deceived by Simnel, and was resolved never again to be cajoled by
another impostor. Perkin, who admitted that she had reason to be
suspicious, nevertheless persisted that he was her nephew, the Duke of
York. The duchess, feigning a desire to convict him of imposture
before the whole of her attendants, put several questions to him which
she knew he could readily answer, affected astonishment at his
replies, and, at last, no longer able to control her feelings, "threw
herself on his neck, and embraced him as her nephew, the true image of
Edward, the sole heir of the Plantagenets, and the legitimate
successor to the English throne." She immediately assigned to him an
equipage suited to his supposed rank, appointed a guard of thirty
halberdiers to wait upon him, and gave him the title of "The White
Rose of England"--the symbol of the House of York.

When the news reached England, in the beginning of 1493, that the Duke
of York was alive in Flanders, and had been acknowledged by the
Duchess of Burgundy, many people credited the story; and men of the
highest rank began to turn their eyes towards the new claimant. Lord
Fitzwater, Sir Simon Mountfort, and Sir Thomas Thwaites, made little
secret of their inclination towards him; Sir William Stanley, King
Henry's chamberlain, who had been active in raising the usurper to the
throne, was ready to adopt his cause whenever he set foot on English
soil, and Sir Robert Clifford and William Barley openly gave their
adhesion to the pretender, and went over to Flanders to concert
measures with the duchess and the sham duke. After his arrival,
Clifford wrote to his friends in England, that knowing the person of
Richard, duke of York, perfectly well, he had no doubt that this young
man was the prince himself, and that his story was compatible with the
truth. Such positive intelligence from a person of Clifford's rank
greatly strengthened the popular belief, and the whole English nation