It is said that Richard thought for a moment, after his wife's death, of compelling his niece Elizabeth, Edward IV.'s eldest daughter, to marry him, in order to merge her claim to the crown in his own. But the mere rumour of the intention so shocked the people that all his own partisans urged him to disavow it, which he accordingly did. Being wifeless and childless, he nominated as his heir his nephew, John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, the son of his eldest sister. [Sidenote: =Renewal of the rebellion.=] Meanwhile the conspiracy which had failed to overthrow Richard in the autumn of 1483, was again gathering head. The Earl of Richmond had obtained loans of men and money from France, and was only waiting for the news that his friends were ready, to make a second attempt on England. With him were all the enemies of King Richard who had escaped death--Dorset, the son of Queen Elizabeth, Edward Woodville, Morton Bishop of Ely, and the few surviving Lancastrian exiles headed by the Earls of Pembroke and Oxford. They relied, not on their French soldiery, but on the secret allies who were to join them in England, and especially on Lord Stanley, the Earl of Richmond's father-in-law. That noble, though he had been arrested in company with the unfortunate Hastings, had been pardoned by King Richard, and entrusted by him with much power in Lancashire and Cheshire. Richard's court was honeycombed with treason: his own Attorney-General, Morgan of Kidwelly, kept Richmond informed of his plans and actions. Of all those about the king only a very few were really faithful to him. Richard knew that treason was abroad, though he could not identify the traitors. He struck cruelly and harshly at all that he could reach; his ferocity may be gauged from the fact that he actually hung a Wiltshire gentleman named Collingbourn for no more than a copy of verses. The unfortunate rhymester had scoffed at Richard's three favourites, Lord Lovel, Sir William Catesby, and Sir Richard Ratcliffe, in the lines-- "The Cat, the Rat, and Lovel our Dog Rule all England under a Hog." The Hog was Richard himself, whose favourite badge was a white boar. [Sidenote: =Richmond lands in Wales.=] In August, 1485, Henry of Richmond landed at Milford Haven, and was joined by many of the Welsh, among whom he was popular because of his own Welsh blood, that came from his father, Edmund Tudor. Advancing into England, he met with aid from the Talbots of Shrewsbury and many other midland gentry. Lord Stanley gathered a considerable army in Lancashire and Cheshire, but did not openly join the earl, because his son, Lord Strange, was in the king's hands, and would have been slain if Richard had been certain of his father's treachery. [Sidenote: =Battle of Bosworth Field.=]