also sent over his agents to inquire into the
Rose's history. The White Roses declared the
young man to be really the Duke of York;
the King declared him to be PERKIN WARBECK,
the son of a merchant of the city of
Tournay, who had acquired his knowledge
of England, its language and manners, from
the English merchants who traded in
Flanders; it was also stated by the Royal
agents that he had been in the service of
Lady Brompton, the wife of an exiled English
nobleman, and that the Duchess of Burgundy
had caused him to be trained and taught,
expressly for this deception. The King then
required the Archduke Phillip, who was the
sovereign of Burgundy, to banish this new
Pretender, or to deliver him up; but, as the
Archduke replied that he could not control
the Duchess in her own land, the King, in
revenge, took the market of English cloth
away from Antwerp, and prevented all
commercial intercourse between the two
countries.

He also, by arts and bribes, prevailed on
Sir Robert Cliiford to betray his employers;
and he denouncing several famous English
noblemen as being secretly the friends of
Perkin Warbeck, the King had three of the
foremost executed at once. Whether he
pardoned the remainder because they were
poor, I do not know; but it is only too probable
that he refused to pardon one famous
nobleman against whom the same Clifford
soon afterwards informed separately, because
he was rich. This was no other than
Sir William Stanley, who had saved the
King's life at the battle of Bosworth Field.
It is very doubtful whether his treason
amounted to much more than his having said,
that if he were sure the young man was the
Duke of York, he would not take arms
against him. Whatever he had done he admitted,
like an honourable spirit; and he lost
his head for it, and the covetous King gained
all his wealth.

Perkin Warbeck kept quiet for three
years; but, as the Flemings began to complain
heavily of the loss of their trade by the
stoppage of the Antwerp market on his
account, and as it was not unlikely that they
might even go so far as to take his life or
give him up, he found it necessary to do
something. Accordingly he made a desperate
sally, and landed, with only a few hundred
men, on the coast of Deal. But he was
soon glad to get back to the place from
whence he came; for the country people rose
against his followers, killed a great many,
and took a hundred and fifty prisoners: who
were all driven to London tied together with
ropes, like a team of cattle. Every one of
them was hanged on some part or other of
the sea-shore, in order that if any more men
should come over with Perkin Warbeck, they
might see the bodies as a warning before they
landed.

Then the wary King, by making a treaty
of commerce with the Flemings, drove Perkin
Warbeck out of that country; and, by
completely gaining over the Irish to his side,
deprived him of that asylum too. He
wandered away to Scotland, and told his
story at that Court. King James the Fourth
of Scotland, who was no friend to King
Henry, and had no reason to be (for King
Henry had bribed his Scotch lords to betray
him more than once, but had never succeeded
in his plots), gave him a great reception,
called him his cousin, and gave him in marriage
the Lady Catherine Gordon, a beautiful
and charming creature related to the royal
house of Stuart.

Alarmed by this successful re-appearance
of the Pretender, the King still undermined,
and bought, and bribed, and kept his doings
and Perkin Warbeck's story in the dark, when
he might, one would imagine, have rendered
the matter clear to all England. But, for all
his bribing of the Scotch lords at the Scotch
King's Court, he could not procure the Pretender
to be delivered up to him. James,
though not very particular in many respects,
would not betray him, and the ever-busy
Duchess of Burgundy so provided him with
arms, and good soldiers, and with money
besides, that he had soon a little army of fifteen
hundred men of various nations. With these,
and aided by the Scottish King in person, he
crossed the borders into England, and made a
proclamation to the people, in which he called
the King "Henry Tudor;" offered large
rewards to any who should take or distress
him; and announced himself as King
Richard the Fourth, come to receive the
homage of his faithful subjects. His faithful
subjects, however, cared nothing for him, and
hated his faithful troops: who, being of different
nations, quarrelled also among themselves.
Worse than this, if worse were
possible, they began to plunder the country;
upon which the White Rose said, that he
would rather lose his rights, than gain them
through the miseries of the English people.
The Scottish King made a jest of his scruples,
but they and their whole force went back
again without fighting a battle.

The worst consequence of this attempt
was, that a rising took .place among the
people of Cornwall, who considered themselves
too heavily taxed to meet the charges
of the expected war. Stimulated by Flammock,
a lawyer, and Joseph, a blacksmith,
and joined by Lord Audley and some
other country gentlemen, they marched on
all the way to Deptford Bridge, where they
fought a battle with the King's army. They
were defeated—though the Cornish menfought
with great bravery—and the lord was beheaded,
and the lawyer and the blacksmith
were hanged, drawn, and quartered. The
rest were pardoned. The King, who believed
every man to be as avaricious, as himself,
and thought that money could settle anything,
allowed them to make bargains for