compactly and strongly built, and without any sign of deformity,
unless the inelegant defect of a short neck can be so called.]
commended Richard's "princely countenance," the compliment was not one
to be disputed, much less contemned. But now as he rose, obedient to
a whisper from the duchess, and followed her to the window, while
Edward appeared engaged in admiring the shape of his own long,
upturned shoes, those defects in his shape which the popular hatred
and the rise of the House of Tudor exaggerated into the absolute
deformity that the unexamining ignorance of modern days and
Shakspeare's fiery tragedy have fixed into established caricature,
were sufficiently apparent. Deformed or hunchbacked we need scarcely
say he was not, for no man so disfigured could have possessed that
great personal strength which he invariably exhibited in battle,
despite the comparative slightness of his frame. He was considerably
below the ordinary height, which the great stature of his brother
rendered yet more disadvantageous by contrast; but his lower limbs
were strong-jointed and muscular. Though the back was not curved, yet
one shoulder was slightly higher than the other, which was the more
observable from the evident pains that he took to disguise it, and the
gorgeous splendour, savouring of personal coxcombry--from which no
Plantagenet was ever free,--that he exhibited in his dress. And as,
in a warlike age, the physical conformation of men is always
critically regarded, so this defect and that of his low stature were
not so much redeemed as they would be in our day by the beauty and
intelligence of his face. Added to this, his neck was short, and a
habit of bending his head on his bosom (arising either from thought,
or the affectation of humility, which was a part of his character)
made it seem shorter still. But this peculiarity, while taking from
the grace, added to the strength of his frame, which, spare, sinewy,
and compact, showed to an observer that power of endurance, that