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racter rendered his conquest over men's affections the more certain and infallible; his presents were regarded as sure testimonies of -esteem and friendship, and his professions as the overflowings of his genuine sentiments. No less than thirty thousand persons are said to have lived daily at his board, in the different manors and castles which he possessed in England. The military men, allured by his munificence and hospitality, as well as by his bravery, were jealously attached to his interests; the people in general bore him an unlimited affection; his numerous retainers were more devoted to his will than to the prince or to the laws; and he was the greatest, as well as the last of those mighty barons, who formerly overawed the crown, and rendered the people incapable of any regular system of government.*

Hume, vol. iii., p. 182,

* In the absence of an authentic chronicle the following graphic description of Warwick House, and the person of the mighty king-maker, by Sir Edward Lytton Bulwer, presents a faithful illustration of the state of the Neville's, with the costume and domestic arrangements of the period:-"The Earl of Warwick was seated near a large window that opened upon an inner court, which gave communication to the river. The chamber was painted in the style of Henry III., with huge figures representing the Battle of Hastings, or rather, for there were many separate pieces, the Conquest of Saxon England; the ceiling was groined, vaulted, and emblazoned with the richest gilding and colours; the chimney-piece (a modern ornament) rose to the roof, and represented in bold reliefs, gilt and decorated, the signing of Magna Charta; the floor was strewed thick with dried rushes and odorous herbs; the furniture was scanty but rich, the low-backed chairs, of which there were but four, carved in ebony, had cushions of velvet, with fringes of massive gold; a small cupboard, or beaufet, covered with carpetz de cuir (carpets of gilt and painted leather) of great price, held various quaint and curious ornaments of plate, inwrought with precious stones; and besides this-a singular contrast-on a plain gothic table lay the helmet, the gauntlets, and the battle-axe of the master. The earl was in the lusty vigour of his age; his hair, of deepest black, was worn short, as in disdain of the effeminate fashions of the day; and fretted bare from the temples by the constant and early friction of his helmet, gave to a forehead naturally lofty a yet more majestic appearance of expanse and height; his complexion, though dark and sun burnt, glowed with rich health; the beard was closely shaven, and left in all its remarkable beauty the contour of the oval face " and strong jaw-strong as if clasped in iron; the features were marked and aqui⚫ line, as was common to those of Norman blood; the form spare, but of prodigious width and depth of chest, the more apparent from the fashion of the short surcoat, which was thrown back, and left in broad expanse a placard, not of holiday velvet and satins, but of steel, polished as a mirror, and inlaid with gold. When the earl rose to receive his guest his great stature, which from the length of his limbs was not so observable when he sate, actually startled him; tall as he was himself, the earl towered above him, with his high, majestic, smooth, unwrinkled forehead, like some paladin of the rhyme of poet or romancer; and, perhaps, not only in this masculine advantage, but in the rare and harmonious combination of colossal strength, with lithe and graceful lightness, a more splendid union of all the outward qualities we are inclined to give to the heroes of old never dazzled the eye, or impressed the fancy. The faded portrait of Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick, in the Rous Roll, preserved at the Herald's College, does justice at least to the height and majesty of his stature. The portrait of Edward IV. is the only one in that long series which at all rivals the stately proportions of the king-maker. He was slain at the Battle of Barnet, 14th April, 1471.

Last of the Barons, vol. i., p. 160.

MURDER OF HENRY VI.

On the three and twentieth of May, 1472, poore Kpng Henry the Sixte, a little before deprived of his realme, and imperiall crowne, was now in the Tower of London, spoyled of his life and all worldly felicitie by Richard, Duke of Gloucester (as the con= stant fame ranne), whiche to the intent that Kyng Edward his brother should be clere out of all secret suspicion of sodain inua= ston, murthered the said kyng with a dagger.*

Hall's Chronicle.

On the morrow he was brought through Cornhill from the Tower, with a great company of men bearing weapons, as they would have led him to some place of execution, to St. Paul's Church in London, in an open coffin, bare faced, where he bled; thence he was carried to Blackfriars, and there bled; and thence to Chertsey Abbey, in a boat, where he was buried; but since, by Richard III., in the second year of his reign, removed to Windsor, where he was buried without the chancel, at the south door of the quire of Windsor Chapel, where he was worshipped by the name of "Holy King Henry," whose red hat of velvet was thought to heal the head-ache of such as put it on their heads. There he rested for a time; but now his tomb being taken thence it is not commonly known what has become of his body. Thus ended the king his transitory life, having enjoyed as great prosperity as favourable fortune could afford, and as great troubles on the other side as she frowning could point out; yet on both sides he was patient and virtuous, that he may be a pattern of most perfect virtue, as he was a worthy example of fortune's inconstancy; he was plain, upright, free from fraud, wholly given to prayer, reading of scriptures, and alms-giving; of such inte grity of life that the bishop, who had been his confessor ten years, announced that he had not at that time committed any mortal sin. Stowe's Annals, p. 705.

PERSON AND CHARACTER.

His stature was rather above the middle standard, his limbs slim and well formed, his countenance mild and benevolent, and, but for his unhappy mental malady, and his many troubles, which began even in his early days, and wrought premature decay, he would

*To satisfy the credulous it was reported, as had formerly been reported of Richard II., that he died of grief; but though Edward might silence the tongues, he could not control the thoughts or the pens of his subjects; and the writers who lived under the next dynasty not only proclaim the murder, but attribute the black deed to the advice, if not the dagger, of the youngest of the royal brothers, Richard, Duke of Gloucester. Lingard, vol. v., p. 213.

It is a curious fact, that the weapon said to have been employed in the perpetration of this disputed murder was preserved, and long regarded in the neighbourhood of Reading as a relic. "The warden of Caversham," wrote John Loudon, "was accustomed to show many pretie relics, among which were the holy dagger that killed King Henry." Agnes Strickland's Queens, vol. iii., p. 305,

have been thought well favoured. He was studious, inoffensive, and devout, a lover of justice, and an enemy to cruelty and the shedding of blood; and although by the weakness of his intellect he was but in title a king, his blameless private life claimed for him respect and commiseration. Kings of England, p. 76.

CHRONICLE.

1430. Orders were issued for every person worth £40 per annum to take the order of knighthood. 1430, Dec. 17. Henry VI. crowned King of France at Paris. 1441. King's College at Cambridge, and Eton College founded by Henry VI. 1447. Grammar schools first established. The Queen's College, Cambridge, begun by Queen Margaret, finished by Elizabeth, Queen to Edward IV., in 1465. 1453. This year the first Lord Mayor's show in London, and John Norman, the mayor, in a stately barge, built at his own expense, attended by the city companies in their barges, built in imitation of that of their city magistrate, and decorated with flags and banners, first went to Westminster to qualify for his office. 1454. Coffee first imported from Arabia. 23rd May, 1455. The Battle of St. Albans. 1455. The art of spinning, throwing and weaving silk, practised by a company of women in London, called Silkwomen, who continued to monopolise that trade for twenty-five years, when it was first undertaken by men. 1460, Dec. 31. The Battle of Wakefield, in which the Duke of York was slain. 1461, Feb. 2. The Battle of Mortimer's Cross. 1461, March 2. King Henry VI. deposed.

REIGN OF EDWARD IV.

FROM 1461 TO 1483-22 YEARS, 1 MONTH, 5 Days.

QUEEN MARGARET AND THE ROBBER.

The fate of the unfortunate royal family, after the Battle of Hexham, was singular; the queen Margaret of Anjou, flying with her son into a forest, where she endeavoured to conceal herself, was beset during the darkness of the night by robbers, who, either ignorant or regardless of her quality, despoiled her of her rings and jewels, and treated her with the utmost indignity. The partition of this rich booty raised a quarrel among them, and while their attention was thus engaged, she took the opportunity of making her escape with her son into the thickest of the forest, where she wandered for some time, overspent with hunger and fatigue, and sunk with terror and affliction. While in this wretched condition she saw a robber approach with his naked sword, and finding she had no means of escape, she suddenly embraced the resolution of trusting entirely to his faith and generosity. She advanced towards him, and presenting to him the young prince, called out to him, "Here my friend, I commit to your care

the safety of your king's son." The man, whose humanity and generous spirit had been obscured, not entirely lost by his vicious course of life, and struck with the singularity of the event, was charmed with the confidence reposed in him, and vowed not only to abstain from all injury against the princess, but to devote himself entirely to her service. By his means she dwelt some time concealed in the forest, and was at last conducted to the sea coast, whence she made her escape into France. Hume, vol. iii., p. 225.

MARRIAGE OF EDWARD IV.

It chanced that Edward visited Jaquetta, the Duchess of Bedford, and her husband Wydeville, Lord Rivers, at Grafton, where he saw their daughter Elizabeth, a woman of superior beauty and accomplishments, and the relict of Sir John Grey, a Lancastrian, who had fallen at the second battle of St. Albans.

The lady Grey seized the opportunity to throw herself at the feet of her sovereign, and solicit him to reverse the attainder of her late husband in favour of her destitute children. The king pitied the suppliant; and that pity soon grew into love. To marry a woman so far beneath him, without the advice of his council, and at a moment when his throne tottered under him, was a dangerous experiment. But the virtue of Elizabeth was proof against the arts af the royal lover, and his passion scorned the cooler calculations of prudence. About the end of April, 1464, when the friends of Henry were assembling their forces in Northumberland, he repaired to Stony Stratford, whence early in the morning he stole in great secrecy to Grafton. The marriage ceremony was performed by a priest, in the presence of his clerk, of the Duchess of Bedford, and of two female attendants.

After an hour or two Edward returned to Stony Stratford, and pretending lassitude from hunting shut himself up in his chamber. Two days afterwards he invited himself to Grafton. To divert the attention of the courtiers, their time was wholly occupied with the pleasures of the chase; nor did the king and Elizabeth ever meet in private till the duchess had ascertained that the whole family had retired to rest. Thus he spent four days; and then returning to London, issued orders for his army to join him in Yorkshire. But before his arrival in the north the war had been ended by the two victories of Hedgley Moor and Hexham; and after his return it became the principal subject of his solicitude to open the matter to his councillors, and to obtain their approbation. For this purpose he summoned at Michaelmas a general council of the peers to meet in the abbey of Reading; and the Duke of Clarence and the Earl of Warwick, though they are supposed to have disapproved of the marriage, taking Elizabeth by the hand, introduced her to the rest of the lords, by whom, in the presence of the king, she was acknowledged and complimented as queen. Soon afterwards a second council was held at Westminster, and an income was settled on her of four thousand marks

a year. But notwitstanding this outward show of approbation, there were many who murmured in private, and could ill disguise their jealousy at the elevation to the throne of a woman whose father a few years ago was no more than a simple knight. On the feast of the Ascension the king created thirty-eight knights of the Bath, of whom four were prudently selected from the citizens of London. The next day the mayor, aldermen, and different companies met the queen at Shooter's Hill, and conducted her in state to the Tower. On the Saturday, to gratify the curiosity of the populace, she rode in a horse litter through the principal streets, preceded by the newly-created knights. Her coronation followed on the Sunday, and the rest of the week was devoted to feasting, tournaments, and public rejoicings. Lingard, vol. iii., p. 183.

ASSASSINATION OF PRINCE EDWARD,

After the field (of Tewkesbury) was ended, King Edward made a proclamation that whosoever could bring Prince Edward to him alive or dead, should have an annuity of a hundred pounds during his life, and the prince's life to be saved. Sir Richard Croftes, a wise and valiant knight, nothing mistrusting the king's former promise, brought forth his prisoner Prince Edward, being a goodly, feminine, and a well featured young gentleman, whom, when King Edward had well advised, he demanded of him how he durst so presumptuously enter into his realm with banner displayed. The prince, being bold of stomach and of a good courage, answered, saying, "To recover my father's kingdom and inheritage from his father and grandfather to him, and from him, after him, to me lineally divoluted." At which words King Edward said nothing, but with his hand thrust him from him (or as some say, stroke him with his gauntlet), whom incontinent they that strode about (which were George, Duke of Clarence, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, Thomas, Marquis of Dorset, and William, Lord Hastings) suddenly murdered and piteously mangled; the bitterness of which murder some of the actors after in their latter days tasted and essayed by the very rod of justice and punishment of God. His body was homely interred with the other simple corpses in the church of the monastery of Black monks in Tewkesbury. Hall's Chronicle.

JANE SHORE.

Jane Shore, who forms the interesting subject of Rowe's popular tragedy, was born of respectable parents in London; but, unfortunately, views of interest, more than the maid's inclinations, had been consulted on her marriage; and her mind, although framed for virtue, was unable to resist the allurements of the gay and fascinating king. But though seduced from her duty, she still made herself respectable by her other virtues; and the ascendent which her charms and vivacity enabled her long to maintain over her royal lover, was employed in acts of beneficence and endeavours to soften the natural ferocity of his character. After the

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