The Wars of the Roses; or, Stories of the Struggle of York and Lancaster — John Shaqi
The Wars of the Roses; or, Stories of the Struggle of York and LancasterEdgar, John G. (John George)
History
The Wars of the Roses; or, Stories of the Struggle of York and Lancaster
Edgar, John G. (John George)
Great Britain -- History -- Wars of the Roses, 1455-1485
Ere this Henry had been wounded in the neck by an arrow. Sad and
sorrowful, he sought shelter in a thatched house occupied by a
tanner. Thither, fresh from victory, went the duke; and treated his
vanquished kinsman with every respect. Kneeling respectfully, the
conqueror protested his loyalty, and declared his readiness to obey
the king. "Then," said Henry, "stop the pursuit and slaughter, and
I will do whatever you will." The duke, having ordered a cessation
of hostilities, led the king to the abbey; the royal kinsmen, after
praying together before the shrine of England's first martyr, journeyed
to London; and Margaret of Anjou, then with her son at Greenwich,
learned, with dismay, that her favorite was a corpse and her husband a
captive. At such a time, while shedding tears of bitterness and doubt
within the palace built by Humphrey of Gloucester, the young queen must
have reflected, with remorse, on the part she had taken against "The
Good Duke," and considered how different a face affairs might have worn
in 1455, if she had not, in 1447, consented to the violent removal of
the last stately pillar that supported the house of Lancaster.
CHAPTER VII.
THE QUEEN AND THE YORKIST CHIEFS.
When the battle of St. Albans placed the king and kingdom of England
under the influence of the Yorkists, the duke and his friends
exercised their authority with a moderation rarely exhibited in
such circumstances. No vindictive malice was displayed against the
vanquished; not a drop of blood flowed on the scaffold; not an act of
attainder passed the Legislature. Every thing was done temperately and
in order.
As Henry was again attacked by his malady he was intrusted to
Margaret's care, and York was again declared Protector of the realm,
with a provision that he was to hold the office, not as before at
the king's pleasure, but until discharged from it by the Lords in
Parliament. Salisbury was, at the same time, intrusted with the Great
Seal; and Warwick was appointed to the government of Calais. Comines
calls Calais "the richest prize in the crown of England;" and the
government of the city was an office of greater trust and profit than
any which an English sovereign had to bestow.
Margaret of Anjou, however, was not quite absorbed in her duties as
wife and mother. While educating her helpless son and tending her yet
more helpless husband, she was bent on a struggle for the recovery of
that power which she had already so fatally abused; and as necessity
alone had made her submit to the authority of York and his two noble
kinsmen, who were satirized as the "Triumvirate," she seized the
earliest opportunity of ejecting them from power.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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