“Speak you of Robin of Redesdale, now dead?” asked one of the captains.

“He is not dead. [The fate of Robin of Redesdale has been as obscure as

most of the incidents in this most perplexed part of English history.

While some of the chroniclers finish his career according to the report

mentioned in the text, Fabyan not only more charitably prolongs his

life, but rewards him with the king’s pardon; and according to the

annals of his ancient and distinguished family (who will pardon, we

trust, a license with one of their ancestry equally allowed by history

and romance), as referred to in Wotton’s “English Baronetage” (Art.

“Hilyard”), and which probably rests upon the authority of the life of

Richard III., in Stowe’s “Annals,” he is represented as still living in

the reign of that king. But the whole account of this famous demagogue

in Wotton is, it must be owned, full of historical mistakes.] Montagu

informs me that the report was false. He was defeated off York, and

retired for some days into the woods; but it is he who has enticed

the sons of Latimer and Fitzhugh into the revolt, and resigned his

own command to the martial cunning of Sir John Coniers. This Robin of

Redesdale is no common man. He hath had a clerkly education, he hath

travelled among the Free Towns of Italy, he hath deep purpose in all he

doth; and among his projects is the destruction of the nobles here, as

it was whilome effected in Florence, the depriving us of all offices and

posts, with other changes, wild to think of and long to name.”

“And we would have suffered this man to triumph!” exclaimed De Fulke:

“we have been to blame.”

“Under fair pretence he has gathered numbers, and now wields an army. I

have reason to know that, had he succeeded in estranging ye from Edward,

and had the king fallen, dead or alive, into his hands, his object would

have been to restore Henry of Windsor, but on conditions that would have

left king and baron little more than pageants in the state. I knew this

man years ago. I have watched him since; and, strange though it may seem

to you, he hath much in him that I admire as a subject and should fear

were I a king. Brief, thus runs my counsel: For our sake and the realm’s

safety, we must see this armed multitude disbanded; that done, we must

see the grievances they with truth complain of fairly redressed. Think

not, my lords, I avenge my own wrongs alone, when I go with you in your

resolve to banish from the king’s councils the baleful influence of the

queen’s kin. Till that be compassed, no peace for England. As a leprosy,

their avarice crawls over the nobler parts of the state, and devours

while it sullies. Leave this to me; and, though we will redress

ourselves, let us now assist our king!”

With one voice the unruly officers clamoured their assent to all the

earl urged, and expressed their readiness to sally at once from the

gates, and attack the rebels.

“But,” observed an old veteran, “what are we amongst so many? Here a

handful--there an army!”

“Fear not, reverend sir,” answered Warwick, with an assured smile; “is

not this army in part gathered from my own province of Yorkshire? Is it

not formed of men who have eaten of my bread and drunk of my cup? Let

me see the man who will discharge one arrow at the walls which contain

Richard Nevile of Warwick. Now each to your posts,--I to the king.”

Like the pouring of new blood into a decrepit body seemed the arrival,

at that feeble garrison, of the Earl of Warwick. From despair into the

certainty of triumph leaped every heart. Already at the sight of his

banner floating by the side of Edward’s, the gunner had repaired to his

bombard, the archer had taken up his bow; the village itself, before

disaffected, poured all its scanty population--women, and age, and

children--to the walls. And when the earl joined the king upon the

ramparts, he found that able general sanguine and elated, and pointing

out to Clarence the natural defences of the place. Meanwhile, the

rebels, no doubt apprised by their scouts of the new aid, had already

halted in their march, and the dark swarm might be seen indistinctly

undulating, as bees ere they settle, amidst the verdure of the plain.

“Well, cousin,” said the king, “have ye brought these Hotspurs to their

allegiance?”

“Sire, yes,” said Warwick, gravely; “but we have here no force to resist

yon army.”

“Bring you not succours?” said the king, astonished. “You must have

passed through London. Have you left no troops upon the road?”

“I had no time, sire; and London is well-nigh palsied with dismay. Had

I waited to collect troops, I might have found a king’s head blackening

over those gates.”

“Well,” returned Edward, carelessly, “few or many, one gentleman is more

worth than a hundred varlets. ‘We are eno’ for glory,’ as Henry said at

Agincourt.”

“No, sire; you are too skilful and too wise to believe your boast. These

men we cannot conquer,--we must disperse them.”

“By what spell?”

“By their king’s word to redress their complaints.”

“And banish my queen?”

“Heaven forbid that man should part those whom God has joined,” returned

Warwick. “Not my lady, your queen, but my lady’s kindred.”

“Rivers is dead, and gallant John,” said Edward, sadly; “is not that

enough for revenge?”

“It is not revenge that we require, but pledges for the land’s safety,”

answered Warwick. “And to be plain, without such a promise these walls

may be your tomb.”

Edward walked apart, strongly debating within himself. In his character

were great contrasts: no man was more frank in common, no man more false

when it suited; no man had more levity in wanton love, or more firm

affection for those he once thoroughly took to his heart. He was the

reverse of grateful for service yielded, yet he was warm in protecting

those on whom service was conferred. He was resolved not to give up the

Woodvilles, and after a short self-commune, he equally determined not to

risk his crown and life by persevering in resistance to the demand for

their downfall. Inly obstinate, outwardly yielding, he concealed his

falsehood with his usual soldierly grace.

“Warwick,” he said, returning to the earl’s side, “you cannot advise

me to what is misbeseeming, and therefore in this strait I resign my

conduct to your hands. I will not unsay to yon mutinous gentlemen what I

have already said; but what you judge it right to promise in my name

to them or to the insurgents, I will not suppose that mime honour will

refuse to concede. But go not hence, O noblest friend that ever stood

by a king’s throne!--go not hence till the grasp of your hand assures me

that all past unkindness is gone and buried; yea, and by this hand,

and while its pressure is warm in mine, bear not too hard on thy king’s

affection for his lady’s kindred.”

“Sire,” said Warwick, though his generous nature well-nigh melted

into weakness, and it was with an effort that he adhered to his

purpose,--“sire, if dismissed for a while, they shall not be degraded.

And if it be, on consideration, wise to recall from the family

of Woodville your grants of lands and lordships, take from your

Warwick--who, rich in his king’s love, hath eno’ to spare--take the

double of what you would recall. Oh, be frank with me, be true, be

steadfast, Edward, and dispose of my lands, whenever you would content a

favourite.”

“Not to impoverish thee, my Warwick,” answered Edward, smiling, “did I

call thee to my aid; for the rest, my revenues as Duke of York are at

least mine to bestow. Go now to the hostile camp,--go as sole minister

and captain-general of this realm; go with all powers and honours a king

can give; and when these districts are at peace, depart to our Welsh

provinces, as chief justiciary of that principality. Pembroke’s mournful

death leaves that high post in my gift. It cannot add to your greatness,

but it proves to England your sovereign’s trust.”

“And while that trust is given,” said Warwick, with tears in his

eyes, “may Heaven strengthen my arm in battle, and sharpen my brain in

council! But I play the laggard. The sun wanes westward; it should not

go down while a hostile army menaces the son of Richard of York.”

The earl rode rapidly away, reached the broad space where his followers

still stood, dismounted, but beside their steeds,--

“Trumpets advance, pursuivants and heralds go before! Marmaduke, mount!

The rest I need not. We ride to the insurgent camp.”

CHAPTER III. THE CAMP OF THE REBELS.

The rebels had halted about a mile from the town, and were already

pitching their tents for the night. It was a tumultuous, clamorous, but

not altogether undisciplined array; for Coniers was a leader of singular

practice in reducing men into the machinery of war, and where his skill

might have failed, the prodigious influence and energy of Robin of

Redesdale ruled the passions and united the discordant elements. This

last was, indeed, in much worthy the respect in which Warwick held his

name. In times more ripe for him, he would have been a mighty demagogue

and a successful regenerator. His birth was known but to few; his

education and imperious temper made him vulgarly supposed of noble

origin; but had he descended from a king’s loins, Robert Hilyard had

still been the son of the Saxon people. Warwick overrated, perhaps,

Hilyard’s wisdom; for, despite his Italian experience, his ideas were

far from embracing any clear and definite system of democracy. He had

much of the frantic levelism and jacquerie of his age and land, and

could probably not have explained to himself all the changes he desired

to effect; but, coupled with his hatred to the nobles, his deep and

passionate sympathy with the poor, his heated and fanatical chimeras of

a republic, half-political and half-religious, he had, with no uncommon

inconsistency, linked the cause of a dethroned king. For as the

Covenanters linked with the Stuarts against the succeeding and more

tolerant dynasty, never relinquishing their own anti-monarchic theories;

as in our time, the extreme party on the popular side has leagued with

the extreme of the aristocratic, in order to crush the medium policy,

as a common foe,--so the bold leveller united with his zeal for Margaret

the very cause which the House of Lancaster might be supposed the least

to favour. He expected to obtain from a sovereign dependent upon a

popular reaction for restoration, great popular privileges. And as the

Church had deserted the Red Rose for the White, he sought to persuade

many of the Lollards, ever ready to show their discontent, that Margaret

(in revenge on the hierarchy) would extend the protection they had never

found in the previous sway of her husband and Henry V. Possessed of

extraordinary craft, and even cunning in secular intrigues, energetic,

versatile, bold, indefatigable, and, above all, marvellously gifted with

the arts that inflame, stir up, and guide the physical force of masses,

Robert Hilyard had been, indeed, the soul and life of the present

revolt; and his prudent moderation in resigning the nominal command to

those whose military skill and high birth raised a riot into the dignity

of rebellion, had given that consistency and method to the rising which

popular movements never attain without aristocratic aid.

In the principal tent of the encampment the leaders of the insurrection

were assembled.

There was Sir John Coniers, who had married one of the Neviles, the

daughter of Fauconberg, Lord High Admiral, but who had profited little

by this remote connection with Warwick; for, with all his merit, he was

a greedy, grasping man, and he had angered the hot earl in pressing

his claims too imperiously. This renowned knight was a tall, gaunt man,

whose iron frame sixty winters had not bowed. There were the young heirs

of Latimer and Fitzhugh, in gay gilded armour and scarlet mantelines;

and there, in a plain cuirass, trebly welded, and of immense weight, but

the lower limbs left free and unincumbered in thick leathern hose, stood

Robin of Redesdale. Other captains there were, whom different motives

had led to the common confederacy. There might be seen the secret

Lollard, hating either Rose, stern and sour, and acknowledging no leader

but Hilyard, whom he knew as a Lollard’s son; there might be seen the

ruined spendthrift, discontented with fortune, and regarding civil war

as the cast of a die,--death for the forfeiture, lordships for the gain;

there, the sturdy Saxon squire, oppressed by the little baron of his

province, and rather hopeful to abase a neighbour than dethrone a king

of whom he knew little, and for whom he cared still less; and there,

chiefly distinguished from the rest by grizzled beard, upturned

mustache, erect mien, and grave, not thoughtful aspect, were the men

of a former period,--the soldiers who had fought against the Maid of

Are,--now without place, station, or hope in peaceful times, already

half robbers by profession, and decoyed to any standard that promised

action, pay, or plunder.

The conclave were in high and warm debate.

“If this be true,” said Coniers, who stood at the head of the table,

his helmet, axe, truncheon, and a rough map of the walls of Olney before

him--“if this be true, if our scouts are not deceived, if the Earl

of Warwick is in the village, and if his banner float beside King

Edward’s,--I say, bluntly, as soldiers should speak, that I have been

deceived and juggled!”

“And by whom, Sir Knight and cousin?” said the heir of Fitzhugh,

reddening.

“By you, young kinsman, and this hot-mouthed dare-devil, Robin of

Redesdale! Ye assured me, both, that the earl approved the rising; that

he permitted the levying yon troops in his name; that he knew well the

time was come to declare against the Woodvilles, and that no sooner was

an army mustered than he would place himself at its bead; and I say, if

this be not true, you have brought these gray hairs into dishonour!”

“And what, Sir John Coniers,” exclaimed Robin, rudely, “what honour had

your gray hairs till the steel cap covered them? What honour, I say,

under lewd Edward and his lusty revellers? You were thrown aside, like a

broken scythe, Sir John Coniers! You were forsaken in your rust! Warwick

himself, your wife’s great kinsman, could do nought in your favour! You

stand now, leader of thousands, lord of life and death, master of Edward

and the throne! We have done this for you, and you reproach us!”

“And,” began the heir of Fitzhugh, encouraged by the boldness of

Hilyard, “we had all reason to believe my noble uncle, the Earl of

Warwick, approved our emprise. When this brave fellow (pointing to

Robin) came to inform me that, with his own eyes, he had seen the

waxen effigies of my great kinsman, the hellish misdeed of the queen’s

witch-dam, I repaired to my Lord Montagu; and though that prudent

courtier refused to declare openly, he let me see that war with the

Woodvilles was not unwelcome to him.”

“Yet this same Montagu,” observed one of the ringleaders, “when Hilyard

was well-nigh at the gates of York, sallied out and defeated him, sans

ruth, sans ceremony.”

“Yes, but he spared my life, and beheaded the dead body of poor Hugh

Withers in my stead: for John Nevile is cunning, and he picks his nuts

from the brennen without lesing his own paw. It was not the hour for him

to join us, so he beat us civilly, and with discretion. But what hath he

done since? He stands aloof while our army swells, while the bull of the

Neviles and the ragged staff of the earl are the ensigns of our war, and

while Edward gnaws out his fierce heart in yon walls of Olney. How say

ye, then, that Warwick, even if now in person with the king, is in heart

against us? Nay, he may have entered Olney but to capture the tyrant.”

“If so,” said Coniers, “all is as it should be: but if Earl Warwick,

who, though he hath treated me ill, is a stour carle, and to be feared

if not loved, join the king, I break this wand, and ye will seek out

another captain.”

“And a captain shall be found!” cried Robin. “Are we so poor in valour,

that when one man leaves us we are headless and undone? What if Warwick

so betray us and himself,--he brings no forces. And never, by God’s

blessing, should we separate till we have redressed the wrongs of our

countrymen!”

“Good!” said the Saxon squire, winking, and looking wise,--“not till we

have burned to the ground the Baron of Bullstock’s castle!”

“Not,” said a Lollard, sternly, “till we have shortened the purple gown

of the churchman; not till abbot and bishop have felt on their backs

the whip wherewith they have scourged the godly believer and the humble

saint.”

“Not,” added Robin, “till we have assured bread to the poor man, and the

filling of the flesh-pot, and the law to the weak, and the scaffold to

the evil-doer.”

“All this is mighty well,” said, bluntly, Sir Geoffrey Gates, the leader

of the mercenaries, a skilful soldier, but a predatory and lawless

bravo; “but who is to pay me and my tall fellows?”

At this pertinent question, there was a general hush of displeasure and

disgust.

“For, look you, my masters,” continued Sir Geoffrey, “as long as I and

my comrades here believed that the rich earl, who hath half England

for his provant, was at the head or the tail of this matter, we were

contented to wait a while; but devil a groat hath yet gone into my

gipsire; and as for pillage, what is a farm or a homestead? an’ it were

a church or a castle there might be pickings.”

“There is much plate of silver, and a sack or so of marks and royals,

in the stronghold of the Baron of Bullstock,” quoth the Saxon squire,

doggedly hounding on to his revenge.

“You see, my friends,” said Coniers, with a smile, and shrugging his

shoulders, “that men cannot gird a kingdom with ropes of sand. Suppose

we conquer and take captive--nay, or slay--King Edward, what then?”

“The Duke of Clarence, male heir to the throne,” said the heir of

Latimer, “is Lord Warwick’s son-in-law, and therefore akin to you, Sir

John.”

“That is true,” observed Coniers, musingly.

“Not ill thought of, sir,” said Sir Geoffrey Gates; “and my advice is to

proclaim Clarence king and Warwick lord protector. We have some chance

of the angels then.”

“Besides,” said the heir of Fitzhugh, “our purpose once made clear, it

will be hard either for Warwick or Clarence to go against us,--harder

still for the country not to believe them with us. Bold measures are our

wisest councillors.”

“Um!” said the Lollard, “Lord Warwick is a good man, and has never,

though his brother be a bishop, abetted the Church tyrannies. But as for

George of Clarence--”

“As for Clarence,” said Hilyard, who saw with dismay and alarm that

the rebellion he designed to turn at the fitting hour to the service of

Lancaster, might now only help to shift from one shoulder to the other

the hated dynasty of York--“as for Clarence, he hath Edward’s vices

without his manhood.” He paused, and seeing that the crisis had ripened

the hour for declaring himself, his bold temper pushed at once to its

object. “No!” he continued, folding his arms, raising his head, and

comprehending the whole council in his keen and steady gaze,--“no! lords

and gentlemen, since speak I must in this emergency, hear me calmly.

Nothing has prospered in England since we abandoned our lawful king. If

we rid ourselves of Edward, let it not be to sink from a harlot-monger

to a drunkard. In the Tower pines our true lord, already honoured as a

saint. Hear me, I say,--hear me out! On the frontiers an army that keeps

Gloucester at bay hath declared for Henry and Margaret. Let us, after

seizing Olney, march thither at once, and unite forces. Margaret is

already prepared to embark for England. I have friends in London who

will attack the Tower, and deliver Henry. To you, Sir John Coniers, in

the queen’s name, I promise an earldom and the garter; to you, the heirs

of Latimer and Fitzhugh, the high posts that beseem your birth; to

all of you, knights and captains, just share and allotment in the

confiscated lands of the Woodvilles and the Yorkists; to you, brethren,”

and addressing the Lollards, his voice softened into a meaning accent

that, compelled to worship in secret, they yet understood, “shelter from

your foes and mild laws; and to you, brave soldiers, that pay which

a king’s coffers alone can supply. Wherefore I say, down with all

subject-banners! up with the Red Rose and the Antelope, and long live

Henry the Sixth!”

This address, however subtle in its adaptation to the various passions

of those assembled, however aided by the voice, spirit, and energy of

the speaker, took too much by surprise those present to produce at once

its effect.

The Lollards remembered the fires lighted for their martyrs by the House

of Lancaster; and though blindly confident in Hilyard, were not yet

prepared to respond to his call. The young heir of Fitzhugh, who had, in

truth, but taken arms to avenge the supposed wrongs of Warwick, whom

he idolized, saw no object gained in the rise of Warwick’s enemy, Queen

Margaret. The mercenaries called to mind the woful state of Henry’s

exchequer in the former time. The Saxon squire muttered to himself, “And

what the devil is to become of the castle of Bullstock?” But Sir Henry

Nevile (Lord Latimer’s son), who belonged to that branch of his House

which had espoused the Lancaster cause, and who was in the secret

councils of Hilyard, caught up the cry, and said, “Hilyard doth not

exceed his powers; and he who strikes for the Red Rose shall carve out

his own lordship from the manors of every Yorkist that he slays.” Sir

John Coniers hesitated: poor, long neglected, ever enterprising and

ambitious, he was dazzled by the proffered bribe; but age is slow to

act, and he expressed himself with the measured caution of gray hairs.

“A king’s name,” said he, “is a tower of strength, especially when

marching against a king; but this is a matter for general assent and

grave forethought.”

Before any other (for ideas did not rush at once to words in those days)

found his tongue, a mighty uproar was heard without. It did not syllable

itself into distinct sound; it uttered no name; it was such a shout as

numbers alone could raise; and to such a shout would some martial leader

have rejoiced to charge to battle, so full of depth and fervour, and

enthusiasm and good heart, it seemed, leaping from rank to rank, from

breast to breast, from earth to heaven. With one accord the startled

captains made to the entrance of the tent, and there they saw, in the

broad space before them, inclosed by the tents which were grouped in a

wide semicircle,--for the mass of the hardy rebel army slept in the

open air, and the tents were but for leaders,--they saw, we say, in that

broad space, a multitude kneeling, and in the midst, upon his good steed

Saladin, bending graciously down, the martial countenance, the lofty

stature, of the Earl of Warwick. Those among the captains who knew him

not personally recognized him by the popular description,--by the black

war-horse, whose legendary fame had been hymned by every minstrel; by

the sensation his appearance had created; by the armourial insignia of

his heralds, grouped behind him, and whose gorgeous tabards blazed with

his cognizance and quarterings in azure, or, and argent. The sun was

slowly setting, and poured its rays upon the bare head of the mighty

noble, gathering round it in the hazy atmosphere like a halo. The homage

of the crowd to that single form, unarmed, and scarce attended, struck a

death-knell to the hopes of Hilyard,--struck awe into all his comrades!

The presence of that one man seemed to ravish from them, as by magic,

a vast army; power, and state, and command left them suddenly to be

absorbed in HIM! Captains, they were troopless,--the wielder of men’s

hearts was amongst them, and from his barb assumed reign, as from his

throne!

“Gads my life!” said Coniers, turning to his comrades, “we have now,

with a truth, the earl amongst us; but unless he come to lead us on to

Olney, I would as lief see the king’s provost at my shoulder.”

“The crowd separates, he rides this way!” said the heir of Fitzhugh.

“Shall we go forth to meet him?”

“Not so!” exclaimed Hilyard, “we are still the leaders of this army; let

him find us deliberating on the siege of Olney!”

“Right!” said Coniers; “and if there come dispute, let not the rabble

hear it.”

The captains re-entered the tent, and in grave silence awaited the

earl’s coming; nor was this suspense long. Warwick, leaving the

multitude in the rear, and taking only one of the subaltern officers

in the rebel camp as his guide and usher, arrived at the tent, and was

admitted into the council.

The captains, Hilyard alone excepted, bowed with great reverence as the

earl entered.

“Welcome, puissant sir and illustrious kinsman!” said Coniers, who had

decided on the line to be adopted; “you are come at last to take the

command of the troops raised in your name, and into your hands I resign

this truncheon.”

“I accept it, Sir John Coniers,” answered Warwick, taking the place of

dignity; “and since you thus constitute me your commander, I proceed at

once to my stern duties. How happens it, knights and gentlemen, that in

my absence ye have dared to make my name the pretext of rebellion? Speak

thou, my sister’s son!”

“Cousin and lord,” said the heir of Fitzhugh, reddening but not abashed,

“we could not believe but what you would smile on those who have risen

to assert your wrongs and defend your life.” And he then briefly related

the tale of the Duchess of Bedford’s waxen effigies, and pointed to

Hilyard as the eye-witness.

“And,” began Sir Henry Nevile, “you, meanwhile, were banished,

seemingly, from the king’s court; the dissensions between you and Edward

sufficiently the land’s talk, the king’s vices the land’s shame!

“Nor did we act without at least revealing our intentions to my uncle

and your brother, the Lord Montagu,” added the heir of Fitzhugh.

“Meanwhile,” said Robin of Redesdale, “the commons were oppressed, the

people discontented, the Woodvilles plundering, and the king wasting

our substance on concubines and minions. We have had cause eno’ for our

rising!” The earl listened to each speaker in stern silence.

“For all this,” he said at last, “you have, without my leave or

sanction, levied armed men in my name, and would have made Richard

Nevile seem to Europe a traitor, without the courage to be a rebel! Your

lives are in my power, and those lives are forfeit to the laws.”

“If we have incurred your disfavour from our over-zeal for you,” said

the son of Lord Fitzhugh, touchingly, “take our lives, for they are of

little worth.” And the young nobleman unbuckled his sword, and laid it

on the table.

“But,” resumed Warwick, not seeming to heed his nephew’s humility,

“I, who have ever loved the people of England, and before king and

parliament have ever pleaded their cause,--I, as captain-general and

first officer of these realms, here declare, that whatever motives of

ambition or interest may have misled men of mark and birth, I believe

that the commons at least never rise in arms without some excuse for

their error. Speak out then, you, their leaders; and, putting aside all

that relates to me as the one man, say what are the grievances of which

the many would complain.”

And now there was silence, for the knights and gentlemen knew little

of the complaints of the populace; the Lollards did not dare to expose

their oppressed faith, and the squires and franklins were too uneducated

to detail the grievances they had felt. But then the immense superiority

of the man of the people at once asserted itself; and Hilyard, whose

eye the earl had hitherto shunned, lifted his deep voice. With clear

precision, in indignant but not declamatory eloquence, he painted the

disorders of the time,--the insolent exactions of the hospitals and

abbeys, the lawless violence of each petty baron, the weakness of the

royal authority in restraining oppression, its terrible power in aiding

the oppressor. He accumulated instance on instance of misrule; he showed

the insecurity of property, the adulteration of the coin, the burden

of the imposts; he spoke of wives and maidens violated, of industry

defrauded, of houses forcibly entered, of barns and granaries despoiled,

of the impunity of all offenders, if high-born, of the punishment of all

complaints, if poor and lowly. “Tell us not,” he said, “that this is

the necessary evil of the times, the hard condition of mankind. It was

otherwise, Lord Warwick, when Edward first swayed; for you then made

yourself dear to the people by your justice. Still men talk, hereabouts,

of the golden rule of Earl Warwick; but since you have been, though

great in office, powerless in deed, absent in Calais, or idle at

Middleham, England hath been but the plaything of the Woodvilles, and

the king’s ears have been stuffed with flattery as with wool. And,”

continued Hilyard, warming with his subject, and, to the surprise of the

Lollards, entering boldly on their master-grievance--“and this is not

all. When Edward ascended the throne, there was, if not justice, at

least repose, for the persecuted believers who hold that God’s word

was given to man to read, study, and digest into godly deeds. I speak

plainly. I speak of that faith which your great father Salisbury and

many of the House of York were believed to favour,--that faith which is

called the Lollard, and the oppression of which, more than aught else,

lost to Lancaster the hearts of England. But of late, the Church,

assuming the power it ever grasps the most under the most licentious

kings (for the sinner prince hath ever the tyrant priest!), hath put

in vigour old laws for the wronging man’s thought and conscience; [The

Lollards had greatly contributed to seat Edward on the throne; and much

of the subsequent discontent, no doubt, arose from their disappointment,

when, as Sharon Turner well expresses it, “his indolence allied him to

the Church,” and he became “hereticorum severissimus hostis.”--CROYL.,

p. 564.] and we sit at our doors under the shade, not of the vine-tree,

but the gibbet. For all these things we have drawn the sword; and if

now, you, taking advantage of the love borne to you by the sons of

England, push that sword back into the sheath, you, generous, great,

and princely though you be, well deserve the fate that I foresee and

can foretell. Yes!” cried the speaker, extending his arms, and gazing

fixedly on the proud face of the earl, which was not inexpressive of

emotion--“yes! I see you, having deserted the people, deserted by them

also in your need; I see you, the dupe of an ungrateful king, stripped

of power and honour, an exile and an outlaw; and when you call in vain

upon the people, in whose hearts you now reign, remember, O fallen star,

son of the morning! that in the hour of their might you struck down the

people’s right arm, and paralyzed their power. And now, if you will,

let your friends and England’s champions glut the scaffolds of your

woman-king!”

He ceased. A murmur went round the conclave; every breast breathed hard,

every eye turned to Warwick. That mighty statesman mastered the effect

which the thrilling voice of the popular pleader produced on him; but

at that moment he had need of all his frank and honourable loyalty to

remind him that he was there but to fulfil a promise and discharge a

trust,--that he was the king’s delegate, not the king’s judge.

“You have spoken, bold men,” said he, “as, in an hour when the rights of

princes are weighed in one scale, the subject’s sword in the other, I,

were I king, would wish free men to speak. And now you, Robert Hilyard,

and you, gentlemen, hear me, as envoy to King Edward IV. To all of you

I promise complete amnesty and entire pardon. His highness believes you

misled, not criminal, and your late deeds will not be remembered in your

future services. So much for the leaders. Now for the commons. My liege

the king is pleased to recall me to the high powers I once exercised,

and to increase rather than to lessen them. In his name, I pledge myself

to full and strict inquiry into all the grievances Robin of Redesdale

hath set forth, with a view to speedy and complete redress. Nor is this

all. His highness, laying aside his purpose of war with France, will

have less need of impost on his subjects, and the burdens and taxes will

be reduced. Lastly, his grace, ever anxious to content his people, hath

most benignly empowered me to promise that, whether or not ye rightly

judge the queen’s kindred, they will no longer have part or weight

in the king’s councils. The Duchess of Bedford, as beseems a lady so

sorrowfully widowed, will retire to her own home; and the Lord Scales

will fulfil a mission to the court of Spain. Thus, then, assenting

to all reasonable demands, promising to heal all true grievances,

proffering you gracious pardon, I discharge my duty to king and to

people. I pray that these unhappy sores may be healed evermore, under

the blessing of God and our patron saint; and in the name of Edward IV.,

Lord Suzerain of England and of France, I break up this truncheon and

disband this army!”

Among those present, this moderate and wise address produced a general

sensation of relief; for the earl’s disavowal of the revolt took away

all hope of its success. But the common approbation was not shared by

Hilyard. He sprang upon the table, and, seizing the broken fragments of

the truncheon, which the earl had snapped as a willow twig, exclaimed,

“And thus, in the name of the people, I seize the command that ye

unworthily resign! Oh, yes, what fools were yonder drudges of the hard

hand and the grimed brow and the leathern jerkin, to expect succour from

knight and noble!”

So saying, he bounded from the tent, and rushed towards the multitude at

the distance.

“Ye knights and lords, men of blood and birth, were but the tools of a

manlier and wiser Cade!” said Warwick, calmly. “Follow me.”

The earl strode from the tent, sprang upon his steed, and was in the

midst of the troops with his heralds by his side, ere Hilyard had

been enabled to begin the harangue he had intended. Warwick’s trumpets

sounded to silence; and the earl himself, in his loud clear voice,

briefly addressed the immense audience. Master, scarcely less than

Hilyard, of the popular kind of eloquence, which--short, plain,

generous, and simple--cuts its way at once through the feelings to the

policy, Warwick briefly but forcibly recapitulated to the commons the

promises he had made to the captains; and as soon as they heard of taxes

removed, the coinage reformed, the corn thrave abolished, the Woodvilles

dismissed, and the earl recalled to power, the rebellion was at an end.

They answered with a joyous shout his order to disperse and retire to

their homes forthwith. But the indomitable Hilyard, ascending a small

eminence, began his counter-agitation. The earl saw his robust form and

waving hand, he saw the crowd sway towards him; and too well acquainted

with mankind to suffer his address, he spurred to the spot, and turning

to Marmaduke, said, in a loud voice, “Marmaduke Nevile, arrest that man

in the king’s name!”

Marmaduke sprang from his steed, and laid his hand on Hilyard’s

shoulder. Not one of the multitude stirred on behalf of their demagogue.

As before the sun recede the stars, all lesser lights had died in

the blaze of Warwick’s beloved name. Hilyard griped his dagger, and

struggled an instant; but when he saw the awe and apathy of the armed

mob, a withering expression of disdain passed over his hardy face.

“Do ye suffer this?” he said. “Do ye suffer me, who have placed swords

in your hands, to go forth in bonds, and to the death?”

“The stout earl wrongs no man,” said a single voice, and the populace

echoed the word.

“Sir, then, I care not for life, since liberty is gone. I yield myself

your prisoner.”

“A horse for my captive!” said Warwick, laughing; “and hear me promise

you, that he shall go unscathed in goods and in limbs. God wot, when

Warwick and the people meet, no victim should be sacrificed! Hurrah for

King Edward and fair England!”

He waved his plumed cap as he spoke, and within the walls of Olney was

heard the shout that answered.

Slowly the earl and his scanty troop turned the rein; as he receded,

the multitude broke up rapidly, and when the moon rose, that camp was a

solitude. [The dispersion of the rebels at Olney is forcibly narrated by

a few sentences, graphic from their brief simplicity, in the “Pictorial

History of England,” Book V, p. 104. “They (Warwick, etc.) repaired in a

very friendly manner to Olney, where they found Edward in a most unhappy

condition; his friends were dead or scattered, flying for their lives,

or hiding themselves in remote places: the insurgents were almost

upon him. A word from Warwick sent the insurgents quietly back to the

North.”]

Such--for our nature is ever grander in the individual than the

mass--such is the power of man above mankind!

CHAPTER IV. THE NORMAN EARL AND THE SAXON DEMAGOGUE CONFER.

On leaving the camp, Warwick rode in advance of his train, and his

countenance was serious and full of thought. At length, as a turn in the

road hid the little band from the view of the rebels, the earl motioned

to Marmaduke to advance with his prisoner. The young Nevile then fell

back, and Robin and Warwick rode breast to breast out of hearing of the

rest.

“Master Hilyard, I am well content that my brother, when you fell into

his hands, spared your life out of gratitude for the favour you once

showed to mine.”

“Your noble brother, my lord,” answered Robin, dryly, “is, perhaps, not

aware of the service I once rendered you. Methinks he spared me rather,

because, without me, an enterprise which has shaken the Woodvilles from

their roots around the throne, and given back England to the Neviles,

had been nipped in the bud!--Your brother is a deep thinker!”

“I grieve to hear thee speak thus of the Lord Montagu. I know that he

hath wilier devices than become, in my eyes, a well-born knight and a

sincere man; but he loves his king, and his ends are juster than his

means. Master Hilyard, enough of the past evil. Some months after the

field of Hexham, I chanced to fall, when alone, amongst a band of roving

and fierce Lancastrian outlaws. Thou, their leader, recognizing the

crest on my helm, and mindful of some slight indulgence once shown to

thy strange notions of republican liberty, didst save me from the swords

of thy followers: from that time I have sought in vain to mend thy

fortunes. Thou hast rejected all mine offers, and I know well that thou

hast lent thy service to the fatal cause of Lancaster. Many a time

I might have given thee to the law; but gratitude for thy aid in the

needful strait, and to speak sooth, my disdain of all individual efforts

to restore a fallen House, made me turn my eyes from transgressions

which, once made known to the king, had placed thee beyond pardon. I

see now that thou art a man of head and arm to bring great danger upon

nations; and though this time Warwick bids thee escape and live, if once

more thou offend, know me only as the king’s minister. The debt between

us is now cancelled. Yonder lies the path that conducts to the forest.

Farewell. Yet stay!--poverty may have led thee into treason?”

“Poverty,” interrupted Hilyard,--“poverty, Lord Warwick, leads men to

sympathize with the poor, and therefore I have done with riches.” He

paused, and his breast heaved. “Yet,” he added sadly, “now that I have

seen the cowardice and ingratitude of men, my calling seems over, and my

spirit crushed.”

“Alas!” said Warwick, “whether man be rich or poor, ingratitude is the

vice of men; and you, who have felt it from the mob, menace me with it

from the king. But each must carve out his own way through this earth,

without over care for applause or blame; and the tomb is the sole judge

of mortal memory.”

Robin looked hard at the earl’s face, which was dark and gloomy, as he

thus spoke, and approaching nearer, he said, “Lord Warwick, I take

from you liberty and life the more willingly, because a voice I cannot

mistake tells me, and hath long told, that, sooner or later, time will

bind us to each other. Unlike other nobles, you have owed your power not

so much to lordship, land, and birth, and a king’s smile, as to the love

you have nobly won; you alone, true knight and princely Christian,--you

alone, in war, have spared the humble; you alone, stalwart and

resistless champion, have directed your lance against your equals, and

your order hath gone forth to the fierce of heart, ‘Never smite the

commons!’ In peace, you alone have stood up in your haughty parliament

for just law or for gentle mercy; your castle hath had a board for the

hungry and a shelter for the houseless; your pride, which hath bearded

kings and humbled upstarts, hath never had a taunt for the lowly; and

therefore I--son of the people--in the people’s name, bless you living,

and sigh to ask whether a people’s gratitude will mourn you dead!

Beware Edward’s false smile, beware Clarence’s fickle faith, beware

Gloucester’s inscrutable wile! Mark, the sun sets!--and while we speak,

yon dark cloud gathers over your plumed head.”

He pointed to the heavens as he ceased, and a low roll of gathering

thunder seemed to answer his ominous warning. Without tarrying for the

earl’s answer, Hilyard shook the reins of his steed, and disappeared in

the winding of the lane through which he took his way.

CHAPTER V. WHAT FAITH EDWARD IV. PURPOSETH TO KEEP WITH EARL AND PEOPLE.

Edward received his triumphant envoy with open arms and profuse

expressions of gratitude. He exerted himself to the utmost in the

banquet that crowned the day, not only to conciliate the illustrious new

comers, but to remove from the minds of Raoul de Fulke and his officers

all memory of their past disaffection. No gift is rarer or more

successful in the intrigues of life than that which Edward eminently

possessed,--namely, the hypocrisy of frankness. Dissimulation is often

humble, often polished, often grave, sleek, smooth, decorous; but it

is rarely gay and jovial, a hearty laughter, a merry, cordial, boon

companion. Such, however, was the felicitous craft of Edward IV.; and,

indeed, his spirits were naturally so high, his good humour so flowing,

that this joyous hypocrisy cost him no effort. Elated at the dispersion

of his foes, at the prospect of his return to his ordinary life of

pleasure, there was something so kindly and so winning in his mirth,

that he subjugated entirely the fiery temper of Raoul de Fulke and the

steadier suspicions of the more thoughtful St. John. Clarence, wholly

reconciled to Edward, gazed on him with eyes swimming with affection,

and soon drank himself into uproarious joviality. The archbishop, more

reserved, still animated the society by the dry and epigrammatic wit not

uncommon to his learned and subtle mind. But Warwick in vain endeavoured

to shake off an uneasy, ominous gloom. He was not satisfied with

Edward’s avoidance of discussion upon the grave matters involved in the

earl’s promise to the insurgents, and his masculine spirit regarded with

some disdain, and more suspicion, a levity that he considered ill-suited

to the emergence.

The banquet was over, and Edward, having dismissed his other attendants,

was in his chamber with Lord Hastings, whose office always admitted him

to the wardrobe of the king.

Edward’s smile had now left his lip; he paced the room with a hasty

stride, and then suddenly opening the casement, pointed to the landscape

without, which lay calm and suffused in moonlight.

“Hastings,” said he, abruptly, “a few hours since and the earth grew

spears! Behold the landscape now!”

“So vanish all the king’s enemies!”

“Ay, man, ay,--if at the king’s word, or before the king’s battle-axe;

but at a subject’s command--No, I am not a king while another scatters

armies in my realm at his bare will. ‘Fore Heaven, this shall not last!”

Hastings regarded the countenance of Edward, changed from affable beauty

into terrible fierceness, with reflections suggested by his profound and

mournful wisdom. “How little a man’s virtues profit him in the eyes of

men!” thought he. “The subject saves the crown, and the crown’s wearer

never pardons the presumption!”

“You do not speak, sir!” exclaimed Edward, irritated and impatient. “Why

gaze you thus on me?”

“Beau sire,” returned the favourite, calmly, “I was seeking to discover

if your pride spoke, or your nobler nature.”

“Tush!” said the king, petulantly, “the noblest part of a king’s nature

is his pride as king!” Again he strode the chamber, and again halted.

“But the earl hath fallen into his own snare,--he hath promised in my

name what I will not perform. Let the people learn that their idol hath

deceived them. He asks me to dismiss from the court the queen’s mother

and kindred!”

Hastings, who in this went thoroughly with the earl and the popular

feeling, and whose only enemies in England were the Woodvilles, replied

simply,--

“These are cheap terms, sire, for a king’s life and the crown of

England.”

Edward started, and his eyes flashed that cold, cruel fire, which makes

eyes of a light colouring so far more expressive of terrible passions

than the quicker and warmer heat of dark orbs. “Think you so, sir? By

God’s blood, he who proffered them shall repent it in every vein of his

body! Hark ye, William Hastings de Hastings, I know you to be a deep

and ambitious man; but better for you had you covered that learned

brain under the cowl of a mendicant friar than lent one thought to the

counsels of the Earl of Warwick.”

Hastings, who felt even to fondness the affection which Edward generally

inspired in those about his person, and who, far from sympathizing,

except in hate of the Woodvilles, with the earl, saw that beneath

that mighty tree no new plants could push into their fullest foliage,

reddened with anger at this imperious menace.

“My liege,” said he, with becoming dignity and spirit, “if you can thus

address your most tried confidant and your lealest friend, your most

dangerous enemy is yourself.”

“Stay, man,” said the king, softening. “I was over warm, but the wild

beast within me is chafed. Would Gloucester were here!”

“I can tell you what would be the counsels of that wise young prince,

for I know his mind,” answered Hastings.

“Ay, he and you love each other well. Speak out.”

“Prince Richard is a great reader of Italian lere. He saith that those

small States are treasuries of all experience. From that lere Prince

Richard would say to you, ‘Where a subject is so great as to be feared,

and too much beloved to be destroyed, the king must remember how Tarpeia

was crushed.”

“I remember naught of Tarpeia, and I detest parables.”

“Tarpeia, sire (it is a story of old Rome), was crushed under the

weight of presents. Oh, my liege,” continued Hastings, warming with that

interest which an able man feels in his own superior art, “were I king

for a year, by the end of it Warwick should be the most unpopular (and

therefore the weakest) lord in England!”

“And how, O wise in thine own conceit?”

“Beau sire,” resumed Hastings, not heeding the rebuke--and strangely

enough he proceeded to point out, as the means of destroying the earl’s

influence, the very method that the archbishop had detailed to Montagu

as that which would make the influence irresistible and permanent--“Beau

sire,” resumed Hastings, “Lord Warwick is beloved by the people, because

they consider him maltreated; he is esteemed by the people, because they

consider him above all bribe; he is venerated by the people, because

they believe that in all their complaints and struggles he is

independent (he alone) of the king. Instead of love, I would raise envy;

for instead of cold countenance I would heap him with grace. Instead of

esteem and veneration I would raise suspicion; for I would so knit him

to your House, that he could not stir hand or foot against you; I would

make his heirs your brothers. The Duke of Clarence hath married one

daughter,--wed the other to Lord Richard. Betroth your young princess to

Montagu’s son, the representative of all the Neviles. The earl’s immense

possessions must thus ultimately pass to your own kindred. The earl

himself will be no longer a power apart from the throne, but a part of

it. The barons will chafe against one who half ceases to be of their

order, and yet monopolizes their dignities; the people will no longer

see in the earl their champion, but a king’s favourite and deputy.

Neither barons nor people will flock to his banner.”

“All this is well and wise,” said Edward, musing; “but meanwhile my

queen’s blood? Am I to reign in a solitude?--for look you, Hastings,

you know well that, uxorious as fools have deemed me, I had purpose

and design in the elevation of new families; I wished to raise a fresh

nobility to counteract the pride of the old, and only upon new nobles

can a new dynasty rely.”

“My Lord, I will not anger you again; but still, for a while, the

queen’s relations will do well to retire.”

“Good night, Hastings,” interrupted Edward, abruptly, “my pillow in this

shall be my counsellor.”

Whatever the purpose solitude and reflection might ripen in the king’s

mind, he was saved from immediate decision by news, the next morning, of

fresh outbreaks. The commons had risen in Lincolnshire and the county

of Warwick; and Anthony Woodville wrote word that, if the king would

but show himself among the forces he had raised near Coventry, all

the gentry around would rise against the rebellious rabble. Seizing

advantage of these tidings, borne to him by his own couriers, and

eager to escape from the uncertain soldiery quartered at Olney, Edward,

without waiting to consult even with the earl, sprang to horse, and his

trumpets were the first signal of departure that he deigned to any one.

This want of ceremony displeased the pride of Warwick; but he made

no complaint, and took his place by the king’s side, when Edward said

shortly,--

“Dear cousin, this is a time that needs all our energies. I ride towards

Coventry, to give head and heart to the raw recruits I shall find there;

but I pray you and the archbishop to use all means, in this immediate

district, to raise fresh troops; for at your name armed men spring up

from pasture and glebe, dyke and hedge. Join what troops you can collect

in three days with mine at Coventry, and, ere the sickle is in the

harvest, England shall be at peace. God speed you! Ho! there, gentlemen,

away!--a franc etrier!”

Without pausing for reply,--for he wished to avoid all questioning,

lest Warwick might discover that it was to a Woodville that he was

bound,--the king put spurs to his horse, and, while his men were yet

hurrying to and fro, rode on almost alone, and was a good mile out

of the town before the force led by St. John and Raoul de Fulke, and

followed by Hastings, who held no command, overtook him.

“I misthink the king,” said Warwick, gloomily; “but my word is pledged

to the people, and it shall be kept.”

“A man’s word is best kept when his arm is the strongest,” said the

sententious archbishop; “yesterday, you dispersed an army; to-day, raise

one!”

Warwick answered not, but, after a moment’s thought, beckoned to

Marmaduke.

“Kinsman,” said he, “spur on, with ten of my little company, to join

the king. Report to me if any of the Woodvilles be in his camp near

Coventry.”

“Whither shall I send the report?”

“To my castle of Warwick.”

Marmaduke bowed his head, and, accustomed to the brevity of the earl’s

speech, proceeded to the task enjoined him. Warwick next summoned his

second squire.

“My lady and her children,” said he, “are on their way to Middleham.

This paper will instruct you of their progress. Join them with all the

rest of my troop, except my heralds and trumpeters; and say that I shall

meet them ere long at Middleham.”

“It is a strange way to raise an army,” said the archbishop, dryly, “to

begin by getting rid of all the force one possesses!”

“Brother,” answered the earl, “I would fain show my son-in-law, who may

be the father of a line of kings, that a general may be helpless at the

head of thousands, but that a man may stand alone who has the love of a

nation.”

“May Clarence profit by the lesson! Where is he all this while?”

“Abed,” said the stout earl, with a slight accent of disdain; and then,

in a softer voice, he added, “youth is ever luxurious. Better the slow

man than the false one.”

Leaving Warwick to discharge the duty enjoined him, we follow the

dissimulating king.

CHAPTER VI. WHAT BEFALLS KING EDWARD ON HIS ESCAPE FROM OLNEY.

As soon as Edward was out of sight of the spire of Olney, he slackened

his speed, and beckoned Hastings to his side.

“Dear Will,” said the king, “I have thought over thy counsel, and will

find the occasion to make experiment thereof. But, methinks, thou wilt

agree with me that concessions come best from a king who has an army of

his own. ‘Fore Heaven, in the camp of a Warwick I have less power than a

lieutenant! Now mark me. I go to head some recruits raised in haste near

Coventry. The scene of contest must be in the northern counties. Wilt

thou, for love of me, ride night and day, thorough brake, thorough

briar, to Gloucester on the Borders? Bid him march, if the Scot will let

him, back to York; and if he cannot himself quit the Borders, let

him send what men can be spared under thy banner. Failing this, raise

through Yorkshire all the men-at-arms thou canst collect. But, above

all, see Montagu. Him and his army secure at all hazards. If he demur,

tell him his son shall marry his king’s daughter, and wear the coronal

of a duke. Ha, ha! a large bait for so large a fish! I see this is no

casual outbreak, but a general convulsion of the realm; and the Earl

of Warwick must not be the only man to smile or to frown back the angry

elements.”

“In this, beau sire,” answered Hastings, “you speak as a king and

a warrior should, and I will do my best to assert your royal

motto,--‘Modus et ordo.’ If I can but promise that your Highness has for

a while dismissed the Woodville lords, rely upon it that ere two months

I will place under your truncheon an army worthy of the liege lord of

hardy England.”

“Go, dear Hastings, I trust all to thee!” answered the king. The

nobleman kissed his sovereign’s extended hand, closed his visor, and,

motioning to his body-squire to follow him, disappeared down a green

lane, avoiding such broader thoroughfares as might bring him in contact

with the officers left at Olney.

In a small village near Coventry Sir Anthony Woodville had collected

about two thousand men, chiefly composed of the tenants and vassals of

the new nobility, who regarded the brilliant Anthony as their head.

The leaders were gallant and ambitious gentlemen, as they who arrive at

fortunes above their birth mostly are; but their vassals were little

to be trusted. For in that day clanship was still strong, and these

followers had been bred in allegiance to Lancastrian lords, whose

confiscated estates were granted to the Yorkist favourites. The shout

that welcomed the arrival of the king was therefore feeble and lukewarm;

and, disconcerted by so chilling a reception, he dismounted, in less

elevated spirits than those in which he had left Olney, at the pavilion

of his brother-in-law.

The mourning-dress of Anthony, his countenance saddened by the barbarous

execution of his father and brother, did not tend to cheer the king.

But Woodville’s account of the queen’s grief and horror at the

afflictions of her House, and of Jacquetta’s indignation at the foul

language which the report of her practices put into the popular mouth,

served to endear to the king’s mind the family that he considered

unduly persecuted. Even in the coldest breasts affection is fanned by

opposition, and the more the queen’s kindred were assailed, the more

obstinately Edward clung to them. By suiting his humour, by winking at

his gallantries, by a submissive sweetness of temper, which soothed his

own hasty moods, and contrasted with the rough pride of Warwick and the

peevish fickleness of Clarence, Elizabeth had completely wound

herself into the king’s heart. And the charming graces, the elegant

accomplishments, of Anthony Woodville were too harmonious with the

character of Edward, who in all--except truth and honour--was the

perfect model of the gay gentilhomme of the time, not to have become

almost a necessary companionship. Indolent natures may be easily ruled,

but they grow stubborn when their comforts and habits are interfered

with. And the whole current of Edward’s merry, easy life seemed to him

to lose flow and sparkle if the faces he loved best were banished, or

even clouded.

He was yet conversing with Woodville, and yet assuring him that, however

he might temporize, he would never abandon the interests of his queen’s

kindred, when a gentleman entered aghast, to report that the Lords St.

John and de Fulke, on hearing that Sir Anthony Woodville was in command

of the forces, had, without even dismounting, left the camp, and carried

with them their retainers, amounting to more than half of the little

troop that rode from Olney.

“Let them go,” said Edward, frowning; “a day shall dawn upon their

headless trunks!”

“Oh, my king,” said Anthony, now Earl of Rivers,--who, by far the least

selfish of his House, was struck with remorse at the penalty Edward paid

for his love marriage,--“now that your Highness can relieve me of my

command, let me retire from the camp. I would fain go a pilgrim to the

shrine of Compostella to pray for my father’s sins and my sovereign’s

weal.”

“Let us first see what forces arrive from London,” answered the king.

“Richard ere long will be on the march from the frontiers, and whatever

Warwick resolves, Montagu, whose heart I hold in my hand, will bring his

army to my side. Let us wait.”

But the next day brought no reinforcements, nor the next; and the king

retired betimes to his tent, in much irritation and perplexity; when

at the dead of the night he was startled from slumber by the tramp of

horses, the sound of horns, the challenge of the sentinels, and, as he

sprang from his couch, and hurried on his armour in alarm, the Earl of

Warwick abruptly entered. The earl’s face was stern, but calm and

sad; and Edward’s brave heart beat loud as he gazed on his formidable

subject.

“King Edward,” said Warwick, slowly and mournfully, “you have deceived

me! I promised to the commons the banishment of the Woodvilles, and to a

Woodville you have flown.”

“Your promise was given to rebels, with whom no faith can be held; and I

passed from a den of mutiny to the camp of a loyal soldier.”

“We will not now waste words, king,” answered Warwick. “Please you to

mount and ride northward. The Scotch have gained great advantages on

the marches. The Duke of Gloucester is driven backwards. All the

Lancastrians in the North have risen. Margaret of Anjou is on the coast

of Normandy, [at this time Margaret was at Harfleur--Will. Wyre] ready

to set sail at the first decisive victory of her adherents.”

“I am with you,” answered Edward; “and I rejoice to think that at last

I may meet a foe. Hitherto it seems as if I had been chased by shadows.

Now may I hope to grasp the form and substance of danger and of battle.”

“A steed prepared for your Grace awaits you.”

“Whither ride we first?”

“To my castle of Warwick, hard by. At noon to-morrow all will be ready

for our northward march.”

Edward, by this time having armed himself, strode from the tent into the

open air. The scene was striking: the moon was extremely bright and the

sky serene, but around the tent stood a troop of torch-bearers, and the

red glare shone luridly upon the steel of the serried horsemen and the

banners of the earl, in which the grim white bear was wrought upon an

ebon ground, quartered with the dun bull, and crested in gold with the

eagle of the Monthermers. Far as the king’s eye could reach, he saw but

the spears of Warwick; while a confused hum in his own encampment told

that the troops Anthony Woodville had collected were not yet marshalled

into order. Edward drew back.

“And the Lord Anthony of Scales and Rivers?” said he, hesitatingly.

“Choose, king, between the Lord Anthony of Scales and Rivers and Richard

Nevile!” answered Warwick, in a stern whisper.

Edward paused, and at that moment Anthony himself emerged from his tent

(which adjoined the king’s) in company with the Archbishop of York, who

had rode thither in Warwick’s train.

“My liege,” said that gallant knight, putting his knee to the ground, “I

have heard from the archbishop the new perils that await your Highness,

and I grieve sorely that, in this strait, your councillors deem it meet

to forbid me the glory of fighting or falling by your side! I know too

well the unhappy odium attached to my House and name in the northern

parts, to dispute the policy which ordains my absence from your armies.

Till these feuds are over, I crave your royal leave to quit England, and

perform my pilgrimage to the sainted shrine of Compostella.”

A burning flush passed over the king’s face as he raised his

brother-in-law, and clasped him to his bosom.

“Go or stay, as you will, Anthony!” said he; “but let these proud men

know that neither time nor absence can tear you from your king’s heart.

But envy must have its hour Lord Warwick, I attend you; but it seems

rather as your prisoner than your liege.”

Warwick made no answer: the king mounted, and waved his hand to Anthony.

The torches tossed to and fro, the horns sounded, and in a silence moody

and resentful on either part Edward and his terrible subject rode on to

the towers of Warwick.

The next day the king beheld with astonishment the immense force that,

in a time so brief, the earl had collected round his standard.

From his casement, which commanded that lovely slope on which so many

a tourist now gazes with an eye that seeks to call back the stormy and

chivalric past, Edward beheld the earl on his renowned black charger,

reviewing the thousands that, file on file and rank on rank, lifted pike

and lance in the cloudless sun.

“After all,” muttered the king, “I can never make a new noble a great

baron! And if in peace a great baron overshadows the throne, in time

of war a great baron is a throne’s bulwark! Gramercy, I had been mad

to cast away such an army,--an army fit for a king to lead! They serve

Warwick now; but Warwick is less skilful in the martial art than I, and

soldiers, like hounds, love best the most dexterous huntsman!”

CHAPTER VII. HOW KING EDWARD ARRIVES AT THE CASTLE OF MIDDLEHAM.

On the ramparts of feudal Middleham, in the same place where Anne had

confessed to Isabel the romance of her childish love, again the sisters

stood, awaiting the coming of their father and the king. They had only,

with their mother, reached Middleham two days before, and the preceding

night an advanced guard had arrived at the castle to announce the

approach of the earl with his royal comrade and visitor. From the

heights, already they beheld the long array winding in glorious order

towards the mighty pile.

“Look!” exclaimed Isabel, “look! already methinks I see the white steed

of Clarence. Yes! it is he! it is my George, my husband! The banner

borne before shows his device.”

“Ah, happy Isabel!” said Anne, sighing; “what rapture to await the

coming of him one loves!”

“My sweet Anne,” returned Isabel, passing her arm tenderly round her

sister’s slender waist, “when thou hast conquered the vain folly of thy

childhood, thou wilt find a Clarence of thine own. And yet,” added the

young duchess, smiling, “it must be the opposite of a Clarence to be to

thy heart what a Clarence is to mine. I love George’s gay humour,--thou

lovest a melancholy brow. I love that charming weakness which supples to

my woman will,--thou lovest a proud nature that may command thine own.

I do not respect George less, because I know my mind stronger than his

own; but thou (like my gentle mother) wouldst have thy mate lord and

chief in all things, and live from his life as the shadow from the sun.

But where left you our mother?”

“In the oratory, at prayer.”

“She has been sad of late.”

“The dark times darken her; and she ever fears the king’s falseness or

caprice will stir the earl up to some rash emprise. My father’s letter,

brought last night to her, contains something that made her couch

sleepless.”

“Ha!” exclaimed the duchess, eagerly, “my mother confides in thee more

than me. Saw you the letter?”

“No.”

“Edward will make himself unfit to reign,” said Isabel, abruptly. “The

barons will call on him to resign; and then--and then, Anne--sister

Anne,--Warwick’s daughters cannot be born to be simple subjects!”

“Isabel, God temper your ambition! Oh, curb it, crush it down! Abuse

not your influence with Clarence. Let not the brother aspire to the

brother’s crown.”

“Sister, a king’s diadem covers all the sins schemed in the head that

wins it!”

As the duchess spoke, her eyes flashed and her form dilated. Her beauty

seemed almost terrible.

The gentle Anne gazed and shuddered; but ere she found words to rebuke,

the lovely shape of the countess-mother was seen moving slowly towards

them. She was dressed in her robes of state to receive her kingly guest;

the vest fitting high to the throat, where it joined the ermine tippet,

and thickly sown with jewels; the sleeves tight, with the second or over

sleeves, that, loose and large, hung pendent and sweeping even to the

ground; and the gown, velvet of cramousin, trimmed with ermine,--made a

costume not less graceful than magnificent, and which, where compressed,

set off the exquisite symmetry of a form still youthful, and where

flowing added majesty to a beauty naturally rather soft and feminine

than proud and stately. As she approached her children, she looked

rather like their sister than their mother, as if Time, at least, shrunk

from visiting harshly one for whom such sorrows were reserved.

The face of the countess was so sad in its aspect of calm and sweet

resignation that even the proud Isabel was touched; and kissing her

mother’s hand, she asked if any ill tidings preceded her father’s

coming.

“Alas, my Isabel, the times themselves are bad tidings! Your youth

scarcely remembers the days when brother fought against brother, and

the son’s sword rose against the father’s breast. But I, recalling them,

tremble to hear the faintest murmur that threatens a civil war.” She

paused, and forcing a smile to her lips, added, “Our woman fears must

not, however, sadden our lords with an unwelcome countenance; for men

returning to their hearths have a right to a wife’s smile; and so,

Isabel, thou and I, wives both, must forget the morrow in to-day. Hark!

the trumpets sound near and nearer! let us to the hall.”

Before, however, they had reached the castle, a shrill blast rang at the

outer gate. The portcullis was raised; the young Duke of Clarence, with

a bridegroom’s impatience, spurred alone through the gloomy arch, and

Isabel, catching sight of his countenance lifted towards the ramparts,

uttered a cry, and waved her hand. Clarence beard and saw, leaped from

his steed, and had clasped Isabel to his breast, almost before Anne or

the countess had recognized the new comer.

Isabel, however, always stately, recovered in an instant from the joy

she felt at her lord’s return, and gently escaping his embrace, she

glanced with a blush towards the battlements crowded with retainers;

Clarence caught and interpreted the look.

“Well, belle mere,” he said, turning to the countess, “and if yon

faithful followers do witness with what glee a fair bride inspires

a returning bridegroom, is there cause for shame in this cheek of

damascene?”

“Is the king still with my father?” asked Isabel, hastily, and

interrupting the countess’s reply.

“Surely, yes; and hard at hand. And pardon me that I forgot, dear lady,

to say that my royal brother has announced his intention of addressing

the principal officers of the army in Middleham Hall. This news gave me

fair excuse for hastening to you and Isabel.”

“All is prepared for his highness,” said the countess, “save our own

homage. We must quicken our steps; come, Anne.” The countess took the

arm of the younger sister, while the duchess made a sign to Clarence. He

lingered behind, and Isabel, drawing him aside, asked,

“Is my father reconciled to Edward?”

“No,--nor Edward to him.”

“Good! The king has no soldiers of his own amidst yon armed train?”

“Save a few of Anthony Woodville’s recruits, none. Raoul de Fulke and

St. John have retired to their towers in sullen dudgeon. But have you no

softer questions for my return, bella mia?”

“Pardon me, many--my king.”

“King!”

“What other name should the successor of Edward IV. bear?”

“Isabel,” said Clarence, in great emotion, “what is it you would tempt

me to? Edward IV. spares the life of Henry VI., and shall Edward IV.’s

brother conspire against his own?”

“Saints forefend!” exclaimed Isabel; “can you so wrong my honest

meaning? O George! can you conceive that your wife--Warwick’s

daughter--harbours the thought of murder? No! surely the career before

you seems plain and spotless! Can Edward reign? Deserted by the barons,

and wearing away even my father’s long-credulous love; odious! except

in luxurious and unwarlike London, to all the commons--how reign? What

other choice left? none,--save Henry of Lancaster or George of York.”

“Were it so!” said the weak duke; and yet be added falteringly, “believe

me, Warwick meditates no such changes in my favour.”

“Time is a rapid ripener,” answered Isabel; “but hark! they are lowering

the drawbridge for our guests.”

CHAPTER VIII. THE ANCIENTS RIGHTLY GAVE TO THE GODDESS OF ELOQUENCE A

CROWN.

The lady of Warwick stood at the threshold of the porch, which, in the

inner side of the broad quadrangle, admitted to the apartments used by

the family; and, heading the mighty train that, line after line, emerged

through the grim jaws of the arch, came the earl on his black destrier,

and the young king.

Even where she stood, the anxious chatelaine beheld the moody and gloomy

air with which Edward glanced around the strong walls of the fortress,

and up to the battlements that bristled with the pikes and sallets of

armed men, who looked on the pomp below, in the silence of military

discipline.

“Oh, Anne!” she whispered to her youngest daughter, who stood beside

her, “what are women worth in the strife of men? Would that our smiles

could heal the wounds which a taunt can make in a proud man’s heart!”

Anne, affected and interested by her mother’s words, and with a secret

curiosity to gaze upon the man who ruled on the throne of the prince

she loved, came nearer and more in front; and suddenly, as he turned his

head, the king’s regard rested upon her intent eyes and blooming face.

“Who is that fair donzell, cousin of Warwick?” he asked.

“My daughter, sire.”

“Ah, your youngest!--I have not seen her since she was a child.”

Edward reined in his charger, and the earl threw himself from his selle,

and held the king’s stirrup to dismount. But he did so with a haughty

and unsmiling visage. “I would be the first, sire,” said he, with a

slight emphasis, and as if excusing to himself his condescension, “to

welcome to Middleham the son of Duke Richard.”

“And your suzerain, my lord earl,” added Edward, with no less proud

a meaning, and leaning his hand lightly on Warwick’s shoulder, he

dismounted slowly. “Rise, lady,” he said, raising the countess, who

knelt at the porch, “and you too, fair demoiselle. Pardieu, we envy the

knee that hath knelt to you.” So saying, with royal graciousness, he

took the countess’s hand, and they entered the hall as the musicians, in

the gallery raised above, rolled forth their stormy welcome.

The archbishop, who had followed close to Warwick and the king,

whispered now to his brother,

“Why would Edward address the captains?”

“I know not.”

“He hath made himself familiar with many in the march.”

“Familiarity with a steel casque better becomes a king than waisall with

a greasy flat-cap.”

“You do not fear lest he seduce from the White Bear its retainers?”

“As well fear that he can call the stars from their courses around the

sun.”

While these words were interchanged, the countess conducted the king to

a throne-chair raised upon the dais, by the side of which were placed

two seats of state, and, from the dais, at the same time, advanced the

Duke and Duchess of Clarence. The king prevented their kneeling, and

kissed Isabel slightly and gravely on the forehead. “Thus, noble lady,

I greet the entrance of the Duchess of Clarence into the royalty of

England.”

Without pausing for reply, he passed on and seated himself on the

throne, while Isabel and her husband took possession of the state chairs

on either hand. At a gesture of the king’s the countess and Anne placed

themselves on seats less raised, but still upon the dais. But now

as Edward sat, the hall grew gradually full of lords and knights who

commanded in Warwick’s train, while the earl and the archbishop stood

mute in the centre, the one armed cap-a-pie, leaning on his sword, the

other with his arms folded in his long robes.

The king’s eye, clear, steady, and majestic, roved round that martial

audience, worthy to be a monarch’s war-council, and not one of whom

marched under a monarch’s banner! Their silence, their discipline, the

splendour of their arms, the greater splendour of their noble names,

contrasted painfully with the little mutinous camp of Olney, and the

surly, untried recruits of Anthony Woodville. But Edward, whose step,

whose form, whose aspect, proclaimed the man conscious of his rights to

be lord of all, betrayed not to those around him the kingly pride, the

lofty grief, that swelled within his heart. Still seated, he raised his

left hand to command silence; with the right he replaced his plumed cap

upon his brow.

“Lords and gentlemen,” he said (arrogating to himself at once, as a

thing of course, that gorgeous following), “we have craved leave of our

host to address to you some words,--words which it pleases a king to

utter, and which may not be harsh to the ears of a loyal subject. Nor

will we, at this great current of unsteady fortune, make excuse, noble

ladies, to you, that we speak of war to knighthood, which is ever the

sworn defender of the daughter and the wife,--the daughters and the wife

of our cousin Warwick have too much of hero-blood in their blue veins to

grow pale at the sight of heroes. Comrades in arms! thus far towards our

foe upon the frontier we have marched, without a sword drawn or an arrow

launched from an archer’s bow. We believe that a blessing settles on the

head of a true king, and that the trumpet of a good angel goes before

his path, announcing the victory which awaits him. Here, in the hall of

the Earl of Warwick, our captain-general, we thank you for your cheerful

countenance and your loyal service; and here, as befits a king, we

promise to you those honours a king alone worthily can bestow.” He

paused, and his keen eye glanced from chief to chief as he resumed: “We

are informed that certain misguided and traitor lords have joined

the Rose of Lancaster. Whoever so doth is attainted, life and line,

evermore! His lands and dignities are forfeit to enrich and to ennoble

the men who strike for me. Heaven grant I may have foes eno’ to reward

all my friends! To every baron who owns Edward IV. king (ay, and not

king in name, king in banquet and in bower, but leader and captain in

the war), I trust to give a new barony, to every knight a new knight’s

fee, to every yeoman a hyde of land, to every soldier a year’s pay. What

more I can do, let it be free for any one to suggest,--for my domains of

York are broad, and my heart is larger still!”

A murmur of applause and reverence went round. Vowed, as those warriors

were, to the earl, they felt that A MONARCH was amongst them.

“What say you, then? We are ripe for glory. Three days will we halt at

Middleham, guest to our noble subject.”

“Three days, sire!” repeated Warwick, in a voice of surprise.

“Yes; and this, fair cousin, and ye, lords and gentlemen, is my reason

for the delay. I have despatched Sir William, Lord de Hastings, to

the Duke of Gloucester, with command to join us here (the archbishop

started, but instantly resumed his earnest, placid aspect); to the Lord

Montagu, Earl of Northumberland, to muster all the vassals of our shire

of York. As three streams that dash into the ocean, shall our triple

army meet and rush to the war. Not even, gentlemen, not even to the

great Earl of Warwick will Edward IV. be so beholden for roiaulme and

renown, as to march but a companion to the conquest. If ye were raised

in Warwick’s name, not mine,--why, be it so! I envy him such friends;

but I will have an army of mine own, to show mine English soldiery how

a Plantagenet battles for his crown. Gentlemen, ye are dismissed to your

repose. In three days we march! and if any of you know in these fair

realms the man, be he of York or of Lancaster, more fit to command brave

subjects than he who now addresses you, I say to that man, turn rein,

and leave us! Let tyrants and cowards enforce reluctant service,--my

crown was won by the hearts of my people! Girded by those hearts, let me

reign, or, mourned by them, let me fall! So God and Saint George favour

me as I speak the truth!”

And as the king ceased, he uncovered his head, and kissed the cross

of his sword. A thrill went through the audience. Many were there,

disaffected to his person, and whom Warwick’s influence alone could have

roused to arms; but at the close of an address spirited and loyal in

itself, and borrowing thousand-fold effect by the voice and mien of the

speaker, no feeling but that of enthusiastic loyalty, of almost tearful

admiration, was left in those steel-clad breasts.

As the king lifted on high the cross of his sword, every blade leaped

from its scabbard, and glittered in the air; and the dusty banners in

the hall waved, as to a mighty blast, when, amidst the rattle of armour,

burst forth the universal cry, “Long live Edward IV.! Long live the

king!”

The sweet countess, even amidst the excitement, kept her eyes anxiously

fixed on Warwick, whose countenance, however shaded by the black plumes

of his casque, though the visor was raised, revealed nothing of

his mind. Her daughters were more powerfully affected; for Isabel’s

intellect was not so blinded by her ambition but that the kingliness

of Edward forced itself upon her with a might and solemn weight, which

crushed, for the moment, her aspiring hopes.

Was this the man unfit to reign? This the man voluntarily to resign a

crown? This the man whom George of Clarence, without fratricide, could

succeed? No!--there spoke the soul of the First and the Third Edward!

There shook the mane and there glowed the eye of the indomitable lion

of the august Plantagenets! And the same conviction, rousing softer and

holier sorrow, sat on the heart of Anne; she saw, as for the first time,

clearly before her the awful foe with whom her ill-omened and beloved

prince had to struggle for his throne. In contrast beside that form,

in the prime of manly youth--a giant in its strength, a god in its

beauty--rose the delicate shape of the melancholy boy who, afar in

exile, coupled in his dreams, the sceptre and the bride! By one of those

mysteries which magnetism seeks to explain, in the strong intensity of

her emotions, in the tremor of her shaken nerves, fear seemed to grow

prophetic. A stream as of blood rose up from the dizzy floors. The image

of her young prince, bound and friendless, stood before the throne of

that warrior-king. In the waving glitter of the countless swords raised

on high, she saw the murderous blade against the boy-heir of Lancaster

descend--descend! Her passion, her terror, at the spectre which fancy

thus evoked, seized and overcame her; and ere the last hurrah sent its

hollow echo to the raftered roof, she sank from her chair to the ground,

hueless and insensible as the dead.

The king had not without design permitted the unwonted presence of the

women in this warlike audience,--partly because he was not unaware

of the ambitious spirit of Isabel, partly because he counted on the

affection shown to his boyhood by the countess, who was said to have

singular influence over her lord, but principally because in such a

presence he trusted to avoid all discussion and all questioning, and

to leave the effect of his eloquence, in which he excelled all his

contemporaries, Gloucester alone excepted, single and unimpaired; and

therefore, as he rose, and returned with a majestic bend the acclamation

of the warriors, his eye now turned towards the chairs where the ladies

sat, and he was the first to perceive the swoon of the fair Anne.

With the tender grace that always characterized his service to women, he

descended promptly from his throne, and raised the lifeless form in his

stalwart arms; and Anne, as he bent over her, looked so strangely lovely

in her marble stillness, that even in that hour a sudden thrill shot

through a heart always susceptible to beauty as the harp-string to the

breeze.

“It is but the heat, lady,” said he, to the alarmed countess, “and let

me hope that interest which my fair kinswoman may take in the fortunes

of Warwick and of York, hitherto linked together--”

“May they ever be so!” said Warwick, who, on seeing his daughter’s

state, had advanced hastily to the dais; and, moved by the king’s words,

his late speech, the evils that surrounded his throne, the gentleness

shown to the beloved Anne, forgetting resentment and ceremony alike, he

held out his mailed hand. The king, as he resigned Anne to her mother’s

arms, grasped with soldierly frankness, and with the ready wit of the

cold intellect which reigned beneath the warm manner, the hand thus

extended, and holding still that iron gauntlet in his own ungloved and

jewelled fingers, he advanced to the verge of the dais, to which, in

the confusion occasioned by Anne’s swoon, the principal officers had

crowded, and cried aloud,--

“Behold! Warwick and Edward thus hand in hand, as they stood when the

clarions sounded the charge at Towton! and that link what swords forged

on a mortal’s anvil can rend or sever?”

In an instant every knee there knelt; and Edward exultingly beheld that

what before had been allegiance to the earl was now only homage to the

king.

CHAPTER IX. WEDDED CONFIDENCE AND LOVE--THE EARL AND THE PRELATE--THE

PRELATE AND THE KING--SCHEMES--WILES--AND THE BIRTH OF A DARK THOUGHT

DESTINED TO ECLIPSE A SUN.

While, preparatory to the banquet, Edward, as was then the daily classic

custom, relaxed his fatigues, mental or bodily, in the hospitable bath,

the archbishop sought the closet of the earl.

“Brother,” said he, throwing himself with some petulance into the only

chair the room, otherwise splendid, contained, “when you left me to

seek Edward in the camp of Anthony Woodville, what was the understanding

between us?”

“I know of none,” answered the earl, who having doffed his armour, and

dismissed his squires, leaned thoughtfully against the wall, dressed

for the banquet, with the exception of the short surcoat, which lay

glittering on the tabouret.

“You know of none? Reflect! Have you brought hither Edward as a guest or

as a prisoner?”

The earl knit his brows--“A prisoner, archbishop?”

The prelate regarded him with a cold smile.

“Warwick, you, who would deceive no other man, now seek to deceive

yourself.” The earl drew back, and his hardy countenance grew a shade

paler. The prelate resumed: “You have carried Edward from his camp, and

severed him from his troops; you have placed him in the midst of your

own followers; you have led him, chafing and resentful all the way, to

this impregnable keep; and you now pause, amazed by the grandeur of

your captive,--a man who leads to his home a tiger, a spider who has

entangled a hornet in its web!”

“Nay, reverend brother,” said the earl, calmly, “ye churchmen never know

what passes in the hearts of those who feel and do not scheme. When I

learned that the king had fled to the Woodvilles, that he was bent upon

violating the pledge given in his name to the insurgent commons, I vowed

that he should redeem my honour and his own, or that forever I would

quit his service. And here, within these walls which sheltered his

childhood, I trusted, and trust still, to make one last appeal to his

better reason.”

“For all that, men now, and history hereafter, will consider Edward as

your captive.”

“To living men my words and deeds can clear themselves; and as for

history, let clerks and scholars fool themselves in the lies of

parchment! He who has acted history, despises the gownsmen who sit in

cloistered ease, and write about what they know not.” The earl paused,

and then continued: “I confess, however, that I have had a scheme.

I have wished to convince the king how little his mushroom lords can

bestead him in the storm; and that he holds his crown only from his

barons and his people.”

“That is, from the Lord Warwick!”

“Perhaps I am the personation of both seignorie and people; but I design

this solely for his welfare. Ah, the gallant prince--how well he bore

himself to-day!”

“Ay, when stealing all hearts from thee to him.”

“And, Vive Dieu, I never loved him so well as when he did! Methinks it

was for a day like this that I reared his youth and achieved his crown.

Oh, priest, priest, thou mistakest me. I am rash, hot, haughty, hasty;

and I love not to bow my knees to a man because they call him king, if

his life be vicious and his word be false. But could Edward be ever as

to-day, then indeed should I hail a sovereign whom a baron may reverence

and a soldier serve!”

Before the archbishop could reply, the door gently opened, and the

countess appeared. Warwick seemed glad of the interruption; he turned

quickly--“And how fares my child?”

“Recovered from her strange swoon, and ready to smile at thy return. Oh,

Warwick, thou art reconciled to the king?”

“That glads thee, sister?” said the archbishop.

“Surely. Is it not for my lord’s honour?”

“May he find it so!” said the prelate, and he left the room.

“My priest-brother is chafed,” said the earl, smiling. “Pity he was not

born a trader, he would have made a shrewd hard bargain. Verily, our

priests burn the Jews out of envy! Ah, m’amie, how fair thou art to-day!

Methinks even Isabel’s cheek less blooming.” And the warrior drew the

lady towards him, and smoothed her hair, and tenderly kissed her brow.

“My letter vexed thee, I know, for thou lovest Edward, and blamest me

not for my love to him. It is true that he hath paltered with me, and

that I had stern resolves, not against his crown, but to leave him to

his fate, and in these halls to resign my charge. But while he spoke,

and while he looked, methought I saw his mother’s face, and heard his

dear father’s tone, and the past rushed over me, and all wrath was gone.

Sonless myself, why would he not be my son?” The earl’s voice trembled,

and the tears stood in his dark eyes.

“Speak thus, dear lord, to Isabel, for I fear her overvaulting spirit--”

“Ah, had Isabel been his wife!” he paused and moved away. Then, as

if impatient to escape the thoughts that tended to an ungracious

recollection, he added, “And now, sweetheart, these slight fingers have

ofttimes buckled on my mail; let them place on my breast this badge of

St. George’s chivalry; and, if angry thoughts return, it shall remind me

that the day on which I wore it first, Richard of York said to his young

Edward, ‘Look to that star, boy, if ever, in cloud and trouble, thou

wouldst learn what safety dwells in the heart which never knew deceit.’”

During the banquet, the king, at whose table sat only the Duke of

Clarence and the earl’s family, was gracious as day to all, but

especially to the Lady Anne, attributing her sudden illness to some

cause not unflattering to himself; her beauty, which somewhat resembled

that of the queen, save that it had more advantage of expression and

of youth, was precisely of the character he most admired. Even her

timidity, and the reserve with which she answered him, had their charms;

for, like many men, themselves of imperious nature and fiery will,

he preferred even imbecility in a woman to whatever was energetic or

determined; and hence perhaps his indifference to the more dazzling

beauty of Isabel. After the feast, the numerous demoiselles, high-born

and fair, who swelled the more than regal train of the countess, were

assembled in the long gallery, which was placed in the third story

of the castle and served for the principal state apartment. The dance

began; but Isabel excused herself from the pavon, and the king led

out the reluctant and melancholy Anne. The proud Isabel, who had

never forgiven Edward’s slight to herself, resented deeply his evident

admiration of her sister, and conversed apart with the archbishop, whose

subtle craft easily drew from her lips confessions of an ambition higher

even than his own. He neither encouraged nor dissuaded; he thought

there were things more impossible than the accession of Clarence to the

throne, but he was one who never plotted,--save for himself and for the

Church.

As the revel waned, the prelate approached the earl, who, with that

remarkable courtesy which charmed those below his rank and contrasted

with his haughtiness to his peers, had well played amongst his knights

the part of host, and said, in a whisper, “Edward is in a happy

mood--let us lose it not. Will you trust me to settle all differences

ere he sleep? Two proud men never can agree without a third of a gentler

temper.”

“You are right,” said Warwick, smiling; “yet the danger is that I should

rather concede too much than be too stubborn. But look you, all I demand

is satisfaction to mine own honour and faith to the army I disbanded in

the king’s name.”

“All!” muttered the archbishop, as he turned away, “but that call is

everything to provoke quarrel for you, and nothing to bring power to

me!”

The earl and the archbishop attended the king to his chamber, and after

Edward was served with the parting refection, or livery, the earl said,

with his most open smile, “Sire, there are yet affairs between us; whom

will you confer with,--me or the archbishop?”

“Oh, the archbishop, by all means, fair cousin,” cried Edward, no less

frankly; “for if you and I are left alone, the Saints help both of

us!--when flint and steel meet, fire flies, and the house may burn.”

The earl half smiled at the candour, half sighed at the levity, of the

royal answer, and silently left the room. The king, drawing round him

his loose dressing-robe, threw himself upon the gorgeous coverlid of the

bed, and lying at lazy length, motioned to the prelate to seat himself

at the foot. The archbishop obeyed. Edward raised himself on his elbow,

and, by the light of seven gigantic tapers, set in sconces of massive

silver, the priest and the king gravely gazed on each other without

speaking.

At last Edward, bursting into his hale, clear, silvery laugh, said,

“Confess, dear sir and cousin,--confess that we are like two skilful

masters of Italian fence, each fearing to lay himself open by commencing

the attack.”

“Certes,” quoth the archbishop, “your Grace over-estimates my vanity, in

opining that I deemed myself equal to so grand a duello. If there were

dispute between us, I should only win by baring my bosom.”

The king’s bow-like lip curved with a slight sneer, quickly replaced by

a serious and earnest expression. “Let us leave word-making, and to

the point, George. Warwick is displeased because I will not abandon my

wife’s kindred; you, with more reason, because I have taken from your

hands the chancellor’s great seal--”

“For myself, I humbly answer that your Grace errs. I never coveted other

honours than those of the Church.”

“Ay,” said Edward, keenly examining the young prelate’s smooth face, “is

it so? Yes, now I begin to comprehend thee. What offence have I given

to the Church? Have I suffered the law too much to sleep against the

Lollards. If so, blame Warwick.”

“On the contrary, sire, unlike other priests, I have ever deemed that

persecution heals no schism. Blow not dying embers. Rather do I think

of late that too much severity hath helped to aid, by Lollard bows and

pikes, the late rising. My lady, the queen’s mother, unjustly accused of

witchcraft, hath sought to clear herself, and perhaps too zealously, in

exciting your Grace against that invisible giant yclept heresy.”

“Pass on,” said Edward. “It is not then indifference to the ecclesia

that you complain of. Is it neglect of the ecclesiastic? Ha, ha! you

and I, though young, know the colours that make up the patchwork world.

Archbishop, I love an easy life; if your brother and his friends will

but give me that, let them take all else. Again, I say, to the point,--I

cannot banish my lady’s kindred, but I will bind your House still more

to mine. I have a daughter, failing male issue, the heiress to my crown.

I will betroth her to your nephew, my beloved Montagu’s son. They are

children yet, but their ages not unsuited. And when I return to London,

young Nevile shall be Duke of Bedford, a title hitherto reserved to the

royal race. [And indeed there was but one Yorkist duke then in England

out of the royal family,--namely, the young boy Buckingham, who

afterwards vainly sought to bend the Ulysses bow of Warwick against

Richard III.] Let that be a pledge of peace between the queen’s mother,

bearing the same honours, and the House of Nevile, to which they pass.”

The cheek of the archbishop flushed with proud pleasure; he bowed his

head, and Edward, ere he could answer, went on: “Warwick is already

so high that, pardie, I have no other step to give him, save my throne

itself, and, God’s truth, I would rather be Lord Warwick than King

of England! But for you--listen--our only English cardinal is old and

sickly; whenever he pass to Abraham’s bosom, who but you should have

the suffrage of the holy college? Thou knowest that I am somewhat in

the good favour of the sovereign pontiff. Command me to the utmost.

Now, George, are we friends?” The archbishop kissed the gracious hand

extended to him, and, surprised to find, as by magic, all his schemes

frustrated by sudden acquiescence in the objects of them all, his

voice faltered with real emotion as he gave vent to his gratitude.

But abruptly he checked himself, his brow lowered, and with a bitter

remembrance of his brother’s plain, blunt sense of honour, he said,

“Yet, alas! my liege, in all this there is nought to satisfy our

stubborn host.”

“By dear Saint George and my father’s head!” exclaimed Edward,

reddening, and starting to his feet, “what would the man have?”

“You know,” answered the archbishop, “that Warwick’s pride is only

roused when he deems his honour harmed. Unhappily, as he thinks, by your

Grace’s full consent, he pledged himself to the insurgents of Olney to

the honourable dismissal of the lords of the Woodville race. And unless

this be conceded, I fear me that all else he will reject, and the love

between ye can be but hollow!”

Edward took but three strides across the chamber, and then halted

opposite the archbishop, and lay both hands on his shoulders, as,

looking him full in the face, he said, “Answer me frankly, am I a

prisoner in these towers or not?”

“Not, sire.”

“You palter with me, priest. I have been led hither against my will.

I am almost without an armed retinue. I am at the earl’s mercy. This

chamber might be my grave, and this couch my bed of death.”

“Holy Mother! Can you think so of Warwick? Sire, you freeze my blood.”

“Well, then, if I refuse to satisfy Warwick’s pride, and disdain to give

up loyal servants to rebel insolence, what will Warwick do? Speak out,

archbishop.”

“I fear me, sire, that he will resign all office, whether of peace or

war. I fear me that the goodly army now at sleep within and around these

walls will vanish into air, and that your Highness will stand alone

amidst new men, and against the disaffection of the whole land!”

Edward’s firm hand trembled. The prelate continued, with a dry, caustic

smile,--

“Sire, Sir Anthony Woodville, now Lord Rivers, has relieved you of

all embarrassment; no doubt, my Lord Dorset and his kinsmen will be

chevaliers enough to do the same. The Duchess of Bedford will but

suit the decorous usage to retire a while into privacy, to mourn her

widowhood. And when a year is told, if these noble persons reappear at

court, your word and the earl’s will at least have been kept.”

“I understand thee,” said the king, half laughing; “but I have my pride

as well as Warwick. To concede this point is to humble the conceder.”

“I have thought how to soothe all things, and without humbling either

party. Your Grace’s mother is dearly beloved by Warwick and revered by

all. Since your marriage she hath lived secluded from all state affairs.

As so nearly akin to Warwick, so deeply interested in your Grace, she is

a fitting mediator in all disputes. Be they left to her to arbitrate.”

“Ah, cunning prelate, thou knowest how my proud mother hates the

Woodvilles; thou knowest how her judgment will decide.”

“Perhaps so; but at least your Grace will be spared all pain and all

abasement.”

“Will Warwick consent to this?”

“I trust so.”

“Learn, and report to me. Enough for to-night’s conference.” Edward was

left alone, and his mind ran rapidly over the field of action open to

him.

“I have half won the earl’s army,” he thought; “but it would be to

lose all hold in their hearts again, if they knew that these unhappy

Woodvilles were the cause of a second breach between us. Certes, the

Lancastrians are making strong head! Certes, the times must be played

with and appeased! And yet these poor gentlemen love me after my own

fashion, and not with the bear’s hug of that intolerable earl. How came

the grim man by so fair a daughter? Sweet Anne! I caught her eye often

fixed on me, and with a soft fear which my heart beat loud to read

aright. Verily, this is the fourth week I have passed without hearing

a woman’s sigh! What marvel that so fair a face enamours me! Would

that Warwick made her his ambassador; and yet it were all over with

the Woodvilles if he did! These men know not how to manage me, and

well-a-day, that task is easy eno’ to women!” He laughed gayly to

himself as he thus concluded his soliloquy, and extinguished the tapers.

But rest did not come to his pillow; and after tossing to and fro for

some time in vain search for sleep, he rose and opened his casement to

cool the air which the tapers had overheated. In a single casement, in a

broad turret, projecting from an angle in the building, below the tower

in which his chamber was placed, the king saw a solitary light

burning steadily. A sight so unusual at such an hour surprised him.

“Peradventure, the wily prelate,” thought he. “Cunning never sleeps.”

But a second look showed him the very form that chased his slumbers.

Beside the casement, which was partially open, he saw the soft profile

of the Lady Anne; it was bent downwards; and what with the clear

moonlight, and the lamp within her chamber, he could see distinctly that

she was weeping. “Ah, Anne,” muttered the amorous king, “would that I

were by to kiss away those tears!” While yet the unholy wish murmured on

his lips, the lady rose. The fair hand, that seemed almost transparent

in the moonlight, closed the casement; and though the light lingered for

some minutes ere it left the dark walls of the castle without other sign

of life than the step of the sentry, Anne was visible no more.

“Madness! madness! madness!” again murmured the king. “These Neviles are

fatal to me in all ways,--in hatred or in love!”

BOOK VIII. IN WHICH THE LAST LINK BETWEEN KING-MAKER AND KING SNAPS

ASUNDER.

CHAPTER I. THE LADY ANNE VISITS THE COURT.

It was some weeks after the date of the events last recorded. The storm

that hung over the destinies of King Edward was dispersed for the hour,

though the scattered clouds still darkened the horizon: the Earl of

Warwick had defeated the Lancastrians on the frontier, [Croyl. 552] and

their leader had perished on the scaffold; but Edward’s mighty sword had

not shone in the battle. Chained by an attraction yet more powerful than

slaughter, he had lingered at Middleham, while Warwick led his army to

York; and when the earl arrived at the capital of Edward’s ancestral

duchy, he found that the able and active Hastings--having heard, even

before he reached the Duke of Gloucester’s camp, of Edward’s apparent

seizure by the earl and the march to Middleham--had deemed it best

to halt at York, and to summon in all haste a council of such of the

knights and barons as either love to the king or envy to Warwick could

collect. The report was general that Edward was retained against his

will at Middleham; and this rumour Hastings gravely demanded Warwick,

on the arrival of the latter at York, to disprove. The earl, to clear

himself from a suspicion that impeded all his military movements,

despatched Lord Montagu to Middleham, who returned not only with the

king, but the countess and her daughters, whom Edward, under pretence

of proving the complete amity that existed between Warwick and himself,

carried in his train. The king’s appearance at York reconciled all

differences; but he suffered Warwick to march alone against the enemy,

and not till after the decisive victory, which left his reign for a

while without an open foe, did he return to London.

Thither the earl, by the advice of his friends, also repaired, and in

a council of peers, summoned for the purpose, deigned to refute the

rumours still commonly circulated by his foes, and not disbelieved

by the vulgar, whether of his connivance at the popular rising or his

forcible detention of the king at Middleham. To this, agreeably to the

counsel of the archbishop, succeeded a solemn interview of the heads of

the Houses of York and Warwick, in which the once fair Rose of Raby (the

king’s mother) acted as mediator and arbiter. The earl’s word to

the commons at Olney was ratified. Edward consented to the temporary

retirement of the Woodvilles, though the gallant Anthony yet delayed his

pilgrimage to Compostella. The vanity of Clarence was contented by the

government of Ireland, but, under various pretences, Edward deferred

his brother’s departure to that important post. A general amnesty was

proclaimed, a parliament summoned for the redress of popular grievances,

and the betrothal of the king’s daughter to Montagu’s heir was

proclaimed: the latter received the title of Duke of Bedford; and the

whole land rejoiced in the recovered peace of the realm, the retirement

of the Woodvilles, and the reconciliation of the young king with his

all-beloved subject. Never had the power of the Neviles seemed so

secure; never did the throne of Edward appear so stable.

It was at this time that the king prevailed upon the earl and his

countess to permit the Lady Anne to accompany the Duchess of Clarence

in a visit to the palace of the Tower. The queen had submitted so

graciously to the humiliation of her family, that even the haughty

Warwick was touched and softened; and the visit of his daughter at such

a time became a homage to Elizabeth which it suited his chivalry to

render.

The public saw in this visit, which was made with great state and

ceremony, the probability of a new and popular alliance. The archbishop

had suffered the rumour of Gloucester’s attachment to the Lady Anne to

get abroad, and the young prince’s return from the North was anxiously

expected by the gossips of the day.

It was on this occasion that Warwick showed his gratitude for Marmaduke

Nevile’s devotion. “My dear and gallant kinsman,” he said, “I forget not

that when thou didst leave the king and the court for the discredited

minister and his gloomy hall,--I forget not that thou didst tell me

of love to some fair maiden, which had not prospered according to thy

merits. At least it shall not be from lack of lands, or of the gold

spur, which allows the wearer to ride by the side of king or kaisar,

that thou canst not choose thy bride as the heart bids thee. I pray

thee, sweet cousin, to attend my child Anne to the court, where the king

will show thee no ungracious countenance; but it is just to recompense

thee for the loss of thy post in his highness’s chamber. I hold the

king’s commission to make knights of such as can pay the fee, and

thy lands shall suffice for the dignity. Kneel down and rise up, Sir

Marmaduke Nevile, lord of the Manor of Borrodaile, with its woodlands

and its farms, and may God and our Lady render thee puissant in battle

and prosperous in love!”

Accordingly, in his new rank, and entitled to ruffle it with the

bravest, Sir Marmaduke Nevile accompanied the earl and the Lady Anne to

the palace of the Tower.

As Warwick, leaving his daughter amidst the brilliant circle that

surrounded Elizabeth, turned to address the king, he said, with simple

and unaffected nobleness,--

“Ah, my liege, if you needed a hostage of my faith, think that my heart

is here, for verily its best blood were less dear to me than that slight

girl,--the likeness of her mother, when her lips first felt the touch of

mine!”

Edward’s bold brow fell, and he blushed as he answered, “My Elizabeth

will hold her as a sister. But, cousin, part you not now for the North?”

“By your leave I go first to Warwick.”

“Ah, you do not wish to approve of my seeming preparations against

France?”

“Nay, your Highness is not in earnest. I promised the commons that you

would need no supplies for so thriftless a war.”

“Thou knowest I mean to fulfil all thy pledges. But the country so

swarms with disbanded soldiers, that it is politic to hold out to them a

hope of service, and so let the clouds gradually pass away.”

“Alack, my liege,” said Warwick, gravely, “I suppose that a crown

teaches the brow to scheme; but hearty peace or open war seems ever the

best to me.”

Edward smiled, and turned aside. Warwick glanced at his daughter, whom

Elizabeth flatteringly caressed, stifled a sigh, and the air seemed

lighter to the insects of the court as his proud crest bowed beneath the

doorway, and, with the pomp of his long retinue, he vanished from the

scene.

“And choose, fair Anne,” said the queen, “choose from my ladies whom

you will have for your special train. We would not that your attendance

should be less than royal.”

The gentle Anne in vain sought to excuse herself from an honour at once

arrogant and invidious, though too innocent to perceive the cunning

so characteristic of the queen; for, under the guise of a special

compliment, Anne had received the royal request to have her female

attendants chosen from the court, and Elizabeth now desired to

force upon her a selection which could not fail to mortify those not

preferred. But glancing timidly round the circle, the noble damsel’s eye

rested on one fair face, and in that face there was so much that awoke

her own interest, and stirred up a fond and sad remembrance, that she

passed involuntarily to the stranger’s side, and artlessly took her

hand. The high-born maidens, grouped around, glanced at each other with

a sneer, and slunk back. Even the queen looked surprised; but recovering

herself, inclined her head graciously, and said, “Do we read your

meaning aright, Lady Anne, and would you this gentlewoman, Mistress

Sibyll Warner, as one of your chamber?”

“Sibyll, ah, I knew that my memory failed me not,” murmured Anne; and,

after bowing assent to the queen, she said, “Do you not also recall,

fair demoiselle, our meeting, when children long years ago?”

“Well, noble dame,” [The title of dame was at that time applied

indiscriminately to ladies whether married or single, if of high birth.]

answered Sibyll. And as Anne turned, with her air of modest gentleness,

yet of lofty birth and breeding, to explain to the queen that she had

met Sibyll in earlier years, the king approached to monopolize his

guest’s voice and ear. It seemed natural to all present that Edward

should devote peculiar attention to the daughter of Warwick and the

sister of the Duchess of Clarence; and even Elizabeth suspected no

guiltier gallantry in the subdued voice, the caressing manner, which

her handsome lord adopted throughout that day, even to the close of the

nightly revel, towards a demoiselle too high (it might well appear) for

licentious homage.

But Anne herself, though too guileless to suspect the nature of Edward’s

courtesy, yet shrank from it in vague terror. All his beauty, all his

fascination, could not root from her mind the remembrance of the exiled

prince; nay, the brilliancy of his qualities made her the more averse

to him. It darkened the prospects of Edward of Lancaster that Edward

of York should wear so gracious and so popular a form. She hailed with

delight the hour when she was conducted to her chamber, and dismissing

gently the pompous retinue allotted to her, found herself alone with the

young maiden whom she had elected to her special service.

“And you remember me, too, fair Sibyll?” said Anne, with her dulcet and

endearing voice.

“Truly, who would not? for as you, then, noble lady, glided apart from

the other children, hand in hand with the young prince, in whom all

dreamed to see their future king, I heard the universal murmur of--a

false prophecy!”

“Ah! and of what?” asked Anne.

“That in the hand the prince clasped with his small rosy fingers--the

hand of great Warwick’s daughter--lay the best defence of his father’s

throne.”

Anne’s breast heaved, and her small foot began to mark strange

characters on the floor.

“So,” she said musingly, “so even here, amidst a new court, you forget

not Prince Edward of Lancaster. Oh, we shall find hours to talk of the

past days. But how, if your childhood was spent in Margaret’s court,

does your youth find a welcome in Elizabeth’s?”

“Avarice and power had need of my father’s science. He is a scholar of

good birth, but fallen fortunes, even now, and ever while night lasts,

he is at work. I belonged to the train of her grace of Bedford; but when

the duchess quitted the court, and the king retained my father in his

own royal service, her highness the queen was pleased to receive me

among her maidens. Happy that my father’s home is mine!--who else could

tend him?”

“Thou art his only child?--he must--love thee dearly?”

“Yet not as I love him; he lives in a life apart from all else that

live. But after all, peradventure it is sweeter to love than to be

loved.”

Anne, whose nature was singularly tender and woman-like, was greatly

affected by this answer. She drew nearer to Sibyll; she twined her arm

round her slight form, and kissed her forehead.

“Shall I love thee, Sibyll?” she said, with a girl’s candid simplicity,

“and wilt thou love me?”

“Ah, lady! there are so many to love thee,--father, mother, sister,--all

the world; the very sun shines more kindly upon the great!”

“Nay!” said Anne, with that jealousy of a claim to suffering to which

the gentler natures are prone, “I may have sorrows from which thou

art free. I confess to thee, Sibyll, that something I know not how to

explain draws me strangely towards thy sweet face. Marriage has lost me

my only sister, for since Isabel is wed she is changed to me--would that

her place were supplied by thee! Shall I steal thee from the queen when

I depart? Ah, my mother--at least thou wilt love her! for verily, to

love my mother you have but to breathe the same air. Kiss me, Sibyll.”

Kindness, of late, had been strange to Sibyll, especially from her own

sex, one of her own age; it came like morning upon the folded blossom.

She threw her arms round the new friend that seemed sent to her from

heaven; she kissed Anne’s face and hands with grateful tears.

“Ah!” she said at last, when she could command a voice still broken with

emotion--“if I could ever serve--ever repay thee--though those gracious

words were the last thy lips should ever deign to address to me!”

Anne was delighted; she had never yet found one to protect; she had

never yet found one in whom thoroughly to confide. Gentle as her mother

was, the distinction between child and parent was, even in the fond

family she belonged to, so great in that day, that she could never have

betrayed to the countess the wild weakness of her young heart.

The wish to communicate, to reveal, is so natural to extreme youth, and

in Anne that disposition was so increased by a nature at once open and

inclined to lean on others, that she had, as we have seen, sought a

confidante in Isabel; but with her, even at the first, she found but

the half-contemptuous pity of a strong and hard mind; and lately, since

Edward’s visit to Middleham, the Duchess of Clarence had been so rapt in

her own imperious egotism and discontented ambition, that the timid

Anne had not even dared to touch, with her, upon those secrets which it

flushed her own bashful cheek to recall. And this visit to the

court, this new, unfamiliar scene, this estrangement from all the old

accustomed affections, had produced in her that sense of loneliness

which is so irksome, till grave experience of real life accustoms us to

the common lot. So with the exaggerated and somewhat morbid sensibility

that belonged to her, she turned at once, and by impulse, to this

sudden, yet graceful friendship. Here was one of her own age, one who

had known sorrow, one whose voice and eyes charmed her, one who would

not chide even folly, one, above all, who had seen her beloved prince,

one associated with her fondest memories, one who might have a thousand

tales to tell of the day when the outlaw boy was a monarch’s heir. In

the childishness of her soft years, she almost wept at another channel

for so much natural tenderness. It was half the woman gaining a

woman-friend, half the child clinging to a new playmate.

“Ah, Sibyll,” she whispered, “do not leave me to-night; this strange

place daunts me, and the figures on the arras seem so tall and

spectre-like, and they say the old tower is haunted. Stay, dear Sibyll!”

And Sibyll stayed.

CHAPTER II. THE SLEEPING INNOCENCE--THE WAKEFUL CRIME.

While these charming girls thus innocently conferred; while, Anne’s

sweet voice running on in her artless fancies, they helped each other to

undress; while hand in hand they knelt in prayer by the crucifix in

the dim recess; while timidly they extinguished the light, and stole to

rest; while, conversing in whispers, growing gradually more faint and

low, they sank into guileless sleep,--the unholy king paced his solitary

chamber, parched with the fever of the sudden and frantic passion that

swept away from a heart in which every impulse was a giant all the

memories of honour, gratitude, and law.

The mechanism of this strong man’s nature was that almost unknown to the

modern time; it belonged to those earlier days which furnish to Greece

the terrible legends Ovid has clothed in gloomy fire, which a similar

civilization produced no less in the Middle Ages, whether of Italy or

the North,--that period when crime took a grandeur from its excess; when

power was so great and absolute that its girth burst the ligaments of

conscience; when a despot was but the incarnation of WILL; when honour

was indeed a religion, but its faith was valour, and it wrote its

decalogue with the point of a fearless sword.