so through the City of London, then beautified with pageants of divers histories, triumphal arehes, and other shows, of welcome, marvellous, costly, and sumptuous, which I overpass, save only to name a few. At tho Bridge foot, towards Southwark, was a pageant of Peace and Plenty, with verses in English. Upon the Bridge, Noah's Ship, with English verses. At Lcadenhall, Madam Grace, the Chancellor of God. At the Tun Inn, in Curabili, Saint Margaret, with verses in English. At the Great Conduit in Cheap, the five wise and the five foolish virgins, also with English verses. And at Paul's Gate, the resurrection and judgment, with verses accordingly, all made by JohnLydgate." Margaret was crowned with great pomp at Westminster, on the thirtieth of May. The coronation was splendid ; but the rejoicings were marred by the injudicious extravagance of the King, who, much as he wanted money, lavished large, sums on the Queen's English attendants and her foreign suite, even to the minstrels who came to witness her coronation, and the master of the vessel which conveyed her to England. The ceremony was succeeded by a grand tournament, and a few days afterwards, ambassadors from Kings Bene and Charles arrived, and congratulated Henry and Margaret on their nuptials ; and, on departing, declared that Charles desired nothing so much as the establishment of a perpetual peace between England and France. This assurance, however, was false ; for it was the policy of Charles not to conclude a lasting peace until he had completely driven the English from the soil of France. As Cardinal Beaufort and his party had anticipated, Margaret, as soon as she came to England, gained the ascendancy over the easy mind of her husband.. The Cardinal had retired to his bishopric, butTBufTolk, the tool of Beaufort, and the favourite of both the King and the Queen, gradually obtained uncontrolled authority both in the council and in the parliament. But, although ostensibly directing his attentionsplely. to Jbig r religious offices, Beaufort possessed .immense"" power'"oyer the crown. With the Queen, apart from political ambitioh, he was on terms of the sincercst in ti many. She made frequent visits to his mansion at Waltham, where a superbly-fitted chamber, called the Queen's chamber, was kept solely for her use ; whilst, with his immense riches, the Cardinal frequently relieved the pressing necessities of the royal pair. By these and other kind attentions, Beaufort won the confidence of the Queen* a.n(h, through her influence with the King» ri^ml tha council. At the commencement ot'1447, scarcely two years after tho marriage of Margaret, the'rivysterious" 'death'of the TTuTce of Gloucester ÎÔokpTacê^ Pc'has been asserted that the Duke was murdered by the connivance of Beaufort and the Queen : but this improbable assertion is without foundation. All that documentary evidence informs ns being, that Gloucester—who, strongly as he had opposed the marriage of the Queen, testified his approbation of it a few days after her coronation—was, from some evidence not handed down to us, suspected of disloyalty by the King. On the tenth of February, 1447, a parliament was summoned to meet, not at Westminster, but at Bury St. Edmunds. The knights of the shires were ordered to come armed. The King and Queen proceeded to Bury, where their lodgings were strongly guarded ; during the night numerous patrols watched the roads to the town ; and it became evident to the least suspicious that mischief was brewing. Gloucester, however, not dreaming that these measures were taken against himself, was present at the opening of the sessions. The following day he was arrested on a charge of high treason, and seventeen days afterwards was found dead in his bed. It was reported that he had died of apoplexy. His body showed no external marks of violence, and was publicly exhibited, but many still suspected that he had been privately murdered. Whethamstede, a contemporary writer, who had received many benefits from the Duke, and was sincerely attached to his memory, and moreover wrote when the royal party were humbled to the dust, and,