ARCH^OLOGIC AND HISTORIC 
 FRAGMENTS.
 
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 (#rcpacofo<jic 
 
 CONTAINING, INTER ALIA, 
 
 A FACSIMILE OF A RARE MS. PAGE DATED 1638, 
 
 HAVING REFERENCE TO 
 
 TWO OF SHAKESPEARE'S MOST FAMOUS PLAYS, 
 
 JE2Eitfj Notes tfjmon. 
 
 GEORGE R. WRIGHT, F.S.A., 
 
 VICE-PRESIDENT AND HONORARY CURATOR AND LIBRARIAN, ETC., OF THE 
 
 BRITISH ARCHAEOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION. 
 AUTHOR OF "LOCAL LAVS AND LEGENDS", "LVRIC LEAFLETS", ETC. 
 
 "Stare super mas antiquas" 
 
 LONDON : 
 WHITING & CO., 30 AND 32, SARDINIA STREET, 
 
 LINCOLN'S INN FIELDS. 
 1887.
 
 HUNTED BY 
 WHITING AND CO., 30 AND 32, SARDINIA STREET, W.C.
 
 TO 
 
 CHARLES ROACH SMITH, ESQ., F.S.A., 
 
 MY VALUED AND KIND FRIEND OF EARLY AND LATER YEARS, 
 BY HIS PERMISSION I DEDICATE 
 
 THIS BOOK, 
 NOT ONLY AS A MARK OF HIGH REGARD AND RESPECT, 
 
 BUT AS AN ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF 
 
 HOW MUCH I AM INDEBTED TO HIS WRITINGS AND RESEARCHES, 
 FOR WHAT I HAVE CONTRIBUTED TO THE FIELDS OF 
 
 HISTORIC AND ARCH^EOLOGIC ENQUIRY, 
 
 IN WHICH HE HAS BEEN SO LONG KNOWN AS AN EARNEST 
 AND SUCCESSFUL LABOURER. 
 
 11171HO
 
 TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 i. ON A MS. LIST OF PLAYS OF THE YEAR 1638 . i 
 
 2. SIR ANTHONY BROWNE, STANDARD BEARER TO KING 
 
 HENRY VIII, AND HIS DESCENDANTS - 25 
 
 3. ON THE SOURCE AND NOMENCLATURE OF THE RIVER 
 
 THAMES - 57 
 
 4. ON SIR PHILIP SIDNEY AND His FATHER, SIR HENRY 
 
 SIDNEY, IN RELATION TO LUDLOW CASTLE - 74 
 
 5. EPISODES IN THE CAREER OF HUMPHREY DUKE 
 OF GLOUCESTER, AND His FIRST DUCHESS, AND 
 THEIR CONNECTION WITH THE ABBEY OF ST. 
 ALBANS . 97 
 
 6. ON THE INVOLUNTARY VISIT OF PHILIP OF AUSTRIA 
 AND JUANA OF SPAIN TO WEYMOUTH IN 1506, 
 AND ITS CONSEQUENCES - - 132 
 
 7. RECULVER, THE REGULBIUM OF THE ROMANS - 147 
 APPENDIX - - - - - 166
 
 PREFATORY REMARKS. 
 
 IT has been wittily said that nothing benefits by a 
 Translation except a Bishop, and certainly from the 
 experiences I have recently had in mostly re-writing 
 and amending the following Papers, originally con- 
 tributed to the volumes of the British Archaeological 
 Association, I must admit it is my opinion, that Revision, 
 a near connection of translation, does not altogether 
 improve the original thoughts of a writer, although one is 
 taught from earliest days, " that second thoughts are best". 
 This may be so in controversial matters, and where 
 hastiness of temper may influence people to say or do 
 things they are afterwards sorry for ; but in ordinary 
 writings, such as are the sketches which make this book, a 
 revision of the first-fancies or conclusions they in many 
 instances contain, ill or well conceived as they may be, 
 does not tend to improve the style of the individual compo- 
 sition, or to exactly represent the writer's ideas as they 
 were originally set forth in their integrity or conciseness.
 
 x Prefatory Remarks. 
 
 Of course the lapse of time and increase of general 
 knowledge on the various subjects discussed, has much 
 to do with the alteration of earlier views which an author 
 was impressed with, and upon the then given data, 
 founded and constructed his opinions. 
 
 And thus it is, as I have already suggested, amended 
 " first impressions" on Historic and Archseologic sub- 
 jects especially, are not likely to be so vigorous as they 
 were, and too often lose the interest they possessed, by 
 an attempt to embody in them the later ideas or deduc- 
 tions of more recognised or learned enquirers ! 
 
 From our earliest readings of Roman History and all its 
 enchanting stories, now considered " Myths", are we as 
 well pleased to accept Niebuhr's views and conclusions, 
 destroying all our previously formed notions of, let us 
 say, Romulus and Remus, as we, perhaps, ought to be? 
 
 Or, after knowing the "Arabian Nights" by heart as it 
 were, in our youthful days, are we disposed, even in defer- 
 ence to the labours of such writers as Lane, Burton, and 
 others, to abandon all our affectionate thoughts of Alad- 
 din or Sindbad, to find them now called* Ala-ed-Deen, 
 and Es-Sindibad ! or give up our dear old friends the 
 Caliphs, the Viziers, and the Genii, for the Khaleefehs, 
 the Wezeers, and the Jinn of modern times ? 
 
 Truth is no doubt great, and must in the long run 
 prevail, but I cannot but feel in doing so, it too often 
 
 * See Appendix for a Note on this subject.
 
 Prefatory Remarks. xi 
 
 runs counter to our feelings, and creates anything but 
 the pleasure Moralists sternly bid us to receive it with, 
 or I may add, the satisfaction either ! 
 
 Mr. Planche, in one of his clever Comediettas, such 
 alas ! as too seldom are seen upon the Stage now-a-days, 
 makes one of his characters say, " I know it's true, 
 because it's so very disagreeable," and in this sentiment 
 may be found the kernel of the feelings of most of us, 
 when we are dispossessed of early beliefs by the irresis- 
 tible Logic of facts, based upon evidences from appa- 
 rently the most authentic sources, at the time. 
 
 But even these are frequently found not to be so ! and 
 thus Time, the avenger of all things, brings unexpectedly 
 back to the one who has hesitated to believe all that 
 " newer lights" have prosed and preached upon for 
 years, his earlier notions, and thus sees them once more 
 realised to his heart's delight ! 
 
 As an illustration of this view of the case, and in an 
 Archseologic sense entirely, which is the more appro- 
 priate just now, I cannot help alluding to the recent 
 victory my old friend, Mr. Roach Smith, F.S.A., to 
 whom I have the privilege and pleasure to dedicate 
 this Book, has achieved over the modern Dissentients to 
 his published views of years ago, that the walls of Ches- 
 ter were of Roman origin and foundations, they, the 
 " newer lights", contesting, and for a time misleadingly 
 so, that these mural defences are not Roman at all, but 
 Mediaeval, if not of a much later date !
 
 xii Prefatory Remarks. 
 
 Through the excavations lately carried out at the 
 expense of the British Archaeological Association and 
 of the Corporation of Chester (of which I may fairly 
 claim to have been the instigator, as I entirely though 
 silently disagreed with the conclusions so apparently 
 unanimously arrived at, during the meeting of our 
 younger sister society, the " Royal Institute" at Chester, 
 last year, and was supported afterwards by Sir James A. 
 Picton, F.S.A., the President of the late Liverpool 
 Congress and still of the "Association" itself, in my 
 opposition to them, and by others since, who however 
 wavered a good deal at first), these fallacies have been 
 substantially set aside, and Mr. Roach Smith's opinions 
 completely borne out by the discovery of grand founda- 
 tions of massive stone-work, so securely and carefully 
 placed together as to need no mortar or bonding 
 courses of tiles, and identical in construction with the 
 mural remains of Isurium (Aldboro'), the next 
 Station to the North of York, and thus, to all but the 
 obstinate and unlearned few, clearly establishing the 
 Roman origin and workmanship of the walls of Chester, 
 which Mr. Roach Smith had all along maintained (as he 
 did of the walls of Chichester) "against all comers", and 
 has now in both instances proved himself to be a true 
 and consistent champion of such important views, to his 
 increased honour and renown ! 
 
 Again, in another pathway of knowledge, the study of
 
 Prefatory Remarks. xiii 
 
 the origin of man, called Anthropology, we have lately 
 had " Doctors differing" as to what has been taught us 
 for nearly half a century ; and now that most learned if 
 not most autocratic of all modern Professors, as I had 
 cause to know some twenty years since I mean Max 
 Miiller, of Oxford, and from whose bitter attack upon my 
 suggested derivation of the word Thames from the 
 Greek (the Aryan of the Caucasian class according to 
 Blumenbach, and now from the " Indo-Germans", ac- 
 cording to Dr. Schrader), I wonder I ever escaped alive ! 
 is almost compelled by the progress of enquiry and closer 
 reasoning to admit that Professor Sayce is right in his 
 late suggestions, that after all the Aryans came from Ger 
 many or Scandinavia, and not from Asia, as the above 
 Professor of " Everything- Aryan" in this world or out of 
 it (!) asserted and proved, as he thought satisfactorily and 
 indisputably, to his former listeners and readers. 
 
 The Times thus sums up the result of this disagree- 
 ment, fraught with so much consequence to the history of 
 our language, and its better elucidation to my mind, than 
 seeking for its origin and roots in Sanskrit, when, nearer 
 home, the Teutonic seems on many points to be the 
 more primitive and perfect of the two ! " To put the 
 matter plainly," says The Thunderer, "Professor Sayce 
 falls foul of Professor Max Muller on the inspiring theme 
 of the nature and whereabouts of the primitive Aryan . . . 
 It is beginning to be believed that the Aryan was not
 
 xiv Prefatory Remarks. 
 
 Asiatic, and even that, speaking etymologically, he was 
 not an Aryan that is a ploughman at all." 
 
 " Who shall decide when Doctors disagree ?" is an old 
 and sound axiom, and therefore all I wish to point out 
 to my readers, from the illustrations I have given in these 
 Prefatory Notes, is simply that in the days in which we 
 live, when enquiries and researches are so multifarious in 
 every possible channel of information, and results arrived 
 at so entirely different to what contented many of us 
 years ago, it will never do obstinately to adhere to any 
 preconceived opinion, whether in print or not, and espe- 
 cially so when it has become the battle-field of other 
 writers than yourself, as in the Ethnological versus the 
 Phonological case, just referred to, and the previous 
 Archaeological and Historical combat over the true age 
 of the walls of Chester ! 
 
 Thus I hope it will be found in the succeeding pages 
 that I have done my best to tone down and to moderate 
 some of the more pronounced opinions I originally gave 
 way to, in several of the Fragmentary Essays I have now 
 the pleasure of submitting in a more compact form 
 to those readers who I may be honoured with; and I 
 venture to hope, in consequence, that no one of them 
 will consider me perversely disposed to believe in myself 
 alone, even if there should appear at times an air of 
 resoluteness in what I have commented on, or simply 
 suggested (to my way of thinking) as a plain and natural 
 solution of the argument involved !
 
 Prefatory Remarks. xv 
 
 These remarks especially address themselves to those of 
 the several Papers of this little book which contain certain 
 views of mine upon Etymology, that Will-o'-the-Wisp of 
 Literature as it may fitly be called, from too often leading 
 " all sorts and conditions of men", however well intend- 
 ing, into a very Serbonian bog of doubt and difficulty ! 
 
 It is nevertheless an extremely fascinating Study, and 
 one that may be followed pleasantly enough, providing 
 the student does not altogether commit himself to any 
 one derivation in particular, but only permits himself to 
 hint at or suggest an origin, otherwise he will have a 
 whole army of more or less distinguished scholars down 
 upon him, each armed and astride his own Hobby-horse, 
 with his peculiar view or weapon, seeking to crush him 
 to the ground or prove him to be the greatest dolt 
 possible by laws of their own making, which playfully 
 may be described as deciding that such a change of 
 letters as K into C, B into P, or U into Y, cannot pos- 
 sibly B, true Philolo G ! 
 
 It only now remains for me to thank those kind friends 
 who have, whilst these pages were going through the 
 press, given me suggestions or instructive references, in 
 relation to the Papers I ventured to submit to them ; 
 and although not in all instances accepting what they 
 so amiably and learnedly offered, as that would have 
 been running counter to the admittedly true expe- 
 rience (and in which I thoroughly believe), that people 
 often seek advice, but seldom follow it ! I nevertheless
 
 xvi Prefatory Remarks. 
 
 feel greatly indebted and obliged for the interest they 
 have evinced and encouragement afforded me in the 
 production of this little volume, and for the efforts they 
 have made to render it reliable in every way, and let me 
 hope so generally attractive, to my younger Readers, as 
 to induce them hereafter, to make deeper researches into 
 the still rich mines of their Country's History, from the 
 mere surface of which these various "Fragments" have 
 
 been collected. 
 
 GEORGE R. WRIGHT. 
 
 JUNIOR ATHENAEUM CLUB, LONDON, 
 October 1887. 
 
 * Let me here particularly refer to Sir James A. Picton, F.S.A., 
 the Rev. Thomas Halliwell, M.A., of Brighton, Mr. Thomas 
 Morgan, F.S.A., V.P. and Hon. Treasurer of the British Archaeo- 
 logical Association, Dr. B. Winstone, of London and Epping, and 
 to Mr. J. Horace Round, M.A., for their valuable notes and sug- 
 gestions to my Essay on "The Source and Nomenclature of the 
 River Thames"; and to Mr. Roach Smith, F.S.A., Mr. Cecil Brent, 
 F.S.A., and Mr. W. H. Cope, F.S.A., for their contributions in a 
 more general manner to my other papers. And last, though by no 
 means least, to my oldest friend of all, Mr. Halliwell-Phillipps, 
 F.R.S., F.S.A., for his emendations and additions to the Paper on 
 the MS. list of Plays, dated 1638, and which, through his agency, 
 as then Honorary Editor of the British Archaeological Association's 
 Journal was first brought before the public in 1 860, though in a less 
 comprehensive manner than now.
 
 ON A MANUSCRIPT LIST OF PLAYS 
 OF THE YEAR 1638. 
 
 HE extreme rarity and literary importance of 
 all documents connected with the history 
 of the English stage previously to the 
 suppression of the theatres during the 
 Commonwealth, must be the apology, if any be neces- 
 sary, for introducing a subject to my readers on which 
 interesting discussion so much has been written by 
 far abler pens than mine. There seems to have been 
 a fatality attending the records of the ancient English 
 theatre. It is only by the merest chance that any frag- 
 ments are now found. They were not considered of 
 importance in their own day by the public, who did 
 not set value on anything of the kind that came into 
 their hands; while, during the civil wars, the Puritans, 
 from possibly conscientious motives, destroyed, as far as 
 they could, all play-books and papers connected with them. 
 The consequence is that it is now extremely difficult to 
 ascertain any facts connected with the theatrical history 
 of this early period ; and hence arises the value of a 
 
 B
 
 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 document, the fac-simile of which forms the frontispiece 
 of this book. The original page, or, rather, leaflet, 
 by mere accident, came into my hands whilst looking 
 through the dramatic collection of my old friend, the late 
 Mr. Drinkwater Meadows, the famous comedian, of now 
 more than thirty years ago.* 
 
 This paper, the authenticity of which cannot be 
 doubted, contains a list of the plays acted "before the 
 king and queene this year of our Lord, 1638," and 
 is here given in modern language, for the benefit of 
 those who are not able to read the Elizabethan writing, 
 although a study of that, and more ancient hand- 
 writing, would open a field of rich information to all 
 who would take the trouble to learn how to decipher 
 such penmanship. The list appears to have been 
 drawn up by the manager of that theatrical company 
 who were then known as "the lady Elizabeth's servants", 
 or, as they are sometimes denominated, " the queen of 
 Bohemia's players," who performed at the Cockpit, in 
 Drury Lane. It will be observed from the list, that, with 
 the exception of performances at the Court itself, all the 
 plays named were represented at the Cockpit save only 
 one day's representation of the Unfortunate Lovers, which 
 
 * This curious and unique page of writing was sold after the 
 lamented death of its owner, with his books and other MSS., by 
 Messrs. Puttick and Simpson, and fetched the large sum of five 
 pounds, as was told me by Mrs. Drinkwater Meadows, the widow 
 of my friend, at the time ; she was the daughter of the late Admiral 
 Pridham.
 
 The Year 1638. 
 
 took place at the Blackfriars' Theatre. There can be 
 but little doubt that the last-named theatre was lent for 
 the occasion to the Cockpit company, it being extremely 
 improbable that the present list refers to the plays of 
 more than one body of actors. The Blackfriars Theatre 
 was situated near the place where now stands Apothe- 
 caries' Hall, called to this day Playhouse Yard, and not far 
 from The Times printing office. The Cockpit, as has 
 just been stated, was in Drury Lane. The latter theatre 
 was built, or it may be rebuilt, not very long before the year 
 1617 ; in which year, according to a statement in Camden's 
 Annals, it was pulled down by the mob : "1617, Martii 4. 
 Theatrum ludionum nuper erectum in Drury Lane a 
 furente multitudine diruitur et apparatus dilaceratur." 
 According to Malone, the Cockpit " was situated opposite 
 the Castle Tavern in Drury Lane, and was standing some 
 time after the Restoration." It was also called " The 
 Phoenix'', a representation of that fabulous bird having 
 been its external sign. 
 
 This list of plays includes two entries of great interest. 
 I of course allude to the notice of the performance of 
 Shakespeare's Julius Ctzsar here called simply Ctesar 
 at the Cockpit on November the i3th ; and that of The 
 Merry Wives of Windsor, at the same place, two days 
 afterwards. It is pleasing to find that the works of our 
 great dramatist had not been displaced by the novelties 
 of the day. There is also the notice of another play, 
 Sir John Oldcastle, which will always be connected with 
 the name of Shakespeare, having so often been attributed 
 
 B 2
 
 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 to his pen ; but it is now well known to have been written 
 by Munday, assisted by Drayton, Wilson, and Hathway. 
 
 The other plays named are equally well known, and call 
 for little remark. The note of The Passionate Lover being 
 represented at Somerset House in July, is, perhaps, the 
 most curious of these. It confirms a statement in the 
 title-page to the original edition of that play, which ap- 
 peared in the year 1655 as " The Passionate Lover, a 
 tragi-comedy by Lodowick Carlell, in two parts, twice 
 acted before the king and queen at Somerset House, and 
 very often afterwards at Black Friars, with great applause." 
 
 It will be observed that the writer of this list is careful 
 to note more than once, that, owing to the performance 
 at Court, "the day was lost at our house"; in other 
 words, the Cockpit was necessarily closed on such 
 occasions. The object of this memorandum was to call 
 attention to the pecuniary loss thus incurred. There can, 
 I think, be little, if any doubt, that the list was drawn up 
 with the view of obtaining payment for the performances 
 alluded to in it. Such a list would pass with the account 
 through the proper office, previously to payment being 
 ordered. 
 
 "Whilst referring to so interesting a subject as the men- 
 tion of the performance of two of Shakespeare's Plays, in 
 this important document, only twenty-two years after his 
 death, I cannot help making my humble attempt to dis- 
 possess the minds of all those, who (from a greater 
 belief in their own critical acumen, or for the purpose of 
 affecting a singularity of opinion from the vast majority)
 
 The Year 1638. 5 
 
 have adopted such extraordinary views in the foolish 
 doubts they profess to entertain, that Shakespeare ever 
 wrote a line of the Poems and Plays, for upwards of 
 three hundred years attributed to him by the well-known 
 Writers, Poets, and Dramatists of his own time, as well as by 
 those of later periods and up to the present era, including 
 then, as now, the large proportion of the educated classes 
 of both sexes, in all parts of the world ! 
 
 And to this end I herewith append a series of Extracts 
 from contemporaneous and later writers of Shakespeare's 
 praise and blame, (if Robert Greene's envious and ill- 
 natured remarks in his Groats-worth of Wit, written in 
 1592, are to be so taken), when he says, "Yes, trust 
 them not : for there is an upstart Crow, beautiful with 
 our feathers, that with his Tygers heart wrapt in a 
 Player's hide, supposes he is as well able to bombast out 
 a blanke verse as the best of you : and being an absolute 
 Johannes fac Mum, is in his own conceit the onely 
 Shake-scene in a countrie.". These lines are of them- 
 selves sufficient to prove Greene's < knowledge, that 
 William Shakespeare and none other, wrote (at least) one 
 play before Greene died ; or he would certainly in his 
 envy and jealousy of his then great fame, have divulged the 
 names of the authors who are now said to have written 
 this and the others as well. These extracts are taken 
 from my old and, alas ! now departed friend Dr. C. M. 
 Ingleby's valuable and pains-taking volume, entitled 
 Shakespeare's Centurie of Pray se, ed. 1874, containing as 
 it does some 116 quotations in prose and verse of con-
 
 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 temporary and other writers to the close of the i yth century 
 and some twenty-five anonymous ones, chiefly in com- 
 mendation of and having reference " to the estimation in 
 which", as the learned Doctor says in his " Forespeech" 
 to the foregoing excellent Work, " Shakespeare was held 
 by the writers of the century, during which his fame was 
 germinating; viz., 1592-1693." 
 
 These quotations will, I venture to hope, induce all such 
 ignorantly-doubting individuals to alter their views as to 
 Shakespeare being only the mouthpiece and catspaw of 
 Lord Bacon, Sir Philip Sydney, Sir Walter Raleigh, and 
 other of his celebrated contemporaries, who were so 
 diffident, according to these absurd theories, of their own 
 compositions as to allow an illiterate and obscure "Link- 
 Boy" and afterwards " third-rate Actor" at the best, as 
 they assert ! to take the whole credit of their united 
 genius and learning, and pass himself off in London, and 
 at Stratford-on-Avon, as the Author of some thirty-seven 
 Plays, besides the beautiful Sonnets and even better 
 known Poems of Venus and Adonis, Rape of Lucrece, 
 Passionate Pilgrim, etc. 
 
 But there are other instances, besides those given on 
 a succeeding page, of contemporary allusions made to 
 Shakespeare as a Dramatist, and of the high estimation 
 in which he was held as a Man ! John Weever, in 1599,- 
 (whose lines commencing " Honie-tongued Shakespeare '> 
 are given farther on,) writes that " the many-headed 
 multitude were drawn by Brutus' speech", a piece of 
 oratory that has never failed to bring down applause
 
 The Year 1638. 7 
 
 even at these times, however indifferently they may have 
 been delivered after some of the greatest Actors ; and 
 John Marston, in 1598, compliments him on "his well 
 penn'd playes." An anonymous author of the Return 
 from Parnassus? in 1601-2, complained that the Univer- 
 sity-penned plays were too classical, adding " our fellow 
 Shakespeare puts them all down, I (aye) and Ben 
 Jonson too." In his Barons Wars, ed. 1603, Michael 
 Drayton saw in him " all sovereign powers" and de- 
 clared : 
 
 " That't seemd when heaven his modell first began 
 In him it showd perfection in a man. 1 ' 
 
 In 1603, Chettle sang of him as "silver-tongued 
 Melicert " and " the sweet singer Corydon." The poet 
 Spenser, who is sometimes said to have been one 
 of the authors helping the others already referred to, thus 
 giving Shakespeare the credit of what he himself wrote ! 
 praises him as " pleasant Willy " in his Tears of the 
 Muses 
 
 " He, the Man whom Nature's self hath made, 
 To mock herself, and Truth to imitate." 
 
 And now, in leaving my readers to form, if they have 
 not already done so, a decided opinion on the identity 
 of Shakespeare with his own published Poetry and 
 Dramatic writings, as authenticated so conclusively by 
 many of his illustrious contemporaries, let me hope that 
 those amongst them who still have any idle or silly 
 * See page 24. Kempe loq., line 4.
 
 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 fantasies " to the contrary, notwithstanding", may get rid 
 of them at once, and, turning from " the error of their 
 ways", seek to do justice to the wondrous Warwickshire 
 Genius, whom Emerson, probably the greatest of all 
 American writers, calls " the Poet of the Human Race". 
 To this "devoutly to be wished" consummation, I feel 
 I cannot do better then append an extract from an 
 appropriate article, occurring in the Whitehall Review of 
 August last, as it exposes freely and forcibly enough all 
 those eccentric and worse than ridiculous theories, 
 set up of late years by these self-considered Baconian 
 philosophers, although " Mare's-nesters" would probably 
 be a more fitting denomination for such very " peculiar 
 people" ! 
 
 " But the local ideal of the bard of Avon will not do for 
 the world at large, and the commentator, the antiquary, and 
 the student combine to build up a more real figure out of 
 such facts as can be scraped together, while the philosopher 
 tries to evolve from the plays what the man must have been. 
 On the other hand, in direct antagonism, rises another 
 school of critics, who will have none of the Stratford or the 
 scholastic creation. This is the school of doubt and of 
 denial hinted at a little while back. Shakespeare never 
 wrote the plays, these declare. He was a mere stalking- 
 horse for the hidden hunter of a nobler quarry ; he was but 
 the mask that hid the lineaments of loftiest genius ; he was 
 the man of straw whose life, save for its connection with the 
 most marvellous of literary frauds, is of little value or 
 interest. To them, Shakespeare is simply the shrewd, igno- 
 rant adventurer, who is content to accept a false position if 
 it is made worth his while, and who finds that fathering 
 plays which he could neither write nor understand was a
 
 The Year 1638. 
 
 more profitable trade than holding horses outside the 
 theatre or managing a rabble of actors inside. They will have 
 none of Shakespeare. The plays were written by some one else, 
 by X, and they proceed to hunt for their unknown quantity. 
 
 " Every one knows who that unknown quantity is, accord- 
 ing to the vast majority of the Shakespeare sceptics. With 
 an amazing and perplexing pertinacity, they point out the 
 true author of the Shakespearean plays in the man whom 
 Macaulay has described as the ' most devoted worshipper 
 of speculative truth : and the ' boldest champion of intellec- 
 tual freedom ' in a word, in Francis Bacon. From the 
 days when poor Delia Bacon flitted about Stratford Church 
 like an uneasy ghost, to this, our own time, when trans- 
 atlantic Mr. Donelly is preparing to prove to the world that 
 the 1623 folio is the most ingenious and juggling cypher 
 story on record, the Bacon theory has thriven and spread 
 and flourished. There are others, however, a smaller 
 number, wh6, while still stoutly denying Shakespeare's 
 authorship, do not accept Bacon as the hidden man, but 
 consider the plays the work of a kind of guild of wits of the 
 Elizabethan age who, for some extraordinary reason, chose 
 to make Shakespeare their foster-father. Theories so 
 bizarre as these are scarcely more startling, not to say 
 absurd, than one which we once heard suggested with all 
 gravity, that Shakespeare was a very wicked man, who used 
 to lure rising young dramatists to his house in Stratford ; 
 then murder them, filch the MSS. of their tragedies and 
 comedies, and foist them upon a deluded world as his own. 
 We have no doubt that, with a little care, a decent case 
 enough might be made out for this latter notion. Indeed, 
 for that matter, a decent case can almost always be made 
 out for any such fantasy. Only the other day, an advertise- 
 ment in a newspaper hinted to the world that Robert Burton, 
 our old friend of the Anatomy of Melancholy, was the true 
 author. For our own part, we believe an excellent case 
 could be made out for Queen Elizabeth being the real writer,
 
 io Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 and we have half a mind to ' run ' that good lady as the 
 creator of 'Hamlet' and 'Romeo and Juliet,' and so add 
 one other feather to the plumed diadem of England's most 
 famous sovereign." 
 
 MODERN READING OF THE MS. PAGE. 
 
 See Frontispiece. 
 
 . . . BEFORE THE KING & QUEENE THIS YEARE OF OUR 
 LORD 1638. 
 
 At the Cocpit the 26th of March the lost ladie 
 
 At the Cocpit the 2yth of March Damboyes 
 
 At the Cocpit the 3rd of Aprill Aglaura 
 
 At the Blackfryers the 23 of Aprill for the queene 
 
 [the unfortunate lover 
 At the Cocpit the 2Qth of May the princes birthnight 
 
 Quid Castle 
 
 At the Cocpit the last of May agayne the 
 
 [unfortunate lover 
 At Sumerset-house the loth of July and our day lost at our 
 
 house Mr. Carlels play the first part of 
 
 [the passionate lover 
 
 At Hamton Court the 3Oth of September 
 
 [the unfortunate lover 
 At Richmount the 6th of November for the ladie Maries 
 
 berthnight & the day lost at our house 
 
 [the mery divell of Edmonton 
 
 At the Cocpit the 8th of November the fox 
 
 At the Cocpit the i3th of November Ceaser 
 
 At the Cocpit the 1 5th of November 
 
 [the mery wifes of Winsor 
 
 At the Cocp it the 2oth of November ... the fayre favorett 
 At the Cocpit the 22th of November Chances
 
 The Year 1638. H 
 
 At the Cocpit the 27th of November ... the customeof the C 
 At the Cocpit the 2Qth of November ... the northen las 
 At the Cocpit the 6th of Desember ... the Spanish Curatt 
 At the Cocpit the nth of Desember agayne 
 
 [the fayre favorett 
 At the Cocpit the i8th of Desember in Carlels play agayne 
 
 the first part of the pasionate lover 
 
 At the Cocpit the aoth of Desember the 2nd part of 
 
 [the pasionate lover 
 At the Cocpit the 27 of Desember the 2nd part agayne of 
 
 [the pasionate lover 
 At Richmount the 28 of Desember the ladie Elsabeths 
 
 berthnight & our day lost at our house 
 
 [the northen las 
 At Richmount on new yeares Day and our Day lost at our 
 
 house beggers bush 
 
 At Richmount the 7th of Janeuarye and our day lost at our 
 house the Spanish Curatt 
 
 EXPLANATIONS OF THE PLAYS, 
 
 Mentioned on the Preceding List of Performances, etc.* 
 
 THE LOST LADY. A tragi-comedy by Sir William Bar- 
 clay, published in 1639. 
 
 DAMBOYES, see Bussy D'Ambois. 
 
 AGLAURA. Tragi-comedy by Sir John Suckling. Acted 
 at the private house in Black Friars. Fol., 1638 ; 8vo., 
 1646. The Author has so contrived this play, by means of 
 an alteration in the last Act, that it may be acted either as a 
 Tragi-comedy, or a perfect Tragedy : a plan which was fol- 
 lowed by Sir Robert Howard in his " Vestal Virgin". The 
 
 * These notices are taken from J. O. Halliwell's (now Phillipps) 
 Dictionary of Old English Plays, 8vo., 1 860.
 
 12 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 scene lies in Persia. This play was very successful. Brome 
 wrote some verses upon it, which are printed in Muses' Re- 
 creation. Pepys, however, notes it as " but a new play, 
 nothing of design in it." The writer of the letter dated 
 Feb. 7th, 1637, says that this " play cost three or four hun- 
 dred pounds setting out ; eight or ten suits of new clothes 
 he gave the players, an unheard-of prodigality." There is a 
 memorandum that it was played at the Red Bull on Feb- 
 ruary 27th, 1661, " the tragical way." There is an early 
 MS. copy of this play in the Brit. Mus., MS. Bibl. Reg. 18, 
 c. 25. 
 
 THE UNFORTUNATE LOVERS. A Tragedy by Sir Wil- 
 liam Davenant. Acted at the Black Friars, 410. 1643. Scene, 
 Verona. Licensed in 1635. 
 
 OLD CASTLE. Sir John Oldcastle. The first part of the 
 true and Honourable History of the Life of John Oldcastle, 
 the good Lord Cobham. Acted by the Earl of Nottingham 
 the Lord High Admiral's servants. 4to. 1600. This is one 
 of the plays erroneously attributed to Shakespeare, whose 
 name however occurs on the title-page of some copies. It 
 appears, from Henslowe's Diary, that it was written in 1599, 
 by Munday, Drayton, Wilson, and Hathway. No second 
 part is known to exist. 
 
 BUSSY D'AMBOis. Tragedy by G. Chapman, 410. 1607 ; 
 4to. 1608 ; 410. 1616 ; 4to. 1641 ; 4to. 1657. Entered on the 
 Stationers' Registers, June 3rd, 1607. Reprinted in Dilke's 
 Old Plays. This play was often presented at Paul's, in the 
 reign of James I, and after the Restoration was revived with 
 success at the Theatre Royal. The plot of it is taken from 
 the French historians of the reign of Henry III of France. 
 Dryden has spoken of it in terms of unwonted severity. " I 
 have sometimes wondered," he says in the reading, " what 
 was become of those glaring colours which amazed me in 
 ' Bussy d'Ambois' upon the theatre ; but which I had taken
 
 The Year 1638. 13 
 
 up what I supposed a fallen star, I found I had been 
 cozened with a jelly : nothing but a cold dull mass, which 
 glittered no longer than it was shooting, a dwarfish thought 
 dressed up in gigantic words, repetition in abundance, loose- 
 ness of expression, and gross hyperboles ; the sense of one 
 line expanded prodigiously into ten : and, to sum up all, 
 uncorrect English, and a hideous mingle of false poetry and 
 true nonsense ; or at best, a scantling of wit, which lay 
 gasping for life, groaning beneath a heap of rubbish. A 
 famous modern poet used to sacrifice every year a Statius 
 to Virgil's manes ; and I have indignation enough to burn 
 a'd'Ambois' annually to the memory ofjonson." Durfey 
 says that, about 1675, he saw "the 'Bussy d'Ambois' of Chap- 
 man acted by Hart, which, in spight of the obsolete phrases 
 and intolerable fustian with which a great part of it was 
 cramm'd, had some extraordinary beauties which sensibly 
 charmed me, which, being improved by the graceful action 
 of that eternally renowned and best of actors, so attracted 
 not only me, but the town in general, that they were obliged 
 to pass by and excuse the gross errors in the writing, and 
 allow it amongst the rank of the topping tragedies of that 
 time." 
 
 THE PASSIONATE LOVER. A tragi-comedy by Lodowick 
 Carlell,* in two parts. Twice acted before the King and 
 Queen at Somerset House, and very often afterwards at 
 Black Friars, with great applause. 4to. 1655 ; 8vo. 1655. 
 Scene, Burgony and Neustrea. This play is erroneously 
 called, in the title-page, " The Passionate Lovers." 
 
 THE MERRY DEVIL OF EDMONTON. A comedy acted 
 at the Globe. 4to. 1608, 1617, 1626, 1631, 1665, 1780. 
 This comedy is attributed by Kirkman to Shakespeare, but 
 
 * This Dramatist's name appears on the MS. List of Plays, as 
 "Mr. Carlell", see Fac-simile Frontispiece, and page 10 for 
 modern reading of same.
 
 14 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 on what foundation we know not ; as there do not appear 
 in the piece itself any marks that tend to the confirmation 
 of such a suggestion. 
 
 THE Fox. VOLPONE, OR THE Fox. A comedy by Ben 
 Jonson, first printed in 1607 ; acted by the King's Servants 
 in 1605. 
 
 CAESAR (JULIUS), by William Shakespeare, was first 
 printed in the folio collection of his Plays, 1623 ; and first 
 noticed in 1613. 
 
 THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, by William Shake- 
 speare. This play was entered at Stationers' Hall in Janu- 
 ary 1602, and that is the earliest notice of it. 
 
 THE FAIR FAVOURITE. A tragi-comedy by Sir W. 
 Davenant. Fol., 1673. A play so called is mentioned in 
 the list of MSS. said to have been destroyed by Warburton's 
 servant. 
 
 CHANCES. A comedy by Beaumont and Fletcher. Folio, 
 1647. The plot of this play is taken from a novel of 
 Cervantes called, The Lady Cornelia. The scene lies in 
 Bologna. It was revived at the Cockpit in Drury-lane in 
 1662. 
 
 THE CUSTOM OF THE COUNTRY. A tragi-comedy by 
 Beaumont and Fletcher. Fol., 1647. Acted in 1623. The 
 plot is taken from Malespine's novels, Dec. 6, Nov. 6 ; and 
 has been made considerable use of by C. Johnson in his 
 " Country Lasses," and C. Gibber in his " Love Makes a Man." 
 The scene lies sometimes at Lisbon and sometimes in Italy. 
 The following notice of it occurs in Pepj^s Diary, under the 
 date of January 2nd, 1667 "Alone to the King's house, and 
 there saw the ' Custom of the Country', the second time of its 
 being acted, wherein Knipp does the widow well ; but of all 
 the plays that ever I did see, the worst, having neither plot, 
 language, nor anything in the earth that is acceptable ; only 
 Knipp sings a song admirably."
 
 The Year 1638. 15 
 
 THE NORTHERN LASS; OR, A NEST OF FOOLS. A 
 comedy by Richard Brome, acted at the Globe and Black 
 Friars. 410. 1632. This is one of the best of this author's 
 pieces ; it met with good applause in the representation, and 
 is commended by his contemporary, Ben Jonson. It was 
 revived and reprinted in 410. 1684 ; with a new Prologue by 
 Jo. Haynes, and an Epilogue ; and new songs being added 
 to it, the music of which was composed by Daniel Purcell, 
 it was again reprinted in 410. 1706. It has six copies of 
 complimentary verses prefixed to it. 
 
 THE SPANISH CURATE. A comedy by Beaumont and 
 Fletcher. Fol., 1647. This comedy was acted at Court in 
 December 1622. The plot of Don Henrique, Ascanio, 
 Violente and Jacintha, is borrowed from Gerardo's History 
 of Don John, p. 202 ; and that of Leandro, Bactolus, Ama- 
 rantha, and Lopez, from The Spanish Curate of the same 
 author, p. 214. Mr. Planche" produced a well-arranged and 
 compressed edition of this Play, to suit modern taste, very 
 successfully, at Covent Garden Theatre, when under the 
 management of Madame Vestris and Charles Mathews. 
 
 The Second Part of THE PASSIONATE LOVER. 
 
 BEGGAR'S BUSH. Comedy by Beaumont and Fletcher. 
 Fol., 1647, 1661. It was acted at Whitehall in 1622, and at 
 Hampton Court in 1636. " The Beggar's Bush " was revived 
 at Lincoln's Inn Fields in November, 1660. It was at a 
 performance of this comedy, in the following January, that 
 Pepys saw female actors for the first time. Dr. Browne, in 
 MS. Sloane 1900, notes it being acted in 1662, " at the 
 King Playhouse in Covent Garden."
 
 1 6 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 EXTRACTS FROM 
 
 DR. INGLEBY'S " CENTURIE OF PRAYSE", 
 Referred to Page 5.* 
 
 ANONYMOUS, 1603-1604. 
 
 " You Poets all, brave Shakespeare, Johnson, Green, 
 Bestow your time to write for England's Queene. 
 
 Lament, lament, etc. 
 
 " Returne your songs and sonnets and your layes 
 To set forth sweet Elizabeth(a)'s praise, 
 
 Lament, lament," etc. 
 
 "A Moumeful Dittie entituled Elizabeth's losse, together with 
 a Welcome to King James") 
 
 GABRIEL HARVEY, 1598. 
 
 " The younger sort take much delight in Shakespeare's 
 Venus and Adonis, but his Lucrece, and his tragedy of 
 Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke, have it in them to please the 
 wiser sort. 1598." 
 
 (Manuscript Note to Speght's Chaucer, First- printed in 
 Steevens' Shakespeare, 1766. (Reed, xviii, 2. Harwell's 
 Malone, vii, 168 ; Drake, ii, 391, &"c.) 
 
 RICHARD CAREW, 15951600. 
 " Adde hereunto, that whatsoever grace any other lan- 
 guage carrieth in verse or prose, in Tropes or Metaphors, 
 in Ecchoes and Agnominations, they may all be lively and 
 exactly represented in ours : will you have Platoes veine ? 
 reade Sir Tho. Smith ; the lonicke ? Sir Thomas Moore ; 
 Ciceroes ? Ascham ; Varro ? Chaucer ; Demosthenes ? 
 Sir John Cheeke (who in his treatise to the Rebels, 
 
 * In the second edition of this interesting book 1879 the 
 number of quotations is increased to 356 : 41 of which are by 
 anonymous authors.
 
 The Year 1638. 17 
 
 hath comprised all the figures of Rhetorick.) Will you reade 
 Virgill ? take the Earle of Surrey ; Catullus ? Shakespeare 
 and Barlowe (Marlowe) fragment ; Ovid ? Daniel ; Lucan ? 
 Spenser ; Martial ? Sir John Davies, and others : will you 
 have all in all for prose and verse ? take the miracle of our 
 age, Sir Philip Sidney." 
 
 (" The Excellencie of the English tongue, by R. C., of An- 
 thony, Esquire" to W. C. Cantderis " Remaines concern- 
 ing Brittaine." (Languages, 1605. 4(0.) 
 
 JOHN WEEVER, 1595. 
 AD GULIELMUM SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 " Honie-Tong'd Shakespeare when I saw thine issue 
 I swore Apollo got them and none other, 
 Their rosie-tainted features cloth'd in tissue, 
 Some heaven born goddesse said to be their mother : 
 Rose-checkt Adonis with his amber tresses, 
 Faire fire-hot Venus charming him to love her, 
 Chaste Lucretia virgine-like her dresses, 
 Prowd lust-stung Tarquine seeking still to prove her : 
 Romea Richard ; more whose names I know not, 
 Their sugred tongues, and power attractive beuty 
 Say they are Saints, although that Sts. they shew not 
 For thousands vowes to them subjective dutie : 
 They burn in love thy childre Shaksespear het the, 
 Go, wo thy Muse more Nymphish brood beget them." 
 
 (" Epigrammes in the oldest cut and newest fashion. A twise 
 seven houres (in so many tveekes) studie. No longer (like 
 the fashion) not unlike to continue. The first seven. John 
 Weever. Sit vohiisse, sat valuisse." 1599. (i2mo.) The 
 \th week : Epig. 22.) 
 
 FRANCIS MERES, 1596. 
 
 " As the Greeke tongue is made famous and eloquent by 
 Homer, Hesiod, Euripedes, SEschilus, Sophocles, Pindarus, 
 Phocy tides and Aristophanes j and the Latine tongue by 
 
 C
 
 1 8 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 Virgill, Ovid, Horace, Silius Italicus, Lucanus, Lucretius, 
 Ausonius and Claudianus; so the English tongue is mightily 
 enriched and gorgeouslie invested in rare ornaments and 
 resplendent abiliments by sir Philip Sidney, Spencer, 
 Daniel, Dray ton, Warner, Shakespeare, Marlow and Chap- 
 man. 
 
 " As the soul of Euphorbus, was thought to live in Pytha- 
 gorus : so the sweete wittie soule of Ovid lives in mellifluous 
 & hony-tongued Shakespeare, witnes his Venus and Adonis, 
 his Lucrece, his sugred Sonnets among his private friends, 
 &c. 
 
 " As Plautus and Seneca are accounted the best for 
 Comedy and Tragedy among the Latines : so Shakespeare 
 among ye English is the most excellent in both kinds for 
 the stage ; for Comedy, witnes his Getleme of Verona, his 
 Errors, his Love labors lost, his Love labours wonne, his 
 Midsummers night dreame, & his Merchant of Venice : for 
 Tragedy his Richard the 2., Richard the 3., Henry the 4., 
 King John, Titus Andronicus and his Romeo and Juliet. 
 
 "As Epius Stolo said that the Muses would speake with 
 Plautus tongue, if they would speak Latin : so I say that the 
 Muses would speak with Shakespeares fine filed phrase, if 
 they would speake English. 
 
 " And as Horace saith of his ; Exegi monumentum aere 
 perennius; Regaliq ; situ pyramidu altius^- Q,uodnon imber 
 edax ; Non Aquilo impotens possit diruere; aut innu- 
 merabilis annorum feries Q^c- fitga temporum ; so say I 
 severally of sir Philip Sidneys, Spencers, Daniels, Draytons, 
 Shakespeares, and Warners workes. 
 
 "As Pindarus, Anacreon, Callimachus among the Greekes; 
 and Horace and Catullus -among the Latines are the best 
 Lyrick Poets ; so in this faculty the best amog our Poets are 
 Spencer (who excelleth in all kinds) Daniel, Drayton, 
 Shakespeare, Brettd. 
 
 " As .... so these are our best for Tragedie, the
 
 The Year 1638. 1.9 
 
 Lorde Buckhurst, Doctor Leg of Cambridge, Doctor Edes 
 of Oxforde, maister Edward Ferris, the Authour of the 
 Mirrour for Magistrates, Marlow, Peele, Watson, Kid, 
 Shakespeare, Drayton, Chapman, Decker, and Benjamin 
 Johnson. ..... 
 
 " .... so the best for Comedy amongst us bee, 
 
 Edward Earle of Oxforde, Doctor Gager of Oxforde, 
 Maister Rowley once a rare Scholler of learned Pembroke 
 Hall in Cambridge, Maister Edwardes one of her Majesties 
 Chappell, eloquent and wittie John Lilly, Lodge, Gascoyne, 
 Greene, Shakespeare, Thomas Nash, Thomas Heywood, 
 Anthony Mundye our best plotter, Chapman, Porter, Wil- 
 son, Hathway, and Henry Chettle. 
 
 " .... so these are the most passionate among us 
 to bewaile and bemoane the perplexities of Love, Henrie 
 Howard Earle of Surrey, sir Thomas Wyat, the elder, sir 
 Francis Brian, sir Philip Sidney, sir Walter Rawley, sir 
 Edward Dyer, Spencer, Daniel, Drayton, Shakespeare, 
 Whetstone, Gascoyne, Samuell Page, sometimes fellowe of 
 Corpus Chris ti Colledge in Oxford, Churchyard, Bretton.' 1 '' 
 
 (" Palladis Tamia. Wits Treasury. Being the Second Part 
 of Wits Commonwealth." 1598 (izma.) Fols. 280, 281, 282, 
 283, 284.) 
 
 BEN JONSON'S LINES ON DROESHOUT'S 
 
 PORTRAIT OF SHAKESPEARE 
 Prefixed to the first Folio Ed. of his works, 1623. 
 
 TO THE READER. 
 
 " This Figure, that thou here seest put, 
 It was for gentle Shakespeare cut ; 
 Wherein the Graver had a strife 
 With Nature, to .out-doo the life : 
 
 C 2
 
 2O Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 O, could he but have drawne his wit 
 As well in brasse, as he hath hit 
 His face ; the Print would then surpasse 
 All, that was ever writ in brasse. 
 But, since he cannot, Reader, looke 
 Not on his Picture, but his Booke. 
 
 B. I." 
 
 BEN JONSON, 1623. 
 TO THE MEMORY OF MY BELOVED, THE AUTHOR 
 
 MR. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE : 
 AND WHAT HE HATH LEFT US. 
 " To draw no envy (Shakespeare) on thy name 
 Am I thus ample to thy Booke, and Fame : 
 While I confesse thy writings to be such, 
 As neither Man, nor Muse, can praise too much. 
 
 I therefore will begin. Soule of the Age ! 
 
 The applause ! delight ! the wonder of our Stage ! 
 
 My Shakespeare, rise ; I will not lodge thee by 
 
 Chaucer, or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lye 
 
 A little further, to make thee a room : 
 
 Thou art a Moniment without a tombe, 
 
 And art alive still, while thy Booke doth live 
 
 And we have wits to read, and praise to give 
 
 That I not mixe thee so, my braine excuses ; 
 
 I meane with great, but disproportion'd Muses : 
 
 For, if I thought my judgement were of yeeres, 
 
 I should commit thee surely with thy peeres, 
 
 And tell how farre thou didst our Lily outshine, 
 
 Or sporting Kid, or Marlowes mighty line. 
 
 And though thou hadst small Latine, and lesse Greeke, 
 
 From thence to honour thee, I would not seeke 
 
 For names, but call forth thund'ring ^Eschilus 
 
 Euripides, and Sophocles to us,
 
 The Year 1638. 21 
 
 Paccuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead 
 To life againe, to hear thy Busken tread, 
 And shake a Stage : or, when thy Sockes were on 
 Leave thee alone, for the comparison 
 Of all, that insolent Greece, or haughtie Rome 
 Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come. 
 Triumph, my Britaine, thou hast one to showe, 
 To whom all Scenes of Europe homage owe. 
 He was not of an age, but for all time ! 
 And all the Muses still were in their prime, 
 When like Apollo he came forth to warme 
 Our eares, or like a Mercury to charme ! 
 Nature herselfe was proud of his designes, 
 And joy'd to weare the dressing of his lines ! 
 Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit, 
 As, since, she will vouchsafe no other Wit. 
 
 And such wert thou. Looke howe the father's face 
 
 Lives in his issue, even so, the race 
 
 Of Shakespeares minde and manners brightly shines 
 
 In his well torned, and true filed lines : 
 
 In each of which, he seems to shake a Lance, 
 
 As brandish't at the eyes of Ignorance. 
 
 Sweet Swan of Avon ! what a sight it were 
 
 To see thee in our waters yet appeare, 
 
 And make those flights upon the bankes of Thames 
 
 That so did take Eliza and our James / 
 
 But stay, I see thee in the Hemisphere 
 
 Advanc'd, and made a Constellation there ! 
 
 Shine forth, thou Starre of Poets, and with rage 
 
 Or influence, chide or cheere the drooping Stage ; 
 
 Which, since thy flight fro hence, hath mourn'd like night 
 
 And despaires day, but for thy Volumes light." 
 
 (Prefixed to the first Folio Edition of Shakespeare s Works.)
 
 22 Manuscript List of Plays of 
 
 BEN JONSON, circa 1625. 
 
 " I remember, the Players have often mentioned it as an 
 honour to Shakespeare, that in his writing, (whatsoever he 
 penn'd) hee never blotted out line. My answer hath beene, 
 would (one) he had blotted a thousand. Which they thought a 
 malevolent speech. I had not told posterity this, but for their 
 ignorance, who choose that circumstance to commend their 
 friend by, wherein he most faulted. Andtojustifie mine own 
 candor, (for I loved the man, and doe honour his memory [on 
 this side Idolatory]as much as any). Hee was (indeed) honest, 
 and of an open, and free nature : had an excellent Phantsie, 
 brave notions, and gentle expressions : wherein hee flow'd 
 with that facility, that sometime it was necessary he should 
 be stop'd : Sufflaminandus erat: as Augustus said of 
 Haterius. His wit was in his owne power; would the rule 
 of it had beene so to. Many times he fell into those things, 
 could not escape laughter : As when hee said in the person 
 of Ctzsar, one speaking to him : Ccesar thou dost me wrong. 
 Hee replyed : Ccesar did never wrong, but with just cause : 
 and such like which were ridiculous.* But hee redeemed 
 
 * Note by Dr. Ingleby, page 173 of Elucidations : "Ben's 
 critique on the passage (as it must have originally stood) in 
 'Julius Csesar' is captious. The justice of the cause is not inconsis- 
 tent with wrong inflicted on others beside the expiator. Mr. J. O. 
 Phillipps (Halliwell) rightly observes : If wrong is taken in the 
 sense of injury or harm, as Shakespeare sometimes uses it, there is 
 no absurdity in the line. Cf. ' He shall be wrong.' ' 2 Henry 6', v, I. 
 (Life of Shakespeare, 1848, p. 185.) Again, in 'A Winter's Tale', v, 
 I, Paulina, speaking of the hapless Queen, says : 
 ' Had one such power, 
 
 She had just cause. 
 Leontes. She had and would incense me. 
 
 To murther her I marryed.' 
 
 that is, she had just cause to incite him to do another a grievous 
 wrong. This is even more amenable to Jonson's censure than the 
 passage which fell under it."
 
 The Year 1638. 23 
 
 his vices with his vertues. There was ever more in him to 
 be praysed, then to be pardoned." 
 
 (" Timber; or Discoveries" &*c. ; Works: 1640-1. (fa.) 
 Vol. 2, pp. 97, 98.) 
 
 JOHN MILTON, 1630. 
 
 An Epitaph on the admirable Dramaticke Poet, 
 W. SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 " What neede my Shakespeare for his honour'd bones 
 The labour of an Age, in piled stones 
 Or that his hallow'd Reliques should be hid 
 Under a starre-ypointing Pyramid ? 
 Dear Sonne of Memory, great Heire of Fame, 
 What need'st Thou such dull witnesse of thy Name ? 
 Thou in our wonder and astonishment 
 Hast built thyself a lasting Monument ; 
 For whilst to the shame of slow endeavouring Art 
 Thy easie numbers flow, and that each part, 
 Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued Booke, 
 Those Delphicke Lines with deepe Impression tooke 
 Then thou our fancy of her self bereaving, 
 Dost make as Marble with too much conceiving, 
 And so Sepulchefd in such pompe dost lie 
 That Kings for such a pompe would wish to die.". 
 
 (Preface to the Second Folio Ed. of Shakespeare's Works, 
 1640-45.) 
 
 The two following most important Extracts are taken from 
 the 2nd ed. of Dr. Ingleby's Centurie of Pray se, 1876 : 
 
 WILLIAM CAMDEN, 1603. 
 
 " These may suffice for some Poeticall descriptions of our 
 ancient Poets ; if I would come to our time, what a world 
 could I present to you out of sir Philipp Sidney, Ed. 
 Spencer, Samuel Daniel, Hugh Holland, Ben. Johnson, Th.
 
 24 Manuscript List of Plays. 
 
 Campion, Mich. Drayton, George Chapman, John Marston, 
 William Shakespeare, and other most pregnant witts of 
 these our times, whom succeeding ages may justly admire." 
 
 (" Remaines concerning Brittaine"; ist edition, 1605, 4(0. 
 Poems, p. 8.) 
 
 ANONYMOUS, 1601-2. 
 
 Ingenioso. What 's thy judgment of . . William Shake- 
 speare f 
 
 Judicio. Who loves Adonis love, or Lucre's rape, 
 His sweeter verse containes hartrobbing life, 
 Could but a graver subject him content, 
 Without loves foolish lazy languishment. 
 
 Act i, Sc. i. 
 
 Kempe. Few of the university pen plaies well, they smell 
 too much of that writer Ovid, and that writer Metamor- 
 phosis, and talke too much of Proserpina & Juppiter. Why 
 heres our fellow Shakespeare puts them all downe, I and Ben 
 Jonson too. 
 
 O that Ben Jonson is a pestilent fellow, he brought up 
 Horace giving the Poets a pill, but our fellow Shakespeare 
 hath given him a purge that made him beray his credit. 
 
 Burbage. It's a shrewd fellow indeed : I wonder these 
 Schollars stay so long, they appointed to be here presently 
 that we might try them : oh, here they come. 
 
 Bur. I like your face, and the proportion of your body 
 for Richard the 3. I pray M. Phil, let me see you act a 
 little of it. 
 
 Philamusus. "Now is the winter of our discontent, 
 Made glorious summer by the sonne of Yorke." 
 
 Act iv, Sc. 5. 
 
 (" The Return from Pemassus; or, the Scourge of Simony " 
 1606, sign. B2, back, 62, *&., 63, Ai., i,to.)
 
 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE, 
 
 STANDARD-BEARER TO KING HENRY VIII, 
 AND HIS DESCENDANTS. 
 
 HE period of the Reformation must be, to all 
 students of history, one of the most interest- 
 ing as well as the most instructive of which 
 they read. From it we derive all the bless- 
 ings of the freedom of thought and expression we so 
 happily enjoy ; and through it we have learned lessons of 
 the greatest usefulness and moderation, in all that relates 
 to our conduct as a governing body over those who, 
 from family association or from education, have been 
 brought up in that religion which, till the time of Henry 
 VIII, was the accepted one for the country in which we 
 live. Such thoughts as these must surely occupy the 
 minds of all those who, as archaeologists or students, 
 seek to unravel the individual history of families ; or to 
 dive into the motives of action which operated in the 
 breasts of those who were not only our ancestors, but
 
 26 Sir A nthony Browne. 
 
 who, through their fortitude in adversity, their fidelity 
 under temptation, and their courage in the field, have 
 rendered their names a " household word " among us ; 
 and their examples, with rich and poor, high or low, 
 something indeed worthy of being followed, whether they 
 have been of the older or the newer order of worshipping 
 the great Creator, which the Reformation introduced ; 
 and which, indeed, had much to do with the fortunes of 
 the subject of this paper. 
 
 Sir Anthony Browne may be fairly taken as an evi- 
 dence of the truth of that principle which ought to be, 
 and, no doubt is, of the greatest comfort to all aspiring 
 minds, viz., that devotion to a worthy cause, or a course 
 of upright action, must result in the achievement of all a 
 noble heart can wish ; and for which the " slings and 
 arrows of outrageous fortune" may be well despised, if 
 not altogether disregarded. 
 
 Sir Anthony Browne, then, was descended from a 
 family whose actions and deeds were already well known 
 to history, and whose relations had extended very largely 
 into the noble and most influential classes of the king- 
 dom ; and yet, like the condition of almost every other 
 family of note or distinction, his was derived from the 
 people, and boasted to be of that motley and discordant 
 group which has frequently been described as constitu- 
 ting the followers of the Duke William of Normandy, 
 whose coming to these shores, now more than eight 
 hundred years ago, laid the foundation of the pre-
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 27 
 
 sent greatness and prosperity of this our much loved 
 country.* 
 
 The following very interesting remarks on the deriva- 
 tion of the name of Browne, I had given me by the 
 Rev. Charles H. Browne of Cheltenham, a descendant of 
 the illustrious Sir Anthony, and whose beautifully and 
 elaborately drawn pedigrees of the family of Browne and 
 Montague have been exhibited at the meetings of the 
 British Archaeological Association. 
 
 " The name of Browne is not derived, as many people 
 believe, from the colour brown, but boasts of a much 
 higher origin : even the fanciful idea that some writers 
 have given, that it is derived from a Norman tower or 
 castle, called ' Brun', is not a true one, as it is now well 
 understood to be taken from the name of an office, or 
 position of dignity, allied to chieftainship, which in a 
 
 * The family of Browne was, no doubt, derived from the Nor- 
 mans, for on the Roll of Battle Abbey, amongst others occurs the 
 name of Browne. On Stowe's " auncient Role", which he received 
 from " Master Thomas Scriven", as containing the surnames of the 
 " chefe noblemen and gentlemen which came into England with 
 William the Conqueror", the name does not appear, although that 
 of Montague occurs on both lists or rolls. The original Roll is said 
 to have perished in the great fire at Cowdray Castle, whither Sir 
 Anthony or his successors had carried it from Battle Abbey. Of 
 all the copies of this famous deed, that of Leland, made in Henry 
 VIII's reign, is generally thought to be the most reliable, as the 
 monks, no doubt, to gratify the pride of some of the great families, 
 falsified and Frenchified names on the so-called copies they made of 
 the Roll ; but Leland copied his from the Roll itself, and states, in 
 notes to his copy, that some particular marks are the same in the 
 original.
 
 28 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 Scandinavian form is known as ' bran' or ' bren' ; and 
 which was, with the numerous tribes of the north-west of 
 Europe, the title of the chieftain or head of the clan. In 
 later days we got, in the same parts of the world, Bren- 
 denburg ; once, doubtless, Brenni-borg, the town of the 
 ' brann' or chieftain. So, again, in Brunswick, the town 
 or wick of the Bran or Bren. From this may possibly 
 have come the French ' Brun', from which we get easily 
 enough Brown and Browne. 
 
 " The name of Gray is also not the name of a colour, 
 but stands precisely in a like position with Brown : it 
 clearly meaning the head of some high office, as in the 
 modern form in German, we all know 'grew', or 
 'graf, or 'grave', are titles of distinction, as instanced 
 in Landgrave, Margrave, etc. 
 
 " In Roman times, we know that the father of the great 
 British chieftain, Caractacus, was Bran ; and Brennus, 
 who pillaged the city, marked, no doubt, the chieftain- 
 ship he so proudly held. 
 
 " From the above title we have, no doubt, derived the 
 word ' baron', the exact origin of which it is impossible 
 to trace, although, with the Welsh 'vavesour', it rises 
 superior to the ' comes', ' eearls', and ' earldermen', of 
 late times. The proper Latin rendering of ' bran' is 
 ' baronius', although in earlier times it is written ' varo', 
 ' varro-nis.' The origin of the word is to be found in 
 the patriarchal period, it being derived from the Hebrew, 
 the root being 'bar 5 , the 'on' being an augment or 
 emphasis. ' Bar' is a son, the choice one, or the heir as
 
 Sir A nthony Browne. 29 
 
 we now call him, designated by the father or the voice of 
 the tribe, out of all the sons of the father, with the power 
 of life and death, as the right of an independent ruler." 
 
 There was a Sir Anthony Browne in Richard II's time, 
 
 for we have an account in Lilly's Pedigree of Nobility, and 
 
 other MSS., circa 1623, of his being made a Knight of the 
 
 Bath in July 1377, at the coronation of that unfortunate 
 
 king. This member of the family left issue, two sons, 
 
 Sir Robert Browne and Sir Stephen Browne ; and the 
 
 latter, according to Holinshed's Chronicle, becoming Lord 
 
 Mayor of London in Henry VI's reign (1439), despatched 
 
 ships to the Prussian coast for cargoes of rye, when, 
 
 through a falling off in the produce of wheat, that grain 
 
 became very scarce and dear (three shillings a bushel), 
 
 and distributed the rye he had imported amongst the 
 
 poor without charge ; thus materially reducing the price 
 
 of wheat in his native country, to the discontent of the 
 
 corn-factors of the period, without doubt. Sir Robert, 
 
 however, Stephen's elder brother, continued the family 
 
 through his son, Sir Thomas Browne, who held the post 
 
 of treasurer to Henry VI ; and in the middle of his long 
 
 though unhappy reign, was commissioned with others to 
 
 meet at Rochester, to summon and inquire, upon the 
 
 oaths of certain persons, concerning a disturbance that 
 
 had occurred at sea between Richard Earl of Warwick 
 
 (" the king-maker and last of the barons", as he has since 
 
 been called) and his retinue, and some citizens of Lubeck, 
 
 the free city, who were under a treaty of friendship with 
 
 Henry.
 
 3O Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 In the right of his wife, Eleanor, daughter and coheir 
 of Sir Thomas Fitz-Alan (alias Arundel), knight (brother 
 of John Fitz-Alan, Earl of Arundel), he had the Castle 
 of Beechworth, Surrey; now called Betchworth near 
 Dorking, and the property of the late Sir Benjamin 
 Brodie, who died there. The issue of this marriage was, 
 i, Anthony; 2, Sir George Brown; 3, William; 4, 
 Thomas ; and 5, Sir Robert ; five sons in all. Of which 
 issue, Anthony was the most celebrated, although George, 
 his second brother, in Richard the Third's time became 
 notorious for being by proclamation ordered to be 
 apprehended for aiding and abetting the so-called rebel 
 Buckingham. 
 
 Sir Robert married Mary, a daughter of Sir William 
 Mallet, knight, and left an only daughter, Eleanor, who 
 married twice, and on each occasion to men of good 
 condition. 
 
 Sir Thomas Browne had also a daughter, Catharine, 
 who married Humphrey Sackvile of Buckhurst, in the 
 county of Suffolk, an ancestor of the Duke of Dorset, 
 by which marriage the family became first connected 
 with royal blood. 
 
 But of Anthony, the eldest son of this Sir Thomas 
 Browne, it is now necessary to speak, as he was the 
 father of Sir Anthony Browne, the subject of this paper, 
 and one of whom also his king was justly proud. His 
 seat was Cowdray Castle, near Midhurst, co. Sussex ; and 
 he was constituted Governor of Queenborough Castle, 
 Kent, as well as made standard-bearer throughout the
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 3 1 
 
 whole realm of England and elsewhere, by Henry VI. 
 His success at Newark-on-Trent as a soldier, when the 
 Earl of Lincoln and Lambert Simnell, the pretender to 
 the throne, were defeated, brought him especially before 
 his Majesty's notice, and he was knighted for his gallant 
 behaviour. Other honours were also bestowed upon 
 him, and the annual sum of 25,000 francs in gold, due 
 from Louis XI to the king, was twice ordered to be paid 
 to him, as Constable of the Castle of Calais. 
 
 His last will and testament was dated at Calais, 
 September 25, 1505, wherein he is described as "Lieu- 
 tenant" of the castle ; in which will, he ordered his body to 
 be buried at St. Nicholas's Chapel, in the Resurrection 
 Church, near his first wife, and bequeathed to the 
 brotherhood of the said Church, ten shillings, and to 
 the Lord Prior of Christ Church, Canterbury, a standing 
 cup of silver; also two others to Sir Edward Poyning 
 and Sir Hugh Conway, whom he appointed overseers of 
 his will, with Lucy,* his wife, executrix. By the said 
 Lucy, who was the fourth daughter of John Nevill, 
 Marquis of MoNTAGuf or Montacute, and coheir and 
 
 * This was the Lady Lucy Neville, widow of Sir William Fitz- 
 william, and one of the daughters and co-heiress of John Nevill, 
 Marquis of Montacute, brother of the Earl of Warwick. She was 
 descended, in various ways, from Edward I, Edward II, and John 
 of Gaunt ; and also, through her cousin, the celebrated Lady Anne 
 of Shakespeare's Richard III, connected with the royal family of 
 England. 
 
 t It was through this connection with the Montague family that 
 that title was taken by the Brownes, when, in Mary's reign, the s<jn 
 of Sir Anthony was made a viscount.
 
 32 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 widow of Sir Thomas Fitzwilliam of Aldwarke, co. York, 
 he had issue, our Sir Anthony and two daughters ; 
 Elizabeth, who became the wife of Henry Somerset, 
 Earl of Worcester, ancestor to the Dukes of Beaufort ; 
 and Lucy, who married Sir Thomas Clifford, knight, third 
 son to Henry, Earl of Cumberland. 
 
 The Anthony Browne of whom I am speaking, in the 
 fourteenth year of Henry VIII (1523) was knighted for 
 his valour in the assault and taking of the town of 
 Morlaix in Brittany, when, with the Earl of Surrey, Lord 
 High Admiral, he conveyed from Southampton the 
 Emperor Charles I to the port of Biscay ; and this seems 
 to have been the commencement of the good and great 
 fortune he enjoyed in his lifetime. We also find, through 
 Hollinshed, that two years after, being one of the esquires 
 of the king's body, he was one of the challengers during 
 the feast of Christmas, before the king and his court, 
 assembled at the palace of Greenwich, for jousts and 
 tournaments and other feats of arms ; and the following 
 year was made Lieutenant of the Isle of Man and the 
 other islands belonging thereto, during the minority of the 
 Earl of Derby, whose family continued to hold sovereign 
 rights in Mona till the Civil War ended them by the fall 
 of the island into the hands of the Cromwellians, after 
 Lady Derby's heroic defence. 
 
 In 1527, Sir Anthony Browne, with Arthur Plantagenet, 
 Viscount Lisle, Knight of the Garter, and others, were 
 sent to Francis I, to invest that prince with the ensigns of 
 the Order of the Garter, as also to take oath that he
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 33 
 
 should not violate the league he had entered lately into 
 with Henry VIII. In the twenty-fourth year of the king's 
 reign (1533) he was again, in company with the Duke of 
 Norfolk, the Lord Rochford, brother to the queen, Anne 
 Boleyn, and Sir William Paulet, Comptroller of the 
 Household, sent in embassage to the King of France, 
 and to accompany that monarch to Nice, and also to 
 confer with his Holiness the Pope at that time there, 
 concerning his delay in. procuring the king's divorce. 
 
 In 1539 Henry made Sir Anthony Master of the 
 Horse,* a post considered of a very high character in 
 those days, as it is described in the Patent Roll (3Oth 
 year of his reign) as " a grant of that eminent office", and 
 the yearly payment or fee of ^"40 for its service was 
 attached to it ; this office was not a permanent one, but 
 the king, lavishing great favour on Sir Anthony, made 
 him Master of the Horse for life the following year, 
 March 12, and on the 23rd April (St. George's Day) 
 ensuing (1540), he and the Lord Audley, Lord Chan- 
 cellor, were elected Knights of the Garter. Sir Anthony's 
 installation plate is the fifth in the twenty-first stall in 
 St. George's Chapel, Windsor, and runs as follows : 
 
 " Du vaillant Chevalier Anthony Brown, grand Esquire du 
 Roy notre Soveraigne-Sire, frere et Compagnon du replen- 
 
 * From the Letters Patent of Henry VIII, dated Aug. 8, 1538. 
 At this time also he had granted to him the free church of the 
 Castle of Hastings, of which my old and valued friend, the late 
 Edward Levien, M. A., F.S. A., wrote an account. See the Journal 
 of the British Archaological Association, 1867. 
 
 D
 
 34 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 dissent Ordrer du Gartier, fuit install^ a Windesoore, le 8 
 jour de May en 1'un du regne du Nostre Soveraigne Henry 
 le 8 par le Grace de Dieu, Roy d'Angleterre et de France, 
 Seignr. d'Irlande, Defenseur de la Foy, et en Terre Supreme 
 Chief d'Eglise Anglicane, 32." 
 
 But the year before these honours, viz., 1539, Henry, on the 
 dissolution of the monasteries, had (according to Collins, 
 p. 14, vol. vi), in the thirtieth year of his reign, granted 
 to Sir Anthony Browne, "the house and suite of the last 
 monastery of Battle in com. Sussex, to him his heirs and 
 assigns for ever", the greatest evidence yet offered to him 
 of his sovereign's continued regard. 
 
 The grant* took place three months after the last 
 abbot, John Hammond, and his monks had been called 
 upon to surrender " the monastery of Battel, of the order 
 of St. Benedict, and the convent of the same place," to 
 the king's commissioners, Sir John Gage (whose daughter 
 Alice was Sir Anthony's first wife) and Richard Layton, 
 consisting, so runs the charter, of "all the church, bell 
 tower, and churchyard of the said monastery or abbey ; 
 also all the messuages, edifices, granges, stables, dove 
 houses, leads, etc., within or adjoining to the site, circuit, 
 or precinct of the same, etc., etc." . ..." To hold to 
 the said Anthony Browne for ever of the king and his 
 successors, in capite, by the service of two knights' fees, 
 
 * Other writers state that the grant was made August i8th, 1538, 
 which would be the twenty-ninth year of Henry's reign. The dis- 
 solution of monasteries not having ^200 per ann. in revenue, com- 
 menced in the twenty- seventh year of his reign, viz., 1536; and in 
 the thirty-first, all the rest throughout the kingdom were dissolved.
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 35 
 
 and a yearly rent of twelve pounds, in full of all rents, 
 demands." 
 
 Another instance of the attachment that Henry exhibi- 
 ted towards Sir Anthony Browne may be found in the 
 fact, that in 1540, four years after the king's marriage with 
 Jane Seymour, who died in childbirth, he entrusted to 
 Sir Anthony the somewhat delicate task of representing 
 him at the court of John of Cleves, whose sister Anne 
 Henry had agreed to marry, as she was a Protestant, 
 and it suited his views at that time to consider 
 himself one also. At Cowdray Castle, before the fatal 
 fire which destroyed that palatial residence many years 
 afterwards, and of which more anon, there used to be a 
 portrait of Sir Anthony Browne, in the court suit which 
 he had donned for the occasion of personating his master 
 as bridegroom when he was acting as proxy for him, after 
 the marriage ceremony had been performed ; one leg 
 being arrayed in white satin for the purpose of being 
 thrust into the bed of the princess, in token of the real 
 husband's rights over his wife.* 
 
 The king continued to shower favours upon his now 
 fully-established servant, commissioning him in the 
 
 * Horace Walpole, who was at Cowdray Castle in 1749, describ- 
 ing the portrait of Anthony Browne in his wedding proxy suit, thus 
 remarks, after his quaint and satirical fashion, " He is in blue and 
 white ; only the right leg is entirely white, which was robed for the 
 act of putting into bed to her. But when the king came to marry her, 
 he only put his leg into bed to kick her out" ; using, by the way, 
 expressions of a most unkingly character ; which, however, Walpole 
 discreetly omits.
 
 36 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 thirty-fourth year of his reign to accompany the Duke of 
 Norfolk, Lieutenant-General of the English army, with 
 above 200,000 men, into Scotland, where he is said to 
 have distinguished himself greatly.* 
 
 The year after, the king, confiding in Sir Anthony's con- 
 tinued "loyalty, valour, temper, wisdom, foresight and 
 care," commissioned him, with the Lord Chancellor and 
 others, to levy, array, and try all men able to bear arms in 
 the counties of Surrey, Sussex, Southampton, Wilts, Oxon 
 and Berks, and to arm them according to their degrees, 
 and to muster them in proper places ; and to march all 
 his liege subjects so arrayed and tried, as well men-at- 
 arms and archers, as other horse and foot, by themselves 
 or others, by them deputed to suppress his enemies as often 
 as occasion shall require. In the same year he was made 
 Justice in Eyre of all the forests beyond Trent, and in 
 the following was constituted standard-bearer to the king, 
 as his father had been in the reign of Henry VI, and 
 was in such continued favour with his sovereign as to be 
 appointed by him one of the executors, with trust like- 
 wise to be of the Council, and guardian to Prince Edward 
 his son, afterwards Edward VI, who left him also a legacy 
 in his will of ^"300. 
 
 * In the thirty-sixth year of Henry's reign, he went with Charles 
 Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, to Boulogne, and encamped there with 
 the then lieutenant of the king, on the east side of the town, 
 Henry following some time after. The town was nearly yielding to 
 the king when, certain ambassadors from Francis, the French 
 monarch, arriving at Badloe Castle, " to treat of a general accord," 
 the Duke of Suffolk and this Sir Anthony Browne, were sent to 
 confer with him. (Rymer, vol. xv, p. 32.)
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 37 
 
 Sir Anthony was thus distinguished throughout the 
 king's reign, and seems, unlike most other of that un- 
 principled monarch's favourites, to have retained a hold 
 upon his fickle and vindictive nature in a marvellous 
 manner ; indeed, so much so, that when it was certain 
 the king's maladies were incurable, although his temper 
 had grown more overbearing than ever, Sir Anthony was 
 selected for the dangerous and unpleasant duty of telling 
 the monarch of his approaching end ; which duty he no 
 doubt carried out with the same high moral courage and 
 conscience which had helped him so well with his tyran- 
 nical master. A few months afterwards, Sir Anthony 
 followed his sovereign to the grave,* and was succeeded 
 by his son. 
 
 * This occurred on May 6, 1548, at By fleet House, Surrey, which 
 he had built for himself. He was buried in the family vault at 
 Battle Abbey in Sussex, where, in the chancel, is the noble tomb of 
 white marble, once ornamented with gold and colour ; although 
 little of either now remains. Two recumbent figures are on the top 
 of the tomb, which is of an altar character. Sir Anthony, in his 
 mantle, with collar and star as a Knight of the Garter, is in full 
 armour ; his head resting on a helmet, and at his feet a greyhound, 
 and not a wolf, as it has been erroneously described, chained and 
 gouged with a coronet of gold. His first wife, Alice, daughter of 
 Sir John Gage, one of the commissioners for the suppression of 
 holy houses, is by his side in robes and coif ; her head resting on a 
 cushion, beneath a handsome and very rare canopy, which to this 
 day attests the full beauty of its design and execution. At her feet 
 is a small dog with a collar. Underneath, in compartments, are 
 coats-of-arms of the families of Browne and Gage, ornamented with 
 several cherubs curiously cut in marble and painted ; and around 
 and about the upper edge of the tomb is the following inscription 
 recording the date of the death of Lady Alice, but oddly enough
 
 38 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 Lloyd thus sums up the character of this great man, of 
 whose interesting exploits and romantic history a con- 
 siderable volume might be written. " Three things faci- 
 litate all things : i. Knowledge, 2. Temper, 3. Time. 
 Knowledge our knight had, either of his own or others, 
 whom he commended in whatever he went about, laying 
 the ground of matters down in writing, and debating 
 them with his friends before he declared himself in 
 Council. A temperance he had that kept him out of the 
 reach of others, and brought others within his. Time 
 he took always driving, never being driven by his busi- 
 ness, which is rather a huddle than a performance when 
 in haste ; there was something that all admired, and, 
 which was. more, something that all were pleased with in 
 this man's actions. The times were dark, his carriage so 
 too ; the waves were boisterous, but he, the solid rock, 
 or the well-guided ship that could go with the tide. He 
 mastered his own passions, and others too, and both 
 
 leaving out the date of his own, which has led many to believe that 
 the tomb was ordered in the lifetime of the worthy knight, although 
 it is by no means conclusive evidence of the fact, as there are many 
 instances of a similar nature to be found in the monuments of the 
 fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which may as well indicate some 
 interruption to the work in hand as anything else : 
 
 " Here lyethe . the Right . Honorable . Sir Antony Browne . 
 Knyght of the Gartere . Master of the Kyng's Maiesties Horcys and 
 one of the Honorable Privie Council of our most dread Soverayne 
 
 Lorde, and Vic Kyng Henry the Eyght : and dame Alis decesid 
 
 the . 21 day of March ao Dm. 1548. And the said Sir Antony 
 Browne decesid the day of ao Dm. i . On whois 
 
 sowls, and all Cristenchv' have mercy. Amen."
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 39 
 
 by time and opportunity ; therefore, he died with that 
 peace the state wanted, and with that universal repute 
 the statesmen of those troublesome times enjoyed 
 not." 
 
 Sir Anthony Browne, as has been said before, was 
 twice married; the first time to Alice, daughter of Sir 
 John Gage, Knight of the Garter, and by whom he had four 
 sons and three daughters, namely, i. Anthony, his son 
 and heir, and afterwards first Viscount Montagu, which title 
 he chose by reason that the Lady Lucy, his grandmother, 
 was one of the daughters of, and coheir to, John Neville, 
 Marquess Montagu (see note, page 31); 2. William 
 Browne, Esq., who married Anne, daughter and coheir 
 of Hugh Hastings, who held Elfing, in com. Norfolk, 
 and from whom the Brownes of Elfing descend ; 
 
 3. Francis, who married Anne, daughter of Sir Wil- 
 liam Goring of Burton in Sussex, and died 1615 ; 
 
 4. Henry, who died 1610; 5. Mary, married to Lord 
 John Grey of Targo, second son to Thomas, Marquess 
 of Dorset, and ancestor of the Earls of Stamford; 6. 
 Mabel, married to Gerald, eleventh Earl of Kildare in 
 Ireland ; and 7. Lucy, married to Thomas Roper of 
 Eltham in Kent, ancestor of Lord Teynham. 
 
 Sir Anthony's second marriage was with the Lady 
 Elizabeth Fitzgerald, the second daughter of Gerald 
 Fitzgerald, ninth Earl of Kildare, and who, surviving 
 her husband, became the third wife of Edward Clinton, 
 first Earl of Lincoln, and ancestor of Henry, Duke of 
 Newcastle-under-Lyme, and Lord High Admiral of
 
 40 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 England, who died the i6th of January 1584, and 
 was buried in St. George's Chapel, Windsor, where the 
 countess, on her decease shortly after, was also interred. 
 A noble monument to their memories, having two 
 effigies lying on a curiously wrought mat, and at the 
 sides their eight children, five sons and three daughters, 
 kneeling on cushions, being erected over their resting 
 place. 
 
 Anthony, the eldest son, seems to have inherited many 
 of the virtues and talents of his father, and was one of 
 the forty knights made at the coronation of King Ed- 
 ward VI. He was also appointed Master of the Horse 
 in Queen Mary's reign, and at the time of her marriage 
 with Philip of Spain, " and in consideration of the good 
 and laudable service which their beloved and faithful 
 servant, Sir Anthony Browne, hath done, and still con- 
 tinues to do, as also the nobility of birth, early care, 
 loyalty, and honour," she created the said Sir Anthony 
 Browne, Knight, Viscount Montagu, to have and to hold 
 the same honour to him and the heirs male of his body, 
 and further granted to him twenty marks yearly, payable 
 out of the fines and profits of the county of Surrey, by 
 patent dated at Hampton Court, September 27th, 1554. 
 He was also sent to the Pope, by order of Parliament, 
 with Thomas Thirleby, Bishop of Ely, for reducing this 
 realm to an union with the Church of Rome, and to the 
 obedience of that see. He was installed a Knight of 
 the Garter at Windsor, October 22nd, 1555. 
 
 At the accession of Queen Elizabeth, he was naturally
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 41 
 
 left out of her Privy Council, being as staunch a Ro- 
 manist as his father had been before him ; and, in the 
 second year of her reign, on that grand motion in Par- 
 liament for abolishing the Pope's supremacy, and restor- 
 ing it to the crown of this realm, he was the only peer 
 who, with Francis, fifth Earl of Shrewsbury, then voted 
 against it, out of a sentiment of zeal and honour, " urg- 
 ing," according to Camden, " that it would be a very 
 disgraceful reflection for England, which was so well 
 reconciled to the Apostolic See, to make so sudden a 
 revolt from it ; and moreover, that the hazard would be 
 as great as the scandal, should the Pope thunder out his 
 excommunication, and expose the nation, by that means, 
 to the resentment of its neighbouring enemies upon the 
 score of this defection. That he, for his part, had by 
 authority of Parliament, and in the name of the whole 
 body of England, tendered obedience to the Pope, the 
 performance of which he could by no means dispense 
 with."* 
 
 This manly declaration seems rather to have pleased 
 Elizabeth than otherwise, for we find that she sent him 
 ambassador to Spain to satisfy Philip II what just cause 
 she had to send an army into Scotland ; and to represent 
 
 * Camden makes this comment on the first Viscount Montague : 
 "Queen Elizabeth having experienced his loyalty, had a great 
 esteem for him (though he was a stiff Romanist), and paid him a 
 visit some time before his death ; for she was sensible that his 
 regard for that religion was owing to his cradle and education, and 
 proceeded rather from principle than faction, as some people's 
 faith did."
 
 42 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 to him that the proceedings of the Guises might be of as 
 dangerous consequence to his provinces in the Nether- 
 lands, as well as in Spain, as to England. He was also one 
 of the Peers who sat on the trial of the beautiful and ill- 
 fated Mary Queen of Scots. He died at Horsley in Surrey, 
 October igth, 1592, and was buried at Cowdray the 6th 
 of December following. He was twice married, and was 
 succeeded by his grandson, Anthony Maria Browne, " who 
 very commendably followed the good example set him 
 by his grandfather", as old Camden hath it. 
 
 Of this nobleman there is a very interesting account, 
 published in the seventh volume of the Sussex Archceolo- 
 gical Collections, being founded on a Booke of Orders and 
 Rules, and edited from the original MS. preserved at 
 Easebourne Priory (and, probably, saved from the fire at 
 Cowdray House), by the late Sir Sibbald David Scott, 
 Bart., one of the Vice-Presidents of the Hastings 
 Congress of the British Archaeological Association, in 
 1866. 
 
 This paper contains much valuable information, and 
 affords a curious insight into the mode of life of a 
 nobleman of position and power in the sixteenth and 
 seventeenth centuries. The following description, founded 
 on the MS. aforesaid, presents an amusing and instruc- 
 tive picture of such daily doings in " olden times". 
 
 "Ten o'clock has just struck, and the household is mus- 
 tering in the magnificent Buck Hall, it being ' covering 
 time,' or the hour for preparing the table for dinner. The 
 steward, in his gown, is standing at the uppermost part of 
 the hall, over against his appointed table, surrounded by
 
 Sir A nthony Browne. 43 
 
 most of the chief officers and some visitors ; occasionally 
 also travellers, who had availed themselves of the hospitality 
 of those days. The tables are neatly covered with white 
 cloths, saltcellars, and trenchers, under the supervision of 
 the usher of the hall. The yeoman of the ewry and pantry, 
 conducted by the yeoman usher, pass through to the great 
 dining chamber. When they arrive at the middle of that 
 room, they bow reverentially (although no one else be pre- 
 sent), and they do the same upon approaching the table. The 
 usher, kissing his hand, places it on the centre of the dining- 
 table to indicate to his subordinate of the ewry, who 
 kisses the table, where the cloth is to be laid. The yeoman of 
 the pantry then steps forth, and places the salt, trenchers for 
 my lord and lady, rolls, knives ' hafted with silver', and spoons, 
 making a little obeisance, or inclination of the head, as each 
 article is laid down, and a low bow when he has finished. 
 The trio then severally make solemn reverences, and retire 
 in the same order as they arrived. Next in succession comes 
 the yeoman of the cellar, who dresses the sideboard or buffet 
 (cup-borde) with wines, flagons, drinking-cups, and such 
 vessels as are consigned to his charge. The yeoman of the 
 buttery follows him, and brings up beer and ale, and 
 arranges the pewter pots, jugs, and so forth, on the side- 
 board or buffet." 
 
 The dinner-time had now fully come, and the lord's 
 commands being taken by a gentleman usher, who knocked 
 respectfully at the door of his lord's apartments, the 
 dishes, with great state and careful watching, were carried 
 forward, and placed upon the table in the dining cham- 
 ber, where, soon after, the viscount, leading the viscoun- 
 tess, and followed by their gentlemen and gentlewomen, 
 proceeded to their seats at the table, and the banquet 
 commenced.
 
 44 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 This t Viscount Montague died in 1629, and was suc- 
 ceeded by his son, Francis, as third viscount ; but in 
 1650 the estates of this nobleman were sequestrated, and 
 two-thirds seized by the Commonwealth, as he was a 
 papist. Those at Battle Abbey were valued at ,1,200 
 per annum; and one William Yolden, of Blackdown, 
 offered to pay ^800 per annum for the two-thirds. This 
 unfortunate nobleman, whose goods and papers, etc., 
 were also plundered and burnt at his houses, died in 
 1682, and was buried at Midhurst. He was succeeded 
 by his eldest surviving son, Francis, fourth viscount ; but 
 he dying without issue, in 1708, was succeeded by his 
 only brother, Henry, who became fifth Viscount Mont- 
 ague. This nobleman left issue, one son and six 
 daughters ; his son Anthony succeeding him, as sixth 
 viscount, in June 1717. In 1719 this nobleman sold 
 Battle Abbey and the estates thereof to Sir Thomas Web- 
 ster, Bart., and thus ceased the interest of the family of 
 Browne in this noble and historic property. The vis- 
 count married Barbara, daughter of Sir John Webbe of 
 Hathorp, county of Gloucester, and of Oldstock in Wilt- 
 shire, Bart. ; and by her had two sons, whereof the 
 eldest died at Rouen in France, aged one year: and 
 Anthony, who became the seventh viscount on the death 
 of his father, April 23rd, 1767. 
 
 This viscount married, July 1765, Frances Mackworth, 
 daughter of Herbert Mackworth, Esq., and relict of Lord 
 Halkerton, by whom he had issue a son, George Samuel, 
 born 26th June 1769; and a daughter, Elizabeth Mary,
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 45 
 
 born 5th February 1767. On the death of his father, 
 George Samuel became eighth Viscount Montague ; and, 
 losing his life in attempting to shoot the rapids of the 
 Rhine at Lauffen, below Schaffausen, in 1793, was suc- 
 ceeded by his cousin, Anthony Browne, who, dying with- 
 out male issue early in the present century, the celebrated 
 house of Browne, Viscounts Montague, became extinct.* 
 
 Having thus rapidly glanced at the general family his- 
 tory of the Montagues, it remains, to make this paper 
 more complete, to return to Sir Anthony Browne him- 
 self, and to enter upon the more interesting, if not 
 romantic, details connected with his second marriage, 
 and the grant of Battle Abbey to him and "his des- 
 cendants, for ever". 
 
 Sir Anthony's second wife, the Lady Elizabeth Fitz- 
 gerald, was a more celebrated lady than his first ; she was 
 the daughter of the Earl of Kildare (see page 39), and 
 was the issue of that unfortunate nobleman's second wife, 
 the Lady Elizabeth Grey, fourth daughter of Thomas Mar- 
 quis of Dorset, by Cicely his wife, daughter and heir of 
 William Bonville, Lord Bonville and Harrington. This 
 Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald was a great beauty, and had 
 
 * The Titles of the family were, Anthony Brown or Browne, 
 Viscount Montague. Creations. Viscount Montague (the name of 
 a family on the Roll of Battle Abbey) by letters patent of Sep- 
 tember 21, I and 2 Philip and Mary (1554). Arms. Sable, three 
 lions passant in bend between two double cotisses argent. Crest. 
 On a wreath, an eagle displayed vert. Supporters. Two wolves 
 argent, with each a plain collar and chain or. Motto. " Suivez 
 raison."
 
 46 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 been brought up with the Princesses Mary and Elizabeth, 
 afterwards Queens Mary and Elizabeth of England, at 
 Hunsdon House, as she was by descent and relationship 
 their second cousin, her mother being a grand-daughter 
 of the Lady Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Richard Widdville, 
 or Woodville, Earl Rivers, and relict of Sir Thomas Grey 
 of Groby, whose beauty and high character had caused 
 Edward IV to make her his queen. Thus again was Sir 
 Anthony's family connected with royalty ; for his second 
 wife's mother, the Countess of Kildare, was niece, in half- 
 blood, to King Edward the Fifth and his brother Richard 
 Duke of York, who were both so cruelly murdered in the 
 Tower ; and to the Princess Elizabeth, in her own right 
 Queen of England, and wife of King Henry the Seventh, 
 consequently she was cousin to her husband's royal patron 
 and friend Henry the Eighth. 
 
 At Hunsdon House, Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald was 
 seen by Henry Howard, the ill-fated Earl of Surrey ; and 
 by the sonnet he has left behind him in commemoration of 
 her attractions, it is not only natural to conceive that he 
 admired her, but that he would have married her if he 
 could. The sonnet, although by no means the best he 
 ever wrote, is well worthy a place in a history of this 
 description, although it has frequently been in print : 
 
 " From Tuscane came my ladie's worthie race, 
 
 Fair Florence was sometime her ancient seat ; 
 The Western He, whose pleasant shore doth face 
 Wild Camber's cliffes, did give her livelie heat. 
 Fostered she was with milke of Irish breste ; 
 Her sire an earle, her dame of prince's bloude.
 
 Sir A ntJwny Browne. 47 
 
 From tender years in Britaine she doth rest 
 
 With king's child, where she tastes costlie food. 
 Hunsden did first present her to mine eine. 
 
 Bright is her hew, and Geraldine she hight. 
 Hampton me taught to wish her first for mine ; 
 
 And Windsor, alas ! doth chase me from her sight. 
 Her beautie of mind, her vertues from above ; 
 
 Happie is he that can obtain her love." 
 
 " Windsor, alas !" refers to Surrey's imprisonment in that 
 castle, where many of his sonnets were composed ; and 
 the " dame of prince's bloude" applies to her grand- 
 mother, the Marchioness of Dorset, who was daughter 
 and heiress of Henry Duke of Exeter by the Lady Anne, 
 sister of Edward the Fourth. This lady has ever since 
 been known as the " Fair Geraldine", although by that 
 confusion which is frequently caused by the careless writ- 
 ing which is unfortunately too much in fashion even in 
 the most important matters, the first wife of Anthony 
 Browne, Alice, is in some works called by the second 
 one's just sobriquet* This " Fair Geraldine" had no chil- 
 dren by Sir Anthony Browne ; but marrying soon after 
 her husband's demise, she had a large family, as has 
 already been stated, by her second husband, Sir Edward 
 Clinton, first Earl of Lincoln. 
 
 Having thus referred to the beautiful young wife of Sir 
 Anthony, it is now time to mention a very remarkable 
 
 * At p. 529 of the History and Antiquities of Sussex, by Thomas 
 Walker Horsfield (2 vols. 410., 1835), occurs the following note in 
 a reference to the tomb of Sir Anthony Browne : "It is said that 
 Alice was a great beauty, and celebrated by the Earl of Surrey, at 
 the tournaments, under the name of the ' fair Geraldine'. "
 
 48 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 and interesting event which occurred in this family, and 
 that is the marriage of Mabel Browne, second daughter 
 of Sir Anthony by his first wife, with Gerald Fitzgerald, 
 eleventh Earl of Kildare, and brother to the Lady Eli- 
 zabeth, Sir Anthony Browne's second wife. A daughter 
 marrying her mother's brother is an unusual occurrence, 
 and would in these days give rise to no little remark ; but, 
 as there seems to be scarcely any comment made upon 
 the match in the records of the time, we must suppose 
 that since it was not exactly a blood relationship, the 
 families most concerned entertained no serious objection 
 to the alliance. Mabel's husband's career had been a 
 most romantic one, for he was, as a child, hunted down 
 by the rancour of Henry VIII, who had not only exe- 
 cuted his half-brother, Thomas tenth Earl of Kildare, 
 with his five uncles, Sir James, Oliver, Richard, Sir John, 
 and Walter Fitzgerald, but, by keeping his father, Gerald 
 ninth earl, in the Tower, and for many years cruelly treat- 
 ing him, caused him to die, after the execution of his son 
 and brothers, of grief and pain. Gerald had been Lord- 
 Deputy of Ireland, and was a man of high estate and 
 character, who at times had been in much favour with 
 his sovereign, although he was always hated and envied 
 by Wolsey. His death took place on December i2th, 
 1534, and he was buried in the chapel of the Tower, as 
 an inscription on a chest since found there, attests. 
 
 After many stirring adventures in Ireland and in Scot- 
 land, the young Gerald was sent, in the custody of his 
 tutor, Thomas Leverons, who was foster-brother to his
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 49 
 
 father, and was afterwards created Bishop of Kildare as 
 a meet reward for his fidelity, to France. Thence his 
 tutor, having reason to suspect the sincerity of the French 
 (Sir John Wallop, the English ambassador, demanding 
 him in his master's name), removed him secretly to Flan- 
 ders, whither he had no sooner conveyed him, than an 
 Irishman one James Sherlock, a spy, arrived in pursuit 
 of him. Leverons waited on the Governor, and desired 
 his protection from Sherlock's wicked intention to betray 
 the innocent child to his enemies, whereupon the Go- 
 vernor sent for Sherlock and examined him, and finding 
 him guilty, and without reasonable defence, he impri- 
 soned him, until the generous youth interceded for his 
 liberation. 
 
 From Flanders they went to Brussels, where Charles 
 the Fifth held his court ; here, too, the hatred of Henry 
 pursued him, and he was again demanded by the English 
 ambassador, but Charles answered, that he had nothing 
 to do with him, and for aught he knew he intended to 
 make but a short stay in the country, and so sent him to 
 the Bishop of Liege, allowing him for his support one hun- 
 dred crowns a month. The bishop gave him an honour- 
 able reception, and placed him in an abbey of monks for 
 greater safety of his person, whence Cardinal Pole, his 
 kinsman by his mother's side, sent for him to Rome, 
 receiving him very kindly, and gave him an education 
 becoming his high position, under the care of the Bishop 
 of Verona, and the Cardinal of Mantua ; Leverons his 
 tutor being admitted, through the Cardinal's instrument- 
 
 E
 
 5o Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 ality, a member of the English house in Rome, called 
 St. Thomas's Hospital. 
 
 After some year and a half the Cardinal Pole sent for 
 him to Rome, and the Duke of Mantua gave him an 
 allowance annually of three hundred crowns. Continu- 
 ing in Rome some three years, an inmate of the Cardi- 
 nal's house, he travelled with his relative's permission to 
 Naples, and becoming acquainted with the Knights of 
 Rhodes, he accompanied them to Malta ; thence he went 
 to Tripoli on the coast of Barbary, then belonging to 
 those knights, where he remained a short time, serving 
 valiantly against the Turks, or rather Moors, and returned 
 with a large booty, first to Malta and then to Rome. 
 
 The Cardinal was so well satisfied with his kinsman's 
 prowess and doings, that he increased his yearly pension' 
 to ^300, and shortly after preferred him to the service 
 of Cosmo, Duke of Florence, who made him his Master 
 of the Horse, with the yearly pension of three hundred 
 ducats, on the same terms his other pensions were 
 granted, viz., during life, or until restored to his honours 
 and estates. 
 
 Returning to Rome some three years after, he, one 
 day, in the heat of the chase, when accompanying Car- 
 dinal Farnese, Pope Paul Ill's nephew, to hunt the stag, 
 narrowly escaped from death, and as the anecdote is a 
 well attested one and curious, it is here given. In the 
 heat of the chase, and being alone, his horse leaped into 
 a deep pit, which had been concealed from view. Find- 
 ing himself falling, the young man clung to some roots
 
 Sir Anthony Brozvne. 51 
 
 of trees, by which he hung, leaving his unfortunate horse 
 to precede him to the bottom of the dismal opening ; 
 but, at last tired out, he relinquished his hold and fell on 
 his dead horse. In this plight he remained ankle deep in 
 water some three hours, no one coining to relieve him, in 
 spite of his cries for help. When the chase was over, his 
 hound, missing his master, tracked him to the edge of 
 the abyss, and stood howling piteously over him, no 
 doubt encouraging his unhappy master to keep a good 
 heart by his appearance. The Cardinal, at last perceiv- 
 ing something was wrong by the manner of the dog, 
 hastened with his attendants to the spot, and finding out 
 how matters were, soon relieved his kinsman from 
 the imminent peril he was in, by causing one of the 
 company to be let down by ropes, in a basket, who 
 brought the now nearly exhausted Gerald to the sur- 
 face and to life. 
 
 Our hero remained abroad till the joyful news reached 
 him of King Henry's death, and he then came to Lon- 
 don in company with some foreign ambassadors, and 
 his friend and tutor, if not preserver, Father Thomas 
 Leverons. 
 
 It was at a masque or ball in Edward VI's time, that 
 Gerald met with Mabel Browne, and, as he was one of 
 the handsomest young men of the -age, and she a very 
 beautiful young woman, it is not surprising that they both 
 fell at once in love with one another indeed, whether 
 in war or peace, such passages have been common 
 enough in all days. His marriage with Mabel, the 
 
 E 2
 
 52 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 daughter of his king's honoured servant and former guar- 
 dian, Sir Anthony Browne, brought him into especial 
 favour with the young monarch, who not only made him 
 a Knight of the Garter, but honoured him with knight- 
 hood in 1552, restoring to him by letters patent, dated at 
 Westminster, April 25th of the same year, all his for- 
 feited estates in Ireland. In the time of Queen Mary, 
 Cardinal Pole returning to England, our knight was fully 
 restored to his titles of Earl of Kildare and Baron Offaley ; 
 and, with almost an uninterrupted continuance of good 
 fortune, the Earl of Kildare and his Countess Mabel 
 lived for many years a sufficient time to prove the rule 
 true, by being an exception to it that " the course of true 
 love never doth run smooth." He died November i6th, 
 1585, and his wife died a widow, " a lady of great worth 
 and virtue, at her fair house of Maynooth," being the 
 mother of three sons and two daughters, August loth, 
 1610. 
 
 But it is now time to close this lengthy dissertation, 
 over which, it is to be feared, the writer has already too 
 long dwelt ; and, as the most telling incidents of a story 
 are generally left to the last, it is to be hoped that the 
 final one, which this paper shall disclose, will be con- 
 sidered, if not entirely true at least well founded, as the 
 Italian adage, Si non I vero e ben trovato, hath it. 
 
 The circumstances about to be related bear out the 
 curious reasoning upon which Sir Henry Spelman wrote, 
 in his History of Sacrilege, in the year 1632, viz., "that 
 all those families who took or had church property pre-
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 53 
 
 sented to them, came either in their own persons or 
 those of their ancestors to sorrow and misfortune"; and, 
 although in the pages of Spelman it is said some refer- 
 ence is made to the family of the Montagues, I have not 
 been able to find it, after a diligent search through a copy 
 published in 1698. 
 
 The "telling incidents" referred to on the preceding 
 page, were communicated to me by a friend who, from 
 name, family tradition, and documents, considered his 
 connection with this famous House somewhat more than 
 probable, and are to be found below. 
 
 Amongst the many strange stories relating to this 
 eminent knight and his descendants, the following one 
 was sent some years since to, and appeared in, Notes 
 and Queries, by a clergyman of Easebourne Church 
 (close by Cowdray Park, the principal seat, as already 
 has been said, of the Montagues). It stated that at the 
 great festival given in the magnificent hall of the monks 
 at Battle Abbey, on Sir Anthony's taking possession of his 
 sovereign's munificent gift, a venerable monk stalked up 
 the hall to the dais, where the worthy knight sat, and in 
 prophetic language denounced him and his posterity for 
 the crime of usurping the possessions of the Church, 
 predicting their ultimate destruction by fire and water, 
 and which dire fate was eventually so singularly fulfilled. 
 
 The last viscount but one, just before the termina- 
 tion of the eighteenth century (1793) was drowned 
 in the attempt to pass the Falls near Schaffhausen 
 (see p. 45), accompanied by Mr. Sedley Burdett, the
 
 54 Sir Anthony Browne. 
 
 elder brother of the late distinguished "Sir Francis" 
 of that ilk. They engaged an open boat to take them 
 through the rapids, and appointed six o'clock on the 
 following morning to make their voyage, but the fact 
 coming to the knowledge of the authorities, they took 
 measures to prevent so very dangerous an enterprise. But 
 with the invincible hardihood and determination of 
 Englishmen, they resolved to carry out their project re- 
 gardless of all its dangers, and in this spirit they decided 
 on starting two hours earlier than the time previously 
 fixed, namely at four o'clock in the morning, the season 
 of the year being early summer. They commenced their 
 descent accordingly, and successfully passed the first or 
 upper fall, but unhappily the same good fortune did not 
 continue to attend them, as the boat was swamped and 
 sunk in passing the lower one, and was supposed to have 
 been jammed in a cleft of the submerged rock, as neither 
 boat nor adventurers ever again appeared. 
 
 In the same week as that in which this calamity occurred, 
 the ancient seat of the family, the magnificent Cowdray 
 Castle, was destroyed by fire, and its ivy-mantled ruins 
 still remain the significant monument of the fulfilment 
 of the old monk's prophecy and of the extinction of the 
 race of the above great and powerful Noble. 
 
 The last inheritor of the title, the immediate successor 
 and cousin of the rash and ill-fated young nobleman of the 
 above incident, Anthony Browne, the ninth viscount, who 
 died at the opening of this century (1803), left no male 
 issue; but his estates, so far as he could alienate them from
 
 Sir Anthony Browne. 55 
 
 the title, devolved on his only daughter, who intermarried 
 with Mr. Stephen Poyntz, a great Buckinghamshire land- 
 holder, and a most influential member of the legislature, 
 who, from his local importance, was desirous of obtaining 
 a grant of the dormant title, " Viscount Montague," in 
 favour of the elder of his two sons, issue of this mar- 
 riage, and as he was a very large contributor to the then 
 " Loyalty Loan", and had a considerable voice in the 
 legislature and the government through his family con- 
 nexions, he was sanguine of success. 
 
 His hopes, however, became most suddenly and pain- 
 fully destroyed by the deaths of the two boys, his only male 
 issue, who were drowned together, while bathing at Bognor, 
 in the seventeenth and nineteenth years of their respective 
 ages; the fatal "water" thus becoming again the destructive 
 element, in fulfilment, as it were, of the monk's terrible 
 denunciation on the family in his fearful curse ! As if, 
 too, old Time had identified himself with the fate involv- 
 ing their doom, the most indefatigable efforts of those 
 who have considered themselves "collaterals" have been 
 frustrated in their attempts to draw evidence from the 
 " shadowy past" ; for although they have been most ener- 
 getic " tomb-searchers", yet they have now nearly aban- 
 doned their efforts to lift successfully the " shroud that 
 Time has cast" over the scattered records of their ill-fated 
 race. 
 
 The obscurity of the present gradually darkens as 
 years roll on, and the proofs which now " demonstrate 
 thinly", decline to their extinction, and appear to be
 
 56 Sir Anthony Broivne. 
 
 verifying the Fate which the " monk of old" predicted, 
 since the memory of this once great and justly proud 
 family is now nearly lost sight of in the mists of the long 
 gone past. 
 
 Thus has been told, albeit very imperfectly, the tale 
 of the Montague family ; a family that, I hope, I have 
 been able to show once occupied the highest position in 
 the land, and one whose honours are now only remem- 
 bered in the ruins of the houses .they inhabited. 
 From whatever cause, they have died almost out of mind, 
 leaving it only for the wandering antiquary to cast a 
 glance backward, to bring them once more for a moment, 
 as it were, to light, and by the tower and the tomb, to 
 read to those who care to listen, a few of the records of 
 their former greatness, and in the melancholy yet truthful 
 strains of Lord Byron, to exclaim : 
 
 " Out upon Time ! who for ever will leave 
 But enough of the Past for the future to grieve. 
 Out upon Time ! who will leave no more 
 Of the things to come than the things before. 
 Two or three columns and many a stone, 
 Ivy and moss, with grass o'ergrown : 
 Remnants of things that have passed away, 
 Fragments of stone raised by creatures of clay ! "
 
 ON THE 
 
 SOURCE AND NOMENCLATURE 
 OF THE RIVER THAMES. 
 
 HE source of our " noble river", as we so often 
 call it, seems lost in doubt and difficulty ; 
 and, like the sources of other great rivers, 
 the Nile especially, has given rise to much 
 dispute as to where it really has its beginning. The 
 inquiry, however, has not produced hitherto so great a 
 controversy as the so-called " Nile discoveries", perhaps 
 because we have not the same difficulties to overcome 
 in the investigation, in the shape of Mountains of the 
 Moon, the Lake Albert Nyanza ; or a group of ardent 
 travellers encouraged by an enterprising Society, whose 
 President urged first the claim of Beke, and then that of 
 Speke, for the honour of the discovery, while the world 
 at large was then waiting impatiently for further commu- 
 nications as to this disputed point, from Livingstone and 
 Baker, whose energy and perseverance in the pursuit of 
 such interesting knowledge must commend itself to all 
 who admire the courage and endurance of such devoted 
 and distinguished men.
 
 58 On the Source and Nomenclature 
 
 The difficulties of the present inquiry, although not 
 so great, as has just been observed, as those surrounding 
 the source of the Nile, are still numerous enough to 
 puzzle the investigator, and may cause him to pause 
 before he fully commits himself to the precise Spring, 
 out of the very many different ones from which our river 
 has been said to flow. I will endeavour, then, to give a 
 short and running commentary on the subject of this 
 paper, and endeavour to substantiate my belief that 
 '' Father Thames", from the best authorities I have been 
 able to consult, and from the personal observations I 
 have made, takes his rise not many miles from Ciren- 
 cester, close by the well-known Roman road called Ackman 
 Street, and later on the "Bath fosseway"; although, to my 
 mind, not exactly at the spot where most writers have, 
 following one another without examining the question for 
 themselves (a custom too frequently indulged in by his- 
 torians and topographers), been in the habit of placing 
 the source of the river. 
 
 Although, during my investigation of this subject, I 
 have been told of several possible sources of the Thames 
 (the Seven Springs at Cheltenham putting in the principal 
 claim for that honour), I have but little reason to doubt 
 that the true and original source is to be found in a large 
 district, marshy in winter, although dry enough in a hot 
 summer, situated almost north of the above named Foss- 
 Way, in the parish of Kemble, Gloucestershire. This 
 ground is filled with a number of springs, and from the 
 confluence of these, in the field called " Trewsbury
 
 of the River Thames. 59 
 
 Mead", the Thames really takes its rise. This meadow, 
 is just below the high ground on which the celebrated 
 Roman encampment called Trewsbury Castle, is situated, 
 and which was visited during the Cirencester Congress 
 of the British Archaeological Association in 1868. 
 
 In this mead bursts forth, in the wet and wintry 
 seasons, a large volume of water, similar to and as bulky 
 as one of the London fire-mains when first opened ; and 
 this forms, without doubt, the true Thames Head, 
 although the river, as it flows along, is of course fed 
 by other springs existing on the south side of the 
 highroad, where many people still consider the river 
 takes its rise. Rudder, in his History of Gloucester- 
 shire, says : " The Thames has been reputed to rise 
 in the parish of Coats, out of a well that overflows in 
 the winter, or in a very wet season only ; but in the 
 summer this river can be traced no higher than to some 
 springs which rise in the parish of Kemble, a little south 
 of Foss road"; and, as far as our learned historian's 
 observation goes, he is quite right, for in summer there 
 does not appear any further indication of a so-called 
 head or source, although an old culvert of stone does at 
 present exist just under the Foss-Way, from which in wet 
 seasons a stream flows; and this, no doubt, has been 
 considered, and often depicted, as the "Thames Head." 
 
 But to my mind this is nothing more than the continua- 
 tion of the water-course which can be plainly traced on 
 the north side of the Roman road, coming through some 
 fields, leaving Trewsbury Camp or Castle on the right,
 
 60 On the Source and Nomenclature 
 
 and the village of Torleton or Tarlton, on the left ; issuing 
 from the same spring of water in Trewsbury Mead which 
 I have already described as the undoubted source of our 
 River, and therefore the commencement of all its after 
 grandeur and utility. 
 
 The Thames and Severn Canal, formed some hundred 
 years ago, is not far from this spot, and no doubt has 
 materially affected this and other springs in the neigh- 
 bourhood. The water is raised into the canal by means 
 of an engine which is worked like a windmill. By this 
 contrivance several tons of water are thrown into the 
 canal every minute, and this must tend materially to 
 diminish the volume of water which once in this very 
 water-course or way, was found to exist. 
 
 And now, having touched upon the subject of where 
 our river takes its rise, let me proceed to inquire how and 
 in what manner it gets its name of Thames, a subject 
 fraught with deep interest to the Archasologist as well as 
 Etymologist, although it would seem, by the shower of 
 reproaches and rebukes I encountered from the latter 
 learned gentlefolk, when this Paper was noticed in the 
 Daily press of the time, that I offended their dignity by 
 daring to have an opinion of my own as an Antiquary, as 
 to the origin of the name in question ; but to which origin, 
 despite the long letters of the Rev. J. Abrahall to The 
 Times of 1868, and to which my answers were denied 
 publication in that generally impartial journal, and the 
 short and intensely vain one of Professor Max Miiller, 
 in which he told the world " no one knew anything of
 
 of the River Thames. 61 
 
 the matter save himself, I still have every reason to 
 adhere. 
 
 The derivation of the name of our river has evidently 
 caused more trouble to the learned than even the where- 
 abouts of its source ; and it has in consequence had 
 various appellations given to it from very early times, and 
 many reasons assigned for their origin. It has been called 
 the Thames or Tame, the Isis, and the Ouse ; the latter 
 name apparently the most practical one, although certainly 
 the least poetical, as it "oozes" from the marshy mead 
 called Trewsbury in the way I have already described ; 
 and Camden, in his Britannia (folio, 1789), thus refers 
 to the latter name in connexion with the county in which 
 it rises, although I by no means agree with him in the 
 fanciful idea to which he has given expression : "Leaving 
 Corinium, the river Corin six miles off unites itself with 
 the Isis. This river, commonly called the Ouse, to make 
 it derive its origin in Gloucestershire" (Gl<?^ershire he 
 pronounced it, I make no doubt), rises, Camden con- 
 tinues to say, "from a continual spring in the south edge 
 of this country, near the little village of Torleton, or 
 Tarlton, a quarter of a mile from the Ackman Street, 
 out on the main road from Cirencester, not far from 
 the famous Bath "Foss-Way". This is the Isis which 
 afterwards receiving the Thame, takes the compounded 
 name of Tamesis, chief king of British rivers, of which 
 one may justly say that it both sows and waters Britain, 
 as the ancients said of the Euphrates in the East." 
 
 That the erudite Camden is not to be relied on here,
 
 62 On the Source and Nomenclature 
 
 the following extracts from the more exact though later 
 topographer, Rudder, will show ; and I think impartial 
 critics will agree with me, that his steering is the best in 
 the intricate passages of this part of our river's navigation. 
 Under the head " Isis", he says: "This river has gene- 
 rally been considered as the head of the Thames, which, 
 according to the current opinion, had that name from 
 the junction of the names of the two rivers Thame and 
 Isis, as their waters also join near Dorchester in Oxford- 
 shire." But however plausible this etymology may seem, 
 the learned author of the additions to Camden's Britannia, 
 has made it appear that this river, which Camden and 
 others have called Isis and Ouse, was anciently called 
 Themes or Terns before it came near the Thame ; and 
 for this he produces the following authority, " In an 
 ancient charter granted to Abbot Aldhelm there is 
 particular mention made of certain lands upon the east 
 part of the river 'cujus vocabulum Temes, juxta vadum 
 quod appellatur Summerford', and this ford is in Wilt- 
 shire. The same thing appears from several other 
 charters granted to the Abbey of Malmesbury as well as 
 that of Evesham, and from old deeds relating to Crick- 
 lade. And perhaps it may with safety be affirmed that 
 in any charter or authentic history it does not ever occur 
 under the name of Isis ; which, indeed, is not so much 
 as heard of but among scholars ; the common people all 
 along, from the head of it to Oxford, calling it by no 
 other name but that of Thames. So also the Saxon 
 ' (from whence our 'Terns' immediately comes)
 
 of the River Thames. 63 
 
 is a plain evidence that that people never dreamt of any 
 such conjunction. But further. All our historians who 
 mention the incursions of .^Ethelwolf into Wiltshire, 
 A.D. 905, or of Canute, A.D. 1016, tell us that they 
 passed the Thames at Cricklade." As for the original of 
 the word Thames, " it seems'', continues our author, 
 " plainly to be British, because there are several rivers in 
 several parts of England of almost the same name with 
 it, as Tame in Staffordshire, Teme in Herefordshire, 
 Tamar in Cornwall, etc.; and a learned person of that 
 nation (Mr. Llwyd) affirms it to be the same with their 
 Tdf, which is the name of many rivers in Wales ; the 
 Romans changing the pronunciation of the f into m, as 
 the Latin word Demetia is in Welsh Dyfed" (Camden's 
 Britannia, cols. 100, 101). Again, the Gloucestershire 
 historian says : " Mr. Llwyd has also shown that where 
 the Latins use an m, the Britons have a v, as firmus, 
 firv ; terminus^ tervin ; Amm's, Avon; Lima, Lhiv, etc.; 
 and that the word tav was, according to old British 
 orthography, written tarn; wherefore he thinks that Tav 
 or Taff is originally the same word with Tame or Thames, 
 and tamos in potamos is probably no other." 
 
 Although this conclusion of the worthy topographer 
 will by many be considered a fanciful one, I am inclined 
 to give credence to it, not only from the fact that a Greek 
 word like potamos^ which we all know means a river, 
 might naturally have been introduced, with many other 
 Greek roots, into our language long before the conquest 
 of our country by Csesar (who several times speaks of
 
 64 On the Source and Nomenclature 
 
 the river Thames in his Commentaries)* by means of 
 the great and well-authenticated traffic which had been 
 carried on for centuries with the early navigating people, 
 such as the Phoenicians and Tyrians (if not by the Aryans, 
 as Professor Max Miiller insists), in tin and other mineral 
 products of our country; but also from the further 
 knowledge we possess, that throughout the languages of 
 the world there are many kindred forms or roots of words 
 very difficult, in many instances, to account for. These 
 facts naturally lead to the belief that there must have 
 existed a larger intercourse between the peoples of the 
 earth, in former days, than history, as at present written, 
 gives us any complete idea of. Thus, without going into 
 the vexata qiuzstio as to whether Sanskrit (or even an earlier 
 language still, was the parent of all tongues, though now 
 lost and forgotten) was the foundation of the Greek and 
 Latin, through which we get the Italian, French, Spanish, 
 German and English languages, I still, however, consider it 
 
 * Caesar, De Bella Gallico, lib. v, c. n : " Casivellauno, cujus 
 fines a maritimis civitatibus flumen dividit, quod appellatur Tamesis, 
 a mari circiter millia passuum Ixxx." C. 18 : " Caesar, cognito 
 consilio eorum, ad flumen Tamesim in fines Casivellauni exercitum 
 duxit, quod flumen uno omnino loco pedibus, atque hoc aegre, 
 transiri potest. Eo cum venisset, animam advertit ad alteram 
 fluminis ripam magnas esse copias hostium instructas. Ripa autem 
 erat acutis sudibus praefixis munita, ejusdemque generis sub aqua 
 defixae sudes flumine tegebantur. His rebus cognitis a captivis 
 perfugisque Caesar, praemisso equitatu, confestim legiones subsequi 
 jussit. Sed ea celeritate atque eo impetu milites ierunt, cum capita 
 solo ex aqua exstarent, ut hostes impetum legionum atque equitum 
 sustinere non possent, ripasque dimitterent ac se fugae mandarent."
 
 of the River Thames. 65 
 
 very probable that our English word Thames was 
 in some mysterious way connected with the Greek 
 TTOTa/uos, shortened to Ta/io? by common use; and also 
 that TTO in Greek being but an affix or prepositive (though 
 there are some who do not admit this), was not needed 
 to be introduced into a new tongue, to give name to a 
 certain river, which, perhaps, already possessed 'an 
 assimilative character to the foreign word, in its British 
 form or sound. 
 
 I think, however, it may be useful, for the better de 
 velopment of my view as to the influence of Grecian 
 words upon our language, before the coming of the 
 Romans, to subjoin a short list of some out of the many 
 such derivatives, now constantly in use with ourselves. 
 
 These, without doubt, dated their introduction to 
 our country in those early days when intercourse was 
 rare, and the higher civilisation of nations like ancient 
 Greece or Rome (we must put aside the Aryans, or 
 mighty Hindoo races, of whom so little is known after 
 all, or of their presumed connection with our country) 
 would naturally have greater influence than ever over 
 rude and unlettered tribes such as they came in contact 
 with when, in the first instance, the Phoenicians and 
 Grecians traded with us ; and in after times the Romans 
 conquered the much-prized Albion. 
 
 GREEK. LATIN. FRENCH. GERMAN. ENGLISH. 
 
 Oinos, Oii>os Vinum Vin Wein Wine 
 
 Agro, aypm Ager Acre Acker Acre, field 
 
 Gnothi, yvudi (G)nosco Connais Kennen Know 
 
 Duo, 8uo Duo Deux Zwei Two
 
 66 
 
 On the Source and Nomenclature 
 
 GREEK. 
 
 LATIN. 
 
 FRENCH. 
 
 GERMAN. 
 
 ENGLISH. 
 
 IMS, e<s 
 
 Unus 
 
 Un 
 
 Ein 
 
 One 
 
 Treis, rpits 
 
 Tres 
 
 Trois 
 
 Drei 
 
 Three 
 
 Hex, e{ 
 
 Sex 
 
 Six 
 
 Sechs 
 
 Six 
 
 Hepta, ITTTO 
 
 Septem 
 
 Sept 
 
 Sieben 
 
 Seven 
 
 OctO, OKTO 
 
 Octo 
 
 Huit 
 
 Acht 
 
 Eight 
 
 Su, <rv 
 
 Tu 
 
 Tu 
 
 Du 
 
 Thou 
 
 Thura, 8vpa 
 
 Foris 
 
 Porte 
 
 Thtir 
 
 Door 
 
 Ther, e*?p 
 
 Fera 
 
 Be e Fauve 
 
 Thier 
 
 Deer 
 
 Polos, ircoAos 
 
 Pullus 
 
 Poulain 
 
 Fiillen 
 
 Foal 
 
 Pater, TTCITTJP 
 
 Pater 
 
 Pere 
 
 Vater 
 
 Father 
 
 Meter, urtrrip 
 
 Mater 
 
 Mere 
 
 Mutter 
 
 Mother 
 
 Phrator, (ppartap 
 
 Frater 
 
 Frere 
 
 Bruder 
 
 Brother 
 
 Pur, iri/p 
 
 Focus 
 
 Feu 
 
 Feuer 
 
 Fire, fire-place 
 
 Phero, (pepw 
 
 Fero 
 
 Porter 
 
 Fahren 
 
 Bear 
 
 Axon, aoii> 
 
 Axis 
 
 Axe 
 
 Achse 
 
 Axle 
 
 Aster, a<7T7jp 
 
 Astrum 
 
 Astre 
 
 Stern 
 
 Star 
 
 Gonu, 701*1; 
 
 Genu 
 
 Genou 
 
 Knie 
 
 Knee 
 
 Discos, SIOKOS 
 
 Discus 
 
 Disque 
 
 Tisch 
 
 Disk 
 
 'En, eV 
 
 In 
 
 En 
 
 In 
 
 In 
 
 Canna, KO.VVO. 
 
 Canna 
 
 Canne 
 
 
 Cane 
 
 Leicho, \eix w 
 
 Lingo 
 
 Lecher 
 
 Lecken 
 
 Lick 
 
 I think, after the examples I have given of words of 
 Greek origin being constantly used in our language 
 (both being considered to be related the one to the 
 other as "distant cousins", and possibly descended 
 from the Aryan), it will not be thought so very 
 improbable that our river Thames was really taken 
 from a Greek word, and that to the Romans, years 
 afterwards, we are indebted for the fanciful marriage, 
 so to speak, of the Terns to the Egyptian deity 
 Isis ; thus constituting the fuller word Tamesis, with 
 which Caesar and other classic writers designate our
 
 of the River Thames. 67 
 
 river. It is true that at this day we separate the 
 once compound word, and speak of the rivers Thames 
 and Isis; but as they form, after all, but one stream, 
 from one parent source, the word Tamesis really stands 
 for both. A far humbler origin has been assigned, 
 however, to the name of Isis, for that part of our river 
 flowing past Oxford's learned city, viz., that it was 
 derived from the word Ouse, a name which is well 
 known belongs to other rivers, and is derived from an 
 ancient British word, use or usca, meaning "water", 
 and in Cymric " wysg", water in rapid motion, and no 
 doubt of a similar root. Still I am of opinion that the 
 Romans changed the word to Isis, and thus made the 
 name Tamesis, or Thames, more classic than before. 
 
 It would be very interesting to inquire, and at some 
 future time it might be well to pursue the subject, how 
 it happens that in this as well as in other parts of Europe, 
 there should exist a seeming affinity in the names of 
 certain great and well known rivers : for instance, Tiber, 
 Tagus, Thames, Tamar, Tame, Tyne, Tivy, Tees, Tay, 
 and Teme, appear at all events, at first sight, to be con- 
 nected in some root signifying "water"; and I make no 
 doubt there are other rivers besides those already men- 
 tioned which may present a similar relationship.* Should 
 
 * In Hungary, for example, the river Temes runs into the 
 Danube, and there is a city and river Temese referred to by 
 Stephanus, in his work, De Urbibus, in Italy, " ej yap Ta^eo^ iroAis 
 IraXias KOU irora^os ." Polybius also refers to it as Temsa, sometimes 
 named by the Greeks, Temese. Temese, or Tamasa, was also a 
 city of Cyprus, famous for brass, and is mentioned by Homer: "Es 
 
 F 2
 
 68 On the Source and Nomenclature 
 
 this be so, does it not at once surely point to the 
 inference I have attempted to draw, that to our earliest 
 navigators, be they who they might (of an eastern or a 
 western origin), the foundation, at all events, of the 
 nomenclature of some of our rivers may be assigned ? 
 
 A further evidence of the early use of the word 
 " Tamyse" for the name of our river, is to be found in the 
 following extract from a charter to Malmesbury Abbey, 
 in the year 931, by ^Ethelstan. After setting forth cer- 
 tain boundaries in this part of the world, the deed says : 
 " Et sic per fossatum directe usque in rivulum de Tamyse, 
 directe usque le holde mille diche versus austrum; et ab 
 eodem versus occidentem usque le est lake brugge in 
 litle more versus meridiem ; et inde directe usque le mere 
 diche", etc.* This paragraph is interesting not only for 
 pointing out the early spelling of the river, "Tamyse", 
 but for informing us that there was a lake south-east of 
 the Foss Road as well as a ditch; which, I take it, more 
 than ever confirms my view that the source of our river 
 was not even then thought to be the present so-called 
 Thames Head. Still there are other antiquaries who 
 
 It is also alluded to by Strabo, Ovid, and 
 Statius, as Tamesis, Tamasa, Tamese, and Temesa. (From Fearn- 
 side's History of the Thames) 
 
 * My much-honoured friend, the late learned Historian and 
 Antiquary, Mr. Thos. Wright, M.A., in an interesting note on 
 this subject to me, stated that the name of our river, in Anglo- 
 Saxon times, was without any doubt Temesa, and that it is to be 
 found in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle over and over again, and of 
 course represents the Latin name Tamesis.
 
 of the River Thames. 69 
 
 completely differ from me ; and the late esteemed Secre- 
 tary of the parent body, of all Archaeological associations, 
 the Society of Antiquaries, Mr. J. Yonge Akerman, is 
 one of them ; for in his account of the Anglo-Saxon 
 remains discovered in the parish of Kemble, from which 
 the extract I have already given is taken, he says " the 
 Hoar Stone stands, and appears to have stood since the 
 day on which the charter was subscribed by ^Ethelstan 
 and his court, a few yards above the spring, just within 
 the boundary wall of the Foss-Way." Famous old John 
 Leland, who was librarian to Henry VIII, and travelled 
 through England with his royal sign-manual, and the 
 " Father of English Antiquaries", as he has since been 
 truly called, thus mentions the river's source : " Isis riseth 
 at 3 myles from Cirencester, not far from a village called 
 Kemble, within half a mile of the fosseway, wrier the 
 very bed of Isis ys. In a great somer drought there 
 appeareth very little or no water, yet is the stream 
 servid with many of springes resorting to one bottom." 
 And in his account of his journey from Cirencester to 
 Malmesbury, thus also says: "First I roode about a mile 
 on Fosse, then I tumid on the left hand, and cam al by 
 champagne grounde, fruteful of corne and grasse, but 
 very little wood." 
 
 The earliest mention of the parish of Kemble, where 
 the river rises, occurs in a cartulary contained in the 
 Lansdowne MS. No. 417, folio 2 B, in a charter of 
 Caedwealha of Wessex, dated in 682, conveying "terram 
 ex utraque parte silvas quse appellatur Kemele scilicet
 
 32 cassatos"; and in another charter of Caedwealha, in 
 the same collection (folio 3), it gives to St. Aldhelm land 
 " ex utraque parte silvae cujus vocabulum est Kemele, de 
 oriental! plaga termini stratarum, usque famosum amnem 
 qui dicitur Temis c et XL manentes", etc. Mr. Akerman 
 thinks that Kemble (which means wood or grove), here 
 called Kemele or Cemele, was included in a place called 
 ^Ewilme or Ewleme in ^Ethelstan's before referred to 
 charter ; and argues that, as ^Elwine derives its name 
 from -one of the springs which rise in this neighbourhood, 
 that it must be the place known as Thames Head, since the 
 field in which it is situated is called " Yeoing Field", 
 a corruption, doubtless, of the word cewselme (a spring). 
 The south aisle side of Kemble Church is still called the 
 " Ewen aisle", and near it rises a most beautiful spring 
 of water. Here, doubtless, he proceeds to say, were 
 celebrated the heathen rites of the first Anglo-Saxon 
 settlers, until the Christian priesthood consecrated the 
 spot, when a chapel was founded, and the spring dedi- 
 cated to a saint. 
 
 The ecclesiastical canons failed to overcome this deep- 
 seated reverence for wells and fountains. Those of King 
 Edgar were enacted in vain ; and the most poetical of all 
 the rites of heathenism continued to be observed in after 
 ages, though veiled under another name. The custom 
 of well-dressing is still observed : among other places, in 
 the villages of Tissington and Buxton, in Derbyshire. 
 " The origin of this custom of dressing wells", says a 
 writer in the Book of Days (i, p. 597), "is by some
 
 of the River Thames. 
 
 persons supposed to be owing to a fearful drought which 
 visited Derbyshire in 1615, and which is thus recorded 
 in the parish registers of Youlgrave : ' There was no 
 rayne fell upon the earth from the 25th of March till the 
 2nd day of May, and then there was but one shower; 
 two more fell between then and the 4th day of August, 
 so that the greatest part of this land were burnt upp, 
 bothe corn and hay. An ordinary load of hay was at 
 2^, and little or none to be gotte for money.' The 
 wells of Tissington were flowing during all this time, and 
 the people for ten miles round drove their cattle to drink 
 to them. A thanksgiving service was appointed yearly 
 for Ascension Day. But we must refer the origin much 
 farther back, to the ages of superstition, when the 
 pastimes of the people were all out of doors, and when 
 the wakes and day-time dances were on the village green 
 instead of in the close ball-room. It is certainly a 
 ' popish relic', perhaps a relic of pagan Rome. Foun- 
 tains and wells were ever the object of their adoration. 
 'Where a spring rises or a river flows', says Seneca, 
 ' there should we build altars and offer sacrifices.' They 
 held yearly festivities in their honour, and peopled them 
 with the elegant forms of the nymphs and presiding 
 goddesses." 
 
 The observance of silence at these sources, shows the 
 deep reverence with which they were regarded. When 
 St. Willibrord invaded the sanctuary of the God Fossete, 
 in Friesland, we read that he broke the spell by baptising 
 a convert at the fountain dedicated to that divinity, at
 
 72 On the Source and Nomenclature 
 
 which no one was allowed to draw water, except in silence. 
 (Acta Sanctorum, torn, iii, c. x, p. 566.) The same 
 sentiment was observed by the Romans, as may be seen 
 in the inscription given by Guvina de la Vincelle : 
 " Nymphis loci. Bibe, lave, tace." (Arts et Metiers des 
 Ana'ens, planche 74.) 
 
 Before concluding these rough and certainly incon- 
 clusive notes, since both the source of the Thames, as 
 well as the origin of its famous name, may still be 
 considered undecided, I will reproduce an extract from 
 a poem published on the " Marriage of the Thames 
 and Isis", by Camden, in his Britannia, and attributed 
 to him, by his editor, the late Mr. Nichols. Of this 
 poem (originally published in Latin) there exist seve- 
 ral translations ; but I shall print Camden's own, as 
 being most likely to convey the real meaning of the 
 writer, although Rudder rightly says of him, " that he 
 has taken greater license in describing the source of 
 the river than can be allowed the topographer ; for any 
 one who shall survey the places called Thames Head 
 will find that the picture is not a very striking likeness 
 of nature." I will not trouble my readers with the 
 quaint Latin, which is like that we often see on tomb- 
 stones and memorial tablets written to order, during the 
 last century, when it was often the fashion to write, and 
 now and then to speak, in what to us appears an almost 
 " unknown tongue", but at once quote the English 
 version of the extract, which, in the Latin poem, thus 
 commences :
 
 of the River Thames. 
 
 " Lanigeros qua lata greges Cotswoldia nascit 
 Crescit et in colles facilis visura Dobunis 
 Haud procul a fossa longa spelunca recessus. 
 
 "Where spacious Coteswold feeds her fleecy care 
 Rising in gentle hills, and from mid air 
 O'er the Dobuni looks, a cavern lies 
 Siding the Foss ; the broken tops that rise 
 By the hill's margin the recess disguise. 
 
 Here rise in streams of common brotherhood 
 
 Nile, Ganges, and the Amazonian flood, 
 
 Ister with double name, and neighbour Rhine ; 
 
 While interwoven with their streams does shine 
 
 Britain, whom Phrixus' golden spoils adorn ; 
 
 Victorious over Gaul, and crown'd with corn. 
 
 Lord of the waters, on a wavey throne, 
 
 In river majesty, revered, alone, 
 
 Here I sis sits ; here, lavish from his urn 
 
 His azure arms the bounteous waters turn." 
 
 * See Appendix for further notes on this paper.
 
 ON 
 
 SIR PHILIP SIDNEY AND HIS FATHER, 
 SIR HENRY SIDNEY, 
 
 IN RELATION TO LUDLOW AND ITS CASTLE. 
 
 HE connection of an illustrious family, such 
 as was the house of Sidney, with any 
 locality, whether by reason of their resid- 
 ence and rise within the place itself, or on 
 account of some official duties especially relating to it, 
 must ever be an object of deep interest to all who care 
 to reflect upon the glorious deeds of former days, or love 
 to dwell upon the career of those who have made their 
 names known and honoured throughout the world, and 
 for all time. For these reasons I here put before my 
 readers a few fragments from the history of a family so 
 distinguished as that of the house of Sidney, and to 
 treat of some passages in the life of its most distinguished 
 member, the renowned Sir Philip. 
 
 I need hardly observe here, that there is little or 
 nothing new to be obtained concerning this illustrious
 
 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father. 75 
 
 Gentleman ; for, indeed, that term seems singularly 
 applicable to all his acts continued even to the day of 
 his death ; and therefore I must beg to be excused, if, 
 in my anxiety to awaken some memories of so noble 
 and worthy a knight, I tell but an " old, old tale". 
 
 Still I am willing to believe that, for the honour of such 
 an association as that of the great Sidney family with 
 the time-honoured and most interesting town of Ludlow, 
 I shall be pardoned if I write of what is already well 
 known there, and be forgiven if now and then I draw a 
 little upon imagination, in the absence of strict data, 
 for bringing Sir Philip Sidney's name more closely than 
 ever in alliance with the noble castle in which for many 
 years his father lived, and where, doubtless, much of his 
 children's time was passed ; and with the natural beauties 
 by which, in the times of " good Queen Bess", as in our 
 own, it was surrounded, and with which a poetical and 
 romantic mind like Sir Philip's must have been often 
 greatly moved. 
 
 The family of Sidney, as is well established, was derived 
 from an old French house, an early portion of it coming 
 from Anjou, with Henry Duke of Normandy and Anjou ; 
 for we read that before his accession to the throne as 
 Henry II,* Duke Henry granted to one William de 
 Sidne, " militi", the manor of Sutton, with the appurten- 
 ances, to him and his heirs in fee ; and from this Sir 
 William was derived the future family of Sidney, which 
 
 * Sir William Sidney was knight and chamberlain to King 
 Henry II.
 
 76 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 by marriages become connected with the noblest and 
 the greatest families in England, and even with royalty 
 itself. 
 
 But I will not notice particularly, any earlier portion of 
 the family than that of Sir William Sidney, temp. Henry 
 VIII, who was one of the commanders at Flodden 
 Field in 1513, and a person of great note in his time, 
 eldest son of Nicholas Sidney by Anne, daughter of Sir 
 William Brandon, father of the Duke of Suffolk, who 
 was himself descended from the King of Scotland. Sir 
 Henry Sidney, the father of Sir Philip Sidney, was this 
 Sir William's only surviving son, and from his infancy 
 was bred and brought up with the young Prince Edward 
 (afterwards Edward VI), who treated him with great 
 familiarity, and made him his companion, so much so 
 that they were oftentimes as boys together, even bed- 
 fellows ; Sir William Sidney, the father, having been 
 appointed tutor and chamberlain, and afterwards steward, 
 to the " most highest and famous prynce, King Edward 
 the 6th", when he, Henry Sidney, was but a child. 
 
 Sir Henry Sidney, Knight of the Garter, Lord Deputy 
 of Ireland, and Lord President of Wales, married Lady 
 Mary, eldest daughter of John Dudley, Viscount L'Isle, 
 Baron Malpas and Somerie, Lord Basset of Drayton and 
 Tyesse, afterwards Earl of Warwick and Duke of North- 
 umberland (so created by Edward VI), whose fourth son, 
 Lord Guilford Dudley, became the husband of Lady 
 Jane Grey. 
 
 Lady Jane Grey was the eldest daughter to Henry,
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 77 
 
 Duke of Suffolk, by Frances, daughter to Mary, second 
 sister to King Henry VIII ; and thus through the interest 
 of his brother, the before-named Duke of Northumber- 
 land, by this descent, the succession to the crown of 
 England was secured to her in a patent sealed by King 
 Edward VI, excluding his two sisters, Mary and Eliza- 
 beth; and which subsequently led to this unfortunate 
 lady and her husband's death, on the scaffold, where 
 also perished the Duke of Northumberland, her illus- 
 trious parent. 
 
 The descendants of Sir Henry Sidney were the Earls 
 of Leicester, of the name of Sidney*; and the family 
 seats of Penshurst Place, Kent ; Leicester House, West- 
 minster (on the site formerly known as Savile House, 
 Leicester Square, and now where the Empire Theatre 
 stands), became theirs, with all estates thereto belong- 
 ing. 
 
 The Duchess of Northumberland had but a melancholy 
 time of it, for after the death of her husband and 
 fourth son, Lord Guilford Dudley, with her other sons 
 under sentence of death, her house and furniture were 
 seized, and everything that belonged to it, by order of 
 Queen Mary, taken from the poor lady. When Mary 
 married Philip of Spain, some of the miseries of the 
 duchess were softened to her ; for through Philip's inter- 
 cession, he having known the family in happier days, her 
 sons were pardoned, and in her will, written throughout 
 
 * Robert Dudley, the great Earl of Leicester, was Lady Mary 
 Sidney's brother.
 
 78 On Sir Philip Sidney and his FatJier, 
 
 in her own hand, she expressed her gratitude to him and 
 to some Spanish noblemen also, who had pleaded for 
 them. In this will, she particularly refers to het daughter, 
 Mary Sidney, wife of the before-mentioned Sir Henry, 
 in the following manner : " To my daughter, Mary 
 Sidney, I bequaeth 200 marks, and 200 marks to her 
 little son ; but if he chance to die, the money to go to 
 his mother ; and she chance to die, the money to go to 
 her son ; and if they both die, to go to her son Sidney, 
 because, having no Council by me," she continues, " I 
 think the law will give it to him." She further bequeaths 
 to her daughter, Mary Sidney, her " gown of black bard 
 velvet, fured with sables", etc., and a " gown with a high 
 back of fair wrought velvet". To her son (in law), Sir 
 Henry Sidney, whom she appoints one of her executors, 
 she leaves " the hangings of the gallery at Chelsea, that 
 is gold and green, and with her lord's arms and hers ; 
 also a chair of green wrought velvet with a long cushion, 
 and a foot carpet of Turkey work." She also wills to 
 Mary Sidney her own nag and her saddle of black 
 wrought velvet, and her Clock again, she did so much set 
 by, that was the lord her father's, praying her to keep it 
 as a jewel ; also her son Sidney to have his Clock 
 again." 
 
 So great a regard had the young King Edward for Sir 
 Henry Sidney, that he conferred many favours upon him 
 who for "hisvirtues, fine composition of body, gallantry, and 
 kindness of spirit, was considered the most compleat young 
 gentleman in the court." In the fifth year of his reign,
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 79 
 
 Sir Henry Sidney went, with the Marquis of North- 
 ampton, to the French king, Henry II, with the habit of 
 the Order of the Garter, as one of the gentlemen of 
 Edward's privy chamber ; and on his return to England 
 married, as before noticed, the Lady Mary Dudley, 
 daughter of the unhappy Duchess of Northumberland, 
 whose will we have just quoted from. 
 
 About this time the young king gave his newly married 
 friend several manors and estates in Kent and Wiltshire ; 
 and he would, doubtless, have enriched him still further, 
 had he not died at Greenwich as suddenly as he did, and 
 in Sir Henry's arms : thus there was an end, of course, to 
 all such preferment. Overpowered with grief at the loss 
 of so kind a patron and friend, Sir Henry retired to his 
 house at Penshurst, where, in the quietude of that lovely 
 spot, he remained, and was thus saved from the sad trou- 
 bles which happened on the coming to the throne of 
 Edward's sister, Mary, to his father-in-law, the Duke of 
 Northumberland, and the other members of his wife's 
 family, as has already been described. Here our hero, Sir 
 Philip Sidney, was born on the 2gth November 1554, and 
 was named Philip after the queen's husband, she having 
 lately married Philip of Spain, and the family was honoured 
 by his being godfather to the infant. Ben Jonson, in the 
 following lines, refers to the birth of Philip Sidney (an 
 acorn appearing to have been planted, or more probably 
 a young tree, tcr commemorate the auspicious event ; this 
 tree was said to be standing some years ago, and used to 
 be shown to the visitors at Penshurst, as the "Bear's
 
 8o On Sir Philip Sidney and Jds Father, 
 
 Oak", an allusion to one of the cognizances of the 
 Sidney family, known as the " Bear and ragged staft") 
 
 " Thou hast thy walks for health as well as sport, 
 Thy mount to which the Dryads do resort, 
 Where Pan and Bacchus their high feasts have made 
 Beneath the broad beech and the chestnut shade ; 
 That taller tree, which of a nut was set 
 At His great birth, where all the Muses met." 
 
 Sir Henry Sidney was from this time taken into favour 
 by Queen Mary, and all the various grants of her brother 
 Edward to him were confirmed by her. An interesting 
 confirmation of a previous grant of property to Sir Henry 
 Sidney, related to a property in Middlesex, and was no 
 less than the manor of " Tibourne", held at the time by 
 an individual of the , name of Jaquett, or Jacquette ; 
 from whom there is little doubt but that the popular name 
 of "Jack Ketch", in miserable connection with the execu- 
 tions for which Tyburn, now fashionable "Tyburnia", 
 became so celebrated, was Jirived.* 
 
 Queen Mary conferred various offices on Sir Henry, 
 finding him in every way worthy to fill them. Thus he 
 was made vice-treasurer and general governor of all the 
 king's and queen's revenues in the kingdom of Ireland, 
 treasurer of the wars, and afterwards sole lord justice ; 
 the king and queen, so running the patent of appointment, 
 
 * In 1st and 2nd Philip and Mary, Sir Henry Sidney, with a 
 John Somerfield, obtained a grant of the third part of the manor of 
 Hales Owen, in co. Salop; and this probably brought the family 
 first into connection with Ludlow, and of which this paper is a slight 
 historical memorial.
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 8 1 
 
 having especial trust and confidence in the approved 
 fidelity, wisdom, and discretion of their trusty and well- 
 beloved councillor, Sir Henry Sidney. It was, however, 
 not till the second year of Queen Elizabeth's reign that 
 Sir Henry's more important post as regards Ludlow and its 
 neighbourhood was conferred upon him, when by royal 
 warrant he was constituted Lord President of the Marches 
 of Wales (1559-60) ; an office of high distinction, and simi- 
 lar in degree to that of viceroy, or now Lord-Lieutenant, 
 of a county. Afterwards he went over to his government 
 of Ireland, where, though he continued but a short time, 
 yet by his prudent demeanour he obliged Shane O'Neil, 
 who had disclaimed the English jurisdiction, to a sub- 
 mission to her Majesty, and to continue quiet, till he 
 resigned his office to the Earl of Sussex, who took on 
 him the government the 3oth August of the same year. 
 
 In the fifth year of Elizabeth's reign, Sir Henry desiring 
 his discharge for all disbursements on account of his vice- 
 treasurership and receiver-generalship of the revenues of 
 Ireland, and treasurer of wars, the Queen commissioned 
 Thomas Earl of Sussex, Lord Deputy, Hugh, Archbishop 
 of Dublin, Chancellor, and others, to examine into the 
 state of his accounts, and on sufficient proof thereof, to 
 discharge him, the said Sir Henry Sidney, his heirs and 
 executors, against the queen, her heirs and successors. 
 
 In the same year the war of the Guises having broken 
 out in France, the Queen, fearing that the English would 
 be involved in it, and being informed that the Guises, to 
 gain Anthony of Bourbon, King of Navarre, had promised
 
 82 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 to procure him in marriage the Queen of Scots, with the 
 kingdom of England for her portion, and also that 
 through the help of Spain, and interposition of the Pope, 
 the then marriage of the King of Navarre should be dis- 
 solved, his wife being a heretic, for which cause also 
 Queen Elizabeth should be dispossessed of her throne. 
 Whereupon, as Camden writes (see History of England, 
 vol. ii, p, 317), "she dispatched to France Sir Henry 
 Sydney, a person of approved abilities and great reputa- 
 tion, to fathom this business, and persuade the heads of 
 each party to an accommodation. But things were now 
 gone too far to admit of any remedy ; therefore Sydney 
 returning out of France, he was immediately sent to the 
 Queen of Scots to adjourn the interview which she had 
 desired with the Queen of England, till the ensuing year, 
 or till the wars of France were ended." 
 
 In the same year Ambrose Dudley, Earl of Warwick 
 (whose sister Sir Henry had married), being elected one of 
 the Knights of the Garter, the Queen commissioned the 
 Duke of Norfolk, her lieutenant, to install Sir Henry- 
 Sidney in his place, the Earl being beyond the seas on 
 the Queen's affairs, as the commission sets forth ; and 
 that her Majesty, by her special licence, had appointed 
 Sir Henry Sidney to be his deputy, and accordingly he 
 was installed with great magnificence ; Ashmole, in his 
 History of the Order of the Garter, observing "that the 
 mantle was borne before him by the Garter (King-at-Arms) 
 in the same manner as is used to knights personally in- 
 stalled ; and that he also proceeded before ' the alms
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 83 
 
 knights', the only instance he had met with when a 
 Proxy was installed." The next year Sir Henry was 
 himself elected a knight of that most noble order, with 
 the French king, Charles IX, and the Earl of Bedford, 
 and was installed with them on i4th May 1564. His 
 plate exists in the eighth stall of St. George's Chapel, 
 Windsor, wherein he is styled " the thrice valiant Knight 
 Deputy of the realm of Ireland, and President of the 
 Council in Wales, 1564." 
 
 On the 1 3th Oct., in the yth Eliz., Sidney still retaining 
 his place as Lord President of Wales, he was again con- 
 stituted Lord Deputy of Ireland, with power to confer all 
 offices in that kingdom, except the offices of Chancellor, 
 Treasurer, Sub-treasurer, Chief Justice of the bench, Chief 
 Baron of the Exchequer, and Master of the Rolls ; and to 
 present to all ecclesiastical benefices, viz., vicarages, par- 
 sonages, prebends, chancellors, deans, and all other digni- 
 ties whatsoever, except archbishops and bishops. On the 
 1 3th January following he landed at Dublin, and was re- 
 ceived with great joy, as is related by Hooker, " being a 
 person whose excellent government that kingdom had long 
 experienced. W T hen he received the sword, he made an 
 eloquent speech setting forth what a precious thing good 
 government is, and how all realms, commonwealths, 
 cities, and countries, do flourish and prosper where it is 
 maintained." 
 
 Among many useful things Sir Henry did, or caused to 
 be done, and what true Archaeologists will applaud the 
 most, was the following very praiseworthy, and for the 
 
 G 2
 
 84 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 time in which he lived, advanced act of duty as well as of 
 regard for those who were to come after him ; it is thus 
 recorded : " Having found the records of the kingdom 
 in an open place, subject to wind, rain, and all weather, 
 and so neglected that they were taken for common 
 uses, wherefore with great care and diligence he 
 caused them to be perused and sorted, and placed 
 within the Castle of Dublin, in a room well boarded, with 
 a chimney for a fire, so that neither by the moisture of 
 the walls or any other means they could receive prejudice. 
 And several divisions were made for laying them sepa- 
 rate ; and one of discretion and skill appointed to look 
 after them, with an assignment for his labour." He also 
 caused the statutes and ordinances of the realm, which 
 lay hid, and hardly known, but yet kept in safety, to be 
 searched, surveyed, and viewed by men of the best 
 learning, skill, and discretion he could select, giving them 
 express charge to peruse all, and collect so many thereof 
 as they should think necessary and expedient to be made 
 public, and the which being perused, he caused them to 
 be printed, that every one might know the laws and the 
 statutes of his country, and obey them. A saying of his, 
 that " Science was to be honoured in whomsoever it was 
 to be found", shows clearly enough the bent of the man's 
 mind, and from it we can learn at once the nature of his 
 character. 
 
 It was the glory of Elizabeth's reign that she had the 
 wisdom to distinguish and employ persons of eminent 
 abilities, integrity, and honour ; and there cannot be a
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 85 
 
 greater instance of it than in her choice of Sir Henry 
 Sidney, whose letters to her Majesty, to her Council, the 
 great Cecil, Walsingham, and others of her ministry, 
 show how true a judgment he made of men and all affairs 
 under his cognizance. He was four several times Lord 
 Justice of Ireland, and three times, by special commis- 
 sion, sent Lord Deputy out of England. He also held, with 
 the above office, that of Lord President of the Marches of 
 Wales ; and these chief offices never before or since have 
 been held together. In short, he was a man for the 
 time he lived in ; and no doubt by his zeal, courage, and 
 ability, set that example before his son, Sir Philip, which 
 proved to him in future years the great cause of his high 
 and exalted character. Sir Henry highly favoured all 
 men of letters and science ; and he never in public 
 assemblies, consultations, field, or feast, omitted any- 
 thing that appertained to his office or honour. 
 
 His office of Lord President of the Council established 
 in the Marches of Wales brought him into close con- 
 nection with Ludlow ; and his residence at its famous 
 Castle, then the principal stronghold between England 
 and Wales, must have had a useful as well as elevat- 
 ing influence over the people of the place in which 
 so distinguished a gentleman lived. An extract from 
 a letter in the ninth year of Elizabeth (1566), written to 
 his son, Sir Philip Sidney, then a boy of twelve years of 
 age, at school at Shrewsbury, so justly celebrated for 
 turning out great men and scholars, who was evidently in 
 the habit of writing to his father at Ludlow, will show at
 
 86 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 a glance what kind of influence that would be, and serve 
 as an example to parents generally how to encourage and 
 advise their children when away from their custody or care : 
 
 " I have received two letters from you, one written in 
 Latine, the other in French, which I take in good part, and 
 will (wish) you to exercise that practice of learning often ; 
 for that will stand you in most stead in that profession of 
 life that you are born to live in. And since this is my first 
 letter that ever I did write to you, I will not that it will be all 
 empty of such devices, which my natural care of you pro- 
 voketh me to wish you to follow, as documents to you in this 
 your tender age. 
 
 " Let your first action be the lifting up your mind to 
 Almighty God by hearty prayer, and feelingly digest the 
 words you speak in prayer, with continual meditation and 
 thinking of Him to whom you pray, and of the matter for 
 which you pray. ... Be humble and obedient to your master, 
 for unless you frame yourself to obey others, yea, and feel 
 in yourself what obedience is, you will never be able to 
 teach others how to obey you. . . . Well (my little Philippe) 
 this is enough for me, and too much I fear for you. 
 
 " Your loving father so long as you live in the fear of 
 God, 
 
 "H. SYDNEY." 
 
 This charming letter was probably, though undated, 
 written from Ludlow Castle. 
 
 Sir Henry Sidney died at the Castle of Ludlow on the 
 5th May 1586, aged fifty-seven years, wanting a month and 
 fifteen days. The Queen being certified thereof, ordered 
 Sir William de Kirk, Garter King of Arms, to prepare all 
 things appertaining to his office for his funeral. Accord- 
 ingly Garter and the other heralds coming to Worcester, 
 ordered the corpse, robed with velvet, to be brought from
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 87 
 
 Ludlow, which was solemnly conveyed into the cathedral 
 church at Worcester, and there placed ; and after a 
 sermon preached by one of his chaplains, the corpse was 
 conveyed into a chariot covered with velvet,, hung with 
 escutcheons of his arms, etc. ; and being accompanied 
 with " Mr. Garter" and the other heralds, with the 
 principal domestics of the deceased, and officers of the 
 court of Ludlow, they proceeded on their journey to 
 London, and from thence to Penshurst; where, on Tuesday, 
 aist June 1586, he was interred in the chancel of the 
 church of that place, attended from his house by a noble 
 train of lords, knights, gentlemen, and ladies, something 
 like six weeks after his death, giving us a slight idea of 
 the length of time consumed in those days in journey- 
 ing from Ludlow to the metropolis, albeit this was a 
 solemn and grand occasion. 
 
 He had issue by his marriage with the Lady Mary 
 Dudley, who was, as has been before remarked, not only 
 of great descent, but by nature of a large ingenuous 
 spirit (and who survived him a very short time, dying in 
 the August following, and buried with him at Penshurst, 
 Kent, in 1586), three sons, Sir Philip, Sir Robert, and Sir 
 Thomas Sidney ; and four daughters, whereof the eldest 
 died an infant ; as did Margaret, the second daughter, 
 who lies buried at Penshurst. Another of his daughters 
 lived to near the age of twenty, but died unmarried. She 
 lies buried in the chancel of the collegiate parish church 
 of the good town of Ludlow, where the following inscrip- 
 tion to her memory, on a handsome monument on the
 
 88 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 right-hand side of the altar, may be seen to this day : 
 "Heere lyethe the bodye of Ambrozia Sydney, 4th 
 daughter of the Righte Honorable Sir Henry Sidney, 
 Knight of the most noble order of the Garter, Lord Pre- 
 sident of the Counsell of Wales, &c. ; and of the Lady 
 Mary his wief, daughter of the ffamous Duke of Northum- 
 berland. Who died in Ludlow Castell the 22nd Febru- 
 arii, 1574." 
 
 The only surviving daughter was Mary, married to 
 Henry Earl of Pembroke, from whom the late lamented 
 statesman, Sidney, Lord Herbert, whose son is now Earl 
 of Pembroke, was descended. Robert Dudley, the great 
 or wicked Earl of Leicester, as the case may be, her 
 uncle, made the match for her, and paid part of her 
 dower, which her father, Sir Henry, acknowledged as a 
 favour to him by his letter from Dundalk in Ireland, 
 dated 4th Feb. 1576. This lady was very accomplished, 
 and composed, with her brother Philip, several of the 
 Psalms in verse. She also translated several discourses 
 and essays from the French. She lived to an advanced 
 age, and died at her house in Aldersgate Street, London, 
 the 25th Sept. 1621, and was buried in the chancel of 
 Salisbury Cathedral. The famous epitaph given below 
 was made for her, but by whom is uncertain : 
 
 " Underneath this sable Herse 
 Lyes the subject of all Verse, 
 Sydney's sister, Pembroke's Mother. 
 Death ! ere thou hast killed another 
 Faire and learn'd and good as she, 
 Tyme shall throw a Dart at thee.
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 89 
 
 " Marble pyles let no man rayse 
 To her Name for after Dales : 
 Some kinde Woman, borne as she, 
 Reading this, like Niobe", 
 Shall turn Marble, and become 
 Both her Mourner and her Tombe." 
 
 It was during the time of Sir Henry's presidency that 
 many important additions were made to the Castle of 
 Ludlow ; and there, no doubt, he often resided in great 
 pomp and splendour. The young Philip was conse- 
 quently a frequent indweller of the Castle ; and the 
 woods and hills around must have often been the scene of 
 many hunting or hawking excursions, in which he with his 
 noble brothers and sisters shared. In the Ludlow Sketches of 
 my lamented friend, the late Mr. Thos. Wright, he ventures 
 thus to speculate on other proceedings likely to have taken 
 place, and which, from the circumstances of Sir Henry's 
 high estate and office, there can be little doubt did happen : 
 " Sir Philip Sidney, thepreux chevalier Q{ his age, the poet, 
 and lover of letters and of men of letters, who was, no 
 doubt, a frequent resident in Ludlow Castle, and pro- 
 bably there collected at times around him the Spensers 
 and the Raleighs, and the other literary stars of his day." 
 
 The stone bridge which doubtless supplies the place of 
 a drawbridge, is apparently of Sir Henry Sidney's time, 
 and the great portal also is of the same date. Over the 
 archway, on a small stone tablet, are these words : 
 
 " Hominibus injustis loquimini 
 Lapides an regni Reginas 
 Elizabethan, the 22nd year. 
 
 (Coplet by Sir Henry Sidney, etc.)"
 
 go On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 This allusion to the ingratitude of man, seems very 
 curious, and must refer to some great disappointment 
 Sir Henry met with at this time. I shall not here attempt 
 to unravel the mystery, but leave it to other and 
 abler hands to find out hereafter. The mere fact that 
 much of the work he did in the Castle, at great expense 
 to himself, and which the Government ought to have paid 
 for, but did not, I cannot believe to be, as some have 
 surmised, the cause of this complaint on the Castle wall. 
 
 Sir Philip's career is so well known that I shall not 
 venture to do more than to glance at it, merely recalling 
 to your memories that after school he went to Christ 
 Church, Oxford, where he continued until he was seven- 
 teen years of age. In 1572 he commenced his travels 
 with the view of attaining a full knowledge of foreign 
 languages. During his peregrinations, Lord Brook, his 
 friend and companion, and to whom we are indebted for 
 much that we know about him, says, "that though so 
 young he gained reverence among the chief learned men 
 abroad"; and that Charles IX was so taken with him 
 that he made him one of the gentlemen of his chamber. 
 Young Philip was in Paris on the memorable night of the 
 Massacre of St. Bartholomew, and took shelter from that 
 dreadful carnage in the house of Sir Francis Walsingham, 
 Queen Elizabeth's ambassador. Here he met with, and 
 probably for the first time, the fair Frances, the youngest 
 daughter of his host, who was destined to become his 
 wife in after years. 
 
 By the desire of the Queen, who seems to have taken
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 91 
 
 great interest in him (as, indeed, Elizabeth did as a rule 
 with all the handsome young noblemen and gentlemen 
 of her court), the Earl of Leicester, his uncle by mar- 
 riage, wrote for him to come to England, and there is 
 reason to believe he returned immediately. 
 
 How he afterwards travelled, and lived in Germany, win- 
 ning the esteem of all he met ; how the crown of Poland 
 was offered to him, and the Queen would not allow him 
 to accept it ; and how he projected a journey to America, 
 and was again prevented carrying out the expedition, I 
 need not further dwell upon ; but at once refer to the 
 noble poetry he has left behind him in the sonnets he 
 wrote, and the well-known poem of Arcadia, written at 
 Wilton, and dedicated to his sister, the Countess of 
 Pembroke, whose elegant, epitaph we have given already. 
 
 The sonnets were written at a time when it is to be pre- 
 sumed he first fell in love, but at what exact time that 
 was, there is no real evidence to show. Penelope 
 Devereux, the daughter of the first Earl of Essex, Walter 
 Devereux (who even on his death-bed desired that his 
 " friend Sir Philip" would marry his child, writing thus 
 of the object of his heart : " O, that good gentleman ! 
 Have me commended unto him, and tell him I send him 
 nothing but I wish him well ; and so well, that if God so 
 move both their hearts, I wish that he might match with 
 my daughter. I call him son : he is wise, virtuous, and 
 godly ; and if he go on in the course he hath begun, he 
 will be as famous and worthy a gentleman as ever Eng- 
 land bred)", was, doubtless, the young Philip's choice ;
 
 92 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 but circumstances over which he had no control kept 
 them apart, and he died, as we all know, married to 
 another. Philip married Frances Walsingham in 1583, 
 and of course, to a certain extent, annoyed Elizabeth, as 
 well as, no doubt, other ladies of the court, who had, to 
 use an old and well-known saying, " set their caps" at 
 the young and noble knight. But Philip did not marry 
 until after his presumed first love, Penelope Devereux 
 some say by compulsion, some by choice married 
 Robert Rich, third Lord Rich, who succeeded to that 
 title in 1581 ; and as far as can be made out by his sub- 
 sequent poetry, Philip never ceased to remember, if not 
 love, his fair Stella, for under that name he evidently 
 referred constantly to her in his beautiful sonnets entitled 
 "Astrophel and Stella". An example of this habit of 
 his may be found in the following extract from that 
 well-known work ; and as there is evidence in the lines 
 that the lovely sylvan -scenery of the neighbourhood of 
 his father's official residence had impressed the young 
 poet with all the imagery he knew so well how to depict 
 (as it did another later writer, and yet more celebrated 
 poet, John Milton, whose Masque of Comus was written and 
 performed for the first time at Ludlow Castle), I trust I 
 shall be pardoned for giving them in illustration of my 
 paper, although they have so often been quoted before : 
 
 '' In a grove most rich of shade, 
 Where birds wanton music made, 
 May then young his pied weeds showing, 
 New perfumed with flowers fresh growing ;
 
 Henry Sidney. 93 
 
 Astrophel with Stella sweet 
 Did for mutual comfort meet ; 
 Both within themselves oppressed, 
 But each in the other blest." 
 
 In the thirty-seventh sonnet, the young poet, who has 
 lost his first love, and let us hope he had not yet mar- 
 ried his second thus boldly leaves out Stella, and pun- 
 ningly tells us who she was : 
 
 " My mouth doth water, and my breast doth swell ; 
 My tongue doth itch, my thoughts in labour be : 
 Listen, thou Lordlings, with good ear to me ; 
 For of my life I must a riddle tell. 
 Toward Aurora's court a nymph doth dwell 
 Rich in all beauties which man's eye can see : 
 Beauties so far from reach of words that we 
 Abuse her praise, saying she doth excel : 
 Rich in the treasure of deserved renown, 
 Rich in the riches of a royal heart, 
 Rich in those gifts which give the eternal crown ; 
 Who, though most rich in these and every part 
 Which makes the patents of true worldly bliss, 
 Hath no misfortune but that RICH she is." 
 
 That, however, Frances and Philip were a happy 
 couple there can be little doubt ; and that she was a true 
 and devoted wife, we know from the fact of her having 
 followed her husband to the Netherlands in the end of 
 June or beginning of July, and that she was with him 
 when he died ; for the Earl of Leicester writes thus to 
 Sir Francis Walsingham from Utrecht, 25th Oct. 1586: 
 " Your sorrowful daughter and mine is here with me at 
 Utrecht till she may recover some strength, for she is
 
 94 On Sir Philip Sidney and his Father, 
 
 wonderfully overthrown through her long care since the 
 beginning of her husband's hurt ; and I am the more 
 careful that she should be in some strength ere she take 
 her journey into England, for that she is with child ; 
 which I pray God send to prove a son, if it be his will. 
 But whether son or daughter, they shall be my children 
 too. She is most earnest to be gone out of this country ; 
 and so I could wish her, seeing it is against her mind, 
 but for her weakness yet, her case considered." 
 
 Lady Sidney had already had a daughter; but no 
 living child was born afterwards : indeed, on her return 
 to England she was long very ill, and her life despaired 
 of; no doubt brought on by the anxieties and troubles 
 she had gone through. For four years Lady Sidney re- 
 mained a widow, and then she married the unfortunate 
 Earl of Essex, who thus again offending Queen Elizabeth, 
 and this time mortally, ultimately perished on the scaf- 
 fold, the Queen never really in her heart forgiving her 
 once great favourite's desertion. Lady Essex and Pene- 
 lope Devereux, or rather Penelope Rich, were now sisters ; 
 the first love and the second love, thus coming strangely 
 together by the mysterious hands of Cupid and of 
 Hymen, a romance of real life, such as would have 
 been thought improbable, if invented by the imagination 
 of any ancient or modern writer ; so correct, after all, is 
 the saying, that " Truth is stranger than Fiction ! " 
 
 Upon Sidney's melancholy fate, and of his early death, 
 I need not here descant ; the story of his being wounded 
 at Warnsfeld, a little to the east of Zutphen, and his
 
 Sir Henry Sidney. 95 
 
 behaviour on the field of battle, being familiar as 
 " household words". He died at Arnheim, to which 
 village or town he was taken in his barge, and at- 
 tended by the best " chirurgeons" of the day. But all 
 was in vain ; for after the wearying and tedious passage 
 of some sixteen days, mortification of his wound set in ; 
 and amidst the tears and lamentations of his wife and 
 brother, Sir Philip Sidney breathed his last as quietly and 
 peacefully as he had lived ; calling for music at the last 
 moment, and dying with the sounds of a song he is said 
 to have written himself, entitled " La Caisse Rompue", in 
 his ears.* Thus died the flower of English knighthood in 
 the first bloom of his manhood, and when all things seem 
 to have combined to make him one of the happiest and 
 most successful of men. History is said to repeat itself ; 
 and in the destruction of cities, the overthrow of mon- 
 
 * Sidney's calling for music on his death-bed may have been 
 brought to his mind, not only from the love of it, but from the 
 melancholy manner in which his father's true friend, the Earl of 
 Essex, who wished his daughter to marry Sidney, acted when he 
 was dying, strongly suspecting himself poisoned by the Earl of 
 Leicester. The story goes thus : "The night following, the Friday 
 night, which was the night before he died, he called William Hewes, 
 which was his musician, to play upon the virginals and sing. 'Play', 
 said he, ' my song, William Hewes, and I will sing it myself.' So 
 he did it most joyfully, not as the howling swan, which still looking 
 down waileth her end, but as a sweet lark, lifting up his hands 
 and casting up his eyes to his God ; with this mounted the crystal 
 skies, and reached with his unwearied tongue the top of the highest 
 heaven."
 
 g6 On Sir Philip Sidney and Jiis Father. 
 
 archies, and the disruption of races, this assertion may 
 be correct ; but in the production of such noble and true- 
 hearted men as Sir Philip Sidney, there seems indeed a 
 pause ; for neither in earlier nor later epochs can we 
 find his parallel ; and as the world seems at present con- 
 stituted, we are likely to seek for one in vain.
 
 EPISODES IN THE CAREER OF 
 
 HUMPHREY DUKE OF GLOUCESTER, 
 AND HIS FIRST DUCHESS; 
 
 AND THEIR CONNECTION WITH THE ABBEY OF 
 ST. ALBAN'S. 
 
 HE strange, eventful history of Humphrey 
 Duke of Gloucester, so commonly called 
 "the Good" that we are prone to inquire 
 why, and that of his beautiful but ill-fated 
 first wife, Jacqueline, or Jacoba of Hainault, might, 
 without doubt, be made the subject of a most interesting 
 and exciting romance, and would, at the hands of Sir 
 Walter Scott, or of the late Lord Lytton, both so gifted 
 in the consideration and portrayal of historic characters 
 and events, have become an important addition to the 
 poetic and romantic literature of our day. 
 
 The times of the "Good Duke" were of a most stormy 
 nature, and, as far as the then future of our country was 
 concerned, of the utmost interest and importance ; and 
 although the result, in after years, tended to the firm,
 
 98 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 establishment of England's greatness, no man then living 
 could have imagined what would come out of the con- 
 stant struggles for place and power, at the court of a 
 child-like king, between exalted and highly gifted men, 
 culminating in the famed faction-fight of the houses of 
 York and Lancaster; what would eventuate from the 
 rapid decline of our influence and possessions in France, 
 which startled and dismayed the stoutest hearts of Eng- 
 land ; nor venture to predict anything but disgrace and 
 ruin to his country out of the unseemly and incessant 
 intrigues of the royal family itself, and the ambitious 
 acts of the haughty nobles by whom it was surrounded. 
 
 But as it is the object of this paper to concentrate as 
 much as possible the interest of Duke Humphrey's life 
 with his acts of beneficence and kindness to the Abbey 
 of St. Alban's, and not to go too far away into the other 
 tempting details of his adventurous career, I must be 
 pardoned if I at once proceed to the matter in hand, and 
 only glance at those romantic incidents which his marriage 
 with Jacqueline, and subsequent separation from her, 
 brought about, but which I trust my readers will forgive 
 me also for not entirely leaving unrecorded. 
 
 The Duke of Gloucester's interest in the Abbey of 
 St. Alban's took its rise most probably in his friendship 
 for John Bostock (afterwards the famous Abbot Whet- 
 hamsted) whilst at Oxford, where, no doubt, was en- 
 couraged that love of books and learning which so 
 peculiarly distinguished Humphrey's character, and which, 
 considering the days in which he lived, speaks well and
 
 arid his First Duchess. 99 
 
 eloquently for him ; and tends to prove that, had the 
 times been less distraught, and his own fancies and feel- 
 ings had fuller opportunities of development, the name of 
 the " Good Duke" would have been more richly deserved 
 than, with all his many faults and wicked acts, as seen 
 by the light of our experience, it appears to have been. 
 
 It was at Gloucester College, which had been the resi- 
 dence of Gilbert Clare, Earl of Gloucester, in 1260, that 
 Humphrey and Whethamsted met ; for at that College, 
 we are told, all young monks were sent to complete their 
 education in more classical learning than they could 
 obtain at their Benedictine houses, and especially from 
 St. Alban's ; and this was the reason of John Bostock's 
 going there, and becoming acquainted with his afterwards 
 patron and friend. 
 
 That the Duke of Gloucester, when Protector of the 
 King, if not of England (as his enemies contend he con- 
 trived to be), was a true friend to Whethamsted, who 
 was once abbot of the monastery of St. Alban's, is abund- 
 antly proved by the fact that the Duke helped to get the 
 charter of the Abbey renewed, and so enlarged that no 
 monastery in the kingdom had the like, nor any church 
 such a franchise ; and also by the Duke and his wife 
 Jacqueline becoming members of the fraternity of the 
 monastery, and living there for a time in conformity with 
 a practice that had formerly prevailed, but which this 
 abbot's predecessors had suffered to fall into abey- 
 ance. 
 
 The reason of Whethamsted reviving this old custom 
 
 H 2
 
 ioo Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 was, no doubt, to obtain funds for the repair and restora- 
 tion of the Abbey church, which had, through neglect 
 and natural decay, fallen into very bad condition ; and it 
 is easy to perceive that the Duke of Gloucester's going 
 to the monastery with his young and beautiful wife gave 
 an attraction to the occurrence which greatly contributed 
 to the ends the worthy abbot had in view. 
 
 It was in the year 1423 this event happened ; and Clut- 
 terbuck, in his History of the County of 'Hertford, thus refers 
 to the revival of the old custom above alluded to : "To 
 this purpose he, the Abbot John de Whethamstede, col- 
 lected many sums from the lay gentry who were well dis- 
 posed towards the monastery, and he encouraged an old 
 practice of admitting into the fraternity many gentlemen 
 and ladies of high rank and quality. They were said 'sus- 
 cipere in se fraternitatem'; and at others, ' admissi sunt ad 
 fraternitatem' ; but the meaning of both phrases is the 
 same. In the number who entered this year, Roland 
 Penteshall, Knt., and many others who were of rank and 
 eminence for fortune, knights also ; and one of them is 
 styled ' Dapifer Reginae ' ; another who entered was 
 Thomas More, formerly Dean of St. Paul's, whose 
 executors, some years after, gave ^26 towards the re- 
 pairs. In 1423 there were admitted the illustrious Hum- 
 phrey, Duke of Gloucester, and Jacqueline, Duchess of 
 Holland and Haynault, his wife. These two personages 
 having kept the Feast of the Nativity (or, in modern 
 phrase, passed the Christmas holidays in the monastery), 
 conferred, at their departure, two purple robes to the
 
 and his First Duchess. 101 
 
 Abbey. This admission into the fraternity gave no new 
 civil privileges to the persons, nor laid on them any new 
 duties or burdens ; they were not compellable to undergo 
 the strict and rigid way of living observed by the monks, 
 neither to rise early, nor eat the bread of carefulness. 
 But it was a token of their esteem and honour for 
 religion, and they were allowed to vote in the Chapter. 
 So that it was a wise policy to encourage the rich and great 
 to become thus interested for the safety and prosperity of 
 these institutions. In 1428 above thirty persons took on 
 them the rule of the fraternity, as appears by the list ; 
 and one of them was Sir Henry Beauchamp, probably 
 the son of Henry Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick. All 
 these contributed to the works of the church." 
 
 It is well known that the Duke was a master of lan- 
 guages, and used to correspond with the most distin- 
 guished foreigners and learned men of his time, in their 
 own and the Latin tongue, and was always ready to 
 receive and entertain them when visiting England : in- 
 deed, his love and devotion to literature and science were 
 so great as to induce him to bequeath to the University of 
 Oxford (his venerated Alma Mater] some one hundred 
 and thirty " rare book", as an entry in an old register at 
 Oxford records ; and although no catalogue of them is 
 in existence, there can be little doubt of their value, when 
 books at this time (so soon after the discovery of printing) 
 were costly and rare enough, in fact, treasures that few 
 beyond princes and rich nobles could indulge in. We 
 may rest assured that the gift to the University was as
 
 IO2 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 highly appreciated as it was generous and noble on the 
 part of the accomplished donor.* 
 
 That the "Good Duke" was also a lover of archi- 
 tectural studies and pursuits is evidenced by his not only 
 building the " Divinity School" at Oxford, but by his 
 helping to beautify and restore parts of the Abbey of St. 
 Alban's itself, where, with his congenial friend and former 
 fellow-student, the zealous and learned Whethamsted, he 
 probably spent many of his early and happiest days. The 
 gift, too, noticed before was not by any means the only 
 one he made to the Abbey, since he is said to have be- 
 stowed costly vestments for the use of the choir, and rich 
 hangings for the altar, together with a variety of em- 
 broidered suits and several hoods of cloth, and velvet, 
 and satin, for the use of the ecclesiastics. Of the Duke's 
 interest in and preservation of works of art as well as 
 literature, in fact, for his taste generally as an antiquary, 
 we have a satisfactory proof in some curious lines written 
 by John Lydgate, the court poet of those days, albeit but 
 a poor one after the " Father of English Poetry", as he is 
 generally termed, Geoffrey Chaucer ; or his friend and 
 companion, Gower, who joined with him in improving 
 and reforming the English language, not many years 
 before Lydgate's time. The lines were written by Lyd- 
 gate in honour of his patron, the Duke Humphrey, at 
 the time of his nephew's grand coronation, as Henry VI 
 
 * The remains of this celebrated and early bequest of books were 
 long afterwards absorbed in the Bodleian Library, and where some 
 of the choicest of them now exist.
 
 and his First Duchess. 103 
 
 of England and King of France, at Paris, Dec. 17, 1430, 
 an event that inspired, by its grandeur and unexampled 
 interest, all the poets and painters of the day to com- 
 memorate it. The words are as follow, and point out 
 specifically enough the great Duke's love for antiquarian 
 studies, even in the midst of his other employments and 
 duties ; weighty enough at this period of his history, as 
 all know from what followed so soon after the King's 
 coronation in France, and England's loss of territory 
 thereby : 
 
 " Due of Gloucester men this prince call ; 
 And notwithstanding his state and dignite, 
 His corage never doth appalle 
 To studie in booke of Antiquite ; 
 Therin he hath so great felicite 
 Vertuousli himself to occupie, 
 Of vinous slouth to have the maistrie." 
 
 It may well be supposed that Humphrey's taste for 
 architecture, and the embellishment of the Abbey, led 
 him to design the noble shrine which to this day exists 
 (albeit shorn of many of its former beauties) over the 
 Duke's resting-place in the Saints' Chapel, and which 
 Abbot Whethamsted is generally supposed to have erected 
 as a fitting monument to his truly devoted friend and 
 patron. Still, this is a disputed point, as many are of 
 opinion that when Whethamsted, after ruling over the 
 Abbey about twenty years, resigned his office upon the 
 plea of ill health, although the decline of the power of 
 his great friend at court was probably the cause, and John
 
 IO4 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 Stoke, Prior of Wallingford, was elected to succeed him, 
 it was he, and not Whethamsted, who built the tomb, or 
 perhaps completed what his predecessors had so piously 
 begun ; as in his time the death and burial of the illus- 
 trious Duke took place, the latter with great pomp and 
 circumstance at the Abbey ; forming, indeed, the princi- 
 pal event of John Stoke's rule, which was by no means a 
 successful one for the establishment, as he suffered its 
 possessions to be wasted by the inferior inmates ; and al- 
 though he stood up in the defence of the Abbey's rights 
 and privileges, as is seen by the Cotton MS., Nero D. vii, 
 the exertions he made to preserve them proved ultimately 
 fruitless. 
 
 There are, however, others who do not agree that the 
 splendid tomb, forming even now one of the most in- 
 teresting features of the Abbey, was erected by Stoke ; 
 and Mr. Gough, in his work on Sepulchral Monuments of 
 Great Britain, considers that the tomb was built by 
 Abbot Whethamsted, " the firm friend and admirer of 
 the Duke", entirely, although the following extract from 
 the Cottonian MS. above alluded to seems to point to a 
 different conclusion : " Et quemadmodum pro jure et 
 libertate suse ecclesise viriliter ssepius se opposuit : sic 
 etiam Dei ad honorem et decorem ipsius vicibus variis 
 quam plura fabricari fecit. Nam dum sospes super- 
 stesque fuerat illud lapideum tabernaculum quod pro nunc 
 erigitur super domini ducis Gloucestrise sarcophagum 
 fabricari faciebat." 
 
 It may be as well here to give an account, taken from
 
 and his First Duchess. 105 
 
 Clutterbuck's before-mentioned work, of the interesting 
 discovery of the remains of the celebrated Duke, and a 
 description of the tomb, which, although worn by time 
 and natural decay, still presents features of great interest, 
 and evidences of former grandeur : " It seems that in mak- 
 ing an excavation to form a vault in the Saints' Chapel, the 
 workmen employed in digging struck against a little stone 
 staircase of four or five steps, which led to a further ex- 
 amination, and at length introduced them to a more 
 ancient vault, where they found a leaden coffin contain- 
 ing the Duke's body embalmed in a brown liquor. 
 
 " In consequence of this the staircase with the vault and 
 all its contents were opened to the view of the public ; and 
 a trap-door being placed over it, Duke Humphrey's vault 
 in St. Alban's Abbey became a mine of wealth to the 
 parish clerk for a long series of years, till at length the 
 embalming liquor became exhausted by exposure to the 
 air, and all the bones of the skeleton were either moul- 
 dered into dust or carried away." Upon the wall of 
 the east end of the vault was painted a crucifix ; and just 
 over this vault, between the two eastermost pillars on the 
 south side of the chapel, stands the Duke's magnificent 
 shrine, built (again says Clutterbuck) " under the direc- 
 tion of Abbot Whethamsted, and enriched with canopied 
 niches reaching nearly to the top of the arch, which once 
 contained figures. The central part is adorned with 
 seventeen shields of the Duke's arms, France and Eng- 
 land quarterly, within a bordure; seven of which are 
 larger than the rest, and have either been supported by
 
 io6 
 
 two antelopes, or crowned with a large and handsome 
 coronet like a turban. The roof of the canopy of the 
 arch is adorned with rich pendants and much curious 
 minute carving in stone. The back of it, looking into 
 the south aisle, is defended by a strong iron grating or 
 lattice-work, in compartments alternately disposed in 
 saltire and in cross, once painted blue. Above, as on 
 the opposite side, are seventeen canopied niches, on each 
 of which stands a little, squat figure of a king with a 
 crown on his head." Sandford thinks these figures are 
 intended to represent the " Good Duke's" ancestors ; but 
 Mr. Gough inclines to believe them to be effigies of 
 kings of Mercia. High on the wall that closes the 
 south aisle, just by the shrine, are the Duke's arms sur- 
 mounted by a coronet, and beneath them this inscrip- 
 tion : 
 
 " Piae Memoriae V . opt. 
 
 Sacrum 
 Serotinum. 
 
 Hie jacet Humphredus dux ille Glocestrius, olim 
 Henrici sexti protector, fraudis ineptas 
 Delector, dum ficta notat miracula coed : 
 Lumen erat Patriae, columen venerabile regni, 
 Pacis amans, musisq : favens melioribus, unde 
 Gratum opus Oxonie, quae nunc schola sacra refulget, 
 Invida sed mulier regno, regi, sibi nequam 
 Abstulit hunc, humili vix hoc dignita sepulchre : 
 Invidia rumpente tamen, post funera vivit. 
 Deo Gloria." 
 
 The following account of the expense of making the 
 Duke's grand tomb and resting-place, taken from the
 
 and his First Duchess. 107 
 
 Cotton MSS. in the British Museum, marked Claud. A. 
 8> 195, will be found interesting, and may very appropri- 
 ately be introduced at this portion of my paper : 
 
 In this sedule be conteyned the charges and observances 
 appointed by the noble Prince Humfrey, late Duke of 
 Gloucester, to be perpetuelly boren by the Abbot and 
 Convent of the monasterie of Seint Alban : 
 
 First, the Abbot and Convent of the seid monasterie 
 have payd for makynsje of the tumbe and place of 
 sepulture of the seid duke, within the seid monasterie 
 above the sume of ccccxxxiii/. vu. viiit/. . ^433 6 8 
 
 Item. Two monks prests dayly saying messe at the 
 Auter of Sepulture of the seid prince, everych taking 
 by the day 6cf., summa thereof by one hole yere, 
 xviij/. vj. . . . . . . 18 5 o 
 
 Item. To the abbot ther yerly the day of the anniver- 
 sary of seid prince attendying his exequyes* . .1000 
 
 Item. To the priour ther yerly the same day in like- 
 wise attendying . . . . . 10 O o 
 
 Item. To 40 monks not priests yerely, the said day, to 
 
 everych of them the same day 6s. &/. Summa therof .1368 
 
 Item. To ii Ankresses at St. Peter's Church and St. 
 
 Michael, the seid day, yerely, to everych . . o 20 o 
 
 Item. In money to be distribut to pore people ther the 
 
 seid day . . ' . . . . o 40 o 
 
 Item. To 13 pore men berying torches about the 
 
 Sepulture the seid day . . . o 40 o 
 
 Item. For wex brennyng daily at his masses and his 
 
 seid anniversary and of torches yerely . . 6134 
 
 Item. To the kechen of the convent ther yerely in relief 
 of the grete decay of the livehode of the said Monas- 
 terie, in the Marches of Scotland, which before time 
 hath he appointed to the seid kechyn . . . 40 o o 
 
 * Clutterbuck prints this sum at 40^. ; but Newcome 10, which 
 seems the most likely amount.
 
 io8 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 Whilst on the subject of this great prince's tomb in 
 the Abbey of St. Alban's, it would be appropriate to refer 
 to the origin of the well-known saying, " to dine with Duke 
 Humphrey", with which his last resting-place is curiously 
 and directly connected, and which has become a common 
 phrase for going without any dinner at all. 
 
 The popularity of the Duke with the Commons, or 
 people of England generally, and the citizens of London 
 in particular, is so well-known, that many writers have 
 reproached him as having used his power and influence 
 over their minds for his own ends, and not for the good 
 of the state generally ; indeed, there is very little doubt 
 but that the secret manner of the Duke's being done to 
 death at Bury St. Edmund's, through the instrumentality 
 of the arrogant and haughty Cardinal Beaufort, and the 
 cruel and aspiring Richard Plantagenet, arose from the 
 fear of a public trial exciting the people in his favour, 
 and thereby frustrating the ambitious plans of his all- 
 powerful enemies. It, therefore, happened that at the 
 discovery of his murder, so great indignation and excite- 
 ment prevailed amongst his friends and faithful Commons, 
 that the weak king, who certainly loved his uncle, and 
 deeply deplored his miserable death, to make all the 
 reparation he could to the memory of one so dear to 
 England, gave orders for a grand and public funeral ; 
 and, to appease the anger of the people, and the citizens 
 of London particularly, who were the steadfast adherents 
 of the great Duke, no doubt had his body conveyed to 
 St. Paul's, where, in accordance with Henry's devotion to
 
 and his First Duchess. 109 
 
 religious observances, great pomp and ceremony were 
 used during the time the royal remains rested there, and 
 until the magnificent shrine and tomb at St. Alban's 
 could be made ready to receive them, where we know 
 they were ultimately deposited. The temporary inter- 
 ment of the " Good Duke" in St. Paul's, if this conjec- 
 tural view of Henry's action on the decease of his uncle 
 be a correct one, gave rise to the curious mistake after- 
 wards made by his friends and retainers, in continuing 
 to believe that the Duke of Gloucester still remained 
 in that cathedral, since we find in Dugdale's History of 
 St. Paul's, edited by Sir Henry Ellis, p. 107, the follow- 
 ing passages in connexion therewith : 
 
 " The expression, ' to dine with Duke Humphrey',, ap- 
 plied to persons who, being unable either to procure a din- 
 ner by their own money or from the favour of their friends, 
 walk about and loiter during dinner-time, had its origin 
 in one of the aisles of St. Paul's which was called Duke 
 Humphrey's Walk ; not that there ever was in reality a 
 cenotaph there to the Duke's memory, who every one 
 knows was buried at St. Alban's in Herts, but because, 
 says Stowe, ignorant people mistook the fair monument 
 of Sir John Beauchamp, who died in 1358, and which 
 was in the south side of the body of the church, for that 
 of Humphrey Duke of Gloucester." 
 
 It appears that a monument to the memory of a Sir 
 John Beaumont, described as Constable of Dover and 
 Warden of the Ports, K.G., and a brother to the Earl of 
 Warwick (which should have made the name Beauchamp,
 
 no Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 if such were the case), and who was buried in a chapel 
 of St. Paul's in the year 1358, had the honour of being 
 mistaken for the great Duke's tomb, since Stowe, in his 
 Survey of London, vol. i, 165, part i, thus quaintly refers 
 to this occurrence : 
 
 " He is by ignorant people misnamed to Humphrey, 
 Duke of Gloucester, who lieth buried honourably at St. 
 Alban's, twenty miles from London. And, therefore, such 
 as merrily profess themselves to serve Duke Humphrey 
 are to be punished here and sent to St. Alban's to be 
 punished again for their absence from their master as they 
 call him. 
 
 " In idle and frivolous opinion of whom some men 
 of late times have made a solemn meeting at his tomb, 
 upon St. Andrew's day in the morning before Xmas, 
 and concluded on a Breakfast or Dinner as assuming 
 themselves to be Servants and to hold diversity of offices 
 under the Duke Humphrey." 
 
 The following extract is appended by way of a note to 
 the above paragraph, although it does not go far to ex- 
 plain it, but makes what was difficult to understand before 
 more inexplicable still : 
 
 " Likewise on May day, Tankard Bearers, Watermen, 
 and some other like quality beside, would use to come to 
 the same Tomb early in the morning (according as the 
 other) have delivered serviceable presentation at the same 
 Monument, by strewing Herbs and sprinkling fair Water 
 on it as in duty of Servants and according to the degrees 
 and charges in office."
 
 and his First Duchess. in 
 
 By those who may be interested enough in this curious 
 custom and the quaint saying that evidently grew out of 
 it, reference should be made to Brand's Popular Antiqui- 
 ties, ed. 1813, p. 670, vol. ii ; Sandford's Genealogical 
 History, p. 317 ; and Reed's edition of Shakespeare, vol. 
 xiv, pp. 458-9. Dean Milman, in his History of St. 
 Paul's Cathedral, also refers to the legend in question. 
 
 It is time now to turn to an episode in the life of the 
 Duke of Gloucester, which is not only of a very interest- 
 ing character, but from the ultimate effects of which, 
 Humphrey in his silent and saddened hours, deeply 
 overshadowing the latter years of his life, could never 
 wholly have recovered, and which, perhaps unknown even 
 to himself, influenced his actions and led him to escape 
 from the remorse attending his cruel conduct in early 
 days, into those wild schemes of ambition and extrava- 
 gance which his enemies accused him of, and which, 
 after the degradation of his second wife, the Duchess 
 Eleanor, so piteously painted by Shakspeare in the his- 
 toric play of King Henry VI, culminated in his unhappy 
 and untimely death. I allude to the story of Duke 
 Humphrey's first love and subsequent marriage with that 
 ill-used, and too often unjustly blamed, heroine of 
 romance Jacoba or Jacqueline, as she is most usually 
 called Duchess of Hainault and Holland, who seems 
 in much of her unfortunate career to have resembled the 
 equally ill-starred and unhappy Lady Jane Seymour, Isa- 
 bella Stuart, and Mary Queen of Scots ; the latter, per- 
 haps, more nearly than the other two, in the matter of
 
 H2 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 their great alliances and subsequent misfortunes the 
 sorrows and romantic incidents of whose lives have, 
 " time out of mind," furnished themes for the best writers, 
 both in poetry and prose, throughout the world, to dis- 
 course upon. 
 
 We know that Henry V, on his deathbed, entrusted to 
 his elder brother, John, Duke of Bedford, the Regency 
 of France, with, also, the superintendence of affairs in 
 England, and that he appointed Humphrey Duke of 
 Gloucester, his youngest brother, Protector of the 
 future King, then but an infant, subject, however, to 
 the governance of the Privy Council of England. This 
 unhappily caused much annoyance and pain to Gloucester, 
 who, being of a proud and ambitious nature, could not 
 brook the interference of others, however great and 
 noble ; neither did he covet the possession of mere 
 empty titles of honour, since in the stirring and eventful 
 times of his brother's warlike life, the latter had con- 
 stantly allowed him, in matters of the highest importance, 
 to act entirely by himself, and had been well satisfied 
 with the able conduct he had evinced on such occa- 
 sions. 
 
 These feelings of disappointment and injured pride 
 naturally produced their evil fruit ; for Humphrey, finding 
 that the Parliament was in no way disposed to listen to 
 his protests against the control which the Lords exercised 
 over him, and which the Bishop of Winchester, afterwards 
 Cardinal Beaufort, as has before been referred to in this 
 paper, was one of the chief to incite and keep up on all
 
 and his First Duchess. 113 
 
 occasions against his nephew, threw himself into the hands 
 of the people and courted them every way, thus creating 
 in the minds of an easily led and excitable populace that 
 powerful feeling of admiration and regard, which, up to 
 the time of the Duke's death, as well as long afterwards, 
 reigned in the hearts of the Commons and citizens of 
 London for him, and, unfortunately, for twenty years 
 of the unhappy Henry's reign, produced those quarrels 
 and bickerings between the Duke and the Bishop Cardinal, 
 who was, no doubt, secretly jealous of Humphrey's great 
 ability and talents as well as of the people's regard for 
 him (who were now beginning to feel uneasy under the 
 intolerable yoke which, in the name of holy religion, the 
 Church of Rome imposed upon the country), and which 
 ultimately led to the horrors of civil war and the complete 
 downfall of the House of Lancaster. 
 
 It was at the time of the great King Henry the Fifth's 
 death, at the Castle of Vincennes, near Paris, and before 
 these feelings of irritation and wounded pride could well 
 have taken deep root in Humphrey's nature, that he met 
 with and subsequently married the young and lovely, 
 though then almost twice widowed, Jacqueline, Countess 
 of Hainault, of whose history to this time it is now neces- 
 sary to speak. 
 
 Jacqueline was the only daughter of William, Count of 
 Hainault, and was married at the early age of fifteen to 
 the Duke of Touraine, the second son of Charles VI of 
 France, and who, by the death of his elder brother, be- 
 came Dauphin a few months after his marriage, thus 
 
 i
 
 114 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 opening to his beautiful and accomplished wife, who 
 had already inherited from her father the sovereignty ot 
 Holland, Zealand, and Friesland, the prospect of being 
 some day Queen of France. 
 
 But, alas ! for Jacqueline, these brilliant visions quickly 
 disappeared, for in the second year of her wedded life 
 her husband, the Dauphin, died suddenly, strongly sus- 
 pected of being poisoned by Catherine de Medicis 
 (whose subsequent deeds of death-dealing, by means of 
 secret poisons known to her family, as the name of the 
 House so fatally in her instance would seem to indicate), 
 leaves very little doubt of the probable cause of his 
 death. 
 
 The young and rich widow of the Dauphin, for she 
 was still but seventeen, was, however, not long destined 
 to wear her weeds, since her father, who died a year after, 
 is said to have exhorted his child on his deathbed, to 
 complete a scheme he had indulged in since her becoming 
 a widow, to marry again ; and this time, with a view to 
 strengthen the house of Hainault, he besought her to 
 marry the Duke of Brabant, a near kinsman, but a man 
 in every way, from his habits of life and low state of intel- 
 lect, entirely unfitted to be her husband. However, his 
 influence, coupled by that of her mother, prevailed, and 
 again was Jacqueline conducted to the altar, but this 
 time by a man who, neither by personal nor mental ac- 
 quirements, was suited to his high-spirited and gifted 
 bride, who was thus sacrificed to that false, though common 
 feeling of keeping family possessions together, without
 
 and his First Ducliess. \ 1 5 
 
 the smallest reference to the chances of future happiness 
 to the parties most concerned, which in earlier ages, as 
 well as at the present time, so largely prevailed, and pre- 
 vails, in matrimonial alliances. 
 
 The marriage turned out as badly as so ill-advised a 
 one might have been expected to do, from the thorough 
 unfitness of the contracting parties ; and ere long the 
 Duchess of Brabant, as Jacqueline had now become, 
 found out to her sorrow, that her husband was as con- 
 temptible and cowardly in the field of battle as he had 
 already proved himself to be, by his unmanly conduct, in 
 married life. 
 
 Her uncle, John of Bavaria, having asserted his claims 
 to the sovereignty of Holland and Hainault, on the death 
 of her father, Jacqueline, called together her forces and 
 took the field against him, and, of course, relied upon her 
 husband the Duke, with, his Brabanters, for material aid. 
 
 She is said to have performed prodigies of valour, armed 
 cap-a-pie, like another Minerva, fighting gallantly for her 
 rights ; but her husband's craven-like conduct in ordering 
 a retreat of his followers, at a critical moment, in one of 
 the contests they were engaged in, lost the Duchess all 
 the advantages her prowess had hitherto gained ; and 
 dismay having taken possession of the Brabanters, they 
 fled from the field, and their Duke concluded an igno- 
 minious peace with his wife's enemy, John of Bavaria, 
 after having, to hide his shame and disgrace, withdrawn 
 his forces from Holland, and commanded his indignant 
 and insulted Duchess to follow him to Brabant. 
 
 I 2
 
 In strong and indignant terms is Jacqueline said to 
 have reproached the Duke for his mean-spirited conduct, 
 and this quickly produced, on a low and narrow-minded 
 nature like his, the evil effects which soon followed for, 
 wholly neglecting his wife, he abandoned himself to 
 the vilest gratifications and pursuits, and treated the 
 Duchess with every mark of brutality he was capable of. 
 
 Conduct such as this, and from such a man, was not 
 likely to be long submitted to by the high-spirited and 
 outraged Jacqueline, and, her contempt being now 
 changed into hatred, she withdrew entirely from her 
 husband's society, and returned to her native country, 
 Hainault, where, in the full lustre of her beauty and 
 womanhood, being at the time only twenty years of age, 
 she remained for a time in comparative privacy. 
 
 During this period she sedulously set to work to get her 
 unfortunate marriage with the Duke of Brabant dissolved, 
 on the plea of the closeness of her blood-relationship to 
 him ; and through her family interest, which was still 
 very great, she at length obtained a papal dispensation 
 from the half-deposed Benedict XIII, which, we shall see 
 by and by, led to fresh misfortunes for the unhappy 
 Countess of Hamault, as she now called herself. 
 
 It was soon after her divorce from the miserable alli- 
 ance that had been formed for her, with this recreant 
 member of the great house' of Burgundy, to which the 
 Duke, as well as herself, belonged, that she met with the 
 handsome and gallant Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, 
 and, as it afterwards appeared, they were immediately
 
 and his First Duchess. 1 1 7 
 
 struck with one another for within a short time of 
 their first introduction the Duke made Jacqueline a 
 declaration of his love ; and, for the sake of his then 
 character, let us hope it was of that pure nature of 
 which poets so delight to picture, but which stern 
 reality, alas ! so little permits us to believe in. 
 
 Jacqueline's great personal attractions, as well as her 
 courage and self-command under such heavy misfortunes 
 as hers had been, were, without doubt, the theme of 
 general talk at the French Court, where the youthful 
 pair first met, and naturally impelled the ardent Hum- 
 phrey to offer her his hand, as soon as he found his 
 advances had not been ill-received by the handsome 
 widow ; if, in taking his subsequent desertion of his 
 wife into consideration, as we are obliged to do, a 
 thought that the rich possessions that belonged to the 
 Countess in her own right, might possibly have influenced 
 his action in so soon making her his Duchess, should 
 cross the mind of the reader, we can only regret the 
 supposition, although we may be bound to confess that 
 there is some reason to believe it true. 
 
 The annulment of Jacqueline's marriage with her 
 cousin of Brabant having been, as was thought at the 
 time, legally and effectually carried out, the young 
 Countess and the handsome Humphrey set out for 
 England, and despite the powerful influence of her kins- 
 man, the Duke of Burgundy, who, being already lord of 
 great domains in the Netherlands, looked with a greedy 
 eye upon the large possessions of Jacqueline, and liked
 
 1 1 8 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester \ 
 
 not her "taking the property out of the family", the 
 young couple were wedded with great pomp and splen- 
 dour, and received with the most flattering marks of 
 attention by the King and the Court ; while the Duke, 
 her husband, in right of his newly-acquired wife, took at 
 once the title of Count of Hainault, Holland, and 
 Flanders, and Lord of Friesland. 
 
 For a time the royal pair lived in great happiness and 
 splendour, and the star of Jacqueline appeared to be once 
 again in the ascendant, but, alas ! bitter trials were in 
 store for her, and that malignant fortune which pursued 
 her so persistently, soon made the sunshine of her pros- 
 perity diminish, and her hope of peacefulness and love 
 quickly to fade away. 
 
 It was during this happy period of their lives that our 
 illustrious couple made even St. Alban's Abbey more 
 memorable still in the hearts of its many admirers, by 
 passing the Christmas holiday in the Monastery, and 
 for the time being, in accordance with the old custom 
 revived by Abbot Whethamsted, as has before been 
 referred to, becoming Lay members of the establishment. 
 
 That during their stay at the Abbey great feasts and 
 festivities were carried on, there is every reason to 
 believe, and we know, through the famous scenes at St. 
 Alban's in Shakspeare's second part of Henry VI, how 
 fond the King and Humphrey were of field sports of 
 every kind, and what great excellence his birds attained 
 to, since Henry says to the Duke of Gloucester : 
 
 " But what a point, my Lord, your falcon made ; 
 And what a pitch she flew above the rest !"
 
 and his First Duchess. 1 1 9 
 
 No doubt constant hunting and hawking parties were the 
 order of the day, in which, as the youthful Monarch 
 frequently resided at the palace of King's Langley (the 
 ruins of which are yet to be seen in the immediate 
 neighbourhood of St. Alban's), his Majesty with the 
 ladies and gentlemen of his court were in the habit of 
 joining. 
 
 The following extract from Sandford's History, will ' 
 show how grandly the royal pair kept up their state 
 whilst at the Abbey, and the manner 'of making their 
 visits to their youthful Sovereign at King's Langley, or 
 pleasure excursions in the neighbourhood : 
 
 " In this year the Dutchess of Holland, and wife of 
 Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, rode through the great 
 Court of the Abbey, attended by 24 horsemen, on her 
 way to the royal mansion at Langley, and next day the 
 Duke followed her, accompanied by Sir John Roberts, 
 his Master of the Horse, and 10 horsemen." 
 
 After some time spent in England, in such joyous and 
 pleasurable proceedings (for the dark clouds gathering 
 over the fortunes of the young King had not burst yet), 
 the Duke and his Duchess set off for Hainault, and 
 there Jacqueline began to experience in full the bitter 
 resentment of the Duke of Burgundy at her marriage 
 with Humphrey. 
 
 Her cousin of Burgundy had made common cause 
 with her divorced husband, the Duke of Brabant, 
 and joining their forces together they assailed the army 
 which she had hastily collected on her arrival. The
 
 I2O Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 Duke of Gloucester fought well and bravely in his 
 beautiful wife's cause, but, being overpowered by num- 
 bers, his troops were at length defeated with great 
 slaughter at a place called Braine, in Hainault. Here- 
 upon he decided to return to England to raise fresh 
 forces to avenge his defeat, and at first his sorrowful 
 Duchess determined to accompany him, but unfortun- 
 ately, as it afterwards proved, she, at the entreaty of the 
 people of Mons, her capital city, remained behind ; and, 
 a'lthough the Duke despatched fresh forces to her assist- 
 ance, and did all in his power to aid her, not being able 
 to come himself, her cousin of Burgundy again defeated 
 her in a pitched battle, and took Jacqueline herself 
 prisoner, and had her confined in the city of Ghent, 
 where for a long time she remained in a sad and solitary 
 condition. 
 
 The poor Duchess never saw her husband Humphrey 
 again ; for he, upon one plea or another (affairs of state 
 being doubtless the principal ones), excused himself 
 from even fighting in her cause, and, what was worse, 
 once more crossing the water to see her. Thus deserted 
 by one who ought never to have forsaken her, Jacque- 
 line must have been despondent indeed, in her lonely 
 hours of captivity ; but even this misfortune did not 
 crush her courageous spirit, for, with the help of some of 
 her still true friends, disguised in male attire, she 
 managed to escape one night from her prison in Ghent, 
 and gained in safety her province of Holland, where 
 again assisted by her faithful followers, she essayed
 
 and his First Duchess. 121 
 
 her fortune on the battle-field, and for a time was suc- 
 sessful in her efforts against her relentless enemies, who, 
 however, keeping up their combination against her, 
 ultimately prevailed, and poor Jacqueline fell once more 
 into the power of her cruel and sordid cousin, the Duke 
 of Burgundy. 
 
 To add to her grief and distress at this unhappy turn 
 of Fortune's wheel, the Duke, through his influence with 
 the new Pope Martin V, obtained a Bull from him, by 
 which her former marriage with the Duke of Brabant was 
 confirmed, and Benedict's dispensation to dissolve it set 
 aside, thus annulling her alliance with the Duke of 
 Gloucester altogether ; and what was worse, and to show 
 her cousin's jealousy at that connection, a clause was in- 
 troduced in the document to the effect, that even were 
 she to become again a widow, she could not re-marry the 
 Duke of Gloucester. 
 
 But a greater blow was yet to fall on the unfortunate 
 lady, whose cup of sorrow was already full enough, and 
 this was the news of her cruel and complete desertion by 
 the Duke of Gloucester, whose fickle disposition and in- 
 constancy were now fully proved, by his eagerly availing 
 himself of the so-called dissolution of his marriage to the 
 Countess of Hainault, by wedding, without further loss of 
 time, Eleanor, the daughter of Lord Cobham of Ster- 
 borough, a lady with whom it is probable enough he had 
 been for some time on close terms of intimacy, as it is 
 said the Duke first met with her in the suite of his now 
 abandoned and deeply outraged Duchess. To the miseries
 
 122 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 that attended this ill-omened marriage, it is not in the 
 province of this paper to do more than simply allude, 
 although the details connected with it are full of the 
 deepest interest, and may serve at some future time for a 
 sequel to this page of historical romance. 
 
 That it brought a heavy, if not just punishment on 
 Humphrey, is at least certain, for without doubt the 
 ambitious views of his new Duchess led not only to the 
 ultimate downfall and disgrace of herself, as is so 
 poetically yet painfully described in Shakspeare's Henry 
 VI, Part II, Act ii, Scenes 3 and 4, but paved the way 
 to the miserable fate and mysterious death of the Duke 
 himself, who, after the accusations levelled and proved 
 against his proud wife Eleanor, and her public penance, 
 never held up his head again, and soon fell into the 
 snares and pitfalls his cunning and triumphant enemies 
 had prepared for him. 
 
 But we must now again return to the unfortunate 
 Countess of Hainault, whose wrongs at the instance of 
 Humphrey were, in his future troubles and remorse for 
 his cruelty to her, to be duly avenged thus showing 
 that a Nemesis awaits on all, either in peasant life or 
 princely condition, however completely, for a time, the 
 crimes that have been committed may have been con- 
 cealed. 
 
 The poor lady was not only once more alone in the 
 world, and overcome by grief and shame at the base 
 desertion of her treacherous royal spouse, but again in the 
 hands of her powerful and relentless kinsman, the Duke
 
 and his First Duchess. 123 
 
 of Burgundy, who taking advantage of the unhappy con- 
 dition of his wretched captive, compelled her to the 
 following hard terms, on which alone would he agree to 
 give her, what she now sighed for, liberty and peace. He 
 stipulated that he should henceforth be her Lieutenant 
 over her fair dominions, thereby, of course, making 
 Jacqueline wholly dependent upon him, and, as she was 
 now a second time a widow, her former husband and 
 cousin, the Duke of Brabant, being dead, her hard- 
 hearted relative made her enter into a solemn engage- 
 ment never to marry again without the consent of her 
 provinces, and of himself, her guardian and nearest male 
 kinsman. 
 
 Thus, at the age of twenty-seven, was the now almost 
 broken-hearted Countess made the victim, not only to 
 the greedy and rapacious nature of her imperious cousin, 
 the Duke of Burgundy, but forced, under the cruel cir- 
 cumstances she found herself placed in, to consent to an 
 insulting condition which no woman of spirit could 
 willingly accept, and which, extorted from her by violence 
 and cunning, no wonder she in her secret thoughts 
 resolved not to abide by, when the opportunity served. 
 
 For a time Jacqueline lived in quietude and retirement 
 in her province of Zealand, and, although wholly de- 
 pending for her comparatively modest support on the 
 allowance her cruel cousin of Burgundy made her, she 
 managed to divert her thoughts, oftentimes melancholy 
 and sad enough, when she recalled her former happy 
 hours, by joining in the village sports near her chateau ;
 
 124 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 and in the frequent practice of archery, or of feats of 
 arms and of horsemanship, she became a great expert, 
 and so won the admiration of all who beheld her ; she 
 also gained the love of her humble villagers and retainers, 
 and in their honest-hearted affection found a solace, 
 temporary though it proved to be, for the broken vows 
 and cruel disappointments she had met with in a much 
 higher sphere of life. 
 
 But an event soon happened to disturb the serenity of 
 her now peaceful life, and for a time overwhelmed the 
 almost thrice widowed Princess with fresh misfortunes, 
 and compelled her again to undergo the most cruel treat- 
 ment at the hands of her implacable foe, the Duke of 
 Burgundy. 
 
 Among the Lords of Holland who had been the most 
 persistent in their enmity to the young Countess, was 
 Francis Borselen, Lord of Martendyke, and a great pos- 
 sessor of estates in Zealand, where he constantly resided ; 
 his continued opposition to the interests of the unfor- 
 tunate lady, although so near a neighbour, had naturally 
 kept him apart from her society and influence ; but a 
 mightier power was now at work, by which these seeming 
 foes were to become close friends, and ultimately to dis- 
 perse much of the gloom by which the destiny of the 
 Countess had so long been shrouded. 
 
 It happened that Margaret of Burgundy, the mother of 
 Jacqueline, who, though still living, was not permitted to 
 reside with her almost imprisoned daughter, sent to the 
 Countess from her much loved Hainault, a noble horse,
 
 and his First Duchess. 125 
 
 as a present and token of her affection ; and her daughter, 
 anxious to reward her mother's messenger in a manner 
 becoming her rank and condition, and to testify her 
 appreciation of such a welcome gift, found herself, to 
 her great annoyance and dismay, without the means of 
 doing so ; at a loss what to do, she entertained the 
 messenger at her chateau, and made her sorrow known 
 to her trusty friends alone, and one of them, out of kind- 
 ness and sympathy with the loved mistress of their 
 village, contrived that the Lord of Borselen should hear 
 of the dilemma the Countess was in. To his honour 
 and subsequent renown, the noble-hearted Borselen, 
 forgetting all his animosity to 'Jacqueline, at once des- 
 patched to her in private a large sum of money, and 
 thus enabled her adequately to reward her mother's envoy. 
 Touched by the generosity as well as delicacy of the 
 young nobleman's conduct, the Countess determined to 
 thank in person her generous -benefactor, and so, laying 
 aside all recollections of his past unkindness and perse- 
 cution, she intimated to him her wish to see and to 
 render him her thanks for his timely service. The meet- 
 ing took place at her own castle, where the Lord of 
 Borselen hastened to greet the still beautiful Countess, 
 and, as the "Blind god" would have it, these two bitter 
 enemies fell deeply in love with each other; and, 
 although there was great disparity in their station of 
 life, the Countess accepted the offer of the young 
 Knight's hand, and after a short time was secretly 
 married to him.
 
 126 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 Thus was Jacqueline a fourth time wedded, and at her 
 then early age, there was every reason to suppose that a 
 brighter fortune than she had hitherto enjoyed was in 
 store for her; but it was not to be, as the sequel will 
 prove, and soon again was the now once more happy 
 Princess to be made the sport of cruel fortune. 
 
 The Duke of Burgundy quickly learnt, by means of 
 paid servants and spies, by whom he had long sur- 
 rounded his cousin, of the marriage she had contracted ; 
 and, vowing vengeance for her breach of the engagement 
 he had so wickedly wrung, from her, he, by virtue of the 
 power he held over her territories, ordered the immediate 
 arrest of the Lord of Borselen, and had him conveyed to 
 the Castle of Rupelmonde, in Flanders, situated at the 
 confluence of the rivers Rupel and Scheldt, and where, 
 to the great grief of the forlorn Jacqueline, he kept him 
 a close prisoner, torturing her from time to time with 
 rumours, which he contrived should come to the poor 
 lady's ears, that her husband's life was about to be for- 
 feited for the presumption of which he had been guilty 
 in marrying so far above his station, and without the per- 
 mission of the Duke, his wife's cousin and protector ! 
 The reports thus so cunningly contrived produced the 
 desired effect, for the brave Countess, believing in the 
 danger her lord was in, and feeling that his love and 
 devotion for her had brought the misfortune upon him, 
 collected a small force in Zealand, and with some vessels 
 she managed to procure, well-armed and equipped, set 
 sail up the river Scheldt, with the intention of delivering 
 her husband from his captivity.
 
 and his First Duchess. 127 
 
 The Duke of Burgundy, however, was before her, for, 
 having heard of his cousin's proceedings, he had arranged 
 to meet her ships with a superior force, and therefore, on 
 her reaching the castle in which her husband was con- 
 fined, she found the place too well guarded to enable her 
 to carry out her plans. 
 
 Disappointed, although not yet daunted, by this sudden 
 and unexpected failure of her scheme, Jacqueline de- 
 manded to see the Duke himself, which request being 
 at once accorded, an interview took place on board his 
 ship, and the unhappy lady entreated her haughty cousin 
 to inform her whether her husband was still living, and if 
 so to give her immediate proof of the fact. 
 
 The Duke, apparently with a view to gratify the 
 Countess, whom he had received with great courtesy, 
 but secretly with an intention of again getting her into 
 his power, gave orders that his prisoner should be im- 
 mediately brought on to the terrace of the castle in front 
 of the vessel on which they stood. The Countess, being 
 overcome with joy at again seeing her husband before 
 her alive and well, and forgetting in the ardour of her 
 affection the danger she ran, gave a spring from the 
 vessel's side, and was soon locked in the embrace of her 
 much-loved Borselen. But the rapture at this unexpected 
 meeting was not to last long, for the Duke, taking advan- 
 tage of Jacqueline's impulsive act, immediately im- 
 prisoned her, as well as her husband, in the very castle 
 from which she had hoped to free him. 
 
 Here the Duke continued to keep his cousin a ctosely 
 confined prisoner, and apart from her unhappy husband ;
 
 128 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 and working upon her fears for the safety of the man she 
 so loved, he at length succeeded in gaining from the 
 miserable Countess a renunciation of her sovereign rights 
 in his favour, the game for which he had so long and so 
 persistently played ; and on condition that she would not 
 incite her ancient and still devoted subjects to revolt 
 against him, he restored them both to liberty, giving his 
 cousin back certain states in Holland and Zealand, 
 which, out of regard and affection for the man who 
 had sacrificed so much for her sake, Jacqueline made 
 over as a free gift to her devoted husband, who was 
 afterwards created Count of Ostervant, and decorated 
 with the order of the Golden Fleece, by Philip of 
 Spain. 
 
 Thus at length were the troubles and misfortunes of 
 the poor Countess brought to an end, and in her com- 
 paratively humble condition she continued to live in 
 happiness and peace with her faithful spouse, who sought 
 in every way to make her forget the sorrows of her early 
 days. She died at the early age of thirty-six, and was 
 buried in the family tomb of the Counts of Holland, 
 with all the ceremonies befitting her exalted rank ; and 
 her last resting-place is to this day sought for and shown 
 to the traveller who desires to pay a passing tribute of 
 respect to whom it may be said : " She loved not wisely, 
 but too well." 
 
 During the last and happy period of her life, Jacque- 
 line, the once proud consort of the Dauphin of France, 
 and the afterwards equally proud wife of Humphrey,
 
 and his First Ducliess. 129 
 
 Duke of Gloucester, uncle of and Protector to the King 
 of England, amused and employed her leisure hours in 
 the making of vessels and vases in earthenware and clay ; 
 and this employment she carried on so successfully and 
 thoroughly, that to this time the cups she made are well- 
 known and much esteemed. Many of them were, from 
 time to time, found in the moat that surrounded her 
 castle, and religiously kept by the country people into 
 whose hands they fell, who named them the vases of the 
 Lady Jacoba of Hainault, and thus, by this simple act of 
 their admiration and esteem, have perpetuated the memory 
 of their illustrious, though truly unfortunate, friend and 
 Princess. 
 
 As archaeologists, we must all admire the devotion of 
 Jacqueline to the study and practice of so ancient and 
 classic an art as that of the manufacture of ceramic ware ; 
 and, although it is the belief of some writers that the 
 vases she made were not of any great or grand character, 
 there can exist little doubt, I should think, that much of 
 her work was of the highest order. Indeed, from her 
 well-known ability and excellence in all she undertook to 
 do, and her experience of the highest refinement that the 
 days she lived in could produce, both in France and 
 England, it is impossible not to suppose that such a 
 gifted woman would attain perfection in the copying of 
 any work of ceramic art then known, either of Chinese 
 or of Classic origin ; and, therefore, I am inclined to 
 believe the true merit of this lady's proficiency in the 
 production of fictile ware has not been assigned to her ; 
 and, to realise such an idea, I fancy I may possibly have 
 
 K
 
 130 Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, 
 
 solved a problem that has set many people thinking for 
 years and years, and which, if correct, must henceforth 
 add additional interest to the story of Jacqueline of 
 Hainault. 
 
 I allude to the origin of the word, porcelain, of which John- 
 son, in the 4to edition of his work, edited by Todd, gives 
 the following different explanations and extracts : " Por- 
 celaine, French, said to be derived from 'pour cent annees,' 
 because it was believed by Europeans that the materials 
 of porcelain were matured under ground one hundred 
 years." "Others say it is from the Portuguese porcellana, 
 a cup ; Mr. Douce, from the Italian ' porcellana? which, 
 as well as the French ' porcelaine,' is the name of a shell 
 called Concha Veneris, Venus's shell, to the polished 
 exterior of which china bears resemblance." "We are 
 not thoroughly resolved concerning porcelain or china 
 dishes ; that, according to common belief, they are made 
 of earth, which lieth in preparation about a hundred 
 years under ground." Brown, Vulg. Err. " We have 
 burials in several earths, where we put divers cements, as 
 the Chinese do their porcelain" Bacon. 
 
 Now, since these derivations' are as various as they 
 are vague, and as the manufacture in potter's clay 
 of the highest kind now known under the term of 
 Ceramic art, came from China and Japan, where this 
 elegant material termed by Europeans porcelain, was 
 first made, it is, I think, clear enough that our name for 
 the ware in question does not represent theirs, whatever 
 it may be, the term " China" to this day representing to 
 us the finest productions of works in clay, which have
 
 and his First Duchess. 131 
 
 - ~ " -- .--_.. ( 
 
 come direct from that country or Japan, as well as inferior 
 manufactures also. 
 
 Thus, as we certainly have gone out of our way to 
 create a name for this beautiful production, and from 
 European sources only, since even Professor Skeat, 
 in his Dictionary, wavers between the Portuguese 
 and Italian derivation, favouring withal the idea that 
 " Porcellana" is from the Latin " Porcus" ! why should 
 we not venture on another guess, and assume that as the 
 Countess Jacqueline became the "Lady of Borselen", and 
 employed herself in the manufacture of earthenware 
 vessels, well known during her life and afterwards as the 
 " Borselen vases", this name was ultimately changed into 
 " Porcelain", which a very slight alteration in sound and 
 spelling would effect ; and thus arrive, after all, at a 
 better and more natural solution of the puzzle, which 
 this word has evidently been to Lexicographers and 
 Etymologists " time out of mind" ! 
 
 In Sir Thomas Herbert's Travels, printed in 1665, he 
 writes the word " Porcellan", thus making the change of 
 Borselen into " Porcelain" simpler still, and to my idea, 
 whatever modern Word-manipulators may say to the 
 contrary (as of course they will), much more probaWe 
 than Johnson's far-fetched "pour cent annees", or Skeat's 
 later very inelegant and disagreeable "Porcine" derivation ! 
 
 [See Appendix for further Notes on this snbjectl\ 
 
 K 2
 
 ON THE INVOLUNTARY VISIT OF 
 
 PHILIP OF AUSTRIA AND JUANA OF 
 SPAIN, TO WEYMOUTH IN 1506, 
 
 AND ITS CONSEQUENCES. 
 
 HE sad and unexpected death of my valued 
 friend and fellow labourer for several years 
 on the committee of the Junior Athenaeum 
 Club, which I founded in 1864, Mr. H. F. 
 Holt, induced me to take up the subject he had given 
 notice of preparing for the then coming Congress of the 
 British Archaeological Association at Weymouth in 1871, 
 and in doing so I need hardly observe I fully recognised 
 the delicate nature of the work I undertook, since Mr. 
 Holt was no ordinary writer, as is evidenced in the 
 several historic and descriptive papers contributed by 
 him to the Journal of the above Society, from time to 
 time, and, therefore, although quite aware of how weak 
 must be any attempt to illustrate, as he would have 
 done, the curious, though true, story he had selected for 
 his descriptive and accurate pen to comment upon,
 
 Philip of Austria and Jiiana of Spain. 133 
 
 I felt I had no alternative but to do my best, and 
 so proceeded with my self-imposed task, or, rather let 
 me say, " labour of love". The notes and extracts which 
 I now bring before my readers are, after all, but a reduc- 
 tion of the much larger canvas which my friend proposed 
 to fill in ; and I have purposely compressed them, so as 
 to present a sketch of the subject he would have so much 
 better and more elaborately drawn. 
 
 Although the story of the sudden landing of Philip and 
 Juana on our coast, in the year 1506, is, in the county of 
 Dorset, a well known tale, still as there is much of great 
 historic importance that arose out of it, and much that is 
 of interest as connected with the rise of the Russells and 
 the future great house of Bedford, I feel sure there is no 
 need, having paid a visit to the site of the old embattled 
 house of Wolferton (or Wolveton as now called), so 
 closely identified with the incident, to make any apology 
 for giving it once again, or of calling to the attention of 
 those who may never have heard or read of the occur- 
 rence, the extremely interesting narrative ; and point 
 out, as concisely as I can, the most attractive portions of 
 this page from the romance of history. 
 
 At the time this paper commences, Henry VII, who 
 had reigned some twenty years, and, no doubt, felt 
 frequent misgivings about his health (which was destined 
 to give way altogether a few years after), had been seeking 
 to strengthen his house as well as throne, through the 
 marriage of his son, Prince Arthur, to the Lady Katha- 
 rine, fourth daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain,
 
 134 Involuntary Visit of Philip of Austria 
 
 who was so soon left a widow ; and then through his son 
 Henry and other members of his family, by alliance with 
 the house of Austria ; or even, as it chanced in Henry's 
 case, with that of Spain again. Indeed, the old chroni- 
 clers, who tell the story of these days in their quaint 
 manner, chiefly lead us to infer that nothing could have 
 served King Henry's purpose, in these particulars, better 
 than the rising of the sudden tempest which blew the 
 fleet with which Philip, Archduke of Austria, and son of 
 Maximilian, accompanied by his Queen, had set sail from 
 Middleburgh, in the Low Countries, on January 3oth, 
 1505-6, for Spain, to the coast of Dorsetshire; and had 
 forced the royal pair, after their navy of eighty ships had 
 been dispersed during some six or seven days of severe 
 weather, to land at Weymouth (then even, with Melcombe 
 Regis, a well-known and thriving port), and with the 
 greatest difficulty, after all, to save their lives. It will be 
 as well here to make certain extracts from the Right 
 Hon. Francis Lord Verulam's (better known, perhaps, 
 as Lord Bacon) " History of the Rayne of Henry the 
 Seventh" (dated 1622), a work of great value, and one of 
 the very few authorities connected with this period of 
 England's history most to be relied upon. 
 
 " But to corroborate his alliance with Philip, the winds 
 gave him an interview; for Philip, chosing the winter 
 season, the better to surprise the King of Aragon, set 
 foorth with a great navie out of Flanders for Spaine, in 
 the moneth of Januarie, the one and twentieth yeare of 
 the King's rayne. But himself was surprised with a
 
 and Juana of Spain to Wey mouth. 1 3 5 
 
 cruell tempest that scattered his ships upon the several 
 coasts of England ; and the ship wherein the King and 
 Queen were (with two other small barkes onely), torne, 
 and in great perill, to escape the furie of the weather, 
 thrust into Way mouth. King Philip himself having not 
 been used, as it seemes, to sea, all wearied and extreeme 
 sick, would needes land to refresh his spirits, though it 
 was against the opinion of his counsell, doubting it might 
 breed delaie, his occasions requiring celeritie. The 
 rumour of the arrival of a puissant navie upon the coast 
 made the countrie arme. And Sir Thomas Trenchard, 
 with forces suddenly raised, not knowing what the matter 
 might bee, came to Waymouth, where, understanding the 
 accident, he did in all humblenesse and humanitie invite 
 the King and Queene to his house at Wolveton, near 
 Dorchester, and forthwith despatched posts to the Court. 
 Soone after came Sir John Caroe likewise, with a great 
 troupe of them well armed, using the like humblenesse 
 and respect towards the King when he knew the case. 
 King Philip doubting that they, being but subjects, durst 
 not let him passe away againe, without the King's notice 
 and leave, yielded to their entreaties to staie till they 
 heard from the Court. 
 
 " The King, as soone as hee heard the newes, com- 
 manded presently the Earl of Arundell to go to visile the 
 King of Castile, and let him understand that as hee was 
 verie sorrie for his mishap, so hee was glad that hee 
 had escaped the danger of the seas ; and likewise of the 
 occasion himselfe had to doe him honour, and desiring
 
 136 Involuntary Visit of Philip of Austria 
 
 him to thinke himself as in his owne land, and that the 
 King made all hast possible to come and imbrace him. 
 The Earle came to him in great magnificence, with a 
 brave troupe of three hundred horse ; and, for more state, 
 came by torchlight. 
 
 " After hee had done the King's message, King Philip, 
 seeing how the world went, the sooner to get away, went 
 upon speed to the King at Windsor, and his Queene 
 followed by easie journeys. The two Kings, at their 
 meeting, used all the caresses and loving demonstrations 
 that were possible. 
 
 " And the King of Castile said pleasantly to the King 
 (of England) ' That he was now punished for that hee 
 would not come within his walled towneof Calice when 
 they met last.' But the King answered ' that walles and 
 sees were nothing where hearts were open, and that hee 
 was heere no otherwise but to bee served.' 
 
 " After a day or two's refreshing, the Kings entred into 
 speach of renewing the Treatie, the King saying 'that 
 though King Philip's person were the same, yet his for- 
 tunes and state were raised, in which case a renovation of 
 treatie was used among princes.' But while these things 
 were in handling, the King, choosing a fit time, and 
 drawing the King of Castile into a roome where they two 
 onely were private, and laying his hande civilly upon his 
 arm, and changing his countenance a little from a coun- 
 tenance of intertainment, said to him, 'Sir, you have 
 been saved upon my coast. I hope you will not suffer 
 mee to wracke upon yours.' The King of Castile asked
 
 and Juan a of Spain to Wey month. 137 
 
 him what hee meant by that speech ? ' I mean it' (saith 
 the King) ' by that some harebraine wild fellow, my 
 subject, the Earle of Suffolke, who is protected in your 
 countrie, and begins to play the foole, when all others 
 are wearie of it.' The King of Castile answered, ' I had 
 thought (sir) your felicitie had beene above those 
 thoughts ; but if it trouble you I will banish him.' The 
 King replied, ' Those hornets were best in their nest, and 
 worse than when they did fly abroad, and that his desire 
 was to have him delivered to him.' The King of Castile, 
 herewith a little confused, and in a studie, said ' That can 
 I not doe with my honour, and lesse with yours, for you 
 will bee thought to have used me as a prisoner.' The 
 King presently said, ' Then the matter is at an end, for 
 I will take that dishonour upon mee, and so your honour 
 is saved.' The King of Castile, who had the King in 
 estimation, and besides remembered where hee was, and 
 knew not what use hee might have of the King's amitie, 
 for that himself was new in his estate of Spaine, and un- 
 settled both with his father-in-law and with his people, 
 composing his countenance, said, 'Sir, you give law to 
 mee; but so will I to you. You shall have him, but 
 (upon your honour) you shall not take his life.' The 
 King, embracing him, said ' Agreed.' 
 
 " Saith the King of Castile, ' Neither shall it dislike 
 you if I send to him in such a fashion as hee may 
 partly come with his owne good will.' The King said 
 ' it was well thougte of, and, if it pleased him, hee 
 would joyne with him in sending to the Earle a message
 
 138 Involuntary Visit of Philip 'of Austria 
 
 to that purpose'. They both sent severally, and meane 
 while they continued feasting and pastimes; the King 
 being, on his part, willing to have the Earle sure before 
 the King of Castile went, and the King of Castile being 
 as willing to seeme to be inforced. The King also, with 
 many wise and excellent persuasions, did advise the 
 King of Castile to be ruled by the council of his father- 
 in-law, Ferdinando, a prince so prudent, so experienced, 
 so fortunate. The King of Castile (who was in no verie 
 good termes with his father-in-law) answered ' that if his 
 father-in-law would suffer him to governe his kingdomes, 
 he should governe him.' 
 
 " There were immediately messiagers sent from both 
 Kings to recall the Earle of Suffolke. Who, upon 
 gentle words used to him, was soone charmed, and 
 willing enough to returne, assured of his life, and hoping 
 for his libertie. Hee was brought through Flanders to 
 Calice, and thence landed at Dover, and with sufficient 
 guard delivered and received at the Tower of London. 
 Meanwhile King Henry (to draw out the time) con- 
 tinued his feastings and entertainments, and after hee 
 had received the King of Castile into the fraternitie of 
 the Garter, and for a reciprocate had his sonne, the 
 Prince, admitted to the order of the Golden Fleece, he 
 accompanied King Philip and his Queene to the citie of 
 London, where they were entertained with the greatest 
 magnificence and triumph that could bee upon no greater 
 warning. And as soone as the Earle of Suffolke had 
 been conveyed to the Tower (which was the serious
 
 and Juana of Spain to Weymoiith. 1 39 
 
 fact), the jollities had an end, and the King took 
 leave. 
 
 " Nevertheless, during their beeing heere, they in 
 substance concluded that treatie which the Flemings 
 terme ' Intercursus ma!us\ and beares date at Windsore ; 
 for that there bee some things in it more to the advan- 
 tage of the English than of them especially, for that the free 
 fishing of the Dutch upon the coasts and seas of Eng- 
 land, granted in the treatie of Undecimo, was not by 
 this treatie confirmed. All articles that confirme former 
 treaties being precisely and warily limited, and confined 
 to matters of commerce onely, and not otherwise. 
 
 " It was observed that the great tempest which drove 
 Philip into England, blew downe the golden eagle from 
 the spire of Pawles ; and in the fall it fell upon a syne of 
 the Black Eagle which was in Pawles Churchyard, in the 
 place where the Schoole house now standeth, and battered 
 it downe, which was a strange stooping of a hawke upon 
 a fowle. This the people interpreted to bee an ominous 
 prognosticke upon the Imperiell house, which was (by in- 
 terpretation also) fulfilled upon Philip, the Emperour's 
 sonne, not onely in the present disaster of the tempest 
 but in that that followed ; for Philip arriving in Spaine, 
 and attaining the possession of the kingdome of Castile 
 without resistance (inasmuch as Ferdinando, who had 
 spoke so great before, was with difficultie admitted to the 
 speech of his Sonne-in-law), sickened soone after, and 
 deceased. Yet after such time as there was an observa- 
 tion by the wisest of that Court, that if hee had lived his
 
 1 40 Involuntary Visit of Philip of A ustria 
 
 Father would have gained upon him in that sort as hee 
 would have governed his Councells and Designes, if not 
 his Affections. By this all Spaine returned into the 
 power of Ferdinando in state as it was before, the rather 
 in regard of the infirmitie of Joan, his daughter, who, 
 loving her husband (by whom she had many children") 
 dearely well, and no less beloved of him (howsoever, 
 her Father, to make Philip ill beloved of the people of 
 Spaine, gave out that Philip used her not well), was 
 unable in strength of minde to beare the Griefe of his 
 Decease, and fell distracted of her Wittes ; of which 
 Maladie her Father was thought no waies to endeavour 
 the Cure, the better to hold his Regall power in Castile. 
 So that as the felicitie of Charles the Eighth was said to 
 bee a Dreame, so the adversitie of Ferdinando was said 
 likewise to be a Dreame, it passed over so soone." 
 
 These extracts, so quaintly, and no doubt so truth- 
 fully, given for it is evident our author would have the 
 best means of getting at the State papers and other 
 documents connected with the events of Henry VI Fs 
 life, from the office he held as Lord-Keeper, and his 
 anxiety to do justice to the memory of his Queen's 
 grandfather will have served to tell my readers the 
 story of Philip and his wife's landing and living in 
 England, perhaps better than by giving them a fanciful 
 version of the story, which subsequent writers have fre- 
 quently done, and which certainly there are many tempta- 
 tions, from the picturesque character of the events sur- 
 rounding the whole narrative, to induce an author to do
 
 and Juana of Spain to Wey mouth. 141 
 
 And, having thus far delivered this " plain, unvarnished 
 tale", let me "hark back" a little, and refer to that 
 interesting part of the story which connects the names of 
 two well-known Dorset families with the occurrences 
 described, and produced some of the consequences to 
 which the title of this paper alludes. When the visit 
 was paid to Wolverton, during the Weymouth Con- 
 gress, already referred to, the party stood upon the 
 very spot, and carefully examined the interesting house, 
 where formerly existed the original mansion wherein 
 Sir Thomas Trenchard received and entertained his 
 royal and certainly disguise it how they might most 
 unwilling guests ; and it was there that the introduc- 
 tion took place, to the royal couple, of that kinsman 
 of Sir Thomas Trenchard, Mr. John Russell, which was 
 afterwards destined not only to bring a private country 
 gentleman's family, from comparative obscurity, to the 
 highest power and wealth in the kingdom, but to be 
 the means of handing down the name of the house, with 
 honour and renown, even to the present period of our 
 history. 
 
 Sir Thomas Trenchard, it seems, had most oppor- 
 tunely just finished building what was then an embattled 
 house, that welcome change of residence from the 
 cramped and confined castles and fortresses of the 
 middle ages, which was at this time gradually obtaining 
 in England, and culminated in many of those Tudor 
 or Elizabethan homes of which we are naturally 
 proud, and of which the British Archaeological Asso-
 
 142 Involuntary Vistt of Philip of A ttstria 
 
 elation has so many agreeable recollections ; and 
 also, fortunately for him, had the opportunity, when 
 finding himself beset with the difficulties of having 
 to entertain such great and distinguished people, 
 without knowing anything of the language they spoke 
 for linguists were not so rife in those days as they are 
 now, when everyone seems to pride himself on the know- 
 ledge of some other tongue than his own, albeit, it may 
 often be quite " unknown" to the countries from whence 
 it is derived. Our friend Sir Thomas had the good 
 fortune again of finding a way out of these unexpected 
 troubles, in having his young kinsman, John Russell,* 
 
 * "John Russell, the elder of these two sons, was born near 
 Bridport in Dorsetshire. Having entered into the army when very 
 young, under Henry VII, and visiied most of the courts in Europe, 
 he returned one of the most complete gentlemen and best scholars 
 of his time. He had been no less distinguished for his bravery 
 than his other accomplishments, and had lost one of his eyes at the 
 siege of Montreuil in France. A singular circumstance introduced 
 him more particularly to the notice of this monarch, and laid the 
 establishment of those honours and fortunes which have since 
 attended his family. His Majesty had just concluded the solemni- 
 zation of his second son's (Henry) marriage with the Infanta 
 Catherine of Spain, when the magnificence of these nuptials was 
 eclipsed by the accidental arrival of Philip, the Archduke of 
 Castile, with Joan his consort 
 
 " This gentleman, in the subsequent reign, was created, for his 
 great services to the State, a baron of the realm, under the title of 
 Lord Russell, Baron Russell of Cheynes in the county of Bucking- 
 ham. His grandfather John was knighted, having been Speaker 
 of the House of Commons in the second and tenth years of Henry 
 VI. He married Alice, daughter of Froxmore, and had issue, 
 one son and two daughters. Alice, the eldest, married Trench-
 
 and J uana of Spain to WeymoutJi. 143 
 
 near enough to send for, he having but lately returned 
 from his travels on the Continent, with the highest repu- 
 tation for his skill in foreign languages ; and, as it on this 
 occasion proved, in the Spanish especially. Invited by 
 Sir Thomas Trenchard to assist in the entertainment of 
 his kingly visitor and his Queen, and to interpret for the 
 service of the royal guests, John Russell at once made 
 his mark, and so captivated Philip and Juana by his 
 graceful manners and his great accomplishments, added 
 to a handsome mien and bearing, so well suited to the 
 notions of the proudest people, perhaps, of those days 
 for Spain had about reached the highest pinnacle of her 
 greatness in the grand discovery of Columbus especially 
 that when Philip set out for Windsor he besought Sir 
 Thomas to allow his relative to accompany him, and, 
 having succeeded in obtaining his request, took great 
 pleasure in introducing John Russell to the King, as a 
 gentleman to whom he had been so much indebted, and 
 highly recommended him to the royal favour. 
 
 Henry VII was a very discriminating prince, and was 
 ever looking for, and accustomed to engage into his 
 service, the cleverest men he could get hold of, so that 
 he found in young Russell all he required, and soon 
 
 ard, and had issue, Sir Thomas Trenchard of Wolferton or Wolve- 
 ton, at whose house, subsequently, our John Russell was introduced 
 to Philip of Castile. James, the son of the above Sir John Russell, 
 was twice married. But he had no issue by the second marriage ; 
 but by his first, Alice, daughter of Thomas Wyse, gentleman, he 
 had two sons and two daughters." From Anecdotes of the House 
 f Bedford, 8vo, 1796.
 
 144 Involuntary Visit of Philip of Austria 
 
 appointed him a gentleman of his privy chamber, and 
 uniformly distinguished him by a more than ordinary 
 kindness. It would be as well here to point out the 
 very words that Russell makes use of in describing his 
 impressions of Henry, when he was first introduced to 
 him, and the expressions are taken from a letter of 
 his, possibly written to thank his cousin Trenchard for 
 the lift he had been the means of giving to him, although 
 I am not certain on that interesting head. He speaks 
 of the King as "a slender, but comely personage, 
 with a reverend countenance little like a churchman, 
 which, as it was not winning or pleasing, so neither was 
 it strange nor dark, the face of a well-disposed person ; 
 but one which would have been to the disadvantage of a 
 painter, for it had the best expression when he spoke."* 
 The Archduke, before leaving England, pressed Sir 
 Thomas to receive rich presents for his hospitality, but 
 the worthy Knight refusing to accept such, only would 
 take portraits of the King and Queen, by Mabuse, and a 
 handsome China bowl of great rarity and of Moorish 
 workmanship; all of which are still preserved in the 
 Trenchard family, and copies of the portraits are figured 
 in Hutchins' History of the County of Dorset. The 
 paintings represent the royal pair in the full bloom of 
 youthful beauty, and that of Philip fairly entitles him to 
 be called " the Handsome."t Philip, as we know (see 
 
 * Lord Verulam's (Bacon) Henry the Seventh, p. 246. 
 f Chiefly taken from Historical Memoirs of the House of Russell, 
 by J. H. Wiffen, M.R.S.L., vol. i, 8vo.
 
 and J uana of Spain to Wey mouth. 145 
 
 page 139), died prematurely in the following September, 
 three months after the enjoyment of his kingdom of Cas- 
 tile ; and from the shock his wife Juana never recovered, 
 her mind becoming a total wreck therefrom. 
 
 Of the future greatness of John Russell, and his acqui- 
 sition of large property and ultimate title in Henry VIII's 
 reign, I have no intention in this paper to discuss or 
 further dwell upon. All I will do is to refer the founda- 
 tion of the ducal house of Bedford to the circumstance 
 of the happy introduction of this accomplished gentle- 
 man to that tyrannical king's father ; and call especially 
 to the notice of our younger friends, who are rejoicing 
 in the morning of life, as we old archaeologists are enter- 
 ing fast into the evening of it, the necessity of applying 
 themselves to their studies in every way, making the 
 best of the gifts with which Providence has endowed 
 them, and then a similar good fortune may attend upon 
 them, and they have the honour to be the authors of 
 their own fortunes, and, what is better still, be enabled to 
 leave a good name behind them. It may be as well to 
 note here that this same John Russell, from this happy 
 incident in his early career, changed the ancient war-cry 
 of the Norman "Rozels" or Roussels, "Dicx-aie", for the 
 present well-known motto of "Che sara sara"; implying 
 a certainty of an over-ruling Providence in the ordinary 
 events of life, and which he, no doubt, felt the above 
 fortunate circumstance amply verified. 
 
 The more historic portion of this paper, I mean the 
 political part of it, I have purposely avoided in these 
 
 L
 
 146 Philip of Austria and Juana of Spain. 
 
 simple Notes, although, at some future time, it may 
 happen that I shall try to embody the views of my 
 late friend, Mr. Holt, in a longer essay than the present ; 
 and thus endeavour to show, as he had already con- 
 ceived, that there was no attempt upon Henry's part 
 to keep Philip a prisoner whilst he extorted treaties 
 and engagements from him ; and that in the matter of 
 the Earl of Suffolk's being given up to the King, who so 
 far kept his royal word (Suffolk living, albeit a prisoner, 
 throughout Henry's reign), the King of Castile did all 
 that a high-minded and generous-hearted man could do, 
 and when at length compelled by circumstances to give 
 up the custody of this troublesome Earl, did so in the 
 most reluctant manner, taking care in every way to bind 
 Henry, on his honour as a gentleman, and on his royal 
 word as a King, not to punish Suffolk with death, but to 
 be as lenient to him as he well could.
 
 .For Description, sec Appendix, p. 170. 
 
 MAP OF R
 
 FLYER, 1685,
 
 RECULVER : 
 
 THE REGULBIUM OF THE ROMANS. 
 
 OW few there are of the countless myriads 
 who pass or repass, on their never-ending 
 voyage of life, this once famous spot now 
 best known and remembered by its striking 
 yet silent "Sister Towers", standing neglected and 
 alone, on the verge of an earthen cliff, close upon the 
 entrance of the River Thames, to be afterwards the 
 principal gateway, as it were, of the civilising power 
 exercised by the commercial influence of Great Britain 
 throughout the world ever think, or perhaps even know, 
 that here, in the early days of the history of our country, 
 was situated an important Roman station (occupying, by 
 reliable measurements, made as far back as 1781 by 
 Mr. Boys, more than eight acres of land within its 
 walls), erected probably at a late time* to defend 
 
 * RECULVER CASTLE. Kilburn tells us that the Emperor Severus, 
 about A.D. 205, and the Sandwich MSS. also say, that Severus 
 built Reculver in the Isle of Finlade, which I guess to be corruption 
 in the writing, instead of Ynlade, for Reculver is situate near to the 
 north inlet, or Ynlade, as I have before observed, whtn I spake 
 
 L 2
 
 148 Reculver : 
 
 the then existing estuary, or rather watercourse, which 
 constituted Thanet an island, on its Northern outlet, as 
 did the even more celebrated fortress Rutupise, or Rutu- 
 pium (the Richborough Castle of our times), at its South- 
 ern entrance ; or that much later on, there existed be- 
 neath the very waters now traversed by vessels of peace 
 and of war, " outward or homeward bound", an historic 
 Saxon town of considerable extent, having within it a 
 royal palace, where King Ethelbert of Kent sometimes 
 dwelt, and where it is probable he entertained the pious 
 St. Augustine, after having been converted to Christianity 
 
 of Sandwich and Thanet ; and as this place, in a charter of King 
 Edmund, A.D. 784, is called Raculfcester ; we may conclude, as 
 Mr. Burton doth, in his Comment on the Itinerary of Antonine, p. 41, 
 that this place, as well as many others whose names end in Chester, 
 arose from the ruins of some old Roman castrum. " For the ancient 
 stations," saith he, "about the wall, the carcasses of many of which do 
 at this day appear, are called by the country people chesters." And 
 in the Notitia Imperil Occidentalis, we read that the tribune or first 
 captain of the band of the Vetasians lay here in garrison, at Regul- 
 bium. The place of this fort, castrum, and watch-tower, was no 
 doubt on the rising ground whereon the church now stands, and 
 where the palace of King Ethelbert, and afterwards the monastery 
 stood, for that was the most proper situation for the use it was 
 intended for, and Mr. Burton's observation is very just and true, 
 that all the Roman colonies, towns, stations, or forts, were generally 
 set upon hills, and what their use and design was we learn from 
 Gildas's History, who, speaking of the Romans here, saith " In 
 littore oceani ad meridiem quo naves eorum habebantur quia, etc., 
 inde barbarorum irruptio timebatur, turres per intervalla ad prospec- 
 tum maris collocabant," etc., and all agree that one of these watch- 
 towers was placed here at Regulbium or Reculver. There were four 
 more such in this county, of which I shall speak in their proper 
 places. (From Harris's Kent, p. 337.)
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans. 149 
 
 by him ; and beneath the ruined remains of the present 
 Church, then part of a monastery, built without doubt 
 upon the site of a Roman temple, King Ethelbert is said, 
 though disputed by recent writers, to have been buried. 
 
 Yet so it is, beyond a question, as far as the main facts 
 are concerned, and which the present fast-decaying re- 
 mains of portions of the walls of this Roman castrum 
 fully attest, as well as those "vestigia" of a later Saxon 
 occupation that Batteley, in his Latin work entitled Anti- 
 quitates RutupincR, Oxon., 1711, particularly specifies and 
 describes, and of which learned and industrious author, 
 Mr. Roach Smith, F.S.A., thus writes, in his Antiquities of 
 Richborough, Reculver, and Lymne, a work to which I have 
 been much indebted in constructing this little history : 
 "Batteley, while Rector of Adisham, was to Reculver 
 what Mr. Rolfe of Sandwich was to Richborough, the 
 tutelary ' genius locf ". 
 
 Having thus called to the minds of my readers, and to 
 my juvenile ones, I hope, in particular, should I be so 
 fortunate as to have any in these days, when, alas ! 
 archaeological and historical researches are too apt to be 
 considered very " dry reading" by, I fear, the majority of 
 them, the several well-authenticated facts of the former 
 grandeur and importance of this other " Corner"* of the 
 beautiful county of Kent, let me proceed with the 
 further and fuller details of my paper, which, as far as 
 
 * See my old and revered friend the late Mr. Planche's charm- 
 ing book, entitled a Corner of Kent, relating chiefly to Ash and its 
 immediate neighbourhood.
 
 150 Reculver: 
 
 space will allow, I trust may prove so attractive as to 
 cause them for the future to look upon the solitary 
 Twin Towers of Reculver with an awakened and 
 increasing interest ; and which certainly may be regarded, 
 in a very emphatic if not romantic manner, as a warning 
 and a landmark not only for passing ships, as they were 
 originally intended to be, but as a prouder monument still 
 of our country's past history, and, let us hope, for its all 
 greater time to come. 
 
 The position which the Reculver coast held in for- 
 mer years, when Britain was but newly under the rule 
 of the Romans, must at once have proved to those enter- 
 prising soldiers the importance not only of entrenching 
 themselves upon its gently rising ground, which probably 
 the Britons had already done in their ruder and simpler 
 manner, but also of fortifying it in a securer and more 
 scientific way, whenever the opportunity presented itself j 
 since being situated on the banks of an Estuary (as 
 before described), which reached in those days across 
 the country eastward, as far as Richborough and Deal, 
 where it again fell into the sea, covering the spot where 
 Sandwich now stands with a bay, and navigable the 
 whole distance for the vessels of that period; an able 
 commander like the eagle-eyed Cassar, would at a glance 
 discover the capabilities of the place, and use his best 
 endeavour to increase, by every then known military 
 method, its natural advantages. 
 
 In the Notitia Imperii^avA. not in the Itinerary of Anto- 
 ninus, as some have incorrectly stated,the first mention of 
 Reculver occurs. It is there called Regulbium, which was
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans. 151 
 
 probably, and according to Batteley, the name given by the 
 Romans to express the British designation as nearly as 
 possible, for he maintains it was originally composed 
 of two words, viz : Rhag and Gwylfa, which joined 
 together signifies the "first watch tower", and from 
 the situation and assumed history of the place, we 
 may well permit the etymology to pass by without 
 controversy, although there are other antiquaries who 
 give different derivations, and with, perhaps, equal truth 
 and ingenuity. The quotation from the Notitia merely 
 informs us that the tribune of the first cohort of the 
 Vetasii or Betasii, a people of Belgic Gaul, now known 
 as Brabant in Belgium, was stationed there. " Tribunus 
 cohortis primae Vetasiorum Regulbio." 
 
 This cohort was under the command of an officer 
 called the Count of the Saxon shore, "Comes littoris 
 Saxonici" : and with the station of Regulbium, he also 
 held sway over several maritime posts in the southern 
 parts of Kent and Sussex. The title of this officer seems 
 to indicate that his duty was more especially to defend 
 that portion of the coast of Kent exposed to the constant 
 and vigorous onslaughts of a people who were ultimately 
 to produce in Britain a civilization of a higher kind, both 
 as respects national and social improvement, than was 
 ever attained by Greece and Rome. The Saxons had 
 for nearly two hundred years been attacking Britain, 
 and would most likely, long before the expiration of so 
 long a period, have been successful in occupying at least 
 some portion of the country, had it not been for the 
 Roman legions stationed in our island.
 
 152 Reculver : 
 
 It was at Ebbs-fleet, or in the Saxon Chronicle, 
 " Ypwines fleot," near Richbofough, where Hengist and 
 his brother Horsa arrived with three cyules or vessels (as 
 exiles, or as some think, by accident), when they and 
 their followers were retained as subsidiary soldiers by the 
 British, against their then most annoying and warlike 
 enemies, the Picts and Scots. They were promised food 
 and clothing for their services, and for a time stationed 
 in Thanet, the ancient British name of which was Rui- 
 thina, and soon afterwards helped their new friends with 
 great success against the Irish and Picts.* Batteley says 
 that Ebbs-fleet was near the estuary of the Wantsum, which 
 divides Thanet from the main land of Kent, and once 
 navigable for ships of large burthen. In Bede's time it 
 was three stadia broad, and fordable only in two places. 
 It is sometimes called the river Genlad, and is now at 
 Sarr and Reculver a brook, which may be stepped over ; 
 Ebbs-fleet is an inland spot at some distance from the sea. 
 
 Reculverf was thus intimately connected with the first 
 appearance of those two races, the Roman and the Saxon, 
 which exercised so great an influence over this country. 
 
 * Sharon Turner's Anglo-Saxon, vol. L 
 
 f " Dart, in his History of Canterbury (fol., ed. 1726), seems to 
 intimate that Reculver was once called Genlads, for he says, speak- 
 ing of the monastery, ' At the death of Theodore a vacancy of two 
 years occurred, when Brichtwald (called by others, says Weever 
 allusively, Bright-world), an Englishman, abbot of Reculver, then 
 called Genlands, and said, but falsely, to have been first a monk of 
 Glastonbury, was elected and consecrated archbishop of Canterbury 
 by one Godwin, metropolitan of France, in the year 694.'"
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans. 153 
 
 In addition to the military station at the then Regul- 
 bium, there had grown up a populous Roman town, for 
 in the fall of the cliff, and the various displacements of 
 the earth that have taken place from time to time, have 
 been discovered the remains of the foundations of build- 
 ings, cisterns and vaults, together with many fragments of 
 urns, utensils of silver and brass, pottery, coins, sewing 
 needles, pins, bodkins, tweezers, images and fibulae ; and 
 although many of these remains may be taken to have 
 belonged to the more modern town which succeeded to 
 the earlier one, there are sufficient evidences in the 
 objects above enumerated, to class them at once 
 amongst undoubted works of art and manufacture of the 
 Romans, although used and probably imitated by suc- 
 ceeding people. 
 
 The most interesting fact, as has before been alluded 
 to, connected with Reculver, is that which identifies it 
 with the appearance of the monk Augustine, and the 
 introduction of the Christian religion ; for here it was 
 that Ethelbert, the fourth successor of Hengist (who 
 established his Saxons, or more properly Jutes, in 
 Kent, seven years after his visit to Ebbs-fleet, by a 
 great battle in the year 457, at Crayford), retired, 
 when giving up his residence at Canterbury to this pious 
 priest, after his interview in the open air at Thanet with 
 him and his forty followers.* As Ethelbert himself became 
 
 * According to Kilburn, " Ethelbert, the first Christian King of 
 Kent, about 1060 years since", built himself a palace within the 
 area of the Roman walls, and said to have been upon the site of a
 
 1 54 Reculver : 
 
 a convert to the Christian religion shortly afterwards, it is 
 not at all improbable that Augustine used many of his 
 arguments to that prince, whilst he dwelt at Reculver in 
 comparative quietude, away from the duties and excite- 
 ment of his capital. In the year 616, Ethelbert died, 
 and according to the opinion of some chroniclers, was 
 buried in the monastic establishment instituted at Re- 
 culver, probably under the superintendence of Augustine 
 himself. There are various accounts of the original 
 building of this monastery, and doubts as to the founders 
 of it ; but it is certainly not unreasonable to suppose that 
 Ethelbert, who is acknowledged to have done so much 
 for Augustine and the new religion, should have instigated 
 or aided him in the desire to devote a place to the 
 worship of the living God, upon a spot where for years had 
 stood a temple erected by the Romans to some one or 
 more of their divinities. 
 
 On the legendary tomb of Ethelbert, Weever* makes 
 the following observations : 
 
 " At the upper end of the south aisle in this church, I 
 saw a monument of an antique forme, mounted with two 
 spires. Wherein (as the inhabitants have it by tradition) 
 the body of one Ethelbert, a Saxon king, who had his 
 pallace royall here in Reculver, lieth entombed, and the 
 Annals of Canterbury affirme as much : And true it is 
 that Ethelbert the first, and first Christian king, built 
 here a princely mansion for himself and his successours ; 
 
 castle erected by Severus, possibly not far from the spot where stand 
 the towers of the present day. 
 
 * Ancient Funeral Monuments, p. 260.
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans, 155 
 
 wherein divers of the Kentish kings sometimes kept 
 their courtly residence. But whether he be this Ethel- 
 bert, or the Second, or Ethelbert surnamed Pren, that 
 lieth here interred, it is not materiall, for they both dyed 
 without any memorable act, either of themselves, or 
 their kingdomes affaires : and so dyed Cuthred and 
 Baldred, their next successours, and the last kings of 
 Kent." 
 
 The successor of Ethelbert was his son Eadbald, and, 
 as he restored Paganism in Kent, he doubtless drove 
 out the ecclesiastics from the monastery at Reculver, 
 and once more perverted it from Christian worship. 
 
 His example was followed in the kingdom of Essex by 
 the three sons of Sabert, who was the son of Ethelbert's 
 sister, and had encouraged Augustine, as his uncle had 
 done. However, Laurence, the successor of Augustine, 
 by a simple contrivance, so worked upon the fears of 
 Eadbald, that the exiled bishops were recalled, and the 
 old Saxon rites were for ever abolished in Kent and 
 Essex. Thus the monks at Reculver once more pur- 
 sued the even tenour of their way, and practised fast- 
 ings, and sung masses for the repose of the soul of their 
 pious founder. Then it was that the palmy days of 
 Saxon rule were seen at Reculver. 
 
 It is probable that about this time the Saxons called 
 the place we have been describing Raculf-cester, on 
 account of the castle or palace of the king ; and Raculf- 
 minster, from the monastery supposed to have been 
 erected by the influence of Augustine. Mention is made of
 
 156 Reculver: 
 
 this monastery in the manuscript cartulary of the Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury in the Bodleian Library, and in a 
 grant of lands to it at Westanea and Sturidge, in the year 
 679, about eighty years after the foundation of the same. 
 Eadbert ascended the throne of Wihtred in 725. He 
 reigned for nearly thirty-five years in Kent ; his laws yet 
 remain to us, according to Sharon Turner ; and in 747 he 
 gave to the monastery the tolls arising from one ship in the 
 town of Fordwich, even now an important place on the 
 banks of the Stour, and called in Domesday the little 
 borough of Fordwich. 
 
 To these benefactions succeeding kings added, and 
 in 784 the name of Eadmund occurs as enriching it 
 with a grant of land. Thus Raculf-minster grew in 
 power and riches ; and there is little doubt but the fame 
 of the place, not only as a royal residence, spread about 
 the kingdom of Kent, but as the possible burial-place and 
 shrine of Ethelbert, it was visited by the pilgrims of distant 
 lands. War, however, soon fell upon their peaceful 
 pursuits; for Egbert, king of the West Saxons, after 
 conquering the other divisions of the Heptarchy, or 
 rather Octarchy,* dispatched his son Ethelwulf, with 
 Ealstan, the warlike bishop and able statesman, with a 
 complete army, into Kent, and, driving out the petty 
 sovereign then ruling there, made all the Anglo-Saxon 
 kingdoms subordinate to his own, and according to a 
 popular belief, though not to be supported by evidence, 
 became king of England. The inhabitants of Reculver 
 
 * Turner's Anglo-Saxons, voL i, p. 309.
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans. 157 
 
 must have suffered in these warlike proceedings, as 
 doubtless did the castle and monastery, by the incursions 
 of the piratical Danes, who, about the year 832, under 
 their celebrated king, Ragnar Lodbrog, ravaged the Isle of 
 Sheppey, and in the next year defeated Egbert himself, 
 according to the Saxon Chronicle, at Charmouth in Dorset- 
 shire. It was some years after these stirring times, when 
 perhaps from the representations of the monks themselves, 
 who were exposed to so much danger in their sea-built 
 cloisters, and had frequently suffered from the visitations 
 of such ruthless and savage foes, that king Edred, in the 
 presence of Archbishop Odo and a train of nobility, granted 
 the annexation of Reculver and its possessions to the 
 monastery of Christchurch, Canterbury, and thither the 
 monks with their abbot are supposed to have retired 
 in the year 949.* 
 
 From these circumstances, the termination of the regal 
 residence and the removal of the religious establishment, 
 Reculver seems gradually to have lost most of its import- 
 
 * "RECULVER MANOR. This Philpot saith was, with all its pas- 
 ture, glebe, and marsh land, with the benefit of the adjacent sea- 
 shore, A.D. 949, given to the monastery of Christ Church, in 
 Canterbury, by King Eadred, in the presence of his queen Edgiva 
 and of Archbishop Odo, and there were then in it twenty-five 
 mansions or dwelling-houses. And in the Domesday Survey is 
 this entry : 
 
 " ' Raculf, T. E. R. se defendebat pro vin Sull. & est appre- 
 tiatum XL/. & ill. & vs. ties minutes minus. 
 
 "'A.D. 1130 William Abp. of Canterbury gave 8/. of annual 
 rent out of his manor of Reculver to the monks of Christ Church 
 for ever ; which gift was afterwards confirmed by St. Edmund,
 
 158 Reculver: 
 
 ance. The cloisters of the convent fell to ruin, the con- 
 sequence of the town declined, the Roman and Saxon 
 buildings began to decay, and the squalor of poorer 
 dwellings in time superseded the noble and magnificent 
 character of the place, and Raculf-cester and minster 
 lost their grandeur. 
 
 During the eleventh century the waters of the Estuary 
 seem to have gradually subsided, and consequently the 
 thoroughfare from the channel to the Thames was thus 
 begun to be destroyed ; this may serve to account in some 
 degree for the " decline and fall " of the once renowned 
 Reculver. The alteration of this course for the vessels 
 of the period must have been attended with much incon- 
 venience to our ancestors, for even in our own day the 
 navigation of the Forelands in stormy weather is a matter 
 of great anxiety and difficulty. This Water-way, of which 
 then, as we have already heard, Regulbium guarded the 
 northern entrance, is often mentioned in old writers ; and 
 Twine the antiquary, speaking of it, observes that when he 
 was mayor of Canterbury in 1553 he had often conversed 
 with people who had seen vessels pass through the Strait in 
 their youth. The sea, receding from the estuary at Rich- 
 borough, seems shortly after to have commenced its 
 
 Abp. of Canterbury, in King Henry the First's reign' (see Somner's 
 Cant., Append. N., xxxvi). 
 
 "Leland saith there was once here a neglected desolate chapel, 
 out of the church -yard ; this some will have to be the remains of 
 another parish church, before the abbey was suppressed, and the 
 manor given to the Archbishop of Canterbury, as above." From 
 Harris's Kent, p. 246.
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans. 159 
 
 encroachment at Reculver, and here we arrive at another 
 cause for the present desolation of the spot. 
 
 According to old John Leland, Reculver was two miles 
 and more by water, and a mile less by land beyond 
 Heron, now Herne ; from Canterbury five goode myles, 
 and " stondeth withy n a quarter of a myle, or little more, 
 of the se syde." The town at that time, he adds, was 
 but " village lyke." He continues " Sumtyme, wher as 
 the paroche chyrch is now, was a fayre and greate abbaye, 
 and Brightwald) archbishop of Cant., was of that howse. 
 The old building of the chirch of the abbaye remayneth, 
 having ii goodly spiring steples. Yn the enterying of the 
 quyer ys one of the fayrest, and the most auncyest crosse 
 that ever I saw, a ix footes, as I ges, yn highte. It 
 standeth lyke a fayr columne. The base greate stone ys 
 not wrought. The second stone, being round, hath 
 curiously wrought and paynted images of Christ, Peter, 
 Pawle, John, and James, as I remember. Christ sayeth, 
 'Ego sum Alpha & fi,' Peter sayith, 'Tu es Christus 
 filius dei vivi.' The saying of the other iii wher painted 
 ' majusculis literis Ro.', but now obliterated. The second 
 stone is of the Passion. The iii conteineth the xii Apos- 
 tles. The iiii hath the image of Christ hanging, and 
 fastened with iiii nayles, and sub pedibus sustentacu- 
 lum. The hiest part of the pyller hath the figure of a 
 corpse. In the chirch is a very auncient Boke of the 
 Evangelyes in majusculis literis Ro., and yn the bordes 
 therof ys a christal stone, thus inscribed: 'CLAVDIA. 
 ATEPICCUS.' Yn the north side of the chirch is the
 
 1 60 Reculver : 
 
 figure of a bishop paynted under an arch. In digging 
 abowte the chyrch-yard they find old bokels of girdels 
 and rings. The hole precinct of the monastery appereth 
 by the old walle : and the vicarage was made of the ruines 
 of the monastery. Ther is a neglect chapel, owt of the 
 chyrch-yard, wher sum say was a paroch chirch or the 
 abbay was suppressed and given to the bishop of Cant. 
 Ther hath been much Romain mony fownd abowt Re- 
 culver."* 
 
 Some years ago, at a short distance to the west of the 
 Towers, there was to be observed the mouldering remains 
 of a small hermitage. It was doubtless "the neglect 
 chapel owt of the chyrch-yard" of Leland, and was dedi- 
 cated to St. James. Here a hermit was appointed to 
 officiate in early days, to lead a lone and austere life and 
 pray for the souls of the drowned sailors and wayfarers, 
 picked up on the adjacent sands. This building is said to 
 have been for the most part constructed of Roman bricks, 
 and one arch of the wall entirely so. Richard the Second, 
 in the third year of his unhappy reign (1380), granted a 
 commission to Thomas Hamond, the resident hermit of 
 Reculver, for the sepulture of such persons as were found 
 dead upon the shore, and who had perished from storm 
 and wreck. The hermit was also enjoined to collect 
 alms from the charitable for the rebuilding of the chapel 
 roof, which had fallen down. But neither the charity of 
 the passing stranger, nor the exertions of the pious 
 hermit, hath sufficed to keep this curious building from 
 * Itinerary, vol. vii, p. 136.
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans, 161 
 
 destruction. Both hermitage and place of sepulture have 
 alike been swept away by the fall of the cliff, and the sea 
 has again claimed the drowned remains it had before 
 disgorged. 
 
 At the present time, little else remains to tell the tale 
 of the former greatness of Reculver than some portions 
 of the Roman walls on the East and Southern sides of 
 the once famous Castrum ; which objects of antiquity, 
 covered by masses of ivy, as well as here and there by 
 the yet fruit-bearing fig-tree, sprung possibly from Roman 
 planting! let us hope, will be long preserved in their 
 picturesque grandeur, though destined doubtless to ulti- 
 mate decay, as well as the frequently before mentioned 
 " Sister Towers", which form in their modern ugliness a 
 still important and interesting point of vision, to all who 
 travel by sea or land by this part of the coast of Eng- 
 land, and the reverence for which in the first days of their 
 predecessors' existence was so great, as to induce the 
 mariners of those remote times to lower the topsails of 
 their vessels whilst passing by the then no doubt much 
 grander and more stately pinnacles, so piously and use- 
 fully erected by the Lady Abbess of the Benedictine Nuns 
 of Davington, near Faversham.* 
 
 Of the Church itself much has been written, and 
 great diversity of opinion expressed. Mr. Freemant con- 
 siders its structure as a mixture of Saxon and Norman 
 architecture ; whilst Mr. Roach Smith regards it as pos- 
 
 * For this romantic legend, see Appendix. 
 f In his little book on Regulbium, published in 1810. 
 
 M
 
 1 62 Reculver : 
 
 sessing many features of Roman workmanship, and espe- 
 cially directs attention to some discoveries that were made 
 in the old church during the process of demolition early 
 in the present century. The chancel was separated from 
 the nave by one large and two smaller semi-circular 
 arches, and it was in these arches and their columns, with 
 portions of their side walls, that certain peculiarities were 
 found to exist. The arches were turned with Roman 
 tiles, and the walls banded with three courses of the 
 same ; the upper and lower, in each wall, consisting of 
 four rows, the centre of five; the walls were of rough 
 stone. Unfortunately, adds Mr. Roach Smith, the mortar, 
 an important evidence in determining pure Roman 
 masonry, was not described ; but there was every other 
 requisite for referring this remarkable portion of the 
 church to the Roman epoch. The columns* also har- 
 monised with the arches and walls, and presented features, 
 especially at the capitals, which further seem to decide 
 their Roman construction. My old friends, the late Mr. 
 Charles Baily and Mr. Duesbury, fully concurred in the 
 idea that this church was built upon a Roman foundation, 
 and Mr. Baily suggested that the capitals which present 
 an incomplete appearance may have been intended to 
 receive bronze foliated ornaments of the Corinthian order. 
 These discoveries and opinions would appear to settle the 
 
 * Two of these columns are at present standing in an enclosure 
 with other Roman remains, near the Deanery, at Canterbury Cathe- 
 dral, and where they were taken after the barbarous destruction of 
 the church in 1809. They were discovered by Mr. J. B. Sheppard, 
 who recognised them from the engraving in Mr. Roach Smith's work.
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans. 163 
 
 question raised by Mr. Freeman as to the age of the 
 church. There can be no doubt but that a temple 
 existed on the spot in the Roman times, and that the 
 Saxon Christians added their building to the parts which 
 were remaining of the original structure. 
 
 The monuments of the Church, though not nume- 
 rous, were interesting, and were jchiefly raised to the 
 memory of some of the influential people about the 
 neighbourhood ; amongst them might be mentioned 
 those to the Maycotes, the Sandeways, and Ralph 
 Brooke the celebrated York Herald, who died in 1625. 
 
 All these, however, with many other memorials of the 
 virtues and greatness of a former generation, have passed 
 away, and save where the long, tangled grass discloses 
 now and then a half-obliterated tomb-stone, there is 
 little remaining to mark the spot or tell the names of 
 those who slept beneath. Of the final destruction of 
 the old Church by people who ought rather to have 
 assisted in the preservation of such a fine relic of 
 bygone times, full information will be obtained by refer- 
 ring to several communications made to the Gentleman's 
 Magazine in the years 1808, 1809, and 1810. In the 
 latter year the lead taken from the roof and spires was 
 sold for ^900, and it only remains to be said, that the 
 spires were purchased by the Corporation of the Trinity 
 House. From an inscription affixed on the wall of the 
 gateway between the present towers, we learn that 
 
 "These towers, the remains of the once venerable 
 church of Reculver, were purchased of the parish by the
 
 164 Reculver: 
 
 Corporation of Trinity House, of Deptford, Stroud, in 
 the year 1810, and groins laid down at their expense to 
 protect the cliff on which the church had stood. When 
 the ancient spires were afterwards blown down, the present 
 substitutes were erected to render the towers still suffi- 
 ciently conspicuous to be useful to navigators. Captain 
 Joseph Catton, Deputy-master, in the year 1819." 
 
 Such, then, is the condition of a once mighty and 
 imposing fabric, the shrine of a Christian king, and the 
 seat of the learning and piety of by-gone ages. Here for 
 a time, saved by the hand of man, may these old towers 
 rear their heads and warn the mariner off a treacherous 
 shore ; but the day will come, and that probably at no 
 very distant period, despite the appliances of art or of 
 engineering skill, when these ancient walls will topple over 
 and become the prey of devouring waters which secretly 
 and silently are now sapping their foundations. These 
 vestiges of the past, which have seen the Roman, the 
 Saxon, and the Norman pass away in all their separate 
 epochs of grandeur and importance, must, ere long, them- 
 selves fall victims to that unsated element which has 
 overwhelmed already the larger portion of their greatness. 
 
 These ancient sea and landmarks must yield to the 
 destiny which awaits them, and perchance remain to 
 future generations as much a subject for speculation and 
 enquiry, as the British mound on which they still stand, 
 or of the earlier Parish Church or " neglect chapel" once 
 existing, as honest old Leland hath it, where now we 
 witness the foaming billows break and curl around the
 
 The Regulbium of the Romans. 165 
 
 darkly-hidden foundations of this solemn, ever-changeful 
 shore. 
 
 Surely, if ever, the immortal words of Prospero may 
 be fitly applied here, " to point a moral and adorn the 
 tale", which the few foregoing pages have attempted, how- 
 ever imperfectly, to unfold ! 
 
 " These our actors 
 
 As I foretold you, were all spirits and 
 Are melted into air, into chill air ; 
 And like the baseless fabric of this vision, 
 The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, 
 The solemn temples, the great globe itself, 
 Yea, all which it inhabit, shall dissolve 
 And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, 
 Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff 
 As dreams are made on, and our little life 
 Is rounded with a sleep." 
 
 \_For further Notes on this Paper and description of the 
 Map at its commencement, see Appendix.~\
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 NOTES ON THE "SOURCE AND NOMENCLA- 
 TURE OF THE RIVER THAMES." 
 (Pages 57 to 73.) 
 
 (From John Aubrey's "Natural History of Wiltshire j Remarques 
 in the County of Wilts", qto., 1685.) 
 
 " THE Silver Thames takes some part of this county in its 
 journey to Oxford. The source of it is in Gloucestershire, 
 near Cabberley (in the rode from Oxford to Gloucester), where 
 there are severall springs. In our county it visits Cricklad, 
 a market town, and gives name to Isey, a village near ; and 
 with its fertile overflowing makes a glorious verdure in the 
 spring season. 
 
 "In the old deeds of lands at and about Cricklad they find 
 this river by the name of Thamissis fluvius and the Thames. 
 The towne in Oxfordshire is writt Tame, and not Thame ; 
 and I believe that Mr. Cambden's Marriage of Thame and 
 his, in his elegant Latin poem, is but a poetical fiction ; I 
 mean as to the name of Thamisis, which he would not have 
 till it comes to meet the river Thame at Dorchester." 
 
 John Britton, who edited the above work, in 1847, says, 
 " The true source of the river Thames has been much dis- 
 puted. A spring which rises near the village of Kemble, at 
 the north-western extremity of Wiltshire, has been commonly 
 regarded during the last century as the real ' Thames head'. 
 It flows thence to Ashton Keyms, and onward to Cricklade. 
 At the latter place it is joined by the river Churn, which 
 comes from Coberly, about twenty miles to the Northward, 
 in Gloucestershire. Aubrey refers to the latter stream as the 
 source of the Thames ; and on the principle of tracing the
 
 Appendix. 167 
 
 origin of a river to its remote source, the same view has 
 been taken by other writers, who consequently dispute the 
 claims of the Kemble spring." 
 
 (From Samuel Ireland's "Picturesque Views on the River Thames", 
 etc., Vol. i, 1801.) 
 
 " The name also of this river has long been matter of con- 
 troversy, even amongst the learned, on whom we ought to 
 rely ; it therefore becomes necessary previously to investi- 
 gate the various opinions and authorities that have been ad- 
 vanced on the subject. The vulgar appellation it bears 
 above Oxford, is Thame-Isis, evidently formed from a com- 
 bination of the words Thame and Isis ; the supposed con- 
 flux of which gave rise to a poem of some eminence called 
 The Marriage of Thame and Isis. How this river obtained 
 the latter name, or at what period, I cannot learn. Stow 
 seems to concur in this poetical fiction, and deems everyone 
 ignorant who gives the river any other appellation than 
 that of Isis ; but to show that no great reliance is to be 
 placed on his opinion, I will use his own words, which are so 
 flatly contradictory to themselves as to invalidate his autho- 
 rity : he says, in the fifth chapter of his Survey of London, 
 that ' the Thames beginneth a little above a village called 
 Winchcomb in Oxfordshire, and still increasing, passeth 
 first by the University of Oxford, etc., to London', and in 
 the next chapter that the Isis 'goeth into Thame in Oxford- 
 shire' (which is more than fifteen miles below Oxford), 'where 
 joining with a river of the same denomination it loseth the 
 name of Isis or Ouse, and from thence is called Thamesis 
 all along as it passeth.' 
 
 " As Master Stow, therefore, does not seem to understand 
 himself, I must, to clear up this disputed point, refer to 
 Camden, on whose authority I am inclined to rely. He says, 
 ' it plainly appears that the river was always called Thames,
 
 1 68 Appendix. 
 
 or Terns, before it came near the (town of) Thame'; and 
 that in several charters granted to the Abbey of 'Malmes- 
 bury, as well as that of Evesham', and from old deeds ' rela- 
 ting to Cricklade', it is never considered under any other 
 name than that of Thames." 
 
 "All historians", says this same author, Samuel Ireland, 
 " who mention the incursions of Ethelwold into Wiltshire, 
 A.D. 905. or of Canute, in 1016, concur likewise in the same 
 opinion by declaring ' that they passed over the Thames 
 at Cricklade.' 
 
 " There is still further reason in confiding in these authori- 
 ties, as it is not probable that the THAMES HEAD, an appel- 
 lation by which the source has usually been distinguished, 
 should give birth to a river, after having run half its course, 
 or should reassume the name of Thames, the appellation of 
 its parent spring. 
 
 " As to the origin of its name it may possibly be derived 
 from the Saxon Temere, or from the British word Tavuys, 
 which implies a gentle stream, and from which many rivers 
 in this island derive their appellation ; as Tamen in Stafford- 
 shire, Teme in Herefordshire, Tamer in Cornwall, etc. 3 ' 
 
 NOTES ON "HUMPHREY, DUKE OF GLOUCES- 
 TER, AND HIS FIRST DUCHESS." 
 
 (Pages 97 to 131.) 
 
 ( From Marryafs "History of Pottery and Porcelain, Mediaeval and 
 Modern", %vo., yd ed., 1868.) 
 
 " MANY fanciful derivations are given of the term porce- 
 lain. The word ' pourcelaine' exists in the Inventories of 
 the I4th to the i6th centuries, applied to some glossy, 
 precious substance, which M. de Laborde considers to have 
 been Mother-o'-pearl. Passeri also informs us that the fine
 
 Appendix. 169 
 
 Majolica invented in 1500 was termed 'pocellana.' When 
 the name was transferred to Oriental china is difficult to say, 
 but it is so called in the extracts already given from Barbaro, 
 1478 ; Lorenzo de Medici, 1487 ; and earlier still by Marco 
 Polo, 1298, if the term exists in his original MS., which was 
 not published till 1559. The common notion, therefore, of 
 deriving it from the Portuguese navigators of 1509 must be 
 dismissed." 
 
 "According to tradition," says Marryat, "Jacqueline 
 Countess of Hainault and Holland (after her marriage 
 with Francis Von Borselen, Stadholder of Holland, yet 
 her subject, and under compulsion of her uncle, John of 
 Bavaria, and Bishop of Liege), is said to have retired to the 
 Castle of Teylingen near Leyden, and there employed her 
 leisure in the superintendence of the manufacture of stone- 
 ware, and to have thrown flasks of this pottery into the 
 Rhine, that they might in after ages be deemed works of 
 antiquity. Hence these pots were called Jacobakenitjes." 
 
 This has already been noticed at page 129 of the fore- 
 going Paper, and only goes to prove that the unfortunate 
 and ill-treated Jacoba was evidently anxious to have her 
 name known to posterity as a Ceramic artist, and therefore 
 tends, as has been before suggested, to the idea that she 
 did not devote all her time to common stoneware, which she 
 so deliberately and constantly threw away, but doubtless 
 produced choicer specimens of Ceramic Art at other 
 times. 
 
 The following extracts, taken from Mons. de Laborde's 
 " Glossaire'\ refer, without doubt, says Marryat, to Oriental 
 porcelain, 1524 : " Ung beau grant pot de pourcelaine a 
 deux agneaux (anneaux) d'argent. Deux autres petits 
 pots de porcelaine. Six plats et escuelles et salieres de 
 pourcelayne de plusieurs sortes. Deux autres esquieres 
 d'une sorte de pourcelayne bleue, garnies les Couvecles 
 d'argent dore". Ung beau gobelet de porcelayne Blanche &>
 
 170 Appendix. 
 
 couvercle, painct a 1'autour de personnaiges d'hommes et 
 femmes. Inventaire de Marguerite d'Autriche." 
 
 I may mention here that my friend, Mr. W. H. Cope, 
 F.S.A., who is well known as an authority on Oriental china, 
 and has a valuable collection of Ceramic ware, Jade, etc., 
 and to whom I referred my suggested derivation of Porcelain 
 from "Borselen", thus writes on the subject: "I return you the 
 Pamphlet, which I took down to Paddock Wood and read 
 to our friend 'the Chisholm'; he quite agrees with me, that 
 your etymology of the word Porcelain from Borselen, is 
 much nearer the mark than ' Porcellena,' ' Porcus,' or 
 'pour cent amides,' which I think very far-fetched and 
 stretched out. I have nothing to add to your paper, nor 
 could I suggest anything better than you have done. I 
 think ' Porcelain' will still be a Ceramic crux, though I 
 think you have gone far to solve it." 
 
 NOTES ON "RECULVER: THE REGULBIUM OF 
 THE ROMANS." 
 
 THE little map which precedes this paper, and is copied, by 
 kindly permission of Mr. Roach Smith, from an illustration 
 in his before-referred-to Antiqiiities of Richborough, Re- 
 culver, etc., shows the gradual progress of the sea from 
 Leland's time to the date of this Survey, about 1 50 years 
 space, or interval, elapsing between the two periods ; and is 
 thus described. 
 
 " This interesting document belonging to Mr. Robert Col- 
 lard of Brooke, who kindly permitted the original facsimile 
 to be made, is entitled, ' A Mapp and description of a farme 
 w 01 12 parcels of land there belonging, lying in the parish of 
 Reculver, in ye County of Kent, being owned by Mr 
 Gideon Despaigne (and by his order measured and herein 
 described) ; being now in ye tenure, or occupation of Robert
 
 Appendix. ' 171 
 
 Wellbe. Measured andlmapt by Thomas Hill, sworne sur- 
 veyor, 1685.' 
 
 " The Map is described as showing also the person's names 
 whose land bound thereunto. A considerable portion of the 
 Map is occupied by plain marsh-land and fields, an orna- 
 mental border enclosing the title, and a long historical de- 
 scription, which is given below. 
 
 " No portion of any interest has been omitted in our en- 
 graving, if we except a part of the western boundary, at the 
 distance of a hundred and fifty-five rods from the Church- 
 tower, where appears 'a place anciently for a harber of ships, 
 called the Old Pen',* and which runs inland from the cliff in 
 a diagonal direction westward, for forty-six rods in length, 
 but not more than forty-eight rods distance from the Cliff 
 at its extremest inland point." 
 
 The historical description, above alluded to, is as 
 follows : 
 
 "Near the Church of Reculver was once an ancient 
 
 * This is now known as the Pan Sand, or Pudding-pan Rock, 
 from which oyster- fishers constantly dredge up quantities of Samian 
 ware, and hence, no doubt, the name of "Pan" has been converted 
 from the original word Pen. Mr. Roach Smith says, " It has been 
 supposed by some, that a Vessel laden with Samian ware may have 
 foundered here, others suggest that a Pottery has been submerged. 
 As the Sea has made extensive inroads upon this Coast, it is more 
 than probable that the locality which furnishes the ware was for- 
 merly dry ground ; but neither of these theories seems altogether 
 satisfactory." My friend, Mr. Cecil Brent, F.S.A., has a fine 
 collection of Roman pottery from this spot, some of which his 
 brother the late Mr. John Brent, F.S.A., of Canterbury, the ac- 
 complished poet and archaeologist, collected and purchased. Mr. 
 ' Cecil Brent is of opinion that this " Pan Sand" was an island, and 
 he also tells me that at Reculver, his mother remembered a Cottage 
 standing on the sea side of the ruined Church and its modern 
 Trinity House Steeples.
 
 172 Appendix. 
 
 towne (but now demolished, except a small village of houses 
 yet standing). Anciently, there was a Mint, or coynage for 
 Roman money, being then under that empire ; for in the 
 days of Severus, Emperor of Rome (being 1480 years since), 
 built here a Castle, which he fortified against the Britains, 
 the foundation yet to be seene about the church (like the 
 figure on this plott, about 10 acres of land), neer a mile dis- 
 tance then from the sea, only a large river (called Want- 
 sume, but now Marshland), which passed near the east side 
 of this castle at K, so winding it selfe about by the castle of 
 Richborrow, so opening into the sea where Sandwich since is 
 built. And 382 years after, Ethelbert, the fifth king of Kent, 
 built here a colledge, and dedicated it to the Virgine Mary. 
 And, Ano. Dom. 792, Egbert, a king likewise of the said 
 County, built in this parish a Monasterie of ye order of St. 
 Benedict, and short time after, another king (Eadric 
 (Edred) by name), gave it to Christ Church of Canterbury, 
 to w ch it yet continues. This parish is in the liberty of St. 
 Austine ; but the Manner, the Archbishop of Canterbury 
 claimeth there,'' etc. 
 
 THE LADY ABBESS, ETC. The following Legend refers to 
 the " Sister Towers", and is of so romantic and pathetic a 
 character, that we cannot but hope it may be true, although, 
 of course, it is very difficult in these days to authenticate it. 
 
 " Francis St. Clare, lady-abbess of the Benedictine nuns 
 at Faversham (or rather of ' poor Nuns of Davington' near 
 Faversham, belonging to the Benedictine Priory, founded 
 there by Fulke de Newesham in 1 1 53), being visited by a 
 violent sickness, vowed that in the event of her recovery she 
 would visit the Shrine of the Blessed Virgin at Bradstow 
 (Broadstairs), and there present a costly offering in grati- 
 tude for the Virgin's intercession on her behalf. In accord- 
 ance with this vow, she embarked on the 3rd of May, the 
 Feast of Holy Cross, accompanied by her Sister Isabel, for 
 whom she entertained the warmest affection, but they had
 
 Appendix. 1 73 
 
 not been at sea two hours ere a storm arose, which drove 
 the vessel on a sandbank near Reculver. Part of the crew 
 and passengers, including the Abbess, succeeded in reaching 
 the shore in a boat, but Isabel, who remained on the wreck 
 till another was sent to the rescue of herself and all those 
 left behind, suffered so severely from cold and exhaustion 
 that she died the following day. To perpetuate her memory, 
 as well as to warn Mariners against the recurrence of similar 
 calamities, the Abbess caused the Church towers, then much 
 decayed, to be repaired, and two spires to be added, which she 
 directed should be thenceforth called 'the Sisters.'" 
 
 In an interesting Paper by Mr. George Dowker, entitled 
 " Reculver Church", printed in vol. xii of the Archceologia 
 Cantiana, there is a very full account of that ancient edifice 
 as it was and as it is, and to that Paper I cannot do better 
 than refer my readers for much more information in con- 
 nection with it than I have been able to give in the preced- 
 ing pages on Reculver itself. Amongst other things he 
 states that King Ethelbert was buried in the monastery of 
 St. Augustine, in the porticus of St. Martin, and gives the 
 Historia Monasterii S. Augustini: Cantuariensis, as his 
 authority. He also quotes from Kilburn : " Ethelbert, the 
 first Christian King of Kent, about 1060 years since, built a 
 place here for himself and successors ;" and observes : 
 " I can find no confirmation of this statement. Ford House 
 was the most ancient seat belonging to the see of Canter- 
 bury, being given to it by Ethelbert, King of Kent, who 
 resided the latter part of his reign in Reculver. This 
 palace is about four miles distant, and in Ethelbert's time 
 might be considered a part of Reculver. It is probable that 
 he retired here." He continues thus in a footnote to the 
 above : " I have examined Ford, and find early foundations 
 of compact masonry in which Roman tiles are introduced, 
 though most of the present walls appear to have been re- 
 built to the foundations (I give this merely as a conjecture),
 
 174 Appendix. 
 
 but the masonry in the foundations of these walls is wonder- 
 fully like that in the earliest part of Reculver Church." 
 
 NOTE ON THE. "ARABIAN NIGHTS" 
 ALTERED SPELLING, ETC. 
 
 THE following Extracts are taken from a leading Article 
 which appeared in the Globe and Traveller Evening paper of 
 Wednesday, September 2ist, 1887, under the heading of 
 ' The Spelling Fiend", and as they are singularly appropriate 
 to the subject referred to at page 10 of the Prefatory Remarks 
 of this book, it has been deemed fitting to print them in this 
 Appendix. 
 
 " A Tutor" has been reading with some of his pupils a 
 history of England, professing to be written " in a simple 
 style for the use of middle forms of schools", and he has 
 been puzzled by meeting therein with an altogether new 
 race of British heroes. "Boudicea" might no doubt pass as 
 an error of that scapegoat, the printer ; but not when she 
 appears in such company as she keeps in that English 
 history for middle forms. 
 
 What average boy, trained in a more conventional way, 
 would recognise in Ecgberht the destroyer of the Heptarchy 
 which so many of us are striving to restore ? Why should 
 we in Bceda lose an acquaintance upon whom we learned 
 to look as " venerable" under another name ? Would any- 
 body like to see Burns amended into " Scots whom Brus 
 has often led" ? A boy who wrote home for a remittance 
 and signed himself " Eadweard" would probably not get it, 
 even if he did not draw on himself the wrath of the older 
 Caxton, when his son wrote himself " Peisistratos" instead 
 of " Pisistratus." " Archbishop yElfheah" is altogether too 
 dreadful a person ; " Glyndwr" wants a Welsh tongue ; and
 
 Appendix. 175 
 
 the statement that " The Wickings rove the sea in their 
 Ashes" requires translation. It is altogether a dreadful 
 question. Are we to sacrifice everything to correctness? 
 In that case a universal arbiter must be elected to rule what 
 correctness means. In the days of Shakspere or Shake- 
 speare, for example, not to speak of older and later times, 
 names were spelled according to fancy, the owners own 
 fancy being often the most variable of all. There has 
 always been a great deal of the sort of work going on in 
 history, which caused the Alsatian authority in the Fortunes 
 of Nigel \.Q enter Nigel Graham upon the archives of the 
 sanctuary as " Niggle Green." Then places, English and 
 foreign, have their rights as well as men and women. He 
 who writes Glyndwr for Glendower, is bound for bare con- 
 sistency's sake, to write Wien when he means Vienna, 
 Miinchen for Munich, and Regensburg for Ratisbon. 
 
 As things are, Dr. Hunter has already rendered many 
 otherwise happy lives a burden to themselves by his well- 
 intentioned system of representing Indian place-names 
 with an approximation to phonetic accuracy. His system 
 is admirable of course ; systems always are. But he has 
 added confusion to confusion in the study of Indian history. 
 And the worst of it is that European history has not even 
 obtained its Dr. Hunter. Every man is becoming a law 
 unto himself ; while there is scarce a historian left who is 
 not some sort of a crocheteer. Sometimes a particular 
 spelling will help in an infinitesimal way to support a his- 
 torical argument ; and then are " wigs on the green." For 
 example, there is a great controversy now proceeding as to 
 the extent to which the Romanised Britons were expelled 
 by their Saxon invaders ; and in looking for traces of their 
 remaining where they were found, it is obvious that every- 
 thing may depend upon the spelling of a proper name ; or 
 whether a little twist in one direction or another can give it 
 a look of Celtic we beg pardon, Keltic or Saxon. And
 
 1 76 Appendix. 
 
 of course such a twist may always be given in either direc- 
 tion at pleasure. 
 
 So, on the whole, with a view to minimising the crotchety 
 way of studying history, and to leaving the student's mind 
 open, it seems fairest to accept the traditional and conven- 
 tional forms of proper names, be they British, Continental, 
 Classical, or Oriental. Such a course makes life for a great 
 many people, indeed for the majority, simpler and easier. 
 And fortunately, it implies but little difficulty. The names 
 that have acquired a customary spelling are so decided in 
 their character as to leave little room for doubt as to whether 
 any given name ought to be included in their category. The 
 use and wont at, say, the year of the Queen's accession, 
 would be a very satisfactory guide. 
 
 Upon the minor worthies and obscure towns and villages, 
 mere biographical or geographical expressions without any 
 bearing on popular history, the reformers may be con- 
 veniently left to do their work. It is with the names which 
 have become incorporated in our language as current words 
 that we are concerned. And in that regard Ecgberht is 
 just as obsolete, and therefore just as wrong, as if we were 
 to revive the Chaucerian spelling. 
 
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