Not that the people generally will join in the strife. The family feuds of great nobles concern them but little; they merely desire peace and good government, that they may till their lands, labour in their workshops, buy and sell, and fill their exhausted purses without distraction. Right willingly would they let the sword rust in its scabbard and the unstrung bow hang idly on the wall. But the land is full of men who have made war their trade in France, and they are eager to be hired for any adventure that is going. These roving mercenaries, the gentry, and their hosts of retainers constitute the armies which will maintain the long and bitter contest. But despite the bloody duels of factious nobles, the business of the country is not interrupted. The judges go on circuit as of old, taking their commissions from whichever king is in the ascendant; and the peasant pauses in his hillside furrow and leans on the handles of his plough to view the nobles of the land dashing themselves to pieces in battle on the plain below. The war is a war of nobles, and not of the commonalty.
The wild northern levies triumph, and the king is recovered. Then Margaret arrays her prisoners, and sets up the little prince, her son, to judge them. “Fair son,” she cries, “what deaths shall they die?” and the lad forthwith orders their heads to be struck off. The wild, lawless host tarries eight days at St. Albans, and this delay enables Warwick to unite with the new Duke of York and reach London. The king and queen gain nothing from their victory. They are forced to march north, and the Londoners, glad to be saved from Margaret and her Border freebooters, welcome York’s heir, and sing:—
“He that could London forsake, we will no more to us take.”
They crown the young man at Westminster, and as Edward the Fourth he takes up the sceptre. It is Warwick who has made him king.
Now comes the story of a great quarrel and its dramatic sequel. Edward has fallen in love with beautiful Elizabeth Woodville, the daughter of a Red Rose father, and the widow of a Red Rose husband. He marries her secretly, and all the while Warwick is negotiating a foreign marriage for him with the French king’s sister. When Edward’s marriage to Elizabeth Woodville is announced, Warwick’s annoyance and disgust know no bounds. He dissembles, however, though day by day he grows angrier and angrier as he sees power slipping from him and passing to the “upstart” relatives of the new queen.
Edward, instigated by his new domestic circle, is bent on throwing off the Neville yoke. So he heaps honours, high offices, lands, and wealth on the Greys and the Woodvilles, and Warwick is furious. Such treatment he will not brook. He who has set up the king can pull him down again. So he seeks “false, fleeting, perjured Clarence,” who is now jealous of his brother, the king, and eager for a throne. Clarence marries Warwick’s daughter, and the strings of insurrection are vigorously pulled by the wily earl. Edward rouses himself at last and hastens northward, where his cannon soon put the rebels to flight, and their captured leader reveals Warwick’s plot to make Clarence king. At once the pair of conspirators flee to France.
Warwick and that crafty intriguer, Louis the Eleventh, now concoct a plan for driving their common enemy, King Edward, off the throne, and restoring Henry the Sixth. Queen Margaret at first indignantly refuses to accept the support of the man who has driven her into exile, and cast foul aspersions on her character; but Warwick goes on bended knee to her, and withdraws every charge. The queen keeps him in this humiliating position for a quarter of an hour, and then relents. She agrees that her son shall marry Warwick’s daughter, but only when he has restored Henry to his throne. Then the king-maker, who has broken so many solemn oaths, swears on a piece of the true cross to remain faithful to the Lancastrian cause. A fleet is fitted out, Warwick lands at Dartmouth, proclaims King Henry, and summons the national levies to his banner. As Edward lies in bed at Doncaster, two friends burst into his chamber and bid him rise and flee, for his foes are within an hour’s march. He flings on his clothes, and without armour or money rides at breakneck speed to Lynn, where he sets sail for Holland. Once more the king-maker has made and unmade a king.
The old king is clad in a robe of blue velvet, brought out of the Tower, set on horseback, and led to St. Paul’s amidst crowds of Londoners who shout “God save King Henry.” The poor old king knows full well that the proud noble who bears his train in the state procession is his and England’s master, and that he must do his bidding or return whence he came. Warwick has again triumphed, but his hold on power is far from secure. The Lancastrians have no desire for a puppet king whose strings are worked by their old enemy, and the Yorkists are busy preparing for the return of Edward. Next spring he appears in the Humber, and pushes on to London, where the gates are opened to him, and he secures the person of King Henry. Warwick is in battle-array to the north of Barnet, his forces “under a hedge-side.” Clarence, who has made peace with his brother, offers mediation; but Warwick, angry at his double faithlessness, contemptuously rejects his advances.
“Last scene of all, to end this strange, eventful history.” Raw, cold, and dismal dawns the morning on Easter Sunday in the year 1471. A heavy mist, which many a soldier ascribes to magical arts, rolls over the field and hides the opposing armies from each other. The battle begins, and men fight as in a dream, striking wildly at each other, and scarce distinguishing friend from foe. Now Warwick thinks the day is his; now Edward believes victory to be in his grasp. Then comes a lift of the cloud, and both generals perceive that their hopes are vain. For three hours the desperate fight rages; the bombards roar, and sword and arrow do their deadly work. Now deluded by the mist, the two wings of Warwick’s army are busy fighting each other, and the fatal cry “Treason! treason!” is heard on the field. Warwick’s men give way, his brother is slain, and there is only safety for the great earl in flight. He leaps on horseback and gallops to a neighbouring wood, from which there is no egress. He is followed and surrounded, and though he plies his great battle-axe fiercely he is overborne by superior numbers and slain. The king-maker will never make or unmake kings again.
“Now lies he there,