^ueen'g <Dafe. 221 



band of Elizabeth Woodville, Gray Lord Ferrars, was then 

 in the twenty-fifth year of his age. Handsome, valorous, 

 and intrepid, and devotedly attached to the cause of Henry 

 VI. ; he was appointed commander of the Red-rose 

 cavalry, and, while leading on the memorable onset by 

 which the field was won, he received a mortal wound, of 

 which he died a few days after, at the village of Colney, 

 on the twenty-eighth of February 1461.* Henry VI. 

 visited and endeavoured to console the dying youth, and 

 sought, with the usual kindliness of his nature, to reconcile 

 him to the thought of death, by pointing to the only 

 Refuge, on whom his own hopes rested. Some chro- 

 niclers relate, that, according to the fashion of the age, 

 he conferred the honour of knighthood on the wounded 

 earl, for the sake of his sons, for although his father, 

 Lord Ferrars, had died two months before, the distracted 

 condition of the country had prevented the young noble- 

 man from taking his place in the house of peers. A deep 

 and rancorous feeling seems to have existed against the 

 memory of this brave and devoted adherent of King 

 Henry ; his harmless children, the eldest of whom was 

 not more than four years of age, were deprived of their 

 inheritance, and his widow was not permitted to remain 

 on the family estate ; the fine old mansion, with its broad 

 lands, was confiscated ; it became the property of another, 

 who repaired thither to take possession, and with him 

 his family and dependents, who filled all the offices and 

 * Whetherastede and Guthrie. 



