Before long in another part of the field, Richmond was seen, with Stanley bearing the crown; and from them we learn the issue of the battle of Bosworth, and the fatal reality of Richard's dream:

Richm. God and your arms be praised, victorious friends;

The day is ours, the bloody dog is dead.

Stan. Courageous Richmond, well hast thou acquit thee.

Lo, here, this long-usurped royalty

From the dead temples of this bloody wretch
Have I plucked off, to grace thy brows with it.
Wear it, enjoy it, and make much of it.

Prose history tells that after the fight, the crown, deeply indented with the stout strokes it had caught while on Richard's head, was found hanging upon a hawthorn bush, and that this strange fruit was plucked by Stanley.

The dead king's body was exposed for three days in the church at Leicester, that the people might make themselves sure of the death of the last prince of the House of York. He was interred in the monastery of the Grey Friars. In the words of Guizot: "The wars of the Two Roses had ended, and the era of the great reigns was about to begin for England.”

Shakespeare's Richard III is a man wicked almost beyond our conception of villainy; admitting his crimes, nay boasting of them. Before we leave him, to let a ray of sun fall upon the dark portrait, let us recall that he was a substantial friend of Caxton, the

great English printer, and that upon one subject, at least, his views far exceeded in liberality those of many lawmakers of the present century and day. He provided that no statute should act as a hindrance "to any artificer or merchant stranger, of what nation or country he be, for bringing unto this realm or selling by retail or otherwise of any manner of books, written or imprinted." He would admit free the sources of knowledge, and multiply these sources by the use of the art preservative of arts.

THE STORY OF HENRY VIII, 1509-1547.

THE Coming of Henry VII upon the dramatic stage is foretold by his brother actors, who allude to his whereabouts, and foretell his future greatness, and let us know his kinship to certain persons who have gained our active attention. When, in the fullness of time, Richmond is about to rid the stage of its heavy villain, spirits from the vasty deep are called by the dramatic Glendower to bless his enterprise—and they come. We hear their prayer, and spontaneously we join in it, and shout our acclamations over Richard's downfall and Richmond's uprising. But out of Richmond's history all the romance seems to fade with his coronation. Stanley, before Bosworth, had sent word to Richmond:

The Queen hath heartily consented

He shall espouse Elizabeth her daughter.

But the king was far from hastening on the wedding. He delayed it till the Yorkists began to show signs of discontent at his postponing the union of the Roses, and the Commons on condition of his marriage had given him large interests in the internal revenues. After the tardy wedding he made a tour through the northern counties, where the white rose still flourished,