Page:The Queens of England.djvu/231

 MARGARET OF ANJOU. 195 not yet twenty-four years of age when this her only child was born. The hapless prince was born on the 13th of Oc- tober, 1453, at Westminster, to which palace his royal sire had been removed, and was lying utterly incapable of recognizing the intelligence of an event, which he otherwise might have looked upon as in the midst of darkness and sorrow. But the king's malady was productive of serious political embarrassment to the queen and her partisans, besides the infliction of domestic distress ; for, unsupported by the shadow of Henry's authority, which hitherto had sanctioned all her measures, Margaret was compelled to yield a tacit consent to those laid down for her, in the imprisonment of the Duke of Somerset and the appointment of York as protector. In fact, the former was "arrested in the queen's great chamber," and sent to the Tower, where, as Stow quaintly observes, "he kept his Christmas with great solemnity." York, meanwhile, "bear- ing all the rule, governed as regent ;" but when all for a period appeared lost, the king unexpectedly "recovered, caused the Duke of Somerset to be set at liberty, and preferred him to be captain of Calais, wherewith not only the Commons, but many of the nobility, favorers of Richard, Duke of York, were greatly grieved and offended, saying that he had lost Normandy, and would lose also Calais."* York, from the contrariety of occurrences to his wishes, and foiled in his last expedient for preserving peace, hurried by his party into measures which his own moderation reprehended, after an unsuccessful attempt at the arbitration of his quarrel with Somerset, retired into Wales, and employed himself in raising an army, soon to strike the first blow in the memora- ble contest between the rival Red and White Roses, which plucked from the bosom of the isle "the pale and maiden blos- som" — peace, and "incarnadined" the green fields of England with the blood of her noblest children. After the battle of St. Alban's, which was fought on the 23rd of May, 1455, and lasted but an hour, the king was taken pris- oner by the Duke of York, and having sustained a slight wound, was conducted with much care to London ; while the death of Somerset, who, with Lords Clifford, Strafford and Northumberland, fell in this action, would have apparently
 * ' the rainbow of his future years,"
 * Stow.