prisoner, but his cause lives in
Margaret and his son. There is but one power in Europe that can threaten
thee with aid to the Lancastrians; that power is France. Make Louis thy
friend and ally, and thou givest peace to thy life and thy lineage; make
Louis thy foe, and count on plots and stratagems and treason, uneasy
days and sleepless nights. Already thou hast lost one occasion to secure
that wiliest and most restless of princes, in rejecting the hand of the
Princess Bona. Happily, this loss now can be retrieved. But alliance
with Burgundy is war with France,--war more deadly because Louis is
a man who declares it not; a war carried on by intrigue and bribe, by
spies and minions, till some disaffection ripens the hour when young
Edward of Lancaster shall land on thy coasts, with the Oriflamme and
the Red Rose, with French soldiers and English malcontents. Wouldst thou
look to Burgundy for help?--Burgundy will have enough to guard its own
frontiers from the gripe of Louis the Sleepless. Edward, my king, my
pupil in arms, Edward, my loved, my honoured liege, forgive Richard
Nevile his bluntness, and let not his faults stand in bar of his
counsels."

"You are right, as you are ever, safeguard of England, and pillar of my
state," said the king, frankly, and pressing the arm he still held. "Go
to France and settle all as thou wilt."

Warwick bent low and kissed the hand of his sovereign. "And," said
he, with a slight, but a sad smile, "when I am gone, my liege will not
repent, will not misthink me, will not listen to my foes, nor suffer
merchant and mayor to sigh him back to the mechanics of Flanders?"

"Warwick, thou deemest ill of thy king's kingliness."

"Not of thy kingliness; but that same gracious quality of yielding to
counsel which bows this proud nature to submission often makes me fear
for thy firmness, when thy will is, won through thy heart. And now, good
my liege, forgive me one sentence more. Heaven forefend that I should
stand in the way of thy princely favours. A king's countenance is a sun
that should shine on all. But bethink thee well, the barons of England
are a stubborn and haughty race; chafe not thy most puissant peers by
too cold a neglect of their past services, and too lavish a largess to
new men."

"Thou aimest at Elizabeth's kin," interrupted Edward, withdrawing his
hand from his minister's arm, "and I tell thee once for all times, that
I would rather sink again to mine earldom of March, w