128 HISTORY OF KING HENRY VII. 



and used him honourably during his time, though 

 Richard the Third afterwards confined him. So that 

 it cannot be, but that some great person that knew 

 particularly and familiarly Edward Plantagenet, 

 had a hand in the business, from whom the priest 

 might take his aim. That which is most probable, 

 out of the precedent and subsequent acts is, that it 

 was the queen dowager from whom this action had 

 the principal source and motion. For certain it is, 

 she was a busy negotiating woman, and in her with- 

 drawing-chamber had the fortunate conspiracy for 

 the king against King Richard the Third been 

 hatched ; which the king knew, and remembered 

 perhaps but too well ; and was at this time extremely 

 discontent with the king, thinking her daughter, as 

 the king handled the matter, not advanced but de 

 pressed : and none could hold the book so well to 

 prompt and instruct this stage-play as she could. 

 Nevertheless it was not her meaning, nor no more was 

 it the meaning of any of the better and sager sort that 

 favoured this enterprise, and knew the secret, that 

 this disguised idol should possess the crown ; but at 

 his peril to make way to the overthrow of the king ; 

 and that done they had their several hopes and ways. 

 That which doth chiefly fortify this conjecture is, 

 that as soon as the matter brake forth in any strength, 

 it was one of the king s first acts to cloister the 

 queen dowager in the nunnery of Bermondsey, and 

 to take away all her lands and estate ; and this by a 

 close council, without any legal proceeding, upon far 

 fetched pretences that she had delivered her two 



