hands, letters to Clarence, the Archbishop of York, and Warwick. To
the last he wrote touchingly.

"We do not believe" (said the letter) "that ye should be of any such
disposition towards us as the rumour here runneth, considering the
trust and affection we bear you,--and cousin, we think ye shall be to
us welcome." [Paston Letters, ccxcviii. (Knight's edition), vol. ii.
p. 59. See also Lingard, vol. iii. p. 522 (4to edition), note 43, for
the proper date to be assigned to Edward's letter to Warwick, etc.]

But ere these letters reached their destination, the crown seemed
well-nigh lost. At Edgecote the Earl of Pembroke was defeated and
slain, and five thousand royalists were left on the field. Earl
Rivers and his son, Sir John Woodville, [This Sir John Woodville was
the most obnoxious of the queen's brothers, and infamous for the
avarice which had led him to marry the old Duchess of Norfolk, an act
which according to the old laws of chivalry would have disabled him
from entering the lists of knighthood, for the ancient code
disqualified and degraded any knight who should marry any old woman
for her money! Lord Rivers was the more odious to the people at the
time of the insurrection because, in his capacity of treasurer, he had
lately tampered with the coin and circulation.] who in obedience to
the royal order had retired to the earl's country seat of Grafton,
were taken prisoners, and beheaded by the vengeance of the insurgents.
The same lamentable fate befell the Lord Stafford, on whom Edward
relied as one of his most puissant leaders; and London heard with
dismay that the king, with but a handful of troops, and those lukewarm
and disaffected, was begirt on all sides by hostile and marching
thousands.