had as yet meditated more than securing the regency; for had he had
designs on the crown, would he have weakened his own claim by
assuming the protectorate, which he could not accept but by
acknowledging the title of his nephew? This in truth seems to me to
have been the case. The ambition of the queen and her family alarmed
the princes and the nobility: Gloucester, Buckingham, Hastings, and
many more had checked those attempts. The next step was to secure
the regency: but none of these acts could be done without grievous
provocation to the queen. As soon as her son should come of age, she
might regain her power and the means of revenge. Self-security
prompted the princes and lords to guard against this reverse, and
what was equally dangerous to the queen, the depression of her
fortune called forth and revived all the hatred of her enemies. Her
marriage had given universal offence to the nobility, and been the
source of all the late disturbances and bloodshed. The great earl of
Warwick, provoked at the contempt shewn to him by King Edward while
negotiating a match for him in France, had abandoned him for Henry
the Sixth, whom he had again set on the throne. These calamities
were still fresh in every mind, and no doubt contributed to raise
Gloucester to the throne, which he could not have attained without
almost general concurrence yet if we are to believe historians, he,
Buckingham, the mayor of London, and one Dr. Shaw, operated this
revolution by a sermon and a speech to the people, though the people
would not even give a huzza to the proposal. The change of
government in the rehearsal is not effected more easily by the
physician and gentleman usher, "Do you take this, and I'll seize
t'other chair."

(10) This is confirmed by the chronicle of Croyland, p. 566.