Henry Tudor had the good fortune to appear upon the scene as the avenger of all wrongs, those of the injured heirs of York no less than those of the long-exiled partisans of Lancaster. His victory had been won by the aid of Yorkists like Stanley, Dorset, and Edward Woodville, no less than by that of Oxford, Pembroke, the Courtenays, the Talbots, and other old Lancastrian names. It had been settled, long before he started, that he should blend the claims of the two rival houses by marrying the Princess Elizabeth, the eldest child of Edward IV. Thus he was able to pose as the reconciler of parties, and the bringer-in of peace and quiet. He proved his moderation by abstaining from bloodshed; he spared all the prisoners of Bosworth save three alone, and though he caused a bill of attainder to be passed against King Richard's chief partisans, no more executions followed. Henry's wise view of the situation was set forth by a law which he caused one of his Parliaments to approve at a subsequent date, to the effect that no man should ever be accused of treason for supporting the king _de facto_ against the king _de jure_. [Sidenote: =Title of Henry VII. to the throne.=] It required all Henry's moderation and ability, however, to make firm his seat upon the throne. His title to it was very weak--only that of conquest in fact--for the legitimacy of the Beaufort line as representatives of John of Gaunt was more than doubtful. Henry refused to rest his claim to the crown merely on his marriage to Elizabeth of York; he would be no mere king-consort, and he deliberately put off the wedding until he had been crowned at Westminster, and had been saluted by Parliament as king in his own right. Having thus made his position clear, he married Elizabeth, six months after the day of Bosworth Field. [Sidenote: =Character of Henry.=] Henry Tudor was precisely the sovereign that England required to put an end to the general unrest and unruliness that were the legacy of the Wars of the Roses. He had not an amiable character; he was reserved and suspicious, a master of plot and intrigue, selfish in act and thought, prone to hoard money in and out of season, and ready to strike unmercifully when a stroke seemed necessary. But his brain ruled his passions, and from policy, if not from natural inclination, he was clement and slow to anger. He had some turn for art and letters, and was religious in his own self-centred way. His ministers were wisely chosen; the two chief of them, Bishops Morton and Foxe, were prudent and blameless men. If Empson and Dudley, his two financial advisers, were much hated by the people for their extortions, it was because their master bade them fill his coffers, and was content that they should bear the unpopularity which must otherwise have fallen on himself. He deliberately chose to have scapegoats, lest he should have to take the responsibility for the harsher side of his policy. [Sidenote: =Lovel's rising.=]