Could King Richard have looked forward five short years, he would have seen that one young man, who now refused to follow his King to evil, alone of all the four giving his life for that King’s sake. The man who would not deny his God for fear of his sovereign, was the one who was ready to die for God and him. It was during this short period of glamour thrown over King Richard by the astute Archbishop that certain Lollards were imprisoned in Beaumaris Castle, that some recanted, and that various edicts were issued, in the strong language wherein Gloucester and Courtenay delighted, against those who "sowed tares among the people." The complete change of tone in the royal mandates is very striking, between those periods when Gloucester’s influence paralysed the King, and the two short intervals when Richard was left to himself. Yet to this day Richard, not Gloucester or Courtenay, is assailed with all the obloquy which is due only to the two latter. On this occasion Richard followed the Archbishop’s leading up to a certain point. But when Courtenay pressed the advantage which he had gained, and urged capital punishment for the heretics, the King drew back. The cards had been shown a little too plainly. A short term of imprisonment for obnoxious politics was consonant with Richard’s ideas of right and justice: but death as the penalty of religious opinions he would not give. Was it likely, when the religious opinions were to some extent his own? Courtenay appeared to waive the matter. Ostensibly, he deferred to the King’s judgment. And Richard never suspected that the sentence of death had merely been, by Courtenay and Gloucester, transferred to another person, and that their resolve was that if he would not permit the heretics to die, Richard must die himself. It was during this period that Earl Roger kept quiet and silent,—so quiet that we never hear a word about him for a whole twelvemonth, though circumstantial evidence tends to show that he was in London all the time. His high position, and his known opinions, alike placed him in danger. The only safe thing to do was, so far as possible, to reduce himself to a nonentity, and hope that Gloucester and his myrmidons would forget him. During the last two years death had been very busy in high places. The plague of 1394 had made three royal widowers—the Duke of Lancaster, the King, and the Earl of Derby. In the summer of 1396, Archbishop Courtenay was also summoned to the judgment bar. Removed from Courtenay’s influence, the King awoke from his dream, and determined to initiate a new order of things. He knew at last—all but too late—that Gloucester and Arundel were among his worst enemies. Had he seen it with regard to one man more—his cousin Derby—the course of English history would probably have been different.