Henry himself, who had long been the paffive fpectator of all these horrors, was now thought unfit to live. The duke of Gloucefter, afterwards Richard the third, entering his chamber alone, murdered him in cold blood. Of all those that were taken, none were fuffered to furvive but Margaret herself. It was perhaps expected that fhe would be ranfomed by the king of France; and in this they were not deceived, as that monarch paid the king of England fifty thousand crowns for her freedom. This extraordinary woman, after having fuftained the caufe of her husband in twelve battles, after having furvived her friends, fortunes, and children, died, a few years after, in privacy in France, very miferable indeed; but with few other claims to our pity, except her courage and her diftreffes.

CHAP.

CHA P. XIX.

OF

Fall people the English are the moft truly compaffionate; and a throne raised upon cruelty never wanted enemies among them. Nothing could have been more ill judged than any attempts to govern fuch a people by the hands of the executioner; and the leaders of either faction feemed infenfible of this truth. Edward being now freed from great enemies, turned to the punishment of thofe of the leffer note; fo that the gibbets were hung with his adverfaries, and their eftates confifcated to his use. The baftard Falconbridge, among others, having advanced to London at the head of a fmall body of forces, was repulfed; and being taken prifoner was immediately executed.

But while Edward was thus rendering himself terrible on the one hand, he was immerfed in abandoned pleasures on the other, Nature, it feems, was not unfavourable to him in that refpect; as he was univerfally allowed to be the most beautiful man of his time. His courtiers alfo feemed willing to encourage thofe debaucheries in which they had a fhare; and the clergy, as they themfelves practifed every kind of lewdness with impunity, were ever ready to lend abfolution to all his failings. The truth is, enormous vices had been of late fo common, that adultery was held but as a very flight offence. Among the number of his miftreffes was the wife of one Shore, a merchant in the city, a woman of« exquifite beauty and good fenfe, but who had not

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virtue

virtue enough to refift the temptations of a beautiful man, and a monarch.

England now enjoying a temporary calm, Edward thought that the best way to ingratiate himfelf with his fubjects, would be to affert his right to his dominions in France, which the infurrections of his father had contributed to alienate during the former reign. An attempt of this kind would serve to give vent to the malignant difpofition of his enemies, and would be fure to please the vulgar, who are ever more fond of fplendid, than of useful acquifitions. To profecute this fcheme, the king fent off to his ally, the duke of Burgundy, a reinforcement of three thousand men, and foon after paffed over himself at the head of a numerous army. Lewis the eleventh, who was then king of France, was, not without reason, alarmed at this formidable invafion, which as he was unable to refift, he ftrove to obviate by treaty.

This fucceeded more effectually than arms; the two kings had an interview at the bridge of Perpignan ; and, upon the promife of a ftipulated fum, Edward agreed to lead his forces back to England. This monarch wanted to return home to his miftreffes to spend upon them the money he expected to receive from France; and the French monarch - hoped foon to put himself in a pofture to refuse giving these fums which he had only made a promife to pay.

Upon the conclufion of this expedition, which thus ended without effect, Edward appeared no lefs actuated by private paffions unworthy a fovereign and a statefman, than jealous of all who feemed to defpife his conduct. Among the detail of private wrongs, which are too minute for hiftory, an act of tyranny, of which he was guilty in his own family, deferves the deteftation of pofterity. The duke of Clarence, by all his fervices

in

in deferting Warwick, had never been able to rccover the king's friendship, which he had forfeited. by his former confederacy with that nobleman. A pretext was therefore fought to ruin him; and the openness of his hafty temper foon gave the withedfor occafion. The king hunting one day in the park of Thomas Burdet, a creature of the duke's, he killed a white buck, which was a favourite of the owner. Burdet vexed at the lofs, broke into a paflion, and wished the horns of the deer in the belly of the perfon who had advised the king to that infult. For this trifling exclamation, Burdet was tried for his life, and publicly executed at Tyburn. The duke of Clarence, upon the death of his friend, vented his grief in renewed reproaches against his brother, and exclaimed against the iniquity of the fentence. The king, highly offended with this liberty, or ufing that as a pretext against him, had him arraigned before the house of peers, and appeared in perfon as his accufer. In thofe times of confulion, every crime alleged by the prevailing party was fatal; the duke was found guilty, and being granted a choice of the manner in which he would die, he was privately drowned in a butt of malmfey in the Tower; a whimsical choice, and implying that he had an extraordinary paffion for that liquor.

The rest of this monarch's life was spent in riot and debauchery; in gratifications that are pleafing only to the narrow mind, in useless treaties with France, in which he was ever deceived, and in empty threats against the monarch who had deceived him. His parliament, become merely the ministers of his will, confented, at his request, to a war with France, at a time when his alliances upon the continent were fo broken, that it was impoffible for it to fucceed. The people feemed equally pleased with the profpect of an expedition which,

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which, without ferving, could only tend to impoverish the nation; and great hopes were revived of once more conquering France. While all were thus occupied with hope, or private diftrust, and while Edward was employed in making preparations for that enterprize, he was feized with a diftemper, of which he expired in the forty-fecond year of his age, (and continuing from his firft ufurpation,) in the twenty-third year of his reign. The character of this prince is eafily fummed up. best qualities were courage and beauty; his bad, a combination of all the vices. Befides five daughters, this king left two fons, Edward, prince of Wales, his fucceffor, then in his thirteenth year; and Richard, duke of York, in his seventh.

His

CHAP.