ide, axe and sword
still griped in their iron hands, lay Montagu and Warwick.

The young duke, his visor raised, contemplated the fallen foes in
silence. Then dismounting, he unbraced with his own hand the earl's
helmet. Revived for a moment by the air, the hero's eyes unclosed, his
lips moved, he raised, with a feeble effort, the gory battle-axe,
and the armed crowd recoiled in terror. But the earl's soul, dimly
conscious, and about to part, had escaped from that scene of strife, its
later thoughts of wrath and vengeance, to more gentle memories, to such
memories as fade the last from true and manly hearts!

"Wife! child!" murmured the earl, indistinctly. "Anne! Anne! Dear ones,
God comfort ye!" And with these words the breath went, the head fell
heavily on its mother earth, the face set, calm and undistorted, as the
face of a soldier should be, when a brave death has been worthy of a
brave life.

"So," muttered the dark and musing Gloucester, unconscious of the
throng, "so perishes the Race of Iron. Low lies the last baron who could
control the throne and command the people. The Age of Force expires with
knighthood and deeds of arms. And over this dead great man I see the New
Cycle dawn. Happy, henceforth, he who can plot and scheme, and fawn and
smile!" Waking with a start from his revery, the splendid dissimulator
said, as in sad reproof, "Ye have been over hasty, knights and
gentlemen. The House of York is mighty enough to have spared such noble
foes. Sound trumpets! Fall in file! Way, there,--way! King Edward comes.
Long live the king!"

CHAPTER VII. THE LAST PILGRIMS IN THE LONG PROCESSION TO THE COMMON
BOURNE.

The king and his royal brothers, immediately after the victory, rode
back to London to announce their triumph. The foot-soldiers still stayed
behind to recruit themselves after the sore fatigue. And towards the
eminence by Hadley church, the peasants and villagers of the district
had pressed in awe and in wonder; for on that spot had Henry (now sadly
led back to a prison, never again to unclose to his living form) stood
to watch the destruction of the host gathered in his name; and to that
spot the corpses of Warwick and Montagu were removed, while a bier was
prepared to convey their remains to London; [The bodies of Montagu and
the earl were exhibited bareheaded at St. Paul's church for three days,
"that no pretence of their being alive might stir up any rebellion
afterwards;... they were the