the third lady of the realm, chose for her second helpmate another squire of Henry V., Richard Woodville, who was con sidered the handsomest man in England. This marriage was occasioned by the accident of sir Richard Woodville' being appointed as the commander of the guard which escorted the young duchess of Bedford to England.

The marriage of the duchess of Bedford and Richard Woodville was kept secret full five years. Its discovery took place about the same time as that of the queen with Owen Tudor; and certainly the duke of Gloucester (though his own loveaffairs were quite as astounding to the nation) must have thought his two sisters-in-law had gone distracted with love for squires of low degree. What scandals, what court gossip, must have circulated throughout England in the year of grace 1436! The duchess's dower was forfeited in consequence of her marriage with Woodville, but restored, on her humble supplication to parliament, through the influence of her husband's patron, cardinal Beaufort. Grafton-castle was the principal residence of the duchess. Probably Elizabeth Woodville was born there, about 1431, some years before the discovery of her parents' marriage. Her father, sir Richard Woodville, was one of the English commanders at Rouen under the duke of York, during that prince's regency.3

2

After the death of the unfortunate queen-mother Katherine, and that of the queen-dowager Joanna, the duchess of Bedford became for some time, in rank, the first lady in England, and always possessed a certain degree of influence in consequence. Her husband was in the retinue sent to escort Margaret of Anjou to England; he was afterwards rapidly advanced at court, made baron, and finally earl of Rivers, and the duchess of Bedford became a great favourite of the young queen. The duchess was still second lady in England, yet her rank was many degrees more exalted than her fortune; therefore, as her children grew up, she was glad to provide for them at the

1 After the death of Henry V., he was in the service of the duke of Bedford, then regent of France: Richard Woodville was his partisan. He is named in chronicle as holding out the Tower for him against Humphrey duke of Gloucester. All history affirms that Elizabeth was thirty-three in 1464. 3 Monstrelet, vol. ii. p. 114: new edition 4 Breknoke Computus.

1

court of her friend, queen Margaret. Her eldest daughter, the beautiful Elizabeth Woodville, was appointed maid of honour' to that queen, little deeming that she was one day to fill her place on the English throne. While yet in attendance on her royal mistress, she captured the heart of a brave knight, sir Hugh Johns, a great favourite of Richard duke of York. Sir Hugh had nothing in the world wherewithal to endow the fair Woodville but a sword, whose temper had been proved in many a battle in France; he was, moreover, a timid wooer, and, very unwisely, deputed others to make the declaration of love which he wanted courage to speak himself. Richard duke of York was protector of England when he thus, in regal style, recommended his landless vassal to the love of her, who was one day to share the diadem of his heir:

"TO DAME ELIZABETH WODEVILLE.3

Right trusty and well-beloved, we greet you well.

"Forasmuch as we are credibly informed that our right hearty and wellbeloved knight sir Hugh John, for the great womanhood and gentleness approved and known in your person-ye being sole, [single,] and to be married-his heart wholly have; wherewith we are right well pleased. Howbeit your disposition towards him in that behalf as yet, is to us unknown. We therefore, as for the faithful, true, and good lordship we owe unto him at this time, (and so will continue,) desire and heartily pray ye will on your part be to him well-willed to the performing of this our writing and his desire. Wherein ye shall do not only to our pleasure, but, we doubt not, to your own great weal and worship in time to come; certifying, that if ye fulfil our intent in this matter, we will and shall be to him and you such lord, as shall be to both your great weal and worship, by the grace of God, who precede and guide you in all heavenly felicity and welfare. "Written by RICHARD, DUKE OF YORK."

Even if Elizabeth's heart had responded to this earnest appeal of her lover's princely master, yet she was too slenderly gifted by fortune to venture on a mere love-match. She probably demurred on this point, and avoided returning a decisive answer, for her delay elicited a second letter on the subject f sir Hugh's great love and affection. This time it was from 'Parliamentary History, vol. ii. p. 345. Hall's Chronicle, p. 365. Bucke and Provost likewise dwell on this circumstance.

Bib. Reg. 17, b. xlvii. fol. 164, vol. clxv. &c. This and the following letters, ich are not yet named in the catalogue of the British Museum, were discovered y the indefatigable research of Mr. Halliwell, and with great liberality commicated to the author. Their biographical value every one will perceive.

* The name is spelled Wodeville in the MS. letters, though one of the addresses is spelled Wodehill; but this is a mere slip of the transcriber's pen, as it is evident that both are addressed to the same person.

the pen of the famous Richard Neville, earl of Warwick. It is not written as if by a stranger to a stranger; at the same time, by his promises of "good lordship" (patronage) to Elizabeth and her lover, it is very evident he considers himself as the superior of both.

"TO DAME ELIZABETH WODEVILLE.

"Worshipful and well-beloved, I greet you well: And forasmuch my right well-beloved sir Hugh John, knight, (which now late was with you unto his full great joy, and had great cheer, as he saith, whereof I thank you,) hath informed me how that he hath, for the great love and affection that he hath unto your person, as well as for the great sadness [seriousness] and wisdom that he hath found and proved in you at that time, as for your great and praised beauty and womanly demeaning, he desireth with all haste to do you worship by way of marriage, before any other creature living, (as he saith). I (considering his said desire, and the great worship that he had, which was made knight at Jerusalem, and after his coming home, for the great wisdom and manhood that he wa renowned of, was made knight-marshal of France, and after knight-marshal of England, unto his great worship, with other his great and many virtues and desert, and also the good and notable service that he hath done and daily doth te ine,) write unto you at this time, and pray you effectuously that ye will the rather (at this my request and prayer) to condescend and apply you unto his said lawft and honest desire, wherein ye shall not only purvey [provide] right notably fr yourself unto your weal and worship [profit and honour] in time to come, as I hereby trust, but also cause me to show unto you such good lordship [patronage] as ye by reason of it shall hold you content and pleased, with the grace of God, which everlastingly have you in his bliss, protection, and governance.

"Written by the EARL OF WARWICK.” No one can read this epistle without the conviction that the great earl of Warwick had some ambition to become a match-maker as well as a king-maker. Nevertheless, sir Hugh met with the usual fate of a lover who has not the spirit to speak for himself, and deputes his wooing to the agency of friends, he was rejected by the fair Elizabeth. He married

a nameless damsel, and in course of time died possessor of a single manor. A far different destiny was reserved for the lady of his love.

1 This, according to sir Hugh's monument, was in 1451; therefore, these letters, which are dateless, must have been written after that year. A fact which proves that Elizabeth was single then.

2 See the copy of the monumental brass of sir Hugh Johns, in sir R. C. Hoare's edition of the Itinerary of Giraldus Cambrensis. He was lord of the manor of Landymo, which it is expressly affirmed was given him by John the Good, duke of Norfolk; his bravery, and the orders of knighthood he won, are detailed nearly in the words of the earl of Warwick, but the monument adds dates which throw some light on the above correspondence. It declares his wife was " Mand,” but mentions no surname or descent. Sir Hugh Johns was the father of five children:

The foregoing letters could not have been written till some time in 1452. Elizabeth was that year twenty-one, and she was then, as Richard of York says, "sole and to be married," that is, she was single and disengaged; a remarkable crisis of her life, when in her maiden beauty she was eagerly wooed by the avowed partisans of "the pale and of the purple rose." Some worldly considerations, besides her duty to her royal mistress queen Margaret, seem to have led Elizabeth to reject the Yorkist partisan sir Hugh Johns, and accept the hand of the heir of the illustrious and wealthy lordship of Ferrers of Groby, a cavalier firmly attached to the house of Lancaster. The time is not distinctly specified of the marriage of Elizabeth Woodville with John Gray; it probably took place soon after her rejection of the Yorkist champion in 1552. This. wedlock was certainly a great match for the penniless maid of honour, for it was equal to several of the alliances of the Plantagenet princesses. John Gray was son and heir to lord Ferrers of Groby, possessor of the ancient domain of Bradgate, which was hereafter to derive such lustre from being the native place of Elizabeth's descendant, lady Jane Gray. Bradgate was Gray's patrimony, by reason of his descent from the proudest blood of our Norman nobility.' Elizabeth, after she was married, became one of the four ladies of the bedchamber of her royal mistress, Margaret of Anjou, in whose wardrobebook, preserved in the office of the duchy of Lancaster, she is mentioned as "lady Isabella Gray, in attendance on the queen's person,”—the name of Isabella being, until she became queen, usually written instead of Elizabeth. Tradition declares that her marriage with the heir of Groby was a happy one; although

is name appears as a second in one of those legalized duels which heralded the wars of the roses. In the year 1553, he was second on appeal of battle for Lyalton, who accused John Norris of treason.-Acts of the Privy Council, by sir il Nicolas, vol. vi. p. 129.

See Dugdale, collated by Edward Brayley with other genealogical proofs.Istorical Perambulator. Bradgate had been part of the inheritance of Petronilla, ghter of Grantmesnil, one of the Conqueror's great tenants in capite; it dewended from her through a co-heiress of Blanchmains earl of Leicester to the te of Ferrers of Groby, and by the heiress of the Ferrers to sir Edward Gray, Sither to the husband of Elizabeth. It was the chance of war that made Elizabeth a poor suppliant widow.

There is a well-known and amusing paper, called the "Journal of Elizabeth

they were frequently separated by the ferocious contests be tween York and Lancaster, which commenced directly after their union.

An adventure connected with the struggle for the crown in the last stormy years of Henry VI.'s reign, placed young Edward Plantagenet, then earl of March, and earl Rivers, the father of Elizabeth, in extraordinary collision. The earl of Rivers and his son sir Anthony, ardent partisans of Lancaster, were fitting out ships at Sandwich by orders of queen Margaret, in order to join the duke of Somerset's naval armament in 1458. At this time sir John Dinham, a naval captain in the service of Warwick, made a descent at Sandwich, and, surprising the earl of Rivers and his son in their beds, carried them prisoners to Calais. How they were received there, William Paston' shall tell, in one of his letters to a Norfolk knight, his brother :

"To my right worshipful Brother be this letter delivered. As for tidings, the lord Rivers was brought to Calais, and before the lords by night, with eight-secre torches; and there my lord of Salisbury rated him, calling him 'knave's son' that such as he should be so rude as to call him and these other lords traitors, for they should be found the king's true liegemen when such as he should be found a traitor!' And my lord of Warwick rated him, and said, His father was but a little squire brought up with king Henry V., and since made himself by marriage, and also made a lord, and it was not his part to have held such language to those who were of king's blood! And my lord March rated him likewise. And sir Antony Woodville was likewise rated, for his language, by all the three lords."

All this rating seems to have been the dénouement of some old quarrel at court with the earl of March. As the duke of York had not yet claimed the crown, but only the right of succession, his son dared not take the lives of Henry VI.'s subjects in cold blood; therefore the Woodvilles escaped with the payment of ransom.

Edward lord Ferrers, the father-in-law of Elizabeth, died December 18th, 1457. The distraction of the times was such, that her husband had no opportunity of taking his place as lord Ferrers in the house of peers. He was then twenty-five, Woodville" when courted by sir John Gray, which makes her fill a very pastoral situation as a country lady at Grafton: it is a palpable fabrication, and therefore not to be quoted here.

1 Paston Papers. Hall, Holinshed, and Rapin mention the incident.

2 Dugdale.