A Student's History of England Volume I Part 21

[Footnote 31: Genealogy of the Houses of Lancaster and York:--

EDWARD III.

(1307-1377) | ------------------------------------------------ | | | | Edward, Lionel, Duke John of Edmund, Duke of the Black Prince of Clarence Gaunt of York | | | | | ------- | ---------------- | | | | RICHARD II. Philippa = Edmund HENRY IV. | (1377-1399) | Mortimer, (1399-1413) | | Earl of | | | March ----------------- | | | | | | (1) HENRY V. (2) John, Duke | | (1413-1422) of Bedford | | | (3) Thomas, Duke | Roger Mortimer, HENRY VI. of Clarence | Earl of March (1422-1461) (4) Humphrey, | | Duke of | | Gloucester | | | --------------------- ---------------------------- | | | Edmund Mortimer, Anne = Richard, Earl of Cambridge Earl of March | Richard, Duke of York | Edward, Earl of March, afterwards EDWARD IV.]

11. =The Battle of Wakefield. 1460.=--The struggle, which had at first been one between two unequal sections of the n.o.bility, each nominally acknowledging Henry VI. as their king, thus came to be one between the Houses of Lancaster and York. The queen, savage at the wrong done to her son, refused to accept the compromise. Withdrawing to the North, she summoned to her aid the Earl of Northumberland and the Lancastrian lords. The North was always exposed to Scottish invasions, and the constant danger kept the inhabitants ready for war, and strengthened the authority of the great lords who led them. For the same reason the people of the North were ruder and less civilised than their fellow-countrymen in the South. Plunder and outrage did not come amiss to men who were frequently subjected to plunder and outrage. An army composed of 18,000 of these rough warriors placed itself at the queen's disposal. With these she routed her enemies at Wakefield. York himself was slain. His son, Rutland, was stabbed to death by Lord Clifford, whose father had been slain at St. Albans. Salisbury was subsequently beheaded by the populace at Pontefract. By command of Margaret, York's head was cut off, and, adorned in mockery with a paper crown, was fixed with those of Salisbury and Rutland above one of the gates of York.

12. =The Battle of Mortimer's Cross and the Second Battle of St.

Albans. 1461.=--The battle of Wakefield differed in character from the earlier battles of the war. They had been but conflicts between bands of n.o.blemen and their armed retainers, in which the general population took little part, whilst the ordinary business of the country went on much as usual. At Wakefield not only were cruel pa.s.sions developed, but a new danger appeared. When Margaret attempted to gain her ends with the help of her rude northern followers, she roused against her the fears of the wealthier and more prosperous South. The South found a leader in York's son, Edward. Though only in his nineteenth year, Edward showed that he had the qualities of a commander. Rapid in his movements, he fell upon some Lancastrian forces and defeated them on February 2, =1461=, at Mortimer's Cross. In the meanwhile Margaret was marching with her northern host upon London, plundering and destroying as she went. Warwick, carrying the king with him, met her on the way, but in the second battle of St. Albans--fought on February 17--was driven back, leaving the king behind him.

13. =The Battle of Towton and the Coronation of Edward IV.

1461.=--With a civilised army at her back, Margaret might have won her way into London, and established her authority, at least for a time.

Her unbridled supporters celebrated their victory by robbery and rape, and Margaret was unable to lead them forward. The Londoners steeled their hearts against her. Edward was marching to their help, and on February 25 he entered London. The men of the neighbouring counties flocked in to his support. On March 2 the crown was offered to him at Clerkenwell by such lords as happened to be in London. On his presenting himself to the mult.i.tude in Westminster Hall, he was greeted with shouts of "Long live the king!" Edward IV. represented to peace-loving England the order which had to be upheld against the barbarous host which Margaret and the Lancastrian lords had called to their aid. He had yet to justify the choice. The northern host had retreated to its own country, and Edward swiftly followed it up. His advanced guard was surprised and driven back at Ferry Bridge; but his main army pressed on, and on March 29 gained a decisive victory at Towton. The slaughter of the defeated side was enormous. Margaret escaped with Henry to Scotland, and Edward, returning southwards, was crowned at Westminster on June 29.

CHAPTER XXII.

THE YORKIST KINGS.

EDWARD IV., =1461--1483=. EDWARD V., =1483=. RICHARD III., =1483--1485=.

LEADING DATES

Coronation of Edward IV. 1461 Restoration of Henry VI. 1470 Edward IV. recovers the crown--Battles of Barnet and Tewkesbury 1471 Edward V. 1483 Richard III. deposes Edward V. 1483 Richard III. killed at Bosworth 1485

1. =Edward IV. and the House of Commons. 1461.=--On June 29, =1461=, Edward IV. was crowned, and created his two brothers, George and Richard, Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester. His first Parliament declared the three Lancastrian kings to have been usurpers, and Henry VI., his wife, his son, and his chief supporters, to be traitors. At the end of the session Edward thanked the Commons for their support, and a.s.sured them of his resolution to protect them at the hazard of his own life. It was the first time that a king had addressed the Commons, and his doing so was a sign that a new era had begun, in which the wishes of the middle cla.s.s in town and country were to prevail over those of the great n.o.bles. It did not follow that the House of Commons would take the control of the government into its own hands, as it does at the present day. For a long time the election of the members had been carried out under pressure from the local n.o.bility. If the great men in a county resolved that certain persons should be returned as members, those who came to the place of election in support of others would be driven off, and perhaps beaten or wounded. Consequently each House of Commons had hitherto represented the dominant party, Lancastrian or Yorkist, as the case might be.

Before there could be a House of Commons capable of governing, the interference of the n.o.bles with elections would have to be brought to an end, and it was only by a strong king that their power could be overthrown. The strengthening of the kings.h.i.+p was the only road to future const.i.tutional progress.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Edward IV.: from an original painting belonging to the Society of Antiquaries.]

2. =Loss of the Mediaeval Ideals.=--Before the end of the 15th century the English people had lost all the ideals of the middle ages. The attempt of Henry V. to revive the old ecclesiastical feeling had broken down through the race for material power opened by his French wars, and through the savagery of the wars of the Roses. The new religious feeling of Wycliffe and the n.o.bler Lollards had perished with Sir John Oldcastle from the same causes. Neither the Church nor the opponents of the Church had any longer a sway over men's hearts.

The clergy continued to perform their part in the services of the Church not indeed without belief, but without the spiritual fervour which influences the lives of men. The chivalry of the middle ages was as dead as its religion. Men spoke of women as coa.r.s.ely as they spoke of their cattle. Human nature indeed could not be entirely crushed.

John Paston's wife (see p. 321), for instance, was quaintly affectionate. "I would," she once wrote to her husband, "ye were at home, if it were for your ease ... now liever than a gown, though it were of scarlet." But the system of wards.h.i.+p (see p. 116) made marriages a matter of bargain and sale. "For very need," wrote a certain Stephen Scrope, "I was fain to sell a little daughter I have for much less than I should." When Scrope was old he wished to marry Paston's young sister, and the girl was willing to take him if she were sure that his land was not burdened with debt. She would be glad enough to escape from home. Her mother kept her in close confinement and beat her once or twice every week, and sometimes twice a day, so that her head was broken in two or three places. This low and material view of domestic life had led to an equally low and material view of political life, and the cruelty which stained the wars of the Roses was but the outcome of a state of society in which no man cared much for anything except his own greatness and enjoyment. The ideal which shaped itself in the minds of the men of the middle cla.s.s was a king acting as a kind of chief constable, who, by keeping great men in order, would allow their inferiors to make money in peace.

3. =Fresh Efforts of the Lancastrians. 1462--1465.=--Edward IV. only very partially responded to this demand. He was swift in action when a crisis came, and was cruel in his revenge, but he was l.u.s.tful and indolent when the crisis was pa.s.sed, and he had no statesmanlike abilities to lay the foundations of a powerful government. The wars were not ended by his victory at Towton. In =1462= Queen Margaret reappeared in the North, and it was not till =1464= that Warwick's brother, Lord Montague, thoroughly defeated her forces at Hedgeley Moor and Hexham; for which victories he was rewarded by Edward with the earldom of Northumberland, which had been forfeited by the Lancastrian head of the House of Percy. Montague's victory was marked by the usual butcheries; the Duke of Somerset, a son of the duke who had been slain at St. Albans, being amongst those who perished on the scaffold. In =1465= Henry himself was taken prisoner and lodged in the Tower.

4. =Edward's Marriage. 1464.=--Whilst these battles were being fought Edward was lingering in the South courting the young widow of Sir John Grey, usually known by her maiden name as Elizabeth Woodville. His marriage to her gave offence to his n.o.ble supporters, who disdained to acknowledge a queen of birth so undistinguished; and their ill-will was increased when they found that Edward distributed amongst his wife's kindred estates and preferments which they had hoped to gain for themselves. The queen's father became Earl Rivers and Lord Constable, and her brothers and sisters were enriched by marriages with n.o.ble wards of the Crown. One of her brothers, a youth of twenty, was married to the old d.u.c.h.ess of Norfolk, who was over eighty.

5. =Estrangement of Warwick. 1465--1468.=--No doubt there was as much of policy as of affection in the slight shown by Edward to the Yorkist n.o.bility. Warwick--the King-maker, as he was called--had special cause for ill-humour. He had expected to be a King-ruler as well as a King-maker, and he took grave offence when he found Edward slipping away from his control. It seemed as if Edward had the settled purpose of raising up a new n.o.bility to counterbalance the old. In =1467= Warwick's brother, the Archbishop of York, was deprived of the chancellors.h.i.+p. In foreign politics, too, Edward and Warwick disagreed. Warwick had taken up the old policy of the Beauforts, and was anxious for an alliance with the astute Louis XI., who had in =1461= succeeded his father, Charles VII., as king of France. Edward, perhaps with some thought pa.s.sing through his head of establis.h.i.+ng his throne by following in the steps of Henry V., declared for an alliance with Burgundy. In =1467= Warwick was allowed to go to France as an amba.s.sador, whilst Edward was entertaining Burgundian amba.s.sadors in England. In the same year Charles the Rash succeeded his father, Philip the Good (see p. 306), as Duke of Burgundy, and in =1468= married Edward's sister, Margaret. The Duke of Burgundy, the rival of the king of France, was the lord of the seventeen provinces of the Netherlands, and his friends.h.i.+p brought with it that peaceful intercourse with the manufacturing towns of Flanders which it was always the object of English policy to secure.

6. =Warwick's Alliance with Clarence. 1469--1470.=--Warwick, disgusted with Edward, found an ally in Edward's brother, Clarence, who, like Warwick, was jealous of the Woodvilles. Warwick had no son, and his two daughters, Isabel and Anne, would one day share his vast estates between them. Warwick gave Isabel in marriage to Clarence, and encouraged him to think that it might be possible to seat him--in days when everything seemed possible to the strong--on Edward's throne.

Edward had by this time lost much of his popularity. His extravagant and luxurious life made men doubt whether anything had been gained by subst.i.tuting him for Henry, and in =1469= and =1470= there were risings fomented by Warwick. In the latter year Edward, with the help of his cannon, the importance of which in battles was now great, struck such a panic into his enemies at a battle near Stamford that the place of action came to be known as Lose-coat Field, from the haste with which the fugitives stripped themselves of their armour to make their flight the easier. Warwick and Clarence fled across the sea. Warwick was governor of Calais, but his own officer there refused to admit him, and he was forced to take refuge in France.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A fifteenth-century s.h.i.+p: from Harl. MS. 2278.]

7. =The Restoration of Henry VI. 1470.=--Warwick knew that he had no chance of recovering power without the support of the Lancastrian party, and, disagreeable as it was to him, he allowed Louis XI. to reconcile him to Queen Margaret, the wife of that Henry VI., of whom he had been the bitterest enemy. Louis, who dreaded Edward's alliance with the Duke of Burgundy, did everything to support Edward's foes, and sent Warwick off to England, where he was subsequently to be joined by the queen. Edward, who was in his most careless mood, was foolish enough to trust Warwick's brother, Montague, from whom he had taken away, not only his new earldom of Northumberland to restore it to the head of the Percies (see p. 331), but all the lands connected with it, and had thought to compensate him with the mere marquisate of Montague, unaccompanied by any estate wherewith to support the dignity of his rank. Montague turned against him, and Edward, fearing for his life, fled to Holland. Warwick became master of England, and this time the King-maker drew Henry from the Tower and placed him once more on the throne, imbecile as he now was.

8. =Edward IV. recovers the Throne. 1471.=--In the spring of =1471= Edward was back in England, landing at Ravenspur, where Henry IV. had landed in =1399=. Like Henry IV., he lyingly declared that he had come merely to claim his duchy and estates. Like Henry IV., too, he found a supporter in an Earl of Northumberland, who was this time the Percy who, Lancastrian as he was, had been restored by Edward to his earldom at the expense of Montague. Clarence, too--false, fleeting, perjured Clarence, as Shakspere truly calls him--had offered to betray Warwick.

Edward gathered a sufficient force to march una.s.sailed to London, where he was enthusiastically received. Taking with him the unfortunate Henry he won a complete victory at Barnet. The battle was fought in a dense fog, and was decided by a panic caused amongst Warwick's men through the firing of one of their divisions into another. Warwick and Montague were among the slain. By this time Margaret had landed with a fresh army at Weymouth. Edward caught her and her army at Tewkesbury, where he inflicted on her a crus.h.i.+ng defeat. Her son, Edward Prince of Wales, was either slain in the battle, or more probably murdered after the fight was over; and the Duke of Somerset, the brother of the duke who had been executed after the battle of Hexham (see p. 331), the last male heir of the House of Beaufort, as well as others, who had taken refuge in the abbey, were afterwards put to death, though Edward had solemnly promised them their lives. On the night after Edward's return to London Henry VI.

ended his life in the Tower. There can be no reasonable doubt that he was murdered, and that, too, by Edward's directions.

9. =Edward IV. prepares for War with France. 1471--1474.=--Edward IV.

was now all powerful. He had no compet.i.tor to fear. No descendant of Henry IV. remained alive. Of the Beauforts, the descendants of John of Gaunt by Catherine Swynford (see p. 282), the male line had perished, and the only representative was young Henry, Earl of Richmond, whose mother, the Lady Margaret, was the daughter of the first Duke of Somerset, and the cousin of the two dukes who had been executed after the battles of Hexham and Tewkesbury.[32] His father, Edmund Tudor, Earl of Richmond, who died before his birth, was the son of a Welsh gentleman of no great mark, who had had the luck to marry Catherine of France, the widow of Henry V. The young Richmond was, however, an exile, and, as he was only fourteen years of age when Edward was restored, no serious danger was as yet to be apprehended from that side. Moreover, the slaughter amongst both the Yorkist and the Lancastrian n.o.bility had, for the time, put an end to all danger of a rising. Edward was, therefore, at liberty to carry out his own foreign policy. He obtained grants from Parliament to enable him, in alliance with Charles of Burgundy, to make war against Louis XI. The grants were insufficient, and he supplemented them by a newly invented system of benevolences, which were nominally free gifts made to him by the well-to-do, but which were in reality exactions, because those from whom they were required dared not refuse to pay. The system raised little general ill will, partly because the small owners of property who were relieved from taxation were not touched by the benevolences, and partly because the end which Edward had put to the civil war made his government welcome. In some cases his personal charm counted for something. One old lady whom he asked for ten pounds replied that for the sake of his handsome face she would give him twenty. He kissed her and she at once made it forty.

[Footnote 32: Genealogy of the Beauforts and the Tudors:--

John of Gaunt = Catherine Swynford ----------+------------ | | John Beaufort, Cardinal Beaufort, Earl of Somerset, legitimated by Act legitimated by Act of of Parliament Owen Tudor = Catherine, Parliament | widow of | | Henry V. |---------------------- | | | | John, 1st Duke of Somerset Edmund, | | 2nd Duke of | | Somerset, | | killed at | | St. Albans, | | 1455 | | ------------+---- | | | | Edmund Tudor = Margaret Henry, Edmund, Earl of Richmond, | 3rd Duke of 4th Duke of d. 1456 | Somerset, Somerset, HENRY VII. executed after executed after (1485-1509) the battle of the battle of Hexham, 1464 Tewkesbury, 1471]

10. =The Invasion of France. 1475.=--In =1475= Edward invaded France.

If he could have secured the steady support of the Duke of Burgundy he might have accomplished something, but the Duke's dominions were too scattered to enable him to have a settled policy. He was sometimes led to attack the king of France, because he had interests as a French va.s.sal; whilst at other times he threw all his strength into projects for encroachments in Germany, because he had also interests as a va.s.sal of the Emperor. When Edward landed Charles was anxious to carry on war in Germany, and would give no help to Edward in France. Louis XI., who preferred a victory of diplomacy to one of force, wheedled Edward into a seven years' truce by a grant of 75,000 crowns, together with a yearly pension of 50,000, and by a promise to marry the Dauphin Charles to Elizabeth, the eldest daughter of the king of England.

Louis also made presents to Edward's chief followers, and was delighted when the English army turned its back on France. In consequence of this understanding Queen Margaret recovered her liberty.

11. =Fall and Death of Clarence. 1476--1478.=--Soon after Edward's return he became suspicious of his brother Clarence, who took upon himself to interfere with the course of justice. In =1477= the Duke of Burgundy, Charles the Rash, was slain at Nancy by the Swiss, leaving only a daughter, Mary. Ducal Burgundy was at once seized by Louis, as forfeited for want of male heirs, but Franche Comte, or the county of Burgundy, was a part of the Empire, and therefore beyond his reach; and this latter district, together with the provinces of the Netherlands, formed a dower splendid enough to attract suitors for Mary's hand. Amongst these was Clarence,[33] now a widower. Edward, who had no wish to see his brother an independent sovereign, forbade him to proceed with his wooing. Other actions of Clarence were displeasing to the king, and when Parliament met, =1478=, Edward with his own mouth accused his brother of treason. Clarence was condemned to death, and perished secretly in the Tower, being, according to rumour, drowned in a b.u.t.t of malmsey.

[Footnote 33: Mary was the child of an earlier wife of Charles the Bold than Margaret the sister of Edward IV. and Clarence, and the latter was therefore not related to her.]

12. =The Last Years of Edward IV. 1478--1483.=--The remainder of Edward's life was spent in quiet, as far as domestic affairs were concerned. In foreign affairs he met with a grave disappointment.

Mary of Burgundy had found a husband in Maximilian, archduke of Austria, the son of the Emperor Frederick III. In =1482= she died, leaving two children, Philip and Margaret. The men of Ghent set Maximilian at naught, and, combining with Louis, forced Maximilian in the treaty of Arras to promise the hand of Margaret to the Dauphin, and the cession of some Netherlandish territory to France. Edward died on April 9, =1483=, and it has been said that the treaty of Arras, which extended French influence in the Netherlands, brought about his death. It is more reasonable to attribute it to the dissoluteness of his life.

13. =Edward V. and the Duke of Gloucester. 1483.=--Edward IV. left two sons. The elder, a boy of twelve, was now Edward V., and his younger brother, Richard, was Duke of York.[34] The only grown-up man of the family was the youngest brother of Edward IV., Richard, Duke of Gloucester. Gloucester had shown himself during his brother's reign to be possessed of the qualities which fit a man to fulfil the duties of a high position. He was not only a good soldier and an able commander, but, unlike his brother Clarence, was entirely faithful to Edward, though he showed his independence by refusing to take part in Edward's treaty with Louis of France. He had a rare power of winning popular sympathy, and was most liked in Yorks.h.i.+re, where he was best known. He had, however, grown up in a cruel and unscrupulous age, and had no more hesitation in clearing his way by slaughter than had Edward IV.

or Margaret of Anjou. Though absolute proof is wanting, there is strong reason to believe that he took part in cutting down Prince Edward after the battle of Tewkesbury, and that he executed his brother's orders in providing for the murder of Henry VI. in the Tower. He made no remonstrance against, though he took no part in, the death of Clarence, with whom he was on bad terms, because Clarence claimed the whole of the estates of the King-maker, whose eldest daughter Isabel he had married; whereas Gloucester, having married the younger daughter Anne, the widow of the slaughtered son of Henry VI.

put in a claim to half. Gloucester was now to be tried as he had never been tried before, his brother having appointed him by will to be the guardian of his young nephew and of the kingdom. If the authority thus conferred upon him met with general acceptance, he would probably make an excellent ruler. If it were questioned he would strike out, and show no mercy. In those hard days every man of high position must be either hammer or anvil, and Richard was resolved that he would not be the anvil.

[Footnote 34: Genealogy of the Yorkist Kings:--

Richard, Duke of York, killed at Wakefield, 1460 | ---------------------------------------------------- | | | | Elizabeth = EDWARD IV. Margaret = Charles, George = Isabel RICHARD Woodville | (1461-1483) the Rash, Duke of | Nevil III., | Duke of Clarence,| Duke of | Burgundy d. 1478| Gloucester, | | afterwards | | king, m. to | | Anne Nevill | | (1483-1485) --------------------------- | | | | | | | Elizabeth, m. EDWARD V., Richard, Edward, | to Henry VII. murdered Duke of York, Earl of Edward, 1483 murdered 1483 Warwick, d. 1484 executed 1499]

14. =Fall of the Queen's Relations. 1483.=--The young king was at Ludlow, and rode up towards London, guarded by Earl Rivers, his uncle on his mother's side, and by his half-brother, Sir Richard Grey.

Another half-brother, the Marquis of Dorset, was lieutenant of the Tower.[35] Gloucester had strong reasons for believing that the Greys intended to keep the young king in their hands and, having him crowned at once, so as to put an end to his own guardians.h.i.+p, to make themselves masters of the kingdom. He therefore struck the first blow.

Accompanied by his friend and supporter, the Duke of Buckingham, he overtook the cavalcade, and sent Rivers and Grey prisoners to Pontefract. The queen-mother at once took refuge in the sanctuary at Westminster, whence no one could remove her without violating the privileges of the Church.

[Footnote 35: Genealogy of the Woodvilles and Greys:--

Richard, Earl Rivers | +--------------------------------+ | | Anthony (1) Sir John Grey = Elizabeth Woodville = (2) EDWARD IV.

Woodville, | | Earl Rivers, +----------+---------+ +-----+ executed | | | 1483 Thomas Grey, Sir Richard Grey, EDWARD V., Marquis of Dorset executed 1483 murdered 1483]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Large s.h.i.+p and boat of the fifteenth century. The mainsail of the s.h.i.+p has the Beauchamp arms, and the streamer the bear and ragged staff. From the 'Life of Richard Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick,' by John Rous; drawn about 1485.]

15. =Execution of Lord Hastings.=--The young king arrived in London on May 4. The Council acknowledged Gloucester as Protector, and removed Edward to the Tower, which in those days was a place of safety rather than a prison. Dorset, however, had equipped a fleet, and Gloucester was afraid lest a fresh attempt might be made by the queen's party to overthrow him. His fears were increased because Lord Hastings, the leading member of the Council, who had taken his part against the Woodvilles, now turned against him and began to intrigue with the queen's supporters. Coming into the council chamber on June 13, he laid bare his left arm, which had been withered from his birth, and declared that the mischief was the effect of witchcraft, and that the witches were the queen and Jane Sh.o.r.e, who had been one of the many mistresses of Edward IV., and was now the mistress of Hastings.

Hastings admitted that the queen and Jane Sh.o.r.e were worthy of punishment if they were guilty. "What!" cried Gloucester, "dost thou serve me with ifs and with ands? I tell thee they have done it, and that I will make good on thy body, traitor." Gloucester struck his fist on the table. Armed men rushed in, dragged Hastings out, and cut off his head on a log of wood. Jane Sh.o.r.e was compelled to do public penance in a white sheet. Of the causes of Hastings' desertion of Gloucester it is impossible to speak with certainty. It is a probable conjecture that he had discovered that Gloucester entertained the thought of making himself more than Protector. Young Edward's coronation would make the boy capable, formally at least, of exercising royal power, and as it was known that the boy loved his mother's relations, it was almost certain that he would place the Woodvilles in power. Now that Gloucester had imprisoned Rivers and Grey, it was certain that the first thing done by the Woodvilles, if they got a chance, would be to send Gloucester to the scaffold, and Gloucester was not the man patiently to allow himself to be crushed.

It is ridiculous to speak of Gloucester as an accomplished dissembler.

The story of witchcraft served its purpose, but it was the stupid lie of a man who had not hitherto been accustomed to lying.

16. =Deposition of Edward V. 1483.=--The execution of Hastings was promptly followed by the execution of Rivers and Grey. Dorset saved himself by escaping beyond sea. By threats Gloucester got the Duke of York into his hands, and lodged him with his brother in the Tower. He was now in a temper which would stop at no atrocity. He put up a Dr.

Shaw to preach a sermon against Edward's claim to the throne. In those days if a man and woman made a contract of marriage neither of the contracting parties could marry another, though no actual marriage had taken place. Shaw declared that Edward IV. had promised marriage to one of his mistresses before he met Elizabeth Woodville, and that therefore, his marriage with Elizabeth being invalid, all his children by her were illegitimate, and Gloucester was the true heir to the throne. Further, Shaw declared that Gloucester was the only legitimate son of the Duke of York, both Edward IV. and Clarence being the sons of their mother by some other man. That Richard should have authorised so base an attack upon his mother's honour shows the depth of infamy to which he had now sunk. At first it seemed as if he had lowered himself to no purpose. The hearers of the sermon, instead of shouting, "G.o.d save King Richard!" held their peace. At a meeting in the City the Duke of Buckingham told the same story as had been told by Shaw, and there the servants of the two dukes shouted for 'King Richard,'