gave him the daughter, Isabel, whom he had, perhaps, intended for the king. Through all these wars the nobles were constantly changing sides and betraying one another. Even the royal family itself was not faithful, and Clarence now conspired to betray his brother. Afterward he changed again, and betrayed his father-in-law. He himself was finally betrayed and murdered.

Perhaps the king thought, as he had married greatly beneath his dignity, and his wife and her relations were looked down upon by all the aristocracy of the land, that it would set things right to make them noble now. Accordingly, all the greatest honors and riches were poured out upon them. Her father and her brothers received great titles and estates; her son was married to the heiress of the duke of Exeter, whom Warwick wanted for his own nephew; her sisters were married to the richest young men who could be found, heirs of earls and dukes, whom the lords would have liked to marry their own daughters. All this, therefore, instead of setting things right, angered the earl of Warwick and the rest of the old nobility beyond bearing.

Except for their being "upstarts," however, there was nothing to be said against these relations of the queen. One of them in particular, her brother, Lord Rivers, was good, accomplished, and faithful. But their glory was short-lived, and they paid very dear for it. At last things came to an open rupture, and Warwick, forsaking Edward, allied himself with his most bitter enemy, Margaret of Anjou, who had never ceased stirring and striving to reinstate her husband and son. He now married his other daughter to her son, Edward, so that he had, we may say, two strings to his bow— two daughters who might, in the changes of that changing time, come to be queens of England. This second daughter, Anne, was, indeed, queen for a short time, though not at all by the means her father expected.

As soon as Warwick appeared in England the people, who

loved and admired him, flocked around him in crowds. Edward had to flee out of the country, and to flee in such haste that he took nothing with him, and had no means of paying the captain of the ship which carried him across but by giving him a cloak lined with sable. As to his poor wife, whom he left behind him, as well as his luggage, she took refuge with her young daughters in the sanctuary at Westminster.

Here the poor queen remained, and here her unhappy little son, Edward V., was born. Shakespeare makes her say, Small joy have I in being England's queen." Katherine of France, who was so despised for descending to marry a private gentleman, was, perhaps, a good deal wiser and happier than poor Elizabeth Woodville, who rose from being a private lady to marry a king. However, it was not very long before Edward returned. His brother Clarence was treacherous again, and deserted Warwick. Two great battles were fought, in both of which Edward was victorious. The first was at Barnet (1471), and there Warwick, the king-maker, was slain; the second was at Tewkesbury, and it utterly ruined the Lancastrian house. The poor young Prince Edward, son of Henry and Margaret, was brutally murdered, it is said. by Edward's two brothers, Clarence and Gloucester. Margaret was made prisoner, and Henry was taken back to the Tower, where he very soon after died. The Yorkists gave out that he died of a broken heart, but every body believed that he was murdered, and Richard, duke of Gloucester, had all the credit of it, whether he really deserved it or not. The people soon began to look on poor King Henry as a saint, and said that wonderful miracles were worked at his tomb.

XXIX.

BOSWORTH FIELD.-GAIRDNER.

[Edward IV. left two young sons, Edward V. and Richard, duke of York. Their uncle, Richard, duke of Gloucester, was appointed Protector of the Realm, and then claimed the crown on the ground that his nephews were illegitimate. He was crowned July 6, 1483, and soon afterward the young princes disappeared. Though nothing absolutely certain is known as to their fate, it is exceedingly probable that they were murdered by Richard's order. As king, he pursued a conciliatory policy; but there was much disaffection, and it gradually centered around Henry, earl of Richmond, the representative of the Lancastrian line. In 1485 Henry invaded the kingdom, and the two rivals met on Bosworth Field.]

RICHARD III.

By repeated proclamations Richard called upon his subjects to resist the intended invasion of Richmond with all their force. He denounced the earl and his followers as men who had forsaken their true allegiance, and put themselves in subjection to the French king. He pointed out that, owing to the illegitimacy of the Beauforts, Henry could have no claim to the crown, and that even on the father's side he was come of bastard blood. He declared that he had bargained to give up forever all claims hitherto made by the kings of England either to the crown of France, the duchy of Normandy, Gascony, or even Calais. Richmond, however, had sent messages into England by which he was assured of a considerable amount of support; and he borrowed money from the king of France with which he fitted out a small fleet at Harfleur, and embarked for Wales, where his uncle, Jasper Tudor, earl of Pembroke, possessed great influence.

Richard, knowing of the intended invasion, but being uncertain where his enemy might land, had taken up his position in the center of the kingdom. Following a plan first put in use by his brother, Edward, during the Scotch war, he had stationed messengers at intervals of twenty miles along all the principal roads to the coast to bring him early intelligence. But Henry landed at Milford Haven, at the farthest extremity of South Wales, where, perhaps, Richard had least expected him; and so small was the force by which he was accompanied, that the news did not, at first, give the king very much anxiety. He professed great satisfaction that his adversary was now coming to bring matters to the test of battle. The earl, however, was among friends from the moment he landed. Pembroke was his native town, and the inhabitants expressed their willingnesss to serve his uncle, the earl of Pembroke, as their natural and immediate lord. The very men whom Richard had placed to keep the country against him at once joined his party, and he passed on to Shrewsbury with little or no opposition.

The king's "unsteadfast friendships," on the other hand, were now rapidly working his ruin. His own attorney-general, Morgan Kidwelly, had been in communication with the enemy before he landed. Richard, however, was very naturally suspicious of Lord Stanley, his rival's step-father, who, though he was steward of the royal household, had asked leave, shortly before the invasion, to go home and visit his family in Lancashire. This the king granted only on condition that he would send his son George, Lord Strange, to him at Nottingham in his place. Lord Strange was, accordingly, sent to the king; but when the news arrived of Henry's landing, Richard desired the presence of his father also. Stanley pretended illness, an excuse which could not fail to increase the king's suspicions. His son at the same time made an attempt to escape, and, being captured, confessed that he himself and his uncle, Sir William Stanley, had formed

a project, with others, to go over to the enemy; but he protested his father's innocence, and assured the king that he would obey his summons. He was made to understand that his own life depended on his doing so, and he wrote a letter to his father accordingly.

Richard, having mustered his followers at Nottingham, went on to Leicester to meet his antagonist, and encamped at Bosworth on the night of August 21. The earl of Richmond had arrived near the same place with an army of 5,000 men, which is supposed to have been not more than half that of the king.. That day, however, Lord Stanley had come to the earl secretly at Atherstone to assure him of his support in the coming battle. He and his brother, Sir William, were at the head of a force not far off, and were only temporizing to save the life of his son, Lord Strange. This information relieved Henry's mind of much anxiety, for at various times since he landed he had felt serious misgivings about the success of the enterprise. The issue was now to be decided on the following day.

Early in the morning both parties prepared for the battle. Richard arose before day-break, much agitated, it is said, by dreadful dreams that had haunted his imagination in the nighttime. But he entered the field wearing his crown upon his head, and encouraged his troops with an eloquent harangue. There was, however, treason in his camp, and many of his followers were only seeking an opportunity to desert and take part with the enemy. A warning, indeed, had been conveyed by an unknown hand to his foremost supporter, the duke of Norfolk, in the following rhyme, which was discovered the night before, written on the door of his tent :

"Jack of Norfolk, be not too bold,

For Dickon, thy master, is bought and sold,"

Lord Stanley, who had drawn up his men at about equal distance from both armies, received messages early in the morning from both leaders desiring his immediate assistance.