true duke of York. His utmost industry was exerted in sifting to the
bottom of the plot, in learning who was engaged in the conspiracy,
and in detaching the chief supporters. It is said, though not
affirmatively that to procure confidence to his spies, he caused
them to be solemnly cursed at Paul's cross. Certain it is, that, by
their information, he came to the knowledge, not of the imposture,
but of what rather tended to prove that Perkin was a genuine
Plantagenet: I mean, such a list of great men actually in his court
and in trust about his person, that no wonder he was seriously
alarmed. Sir Robert Clifford,(39) who had fled to Margaret, wrote to
England, that he was positive that the claimant was the very
identical duke of York, son of Edward the Fourth, whom he had so
often seen, and was perfectly acquainted with. This man, Clifford,
was bribed back to Henry's service; and what was the consequence? He
accused Sir William Stanley, lord Chamberlain, the very man who had
set the crown on Henry's head in Bosworth field, and own brother to
earl of Derby, the then actual husband of Henry's mother, of being
in the conspiracy? This was indeed essential to Henry to know; but
what did it proclaim to the nation? What could stagger the
allegiance of such trust and such connexions, but the firm
persuation that Perkin was the true duke of York? A spirit of
faction and disgust has even in later times hurried men into
treasonable combinations; but however Sir William Stanley might be
dissatisfied, as not thinking himself adequately rewarded, yet is it
credible that he should risk such favour, such riches, as lord Bacon
allows he possessed, on the wild bottom of a Flemish counterfeit?
The lord Fitzwalter and the other great men suffered in the same
cause; and which is remarkable, the first was executed at Calais
--another presumption that Henry would not venture to have his
evidence made public. And the strongest presumption of all is, that