ty, and setting sail, quickly landed at
Dartmouth with the duke of Clarence, the earls of Oxford and Pembroke,
and a small body of troops, while the king was in the north, engaged
in suppressing an insurrection which had been raised by Lord Fitz-Hugh,
brother-in-law to Warwick.

* Comines, liv. iii. chap. 4. Hall, fol. 207.

** Grafton, p. 687.

*** Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5. Hall, fol. 208.

**** Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5.

The scene which ensues resembles more the fiction of a poem or romance
than an event in true history. The prodigious popularity of Warwick,[*]
the zeal of the Lancastrian party, the spirit of discontent with which
many were infected, and the general instability of the English nation,
occasioned by the late frequent revolutions, drew such multitudes to his
standard, that in a very few days his army amounted to sixty thousand
men and was continually increasing. Edward hastened southwards to
encounter him; and the two armies approached each other near Nottingham,
where a decisive action was every hour expected. The rapidity of
Warwick's progress had incapacitated the duke of Clarence from executing
his plan of treachery; and the marquis of Montague had here the
opportunity of striking the first blow. He communicated the design to
his adherents, who promised him their concurrence: they took to arms
in the night-time, and hastened with loud acclamations to Edward's
quarters; the king was alarmed at the noise, and starting from bed,
heard the cry of war usually employed by the Lancastrian party. Lord
Hastings, his chamberlain, informed him of the danger, and urged him
to make his escape by speedy flight from an army where he had so many
concealed enemies, and where few seemed zealously attached to his
service. He had just time to get on horseback, and to hurry with a small
retinue to Lynne, in Norfolk, where he luckily found some ships ready,
on board of which he instantly embarked.[**] And after this manner the
earl of Warwick, in no longer space than eleven days after his first
landing, was left entire master of the kingdom.

* Hall, fol. 205.

** Comines, liv. iii. chap. 5. Hall, fol. 208.

But Edward's danger did not end with his embarkation. The Easterlings
or Hanse Towns were then at war both with France and England; and some
ships of these people, hovering on the English coast, espied the king's
vessels, and gave chase to them; nor was it without extreme dif