nst
archbishop Morton and Sir Reginald Bray, the supposed authors of the
grievance. An insurrection against a tax in a southern county, in
which no mention is made of a pretender to the crown, is surely not
so forcible a presumption against him, as the persuasion of the
northern counties that he was the true heir, is an argument in his
favour. Much less can it avail against such powerful evidence as I
have shown exists to overturn all that Henry can produce against
Perkin.

I have thus, I flatter myself, from the discovery of new
authorities, from the comparison of dates, from fair consequences
and arguments, and without straining or wresting probability, proved
all I pretended to prove; not an hypothesis of Richard's universal
innocence, but this assertion with which I set out, that we have no
reasons, no authority for believing by far the greater part of the
crimes charged on him. I have convicted historians of partiality,
absurdities, contradictions, and falshoods; and though I have
destroyed their credit, I have ventured to establish no peremptory
conclusion of my own. What did really happen in so dark a period, it
would be rash to affirm. The coronation and parliament rolls have
ascertained a few facts, either totally unknown, or misrepresented
by historians. Time may bring other monuments to light(46) but one
thing is sure, that should any man hereafter presume to repeat the
same improbable tale on no better grounds that it has been hitherto
urged, he must shut his eyes against conviction, and prefer
ridiculous tradition to the scepticism due to most points of
history, and to none more than to that in question.

(46) If diligent search was to be made in the public offices and
convents of the Flemish towns in which the duchess Margaret
resided, I should not despair of new lights being gained to that
part of our history.

I have little more to say, and only on what regards the person of
Richard, and the story of Jane Shore; but having run counter to a
very valuable modern historian and friend of my own, I must both
make some apology for him, and for myself for disagreeing with him.

When Mr. Hume published his reigns of Edward the Fifth, Richard the
Third, and Henry the Seventh, the coronation roll had not come to
light. The stream of historians concurred to make him take this
portion of our story for granted. Buck had been given up as an
advancer of paradoxes, and nobody but Carte had dared to controvert
the