time;' but fror his portrait in the Rous-roll, in the Heralds' College, and the drawings published by Horace Walpole, in his 'Historic Doubts,' there is good reason to believe that his title to the surname of crook-back' was well founded."-Selby's Events to be Remembered.

13. Civil Convulsions in the 15th Century (p. 121, 33).-"During that portion of the 15th century which comprised the reigns of Henry the Sixth and succeeding monarchs down to the accession of Henry the Seventh, English history exhibits a rapid succession of violent and bloody convulsions. In that period the throne was twice lost and twice regained by each of the rival houses that laid claim to it. Thirteen pitched battles were fought between Englishmen and on English soil. Three out of four kings died by violence; eighty persons connected with the blood royal were reckoned as having perished in war or by the hand of the executioner or of the assassin; and the great majority of the noble families became extinct or sank into obscurity."-Kirk's Charles the Bold.

14. Alchemy in the Reign of Henry VI. (p. 122, ¶ 36)." Henry VI., Evelyn observes in his Numismata, endeavored to recruit his empty coffers by alchemy. The record of this singular proposition contains the most solemn and serious account of the feasibility and virtues of the philosopher's stone, encouraging the search after it, and dispensing with all statutes and prohibitions to the contrary. This record was probably communicated by Mr. Selden to his beloved friend Ben Jonson, when the poet was writing his comedy of the Alchemist. After this patent was published, many promised to answer the king's expectations so effectually that, the next year, he published another patent; wherein he tells his subjects that the happy hour was drawing nigh, and by means of the stone, which he should soon be master of, he would pay all the debts of the nation in real gold and silver. The persons picked out for his new operators were as remarkable as the patent itself, being a most miscellaneous rabble of friars, grocers, mercers, and fishmongers!"—Disraeli's Curiosities of Literature.

15. Caxton and the Printing-Press (p. 122, ¶ 37).—“ A Kentish boy by birth, but apprenticed to a London mercer, William Caxton had already spent thirty years of his manhood in Flanders, as Governor of the English guild of Merchant Adventurers there, when we find him engaged as copyist in the service of the Duchess of Burgundy. But the tedious process of copying was soon thrown aside for the new art which Colard Mansion had introduced into Bruges. Forasmuch as in the writing of the same,' Caxton tells us in the preface to his first printed work, the Tales of Troy,' 'my pen is worn, my hand is weary and not steadfast, mine eyes dimmed with overmuch looking on the white paper, and my courage not so prone and ready to labor as it hath been, and that age creepeth on me daily and feebleth all the body, and also because I have promised to divers gentlemen and to my friends to address to them as hastily as I might the said book, therefore I have practised and learned at my great charge and dispense, to ordain this said book in print after the manner and form as ye may see, and is not written with pen and ink as other books be, to the end that every man may have them at once, for all the books of this story here emprynted as ye see were begun in one day and also finished in one day.' The printing-press was the precious freight he brought back to England, after an absence of five-and-thirty years."-Green's Short History of the English People.

p. 126-4

Warwick, the King-maker..114, 115, 117 Northampton

Duke of Gloster (Richard III.) 117,118,119 Towton....

PART III.

MODERN ENGLAND.

SECTION I.

THE TUDOR FAMILY.

Extending from the Accession of Henry VII. (1485) to that of James 1

1485

1509

(1603).

1. Henry VII.-The decisive victory which to Henry had gained at Bosworth gave him the throne, but he had no legal title to it. He was, however, prudent and vigorous; and as he foresaw that he would have many difficulties to contend with in consequence of the popularity of the house of York, he determined to show all opponents that nothing but successful war would avail to dethrone him. His first acts showed much partisan jealousy and hatred. The young Earl of Warwick, son of the Duke of Clarence, and grandson of the "King-maker," he caused to be kept securely in the Tower; and though he had promised to marry the princess Elizabeth, daughter of Edward IV., he delayed the nuptials for some months, greatly to the dissatisfaction of the nation, eager by this union to remove all occasion for civil dissensions.

2. A rumor having spreal among the people that the Earl of Warwick had escaped from the Tower and was lying concealed in some part of England, a priest of Oxford, named Simon, brought forward a handsome youth, whose

1. What policy did Henry VII. adopt? How did he show partisan rancor! 2. What impostor was brought forward? By whom was he supported?