rable charms to have won the
love of the Lancastrian Prince Edward, and to have inspired a tender and
human affection in Richard Duke of Gloucester. [Not only does Majerus,
the Flemish annalist, speak of Richard's early affection to Anne, but
Richard's pertinacity in marrying her, at a time when her family was
crushed and fallen, seems to sanction the assertion. True, that Richard
received with her a considerable portion of the estates of her parents.
But both Anne herself and her parents were attainted, and the whole
property at the disposal of the Crown. Richard at that time had
conferred the most important services on Edward. He had remained
faithful to him during the rebellion of Clarence; he had been the
hero of the day both at Barnet and Tewksbury. His reputation was then
exceedingly high, and if he had demanded, as a legitimate reward,
the lands of Middleham, without the bride, Edward could not well have
refused them. He certainly had a much better claim than the only other
competitor for the confiscated estates,--namely, the perjured and
despicable Clarence. For Anne's reluctance to marry Richard, and the
disguise she assumed, see Miss Strickland's "Life of Anne of Warwick."
For the honour of Anne, rather than of Richard, to whose memory one
crime more or less matters but little, it may here be observed that
so far from there being any ground to suppose that Gloucester was an
accomplice in the assassination of the young prince Edward of Lancaster,
there is some ground to believe that that prince was not assassinated at
all, but died (as we would fain hope the grandson of Henry V. did
die) fighting manfully in the field.--"Harleian Manuscripts;" Stowe,
"Chronicle of Tewksbury;" Sharon Turner, vol. iii. p. 335.] It is also
noticeable, that when, not as Shakspeare represents, but after long
solicitation, and apparently by positive coercion, Anne formed her
second marriage, she seems to have been kept carefully by Richard from
his gay brother's court, and rarely, if ever, to have appeared in London
till Edward was no more.

That considerable obscurity should always rest upon the facts connected
with Edward's meditated crime,--that they should never be published
amongst the grievances of the haughty rebel is natural from the very
dignity of the parties, and the character of the offence; that in such
obscurity sober History should not venture too far on the hypothesis
suggested by the chronicler, is right and laudable