Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 1.djvu/503

A.D. 1400.] Richard's, and buried there in the monastery of the preaching friars, as more out of the way of inquiry and research.

Since Mr. Tytler has produced his evidence in favour of Richard's escape, the condition of the supposed body of Richard, on the opening of his tomb, has been peferred to as proof that the story of his death by Sir Piers Exton could not be true. The skull exhibited no decided fracture, but the suture above the os temporis was open, and that might certainly have been produced by the stroke, and the os temporis be covered at the time of the exposition of the body by the bandage. That it could not, however, be the body of Maudelain was sufficiently clear, as the head had not been severed from the body by the axe, as Maudelain's was.

It might, therefore, really be Richard's body, and the death be as related—namely, by Exton and his assassins. The evidence for Richard's escape to Scotland brought forward by Tytler is this:—Bower, or Bow-maker, the continuator of Pordun, and one of the most ancient and authentic of our historians, says that Richard II. found means of escape from Pontefract Castle; that he succeeded in reaching the Scottish isles, and travelling in disguise through those remote parts, was accidentally recognised when sitting in the kitchen of Donald, Lord of the Isles, by a jester who had been educated at the court of the king. He adds that Donald sent him under the charge of Lord Montgomery to Robert III., with whom as long as the Scottish monarch lived, he was supported as became his rank; and that, after the death of this king, the royal fugitive was delivered to the Duke of Albany, then governor of Scotland, by whom he was honourably treated; and he concludes this remarkable sentence by affirming that Richard at length died in the castle of Stirling, and was buried in the church of the preaching friars on the north side of the altar. In the events of the year 1419 the same historian has this brief entry:—"In this year died Richard, King of England, on the feast of St. Luke, in the castle of Stirling."

Andrew Winton, the author of a rhyming chronicle, who wrote before Bower, also relates the same story, with some additional incidents—namely, that Richard was placed by Henry in the custody of two gentlemen of rank and reputation, named Swinburn and Waterton, who took compassion on him, connived at his escape, and spread the report of his death. Mr. Tytler, by application to the present descendants of those gentlemen, has learnt that it has always been a tradition in the family of Mr. Waterton, the well-known naturalist, that his ancestor. Sir Robert Waterton, master of the horse to Henry IV., had Richard II. in charge at Pontefract.

Sir Robert was steward of the honour of Pontefract: and what is a curious circumstance, in 1405 the Earl of Northumberland seized and kept Sir Robert Waterton in close confinement in the castles of Warkworth, Alnwick, Berwick, and elsewhere; and that the Earl of Northumborland afterwards entered into league with Robert of Scotland to maintain the cause of King Richard.

In an ancient manuscript in the Advocates' Library, at Edinburgh, Mr. Tytler finds that Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland, with his nephew, Henry the younger, came to King Richard, at this time an exile, but well treated by the governor." The same manuscript gives the account of his death, and adds his Latin epitaph, which was still remaining on the tomb in the time of Boece, who quotes it. On examining the accounts of the chamberlain of the Duke of Albany, signed after the death of Robert III., and while James I. was a captive in England, Mr. Tytler finds four several entries in the years 1408, 1414, 1415, and 1417, stating the expenses of maintaining King Richard at the annual cost of 100 marks a year, in total of £733 6s. 8d.

Mr. Tytler then reminds us of the fact that all those who insisted on King Richard being still alive, were summarily dispatched whenever they fell into the hands of Henry. Walsingham states that the year 1402 absolutely teemed with reports of Richard being alive, and a priest of Ware was put to death by Henry for affirming it. Then eight Franciscan friars were hanged at London for obstinately maintaining that this was true. Walter de Baldock, Prior of Launde, in Leicestershire, was hanged for publishing the same story. Sir Roger de Clarendon, a natural son of the Black Prince, and one of the gentlemen of the bedchamber to Richard II., along with his armour-bearer and page, was condemned and executed for the same offence. Still more, the celebrated Lord Cobham, the chief of the Lollards, on his trial in 1417, refused to plead, denying the authority of the court before which he was arraigned for heresy, saying, "He could acknowledge no judge amongst them so long as his liege lord, King Richard, was alive in Scotland." Mr. Tytler rests much weight on the position and character of Lord Cobham, whose integrity was of the highest kind, who had sat in Parliament, and held high office under Richard, Henry IV., and Henry V.; and must, he contends, have had ample opportunity for ascertaining the truth.

Finally, Mr. Tytler shows that when Sir David Fleming was in possession of the person of the asserted King Richard, Henry IV. entered into a secret correspondence with that gentleman, and granted him a passport for a personal interview; that Henry was about the same time carrying on private negotiations with Lord Montgomery, to whom, as we have stated, Richard had been delivered by the Lord of the Isles, and with the chaplain of the Lord of the Isles also.

Such are the chief points of the case brought forward by the ingenious historian of Scotland; and certainly they are strong and curious, but they fail to carry conviction to our minds. The pretended King Richard was no impostor, for he was asserted by others to be King Richard; but he uniformly denied it himself. He was positively declared by the former jester of King Richard to be that king, and also by the sister-in-law of the Lord of the Isle, who declared she had seen him in Ireland.

This supposed Richard is declared by Wynton "to have seemed half-mad or wild, from the manner in which he conducted himself," and therefore it was supposed that he had lost his understanding through his misfortunes. Though we are told that Lord Percy and other noblemen came to him, we are also informed that he would not see them. Yet for seventeen years at least, was this mysterious personage maintained at the court of Scotland as the venerable King Richard. But it appears that he was kept in the closest seclusion. Now, had the King of Scotland been