Tracts, legal and historical

78
press ourselves, three Richards — the real Richard —
the Maudelain Richard, — and the Scottish or ideot
Richard — so strangely has the former been multi-
plied through the prism of fancy and credulity.
Any summing up of the particulars connected
with the present subject, is hardly necessary. There
is first the direct fact of the death of Richard II.
in 1400, established by proof that is rarely to be
found in points of such antiquity — then there is the
strongest circumstantial evidence, to the same effect,
derived from unavoidable inferences and conclusions,
and whatever can be gleaned — while, independently
of this, it now appears that the Scottish, or pseudo-
Richard, was no other than a crazed individual —
Thomas Warde of Trumpington. In short, what
we were disposed at the outset to give as a theory,
may be now held to be converted into a reality ; and
we may well conclude, in the quaint words of honest
Speed — that this " fond fable, (Hector Boetius' tale
of Richard's escape to Scotland, &c.) hathe neverthe-
lesse somewhat in it, for that some personated
Richard ; might soe doe is neither impossible nor
improbable, and indeed it was so." 1 The thing,
in fact, appears to have been a plot devised and
executed by underlings in Richard's household.
1 Chronicle, p. G14.