Queen Elizabeth, who still remained, with the Princess Elizabeth, her oldest daughter, and some of her other children, in the sanctuary at Westminster, was the centre of this movement. She communicated privately with the nobles who were disposed to espouse her cause. The nobles had secret meetings among themselves to form their plans. At these meetings they drank to the health of the king in the Tower, and of his brother, the little Duke of York, and pledged themselves to do every thing in their power to restore the king to his throne. They little knew that the unhappy princes were at that very time lying together in a corner of the court-yard of the prison in an ignoble grave. At length the conspirators' plans were matured, and the insurrection broke out. Richard immediately prepared to leave York, at the head of a strong force, to go toward London. At the same time, he allowed the tidings to be spread abroad that the two princes were dead. This news greatly disconcerted the conspirators and deranged their plans; and when the dreadful intelligence was communicated to the queen in the sanctuary, she was stunned, and almost killed by it, as by a blow. "She swooned away, and fell to the ground, where she lay in great agony, like a corpse;" and when at length she was restored to consciousness again, she broke forth in shrieks and cries of anguish so loud, that they resounded through the whole Abbey, and were most pitiful to hear. She beat her breast and tore her hair, calling all the time to her children by their names, and bitterly reproaching herself for her madness in giving up the youngest into his enemies' hands. After exhausting herself with these cries and lamentations, she sank into a state of calm despair, and, kneeling down upon the floor, she began, with dreadful earnestness and solemnity, to call upon Almighty God, imploring him to avenge the death of her children, and invoking the bitterest curses upon the head of their ruthless murderer. [Illustration: QUEEN ELIZABETH AT THE GRAVE OF HER CHILDREN.] It was but a short time after this that Richard's child died at Middleham Castle, as stated in the last chapter. Many persons believed that this calamity was a judgment of heaven, brought upon the king in answer to the bereaved mother's imprecations. It is said that when Queen Elizabeth had recovered a little from the first shock of her grief, she demanded to be taken to her children's grave. So they conducted her to the Tower, and showed her the place in the corner of the court-yard where they had first been buried.