complaints made to the King by the Subjects of the King of France and of Denmarke which was well expedited Anno Regni 2. That Treatie of Peace and League with Scotland began before was continued and finished by Commissioners sent from Iames the fourth King of Scotland and by other Commissioners delegate for the King of England those for Scotland were Coli Earl of Argile Chancellor of Scotland N. Bishop of Aberdene the Lord Lisle the Lord Dromonde of Stobhall Master Archibald Quhitlaw Arch-Deacon of Lodion Secretary to the King Lion King at Arms and Duncan of Dundas they came to Nottingham in September Anno Domini 1484 and were honourably receiv'd in the great Chamber of the Castle the King sitting under his Royall Cloth of State Master Archibald Quhitlaw stepping before the rest addrest a very Eloquent Oration unto him in Latine which reflected upon the praise of Martial men Art Military including much to the honour and praise of King Richard This Treatie aimed partly at a Truce and Peace partly at a Marriage betweene Iames the Prince of Scotland and the Lady Anne Daughter of Iohn de la Poole Duke of Suffolke and Neice to King Richard Commissioners for the King of England were Iohn Bishop of Lincolne Richard Bishop of Asaph Iohn Duke of Norfolke Henry Earle of Northumberland Master Iohn Gunthorpe custos privati sigilli Sir Thomas Stanley Lord Stanley Sir N. Lord Strange Sir N. Lord Powis Sir Henry Lord Fitz hugh Sir Humphry Lord Dacres Master Thomas Barrow Master of the Rowles Sir Richard Ratcliff William Catesby and Richard Salkeld The other for the Treatie of Alliance and Marriage were Thomas Arch-Bishop of Yorke Iohn Bishop of Lincolne Iohn Bishop of Worcester Iohn Duke of Norfolke William Earle of Nottingham Iohn Sutton Lord Dudley N. Lord Scroope of Upsall Sir William Hussey Chiefe Justice of the Kings Bench Sir Richard Ratcliffe and William Catesby But the successe of that and many other good intendments were interposed by the inconstancy and contraste of the times The Lady Anne de la Poole upon the the breach thereof resolving to accept no other motion forthwith tooke a religious habit in the Monastery of Sion There was another Treatie of Peace and Truce in this second yeare betweene him and the Duke of Brittaine or at the least given out for peace yet was indeed but a part and pretext of the Treatie for the maine negotiations on the Kings side was how to get the Earle of Richmond out of his custody into his owne or be as well secured of him there as his Brother King Edward was And for this Treatie the chiefe Negotiators were the Bishop of Lincolne and Sir Thomas Hutton for the King the Bishop of Leon and others for the Duke The Treatie began Anno Domini 1484. and was finished and ratified in the yeare following but the Duke violated his part immediately by giving ayde to the Kings Enemies In the same yeare there were Letters made which are yet extant in the Treasury of the Exchequor that moved a Peace and Truce beweene King Richard and Charles the eighth King of France wherein it must be understood the tribute before mentioned was Articled Also in this yeare and the yeare before there was a private Treatie which we must not passe by for the Marriage of the Lady Elizabeth with King Richard himselfe what the successe of it was and how farre it proceeded will more aptly present it selfe in another place Wee are now to take notice of the Duke of Buckinghams revolt for this was the preparative and fourrier of the rest And to give it the more taking feature and specious pretence it must be given out That the cause was the Reformation of an ill Government and Tyranny under which species for Treason is ever fairely palliated and seldome wants the forme of some plea though at the Barre they must take up Armes against the King And here as some Rivers deriv'd from the Sea cannot suddenly loose their taste of saltnesse they discovered their ancient taint and inconstancy which the Prince wisely suspected from the first For the Duke of Buckingham how affably soever he trim'd his countenance it should seeme departed male-content from Court yet made not that generall publick pretended cause of the Kings Crimes all his quarrell but challenged him by some private grudges as denying to give or restore to him the Earledome of Hereford and Constableship of England for they went together a long time which he alledged belonged to the Partage that fell to his great Grand-mother the Lady Anne Daughter and Heire of Thomas Plantagenet alias Woodstock created by King Richard the second Duke of Glocester and Earle of Buckingham and of his Wife Elianor daughter and co-heire of Humphry de Bohun Earle of Hereford and Constable of England Which claime had he considerately look't upon could not rightly revolve to him but rather was for the Kings part For Humphry de Bohun Earle of Hereford of Essex and Northampton Lord of Brecknock and Constable of England in the time of King Edward the third and the last Earle of the Family of the Bohuns had by the Lady Iane his Wife Daughter of Richard Fitz-Allan Earle of Arundel two Daughters and Heires Elianor and Mary Elianor was Married to the same Thomas Plantagenet alias de Woodstock youngest Sonne of King Edward the third Duke of Glocester and Earle of Buckingham Mary the second Daughter was Married to Henry Plantagenet Duke of Lancaster and after King of England by the name of Henry the fourth and the Earledome of Hereford fell to his Wife In favour whereof he was Created Duke of Hereford by King Richard the second and the Earledome now a Dutchy and the rights therof remained in the King and in the Kings Heires and Successors untill the death of King Henry the sixt who dyed without Issue then all the Estate of Lancaster especially that of the Royall Family of Lancaster escheated to King Edward the fourth and from him it came to King Richard as Heire to his Brother and all his Ancestors But the Duke of Buckingham pretended Title to that Earledome by his said Grandmother Anne who was one of the Daughters and Heires of the aforesaid Lady Elianor Wife of Thomas de Woodstock Duke of Glocester and the Wife of Edmond Stafford Earle of Stafford and Grand-father to this Henry Duke of Buckingham who the rather presumed to make this Claime because the Issue of the other Sister Mary being extinct he tooke himselfe also to be her Heire But King Richard relishing something in this neare the disposition and inclination of Bullingbrooke answered That the Earledome of Hereford was of the inheritance of Henry the fourth who was also King of England though by tort and usurpation and will you my Lord of Buckingham Claime to be Heire of Henry the fourth You may then also happily Assume his spirits and lay Claime to the Crowne
that divers continued of his Sir-name in that Countrey along time after him which makes it probable he had a naturall Son at least bearing his owne name of Heward that next to him was the Originall Ancestor of this house of Howards And let it not be thought any disparagement for a Noble Family to be raysed from a naturall Issue for many Princely Families have beene derived and propagated from naturall Sonnes as was Eneas Romulus the Founders of the Roman Families so was Theseus and Themistocles as Plutarch writeth others say as much of Hercules c. The King of Spaine descended from Henry de Trastamara base sonne of Alphonsus the Justicer King of Castile And who doth not honour the Princely Race of William the Conquerour Bastard son to the Duke of Normandy where was a more Heroicall man then Robert Earle of Glocester base sonne of King Henry the first The Earles of Warren descended from Hamelin a base sonne of Geoffry Plantagenet Earle of Aniow The Noble Herberts are also said to come from a base sonne of Henry the first And the Duke and Earles of Somerset which followed the Red Rose were the Off-spring of the Beauforts naturall sonnes of Iohn de Gaunt For a further conjecture why these Howards must be descended from Hewardus or Herewardus for so some Writers call him but Iugulfus who best knew him constantly calls him Hewardus both names may signifie in the Saxon or old Dutch a chiefe Captaine of an Army whom the Romans call'd Imperator And that the Titles and names of great Offices have given Sir-manes to many Noble Families wee have examples in plentie Particularly the Visconti of Millan the Chamberlaines of Normandy the Stewards of Scotland the Butlers of Ireland and divers others who had their Sir-names from the Offices of their Ancestours and Fathers and the same presumption or argument may be for taking the Sir-name of Howard and the Origine of their Family from Hewardus the Howards from the time of Heward dwelling in these Countries of Holland and Marshland and were Lords of some Lands belonging to him untill by their matches with the Daughters and Heires of Fitton Tendring Mowbray Tillney c. they became possessed in Norfolke suffolke and Berkeshire and were Lords sometime of Sunning-hill neare Windsor and bore the Sir-name ever since or with small interruption the old Sir-name written Heward or Hereward in Charters and Records and Howard in Stories But descend wee through the succession of those times to William Haward Chiefe Justice in the Raigne of Edward the first Grand-father to Sir Iohn Howard Admirall of the North Fleet in the Navall Warres of Edward the third his Sonne Sir Robert Howard married the Daughter of the Lord Scales and Sir Iohn Howard who lived in the time of Henry the fourth and dyed Anno 16. Henry the sixt had two Wives Margaret Daughter and Heire of Sir Iohn Plais Knight by whom hee had Eliza an onely Daughter married to Iohn de Vere Earle of Oxford who brought him a goodly part of the Howards Lands Her Heires were married to Latimer and Winckfield very fruitfull Families His second Wife was the Daughter and heire of Sir William Tendering of Stoke-Nayland in Suffolke by whom he had Sir Robert Howard his eldest Sonne who married Margaret Mowbray Daughter of a Cadet of the house of Lancaster who became Co-heire with her Sister the Lady Berkely Wife to Thomas Mowbray Duke of Norfolke dead in Venice and left his Sonne Henry Haward heire to Haward and Mowbray and Iohn Howard the sonne of Iohn Howard was created Earle of Norfolke by King Richard the third in the right of his Mother Mowbray he married the Daughter of the Lord Moulines and by her had Thomas Howard the first Howard Earle of Surrey this is he who survived the danger of Bosworth Field and became afterwards Duke of Norfolke from whom all the Howards now living are descended whose Family hath beene so fruitfull to furnish this Kingdome with foure Dukes many Earles Viscounts and Barons three high Treasurers six high or great Marshalls tenne high Admiralls with some honourable Custos of the Privie Seale and sundry Chamberlaines of the Kings house and one lately lived who had borne the Offices of high Constable Lord Lieutenant Lord high Steward Marshall and Admirall of England Lord Chiefe Justice in Oyer of the better part of this Kingdome and Chamberlaine of the Royall house a man honourable in his deportments and fortunate in his undertakings as at the great Marine Battells against all the Navall powers of Spaine the Pope and Princes of Italy Anno Domini 1588. and in the siege of Gadys Anno Domini 1596. And this is the Grand-child of that Thomas Lord Howard who for his better distinction and perpetuall honour is stiled Triumphator Scotorum I have strayed into this digression as a gratefull tender of an acknowledgement I owe to that Illustrious Family for their Noble Patronage and Favour to my Ancestors especially to that unfortunate Bucke and his Children who withered with the White Rose bearing an Ancient and Hereditary love to the House of Yorke and stood in good Credit and Favour with the King his Master noâ— let this remembrance of him and his obscured Family seeme ostentation or vaine-glory whilst I say no more then what other Historios dictate which give him an able Character Master Camden Clarentius in his Immortall Brittannia deriveth this Sir Iohn Bucke from Sir Walter de Bucke of Brabant and Flanders who had that Sir-name of great Antiquity from the Castle de Bucke in Lisâ—e a City and Frontire Towne in Flanders where the Ancient Earles were accustomed much to reside the ruines of this Castle remained in the late time of Lodwicke Guicciardine who saith he saw the Carcasse thereof And this Walter Bucke was a Cadet of the House of Flanders employed and sent by the Prince then Duke of Brabant and Earle of Flanders to King Iohn with Auxiliary Troopes Roger Wondover saith Walter Bucke Gerardde Scottigni and Godescalius venerunt in Angliam cum tribus legionibus Flandrensium Braâ—antianoruâ— militum c. and he did the King excellent service here as many of our Historians report for which the King bountifully rewarded him with Lands in Yorkeshire and Northampton shire And in Yorkeshire where he made his Seat he found an Ancient Family of the Sirname of Bucke of Bucton in the Wapentake of Bucrosse where that Family had anciently been for the name is a Saxon or Dutch word and signifieth a Beech Tree or Beech Wood here Walter contracted alliance and Married Ralph de Bucke his Eldest Sonne to the Daughter and Heire of Gâ—celinus de Bucke Grandchild to Radolphus de Bucke who was a part Founder and Beneâ—actour to the Abbey of Bredlington as is mentioned in the Charter of Henry the first made for the foundation of that Monastery and from this Walter descended Iohn Bucke Knight who married a
Strelley and was so constant in his Affection that although she dyed in his best Age he made a Religious Vow and became a Knight of the Rhodes his Armes are yet to be seene in the Ruines of the Hospitall of Saint Iohns neaâ—e Smithfield and in the Church of Alhallows at the upper end of Lumbard Street which was repaired and enlarged with the Stones brought from that demolished Caenoby he lived sub rege Edvardo filio Regis Henrici as I have seene by the date of his deed in Herthilâ— Anno 1 Ed. 1. Anno 22. Ed. 1. From this Knight of the Rhodes descended Sir Iohn Bucke who for his too much forwardnesse in charging a Fleet of Spaniards without the leave of the Earle of Arundell Lord Admirall was committed to the Tower testified by the Records there Anno 13. Richard the second Lawrence Buck his Son followed Edward Plantagenet Duke of Yorke and was at the Battel of Agin Court with him when he was slaine Iohn Bucke Knight the Sonne of this Laurence married a Daughter and Heire of the House of Staveley out of which are descended the Barons Parres of Kendall and Rosse Queene Katherine the last wife of King Henry the eighth the Lord Parre Marquesse of Northampton and the Herberts Earles of Pembrooke and Montgomery These Bucks residing for the most part at West-Stanton and Herthill in Yorkeshire and matched into the Families of Strelley or Stirely of Woodhall Thorpe Tilney then of Lincolnshire and Savill by which we have much Noble kindred Sir Iohn Bucke for his service to the House of Yorke especially at Bosworth lost his head at Leicester he married the Daughter of Henry Savill by whom he had Robert Bucke and other Children who were brought into the Southerne parts by Thomas Duke of Norfolke where they have remained ever since for the Children being Orphans were left in miserable estate by the Attainder of their Father But the Duke bestowed two Daughters in marriage one with the Heire of Buck The other with the Heire of Fitz-Lewis very Ancient Families from which Matches divers honourable and Noble Persons are descended The Sonnes were one a Souldier the other a Courtier the third a Priest afterward the Duke bestowed Robert Bucke the Eldest Sonne at Melford Hall in Suffolke and married him into the Families of Higham and Cotton as also did the Blounds of Elwaston the Talbots of Grafton from whom the Barons of Monioy and the late Earles of Shrewsbury descended one of the Daughters of this Bucke Married to Fredericke Tilney of Shelley Hall in Suffolke his nearest Kinsman by the Duchesse his Mothers side But some perhaps must call this my vanity I shall but answer them that I thinke my selfe bound by all the bloud and memory I claime from them to pay them my best Relations and endeavours acknowledging with the great Consulare Philosopher Parentes charissimos habere debemus quod ab ijs vita patrimontum libertas Civit as tradita est And I should thinke there is none who hath an interest in the quality of Gentile or Noble for all is one but lookes backe which some delight to their first Commemoration and finds a strong engagement due to the Vertues and worth of their first Fathers for that expresse charge to honour Father and Mother is not to be understood only of our Parents superstits and living here with us but our forefathers that is beyond our great Grandfather for we have no proper word for them above that degree but Antecessours vulgò Ancestours whom the Romans called Majores and comprehendeth all our Progenitours departed sooner or later for the word Pater and Mater as also Parens Parentes extend very largely and reach up to the highest Ancestours The Ancient Roman Jurisconsults deliver in their Law for an Axiome that Appellatione Parentum omnes in infinitum majores utriusque sexus significantur and the word Parentes yet spreadeth further comprehending all Kinsfolkes and Cosins of our Bloud and Linage being used in that sense by AElius Lampridius by Iulius Capitolinus and other the best Writers in the times of the declined Empire as Isaac Causabonus hath well observed in his Annotations The Italians Spanish and French whose Language is for the most part Romanzi mongrell Latine and broken and corrupted Romane Language use Parenti Parentes and Parents for all their Kinsfolkes and Gentilitious Cosins We English-men being more precise follow the Ancient and Classique Latine Writers holding Parent strictly to the simple signification of Pater and Mater the present and immediate Parents But the using of the word Parentes as those Imperiall Historians use it serveth better for our purpose here And I could most willingly imitate the Pious Gentlemen of Italy Spainâ— and France in their Religious and Charitable indeavours to advance the happinesse of their Parents defunct if those desires could besteed them But where I should crave pardon I become more guilty and extravogant it is time therefore to know good manners and returne home to our proper taske which will be to refell the grosse and blacke Calumnies throwne unjustly upon the Memory and Person of King RICHARD And falls within the Circle of the next Booke Explicit Liber Secundus THE THIRD BOOKE OF KING RICHARD THE THIRD The Contents of this Booke THe Defamations of King Richard examined and answered Doctor Morton and Sir Thomas Moore malevolent to the House of Yorke Their frivolous exceptions against his gestures lookes teeth shape and birth hie vertues depraved The death of King Henry the sixth and his Sonne Edward Prince of Wales The Actors therein The offence of killing an anointed King Valiant men hate treacheries and bloudy acts King Richard not deformed The Slanders of Clarence translated to King Richard The Cause of Clarences execution How the Sonnes of King Edward came by their deaths King Richard Exculpable thereof The story of Perkin VVarbeck compared with Don Sebastian King of Portugall who are Biothanati Counterfeit Prince detected young Prince marvellously preserved Many testimonies for the assertion that Perkin VVarbeck was Richard Duke of Yorke his honourable entertainment with forraigne Princes vox populi Reasons why it is not credible King Richard made away his two Nephewes the force of Confession The evill of Torture the guilt of attempting to escape out of prison what an escape is The Earle of Oxford severe against Perkin and his end The base Sonne of King Richard the third secretly made away The Sonne of the Duke of Clarence put to death The power of furies Demones Genii Apollonii Majestas Quid tibi non vis alteri ne feceris THE THIRD BOOKE OF KING RICHARD THE THIRD THere is no story that shewes the planetary affections and malice of the vulgar more truly then King Richards and what a tickle game Kings have to play with them though his successor Henry the seventh play'd his providently enough with helpe of the standers by yet even those times which had promised the happiest example of a
in their greatest height were called Principes therefore Princeps is thus defined Princeps est penes quem summa Reip. potestas est qui primus omnium dominatur And Principatus and Dominatus are used as Synonomies But it is conceiv'd an errour now to take Principatus for Regnum Oâ— Supremus Dominatus being the word Principatus long before and in the age of Richard the second also ever since hath beene restrained to the Estate of Primogenitus and Heire apparant not onely of Kings but also of Dukes and Marquesses as well Feudall as Soveraigne And the next King Henry the fourth a wise discreet and wary Prince though he was much inclin'd to those Beauforts as being his naturall Brethren by the Paternall side and willing to advance them all he could yet he discovered clearely enough by that certaine Charter in which he entailed the Crowne successively to his soure Sonnes and to the Heires of their bodies that he reputed not the Beauforts to be Lancastrians or neare the Crown Neither is there the least clause or mention to leave any remainder therein to them First he intaild the Crowne to his eldest sonne Henry Prince of Wales after him to the Heires of his body If they faile then to Thomas of Lancaster his second sonne and to the Heires of his body so to his third sonne Iohn of Lancaster and to the Heires of his body Lastly to the fourth sonne Humphrey and to the Heires of his body for still and for every estate the words are Post ipsum successive Heredibus suis de ipsius Corpore legitime procreandis which is all and implicatively an expresse exclusion of the Beauforts This Charter was confirmed by Act of Parliament holden at Westminster the two and twentieth day of December in the eight yeare of Henry the fourth and sealed with his owne Signet Upon the Dexter side of that hung the seales of sundry Lords Spirituall on the left side the seales of the Lords Temporall witnesses And albeit the Earle of Richmond could not so well and rightly beare the name of Beaufort or Somerset being a Teador by his Father and so to be Sir-named or of some other Welch-name if there were any in his Family by his Mother he was descended from the Beauforts for the Lady Margaret Countesse of Richmond was daughter and heire to Sir Iohn de Beaufort Duke of Somerset and Grand-child to Iohn of Gaunt by Katherine the wife of Otho de Swinford which Iohn de Beaufort was created Duke of Somerset by Henry the fift his Wife was the daughter and at length the heire of Sir Iohn Beauchamp of Blet so and the widow of Sir Oliver Saint-Iohn when he married her But the Earle of Richmond by his Grand-mother Katherine Queene of England was descended from the Kings of France and I have seen him in a Pedigrce drawne after he was King derived from the ancient Kings Princes of Brittaine Polidore saith he was Ex fratre Nepos to King Henry the sixt who cal'd him Nephew and he the King Avunculum nostrum our Uncle insteed of Patruum as it is in the Records of Parliament Ann. 1. of Henry the seventh but not his Nephew as wee erroneously now take it that is his German younger Brothers Sonne for then he had beene a true Masculine Issue of the house of Lancaster and Royall blood of England But he was Nephew to him by his Brother Uterine Edmond Teudor Earle of Richmond the sonne of Owen Teudor or Meridock and of Queene Katherine daughter of Charles the sixt King of France and widow of Henry the fift King of England which the French well knew and gave him the better esteeme for it but those Honours were obscure Additions to him that must not goe lesse then for a Prince of the house of Lancaster and so of England which passed with such vulgar credit in France that Du Tillet mistooke Iohn Duke of Somerset Father of Margaret Countesse of Richmond for the true and lawfull Sonne of Iohn de Gaunt c. by his first Wife Blanch Plantagenet Daughter and Heire of the Earle and Earledome of Lancaster Philip de Comines Lord of Argent had better intelligence of his Pedigree and Title which he gives us thus Iln ' avoit croix ny pile ne null droit Come je croy a la Coronne d'Angleterre And this expresses he had no great opinion of either though he were then King when this was writ But let us suppose him lawfully from that Duke of Lancaster his claime must stand excluded whilst the house of Yorke survived for Richard Plantagenet Duke of Yorke and King of England designat by Act of Parliament holden 39 yeare of King Henry the sixt to whom these Titles of Prince of Wales Duke of Cornwall Earle of Chester and Protector of England were given by the three Estates in that Parliament descended from the Daughter and Heire of the second Sonne of King Edward the third For as before so still I leave the Infant William of Hatfield without the Catalogue and King Henry the fourth and his Progeny descended from the third Sonne and King Henry the sixt being the best of the house of Lancaster then living did acknowledge in that Parliament the Title of Richard Duke of Yorke the onely lawfull and just Title so consequently next and better then that of Lancaster or any other and before any Beaufort or their Heires the Issue of the two daughters of Iohn Duke of Lancaster Philip and Katherine married to the King of Portugall and Castile were to be preferr'd if Forraigne Titles be not excluded by Parliament But the Earle of Richmond measuring his owne height by the advantage of a tumultuary and indisposed time and finding his Lancastrian pretence began to have a popular retinew he was now incompatible of any others precedency and propinquity for those great ones that led him by the hand unto the Action layd the line by their owne corrupted hopes and feares of the successe therefore would not let the fortune of their expectation faint in him Bishop Morton steered much in the course of their Affaires and was a great Oracle to the Earle who was noted too partiall and credulous especially where he believed the persons of any honesty vertue or learning for which his fame yet beares some staines of Morton Dudley Empson Bray Vrswike Knevett c. for there be two extreames observed in the Councells of Princes one when the Prince is subject to follow the councells of evill men the other when the Prince is too opinionated to consult with Counsell such an one as was Charles the hardy Duke of Burgundy so opinionated and overweening of his owne wisedome and judgement that he under-thought all mens else which wide conceit of his hath left this Monument Carolus pugnax altorum consilia rationes ne dicam sequi uix audire volebat ignominiae loco habens ab alijs discere judicavit
nor by Reason Honour or Policy that this crime could be his though many to the contrary for he not onely preserved his Nephew the young Earle of Warwicke but in his confidence a speciall note of his magnanimity gave him libertie pleasure and the command of a Statly house of his owne Now if he had beene so Ambitious and bloudy he would have provided otherwise for him knowing his Title was to take place if his bloud had not beene attainted in his Father in regard whereof King Richard when his owne Sonne was dead caused his Nephew Iohn de la Poole Eldest Sonne of the Duke of Suffolke and of the Dutches his sister then the next lawfull heir to the Crowne to be proclaimed heir apparant an Argument of respect to his kindred next title to the Crowne in whomsoever it was which other men regarded not so much as the unhappy Sequel shewed there was an impious necessitie in that for whilst the Prince of Yorke survived Especially the males no other titular Lord or pretender could be King by his owne right or by colour of right nor by any other meanes unlesse he had married a daughter and the Eldest Daughter of King Edward the Fourth And although the deathes manner of taking away these Princes the Sonnes of King Edward is held by our writers uncertaine and obscure It is manifest at least for the generall manner of their death to be either by the Publicke sword that is the sword of Justice or of Battaile as were King Richard the Children of the Duke of Clarence and the Duke of Suffolke c or by the private sword that is by secret and close slights treachery which the Romans called Insidiae dolus by Smothering Strangling Poyson Sorcery c. And that the sword was used against the family of Yorke there is more then conjecture both by Testimonies of writers and records King Edward himselfe as Credible Authors report dyed of poyson In the Parliament Anno. 1. Richardi tertij there was aâ—cused and attainted of sorcerie and such other devilish practices Doctor Lewis Doctor Morton William Knevitt of Buckin gham the Countesse of Richmont Thomas Nandick of Cambridge Conjurer with others There was also an Earle accused of the same hellish Art and an old Manuscript Booke which I have seene sayes that Doctor Morton and a certaine Countesse contriveing the death of King Edward and others resolv'd it by poyson Which are conjectures and proofes more positive and strong against them then any they have against King Richard but it was a great neglect in their malice makeing King Richard soe politick and treacherous as they did not to charge him also with these Princes Sisters For it could not serve his turne to rid away the Brothers and not them who were capable of the Crowne and had their turne royall before any Collaterall males Then he had the children of his elder Brother George Duke of Clarence Edward Plantagent Earl of Warwick the Lady Margaret his sister after countesse of Salisbury to make away for they without their Fathers corruption of bloud which might easily have beene salved by Parliament the Lords and Commons affecting them had a Priority of bloud and precedency of Title before the Protector I would aske the reason too why King Richard might not endure his Nephewes being by Parliament held and adjudged illegitimate as well as the Kings Henry 7. and Henry the eight endured Arthur Plantagenet the Bastard of the same King Edward their natales and cases being alike or why Sir Thomas Moore and Doctor Morton should in one place say it was held in doubt when or how they were made away and in another place to averr that Tiroll and Dighton being examined confessed plainely the murder of them and all the manner of it These be contraries which with a great disadvantage drawes their allegation into another argument Bicorne or Crocodilites For in revealing the confession of these men it is implicatively granted their fault was not then to be punished and soe it appeares no fault or not worth the consideration the confession of a man being the greatest evidence can be produced against him Then in regard the confession of those was such as might not be opened nor the crime called in question as the same Authors acknowledge it was but a fained confession and they had done better not to have mentioned such a thing which begot but a jealousie in the falsitie thereof or privity of some great ones in it a just imputation of injustice upon the Magistracy For if Dighâ—on Tirroll Forrest and Slater confesse the murder in Act and manner King Richard being dead who was said to subborne and protect them necessarily and in due course of justice especially in the Act of so high a nature and notice as this was The punishment should have beene expected with all extremity But being for some unknowne causes deferred and after a while quite omitted and pardoned it may be thought such strange Clemency and impunitie proceeded from a singular high indulgence or else those examinations and confessions werebut Buzes and quaint devises to amaze the people and entertaine them with expectation of a justice to be done in some more convenient time which was never This was after the death of King Richard All that was done before was to make him the Author of that horrible crime and no bodie else For Dighton and the rest were in security and liberty yet it stood in good steed with the Lancastrians to draw the peoples hate upon King Richard not unlike that story of great Alexander and a noble man in his Court who stood so high in the favour of his Nobles and people that the King grew jealous and fearefull of his Popularity studying how he might decline it and him to contempt but could finde no colour or apt occasion because he was soe strongly fixt in the peoples likeing and was a man of so great a desert that noe crime could bee charged upon him The King unbosoming himselfe to the councell and care of a friend one Medius of his Country as I thinke had this advise Sir quoth hee let not this mans greatnesse trouble you cause him to be accused of some hainous crime though falsly and wee will finde meanes to make him guiltie so formally and firmely that the brand of it shall sticke up on him ever which he delivered in these termes though divers yet the same in effect Medeatur licet vulueri qui morsus aut dilaniatus est remanebit tamen Cicatrix And it is truely approved by an Antient Christian Poet thus Paulum distare videntur Suspecti verèque rei The guilty and suspected Innocent In mans opinion are little different For there is no more dangerous or fatall destiny to greatenesse then to be intangled in the multitudes contempt Odium et Contempt us being the two evills that overthrow Kings and Kingdomes the one that is Contempt
Elizabeth Wiatt alias Lucy Iane Shore the Lady Elianor Talbot And it is worth the remembring in the Concourse of such matters as these there was another fair Creature so dear unto him that his too much Affection begat Suspition of which he gave her a kinde expression by a quaint device sent unto her in a rich Jewel fashioned much after the manner of the trivial Hierogliffs used in France and called Rebus de Picardy The device was A Faulcon encompassed with a Fetter-lock The Mott Au Faulcon Serrure The Caution lying in the ambiguity and double sense of Faulcon which being whole and proper signifieth a Hawk but divided hath an obscene signification and so Faulcon becometh an aequivoque The King afterward was so affected with this device that he would have it carved and painted in many of his Royal works yet to be seen at Fotheringhay and elsewhere Yet although the Kings Jealousie was thus particular to her his Affection was as general to others being a frank Gaâ—ester and he that would cast at all fairly set Above all for a time he was much speld with Elianor Talbot daughter of Iohn Talbot Earl of Shrewsbury called in the Act of Parliament 1 Rich. 3 The old Earl of Shrewsbury her mother was the Lady Katherine Stafford daughter of Humphrey Stafford Duke of Buckingham and she the widow of Thomas Lord Butler Baron of Sudesley Her beauty and sweetnesse of disposition drew his desire so vehemently and with such respect that he was suddenly Contracted and after Married by Doctor Thomas Stillington Bishop of Bath Councellor of State one much favoured by the King and often employed by him in great Affairs This is witnessed by our English Writers and veritable Philip de Comines in these words Le Evesque de Bath lequel avoit este Conseillier du Roy Edward disoit que le dit Roy avoit promis foy de Mariage a une Dame de Angleterre qu'il avoit nommè que le Roy avoit fait la promise entre les mains dudict Euesque dit aussi c'est Euesque qu'il avoit apres espousè n'y avoit que luy ceux deux In English thus The Bishop of Bath a Privie Councellor of King Edward said That the King had plighted his faith to marry a Lady of England whom the Bishop named the Lady Elianor Talbot and that this Contract was made in the hands of the Bishop who said that afterwards he married them no persons being present but they twain and he the King charging him strictly not to reveal it Which Contract and Marriage are related in the Act of Parliament aforesaid where it is disertly called a former Marriage and the King had a childe by her But where desires are unlawful they will be unlimited We are ever young enough to sin never old enough to repent never constant never satisfied in our neerest desires Though to morrow shew us the sting of to day the third shall betray us again and we are taken like children in a shop of trinkets by the eye liking all things from one to another until pleasure dull pleasure and we grow weary of them As in the dotages of this King who had now received others into the bosome of his fancy especially the fame which was then in every Courtiers ear and mouth of an excellent Lady in the Court of France with the Queen Chareltts wife of King Lewis 11 and sister to this Lady whose name was Bona the daughter of Lewis Duke of Savoy And so suddenly and strongly had he taken fire and apprehension of her report the bent of his affection being meerly wanton to every new object thinking Love a cold Composition without the priviledge of Variety that he straight falls into terms of engagement and capitulation of Marriage to which purpose the great and renowned Richard Nevil Earl of Warwick and Salisbury and Captain of Calais then in the esteem of his best and most trusty friend had a Commission of Treaty and with all speed was sent Ambassadour into France who with all honour and magnificence to his wish effects it with the more noble and easie dispatch the Earl of Warwick being a man eminent thorow all the parts of Europe for his Valour Wisedom and Heroical vertues Expecting a welcome at his return answerable to the period of his employment but findes an alteration not onely of the Kings affection but of his countenance for in the interim he had in an instant or particle of time as it were wooed and wedded the Lady Elizabeth Gray Relict of Sir Iohn Gray daughter of Sir Richard Woodville and of Iaquetta sometime Dutchesse of Bedford and daughter of the Earl of St. Poole Her husband was one Gray a Knight of Grooby who became a very vehement Lancastrian revolting from the House of York and therefore the more hateful to those of that Family and the well-wishers thereof so to the Earl of Warwick He was slain at the Battel of St Albans Of whom and of this Lady his wife as of this Marriage Philip de Comines relates something which I shall leave to the interpretation of the better knowing and desire not to understand it in the words Or de puis le dict Roy Eduart espousè la fille d'un Châ—vallier de Angleterre femme veufue qui avoit deux filz aussi per Amorrettes But neither the despised state of widowhood nor the meannesse of her quality and condition the earnest disswasion of the Dutchesse his mother and best friends could make him withdraw his affection so deeply and obstinately he was surprised with her beauty yet if he could have enjoyed his longings otherwise he haâ— not married her But she was of so pregnant and reserved a wit seconded by the caution and counsel of the Dutchesse her mother that his highest temptations and sweetest batteries could not win upon her protesting never to yeeld to any dishonorable parley or unchaste motion although it might warrant the safeâ—y of her life and humbly implored his Grace not to think her so exorbitantly and vainly ambitious to wish her self a Queen or to have the hope and presumption to be any thing higher then what she was His poor and humble vassal nor was she of so lowe and lost a minde as to violate her Chastity or be a Concubine to the greatest King When the King perceived there was no other remedy but that he must shift his sail to that scantling of winde he complies with her and protests it was his desire and â—uit to marry her notwithstanding her inequality for in his esteem her love her beauty and her vertue made her Fortunes and Dowry great and high enough for any King Nor did he defer it any longer then there was necessity but marry her he did and with such dispatch that he stayed not for the advice of any either Councellor Kinsman or other whatsoever Nay his speed admitted not the approved Ceremony of the
masculine line from Edmond Plantagenet alias de Langley the first Duke of Yorke and the fourth Sonne of King Edward the third who was the most renowned and glorious Progenitor to those Princes of Yorke and Lancaster and the first King in a Lineall descent from that great Henry sirnamed Plantagenet famous for his great Prowesse and many victories King of England in the right of his Mother the Empresse Matilâ—â— or Maud daughter and heire of King Henry the first and stiled Anglâ—rum Domina sometime wife of the Emperour Henry the fifth by which he was also sirnamed filius imperatricis The French men called him Henry du Court Manteaâ— or Court Mantle because he wore a cloake shorter then the fashion was in those times By his Father Galfride or Geoffry Plantagenet he was Earle or Duke of Anjou for then Dux Comes and Ducatus Comitatus were Synonomies promiscuous words he was also Earle of Maine of Torraine and hereditary Seneschall or High Steward of France and by his marriage of Elianor Queene of France Repudiate Daughter and heire of William Duke of Gascoigne and of Guiene and Earle of Poictou He was Duke and Earle of those Principalities and Signiories also by the Empresse his Mother Duke of Normandy He was Lord of Ireland by Conquest and confirmed by Pope Adrian But these were not all his Seigniories and Dominions for after he was King of England he extended his Empire and Principate in the South to the Pyrerean mountaines The Confines of Spaine and France in the North to the Isles of Orkney and in the East and West with the Ocean as Giraldus Cambrensis Gâ—l Neubrigensis Ioannes Sarisburiensis grave and credible Authors affirme who stiled him Regum Britanniae maximus and doubtlesse he was the greatest King of Brittaine since King Arthur But it is controverted amongst the Antiquaries and Heralds which Earle of Anjou first bare the sirname and Sobriquet of Plantagenest or Plantagenet after the vulgar Orthodoxe by what occasion and for what cause it was taken and borne and from what time and age it had beginning Some would have the forenamed Geoffry Plantagenet Father of this Henry the first Earle of Anjou which bare it But we shall finde stronger reasons to derive it from a much more ancient Earle of Anjou and better causes then can be found in him if we step but a little backe to their stories and compare the men and their times Geoffry Plantagenet being a man of a gallant and active fire disposed to the Courts of Princes to Justs Turnaments c. and to the Courtship of faire Ladies those of the highest ranke and had so amorous a Star That Philippe le Grosse K. of France suspected him for too familiar commerce with his bed But it was of better influence when he archieved and married the Empresse Matilda by which we may very well calculate he neither had nor would be intent or at leisure for such a mortified and perilous Pilgrimage to Jerusalem But if we would know the man let us looke upon the first Fulke Earle of Anjou who lived about an hundred yeares before the Norman Conquest of England and was Sonne of Godefray or Geoffry Grisegonell the first Earle of Anjou according to du Haillon Ancestor and Progenitor to the foresaid Geoffry Plantagenet some seven or eight degrees in the ascending Line as Paradin accounteth a man raised upon the foundation of a great courage and strength two of the best Principles when they have good seconds and make too a glorious man where they serve his vertues not affections as in this Prince they did whose disposition on the other side being let out into as vaste an ambition and covetousnesse ne're looked upon the unlawfulnesse of his desires how horrid soever which amongst the many rest run him upon the shelves of wilfull perjury and murder the one for defrauding spoiling a Church of certaine Rights and the other for contriving the Tragedy of his young Nephew Drogâ— Earle of Brittaine to make himselfe Lord of his Countrey and Principallity The secret checke and scourge of those crimes had a long time to worke upon his conscience and of a great sinner made a great Penitent being old and having much solitary time and many heavy thoughts which naturally accompany old age and suggest better considerations of our former and youthfull sinnes he opens the horrour of them and his afflicted mind to his Confessor as great Constantine to AEgyppus who enjoyned him to make the same confession before the holy Sepulcher at Jerusalem which Pilgrimage the Earle performed in all lowly and contemptible manner passing as a private and unworthy person without traine or followers save two of his meanest which he tooke rather for witnesses then servants whose service was when they came neare Jerusalem the one with a cord such as is used for the strangling of Criminals thrown about his Masters neck to draw or leade him to the holy sepulcher whilst the other did acoustré and strip him as a condemned person and with extremity scourge him untill he was prostrate before the sacred Monument where he gave evidence of his unfained contrition and sorrow Amongst other devout expressions uttering this Mon dieu Signeur recâ—y a Pardon le perjure homicide miserable Foulque And after this pilgrimage he lived many years of prosperity in his Country honoured of all men To justifie this there be many Examples of other Princes and Noble Persons who lived about the yeare of our Lord one thousand and somewhat before and in three or foure ages after who under went the like Pilgrimages imposed under base and mechanicke nick-names and persons as of a Carpenter a Smith a Fisher-man a Mariner a Shepheard a Woodman a Broome-man c. In my Inquiry after that of Plantagenet I met with an ancient Manuscript that afforded me a large Catalogue of many such by the French called Sobriquets from whence I have transcribed these few for a taste Sobriquets Berger Shepheard GrisegoÌ„nelle gray-coat Teste de Estoupe Head of towe Arbuste A Shrub Martell A Hammer Grande boeuf Ox-face LaZouch Branch upon a Stem Houlette a sheep-hook Hapkin Hatchet Chapelle Hood Sans-terre Lackland Malduit Ill taught Geffard Ieuvencas or Heyfer Filz de Fleau Son of a Flaile Plantagenest the Plant or stalk of a Broome And under the name and habit of a Broome-man our Pilgrim performed this Penance and tooke the Sobriquet of Plantagenest from wearing a stalke of Broome or plant of Genest this is generally received but the time and reason neither set downe nor rendred by any of our Heralds and Antiquaries French or English for the time when he performed this I observe it about the yeare of our Lord one thousand certainly But for the particular relation this Count had to chuse the genest plant or Broome stalke before any other vegitall or thing I shall lay downe that opinion which is mine owne
noting for a circumstance by the way that the Broome in Hieroglyphicall Learning is the Symbole of humility and the Poets particularly Virgil the best of Poets give it the Epithet of humilis humilis genista and the Etymologists derive it from genu the knee the part most applyed and as it were dedicate to the chiefe Act of Reverence kneeling to which the naturall Philosophers say there is so mutuall a correspondency and so naturall a sympathy between genu and genâ—sta that of all other plants or vegitals it is most comfortable and medicinable to the paines and diseases of the knees Pliny a great Master amongst them saith Genista tuscae cum c. genua dolentia sanat But the considerable reason is as I conceive it from the use he was constrained to make of the twigges of Broome when he came to be scourged at Jerusalem the place necessitating the use of them to that purpose being as Strabo relates a stony sandy and barren soyle only naturall and gratefull to the genest as the watry and moist to the Birch Willow and Withy of which there could be none there for that reason And from hence it must most conjecturally take the beginning of that Honour which afterward his Princely and Noble Posteries continued for their sirname who became Dukes Princes in sundry places and some of them Kings of England France Scotland and Ireland and as the pious people of that Age verily beleeved by their observation were the more prosperous and happy for his sake For the continuance of the Name some who pretend to see further and better in the darke then others as cleare sighted would have it taken of late time and not used by the Kings and Princes of England of the Angeume race But there are many proofes to be adduced against them Let us looke into Master Brookes genealogies of England we shall find nothing more obvious and frequent in the deductions of those Princes of the House of Anjou then the addition and sirname of Plantagenet Edm. Plantagenet Geo. Plantagenet Iohn Plantagenet Edward Plantagenet Lyonell Plantagenet Humphry Plantagenet c. In the French Historians and Antiquaries Ion de Tillet Girard du Haillon Clande Paradin Iean Baron de la Hay we shall often meet with Geoffry Plantagenet Arthur Plantagenet Richard Plantagenet and diverse the like all of the first Age when the Angeume Princes first became English and some before Master Camden also in his Immortall Pâ—â—tannia mentioneth some very ancient as Richard Plantagenet Iohn Plantagenet c. And witnesseth that the forenamed Geoffry Plantagenet used to weare a Broome-stalke in his Bonnet as many Nobles of the House of Anjou did and tooke it for their chiefe sirname It might be added that these Earles of Anjou were descended out of the great house of Saxon in Germany which hath brought forth many Kings Emperors and Dukes and that they were of kindred and alliance to the ancient Kings of France and sundry other Princes But I will close here for the high Nobility of King Richard as the good old Poet did for another Heroicall Person Deus est utroque parente Ovid. And come to the other matters of his private story And first for his Birth and native place which was the Castle of Fotheringay or as some write the Castle of Birkhamsteed both Castles and Honours of the Duke his Father about the yeare of our Lord 1450 which I discover by the calculation of the Birth Raigne and death of King Edward his brother who was borne about 1441 or 1442. and raigned two and twenty yeares dyed at the age of one and forty Anno 1483. The Dutchesse of Yorke their Mother had five children betwixt them so that Richard could not be lesse then seven or eight yeares younger then King Edward and he survived him not fully three yeares This Richard Plantagenet and the other children of Richard Duke of Yorke were brought up in York-shire and Northampton-shire but lived for the most part in the Castle of Midelham in York-shire untill the Duke their Father and his Sonne Edmund Plantagenet Earle of Rutland were slaine in the battell of Wakefield Anno Dom. 1641 upon which the Dutchesse of Yorke their Mother having cause to feare the faction of Lancaster which was now growne very exulting and strong and of a mortall enmity to the House af Yorke secretly conveyed her two younger sonnes George and Richard Plantagenet who was then about some ten yeares old into the Low-Countries to their Aunt the Lady Margaret Dutchesse of Burgundy Wife of Charles Duke of Burgundy and Brabant and Earle of Flanders They continued at Utrich the chiefe City then in Holland where they had Princely and liberall education untill Edward Earle of March their eldest Brother had revenged his Fathers death and taken the Kingdome and Crowne as his right from Henry the sixth when he called home his two Brothers and enters them into the practise of Armes to season their forwardnesse and honour of Knighthood which he had bestowed upon them and soone after invests George into the Dutchy of Clarence and Earledome of Richmond which Earledome he the rather bestowed upon him to darken the young Earle of Richmond Henry Teudor Richard had the Dukedome of Glocester and Earledome of Carlile as I have read in an old Manuscript story which Creation the Heralds doe not allow But whether he were Comes thereof after the ancient Roman understanding that is Governour or Comes or Count after the common taking it by us English or others that is for a speciall Titular Lord I will not take upon me to determine but affirme I have read him Comes Carliolensis And after the great Earle of Warwicke and Salisbury Richard de Neville was reconciled to the Kings favour George Duke of Clarence was married to the Lady Isabell or Elizabeth the elder Daughter of that Earle and Richard Duke of Glocester to the Lady Anne which Ladies by their Mother the Lady Anne de Beauchamp Daughter and heire of Sir Richard de Beauchamp Earle of Warwicke were heires of that Earledome But Anne although the younger sister was the better woman having been a little before married to Edward Plantagenet Prince of Wales and Duke of Cornwall only Sonne of King Henry the sixth and was now his Princesse and Dowager by whom Duke Richard had a sonne called Edward created Prince of Wales when his Father came to the Crowne The imployment of this Duke was for the most part in the North as the Countrey of his birth so more naturally affected by him according to the Poet Natale solum dulcedine cunctos mulcet Ovid. And there lay his Appanage and Patrimony with a great Estate of the Dutchesse his Wife of which the Signiory of Penrith vulgò Perith in Cumberland was part where he much resided and built or repaired most of the Castles all that Northerne side generally honouring and affecting his Deportment being magnificent
to apply Sir Thomas Moore something above his ability which he exprest most in his hospitality And surely if men are taken to the life best from their actions we shall find him in the circle of a Character not so commaculate and mixt as passionate and purblinde pens have dasht it whilst we squint not at those vertues in him which make up other Princes absolute His wisedome and courage had not then their nicknames and calumny as now but drew the eyes and acknowledgment of the whole Kingdome towards him and his brother had a sound experience of his fidelity and constancy in divers hazardous congresses and battels through which he had faithfully followed his fortune and return'd all his undertakings successefull as at Barnet where he entred so farre and boldly into the Enemies Army that two of his Esquires Thomas Parr and Iohn Milwater being nearest to him were slaine yet by his owne valour he quit himselfe and put most part of the Enemies to flight the rest to the sword With the like valour he behaved himselfe at the battell of Exon Doncaster St Albans Blore-heath Northampton Mortimers Crosse and Tewkesbury And it was then confest a very considerable service to the State his taking of the famous Pyrate Thomas Nevill alias Faulkonbridge Earle of Kent with whom complyed Sir Richard de Nevill Earle of Warwicke a neare kinsman to the Earle of Kent his naturall Father which â—â—â—d him up in the better esteeme and whetted him to any Attempt â—or this haughty Earle who had drawne him from the House of Yorke to which he had done valiant service not long before to the party of Henry 6. and his Lancastrian faction and fearing what forces and aid King Edward might have from beyond Sea provides a warlike Fleet for the narrow Seas of which this Faulconbridge was appointed Admirall with Commission to take or sinke all Ships he met either of the Kings friends or Subjects who did not under act it but made many depredations on the Coasts and put many to the Sword becoming an Enemy the more considerable King Edward finding as the case stood then with him his Attemps by Sea would be of too weake a proofe to surprise him which the Duke of Gloucester contrived by an advertisement he had of his private stealth into severall of the parts sometimes where he had recourse to some abetters of that Faction and comming too shore at Southampton by a ready Ambush seized and apprehended him from whence he was conveyed to London so to Middleham Castle and after he had told some Tales put to death And whilst he continued in the Northern parts he governed those Countries with great Wisdome and Justice preserving the Concord and Amity betweene the Scots and English though the breaches were not to be made up with any strength and continuance the borders living out of mutuall spoyles and common Rapines ever prompt for any cause that might beget braules and seâ—ds And in the last yeare of the Reigne of the King his brother the Quarrels grew so outragious and hostile that nothing could compose them but the Sword and open War arising from an unjust detaining the Tribute King Iames was yearly bound to pay as Polidore thus writeth King Edward tooke it very ill at the hands of Iames fourth King of Scotland that he refused to pay the Tribute whereunto he was bound by Convenant And therefore resolved by Armes to compell him to it But King Edward being distracted with a jealous care and watching of France neglected that businesse of Scotland and in the meane time Alexander Duke of Albany Brother to King Iames pretending earnest businesse in France makes England in his way and instigates King Edward to put on Armes against his Brother promising to returne shortly out of France and raise a power in Scotland for his aide Hereupon the King resolved it and sent the Duke of Glocester with a good Armie into Scotland who marched master of the field neare to Barwicke having a little before sent thither Thomas Stanley to besiege it and soone after tooke it himselfe But the Duke of Albany failed him and had underhand strooke up a peace with his Brother of Scotland yet Richard of Gloucester accomplished the expedition very honourably and happily Thus Polidore But to enlarge what he reporteth desertively and abridgeth King Edward notwithstanding that negligence noted by him levied strong forces the King of Scotland being as vigilant in that businesse and made the Duke of Glocester his Generall under whom went Sir Henry Peircy Earle of Northumberland the Lord Stanley after Earle of Derby the Lord Lovell the Lord Gray of Grestocke the Lord Scroope of Bolton the Lord Fitzhugh Sir William Parre of Rose a noble and valiant Gentleman Father of the Lord Parr of Rose Kendall and Fitzhugh and Grandfather to Sir William Parr Earle of Essex and Marquesse of Northampton Sir Edward Woodville Lord Rivers Brother to the Queene Elizabeth with many other of Eminency and Noble quality The Duke marched first with his Armie to the borders and frontieres of Scotland giving the overthrow to such as resisted then made up to the strong Towne of Barwicke which at that instant the King of Scotland possessed by the surrender of Henry 6 and had the like successe with those Troopes of the Enemies he met and found about the Towne After a short siege the besieged upon Summons and Parlee finding themselves too weake to make good the opposition were easily perswaded to be at quiet and safely rendring the Towne and Castle vpon very slender conditions as is recorded in the Chronicle of Croyland Having plac't a Governour and Garrison in the Towne he continued his march towards Edenborough with a purpose to besiege and sacke it but was met in the halfe way by Embassadours from thence who after a favourable audience and accesse craved in the name of their King and Nation implore a League or at least a Truce betweene the Kingdomes offering so faire conditions for it that the Generall after a deliberate consultation granted to suspend or intermit all hostile proceedings with a faire entertainement to their persons and a publike Edict throughout the Army that no English should offer any violence or offence to any Scot or their goods and by this provident truce that ruddy storme which seemed terrible to impend was diverted and made a calme preface to the famous League afterward concluded by him when he was K. and Iames the 4 th of Scotland But whilst these imployments staid him there newes arrived of King Edwards death and was muttered very doubtfully by some who had confidence and ground to suppose it hastened by treachery The Nobles at London and in the South parts speedily call the Duke home by their private letters and free approbation to assume the Protection of the Kingdome and two Princes committed unto him by the King Rex Edwardus 4. filios suos Richardo Duci Glocestriae
judging by the noyse which he sought earely to prevent For Phillip Comines reports When he first came to know this Earle he was then a Prisoner in Brittaine and told him he had beene either in Prison or under strict command from five yeares old which is not unlikely for I find him but young when he was committed to the custody of Sir William Herbert Lord of Ragland Castle in Montmouthshire where he continued not long for Iasper Earle of Pembrooke who was Uncle unto Him being then in France whether he had fled after the overthrow of the Lancastrians at Tewkesbury as Iohn Sâ—ow having advertisement that his Nephew was under Sir William Herberts custody with whom he had Alliance and friendship came secretly out of France into Wales and at Ragland Castle found onely the Lady Herbert her Husband being with the King in whose absence the Earle practised so cunningly with her that he got his Nephew from thence and conveighed him to his owne Castle of Pembrooke the young Earles native place presuming upon the strength of it and the peoples affection but over-weaned in his opinion and hope For so soone as the King received notice of the escape Sir William Herbert was commanded to Levie Forces and make towards them a man of a wise and valiant disposition descended from Herbertus who was Chamberlaine and Treasurer of the Kings William Rufus and Henry Beauclerke and was created Earle of Pembrooke afterward from this Noble Herbertus are descended the Herberts Earles of Pembrooke and Montgomery and many other Welâ—h Gentlemen of that Sir name and Family The two Earles being informed of his approaches and strength distrusting their owne fled by night and posted to the Port of Timby where they kept close untill a fit opportunitie offered them transportation for France intending to see the Court there where the Earle of Pembrooke had not long before received very favourable entertainment But a violent storme diverted their course and runne them upon the coasts of Little Brittaine which fell out as a sad disaster and crosse to them and their Designe for a long time after the Duke of Brittaine being no friend to it but at the Port of St. Malos they must land What successe they met with in this flight and other Noble Englishmen which followed the unluckie partie of Henry the sixt being constrained when he was overthrowne by Edward the fourth to fly will fall into our discourse hereafter there is this memoriall in the Stories of Brittaine Plusieurs du Seigneâ—rs d' Angleterre qui tenoyent la partie du Roy H. 6. sen fairent par mer hâ—rs du Royaâ—lme entr autres le Conte du Pembrooke â—aisant sauué un jeune Prince de Angleterre nommé Henry Conte du Richmont Whilst these Earles made some stay in Saint Malo to refresh themselves Francis the second Duke of Brittaine had notice of their landing who sent as speedily a Command to the Governour to arrest them both into safe custody an act as it appeared both strange and injurious being subjects to a Prince with whom the Duke had league But for a better glosse he had found a considerable clause to detaine the Earle of Richmond untill he had received satisfaction of him for usurping and holding the Title and Estate of Richmond belonging to the ancient Dukes of Brittaine whose heire and successor he was though diseised by the space of thirty yeares now he would expect either restitution or compensation for it and the better to assure himselfe he conveyes them with a good guard to the Castle of Vanes where himselfe often resided continuing a more cautious and strict eye upon the Earle of Richmond as Nephew to Henry the sixt and he that laid claime to the Title and Crowne of England by the bloud of Lancaster For which he made their imprisonment more honourable as Philip Comines saith Le Duc les traict'e doâ—cement pour Prisonniers And Iean Froisard cals it Prison Courtoise for the Duke had well considered what expectation and use he might raise by them and knew the newes could not be distastefull to the King of England whose Throne had been threatned so much by the Earle of Richmonds liberty and therefore from hence he hoped an answerable benefit and to contract the King in a firme amity and acknowledgment unto him nay which is further if we may beleeve Iac. Nyerus he thought by this occasion to beare the reines so hard upon King Edward as that he should not dare to make any breach with him propter Henricum Richmontiae Comitem non audebat Anglus ab amicitia Brittani discedere Nor was this Author much mistaken for the King would have accorded to any reasonable thing to purchase the Earle into his hands and it was no little perplexity to him when he heard of their flight but was the better calmed when he understood where they were the Duke of Brittaine being his friend and Allie in whom he supposed so neare an interest set off by some other conditions that he saw a faire encouragement to demand and gaine them both whereas had they falne into France he must have expected the greatest disadvantage could have been contrived out of such an occasion For Lewis though he were then in truce and league with him was meerly a Politician and studied only his owne ends yet feares him as a King famous for his Prowesse and Victories and as ably supplyed in his Coffers for all undertakings But which did equally quicken the hate aswell as feare of France had threatened to enter it with fire and sword for the reconquest of the Dutchy of Normandy and Aquitaine the Counties of Poictou and Turaine wherefore we may beleeve that beares the credit of an Oracle which good Ennius said Quem metâ—unt â—derunt Quem oderunt periisse expetunt And doubtlesse in his heart he was favourable to any chance that might have ruined or insested England and could have wisht the Earle of Richmond and his Title under his Protection King Edward seasonably prevented this that such attempts though at first they appeared but like the Prophets Cloud might not spread after into spacious stormes And to prevent all underhand Contracts with the Duke of Brittaine dispatcht Letters unto him further interpreted by a rich Prssent and richer promises The Duke receives both with as Honourable Complement protesting none could be more ready to doe the King of Englands Commands then he But where he treated for tâ—e delivery of the Earles he hoped to be lawfully excused being an Act would cast a staine and scandall not only upon his credit and honour but upon all Princely and hospitable Priviledges and could appeare no lesse then a meere impiety to thrust such distressed persons as fled to their protection into the Armes of their enemies and it was his opinion if any malice or violence should be acted upon them the guilt must reflect on him But that
against the Sonnes of King Edward And therefore being certaine there is no man to whom the Crowne by just Title can be so due as to our selfe the rightfull Sonne and Heire of our most deare and Princely Father Richard Duke of Yorke to which Title of blood and nature your favours have joyned this of Election wherein wee hold our selfe to be most strong and safe And having the lawfull power of both why should I endure my professed Enemy to â—surpemy right and become a Vassall to my envious Subject The necessitie of these causes as admitting no other remedy urges me to accept your offer and according to your request and our owne right we here assume the Regall Praeheminence of the two Kingdoms England and France from this day forward by us and our heires to Govern and defend the one and by Gods grace and your good aydes to recover and establish the other to the Ancient Allegeance of England desiring of God to live no longer then wee intend and endeavour the advancement and flourishing Estate of this Kingdome at which they all cry'd God save King Richard And thus he became King But yet his Detractors stick not to slander and accuse all that was said or done in these proceedings of State for meer dissimulation by which justice they may as well censure At siâ— Reverentia dictum all the Barons worthy and grave Commons which had their Votes therein which would fall a most impudent and intolerable Scandall upon all the High Court of Parliament for in short time after all that was alledged and acted in that Treatie and Colloquy was approved and ratified by the Court of Parliament so that their Cavills onely discover an extreame malice and envy For it was not possible therefore not credible he could upon such an instant as it were by any practice attaine to that power and credit with all the Barons Spirituall and Temporall and Commons to procure and perswade them from the Sonnes of King Edward so unanimously to become his Subjects and put the Crowne upon his head with such Solemnitie and publicke Ceremonies Whilst those matters had their current the Northerne Gentlemen and his Southerne Friends joyned in a Bill Supplicatory to the Lords Spirituall and Temporall earnestly expressing their desires for the Election of the Lord Protector with the former causes urged Also that the blood of the young Earle of Warwicke was attainted and his Title confiscate by Parliament This Bill was delivered to the Lords Assembled in the great hall at Westminster the Lord Protector sitting in the Chaire of Marble amongst them upon the 26 of June some six or seven dayes after he was Proclaimed the tenor of the Bill was thus written in the Chronicle of the Abbey of Croyland PRotector eodem die quo Regimen sub titulo regii nominis sibi vendicarit viz 26 o die Iunii Anno Dom. 1483. se apud Magnam Aulam Westmonasterii in Cathedram Marmoream Immisit tum mox omnibus proceribus tam Laicis quam Ecclesiasticis Caeteris assidentibus astantibus c. ostendebatur rotulus quidam in quo per modum supplicationis in nomine procerum populi Borealis exhibita sunt Primum quod silii Regis Edwardi erant Bastardi supponendo illum praecontraxisse matrimonium cum quadam Domina Elianora Boteler antequam Reginam Elizabetham duxisset in uxorem deinde quod sanguis alterius Fratris Georgii Scil Clarensiâ— ducis fuisset Attinctus Ita quod nullus certus incorruptus sanguis Linealis ex parte Richardi Ducis Eboraci poterat inveniri nisi in persona Richardi Protectoris Ducis Glocestriae jam eidem Duci suplicabant ut jus suum in Regno Angliae sibi assumeret Coronam acciperet But the Barons were all accorded before this Bill came both sides moving with an equall and contented forwardnesse And in July next following 1483. was Crown'd and receiv'd with as generall Magnificence and Acclamations as any King in England many years before For as a grave man writeth Fuit dignissimus regno c. non inter malos sed bonos principes Commemorandus That he was most worthy to Reigne and to be numbred amongst the good not bad Princes The Queene his Wife was Crowned with him and with no lesse State and Greatnesse Accompanied him from the Tower to Westminster having in their Traine besides the Nobilitie of the South parts foure thousand Gentlemen of the North. Upon the 19. of June 1483. in the 25. yeare of Lewis the French King he was named King of England the morrow Proclaimed and rode with great Solemnitie from London to Westminster where in the seat Royall he gave the Judges of the Land a strickt and religious charge for the just executing of the Lawes then departed towards the Abbey being met at the Church doore with Procession and the Scepter of King Edward delivered to him by the Abbot so Ascended to Saint Edwards Shrine where he offered the Monks in the meane time singing Te Deum From thence he return'd to the Palace where he lodged untill his Coronation Upon the fourth of July he went to the Tower by water with the Queene his Wife and the next day Created Edward his onely Son about ten yeares old Prince of Wales He Invested Sir Iohn Howard who was made Lord Howard and Knight of the Garter 17. Edward 4. in the Dukedome of Norffolke in a favourable admission of the right of the Lady Margaret his Mother Daughter of Sir Thomas Mowbray Duke of Norffolke and an heire generall of the Mowbrayes Dukes of Norffolke and Earles of Surrey descended from the Lord Tho. Plantagenet of Brotherton a younger Sonne of King Edward the first and Earle of Norffolke This King also made him Marshall and Admirall of England he was as rightfully Lord Mowbray Lord Segrave Lord Bruce as Lord Howard as I have seene him Stiled by Royall Warrant in a Commission for Treatie of Truce with Scotland His eldest Sonne Sir Thomas Howard was at the same time Created Earle of Surrey and made Knight of the Garter Henry Stafford Duke of Buckingham was made Constable of England for terme of life but he claimed the Office by inheritance Sir Thomas Moore writes That Sir Thomas Howard Executed the Office of Constable that day William Lord Berkley was Created Earle of Nottingham Francis Lovel Viscount Lovel and Chamberlain to the King the Lord Stanley restor'd to liberty and made Steward of the Household Thomas Rotheram Chancellour and Arch-Bishop of Canterbury having beene committed for delivering the Great Seale to the Queene Widow receiv'd to grace and many Knights Addubbed of the old Order and some of the new or habit of the Bath whose names I have set downe to shew what regard was had of their Family and in those times accused of so much Malignity Sir Edward De-la-Poole Sonne to the Duke of Norfolke George Gray Sonne to the Earle of Kent William Souch Sonne to the
Lord Souch Henry Nevil Sonne to the Lord Abergaveny Christopher Willowby Henry Bainton Thomas Bullen William Say William Enderby Thomas of Vernon William Barkley Thomas Arundel Gervoise of Clifton Edmond Beddingfield Tho. Leukenor Iohn Browne William Berkley i. Another Berkley The fift day of July he rode from the Tower through the City in Pompe with his Sonne the Prince of Wales three Dukes and nine Earles twentie two Viscounts and simple Barons eighty Knights Esquires and Gentlemen not to be numbred besides great Officers of the Crowne which had speciall service to doe But the Duke of Buckingham carried the Splendour of that dayes Bravery his habit and Caparisons of blew Velvet imbroidered with golden Naves of Carts burning the trappings supported by Foot-men habited costly and sutable On the morrow being the sixt of July all the Prelates Miter'd in their Pontificalibus receiv'd him at Westminster-Hall towards the Chappell the Bishop of Rochester bare the Crosse before him the Cardinall and the Earle of Huntington followed with a pair of guilt Spurres and the Earle of Bedford with Saint Edwards Staffe for a Relique After the Precession the Earle of Northumberland beares a poyntlesse Sword naked the Lord Stanley the Mace of the Constableship but waited not for Constable the Earle of Kent bare the second Sword naked with a poynt upon the right hand of the King the Viscount Lovel another Sword on the Kings left hand with a poynt Next came the Duke of Suffolke with the Scepter the Earl of Lincoln with the Ball and Crosse then the Earle of Surry with the Sword of State in a rich Scabbard in place of the Constable of England the Duke of Norfolke on his right hand with the Crowne After him immediately the King in a SurCoat and Robe of Purple the Canopy borne by the Barons of the five Ports the King betweene the Bishop of Bath and Durham the Duke of Buckingham bearing up his Traine and served with a white Staffe for Seneshall or High Steward of England In the Front of the Queenes Traine the Earle of Huntington bare the Scepter Viscount Liste the Rod with the Dove the Earle of Wiltshire her Crowne and next to him followed the Queene her selfe in Robes like the King betweene two Bishops the Canopy borne by Barons of the Ports upon her head a Coronet set with precious Stones the Lady Margaret Somerset Countesse of Richmond carried up her Traine followed by the Dutchesse of Suffolke with many Countesses Baronesses and other Ladies In this manner the whole Procession passed through the Palace and entred the West doore of the Abbey the King and Queene taking their seats of State stayed untill divers holy Hymnes were sung then ascended to the high Altar shifting their Robes and putting on other open and voyded in sundry places for their Anoynting which done they tooke other Robes of Cloth of Gold so teturned to their seats where the Cardinall of Canterbury and the other Bishops Crowned them the Prelate putting the Scepter in the left hand of the King the Ball and Crosse in his right and the Queenes Scepter in her right hand and the Rod with the Dove in her left on each hand of the King stood a Duke before him the Earle of Surrey with the Sword as aforesaid on each hand of the Queene stood a Bishop by them a Lady kneeling the Cardinall said Masse and gave the Pax then the King and Queene descending were both housâ—ed with one host parted betweene them at the high Altar This done they offered at Saint Edwards Shrine where the King layd downe Saint Edwards Crowne put on another so returned to Westminster-Hal in the same State they came there dispersed and retired themselves for a season In which interim came the Duke of Norfolke Marshall of England mounted upon a brave Horse trapped with Cloth of Gold downe to the ground to submove the presse of people and void the Hall About foure of the clocke the King and Queene sat to Dinner the King at the middle Table of the Hall and the Queene on his left hand on each side a Countesse attending her holding a Cloth of Plaisance or rather of Essuyance for her Cup On the Kings right hand sate the Arch-Bishop of Canterbury and all the Ladies were placed on one side of a long Table in the middle of the hall against them at another Table the Lord Chancellour and all the Nobles at a Table next to the Cup-board the Lord Maior of London and the Aldermen Behind the Barons of the Kingdome sate the Barons of the Ports there were other Tables for persons of qualitie After all were seated came the Lord Marshall againe the Earle of Surrey Constable Pro illa vice tantum the Lord Stanley Lord Steward Sir William Hopton Treasurer of the Houshold and Sir Thomas Piercy Controler they served the Kings boord with one dish of Gold and another of Silver The Queene was served all in guilt Vessells and the Cardinall Arch-Bishop in Silver Dishes As soone as the second course was served in Sir Robert Dimock the Kings Champion makes Proclamation That whosoever would say King Richard the third was not lawfully King he would fight with him at all gutterance and for gage thereof threw downe his Gauntler then all the people cryed King Richard God save King Richard And this he acted in three severall parts of the Hall then an Officer of the Cellar brought him a guilded Bowle with Wine which he dranke and carries the Cup away as his ancient Fee After that the Heralds cryed Largesse thrice and returned to the Scaffold Lastly came the Maior of London with the Sheriffs with a Voyder serving the King and Queene with sweet Wines who had each of them a covered Cup of Gold for reward By which time the day began to give way to the night the King and Queene departing to their Lodgings And this is a briefe and true Relation of his Coronation testified by all the best Writers and Chroniclers of our Stories publicke and allowed which may confute the boldnesse of that slander that sayes he was not rightfully and Authentically Crowned but obscurely and indirectly crept in at the Window But all times have Detractors and all Courts their Parasits and many that have admired Princes to their graves even there have turn'd from them with ingratitude and murmur Soone after this the King dismissed and sent home all the Lords Spirituall and Temporall with a straight charge and direction to them the Judges of Oyer and Terminer with all other Magistrates and Officers in generall and particular for the Equitable and just Government of their Jurisdictions and Circuits And it is observed those times were under as happy an expectation of Law and Justice as those either before or after more flatter'd which Iohn Hide a Learned man and Doctor of Physick implyes in a Manuscript Poesy of his Solio juris rectique Minister Ille sedens alto tali sermone profatur Moses
concilio soceri persuasus Iethro Solus quod Populi nequijt componere lites Constituit populi praefectos atque tribunos Sic cum me praecelsa premant fastigia Regni Ardua magnarum teneatis muner a rerum Et primùm à vobis pravos secludite motus AEquis Iustitiae trutinis appendite causas Ob paupertatem miseros ne spernite cives Nec vota in cassum fundat pupillus in auras Denique largitio nè vos Corrumpat iniqua c. All things thus in a happy presage and good order the King with the Queene departed from London and makes Windsor the first gift in his Progresse for some few dayes From thence to his Mannor of Woodstock then to the Universitie of Oxford where the Muses Crown'd their browes with fragrant Wreathes for his entertainment Next he visited the circular Citie of Glocester and gave the Citizens for the love and loyaltie they exprest in holding the Castle and Towne so constantly against Queene Margaret and the forces of Henry the sixt for him and his Brother the King large Priviledges and Immunities And here the Duke of Buckingham takes his leave for Brecknock constantly disposed and affected in all outward appearance The King making small stay any where save at Coventry untill he came to the goodly and ancient Citie of Yorke the scope and goale of his Progresse which receiv'd him with all honour and Festivitie and was there the second time Crowned by Dr. Rotheram Arch-Bishop of that Sea in the Cathedrall Church and his Sonne invested in the Principalitie of Wales as the Prior of Croyland reporteth Eodem die quo Richardus Coronatus est Rex in Ecclesia Metropolitana Eboracensi mox filium Edwardum in Principatum Walliae eum insigntis virgae aureae c. evexit Pomposa sumptuosa festa convivia ibi fecit And indeed it was a day of great state for as Polidore saith There was then three Princes in Yorke wearing Crownes the King Queene and Prince In acclamation whereof there was Stage-Playes Turneaments and other Triumphall Sports as Sir Thomas Moore relates At this time the King Knighted Richard of Glocester his base sonne who was after Captaine of Calice and many Gentlemen of those parts But albeit this was an intermission as it were of all busie and serious agitations yet the King still where he travall'd had a just regard to the Administration and Execution of Justice and the more facinerous Malefactors And surely these respective inclinations of his had their solemn affections and desires Naturalized in him witnessed by the scope and integritie of those just Lawes which after followed The Progresse thus spent he returnes to London and having consulted some matters of State declares his first resolution for the Tribute detain'd by France which he had formerly by a friendly Message demanded but now sends stout menaces and threats for it The French would not have it cal'd a Tribute but a Pension as Philip de Comines insinuates though it had beene rays'd and payd to King Edward the fourth in lieu of the Dutchy and Countries of Aquitaine Normandy Poictou and Maine c. whereof the the French had deseis'd the Crowne of England which King Edward the fourth forced Lewis to acknowledge and to Covenant and agree That he his heires and Successors should pay unto the Crowne of England the summe of fiftie thousand Crowns with caution and securitie to be payd in the Citie of London or after Iean Tillet and Iohn Maierus seventy five thousand Crowns to be payd into the Tower with which the French King also granted in the name of Annuall Pension sixteen thousand pounds to some Noblemen and others of speciall credit with the King As to Sir Thomas Gray Marquesse of Dorset William Lord Hastings Chamberlaine to the King Doctor Thomas Rothram Bishop of Lincolne and Lord Chancellour of England Iohn Lord Howard Sir Iohn Cheyney Master of the Horse Sir Thomas Mountgomery Master Challoner and to the Master of the Rowles The chiefest of these had two thousand Crownes apiece per annum Besides which Pensions he gave rich Presents and sent rewards to such Lords as stood most for this accord Eugueraunt de Moustrolet avoucheth that the Lord Howard and the Master of the Horse were the chiefest of the mediators in it his reason is that they were the men most in favour with King Edward Iean Tillet with Philip de Comines tells us the Lord Howard in lesse then two yeares had the value of twentie foure thousand Crownes in Plate Coine and Jewels over and above his Annuall Pension the Lord Hastings at one time to the value of two thousand markes in Plate besides his Pension And if their owne Stories speake truth Richard de Nevil the great Earle of Warwick had of the Kings of France much more then any other English Nobleman which the Chronicle of Brittaine seconds And doubtlesse King Richard had still compel'd him to continue it had not eruptions of State and tumultuary practises fatally deterr'd his Sword For as Kings have vaster limits they have higher bounds then others If our vulgar paths be rugged theirs are slippery and all their mighty resolutions and ambitions have their fate and circle hither they must and no further yet as envious as fortune shew'd her selfe he brought King Lewis to termes of faire promises and mediation for time of payment as Comines obscurely implyes This yeare the King kept a very magnificent Christmas at Westminister and was reconciled to the Queene Dowager who left Sanctuary and to congratulate the Kings favour sent her five daughters to Court where they were received with all Princely kindnesse On the three and twentieth day of January in the first yeare of his Raigne he summon'd a Parliament to be holden at Westminster i◠which after the enacting of many good Lawes the marriages o◠King Edward were debated that with the Lady Gray adjudged unlawfull and her children illegitimate there being proofe of a former Contract and Marriage with the Lady Elianor Talbot daughter of the old Earle of Shrewsbury and Relict of the Lord Butler of Sudely then and long after living and all that had been inferred by the Duke of Buckingham or contained in the Bill supplicatory demonstrated was againe consulted and judgement given against that Marriage and incapacity of the Children also of the Earle of Warwicke and his sister the Lady Elizabeth Plantagenet all decreed and confirmed by Act of Parliament so that here to taxe so generall an Assent were to say there was not one honest nor just man in that High Court and what greater scandall to the whole Kingdome There was likewise notice taken of the Earle of Richmonds pretence to the Crowne by a Title derived from the House of Lancaster who was at that time in France labouring to engage the King and the Duke of Brittaine in the quarrell Oh the infinite windings and perplexed sleepes we labour through to get that we must bid goodnight
men by their out-sides or as boyes Poetry with a tickled faith through such wide eares and observations crept in that Parasitisme on the one side and Pride and Usurpation on the other side that made the house of Lancaster and the Beauforts alias Somersets all one which whilst the house of York flourished was held to differ as much as Royall and Feudall Soveraignty and Suzeraignty for their modestie at first was very well pleased with that of Beaufort and it seem'd honourable enough untill the children of Iohn de Beaufort the eldest Brother being Earle of Somerset assumed the name of their Fathers greatest honour and Earledome for their Sir-name and the rest following quite left the name of Beaufort and made the other Hereditary From this Iohn de Beaufort Earle of Somerset and Marquesse of Dorset descended Henry Duke of Somerset Father naturall to Charles Somerset created Earle of Worcester by King Henry the eight And it is worth the noting that this Duke Henry left the Faction of Lancaster to follow Edward the fourth The first Beauforts legitimated by the Pope and Richard the second have no other Sir-names but Beaufort in either of the instruments Apostolicall nor any words to give or emure them to any capacitie of Royall Title or state of Soveraignty in the Crown onely purged them by the Popes spirituall power from the foulenesse of Bastardy allowing them as children legitimate and lawfully born but gives them no other title then Ioanna de Beaufort miles Henricus de Beaufort Clericus Thomas de Beaufort Domicellus Ioannus de Beaufort Domicella and more the Pope cannot doe As the Doctors of Sorbone and some of the best Canonists hold who peremprorily affirme That the Pope cannot make Bastards capable to inherit the Hereditary Lands of their Father neither can give them power to Constitute Successours or Heires or hold Offices Dignities or Titles without the Princes speciall dispensation to which the Civill and Imperiall Lawes agree and is Authentick in England as a Learned and eminent Judge reports though others thinke it of too severe a nature and moderately agreeable to reason and Law the Law much observing reason That Bastards being honest and worthy men the rather if they be avowed by their Fathers may be admitted to Honours Dignities Titles Feuds and other Ornaments of rewards and vertue Of this indulgence and connivence wee have examples in England by two worthy and deserving men flourishing in this Age who though Bastards held the greatest Offices in England So Richard the second in his Charter for the legitimation of the Beauforts would have men of desert and avowed by their Fathers capable of Advancement and Honours The Tenor of which Charter and Confirmation of it by Parliament I shall exhibite as it is taken out of the Archives and Tower Records opening the way by a short advertisement That in this Act of Parliament there is an Induction to the Charter made by Doctor Edmond Stafford Brother to the Earle of Stafford and Bishop of Exeter Lord Chancellour of England in the twentieth yeare of Richard the second which intimateth that Pope Vrbanus the sixt at the earnest request of the King vouchsafed to legitimate these Beauforts the base sonnes and the daughter of the Duke of Guyen and Lancaster That the King also having power to legitimate and enable Bastards in the same kind and in as ample manner as the Emperour hath or had for so he pressed and avowed in the Act was pleased at the humble request and suit of the Duke their Father to make them not onely legitimate but also capable of Lands Heritages Titles Honours Offices Dignities c. And that the King for the more authority therof crav'd the allowance and favourable assent of the Barons in Parliament which was granted The Charter runnes thus Charta Legitimationis Spuriorum Ioannis Ducis Lancastriae RIchardus dei gratia Rex Angliae Franciae Dominus Hiberniae charissimis Consanguineis nostris Nohilibus viris Ioanni de Beaufort Militi Henrico de B. Clerico Thomae de Beaufort Domicello Nobili mulieri Ioannae Beaufort domicellae praeclarissimi patrui nostri Nobilis viri Ioannis Ducis Aquitaniae Lancastriae Germanis natis liegis nostris salutem Nos pro honore meritis c. Avunculi nostri Proprio arbitratu meritorum suorum intuitu vos quia magno probitatis ingenio ac vitae ac morum Honestate fulgetis ex regali estis prosapia propagati c. hinc est quod Ioannis c. avunculi nostri genitoris vestri precibus inclinati vobis cum ut asseritur defectum natalium patimini hujusmodi defectum ejusdem qualitates quascunque abolere praesentes vos haberi volumus pro sufficientibus ad quoscunque honores dignitatis praeeminentias status gradus officia publica privata tam perpetua quam temporalia atque Iudicialia Nobilia quibuscunque nominibus nuncupentur etiam si Ducatus Principatus Comitatus Baroniae vel alia feuda fuerint etiamsi mediate vel immediate à nobis dependeant seu teneantur praefici praemoveri eligi assumi admitti illaque recipere pro inde libere ac licite valeatis ac side legitimo thoro nati existeritis quibuscunque Statutis seu Consuetudinibus regni nostri Angliae in contrarium editis seu observatis quae hic habemus pro totaliter expressis nequa quam obstantibus de plenitudine nostrae regalis potestatis de assenssu Parliamenti nostri tenore praesentium dispensamus vosque quemlibet vestrum natalibus restituimus Legitimanus Die Feb. Anno regni 20. R. 2. Here wee find large Graces Honours and Priviledges conferred upon those Beauforts for the King calls them Consanguineos sous and not onely confirmes their Legitimation but makes them by the helpe of the Parliament capable of Baronies Earledomes Dukedomes and Principalities enableth them for all Offices publique and private temporary and perpetuall to take hold of and injoy all Feuds as well noble as other all Lands and Signiories Hereditary as lawfully firmly and rightfully as if they had beene borne in lawfull matrimony but yet conferres no Royall Title nor interest in the Crowne at the least to the observation of those who allow not the claime of the Beauforts and Somersets and say that to reach that there must be words of a higher intent words of Empire Majesty and Soveraigntie such as Regni summa potestas Corona Sceptrum Diadema Purpura Majestas and the like Neither of these nor any importing their extent being in this grant so no Title to the Crowne nor Soveraigntie could passe to them To which the other side replyes That there is a word in the Charter that comprehendeth Empire Raigne and Soveraigntie that is Principatus whereof the King and Parliament make the Beauforts capable Principatus being the State of Princeps a Title of the most absolute Soveraigne Power for the Roman Emperours
Richard pursued him with so much speed and fiercenesse that he forc't him to his Standard And now high in bloud and anger to see his Valour deluded by such a politicke Bravery with his Sword makes way and with his owne hand slew Sir Charles Brandon Standerd-Bearer thinking to have made the next blow as fatall to the Earle but the confluence of Souldiers interjecting rescued him Sir Iohn Cheney being one of the foremost whom the King stroke from his Horse to the Earth But Charged and invironed with multitudes that like a storme came on him Valiant Richard falls the Sacrifice of that day under their cruell Swords so rabious in their execution as if his body must suffer more because they could not kill his better part mangling and wounding his dead Corps whilst it lies drentcht in gore Et Lupus turpes instant morientibus ursi Et quaecunque minor nobilitate fera est As Currs in their kenells will bite and teare the skin of those beasts which in the fields they durst not barke at Occidit in bello miseranda caede Richardus Crinibus attractus dum ferro saeviat hostis And after all to compleate their barbarisme threw his body behind one upon a Jade and so conveyed it to Leicester A story to be thought incredible at least to charitable and modest eares and highly upbraided by the happier and Christian fame of William the Conquerour who severely punished a Souldier but for hacking the thigh of King Harold after he was dead though an Usurper and his perfidious enemy with all noblenesse causing the body to be delivered to his Mother for an honourable interment which was solemnly celebrated in his own Abbey at Waltham The Battle thus fought and won the Victor was Crowned in the field with that Crown K. Rich. wore which the L. Stanley put upon his head salutes him King by the stile of Hen. 7. K. of England c. And Henry Earle of Richmond Son of Edmund ap Meredith ap Teudor alias of Hadham Earle of Richmond and of Margaret Daughter and Heiâ—e of Iohn Beaufort Duke of Sommerset attained to the Crowne and had the easier ascent by the oversight and remissnesse of Richard in that Catastrophe of his Raign who gave too much opportunity and scope to the actings of his Enemies when they were under his power and arme And in the Fortune of his judgment at the closing Scene that did not better presuppose his Enemy too prudent and reserved to trust the advantage he had upon so sharpe and single an hazzard But Richard beleeving he had the odds in courage and monomachie of him which probably might make him Master of the Combate and so of the Field the straite being so desperate too resolved rather to trust to the Fate of his owne Valour then the chance of an uncertaine escape a resolution not so rash and overweening as commendable if we looke upon the very aymes and necessity of it neither is it new or improper for Princes to demand the tryall of campe fight or single Combate personaly in their Armies and to the Generals in their absence William the Conquerour challenged King Harold Before that a Combate was fought betweene Edmund Ironside and Canute the Danish King for the whole Kingdome of England our Richard the first and Edward the first in Palestine proffered the like to some of the Pagan Princes so did Edward the third Henry the fifth with the Kings of France In the last Age the valiant Prince Iaâ—es the fifth of Scotland in Person challenged Thomas Lord Howard Duke of Norfolke Generall for the King of England who accepted it But the King into his Demands would have the Country or Lands then in Controversie to be made Brabium victoris which was without the Generalls power to engage being the Inheritance of the King his Master but proffers better Lands of his owne upon the Combate which was not accepted so that concluded nothing The better end of these Challenges and Combates being at first levelled from Mercy and Piety for by this single adventure the Innocent bloud of Armies was more then stanched preserved Forraigne Stories brings this home to us and highly Characters their Kings and Generalls in the like examples which this Age draws a Curtaine before as not fit for imitation making too desperate a wound in a setled State and Succession the first who rendred that or some more Politike reason for Princes not to adventure themselves was Phi. the 2 K. of Spain as a late writer ascribeth but is mistaken For the more ancient Histories of Syria and Persia mentions some Kings that refrain'd from Warres long before as Herodotus Diodorus Trogus Pompeius tells us But let us take measure from that Times Wisedome Valour Policy c. to this and wee shall find them but tottering foundations of States which cannot uphold themselves or obvert the least Decree of God when he intends to scourge or alter kingdomes for where such vicissitudes are destin'd the Councells and faculties of men must be darkned and there will fall out all concurrences and advantages to further that purpose So in the extirpation and transferring of Families the Potter in Ieremy breaking one Jarre to make another whose fatall commutations should extimulate the pietie of our natures and make us modest censurers of their events For as wee see things but through a Cloud whilst wee measure them by accidents so wee intrude on Gods providence judging mens actions in their successe while wee over-act our owne Of such a composition was the ill-wishers of King Richard who forgot him not in his grave but indeavoured to be equally cruell to his memory And in November following a Parliament was holden in which he was attainted of High Treason a straine very high to make him guiltie of that being a King he could not commit By the same figure may others who were stiled chiefe ayders and assistants of King Richard in the Battaile of Bosworth as Sir Iohn Howard Duke of Norfolke c. though some would have him retired from the Court all King Richards raigne But Sir Thomas Moore affirmes He was constantly with him and neare his Counsells Sir Thomas Howard Earle of Surrey Sonne and heire apparent to the Duke Francis Lovel Viscount Lovel Sir Walter Devereux Lord Ferrers of Chartley Sir Iohn de la Sâ—uch Sir Robert Harrington Richard Charleton Richard Ratcliffe William Berkley William Catesby Thomas Broughton Iohn Buck Humphrey Stafford Robert Midleton Robert Brokenbury Iohn Kendall Secretary to the King Walter Hopton Ieoffry Saint-German Roger Wake Thomas Billington William Sapcoate William Brampton all Knights and some Heralds at Armes with divers other an Act of Parliament being made to disable and fore-judge them of all manner of Honour State Dignitie Also to â—orfeit all Mannors Castles Lordships Hundreds Franchises Lâ—berties Advowsons Priviledges Nominations Presentations Tenements Rents Suits Reversions Portions Annuities Pensions Rights Hereditaments
so consequent and mighty as the recovery of a Kingdome neither were the times and opportunity yet ripe or propitious to fashion such an alteration as was projected and must be produced though there was pregnant hope of an induction to a change of Government stir'd by the Kings coveteousnesse and some acts of Tyrany Greivance and Rebellions in the North and West parts not long after which lent a seasonable hand to these designes great unkindnesse fell out betwixt Charles the French King and Henry the 7. who so far provoked the French that he besieged Bulloigne with a great army by land and Sea the quarrell was of good advancement to the Dutchesse of Burgondy's Plot and brought the Duke of Yorke better acquainted with forraigne Princes and their Courts who was sent into France into Portugall and other places where he was received and entertained like a Prince In which time such of the English Nobility as were interessed in the secret and knew where this Prince resided found some opportunity to give him assistance and sent Sr. Robert Clifford and Sr. William Barley into Flanders to give him a visit and intelligence of what noble friends he had ready to serve him though their more particular errant was to take a strict observance of him and such private marks as hee had bin knowne by from his Cradle there had beene some counterfeits incouraged to take upon them the persons of Edward E. of Warwick and Richard Duke of Yorke But here the certainty of their knowledge found him they looked for by his Face Countenance Lineaments and all tokens familiarly and privately knowne to them observing his behaviour naturaliz'd and heightned with a Princely grace and in his discourse able to give them a ready accompt of many passages he had heard or seene whilst hee was in England with such things as had beene done and discourst very privately speaking English very perfectly and better then the Dutch or Wallonish by which Sr. Kobert Clifford and the rest found themselves so well satisfied and were so confirm'd That they wrot to the Lord Fitzwater to Sir Symon Mountford and others who had a good opinion towards him the full accompt of what they had observ'd ex certa scientia supra visum corporis About this time to intermix the Scene with more variety and fill the Stage some principall persons well affecting the E. of Warwick and hoping to get him forth of the Tower in purpose to make him King had inticed a handsome young fellow one Lambert Simonell of Lancashire bred in the University of Oxford to become his counterfeit and so instructed him in the royall Genealogy that hee was able to say as hee was taught maintained and abetted cheifly by the Viscount Lovell the E. of Lincolne Sir Thomas Broughton and Sir Symon Preist c. who being presented to the Duke and Dutchesse of Burgondy and by them honorably entertained drew to him in Flanders one Martin Swartz a Captaine of a very eminent fame and some forces with which hee made over into Ireland where they received him as Edward Earle of Warwick as hee was of many here at home and when the deceit was discovered the excuse was those Lords but used this counterfet of the Earle for a Colour whilst they could get him out of the Tower to make him King But the vaile is easily taken from the face of such impostors examples giving us light in many for though some men may all cannot be deceived so Speudo-Agrippa in the time of Tiberius was soone found to bee Clemens the servant of Agrippa though very like to him and Puesdo-Nero in Otho's time who tooke upon him to be Nero revived was quickly unmasked Valerius Paterculus telleth of a certaine ambitious counterfet in Macedonia who called himselfe Philip and would be reputed the next heire of the Crowne but was discovered and nicknamed Pesudo-Philippus Also in the Raigne of Commodus one pretended to be Sextus Claudianus the son of Maximus with many such that are obvious in old stories and many of the like stampe have beene here convicted in England which bred the greater jealousy of this Richard when hee came first to be heard of Though those jealosies proceeded not from the detection of any fraud in him but of the late imposture of the said Lambert the Shooemakers son and the abuse of the Complotters for the Kingdome having been abused with those Pseudo-Clarences had reason to bee doubtfull of every unknowne person which assumed the name of greatnesse in regard whereof many shrunke in their opinions from this Perkin or Richard many others suspecting their beliefe were very curious to inform themselves who the further they inquired were the more confirmed that hee was no other but the second son of Edward the Fourth against whom those of the harder credulity objected it as an impossibility that this young Duke could bee conveyed out of the Tower so long and so concealed which the wiser sort could easily answer by many ancient examples which give us divers Relations of Noble Children preserved more admirably and this young Duke himselfe in his owne behalfe when such objections were made against him did alledge to Iames King of Scotland the History of Ioah mentioned in the Booke of the Kings and that most speciall one of Moses which the Dutches his Aunt Sister German to his Father was strongly confirmed in giving him all answerable and honorable accommodation so did the chiefe Nobility of those parts and as an heire of the house of Yorke there was rendred him the Title of La Rose-Blanch the proper and ancient devise of the house of Yorke with all a gallant Guard of Souldiers was allowed him for attendance and much was hee favored by the Arch-Duke Maximilian King of the Romans by Philip his Sonne Duke of Burgondy Charles the French King the King of Portugall and Scotland by the chiefest of Ireland and many Personages in England who at extreame perill and hazard avowed him to be the second son of Edward the fourth The Princes aforementioned readily supplying him with Coyne and assistance towards his atcheivements King Henry actively apprehends what it threatned and bestirs himselfe to take of their inclinations dispatching Doctor William Warkam after Archbishop of Canterbury with Sr. Edward Poynings a grave and worthy Knight to under-rare his credit with those Princes and such strong perswasions were used That Philip Duke of Burgondy for his Father Maximilian was before returned into Austria utterly declines himselfe and his subjects from his first ingagement but excepted the Widdow Dutchesse of Burgondy over whom hee had no power of command because shee had all justice and Jurisdiction in those large signories whereof her dowry was composed And thus Richard was supplanted here what hope of ayde hee had or did expect by his voyage into Portugall I cannot say though his entertainment there was honorable but by reason of the distance of the Country â—it may bee thought hee was
to your Father-hood by the Passion of Jesus Christ this man is truly the King Don Sebastian he hath all the markes on his body without failing in any one as he had in his infancy only the wounds excepted which he received in that Battel at Affricke he gives the reason of his life account of all his passages c. He is knowne and re-known by the Conciergres by the Judges by the greater part of the Senate and by his owne Confessor c. and a great deal more of him upon knowledg he justifies as much witnesses Ion de Castro Sonne to Don de Alvaro de Castro one of the four Governours that ruled the Kingdome Conjunctly with the King Don Sebastian who in his letter the same man sayes thus The King Don Sebastian whom the enemies call a Calabrois is the very same which is detained here as certainly as you are Fryer Ioseph and my selfe Don Ion. He departed alive from the battaile but very sore wounded God having so delivered him with some other of his company amongst whom was the Duke Anegro c. as for the Exterior marks of his body he wants not one of them he is wounded on the brow of the right eye and on the head as many witnessed when they saw him in the Affrick Battell His hand-writing is still the same observing the very same method as is very well remembred by divers There might much more be instanced in the behalfe of this Sebastian but this may serve for better intelligence to which I may adde that men experienced in the Affaires and policy of State know it a rare thing to find in any History the examples of a Prince being seised and possessed of any Signiory or Principality how unlawfull soever who hath resigned them or any part to the true heires Have we not instances at home where the Sonne hath taken the Kingdome from the Father and would not let it goe againe but rather endeavoured to hast his Fathers fate Much after that manner when Henry Duke of Lancaster had got the Kingdome he held it and would not resigne to the right Heyr Richard the second nor after his death to the Earle of March though these were no Impostors neither was Edward Earl of Warwicke yet King Henry would not let his hold goe and the Cardinall Favourite finding he could not compasse his aymes one way contrived it another By the Machivilian advice he gave to Ferdinand King of Castile not to conclude the treaty of the Marriage betweene Prince Arthur and his Daughter Katherine untill this Earle and Perkin were disposed of which Ferdinando followed and urged the King pretending it the security of his Estate and Issue In briefe it is not possible to perswade a private man though wrongfully possessed to acknowledge the true proprietary hath a better title then he How unjustly have the Kings of Spaine detain'd sundry Signeuries and Principalities from the lawfull Heirs yet if the wrong done by such another disseising Lord be put to this former Usurper Malafide as the Imperiall Iurisconsults will terme him his sentence will be such a Rapinous Prince doth wrong But let us now take a more particular view of those witnesses who stood for Perkin And having formerly mentioned Sir Robert Clifford a Knight of the Noble Family of the Barons Cliffords I will proceed with that which may be the more remarkable in him because hee was of a Family that long hated the House of Yorke from the Battaile of Wakefield when and where they resolved an enmity so deadly as was not to bee reconciled or satisfied whilst one of them remained yet became followers againe of the White Rose family and this Sir Robert Clifford served King Edward very neare and in good credit so could not but have an assured knowledge of the Kings Sonnes and was therefore the more particularly sent to certifie his knowledge who certainely affirmed him to bee the younger sonne of Edward 4. and confirmed many with him such as had likewise served King Edward and had been acquainted with the Prince his conveying beyond Sea though much was done to alter Sir Roberts opinion the Lord Fitz-Walter was of the same beliefe and avowed Perkin the true Duke of York most constantly unto death as resolute was Sir William Stanley though he were Lord Chamberlaine to Henry the seventh and in great favour with Sir George Nevill Brother to the Earle of Westmorland Sir Symon Mountford Sir William Daubeny father to the Lord Daubeny Sir Thomas Thwaits Sir Robert Ratcliffe of the house of the Baron FitzWalter Sir Iohn Taylor Sir Thomas Chaloner Thomas Bagnall with many other Gentlemen of quality all maintaining him to be the Duke of Yorke sonne of Edward the fourth sundry of the Clergy who had beene Chaplaines to the King his Father or otherwise occasioned to attend the Court as Doctor Rochford Doctor Poynes Doctor Sutton Doctor Worsley Deane of St. Pauls Doctor Leyborn Doctor Lesly with many other learned Professors of Divinity who would not endure to heare him called Perkin The Lord FitzWater Sir William Stanley Sir Simon Mountford Sir Robert Ratcliffe Sir William Daubeny as martyrs of state confirmed their Testimonies with their bloods So did the Kings Serjant Ferrier who left the Kings service and applyed himself to Perkin for which he was executed as a Traitor and one Edwards who had served this Duke Richard was cut in pieces for the same cause also Corbet Sir Quinton Betts and Gage Gentlemen of good worth with 200. more at least put to death in sundry Cities and Townes particularly in Kent Essex Suffolke Norfolke and about London for their confidence and opinions in this Prince There were some great men though they made noe profession of their knowledge of him could whisper it one to another which in generall words is confessed by all our better writers who say that as well the Noblemen as others held the said Perkin to be the younger Sonne of King Edward the Fourth And Sir Thomas Moore after Doctor Morton thus writeth The man commonly called Perkin Warbeck was as well with the Prince as with the people held to be the younger Sonne of King Edward the Fourth Richard Grafton affirmeth the same in Flanders saith he and most of all here in England it was received for an undoubted truth not onely of the people but of the Nobles that Perkin was the Sonne of King Edward the Fourth And they all swore and affirmed this to be true The learned and famous Mr. Cambden averreth there were many wise grave and persons of good intelli gence who liued in that time and neere it That affirmed considently this Perkin was second Sonne to King Edward then both the Brothers were not made a way by King Richard and sarely it was little reason or policy to cut off the one spare the other neither indeed was there ever any proofes made by Testimony Argument or Presumption
Banes asking And such was the want of Reverend Bishops then that he was fain to take an ordinary Priest to marry them in a Chamber too in stead of a Church and that in a Lodge or Foresthouse no body being present but the Dutchesse and some few of her company So where he first saw her and by chance there at the next interview he married her an act of as high exception as improvidence For his Barony thought it a most unworthy and unequal Match distasting it the more as done without their consent which they asâ—ever'd the King ought to have by their ancient priviledges and were the more exasperated considering the great inequality between her condition and the Imperial Majestie of England being the Relict but of a poor Knight his mortal enemy too Above all the Earl of Warwick took it for an high indignity and scandal to his Honour which stood so far engaged in France to the Lady Bona and her Princely friends knowing the French would be as sensible of the scorn besides the great charge he had been at to manage the employment In the heat of these disgraces for transcendent spirits have their answerable passions and it is as dangerous to stand in their way as in the reaches of an angry Tyde he forsook the King and soon after takes up Arms against him an Induction to those succeeding evils which pursued that inconsiderate Marriage of which the judicious Polidor lib. 24. maketh this Censure â—ex Edwardus mutato Concilio de ducenda in uxorem Bona filia Ducis Sabaudiae Elizabetham viduam Johannis Gray Militis in Matrimonium duxit de eo Matrimonio ob mulieris humilita tem non modo necessarios Principes verum etiam Richardum Woodvillum Patrem mulieris celat qua causa cognita cuncti protivus mirari Principes fremere Passimque voces emittere indignationis Regem non ex sua dignitate fecisse easque nuptias se crimini dare dedecori assignare quod caeco amore non ratione duct us esset sed inde initium profectum est simultatis ortae inter Regem Edwardum Richardum Comitem Warwici c. But if you will not give credit to him you shall hear an English Prelate living in those times Edwardus Rex fret us propria electione cujusdam Militis relictam nomine Elizabeth inconsultis Regni proceribus clandestino sibi destinavit Matrimonio postea ipsam in reginam Coronari fecit quod quidem Regni optimates aegrè tulerunt quia de tam mediocri stirpe foeminam procreatam ad Regni Consortium secum praepropere sublimaret Thus this amorous King lost his honour with many of his best and great friends yet escaped well that he had no more real and present feeling of the errour being the first King of England that ever mingled his Royal Blood and Majestie in the Alliance of so private and mean a family The Story of Arragon mentions a King deposed for marrying the daughter of his subject And King Edward was somewhat â—â—er it for soon after he was expulsed his Kingdom But being a man that kept an industrious and invincible Courage above his troubles he happily recovered that losse never his honour and friends which he might have preserved and prevented all those â—alamities that overtook him in his issue by the advice of the Dutchesse his mother who upon the secret advertisement of his love to this Lady Gray used all the perswasions and authority of a mother to return him to the Lady Elianor Talbot his formeâ— love and wife at least his contracted to finish and consummate what he was bound to by publike Solemnity of Marriage and prest it with such ingenious engagements that for the Arguments sake I have transcribed the passage out of Sir Thomas Moor and the rest of our English Writers Thus she disswades him MY Liege Lord and my dear Son It is very commonly reported you are purposed to marry the Lady Gray a widow and a mean Gentlewoman which you cannot but conceive will redound to your disparagement and dishonour all the wise great and noblest persons of your Kingdom thinking it far more to the advantage of your Honour profit and Safety to seek the Alliance of a Noble Progeny and rather in a forraign Countrey then your own as well in regard thereupon may depend great strength to your Estate and great possibility to enlarge your possessions by such Affinity Also if well considered you may not safely marry any other then the Lady Bona the Earl of Warwick having proceeded so far in the Current of that Match already that it is likely he will not sit down contented if his troublesome and costly negotiation should be so slightly blown off and frustratâ—d Besides Sir consider it is not Princely for a King to marry his own Subject at least no great and important occasion leading him thereunto nor possessions or other commodity depending thereupon but will be lesse tolerable to all opinion then if a rich man should marry his maid onely for a little wanton dotage upon her person in which kinde of Marriages many men commend more the maids fortune then the masters discretion Yet there must needs be more honesty in such a Marriage then can be honour in this which you affect for the difference is not so great betwixt a rich Merchant and his servant as you must think between the King and the widow Gray in whose person albeit there be nothing to be mistiked there is nothing so excellent but it may be found in divers other women much more noble and many ways exceeding her and more comparatively to your Estate those also Virgins who must be thought of a much more honourable estimation then widows wherefore the Widowhood onely of Elizabeth Gray though in all other things she were convenient for you were enough to restrain you being a King and so great a King And it must needs stick as a foul disparagement to the sacred Majestie of a Prince who ought as nearly to approach the Priesthood in Purenesse and Cleannesse as he doth in Dignity to be defiled with Bigamy in his first Marriage Thus far the King could with attention hear the Dutchesse But being extremly far gone in love or rather in the hot passion of Love he was resolute to marry her and partly in earnest and partly in play as one that well wist he was out of the check of a mother yet reverently thus replied MADAM ALthough Marriage being a Spiritual thing ought rather to be made according to the Will and Ordinance of Almighty God where he by his grace inclineth either parties to love mutually and vertuously as I hope and trust he doth work in ours and not for the regard of any temporal advantage yet neverthelesse this Marriage as it seemeth to me being considered even after the worlds account is not unprofitable nor without fruits for I reckon not the Alliance and Amity of any
earthly Nation or forraign Prince so necessary for me as the friendship and love of mine own Subjects who as I hope will be the more induced to love me and acknowledge mine to them seeing I disdain not to marry one of my own Land When if a forraign Alliance were thought so requisite I could finde the means of that much better by other of my kin where all those parties would be content but to marry myself to one whom I should peradventure never love and for the possibility of more possessions lose the fruit and pleasure of this which I have already For small pleasure taketh a man of all he hath or can have if he be wived against his appetite And I doubt not but there be as you say Madam other women in every point comparable to the Lady Gray therefore I lett not other men to wed them no more then have they reason to mistike where it liketh me Nor doubt I my Cousin of Warwick's love can be so slightly setled to me as to grudge at that which I affect nor so unreasonable to look that in my choice of a wife I should rather be ruled by his eye then mine own that were to make me a Ward and binde me to marry by the appointment of a Guardian with which servile and hard condition I would not be King As for the possibility you urge of more inheritance by new Affinity in strange Lands that is not always certain but contrariwise it is oftentimes the occasion of more trouble then profit Besides we have already a Title and Seisine so good and great as may suffice to be gotten and so to be kept by one man and in one mans days For your Objection that the Lady Gray hath been a wife and is now a widow and hath already Children Why by Gods blessed Lady I that am a Batchelor have some Children too and so for our better comfort there is proof that neither of us are like to be barren And I trust in God Madam you shall live to see her bring forth a young Prince and your pretty Son that shall be a joy and pleasure to you For the Bigamy objected let the Bishop lay it hardly in my way when I come to take Orders of Priesthood for I confesse I understand Bigamy is forbidden to a Priest but I never wist it yet forbidden to a Prince Therefore I pray you good Madam trouble yourself and me no further in this matter Then she urged his Contract with the Lady Elizabeth Lucie and his having had a childe by her as she said and thought her self bound in conscience to charge him with Master Moor Grafton Stow and the rest say the King utterly denied that Contract and protested it a slander which well and justly he might do and these Authors may retract what they have written For the truth is he was never contracted to her though he loved her well being of an affable and witty temper nor did she ever alleadge the King was betrothed to her but that he had entangled her by sweet and tempting language And who knoweth not Credula res amor est But true it is he had a childe by her which was the Bastard Arthur called commonly but unduly Arthur Plantagenet afterward made Viscount Lisle by H. 8. In this Relation the Historians have much and foully erred not onely corrupting the story but have injured the Dutchesse of York in her judgement and knowledge of these matters and the tenour of her former Speech making her to charge the King as contracted to this Elizabeth Lucy of birth and quality much meaner then the Lady Gray whom she conceived so basely of for Elizabeth Lucy was the daughter of one Wyat of Southampton a mean Gentleman if he were one and the wife of one Lucy as mean a man as Wyat. True it is the King kept her as his Concubine and she was one of those most famous three who had peculiar Epithets being called his Witty Leman For that they would have her say the King was never betrothed to her it importeth nothing and therefore I conceive it was never extracted from her But truely to salve the story and errour of these Writers we must know That Lady to whom the King was first betrothed and married was Elinor Talbot daughter of a great Peer of this Realm of a most noble and illustrious Family the Earl of Shrewsbury who is also called in authentick Writings the Lady Butler because she was then the widow of the Lord Butler a Lady of a very eminent beauty and answerable vertue to whom the King was contracted married and had a childe hy her This is that Lady not Elizabeth Lucy the Queen spake of to her son and to note Obiter the Kings breach with this Lady was a cause the subtil widow would not listen unto him before Marriage having learned Credulitas damno solet esse puellae This Marriage cast the Lady Elianor Butler into so perplext a Melancholy that she spent her self in a solitary life ever after and how she died is not certainly known but out of doubt kindnesse was not the cause he having a heart for every new face and was so become exceedingly fancied to his new wife the Lady Gray no Court or pleasure now but where she is In this continuance of his amorous Indulgence which was many yeers and rendred a fruitful issue to him no question that party of her kinred made their best advantage from it Yet the remembrance of that Pre-contract after a time moved him by such sensible apprehensions he could not brook to have it mentioned which was the cause of his displeasure against his ancient Chaplain Doctor Stillington of Bath because he did what his conscience urged to God and the Kingdom in discovering the Marriage occasioned by the Ladies sudden indisposition and pressing sorrow who not able to contain her self had open'd it to a Lady her sister or as some say to her mother the Countesse of Shrewsbury she to the Earl her husband he consults it with his noblest kinsfolks and friends as it was a general scandal to them all they to inform themselves the better had conference with Dr. Stillington who affirmed the Contract and Marriage with whom they advise that as he was a Bishop and a Privie Councellor it behoved him to prepare it to the Kings consideration for some redresse and satisfaction But the Bishop though willing durst not deal with the King in that manner rather wisht they would apply it to the Duke of Gloucester as the man most inward with the King whereof Philip de Comines thus writeth Cestuy Euesque d'Bath mit en avant ace Dux de Gloucester que le dit Roy Edouart estoit fort amoreux d'un Dame d'Angleterre luy promise de l'espouser pour veu qu'il couchat avec illa ells s'y consentit dit ceste Euesque qu'il les avoit Espouses n'y avoit que luy eux deux
words the names Shire-motts Eolmotts and Halymotts that is the meeting or assembling of the men of a Shire of a Town and of the Tenants of a Hall or Mannor had their beginning also Now as Sinoth is more used in the Parliaments themselves so Gemott is more familiar to the Historians And this Parliament of Anno 1 Rich. 3. could be of no lesse power and vertue witnesse the many and good Laws made in it albeit the second Marriage of King Edward was adjudged unlawful and the Acts of that Parliament for the most part repealed and abrogated afterward yet the evidence is clear enough that the Judges and Law-makers of that Parliament were wise and religious men and their Laws upright and just Therefore whatsoever was adjudged by them was to be received and held as authentick and inviolable how roughly soever it was afterward handled And in this case of the disabling of King Edwards sons there is least reason to suspect them the cause being so new so plain and notoriously known that no man could be ignorant therein Therefore to have given any other Judgement but according to the truth of evidence and certainty of knowledge it might justly have been censured an act of errour and ignorance or partiality and injustice For it was not the opinion of a few nor raised out of a weak judgement and perverted knowledge but a strong and general evidence by the ablest and best knowing If it be objected The case was obscure and doubtful That cannot be for the Estates had all substantial and ready means to inform themselves of the truth and every circumstance whereby they might be fully satisfied and cleared in all the niceties and doubts for all the witnesses and dealers in that cause and such persons as were acquainted with it were then living and they must and would have truely and certainly informed the Court of Parliament For the special and reverend care of this Court is The advancing of Justice and Right Therefore all Subjects by nature or grace are bound in their Allegeance to give pious and religious credit to Parliaments and to believe in their Authority and Power as the former times did in Oracles We must also confidently hold the high and transcendent quality and vertue of that Court to have all power and authority And no question to repeal a good and just Law made in Parliament is a wrong and scandal to that General Councel and to the universal wisedom providence justice and piety of the Kingdom In the Parliament 1 H. 7. there is an Act attainting the King R. 3. of high Treason for bearing Arms against the Earl of Richmond intituled The Soveraign Lord this was at his proceeding from Milford-haven into Leicester But when he came to fight the Battel he was then no King nor Soveraign but a Chief of such as made head against their Soveraign In which Paragraph there appears three grosse faults First Certain it is Richard during his Raign was a Soveraign therefore no Subject Next there was no enemy in the field who was then a Soveraign but all liege Subjects to the Crown And Richard being the King and Soveraign could not be adjudged a Traitor nor lawfully attainted of High Treason Then let it be considered whether a person of sacred Majestie that is an Anointed Soveraign may commit the Crime of Treason Also in this Parliament all the Barons Knights and Gentlemen that bore Arms in the field for the King were attainted of Treason their goods and lands confiscate and one Thomas Nan dickâ— a Necromancer and Sorcerer who with others had been condemned to die for using that hellish Art was in this Parliament pardoned the horrible things he had committed And it seemed he had not then left his black trade for he hath in that Act of Parliament still the style of Conjurer viz. Thomas Nandick of Cambridge Conjurer which had been a fitter style for his Gibbet then his Pardon although he had not by his Sorcery or Inchantment hurt or destroyed any humane yet for his renouncing and abjuration of Almighty God for it is the opinion of a learned and religious Doctor Magos Incantores saith he hominum genus indignum quod vel ob solam Dei O. M. abjurationem capitali suplicio afficiatur Other such things there be in that Parliament which detract it in the opinion of some those of the best and wisest repute Now let us come to examine that Treaty the King had about marrying the Lady Plantagenet which is censured to be a thing not onely detestable but much more cruel and abominable to be put in agitation Item That all men and the Maid her self most of all detested this unlawful Copulation Item That he made away the Queen his wife to make way for this Marriage and that he propounded not the Treaty of Marriage until the Queen his wife was dead That there was such a motion for the marriage of this Lady to the King is true and which is more and most certain it was entertained and well liked by the King and his friends a good while also by the Lady Elizabeth and by the Queen her mother who received it with so much content and liking that presently she sent into France for her son the Marquesse of Dorset that was there with the Earl of Richmond earnestly solliciting him to renounce the Faction and return home to the Kings favour and advancement which she assured him and sends the Lady Elizabeth to attend the Queen at Court or to place her more in the eye so in the heart of the King The Christmas following which was kept in Westminster-Hall for the better colour of sending her eldest daughter she sends her other four thither who were received with all honourable courtesie by the King and Queen Regent especially the Lady Elizabeth was ranked most familiarly in the Queens favour and with as little distinction as Sisters But society nor all the Pomp and Festivity of those times could cure that sad wound and languor in the Queens brest which the death of her onely son had left The addresse of those Ladies to Court albeit the feigned wooing of the King was in a politick and close way gave cause of suspition to the Earl of Richmonds intelligencing friends that the King had a purpose to marry the Lady Elizabeth which must prevent the Earl both of his hope to her and to the Crown by her Title a clause that made them mutter very broadly against it for indeed what more concern'd them therefore the King treats it more privately and coldly but the Queen-widow and the Lady stood constant in their desires and expectation onely the Objection was The King had a wife as though he could not marry another whilst she lived not remembring how usual it was not onely for Kings but private men to put away one wife and marry another for venial crimes as well as Adultery and Treason The Romanes might repudiate their
wives for conversing with men that were not of their lâ—inred and for going to see Playes and Cirque Spectacles their husbands not being with them or if the wife were unquiet or curst of her tongue c. Henry the Eighth put away Queen Katharine of Castile and Queen Anne of Cleve the one because she was too old and cold for pleasure the other because she was not fruitful or wanton enough Sometimes men have put away their wives for being Sluts for having unsavoury breaths or some infectious disease without a necessity of taking away their lives and it was lawful for either of them to marry when they would Pope Clement the Seventh so ratified the Divorce of King Henry the Eighth against Katherine of Castile as he defied all Laws Divine and Humane that should contradict and impugn his Power and Dispensation in these words Non obstante Iure Divino nec Humano nec quibuscunque Constitutionibus repugnantibus aut in contrarium Edictis Ther was a formal Bill or Libel of Separation prescribed by Moses with the manner of Divorces and Repudiations in this tenour as Andreas Osiander who translated it out of Hebrew into Latin affirmeth which for the rarity I have here transcribed Die tertia Hebdomadis 29 die mensis Octobris Anno ab orbe condito 4349. EGo Ioachim cognominatus N. filius Nathanis qui consisto hodie in urbe N. in Regno N. Te. N. uxorem meam cognominatam N. filiam N. quae fuisti uxor mea ante hac nunc demisi liberavi repudiavi te tibi ut sis tui juris domina animae tuae ad abeundum ut ducaris abs quolibet viro quem volueris ne vir quisquam prohibeat quo minus sis in manu tua ito hoc die in aeternum Et ecce permissa es unicuique viro hic esto tibi a me datus Libellus repudii Epistola dimissoria Instrumentum libertatis juxta Legem Mosis Israelis But the Answer which was made in the name of the King to the Lady Elizabeth concerning his Queen was That she could be no impediment of long continuance being a very weak woman in a Consumption and past hopes of recovery her Physitians giving their opinions she could not live past the middle of February next following nor ghessed they much amisse for the died in the next month March When the midst and last of February was past the Lady Elizabeth being more impatient and jealous of the successe then every one knew or conceived writes a Letter to the Duke of Norfolk intimating first that he was the man in whom she most affied in respect of that love her Father had ever bore him c. Then she congratulates his many courtesies in continuance of which she desires him to be a mediator for her to the King in the behalf of the Marriage propounded between them who as she wrote was her onely joy and maker in this world and that she was his in heart and thought withall insinuating that the better part of February was past and that she feared the Queen would never die All these be her own words written with her own hand and this is the sum of her Letter which remains in the Autograph or Original Draft under her own hand in the magnificent Cabinet of Thomas Earl of Arundel and Surrey by which it may be observed that this young Lady was ignorant that a man having a wife living might marry another and suffer her to live But the truth is the King had no real intent to make her his wife from the beginning onely in policy entertained this Treaty as it appeared afterward when his Queen was dead and he had all fit accesses without any impediment to marry her yet did not professing he wooed her not to that end but for some other causes and made Protestation in the great Hall at Saint Iones neer Smithfield before all the Knights of Malta and a great Assembly of Noble-men the Lord Maior Aldermen and many Citizens being present that he had no purpose nor intent to marry the Lady Elizabeth avowing Quodeares viz. Voluntas contrahendi Matrimonium cum Consanguinea Germana sua nunquam â—i venerat in mentem for so it is testified by the Prior of Croyland Yet it may not be denied he pretended love to her and a proffer of Marriage which he projected in policy to divert her affection from Richmond whose party the King apprehended privately wrought that way of which the said Author thus saith Non aliter videbat Richardus Rex regnum sibi confirmari neque spem competitoris sui aufferri posse nisi in Matrimonio cum dicta Elizabeth contrahendo vel simulando And it is most likely the King had no other aim but meerly of Prevention neither was there any cause had he been so wicked to do it by blood nor any just reason to frame so hard an argument against him being always so affectionately inclined to his wife that he was rather thought uxorious then otherwise which appeared unfeignedly at her death in the expression of sorrow and magnificent Exequies for her Non eum immorte honore quam Reginam dicunt as the Prior of Croyland testifieth Let us look therefore with clearer consideration upon the motion or pretence of this Marriage to call it detestable and cruel is ignorant and malicious though she were so neer of kin to him for Marriages between Uncles and Neeces have been very frequent and allowed in other Countreys by the Church In our time the daughter and heir of Duke Infantasgo in Spain was married to his brother Don Alde Mendoza and more lately the Earl of Miranda married his brothers daughter In the House of Austria Marriages in this kinde have been very usual and thought lawful the Pope dispensing with them for they say in Spain Que el padre santo quiere Dios loquire Therefore how could it be so highly unlawful in King Richard Or if his intents had been so forward where was the Bar when his wife was dead and he absolute unlesse the Ladies aversenesse But that suggestion is answered by her own Letter and other testimonies So the Account will be if rightly summed by what hath been produced that he had never any serious determination of Marriage onely took the advantage of his gain by looking into her hand then no cause to make away his Queen which his accusers themselves directly and peremptorily charge him not with but doubtfully say The Queen however it fortuned departed out of this life the 16 of March in the Lent season But although he had the commendations of a loving and indulgent husband I say not he lived always continently for I finde he had some bastards two of them I have mentioned yet peradventure he might have them before his Marriage and then the fault was lesse So then let them that affect not blinde and
then Tyranny according to the style of Sir Thomas Moore When King Henry the Seventh as soon as he had got the Crown sent this young Prince to the Tower afterwards cut off his head yet that was no Tyranny after Sir Thomas Moore But our King Iames of ever happie memory hath thought it an act of so much detestation that particularly he protested against it and shewed another temper of Justice and Power in his Royal Clemencie to certain Noble persons in one of his Kingdoms who being Regal Titulars and pretending title to the Crown there as descended from some King of that Countrey his gracious and pious inclination was so far from seeking their ruine or so much as the restraining them that he suffered their liberty with possession of what they had Then they call the punishment of Iane Shore a Tyrannie A common and notorious Adulteresse as the Duke of Buckingham who knew her very well censured her which she deserved so justly that it was rather favourable then severe or tyrannous Next the death of William Collingborn is made one of his Tyrannies who as some trivial Romancers say was hanged for making a Satyrical Rhyme when the truth is he had committed Treason and was arraigned and condemned of High Treason as may be yet seen in the Record and then it was Justice and not Tyrannie Another proof against their grosse Paralogisms take from this observation made by Demosthenes Tyrannus res est inimica Civibus legibus contraria But King Richard was ever indulgent to his people careful to have the Laws duely observed his making so many good ones being an evident argument of his love to Law and Justice It is further observed that Tyrants contemn good counsel are opinionated of their own wisedoms and obstinate to determine all matters by themselves These Plaintiffs being called by the Greeks 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is self-Councellors who say they are natura plerumque occulti insidiosi Arte Astu ea Tagere dissimulare conantur quae agunt non communicantes quicquid de suis Conciliis aut rebus cum aliis nec ab aliis Concilium petentes neque admittentes sed tantum sua Concilia sequuntur Also Erasmus hath this Axiome Nullo Concilio quicquam magnae rei aggredi tyrannicum est But King Richard nor did nor would do any thing of importance without consultation with the wisest and noblest And if in any matters he had delivered his judgement yet his manner as his detractors confesse was to say in the end and conclusion My Lords this is my minde if any of you know what may else be better I shall be ready to change it for I am not wedded to my own will Thus Sir Thomas Moor. Eastly Largition and excessive expences are thought vices proper to Tyrants the rather because the Romane Tyrants for their extreme excesses were called Monstra prodigia lues Imperii pesâ—es reipublicae c. As Caligula Nero Vitellius Domitian Commodus Heliogabolus Caracalla c. King Kichard was ever held to be frugal with the preservation of his honour nor can they tax him with Palliardise Luxury Epicurism nor Gluttony vices following many Tyrants but moderate and temperate in all his actions and appetites which is confessed and therefore needeth no further proof Indeed it had been advantage and safety to him in the event if he had been a Tyrant a while for then he might have preserved his life and kingdom and given a timely check to the practice of Bishop Morton the Marquesse Dorset Earl of Devon and his brother the Bishop the Lord Talbot the Lord Stanley and his brother Sir William Stanley with the Countesse of Richmond his wife and the rest But his remisnesse and patience bred his ruine not his tyranny that had been his protection And now the black curtain of malice and detraction is drawn let us see this King in his proper Royalty and vertues casting up the general and particular notions of A good King and happie Government then peruse what was wanting in him First then There is necessarily required proper to Empire Wisedom Justice Fortitude Beauty Magnificence Temperance and Piety That he had Wisedom and Prudence need no other witnesse then his wise and provident managing both of his own private affairs and Government of the Publike Also in the Military actions in which he was tried both as a Subject and a King his adversaries can allow him to be a wise prudent politick and heroical Prince his Wisedom appearing with his Justice very clearly in the good Laws he made acknowledged and honourably predicated by our Reverend and most learned Professors of the Laws For his further knowledge and love of Justice there can be no fairer argument then his desire and custome to sit in Courts of Justice hearing and distributing Justice indifferently to all men And when he made his Progresse into York-shire being informed there of some extortioners and foul offenders who were apprehended not tried he caused the Law to take the just current giving strict charge and commandment to all Officers of Justice for just administration to all men without partiality or private respects The Fortitude and Magnanimity of this Prince though of lowe stature were so great and famous as they need no Trumpet or Praecony being bred from his youth in Martial actions and the Battels of Barnet Exham Doncaster the second of S t Albans and of Tewksbury will give him the reputation of a Souldier and Captain Being made General of the Kings Armies into Scotland he prevailed happily in his Expedition and particularly recovered that famous and strong Hold of Berwick which King Henry the Sixth had so weakly let go And in this you shall hear the Elogie of one that was loth to speak much in his favour yet occasion forced him to speak his knowledge though coldly and sparingly King Richard was no ill Captain in the War he had sundry Victories and sometimes Overthrows but never by his own default for want of hardinesse or politick order Whereunto he addeth concerning his Bounty Free was he called of dispence and liberal somewhat above his power To which I will adde one Elogie more above all for Credit and Authority recorded in an Act of Parliament and addressed to him in the name of the whole high Court of Parliament in these words We consider your great Wit Prudence Iustice and Courage and we know by experience the memorable and laudable acts done by you in several Battels for the salvation and defence of this Realm Here followeth another general and memorable testimony of him and of more regard and honour because it is averred by one that knew him from his youth the Duke of Buckingham who after Richard was made King and this Duke became ill affected acknowledged to Bishop Morton in private speeches between them That he thought King Richard from his first knowledge even