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!"