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[ NOTE A, p. 58. Stowe, Baker, Speed, Biondi, Holingshed, Bacon. Some late writers, particularly Mr. Carte, have doubted whether Perkin were an impostor, and have even asserted him to be the true Plantagenet. But to refute this opinion, we need only reflect on the following particulars: (1.) Though the circumstances of the wars between the two roses be in general involved in great obscurity, yet is there a most luminous ray thrown on all the transactions during the usurpation of Richard, and the murder of the two young princes, by the narrative of Sir Thomas More, whose singular magnanimity, probity, and judgment, make him an evidence beyond all exception. No historian, either of ancient or modern times, can possibly have more weight: he may also be justly esteemed a contemporary with regard to the murder of the two princes; for though he was but five years of age when that event happened, he lived and was educated among the chief actors during the period of Richard; and it is plain from this narrative itself, which is often extremely circumstantial, that he had the particulars from the eyewitnesses themselves. His authority, therefore, is irresistible, and sufficient to overbalance a hundred little doubts, and scruples, and objections. For in reality his narrative is liable to no solid objection, nor is there any mistake detected in it. He says, indeed, that the protector’s partisans, particularly Dr. Shaw, spread abroad rumors of Edward IV.‘s pre-contract with Elizabeth Lucy; whereas it now appears from record, that the parliament afterwards declared the king’s children illegitimate, on pretence of his pre-contract with lady Eleanor Talbot. But it must be remarked, that neither of these pre-contracts was ever so much as attempted to be proved; and why might not the protector’s flatterers and partisans have made use sometimes of one false rumor, sometimes of another? Sir Thomas More mentions the one rumor as well as the other, and treats them both lightly, as they deserved. It is also thought incredible by Mr. Carte, that Dr. Shaw should have been encouraged by Richard to calumniate openly his mother the duchess of York, with whom that prince lived in good terms. But if there be any difficulty in this supposition, we need only suppose, that Dr. Shaw might have concerted in general his sermon with the protector or his ministers, and yet have chosen himself the particular topics, and chosen them very foolishly. This appears, indeed, to have been the case, by the disgrace into which he fell afterwards, and by the protector’s neglect of him. (2.) If Sir Thomas’s quality of contemporary be disputed with regard to the duke of Glocester’s protectorate, it cannot possibly be disputed with regard to Perkin’s imposture: he was then a man, and had a full opportunity of knowing and examining and judging of the truth. In asserting that the duke of York was murdered by his uncle, he certainly asserts, in the most express terms, that Perkin, who personated him, was an impostor. (3.) There is another great genius who has carefully treated this point of history; so great a genius, as to be esteemed with justice one of the chief ornaments of the nation, and indeed one of the most sublime writers that any age or nation has produced. It is Lord Bacon I mean, who has related at full length, and without the least doubt or hesitation, all the impostures of Perkin Warbeck. If it be objected, that Lord Bacon was no contemporary, and that we have the same materials as he upon which to form our judgment; it must be remarked, the lord Bacon plainly composed his elaborate and exact history from many records and papers which are now lost, and that consequently he is always to be cited as an original historian. It were very strange, if Mr. Carte’s opinion were just, that, among all the papers which Lord Bacon perused, he never found any reascn to suspect Perkin to be the true Plantagenet. There was at that time no interest in defaming Richard III. Bacon, besides, is a very unbiased historian, nowise partial to Henry; we know the detail of that prince’s oppressive government from him alone. It may only be thought that, in summing up his character, he has laid the colors of blame more faintly than the very facts he mentions seem to require. Let me remark, in passing, as a singularity, how much English history has been beholden to four great men who have possessed the highest dignity in the law, More, Bacon, Clarendon, and Whitlocke. (4.) But if contemporary evidence be so much sought after, there may in this case be produced the strongest and most undeniable in the world. The queen dowager, her son the marquis of Dorset, a man of excellent understanding Sir Edward Woodville, her brother, Sir Thomas St. Leger, who had married the king’s sister, Sir John Bourchier, Sir Robert Willoughby, Sir Giles Daubeney, Sir Thomas Arundel, the Courtneys, the Cheyneys, the Talbots, the Stanleys, and, in a word, all the partisans of the house of York, that is, the men of chief dignity in the nation; all these great persons were so assured of the murder of the two princes, that they applied to the earl of Richmond, the mortal enemy of their party and family; they projected to set him on the throne, which must have been utter ruin to them if the princes were alive; and they stipulated to marry him to the princess Elizabeth, as heir to the crown, who in that case was no heir at all. Had each of those persons written the memoirs of his own times, would he not have said that Richard murdered his nephews? Or would their pen be a better declaration than their actions, of their real sentiments? (5.) But we have another contemporary authority, still better than even those great persons, so much interested to know the truth: it is that of Richard himself. He projected to marry his niece, a very unusual alliance in England, in order to unite her title with his own. He knew, therefore, her title to be good: for as to the declaration of her illegitimacy, as it went upon no proof, or even pretence of proof, it was always regarded with the utmost contempt by the nation, and it was considered as one of those parliamentary transactions, so frequent in that period, which were scandalous in themselves, and had no manner of authority. It was even so much despised, as not to be reversed by parliament after Henry and Elizabeth were on the throne. (6.) We have also, as contemporary evidence, the universal established opinion of the age, both abroad and at home. This point was regarded as so uncontroverted, that when Richard notified his accession to the court of France, that court was struck with horror at his abominable parricide in murdering both his nephews, as Philip de Comines tells us; and this sentiment went to such an unusual height, that, as we learn from the same author, the court would not make the least reply to him. (7.) The same reasons which convinced that age of the parricide still subsist, and ought to carry the most undoubted evidence to us; namely, the very circumstance of the sudden disappearance of the princes from the Tower, and their appearance nowhere else. Every one said, “They have not escaped from their uncle, for he makes no search after them: he has not conveyed them elsewhere; for it is his business to declare so, in order to remove the imputation of murder from himself. He never would needlessly subject himself to the infamy and danger of being esteemed a parricide, without acquiring the security attending that crime. They were in his custody. He is answerable for them. If he gives no account of them, as he has a plain interest in their death, he must, by every rule of common sense, be regarded as the murderer. His flagrant usurpation, as well as his other treacherous and cruel actions, makes no better be expected from him. He could not say, with Cain, that he was not his nephews’ keeper.” This reasoning, which was irrefragable at the very first, became every day stronger from Richard’s continued silence, and the general and total ignorance of the place of these princes’ abode. Richard’s reign lasted about two years beyond this period; and surely he could not have found a better expedient for disappointing the earl of Richmond’s projects, as well as justifying his own character, than the producing of his nephews. (8.) If it were necessary, amidst this blaze of evidence, to produce proofs which, in any other case, would have been regarded as considerable, and would have carried great validity with them, I might mention Dighton and Tyrrel’s account of the murder. This last gentleman especially was not likely to subject himself to the reproach of so great a crime, by an imposture which, it appears, did not acquire him the favor of Henry. (9.) The duke of York, being a boy of nine years of age, could not have made his escape without the assistance of some elder persons. Would it not have been their chief concern instantly to convey intelligence of so great an event to his mother, the queen dowager, to his aunt, the duchess of Burgundy, and to the other friends of the family. The duchess protected Simnel; a project which, had it been successful, must have ended in the crowning of Warwick and the exclusion of the duke of York. This, among many other proofs, evinces that she was ignorant of the escape of that prince, which is impossible had it been real. (10.) The total silence with regard to the persons who aided him in his escape, as also with regard to the place of his abode during more than eight years, is a sufficient proof of the imposture. (11.) Perkin’s own account of his escape is incredible and absurd. He said, that murderers were employed by his uncle to kill him and his brother; they perpetrated the crime against his brother, but took compassion on him, and allowed him to escape. This account is contained in all the historians of that age. (12.) Perkin himself made a full confession of his imposture no less than three times; once when he surrendered himself prisoner, a second time when he was set in the stocks at Cheapside and Westminster, and a third time, which carries undoubted evidence, at the foot of the gibbet on which he was hanged. Not the least surmise that the confession had ever been procured by torture; and surely the last time he had nothing further to fear. (13.) Had not Henry been assured that Perkin was a ridiculous impostor, disavowed by the whole nation, he never would have allowed him to live an hour after he came into his power, much less would he have twice pardoned him. His treatment of the innocent earl of Warwick, who, in reality, had no title to the crown, is a sufficient confirmation of this reasoning. (14.) We know with certainty whence the whole imposture came, namely, from the intrigues of the duchess of Burgundy. She had before acknowledged and supported Lambert Simnel, an avowed imposter. It is remarkable that Mr. Carte, in order to preserve the weight of the duchess’s testimony in favor of Perkin, suppresses entirely this material fact: a strong effect of party prejudices, and this author’s desire of blackening Henry VII., whose hereditary title to the crown was defective. (15.) There never was, at that time, any evidence or shadow of evidence produced of Perkin’s identity with Richard Plantagenet. Richard had disappeared when near nine years of age, and Perkin did not appear till he was a man. Could any one from his aspect pretend then to be sure of the identity? He had got some stories concerning Richard’s childhood, and the court of England; but all that it was necessary for a boy of nine to remark or remember, was easily suggested to him by the duchess of Burgundy, or Frion, Henry’s secretary, or by any body that had ever lived at court. It is true, many persons of note were at first deceived; but the discontents against Henry’s government, and the general enthusiasm for the house of York, account sufficiently for this temporary delusion. Everybody’s eyes were opened long before Perkin’s death. (16.) The circumstance of finding the two dead bodies in the reign of Charles II. is not surely indifferent. They were found in the very place which More, Bacon, and other ancient authors, had assigned as the place of interment of the young princes; the bones corresponded by their size to the age of the princes; the secret and irregular place of their interment, not being in holy ground, proves that the boys had been secretly murdered; and in the Tower no boys but those who are very nearly related to the crown can be exposed to a violent death. If we compare all these circumstances, we shall find that the inference is just and strong, that they were the bodies of Edward V. and his brother, the very inference that was drawn at the time of the discovery.
Since the publication of this History, Mr. Walpole has published his Historic Doubts concerning Richard III. Nothing can be a stronger proof how ingenious and agreeable that gentleman’s pen is, than his being able to make an inquiry concerning a remote point of English history, an object of general conversation. The foregoing note has been enlarged on account of that performance.]
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[ NOTE B, p. 69. Rot. Parl. 3 Henry VII. n. 17. The preamble is remarkable, and shows the state of the nation at that time. “The king, our sovereign lord, remembereth how, by our unlawful maintainances, giving of liveries, signs, and tokens, retainders by indentures, promises, oaths, writings, and other embraceries of his subjects, untrue demeanings of sheriffs in making panels, and untrue returns by taking money, by juries, etc. the policy of this nation is most subdued.” It must indeed be confessed, that such a state of the country required great discretionary power in the sovereign; nor will the same maxims of government suit such a rude people, that may be proper in a more advanced stage of society. The establishment of the star-chamber, or the enlargement of its power, in the reign of Henry VII., might have been as wise as the abolition of it in that of Charles I.]
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[ NOTE C, p. 72. The duke of Northumberland has lately printed a household book of an old earl of that family, who lived at this time. The author has been favored with the perusal of it; and it contains many curious particulars, which mark the manners and way of living in that rude, not to say barbarous, age; as well as the prices of commodities. I have extracted a few of them from that piece, which gives a true picture of ancient manners, and is one of the most singular monuments that English antiquity affords us; for we may be confident, however rude the strokes, that no baron’s family was on a nobler or more splendid footing. The family consists of one hundred and sixty-six persons, masters and servants. Fifty-seven strangers are reckoned upon every day; on the whole, two hundred and twenty-three. Twopence halfpenny are supposed to be the daily expense of each for meat, drink, and firing. This would make a groat of our present money. Supposing provisions between three and four times cheaper, it would be equivalent to fourteenpence: no great sum for a nobleman’s housekeeping; especially considering that the chief expense of a family at that time consisted in meat and drink; for the sum allotted by the earl for his whole annual expense is one thousand one hundred and eighteen pounds seventeen shillings and eightpence; meat, drink, and firing cost seven hundred and ninety-six pounds eleven shillings and twopence, more than two thirds of the whole; in a modern family it is not above a third, (p. 157, 158, 159.) The whole expense of the earl’s family is managed with an exactness that is very rigid, and, if we make no allowance for ancient manners, such as may seem to border on an extreme; insomuch that the number of pieces which must be cut out of every quarter of beef, mutton, pork, veal, nay, stock-fish and salmon, are determined, and must be entered and accounted for by the different clerks appointed for that purpose. If a servant be absent a day, his mess is struck off. If he go on my lord’s business, board-wages are allowed him, eightpence a day for his journey in winter, fivepence in summer. When he stays in any place, twopence a day are allowed him, besides the maintenance of his horse. Somewhat above a quarter of wheat is allowed for every mouth throughout the year; and the wheat is estimated at five shillings and eightpence a quarter. Two hundred and fifty quarters of malt are allowed, at four shillings a quarter. Two hogsheads are to be made of a quarter, which amounts to about a bottle and a third of beer a day to each person, (p.4,) and the beer will not be very strong One hundred and nine fat beeves are to be bought at Allhallow-tide, at thirteen shillings and fourpence apiece; and twenty-four lean beeves to be bought at St. Helens, at eight shillings apiece. These are to be put into the pastures to feed; and are to serve from Mid-summer to Michaelmas; which is consequently the only time that the family eats fresh beef. During all the rest of the year they live on salted meat. (p.5.) One hundred and sixty gallons of mustard are allowed in a year, which seems indeed requisite for the salt beef, (p.18.) Six hundred and forty-seven sheep are allowed, at twentypence apiece; and these seem also to be all eat salted, except between Lammas and Michaelmas, (p.5.) Only twenty-five hogs are allowed at two shillings apiece; twenty-eight veals, at twentypence; forty lambs, at tenpence or a shilling, (p. 7.) These seem to be reserved for my lord’s table, or that of the upper servants, called the knights’ table. The other servants, as they eat salted meat almost through the whole year, and with few or no vegetables, had a very bad and unhealthy diet; so that there cannot be any thing more erroneous than the magnificent ideas formed of “the roast beef of old England.” We must entertain as mean an idea of its cleanliness. Only seventy ells of linen, at eightpence an ell, are annually allowed for this great family. No sheets were used. This linen was made into eight table-cloths for my lord’s table, and one table-cloth for the knights, (p.16.) This last, I suppose, was washed only once a month. Only forty shillings are allowed for washing throughout the whole year; and most of it seems expended on the linen belonging to the chapel. The drinking, however, was tolerable, namely, ten tuns and two hogsheads of Gascogny wine, at the rate of four pounds thirteen shillings and fourpence a tun. (p.6.) Only ninety-one dozen of candles for the whole year. (p.14.) The family rose at six in the morning, dined at ten, and supped at four in the afternoon. The gates were all shut at nine, and no further ingress or egress permitted, (p. 314, 318.) My lord and lady have set on their table for breakfast at seven o’clock in the morning a quart of beer, as much wine; two pieces of salt fish, six red herrings, four white ones, or a dish of sprats. In flesh days, half a chine of mutton, or a chine of beef boiled, (p.73, 75.) Mass is ordered to be said at six o’clock, in order, says the household book that all my lord’s servants may rise early, (p.170.) Only twenty-four fires are allowed, beside the kitchen and hall, and most of these have only a peck of coals a day allowed them. (p.99.) After Lady-day, no fires permitted in the rooms, except half-fires in my lord’s and lady’s, and lord Piercy’s and the nursery, (p.101.) It is to be observed, that my lord kept house in Yorkshire, where there is certainly much cold weather after Lady-day. Eighty chalders of coals, at four shillings and twopence a chalder, suffices throughout the whole year; and because coal will not burn without wood, says the household book, sixty-four loads of great wood are also allowed, at twelvepence a load.(p.22.) This is a proof that grates were not the used. Here is an article. “It is devised that from henceforth no capons to be bought but only for my lord’s own mess, and that the said capons shall be bought for twopence apiece, lean, and fed in the poultry; and master chamberlain and the stewards be fed with capons, if there be strangers sitting with them.” (p. 102.) Pigs are to be bought at threepence or a groat a piece; geese at the same price; chickens at a halfpenny; hens at twopence, and only for the abovementioned tables. Here is another article. “Item, it is thought* good that no plovers be bought at no season but only in Christmas* and principal feasts, and my lord to be served therewith and his board-*end, and none other, and to be bought for a penny apiece, or a penny halfpenny at most.” (p. 103.) Woodcocks are to be bought at the same price. Partridges at twopence, (p. 104, 105.) Pheasants a shilling; peacocks, the same. (p. 100.) My lord keeps only twenty-seven horses in his stable at his own charge. His upper servants have allowance for maintaining their own horses, (p. 126.) These horses are six gentle horses, as they are called, at hay and hard meat throughout the whole year, four palfreys, three hobbies and nags three sumpter horses, six horses for those servants to whom my lord furnishes a horse, two sumpter horses more, and three mill horses two for carrying the corn, and one for grinding it; whence we may infer that mills, either water or windmills, were then unknown, at least very rare; besides these, there are seven great trotting horses for the chariot or wagon. He allows a peck of oats a day, besides loaves made of beans, for his principal horses; the oats at twentypence, the beans at two shillings a quarter. The load of hay is at two shillings and eightpence. When my lord is on a journey, he carries thirty-six horsemen along with him; together with bed and other accommodation. (p. 157.) The inns, it seems, could afford nothing tolerable. My lord passes the year in three country seats, all in Yorkshire; Wrysel, Leckenfield, and Topclyiffe; but he has furniture only for one. He carries every thing along with him, beds, tables, chairs, kitchen utensils, all which, we may conclude, were so coarse, that they could not be spoilt by the carriage; yet seventeen carts and one wagon suffice for the whole. (p. 391.) One cart suffices for all his kitchen utensils, cooks’ beds, etc. (p. 388.) One remarkable circumstance is, that he has eleven priests in his house, besides seventeen persons, chanters, musicians, etc. belonging to his chapel; yet he has only two cooks for a family of two hundred and twenty-three persons. (p. 325.)[*]
Their meals were certainly dressed on the slovenly manner of a ship’s company. It is amusing to observe the pompous and even royal style assumed by this Tartar chief. He does not give any orders, though only for the right making of mustard, but it is introduced with this preamble: “It seemeth good to us and our council.” If we consider the magnificent and elegant manner in which the Venetian and other Italian noblemen then lived, with the progress made by the Italians in literature and the fine arts, we shall not wonder that they considered the ultramontane nations as barbarous. The Flemish also seem to have much excelled the English and even the French. Yet the earl is sometimes not deficient in generosity; he pays, for instance, an annual pension of a groat a year to my lady of Walsingham, for her interest in heaven: the same sum to the holy blood at Hales. (p. 337.) No mention is anywhere made of plate; but only of the hiring of pewter vessels. The servants seem all to have bought their own clothes from their wages.]
* In another place mention is made of four cooks. (p. 388.)
But I suppose that the two servants, called in p. 325 groom
of the larder and child of the scullery, are on p. 368,
comprehended in the number of cooks.
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[ NOTE D, p. 132. Protestant writers have imagined, that because a man could purchase for a shilling an indulgence for the most enormous and unheard-of crimes, there must necessarily have ensued a total dissolution of morality, and consequently of civil society, from the practices of the Romish church. They do not consider, that after all these indulgences were promulgated, there still remained (besides hell fire) the punishment by the civil magistrate, the infamy of the world, and secret remorses of conscience, which are the great motives that operate on mankind. The philosophy of Cicero, who allowed of an Elysium, but rejected all Tartarus, was a much more universal indulgence than that preached by Arcemboldi or Tetzel; yet nobody will suspect Cicero of any design to promote immorality. The sale of indulgences seems, therefore, no more criminal than any other cheat of the church of Rome, or of any other church. The reformers, by entirely abolishing purgatory, did really, instead of partial indulgences sold by the pope, give, gratis, a general indulgence of a similar nature, for all crimes and offences, without exception or distinction. The souls once consigned to hell were never supposed to be redeemable by any price. There is on record only one instance of a damned soul that was saved, and that by the special intercession of the Virgin. See Pascal’s Provincial Letters. An indulgence saved the person who purchased it from purgatory only.]