Page:The religious life of King Henry VI.djvu/33

Rh saintly monarch, relates that he "well remembered, whilst he was in the schools at Oxford, that King Henry VI, whenever he was in those parts was wont to make some stay with the [Carmelite] Friars there, just as if he was in his own palace." Indeed, in the midst of all the troubles of his reign: in the varying changes of his fortune: in his successes and defeats during the Wars of the Roses, Henry sought for consolation in religion and in the society of religious men. He spent the Christmas of 1459-60 with the Canons of Leicester, and in the Lent of 1460 he passed three days in prayer before the shrine of St. Guthlac at Crowland. On Palm Sunday, the 29th of March 1461, Edward IV, then in possession of the throne, gained a decisive battle at Towton. Henry was not present in the field since, as is said, he "preferred to pass so holy a day in prayer at York." At one time during Henry's wanderings in the north to escape from his enemies, he took refuge in a monastery and lived there for a time disguised in the habit of a monk.

On the 4th of May 1471 the decisive battle of Tewkesbury was fought, when Queen