RICHARD'S MARRIAGE WITH LADY ANNE.

Our great poet, Shakspeare, has presented us with such ar affecting history of the "gentle Lady Anne," that we are almost tempted, when we compare it with the stern facts of contemporary chroniclers, to doubt their authenticity, and cling to our first impressions; but fiction must give way to truth, and the plain unvarnished tale is thus recorded by the monk of Croyland :"Anne Neville was the second daughter of Richard Neville, the great Earl of Warwick, the king-maker, and was betrothed (not married, as Shakspeare and many historians have erroneously related), to Edward, the Prince of Wales, son of Henry VI. and Margaret of Anjou, who was murdered after the Battle of Tewkesbury. Richard and Anne had been playmates from their childhood, and there is little doubt mutually attached; but on Richard, then Duke of Gloucester, desiring her for his wife, the Duke of Clarence, who had married her elder sister, Isabel, was unwilling to share so rich an inheritance with his brother, and concealed the young heiress; but Richard was too alert for him, and discovered Lady Anne, in the disguise of a cook-maid, in an obscure part of London, and removed her to the sanctuary of St. Martin. The brothers pleaded each his cause in person before their elder brother, King Edward IV. in council, and every man admired the strength of their respective arguments. The king composed their differences, bestowed the maiden on Richard, and parted the estate between him and Clarence; the Countess of Warwick, mother of the heiresses, who had brought the vast wealth to the house of Neville, remaining the only sufferer, being thereby reduced to a state of absolute necessity. Richard and Anne were married long before the death of Edward IV., and not as Sir Richard Baker has recorded, after Richard's accession, in 1483, at which time the Prince of Wales, their son, was nearly ten years old, and his legitimacy undisputed. They were crowned at Westminster on the 6th July, 1483, and Anne's death, supposed to have been caused by poison administered by her husband, who wished to remove her to marry his niece Elizabeth, took place 16th March, 1484. Kings of England, p. 87.

BOSWORTH FIELD-DEATH OF RICHARD. Henry, after crossing the Severn, was joined by the Talbots, and a few other families, but his force was still very inconsiderable compared with the army under his bold and experienced rival.

historic cavillers, that the princes were not murdered and buried in the manner handed down to us by Sir Thomas More and popular tradition; great stress is laid on the bones being found at a spot far removed from the traditional place of their interment; but when the wish of King Richard, that "the bodies might be buried in a better place," be considered, it is not unnatural to conclude that Sir Robert Brackenbury's chaplain removed them secretly to the precincts of his chapel, and dying a few days afterwards, the secret of their last resting place was not divulged. Thus all the researches of Henry the Seventh were baffled, and the fate of the princes enveloped in so much mystery.

M

66

But Henry knew that not one man in ten would fight for Richard, and he continued to press forward. On the 21st August he moved from Tamworth town to Atherstone, where he was joined by swarms of deserters from the enemy. On the same day Richard marched from Leicester, and encamped near the town of Bosworth. Early on the following morning Richard, with his crown on his head, mounted his horse, marshalled his troops, and advanced. Henry at the same time moved from Atherstone: and the two armies met in the midst of a fine and spacious plain, nearly surrounded by hills, which commences about a mile to the south of Bosworth. 66 "There," in the quaint language of a contemporary (Fabian), was fought a sharp battle, and sharper should it have been if the king's party had been fast to him, but many towards the field refused him, and rode over to the other party, and some stood hovering afar off till they saw to which party the victory should fall." In fact, of all the lords that followed Richard, scarcely was one true to him except the Duke of Norfolk, and his son the Earl of Surrey. As he gazed along the enemies lines he saw many a banner, which, a few hours before, had been on his own side, and either immediately before the first attack, or very soon after, Lord Stanley appeared in the field with three thousand men, and joined his adversary. On looking back on his own lines he saw them wavering and broken by desertion, for whole bands at a time left their positions to fall into the rear or go over to Henry. Even the Earl of Northumberland, with the hardy men of the north, seemed inclined to keep aloof. Hesitation could only increase these evils; Richard gave the order, and the Duke of Norfolk, who led the van, began the attack by falling on the advanced guard of the enemy, which was commanded by the old Earl of Oxford, who had recently been delivered from prison by Sir Walter Blount, once Richard's sworn friend, but who now, like so many other adherents, drew his sword for the Earl of Richmond. Norfolk's attack made a great impression, but no other leader seconded him.

While the forewards thus mortally fought, eche entendyng to vanquishe and conuice the other, King Richarde was admonished by his espialles that the Erle of Richemond, accompanied with a small number of men-of-armes, was nor farre of, and as he ap= proached and marched towards him, he perfectly knewe his person= age by certaine demonstrations and tokens which he had learned, and knowen of other, and beyng inflamed with pre, and vered with outragious malice, he put spurres to his horse, and rode out of the side of the range of his bataile, leauyng the auaunt-gardes fighting, and like a hungrie Lyon raune with speare in rest towarde hym. The Erle of Richemond perceaued well the king furiously coming towar e hym, and because the whole hope of hys welth and purpose was to be determined by battayle, he gladly profered to encounter wyth hym bodye to bodye, and man to man. King Richarde set on so sharpely at the first brunt, that he overthrew and slue Sir William Brandon, the Erle's standard-bearer, and

matched hande to hande with Sir John Cheiney, a man of great force and strength, which would have resisted him, but the said Sir John was by him manfully overthrowne, and, so makyng open pas= sage by dent of sworde as he wente forwarde, the Erle of Richemonde withstoode his violence, and kept him at the swordes point without adnantage longer than his companions cyther thought or iudged, which, beyng almost in dispaire of victory, were sodenly recom= forte by Sir William Stanley, who came to succors with three M tall men, at which very insiant King Richardes men were driven back and fled, and he himself manfully fighting in the middle of his 'enemies was slaine, and brought to his death as he worthely had deserued.

Then Lord Stanley picked up his crown, battered and bloodstained, and put it on the head of Henry. The Duke of Norfolk, the Lord Ferrers, Sir Richard Ratcliffe, Sir Robert Brackenbury, and a few other knights shared the fate of their master. It is said, that in the battle, and in the flight, three thousand men perished; but, considering the way in which the affair was managed, and Henry's politic anxiety to reconcile parties, and to show himself a clement sovereign, it is probable that this number is somewhat exaggerated. The battle of Bosworth Field, which terminated the wars of the Roses, was altogether on an inferior scale to that of several preceding conflicts. Counting both armies there were not eighteen thousand men on the field, and of these the greater part were never engaged.

En the meane season the dead corpse of King Richarde was as shameful caryed to the towne of Leycester, as he gorgeously the day before with his pompe and pride departed out of the same towne. For his bodie was naked and dispoyled to the skinne, and was trussed behinde a Pursyaunt of armes, called Blaunche Senglier, or white Bore, like a Hogge or a Calfe, the head and armes hang= png on the one syde of the horse, and the legs on the other syde, and, all besprinckled with mire and blood, was brought to Grey Friars church, within the towne, and there lay like a miserable spectacle; but surely consideryng his mischievous actes and vn= gracious dopngs, men may worthely wonder at such a captive, and in the sayde church he was with no lesse funeral pompe and solem= nitie enterred than he would to be done at the burying of his inno= cent Nephews, whom he caused cruelly to be murthered, and_vnna= turally to be quelled. When his death was knowen, fewe lamen= ted, and many reioysed, the prowde, braggyng whyte Bore (which was his badge) was violently rased and plucked downe from euery signe and place where it might be espyed, so yll was his lyfe, that men wished the memorie of him to be buryed with hys carren corps.' Cabinet History of England, vol. i., p. 230, and Grafton's Chronicle, vol. ii., p. 156.

As Richard rode over Leicester Bridge his left foot struck against a low wooden post; a blind beggar, who was sitting near it, said oracularly, "HIS HEAD SHALL STRIKE AGAINST THAT VERY PLACE AS HE RETURNS THIS NIGHT;" and the local tra

PERSON AND CHARACTER.

He was of small stature, humpbacked, and had a harsh and disagreeable countenance. * Hume, vol iii., p. 296. On the character of Richard it is unnecessary to say much; if he was guilty of the crimes laid to his charge he was little better than a monster in human shape. Writers have indeed existed in modern times who have attempted to prove his innocence; but their arguments are rather ingenious than conclusive, and dwindled into groundless conjectures when confronted with the evidence which may be arrayed against them. Lingard, vol v., p. 271.

CHRONICLE.

1483, July 6. Richard and his queen crowned at Westminster. 1483, Nov. 20th. The Duke of Buckingham beheaded in the marketplace at Salisbury. 1483. Prince Edward, Richard's only son, dies suddenly at Middleham. 1485, March 16. The queen dies unexpectedly, and not without suspicion of poison. Aug. 16. The Earl of Richmond landed at Milford Haven with 2,000 men.

REIGN OF HENRY VII.

FROM 1485 TO 1509-23 YEARS, 8 MONTHS.
LAMBERT SIMNEL.

The great uncertainty regarding the fate of the two sons of Edward IV. giving rise to numerous idle speculations and conjectures, and offering to evil-minded and self-interested persons a wide field for imposture, it was not long ere a claimant to the crown appeared,

ditions say that as the dead body of the king was carried across the bridge after the battle, with his head dangling from the horse of the pursuivant, Blanche Sanglier, like a thrum mop, struck against this very piece of wood, and thus the beggar's prophecy was fulfilled.

The exact spot of ground on which the Battle of Bosworth was fought is frequently more and more discovered by pieces of arinour, weapons, and especially abundance of arrow's heads found there of long and large proportion. There is a little mount cast up on which Henry VII. is said to have made his speech to his soldiers. Richard (according to Sandford) was not above thirty-three or thirtyfour when he was killed; a monument of various coloured marbles, surmounted with his statue in alabaster, was erected by Henry VII. in St. Mary's Church; it stood till the dissolution of the abbeys under Henry VIII., when it was pulled down and utterly defaced; since then the grove being overgrown with weeds and nettles no trace of it can be found, except the stone coffin, which was long used as a drinking trough at the White Horse Inn, in Leicester.

*Many historians have endeavoured to throw discredit on the popular tradition of Richard's deformity, and quote Buck, Rous and the old Countess of Desmond, who state that he "was well-formed and active, and with the exception of one shoulder being a trifle higher than the other, he was, save his brother Clarence, the handsomest man of his time;" but from his portrait in the Rous-roll, in the Herald's College, and the drawings published by Horace Walpole, in his "Historic Doubts," there is good reason to believe his title to the surname of "crook-back" was well founded.

who, diverting the public attention from the young princes who were supposed to have been smothered, or otherwise disposed of by Richard III., turned it on the young Earl of Warwick, the son of the Duke of Clarence, said by report to have contrived his escape from the Tower, where he had been confined ever since the accession of Henry VII. to the throne. The history of this wild and seemingly insane conspiracy is perhaps one of the most extraordinary records of barefaced fraud that was ever conceived, or attempted to be executed, the real Earl of Warwick being at that time not only alive, but in safe custody of the king, and his person well known to all the nobility, and many of the people. The agent selected to represent the young earl was a youth of fifteen years of age, called Lambert Simnel, the son of a baker, who, suborned and instructed by a wily priest of Oxford, called Richard Simon, and possessing a handsome person, and superior manners and understanding, found little difficulty in creating a sensation, and raising partizans. He was first carried to Ireland, his tutor, Simon, considering that place the most favourable for the enterprise; there, throwing himself at the feet of the Earl of Kildare, the deputy, he claimed his protection as the unfortunate Warwick, and acted his part with so huch skill, that the generous and credulous Irishman, not suspecting so bold an imposture, gave credence to him, and after consulting some of his friends as weak as himself, it was determined to receive Simnel as a genuine Plantaganet. He was lodged in the castle of Dublin, a diadem taken from a statue of the virgin was placed on his head, and he was publicly proclaimed Edward VI., King of England, and Lord of Ireland. The example set by the capital was followed by the whole island, and not a sword was any where drawn in Henry's quarrel. Simnel shortly afterwards having mustered an army of his Irish friends, among whom were the Earls of Lincoln and Kildare, and Lord Lovell, and some German mercenaries, determined to invade England. He landed at Fondrey, in Lancashire; continuing his march he met the king at Stoke, near Newark, in Nottinghamshire, where an obstinate battle was fought, and Simnel and his tutor were taken prisoners. Simon being a priest was not tried at law, and only committed to safe custody. Simnel was too contemptible to be an object of either apprehension or resentment to Henry; he was pardoned, and made a scullion in the king's kitchen, which very dignified office, for one who had worn a crown and claimed to be sovereign of England, he continued to fulfil until he was advanced to the rank of falconer.

That such a palpable imposture should for a moment have been countenanced seems too absurd for belief, yet such was the strange infatuation attending it, notwithstanding the true Earl of Warwick was brought from his prison in the Tower, and publicly shown in procession through the streets and at St. Paul's, there were still many dupes, whom the intriguing and reckless York faction enlisted in their ranks, and persuaded that in spite of ocular demonstration to the contrary, the baker's son was the veritable prince. Kings of England, p. 83.