to believe
she possessed. This scene is occasioned by the demand of delivering
up her second son. Cardinal Bourchier archbishop of Canterbury is
the instrument employed by the protector to effect this purpose. The
fact is confirmed by Fabian in his rude and brief manner, and by the
Chronicle of Croyland, and therefore cannot be disputed. But though
the latter author affirms, that force was used to oblige the
cardinal to take that step, he by no means agrees with Sir Thomas
More in the repugnance of the queen to comply, nor in that idle
discussion on the privileges of sanctuaries, on which Sir Thomas has
wasted so many words. On the contrary, the chronicle declares, that
the queen "Verbis gratanter annues, dimisit puerum." The king, who
had been lodged in the palace of the bishop of London, was now
removed with his brother to the Tower.

This last circumstance has not a little contributed to raise horror
in vulgar minds, who of late years have been accustomed to see no
persons of rank lodged in the Tower but state criminals. But in that
age the case was widely different. It not only appears by a map
engraven so late as the reign of Queen Elizabeth, that the Tower was
a royal palace, in which were ranges of buildings called the king's
and queen's apartments, now demolished; but it is a known fact, that
they did often lodge there, especially previous to their
coronations. The queen of Henry the Seventh lay in there: queen
Elizabeth went thither after her triumphant entry into the city; and
many other instances might be produced, but for brevity I omit them,
to come to one of the principal transactions of this dark period: I
mean Richard's assumption of the crown. Sir Thomas More's account of
this extraordinary event is totally improbable, and positively false
in the groundwork of that revolution. He tells us, that Richard
meditating usurpation, divided the lords into two separate councils,
assembling the king's or queen's party at Baynard's castle, but
holding his own private junto at Crosby Place. From the latter he
began with spreading murmurs, whispers, and reports against the
legality of the late king's marriage. Thus far we may credit him--
but what man of common sense can believe, that Richard went so far
as publicly to asperse the honor of his own mother? That mother,
Cecily duchess dowager of York, a princess of a spotless character,
was then living: so were two of her daughters, the duchesses of
Suffolk and Burg