole country was shocked at hearing 
 of these sudden and terrible executions ; but 
 the power was in Richard's hands, and there was 
 no one capable of resisting him. The death of 
 the leaders of what would have been the young- 
 king's party struck terror into the rest, and 
 Richard now had every thing in his own hands, 
 or, rather, almost every thing; for the queen 
 and her family, being still in the sanctuary, 
 
 * Called sometimes Pontefract. 
 
250 King Richard III. [AD. 1483. 
 
 Pdchard' s plans in respect to the Duke of York. 
 
 were beyond his reach. He, however, had noth- 
 ing to fear from her personally, and there were 
 none of the children that gave him any concern 
 except the Duke of York, the king's younger 
 brother. He, you will recollect, was with his 
 mother at "Westminster when the king was 
 seized, and she had taken him with the other 
 children to the Abbey. Richard was now ex- 
 tremely desirous of getting possession of this 
 boy. 
 
 The reason why he deemed it so essential to 
 get possession of him was this. The child was, 
 it is true, of little consequence while his broth- 
 er the king lived; but if the king were put 
 out of the way, then the thoughts and the hearts 
 of all the loyal people of England, Richard 
 knew very well, would be turned toward York 
 as the rightful successor. But if they could 
 both be put out of the way, and if the people 
 of England could be induced to consider Clar-. 
 ence's children as set aside by the attainder of 
 their father, then he himself would come for- 
 ward as the true and rightful heir to the crown. 
 It is true that it was a part of his plan, as has 
 already been said, to declare the marriage of 
 Elizabeth Woodville with the king null, and 
 thus cut off both these children of Edward from 
 their right of inheritance : but he knew very 
 
Eichakd Lord Protector. 251 
 
 He determines to seize him, 
 
 well that even if a majority of the people of 
 England were to assent to this, there would cer- 
 tainly be a minority that would refuse their as- 
 sent, and would adhere to the cause of the chil- 
 dren, and they, if the children should fall into 
 their hands, might, at some future time, make 
 themselves very formidable to him, and threat- 
 en very seriously the permanence of his do- 
 minion. It was quite necessary, therefore, he 
 thought, that he should get both children into 
 his own power. 
 
 "I must," said he to himself, therefore, "I 
 must, in some way or other, and at all hazards, 
 get possession of little Eichard." 
 
 It is always the policy of usurpers, and of all 
 ambitious and aspiring men who wish to seize 
 and hold power which does not properly belong 
 to them, to carry the various measures neces- 
 sary to the attainment of their ends, especially 
 those likely to be unpopular, not by their own 
 personal action, but by the agency of others, 
 whom they put forward to act for them. Eich- 
 ard proceeded in this way in the present in- 
 stance. He called a grand council of the peers 
 of the realm and great officers of state, and 
 caused the question to be brought up there of 
 removing the young Duke of York from the 
 custody of his mother to that of the Protector, 
 
252 King Richard III. 
 
 The case of the little Richard argued. 
 
 in order that he might be with his brother. The 
 peers who were in Richard's interest advocated 
 this plan ; but all the bishops and archbishops, 
 who, of course, as ecclesiastics, had very high 
 ideas of the sacredness and inviolability of a 
 sanctuar}^, opposed the plan of taking the duke 
 away except by the consent of his mother. 
 
 The other side argued in reply to them that 
 a sanctuary was a place where persons could 
 seek refuge to escape punishment in case of 
 crime, and that where no crime could have been 
 committed, and no charges of crime were made, 
 the principle did not apply. In other words, 
 that the sanctuary was for men and women 
 who had been guilty, or were supposed to have 
 been guilty, of violations of law ; but as chil- 
 dren could commit no crime for which an asy- 
 lum was necessary, the privileges of sanctuary 
 did not extend to them. 
 
 This view of the subj ect prevailed. The bish- 
 ops and archbishops were outvoted, and an or- 
 der in council was passed authorizing the Lord 
 Protector to possess himself of his nephew, the 
 Duke of York, and for this purpose to take him, 
 if necessary, out of sanctuary by force. 
 
 Still, the bishops and archbishops were very 
 unwilling that force should be used, if it could 
 possibly be avoided ; and finally the Archbish- 
 
Richard Lord Protector. 253 
 
 Delegation sent to the Tower. 
 
 op of Canterbury, who was the highest prelate 
 in the realm, proposed that a deputation from 
 the council should be sent to the Abbey, and 
 that he should go with them, in order to see 
 the queen, and make the attempt to persuade 
 her to give up her son of her own accord. 
 
 After giving notice to the abbot of their in- 
 tended visit, and making an arrangement with 
 him and with the queen in respect to the time 
 when they could be received, the delegation 
 proceeded in state to the Abbey on the appoint- 
 ed day, and were received by the abbot and by 
 Elizabeth with due ceremony in the Jerusalem 
 chamber, the great audience hall of the Abbey, 
 which has already been described. 
 
 The Archbishop of Canterbury, who was at 
 the head of the delegation, explained the case 
 to the queen. They wished her, he said, to al- 
 low her son, the Duke of York, to leave the 
 sanctuary, and to join his brother the king at 
 his royal residence in the Tower. He would 
 be perfectly safe there, he said, under the care 
 of his uncle, the Lord Protector. 
 
 " The Protector thinks it very necessary that 
 the duke should go," added the archbishop, 
 "to be company for his brother. The king is 
 very melancholy, he says, for want of a play- 
 fellow," 
 
254 King Eichard III. 
 
 Interview with the mother of the princes. 
 
 " And so the Protector," replied the queen — 
 "God grant that he may really prove a pro- 
 tector — thinks that the king needs a playfel- 
 low ! And can no playfellow be found for him 
 except his brother ? 
 
 "Besides," she added, "he is not in a mood 
 to play. He is not well. They must find some 
 other playmate for his brother. Just as if 
 princes, while they are so young, could not as 
 well have some one to play with them not of 
 their own rank, or as if a boy must have his 
 brother, and nobody else for his mate, when 
 every body knows that boys are more likely 
 to disagree with their brothers than they are 
 with other children." 
 
 The archbishop, in reply, proceeded to argue 
 the case with the queen, and to represent the 
 necessity, arising from reasons of state, why the 
 young duke should be committed to the charge 
 of his uncle. He explained to her, too, that the 
 Lord Protector had been fully authorized, by a 
 decree of the council, to come and take his 
 nephew from the Abbey, and to employ force, if 
 necessary, to effect the purpose, but that it would 
 be much better, both for the queen herself and 
 the young duke, as well as for all concerned, 
 that the affair should be settled in a peaceable 
 and amicable manner. 
 
Eichard Lord Protector. 255 
 
 The queen is forced to give up the child. 
 
 The unhappy queen saw at last that there 
 was no alternative but for her to submit to her 
 fate and give up her boy. Slowly and reluc- 
 tantly she came to this conclusion, and finally 
 gave her consent. Eichard was brought in. 
 His mother took him by the hand, and again 
 addressed the archbishop and the delegation, 
 speaking substantially as follows : 
 
 " My lord," said she, " and all my lords now 
 present, I will not be so suspicious as to mis- 
 trust the promises you make me, or to believe 
 that you are dealing otherwise than fairly and 
 honorably by me. Here is my son. I give 
 him up to your charge. I have no doubt that 
 he would be safe here under my protection, if 
 I could be allowed to keep him with me, al- 
 though I have enemies that so hate me and all 
 my blood, that I believe, if they thought they 
 had any of it in their own veins, they would 
 open them to let it flow out. 
 
 " I give him up, at your demand, to the pro- 
 tection of his brother and his uncle. And yet 
 I know well that the desire of a kingdom knows 
 no kindred. Brothers have been their broth- 
 ers' bane, and can these nephews be sure of their 
 uncle ? The boys would be safe if kept asun- 
 der; together — I do not know. Nevertheless, 
 I here deliver my son, and with him his broth- 
 
256 King Kichard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 The parting scene. The prince is taken away. 
 
 er's life, into your hands, and of you shall I re- 
 quire them both, before God and man. I know 
 that you are faithful and true in what you in- 
 tend, and you have power, moreover, to keep 
 the children safe, if you will. If you think that 
 I am over-anxious and fear too much, take care 
 that you yourselves do not fear too little." 
 
 Then drawing Eichard to her, she kissed him 
 very lovingly, the tears coming to her eyes as 
 she did so. 
 
 " Farewell," she said, "farewell, mine own 
 sweet son. God send jou good keeping. I 
 must kiss you before you go, for God knows 
 when we shall kiss together again." 
 
 She kissed him again and blessed him, and 
 then turned to go away, weeping bitterly. 
 
 The child began to weep too, from sympathy 
 with his mother's distress. The archbishop, 
 however, took him by the hand and led him 
 away, followed by the rest of the delegation. 
 
 They conveyed the young duke first to the 
 hall of the council, which was very near, and 
 thence to the Lord Protector's residence in the 
 city. Here he was received with every mark 
 of consideration and honor, and a handsome es- 
 cort was provided to conduct him in state to 
 the Tower, where he joined his brother. 
 
 Eichard had now every thins under his own 
 
Richard Lord Protector. 257 
 
 Both princes entirely in Richard's power. 
 
 control. The delivery of the Duke of York 
 into his hands took place on the sixteenth of 
 June. The time which had been set for the 
 coronation was the twenty -second. 
 R 
 
258 King Richard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 The Duke of Buckingham. Historical doubts. 
 
 Chapter XIII. 
 Proclaimed King. 
 
 EICHARD, having thus obtained control of 
 every thing essential to the success of his 
 plans, began to prepare for action. His chief 
 friend and confederate, the one on whom he re- 
 lied most for the execution of the several meas- 
 ures which he proposed to take, was a powerful 
 nobleman named the Duke of Buckingham. I 
 shall proceed in this chapter to describe the suc- 
 cessive steps of the course which Richard and 
 the Duke of Buckingham pursued in raising 
 Richard to the throne, as recorded by the dif- 
 ferent historians of those days, and as generally 
 believed since, though, in fact, there have been 
 great disputes in respect to these occurrences, 
 and it is now quite difficult to ascertain with 
 certainty what the precise truth of the case 
 really is. This, however, is, after all, of no great 
 practical importance, for, in respect to remote 
 transactions of this nature, the thing which is 
 most necessary for the purposes of general edu- 
 cation is to understand what the story is, in 
 detail, which has been generally received among 
 
Proclaimed King. 259 
 
 Richard at Bayna rd's Castle. The expense-book. 
 
 mankind, and to which the allusions of orators 
 and poets, and the discussions of statesmen and 
 moralists in subsequent ages refer, for it is with 
 this story alone that for all the purposes of gen- 
 eral reading we have any thing to do. 
 
 Eichard was residing at this time chiefly at 
 Baynard's Castle with his mother* The young 
 king and his brother, the Duke of York, were 
 in the Tower. They were not nomina!ly pris- 
 oners, but yet Richard kept close watch and 
 ward over them, and took most effectual pre- 
 cautions to prevent their making their escape. 
 The queen, Elizabeth Woodville, with her 
 daughters, was in the sanctuary. Richard's 
 wife, with the young child, was still at Middle- 
 ham Castle. 
 
 It is a very curious circumstance, showing 
 how sometimes records of the most trivial and 
 insignificant things come down to us from an- 
 cient times in a clear and certain form, while 
 all that is really important to know is involved 
 in doubt and obscurity— that the household ex- 
 pense-book of Anne at Middleham is still ex- 
 tant, showing all the little items of expense in- 
 curred for Richard's son, while all is dispute and 
 uncertainty in respect to the great political 
 * For view of this castle, see page 273. 
 
260 King Richard III. 
 
 Items from the expense-book. llichard's plans. 
 
 schemes and measures of his father. In this 
 book there is a charge of 22s. 9c?. for a piece 
 of green cloth, and another of Is. Sd. for mak- 
 ing it into gowns for " my lord prince." There 
 is also a charge of 5s. for a feather for him, and 
 135. Id. paid to a shoemaker, named Dirick, for 
 a pair of shoes. This expense-book was con- 
 tinued after Anne left Middleham Castle to go 
 to London, as will be presently related. There 
 are several charges on the journey for offerings 
 and gifts made by the child at churches on the 
 way. Two men were paid 6s. Sd. for running 
 on foot by the side of his carriage. These 
 men's names were Medcalf and Pacock. There 
 is also a charge of 2d. for mending a whip ! 
 
 But to return to our narrative. The time for 
 the coronation of Edward the Fifth was draw- 
 ing near, but Richard intended to prevent the 
 performance of this ceremony, and to take the 
 crown for himself instead. The first thing was 
 to put in circulation the story that his two 
 nephews were not the legitimate children of his 
 brother, Edward the Fourth, and to prepare the 
 way for this, he wished first, by every means, to 
 cast odium on Edward's character. This was 
 easily done, for Edward's character was bad 
 enough to merit any degree of odium which his 
 brother might wish it to bear. 
 
Proclaimed King. 261 
 
 Richard's determination in respect to Jane Shore. 
 
 Accordingly, Kichard employed his friends 
 and partisans in talking as much as possible in 
 all quarters about the dissoluteness and the 
 vices of the late king. False stories would 
 probably have been invented, if it had not been 
 that there were enough that were true. These 
 stories were all revived and put in circulation, 
 and every thing was made to appear as unfa- 
 vorable for Edward as possible. Kichard him- 
 self, on the other hand, feigned a very strict and 
 scrupulous regard for virtue and morality, and 
 deemed it his duty, he said, to do all in his pow- 
 er to atone for and wipe away the reproach 
 which his brother's loose and wicked life had 
 left upon the court and the kingdom. Among 
 other things, the cause of public morals demand- 
 ed, he said, that an example should be made of 
 Jane Shore, who had been the associate and 
 partner of the king in his immoralities. 
 
 Jane Shore, it will be recollected, was the 
 wife of a rich citizen of London, whom Edward 
 had enticed away from her husband and brought 
 to court. She was naturally a very amiable 
 and kind-hearted woman, and all accounts con- 
 cur in saying that she exercised the power that 
 she acquired over the mind of the king in a 
 very humane and praiseworthy manner. She 
 was always ready to interpose, when the king 
 
262 King Eichard III. 
 
 Jane's character. Her jewelry confiscated. 
 
 contemplated any act of harshness or severity, 
 to avert his anger and save his intended victim, 
 and, in general, she did a great deal to soften 
 the brutality of his character, and to protect the 
 innocent and helpless from the wrongs which 
 he would otherwise have often done them. 
 These amiable and gentle traits of character do 
 not, indeed, atone at all for the grievous sin 
 which she committed in abandoning her hus- 
 band and living voluntarily with the king, but 
 they did much toward modifying the feeling of 
 scorn and contempt with which she would have 
 otherwise been regarded by the people of En- 
 gland. 
 
 Eichard caused Jane to be arrested and sent 
 to prison. He also seized all her plate and jew- 
 els, and confiscated them. She had a very rich 
 and valuable collection of these things.* Eich- 
 ard then caused an ecclesiastical court to be or- 
 ganized, and sent her before it to be tried. The 
 court, undoubtedly in accordance with instruc- 
 tions that Eichard himself gave them, sentenced 
 her, by way of penance for her sins, to walk in 
 midday through the streets of London, from 
 one end of the city to the other, almost entirely 
 
 * The husband with whom she had lived before she be- 
 came acquainted with Edward was a wealthy goldsmith 
 and jeweler. 
 
Proclaimed King. 263 
 
 The punishment of Jane Shore. 
 
 undressed. The intention of this severe expo- 
 sure was to designate her to those who should 
 assemble to witness the punishment as a wan- 
 ton, and thus to put her to shame, and draw 
 upon her the scorn and derision of the popu* 
 lace. They found some old and obsolete law 
 which authorized such a punishment. The 
 sentence was carried into effect on a Sunday. 
 The unhappy criminal was conducted through 
 the principal streets of the city, wearing a night- 
 dress, and carrying a lighted taper in her hand, 
 between rows of spectators that assembled by 
 thousands along the way to witness the scene. 
 But, instead of being disposed to receive her 
 with taunts and reproaches, the populace were 
 moved to compassion by her saddened look and 
 her extreme beauty. Their hearts were soft- 
 ened by the remembrance of the many stories 
 they had heard of the kindness of her heart, 
 and the amiableness and gentleness of her de- 
 meanor, in the time of her prosperity and pow- 
 er. They thought it hard, too, that the law 
 should be enforced so rigidly against her alone, 
 while so many multitudes in all ranks of soci- 
 ety, high as well as low, were allowed to go 
 unpunished. 
 
 Still, Kichard's object in this exhibition was 
 accomplished. The transaction had the effect 
 
264 King Richard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 Alleged marriage of Edward IV. to Elinor Talbot. 
 
 of calling the attention of the public universal- 
 ly and strongly to the fact that Edward the 
 Fourth had been a loose and dissolute man, and 
 prepared people's minds for the charge which 
 was about to be brought against him. 
 
 This charge was that he had been secretly 
 married to another lady before his union with 
 Elizabeth Woodville, and that consequently by 
 this latter marriage he was guilty of bigamy. 
 Of course, if this were true, the second marriage 
 would be null and void, and the children spring- 
 ing from it would have no rights as heirs. 
 
 Whether there was any truth in this story or 
 not can not now ever be certainly known. All 
 that is certain is that Eichard circulated the re- 
 port, and he found several witnesses to testify 
 to the truth of it. The maiden name of the 
 lady to whom they said the king had been mar- 
 ried was Elinor Talbot. She had married in 
 early life a certain Lord Boteler, whose widow 
 she was at the time that Edward was alleged 
 to have married her. The marriage was per- 
 formed in a very private manner by a certain 
 bishop, nobody being present besides the par- 
 ties except the bishop himself, and he was 
 strictly charged by the king to keep the affair 
 a profound secret. This he promised to do. 
 Notwithstanding his promise, however, the bish- 
 
Proclaimed King. 265 
 
 Particulars of the story. Plan for publishing it. 
 
 op -some time subsequently, after the king had 
 been married to Elizabeth Woodville, revealed 
 the secret of the previous marriage to Glouces- 
 ter, at which the king, when he heard of it, was 
 extremely angry. He accused the bishop of 
 having betrayed the trust which he had reposed 
 in him, and, dismissing him at once from office, 
 shut him up in prison. 
 
 Eichard having, as he said, kept these facts 
 secret during his brother's lifetime, out of re- 
 gard for the peace of the family, now felt it his 
 duty to make them known, in order to prevent 
 the wrong which would be done by allowing 
 the crown to descend to a son who, not being 
 born in lawful wedlock, could have no rights 
 as heir. 
 
 After disseminating this story among the in- 
 fluential persons connected with the court, and 
 through all the circles of high life, during the 
 week, it was arranged that on the following 
 Sunday the facts should be made known pub- 
 licly to the people. 
 
 There was a large open space near St. Paul's 
 Cathedral, in the very heart of London, where 
 it was the custom to hold public assemblies of 
 all kinds, both religious and political. There 
 was a pulpit built on one side of this space, 
 from which sermons were preached, orations 
 
266 King Richard III. 
 
 Sermon preached by Dr. Shaw near st. Paul's. 
 
 and harangues pronounced, and proclamations 
 made. Oaths were administered here too, in 
 eases where it was required to administer oaths 
 to large numbers of people. 
 
 From this pulpit, on the next Sunday after 
 the penance of Jane Shore, a certain Dr. Shaw, 
 who was a brother of the Lord-mayor of Lon- 
 don, preached a sermon to a large concourse of 
 citizens, in which he openly attempted to set 
 aside the claims of the two boys, and to prove 
 that Richard was the true heir to the crown. 
 
 lie took for his text a passage from the Wis- 
 dom of Solomon, " The multiplying brood of 
 the ungodly shall not thrive." In this discourse 
 he explained to his audience that Edward, 
 when he was married to Elizabeth TVoodville, 
 was already the husband of Elinor Boteler, and 
 consequently that the second marriage was il- 
 legal and void, and the children of it entirely 
 destitute of all claims to the crown. He also, 
 it is said, advanced the idea that neither Ed» 
 ward nor Clarence were the children of their 
 reputed father, the old Duke of York, but that 
 Richard was the oldest legitimate son of the 
 marriage, in proof of which he offered the fact 
 that Richard strongly resembled the duke in 
 person, while neither Edward nor Clarence had 
 borne any resemblance to him at all. 
 
Proclaimed King. 267 
 
 Ingenious contrivance. CooIiiuhh of th« people 
 
 It was arranged, moreover — so it was said — 
 that, when the preacher came to the passage 
 where he was to speak of the resemblance 
 which Kichard bore to his father, the great Duke 
 of York, Richard himself was to enter the as- 
 sembly as if by accident, and thus give the 
 preacher the opportunity to illustrate and con- 
 firm what he had said by directing his au- 
 dience to observe for themselves the resem- 
 blance which he had pointed out, and also to 
 excite them to a burst of enthusiasm in Rich- 
 ard's favor by the eloquent appeal which the 
 incident of Richard's entrance was to awaken. 
 But this intended piece of stage effect, if it was 
 really planned, failed in the execution. Rich- 
 ard did not come in at the right time, and when 
 he did come in, either the preacher managed 
 the case badly, or else the people were very lit- 
 tle disposed to espouse Richard's cause; for 
 when the orator, at the close of his appeal, ex- 
 pected applause and acclamations, the people 
 uttered no response, but looked at each other in 
 silence, and remained wholly unmoved. 
 
 In the course of the following two or three 
 days, other attempts were made to excite the 
 populace to some demonstration in Richard's 
 favor, but they did not succeed. The Duke of 
 Buckingham met a large concourse of London- 
 
268 King Richard III. 
 
 Meeting at the Guildhall. The people do not respond. 
 
 ers at the Guildhall, which is in the centre of 
 the business portion of the city. He was sup- 
 ported by a number of nobles, knights, and dis- 
 tinguished citizens, and he made a long and 
 able speech to the assembly, in which he argued 
 strenuously in favor of calling Richard to the 
 throne. He denounced the character of the for- 
 mer king, and enlarged at length on the dissi- 
 pated and vicious life which he had led. He 
 also related to the people the story of Edward's 
 having been the husband of Lady Elinor Boteler 
 at the time when his marriage with Queen Eliz- 
 abeth took place, which fact, as Buckingham 
 showed, made the marriage with Elizabeth 
 void, and cut off the children from the inherit- 
 ance. The children of Clarence had been cut 
 off, too, by the attainder, and so Richard was the 
 only remaining heir. 
 
 The duke concluded his harangue by asking 
 the assembly if, under those circumstances, they 
 would not call upon Richard to ascend the 
 throne. A few of the poorer sort, very likely 
 some that had been previously hired to do it, 
 threw up their caps into the air in response to 
 this appeal, and cried out, "Long live King- 
 Richard !" But the major part, comprising all 
 the more respectable portion of the assembly, 
 looked grave and were silent. Some who were 
 
Proclaimed King. 269 
 
 The appeals to the people faiL Grand council convened. 
 
 pressed to give their opinion said they must 
 take time to consider. 
 
 Thus these appeals to the people failed, so far 
 as the object of them was to call forth a popu- 
 lar demonstration in Kichard's favor. But in 
 one respect they accomplished the object in 
 view : they had the effect of making it known 
 throughout London and the vicinity that a rev- 
 olution was impending, and thus preparing 
 men's minds to acquiesce in the change more 
 readily than they might perhaps have done if 
 it had come upon them suddenly and with a 
 shock. 
 
 On the following day after the address at the 
 Guildhall, a grand assembly of all the lords, 
 bishops, councilors, and officers of state was con- 
 vened in Westminster. It was substantially a 
 Parliament, though not a Parliament in form. 
 The reason why it was not called as a Parliament 
 in form was because Eichard, having doubts, as 
 he said, about the right of Edward to the throne, 
 could not conscientiously advise that any pub- 
 lic act should be performed in his name, and a 
 Parliament could only be legally convened by 
 summons from a king. Accordingly, this as- 
 sembly was only an informal meeting of the 
 peers of England and other great dignitaries 
 of Church and State, with a view of consulting 
 
270 King Richard III. [A-.D.1483. 
 
 Arrangements made by Buckingham. The petition. 
 
 together to determine what should be done. 
 Of course, it was all fully arranged and settled 
 beforehand, among those who were in Richard's 
 confidence, what the result of these delibera- 
 tions was to be. The Duke of Buckingham, 
 Richard's principal friend and supporter, man- 
 aged the business at the meeting. The assem- 
 bly consisted, of course, chiefly of the party of 
 Richard's friends. The principal leaders of the 
 parties opposed to him had been beheaded or 
 shut up in prison ; of the rest, some had fled, 
 some had concealed themselves, and of the few 
 who dared to show themselves at the meeting, 
 there were none who had the courage, or per- 
 haps I ought rather to say the imprudence and 
 folly, to oppose any thing which Buckingham 
 should undertake to do. 
 
 The result of the deliberations of this council 
 was the drawing up of a petition to be present- 
 ed to Richard, declaring him the true and right- 
 ful heir to the crown, and praying him to as- 
 sume at once the sovereign power. 
 
 A delegation was appointed to wait upon 
 Richard and present the petition to him. Buck- 
 ingham was at the head of this delegation. The 
 petition was written out in due form upon a roll 
 of parchment. It declared that, inasmuch as it 
 was clearly established that King Edward the 
 
AD. 1483.] Proclaimed King. 271 
 
 Substance of the petition. Real object of it. 
 
 Fourth was already the husband of 'Dame Ali- 
 onora Boteler," by a previous marriage, at the 
 time of his pretended marriage with Elizabeth 
 Woodville, and that consequently his children 
 by Elizabeth Woodville, not being born in law- 
 ful wedlock, could have no rights of inheritance 
 whatever from their father, and especially could 
 by no means derive from him any title to the 
 crown ; and inasmuch as .the children of Clar- 
 ence had been cut off from the succession by 
 the bill of attainder which had been passed 
 against their father ; and inasmuch as Kichard 
 came next in order to these in the line of suc- 
 cession, therefore he was now the true and 
 rightful heir. This his right moreover by birth 
 was now confirmed by the decision of the es- 
 tates of the realm assembled for the purpose ; 
 wherefore the petition, in conclusion, invited 
 and urged him at once to assume the crown 
 which was thus his by a double title — the right 
 of birth and the election of the three estates of 
 the realm. 
 
 Of course, although the petition was address- 
 ed to Richard as if the object of it was to pro- 
 duce an- effect upon his mind, it was really all 
 planned and arranged by Richard himself, and 
 by Buckingham in conjunction with him ; and 
 the representations and arguments which it 
 
272 King Richard III. 
 
 Richard receives the petition at Barnard' s Castle. 
 
 contained were designed solely for effect on the 
 mind of the public, when the details of the 
 transaction should be promulgated throughout 
 the land. 
 
 The petition being ready, Buckingham, in be- 
 half of the delegation, demanded an audience 
 of the Lord Protector that they might lay it 
 before him. Kichard accordingly made an ap- 
 pointment to receive them at his mother's res- 
 idence at Baynard's Castle. 
 
 At the appointed time the delegation appear- 
 ed, and were received in great state by Eichard 
 in the audience hall. The Duke of Bucking- 
 ham presented the petition, and Kichard read 
 it. He seemed surprised, and he pretended to 
 be at a loss what to reply. Presently he began 
 to say that he could not think of assuming the 
 crown. He said he had no ambition to reign, 
 but only desired to preserve the kingdom for 
 his nephew the king until he should become 
 of sufficient age, and then to put him peaceably 
 in possession of it. But the Duke of Bucking- 
 ham replied that this could never be. The peo- 
 ple of England, he said, would never consent to 
 be ruled by a prince of illegitimate birth. 
 
 " And if you, my lord," added the duke, " re- 
 fuse to accept the crown, they know where to 
 find another who will gladly accept it." 
 
Proclaimed King. 275 
 
 Richard concludes to accept the crown. 
 
 In the end, Kichard allowed himself to be 
 persuaded that there was no alternative but for 
 him to accept the crown, and he reluctantly 
 consented that, on the morrow, he would pro- 
 ceed in state to Westminster, and publicly as- 
 sume the title and the prerogatives of king. 
 
 Accordingly, the next day, a grand proces- 
 sion was formed, and Kichard was conducted 
 with great pomp to Westminster Hall. Here 
 he took his place on the throne, with the lead- 
 ing lords of his future court, and the bishops 
 and archbishops around him. The rest of the 
 hall was crowded with a vast concourse of peo- 
 ple that had assembled to witness the ceremony. 
 
 First the king took the customary royal oath, 
 which was administered by the archbishop. 
 He then summoned the great judges before 
 him, and made an address to them, exhorting 
 them to administer the laws and execute judg- 
 ment between man and man in a just and im- 
 partial manner, inasmuch as to secure that end, 
 he said, would be the first and greatest object 
 of his reign. 
 
 After this Kichard addressed the concourse 
 of people in the hall, who, in some sense, repre- 
 sented the public, and pronounced a pardon for 
 all offenses which had been committed against 
 himself, and ordered a proclamation to be made 
 
276 
 
 King Kichard III. 
 
 Ceremonies connected with the investiture of the king. 
 
 of a general amnesty throughout the land. 
 These announcements were received by the 
 people with loud acclamations, and the ceremo- 
 ny was concluded by shouts of "Long live 
 King Kichard!" from all the assembly. 
 
 We obtain a good idea of this scene by the 
 following engraving, which is cojDied exactly 
 from a picture contained in a manuscript vol- 
 ume of the time. 
 
 THE KING ON IIIS THRONE. 
 
 The royal dignity having thus been assumed 
 by the new king at the usual centre and seat 
 
A.D.1483.] Proclaimed King. 277 
 
 Richard marches through London. Is every where proclaimed king. 
 
 of the royal power, the procession was again 
 formed, and Richard was conducted to West- 
 minster Abbey for the purpose of doing the 
 homage customary on such occasions at one of 
 the shrines in the church. The procession of 
 the king was met at the door of the church by 
 a procession of monks chanting a solemn an- 
 them as they came. 
 
 After the religious ceremonies were com- 
 pleted, Richard, at the head of a grand caval- 
 cade of knights, noblemen, and citizens, pro- 
 ceeded into the city to the Church of St. Paul. 
 The streets were lined with spectators, who sa- 
 luted the king with cheers and acclamations as 
 he passed. At the Church of St. Paul more 
 ceremonies were performed and more procla- 
 mations were made. The popular joy, more or 
 less sincere, was expressed by the sounding of 
 trumpets, the waving of banners, and loud ac- 
 clamations of " Long live King Richard !" At 
 length, when the services in the city were con- 
 cluded, the king returned to Westminster, and 
 took up his abode at the royal palace ; and while 
 he was returning, heralds were sent to all the 
 great centres of concourse and intelligence in 
 and around London to proclaim him king. 
 
 This proclamation of Richard as king took 
 place on the twenty-sixth of June. King Ed- 
 
278 King Eichard III. [AD. 1483. 
 
 Extraordinary character of the reign of Edward V. 
 
 ward the Fourth died just about three months 
 before. During this three months Edward the 
 Fifth is, in theory, considered as having been 
 the King of England, though, during the whole 
 period, the poor child, instead of exercising any 
 kingly rights or prerogatives, was a helpless 
 prisoner in the hands of others, who, while they 
 professed to be his protectors, were really his 
 determined and relentless foes. 
 
A.D.1483.] The Coronation. 279 
 
 Plan for the coronation. Anne is sent for, and comes to London. 
 
 Chapter XIV. 
 The Coronation. 
 
 IT was on the 26th of June, 1483, that Eich- 
 ard was proclaimed king, under the circum- 
 stances narrated in the last chapter. In order 
 to render his investiture with the royal author- 
 ity complete, he resolved that the ceremony of 
 coronation should be immediately performed. 
 He accordingly appointed the 6th of July for 
 the day. This allowed an interval of just ten 
 days for the necessary preparations. 
 
 The first thing to be done was to send to 
 Middleham Castle for Anne, his wife, who 
 now, since the proclamation of Kichard, became 
 Queen of England. Kichard wished that she 
 should be present, and take part in the cere- 
 mony of the coronation. The child was to be 
 brought too. His name was Edward. 
 
 It seems that Anne arrived in London only 
 on the 3d of July, three days before the ap- 
 pointed day. There is a specification in the 
 book of accounts of some very elegant and 
 costly cloth of gold bought on that day in Lon- 
 don, the material for the queen's coronation robe. 
 
280 King Richard III. 
 
 Procession of barges. Great crowds of spectators. The royal barges. 
 
 Richard determined that the ceremony of his 
 coronation should be more magnificent than 
 that of any previous English monarch. Prep- 
 arations were made, accordingly, on a very 
 grand scale. There were several preliminary 
 pageants and processions on the days preceding 
 that of the grand ceremony. 
 
 On the 4th of July, which was Sunday, the 
 king and queen proceeded in state to the Tow- 
 er. They went in barges on the river. The 
 party set out from Baynard's Castle, the resi- 
 dence of Richard's mother, and the place where 
 the queen went on her arrival in London. 
 
 The royal barges destined to convey the 
 king and queen, and the other great personages 
 of the party, were covered with canopies of 
 silk, and were otherwise magnificently adorned. 
 Great crowds of spectators assembled to wit- 
 ness the scene. Some came in boats upon the 
 water, others took their stations on the shores, 
 where every prominent and commanding point 
 was covered with its own special crowd, and 
 others still occupied the windows of the build- 
 ings that looked out upon the river. 
 
 Through the midst of this scene the royal 
 barges passed down the river to the Tower. 
 As they moved along, the air was filled with 
 prolonged and continual shouts of " Long live 
 
The Coeonation. 281 
 
 Arrival at the Tower. Measures adopted. 
 
 King Kichard!" "Long live the noble Queen 
 Anne !" 
 
 Eoyal or imperial power, once firmly estab- 
 lished, will never fail to draw forth the accla- 
 mations of the crowd, no matter by what means 
 it has been acquired. 
 
 On his arrival at the Tower, Eichard was 
 received with great honor by the authorities 
 which he had left in charge there, and he took 
 possession of the edifice formally, as one of his 
 own royal residences. He held a court in the 
 great council-hall. At this court he created 
 several persons peers of the realm, and invest- 
 ed others with the honor of knighthood. These 
 were men whom he supposed to be somewhat 
 undecided in respect to the course which they 
 should pursue, and he wished, by these compli- 
 ments and honors, to purchase their adhesion 
 to his cause. 
 
 He also liberated some persons who had been 
 made prisoners, presuming that, by this kind- 
 ness, he should conciliate their good-will. 
 
 He did not, however, by any means extend 
 this conciliating policy to the case of the young 
 ex-king and his brother ; indeed, it would have 
 been extremely dangerous for him to have done 
 so. He was aware that there must be a large 
 number of persons throughout the kingdom 
 
282 King Richard III. 
 
 The princes imprisoned. Richard and Anne proceed to Westminster. 
 
 who still considered Edward as the rightful 
 king, and he knew very well that, if any of 
 these were to obtain possession of Edward's 
 person, it would enable them to act vigorously 
 in his name, and to organize perhaps a pow- 
 erful party for the support of his claims. He 
 was convinced, therefore, that it was essential 
 to the success of his plans that the boys should 
 be kept in very close and safe custody. So he 
 removed them from the apartments which they 
 had hitherto occupied, and shut them up in 
 close confinement in a gloomy tower upon the 
 outer walls of the fortress, and which, on ac- 
 count of the cruel murders which were from 
 time to time committed there, subsequently ac- 
 quired the name of the Bloody Tower. 
 
 Richard and the queen remained at the Tow- 
 er until the day appointed for the coronation, 
 which was Tuesday. The ceremonies of that 
 day were commenced by a grand progress of 
 the king and his suite through the city of Lon- 
 don back to Westminster, only, as if to vary 
 the pageantry, they went back in grand caval- 
 cade through the streets of the city, instead of 
 returning as they came, by barges on the river. 
 The concourse of spectators on this occasion 
 was even greater than before. The streets were 
 every where thronged, and very strict regula- 
 
THE BLOODY TOWER. 
 
The Coeonation. 285 
 
 Ceremonies connected with the coronation. The royal paraphernalia. 
 
 tions were made, by Eicliard's command, to pre- 
 vent disorder. 
 
 On arriving at Westminster, the royal party 
 proceeded to the Abbey, where, first of all, as 
 was usual in the case of a coronation, certain 
 ceremonies of religious homage were to be per- 
 formed at a particular shrine, which was re- 
 garded as an object of special sanctity on such 
 occasions. The king and queen proceeded to 
 this shrine from the great hall, barefooted, in 
 token of reverence and humility. They walk- 
 ed, however, it should be added, on ornamented 
 cloth laid down for this purpose on the stone 
 pavements of the floors. All the knights and 
 nobles of England that were present accom- 
 panied and followed the king and queen in 
 their pilgrimage to the shrine. 
 
 One of these nobles bore the king's crown, 
 another the queen's crown, and others still va- 
 rious other ancient national emblems of royal 
 power. The queen walked under a canopy of 
 silk, with a golden bell hanging from each of 
 the corners of it. The canopy was borne by 
 four great officers of state, and the bells, of 
 course, jingled as the bearers walked along. 
 
 The queen wore upon her head a circlet of 
 gold adorned with precious stones. There were 
 four bishops, one at each of the four corners of 
 
286 King Richard III. 
 
 Religious services. The king and queen crowned. The dais. 
 
 the canopy, who walked as immediate attend- 
 ants upon the queen, and a lady of the very 
 highest rank followed her, bearing her train. 
 
 "When the procession reached the shrine, the 
 king and queen took their seats on each side 
 of the high altar, and then there came forth a 
 procession of priests and bishops, clothed in 
 magnificent sacerdotal robes made of cloth of 
 gold, and chanting solemn hymns of prayer and 
 praise as they came. 
 
 After the religious services were completed, 
 the ceremony of anointing and crowning the 
 king and queen, and of investing their persons 
 with the royal robes and emblems, was per- 
 formed with the usual grand and imposing so- 
 lemnities. After this, the royal cortege was 
 formed again, and the company returned to 
 Westminster Hall in the same order as they 
 came. The queen walked, as before, under her 
 silken canopy, the golden bells keeping time, 
 by their tinkling, with the steps of the bear- 
 ers. 
 
 At Westminster Hall a great dais had been 
 erected, with thrones upon it for the king and 
 queen. As their rhaj esties advanced and ascend- 
 ed this dais, surrounded by the higher nobles 
 and chief officers of state, the remainder of the 
 procession, consisting of those who had come to 
 
The Coronation. 287 
 
 Ceremonies in Westminster Hall. The banquet. 
 
 accompany and escort them to the place, fol- 
 lowed, and filled the- hall. 
 
 As soon as this vast throng saw that the 
 king and queen were seated upon the dais, 
 with their special and immediate attendants 
 around them, their duties were ended, and they 
 were to be dismissed. A grand officer of state, 
 whose duty it was to dismiss them, came in on 
 horseback, his horse covered with cloth of gold 
 hanging down on both sides to the ground. 
 The people, falling back before this horse- 
 man, gradually retired, and thus the hall was 
 cleared. 
 
 The king and queen then rose from their 
 seats upon the dais, and were conducted to their 
 private apartments in the palace, to rest and re- 
 fresh themselves after the fatigues of the public 
 ceremony, and to prepare for the grand banquet 
 which was to take place in the evening. 
 
 The preparations for this banquet were made 
 by spreading a table upon the dais under the 
 canopy for the king and queen, and four other 
 very large and long tables through the hall for 
 the invited guests. 
 
 The time appointed for the banquet was four 
 o'clock. When the hour arrived, the king 
 and queen were conducted into the hall again, 
 and took their places at the table which had 
 
288 King Eichakd III. 
 
 The royal champion. Grand challenge. 
 
 been prepared for them on the dais. They had 
 changed their dresses, having laid aside their 
 royal robes, and the various paraphernalia of 
 office with which they had been indued at 
 the coronation, and now appeared in robes of 
 crimson velvet embroidered with gold, and 
 trimmed with costly furs. They were attended 
 by many lords and ladies of the highest rank, 
 scarcely less magnificently dressed than them- 
 selves. They were waited upon, while at table, 
 by the noblest persons in the realm, who served 
 them from the most richly wrought vessels of 
 gold and silver. 
 
 After the first part of the banquet was over 
 a knight, fully armed, and mounted on a war 
 horse richly caparisoned, rode into the hall 
 having been previously announced by a herald 
 This was the king's champion, who came, ac 
 cording to a custom usually observed on such 
 occasions, to challenge and defy the king's ene- 
 mies, if any such there were.* 
 
 The trappings of the champion's horse were 
 of white and red silk, and the armor of the 
 knight himself was bright and glittering. As 
 he rode forward into the area in front of the 
 dais, he called out, in a loud voice, demanding 
 of all present if there were any one there who 
 
 * See Frontispiece. 
 
The Coronation. 289 
 
 The spectators. Gauntlet thrown down. A largesse. 
 
 disputed the claim of King Kichard the Third 
 to the crown of England. 
 
 All the people gazed earnestly at the cham- 
 pion while he made this demand, but no one 
 responded. 
 
 The champion then made proclamation again, 
 that if any one there was who would come for- 
 ward and say that King Kichard was not law- 
 fully King of England, he was ready there to 
 fight him to the death, in vindication of Kich- 
 ard's right. As he said this, he threw down 
 his gauntlet upon the floor, in token of defi- 
 ance. 
 
 At this, the whole assembly, with one voice, 
 began to shout, "Long live King Kichard!" 
 and the immense hall was filled, for some min- 
 utes, with thundering acclamations. 
 
 This ceremony being concluded, a company 
 of heralds came forward before the king, and 
 proclaimed " a largesse," as it was called. The 
 ceremony of a largesse consisted in throwing 
 money among the crowd to be scrambled for. 
 Three times the money was thrown out, on this 
 occasion, among the guests in the hall. The 
 amount that is charged on the royal account- 
 book for the expense of this largesse is one 
 hundred pounds. 
 
 The scrambling of a crowd for money thrown 
 T 
 
290 King Eichakd III. 
 
 Modern largesses. The torches. 
 
 thus among them, one would say, was a very 
 rude and boisterous amusement, but those were 
 rude and boisterous times. The custom holds 
 its ground in England, in some measure, to the 
 present day, though now it is confined to throw- 
 ing out pence and halfpence to the rabble in 
 the streets at an election, and is no longer, as 
 of yore, relied upon as a means of entertaining 
 noble guests at a royal dinner. 
 
 After the frolic of the largesse was over, the 
 king and queen rose to depart. The evening 
 was now coming on, and a great number of 
 torches were brought in to illuminate the hall. 
 By the light of these torches, the company, aft- 
 er their majesties had retired, gradually with- 
 drew, and the ceremonies of the coronation were 
 ended. 
 
The Fate of the Princes. 291 
 
 The king resolves on a grand progress through the kingdom. Oxford. 
 
 Chapter XV. 
 The Fate of the Princes. 
 
 AFTER the coronation, King Richard and 
 Anne, the queen, went to Windsor, and 
 took up their residence there, with the court, 
 for a short time, in order that Richard might 
 attend to the most important of the preliminary 
 arrangements for the management of public af- 
 fairs, which are always necessary at the com- 
 mencement of a new reign. As soon as these 
 things were settled, the king set out to make a 
 grand progress through his dominions, for the 
 purpose of receiving the congratulations of the 
 people, and also of impressing them, as much as 
 possible, with a sense of his grandeur and pow- 
 er by the magnificence of his retinue, and the 
 great parades and celebrations by which his 
 progress through the country was to be accom- 
 panied. 
 
 From Windsor Castle the king went first to 
 Oxford, where he was received with distin- 
 guished honors by all the great dignitaries con- 
 nected with the University. Hence he proceed- 
 ed to Gloucester, and afterward to Worcester. 
 
292 King Richard III. 
 
 State of public sentiment. Warwick Castle. 
 
 At all these places lie was received with great 
 parade and pageantry. Those who were dis- 
 posed to espouse his cause, of course, endeav- 
 ored to gain his favor by doing all in their pow- 
 er to give eclat to these celebrations. Those 
 who were indifferent or in doubt, flocked, of 
 course, to see the shows, and thus involuntarily 
 contributed to the apparent popularity of the 
 demonstrations ; while, on the other hand, 
 those who were opposed to him, and adhered 
 still secretly to the cause of young King Ed- 
 ward, made no open opposition, but expressed 
 their dissent, if they expressed it at all, in pri- 
 vate conclaves of their own. They could not 
 do otherwise than to allow Richard to have his 
 own way during the hour of his triumph, their 
 hour being not yet come. 
 
 At last, Richard, in his progress, reached 
 Warwick Castle, and here he was joined by the 
 queen and the young prince, who had remained 
 at Windsor while the king was making his tour 
 through the western towns, but who now came 
 across the country with a grand retinue of her 
 own, to join her husband at her own former 
 home ; for Warwick Castle was the chief strong- 
 hold and principal residence of the great Earl 
 of Warwick, the queen's father. The king and 
 queen remained for some time at Warwick 
 
The Fate of the Princes. 293 
 
 Embassadors. Arrival at York. 
 
 Castle, and the king established his court here, 
 and maintained it with great pomp and splen- 
 dor. Here he received embassadors from Spain, 
 France, and Burgundy, who had been sent by 
 their several governments to congratulate him 
 on his accession, and to pay him their homage. 
 Each of these embassadors came in great state, 
 and were accompanied by a grand retinue ; and 
 the ceremonies of receiving them, and the en- 
 tertainments given to do them honor, were mag- 
 nificent beyond description. 
 
 One of these embassadors, the one sent by 
 the government of Spain, brought a formal pro- 
 posal from Ferdinand and Isabella for a mar- 
 riage between their daughter and Eichard's lit- 
 tle son. The little prince was at that time 
 about seven years of age. 
 
 After remaining some time at Warwick Cas- 
 tle, the royal party proceeded northward, and, 
 after passing through several large towns, they 
 arrived finally at York, which was then, in 
 some sense, the northern capital of the king- 
 dom. Here there was another grand reception. 
 All the nobility and gentry of the surrounding- 
 country came in to honor the king's arrival, 
 and the ceremonies attending the entrance of 
 the royal cortege were extremely magnificent. 
 
 While the court was at York, Eichard re- 
 
294 King Richard III. 
 
 The coronation repeated. Richard's son. Celebrations and rejoicings. 
 
 peated the ceremony of the coronation. On this 
 occasion, his son, the little Prince Edward, was 
 brought forward in a conspicuous manner. He 
 was created Prince of Wales with great cere- 
 mony, and on the day of the coronation he had 
 a little crown upon his head, and his mother led 
 him by the hand in the procession to the altar. 
 
 The poor child did not live, however, to 
 realize the grand destiny which his father thus 
 marked out for him. He died a few months 
 after this at Middleham Castle. 
 
 The coronation at York was attended and 
 followed, as that at London had been, with ban- 
 quets and public parades, and grand celebra- 
 tions of all sorts, which continued for several 
 successive days, and the hilarity and joy which 
 these shows awakened among the crowds that 
 assembled to witness them seemed to indicate 
 a universal acquiescence on the part of the peo- 
 ple of England in Richard's accession to the 
 throne. 
 
 Still, although outwardly every thing looked 
 fair, Richard's mind was not yet by any means 
 at ease. From the very day of his accession, 
 he knew well that, so long as the children 
 of his brother Edward remained alive at the 
 Tower, his seat on the throne could not be se- 
 cure. There must necessarily be, he was well 
 
The Fate of the Princes. 295 
 
 His determination in respect to the children. His agent Green. 
 
 aware, a large party in the kingdom who were 
 secretly in favor of Edward, and he knew that 
 they would very soon begin to come to an un- 
 derstanding with each other, and to form plans 
 for effecting a counter-revolution. The most 
 certain means of preventing the formation of 
 these plots, or of defeating them, if formed, 
 would be to remove the children out of the 
 way. He accordingly determined in his heart, 
 before he left London, that this should be done.* 
 
 He resolved to put them to death. The 
 deed was to be performed during the course of 
 his royal progress to the north, while the minds 
 of the people of England were engrossed with 
 the splendor of the pageantry with which his 
 progress was accompanied. He intended, more- 
 over, that the murder should be effected in a 
 very secret manner, and that the death of the 
 boys should be closely concealed until a time 
 and occasion should arrive rendering it neces- 
 sary that it should be made public. 
 
 Accordingly, soon after he left London, he 
 sent back a confidential agent, named Green, to 
 
 * I say he determined ; for, although some of Richard's 
 defenders have denied that he was guilty of the crime which 
 the almost unanimous voice of history charges upon him, the 
 evidence leaves very little room to doubt that the dreadful 
 tale is in all essential particulars entirely true. 
 
296 King Eichard III. 
 
 Green's return. Conversation with the page. i-ir James Tyrrel. 
 
 Sir Eobert Brakenbury, the governor of the 
 Tower, with a letter, in which Sir Eobert was 
 commanded to put the boys to death. 
 
 Green immediately repaired to London to 
 execute the commission. Eichard proceeded 
 on his journey. When he arrived at Warwick, 
 Green returned and joined him there, bringing 
 back the report that Sir Eobert refused to obey 
 the order. 
 
 Eichard was very angry when Green deliv- 
 ered this message. He turned to a page who 
 was in waiting upon him in his chamber, and 
 said, in a rage, 
 
 "Even these men that I have brought up 
 and made, refuse to obey my commands." 
 
 The page replied, 
 
 " Please your majesty, there is a man here in 
 the ante-chamber, that I know, who will obey 
 your majesty's commands, whatever they may 
 be." 
 
 Eichard asked the page who it was that he 
 meant, and he said Sir James Tyrrel. Sir 
 James Tyrrel was a very talented and accom- 
 plished, but very unscrupulous man, and he 
 was quite anxious to acquire the favor of the 
 king. The page knew this, from conversation 
 which Sir James had had with him, and he had 
 been watching an opportunity to recommend 
 
The Fate of the Princes. 297 
 
 Richard employs Tyrrel. The letter. Tyrrel arrives at the Tower. 
 
 Sir James to Eichard's notice, according to an 
 arrangement that Sir James had made with 
 him. 
 
 So Eichard ordered that Sir James should 
 be sent in. When he came, Eichard held a 
 private conference with him, in which he com- 
 municated to him, bj means of dark hints and 
 insinuations, what he required. Tyrrel under- 
 took to execute the deed. So Eichard gave 
 him a letter to Sir Eobert Brakenbury, in which 
 he ordered Sir Eobert to deliver up the keys 
 of the Tower to Sir James, " to the end," as the 
 letter expressed it, "that he might there ac- 
 complish the king's pleasure in such a thing as 
 he had given him commandment." 
 
 Sir James, having received this letter, pro- 
 ceeded to London, taking with him such per- 
 sons as he thought he might require to aid him 
 in his work. Among these was a man named 
 John Dighton. John Dighton was Sir James's 
 groom. He was "a big, broad, square, strong 
 knave," and ready to commit any crime or deed 
 of violence which his master might require. 
 
 On arriving at the Tower, Sir James deliver- 
 ed his letter to the governor, and the governor 
 gave him up the keys. Sir James went to see 
 the keepers of the prison in which the boys 
 were confined. There were four of them. He 
 
298 King Eichard III. 
 
 Murder of the princes. Action of the assassins. 
 
 selected from among these four, one, a man 
 named Miles Forest, whom he concluded to 
 employ, together with his groom, John Dighton, 
 to kill the princes. He formed the plan, gave 
 the men their instructions, and arranged it with 
 them that they were to carry the deed into ex- 
 ecution that night. 
 
 Accordingly, at midnight, when the princes 
 were asleep, the two men stole softly into the 
 room, and there wrapped the poor boys up sud- 
 denly in the bed-clothes, with pillows pressed 
 down hard over their faces, so that they could 
 not breathe. The boys, of course, were sud- 
 denly awakened, in terror, and struggled to get 
 free ; but the men held them down, and kept 
 the pillows and bed-clothes pressed so closely 
 over their faces that they could not breathe or 
 utter any cry. They held them in this way 
 until they were entirely suffocated. 
 
 When they found that their struggles had 
 ceased, they slowly opened the bed-clothes and 
 lifted up the pillows to see if their victims were 
 really dead. 
 
 "Yes," said they to each other, u they are 
 dead." 
 
 The murderers took off the clothes which the 
 princes had on, and laid out the bodies upon the 
 bed. They then went to call Sir James Tyrrel, 
 
The Fate of the Princes. 299 
 
 The burial. Joy of Richard. Re-interment of the bodies. 
 
 who was all ready, in an apartment not far off, 
 awaiting the summons. He came at once, and, 
 when he saw that the boys were really dead, he 
 gave orders that the men should take the bodies 
 down into the conrt-yard to be buried. 
 
 The grave was dug immediately, just outside 
 the door, at the foot of the stairs which led up 
 to the turret in which the boys had been con- 
 fined. When the bodies had been placed in 
 the ground, the grave was filled up, and some 
 stones were put upon the top of it. 
 
 Immediately after this work had been accom- 
 plished, Sir James delivered back the keys to 
 the governor of the castle, and mounted his 
 horse to return to the king. He traveled with 
 all possible speed, and, on reaching the place 
 where the king then was, he reported what he 
 had done. 
 
 The king was extremely pleased, and he re- 
 warded Sir James very liberally for his energy 
 and zeal ; he, however, expressed some dis- 
 satisfaction at the manner in which the bodies 
 had been disposed of. " They should not have 
 been buried," he said, "in so vile a corner." 
 
 So Kichard sent word to the governor of the 
 Tower, and the governor commissioned a priest 
 to take up the bodies secretly, and inter them 
 again in a more suitable manner. This priest 
 
300 King Eichard III. 
 
 Richard keeps the murder secret. 
 
 soon afterward died, without revealing the 
 place which he chose for the interment, and so 
 it was never known where the bodies were 
 finally laid. 
 
 Eichard gave all the persons who had been 
 concerned in this affair very strict instructions 
 to keep the death of the princes a profound se- 
 cret. He did not intend to make it known, 
 unless he should perceive some indication of 
 an attempt to restore Edward to the throne; 
 and, had it not been for the occurrence of cer- 
 tain circumstances which will be related in the 
 next chapter, the fate of the princes might, per- 
 haps, have thus been kept secret for many 
 years. 
 
Domestic Troubles. 301 
 
 Plots formed against Richard. Situation of Elizabeth Woodville. 
 
 Chapter XYI. 
 Domestic Troubles. 
 
 WHILE Kichard was making his trium- 
 phal tour through the north of England, 
 apparently receiving a confirmation of his right 
 to the crown by the voice of the whole popu- 
 lation of the country, the leaders of the Lancas- 
 ter party were secretly beginning, in London, 
 to form their schemes for liberating the young 
 princes from the Tower, and restoring Edward 
 to the kingdom. 
 
 Queen Elizabeth, who still remained, with 
 the Princess Elizabeth, her oldest daughter, and 
 some of her other children, in the sanctuary at 
 Westminster, was the centre of this movement. 
 She communicated privately with the nobles 
 who were disposed to espouse her cause. The 
 nobles had secret meetings among themselves 
 to form their plans. At these meetings they 
 drank to the health of the king in the Tower, 
 and of his brother, the little Duke of York, and 
 pledged themselves to do every thing in their 
 power to restore the king to his throne. They 
 little knew that the unhappy princes were at 
 
302 King Richard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 Plan3 of the conspirators. Queen Elizabeth's agony. 
 
 that very time lying together in a corner of the 
 court-yard of the prison in an ignoble grave. 
 
 At length the conspirators' plans were ma- 
 tured, and the insurrection broke out. Rich- 
 ard immediately prepared to leave York, at the 
 head of a strong force, to go toward London. 
 At the same time, he allowed the tidings to be 
 spread abroad that the two princes were dead. 
 This news greatly disconcerted the conspirators 
 and deranged their plans ; and when the dread- 
 ful intelligence was communicated to the queen 
 in the sanctuary, she was stunned, and almost 
 killed by it, as by a blow. " She swooned away, 
 and fell to the ground, where she lay in great 
 agony, like a corpse ;" and when at length she 
 was restored to consciousness again, she broke 
 forth in shrieks and cries of anguish so loud, 
 that they resounded through the whole Abbey, 
 and were most pitiful to hear. She beat her 
 breast and tore her hair, calling all the time to 
 her children by their names, and bitterly re- 
 proaching herself for her madness in giving up 
 the youngest into his enemies' hands. After 
 exhausting herself with these cries and lamen- 
 tations, she sank into a state of calm despair, 
 and, kneeling down upon the floor, she began, 
 with dreadful earnestness and solemnity, to call 
 upon Almighty God, imploring him to avenge 
 
: 
 
 
 QUEEN ELIZABETH AT THE GRAVE OF HER CHILDREN. 
 
Domestic Troubles. 305 
 
 Retribution. Elizabeth visits the grave. The Duke of Buckingham. 
 
 the death of her children, and invoking the bit- 
 terest' curses upon the head of their ruthless 
 murderer. , 
 
 It was but a short time after this that Kich- 
 ard's child died at Middleham Castle, as stated 
 in the last chapter. Many persons believed 
 that this calamity was a judgment of heaven, 
 brought upon the king in answer to the be- 
 reaved mother's imprecations. 
 
 It is said that when Queen Elizabeth had re- 
 covered a little from the first shock of her grief, 
 she demanded to be taken to her children's 
 grave. So they conducted her to the Tower, 
 and showed her the place in the corner of the 
 court-yard where they had first been buried. 
 
 One of the principal leaders of the conspiracy 
 which had been formed against Kichard was 
 the Duke of Buckingham — the same that had 
 taken so active a part in bringing Kichard to 
 the throne. What induced him to change sides 
 so suddenly is not certainly known. It is sup- 
 posed that he was dissatisfied with the rewards 
 which Kichard bestowed upon him. At any 
 rate, he now turned against the king, and be- 
 came the leader of the conspirators that were 
 plotting against him. 
 
 When the conspirators heard of the death 
 of the princes, they were at first at a loss to 
 U 
 
306 King Richard III. 
 
 Richmond. Elizabeth. Plans formed for a marriage. 
 
 know what to do. They looked about among 
 the branches of the York and Lancaster fami- 
 lies for some one to make their candidate for 
 the crown. At last they decided upon a cer- 
 tain Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond. This 
 Henry, or Richmond, as he was generally call- 
 ed, was descended indirectly from the Lancas- 
 ter line. The proposal of the conspirators, 
 however, was, that he should marry the Prin- 
 cess Elizabeth, Queen Elizabeth Woodyille's 
 daughter, who has already been mentioned 
 among those who fled with their mother to the 
 sanctuary. Now that both the sons of Eliza- 
 beth were dead, this daughter was, of course, 
 King Edward's next heir, and by her mar- 
 riage with Richmond the claims of the houses 
 of York and Lancaster would be, in a measure, 
 combined. 
 
 When this plan was proposed to Queen 
 Elizabeth, she acceded to it at once, and prom- 
 ised that she would give her daughter in mar- 
 riage to Richmond, and acknowledge him as 
 king, provided he would first conquer and de- 
 pose King Richard, the common enemy. 
 
 The plan was accordingly all arranged. 
 Richmond was in France at this time, having 
 fled there some time previous, after a battle, in 
 which his party had been defeated. They 
 
Domestic Troubles. 307 
 
 Richmond plans an invasion. Buckingham' s attempt to co-operate. 
 
 wrote to him, explaining the plan. He imme- 
 diately fell in with it. He raised a small force 
 — all that he could procure at that time — and 
 set sail, with a few ships, from the port of St. 
 Malo, intending to land on the coast of Devon- 
 shire, which is in the southwestern part of En- 
 gland. 
 
 In the mean time, the several leaders of the 
 rebellion had gone to different parts of the king- 
 dom, in order to raise troops, and form centres 
 of action against Eichard. Buckingham went 
 into Wales. His plan was to march down, 
 with all the forces that he could raise there, to 
 the coast of Devonshire, to meet Eichmond on 
 his landing. 
 
 This Eichard resolved to prevent. He raised 
 an army, and marched to intercept Bucking- 
 ham. He first, however, issued a proclamation 
 in which he denounced the leaders of the rebel- 
 lion as criminals and outlaws, and set a price 
 upon their heads. 
 
 Buckingham did not succeed in reaching the 
 coast in time to join Eichmond. He was stop- 
 ped by the Eiver Severn, which you will see, by 
 looking on a map of England, came directly in 
 his way. He tried to get across the river, but 
 the people destroyed the bridges and the boats, 
 and he could not get over. He marched up to 
 
308 King Eichard III. [A.D.1483. 
 
 Failure of the plan. Death of Buckingham. Richmond retreats. 
 
 where the stream was small, in hopes of finding 
 a fording place, bnt the waters were so swollen 
 with the fall rains that he failed in this attempt 
 as well as the others. The result was, that 
 Eichard came up while Buckingham was en- 
 tangled among the intricacies of the ground 
 produced by the inundations. Buckingham's 
 soldiers, seeing that they were likely to be sur- 
 rounded, abandoned him and fled. At last 
 Buckingham fled too, and hid himself; but one 
 of his servants came and told Eichard where he 
 was. Eichard ordered him to be seized. Buck- 
 ingham sent an imploring message to Eichard, 
 begging that Eichard would see him, and, be- 
 fore condemning him, hear what he had to say ; 
 but Eichard, in the place of any reply, gave 
 orders to the soldiers to take the prisoner at 
 once out into the public square of the town, 
 and cut off his head. The order was imme- 
 diately obej^ed. 
 
 When Eichmond reached the coast of Dev- 
 onshire, and found that Buckingham was not 
 there to meet him, he was afraid to land with 
 the small force that he had under his command, 
 and so he sailed back to France. 
 
 Thus the first attempt made to organize a 
 forcible resistance to Eichard'n power totally 
 failed. 
 
Domestic Troubles. 309 
 
 Unhappy situation of Elizabeth. The princess. 
 
 The unhappy queen, when she heard these 
 tidings, was once more overwhelmed with grief. 
 Her situation in the sanctuary was becoming 
 every day more and more painful. She had 
 long since exhausted all her own means, and 
 nhe imagined that the monks began to think 
 that she was availing herself of their hospi- 
 tality too long. Her friends without would 
 gladly have supplied her wants, but this Eich- 
 ard would not permit. He set a guard around 
 the sanctuary, and would not allow any one to 
 come or go. He would starve her out, he said, 
 if he could not compel her to surrender herself 
 in any other way. 
 
 It was, however, not the queen herself, but 
 her daughter Elizabeth, who was now the heir 
 of whatever claims to the throne were possessed 
 by the family, that Eichard was most anxious 
 to secure. If he could once get Elizabeth into 
 his power, he thought, he could easily devise 
 some plan to prevent her marriage with Henry 
 of Eichmond, and so defeat the plans of his en- 
 emies in the most effectual manner. He would 
 have liked still better to have secured Henry 
 himself; but Henry was in Brittany, on the oth- 
 er side of the Channel, beyond his reach. 
 
 He, however, formed a secret plan to get pos- 
 session of Henry. He offered privately a large 
 
310 King Eichard III. [A.D.1484. 
 
 He seeks to get possession of Richmond. Parliament. New policy. 
 
 reward to the Duke of Brittany if he would 
 seize Henry and deliver him into his, Eichard's 
 hands. This the duke engaged to do. But. 
 Henry gained intelligence of the plot before it 
 was executed, and made his escape from Brit- 
 tany into France. He was received kindly at 
 Paris by the French king. The king even 
 promised to aid him in deposing Eichard, and 
 making himself King of England instead. This 
 alarmed Eichard more than ever. 
 
 In the mean time, the summer passed away 
 and the autumn came on. In November Eich- 
 ard convened Parliament, and caused very se- 
 vere laws to be passed against those who had 
 been engaged in the rebellion. Many were ex- 
 ecuted under these laws,, some were banished, 
 and others shut up in prison. Eichard attempt- 
 ed, by these and similar measures, to break down 
 the spirit of his enemies, and prevent the pos- 
 sibility of their forming any new organizations 
 against him. Still, notwithstanding all that he 
 could do, he felt very ill at ease so long as Hen- 
 ry and Elizabeth were at liberty. 
 
 At last, in the course of the winter, he con- 
 ceived the idea of trying what pretended kind- 
 ness could do in enticing the queen and her 
 family out of sanctuary. So he sent a messen- 
 ger to her, to make fair and friendly proposals 
 
AJ). 14S4.J Domestic Troubles. 311 
 
 The plan succeeds. Excuses for the queen. 
 
 to her in case she would give up her place of 
 refuge and place herself under his protection. 
 He said that he felt no animosity or ill will 
 against her, but that, if she and her daughters 
 would trust to him, he would receive them at 
 court, provide for them fully in a manner suit- 
 ed to their rank, and treat them in all respects 
 with the highest consideration. She herself 
 should be recognized as the queen dowager of 
 England, and her daughters as princesses of the 
 royal family ; and he would take proper meas- 
 ures to arrange marriages for the young ladies, 
 such as should comport with the exalted sta- 
 tion which they were entitled to hold. 
 
 The queen was at last persuaded to yield to 
 these solicitations. She left the sanctuary, and 
 gave herself and her daughters up to Eichard's 
 control. Many persons have censured her very 
 strongly for doing this ; but her friends and de- 
 fenders allege that there was nothing else that 
 she could do. She might have remained in the 
 Abbey herself to starve if she had been alone, 
 but she could not see her children perish of 
 destitution and distress when a word from her 
 could restore them to the world, and raise them 
 at once to a condition of the highest prosperity 
 and honor. So she yielded. She left the Ab- 
 bey, and was established by Eichard in one of 
 
812 King Kichakd III. 
 
 Her situation still unhappy. The marriage countermanded. 
 
 his palaces, and her daughters were received at 
 court, and treated, especially the eldest, with the 
 utmost consideration. 
 
 But, notwithstanding this outward change 
 in her condition, the real situation of the queen 
 herself, after leaving the Abbey, was extreme- 
 ly forlorn. The apartments which Kichard as- 
 signed to her were very retired and obscure. 
 He required her, moreover, to dismiss all her 
 own attendants, and he appointed servants and 
 agents of his own to wait upon and guard her. 
 The queen soon found that she was under a 
 very strict surveillance, and not much less a 
 prisoner, in fact, than she was before. 
 
 While in this situation, she wrote to her son 
 Dorset,* at Paris, commanding him to put an 
 end to the proposed marriage of her daughter 
 Elizabeth to Henry of Kichmond, " as she had 
 given up," she said, "the plan of that alliance, 
 and had formed other designs for the princess." 
 Henry and his friends and partisans in Paris 
 were indignant at receiving this letter, and the 
 queen has been by many persons much blamed 
 for having thus broken the engagement which 
 she had so solemnly made. Others say that 
 
 * The Earl of Dorset, you will recollect, was Queen Eliz- 
 abeth's son by her first marriage ; he, consequently, had no 
 claim tQ the crown. 
 
Domestic Troubles. 318 
 
 Richard's plan for the princess. Elizabeth's views on the subject. 
 
 this letter to Paris was not her free act, tut that 
 it was extorted from her by Eichard, who had 
 her now completely in his power, and could, of 
 course, easily find means to procure from her 
 any writing that he might desire. 
 
 Whether the queen acted freely or not in 
 this case can not certainly be known. At all 
 events, Henry, and those who were acting with 
 him at Paris, determined to regard the letter as 
 written under constraint, and to go on with the 
 maturing of their plans just as if it had never 
 been written. 
 
 Eichard's plan was, so it was said, to marry 
 the Princess Elizabeth to his own son ; for the 
 death of his child, though it has been already 
 once or twice alluded to, had not yet taken 
 place. Eichard's son was very young, being 
 at that time about eleven years old; but the 
 princess might be affianced to him, and the mar- 
 riage consummated when he grew up. Eliza- 
 beth herself seems to have fallen in with this 
 proposed arrangement very readily. The pros- 
 pect that Henry of Eichmond would ever suc- 
 ceed in making himself king, and claiming her 
 for his bride, was very remote and uncertain, 
 while Eichard was already in full possession of 
 power ; and she, by taking his side, and becom- 
 ing the affianced wife of his son, became at once 
 
314 King Richard III. 
 
 Death of Richard's son. Sickness of Queen Anne. 
 
 the first lady in the kingdom, next to Queen 
 Anne, with an apparently certain prospect of 
 becoming queen herself in due time. 
 
 But all these fine plans were abruptly brought 
 to an end by the death of the } r oung prince, 
 which occurred about this time, at Middleham 
 Castle, as has been stated before. The death 
 of the poor boy took place in a very sudden 
 and mysterious manner. Some persons sup- 
 posed that he died by a judgment from heaven, 
 in answer to the awful curses which Queen 
 Elizabeth Woodville imprecated upon the head 
 of the murderer of her children ; others thought 
 he was destroyed by poison. 
 
 Not very long after the death of the prince, 
 his mother fell very seriously sick. She was 
 broken-hearted at the death of her son, and 
 pining away, she fell into a slow decline. Her 
 sufferings were greatly aggravated by Richard's 
 harsh and cruel treatment of her. He was 
 continually uttering expressions of impatience 
 against her on account of her sickness and use- 
 lessness, and making fretful complaints of her 
 various disagreeable qualities. Some of these 
 sayings were reported to Anne, and also a ru- 
 mor came to her ears one day, while she was 
 at her toilet, that Richard was intending to put 
 her to death. She was dreadfullv alarmed at 
 
A.D.1484.] Domestic Troubles. 315 
 
 Sufferings of the queen. Suspicions. 
 
 hearing this, and she immediately ran, half 
 dressed as she was, and with her hair dishev- 
 eled, into the presence of her husband, and, 
 with piteous sobs and bitter tears, asked him 
 what she had done to deserve death. Kichard 
 tried to quiet and calm her, assuring her that 
 she had no cause to fear. 
 
 She, however, continued to decline ; and not 
 long afterward her distress and anguish of 
 mind were greatly increased by hearing that 
 Kichard was impatient for her death, in order 
 that he might himself marry the Princess Eliz- 
 abeth, to whom every one said he was now, 
 since the death of his son, devoting himself per- 
 sonally with great attention. In this state of 
 suffering the poor queen lingered on through 
 the months of the winter, very evidently, though 
 slowly, approaching her end. The universal 
 belief was that Richard had formed the plan of 
 making the Princess Elizabeth his wife, and that 
 the decline and subsequent death of Anne were 
 owing to a slow poison which he caused to be 
 administered to her. There is no proof that 
 this charge was true, but the general belief in 
 the truth of it shows what was the estimate 
 placed, in those times, on Richard's character. 
 
 It is very certain, however, that he contem- 
 plated this new marriage, and that the princess 
 
.316 King Richard III. 
 
 Elizabeth's eagerness to marry the king. Death of the queen. 
 
 herself acceded to the proposed plan, and was 
 very deeply interested in the accomplishment 
 of it. It is said that while the queen still lived 
 she wrote to one of her friends — a certain noble 
 duke of high standing and influence — in which 
 she implored him to aid in forwarding her mar- 
 riage with the king, whom she called " her 
 master and her joy in this world — the master 
 of her heart and thoughts." In this letter, too, 
 she expressed her impatience at the queen's 
 being so long in dying. " Only think," said 
 she, "the better part of February is past, and 
 the queen is still alive. Will she never die?" 
 
 But the patience of the princess was not des- 
 tined to be taxed much longer. The queen 
 sank rapidly after this, and in March she died. 
 
 The heart of Elizabeth was now filled with 
 exultation and delight. The great obstacle to 
 her marriage with her uncle was now removed, 
 and the way was open before her to become a 
 queen. It is true that the relationship which 
 existed between her and Richard, that of uncle 
 and niece, was such as to make the marriage 
 utterly illegal. But Richard had a plan of ob- 
 taining a dispensation from the Pope, which he 
 had no doubt that he could easily do, and a 
 dispensation from the Pope, according to the 
 ideas of those times, would legalize any thing. 
 
Domestic Troubles. 317 
 
 Remonstrance of Richard' s counselors. 
 
 So Richard cautiously proposed his plan to some 
 of his confidential counselors. 
 
 His counselors told him that the execution 
 of such a plan would be dangerous in the high- 
 est degree. The people of England, they said, 
 had for some time been led to think that the 
 king had that design in contemplation, and that 
 the idea had awakened a great deal of indigna- 
 tion throughout the country. The land was 
 full of rumors and murmurings, they said, and 
 those of a very threatening character. The 
 marriage would be considered incestuous both 
 by the clergy and the people, and would be 
 looked upon with abhorrence. Besides, they 
 said, there were a great many dark suspicions 
 in the minds of the people that Richard had 
 been himself the cause of the death of his for- 
 mer wife Anne, in order to open the way for 
 this marriage, and now, if the marriage were 
 really to take place, all these suspicions would 
 be confirmed. They could judge somewhat, 
 they added, by the depth of the excitement 
 which had been produced by the bare suspicion 
 that such things were contemplated, how great 
 would be the violence of the outbreak of pub- 
 lic indignation if the design were carried into 
 effect. Richard would be in the utmost danger 
 of losing his kingdom. 
 
318 
 
 King Richard III. 
 
 Richard gives up the plan. 
 
 PORTRAIT OF THE PRINCESS ELIZABETH. 
 
 So Richard determined at once to abandon 
 the plan. He caused it to be announced in the 
 most public manner that he had never contem- 
 plated such a marriage, and that all the rumors 
 attributing such a design to him were malicious 
 
Domestic Troubles. 319 
 
 Disappointment of Elizabeth. 
 
 and false. He also sent orders abroad through- 
 out the kingdom requiring that all persons who 
 had circulated such rumors should be arrested 
 and sent to London to be punished. 
 
 Elizabeth's' hopes were, of course, suddenly 
 blasted, and the splendid castle which her im- 
 agination had built fell to the ground. It was 
 only a temporary disappointment, however, for 
 she became Queen of England in the end, aft- 
 er all. 
 
320 King Richard III. 
 
 Lichmond goes on with his preparations at Pari.?. 
 
 Chapter XVII. 
 
 The Field of Bosworth. 
 
 IN the mean time, while Richard had been 
 occupied with the schemes and manoeuvres 
 described in the last chapter, Richmond was go- 
 ing on steadily in Paris with the preparations 
 that he was making for a new invasion of En- 
 gland. The King of France assisted him both 
 by providing him with money and aiding him 
 in the enlistment of men. When Richmond 
 received the message from Elizabeth's mother 
 declaring that the proposed match between him 
 and the princess must be broken off, and heard 
 that Richard had formed a plan for marcying 
 the young lady himself, he paid no regard to 
 the tidings, but declared that he should proceed 
 with his plans as vigorously as ever, and that, 
 whatever counter-schemes they might form, 
 they might rely upon it that he should fully 
 carry into effect his purpose, not only of depos- 
 ing Richard and reigning in his stead, but also 
 of making the Princess Elizabeth his wife, ac- 
 cording to his original intention. 
 
 At length the expedition was ready, and the 
 
Field of Bosworth. 321 
 
 The expedition sails. Eichard issues a proclamation. 
 
 fleet conveying it set sail from the port of Har- 
 fleur. 
 
 Eichard attempted to arouse the people of 
 England against the invaders by a grand proc- 
 lamation which he issued. In this proclama- 
 tion he designated the Earl of Eichmond as 
 " one Henry Tudor," who had no claim what- 
 ever, of any kind, to the English throne, bat 
 who was coming to attempt to seize it without 
 any color of right. In order to obtain assist- 
 ance from the King of France, he had promised, 
 the proclamation said, " to surrender to him, in 
 case he was successful, all the rich possessions 
 in France which at that time belonged to En- 
 gland, even Calais itself; and he had promised, 
 moreover, and given away, to the traitors and 
 foreigners who were coming with him, all the 
 most important and valuable places in the king- 
 dom — archbishoprics, bishoprics, duchies, earl- 
 doms, baronies, and many other inheritances be- 
 longing of right to the English knights, es- 
 quires, and gentlemen who were now in the 
 possession of them. The proclamation farther 
 declared that the people who made up his army 
 were robbers and murderers, and rebels attaint- 
 ed by Parliament, many of whom had made 
 themselves infamous as cutthroats, adulterers, 
 and extortioners." 
 
 X 
 
322 King Eichard III. [A.D.1485. 
 
 Plans of the campaign. The king goes to Nottingham. 
 
 Eicliard closed his proclamation by calling 
 upon all his subjects to arm themselves, like 
 true and good Englishmen, for the defense of 
 their wives, children, goods, and hereditaments, 
 and he promised that he himself, like a true and 
 courageous prince, would put himself in the 
 forefront of the battle, and expose his royal per- 
 son to the worst of the dangers that were to be 
 incurred in the defense of the country. 
 
 At the same time that he issued this procla- 
 mation, Kichard sent forth orders to all parts 
 of the kingdom, commanding the nobles and 
 barons to marshal their forces, and make ready 
 to march at a moment's warning. He dis- 
 patched detachments of his forces to the south- 
 ward to defend the southern coast, where he 
 expected Eichmond would land, while he him- 
 self proceeded northward, toward the centre 
 of the kingdom, to assemble and organize his 
 grand army. He made Nottingham his head- 
 quarters, and he gradually gathered around 
 him, in that city, a very large force. 
 
 In the mean time, while these movements 
 and preparations had been going on on both 
 sides, the spring and the early part of the sum- 
 mer passed away, and at length Eichard, at Not- 
 tingham, in the month of August, received the 
 tidings that Eichmond had landed at Milford 
 
A.D.1485.] Field of Bos worth. 323 
 
 Richmond' 8 hopes and expectations. The various negotiations. 
 
 Haven, on the southwestern coast of Wales, 
 with a force of two or three thousand men. 
 Kichard said that he was glad to hear it. "I 
 am glad," said he, " that at last he has come. I 
 have now only to meet him, and gain one de- 
 cisive victory, and then the security of my 
 kingdom will be disturbed no more." 
 
 Eichmond did not rely wholly on the troops 
 which he had brought with him for the success 
 of his cause. He believed that there was a great 
 and prevailing feeling of disaffection against 
 Eichard throughout England, and that, as soon 
 as it should appear that he, Eichmond, was 
 really in earnest in his determination to claim 
 and take the crown, and that there was a rea- 
 sonable prospect of the success of his enterprise, 
 great numbers of men, who were now ostensi- 
 bly on Eichard' s side, would forsake him and 
 join the invader. So he sent secret messen- 
 gers throughout the kingdom to communicate 
 with his friends, and to open negotiations with 
 those of Eichard's adherents who might possi- 
 bly be inclined to change sides. In order to 
 give time for these negotiations to produce their 
 effect, he resolved not to march at once into the 
 interior of the country, but to proceed slowly 
 toward the eastward, along the southern coast 
 of Wales, awaiting intelligence. This plan he 
 
324 King Richard III. 
 
 Richard at Nottingham. He commences his march. 
 
 pursued. His strength increased rapidly as he 
 advanced. At length, when he reached the 
 eastern borders of Wales, he began to feel strong 
 jenough to push forward into England to meet 
 Richard, who was all this time gathering his 
 forces together at Nottingham, and preparing 
 for a very formidable resistance of the invader. 
 He accordingly advanced to Leicester, and 
 thence to the town of Tamworth, where there 
 was a strong castle on a rock. He took pos- 
 session of this castle, and made it, for a time, 
 his head-quarters. 
 
 In the mean time, Richard, having received 
 intelligence of Richmond's movements, and hav- 
 ing now made every thing ready for his own 
 advance, determined to delay no longer, but to 
 go forth and meet his enemy. Accordingly, 
 one morning, he marshaled his troops in the 
 market-place of Nottingham, "separating his 
 foot-soldiers in two divisions, five abreast, and 
 dividing his cavalry so as to form two wide- 
 spreading wings." He placed his artillery, 
 with the ammunition, in the centre, reserving 
 for himself a position in a space immediately 
 behind it. 
 
 "When all was ready, he came out from the 
 castle mounted upon a milk-white charger. He 
 wore, according to the custom of the times, a 
 
§" 
 
 ., w 
 
Field of Bosworth. 327 
 
 The long column. Bosworth. The two armies. 
 
 very magnificent armor, resplendent with gold 
 and embroidery, and with polished steel that 
 glittered in the sun. Over his helmet he wore 
 his royal crown. He was preceded and follow- 
 ed, as he came out through the castle gates and 
 descended the winding way which led down 
 from the hill on which the castle stands, by 
 guards splendidly dressed and mounted — arch- 
 ers, and spearmen, and other men at arms — 
 with ensigns bearing innumerable pennants and 
 banners. As soon as he joined the army in the 
 town the order was given to march, and so great 
 was the number of men that he had under his 
 command that they were more than an hour 
 in marching out of Nottingham, and when all 
 had finally issued from the gate, the column 
 covered the road for three miles. 
 
 At length, after some days of manoeuvring 
 and marching, the two armies came into the im- 
 mediate vicinity of each other near the town 
 of Bosworth, at a place where there was a wide 
 field, which has since been greatly renowned in 
 history as the Field of Bosworth. The two 
 armies advanced into the neighborhood of this 
 field on the 19th and 20th days of August, and 
 both sides began to prepare for battle. 
 
 The army which Eichard commanded was 
 far more numerous and imposing than that of 
 
328 King Kichaed III. 
 
 Richard' s depression and anxiety. His painful suspicions. 
 
 Richmond, and every thing, so far as outward 
 appearances were concerned, promised him an 
 easy victory. And yet Richmond was exultant 
 in his confidence of success, while Richard was 
 harassed with gloomy forebodings. His mind 
 was filled with perplexity and distress. He be- 
 lieved that the leading nobles and generals on 
 his side had secretly resolved to betray him, 
 and that they were prepared to abandon him 
 and go over to the enemy on the very field of 
 battle, unless he could gain advantages so de- 
 cisive at the very commencement of the con- 
 flict as to show that the cause of Richmond was 
 hopeless. Although Richard was morally con- 
 vinced that this was the state of things, he had 
 no sufficient evidence of it to justify his taking 
 any action against the men that he suspected. 
 He did not even dare to express his suspicions, 
 for he knew that if he were to do so, or even 
 to intimate that he felt suspicion, the only ef- 
 fect would be to precipitate the consummation 
 of the treachery that he feared, and perhaps 
 drive some to abandon him who had not yet 
 fully resolved on doing so. He was obliged, 
 therefore, though suffering the greatest anxiet}' 
 and alarm, to suppress all indications of his un- 
 easiness, except to his most confidential friends. 
 To them he appeared, as one of them stated, 
 
Field of Boswoeth. 329 
 
 His remorse. The battle. Richard betrayed. Defection of his men. 
 
 " sore moved and broiled with melancholy and 
 dolor, and from time to time he cried out, ask- 
 ing vengeance of them that, contrary to their 
 oath and promise, were so deceiving him." 
 
 The recollection of the many crimes that he 
 had committed in the attainment of the power 
 which he now feared he was about to lose for- 
 ever, harassed his mind and tormented his con- 
 science, especially at night. " He took ill rest 
 at nights," says one of his biographers, "using 
 to lie long, waking and musing, sore wearied 
 with care and watch, and rather slumbered than 
 slept, troubled with fearful dreams." 
 
 On the day of the battle Kichard found the 
 worst of his forebodings fulfilled. In the early 
 part of the day he took a position upon an ele- 
 vated portion of the ground, where he could 
 survey the whole field, and direct the move- 
 ments of his troops. From this point he could 
 see, as the battle went on, one body of men aft- 
 er another go over to the enemy. He was over- 
 whelmed with vexation and rage. He cried 
 out, Treason! Treason! and, calling upon his 
 guards and attendants to follow him, he rushed 
 down the hill, determined to force his way to 
 the part of the field where Richmond himself 
 was stationed, with a view of engaging him 
 and killing him with his own hand. This, he 
 
330 King Eichard III. 
 
 Richard's "Well. His despair. Terrible combat 
 
 thought, was the last hope that was now left 
 him. 
 
 There was a spring of water, and a little 
 brook flowing from it in a part of the field 
 where he had to pass. He stopped at this 
 spring, opened his helmet, and took a drink 
 of the water. He then closed his helmet and 
 rode on. 
 
 This spring afterward received, from this cir- 
 cumstance, the name of " Eichard' s "Well," and 
 it is known by that name to this day. 
 
 From the spring Eichard rushed forward, at- 
 tended by a few followers as fearless as him- 
 self, in search of Eichmond. He penetrated the 
 enemies' lines in the direction where he sup- 
 posed Eichmond was to be found, and was soon 
 surrounded by foes, whom he engaged desper- 
 ately in a hand-to-hand encounter of the most 
 furious and reckless character. He slew one 
 or two of the foremost of those who surround- 
 ed him, calling out all the time to Eichmond to 
 come out and meet him in single combat. This 
 Eichmond would not do. In the mean time, 
 many of Eichard' s friends came up to his assist- 
 ance. Some of these urged him to retire, say- 
 ing that it was useless for him to attempt to 
 maintain so unequal a contest, but he refused 
 to go. 
 
Field of Bosworth. 331 
 
 He refuses to fly. Richard is ki lled. Transfer of the crown. 
 
 "Not one foot will I fly," said he, "so long 
 as breath bides within my breast ; for, by Him 
 that shaped both sea and land, this day shall 
 end my battles or my life. I will die King of 
 England." 
 
 So he fought on. Several faithful friends 
 still adhered to him and fought by his side. 
 His standard-bearer stood his ground, with the 
 king's banner in his hand, until at last both his 
 legs were cut off under him, and he fell to the 
 earth ; still he would not let the banner go, 
 but clung to it with a convulsive grasp till he 
 died. 
 
 At last Richard too was overpowered by 
 the numbers that beset him. Exhausted by 
 his exertions, and weakened by loss of blood, 
 he was beaten down from his horse to the 
 ground and killed. The royal crown which he 
 had worn so proudly into the battle was knock- 
 ed from his head in the dreadful affray, and 
 trampled in the dust. 
 
 Lord Stanley, one of the chieftains who had 
 abandoned Eichard's cause and gone over to 
 the enemy, picked up the crown, all battered 
 and bloodstained as it was, and put it upon 
 Richmond's head. From that hour Richmond 
 was recognized as King of England. He reign- 
 ed under the title of Henry the Seventh. 
 
332 King Richard III. [A.D.1485. 
 
 Flight of Eichard's troops. 
 
 KING HENRY VII. 
 
 The few followers that had remained faithful 
 to Richard's cause up to this time now gave 
 up the contest and tied. The victors lifted up 
 the dead body of the king, took off the armor, 
 and then placed the body across the back of a 
 horse, behind a pursuivant-at-arms, who, thus 
 mounted, rode a little behind the new king as 
 
Field of Bosworth. 333 
 
 Disposition of the body. Henry marries the princess. 
 
 he retired from the field of battle. Followed 
 by this dreadful trophy of his victory, King 
 Henry entered the town of Leicester in tri- 
 umph. The body of Eichard was exposed for 
 three days, in a public place, to the view of all 
 beholders, in order that every body might be 
 satisfied that he was really dead, and then the 
 new king proceeded by easy journeys to Lon- 
 don. -The people came out to meet him all 
 along the way, receiving him every where with 
 shouts and acclamations, and crying, "King- 
 Henry ! King Henry ! Long live our sover- 
 eign lord, King Henry !" 
 
 For several weeks after his accession Hen- 
 ry's mind was occupied with public affairs, but, 
 as soon as the most urgent of the calls upon his 
 attention were disposed of, he renewed his pro- 
 posals to the Princess Elizabeth, and in Janu- 
 ary of the next year they were married. It 
 seems to have been a matter of no consequence 
 to her whether one man or another was her 
 husband, provided he was only King of En- 
 gland, so that she could be queen. Henry's 
 motive, too, in marrying her, was equally mer- 
 cenary, his only object being to secure to him- 
 self, through her, the right of inheritance to her 
 father's claims to the throne. He accordingly 
 never pretended to feel any love for her, and, 
 
334 King Richard III. [A.D.1492. 
 
 Queen Elizabeth Woodville. Last years of her life. 
 
 after his marriage, lie treated her with great 
 coldness and neglect. 
 
 His conduct toward her poor mother, the 
 dowager queen, Elizabeth Woodville, was still 
 more unfriendly. He sent her to a gloomy 
 monastery, called the Monastery of Bermond- 
 sey, and caused her to be kept there in the cus- 
 tody of the monks, virtually a prisoner. The 
 reason which he assigned for this was his dis- 
 pleasure with her for abandoning his cause, and 
 breaking the engagement which she had made 
 with him for the marriage of her daughter to 
 him, and also for giving herself and her daugh- 
 ter up into Richard's hands, and joining with 
 Mm in the intrigues which Richard formed for 
 connecting the princess with his family. In 
 this lonely retreat the widowed queen passed 
 the remainder of her days. She was not pre- 
 cisely a prisoner — at least, she was not kept in 
 close and continual confinement, for two or 
 three times, in the course of the few remaining 
 years that she lived, she was brought, on spe- 
 cial occasions, to court, and treated there with 
 a certain degree of attention and respect. One 
 of these occasions was that of the baptism of 
 her daughter's child. 
 
 In this lonely and cheerless retreat the queen 
 lingered a few years, and then died. Her body 
 
A.D.1492.] Field of Bosworth. 337 
 
 Her death and burial. 
 
 was conveyed to Windsor for interment, and 
 her daughters and the friends of her family 
 were notified of the event. A very few came 
 to attend the funeral. Her daughter Elizabeth 
 was indisposed, and did not come. The inter- 
 ment took place at night. A few poor old men, 
 in tattered garments, were employed to officiate 
 at the ceremony by holding " old torches and 
 torches' ends" to light the gloomy precincts of 
 the chapel during the time while the monks 
 were chanting the funeral dirge. 
 Y 
 
 The End. 
 
INSTRUCTION AND ENTERTAINMENT 
 FOR THE YOUNG. 
 
 Books Adapted to Family, School, Town, Dis- 
 trict, and Sunday-School Libraries. 
 By Jacob and John S. C. Abbott. 
 
 Abbotts' Illustrated Histories, 
 
 A Series of Volumes by Jacob and John S. C. Abbott, con- 
 taining severally full accounts of the lives, characters, 
 and exploits of the most distinguished Sovereigns, Poten- 
 tates, and Rulers that have been chiefly renowned among 
 mankind, in the various ages of the world, from the ear- 
 liest periods to the present day. 
 
 The Volumes of this Series are printed and bound uni- 
 formly, and are adorned with richly illuminated Title- 
 pages and numerous Engravings. 16mo, Muslin, 60 cents 
 per Volume; Muslin, gilt edges, 75 cents per Volume; 
 Library Sheep, 75 cents per Volume. The Volumes may 
 be obtained separately. 
 
 Cyrus the Great. ' Alfred the Great. 
 
 Darius the Great. William the Conqueror. 
 
 Xerxes. Mary Queen of Scots. 
 
 Alexander the Great Queen Elizabeth. 
 
 Romulus. Charles I. 
 
 Hannibal. Charles II. 
 
 Pyrrhus. Josephine. 
 
 Julius Csesar. Maria Antoinette. 
 
 Cleopatra. Madame Roland. 
 
 Nero. Hernando Cortez. 
 
 The narratives are succint and comprehensive, and are strictly faith- 
 ful to the truth, so far as it can now be ascertained. They are written 
 in a very plain and simple style, but are not juvenile in their character, 
 nor intended exclusively for the young. The volumes are sufficiently 
 large to allow each history to comprise all the leading facts in the life of 
 the" personage who is the subject of it, and thus to communicate all the 
 information in respect to him which is necessary for the purposes of the 
 general reader. 
 
 The several volumes of the series follow each other, in the main, in 
 regular historical order, and each one continues the general narrative 
 of history down to the period at which the next volume takes up the 
 story ; so that the whole series will, when completed, present to the 
 reader a connected line of general history from the present age back to 
 the remotest times. Thus the whole series constitutes a very complete 
 and valuable treasury of historical knowledge, while yet each volumr. 
 consisting as it does of a single distinct and entertaining narrative, has 
 all the interest, for the reader, of a tale. 
 
2 INSTRUCTION AND ENTERTAINMENT FOR THE YOUNG. 
 
 Such being the design and character of the works, they would seem 
 to be specially adapted, not only for family reading, but also for district, 
 town, school, and Sunday-school Libraries, as well as for text-books in 
 literary seminaries. 
 
 The volumes already issued have had a wide circulation in all parts 
 of the country — more than two hundred thousand volumes having been 
 already sold. The plan of the series, and the manner in which the de- 
 sign has been carried out by the authors in the execution of it, have 
 been highly commended by the press in all parts of the country, and many 
 individual parents have spoken of the books as exerting a very power- 
 ful influence in awakening a taste for instructive reading among then 
 children, and a love for the acquisition of useful knowledge. 
 
 The whole series has been introduced into the school libraries of sev- 
 eral of the largest and most influential states. 
 
 They have, moreover, been republished in England in many different 
 forms, and have had a widt circulation in that country. 
 
 The Little Learner, by Jacob Abbott, 
 
 The " Little Learner" is a series of juvenile books adapted to the ear- 
 liest age, and designed to assist in the very first development of the mind 
 of a child while under its mother's special care. The series is comprised 
 in Five Volumes, and is intended to constitute a complete manual of in- 
 struction for the child during the five or six first years of life. 
 
 LEARNING TO TALK j or, Entertaining and Instructive Lessons in 
 the use of Language. Illustrated with 170 Engravings. Small 4to, 
 Muslin, 50 cents. 
 
 This volume is designed to assist the child in its first attempt to ac- 
 quire the use of language. It consists of a great number of beautiful 
 engravings, with simple explanations to be read to the child by a parent, 
 or older brother or sister, with many explanations of words and lessons 
 in pronunciation interposed. 
 
 LEARNING TO THINK. Consisting of Easy and Entertaining Les- 
 sons, designed to assist in the first unfolding of the Reflective and 
 Reasoning Powers of Children. Illustrated with 120 Engravings. 
 Small 4to, Muslin, 50 cents. 
 
 Designed to call out and cultivate the reflective and reasoning powers 
 of the child, and to exercise and develop the imagination. It contains a 
 great number of beautiful engravings, accompanied by explanations and 
 remarks, and with a great number and variety of questions to be read 
 by the parent or teacher, and answered by the child. 
 LEARNING TO READ. Consisting of Easy and Entertaining Les- 
 sons, designed to assist young children in studying the forms of the 
 Letters, and in beginning to Read. Illustrated with 160 Engravings. 
 Small 4to, Muslin, 50 cents. 
 
 This volume is intended to amuse and interest the child in the work 
 of learning the forms of the letters, and in beginning to read. Like all 
 the other volumes of the series, it is profusely illustrated with beautiful 
 engravings. 
 
 LEARNING ABOUT COMMON THINGS ; or, Familiar Instructions 
 for Children in respect to the Objects around them, that attract their 
 Attention, and awaken their Curiosity, in the earliest Years of Life. 
 Illustrated with 120 Engravings. Small 4to, Muslin, 50 cents. 
 The object of this volume is to communicate useful elementary instruc- 
 tion to the child, in respect to the various objects that come within his 
 observation, and attract his attention in the earliest years of his life. 
 It aims to give a right direction to his thoughts on these subjects, and to 
 accustom him to correct and careful habits, both of observation and re- 
 
INSTRUCTION AND ENTERTAINMENT FOR THE YOUNG. 3 
 
 flection in respect to them, and to a correct and discriminating use of 
 language in describing what he sees. 
 
 LEARNING ABOUT RIGHT AND WRONG. (Nearly ready.) 
 
 This volume explains those simple and universally admitted principles 
 of moral and religious duty which are applicable to the conduct and char- 
 acter in the earliest years of life. Its aim is to assist in the develop- 
 ment of the dawning conscience of the little learner, and cultivate and 
 enlighten his moral sense. The principles are all presented in a very 
 practical form, and are illustrated w th a great variety of examples made 
 real and vivid to the child by means of the engravings. 
 
 Harper's Story Books. 
 
 A Monthly Series of Narratives, Biographies, and Tales 
 for the Instruction and Entertainment of the Young. By 
 Jacob Abbott. Embellished with numerous and beautiful 
 Engravings. 
 
 These books are published in monthly Numbers of 160 
 pages, small quarto. They are very beautifully illustra- 
 ted, and are printed on fine calendered paper. 
 
 The Series may be obtained of Booksellers, Periodical 
 Agents, and Postmasters, or from the Publishers, at Three 
 Dollars a Year, or Twenty-five Cents a Number. Sub- 
 scriptions may commence with any Number. The Post- 
 age upon "Harper's Story Books," which must be paid 
 Quarterly, in advance, is Two Cents. 
 
 The several Numbers are also bound separately in Mus- 
 lin, and are to be procured in this form at any Booksellers, 
 at Forty Cents per Volume. 
 
 The Numbers are also bound in Quarterly Volumes, 
 Three Numbers in a Volume, and are sold at $1 00 per 
 Volume. 
 
 The two Periodicals, "Harper's New Monthly Maga- 
 zine" and " Harper's Story Books," will be supplied to 
 Subscribers at Five Dollars a Year, and will be published 
 on the first day of each Month. 
 
 The successive numbers of the Story Books present a great variety 
 of subjects and of styles of composition, including narratives, dialogues, 
 descriptive essays, histories, and entertaining stories of a character to 
 interest and please the youthful mind, and, at the same time, to impart 
 information that will be useful in subsequent life. Thus they combine 
 the presentation of important and interesting facts with the inculcation 
 of sound principles in taste, morals, and religion, and thus form a wel- 
 come and efficient aid in the work of home education. Though "ot in- 
 tended to be of exclusively religious character, they are so far designed 
 to exert a moral and religious influence on the minds of the readers as 
 to lead to their introduction in many instances to Sabbath School Li- 
 braries. 
 
 The illustrations of the successive numbers are very numerous, and 
 are executed in the highest style of modern xylography. 
 
4 INSTRUCTION AND ENTERTAINMENT FOR THE YOUNG. 
 
 The following volumes are now ready: 
 
 Vol.. I. BRUNO ; or, Lessoivs of Fidelity, Patience, and Self-denial 
 
 taught by a Dog. 
 WILLIE AND THE MORTGAGE. Showing how much may 
 
 be accomplished by a boy. 
 THE STRAIT GATE ; or, The Rule of Exclusion from 
 
 Heaven. 
 
 Vol. II. THE LITTLE LOUVRE ; or, The Boys' and Girls' Picture 
 Gallery. 
 PRANK ; or, The Philosophy of Tricks and Mischief. 
 EMMA ; or The Three Misfortunes of a Belle. 
 Vol. III. VIRGINIA ; or, A Little Light on a Very Dark Saying. 
 TIMBOO AND JOLIBA ; or, The Art of being Useful. 
 T1MBOO AND FANNY; or, The Art of Self-instruction. 
 
 Vol. IV. THE HARPER ESTABLISHMENT; or, How the Story 
 
 Books are Made. 
 FRANKLIN, the Apprentice Boy, 
 THE STUDIO ; or, Illustrations of the Theory and Practice 
 
 of Drawing, for Young Artists at Home. 
 
 Vol. V. THE STORY OF ANCIENT HISTORY, from the earliest 
 Periods to the Fall of the Roman Empire. 
 THE STORY OF ENGLISH HISTORY, from the earliest 
 
 Periods to the American Revolution. 
 THE STORY OF AMERICAN HISTORY, from the earliest 
 Settlement of the Country to the Establishment of the Fed- 
 eral Constitution. 
 
 Vol. VI. JOHN TRUE ; or, The Christian Experience of an Honest 
 Boy. 
 ELFRED ; or, the Blind Boy and his Pictures. 
 THE MUSEUM ; or, Curiosities Explained. 
 
 Abbott's Franconia Stories. 
 
 Franconia Stories. By Jacob Abbott. Beautifully bound, 
 engraved Title-pages, and numerous Illustrations. Com. 
 plete in 10 vols. 16mo, Muslin, 50 cents each. The Vol- 
 umes may be obtained separately. 
 
 Malleville. Wallace. Mary Erskine. 
 
 Mary Bell. Beechnut. Rodolphus. 
 
 Ellen Linn. Stuyvesant. Caroline. 
 
 Agnes. 
 This charming series of connected stories is complete in ten volumes. 
 Each volume is an entirely distinct and independent work, having no 
 necessary connection of incidents with those that precede or follow it, 
 while yet the characters of the scenes in which the stories are laid are 
 substantially the same in all. They present peaceful pictures of happy 
 domestic life, and are intended not chiefly to amuse and entertain the 
 children who shall peruse them, but to furnish them with attractive les- 
 sons of moral and intellectual instruction, and to train their hearts to 
 habits of ready and cheerful subordination to duty and law. 
 
 The most attractive tales for children which have been issued from 
 the press for years.— Cincinnati Gazette. 
 
INSTRUCTION AND ENTERTAINMENT FOR THE YOUNG. 5 
 
 Aobott's Marco Paul Series, 
 
 Marco Paul's Voyages and Travels in the Pursuit of 
 Knowledge. By Jacob Abbott. Beautifully Illustrated. 
 Complete in 6 vols. 16mo, Muslin, 60 cents each. The 
 Volumes may be obtained separately. 
 
 In New York In Vermont. 
 
 On the Erie Canal. In Boston. 
 
 In the Forests of Maine. At the Springfield Armory. 
 
 The design of these volumes is not simply to present a narrative of ju- 
 venile adventures, but also to communicate, in connection with them, a 
 knowledge of the geography, scenery, and customs of the sections of 
 country over which the young traveler is conducted. Marco Paul makes 
 his journeyings under the guidance of a well-informed tutor, who takes 
 care to give him all the information of which he stands in need. The 
 narrative is rendered still further attractive by the introduction of per- 
 sonal incidents which would naturally befall the actors of the story. No 
 American child can read this series without delight and instruction. But 
 it will not be confined to the juvenile library. Presenting a vivid com- 
 mentary on American society, manners, scenery, and institutions, it has 
 a powerful charm for readers of all ages. 
 
 Abbott's Young Christian Series, 
 
 The Young Christian Series. By Jacob Abbott. Very 
 greatly Improved and Enlarged. "With numerous En- 
 gravings. Complete in 4 vols. 12mo, Muslin, $1 00 each. 
 The Volumes may be obtained separately. 
 
 The Young Christian. The Way to do Good. 
 
 The Corner Stone. Hoaryhead and M'Donner. 
 
 The present edition of Abbott's Young Christian Series is issued in a 
 style of uncommon neatness, and is illustrated with numerous spirited 
 and beautiful engravings. It is superfluous to speak of the rare merits 
 of Abbott's writings on the subject of practical religion. Their extensive 
 circulation, not only in our own country, but in England, Scotland, Ire- 
 land, France, Germany, Holland, India, and at various missionary sta- 
 tions throughout the globe, evinces the excellence of their plan, and the 
 felicity with which it has been executed. In unfolding the different top- 
 ics which he takes in hand, Mr. Abbott reasons clearly, concisely, and 
 to the point ; but the severity of the argument is always relieved by a 
 singular variety and beauty of illustration. It is this admirable combi- 
 nation of discussion with incident that invests his writings with an al- 
 most equal charm for readers of every diversity of age and culture. 
 
 Abbott's Summer in Scotland. 
 
 A Summer in Scotland. By Jacob Abbott. AVith En- 
 gravings. 12mo, Muslin, $1 00. 
 
 A pleasant and agreeable record of observations made during a sum- 
 mer's residence and traveling in the land of Bruce and Wallace. 
 
Cjarper's Nero Catalogue. 
 
 A new Descriptive Catalogue of Harper & Brothers' Pub- 
 lications is now ready for distribution, and may be obtained gratui- 
 tously on application to the Publishers personally, or by letter enclosing 
 Six Cents in postage stamps. 
 
 The attention of gentlemen, in town or country, designing to form Li- 
 braries or enrich their literary collections, is respectfully invited to this 
 Catalogue, which will be found to comprise a large proportion of the 
 standard and most esteemed works in English Literature— compre- 
 hending more than two thousand volumes — which are offered in 
 most instances at less than one half the cost of similar productions in 
 England. 
 
 To Librarians and others connected with Colleges, Schools, etc., who 
 may not have access to a reliable guide in forming the true estimate of 
 literary productions, it is believed the present Catalogue wili prove es- 
 pecially valuable as a manual of reference. 
 
 To prevent disappointment, it is suggested that, whenever books can 
 not be obtained through any bookseller or local agent, applications with 
 remittance should be addressed direct to the Publishers, which will be 
 promptly attended to. 
 
 Franklin Square, New York- 
 
 LRBFe",j 
 
<"■ 
 
 
 
 •** 
 
 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 V* 
 
 
 
 x ^. 
 
 * ^ 
 
 
 
 
 o * 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 'o$ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 ^ V* 
 
 
 
 ,/ < 
 
 A 
 
 * • . A * 
 
 
 ■ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ' 
 
 *