joined by all the English exiles then in France,
she landed, within a year, at Orewell, in
Suffolk, where she was immediately joined
by the Earls of Kent and Norfolk, the King's
two brothers; by other powerful noblemen;
and lastly, by the first English general who
was despatched to check her: who, went over
to her with all his men. The people of London,
receiving these tidings, would do nothing for
the King, but broke open the Tower, let out
all his prisoners, and threw up their caps and
hurrahed for the beautiful Queen.

The King, with his two favorites, fled to
Bristol, where he left old Despenser in charge
of the town and castle, while he went on with
the son to Wales. The Bristol men being
opposed to the King, and it being impossible
to hold the town with enemies everywhere
within the walls, Despenser yielded it up on
the third day, and was instantly brought to
trial for having traitorously influenced what
was called "the King's mind"—though I
doubt if the King ever had any. He was a
venerable old man, upwards of ninety years
of age, but his age gained no respect or
mercy. He was hanged, torn open while he
was yet alive, cut up into pieces, and thrown
to the dogs.  His son was soon taken, tried at
Hereford before the same judge on a long series
of foolish charges, found guilty, and hanged
upon a gallows fifty feet high, with a chaplet
of nettles round his head. His poor old
father and he were innocent enough of any
worse crimes than the crime of having been
the friends of a King, on whom, as a mere
man, they would never have deigned to cast
a favorable look. It is a bad crime, I know,
and leads to worse; but, many lords and
gentlemen—I even think some ladies, too, if I
recollect right—have committed it in England,
who have neither been given to the dogs, nor
hanged up fifty feet high.

The wretched King was running here and
there, all this time, and never getting
anywhere in particular, until he gave himself up,
and was taken off to Kenilworth Castle.
When he was safely lodged there, the Queen
went to London and met the Parliament. And
the Bishop of Hereford, who was the most skilful
of her friends, said, What was to be done
now? Here was an imbecile, indolent, miserable
King upon the throne; wouldn't it be
better to take him off, and put his son there
instead ?  I don't know whether the Queen
really pitied him at this pass, but she began
to cry; so, the Bishop said, Well, my Lords
and Gentlemen, what do you think, upon the
whole, of sending down to Kenilworth, and
seeing if His Majesty  (God bless him, and
forbid we should depose him!)  won't resign?

My Lords and Gentlemen thought it a
good notion, so a deputation of them went
down to Kenilworth;  and there the King
came into the great hall of the Castle,
commonly dressed in a poor black gown; and
when he saw a certain bishop among them,
fell down, poor feeble-headed man, and made
a wretched spectacle of himself. Somebody
lifted him up, and then SIR WILLIAM TRUSSEL,
the Speaker of the House of Commons, almost
frightened him to death by making him a
tremendous speech, to the effect that he was
no longer a King, and that everybody
renounced allegiance to him. After which, SIR
THOMAS BLOUNT, the Steward of the Household,
nearly finished him, by coming forward
and breaking his white wand—which was a
ceremony only performed at a King's death.
Being asked in this pressing manner what he
thought of resigning, the King said he thought
it was the best thing he could do. So, he did
it, and they proclaimed his son next day.

I wish I could close his history by saying
that he lived a harmless life in the Castle and
the Castle gardens at Kenilworth, many years
—that he had a favorite, and plenty to eat
and drink—and, having that, wanted nothing.
But he was shamefully humiliated.  He was
outraged, and slighted, and had dirty water
from ditches given him to shave with, and wept
and said he would have clean warm water, and
was altogether very miserable.  He was moved
from this castle to that castle, and from that
castle to the other castle, because this lord
or that lord, or the other lord, was too kind
to him:  until at last he came to Berkeley
Castle, near the River Severn, where  (the
Lord Berkeley being then ill and absent)  he
fell into the hands of two black ruffians called
THOMAS GOURNAY, and WILLIAM OGLE. One
night—it was the night of September the
twenty-first, one thousand three hundred and
twenty-seven—dreadful screams were heard,
by the startled people in the neighbouring
town, ringing through the thick walls of the
Castle, and the dark deep night; and they
said, as they were thus horribly awakened
from their sleep,  "May Heaven be merciful
to the King; for those cries forbode that no
good is being done to him in his dismal
prison!"  Next morning he was dead—not
bruised, or stabbed, or marked upon tlhe
body, but much distorted in the face;  and it
was whispered afterwards, that those two
villains, Gournay and Ogle, had burnt up his
inside with a red-hot iron.

If you ever come near Gloucester, and see
the centre tower of its beautiful Cathedral,
with its four rich pinnacles, rising lightly in
the air; you may remember that the wretched
Edward the Second was buried in the old
abbey of that ancient city, at forty-three
years old, after being for nineteen years and
a half a perfectly incapable King.

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