when the executioner completed his work-the head of the staunchest friend of the imprisoned king rolled upon the sward.

The council-who from the windows of the chamber had witnessed his death-soon afterwards dispersed; nor was the subject of Edward's coronation ever again seriously mooted at any of their future meetings.

CHAPTER XIV.

Shall after ages, when these children's tale

Is told, drop tears in pity of their hapless fate;
And read with detestation the misdeeds
Of Glo'ster?

SHAKSPEARE.

FROM the date of the execution of her unfortunate brother and son-the Lords Rivers and Gray-the unhappy Elizabeth abandoned herself to despair. It was evident, that Gloucester, who, without form or trial, had taken the lives of the uncle and halfbrother of the imprisoned king, would not hesitate at taking the life of the royal captive himself, as soon as he found that his death was necessary to the accomplishment of his ambitious

schemes.

The next blow levelled at the fallen queen, was the impeachment of the validity of her marriage and the legitimacy of her children, made by Dr. Shaw, in a sermon which he preached at St. Paul's Cross.

But perhaps the most unnatural part acted in the dark transaction was that of Cicely-the Dowager Duchess of York-the grandmother of the unfortunate prisoners in the Tower: it was at her house that most of the secret councils of Richard and his partisans were held, and from the correspondence which still exists between the ambitious hunchback and his mother, there is little doubt but she was cognizant of his plans. True, she hated

the Woodvilles, yet that hatred can but ill excuse her unnatural conduct to her grandsons. Shakspeare used more than a poet's license when he portrayed the conduct of the widowed duchess as hostile to the plans of Richard.

An address, got up by the partisans of Gloucester, calling on him to prevent the crown falling to the issue of a clandestine and illegal marriage, was presented to the Protector; and in June following Richard was acknowledged king.

A few days afterwards he was solemnly crowned, together with his queen, Anne of Warwick, who had borne him a son.

Shortly after his coronation, the usurper set out for Warwick Castle, which he held in right of his wife; even his hardened nature recoiled from braving the curses of a bereaved mother and the indignant murmurs of the nation, at the completion of the crime he meditated, which was nothing less than the death of his two nephews, whom he had so infamously despoiled.

Sir James Tyrrel was the fit instrument of so horrid a deed. History points out the gloomy arched gateway, known by the names of the Portcullis and Bloody Tower, as the scene of this atrocious murder. From the moment of Richard's assumption of the regal dignity, the poor children were removed from that part of the Tower known as the royal lodgings, to this building; their attendants were removed, and four keepers appointed to guard them. Of the elder brother it is observed that he anticipated his fate, and was frequently heard to observe, that if his uncle would only spare his life, he would willingly give him his

crown.

The innocent children had retired to rest when Sir James Tyrrel arrived at the Tower with the order for their death. To the lasting honor of the governor, Sir Robert Brackenbury, he refused to have anything to do with it, but resigned his keys for the night to the usurper's confidant.

History has preserved for eternal execration the names of the murderers: the men who actually committed the barbarous and cruel deed were Miles Forrest, one of the warders; and John Deighton, a servant of Tyrrel's-remorseless, cruel ruffians.

They entered their chamber, having first secretly removed the usual warders, and smothered them in their sleep.

Could Edward IV. have foreseen the fate which awaited his sons, it might have withheld his hand when, after the Battle of Tewkesbury, he so barbarously gave the signal for the murder of the heir of Lancaster-when he commanded the assassination of King Henry-and have softened the rigors of the imprisonment of the ill-fated Margaret of Anjou.

By the partisans of the red rose, the murder of the unoffending princes was regarded as an expiation of the sins of their father. The same gloomy fortress which witnessed the crimes of Edward was chosen, they said, by Providence, for the extinction of the male line of his race.

The Tower!-how many royal and innocent victims have perished in its walls? It was, indeed,

"A den of drunkards with the blood of princes!"

The bodies of the innocent children were hastily interred on the night of the murder, under the staircase which led to their apartment. The priest of the Tower afterwards removed them to the entrance to his chapel-being consecrated ground—where their remains were discovered in the reign of Charles II., when the building was turned into a place of deposit for state papers. The Merry Monarch caused their bones to be removed to Westminster Abbey, where their tomb may still be seen.

When the news was brought to Elizabeth-who still remained in the sanctuary-she swooned, and fell to the ground. Even those who had been most offended by her pride and avarice in the days of her prosperity, must have pitied the unhappy mother, could they have witnessed her intense agony. She beat her bosom, says Sir Thomas More-who speaks as if he had been an eye-witness of the piteous scene-and tore her long, fair hair, calling upon her murdered children, with sobs and cries. It was in vain that those around her tried to comfort her.

"I was mad!" she exclaimed-" mad, when I resigned my precious boy--the pledge of my dead Edward's love-into the

keeping of his cruel uncle! Monster as he is, he would not have dared to have forced him from me-the people would have revolted at the violation of the sanctuary! Had I remained firm in my refusal, I might have preserved them both. Monster as Gloucester is, I should have baffled him !”

"It is useless, madam, to vituperate," coolly observed John Nesfield, "where you are powerless to avenge!"

"But I have an avenger!" frantically exclaimed the outraged

mother.

"An avenger !" repeated the messenger, in a tone of scornful incredulity—for he was a devoted partisan of the usurper's, and commanded the guard which constantly surrounded the sanctuary-"Who ?"

"God!" replied Elizabeth, solemnly-at the same time sinking on her knees upon the rush-strewn floor-"the avenger of the widow and the fatherless! Remember the murderer!" she added, raising her streaming eyes to heaven, "and strike him in his pride; make his heart desolate, as mine is made; a curse— the widow's and the outraged mother's curse-rest on him! Let his name be a bye-word for cruelty and treachery throughout the land-scorned and abhorred to future ages!"

Overcome by the violence of her grief, the unhappy Elizabeth -heart-broken and crushed by the misfortunes which had befallen her was removed to her chamber by her women.

So deep and universal was the sympathy excited by her bereavement that she was visited by several charitable personsamongst others by Dr. Lewis, who was ostensibly both a physi cian and a priest, but in reality an agent of the House of Lancaster-whose head, the young Earl of Richmond, was at that time an exile in Brittany.

A few days after the murder of his nephews, the usurper—as if conscious of the invalidity of his former coronation-caused himself and queen to be consecrated and crowned a second time at York.

The nation seem to have acquiesced in, rather than approved of, Richard's assumption of the regal dignity. Even his friends

-disgusted by his cruelties-fell from him. The short-lived rebellion of the Duke of Buckingham-which was quickly and vigorously crushed-only added to the stability of the assassin's throne. Before he was hurled from it, it was necessary that, in his turn, he should be struck by the arm of Providence in the only part where he was sensible-his paternal love his son by the unfortunate Anne of Warwick, whom his father appears to have been doatingly fond of, expired shortly after the second coronation at York. Richard, on his successful usurpation of the crown, had created him Prince of Wales.

CHAPTER XV.

My curse hath reached him; heaven is just at last! OLD PLAY.

ALTHOUGH little real danger was to be apprehended from the efforts of a helpless woman,-who in her retirement was as much a prisoner (or nearly so) as if the place of her retreat had been the Tower instead of the Sanctuary of Westminster,--yet it is the natural consequence of crime to be continually haunted by suspicion. Richard caused the refuge of his sister-in-law to be continually surrounded by armed men, under the command of his devoted adherent, John Nesfield, who strictly questioned all visitors to the sanctuary; for his master even then contemplated the removing her, either by force or fraud, from the place which had twice proved a secure asylum to the desolate Elizabeth. It was on a dark night in the month of March, whilst the tyrant was still absent in the north, that two persons were seen wending their way towards the sanctuary. As they approached the wa.ch-fire which the soldiers had lit in front of the building-for the weather was extremely cold--their persons might easily be