Page:The fortunes of Perkin Warbeck.djvu/54

46 Lincoln unfolded these schemes with sagacity and deliberation, and the queen eagerly adopted his ideas as he disclosed them. It was also the earl's suggestion that Simnel should first appear in Ireland. The duke of Clarence had been lieutenant there, and was much beloved throughout the island. Through neglect and forgetfulness all the counsellors and officers appointed by Clarence had been unremoved by the new government, and might easily be induced to favour his persecuted son. The duchess of Burgundy was also to be applied to; and counsel was held as to who should be informed of the truth—who deceived in this hazardous attempt. Night wore away, while still the conspirators were in deliberation; they separated at last, each full of hope—each teeming with gallant resolution. Henceforth the false smile or ill-concealed frown of their enemy was indifferent to them; their good swords were their sure allies; the very victory gained by Henry at Bosworth raised their expectations; one other battle might give them again all that then they lost.

the consciousness of this plot weighing on her mind, Elizabeth Woodville continued her usual routine of life, and made a part of the court of Henry the Seventh. She had long been accustomed to pass from one evil to the other, and to find that when one cause for unhappiness died away, it gave instant place to another. She felt, with all the poignancy of a mother's disappointed pride, the situation of her daughter. Neglect was the lightest term that could be applied to the systematized and cold-hearted tyranny of Henry towards his wife. For not only he treated her like an unfavoured child, whose duty it was to obey without a murmur, and to endeavour to please, though sure of being repulsed. At the same time that he refused to