When the Venetian admiral arrived next day with the fleet, in place of a beleagured town he beheld the citizens in their holiday attire, headed by the magistrates in their robes of state, marching in procession to meet him, conducting the heroine Marulla, their deliverer. To reward her bravery, the Venetian commander ordered each of his soldiers to give her a present, and he promised that she should be adopted by the Republic. He offered her the hand of any one of his captains that she might prefer. But Marulla replied that "it was not by chance that she should choose a husband; for the virtues of a camp would not make a good master of a family; and the hazard would be too great." When the Venetian senate received the news of Marulla's bravery, they decreed that various privileges and exemptions from taxes should be settled upon her and her children for evermore. * * * * * Henry VI., after losing the crown of France through a female warrior, very nearly saved the crown of England through another; and, what is more remarkable, both were Frenchwomen. But the high-spirited, fierce Margaret of Anjou, though fully as brave, was very different from the peaceful, the angelic Maid of Orleans. However, had the king possessed half the spirit of his wife, the Wars of the Roses might have terminated very differently. When the feeble, almost imbecile king, wishing for peace at any price, publicly acknowledged the Duke of York as heir-apparent to the throne, Margaret refused her consent, and the war was renewed. Henry was made prisoner in the battle of Northampton; but the queen assembled a formidable army at York, where she awaited her rival. On the last day of the year 1460, the battle of Wakefield was fought. Within half-an-hour of the onset, nearly three thousand Yorkists lay dead on the field. This battle, in which Margaret is said to have taken an active part, terminated in a complete victory for the House of Lancaster. The Duke of York, covered with wounds, fell into the hands of the victors. His dying moments were embittered by the taunts of his captors; and afterwards, it is said, his head was cut off by order of the queen, crowned with a paper crown, and placed on one of the gates of York. The next year, 1461, Margaret defeated the Earl of Warwick in the second battle of St. Alban's, and recovered the king, who was now merely a passive agent in the hands of friends or foes. She advanced to London; but Edward, Earl of March, son of the Duke of York, having gained a victory at Hereford almost the same day as the battle of St. Alban's, obliged her to retreat towards the north. He then entered London, where a few days later, March 4th, 1461, he was proclaimed King of England, as Edward IV.