e battle,
'in part of revenge' (say the Authors of the _History of Cumberland and
Westmoreland_); 'for the Earl's father had slain his.' A deed which
worthily blemished the author (saith Speed); but who, as he adds, 'dare
promise anything temperate of himself in the heat of martial fury?
chiefly, when it was resolved not to leave any branch of the York line
standing; for so one maketh this Lord to speak.' This, no doubt, I would
observe by the bye, was an action sufficiently in the vindictive spirit
of the times, and yet not altogether so bad as represented; 'for the
Earl was no child, as some writers would have him, but able to bear
arms, being sixteen or seventeen years of age, as is evident from this,
(say the _Memoirs of the Countess of Pembroke_, who was laudably anxious
to wipe away, as far as could be, this stigma from the illustrious name
to which she was born,) that he was the next child to King Edward the
Fourth, which his mother had by Richard Duke of York, and that King was
then eighteen years of age: and for the small distance betwixt her
children, see Austin Vincent, in his _Book of Nobility_, p. 622, where
he writes of them all. It may further he observed, that Lord Clifford,
who was then himself only 25 years of age, had been a leading man and
commander, two or three years together in the army of Lancaster, before
this time; and, therefore, would be less likely to think that the Earl
of Rutland might be entitled to mercy from his youth.--But, independent
of this act, at best a cruel and savage one, the Family of Clifford had
done enough to draw upon them the vehement hatred of the House of York:
so that after the battle of Towton there was no hope for them but in
flight and concealment. Henry, the subject of the poem, was deprived of
his estate and honours during the space of twenty-four years; all which
time he lived as a shepherd in Yorkshire, or in Cumberland, where the
estate of his father-in-law (Sir Lancelot Threlkeld) lay. He was
restored to his estate and honours in the first year of Henry the
Seventh. It is recorded that, 'when called to Parliament, he behaved
nobly and wisely; but otherwise came seldom to London or the Court; and
rather delighted to live in the country, where he repaired several of
his castles, which had gone to decay during the late troubles.' Thus far
is chiefly collected from Nicholson and Burn; and I can add, from my own
knowledge, that there is a tradition current in the vil