ENGLAND. 215 



was declared guardian of the kingdom, and at last accepted the crown, 

 which was offered him by the Londoners ; having first put to death 

 all the nobility and men of rank whom he thought to be well affected 

 to the late king's family. Whether the king and his brother were 

 murdered in the Tower, by his direction, is doubtful. Be this as it 

 may, the English were prepossessed so strongly against Richard, as 

 being the murderer of his nephews, that the earl of Richmond, who 

 still remained in Fiance, carried on a secret correspondence with the 

 remains of Edward IV's friends ; and by offering to marry his eldest 

 daughter, he was encouraged to invade England at the head of about 

 2000 foreign troops; but they were soon joined by 7000 English and 

 Welch. A battle between him and Richard, who was at the head 

 of 15,000 men, ensued at Bosworth-field, in which Richard, after dis- 

 playing astonishing acts of personal valour, was killed, having been 

 first abandoned by a main division of his army, under lord Stanley 

 and his brother, in the year 1485- 



Though the same act of bastardy affected the daughters as well as 

 the sons of the late king, yet no disputes were raised upon the legiti- 

 macy of the princess Elizabeth, eldest daughter to Edward IV, and 

 who, as had been before concerted, married Henry of Lancaster, earl 

 of Richmond, thereby uniting both houses, which happily put an end 

 to the long and bloody wars between the contending houses of York 

 and Lancaster. 



Henry, after encountering and surmounting many difficulties both 

 in Fiance and Ireland, was attacked in the possession of his throne 

 by a young man, one Perkin Warbeck, who pretended to be the duke 

 of York, second son to Edward IV, and was acknowledged as such by 

 the duchess of Burgundy, Edward's sister. Perkin, after various un- 

 fortunate adventures, fell into Henry's hands, and was shut up in 

 the Tower of London, irom whence he endeavoured to escape along 

 with the innocent earl of Warwick ; for which Perkin was hanged, 

 and the earl beheaded. In 1499, Henry's eldest son, Arthur prince 

 of Wales, was married to the princess Catharine of Arragon, daugh- 

 ter to the king and queen of Spain ; and he dying soon after, such was 

 Henry's reluctance to refund her great dowry, 200,000 crowns of 

 gold, that he consented to her being married again to his second son, 

 then prince of Wales, on pretence that the first match had not been 

 consummated. Soon after, Henry's eldest daughter, the princess 

 Margaret, was sent with a most magnificent train to Scotland, where 

 she was married to James IV. Henry, at the time of his death, which 

 happened in 1509, the fifty-second year of his age, and twenty-fourth 

 of his reign, was possessed of 1,800,000/. sterling, which is equiva- 

 lent to five millions at present. He was immoderately fond of re- 

 plenishing his coffers, and often prevailed on his parliament to grant 

 him subsidies for foreign alliances which he never intended to form. 



Perhaps no prince ever entered with greater advantages on the 

 exercise of royalty than Henry VIII. Young, vigorous, and rich, 

 without any rival, he held the balance of power in Europe; but it is 

 certain that he neglected those advantages in commerce with which 

 his father became too lately acquainted. His vanity engaged him too 

 much in the affairs of the continent; and his flatterers encouraged 

 him to make preparations for the conquest of all France. These pro- 

 jects led him into incredible expences. He became a candidate for' 

 the German empire, during its vacancy; but soon resigned his pre- 



