retended to be apprehensive for his personal
safety; a circumstance taken notice of by Buckingham, who observed "that
the Prince was ignorant of the whole design." At last he was persuaded to
step forth, but he still kept at some distance; and he asked the meaning
of the intrusion and importunity. Buckingham told him that the nation
was resolved to have him for King. The Protector declared his purpose of
maintaining his loyalty to the present sovereign. He was told that the
people had determined to have another prince; and if he rejected their
unanimous voice, they must look out for one who would be more compliant.
This argument was too powerful to be resisted; he was prevailed on to
accept of the crown; and he thenceforth acted as legitimate and rightful
sovereign.

This ridiculous farce was soon after followed by a scene truly
tragical--the murder of the two young princes. Richard gave orders to Sir
Robert Brakenbury, constable of the Tower, to put his nephews to death,
but this gentleman, who had sentiments of honor, refused to have any hand
in the infamous office. The tyrant then sent for Sir James Tyrrel, who
promised obedience; and he ordered Brakenbury to resign to this gentleman
the keys and government of the Tower for one night. Tyrrel, choosing
three associates, Slater, Dighton, and Forest, came in the night-time to
the door of the chamber where the princes were lodged, and, sending in
the assassins, he bade them execute their commission, while he himself
stayed without. They found the young princes in bed and fallen into a
profound sleep. After suffocating them with the bolster and pillows, they
showed their naked bodies to Tyrrel, who ordered them to be buried at the
foot of the stairs, deep in the ground, under a heap of stones, 1483.

These circumstances were all confessed by the actors in the following
reign; they were never punished for the crime, probably because Henry,
whose maxims of government were extremely arbitrary, desired to establish
it as a principle that the commands of the reigning sovereign ought to
justify every enormity in those who paid obedience to them. But there is
one circumstance not so easy to be accounted for: it is pretended that
Richard, displeased with the indecent manner of burying his nephews, whom
he had murdered, gave his chaplain orders to dig up the bodies, and to
inter them in consecrated ground; and as the man died soon after, the
place of their burial remained unknown,