ARY
AID IN THE PROGRESS OF EMANCIPATION.

Henry VI. left no royal record worth remembering save the establishment
of Eton and King's Colleges. Edward IV., who began his reign in 1461,
was bold and active. Queen Margaret's army of sixty thousand men which
attacked him was defeated and half her forces slaughtered, no quarter
being given.

His title was now confirmed, and Margaret fled to Scotland. Three years
later she attempted again to secure the throne through the aid of Louis
XI., but failed. Henry, who had been in concealment, was now confined in
the Tower, as shown in the engraving on the following page.

[Illustration: HENRY VI. IMPRESSED IN THE TOWER.]

Edward's marriage was not satisfactory, and, as he bestowed all the
offices on his wife's relatives, Warwick deserted him and espoused the
cause of Queen Margaret.

He had no trouble in raising an army and compelling Edward to flee.
Henry was taken from the Tower and crowned, his rights having been
recognized by Parliament. Warwick and his son-in-law, the Duke of
Clarence, brother to Edward IV., were made regents, therefore, in 1471.
Before the year was out, however, the tables were again turned, and
Henry found himself once more in his old quarters in the Tower. Warwick
was soon defeated and slain, and on the same day Margaret and her son
Edward landed in England. She and Edward were defeated and taken
prisoners at Tewkesbury, and the young prince cruelly put to death by
the Dukes of Clarence and Gloucester, brothers of Edward IV. Margaret
was placed in the Tower, and a day or two after Henry died mysteriously
there, it is presumed at the hands of Gloucester, who was socially an
unpleasant man to meet after dark.

Margaret died in France, in 1482, and the Lancastrians gave up all hope.
Edward, feeling again secure, at the instigation of his younger
brother, Richard, Duke of Gloucester, caused Clarence, the other
brother, to be put to death, and then began to give his entire attention
to vice, never allowing his reign to get into his rum or interfere with
it.

He was a very handsome man, but died, in 1483, of what the historian
calls a distemper. Some say he died of heart-failure while sleeping off
an attack of coma. Anyway, he turned up his comatose, as one might say,
and passed on from a spirituous life to a spiritual one, such as it may
be. He was a counterfeit sovereign.

In 1474 the first book was printed in England, and more attention was
then pa