The only crimes for which they were condemned, were the old attempts against the crown, which seemed to be obliterated both by the distance of time and by repeated pardons.[*] The reasons of this method of proceeding it is difficult to conjecture.

The recent conspiracies of Glocester seem certain from his own confession; but perhaps the king and ministry had not at that time in their hands any satisfactory proof of their reality; perhaps it was difficult to convict Arundel and Warwick of any participation in them; perhaps an inquiry into these conspiracies would have involved in the guilt some of those great noblemen who now concurred with the crown, and whom it was necessary to cover from all imputation; or perhaps the king, according to the genius of the age, was indifferent about maintaining even the appearance of law and equity, and was only solicitous by any means to insure success in these prosecutions.

This point, like many others in ancient history, we are obliged to leave altogether undetermined.
A warrant was issued to the earl mareschal, governor of Calais, to bring over the duke of Glocester, in order to his trial; but the governor returned for answer, that the duke had died suddenly of an apoplexy in that fortress.

Nothing could be more suspicious, from the time, than the circumstances of that prince's death: it became immediately the general opinion, that he was murdered by orders from his nephew: in the subsequent reign, undoubted proofs were produced in parliament, that he had been suffocated with pillows by his keepers:[**] and it appeared that the king, apprehensive lest the public trial and execution of so popular a prince, and so near a relation, might prove both dangerous and invidious, had taken this base method of gratifying, and, as he fancied, concealing, his revenge upon him.

Both parties, in their successive triumphs, seem to have had no further concern than that of retaliating upon their adversaries; and neither of them were aware that, by imitating, they indirectly justified, as far as it lay in their power, all the illegal violence of the opposite party.
* Tyrrel, vol.iii.part ii.p.968, from the records.
** Cotton, p.