Note 20 — Chapter II
Reading edition
Hall is notorious for the embellishment of fables that were passed on to him by Polydore Virgil, by adding names and incidents of his own invention. In the case of the death of the young Earl of Rutland, he first took several years off his age and made a little child of him, then gave him a tutor and supplied the tutor's name. With these properties he got up a very effective scene on Wakefield Bridge. When Rutland's real age is known, Hall's story becomes absurd, and he is convicted of intentional inaccuracy. Again when he described the burial of Henry VI., he said that the corpse was conveyed to Chertsey 'without priest or clerk, torch or taper, singing or saying.' This is something worse than embellishment, it is absolutely false. The payments are recorded (and the records are still preserved), for obsequies and masses said by four orders of brethren, for linen cloth, spices, and for wages of men carrying torches. The statements of Hall are certainly unreliable. In retailing Polydore Virgil's calumny about the assassination of Prince Edward at Tewkesbury, Hall cannot refrain from similar inventions and embellishments. He adds that Edward was taken prisoner by Sir Richard Croft and delivered up to the King in consequence of a proclamation offering a reward of 100l. a year to whosoever should yield up the Prince dead or alive: accompanied by an assurance that his life should be spared (Hall, p. 301). Habington repeats this and adds, as his own contribution, that 'the good knight repented what he had done, and openly professed his service abused and his faith deluded' (Life of Edward IV. p. 96). This statement is confuted by the fact that it was on the battle-field of Tewkesbury that Richard Croft received his knighthood from King Edward. This would not have been so if he had 'openly declared his service abused.' He afterwards received benefits from King Richard (Paston Letters). The fable of Fabyan was embellished and added to by various hands, until it became a very elaborate and highly finished lie circumstantial.