This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
1470.]
CLARENCE CONSPIRES WITH WARWICK.
389

again by a gale of wind before she could disembark, and was obliged to proceed to Betwick.[1] With Scots and French help, she maintained for a year a desultory war on the border; but after the battle of Hexham, in May, 1464, she found it expedient to flee to Flanders. In the following year the ex-king, Henry VI., fell into Edward's hands; and from that moment all might have gone well with the new House but for the king's ill-considered marriage with Elizabeth Woodville. Perhaps even the marriage would not have alienated Warwick, had not Edward shown signs of an intention to exalt his wife's relatives at the expense of the Nevilles. A rupture resulted in 1467, Warwick being joined by the king's brother, the Duke of Clarence. Yet, though Edward was for a time a prisoner in the hands of the king-maker, that astute statesman foresaw that the downfall of York would probably lead to he restoration of Lancaster; and, as he was not then prepared to face such a consequence, he released his captive, and a pacification was made. Bu in 1470, Edward discovered that his brother Clarence, who had married Isabel, Warwick's eldest daughter, was once more plotting with his father-in-law. The two conspirators fled to Calais, the navy for the most part adhering to them; and they opened negotiations with Queen Margaret. It was, no doubt, the temporary loss of so much of his fleet that prevented Edward from opposing their passage across the Channel. They landed in September, 1470; and the king, not without difficulty, fled by way of Lynn to Flanders.[2] For a few months Henry VI. was restored; but the fact did not apparently please the Duke of Clarence,[3] who may have anticipated that the king-maker would offer him the crown instead of only a contingent interest in it; and within a very short time Clarence was in treacherous correspondence with Edward.

Edward, for his part, did not sit still amid his misfortunes. Obtaining help from the Duke of Burgundy, he sailed from Flushing with four ships of war, fourteen transports, and about two thousand men;[4] and on March 12th, 1471, was off Cromer. He would have landed there had the weather been favourable; but on the 14th he was able to put into Ravensrode. Clarence, after betraying his father-in-law, joined Edward; and in the result Warwick was

  1. Fabian, 473, 493; Speed, 670; Holingshed, ii. 666.
  2. Landing near Alkmaar. Fabian, 500; Hall, f. 17-19; Speed, 681.
  3. Although the crown was entailed upon him in case of failure of the male line of Henry VI. Fabian, 501; Speed 681.
  4. Hall, f. 24b; Stowe, 412.