Page:The fortunes of Perkin Warbeck.djvu/56

48 Henry alone heard these momentous tidings with contempt. The earl of Kildare, lord-lieutenant of the kingdom, had received the pretender with princely honours; yet the very circumstance of a false son of Clarence being supported by the Yorkists was the occasion of satisfaction to him; his only fear arose from the probable mystery covered by these designs. He was angry at the disloyalty manifested; but it was in a distant province, and so came not home to him. There appeared no falling off, no disturbance among his English subjects. Still caution and policy were the weapons he best loved to wield; and he despatched several spies to Ireland, to endeavour to fathom the extent and nature of the rebellion. The chief among them was his own secretary, Frion, a Frenchman—a crafty and experienced implement. He succeeded in bringing back irrefragable proof that the dowager queen mingled deeply in the plot.

Henry hated Elizabeth Woodville. He considered that it was principally through her restless scheming that he had been forced to marry the portionless (her detested claim to his crown her only dower) daughter of York, instead of forming ana [sic] union with a foreign princess; perhaps Mary of Burgundy, or Anne of Britanny, either of whom would have brought gold to his coffers, or extensive domains to his empire. He hated her, because he deeply suspected that she was privy to the existence of a formidable rival to his state. He knew that the young duke of York had not died in the Tower. In every way she was his enemy; besides that linked to her ruin was the sweet idea of confiscation, one ever entertained with delight by the money-loving king.

He assembled a council in his palace at Shene, which stood near where Richmond now stands. The chiefs of the English nobility were his counsellors. The duke of Buckingham, son of him who first favoured, and then rose against Richard the Third. The lords Dawbeny and Broke, who had been raised to the peerage for their services in the same cause. Lord and Sir William Stanley, men to whom Henry principally owed his crown. Others there were of high rank and note; but the king paid most attention to two priests: John Morton, bishop of Ely, and Richard Fox, bishop of Exeter, were his private advisors and friends, as well as public counsellors. Morton had watched over his interests while in exile; he first had excited the duke of Buckingham to revolt, and hatched the plot which placed Richmond on the throne.

The council held was long and solemn, and the results brought about more by insinuation than open argument, were different from those expected by most of the persons present. First it