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 ANCESTRAL STORIES 
 
 TRADITIONS OF GREAT FAMILIES.
 
 WORKS BY JOHN TIMES. 
 
 LADY BOUNTIFUL'S LEGACY TO HER FAMILY 
 AND FRIENDS: 
 
 A BOOK OF PRACTICAL INSTRUCTIONS AND DUTIES, COUNSELS, AND 
 EXPERIENCES, HINTS, AND RECIPES IN HOUSEKEEPING, AND 
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 STRANGE STORIES OF THE ANIMAL WORLD: 
 
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 ANCESTRAL STORIES 
 
 TRADITIONS OF GREAT FAMILIES 
 
 iin of 
 
 BY 
 
 JOHN TIMES, F.S.A., 
 
 AUTHOR OK ' NOOKS AND CORNERS OF ENGLISH LIFE,' ETC. 
 
 LONDON: 
 GRIFFITH AND FARRAN, 
 
 SUCCESSORS TO NEWBERY AND HARRIS, 
 
 CORNER OF ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD. 
 MDCCCLXIX.
 
 MURRAY AND GIBB, EDINBURGH. 
 PRINTERS TO HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE.
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 7^1 nt^"^ Ancestral Histories of the Great Families of 
 England are rich beyond compare in Episodes 
 
 of Thought and Action, such as are the master- 
 springs by which the world is moved. 
 
 The gravity of History has been estimated as ' Philo- 
 sophy teaching by example.' In this long lesson, how in- 
 tricate is the chequer-work of success and defeat, of light 
 and shade; yet how interesting to those who delight to 
 seek out the motives of human action in the lives of master- 
 minds, their rise and fall I 
 
 In the Histories of Great Families, which are the nooks 
 and byeways of History proper, are to be found garnered 
 many records of change, which sometimes make men giddy 
 by looking too long upon their wheels. In the present 
 volume an attempt is made to focus some of these Scenes 
 and Stories from English History, and the parts which 
 the leaders of Great Families have played in the grand 
 drama of our country's fame : in its Monastic and Castle 
 
 2000094
 
 vi PREFACE. 
 
 Life ; its Traditions and Legends ; its Domestic Tragedies ; 
 its Battles and Sieges ; as well as its ' trivial fond records ' 
 of Private Life, and its abode of quiet contentment. The 
 inner life of the people, as well as of their rulers, has been 
 here glanced at, with their habits and modes of living, as 
 well as the great changes by which they have been influenced. 
 
 In the preparation of this volume the general aim has 
 been "to present such a book as, by seizing salient points 
 in our History, should supplement narratives of striking 
 events of domestic interest, which are already popular, 
 and thus add to their attractiveness as well as complete- 
 ness. Localities and love of country have not been over- 
 looked, but studied for the charm with which they invest 
 scenes and circumstances, and people the historic page 
 with actual life. 
 
 It is now the Author's grateful duty to acknowledge how 
 much he has, in preparing the present volume, availed him- 
 self of the valuable historical, genealogical, and heraldic 
 works of Sir Bernard Burke, Ulster King-at-Arms, who has 
 devoted a lifetime to studies in these classes of literature ; 
 and although the Author's quotations are in most instances 
 specially indicated, he feels it due to Sir Bernard Burke 
 here to refer to the extent of the obligation in the spirit as 
 well as the letter. He should further state that his extracts 
 can nowise, and are not at all intended to interfere with 
 the necessary perusal of Sir Bernard's popular books, 
 and especially of his charming series, The Vicissitudes of 
 Families.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 LACOCK ABBEY, AND ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. 
 
 Village of Lacock, I ; Nunnery of Lacock, 2 ; William Longspe, Earl of 
 Sarum, 2 ; Childhood of Ela, 2 ; Annals of Lacock, 3 ; Pilgrimage 
 of William Talbot, 3, 4 ; Marriage of Ela, 4 ; Salisbury Cathedral 
 founded, 5 ; Death of the Earl of Salisbury, 6 ; Ela Sheriff of 
 Wiltshire, 7 ; Lacock Abbey founded, 7 ; Ela's Abbacy, 8 ; Death 
 of Ela, 9 ; Lacock preserved, 1 1 ; A Love Adventure, 12 ; Mr. Fox 
 Talbot and Photography, 13 ; Lacock Abbey described, 14, 15 ; 
 Mrs. Crawford's account of Lacock, 15 ; Lady Shrewsbury and Miss 
 Dormer, 16 ; Legend of Spye Park and the Bayntons, 17, 18. 
 
 THE LUMLEY PORTRAITS. 
 
 Lumley Castle, Durham, 19 ; Liulph the Saxon, 19 ; Series of Family 
 Portraits, 20; Surtees' and Planche's accounts of the Pictures, 20-22. 
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 Village of Fotheringhay, 23 ; Fotheringhay Castle built, 23 ; Mary of 
 Valence, her good works, 24 ; Fetterlock plan of the Castle, 25 ; 
 College and Church of Fotheringhay, 25-27 ; Cicely Duchess of 
 York, 26 ; History of the Castle, 28 ; Henry v. buried, 29 ; Richard 
 III. born, 29 ; State Funeral, 30 ; The Duchess Cicely, death of, 32 ; 
 Catharine of Aragon at Fotheringhay, 33 ; Ampthill Park, 33 ; 
 Fotheringhay a Prison of State, 34 ; Mary Queen of Scots impri- 
 soned here, 34 ; Mary's Trial, 35 ; Sentence, 36 ; Elizabeth and 
 Mary, 37 ; Souvenirs of Mary, 37, 38 ; Execution of Mary, 42 ; 
 Conduct of Elizabeth, 42 ; Portraits of Mary, 43 ; Ruins of Fother- 
 inghay Castle, 44, 45 ; Case of Mary Queen of Scots and Mr. 
 Froude's Views, 46, 47.
 
 viii CONTENTS. 
 
 TRADITIONS OF WALLINGTON AND THE 
 CALVERLEYS. 
 
 Wallington Border Tower, 48 ; Sir John Fenwick's Hospitality, 48 ; 
 his Execution, 49 ; Walter Calverley's Adventures, 50 ; the Vava- 
 sours of Weston, 51 ; Yorkshire Tragedy, 51 ; Headless Horse 
 Superstition, 52 ; Calverley Wood, 52. 
 
 FORTUNES OF THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 
 
 The Irish Geraldines, 54; The Earl of Kildare saved from fire in 
 Woodstock Castle, 54 ; The Vescis and the Geraldines, 55 ; The 
 Baron of Offaly, 56 ; Gerald the Great Earl of Kildare, 57 ; Lam- 
 bert Simnel and Perkin Warbeck, 57, 58 ; The Lord of Clanricarde, 
 58, 59 ; Death of Kildare, 59 ; Gerald Oge, ninth Earl, 60, 61 ; 
 Strange Story, 61 ; ' Silken Thomas,' 62 ; His Rebellion, 63 ; Lord 
 Edward Fitzgerald, 64. 
 
 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE AND HIS DESCENDANTS. 
 
 Sir Anthony Browne's family connection with Royalty, 66, 67 ; Huns- 
 don House and the Earl of Surrey, 66 ; The Fair Geraldine's Story, 
 67 ; Mabel Browne, 67 ; Gerald eleventh Earl on his Travels, 68, 69 ; 
 Cardinals Pole and Farnese, 69 ; Battle Abbey and Sir Anthony 
 Browne, 71 ; Schaffhausen Catastrophe, 71, 72 ; Cowdray Castle 
 and Viscount Montague, 72 ; The Family of Browne, 72, 73. 
 
 THE OSBORNE AND LEEDS FAMILIES. 
 
 Edward Osbome, the Gallant Apprentice of London Bridge, and Sir 
 William Hewet, Cloth-worker, 76 ; Hewet's Daughter saved, 76 ; 
 Family of Osborne, 77; Prints and Pictures of Osbome, 78, 79. 
 
 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, AND THE 
 MORE FAMILY. 
 
 Loseley, near Guildford, 80 ; Battle of Hastings, and Roger de Mont- 
 gomery, 80 : Manor held of the House of Gloucester, 81 ; Pur- 
 chased by Christopher More, Sheriff of Surrey and Sussex, 81 ; 
 Loseley House founded by William More, 82 ; Sir William More 
 a favourite of Queen Elizabeth, 82 ; Elizabeth's Visits to Loseley,
 
 CONTENTS. ix 
 
 83 ; Sir Christopher Hatton, the Queen's Chamberlain, 83 ; Visits 
 of James I., 84 ; Sir George More and the Trial of Overbury, 85 ; 
 Dr. Donne and Mrs. Donne, 85 ; Loseley Manuscripts, 86 ; 
 Loseley described, 87 ; Lines upon a Clock at Loseley, 89 ; 
 Rebus of the More Family, 90 ; Drawing-room at Loseley, 91 ; 
 Memorials of the Mores and Molyneux, 92 ; Sir William More, 
 Master of the Swans, 93. 
 
 GOD'S PROVIDENCE IS MAN'S INHERITANCE. 
 
 Inscription at Chester, 94 ; Motto of the Earl of Cork, 95 ; Dr. South 
 on ' the Providence of God,' 95. 
 
 SUSSEX AND ITS WORTHIES. 
 
 Sussex, or the Land of the South Saxons, 97 ; Saxon Times, 98 ; 
 Godwin, Harold, and Pevensey, 98 ; Arundel, Lewes, Petworth, 
 Cowdray, and Stanstead, 99 ; Great Names in Church and State, 
 
 99 ; Archbishops of Canterbury, 99 ; Bodiam Castle, 99 ; Selden, 
 Gibbon, Leighton, Shelley, St. Leonards, Erskine, three Shirleys, 
 
 100 ; Howards and the Sackvilles, Fienneses, Pelhams, Ashburn- 
 hams, Percys, and the Montagues, 101 ; Historians of Sussex, 
 
 101 ; Burrell MSS., ioi ; Lower's Battle of Hastings, 101. 
 
 ' A WORTHY COMMANDER IN THE WARRES.' 
 
 From the Miscellaneous Works of Sir Thomas Overbury. Now first 
 collected and edited by E. F. Rimbault, LL.D., 102. 
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 The Hungerfords of Somerset and Wilts, 104 ; Sir Richard Colt Hoare's 
 ffungerfordiana, 104 ; Farleigh Castle, History of, 104, 105 ; An 
 Episode of Bosworth Field, 106 ; Lady Hungerford Executed at 
 Tybourn, 106 ; Hungerfords, 107 ; Lord Hungerford of Heytes- 
 bury, 108 ; Inventory of Lady Hungerford's Goods, 108 ; The 
 Hungerford Badge and Crest, 113, 114 ; Heytesbury Manor-house, 
 116 ; Bottreaux Shield in the Hungerford Arms, 117 ; Hungerford 
 House, Strand, 117 ; A Five Hundred Guinea Wig, 118 ; Aubrey 
 and Britton's Accounts of the Hungerford Family, 119, 120.
 
 x CONTENTS. 
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 The Family of Shirley, 121 ; Lordship of Etington, 121 ; Sir Thomas 
 Shirley, 122 ; Chartley Estate, 123 ; Staunton Harold Church, 123 ; 
 Sir Robert Shirley, 123, 124; Laurence Earl Ferrers murders his 
 Steward, 124; Trial of Lord Ferrers, 127; Execution of Lord 
 Ferrers, 129-132 ; Chartley Tradition, 133. 
 
 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 
 
 The Earl of Shrewsbury, 135 ; Gooderich Castle, 136 ; John Talbot, 
 136; Wars of Henry v., 137; Monument at Whitchurch, 138; 
 Sir Gilbert Talbot at Bosworth, 138 ; George Earl of Shrewsbury 
 and Mary Queen of Scots, 139 ; The Duke of Shrewsbury and 
 Addison, 140 ; The Great Shrewsbury Will Case, 140, 141 ; In- 
 scription in Bromsgrove Church, 142. 
 
 GEORGE VILLIERS, DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM, ASSASSI- 
 NATED BY JOHN FELTON. 
 
 Buckingham the Favourite of James I. and Charles I. , 143 ; ' Sweet 
 Steenie,' 144; Death of Dr. Lambe, 'the Duke's Devil,' 145; 
 Attempts upon Buckingham's Life, 146 ; Assassination by Felton 
 at Portsmouth, 146, 147 ; Paper found in Felton's Hat, 148 ; 
 Charles I. at Southwick, 149 ; Account of Felton, 149 ; Purchase 
 of the Knife, 150; Execution of Felton, 151 ; Funeral of Bucking- 
 ham, 151 ; D 'Israeli on the Assassination, 152 ; Poems and Songs 
 printed by the Percy Society, 153 ; Mutiny at Portsmouth, 154 ; 
 - Forster's Life of Sir John Eliot, 154. 
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 Wolves exterminated, 156; Serpent, Dragon, and Crocodile Stories, 
 157; Lindwurm or Dragon in Moravia, 158; The Dragon of Want - 
 l y 159-161 ; St. Leonard's Forest Serpent or Dragon, 161-163 ! 
 Geological Lights, 163, 164 ; Sir John Conyers, the Dragon-slayer, 
 165; Worm of Lambton Hall, 166, 167; The Lambton Family, 
 168 ; Gigantic Snail and Laidly Worm, 169 ; ' Serpent hi the Sea,' 
 170.
 
 
 CONTENTS. xi 
 
 LEGENDS OF 'THE RED HAND.' 
 
 Heraldry, its uses, 171 ; ' The Red Hand of Ulster,' 171 ; Hatchment 
 at Hagley, 172; Holt Tradition and Aston Church, 172, 173; Red 
 Hand at Wateringbury and Gray's Inn, 175, 176; Legend of Sir 
 Richard Baker, 176-178; Stoke D'Abernon Church, 178; Legend 
 of the Bodach Glass, 179-182; Oxenham Family and white- 
 breasted Bird, 182. 
 
 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 
 
 Castles near Newbury and Leicestershire, 183 ; Castle Doningtons, 
 the two, 185 ; Chaucer's Residence question, 185 ; ' Chaucer's 
 Oak,' 1 86; Death of Chaucer, 188 ; The Stauntons and the 
 Shirleys, 190. 
 
 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 
 
 Sir John Howard, the eminent Yorkist, 191 ; Creation of Earl Marshal, 
 192 ; Catherine Howard, 193 ; The Earl of Surrey, statesman, 
 poet, and warrior, 193 ; Thomas Duke of Norfolk, 194 ; Lines by 
 Queen Elizabeth, 195 ; Philip Earl of Arundel, ' the Renowned 
 Confessor,' 196-199 ; The Earls of Arundel and Charles I., 199 ; 
 The Howards and the Deepdene, 200. 
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 Eland Hall and the Family of Eland, 201 ; Fray and Feud in York- 
 shire, 202 ; Eland, Beaumont, Lockwood, and Quarmby, 202 ; 
 Attack on Crossland Hall, 202 ; Sir John Eland slain, 204-207 ; 
 Search for his Murderers, 207 ; Revenge at Eland Mill and Hall, 
 208-211 ; Quarmby's Fate, 211 ; The Lockwoods extirpated, 212 ; 
 Old Ballad quoted, 213. 
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 Pontefract Town and its Castle, 214; Three Sieges, 215 ; Towers of the 
 Castle, 216; Magnificence of Thomas Earl of Lancaster, 216; The 
 Earl tried in Pontefract Castle, and beheaded, 218, 219 ; Remorse 
 of Edward II., 220; Deposing of Richard II., 221; Richard in 
 Flint Castle, 221, 222 ; Richard II. in the Tower, 222, 223 ; Tradi-
 
 xii CONTENTS. 
 
 tion of the King's Death, 223 ; Murdered by Sir Piers of Exton, 
 224 ; Execution of Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan, 225 ; Tragedies at 
 Pontefract, 226 ; Three Sieges of the Castle, 226-228 ; Views from 
 the Heights, 228, 229 ; Pontefract and Pomfrete, 229 ; Pontefract 
 Cakes, 230. 
 
 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 
 
 The Derwentwater Family, 231 ; Charles Radcliffe and his Support of 
 the Chevalier, 232, 233 ; Rebellion of 1 745, Walpole's account, 
 233, 234 ; Dilston or Devilstone Hall, 235 ; Lord Derwent water's 
 ' Corpse Lights,' 236 ; Derwentwater Estates and Greenwich Hos- 
 pital, 237 ; Relics of the Derwentwaters, 237, 238 ; Genealogical 
 details, 238. 
 
 THE BRAVE EARL OF LEVEN. 
 
 The House of Lesley or Leslie, 239 ; General Lesley's Brave Services, 
 239, 240 ; Imprisoned in the Tower, and liberated by the media- 
 tion of the Queen of Sweden, 241. 
 
 FYNDERN AND THE FYNDERNES. 
 
 Village of Fyndern, County Derby, 242 ; Family of the Fyndernes, 242, 
 243 ; Mary Queen of Scots in Tutbury Castle, 244 ; ' The Fynderne 
 Flowers,' 244; Sir Bernard Burke's Vicissitudes of Families, 245, 
 246. 
 
 THE GOLDSMITH OF LEEDS : A TRAGIC TALE. 
 
 Mace of the Corporation, its Maker hanged for High Treason, 247 ; 
 Clipping Case, 248 ; The Mystery cleared up, 249, 250. 
 
 A COUNTRY GENTLEMAN OF THE SEVENTEENTH 
 CENTURY. 
 
 Mr. Henry Hastings, Son, Brother, and Uncle to the Earl of Hunting- 
 don, his Park and Mansion, and love of Hunting ; A foundling 
 Knight, 251-254.
 
 CONTENTS. xiii 
 
 THREE EARLS OF STANHOPE. 
 
 The First Earl, Soldier and independent Statesman, 255 ; Earl 
 Philip, Patron of learned Men, and honest Statesman, 256 ; Earl 
 Charles, universal Genius (Improver of the Printing-press), 257. 
 
 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 
 
 Drayton's Lines on Rutland, 258; Oakham Hall, 259; Walkeline de 
 Ferrers, 259; Horse-shoes nailed upon the Castle Gate, origin 
 of the custom, 260 ; Possession of the Castle and Manor, 262 ; 
 Castle in the last century, 263 ; List of Shoes on the Castle 
 Walls, 265-267; The 'Golden Shoe,' 267. 
 
 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS IN THE OLDEN TIME. 
 
 Origin of Mumming, 268, 269; Christmas in Guildford Castle in 
 1348, 269; Mummers in 1377, 270; Cornish Miracle-plays, 271; 
 Mumming in Worcestershire and Northamptonshire, 272 ; Had- 
 don Hall and its Festivities, 273; Possessors of Haddon, 274; 
 Stanzas, 275. 
 
 LOVE PASSAGE FROM THE DIARY OF LADY 
 COWPER. 
 
 Lady Cowper's Diary, 276; Lady Harriet Vere and Lord Cowper, 
 277-280 ; History of the Diary, 280, 281. 
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 Lathom House and its Possessors, 282 ; The Earls of Derby and their 
 Magnificence, 284; Siege of Lathom in 1644, and its Defence by 
 the heroic Countess of Derby, 284, 285 ; Sir Thomas Fairfax at 
 Lathom, 286 ; Capture of Bolton, 287 ; Fall of Lathom, 288 ; 
 The Earl of Derby defeated in 1651, 288; Lathom and Knowsley 
 Proverbs, 290, 291 ; Legend of the Eagle and Child, 291-293 ; 
 'The Great Stanley,' his career, 293, 294; His Execution at 
 Bolton, 295 ; The Rev. Mr. Cumming's Narrative, 295, 296.
 
 xiv CONTENTS. 
 
 THE MANOR OF WAKEFIELD AND SANDAL CASTLE. 
 
 Wakefield Manor, 297 ; William first Earl of Warren, 297 ; Discovery 
 of the Remains of Gundreda at Lewes, 298, 299 ; Sandal Castle 
 and the Battle of Wakefield, 300, 301 ; The Battle-field, 301 ; 
 The Battle of Towton, 302; Towton and Waterloo compared, 
 302; Wakefield in olden times, 303; Pindar's Fields and Robin 
 Hood, 303, 304; Sandal Castle, its history, 304, 305; The Civil 
 Wars, 306 ; Wakefield Park, 306. 
 
 MIDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. 
 
 Middleham Castle, History of, 308; Character of Richard III., 309- 
 312 ; His love of Music, 313 ; Richard and Richmond at Bosworth, 
 315; Richard's personal appearance, 315. 
 
 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 
 
 Umngton Castle and White Horse Hill, 316; Battle of Ashdown, 316; 
 The White Horse and Scouring, 317 ; Saxon Standard of the White 
 Horse, 319; Dragon Hill and Wayland Smith, 320; Wayland 
 Smith Cave described, 321; Blowing-stone described, 322; Vale 
 of White Horse, a retrospect, 323, 324. 
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 Monmouth's Progress in Somerset and Dorset, 325, 326 ; White Lack- 
 ington House and Norton St. Philip's, 326 ; Capture of Monmouth, 
 327-329 ; The Ash-tree, 329 ; Monmouth-close, 330 ; Monmouth's 
 Attainder, 331 ; Execution of Monmouth, 333, 334 ; Burial of 
 Monmouth, 334-336; Monmouth House, Soho, 336; Memorials 
 of the Duke, 337; Pocket-book, 337; Verses and Prayers, 340; 
 Diary, 341; Charles II., 341; Interesting Documents, 342. 
 
 THE LADY ALICE LISLE. 
 
 Miles Court, 343; 'The Merciful Assize,' 344; Trial of Lady Alice 
 Lisle, 344-347 ; ' Kirke's Lambs,' 346 ; Chief Justice Jeffreys, 347 ; 
 The Sentence and Execution, 347 ; The Last of Jeffreys, 348, 349.
 
 CONTENTS. xv 
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE AND THE WESTONS. 
 
 West Horsley Place and its Possessors, 350, 351 ; The Berners Family, 
 351; Lord Berners and the Chronicles ofFroissart, 352-354; West 
 Horsley Manor, Sir Anthony Browne, and the Fair Geraldine, 355 ; 
 The Career of Beddington and Carew Raleigh, 355 ; Sir Walter 
 Raleigh and Sherborne Castle, 355, 356 ; The Head of Sir Walter 
 Raleigh, 358, 359; Owners of West Horsley, 359; Great Storm 
 of 1703, 360; The Weston Family, 360, 361 ; Historical Portraits, 
 361 ; The Westons of Sutton, 362; Sutton Place described, 363; 
 Armorial Cognizances, 364 ; Curious Devices, 365 ; Old Portraits, 
 366 ; Chapel, 367. 
 
 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 
 
 Scenery of Craven, 368 ; The Cliffords, and Skipton Castle, 369 ; The 
 Shepherd Lord Craven, 369, 370 ; The Profligate Earl of Cumber- 
 land, 371 ; Ballad of ' The Nut-Brown Mayde,' 372 ; Earls of 
 Cumberland, second and third, 373 ; The Countess of Pembroke 
 and Montgomery, 373 ; Town Mansion of the Cliffords in Clerken- 
 well, 374. 
 
 SCRIVELSBY AND THE QUEEN'S CHAMPIONSHIP. 
 
 Office of the Champion, the Dymokes and Scrivelsby, 375 ; The Mar- 
 myons, 376 ; The Champions at the Coronations, Henry iv. to 
 George iv., 377, 378; Scrivelsby Court, 379; Anglo-Norman 
 Ballad on the Lands of Scrivelsby, 379-381. 
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 Memoir of the Greys of Groby, 382 ; Bradgate described, 383 ; Fami- 
 lies of Ferrers and Grey, 384, 385 ; Birthplace of Lady Jane Grey, 
 386 ; Ruins of Bradgate, 386, 387 ; Aylmer, Lady Jane's Master, 
 388 ; Education and Character of Lady Jane, 388 ; Ascham's 
 Visit to Bradgate, 389 ; Scholarship of Lady Jane, 390, 391 ; The 
 Greys of Groby, 391 ; The Countess of Stamford, 392, 393 ; Mar- 
 riage of Lord Dudley and Lady Jane, 394 ; Committed to the 
 Tower, 395 ; Wyat's Insurrection, 395 ; Execution of Lord Dudley
 
 xvi CONTENTS. 
 
 and Lady Jane, 396-401 ; Lines by Lady Jane, 401, 402 ; Burial 
 of Lady Jane, 401, note; Prison in the Tower, 404 ; Lines on Brad- 
 gate, 405. 
 
 ASSASSINATION OF THE HARTGILLS BY LORD 
 STOURTON. 
 
 Stourton, in Wiltshire, 407 ; The Hartgills of Kilmington, 407 ; Lady 
 Elizabeth Stourton, 407 ; Affray in Kilmington Church, 408, 409 ; 
 Lord Stourton committed to the Fleet, 409 ; The Hartgills at- 
 tacked by Lord Stourton's Men, 410 ; Star Chamber business, 
 411 ; Affray in the Church, 412 ; The Murder, 413, 414; Trial of 
 Lord Stourton and four of his Servants, 415 ; Execution at Salis- 
 bury, 416 ; The Stourton Family, 416. 
 
 THE RED AND WHITE ROSES. 
 
 Dispute in the Temple Garden, 418 ; Badges of York, 418 ; Rose 
 Tenure, 419 ; Clifford Castle, 419, 420. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 Peerages per saltum, 421 ; ' Bell the Cat,' 423.
 
 ANCESTRAL STORIES. 
 
 LACOCK ABBEY, AND ELA COUNTESS OF 
 SALISBURY. 
 
 >BOUT thirteen miles east of Bath, and nearly 
 half-way between the towns of Chippenham 
 and Melksham, in a spacious and level meadow, 
 surrounded by elms, and watered by the Avon, rise 
 the walls and tall spiral chimneys, and arches hung with 
 ivy, of the ancient Nunnery of Lacock. The site, it may 
 be supposed, was originally a solitary glade, adjoining the 
 village or town of Lacock. The name is derived from 
 Lea and Lay, a meadow, and Oche, water; and here, in 
 the Avon, Aubrey found large round pebbles, ' the like of 
 which he had not seen elsewhere.' Lacock was, in the 
 Saxon times, of greater importance than at present; for 
 in an ancient record, quoted by Leland, we read that 
 Dunvallo founded three cities, with three castles, Malmes- 
 bury, Tetronberg (? Troubridge), and Lacock. We need 
 scarcely remark, that what might have been then called
 
 2 LACOCK ABBEY, AND 
 
 cities or castles, would not be much in accordance with 
 our ideas of such places in the present age. 
 
 The Nunnery of Lacock is far more interesting than the 
 Castle of Dunvallo. In the year 1232, Ela, only child of 
 William Earl of Salisbury, and sole heiress of all her father's 
 vast landed possessions in Wiltshire, laid the foundation of 
 this religious house in her widowhood, in pious and affec- 
 tionate remembrance of her husband William Longspe (in 
 her right Earl of Sarum), who had then been dead six years. 
 This brave man was the eldest natural son of Henry n., by 
 the lady whose transcendent beauty has become proverbial 
 under the name of Fair Rosamond. He assisted in found- 
 ing the magnificent Cathedral of New Sarum in the year 
 1220 : six years afterwards he died of poison at the Castle 
 of Old Sarum, and was the first person buried within the 
 walls of New Sarum Cathedral, where his tomb now 
 remains. The earliest ancestor of Ela, whose existence 
 rests on credible record, was Edward of Salisbury, Sheriff 
 of Wilts, whose name occurs in Domesday book, and 
 attesting several charters of the Conqueror. 
 
 The childhood and early life of the pious Ela are fraught 
 with romantic interest. She was born at Amesbury in 
 1188. Until her father's death in 1196, Ela was reared 
 in princely state. Earl William, her father, was one of the 
 distinguished subjects of the chivalric lion king, Richard, 
 and took a prominent part at both his coronations. He 
 also kept the king's charter for licensing tournaments 
 throughout the country. One of the five steads or fields
 
 ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. 3 
 
 then appointed for tournaments in England was situated 
 between Salisbury and Wilton ; and on that spot, when 
 a child, the future Abbess of Lacock may have first wit- 
 nessed the perilous gaiety of knightly enterprise, and its 
 proud exhibitions of personal courage and external splen- 
 dour and gallantry. The situation is well known on the 
 downs in front of the site of Sarum Castle. 
 
 Such was the scene on which Ela in her childhood might 
 have gazed when animated with the glitter of arms and 
 banners ; but from which, on the death of her father, this 
 richly-portioned heiress was suddenly snatched and sub- 
 jected to seclusion in a foreign country. All that is said 
 in the transcript of the annals of the Abbey of Lacock the 
 original perished in the fire at the Cotton Library is that 
 Ela was secretly taken into Normandy by her relations, 
 and there brought up in close and secret custody. These 
 relations, it is conjectured, were her mother and her 
 mother's family, whose estates were either in Normandy 
 or Champagne. Immediately upon the inquisition held 
 after her father's death, Ela's land would, in due course, 
 be taken into the possession of the king, as she had become 
 a royal ward : but- such was not the case. The event 
 which arose from these circumstances is highly characteristic 
 of the court of the minstrel monarch. An English knight, 
 named William Talbot, undertook to discover the place 
 of the youthful heiress' concealment ; the idea having been 
 suggested, if the fact be admitted, by King Richard's own dis- 
 covery, a few years before, by aid of the minstrel Blondel.
 
 4 LACOCK ABBEY, AND 
 
 Assuming the garb of a pilgrim, the gallant Talbot passed 
 over into Normandy, and there continued his search, wan- 
 dering to and fro for the space of two years. When at 
 length he had found the Lady Ela of Salisbury, he ex- 
 changed his pilgrim's dress for that of a harper or travel- 
 ling troubadour, and in that guise entered the court in 
 which the maid was detained. As he sustained to per- 
 fection his character of a gleeman, and was excellently 
 versed in the jests or historical lays recounting the deeds 
 of former times, the stranger was kindly entertained, and 
 
 soon received as one of the household. At last his 
 
 . i 
 
 chivalric undertaking was fully accomplished; when, hav- 
 ing found a convenient opportunity for returning, he carried 
 with him the heiress, and presented her to King Richard. 
 Immediately after, the hand of Ela was given in marriage 
 to William Longspe by his brother King Richard, Ela 
 being then only ten years old, and William twenty-three. 
 
 After the marriage of Ela, we have little to recount 
 of her for several years, unless it were to enumerate the 
 names of her flourishing family of four sons and as many 
 daughters. The Earl was in frequent attendance upon King 
 John ; but the Countess Ela appears to have passed most 
 of her life in provincial sovereignty at Salisbury, or in the 
 quiet retirement of some country manor, most frequently, 
 perhaps, in the peaceful shades of her native Amesbury. 1 
 
 1 Aubrey tells us that ' the last Lady Abbess of Amesbury was a 
 
 Kirton, who, after the Dissolution, married to Appleton of 
 
 Hampshire. She had during her life a pension from King Henry vin.
 
 ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. 5 
 
 We pass over the career of the Earl ; his assumption of 
 Ela's hereditary office of the Shrievalty of Wiltshire ; his 
 attendance at the coronation of John, and upon the king 
 in Normandy ; his progresses with John in England, and 
 his appointment to military command and as Warder of the 
 Marches ; his ruinous campaign in Flanders ; and his pre- 
 sence at the signing of Magna Charta. After the death of 
 John, the Earl returned to his Castle of Salisbury, and to 
 that most interesting scene in which the pious Ela was an 
 active partaker with him. This was no less than the cere- 
 mony of founding the present beautiful Cathedral of Salis- 
 bury, the fourth stone of which was laid by the Earl, and the 
 fifth by the Countess Ela. We next pass the Earl's visit to 
 Gascony in the spring of 1224, and his disastrous return, 
 when, according to Matthew Paris, he was ' for almost 
 three months at sea' before he landed in England. Dur- 
 ing the interval all his friends had despaired of his life, 
 except his faithful wife, who, though now a matron, became 
 an object of pursuit to the fortune-hunters of the Court. 
 The Justice Hubert de Burgh, with most indecent haste, 
 now put forward a nephew of his own as a suitor to the 
 Lady of Salisbury. It is related by Matthew Paris, that 
 whilst King Henry was deeply grieved at the supposed loss 
 of the Earl of Salisbury, Hubert came and required him to 
 bestow Earl William's wife (to whom the dignity of that 
 
 She was 140 years old (?) when she dyed. She was great-great-aunt to 
 Mr. Child, rector of Yatton Keynell, from whom I had this infor- 
 mation. Mr. Child, the eminent banker in Fleet Street, is Parson 
 Child's cousin-german.' Natural History of Wiltshire, 4to, p. 7-
 
 6 LACOCK ABBEY, AND 
 
 earldom belonged by hereditary right) on his own nephew 
 Reimund, that he might marry her. The king having 
 yielded to his petition, provided the Countess would con- 
 sent, the Justice sent Reimund to her, in a noble, knightly 
 array, to endeavour to incline the lady's heart to his suit. 
 But Ela rejected him with majestic scorn, and replied that 
 she had lately received letters and messengers which assured 
 her that the Earl, her husband, was in health and safety ; 
 adding, that if her lord the Earl had indeed been dead, 
 she would in no case have received him for a husband, 
 because their unequal rank forbade such a union. ' Where- 
 fore,' said she, ' you must seek a marriage elsewhere, be- 
 cause you find you have come hither in vain.' Upon the 
 Earl's return, he claimed reparation from the Justiciary, 
 who confessed his fault, made his peace with the Earl by 
 some valuable horses and other large presents, and invited 
 him to his table. Here, it is said, the Earl was poisoned 
 (probably with repletion). He returned to his castle at 
 Salisbury, took to his bed, and died March 7, 1226; and, 
 as already mentioned, was buried in Salisbury Cathedral. 
 
 Ela, now a widow, continued firm in her resolution to 
 remain faithful to the memory of her first lord, and to 
 maintain her independence in what was then termed, in 
 legal phrase, 'a free widowhood.' Her choice, however, 
 was singular ; for ladies of large estate, at that period, were 
 seldom permitted to remain either as virgins or widows 
 without a lord and protector, unless they had arrived at an 
 advanced age. Her case is deemed extraordinary in the
 
 ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. 7 
 
 chronicles. Her son, when he became of age, claimed the 
 inheritance of the earldom ; but the king refused it, by the 
 advice of his judges, and according to the principles of 
 feudal law. The objection probably was, that the earl- 
 dom was then vested in his mother. Thus Ela's entrance 
 into the profession of a recluse may possibly have partaken 
 of a worldly motive, as being likely to facilitate her son's 
 admission to his hereditary dignity ; but if so, it was still 
 unsuccessful. In consequence of her protracted life, the 
 earldom of Salisbury continued dormant ; and as she sur- 
 vived both her son and grandson, it was never revived in 
 the house of Longspd. 
 
 Ela was permitted to exercise in person the office of 
 Sheriff of Wiltshire, and Castellane of Old Sarum. Her 
 great seal, an elegant work of art, is extant, and represents 
 her noble and dignified deportment, and her gracefully 
 simple costume : ' her right hand is on her breast ; on her 
 left stands a hawk, the usual symbol of nobility ; on her 
 head is a singularly small cap, probably the precursor of the 
 coronet ; her long hair flows negligently upon her neck on 
 each side ; and the royal lions of Salisbury appear to gaze 
 upon her like the lion in Spenser on the desolate Una ! ' 
 
 We at length reach the time of the foundation of Lacock 
 Abbey. ' When,' says the Book of Lacock, ' Ela had sur- 
 vived her husband for seven (six ?) years in widowhood, and 
 had frequently promised to found monasteries pleasing to 
 God, for the salvation of her soul and that of her huakyid, 
 and those of all their ancestors, she was directed in visions
 
 8 LACOCK ABBEY, AND 
 
 (per revelationes) that she should build a monastery in 
 honour of St. Mary and St. Bernard in the meadow called 
 Snail's Mead, near Lacock.' This she did on April 16, 1232, 
 although the requisite charters bear prior dates. 
 
 Among the earliest coadjutors with the pious Ela was 
 Constance de Legh, who assisted by giving ' her whole 
 manor.' Ela had' likewise founded a monastery of Carthu- 
 sian monks at Hinton, in Gloucestershire, in which, as 
 also at Lacock, she is supposed to have fulfilled the inten- 
 tions of her husband ; indeed, the profits of his wardship 
 of the heiress of Richard de Camville were assigned to the 
 foundation at Hinton by the Earl's last will. 
 
 The first canoness veiled at Lacock was Alicia Garinges, 
 from a small nunnery in Oxfordshire, which was governed 
 under the Augustine rule, the discipline to be adopted at 
 Lacock. In the transcripts from the Book of Lacock 
 another person is mentioned, either as abbess or canoness, 
 during the eight years which elapsed after the foundation, 
 and before Ela herself took the veil as abbess of her own 
 establishment, in the year 1238, in the fifty-first year of her 
 age ; she ' having, in all her actions and doings, been con- 
 stantly dependent on the counsel and aid of St. Edmund, 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury, and other discreet men.' 
 
 The records of Ela's abbacy are neither copious nor 
 numerous. Among them is a charter, dated 1237, in which 
 the king grants to the Prioress of Lacock, and ' the nuns 
 there<serving God,' a fair to last for three days, namely, on 
 the eve, feast, and morrow of St. Thomas the Martyr. In
 
 ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. 9 
 
 the year 1241 Ela obtained two other charters from the 
 king ; one to hold a weekly market. A beautiful cross stood 
 in the market-place at Lacock until about the year 1825, 
 when its light and elegant shaft was destroyed to furnish 
 stone for building the village school-room. By the second 
 charter the king gave the abbess the privilege of having, 
 every week, one cart to traverse the forest of Melksham, 
 and collect ' dead wood ' for fuel, without injury to the 
 forest, during the royal pleasure. 
 
 Five years before her death, Ela retired from the peaceful 
 rule of her monastic society, and appointed in her place an 
 abbess named Beatrice, of Kent. Yet Ela obtained several 
 more benefits for the abbey from the king. At length, in the 
 seventy-fourth year of her age, August 24, 1261, yielding 
 up her soul in peace, Ela rested in the Lord, and was most 
 honourably buried in the choir of the monastery. Aubrey 
 has this strange entry in his Natural History of Wiltshire : 
 1 Ela Countess of Salisbury, daughter to Longspd, was 
 foundress of Lacock Abbey, where she ended her days, 
 being above a hundred years old : she outlived her under- 
 standing. This I found in an old MS. called Chronicon de 
 Lacock in Bibliotheca Cottoniana? Now, the chronicle re- 
 ferred to was burnt in 1731, and the extracts preserved from 
 it do not confirm Aubrey's statement, but place Ela's death 
 in her seventy-fourth year. 
 
 Ela had been deprived by death of her son and grand- 
 son, and her daughter Isabella, Lady Vesey; and in the 
 last year of her life she was preceded to the tomb by her
 
 io L ACOCK ABBEY, AND 
 
 son Stephen ; so that, of all her family, she left only two 
 sons and three daughters surviving, one of whom died in the 
 following year. Ela's son William Longspe the second, 
 having joined the expedition of St. Louis to the Holy Land, 
 perished at the assault of Mensoura. His mother, accord- 
 ing to the monkish legend, seated in her abbatial stall in 
 the church at Lacock, saw, at the same moment, the mailed 
 form of her child admitted into heaven, surrounded by a 
 radius of glory. His son William Longspe in. was killed 
 in a tournament near Salisbury. 
 
 The annals of the abbey after the death of Ela are by 
 no means complete. In 1291 we first collect a view of its 
 yearly revenue, ^191, 123. ^d. Among the possessions 
 here included is a manor in the Isle of Wight, which had 
 been given to the abbey by Amicia Countess of Devon, 
 and ' Lady of the Isle,' together with her heart. The obit of 
 the Countess was yearly celebrated in the church of Lacock 
 Abbey, on the feast of St. Andrew (November 30), when 
 four bushels of corn were distributed to the poor ; and on 
 the eve and day of that feast, three poor persons were fed 
 with bread, drink, and meat, to the value of 2d. each. 
 Another instance of pious affection in 1297, is the bequest 
 of the heart of the aged Nicholas Longspe, Bishop of Salis- 
 bury, the last surviving son of the foundress. 
 
 The last abbess was Joanna Temys. Lacock was one of 
 the thirty monasteries which the king spared in 1536 ; but 
 it was surrendered in 1539, and the fatal document is still 
 preserved in the Augmentation Office. It is ratified by the
 
 ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. n 
 
 abbey common seal, which is of the same age as the foun- 
 dation, and represents the Virgin and Child, with the lady 
 abbess in a niche below, kneeling in prayer. To the last 
 abbess was assigned a pension of 40 ; and the prioress 
 and 15 other nuns had proportionate provisions. The yearly 
 value of the abbey and its estates, at the surrender, was 
 ^171, 195. 3^d. Among the payments are those for 
 observances in memory of the foundress and others, in 
 candles about their tombs, and doles to the poor : there 
 were maintained three priests for the daily celebration of 
 divine services, and ' the general confessor to the convent.' 
 Some of the principal gentry in the neighbourhood, as well 
 as the abbess' own kinsmen, are also named as holding 
 honourable offices in the service of the abbey. 
 
 Lacock has preserved, from the Dissolution to this day, 
 its most perfect form : the cloisters and cells of the nuns 
 its ancient walls and ivied chimneys almost entire. But the 
 church was wholly destroyed, and not a vestige can be 
 traced of its ancient altars. The bones of the honoured 
 foundress and her family were alike disregarded. One 
 single mark of respectful remembrance has been paid to the 
 Countess Ela : her epitaph is still preserved on a stone 
 within those cloisters which echoed once to her footsteps, 
 and resounded the Ave Marias of the nuns. 
 
 After the Dissolution we find that Lacock was sold to Sir 
 William Sherington in 1544 for ^783, 123. i|d. Thirty 
 years subsequently Lacock was visited by Queen Elizabeth, 
 who was also this year at Longleat and Wilton ; and, most
 
 12 L ACOCK ABBEY, AND 
 
 probably, the queen then knighted her host, Sir Henry 
 Sherington. In the Civil War, 1645, the house was gar- 
 risoned for the king, and taken by the opposite party shortly 
 after Cromwell had won Devizes, the Lord of Lacock having 
 previously been sent prisoner to London. 
 
 Aubrey relates this romantic story, which has the appear- 
 ance of authenticity : ' Dame Olave, a daughter and co-heir 
 of Sir [Henry] Sherington of Lacock, being in love with 
 [John] Talbot, a younger brother of the Earl of Shrewsbury, 
 and her father not consenting that she should marry him, 
 discoursing with him one night from the battlements of the 
 abbey church, said she, " I will leap down to you." Her 
 sweetheart replied he would catch her then, but he did not 
 believe she would have done it. She leapt downe ; and the 
 wind, which was then high, came under her coates, and did 
 something break the fall. Mr. Talbot caught her in his 
 arms, but she struck him dead. She cried out for help, and 
 he was with great difficulty brought to life again. Her 
 father told her that, since she had made such a leap, she 
 should e'en marrie him. She was my honoured friend 
 Colonel Sharington Talbot's grandmother, and died at her 
 house at Lacock about 1651, being about an hundred years 
 old. Quaere, Sir Jo. Talbot ? ' 
 
 The above anecdote was missed by the venerable his- 
 torian of Lacock, the Rev. Canon Bowles, to which work 
 we are largely indebted for the materials of this sketch. 
 John Carter, the antiquary, when he visited Lacock in 
 1801, was told a tradition, that ' one of the nuns jumped
 
 ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. 13 
 
 from a gallery on the top of a turret there into the arms of 
 her lover.' He observes, as impugning the truth of the 
 story, that ' the gallery appears to have been the work of 
 James or Charles the First's time.' This may have been 
 founded upon Aubrey's story : though the abbey church had 
 then been destroyed, there is a galleried tower of later date. 
 From the Sheringtons the property descended to Sir 
 Anthony Mildmay of Apthorp, Northamptonshire, by his 
 marriage with Grace, daughter of Sir Henry Sherington, 
 but had no issue ; so that the whole inheritance of Lacock 
 came to her sister Olive, the wife of John Talbot, Esq. of 
 Salwarp, county Worcester, fourth in descent from John the 
 second Earl of Shrewsbury, from whom it has descended 
 to Henry Fox Talbot, Esq., who in this delightful retreat, 
 in chemical researches for his own recreation, here worked 
 out the secret of Photography. He took up the ground to 
 which Davy and Wedgwood had made their way. Paper 
 was the medium, which he made sensitive to light by nitrate 
 of silver, and then fixed the image by common salt. He 
 first called his process Photogenic Drawing, then Calotype, 
 which his friends changed to Talbotype, in imitation of 
 Daguerre's example. Mr. Fox Talbot is stated, in the 
 Qiiarterly Review, No. ccii., to have sent his method to the 
 Royal Society in the same month that Daguerre's discovery 
 was made known, January 1839 ; but Sir David Brewster 
 dates Mr. Talbot's communication six months earlier. 1 
 
 1 As a new art, which gave employment to thousands, Mr. Fox 
 Talbot brought photography to a high degree of pertection. ' He
 
 14 LACOCK ABBEY, AND 
 
 Lacock Abbey, as it now exists, consists of the octangular 
 turret, with a gallery, already referred to ; and the cloisters, 
 of the time of Henry iv. There are several sepulchral 
 relics, as grave-stones, coffin-lids, etc. The site of the church 
 is now a terrace-walk. The residential portion of the building 
 has handsome bayed windows, pierced parapet, and twisted 
 chimney-shafts. The middle chamber of the tower is re- 
 served as a depository for writings ; here is the Magna 
 Charta of King Henry in., of inestimable value, being the 
 only one perfect in the kingdom; It is i2f inches broad ; 
 and in length, including the fold, 20^ inches : the seal is of 
 green wax, pendent by a skein of green silk. This charter 
 seems to have been designed for the use of the knights and 
 military tenants in Wiltshire, and to have been deposited 
 here by the Countess Ela, who succeeded her husband in 
 the office of Sheriff of Wiltshire. 
 
 expended large sums of money in obtaining for the public the full 
 benefit of his invention ; and towards the termination of his patent he 
 liberally surrendered to photographic amateurs and others all the rights 
 which he possessed. As Mr. Talbot had derived no pecuniary benefit 
 from his patent, he had intended to apply to the Privy Council for an 
 extension of it ; but in this he was thwarted by interested parties.' 
 'Although,' says Sir David Brewster, 'we are confident that a jury 
 of philosophers would have given a verdict in favour of Mr. Talbot's 
 patent, taken as a whole, and so long unchallenged, yet we regret to 
 say that an English judge and jury were found to deprive him of his 
 right, and transfer it to the public. The patrons of science and art 
 stood aloof in the contest ; and none of our scientific institutions, and 
 no intelligent member of the Government, came forward to claim from 
 the State a national reward to Mr. Talbot. How different in France 
 was the treatment of Niepce and Daguerre ! '
 
 ELA COUNTESS OF SALISBURY. 15 
 
 A singular domestic relic is shown here the Nuns' Boiler, 
 which formerly stood in the abbey kitchen. It is very 
 massive, is supported on three legs, and bears this inscrip- 
 tion : 
 
 ' A PETRO WAGHUENS IN MECHLINIA EFFUSUS FACTUS VE 
 FUERAM, ANNO MILLESIMO QUINGENTESSIMO. DEO LAUS ET 
 GLORIA CHRISTO.' 
 
 ' I was moulten or made by Peter Waghuens, of Mechlin, 
 in the year 1 500. Praise be to God and glory to Christ.' 
 
 Mrs. Crawford, in a sketch of the old place, remarks : 
 ' There is something highly picturesque and moving to the 
 feelings in the appearance of this fine abbey, standing in 
 a fertile vale, with its old avenue, broad terrace- walks, and 
 extensive cloisters, breathing, as it were, the heavenly music 
 of those holy spirits that once animated the vestal forms of 
 beauty now mouldered into dust, and of which the profane 
 foot that treads over it takes no account. 
 
 ' The entrance-hall is a magnificent apartment, with a 
 double row of niches round its sides, filled with statues : 
 one of a bishop, with a book in hand, is instinct with life. 
 Over the high mantel are the effigies of the Countess of 
 Shrewsbury and her two beautiful nieces, habited as nuns. 
 From a door on one side of the hall you enter the inner 
 cloisters, which still bear the name of " the nuns' burying- 
 ground." The great dining-room has full-length portraits 
 painted on panel. There is a gallery hung with pictures, 
 among which is the legendary leap of the nun, who " escaped 
 with her lover, having leaped from the high tower, in which
 
 1 6 L ACOCK ABBEY. 
 
 the abbess had confined her, and sustained no injury from 
 her fall but the fracture of her little finger." ' Mrs. Craw- 
 ford relates some interesting recollections of an inmate of 
 the abbey, Lady Shrewsbury, a strict Catholic, eighty years 
 of age, who had been in her youth a great beauty. She had 
 frequently friends staying here ; the Blounts, Cliffords, and 
 Hydes being her most frequent guests. The family priest, 
 a sort of ' Will Wimble,' had three rooms for his special 
 use : a bed-chamber hung with tapestry, and filled with all 
 sorts of curious things ; and two chambers a printing- 
 office and turning-shop. 
 
 Lady Shrewsbury was pious without parade, and one of 
 the old aristocracy, without any of those unbecoming airs of 
 pride too often attending high rank. She was sent by her 
 father, Lord Dormer, to a French convent to be educated. 
 'Her own account of her first interview with the Earl of 
 Shrewsbury is amusing : ' Being told that an English gentle- 
 man had brought letters from my father, I hurried into the 
 Lady Abbess' parlour, where the Earl, then a beautiful young 
 man, was waiting to see me. I had been so long within 
 those dismal walls, and never seen a man but our own con- 
 fessor, and a hideous-looking creature who came to draw my 
 tooth, that the Earl looked like an angel to me.' They were 
 soon married, and spent some time at the French court. 
 On her arrival in England, Lady Shrewsbury went, in all 
 her bridal state, to visit her sister, Miss Dormer, at the con- 
 vent where she was passing her novitiate, previously to her 
 taking the veil. Lady Shrewsbury used all her sisterly arts
 
 LEGEND OF SPYE PARK. 17 
 
 to entice back the young recluse to the gay world she had 
 forsaken, but in vain. 
 
 LEGEND OF SPYE PARK. 
 
 Mrs. Crawford appends : Half-way up to Bowden Hill, 
 and between Bowood and Lacock Abbey, stands Spye Park, 
 the seat of the Bayntons, a family of great antiquity. In 
 1652, at the defeat of Sir William Waller by the Lord 
 Wilmot, Bromham House, the former seat of the Bayntons, 
 was burnt down, after which they removed to Spye Park. 
 There is now in the Royal Museum a curious old pedigree, 
 showing that the Bayntons, in the reign of Henry IL, were 
 Knights of St. John of Jerusalem. Sir Henry Baynton 
 held the office of knight-marshal to the king, a place of 
 great authority at that time ; and his son, who was slain at 
 Bretagne in the year 1201, was a noble Knight of Jeru- 
 salem. Sidney, in his Treatise on Government, mentions 
 this family of ' great antiquity, and that in name and 
 ancient possessions it equals most, if it is not far superior 
 to many, of the nobility.' As all old mansions in the 
 country must be associated with some portion of the super- 
 stitious and the wonderful, Spye Park was not without its 
 share. There was a story told (and credited by the pea- 
 santry) of a knight, clad in armour, haunting one of the 
 chambers supposed to be the spirit of the gallant Sir 
 Henry Baynton, who was beheaded at Berwick, in the time 
 of Henry iv., for taking part with the rebel Earl of North- 
 umberland. More modern spirits also were said to trouble
 
 1 8 SPYE PARK. 
 
 the indwellers of Spye Park ; for old Lady Shrewsbury used 
 to teil that old Sir Edward Baynton, the father of Sir 
 Andrew, was continually seen at nightfall in the park and 
 grounds, and that the latter had often (when in company 
 with his mistress) been startled by the apparition of his 
 father. Sir Andrew, in early life, was remarkable for the 
 possession of engaging and high moral qualities ; but the 
 misconduct of his first wife, to whom he was fondly 
 attached, altered, it was said, his very nature ; and to 
 banish thought, he plunged into reckless libertinism. The 
 circumstances were these : A gentleman of great personal 
 attractions, and related to Lady Maria Baynton, arrived 
 on a visit at the house. The wretched wife and mother 
 forgot her twofold duty; and after many stolen meetings 
 among the shades of Spye Park, she fled with her para- 
 mour. Sir Andrew was at first inconsolable, and, despite 
 her shameless desertion of him, long lamented the mother 
 of his child. Alas ! that sinful mother and guilty wife was 
 speedily visited by an awful retribution. Her infamous 
 companion in guilt treated her with cruelty and brutality. 
 Death at last put an end to her sufferings ; and the young, 
 the elegant, and accomplished Lady Maria, nurtured upon 
 the bosom of indulgence, died in a low house, without a 
 single friend or attendant to minister to her last wants, 
 or a charitable hand to close her dying eyes.
 
 THE LUMLEY PORTRAITS. 
 
 Lumley Castle, in the village of Lumley, 
 Durham, built in the reign of Edward i., the 
 entrance-hall contains full-length portraits of 
 the Lumley family, commencing with Liulph, the Saxon 
 progenitor of the family, and ending with his descendants, 
 who lived in the reigns of Elizabeth and James i. Mr. 
 Planche, Rouge Croix, describes these pictures as evidently 
 ancient, the greater number displaying the well-known and 
 accurately-represented costumes of particular periods, ranging 
 from the fourteenth to the seventeenth centuries. ' Until,' 
 says Mr. Planche, ' I learned from the Rev. John Dodd that 
 they had all been painted by order of Lord John Lumley, 
 in the reign of Elizabeth or James I., I was perfectly ready 
 to believe that each portrait was contemporary with the 
 costume in which the figure was attired ; for though, of 
 course, Liulph the Saxon and the early Norman Lumleys 
 could never have worn the dresses they were painted in, 
 the pictures themselves might have been executed at the 
 various periods when such dresses were worn, according to 
 the invariable practice of medieval artists. Had this been
 
 20 THE LUMLEY PORTRAITS. 
 
 the case with these pictures, the hall of Lumley Castle 
 would have presented us with the most curious and valu- 
 able series of family portraits that could perhaps be found 
 in the world. But such is not the case.' Still they are a 
 remarkable collection of imaginary portraits. Surtees, who 
 wrote nearly fifty years ago, says of them : 'The collection 
 of paintings at Lumley is dispersed ; those only remain 
 which are strictly family portraits. ... In the great hall, 
 besides a portrait of Liulph armed cap-a-pie, like a gallant 
 knight' (in plate armour, with a helmet of the sixteenth 
 century !), and bestriding his war-horse, are fifteen pictures 
 of my lord's ancestors, with a pillar of his pedigree ; all 
 which are noted in the inventory of 1609, and then valued 
 at 8. These, whether in robes or armour, are evidently 
 fictitious or restored, and need no further notice. The 
 most genuine and ancient piece Mr. Surtees considers to 
 be : ' King Richard n., in the bloom of youth, and with 
 bright auburn hair, sits on a chair of state in his royal robes 
 scarlet lined with ermine, his inner dress deep blue or 
 purple, powdered over with golden R's, and crowned. He 
 holds the sceptre in his left hand, and with his right gives a 
 patent of nobility to Sir Ralph Lumley, who kneels before 
 him in his baron's robes.' The frame bears the date 1384. 
 This picture Mr. Planchd considers a close imitation of 
 the celebrated original portrait of Richard, preserved in 
 the Jerusalem Chamber at Westminster. The figure of Sir 
 Ralph Lumley is not authentic, since he was slain at Ciren- 
 cester, in arms against Henry iv., in 1400, when he had
 
 THE LUMLEY PORTRAITS. 21 
 
 not attained the age of thirty-eight, and could scarcely even 
 then have presented the portly and venerable appearance 
 displayed in the picture. 
 
 Mr. Planche describes the portraits as representing the 
 descendants of Liulph for fourteen generations, in various 
 military or civil costumes, some exceedingly picturesque, 
 and all bearing strong evidence to the fact that the robes 
 and armour were painted from authorities of some descrip- 
 tion, and not from the fancy of the artists. They were 
 executed about 1600, when various histories and chronicles 
 were printed and published in Germany, Holland, and 
 Flanders especially, illustrated by very spirited engravings 
 representing the sovereigns and princes whose reigns or 
 biographies were included in them. A great similarity 
 exists in the styles of drawing and the character and cos- 
 tume of all these figures, the dress and armour of the 
 earlier personages being invariably of the fifteenth century. 
 Mr. Planchd was therefore struck by the strong general 
 resemblance the paintings at Lumley Castle bear to the 
 aforesaid engravings. 
 
 We have not space for further details ; but to add, that 
 among the discrepancies should be noted the portrait of 
 Theoderick the first Count of Holland, who lived in the 
 ninth century, in armour and dress of the fifteenth century ; 
 his shield has on it an heraldic lion rampant, some 300 
 years before the earliest appearance of heraldic devices. 
 Mr. Planche, in conclusion, considers the pictures to 
 have been painted by Richard Stevens, a Dutchman,
 
 22 THE LUMLEY PORTRAITS. 
 
 mentioned by Walpole as ' an able statuary, painter, and 
 medallist.' 
 
 Surtees considers ' the connection of Liulph, a southern 
 noble' (grandfather of William de Lumley, Baron of the 
 Bishopric), ' as asserted in the pedigree, with the blood of 
 Syward and Waltheof (Earls of Northumberland), is con- 
 firmed by evidence not very usual in claims of such high 
 and splendid antiquity.' 
 
 Pennant relates that when James i., on his way to the 
 south, visited Lord Lumley in his castle, ' William James, 
 Bishop of Durham, expatiated to the king on the pedigree 
 of their noble host, and wearied him with a long detail 
 of the family ancestry to a period even beyond belief. 
 " Oh, mon !" said the king, " gang na farther ; let me digest 
 the knowledge I ha' gained ; for, by my saul, I did na ken 
 Adam's name was Lumley." ' l 
 
 1 See the able paper by Mr. Planche in the Journal of the British 
 Archaeological Association, March 1866, p. 31.
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 |g EW of the historical villages of England possess 
 such interest as Fotheringhay, celebrated as 
 the peculiar seat of the House of York, the 
 birthplace of Richard in., and memorable as the place 
 where Mary Queen of Scots was condemned to close on 
 the scaffold a life of captivity and sorrow. Fotheringhay 
 lies in the eastern division of Northamptonshire, on the 
 north bank of the river Nen ; and though now reduced 
 to a small village, it formerly held the rank of a market- 
 town ; had its royal castle and market cross, its college, 
 nunnery, hermitage, and other votive buildings, in addi- 
 tion to its collegiate church of highly enriched archi- 
 tecture. 
 
 The Castle of Fotheringhay, not one stone of which 
 remains upon another, was originally built by Simon de St. 
 Liz, or by the second Earl of Northampton, at the close 
 of the eleventh or early in the twelfth century ; the manor 
 having been granted by the Conqueror to his niece Judith, 
 from whom it descended by marriage to the above Earl. It 
 was in the possession of the Crown in the reign of Edward I.,
 
 24 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 who granted it to his nephew, John de Britain Earl of 
 Richmond, who in the second year of Edward n. obtained 
 a grant of the castle to himself and his heirs, and seven 
 years later was certified to be Lord of Fotheringhay. He 
 dying without issue, the castle and manor reverted to the 
 Crown, and were granted to Mary de St. Paul, daughter 
 of Guido de Chatillon, Comte de St. Paul in France, by 
 Mary, daughter of the Earl of Richmond aforesaid. She 
 was Baroness de Voissu and Montanzi, and married to 
 Andemare de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, who fell in a 
 tournament on the day of their nuptials; whence she is 
 characterized by Gray as the 
 
 ' Sad Chatillon on her bridal morn, 
 That wept her bleeding love.' 
 
 She passed the greatest part of her life in the exercises 
 of religion, and employed her estate in founding Denny 
 Abbey, near Ely; and Pembroke Hall, in the University 
 of Cambridge. Her residence at Fotheringhay is thus 
 described : ' The castle, with a certain tower, is built of 
 stone, walled in, embattled, and encompassed with a great 
 moat. Within are one large hall, two chambers, a kitchen 
 and bakehouse, built all of stone, with a porter's lodge and 
 chambers over it, and a drawbridge beneath. Within the 
 castle walls is another place called the manor. The site of 
 the whole contains ten acres.' 
 
 Upon the death of Mary of Valence, the castle and 
 manor again reverted to the Crown, and were granted by 
 Edward in. to his fifth son, Edmund of Langley, then a
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 25 
 
 minor. The castle had fallen into decay, and on his 
 taking actual possession, was so much dilapidated as to 
 induce him to rebuild the greater part of it, the ground 
 plan being in the form of a fetterlock ; } and the fetterlock, 
 enclosing a falcon, was afterwards the favourite device of 
 the family of Edmund of Langley. He also, having pro- 
 jected the building of a college at Fotheringhay, began 
 to fulfil his intention by erecting ' a large and magnificent 
 choir' at the east end of the old parish church. After his 
 death, the building was carried on by his son, and com- 
 pleted by his grandson Richard, whose body was in 1466 
 buried there, under a handsome shrine on the north side 
 of the high altar. The agreement for the buildings was 
 with ' William Howard, a freemason of Fotheringhay ;' 
 but they were not completed till the time of Edward iv., 
 who erected 'the fair cloister,' and the shrine already 
 mentioned, which Leland describes as ' a pratie chapelle,' 
 and Camden as 'a magnificent monument.' The college 
 
 1 Mr. Planche (Rouge Croix), setting aside the old origin of this 
 badge, traces it, by aid of the Promptorium Parvulorum (a Latin and 
 English dictionary of the fourteenth century), to langelyn, 'to bind 
 together ;' and, according to Mr. Halliwell, langele is still used in the 
 north to signify hopling or fettering a horse. Without asserting that a 
 fetterlock was actually called a langel, there is quite enough similarity 
 of sound between langelyn or langele, ' to bind or fetter,' and Langley, 
 the name by which he was known to suggest its adoption for his badge, 
 the object being to typify the name or title of the bearer. The falcon 
 may have been added as a token of descent by his grandson Richard, 
 the said falcon being described by itself as 'falco imagine Ricardi 
 Duels Ebors.' See a paper 'On the Badges of the House of York,' 
 Jonrn. Brit. Arch&ol. Association, 1864.
 
 26 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 being suppressed under Edward vi., and its site granted 
 to Dudley Duke of Northumberland, the church was dis- 
 mantled. Some of the richly carved stalls have been pre- 
 served in the neighbouring churches of Hemington and 
 Tansor : they are decorated with the Yorkist badges and 
 crests. The royal tombs fell to decay. At length Queen 
 Elizabeth, visiting 'the spot, ordered the bodies to be 
 removed to the parish church, where monuments, ' by no 
 means worthy,' says Camden, ' of such princes, sons of 
 kings, and progenitors of kings of England,' still exist to 
 their memory. On opening the graves, the bodies were 
 found enclosed in lead ; and round the neck of Cicely 
 Duchess of York was a silver ribbon, with a pardon- 
 from Rome, written in a fine Roman hand, ' as fair 
 and fresh,' says Fuller, ' as if it had been written yester- 
 day.' 
 
 When Dugdale visited the spot in 1641, the glass was in 
 the windows of the cloister and college halls, and the shields 
 of arms remained. The windows of the nave and side aisles 
 were also painted, and contained figures of saints, cardinals, 
 and prelates. Above these were angels playing on musical 
 instruments. Here, too, were the Bohemian plume, and 
 the falcon, enclosed by a fetterlock, already mentioned as 
 the device of the House of York. Whilst that powerful 
 family was contending for the crown, the falcon was repre- 
 sented as endeavouring to expand its wings and force open 
 the lock. When the family had actually ascended the 
 throne, the falcon was represented as free, and the lock
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 2/ 
 
 open. The western windows were ornamented with the 
 rose, the white hart, the fetterlock, and the lion. ' The 
 whole,' says Stukeley, 'were saved during the Civil War 
 by the minister of the parish, who bribed the soldiers to 
 preserve them.' Many of these figures were perfect in the 
 year 1787, but at present not a window retains its former 
 beauty. In 1817, when the canopy of the pulpit was under 
 repair, some of the ancient gilding was discovered. At 
 the back is a shield of arms, bearing France and England 
 quarterly, supported on the dexter side by a lion rampant 
 guardant, for the earldom of March, and a bull for Clare ; 
 on the sinister by a hart, showing descent from Richard 
 ii., who took that device ; and by a boar for the honour 
 of Windsor, possessed by Richard in. Gray, alluding to 
 the murder of the princes, characterizes Richard by this 
 badge : 
 
 ' The bristled bore, in infant gore, 
 Wallows beneath the thorny shade. ' 
 
 It should be mentioned that the device of the fetterlock 
 remained in most of the windows of the church till the 
 year 1807 ; and it is retained to this day upon the point of 
 the flag-pole on the lantern-tower. 
 
 4 The Church of Fotheringhay,' says Mr. Richard Brooke, 
 ho visited the site in 1857 and 1858, '-must once have been 
 magnificent edifice ; but at present, all that remains of it is 
 
 e nave with its side aisles, and the tower, which are very 
 beautiful. The nave is now used for divine service. The 
 church contains a very handsome and large stone font,
 
 28 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 apparently of the early part of the fifteenth century, which 
 is not only an object of interest from its beauty, but, as King 
 Richard in. was born at Fotheringhay on October 2, 1452 
 (see William of Worcester), it is only a reasonable inference 
 that he was baptized at that font' (Notes and Queries, 2d 
 S. vi.). 
 
 Resuming our history of the castle at the death of 
 Edmund, who had been successively created Earl of Cam- 
 bridge and Duke of York, the fortress descended to his son 
 Edward Earl of Rutland, who succeeded also to his father's 
 honours. But on his falling in the battle of Agincourt, and 
 dying without issue, the castle and lordship descended to 
 his nephew Richard, the son of his brother Richard Earl of 
 Cambridge, who was beheaded in the third year of Henry 
 v., for conspiring against that king. Fotheringhay thus 
 became the residence of the House of York, and the birth- 
 place of Richard in. : 
 
 ' Lo ! on that mound, in days of feudal pride, 
 Thy tow'ring castle frown'd above the tide ; 
 Flung wide her gates, where troops of vassals met 
 With awe the brow of high Plantaganet. 
 But, ah ! what chiefs in sable vest appear ! 
 What bright achievements mark yon warrior's bier ! 
 'Tis York's, from Agincourt's victorious plain, 
 They bear the fallen hero o'er the main ; 
 Through all the land his blooming laurels spread, 
 And to thy bosom give the mighty dead. 
 When from thy lap the ruthless Richard sprung, 
 A boding sound through all the borders rung : 
 It spoke a tale of blood fair Neville's woe, 
 York's murd'rous hand, and Edward's future foe.' 
 
 Antonio's Banks, MS., 1797.
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 2Q 
 
 The hero of Agincourt left minute directions for his 
 funeral, ordering his body to be buried in the church of 
 Fotheringhay, in the midst of the choir, near the steps, 
 under a flat marble. His remains were accordingly brought 
 over to England and carried to Westminster, and thence 
 to Fotheringhay, where, on December i, 1415, they were 
 interred. The tomb is described by Leland, who saw it, 
 ' as a flat marble stone, and upon it was his image flat in 
 brass.' 
 
 Richard in. was the eleventh child of Richard Planta- 
 genet, Duke of York, and nearest of kin to Edward in., the 
 common ancestor of all the royal houses which have, since 
 his death, reigned in Great Britain. His mother was also 
 of royal blood, being the daughter of Ralph Neville, who 
 had married Joan Beaufort, daughter of John of Gaunt. 
 From his earliest childhood at Fotheringhay he was bred 
 up amidst the violence and confusion of civil war, and was 
 only seven years old when, with his mother, he was im- 
 prisoned by Henry vi. ; and one of his earliest recollections 
 must have been his father's death in the battle of Wakefield. 
 Although Shakspeare assigns him a prominent part in this 
 battle, where his father the Duke of York was taken and 
 put to death after exclaiming, 
 
 ' Three times did Richard make a line to me, 
 And thrice cried, Courage, father, fight it out,' 
 
 Richard was then only in his ninth year. His father's body 
 was first interred at Pontefract, but afterwards removed, 
 with that of his son Edmund Earl of Rutland, in great
 
 30 . FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 pomp, to Fotheringhay. On July 22, 1466, their remains 
 were put into a chariot covered with black velvet, richly 
 wrapped in cloth of gold and royal habit. At the feet of 
 the Duke stood the figure of an angel clothed in white, and 
 bearing a crown of gold, to signify that of right he was a 
 king. The chariot was drawn by seven horses, trapped 
 to the ground, and covered with black, charged with 
 escutcheons of that prince's arms. Every horse carried a 
 man, and upon the foremost rode Sir John Skipwith, who 
 bore the Duke's banner displayed. The bishops and abbots 
 in their robes went two or three miles before, to prepare the 
 reception of the remains. Richard Duke of Gloucester 
 followed next after the chariot, accompanied by several of 
 the nobility and officers of arms. In this order they left 
 Pontefract, and that night rested at Doncaster, where they 
 were received by the convent of Cordeliers in grey habit. 
 Thence, by easy stages, they proceeded to Blithe, Tuxford- 
 in-the-Clay, Newark, Grantham, and Stamford ; and on 
 Monday, July 29, the procession reached Fotheringhay, 
 where the bodies were received by several bishops and 
 abbots in their robes, and supported by twelve servants 
 of the deceased. 
 
 At the entrance of the churchyard, King Edward iv., 
 accompanied by several dukes, earls, and barons, in mourn- 
 ing, were in attendance, and proceeded to the choir of the 
 church, near the high altar, where was a hearse covered 
 with black, furnished with banners and other insignia. 
 Upon this hearse were placed the remains of the Duke
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 31 
 
 and his son Edmund. The queen 1 and her two daughters 
 were also present in mourning, attended by ladies and 
 others. Over the image was a cloth of majesty and black 
 sarcenet, with the figure of our Lord, sitting on a rainbow, 
 of beaten gold ; it had in every corner an escutcheon of the 
 arms of France and England quarterly, with a valence round 
 the hearse, fringed half a yard deep, and ornamented with 
 three angels of beaten gold, holding the Duke's arms within 
 a garter, in every part above the hearse. 
 
 Upon the morrow, the 3oth, several masses were said ; 
 and at the offertory of the mass of requiem, the king 
 offered for the prince his father ; and the queen, her two 
 daughters, and the Duchess (Countess) of Richmond, offered 
 afterwards. Then Norroy King-of-arms offered the prince's 
 coat-of-arms ; March King-of-arms the target ; Ireland 
 King-of-arms the sword ; Windsor herald of England, and 
 Ravendor herald of Scotland, offered the helmet ; and M. 
 de Ferreys, the harness and courser : 
 
 ' So sumptuous, yet so perishing withal ! 
 
 A thousand mourners deck the pomp of death : 
 To-day, the breathing marble glows above 
 To decorate its memory, and tongues 
 Are busy of its life ; to-morrow, worms 
 In silence and in darkness seize their prey.' 
 
 Edward Earl of March, afterwards Edward iv., suc- 
 ceeded his father both in the honours of his house and the 
 
 1 Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Richard Woodville, and widow of Sir 
 John Gray, Kent, who was killed in the battle of St. Albans.
 
 32 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 possession of Fotheringliay Castle and lordship; Cicely, 
 his mother, still retaining her right in it until the ninth 
 year of his reign, when Guy Wo'olston, Esq., was appointed 
 constable of the castle and keeper of the great park, Erles- 
 wood, and Newhaugh, lying within the bailiwick of Clyve 
 in Rockingham Forest; here the lord of the castle had 
 housebote (timber out of the lord's wood for repairs) and 
 heybote (thorns and other wood for hedges, gates, fences, 
 etc.), and two leets, held yearly at Easter and Michaelmas. 
 From Leland's account, Fotheringhay appears to have been 
 the favourite residence of this powerful and royal house ; 
 for the Duchess Cicely, who survived her husband thirty- 
 six years, during the greatest part of her widowhood in- 
 habited the castle. She died in the tenth of Henry vn., 
 1495, in her castle at Berkhampstead, where the kings of 
 Mercia had a palace and castle, afterwards enlarged and 
 strengthened in the Norman times, and where Henry n. 
 kept his court. The Duchess Cicely was buried in the 
 choir at Fotheringhay beside her husband. She was the 
 youngest of twenty-one children ; she survived the whole of 
 her family the Nevilles, and by their conquering swords be- 
 came the mother of kings ; she saw three of her descendants 
 kings of England, and her grand-daughter Elizabeth queen 
 of Henry vn. By her death she was saved the additional 
 affliction of the loss of her grandson Edward Earl of War- 
 wick, the last male of the princely house of Plantagenet, who 
 was cruelly put to death by a tyrannical monarch in 1499. 
 After the death of Edward iv., the castle continued in
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 33 
 
 the Crown, and by Act of Parliament i Henry vir. was de- 
 clared to be part of the royal possessions. Henry settled 
 it upon his queen Elizabeth, the only representative of the 
 House of York. Reverting to the king on her death, it 
 continued in the Crown till Henry vin. gave it in dower 
 to Catharine of Aragon, who seems to have been much 
 attached to the castle. Leland records that ' she did great 
 cost of refreshing it.' He describes it as being at that time 
 ' a castle fair and neatly strong, with very good lodgings in 
 it, defended by double ditches, with a very ancient and 
 strong keep.' Queen Catharine removed from Fotheringhay 
 to Ampthill Castle l whilst the process of her divorce from 
 Henry vin. was going on at the neighbouring Priory of 
 Dunstable ; after her divorce she resided some time in 
 Kimbolton Castle. ' I pity Catharine of Aragon,' says 
 Walpole, ' for living at Kimbolton ; I never saw an uglier 
 spot.' The queen died there in 1536. 
 
 1 Ampthill Park, on the site of the old castle, has a grove of firs, in 
 the centre of which, in 1773, Lord Ossory erected an octagonal shaft, 
 raised on four steps, surmounted by a cross, bearing a shield, with 
 Queen Catharine's arms of Castile and Aragon. On a tablet in the 
 base of the cross is the following inscription, by Horace Walpole : 
 
 ' In days of yore, here Ampthill's towers were seen, 
 The mournful refuge of an injured queen ; 
 Here flowed her pure but unavailing tears, 
 Here blinded zeal sustained her sinking years. 
 Yet Freedom hence her radiant banner wav'd, 
 And Love avenged a realm by priests enslav'd : 
 From Catharine's wrongs a nation's bliss was spread, 
 And Luther's light from lawless Henry's bed.' 
 
 Close to Ampthill is Houghton Park, with a pear-tree under which Sir 
 Philip Sidney is said to have written part of his Arcadia. 
 
 C
 
 34 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 Such is an outline of the history of the Castle of Fother- 
 inghay, until it was converted to a prison of state. This 
 seems to have taken place in the reign of Mary, when, 
 25th May 1554, according to Stow, Edward, the last of 
 the Courtneys, Earls of Devonshire, was removed from the 
 Tower of London, to which he had been committed on 
 suspicion of his having consented to Sir Thomas Wyat's 
 conspiracy, by Master Chamberlayne of Suffolk, and Sir 
 Thomas Tresham, Knt., and conveyed to Fotheringhay, to 
 remain under their custody at the queen's pleasure. The 
 Earl's confinement here was of short duration ; for in the 
 Easter of the year following, 1555, he again appeared at 
 court. 
 
 The next and last person who entered the castle as a 
 prisoner, and from whose fate it is noted in English history, 
 was the unfortunate Queen of Scots, who was closely con- 
 fined here, in the custody of Sir William Fitzwilliam of 
 Milton, during the last six years of her life. When Fuller 
 the historian visited the castle, he read in one of the 
 windows the following distich, written on the glass with 
 a diamond by the royal captive : 
 
 ' From the top of all my trust 
 Mishap hath laid me in the dust,' 
 
 which is taken from an old ballad preserved in Ellis's 
 Specimens. 
 
 It will be recollected that the indictment against Babyngton 
 and his companions charged them not only with intending 
 to kill Elizabeth, but also to rise in arms to favour an
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 35 
 
 invasion from Spain, and to release the Queen of Scots. 
 This last was probably the chief object with most of them, 
 but the project terminated as fatally for her as for them- 
 selves. Babyngton had been recently in France, and had 
 brought letters for Mary ; and, in return, she is stated in 
 his indictment to have written letters to him, ' in which she 
 not only signified that she allowed and approved of such 
 intended treasons, but therein also urged Babyngton and 
 his confederates, by promises of great reward, to fulfil the 
 same.' The truth of this assertion, at least as regards any 
 design on the life of Elizabeth, is very doubtful ; but it 
 answered the purpose of the framers of the Association, and 
 it was forthwith resolved to proceed to the judicial murder 
 of the unhappy prisoner. Her secretaries (Nau and Curie) 
 and her papers were seized, and both subjected to rigid 
 examination; and Mary was removed to Fotheringhay 
 Castle preparatory to her so-called trial. 
 
 On October n, 1586, the commissioners assembled at 
 Fotheringhay ; Sir Thomas Bromley, Lord Chancellor, and 
 the Earls of Kent and Shrewsbury, being the leading mem- 
 bers. Three days after, the presence-chamber of the castle 
 was fitted up for the trial. The court sat two days. Mary 
 at first refused to plead ; then acknowledged negotiating 
 with foreign powers to obtain her freedom ; but earnestly 
 disdained any intention against the life of Elizabeth. She 
 also charged Walsingham with forging letters (which he 
 denied), and desired to be confronted with her secretaries, 
 one of whom (Nau) she accused of treachery. Her de-
 
 36 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 mand was refused. The commissioners adjourned, and, 
 October 25, re-assembled in the Star Chamber at West- 
 minster, and pronounced a sentence, ' that Babyngton's 
 conspiracy was with the privity (cum scientia) of Mary ;' as 
 also, ' that she had herself compassed and imagined within 
 this realm of England divers matters tending to the hurt, 
 death, and destruction of the royal person of our sovereign 
 lady the queen.' On October 28 the Parliament met, their 
 principal business being the attainder of Babyngton and his 
 associates, and applications to the queen to consent to the 
 execution of Mary. Elizabeth desired them to reconsider 
 their request ; they again urged it, and then she dismissed 
 them with an ambiguous speech, which she herself termed 
 ' an answer without an answer.' 
 
 The sentence against Mary was confirmed by the queen 
 and her council at Richmond. The proclamation was made 
 in seven different places, ' to the great and wonderful re- 
 joicing of the people of all sorts,' says Stow, 'as manifestly 
 appeared by ringing of bells, making of bonfires, and singing 
 of psalms in every one of the streets and lanes of the city.' 
 Stow adds, that the proclamation was made with serjeants- 
 at-arms and by sound of trumpets : it was witnessed by 
 several of the nobility, the Lord Mayor and aldermen in 
 their scarlet dresses, the city officers, the principal part of 
 the gentry of London, and the most eminent citizens habited 
 in velvet, with gold chains, all mounted on horseback. The 
 sentence was next communicated to the prisoner, who wrote 
 to Elizabeth, praying that she might not be put privately
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 37 
 
 to death ; that she might be buried in France, as the 
 Scottish sepulchres had been profaned; and that her 
 servants might be allowed to go free, and enjoy her 
 legacies. 
 
 Next, James of Scotland and Henry m. of France inter- 
 ceded for Mary's life ; but the Scottish ambassador is said 
 to have abused his trust, and urged Mary's execution ; the 
 French ambassador's representations were not attended to, 
 as his master's sincerity was doubted. The queen gave 
 ambiguous answers. At length, February i, 1587, she signed 
 the warrant for execution, and gave it into the care of 
 William Davison, the secretary, who, by direction of the 
 council, despatched it to Fotheringhay. 
 
 Elizabeth either felt or affected extreme reluctance to take 
 the life of Mary ; but her courtiers (according to Camden) 
 argued that ' the life of one Scottish and titular queen ought 
 not to weigh down the safety of all England ; ' and ' some 
 preachers more tartly than was fit, and some of the vulgar 
 sort more saucily than became them, either out of hope or 
 fear,' held the same language ; and there can be no doubt 
 that her council conceived they were carrying her wishes into 
 effect by acting on the warrant. Yet they had the meanness 
 and cruelty to sacrifice their tool, Davison, who was tried 
 in the Star Chamber, sentenced to a fine of ^10,000, and 
 imprisoned for years. 1 
 
 Sir William Fitzwilliam, the constable of Fotheringhay 
 Castle at this time, conducted himself towards the Queen 
 1 Annals of England, vol. ii. p. 303.
 
 38 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 of Scots with such regard and humanity, that, a short time 
 before her execution, she told him she was unable to make 
 him a proper return ; but if he would accept the picture of 
 her son, then King James vi. of Scotland, and which was 
 hanging at her bed's-head, he should have it. The present 
 was accepted, and is still in the collection of the Fitzwilliam 
 family. The queen also presented to the governor her 
 watch, which passed into the possession of so many different 
 persons, that ultimately, the one who 'had it was scarcely 
 known ; until towards the end of the last century, Lady 
 Godolphin was the owner of it, and she restored it to 
 the family that originally possessed it, for she stood 
 sponsor to the son and heir of a Lord Fitzwilliam, and 
 made the infant a gift of the watch. Another of the 
 Queen of Scots' watches, of French workmanship, with an 
 elegant little jewel called a solitaire, were given or be- 
 queathed to a French lady by Mary the night before her 
 execution. 
 
 On February 7, the Earls of Kent and Shrewsbury 
 waited on Mary, and warned her for death. The hall of 
 the castle had been fitted up with a scaffold, two feet 
 high and twelve feet broad, with rails about, hanged and 
 covered with black, with a low stool, a fair long cushion, 
 and a block covered also with black. Mary having received 
 the said sentence that she was to die * about eight o'clock 
 on the morning of the morrow,' devoted her few last hours 
 to consoling her servants, and making her will : it was 
 near two o'clock in the morning when she had finished
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 39 
 
 writing. 1 Feeling somewhat fatigued, she went to bed. 
 Her women continued praying ; and during this last repose 
 of her body, though her eyes were closed, it was evident, 
 from the slight motion of her lips, and a sort of rapture 
 spread over her countenance, that she was addressing her- 
 self to Him on whom alone her hopes now rested. At 
 daybreak she arose, saying that she had only two hours 
 to live. She picked out one of her handkerchiefs, with a 
 fringe of gold, as a bandage for her eyes on the scaffold, 
 and dressed herself magnificently. She next read to her 
 servants her will, which she then signed ; and afterwards 
 gave them letters, papers, and presents, of which they 
 were to be the bearers, to the princes of her family, 
 and her friends on the Continent. She had already dis- 
 tributed to them, on the previous evening, her rings, jewels, 
 furniture, and dresses ; and she now gave them the purses 
 which she had prepared for them, and in which were, in 
 small sums, five thousand crowns. With finished grace, and 
 with affecting kindness, she mingled her consolations with 
 her gifts, and strengthened her servants for the affliction into 
 which her death would soon throw them. She now retired 
 to her oratory, and was for some time engaged in reading 
 prayers for the dead. A loud knocking at the door inter- 
 rupted these last orisons. She bade the intruders wait a few 
 minutes. Shortly afterwards, eight o'clock having struck, 
 
 1 Pasquier says : ' The night before her execution, Mary, knowing 
 her body must be stripped for her shroud, would have her feet washed, 
 because she used ointment to one of them which was sore.'
 
 40 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 there was a renewed knocking at the door, which this time 
 was opened. The sheriff entered, bearing a white wand, 
 advanced close to Mary, who had not yet moved her head, 
 and said, ' Madam, the lords await me, and have sent me to 
 you.' ' Yes,' replied Mary, rising from her knees, ' let us 
 go.' Just as she was moving away, Bourgoin, her physician, 
 handed to her the ivory crucifix which stood on the altar ; 
 she kissed it, and ordered it to be carried before her. Not 
 being able to support herself alone, on account of the 
 weakness of her limbs, she walked, leaning on two of her 
 own servants, to the extremity of her apartments. There 
 they, with peculiar delicacy, which she felt and approved, 
 desired not to lead her themselves to execution, but en- 
 trusted her to the support of two of Paulet's servants, and 
 followed her in tears. 
 
 On reaching the staircase, where the Earls of Shrewsbury 
 and Kent awaited her, and by which she had to descend 
 into the lower hall, where the scaffold was raised, the 
 attendants were refused the consolation of accompanying 
 her farther. They threw themselves at her feet, kissed her 
 hands, and clung to her dress : when they were removed, 
 Mary resumed her course the crucifix in one hand, and a 
 prayer-book in the other evincing the dignity of a queen 
 with the calm composure of a devout Christian. At the 
 foot of the staircase she was allowed to stop and take fare- 
 well of the master of her household, Sir Andrew Melville, 
 whom her keepers had not suffered to come into her 
 presence for some weeks before. Melville kissed her hand,
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 41 
 
 and in tears declared this was the heaviest hour of his life. 
 ' No so to me,' said^Mary. ' I now feel, my good Melville, 
 that all this world is vanity.' ' When you speak of me here- 
 after, say that I died firm in my faith, willing to forgive 
 my enemies, conscious that I never disgraced my native 
 country, and rejoicing in the thought that I had always been 
 true to France, the land of my happiest years. Tell my 
 son ' and here she burst into a flood of tears ' Tell my 
 son I thought of him in my last moments, and that I said I 
 never yielded, by word or deed, to aught that might tend to 
 his prejudice : tell him to remember his unfortunate parent ; 
 and may he be a thousand times more happy and prosper- 
 ous than she ever was.' The sentence was then read to 
 her ; and, says Camden, ' she heard it attentively, yet as if 
 her thoughts were taken up with something else.' She then 
 made a short speech, in which she repeated the words so 
 frequently in her mouth, ' I am queen born, not subject to 
 the laws ; ' and declared that she had never sought the life 
 of her cousin Elizabeth. She then began to pray. Fletcher, 
 Dean of Peterborough, offered his services, but she declined 
 them, and prayed in Latin with her servants (from the 
 offices of the blessed Virgin) ; she also prayed in English 
 for the church, for her son, and for Queen Elizabeth, and 
 forgave the executioner ; then, having kissed her women, 
 and signed the men with the sign of the cross, she pre- 
 pared for death, and had sufficient command of herself to 
 comfort her weeping attendants. Having covered her face 
 with a linen handkerchief, and laying herself down on the
 
 42 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 block, she recited that psalm, ' In Thee, O Lord, do I 
 trust ; let me never be confounded.' Then stretching forth 
 her body, and repeating many times, ' Into Thy hands, O 
 Lord, I commend my spirit,' her head was stricken off 
 at two strokes, the dean crying out, ' So let Queen Eliza- 
 beth's enemies perish ! ' the Earl of Kent answering ' Amen,' 
 and the multitude sighing and sorrowing. 
 
 Nichols tells us that the executioner at two strokes 
 separated her head from her body, saving a sinew, which 
 a third stroke parted also. When the fatal blow was struck, 
 ' her face was in a moment so much altered that few could 
 remember her by her dead face ; her lips stirred up and 
 down a quarter of an hour after her head was cut off' 
 (Ellis). The executioner that went about to pluck off her 
 stockings found her little dog had crept under her coat, 
 which, being put from thence, went and laid himself down 
 betwixt her head and the body, and being besmeared with 
 her blood, was caused to be washed. 
 
 In her last moments, the Scottish queen exhibited a 
 religious dignity, resignation, and apparent serenity of 
 conscience, that tend greatly to counteract the popular 
 impression regarding her guilt We are at a loss to believe 
 that one who had not lived well could die so well. 
 
 Heretofore the strange conduct of Elizabeth towards her 
 unfortunate cousin had not tended to exculpate her from 
 authorizing the Fotheringhay tragedy. But it now appears 
 that she really did not give the final order for the act, 
 but that the whole was managed, without her consent, by
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 43 
 
 Burleigh, Walsingham, and Davison ; the signature to the 
 warrant being forged, at Walsingham's command, by his 
 secretary Thomas Harrison (Strickland's Lives of the Queens 
 of England, vii. 465) ; so that the queen's conduct to these 
 men afterwards was not hypocritical, as hitherto believed. 
 A fortnight and a day elapsed before King James, while 
 hunting at Calder, was certified of the event, It put him 
 into ' a very great displeasure and grief,' and well might ; 
 and he ' much lamented and mourned her many days.' 
 
 Walpole says of her portrait : ' At the Duke of Devon- 
 shire's, at Hardwicke, there is a valuable though poorly 
 painted picture of James v. and Mary of Guise, his second 
 queen : it is remarkable from the great resemblance of Mary 
 Queen of Scots to her father I mean in Lord Morton's 
 picture of her, and in the image on her tomb at West- 
 minster, which agree together, and which I take to be 
 genuine likenesses.' In a very old trial of her, which 
 Walpole bought from Lord Oxford's collection, it is said 
 ' she was a large, lame woman.' (See note at page 39, 
 ante?) 
 
 The beauty, accomplishments, and hard fortune of this 
 extraordinary princess, who was a captive eighteen years, 
 have given such an interest to the place in which she 
 suffered, that the stranger is apt to imagine he shall find 
 some relic on the spot to gratify his curiosity. He will 
 regret that the ground on which it stood, with the surround- 
 ing moats, and small fragments of the walls near the river 
 and on the east of the mound, are the only marks of this
 
 44 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 once strong and memorable castle. 1 When Walpole visited 
 the spot in 1763, he wrote: 'The castle is totally ruined. 
 The mount on which the keep stood, two doorcases, and a 
 piece of the moat, are all the remains. Near it are a front 
 and two projections of an ancient house, which, by the 
 arms about it, I suppose was part of the palace of Richard 
 and Cicely, Duke and Duchess of York. . . . You may 
 imagine we were civil enough to the Queen of Scots, to feel 
 a pity for her while we stood on the very spot where she 
 was put to death.' 
 
 During the rest of the reign of Elizabeth the castle is 
 passed over unnoticed, and was probably uninhabited ; but 
 in the first year of James i. it was granted to Charles Lord 
 Mountjoy, created afterwards Earl of Devonshire ; Sir 
 Edward Blount, Knt. ; and Joseph Garth, Esq. Upon the 
 death of the Earl, four years after, the two other proprie- 
 tors conveyed the castle and lordship to his natural son, 
 Mountjoy, who was afterwards created Earl of Newport. 
 In 1625, the last year of the reign of James i., the castle 
 was surveyed, and is described as ' very strong, built of 
 stone, and moated about with a double moat.' The great 
 barn and part adjoining were in 1821 tenanted by a farmer. 
 On the east side of what was then the dwelling-house was 
 a Gothic doorway, the only fragment of original architec- 
 ture on the premises. 
 
 1 Historic Notices, by the Rev. H. K. Bonney ; a book wrought with 
 the most trustworthy materials, including an unpublished record of 
 Dugdale.
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 45 
 
 Soon after this survey, we gather from Mr. Bonney's 
 Notices, the castle seems to have been consigned to ruin ; 
 for Sir Robert Cotton, who lived at that time, purchased 
 the hall in which the Queen of Scots was beheaded, and 
 removed it to Connington, in Huntingdonshire. The stone 
 of other parts was purchased by Robert Kirkham, Esq., 
 to build a chapel in his house at Fineshade, in the neigh- 
 bourhood ; and the last remains of the castle were destroyed 
 in the middle of the eighteenth century, for the purpose of 
 improving the navigation of the Nen. There is a tale of 
 Fotheringhay having been destroyed by order of James i., 
 on account of its having been the scene of his mother's 
 sufferings ; but this has been disproved, although it was 
 long believed that the Talbot Inn at Oundle, which is 
 evidently of the age of James i., was built with the stone 
 from the castle. 
 
 In June 1820, the earth on the eastern side of the mount 
 on which the keep stood was removed, when the workmen 
 laid open one of the servants' apartments on the western 
 side of the castle court, and part of the pavement of 
 Norman bricks could be traced. About the same time, in 
 the earth outside the fortification, were found a groat of 
 Edward n. and a shilling of Edward iv. 
 
 Mr. Brooke's visit to Fotheringhay in 1858 gives us this 
 brief but minute account of the aspect of this very interest- 
 ing historic site : ' Sufficient remains of the earthworks and 
 ramparts of the castle are yet there to show that it was built 
 in the form of a fetterlock, with a flat face or portion on
 
 46 POTHERING HAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 
 
 the side (westward) nearest to the village, and circular on 
 the eastward portion. A very small mass of masonry, a 
 few feet long, lies near the river, and seems to have slipped 
 or been thrown down from the outer wall.' 
 
 The events of Mary's life have been minutely discussed by 
 a host of writers. The site we have here described was the 
 closing scene of this most unfortunate of sovereigns. The 
 opposite views of the several authors have led to a protracted 
 controversy as to the guilt of Mary in her ambitious schemes. 
 Of late years evidences from forgotten archives have thrown 
 a flood of light upon her dark career ; and the Simancas 
 papers and the collection at Hatfield have been adduced for 
 the first time, and proved of great importance and interest. 
 These novel materials Mr. Froude has ably digested in 
 his valuable History of England. Of Mary Stuart's history 
 he takes a most unfavourable view. Entirely unprincipled, 
 save in her fidelity to the Church of Rome, which led her 
 into conspiracy against her cousin Elizabeth, Mary was not 
 habitually vicious or depraved. But her passions were 
 strong ; and when they were once aroused, no obstacle 
 either of virtue or of fear could turn her from her purpose. 
 Her energy, her fiery strength of will, were perhaps un- 
 equalled in the history of woman. ' There are only two 
 views which can be entertained of Mary Stuart's character,' 
 says an impartial reviewer. 'Either she was the most 
 curiously and extraordinarily unfortunate woman who ever 
 lived, or she was a foul adulteress and murderess, who 
 lured her husband to his death with circumstances of
 
 FOTHERINGHAY AND ITS MEMORIES. 47 
 
 peculiar treachery and baseness. Mr. Froude has convinced 
 the large majority of his readers that the latter view is the 
 true one. The broad facts of the case point unquestionably 
 to the worst conclusion. Nor can it be well denied, that if 
 Mary had been old and ugly, and had died in her bed, 
 probably not a single voice would have been raised in her 
 defence. Her beauty, her misfortunes, the injuries which 
 she received at the hands of her rival, and her early and 
 tragical death (at the age of forty-five), have thrown a halo 
 of romance round her name which has raised up defenders 
 of her innocence ; but they have been persons led by the 
 heart and not by the head.' Their number must be greatly 
 reduced by evidence recently produced ; and if Mary 
 Stuart was innocent, no conclusion can be considered 
 worthy of reliance. 
 
 The few fragments which remain of this palace and prison 
 can only be duly appreciated by the archaeologist. It is 
 not a little curious, that of so celebrated an edifice in its 
 entirety, not a view exists, or is of extreme rarity. Even a 
 large folio history of the county represents but a few stones.
 
 TRADITIONS OF WALLINGTON AND THE 
 CALVERLEYS. 
 
 the time of Henry vi., there was erected by 
 William de Strother, in Northumberland, a 
 border tower named Wallington, which is de- 
 scribed in a survey of 1542 as consisting of ' a strong toure 
 and a stone house of the inherytance of Sir John Fenwyeke, 
 in good reparacion.' So profuse was the hospitality kept up 
 here, as to become the subject both of song and legend, 
 narrating the frays and frolics that followed a hard day's 
 chase. 'Show us the way to Wallington' is an old and 
 favourite air in the neighbourhood : 
 
 ' Harnham was headless, Bradford breadless, 
 
 Shafto picked at the craw ; 
 Capheaton was a wee bonny place, 
 But Wallington banged them a'.' 
 
 But this hospitality could not be supported after a frequent 
 residence in London, and the profligate habits of Charles 
 ii.'s court encroached too deeply upon the rentals. This 
 led to the sale of the property, and not improbably was the 
 cause of Sir John Fenwicke, its last owner, being implicated
 
 TRADITIONS OF WALLINGTON. 49 
 
 in the plot for the assassination of King William in., for 
 which he was beheaded on Tower-hill, Jan. 28, 1696. All 
 his hopes of court favour being extinguished, disappoint- 
 ment and revenge were likely enough to make him adopt 
 any measures to retrieve his broken fortunes. Be this as it 
 may, the estate passed by sale to Sir William Blackett, who 
 rebuilt the mansion at the end of the seventeenth century. 
 From this family Wallington passed to the Trevelyans, in 
 whose hands the place has lost none of its former interest. 
 There is a museum in the mansion, where is preserved a 
 portrait of Joyce, the widow of Henry Calverley, the only 
 survivor of the Yorkshire tragedy : ' My brat at nurse, my 
 beggar boy.' In this portrait the spiteful old dame is repre- 
 sented with a scroll in her right hand, whereon these lines 
 are inscribed : 
 
 ' Silence, Walter Calverley ; 
 This is all that I will leave W. C. : 
 Time was I might have given thee me.' 
 
 This Walter was her son ; and, whatever may have been 
 his faults, he showed a gentle spirit in not committing this 
 legacy to the flames. 
 
 To the family of Calverley a very tragical story attaches. 
 Walter Calverley having married Philippa Brooke, the 
 daughter of Lord Cobham, became, soon after this mar- 
 riage, jealous of the then Vavasour of Weston. In a 
 moment of ungovernable fury, arising from suspicion of his 
 wife's infidelity, he killed his two eldest sons, and then with 
 his dagger attempted to stab the lady herself. Luckily,
 
 50 TRADITIONS OF WALLINGTON 
 
 however, she wore a steel stomacher, according to the 
 fashion of the day, and the weapon glancing aside, only in- 
 flicted a slight wound. Meanwhile the terrified nurse had 
 caught up the youngest son, and fled with him to a square 
 building about half a mile from the village, said to have 
 been a banqueting-hall of the family. It was situated 
 in a large oak wood, that forms a striking feature in the 
 property. 
 
 After the murder Calverley mounted his horse and endea- 
 voured to escape ; but about ten miles from his dwelling 
 the animal stumbled upon a smooth turf, throwing the rider. 
 This accident enabled the pursuers to overtake the fugitive, 
 when they immediately seized and brought him before Sir 
 John Bland of Kippax, who committed him to York Castle. 
 
 It was now that by some means we are not told how 
 he became convinced of his wife's innocence and the legiti- 
 macy of his children. This change of feeling determined 
 him to atone for the past by saving his estate for his family 
 by an obstinate refusal to plead : otherwise, in the case of 
 conviction, of which there could be little doubt, all his 
 property would escheat to the Crown. He was then con- 
 demned to be pressed until he yielded or died, according 
 to the old law. While he was under this horrible torture, 
 a faithful servant and it is saying much for the culprit that 
 he had a servant so attached requested permission to see 
 his master. His prayer was granted, when Calverley, in 
 the agonies of his torture, begged the poor fellow to sit upon 
 his breast, and thus at once put an end to his suffering.
 
 AND THE CALVERLEYS. 51 
 
 The man complied, and was tried at York, and condemned 
 to death for murder, a sentence which was actually 
 carried into effect. The victims in this tragedy, the two 
 children, are simply entered in the parish register as having 
 died, without any particulars as to the cause of their 
 death. 
 
 The younger son of Calverley, who, as we have seen, 
 had the good fortune to escape, obtained a baronetage, 
 and continued the family; but the last baronet of that 
 name, having inherited large property in Northumberland 
 from the Blacketts,*sold both his old possessions of Cal- 
 verley and his acquired property of Edshall, where he had 
 always lived till he finally left the country. The family 
 in the direct male line is now extinct. The Vavasours 
 of Weston are also extinct, the last of them having died 
 thirty-six years ago, when Weston passed to a son of his 
 sister. In utter opposition to the pride of most landed 
 proprietors so situated, he forbade his elected heir to take 
 the name of Vavasour, declaring that he would be the 
 last Vavasour of Weston, which estate, he maintained, had 
 been in his family since the time of Henry n. 
 
 The tradition above related is the basis of the drama 
 called The Yorkshire Tragedy. In our day it has been 
 adopted by Ainsworth in his romance of Rookwood, who 
 has marred its interest by transferring the date of action 
 from its proper era to the prosaic times of George n., for 
 no other reason, as it would seem, than to introduce the 
 highwayman Turpin. ' I remember,' says the venerable
 
 52 TRADITIONS OF WELLINGTON 
 
 informant who communicated this tradition to Sir Bernard 
 Burke, ' detailing it, with its appended superstitions, to the 
 late Mr. Surtees, our Durham antiquary, expecting him 
 to deliver it to Sir Walter Scott, who, I felt sure, would 
 manufacture it into a clever romance, by keeping it to the 
 true time the beginning of the reign of James i. He 
 promised to do so, but ere long both he and Sir Walter 
 Scott were called away.' The ' appended superstitions' are 
 as follow : ' It was currently reported that Mr. Calverley 
 and his men galloped about through the extensive woods 
 at dead of night on headless horses, Iheir cry being, " A 
 pund of more weight lig on, lig on ! " So ran my native 
 vernacular. As you are perhaps a Southron, I give you 
 the English : " A pound of more weight lay on, lay on !" 
 Their favourite haunt was said to be the Cave, a romantic 
 natural cavern in the midst of the wood. Sometimes the 
 ghosts of the two murdered children were thought to 
 appear, a remarkable instance of which occurred to my 
 father's old clerk in his younger days, though he admitted 
 that he had sat up drinking and carding to " the Sabbath- 
 day morning." It was said that at one time master and 
 men were wont to ride their infernal horses into the very 
 village, to the great terror of all quiet people. However, 
 a skilful exorcist prohibited them from passing the church 
 so long as hollies grew green in Calverley wood ; and there 
 was in my time no lack of hollies in the wood.' 
 
 A good deal of the superstition was in existence some 
 twenty years ago, of which here is an instance : ' In going
 
 AND THE CALVERLEYS. 53 
 
 his rounds, a Methodist preacher was hospitably received 
 by a clothier who lived in the old hall. Whether to 
 account for the fact by the goodness of the cheer, we 
 pretend not to say; but, as the detail ran, the old haunted 
 hall was close to the church, and the window of the room 
 where the gentleman slept looked very awfully into the 
 churchyard. In the dead of the night he felt his bed 
 repeatedly raised from the floor, and then let down again. 
 Whereupon he called up his host ; but the bed-mover was 
 provokingly invisible, and nothing could the two worthies 
 find. 
 
 ' Now, to a native, the amusing part of the story is its 
 topography. The old hall is about a quarter of a mile 
 from the church, with the whole village intervening ; so 
 that if the good man saw into the churchyard from his 
 window, he must have rivalled Lynceus by looking through 
 a dozen good stone walls ; for all the houses are built of 
 stone.'
 
 FORTUNES OF THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 
 
 )F the Irish Geraldines whose great ancestor was 
 a favourite of Edward the Confessor, whose 
 English possessions were numerous, and whose 
 successor was treated after the Conquest as a fellow-country- 
 man of the Normans, and who, moreover, put the cope- 
 stone to his prosperity by marrying a daughter of a prince 
 of North Wales, as did his son by wedding the daughter 
 of a prince of South Wales here are three noteworthy 
 histories. 
 
 First is John Thomas Fitzgerald, who nearly lost his life 
 in an accidental conflagration. In his infancy he was in the 
 Castle of Woodstock when there was an alarm of fire. In 
 the confusion that ensued the child was forgotten ; and on 
 the servants returning to search for him, the room in which 
 he lay was found in ruins. Soon after a strange voice was 
 heard in one of the castle towers ; and upon looking up, 
 they saw an ape, which was usually kept chained, carefully 
 holding the child in its arms. The Earl, afterwards, in 
 gratitude for his preservation, adopted a monkey for his
 
 THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 55 
 
 crest ; and some of his descendants, in memory of it, took 
 the additional motto, ' Non immemor beneficii.' 
 
 The life of the child thus miraculously preserved abounds 
 in romantic adventures. He was at variance with William 
 de Vesci, lord of Kildare, a baron much esteemed by the 
 reigning monarch, Edward i. ; their disputes arising from 
 the contiguity of their estates. De Vesci, who was Lord 
 Justice of Ireland, openly declared that John Fitzthomas 
 was the cause of the existing disturbances, and that he was 
 ' in private quarrels as fierce as a lyon, but in publicke 
 injuries as meeke as a lambe.' This having been reported 
 to Fitzgerald, he, in the presence of the Lords of the Coun- 
 cil, replied : ' You would gladly charge me with treason, 
 that by shedding my blood, and by catching my land into 
 your douches, that but so neere upon your lands of Kyi- 
 dare, you might make your sonne a proper gentleman.' 
 ' A gentleman ! ' quoth the Lord Justice ; ' thou bold baron, 
 I tell thee the Vescis were gentlemen before the Geraldines 
 were barons of Offaly ; yea, and before that Welsh bankrupt, 
 thyne ancestaur, fethered his nest in Leinster;' and then 
 accused him of being ' a supporter of thieves and upholder 
 of traytours.' 'As for my ancestor,' replied the baron, 
 ' whom you term a bankrupt, how riche or how poore he 
 was upon his repayre to Ireland, I purpose not at this time 
 to debate ; yet this much I may boldly say, that he came 
 hither as a byer, not a beggar. He bought his enemies' 
 land by spending his blood ; but you, lurking like a spider 
 in his cobweb to entrappe flies, endeavour to beg sub-
 
 56 FORTUNES OF 
 
 jects' livings wrongfully by despoiling them of their lives. 
 I, John Fitzthomas, Baron of Offaly, doe tell thee, William 
 Vesci, that I am noe traytour, noe felon ; but that thou 
 art the only battress by which the king's enemies are 
 supported.' Both parties being summoned to the royal 
 presence, Fitzgerald maintained the same bold language, 
 accusing the justiciary of corruption, and saying that, while 
 the nobility were excluded from his presence, ' an Irish cow 
 could at all times have access to him. But,' continued 
 Offaly, 'so much as our mutual complaints stand upon, 
 the one his yea and the other his nay, and that you would 
 be taken for a champion, and I am known to be no coward, 
 let us, in God's name, leave lieing for varlets, bearding for 
 ruffians, facing for crakers, chatting for twatlers, scolding 
 for callets, booking for scriveners, pleading for lawyers ; and 
 let us try, with the dint of swords, as it becomes martial 
 men to do, our mutual quarrels. Therefore, to justify that 
 I am a true subject, and that thou, Vesci, art an arch-traitor 
 to God and to my king, here, in the presence of his high- 
 ness, and in the hearing of this honourable assembly, I 
 challenge the combat.' De Vesci accepted the challenge 
 amidst the applauses of the assembly ; but either he doubted 
 the goodness of his cause, or feared to contend with so 
 formidable an adversary. Before the appointed day he 
 fled to France, whereupon the king declared Offaly innocent ; 
 adding, ' Albeit De Vesci conveyed his person into France, 
 yet he left his lands behind him in Ireland ; ' and he granted 
 them to the Baron of Offaly, who subsequently, in many a
 
 THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 57 
 
 hard-fought day, showed himself no less true than valiant. 
 For his good services the English monarch, Edward IL, 
 created him Earl of Kildare, and assigned to him the town 
 and castle of that name. 
 
 We now pass over many illustrious chiefs of this house 
 to come to Gerald eighth Earl of Kildare, called the Great, 
 who was constituted, on his accession to the peerage, lord- 
 deputy to Richard Duke of York. In 1480 he was re- 
 appointed lord-deputy; and again, upon the accession of 
 Henry vu., deputy to Jasper Duke of Bedford, the Lord- 
 lieutenant. Upon the arrival, however, of Lambert Simnel, 
 and his tutor Richard Simon, an Oxford priest, in Ireland, 
 the lord-deputy, the chancellor (Thomas Fitzgerald, the 
 deputy's brother), treasurer, and other nobles in the York 
 interest, immediately acknowledged the impostor, and had 
 him proclaimed in Dublin by the style of Edward vi. ; and 
 the lord-deputy assisted with the others at his coronation 
 in Christ's Church, May 2, 1487, where the ceremony was 
 performed with great solemnity ; the chancellor, the Arch- 
 bishop of Dublin, the Earl of Lincoln, Lord Lovel, Jenico 
 Mark, Mayor of Dublin, and several other persons of rank 
 attending. The crown was borrowed from the image of the 
 Virgin Mary. John Pain, Bishop of Meath, preached the 
 coronation sermon ; and the pretender was subsequently 
 conveyed upon the shoulders of Darcy of Platen, a person 
 of extraordinary height, to the Castle of Dublin, amidst the 
 shouts of the populace. In the engagement which afterwards 
 decided the fate of Simnel, near Stoke, the chancellor
 
 58 FORTUNES OF 
 
 Fitzgerald fell ; but the lord-deputy had the good fortune 
 to make his peace with the king. And well, both by his 
 fidelity and his talents as a statesman and a soldier, did 
 this great man repay the king's confidence. 
 
 Perkin Warbeck, on his landing at Cork in 1497, was 
 successfully opposed by the Earls of Kildare and Desmond, 
 and narrowly escaped being taken prisoner. For this good 
 service King Henry conferred on Kildare several manors 
 in the counties of Warwick and Gloucester. With a strong 
 hand, too, the Earl controlled the unruly native chieftains ; 
 and if he could not entirely extinguish the spirit of revolt, 
 rebellion was instantly put down. 
 
 This unquiet spirit, however, showed itself in formidable 
 array against the king's authority amongst many of the 
 most powerful native chiefs under the Lord of Clanricarde, 
 who had married Kildare's daughter, but had so neglected 
 her as to excite much ill blood between the lady's husband 
 and her father. Never had the Earl's son Gerald's pre- 
 eminent skill and courage been more severely tested. 
 When he came in sight of the rebels, they were drawn 
 up in full force under Knock Taugh, or the hill of axes, now 
 called Knockdoe, about seven miles from Galway. Many 
 of the lords of the Pale began to be alarmed for the 
 result, the enemy having collected the largest army ever 
 seen in the country since the invasion of 1169. They 
 would have persuaded the Earl to offer terms of peace, 
 but the stout old soldier refused to listen for; a moment 
 to such timid counsels. Having drawn up his men in
 
 THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 59 
 
 battle array, he bluntly told them that their own safety, as 
 well as the king's honour, rested on their unflinching valour 
 in that day's service. The onset was made by the rebels 
 in gallant style ; but they were received with such a volley 
 of arrows from the Leinster men, that they fell back in 
 confusion. The Earl then commanded his vanguard to 
 advance, when his son Gerald, in the impatience of youthful 
 courage, charged without orders at the head of his men 
 most bravely and resolutely. ' Far away from the troops,' 
 says the Irish chronicler, 'were heard the violent onset 
 of the martial chiefs, the vehement efforts of the champions, 
 the charge of the royal heroes, the noise of the swords, the 
 clamour of the troops when endangered, the shouts and 
 exultations of the youths, the sound made by the falling 
 of brave men, and the triumph of nobles over plebeians.' 
 It was a fierce battle, such as had not been known in latter 
 times. Of Clanricarde's nine divisions which were in solid 
 array, there survived only one broken battalion. The 
 rebels were completely routed, their slain being computed 
 at nearly 9000 men, though this may be exaggeration. 
 For this good service Kildare was created by Henry a 
 Knight of the Garter. 
 
 The days of this great man were now drawing fast to 
 a conclusion. In 1513 he marched against Lemyvannon, 
 or ' O'Carroll's Castle,' now called Leap Castle, in the 
 King's County; but as he was watering his horse in the 
 River Greese, at Kilkea, he was shot by one of the 
 O'Mores of Leix, and after lingering for a few days he died
 
 60 FORTUNES OF 
 
 of his wound, and was buried in his own chapel at Christ's 
 Church before the high altar. Holinshed describes him as 
 a ' mightie man of stature, full of honours and courage, who 
 had been Lord-deputie and Lord Justice of Ireland three 
 and thirtie yeares. Kildare was in government milde, to 
 his enemies sterne. He was open and playne, hardly able 
 to move himself when he was moved ; in anger not so sharp 
 as short, being easily displeased and sooner appeased.' 
 
 Gerald Oge, that is, Gerald the younger, the ninth Earl 
 of Kildare, entered upon his office of lord -deputy under 
 less favourable auspices than his predecessor had done. 
 As governor of Ireland, Gerald seemed to consider himself 
 as representing the king's interests only in the Pale, which 
 at that time included the counties of Dublin, Louth, Meath, 
 and Kildare, ruling the rest of his possessions as indepen- 
 dently as any native chief; and these were tolerably exten- 
 sive, for he and his kinsmen occupied the counties of 
 Kildare and Carlow as far as the bridge of Leighlin, 
 exacting coin and livery within these bounds. In fact, 
 while he was English to the Irish, he was, to a certain 
 degree, Irish to the English who were placed in this unfor- 
 tunate dilemma : they must of necessity support the lord- 
 deputy, from his influence over the Pale, which was their 
 instrument for curbing the rest of Ireland, then divided 
 amongst thirty great Anglo-Irish lords and sixty Irish 
 chieftains. On the other hand, there was always a danger 
 of the lord-deputy's growing over-powerful, and turning 
 round upon his master.
 
 THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 61 
 
 It happened to Gerald Oge, as it had happened to his 
 predecessors, to more than once incur the jealousy of the 
 English Government, and to be deprived of his office of 
 lord-deputy. What was yet worse, he unluckily drew upon 
 himself the hatred of the stern and lynx-eyed Wolsey, and 
 nearly lost his head in consequence. The stout Earl 
 weathered the storm which had well-nigh foundered him, 
 and even again attained his former dignity ; but it was only 
 to relapse into suspicion and disgrace. He was once more 
 called over to England, and recommitted to the Tower. 
 Before his departure from Ireland, he constituted his son 
 Thomas Lord Offaly vice-deputy, and strictly enjoined 
 him to be ' wise and prudent,' and submissive to the 
 council. Nevertheless, the 'hot and active temper' of the 
 young lord could not be restrained. The murder of Arch- 
 bishop Alen, perpetrated by his followers, led to the severe 
 sentence of excommunication pronounced against him ; 
 which being shown to the old Earl in the Tower, had such 
 an effect on him that he died shortly after of a broken 
 heart. His remains received sepulture within the Tower 
 walls, in St. Peter's Chapel, a sorry recompense for all his 
 services. 
 
 Some time before the ninth Earl died, a report reached 
 Ireland that he was to be beheaded. A strange story is 
 told by Holinshed, how this report was confirmed in secret 
 letters written by certain servants of Sir William Skeffington. 
 ' One of these letters fell into the hands of a priest, who 
 threw it among other papers, meaning to read it at leisure.
 
 62 FORTUNES OF 
 
 That nighte, a gentleman, a retainer of Lord Thomas', 
 lodged with the priest, and sought in the morning when 
 he rose for some paper to darne on his strayte stockings ; 
 and as the divell would, he hit upon the letter, and bore 
 it away in the heele of his stocke.' At night he found 
 the paper ; and seeing that it announced the Earl's death, 
 he carried it to his son Lord Thomas, who immediately 
 resolved to throw off his allegiance to the English Crown. 
 
 From this moment the adventures of Thomas tenth Earl 
 of Kildare, known (from the fringes on the helmets of his 
 retainers) as Silken 77iomas, form a chapter of romance ; 
 and, after all, his determination was not so hopeless of 
 success as many at the time imagined it to be, so extensive 
 was the influence of the Geraldines. In disclaiming the 
 English rule, the young Earl proceeded with all the chivalric 
 honour of a knight of old. He called a meeting of the 
 council at St. Mary's Abbey ; and when he had seated him- 
 self at the head of the table, a party of his followers rushed 
 in, to the sore amazement of those who had not been pre- 
 viously warned of his intentions. The words in which he 
 then addressed them were worthy of his great ancestors, 
 and show of what metal the Geraldines were made. He 
 then tendered his sword of state to the chancellor (Cromer). 
 The gentle prelate, who was a well-wisher of the Geraldines, 
 besought him with tears to abandon his purpose. He 
 might perhaps have succeeded, but that Nolan, an Irish 
 bard then present, burst out into a heroic strain in his 
 native tongue, in praise of ' Silken Thomas,' and concluded
 
 THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 63 
 
 by warning him that he had lingered there over long. This 
 aroused the Earl, who, addressing the chancellor somewhat 
 abruptly, renounced all allegiance to the English monarch, 
 saying that he chose rather ' to die with valiantness and 
 liberty.' 
 
 The subsequent career of ' Silken Thomas ' fully cor- 
 responded with the above commencement. For a length 
 of time he resisted successfully the famous lord-deputy 
 Skeffington, with all the support that England could afford 
 him, or that could be derived from Irish septs. When, 
 finally deserted by the last of his allies, Kildare was obliged 
 to surrender, it was upon a promise sealed upon the holy 
 sacrament, that he should receive a full pardon upon his 
 arrival in England. But this pledge was shamefully violated 
 by Henry vm. For sixteen months the Earl was imprisoned 
 in the Tower of London ; and then, together with his five 
 uncles, two of whom had always been staunch adherents of 
 the king, was hanged, drawn, and quartered at Tyburn, on 
 the 8th of February 1537, the Earl being then but twenty- 
 four years of age. 
 
 The rebellion of ' Silken Thomas ' is a most romantic and 
 touching episode in Irish history. It is melancholy to con- 
 trast the early condition of the gay, glittering noble, ' the 
 Silken Lord,' vice-deputy of Ireland, and head of one of 
 the most illustrious families in the world, with that bitter 
 suffering which he described in a letter to an adherent while 
 a prisoner in the Tower. He writes : ' I never had any 
 money syns I cam unto prison but a nobull, nor I have had
 
 64 THREE EARLS OF KILDARE. 
 
 nethyr hosyn, dublet, nor shoys, nor shyrt buton. ... I 
 have gone barefote dyverse tymes (when y" hath not been 
 very warme), and so I should have done styll, and now, 
 but that pore prysoners, of their gentylnes, hath sometyme 
 geyven me old hosyn, and shoys, and old shyrtes. This I 
 wryte unto you, not as complayning on my fryndes, but for 
 to show you the trewth of my gret ned.' The generous, self- 
 sacrificing spirit of the youth still shines throughout his 
 sufferings ; and the reader will scarcely fail to be struck 
 with the marked resemblance between ' Silken Thomas ' 
 and another equally ill-fated Geraldine of a much later 
 period, the amiable and high-minded Lord Edward Fitz- 
 gerald. Both were led away by the enthusiasm of their 
 nature ; both were chivalrously honourable ; both displayed 
 throughout the contest an unflinching spirit ; and each in 
 the bloom of manhood paid the penalty of his error in a 
 violent death. 
 
 Though attainder followed, the House of Kildare was 
 not destined to perish. Thomas's half-brother Gerald, the 
 eleventh Earl of Kildare, then only twelve years old, became 
 the male representative of the Geraldines. His fortunes 
 will be found narrated in connection with the history of Sir 
 Anthony Browne and his descendants.
 
 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE AND HIS 
 DESCENDANTS. 
 
 HE famous Sir Anthony Browne, standard-bearer 
 to King Henry vin., stands out from the canvas 
 of history by his devotion to a worthy cause 
 and course of upright action. He was twice married : his 
 second wife was a more celebrated lady than his first. She 
 was the second daughter of the ninth Earl of Kildare, the 
 Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald ; and was the issue of that un- 
 fortunate nobleman's second wife, the Lady Elizabeth Grey 
 fourth daughter of Thomas Marquis of Dorset by Cicely his 
 wife, daughter and heir of William Bonville, Lord Bonville 
 and Harrington. The Lady Elizabeth was a great beauty, 
 and had been brought up with the Princesses Mary and 
 Elizabeth, afterwards Queens Mary and Elizabeth of Eng- 
 land, at Hunsdon House ; she being by descent and rela- 
 tionship their second cousin, and her mother being a 
 granddaughter of the Lady Elizabeth, daughter of Sir 
 Richard 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
 
 66 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE 
 
 Anthony's family connected with royalty: for his second 
 wife's mother, the Countess of Kildare, was niece in half- 
 blood to King Edward v. 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 vii. : consequently 
 she was cousin to the husband's royal patron and friend, 
 Henry vnr. 
 
 At Hunsdon House Lady Elizabeth Fitzgerald was seen 
 by Henry Howard the poet, 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 is as follows : 
 
 ' From Tuscane came my ladle's worthie race, 
 
 Fair Florence was sometime her ancient seat ; 
 The Western lie, 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. 
 From tender years in Britaine she doth rest 
 
 With king's child, where she tastes costlie food. 
 Hunsdon 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' refers to Surrey's imprisonment in Windsor 
 Castle, where many of his sonnets were composed ; and the 
 ' dame of prince's bloude ' applies to her grandmother, the
 
 AND HIS DESCENDANTS. 67 
 
 Marchioness of Dorset, who was daughter and heiress of 
 Henry Duke of Exeter by the Lady Anne, sister of Edward 
 iv. This lady has ever since been known as the ' Fair 
 Geraldine,' although by that confusion which is frequently 
 caused by careless writing, the first wife of Anthony Browne, 
 Alice, is in some works called by the second one's just 
 sobriquet?- This ' Fair Geraldine ' had no children by Sir 
 Anthony Browne ; but marrying soon after her husband's 
 demise, she had a large family by her second husband, Sir 
 Edward Clinton, first Earl of Lincoln of that name, and 
 ancestor of the Duke of Newcastle. 
 
 A very remarkable and interesting event occurred in this 
 family, namely, the marriage 'of Mabel Browne, second 
 daughter of Sir Anthony by his first wife, with Geraldine 
 Fitzgerald eleventh Earl of Kildare, and brother to the 
 Lady Elizabeth, Sir Anthony Browne's second wife. 
 
 Mabel's husband's career had been a most romantic one ; 
 tor he was, as a child, hunted down by the rancour of 
 Henry vin., who had not only executed 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 treating him, caused him to die, 
 after the execution of his son and brothers, of grief and 
 
 1 At p. 5 2 9 f the History and Antiquities of Sussex, by Thomas 
 Walker Horsefield (2 vols. 4to, 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 tour- 
 naments, under the name of the " Fair Geraldine." '
 
 68 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE 
 
 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 12, 1534, and he was buried in the chapel of the 
 Tower, as attested by an inscription on a chest found there 
 in 1580. 
 
 After many stirring adventures in Ireland and in Scotland, 
 the young Gerald was sent, in the custody of his tutor, 
 Thomas Leverons, who was foster-brother to his 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 Flanders, 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, where- 
 upon the governor sent for Sherlock and examined him ; 
 and finding him guilty, and without reasonable defence, he 
 imprisoned him, until the generous youth interceded for his 
 liberation. 
 
 From Flanders they went to Brussels, where Charles v. 
 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
 
 AND HIS DESCENDANTS. 69 
 
 stay in the country, and so sent him to the Bishop of Liege, 
 allowing him for his support one hundred crowns a month. 
 The bishop gave him an honourable 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 had 
 him educated under the care of the Bishop of Verona and 
 the Cardinal of Mantua. 
 
 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 300 crowns. He continued in Rome some 
 three years an inmate of the cardinal's house. He travelled, 
 with his relative's permission, to Naples, and accompanied 
 the Knights of Rhodes 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 ; he returned with a rich booty, 
 first to Malta and then to Rome. 
 
 Some three years after, he one day, in the heat of the 
 chase, when accompanying Cardinal Farnese to hunt the stag, 
 narrowly escaped death. In the violent pursuit, his horse 
 leaped into a deep pit which had been concealed from view. 
 Finding himself falling, the young man clung to some roots 
 of trees, by which he hung, leaving his unfortunate horse to 
 precede him to the bottom of this deep pit ; but at last tired 
 out, he relinquished his hold, and fell on his dead horse. 
 In the pit he remained ankle-deep in water some three 
 hours, no one coming to relieve him, notwithstanding his
 
 70 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE 
 
 cries for help. When the chase was over, his hound' miss- 
 ing his master, tracked him to the edge of the precipice, 
 where he stood howling over him. The cardinal, perceiving 
 something was wrong by the manner of the dog, hastened 
 with his attendants to the spot, and had his kinsman re- 
 lieved by causing one of the company to be let down by 
 ropes in a basket; and the nearly exhausted Gerald was 
 thus brought out of the pit to the surface. He remained 
 abroad till the death of King Henry, when he returned to 
 London. 
 
 It was at a masque or ball in the time of Edward vi. that 
 Gerald met with Mabel Browne ; and as he was one of the 
 handsomest men of the age, and she a very beautiful young 
 woman, it is not surprising that they fell at once in love with 
 each other. His marriage with Mabel, the daughter of his 
 king's honoured servant and former guardian, 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 the knighthood in 1552, restoring to 
 him all his forfeited estates in Ireland. In the time of 
 Queen Mary, Cardinal Pole returing to England, our knight 
 was fully restored to his titles of Earl of Kildare and Baron 
 Offaly ; and with an almost uninterrupted good fortune, 
 the Earl of Kildare and his Countess Mabel lived for many 
 years, to prove the rule true by being an exception to it, 
 that ' the course of true love never did run smooth.' He 
 died November 16, 1555 ; and his widow, 'a lady of great 
 worth and virtue, at her fair home of Maynooth,' died
 
 AND HIS DESCENDANTS. 71 
 
 August 10, 1 6 10, being the mother of three sons and two 
 daughters. 
 
 From this chequered story we pass to a circumstance re- 
 lated of the same family which bears out the curious rea- 
 soning upon which Sir Henry Spelman wrote in his History 
 of Sacrilege in the year 1632, namely, that ' all those families 
 who took or had church property presented to them, came, 
 either in their own persons or those of their ancestors, to 
 sorrow and misfortune.' 
 
 One of the many curious occurrences relating to Sir 
 Anthony Browne was sent some years since to Notes and 
 Queries, being communicated in a letter to the Editor of 
 that periodical by a clergyman of Easebourne, near to the 
 famous Cowdray Castle, the principal seat of the Mon- 
 tagues. It stated, that at the great festival given in the 
 magnificent hall of the monks at Battle Abbey, on Sir 
 Anthony Browne taking possession of his sovereign's muni- 
 ficent gift of that estate, a venerable monk stalked up the 
 hall to the dais, where the worthy knight sat, and in pro- 
 phetic language denounced him and his posterity for the 
 crime of usurping the possessions of the church, predicting 
 their destruction by fire and water, which fate was eventually 
 fulfilled. The last viscount but one, just before the termi- 
 nation of the eighteenth century (1793), was drowned in an 
 unsuccessful attempt to pass the Falls of Schaffhausen on 
 the Rhine, accompanied by Mr. Sedley Burdett, the elder 
 brother of the late distinguished Sir Francis. They had 
 engaged an open boat to take them through the rapids, and
 
 72 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE 
 
 had 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. They resolved, however, to carry 
 out their project, regardless of all its perils ; and in this 
 spirit they decided on starting two hours earlier than the 
 time previously fixed, namely at four o'clock in the morning 
 instead of at six, the season of the year being early summer. 
 They commenced their descent accordingly, and success- 
 fully 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 fall, 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, Cowdray Castle, was de- 
 stroyed by fire, and its venerable ruins still stand at Ease- 
 bourne the significant monument, at once of the fulfilment 
 of the old monk's prophecy, and of the extinction of the 
 race of the great and powerful noble. 
 
 The last inheritor of the title the immediate successor 
 and cousin of the ill-fated young nobleman of Schaffhausen, 
 Anthony Browne, the last Viscount Montague, who died at 
 the opening of this century left no male issue; but his 
 estates, so far as he could alienate them from the title, de- 
 volved on his only daughter, who intermarried with Mr. 
 Stephen Poyntz, a great Buckinghamshire landholder and a 
 member of the Legislature, who, from his local importance,
 
 AND HIS DESCENDANTS. 73 
 
 was desirous of obtaining a grant of the dormant title 
 ' Viscount Montague ' in favour of the elder of his two 
 sons, issue of this marriage ; he was a very large contri- 
 butor to the then ' Loyalty Loan,' and through his family 
 connections, he was sanguine of success. His hopes, how- 
 ever, were suddenly and painfully 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 means in fulfilment, as it were, of 
 the monk's terrible denunciation on the family in his fearful 
 curse ! As if, too, Time had identified himself with the 
 fate involving 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 abandoned 
 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 verifying the doom which 
 the monk of old foreshadowed ; for this once proud family 
 of other days is rapidly becoming altogether lost in the 
 mists of obscurity. It once occupied the highest position 
 in the land ; whereas its honours are now only remem- 
 bered in the ruins of its ancestral houses, leaving it for the 
 wandering antiquary to bring them once more to light,
 
 74 SIR ANTHONY BROWNE 
 
 by the tower and the tomb to read a few records of their 
 former greatness, and in the melancholy yet truthful strains 
 of the poet 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 ! ' 
 
 It may be interesting to add, that ' the name of Browne 
 is not derived, as believed, from the colour brown, but 
 boasts of a much higher origin : it is now well understood 
 to be taken from the name of an office or position of dig- 
 nity allied to chieftainship, which in a Scandinavian form 
 is known as " brdn" 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. From this may possibly 
 have come the French Brun, from which we get easily 
 enough Brown and Browne. 
 
 ' The family of Browne was no doubt derived from the 
 Normans ; for on the Roll of Battle Abbey, amongst others, 
 occurs the name of Browne. On Stow's " auncient Role," 
 which he received from " Master Thomas Scriven," as con- 
 taining the surnames of the " chefe noblemen and gentle- 
 men 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
 
 AND HIS DESCENDANTS. 75 
 
 have perished in the great fire at Cowdray, 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 vin.'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.' 
 
 The above narrative has been selected and abridged from 
 an interesting paper contributed by Mr. George R. Wright, 
 F.S. A., to the Journal of the British Archaological Associa- 
 tion, 1867.
 
 THE OSBORNE AND LEEDS FAMILIES. 
 
 IOWARDS the middle of the sixteenth century 
 (1536), when London Bridge was covered with 
 picturesque towers and gateways, and houses 
 of business, there occurred, in one of the latter, an incident 
 which is probably better known and more often related 
 than most other portions of its history. We allude to the 
 anecdote of Edward Osborne leaping into the Thames from 
 the window of one of the bridge houses, to rescue the 
 daughter of Sir William Hewet, a cloth-worker, the son of 
 Edmund Hewet of Wales, in Yorkshire. He possessed 
 an estate of ^6000 per annum, and is said to have had 
 three sons and one daughter, Anne, to which daughter 
 this mischance happened, the father then living upon 
 London Bridge. It happened that the maid-servant, as she 
 was playing with the infant on the edge of the open window 
 over the river Thames, by chance dropped her in, almost 
 beyond expectation of her being saved ; but a young gentle- 
 man named Osborne, then apprenticed to Sir William, the 
 father, seeing the accident, leaped into the river after her 
 boldly, and brought the child out safe, to the great joy of
 
 THE OSBORNE AND LEEDS FAMILIES. // 
 
 its parents and the admiration of the spectators. In 
 memory of this deliverance, and in gratitude, when the 
 child was grown to woman's estate, and asked in marriage 
 by several persons of quality, particularly by the Earl of 
 Shrewsbury, Sir William betrothed his daughter with a 
 very great dowry to her deliverer, and with this emphatic 
 declaration : ' Osborne saved her, and Osborne shall enjoy 
 her.' Part of the property given her in marriage was the 
 estate of Sir Thomas Fanshaw of Barking, in Essex ; 
 together with several other lands in the parishes of Harthil 
 and Wales, in Yorkshire, now in the possession of the 
 noble family of the Duke of Leeds. Sir William Hewet 
 was one of the eminent members of the Cloth-workers' 
 Company, and served the office of Lord Mayor in 1539. 
 He was buried, under a magnificent tomb, between those 
 of Dean Colet and Sir William Cockain, in the south aisle 
 of the old Cathedral of St. Paul. 
 
 Now the family of Osborne, whence sprung ' the gallant 
 apprentice of London Bridge,' is one of considerable 
 antiquity in Kent, and was early seated at Ashford in that 
 county. So far back as the twelfth of Henry vi., John 
 Osborne of Canterbury occurs on the list of Kentish gentry. 
 Sir Edward Osborne, who married Sir William HeWet's 
 daughter, served as Sheriff of London in 1575, and Lord 
 Mayor in 1583-84, the twenty-fifth of Queen Elizabeth, 
 when he received the honour of knighthood at Westmin- 
 ster. He dwelt, according to a MS. in the Herald's College, 
 in Philpot Lane, in Sir W. Hewet's house, and was buried
 
 78 THE OSBORNE AND LEEDS FAMILIES. 
 
 in 1591 in the old church of St. Dionis Back church in 
 Fenchurch Street On the i5th of August 1675, Sir 
 Thomas Osborne, the great-grandson of Sir Edward, was 
 raised to the peerage by the titles of Viscount Latimer and 
 Baron Kiveton, in the county of York, by patent from 
 King Charles the Second. On the 27th of June in the 
 year following he was created Earl of Danby ; on the 2oth 
 of April 1680 he was advanced to the dignity of Marquess 
 of Caermarthen ; and he became first Duke of Leeds on 
 May the 4th, 1694. 'Ancient as is the paternal family 
 of the noble family of Osborne,' says Sir Bernard Burke, 
 ' the illustrious houses of Conyers, D'Arcy, and Godolphin, 
 which the present Duke of Leeds represents, and his 
 descent through various lines of the royal House of 
 Plantagenet, add a lustre to his Grace's coronet of which 
 few other families can boast' (Peerage, 1865). We may 
 here add that Sir Edward Osborne, when Lord Mayor, 
 introduced the custom of drinking to the new Sheriff, 
 although there is a ludicrous instance of such a ceremony 
 in 1487. 
 
 The courageous action of Osborne at London Bridge has 
 been commemorated in various pictures and prints. We 
 even remember its illustration in a little book of our child- 
 hood. The Leeds family preserve the picture of Sir 
 William Hewet, in his habit as Lord Mayor, at Kiveton 
 House in Yorkshire to this day, valuing it at ^"300. 
 Pennant describes this portrait as half-length, on board; 
 dress, a black gown, furred, red vest and sleeves, a gold
 
 THE OSBORNE AND LEEDS FAMILIES. 79 
 
 chain, and a bonnet. There is also an engraved portrait of 
 Osborne himself, said to be unique, in a series of woodcuts, 
 consisting of the portraits of forty-three Lord Mayors in 
 the time of Queen Elizabeth. There is also a small but 
 uncommon engraving of Osborne leaping from the window, 
 executed for some ephemeral publication, from a drawing 
 by Samuel Wale. As this artist died in 1786, it is of course 
 but of little authority as being a representation of the fact : 
 it is nevertheless interesting for its portraiture of the 
 dwellings on London Bridge in the artist's time. With 
 this print may be mentioned one designed by the same 
 hand, and engraved by Charles Grignion, of the first Duke 
 of Leeds pointing to a portrait of Hewet's daughter, and 
 relating to King Charles n. the foregoing anecdote of his 
 ancestors. 
 
 So much, then, for an historical and genealogical illustra- 
 tion of the anecdote of the gallant apprentice of London 
 Bridge.
 
 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, 
 AND THE MORE FAMILY. 
 
 )NE of the most interesting manorial houses of the 
 county of Surrey is Loseley, situated about two 
 miles to the south-east of Guildford, between 
 Compton on the north-east and the lordship of Godalming 
 on the south and east. This manor was held in chief by 
 Roger de Montgomery, Earl of Arundel and Shrewsbury, at 
 the time of the Domesday survey. 
 
 Roger de Montgomery was one of the Norman barons 
 who engaged in the expedition to England under Duke 
 William; and he commanded the central division of the 
 Norman army at the battle of Hastings. In reward for his 
 services he obtained his lands and titles, including among 
 the former three manors in the county of Surrey, besides 
 that of Loseley. After the death of William the First he 
 joined the party in favour of his eldest son, Robert Curt- 
 hose, but at length quitted it, and became the firm adherent 
 of William Rufus. He founded several religious houses, 
 one of which was the Priory of Shrewsbury, where he spent 
 the latter part of his life, and died July 27, 1094.
 
 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS. 81 
 
 Sibilla, the daughter of Earl Roger, who became heiress 
 to his estates, married Robert Fitz Hamon, who, being 
 Lord of the Honor of Gloucester, united to it the manor of 
 Loseley, which was afterwards held as the appurtenance to 
 that house. 
 
 In the reign of Henry in.' this manor was held of the 
 House of Gloucester by the military service of half a knight's 
 fee ; but in the succeeding reigns of Edward i., n., and in., 
 it was held of the same house by the service of a whole 
 knight's fee, and valued at twenty pounds per annum. In 
 1592, Christopher More, Esq., who had previously settled in 
 Derbyshire, became by purchase possessor of the entire 
 Loseley estate, and obtained a grant of free warren, with a 
 licence to make a park here, as appears from a writ of 
 privy seal of Henry vm. preserved among the muniments 
 at Loseley. It is dated Chelseheth (Chelsea), i4th of 
 December, in the 24th of Henry's reign, A.D. 1533; and 
 gives licence to Christopher More, characterized as one of 
 the clerks of the Exchequer, to impark and surround with 
 hedges, ditches, and pedes, two hundred acres of land 
 at his manor of Loseley, free warren to the same, etc. 
 Red deer were then kept in this park. This Christopher 
 More was Sheriff of Surrey and Sussex, both in the 24th 
 and 3ist years of Henry vm., on the first of which occa- 
 sions he received the honour of knighthood. In the 37th 
 of Henry's reign he held the office of King's Remembrancer 
 of the Exchequer, which he retained until his decease in 
 1549-
 
 82 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, 
 
 William More, the eldest surviving son of Christopher, 
 was born on January the 30th, 1519-20. He sat in Par- 
 liament as member for the borough of Guildford several 
 times in the reigns of Mary and Elizabeth, and in that of 
 the latter he was chosen knight of the shire for Surrey ; 
 he was also appointed Vice-Admiral of Sussex, the duty of 
 which office was to enforce the rights of the Admiralty on 
 the shores of the district entrusted to his jurisdiction. On 
 the i4th of May 1576, the honour of knighthood was 
 conferred on him by Dudley Earl of Leicester, in the Earl 
 of Lincoln's garden at Pirford, in Surrey, in the presence 
 of Queen Elizabeth, who, on giving him her hand to kiss, 
 told him that he * well deserved the honour which she had 
 then conferred upon him.' He may be considered as the 
 founder of Loseley House; for in 1562 he began to build 
 the central compartment of the mansion, somewhat to the 
 north, probably, of an earlier edifice, some vestiges of which 
 have been placed in the Great Hall of the present building. 
 On the wainscot is a monogram composed of the letters 
 H. K. P., for Henry and Katherine Parr; H. R., the 
 fleur-de-lis, the rose, and the portcullis, with the motto, 
 Dieu et mon Drott, all evidently executed in the reign of 
 Henry vin. 
 
 Sir William More died, much respected, on the 20th of 
 July 1600, in the 8ist year of his age, and was buried in 
 the family vault at St. Nicholas' Church, Guildford. This 
 gentleman was highly esteemed by Queen Elizabeth, who 
 visited him at Loseley in the years 1577, 1583, and 1594,
 
 AND THE MORE FAMILY. 83 
 
 and probably also on one or two other occasions. He 
 was a firm supporter of the Protestant religion ; and in 1570 
 the safe keeping of Henry Wriothesley, second Earl of 
 Southampton, who had been subjected to restraint as a 
 suspected Papist, was entrusted to him ; and the Earl, in 
 consequence, became his prisoner-guest at Loseley for 
 nearly three years. 
 
 Among the manuscripts at Loseley several letters are 
 extant respecting the arrangements for the Queen's visits, 
 and the caution that was taken to prevent Her Majesty 
 being exposed to any infectious disease during her pro- 
 gresses. In a letter dated from the Court at Oatlands in 
 August 1583, Sir Christopher Hatton informs Sir William 
 More that ' Her Ma tie hath an intention about ten or twelve 
 days hence to visit yo r House by Guylford, and to remayne 
 theere some foure or fyve dayes, w ch I thought good to ad- 
 vertise you of, that in the meane whyle you might see every 
 thinge well ordered, and your House kept sweate and cleane, 
 to receave her Hygnes whensoever she shal be pleased to 
 see it.' Sir Christopher was at that time the Queen's 
 chamberlain. 
 
 How highly Sir William More stood in the Queen's 
 favour may be inferred from a letter sent to him by his 
 daughter Elizabeth, who was one of the ladies of Her 
 Majesty's Privy Chamber. This letter was apparently 
 written in the autumn of 1595, but is not dated, and in- 
 cludes the following passage in reference to Sir William, the 
 spelling modernized : ' Since my coming to the Court, I
 
 84 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, 
 
 have had many gracious words of Her Majesty, and many 
 time she bade me welcome with all her heart, ever since I 
 have waited. Yesterday she wore the gown you gave her, 
 and took thereby occasion to speak of you, saying ere long 
 I should find a mother-in-law, which was herself; but she 
 was afraid of the two widows that are with you, that they 
 would be angry with her for it ; and that she would give 
 ten thousand pounds you were twenty years younger ; for 
 she hath but few such servants as you are.' Loseley Manu- 
 scripts, edited by A. J. Kempe. 
 
 George, the only son and heir of Sir William More, was 
 born in 1553, and educated at Corpus Christi College, 
 Oxford. In 1604 he presented divers manuscripts to the 
 public library at Oxford, together with forty pounds for the 
 purchase of printed books. In 1597 he was nominated 
 Sheriff of Surrey and Sussex, and about that time was 
 knighted. Like his father, he acquired the special favour of 
 the Queen, who on 3d November 1601 augmented his estate 
 by the grant of the lordship and hundred of Godalming. 
 Early in the next reign he was appointed Treasurer to 
 Henry Prince of Wales. On the nth and i2th August 
 1603, both King James and his Queen were 'royally enter- 
 tained' at Loseley by Sir George More; and on 2ist 
 August 1606 he was again honoured by a visit from the 
 king. In 1610 His Majesty promoted him to the Chan- 
 cellorship of the Order of the Garter; and in 1615, from 
 a full ' confidence in his honesty,' and, as James himself 
 expresses it, ' without the knowledge of any,' he appointed
 
 AND THE MORE FAMILY. 85 
 
 him Lieutenant of the Tower, after the removal of Sir 
 Gervase Elwes from that important command, in conse- 
 quence of his being implicated in the murder of Sir Thomas 
 Overbury. 
 
 Among the Loseley manuscripts printed by Mr. Kempe, 
 F.S.A., are four original letters from King James to Sir 
 George More, from which it appears that His Majesty was 
 deeply indebted to Sir George for his management of 
 Somerset previously to his trial for the murder of Overbury. 
 In one of his letters the king says : ' It is easie to be scene 
 that he (the Earl) while threattin me with laying an aspersion 
 upon me of being in some sorte accessorie to the cryme.' 
 Mr. Kempe, in another part of his work, states that, ' from 
 the drafts of sundry disregarded memorials at Loseley, Sir 
 George appears to have been ill requited for his services 
 to James, who neglected him in his declining years. He 
 is noticed in Nichols' Progresses of that king, as attending 
 his funeral in his office of Chancellor of the Garter in a 
 very infirm state.' 
 
 In August 1617 Sir George More entertained the Prince 
 of Wales, afterwards Charles i., at Loseley. Sir George sat 
 in Parliament for Guildford in the reigns of Elizabeth and 
 James i., and for the county of Surrey in the reigns of these 
 two sovereigns and Charles i. Sir George died in his 79th 
 year, i6th October 1632. By his wife Ann, daughter and 
 co-heiress of Sir Adrian Poynings, he had four sons and 
 five daughters, of whom Ann, born May 1584, was privately 
 married in 1600 to John Donne, afterwards celebrated as
 
 86 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, 
 
 a poet and divine, on whom King James conferred the 
 Deanery of St. Paul's, but who at that time was secretary 
 to Lord Chancellor Egerton. The lady's father was so 
 highly incensed by this match, that he procured the dis- 
 missal of Donne from the Lord Chancellor's service, and 
 caused him to be committed to the Fleet Prison ; nor was 
 it until after the lapse of several years that he was pre- 
 vailed on to pardon the offending pair. Although he soon 
 regained his own liberty, the successful bridegroom was put 
 to a long and expensive process in the ecclesiastical court 
 before he could recover possession of his wife, who was 
 forcibly withheld from him ; but at length a decree con- 
 firming the marriage was obtained in 1602. Mrs. Donne 
 died 1 2th August 1615, seven days after the birth of her 
 twelfth child. Most of these particulars are related in the 
 Loseley Manuscripts. 
 
 This curious work consists principally of copies from the 
 manuscripts and other rare documents which are preserved 
 in the muniment room at Loseley, 'the key of which,' Mr. 
 Kempe says, ' had been lost, and its existence disregarded, 
 during an interval of two hundred years.' These manu- 
 scripts had been kept in ponderous oaken coffers ; but Mr. 
 Bray, when proceeding with his History of Surrey, had 
 access to them, and by permission selected a number of 
 the papers, and had them bound in nine folio volumes. 
 Among the fac-similes given in the manuscripts by Mr. 
 Kempe is one of Lady Jane Grey as ' Quene? 
 
 On the decease of the last of the male heirs of the Mores,
 
 AND THE MORE FAMILY. 87 
 
 who died unmarried in May 1689, his sisters became his 
 co-heirs. Elizabeth died a spinster in February 1691-2, 
 when the whole of the inheritance became vested in Mar- 
 garet, her surviving sister. This lady married Sir Thomas 
 Molyneux, Knt., of the ancient family of that name, of 
 Sefton, in Lancashire, from which the present Earl of Sefton, 
 and Viscount Molyneux, of Maryborough, in Ireland, is 
 descended. William de Moulines, the common ancestor of 
 the Molyneux family, came into England in the train of 
 William the Norman ; and his name stands the eighteenth 
 in the order of succession in the Roll of Battle Abbey. 
 
 Loseley Park is an extensive and finely wooded demesne,, 
 and is approached from the Portsmouth road. . The scenery 
 is enriched by venerable oaks and noble elms r standing 
 singly and in clumps or groups. There is also a small 
 sheet of water, and on the west a plantation of firs. Lose- 
 ley, no doubt, 'had from an early period its manse or 
 capital dwelling-house, fortified by a moat, according to the 
 custom of the feudal ages ; ' but although some vestiges of 
 the latter defence still remain, the dwelling itself has been 
 long destroyed. The present mansion is an interesting 
 example of the Elizabethan age, and was erected between 
 the years 1562 and 1568 by Sir William More, as the cen- 
 tral part of a structure intended to form three sides of a 
 quadrangle, if not a complete square. But the design was 
 never executed to the full extent, although a western wing, 
 including a gallery 129 feet in length and 18 feet wide, and 
 also a chapel, were annexed by Sir George More, the son of
 
 88 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, 
 
 the founder. That wing was, however, wholly taken down 
 several years ago, and the building reduced to its original 
 state. The edifice is of grey stone, and in its architectural 
 plan there is a general uniformity, though by no means a 
 strict one. All the windows are square-headed, but they 
 differ much in size, those of the principal apartments being 
 of large dimensions, and separated by mullions and transoms 
 into several lights. In the bay or oriel window of the great 
 hall, among other emblazonments, are the arms of the 
 Mores, painted with the date 1568. 
 
 The principal entrance, which is in the centre of the 
 front, opens into the hall, but was originally more eastward, 
 namely, at the end of the passage between the screens 
 which divide the hall from the kitchen and butteries. The 
 entrance here was by a porch or vestibule, now a butler's 
 pantry, and over it were placed three figures in stone. On 
 the left hand was that of Fortune treading on a globe, and 
 holding a wheel on which was inscribed Fortuna Omnia; 
 in the middle, and raised above the others, a figure, with 
 one foot on a wheel, and the other on a globe, holding a 
 book open, and pointing to these words, Nee Fors nee Fatum, 
 sed . . . ; and over the entrance to the vestibule was 
 inscribed this distich : 
 
 ' Invide, tangendi tibi limina nulla factiltas, 
 At tibi, Amice, patent janua, mensa, domus.' 
 
 Within the porch, over the hall -door, was inscribed, 
 ' Invidise claudor /#/?<? sed semper amico;' over the kitchen 
 door, ' Fa mi, iwn Gula ; ' over the buttery door, ' Situ non
 
 AND THE MORE FAMILY. 89 
 
 ebrietati ;' and over the parlour door, l Probis, non Pravis? 
 More characteristic details, which appear in Manning and 
 Bray's Surrey, were derived from Russell's Guildford, in 
 which work it is also stated that there were ' two gilt needle- 
 work chairs in the gallery, with cushions worked by Queen 
 Elizabeth.' 
 
 In the hall was formerly an extensive collection of mili- 
 tary weapons, but these have long been removed. It now 
 contains several family pictures, namely : 
 
 Queen Anne Boleyn, Holbein j Sir Thomas More ; Sir Wil- 
 liam More, with a long white beard, and his lady,; Sir George, 
 Sir Robert, and Sir Poynings More ; Nathaniel More, and his 
 lady ; Sir Thomas Molyneux, who married one of the two co- 
 heiresses of the Mores ; Elizabeth More (sister of the lady of 
 Sir Thomas Molyneux), who died unmarried ; Sir William 
 More Molyneux, and Cassandra, his lady, and their eleven 
 children, in one piece, by Somers. All the above are whole 
 lengths, as well as James I., and Anne of Denmark his Queen, 
 which were originally placed at Loseley on the occasion of 
 their visit to Sir George More in the year 1603. There is 
 also a small three-quarter length of Edward vi. 
 
 Nichols, in his Progresses of King James, says of the royal 
 visit in 1603 : 'Sir Gorge More entertained their Majesties 
 at Loseley Park ; but all the notice I can find of this visit 
 is mentioned in the following lines, written by Mr. William 
 Fowler, who was Secretary and Master of Requests to Anne of 
 Denmark, and attendant on the Court during the progress : 
 
 " UPON A HOROLOGE OF THE CLOCK AT SIR GEORGE MORE'S, AT HIS 
 
 PLACE OF LOSELEY, 1603. 
 " Court hath me now transform'd into a clock, 
 
 And in my braynes her restles wheels doth place.
 
 90 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, 
 
 Wch makes my thoughts the tacks ther to knock, 
 
 And by ay turning courses them to chase. 
 Yea, in the circuit of that restles space 
 
 Tyme takes the stage to see them turne alwaies, 
 Whilst careles fates doth just desires disgrace, 
 
 And brings me shades of nights for shynes of dayes ; 
 My heart her bell, on which disdaine assaies 
 
 Ingratefully to hamber on ye same, 
 And, beating on the edge of truth, bewraies 
 
 Distempered happe to be her proper name. 
 But here I stay I feare supernall powers : 
 
 Unpoised hambers strikes untymelie howers." 
 
 In the appendix to the Ambulator ; twelfth edition, 1820, 
 we find : ' On the stairs in the gallery is a large allegorical 
 picture, representing at one end the effect of an honourable 
 and virtuous life ; at the other, the consequence of vice and 
 debauchery. At the bottom, in the centre, is a chariot 
 drawn by two oxen ; the driver is an old man with a crutch, 
 with death at his back, and the motto, " Respice finem? 
 Several other mottoes are inscribed on this picture.' 
 
 Among the early apartments at Loseley, the most ela- 
 borate is the west drawing-room, a splendid example of the 
 decorative style of the early part of Queen Elizabeth's 
 reign. On its enriched cornice is the Rebus of the More 
 family, a mulberry tree intersecting the motto, ' Morus 
 tarde Moriens Morum cito Moriturum? 
 
 Mr. Kempe, in his Loseley Manuscripts, considers this 
 motto as implying that ' the family stock, like the mulberry 
 tree, should be of long endurance, but that its individual 
 descendants, like the fruit, should be the common lot of 
 mortality be subject to speedy decay. The piety of our
 
 AND THE MORE FAMILY. 91 
 
 ancestors seldom neglected to proclaim this great though 
 too easily forgotten truth even on the walls of their ban- 
 queting chambers and the cups for their wassail, thus en- 
 forcing the necessity of hourly preparation.' 
 
 The wainscotting of the noble west drawing-room is 
 panelled, and the ceiling has pendent drops and moulded 
 Gothic tracery, within the involved forms of which, among 
 other insignia, the form of a cockatrice is frequently re- 
 peated. The cockatrice was a bearing of the Mudge 
 family, and was doubtless displayed by Sir William More 
 in affectionate remembrance of Margaret, his mother, who 
 was the daughter and heir of Walter Mudge, Esq. The 
 chimney-piece, of elaborate design, and in good preserva- 
 tion, consists of an upper and lower division, the latter 
 Corinthian, composed of two columns and a bracket on 
 each side, sustaining a very florid entablature. Below each 
 bracket is a caryatid figure, and the whole is based on 
 high pedestals, enriched with festoons and other sculptures. 
 The upper division, or mantel, is bounded at the sides by 
 brackets and grotesque caryatides supporting a rich fascia 
 and cornice. In the intermediate panelling are displayed 
 the heraldic bearings of the Mores, etc. Emblazoned 
 shields of arms also enrich the glazing of the mullioned 
 windows of this room, which forms one of the ex- 
 amples in Nash's Mansions of England in the Olden Time. 
 It is also engraved in Brayley's History of Surrey, 1 - from 
 
 1 To this carefully compiled Topographical History, produced by the 
 enterprise and taste of Mr. Robert Best Ede, the well-known printer
 
 92 LOSELEY MANOR AND MANUSCRIPTS, 
 
 a nice drawing by Thomas Allom, the well-known archi- 
 tect 
 
 In St. Nicholas' Church, Guildford, in the Loseley Chapel 
 belonging to the Loseley Manor-house, are the memorials to 
 the More and Molyneux families. The chapel was repaired 
 and restored about the year 1841, when the monuments 
 were re-gilt, painted, etc., at the expense of James More 
 Molyneux, Esq., the proprietor of Loseley. The oldest 
 inscription for the More family commemorates Sir Chris- 
 topher More, Knight, who died at Loseley in 1549. On 
 a large altar monument are recumbent figures in alabaster 
 of Sir William More, Knight, and his wife Margaret ; the 
 former in armour, and the other in the general dress of 
 Queen Elizabeth's reign. The knight's sword is remarkably 
 large. At the head of the inscriptions are small figures of 
 a youth blowing bubbles, and Time with his hour-glass 
 and scythe. Here are numerous other memorials of the 
 family nearly up to the present time. One to Sir Robert 
 More, Knight, ' one of the Honble. Band of Revisioners 
 to King James and King Charles,' has a shield of arms, 
 containing forty-eight quarterings of the alliances and con- 
 nections of this family. 
 
 At the meetings of the Surrey Archaeological Society in 
 l ^55 an d 1861, excursions were made to Loseley, when 
 
 at Dorking, the author of the present sketch of Loseley is in the main 
 indebted for his materials. Mr. Ede avowedly projected the History 
 of Surrey to be executed by his attached friend, the author of the 
 present volume, and who wrote the opening pages of the work, the 
 further execution of which, ill health compelled him to relinquish.
 
 AND THE MORE FAMILY. 93; 
 
 J. More Molyneux, Esq., F.S.A., exhibited the far-famed 
 Loseley manuscripts, and other curious documents in the 
 Great Hall, and courteously received his brother archaeo- 
 logists. 
 
 From the Loseley Manuscripts, ably edited and annotated 
 by Mr. Kempe, we learn that the custom of ' swan-upping ' 
 was the taking of swans upon rivers for the purpose of 
 affixing certain marks to their beaks. Its superintendence 
 was entrusted to a person officially appointed Master of the 
 Swans, who in the reign of Queen Elizabeth was Sir 
 William More, of Loseley. Among the MSS. there has been 
 found An Original Roll of Swan Marks, showing the beaks 
 of the swans to have been notched with stars, arrows, 
 chevrons, crosses, the initials of the owners' names, or other 
 devices. Thus, in the above reign, are given the marks 
 used for the swans of Lord William Howard, Lord Buck- 
 hurst, Sir Henry Weston, Francis Carew, Esq., William 
 More, Esq., and the other principal persons resident in 
 Surrey ; likewise the marks of the Dyers' and Vintners' 
 Companies, who to this day keep swans upon the Thames.
 
 GOD'S PROVIDENCE IS MAN'S INHERITANCE.' 
 
 'N Watergate Street, Chester, one of the curious 
 gable-fronted timber houses is remarkable as 
 being, traditionally, ' the only house in the city 
 that escaped the plague which ravaged the city during the 
 seventeenth century.' In gratitude for that deliverance, the 
 owner of the house is said to have carved upon the front 
 these words, '1652. God's Providence is Man's Inherit- 
 ance;' on the cross-beam, probably derived from some old 
 version of the i6th Psalm, verse 6, ' The Lord Himself is 
 the portion of mine inheritance. . . . Thou shall maintain 
 thy lot.' But the poor old house no longer affords a bright 
 picture of providence of God, as doubtless it once did in its 
 palmy days ; it can no longer take up the next verse, and 
 say, * The lot is fallen unto me in a fair ground ; yea, I have 
 a goodly heritage.' It now looks sordid and degraded, 
 uncared for and gloomy, in a word, Disinherited; and 
 affords us a striking emblem of God's ancient people Israel, 
 in their present forlorn and outcast state. The writer, a 
 correspondent of Notes and Queries, is reminded of this old
 
 ' GOD'S PROVIDENCE is MAN'S INHERITANCE.' 95 
 
 house and its inscription by meeting with the following pas- 
 sage in Bishop Burnet's sermon, preached January 7, 1691, 
 at the funeral of the Hon. Robert Boyle : ' I will say 
 nothing for the stem from which he sprang ; that watered 
 garden, watered with the blessings and dew of heaven, as 
 well as fed with the best portions of this life ; that has pro- 
 duced so many noble plants, and has stocked the most 
 families in these kingdoms of any in our age ; which has so 
 signally felt the effects of their humble and Christian motto, 
 " God's Providence is Man's Inheritance." ' 
 
 The adoption of this motto by the first or great Earl of 
 Cork is recorded in our Peerages, and has become a matter 
 of history. Certainly his career sufficiently proved that he 
 did ' not trust God in vain ;' for it affords one of the most 
 remarkable instances on record of temporal prosperity, and 
 of the advancement of a needy adventurer to almost as high 
 and honourable a position as it was possible for a subject 
 to attain : himself an immensely wealthy Earl, with four sons 
 who were also peers, and the fifth the celebrated philosopher, 
 the Honourable Robert Boyle. Notes and Queries, 3d series. 
 
 Mr. Banks, the graceful novelist, has written a very inter- 
 esting story upon the above text. And here we are reminded 
 of Dr. South's very touching illustration of ' the providence 
 of God:' 
 
 ' A little error of the eye, a misguidance of the hands, a 
 slip of the foot, the starting of a horse, a sudden mist or a 
 great shower, or a word undesignedly cast forth in an army, 
 has turned the stream of victory from one side to another
 
 96 ' GOD'S PROVIDENCE is MAN'S INHERITANCE.' 
 
 and thereby disposed of empires and whole nations. No 
 prince ever returns safe out of a battle, but may well re- 
 member how many blows and bullets have gone by him that 
 might easily have gone through him ; and by what little odd, 
 unforeseen chances death has turned aside, which seemed 
 in a full, ready, and direct career to have been posting to 
 him. All which passages, if we do not acknowledge to 
 have been guided to their respective ends and effects by 
 the conduct of a superior and a divine hand, we do by the 
 same assertion cashier all providence, strip the Almighty of 
 His noblest prerogative, and make God not the Governor, 
 but the mere spectator of His world.'
 
 SUSSEX AND ITS WORTHIES. 
 
 |USSEX, or, as the name denotes, the land of the 
 South Saxons, has seen changes as strange as 
 any of our counties. It is difficult to approach 
 in idea to what it must have been eighteen centuries ago, 
 when three parts of it were an impervious forest, inhabited 
 by our painted, half-naked forefathers ; when the sea-washed 
 hills, which have long since become surrounded by dry 
 land, and fields, now the glory of the husbandman, teemed 
 with ocean-life ; and when many an acre, now covered by 
 the waves, formed part of the English soil. 
 
 Whatever may be said of Professor Airy's opinion, that 
 Caesar twice landed on the shores of Sussex, History dimly 
 sees Vespasian subjugating its savage tribes, making Regnum, 
 the future Chichester, his headquarters ; and three great 
 Roman roads, with their military stations, traversing the 
 length and breadth of the district, whilst its ' high hills ' 
 bristled with earthworks and encampments. 
 
 Descending to Saxon times, we might tell how the county 
 became an independent, though the smallest, kingdom of
 
 98 SUSSEX AND ITS WORTHIES. 
 
 the Heptarchy, and how it possessed a line of princes of its 
 own, of which ^Ella, who landed here, as Hengist and 
 Horsa did in Kent, may be accepted as the founder, till 
 it became merged by Ceadwalla in its powerful western 
 neighbour Wessex, whose King Egbert united England 
 under his consolidating rule. We might dwell on the great 
 doubtful battle-field of Mercredesboume, in which J[\a. 
 finally pushed the Britons eastwards, could we tell our 
 readers where it was, or give them any more satisfactory 
 information regarding its name than that it was probably at 
 a rivulet between Eastbourne and Birling Gap, called after 
 one Mercrede ; and we might dilate on the siege and storm 
 of the strong old city Anderida, the site of which, although 
 now fixed with all but certainty at Pevensey, has been 
 claimed by no less than seven Sussex towns. Later, we 
 may glance with more of historic confidence though not 
 even here without some admixture of legendary exagge- 
 ration at Bishop Wilfrid, whose beauty arrested the arm 
 of the executioner who had beheaded by his side Del- 
 finus, Bishop of Lyons, Wilfrid, now attacked by Sussex 
 wreckers, and now avenging himself on the inhospitable 
 pagans by converting them to Christianity ; at good King 
 Edilwalch too, and his wife Eaba, who granted seven hides 
 of land at Selsey for an endowment of the first Sussex 
 bishopric. Later still, we learn how Earl Godwin obtained 
 the broad acres of Bosham, and how Harold made them 
 his home, and died gloriously on 'the Battaile field ;' how 
 William n. invested Pevensey ; how the Empress Maud
 
 SUSSEX AND ITS WORTHIES. 99 
 
 was received at Arundel Castle by Adeliza the Queen 
 Dowager ; how the great battle, in which Henry in. was 
 completely defeated by his barons, was fought at Lewes, 
 and by-and-by the ' inquisitions of rebels' were held ; and 
 then, how the county grew more loyal, and royal progresses 
 in it became rife ; how Henry vm. was entertained at 
 Michelgrove, Edward vi. at Petworth, Queen Elizabeth at 
 Cowdray, and George i. at Stanstead ; how badly it fared 
 in the days of the Great Rebellion with many a loyal 
 Sussex town and fortress ; and how, in our own day, 
 Brighton has risen to prosperity under royal patronage. 
 
 The county is not without its great names in Church and 
 State. In Sussex were bred or born John Peckham, Robert 
 Winchelsey, Thomas Bradwardine, Thomas Arundell, and 
 William Juxon. Of no other county can it be said, observed 
 Fuller, that it has sent forth five Archbishops of Canterbury. 
 To Sussex also we owe a divine who would have been, 
 had he lived, a worthy leader of the English Church 
 Hugh James Rose, Principal of King's College, London, 1 
 whose stout heart and wise head and eloquent tongue the 
 Church has sorely missed during the struggles and diffi- 
 culties and errors of recent years. Sir Edward Dalyngruge, 
 the founder of Bodiam Castle, was present at Crecy and 
 Poitiers, and was one of the most successful ' knights 
 adventurers' of his time. Thomas Sackville, Baron Buck- 
 hurst, the poet and diplomatist, was Lord High Treasurer, 
 Sir J. Jeffery Chief Baron, and Sir William Pelham of 
 1 Born at Little Horsted, 1795, died 1838.
 
 100 SUSSEX AND ITS WORTHIES. 
 
 Laughton the Irish Chief Justice to Elizabeth. John 
 Selden in himself is worth a host ; Edward Gibbon lies 
 buried at Fletching, under a mausoleum erected by his 
 friend Lord Sheffield ; and the pious Leighton at Horsted 
 Keynes. Shelley was born at Field Place. Sir Edward 
 Sugden, now Lord St. Leonards, whose brief Chancellorship 
 will not be .readily forgotten, resided near the forest from 
 which he takes his title. In Sussex also (says Lord Camp- 
 bell) ex-Chancellor Erskine ' bought an estate, which turned 
 out an unfortunate speculation, for it produced nothing but 
 stunted birch-trees, and was found irreclaimable.' Nor do 
 the ten Protestants burnt at one fire at Lewes, and seven- 
 teen at other places, during the episcopacy of Bishop Chris- 
 topherson of whom Fuller quaintly observes, that though 
 * he had much of Christ in his name, he had none of Him 
 in his nature' less deserve a place among the worthies of 
 the county. The three brothers Shirley, too, of Wistbn, 
 were famous in their generation, and their adventures the 
 admiration of Christendom : Anthony, whom we find suc- 
 cessively in opposite quarters of the globe in Africa, 
 Jamaica, Persia, and Russia, in Germany, and Morocco, 
 and occupying a diplomatic position in every court in 
 Europe ; Robert, who strove to establish commercial rela- 
 tions with Persia, and whose fine portrait by Vandyke 
 adorns the Petworth collection ; and Thomas, imprisoned 
 at Constantinople, and in the Tower, then bankrupt and 
 heart-broken, and selling Wiston to pay his creditors. In 
 few counties, moreover, have the great places changed hands
 
 SUSSEX AND ITS WORTHIES. 101 
 
 seldomer. The Howards and the Sackvilles, the Fienneses, 
 the Pelhams, and the Ashburnhams, the Percys and the 
 Montagues, have been for many generations the lords of 
 the soil, and inseparably identified with Arundel and 
 Buckhurst, with Hurstmonceux, Stanmer, and Laughton, 
 with Ashburnham, Petworth, and Cowdray. 
 
 ' Sussex has never lacked faithful men of letters to do her 
 honour. Among her antiquaries the palm must undoubtedly 
 be awarded to Sir William Burrell. As we turn over those 
 fifteen folio volumes of MSS. which he bequeathed to the 
 British Museum, we actually seem to have before us all 
 the indentures, pedigrees, and manorial records which the 
 county could ever have possessed. Mr. Dallaway, Mr. 
 Cartwright, and Mr. Tierney have laboured skilfully in the 
 same cause; Mr. Horsfield has written on the entire county; 
 whilst Mr. Blaauw's and Mr. Lower's contributions on 
 detached county subjects, but of more than local interest, 
 are very profitable reading : we know of nothing more 
 pleasantly told than the Battle of Hastings by the latter. 
 The works which stand at the head of our article furnish 
 still more recent evidence of the interest which Sussex 
 topography and archaeology excite. The " Collections " of 
 the Sussex Archaeological Society now extend to thirteen 
 goodly octavo volumes. They are among the best and 
 most interesting works of the sort with which we are 
 acquainted.' Abridged from the Quarterly Review,
 
 : A WORTHY COMMANDER IN THE WARRES.' 
 
 I E had rather save one of his own soldiers than 
 kill ten of his enemies. He accounts it an idle, 
 vainglorious, and suspected bounty, to be full of 
 good words; his rewarding, therefore, of the deserver arrives 
 so timely, that his liberality can never be said to be gouty- 
 handed. He holds it next his creed, that no coward can be 
 an honest man, and dare die in it. He doth not think his 
 body yields a more spreading shadow after a victory than 
 before; and when he looks upon his enemy's dead body, 'tis 
 with a noble heaviness, not insultation ; he is so honourably 
 merciful to women, in surprisal, that only that makes him an 
 excellent courtier. He knows the hazard of battles, not the 
 pomp of ceremonies, are soldiers' best theatres, and strives to 
 gain reputation not by the multitude, but by the greatness 
 of his actions. He is the first in giving the charge, and the 
 last in retiring his foot. Equal toil he endures with the 
 common soldier; from his example they all take fire, as one 
 torch lights many. He understands in wars there is no 
 mean to err twice ; the first and least fault being sufficient 
 to ruin an army, faults therefore he pardons none; they
 
 'A WORTHY COMMANDER IN THE WARRES.' 103 
 
 that are presidents of disorder or mutiny repair it by being 
 examples of his justice. Besiege him never so strictly, so 
 long as the air is not cut from him, his heart faints not. 
 He hath learned as well to make use of a victory as to get 
 it ; and in pursuing his enemy, like a whirlwind carries all 
 afore him, being assured if ever a man will benefit him- 
 self upon his foe, then is the time when they have lost 
 force, wisdom, courage, and reputation. The goodness of 
 his cause is the special motive to his valour ; never is he 
 known to slight the weakest enemy that comes armed 
 against him on the hand of justice. Hasty and over much 
 heat he accounts the step-dame to all great actions, that 
 will not suffer them to thrive ; if he cannot overcome his 
 enemy by force, he does it by time. If ever he shakes 
 hands with war, he can die more calmly than most courtiers, 
 for his continual dangers have been, as it were, so many 
 meditations of death ! He thinks not out of his own call- 
 ing, when he accounts life a continual warfare, and his 
 prayers then best become him when armed cap-a-pie. He 
 utters them like the great Hebrew general, on horseback. 
 He casts a smiling contempt upon calumny ; it meets him 
 as if glass should encounter adamant. He thinks war is 
 never to be given o'er but on one of these three conditions 
 an assured peace, absolute victory, or an honest death. 
 Lastly, when peace folds him up, his silver head should 
 lean near the golden sceptre, and die in the prince's bosom.' 1 
 
 1 Miscellaneous Works of Sir Thomas Overbury. Now first collected 
 and edited by E. F. Rimbault, LL.D.
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 jLOTS on the escutcheon is an old phrase used to 
 denote the black spots of disgrace which appear 
 in the records of many opulent families ; but 
 in few so darkly as that of the Hungerfords of Farleigh 
 Castle, in Somersetshire, about nine miles west from Bath. 
 There are other branches of the Hungerfords in Wiltshire ; 
 and their history is so complicated as to baffle collectors, 
 who are ever on the lookout for additions to their stores, 
 notwithstanding that accomplished antiquary, Sir Richard 
 Colt Hoare, printed in 1823 a small octavo volume of this 
 remarkable family, entitled Hungerfordiana. From these 
 accumulations of evidence we may glean a narrative which 
 not only portrays individuals, but affords us pictures of 
 periods which are interesting as well as suggestive. The 
 name of the Hungerfords has been preserved in our metro- 
 polis for several centuries ; and that upon a spot which was 
 long noted as a site of unfortunate speculation. 
 
 The Farleigh Castle estate is of high antiquity. For a 
 long period it was held by Saxon thanes; and in the 
 eleventh century it fell into the possession of Roger de
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 105 
 
 Curcelle, a Norman baron,' who stood in high favour with 
 William the Conqueror. After his death, the property 
 reverted to the Crown, when William Rufus granted it, with 
 other lands, to Hugh de Montfort ; whence in old records 
 we often find it denominated Farley Montfort. A strange 
 character was this same Hugh. In opposition to the almost 
 universal custom of the time, he chose to wear a long 
 beard, whence he acquired the cognomen of the bearded 
 Hugh cum barbA. He was a right valiant soldier, but got 
 killed in a duel with Walkeline de Ferrers, of Oakham 
 Castle. The estate, however, remained in his family till the 
 year 1335, when Sir Henry de Montfort granted this and 
 other lands to Bartholomew Lord Burghersh, who figures in 
 the unfortunate wars carried on by Richard n. against the 
 Scots. His son and successor held the property but a short 
 time, being compelled by his imprudence to part with it to 
 Thomas Lord Hungerford. With his descendants it then 
 continued for many generations, except only for a brief 
 interval, when, its possessor having been beheaded, it was 
 confiscated to the Crown and given to the Duke of Glou- 
 cester. Upon the Duke's accession to the throne it was 
 granted by him to John Howard, Duke of Norfolk 'Jockey 
 of Norfolk' one of the staunchest of his adherents on 
 Bosworth Field, where he fell in a personal encounter with 
 the Earl of Oxford. After shivering their spears on each 
 other's shields or breastplates, they fell to with their swords. 
 Oxford, wounded in the arm by a blow which glanced from 
 his crest, returned it by one which hewed off the vizor of
 
 io6 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 Norfolk's helmet, leaving the face bare ; and then, disdain- 
 ing to follow up the advantage, drew back, when an arrow 
 from an unknown hand pierced the Duke's brain. We must 
 spare room for the close of this striking episode of Bos- 
 worth. Surrey, hurrying up to assist or avenge his father, 
 was surrounded and overpowered by Sir Gilbert Talbot and 
 Sir John Savage, who commanded on the right and left for 
 Richmond. 
 
 ' Young Howard single with an army fights ; 
 When, moved with pity, two renowned knights, 
 Strong Clarendon and valiant Conyers, try 
 To rescue him, in which attempt they die. 
 Now Surrey, fainting, scarce his sword can hold, 
 Which made a common soldier grow so bold, 
 To lay rude hands upon that noble flower ; 
 Which he disdaining anger gives him power 
 Erects his weapon with a nimble round, 
 And sends the peasant's arm to kiss the ground.' J 
 
 If we may credit tradition or the chroniclers, all this was 
 literally true. When completely exhausted, Surrey pre- 
 sented the hilt of his sword to Talbot, whom he requested 
 to take his life, and save him from dying by an ignoble 
 hand. He lived to be the Surrey of Flodden Field, and the 
 worthy transmitter of ' all the blood of all the Howards.' 
 
 To return to the Hungerfords. The fact of a lady of 
 this name having suffered execution at Tybourn on the 
 2oth of February 1523, has been handed down by the 
 Chronicle of Stow ; and it is stated by that historian that 
 
 1 Borworth Field, by Sir John Beaumont, Bart., in Weaver's Funeral 
 Monuments, p. 554.
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 107 
 
 she died for murdering her husband. Stow cites in his mar- 
 gin the Register of the Grey Friars, meaning a volume now 
 preserved in the British Museum, and including a London 
 Chronicle which was printed for the Camden Society in 
 the year 1852. We find that the body of the convicted 
 lady was buried in the Church of the Grey Friars, in the 
 middle of the nave ; and that circumstance evidently 
 occasioned the notice taken of the execution in the 
 chronicle. In a side-note, written by a later but old hand, 
 is, ' Suspendit apud Tyborne.' The passage is as follows : 
 ' And this yere in feverette the xx t! day was the lady Alys 
 Hungerford lede from the Tower unto Holborne, and 
 there put into a carte at the churchyard with one of her 
 servanttes, and so caryed unto Tiborne, and there both 
 hongyd, and she burryed at the Grayfreeres in the nether 
 end of the myddes of the church on the North syde.' 
 
 Sir Richard Colt Hoare, in his Hungerfordiana, already 
 mentioned, connects this tragic event with that branch 
 of the Hungerfords which resided at Cadenham, in Wilt- 
 shire ; but the Rev. Mr. Jackson, F.S.A., who has formed 
 large collections relative to the Hungerfords, corrects 
 the statement of Sir Richard Colt Hoare, and adds : 
 * There were no knights in the Cadenham branch of the 
 Hungerfords before a Sir George, who died in the year 
 1712 j and the only knights of the family living at the 
 date of the execution in 1523 were Sir Walter Hunger- 
 ford of Farley Castle and Heytesbury, and Sir John 
 Hungerford and Sir Anthony his son, both of Down
 
 io8 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 Ampney, whose wives had other names, and are otherwise 
 accounted for.' 
 
 No other Alice Lady Hungerford identifiable with the 
 culprit could be discovered but the second of the three 
 wives of Sir Walter, who was summoned to Parliament 
 as Lord Hungerford of Heytesbury in 1536 ; and consider- 
 ing that the extreme cruelty of that person to all his 
 wives is recorded in a letter written by the third and last 
 of them, and that his career was eventually terminated 
 with the utmost disgrace in 1540, when he was beheaded 
 (suffering at the same time as the fallen minister Thomas 
 Cromwell, Earl of Essex), it was deemed not improbable 
 that the unfortunate lady might have been condemned 
 for some desperate attempt upon the life of so bad a 
 husband, which had not actually effected its object, or 
 even that her life and character had been sacrificed to 
 a false and murderous accusation. In the survey of his 
 lands he is described as Sir Walter Hungerford, Knight, 
 late Lord Hungerford, ' of hyge treason attaynted ' (Hoare's 
 Modern Wiltshire}. It is also stated that part of his offence 
 was maintaining a chaplain named William Bird, who had 
 called the king a heretic, and that he had procured certain 
 persons by conjuration to know how long the king should 
 live (Dugdale's Baronage, ii. p. 242). Holinshed states 
 that ' at the hour of his death he seemed unquiet, as manie 
 judged him rather in a frenzie than otherwise.' 
 
 In the above state the mystery remained until the 
 discovery, a few years since, of an ' Inventory of the goods
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 109 
 
 belonging to the king's grace by the forfeiture of the Lady 
 Hungerford, attainted of murder in Hilary term, anno xiiij. 
 Regis Henrici vm. ; ' where, although the particulars of 
 the tragedy remain still undeveloped, we find that the 
 culprit must have been a different person from the lady 
 already noticed ; and the murdered man, if her husband, 
 of course not the Lord Walter. 
 
 It is ascertained by the inventory before us, that the 
 Lady Hungerford who was hung at Tybourn on the 23d 
 of February 1523, was really a widow, and that she was 
 certainly convicted of felony and murder ; moreover, that 
 her name was Agnes, not Alice, as stated in the Grey 
 Friars Chronicle. This inventory further shows, by the 
 mention it contains of Heytesbury, Farleigh Castle, and 
 other places, as well as by the great amount of personal 
 property described, that the parties were no other than 
 the heads of the Hungerford family. The initials E. and A. 
 placed upon some of the articles point to the names of 
 Edward and Agnes. In short, it is made evident that the 
 lady was the widow of Sir Edward Hungerford, the father 
 of Walter Lord Hungerford already mentioned ; and we 
 are led to infer that it was Sir Edward himself who had 
 been poisoned or otherwise murdered by her agency. 
 
 It is a remarkable feature of the inventory, that many 
 items of it are described in the first person, and conse- 
 quently from the lady's own dictation ; and towards the 
 end of it is a list of ' the rayment of my husbond's, which 
 is in the keping of my son-in-law.' By this expression is
 
 no THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 understood that the person so designated was Sir Walter 
 Hungerford, Sir Edward's son and heir. 
 
 From this conclusion it follows that the lady was not 
 Sir Walter's mother, who appears in the pedigree as Jane, 
 daughter of John Lord Zouch of Horryngworth, but a 
 second wife, whose name has not been recorded by the 
 genealogists of the family. 
 
 To this circumstance must be attributed much of the 
 difficulty that has hitherto enveloped this investigation. 
 The lady's origin and maiden name are still unknown ; but 
 the Rev. Mr. Jackson has favoured Mr. J. G. Nichols with 
 some particulars which clearly identify her as the widow of 
 Sir Edward Hungerford. His observations are as follow : 
 
 ' That Agnes Lady Hungerford was the second wife of 
 Sir Edward Hungerford of Heytesbury, may now be safely 
 declared upon the evidence following. Of this Sir Edward 
 very little is known. But it is quite certain that he was 
 twice married, and that his first wife was a Zouch. The 
 pedigrees uniformly call her Jane; and the arms of Hunger- 
 ford impaling Zouch were found some years ago on 
 stained glass in a cottage near Farleigh Castle, and were 
 transferred to the church of that parish. By this first wife 
 Sir Edward had only one son, Walter, aftenvards created 
 Lord Hungerford of Heytesbury. The date of the first 
 wife's death is not known. The name of the second wife 
 is found in Sir Edward's last .will. He resided chiefly at 
 Heytesbury; and from the circumstance of the eleven 
 witnesses' names all belonging to that immediate neigh-
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 1 1 1 
 
 bourhood, it is most likely that he died there. After be- 
 queathing small legacies to various churches and friends, 
 the will concludes thus : " The residue of all my goodes, 
 debts, catalls, juells, plate, harnesse, and all other move- 
 able, whatsoever they be, I freely give and bequeth to 
 Agnes Hungerforde, my wife. And I make, ordeyn, and 
 constitute, of this my present last wille and testament, the 
 said Agnes, my wife, and sole executrice." Sir Edward 
 must have died soon afterwards, as the will was proved 
 on the 29th of January 1521-2. 
 
 ' After an interval of twelve months comes the fact, sup- 
 plied by the heading of the present inventory, that " Lady 
 Agnes Hungerford, ivydowe, was attaynted of felony and 
 murder in Hillary Term xiiij. Henry viu.," z. e. between 
 January n and January 31, A.D. 1523. And on the 2oth 
 February following (as the Grey Friars Register and 
 Chronicle state), Lady Hungerford, whom those documents 
 call Alice, was executed at Tybourn. Five months after, 
 Walter Hungerford, only son and heir of Edward Hunger- 
 ford, Knight, obtained the royal licence to enter upon all 
 lands and tenements of which the said Sir Edward was 
 seised in fee, or which Agnes, late wife of Sir Edward, held 
 for term of her life. 
 
 ' The inventory agrees with the will in another point. 
 By the will, all goods, debts, chattels, jewels, plate, harness 
 (/. e. armour), and all other moveables whatsoever, were 
 " freely given " to Agnes the wife. These are precisely the 
 articles specified in the inventory ; and that they were the
 
 ii2 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 absolute property of the widow is clear, from their being 
 forfeited to the Crown, which would not have been the 
 case had they been hers only for life. 
 
 ' But though this inventory assists materially in clearing 
 up three points in this transaction viz., isf, the lady's 
 Christian name ; 2d, whose wife she had been ; and 3^, 
 that her crime was "felony and murder" the rest of the 
 story remains as much as ever wrapped in mystery. It is 
 not yet certain who was the person murdered j and of the 
 motive, place, time, and all other particulars, we are wholly 
 ignorant. John Stow, the chronicler, who repeats what he 
 found in the Grey Friars Chronicle, certainly adds to that 
 account the words, " for murdering her husband." But as 
 Stow was not born until two years after Lady Hungerford's 
 execution, and did not compile his own chronicle until forty 
 years after it, and as we do not know whether he was 
 speaking only from hearsay or on authority, the fact that 
 it was the husband still remains to be proved. 
 
 ' Excepting on the supposition that the Lady Agnes was 
 a perfect monster among women, it is almost inconceivable 
 that she should have murdered a husband who, only a few 
 weeks or days before his death, in the presence of eleven 
 clergymen and gentlemen known to them both, signed a 
 document by which he made to her (besides the jointure 
 from lands above alluded to) a free and absolute gift of all 
 the personal property, including the accumulated valuables 
 of an ancient family; and this to the entire exclusion of 
 his only son and heir ! When the character of that son
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 113 
 
 and heir, notoriously cruel to his own wives, and subse- 
 quently sent to the scaffold for an ignominious offence, is 
 considered, and when it is further recollected that he was 
 not the son, but only step-son of this lady, certain suspicions 
 arise which more than ever excite one's curiosity to raise 
 still higher the curtain that hides this tragedy. We have 
 also yet to learn of what family this lady was ; for so far 
 we have only just succeeded in obtaining accurately her 
 Christian name. It is to be hoped that the particulars of 
 the trial may hereafter come to light among the public 
 records.' 
 
 The Inventory describes an extraordinary accumulation 
 of valuable property, and is therefore proportionally curious 
 in illustration of the manners and habits of the times. It 
 commences with a list of plate and jewels. Much of 
 the former was adorned with the Hungerford arms, and 
 with the knot of three sickles interlaced, ^which was used 
 as the family badge or cognizance. A spoon was in- 
 scribed with the motto, ' Myn assuryd truth;' which same 
 motto, under the form ' Myne trouth assured] occurs also 
 on the beautiful seal of Margaret Lady of Hungerford and 
 of Bottreaux, who died in I476. 1 
 
 1 The ancient badge of the Hungerfords was a single sickle, or 
 handled gules (Collectanea Topograph. et Geneal. iii. 71). The sepul- 
 chral brass in Salisbury Cathedral of Walter Lord Hungerford (ob. 
 1449) and his wife, and another supposed to be that of his grandson 
 Robert Hungerford (ob. 1463), were both seme of sickles (see their 
 despoiled slabs or matrices engraved in Cough's Sepulchral Monuments, 
 vol. ii. plate Ivii.). The Hungerford knot was formed by entwining 
 
 H
 
 ii4 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 Among the plate we notice ' forks with spones, to etc 
 grene gynger with all,' the usual destination of the forks 
 mentioned in English inventories. Thus, in an inventory 
 of plate belonging to Edward in. and Richard u., we find 
 these forks set with sapphires, pearls, etc. The forks are 
 mentioned also as spoons : they may have either had 
 prongs at one end and a bowl at the other, or have been 
 made like the folding spoons of a more recent period, 
 where a bowl fits over the prongs of the fork. 
 
 The vestments and ornaments of the chapel are next 
 described ; and then the furniture of the hall, parlour, an 
 adjoining chamber, the nursery, the queen's chamber, the 
 middle chamber, the great chamber, the chapel chamber, 
 the lily chamber, the knighton chamber, the wardrobe 
 chamber, the gallery, the chamber within the gallery, the 
 women's chamber, the cellar, the buttery, the kitchen, the 
 
 three sickles in a circle. Three sickles and as many garbs, elegantly 
 disposed within the garter, formed one of the principal bosses of the 
 cloisters to St. Stephen's Chapel, Westminster. The standard of Sir 
 John Hungerford of Down Ampney (temp. Hen. vm.) was as follows : 
 Red and green in the first compartment out of a coronet, or a garb of 
 the same (charged with a mullet), between two sickles, crest argent, 
 handled gules, banded or ; and in the same compartment three similar 
 sickles, each charged on the blade with a mullet ; in the second com- 
 partment, three sickles interlaced around a mullet ; in the third, three 
 like knots of sickles between two single sickles charged as before. 
 The Hungerford crest was a garb between two sickles, all within 
 a coronet : the garb is supposed to have come from the family of 
 Peveril, one of whose co-heirs married Walter Lord Hungerford, K.G., 
 who died 1449. By that alliance the silver sickle met the golden 
 wheatsheaf.
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 115 
 
 storehouse, and the brewhouse. In the parlour furniture we 
 notice 'a joined cubeboard' a joined cupboard. It must 
 be remembered that cupboards were not, as they are now, 
 closets set even into the walls, but literally a board or table 
 on which plate was set out, more like the modern side- 
 board. A considerable list of cupboard clothes may be 
 found in the inventory of the wardrobe stuffs of Catharine 
 of Aragon. 
 
 Then follows a list of the agricultural stock ' belonging 
 to the Grange Place,' and the particulars of some parcels 
 of armour ' left in the Castle of Farley,' including brigan- 
 dine, formed of small plates of metal quilted with linen 
 or other tissue. Among the curious items is boyde money, 
 or bent money. In the will of Sir Edward Howard, Knight, 
 Admiral of England, 1512, occurs: 'I bequeath him 
 [Charles Brandon] my rope of bowed nobles that I hang 
 my great whistle by, containing ccc. angels.' Money was 
 often bent or bowed when intended to serve as love tokens, 
 a custom perpetuated to the days of Butler : 
 
 ' Like commendation ninenence bent, 
 With " from and to my love" he went.' 
 
 In the present instance it appears to have been bowed for 
 offerings to saints. 
 
 A long and curious catalogue of the lady's own dress and 
 personal ornaments is next given, with a list of some obli- 
 gations or bonds for money, some items of household stuff 
 remaining in her husband's house at Charing Cross (where 
 the Hungerford name still lingers) ; and lastly, the raiment
 
 ii6 THE HUXGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 of her husband, which was in the keeping of her son- 
 in-law. 
 
 The particular dwelling-house at which the principal 
 part of the goods and furniture here described lay, is not 
 positively mentioned by name ; but as, from the expression 
 above quoted regarding the arms and armour, it would 
 seem not to have been Farleigh Castle, there is every pro- 
 bability that the document chiefly relates to the manor- 
 house of Heytesbury, where Sir Edward Hungerford died. 
 The manor is thus described in a survey made upon the 
 attainder of Walter Lord Hungerford in 31 Henry vin. : 
 ' The sayde lordship standeth very pleasauntly, in a very 
 swete ayer, and there ys begon to be buylded a fayre place, 
 whiche, if it had bene fynyshed, had bene able to have 
 receyved the kynges highnes ; a fayre hall, with a goodly 
 new wyndow mad in the same ; a new parlor, large and 
 fayre; iiij. fayre chambers, wherof one is gyhted, very 
 pleasant; a goodlie gallerie, well made, very long; new 
 kitchen ; new larder ; and all other houses of office belong- 
 ing unto the same; moted round aboute; whereunto doth 
 adjoyne a goodly fayre orchard, with very pleasaunte walkes 
 in the same' (Sir R. C. Hoare's Modern Wiltshire). 
 
 This account seems to describe a house that had been 
 erected by Walter Lord Hungerford within the space of 
 the last five years. However, it is certain that his father 
 Sir Edward had also resided at Heytesbury, and the pre- 
 sent document shows that in his time the manor-place was 
 already out of ' good receipt' and ample furniture.
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 117 
 
 The reader will not be surprised at further scandal being 
 attached to the family of the Hungerfords, instances of 
 whose degradation we have just recorded. Hence has 
 arisen the popular story of the device of a toad having 
 been introduced into their armorial bearings ; but we are 
 assured that this report is in every way nonsensical. 
 ' Argent, three toads sable,' says the Rev. Mr. Jackson, 
 ' is certainly one of their old quarterings, as may be seen 
 upon one of the monuments in the chapel at Farley Castle. 
 But it was borne by the Hungerfords for a very different 
 reason. Robert the second Lord, who died in 1459, had 
 married the wealthy heiress of the Cornish family of 
 Bottreaux ; and this was one of the shields used by her 
 family, being in fact nothing more than an allusion, not 
 uncommon in heraldry, to the name. This was spelled 
 variously, Bottreaux or Botterelles ; and the device was pro- 
 bably assumed from the similarity of the old French word 
 Botterel, a toad (see Cotgrave), or the old Latin word 
 Botterella, the marriage with the Bottreaux heiress, and 
 the assumption of the arms, having taken place many years 
 before any member of the Hungerford family was attainted 
 or executed (as some of them afterwards were), so that the 
 toad story, which is in Defoe's Tour, falls to the ground.' 
 
 The town house of the Hungerfords, and which we have 
 already mentioned, was one of the stately mansions which 
 formerly embellished the north bank of the Thames, and 
 stood between York House, and Suffolk, now Northumber- 
 land House. The estate had now devolved to Sir Edward
 
 ii8 THE HUXGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 Hungerford, who was principally noted as a spendthrift. 
 He sat in Parliament many years, sold in the same time 
 twenty-eight manors, and ran through a fortune of thirty 
 thousand pounds per annum. Malcolm is therefore correct 
 in his conjecture as to Sir Edward's waning fortunes in- 
 ducing him to convert his house and gardens into a public 
 market. One of his extravagant freaks was to give five 
 hundred pounds for a wig which he first wore at the coro- 
 nation of Charles n. Malcolm tells us that, ' influenced 
 by the same motives that prompted his illustrious eastern 
 neighbours, he determined to sacrifice the honours of his 
 ancestors at the shrine of Plutus, and obtained an Act of 
 Parliament in the reign of Charles ir. to make leases of the 
 site of his mansion and grounds, where a market was soon 
 afterwards erected.' This privilege was granted in 1679 ; 
 the market rights were fully established in 1685, when they 
 were granted to Sir Stephen Fox and Sir Christopher Wren, 
 who became proprietors of the market estate. The vain- 
 glory of the Hungerfords was not, however, forgotten in the 
 market-house ; for in a niche on the north side was placed 
 a bust of Sir Edward Hungerford in the 5oo-guinea wig. 
 Beneath was this inscription : 
 
 ' Forum utilitatas publicse per quam necessariam, 
 Regis Caroli secundi inuente Majestatae propriis 
 Sumptibus erexit, per fecitque D. Edvardus 
 Hungerford, Balnei Miles, Anno MDCLXXXII.' 
 
 Sir Edward did not, however, retrieve his fallen fortunes : 
 he is said to have lived for the last thirty years of his life on
 
 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 119 
 
 charity, and died at the advanced age of 115 ! By him 
 Farleigh was sold in 1686 to the Bayntons, and it next 
 came into the possession of the Houltons, in which family 
 it still remains. They did not, however, take up their 
 abode in the old castle of the Hungerfords, but at a 
 house in a different part of the parish, adding a park and 
 picturesque grounds. 
 
 The next record of the Hungerford family shows a mem- 
 ber of it in a more favourable light than his predecessors, 
 but strikingly illustrates the transitoriness of human exist- 
 ence. The spendthrift Sir Edward had an only son, Ed- 
 ward, to whom is dedicated the volume entitled Humane 
 Prudence, consisting of quaint maxims and sentences, edited 
 by ' W. de Britaine.' Edward Hungerford was not only heir 
 to a noble fortune, but by a very early marriage, at the age 
 of nineteen, with Lady Alathaea Compton, became entitled, 
 had they both lived, to still larger possessions. ' You have,' 
 says the 'dedication, 'made a fair progress in your studies 
 beyond your years? ' The nobleness of your stock is a spur to 
 virtue.' ' As much as you excel others in fortune] etc. 
 Such phraseology could only be addressed to some young 
 man of good family and great prospects. But Sir Edward's 
 son died in September 1681, aged twenty, and the Humane 
 Prudence did not appear till 1682, which renders it doubtful 
 whether Sir Edward's son was the person to whom the book 
 was dedicated. 
 
 Here our glances at the chequered fortunes of the Hun- 
 gerfords must end. Aubrey has this quaint regret for this
 
 120 THE HUNGERFORD FAMILY. 
 
 family decadence. In his Miscellajiies he points to the place 
 for its ' local fatality,' telling us : ' The honourable family of 
 the Hungerfords is probably of as great antiquity as any in 
 the county of Wilts. Hungerford (the place of the barony) 
 was sold but lately by Sir Edward Hungerford, Knight of 
 the Bath, as also the noble and ancient seat of Farleigh 
 Castle. But that this estate should so long continue is not 
 very strange ; for it being so vast, 'twas able to make several 
 withstandings against the shock of fortune.' 
 
 John Britton, in his Autobiography, tells us the Hunger- 
 ford family possessed numerous estates, manors, and man- 
 sions, in the counties of Wilts, Berks, Somerset, Gloucester, 
 etc. ' Though, at the zenith of its prosperity, the Hungerford 
 genealogical tree spread its branches over a wide tract of 
 territory, it had dwindled almost to nothing in my boyish 
 days, and was said to have had one of its last distant female 
 representatives in Chippenham, near the end of the last 
 century.' Mr. Jackson, in the Wiltshire Magazine, describes 
 two chapels founded by the Hungerfords in the cathedral 
 of Salisbury ; a redeeming record wherewith to close our 
 Hungerfordiana.
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 'HE very ancient and honourable family of Shirley, 
 of whom Earl Ferrers is the head, has had the 
 good fortune to be illustrated by an historical 
 narrative, compiled by a distinguished member of its own 
 house. Sir Thomas Shirley of Botolph's Bridge composed 
 three distinct MS. histories of the Shirleys, all of which are 
 preserved in the British Museum. From these records it 
 appears that the Shirleys derive descent from Sasnallo or 
 Sewallus de Etington, whose name, says Dugdale in his 
 Antiquities of Warwickshire ', argues him to be of old Eng- 
 lish stock. He resided at Nether Etington, in the county 
 of Warwick, about the reign of King Edward the Confessor, 
 which place had been the seat of his ancestors, there is 
 reason to believe, for many generations before that period. 
 ' After the Conquest,' says Sir Bernard Burke, ' the lordship 
 of Etington was given to Henry Earl of Ferrers, in Nor- 
 mandy, who was one of the principal adventurers with 
 the Norman Duke William, and was held under him by 
 this Sewallus, with whose posterity in the male line it has 
 continued to the present reign ; the late Hon. George
 
 122 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 Shirley, who died in 1787, having been owner thereof.' 
 This long continuance of ownership is mentioned by 
 Dugdale, who says, in his Warwickshire, that ' Etington 
 is the only place in the county which could glory in an 
 uninterrupted succession of its owners for so long a space 
 of time.' The above-mentioned Sewallus founded and 
 endowed the Church of Nether Etington. He had large 
 possessions; his estate in this place only amounting to 
 seventeen hides of land, whence he must have been no 
 less than a thane in the time of the Saxons, which was 
 the same degree of honour among them as a baron or 
 peer of England after the Norman Conquest. 
 
 Sir Thomas Shirley, Knt., M.P. for the county of 
 Warwick, in the fourteenth year of Edward in., is said to 
 be ' the great founder of the family of Shirley, famous in 
 his time for his valour, and for the many services he 
 rendered to the Kings of England against the French.' 
 His son and successor, Sir Hugh Shirley, Knt., was made 
 grand falconer to Henry iv. in 1400. He was killed 
 fighting on the side of the same monarch at the battle 
 of Shrewsbury, being one of those who were habited as 
 the king, and taken for him by the opposite party. Shak- 
 speare, in the first part of King Henry iv. Act v. sc. 4, 
 makes Douglas, when fighting and nearly worsting the 
 king, thus accosted by Prince Henry : 
 
 ' Hold up thy head, vile Scot ! or thou art like 
 Never to hold it up again. The spirits 
 Of Shirley, Stafford, Blount, are in my arms ;
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 123 
 
 It is the Prince of Wales that threatens thee, 
 Who never promiseth but he means to pay. ' 
 
 Sir Ralph Shirley, son and successor of Sir Thomas, 
 was one of the chief commanders under Henry v. at 
 Agincourt. 
 
 By the marriage of Sir Henry Shirley, Bart., with the 
 Lady Dorothy, youngest daughter and co-heir of Robert 
 Devereux, Earl of Essex and Lord Ferrers of Chartley 
 (the favourite minister of Queen Elizabeth), the present 
 Earl Ferrers enjoys Chartley and twelve other manors 
 in the county of Stafford. By this alliance the Earls of 
 Ferrers quarter the arms of France and England with 
 their own ; the Earl of Essex having descended maternally 
 from Richard Plantagenet, Earl of Cambridge, grandson of 
 Edward in. (Burke). 
 
 Sir Robert Shirley, who founded the church at Staunton 
 Harold in 1653, was the youngest son by the above mar- 
 riage. He was a zealous royalist, who was committed 
 to the Tower by the usurper Cromwell, May 4, 1650. He 
 was condemned to close imprisonment ; and having re- 
 mained there for some months, but nothing being proved 
 against him to warrant his detention, after several petitions 
 he was set at liberty, that he might be able to furnish the 
 thirteen horses and arms charged by the Parliament on 
 his estate. Sir Robert's building of the church was in 
 those fanatic times hypocritically made a fault; for Beck 
 says : ' It being told the usurping power then reigning 
 that Sir Robert Shirley had built a church, they directed
 
 124 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 an order of council to him to fit out a ship, saying, he 
 that could afford to build a church could no doubt afford 
 to 'equip a man-of-war.' Sir Robert appears to have been 
 altogether imprisoned in the Tower seven times, where he 
 died November 6, 1656, in his twenty-eighth year, not 
 without a suspicion of having been poisoned by his enemies. 
 A funeral sermon was preached from Luke vii. 5, ' He 
 loved our country much, and hath built us a synagogue.' 
 In a book at Staunton, wherein are kept a number of 
 official letters signed by Charles i. to one of his lordship's 
 ancestors, is a letter of condolence written by Charles n. 
 to Dame Catherine Shirley after the death of her husband. 
 All that Charles, however, did for the family on his 
 restoration, to recompense their losses sustained in the 
 cause of his father, was to create the next heir Master 
 of the Horse and Steward of the Household to his Queen 
 Catherine of Spain ; and to make him a present of his own 
 portrait (a small full length, highly finished), and five 
 other pictures (King Charles's Beauties), being duplicates 
 of ladies of his Court, by Sir Peter Lely. The last-men- 
 tioned nobleman was, September 13, 1711, advanced to 
 the dignity of Viscount Tamworth and Earl Ferrers. 
 
 Some years after this, the annals of the family were stained 
 by the records of a foul and brutal murder, committed by 
 Laurence fourth Earl of Ferrers on the body of his aged 
 land-steward, named Johnson, in January 1760. Lord 
 Ferrers, who was a man of violent and ungovernable tem- 
 per, and of whose brutality there are many instances on
 
 THE HOUSE or FERRERS. 125 
 
 record, had behaved to his wife with such cruelty as to 
 oblige her to apply to Parliament for redress, when was 
 passed an Act for allowing her a separate maintenance, to 
 be raised out of his lordship's estates, and Johnson was 
 appointed receiver of the rents. At this time he stood high 
 in Lord Ferrers' opinion ; but he, suspecting that Johnson 
 had combined with the trustees to disappoint him in a con- 
 tract for coal mines, thenceforth spoke of him as a villain. 
 He gave him warning to quit a farm which he held of his 
 lordship ; but finding that the trustees under the Act of 
 Separation had already granted a lease of it, he was an- 
 noyed, and from that moment meditated cruel revenge. 
 
 However, the Earl so craftily dissembled, that Johnson 
 imagined he was never on better terms with his master ; and 
 having arranged with him to come to Staunton on Friday, 
 January 18, 1760, he went, and was admitted into the pre- 
 sence of the Earl, who had contrived to send all the persons 
 from the house except three female servants. When the 
 Earl and Johnson were together, his lordship ordered him 
 to settle an account, and soon after presented him a paper 
 purporting to be a confession of his villany, which he re- 
 quired him to sign. This Johnson refused ; and on expos- 
 tulating with his lordship, the latter drew a pistol from his 
 pocket, and bade him kneel down. He knelt on one knee, 
 when Lord Ferrers cried out so loudly as to be heard by a 
 servant at the kitchen-door, ' Down on your other knee. 
 Declare what you have acted against Lord Ferrers. Your 
 time is come ; you must die !' And immediately firing the
 
 126 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 pistol, the ball entered his body under the last rib. He did 
 not fall ; but expressing both by looks and words the sen- 
 sations of a dying man, the Earl, though he had intended 
 to shoot Johnson, felt involuntary remorse, and ordered the 
 servants to assist him into bed. A surgeon was sent for ; 
 but not arriving till the evening, the Earl had himself ap- 
 plied a pledget dipped in Arquebusade water. On the 
 arrival of the surgeon, the Earl told him Johnson was a 
 villain who deserved to die ; but as he had spared his life, 
 he desired him to do all he could for him. 
 
 From this time, Lord Ferrers, who had been sober when 
 he shot Johnson, continued to drink strong beer till he 
 became drunk ; and giving way to violent fits of rage, he 
 came into the room where the dying man lay, and pulled 
 him by the wig, calling him ' Villain,' and again threaten- 
 ing to shoot him, while he was with difficulty prevented 
 tearing off the bedclothes to strike him. Nor would he 
 consent to his being removed to his own house at Lount, 
 declaring that he would keep him there to plague him. In 
 the night, however, Johnson was removed to his own house, 
 where he died at nine o'clock next morning. Horace Wai- 
 pole relates the circumstances with some difference, telling 
 us ' the Earl sent away all his servants but one, and, like 
 that heroic murderess Queen Christina, carried the poor 
 man through a gallery and several rooms, locking them after 
 him, and then bade the man kneel down, for he was deter- 
 mined to kill him. The poor creature flung himself at his 
 feet, but in vain, was shot, and lived twelve hours. Mad
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 127 
 
 as this action was from the consequences, there was no 
 frenzy in his behaviour. He got drunk, and at intervals 
 talked of it coolly, but did not attempt to escape till the 
 colliers beset his house, and were determined to take him 
 alive or dead.' Another account states : As soon as he 
 (Johnson) was dead, the neighbours set about seizing the 
 murderer, and on reaching Staunton they found him on 
 his way to the stable, half dressed. He, however, returned 
 to the house, fastened the doors, and stood on the defence ; 
 but the people still loitering about, he was seen by one 
 Curtis, a collier, on the bowling-green, armed with a blun- 
 derbuss, two or three pistols, and a dagger ; but Curtis, far 
 from being intimidated, walked up to the Earl, who was so 
 struck with his determined resolution, that he suffered him- 
 self to be seized without resistance. He was thence com- 
 mitted to the gaol at Leicester, and thence to the Tower of 
 London. 
 
 Lord Ferrers was tried by his peers in Westminster 
 Hall, April 1 6, and two following days, 1766. Horace 
 Walpole was present, and describes Lord Ferrers to have 
 behaved rationally and coolly; though it was a strange 
 contradiction to see a man trying, by his own sense, to 
 prove himself out of his senses. It was more shocking 
 to see his two brothers brought to prove the lunacy in their 
 own blood, in order to save their brother's life. Many 
 peers were absent. Never was a criminal tried more 
 literally by his own peers ; for the three persons who in- 
 terested themselves most in the examination were at least
 
 128 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 as mad as he Lord Ravensworth, Lord Talbot, and Lord 
 Fortescue : indeed, the first was almost frantic. The seats 
 of the peeresses were not near full. After Lord Ferrers 
 was condemned, he made an excuse for pleading madness, 
 to which he was forced by his family. He was condemned 
 to be hanged, and to be anatomized, according to the new 
 Act of Parliament. 
 
 The night he received the sentence he played at picquet 
 with the Tower warders, would play for money, and would 
 have continued to play longer than he did, but they refused. 
 The governor of the Tower shortened his allowance of wine 
 after his conviction, agreeably to the recent Act of Parlia- 
 ment. This he much disliked, and at last pressed his 
 brother the clergyman to intercede that at least he might 
 have more porter. His brother protested against it ; but at 
 last consenting (and he did obtain it), then, said the Earl, 
 * Now is as good a time as any to take leave of you adieu ! ' 
 
 The night before his death he made one of his keepers 
 read to him the play of Hamlet. He paid all his bills in 
 the morning, after he was in bed, as if leaving an inn ; 
 and half an hour before the sheriff fetched him, corrected 
 some verses he had written in the Tower, in imitation of 
 the Duke of Buckingham's epitaph, ' Dubius sed non improbus 
 vixi.' These verses were found in his apartment in the 
 Tower, and were as follows : 
 
 ' In doubt I lived, in doubt I die, 
 Yet stand prepared the vast abyss to try, 
 And, undismayed, expect eternity ! '
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 129 
 
 A minute journal of Lord Ferrers's whole behaviour was 
 kept, to see if there was any madness in it. Dr. Munro, 
 after the trial, made an affidavit of his lunacy. ' The 
 Washingtons,' says Walpole, ' were certainly a very frantic 
 race, and I have no doubt of madness in him, but of a 
 very pardonable sort.' Two petitions from his mother and 
 all his family were presented to the king, who said, as the 
 House of Lords had unanimously found him guilty, he 
 would not interfere. The Lord Keeper presented another : 
 the king would not hear him. 
 
 The Earl received sentence to be hung on April 21, but 
 he was, in consideration of his rank, respited till the 5th 
 of May. On the last morning he dressed himself in his 
 wedding-clothes, and said he thought this at least as good 
 an occasion of putting them on as that for which they were 
 first made. This marked the strong impression on his 
 mind. His mother wrote to his wife in a weak, angry 
 style, telling her to intercede for him as her duty, and to 
 swear to his madness. But this was not so easy : in all 
 her cause before the Lords, she had persisted that he was 
 not mad. His courage rose where it was most likely to 
 fail. Even an awful procession of about two hours from 
 the Tower to Tyburn with that mixture of pageantry, 
 shame, and ignominy, nay, and of delay, could not dis- 
 mount his resolution. He set out from the Tower at nine, 
 amidst crowds thousands. First went a string of con- 
 stables ; then one of the sheriffs in his chariot and six, the 
 horses draped with ribands ; next, Lord Ferrers in his own
 
 130 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 landau and six, his coachman crying all the way ; guards 
 at each side; the other sheriff's chariot followed empty, 
 with a mourning-coach and six, a hearse, and the Horse 
 Guards. The other sheriff, Vaillant, the French book- 
 seller in the Strand, was in the coach with the prisoner. 
 Lord Ferrers at first talked on indifferent matters, and 
 observing the prodigious confluence of people, he said, 
 ' But they never saw a lord hanged, and perhaps will 
 never see another.' One of the dragoons was thrown by 
 his mare's leg entangling in the hind-wheel. Lord Ferrers 
 expressed much concern, and said, ' I hope there will be 
 no death to-day but mine,' and was pleased when Vaillant 
 told him the man was not hurt. Vaillant made excuses to 
 him on his office. ' On the contrary,' said the Earl, ' I 
 am much obliged to you. I feared the disagreeableness 
 of the duty might make you depute your under-sheriff. 
 As you are so good as to execute it yourself, I am per- 
 suaded the dreadful apparatus will be conducted with 
 more expedition.' He told the sheriff he had written to 
 the king to beg that he might suffer where his ancestor 
 the Earl of Essex had suffered, and was in great hopes of 
 obtaining that favour, as he had the honour of quartering 
 part of the same arms, and of being allied to his Majesty ; 
 and that he thought it was hard that he must die at the 
 place appointed for the execution of common felons. The 
 chaplain of the Tower talked to the Earl on religion, but 
 he received it impatiently; and all he could obtain was 
 permission to repeat the Lord's Prayer on the scaffold.
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 131 
 
 The procession was stopped by the crowd, when the Earl 
 said he was dry, and wished for some wine-and-water ; 
 which being refused, he replied, ' Then I must be content 
 with this,' and took some pigtail tobacco out of his pocket. 
 As they drew nigh, the Earl, taking out his watch, gave it 
 to Vaillant, desiring him to accept it as a mark of gratitude 
 for his kind behaviour, adding, ' It is- scarce worth your 
 acceptance, but I have nothing else : it is a stop watch, 
 and a pretty accurate one.' He then gave five guineas to 
 the chaplain, and took out as much for the executioner. 
 
 When they came to Tyburn, his coach was detained some 
 minutes by the crowd ; but as soon as the door was opened, 
 he stepped out and readily mounted the scaffold. It was 
 hung with black at the expense of the family. Under the 
 gallows was a newly-invented stage, to be struck from under 
 him. He showed no fear or discomposure, only just look- 
 ing at the gallows with a slight motion of dissatisfaction. 
 He said little, kneeled for a moment to the prayer ; said, 
 ' Lord have mercy upon me, and forgive me my errors,' and 
 immediately mounted the upper stage. He had come 
 pinioned with a black sash, and was unwilling to have his 
 hands tied or his face covered, but was persuaded to both. 
 When the rope (said to be a silken one) was put round his 
 neck, he turned pale, but recovered instantly; and but seven 
 minutes elapsed from leaving the coach to the signal given 
 for striking the stage. He was quite dead in four minutes. 
 Here the decency ended. The sheriffs fell to eating and 
 drinking on the scaffold as he was still hanging, which he
 
 132 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 did for above an hour. The executioners fought for the rope, 
 and the one who lost it cried. The mob tore off the black 
 as relics; 'but,' adds Walpole, 'the universal crowd be- 
 haved with great decency and admiration, as they well 
 might, for no exit was ever made with more sensible resolu- 
 tion and with less ostentation.' 
 
 After execution the body was conveyed to Surgeons' 
 Hall to undergo the remainder of the sentence, and was 
 there publicly exposed to view. There is a print of ' Earl 
 Ferrers as he lay in his coffin at Surgeons' Hall.' On the 
 evening of the 8th of May the body was delivered to the 
 Earl's friends for interment. This, it is said, was in a grave 
 fourteen feet under the tower of old St. Pancras' Church ; 
 but upon the removal of the latter in 1848, we did not hear 
 of the finding of the remains. The bill of expenses for the 
 execution is said to have been found at Staunton, and 
 among the articles enumerated is the silken rope. The 
 landau in which the Earl rode to Tyburn was afterwards 
 locked up in a coach-house at East Acton, and never again 
 used. There it remained until it fell to pieces. 
 
 Neither within Westminster Hall nor without, on the 
 days of trial, was there the least disturbance, though the 
 hall was full, and the whole way from Charing Cross to the 
 House of Lords was lined with crowds. ' The foreigners,' 
 says Walpole, ' were struck with the awfulness of the pro- 
 ceeding. It was new to their ideas to see such deliberate 
 justice, and such dignity of nobility mixed with no respect 
 for birth in the catastrophe, and still more humiliated by
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 133 
 
 anatomizing the criminal.' During the trial in the Hall, the 
 cell to which the prisoner retired was on fire, which, by 
 sawing away some timbers, was put out without any alarm 
 to the Court. 1 
 
 A singular tradition is current in the Ferrers family. 
 The park of Chartley, in Staffordshire, is a wild, romantic 
 spot, and was formerly attached to the Royal Forest of 
 Needwood and the Honour of Tutbury, of the whole of 
 which the ancient family of Ferrers were the puissant lords. 
 Their immense possessions, now forming part of the Duchy 
 of Lancaster, were forfeited by the attainder of Earl Ferrers 
 after his defeat at Burton Bridge, where he led the rebellious 
 Barons against Henry in. The Chartley estate being 
 settled in dower, was alone reserved, and has been handed 
 down to its present possessor. In the park is preserved 
 the indigenous Staffordshire cow, small in stature, of sand- 
 white colour, with black ears, muzzle, and tips at the hoofs. 
 In the year of the battle of Burton Bridge a black calf was 
 born ; and the downfall of the great house of Ferrers hap- 
 pening at the same period, gave rise to the tradition, which 
 to this day has been current among the common people, 
 that the birth of a parti-coloured calf from the wild breed 
 in Chartley Park is a sure omen of death within the same 
 year to a member of the lord's family ; and by a noticeable 
 coincidence, a calf of this description has been born when- 
 
 1 The Countess of Ferrers, who, after his lordship's death, was mar- 
 ried to Lord Frederick Campbell, brother to John fourth Duke of 
 Argyll, was unfortunately burnt to death at her seat, Coomb Bank, 
 Kent, in 1807.
 
 134 
 
 THE HOUSE OF FERRERS. 
 
 ever a death has happened in the family of late years. The 
 decease of the Earl and his Countess, of his son Lord 
 Tamworth, of his daughter Mrs. William Joliffe, as well as 
 the deaths of the son and heir of the eighth Earl and his 
 daughter Lady Frances Shirley, were each preceded by the 
 ominous birth of a calf. In the spring of 1855, an animal, 
 perfectly black, was calved by one of this weird tribe in the 
 park of Chartley, and it was soon followed by the death of 
 the Countess. (Abridged from the Staffordshire Chronicle,} 
 This curious tradition has been cleverly wrought into a 
 romantic story, entitled Chartley, or the Fatalist.
 
 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 
 
 [HE noble family of Talbot, of which the Earl of 
 Shrewsbury is generally regarded as the head, 
 though his right was disputed by the Talbots 
 of Malahide, and those of Bashall, in Yorkshire (now 
 extinct in the male line), is of Norman extraction, and from 
 the Conquest has held a foremost place in the annals of 
 English history and of chivalry. The first upon record is 
 Richard de Talbot, who is mentioned in Domesday Book 
 as holding ' nine hides of land under Walter Gifford, Earl 
 of Buckingham.' His son Hugh, having been governor of 
 the King's Castle at Plessey, or Pleshey, in Essex, assumed 
 the monastic cowl late in life, and died a monk in the 
 Abbey of Beaubeck, in Normandy. His grandson Gilbert 
 was warder of the Castle of Ludlow, and attended the 
 coronation of Richard i. in a distinguished capacity ; and 
 his grandson, another Gilbert, having been placed in 
 command over the ' marches ' of Herefordshire, married 
 Gwendoline, daughter of the Prince or King of South 
 Wales, whose arms his descendants have borne heraldically 
 ever since. His grandson, a third Sir Gilbert, who had
 
 136 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 
 
 been involved in the execution of Piers Gaveston, Earl of 
 Cornwall, received the king's pardon, and was summoned 
 to Parliament as a baron in 1331. His son and successor, 
 Sir Richard Talbot, was summoned as a baron to Parlia- 
 ment in 1332-55 ; and being an eminent officer under 
 Edward in., was made by the king a knight-bannaret on 
 the field of battle. He owned large estates on the borders 
 of Wales; among others, Gooderich Castle on the Wye, 
 where he resided in great state and splendour. It was 
 this nobleman's grandson, John Talbot, whom Shakspeare 
 terms 'the great Alcides of the field,' who became the 
 first Earl of Shrewsbury. 
 
 Gooderich Castle, though not of large dimensions, con- 
 tained all the different works which constitute a complete 
 ancient baronial castle. The general design forms a 
 parallelogram, defended by a round tower at each of the 
 angles, with an Anglo-Saxon keep. The entrance through 
 a dark vaulted passage is the most striking feature. The 
 chapel is graceful, and the hall stately, of the time of 
 Edward i. Another room of almost equal size leads to the 
 Ladies' Tower. The ruin is mantled with ivy and clematis. 
 A castle, which belonged to one Goodric, stood here 
 before the Conquest; the structure underwent alteration 
 down to the reign of Henry vi. 
 
 Born towards the close of the thirteenth century, and 
 having married the heiress of the proud house of Furnival, 
 John Talbot was summoned to Parliament in 1409 as 
 ' Johannes Talbot de Furnyvall.' In 1412 he was appointed
 
 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 137 
 
 Lord Justice of Ireland, and two years later Lord-Lieu- 
 tenant. This post he held for seven years. But it was 
 not on the narrow theatre of Ireland that he manifested 
 his great military capacity. It was in France, where he 
 took the field under Henry v., that he displayed those 
 great qualities which made him the terror of the French 
 nation. His earlier feats of arms were shown at the siege 
 and capture of Meaux. He was with Henry v. when he 
 died, and he seems to have inherited the spirit of his royal 
 master. Equally valiant and faithful was he to that master's 
 successor, Henry vi., for whom he gained so many battles 
 on French soil, that the peasant mothers of Normandy 
 hushed their children to rest by the bare mention of ' the 
 dogge Talbot ' being near. Checked for a moment at Patay 
 by the Maid of Orleans, he was once taken prisoner ; but 
 being speedily exchanged, he soon retrieved the honour 
 of the English arms. In reward, he was created Earl of 
 Shrewsbury in England, and Waterford in Ireland ; reap- 
 pointed to his old viceregal post ; and made High Steward 
 of Ireland, the highest honours which at that time were 
 open to a subject. 
 
 After this, he went once more to fight in France. We 
 find him in command of the fleet, landing and taking 
 Falaise, and as Lieutenant of the Duchy of Aquitaine, 
 marching to the south, and forcing Bordeaux and other 
 towns in that part to surrender to English arms. Thence 
 he advanced to the relief of Chatillon, and giving the be- 
 sieging French army battle, i;th July 1453, in the eightieth
 
 138 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 
 
 year of his age, he received a wound in the thigh which 
 proved immediately mortal. 
 
 Talbot had been victorious in no less than forty battles 
 and dangerous skirmishes; and his death proved fatal to 
 the English rule in France, which never flourished after- 
 wards. He was buried at Whitchurch, in Shropshire, 
 where a fine recumbent monument records his honours in 
 terms very nearly coincident with the well-known lines of 
 Shakspeare : 
 
 ' Valiant Lord Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, 
 Created for his rare success in arms, 
 Great Earl of Wachford, Waterford, and Valence ; 
 Lord Talbot of Goodric and Urchinfield ; 
 Lord Strange of Blackmere ; Lord Verdun of Alton ; 
 Lord Cromwell of Wingfield ; Lord Furnival of Sheffield ; 
 The thrice victorious Lord of Falconbridge ; 
 Knight of the noble order of St. George, 
 Worthy St. Michael, and the Golden Fleece ; 
 Great Mareschal to Henry the Sixth 
 Of all his wars within the realm of France. ' 
 
 In rebuilding the church at Whitchurch about a century 
 and a half ago, the urn was found which contained the 
 heart of the Earl of Shrewsbury, carefully embalmed, and 
 wrapped in a covering of what was once handsome crimson 
 velvet. 
 
 John second Earl of Shrewsbury, true to his family's 
 devotion to the Lancastrian cause, fell, with his brother Sir 
 Christopher, at the battle of Northampton, loth July 1460, 
 fighting under the Red Rose. His third son, Sir Gilbert 
 Talbot, who was High Sheriff of Shropshire in the reign of
 
 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 139 
 
 Richard in., but proved a staunch adherent to the Earl of 
 Richmond at Bosworth, commanded the right wing of his 
 army on that memorable field, and received knighthood, 
 with a grant of lands, for his valiant conduct, from the 
 victor. In two years afterwards, Sir Gilbert had a com- 
 mand at the battle of Stoke, and was made a knight- 
 banneret ; and George, the fourth Earl of Shrewsbury, was 
 installed as Knight of the Garter for his valiant conduct 
 at the same battle. 
 
 George, the sixth Earl of Shrewsbury, had the custody 
 of Mary Queen of Scots, and assisted at her execution. 
 His lordship married secondly Elizabeth of Hardwick, who 
 had already been thrice married. ' She was a woman of 
 masculine understanding and conduct; proud, furious, 
 selfish, and unfeeling. She was a builder, a buyer and 
 seller of estates, a money-lender, a farmer, a merchant of 
 lead, coals, and timber. She died immensely rich.' 
 
 The fortunes of the Duke of Shrewsbury present a remark- 
 able instance of the attainment of the highest honours of 
 rank and state, but limited to his own individual enjoyment 
 of them. He was the elder son of the eleventh Earl of 
 Shrewsbury, who died of a wound received in his duel with 
 George Villiers, second Duke of Buckingham, at Barnes. 
 He was born in the year of the Restoration, and had 
 Charles n. for his godfather. In 1694 he was created 
 Marquis of Alton and Duke of Shrewsbury, and installed a 
 Knight of the Garter. His Grace was a prominent states- 
 man in the reigns of William and Mary, Queen Anne, and
 
 140 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 
 
 George i. He had quitted the Church of Rome and be- 
 come a Protestant in 1679, and by his steady adherence 
 to the Protestant cause had incurred the displeasure of 
 James n. He was one of the seven who in June 1688 
 joined the celebrated Association, inviting over the Prince 
 of Orange. At the demise of Queen Anne (who delivered 
 to him the Treasurer's staff on her death-bed), the Duke 
 of Shrewsbury was at the same time Lord-Lieutenant of 
 Ireland, Lord High Treasurer of Great Britain, and Lord 
 Chamberlain, a circumstance, says Sir Bernard Burke 
 (Peerage, edit. 1862), previously unparalleled in our history. 
 His Grace on this occasion secured the Hanoverian acces- 
 sion by at once signing the order for proclaiming George i. 
 The Duke married the daughter of the Marquis of Palliotti, 
 but died without issue ; when the dukedom and marquisate 
 expired, and the earldom, etc., reverted to his cousin. 1 
 
 In August 1857, died Bertram seventeenth Earl of 
 Shrewsbury, without leaving any cousin or male kinsman to 
 succeed him in his honours and estates ; and it was not 
 until the month of June in the following year that the 
 
 1 When Addison was on his travels in Italy, at Florence he spent 
 some days with the Duke of Shrewsbury, ' who, cloyed with the plea- 
 sures of ambition, and impatient of its pains, fearing both parties and 
 loving neither, had determined to hide in an Italian retreat talents and 
 accomplishments which, if they had been united with fixed principles 
 and civil courage, might have made him the foremost man of his age. 
 These days, we are told, passed pleasantly, and we can easily believe 
 it ; for Addison was a delightful companion when he was at his ease, 
 and the Duke, though he seldom forgot that he was a Talbot, had the 
 invaluable art of putting at ease all who came near him ' (Macaulay).
 
 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 141 
 
 House of Lords was satisfied that Earl Talbot had made 
 out his claim to the Earldom of Shrewsbury and the Irish 
 honours which had always belonged to that ancient and 
 noble title. On the loth of June 1858 he took his seat in 
 the House of Peers as Premier Earl of England, being the 
 only nobleman in that grade of the peerage who takes pre- 
 cedence of Edward Earl of Derby. ' The Great Shrewsbury 
 Case,' as it was called, not without good reason, involved 
 the inheritance not only of a title celebrated in the pages 
 of Shakspeare, and closely interwoven with the thread of 
 English and French history, but also the possession of the 
 costly seat, Alton Tower, and other large landed estates, to 
 the extent of ^50,000 or ^60,000 a-year, all of which had 
 been bequeathed by Earl Bertram to an infant of the 
 Howard family, with the hope and intention that they should 
 never pass into Protestant hands. The case created great 
 interest in the higher circles of society, and no small amount 
 of religious bigotry was evoked on both sides. Eventually, 
 after a long and expensive suit, it was ruled that the estates 
 ought to pass with the titles. Earl Talbot had the Earldom 
 of Shrewsbury adjudged to him, as being descended through 
 William Talbot, Bishop of Durham, and John Talbot of Sal- 
 warp, from Sir John Talbot of Allbrighton, county of Salop, 
 and of Grafton, county of Worcester; he lived in the 
 reigns of Henry vn. and Henry vin., and his father, Sir 
 Gilbert Talbot of Grafton, was the youngest son of John 
 second Earl of Shrewsbury, who fell fighting in the cause of 
 the Red Rose of the House of Lancaster, on the bloody
 
 142 THE HOUSE OF TALBOT. 
 
 field of Northampton, July 10, 1460. This peerage case, 
 therefore, was singular in one respect, namely, that in 
 order to prove a common ancestor to Bertram seventeenth 
 Earl, and Henry John eighteenth Earl, it was necessary to 
 go back to a period of nearly 400 years. 
 
 A copy was given in evidence of an inscription from an 
 ancient monument in the Church of Bromsgrove, Worces- 
 tershire, erected to the memory of Sir John Talbot of 
 Allbrighton and his two wives. This inscription, as far as 
 related to Sir John's issue, was in the following words : 
 ' The Lady Margaret, hys first wyfe, bare to him three 
 sonnes and five daughters, and ye Lady Elizabeth bare to 
 him four sonnes and four daughters.' Major Talbot of 
 Castle Talbot, county Wexford, who was brother of the late 
 Countess of Shrewsbury, opposed Earl Talbot's claim in the 
 House of Lords, and grounded that opposition upon his 
 descent, as he alleged, from one of these younger sons of 
 Sir John Talbot of Allbrighton by his first wife. Sir Ber- 
 nard BurkJs Peerage, 1865.
 
 GEORGE VILLIERS, DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM, 
 ASSASSINATED BY JOHN FELTON. 
 
 murder of the Duke of Buckingham by Felton 
 was the first great home event in one of the 
 most eventful reigns recorded in English history. 
 The prime favourite of two sovereigns, James i. and Charles 
 i., for many years Buckingham had so conducted himself 
 as to give great umbrage to the people ; and the opinion 
 generally held of him is^ expressed in this strong and coarse 
 comment, current towards the end of his career : 
 
 ' Who rules the kingdom ? The King ! 
 Who rules the King ? The Duke ! ! 
 Who rules the Duke ? The Devil ! ! ! ' 
 
 George Villiers (afterwards Duke of Buckingham) first 
 appeared at the court of James i. in 1614, and the political 
 intriguers of the day set him up in opposition to the 
 declining favourite Somerset. He was a man of attractive 
 personal appearance, had been educated at the French 
 Court, and at once fascinated the weak monarch, and 
 rapidly made way in his affections. He heaped honours 
 on him and his family ; and Villiers rose as fast as Somerset
 
 144 DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 
 
 fell; ultimately becoming more powerful than the latter 
 nobleman, and as great a favourite with Prince Charles 
 as he was with the king. He bore himself with great 
 hauteur even to such men as the Lord Chancellor Bacon, 
 who was compelled to dance attendance for days together 
 in his ante-chamber among his servants, ' sitting upon an 
 old wooden chest, with his purse and seal lying by him on 
 that chest.' His brothers and male relatives were married 
 to heiresses (sometimes compulsorily), and the female 
 branches to the richest and noblest of the aristocracy ; 
 while all alike trafficked in titles and places, lodging about 
 the court, and making the most of their lucrative interest. 
 
 But though this excited the jealousy of the courtiers, 
 the people in general were not thoroughly roused against 
 the favourite, until he had fomented the Quixotic expedi- 
 tion of Prince Charles into Spain, and accompanied him 
 thither. The popular dislike to the Spanish match was 
 intense, and the fear of popish innovation excessive : the 
 favourite was therefore loudly condemned by all. At the 
 same time, he was on the most intimate terms with his 
 sovereign and prince, and the letters which passed between 
 them evince a familiar intimacy which has scarcely a 
 parallel in history. James addressed him as ' My sweet 
 hearty,' ' My sweet Steenie * and gossip,' ' My only sweet 
 
 1 This was no Christian name of the Duke's, but is a Scotticism for 
 Stephen, bestowed on him by the king, who is said to have done so 
 because the favourite's good looks reminded him of representations of 
 St. Stephen, depicted with beautiful features, in accordance with Acts 
 vi. 15.
 
 ASSASSINATED BY JOHN FELTON. 145 
 
 and dear child ; ' and tattled about the favourite's family 
 affairs more like an old nurse than a king. Charles addressed 
 him as ' Steenie,' and consulted him on every subject of 
 importance ; while Buckingham returned the familiarity by 
 addressing the king as ' Your sowship ; ' or, ' Dear dad and 
 gossip ; ' and subscribing himself, ' Your humble slave and 
 dog, Steenie ; ' with, ' I kiss your warty hands,' etc. 
 
 Buckingham was raised to the dukedom while at Madrid, 
 in order that he might be elevated in the eyes of the 
 Spaniards; but his dissipation and insolence disgusted 
 them, as much as his freedom of speech and manners 
 before the prince. 
 
 The infirmities of James, and the strong friendship of 
 his son, kept Buckingham at the head of affairs until the 
 death of the king. On the accession of Charles to the 
 throne, the favourite assumed a still more powerful posi- 
 tion ; but this favouritism, and Buckingham's mal-admini- 
 stration, rendered him very unpopular; while the public 
 plunderings of the favourite and his family knew no bounds. 
 On the very day that the Duke was denounced in the 
 House of Commons, his physician, Dr. Lambe generally 
 termed 'the Duke's devil' who was believed to deal in 
 the black art, and instigate the Duke's worst acts, was 
 attacked in the streets of London, and so ill-treated that 
 he died during the same day. A doggerel rhyme of fear- 
 ful import then became current : 
 
 ' Let Charles and George do what they can, 
 The Duke shall die, like Dr. Lambe.' 
 K
 
 146 THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 
 
 A paper was affixed to a post in Coleman Street, upon 
 which were the three lines quoted at p. 143, and this addi- 
 tion : ' Let the Duke look to it ; for they intend shortly to 
 use him worse than they did the doctor ; and if things be not 
 shortly reformed, they will work a reformation for themselves.' 
 
 The Duke's life had been attempted at Rhe by a Jesuit 
 armed with a three-edged knife ; and an account of the 
 event, with a woodcut of the knife, had been published on 
 his return, to endear the Duke to all good Protestants. 
 Popular feeling, however, ran counter to this. Sir Symonds 
 D'Ewes relates that ' some of his friendes had advised him 
 how generally he was hated in England, and how needfull 
 it would bee, for his greater safetie, to weare some coate 
 of maile, or some secret defensive armour ; but the Duke 
 slighting, saied, " It needs not ; there are no Roman spirits 
 left."' Lady Davis, who had become celebrated for the 
 foretelling of events, had confidently predicted the death of 
 the Duke in 1628. A Latin distich was also in very general 
 circulation. A copy, preserved in the Ashmolean MS., states 
 it to have been ' made some few monthes before he (the 
 Duke) was murthered, by John Marston.' An apparition 
 was also stated to have announced the Duke's fate ; but 
 Clarendon considers this story was planned by the Countess 
 and the person to whom it was said to have appeared, to 
 inspire the Duke with a livelier regard to his own safety. 
 
 The following week the King and Duke journeyed in the 
 same coach to Deptford. He parted with the king, and 
 proceeded to Portsmouth, where a more sudden fate than
 
 ASSASSINATED BY JOHN FELTON. 147 
 
 Lambe's awaited him, and is thus described in a letter sent 
 by Sir Dudley Carleton to the Queen on the afternoon : 
 ' This day, betwixt nine and ten of the clock in the morning, 
 the Duke of Buckingham, then comming out of a parlor 
 into a hall, to goe to his coach, and soe to the king (who 
 was four miles off), having about him diverse lords, colonells, 
 and captains, and many of his owne servants, was by one 
 Felton (once a lieutenant of this our army) slaine at one 
 blow with a dagger knife. In his staggering he turn'd about, 
 uttering onely this word " Villaine ! " and never spake word 
 more ; but presently plucking out the knife from himselfe, 
 before he fell to the ground, hee made towards the traytor 
 two or three paces, and then fell against a table, although 
 he were upheld by diverse that were neere him, that (through 
 the villaine's close carriage in the act) could not perceive 
 him hurt at all, but guess'd him to be suddenly overswayed 
 with some apoplexie, till they saw the blood come gushing 
 from his mouth and the wound so fast, that the life and 
 breath at once left his begored body.' 
 
 The house in which the murder was committed is now 
 standing in Portsmouth (No. 10, High Street), but has been 
 so repeatedly altered, both within and without, in converting 
 it first into an inn and then into a private house, that it 
 retains scarcely any of its old features. 
 
 Howell says that Felton ' had thought to have done the 
 deed ' in the room where the Duke was being shaved, after 
 rising from bed, ' for he was leaning upon the window all 
 the while.'
 
 148 THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 
 
 Wotton thus describes the murder : ' The Duke came 
 with Sir Thomas Fryer close at his ear ; in the very moment 
 as the said knight withdrew himself from the Duke, the 
 assassin gave him, with a back blow, a deep wound into his 
 left side, leaving the knife in his body, which the Duke him- 
 self pulling out, on a sudden effusion of spirits, he sank 
 down under the table in the next room, and immediately 
 expired.' 
 
 Sir Symonds D'Ewes, who was related to the Duchess 
 of Buckingham, in his account of the murder, says : ' The 
 Duke having received the stroake, instantlie clapping his 
 right hand on his sword-hilt, cried out, " God's wounds ! 
 the villaine has killed me !'" 
 
 Felton had sewed in the crown of his hat, half within the 
 lining, a written paper, which ran as follows : ' That man 
 is cowardly base, and deserveth not the name of a gentle- 
 man o r souldier, that is not willinge to sacrifice his life for 
 the honor of his God, his kinge, and his countrie. Lett noe 
 man commend me for doinge of it, but rather discommend 
 themselves as the cause of it ; for if God had not taken 
 away o r harts for o r sinnes, he would not have gone so longe 
 unpunished. JNO. FELTON.' 
 
 At the death, the paper was not found, and what had 
 become of it was not known for a certainty. It was long in 
 the possession of Mr. Upcott, and had been found among 
 the Evelyn papers at Wotton, endorsed twice over in John 
 Evelyn's handwriting, ' A note found about Felton when he 
 killed the Duke of Buckingham, 23 Aug. 1628.' Sir Edward
 
 ASSASSINATED BY JOHN FELTON. 149 
 
 Nicholas, Secretary of State, who had the first possession of 
 it, was one of the persons before whom Felton was examined 
 at Portsmouth. His daughter married Sir Richard Browne, 
 and the learned and philosophic Mr. John Evelyn married 
 the only daughter of Sir Richard Browne. Lady Evelyn, 
 the widow of his descendant, presented it to Mr. Upcott. 
 
 King Charles had parted but the day before from Buck- 
 ingham, and was staying at South wick Park, a seat of the 
 Norton family a few miles from Portsmouth, from which 
 place Carleton's letter is dated, he having probably posted 
 there with the news. The King was at prayers, when Sir 
 John Hippesly immediately went up to him and whispered 
 the tidings in his ear. The King is reported to have heard 
 it without visible emotion ; but when the service was ended, 
 he hastily went to his chamber, and bewailed his death 
 passionately, casting himself on his bed with abundance of 
 tears. 
 
 Felton had been bred a soldier, and came of a good 
 family in Suffolk. During his imprisonment he was visited 
 by the Earl and Countess of Arundel and their son, ' he 
 being of their blood.' Sir Henry Wotton terms Felton ' a 
 younger brother of mean fortune, by nature of a deep, 
 melancholy, silent, and gloomy constitution.' Felton stated 
 his inducements to the crime to be the imputations thrown 
 out against the Duke in a pamphlet, and his denunciation 
 by the people and Parliament. The latter was no doubt the 
 real cause, inasmuch as, when Felton was exhorted by the 
 royal chaplain to confess his motives, he answered, ' Sir,
 
 150 THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 
 
 I shall be brief: I killed him for the cause of God and 
 my country.' It was this feeling which probably induced 
 Felton to take so little interest in his own fate, when he might 
 have escaped so easily, as is narrated in Carleton's letter. 
 
 Suspicion at first was excited towards the Frenchmen 
 about the Duke, who were with difficulty saved from the 
 vengeance of the Duke's attendants. Felton meanwhile 
 walked quietly into the kitchen of the house, and remained 
 there unnoticed until the first stupor of amazement had 
 passed away, and the real murderer was sought for. He 
 had expected a sudden death at the hands of the Duke's 
 servants when he struck the blow, and it was this which 
 induced him to fasten the written paper in his hat ; he 
 wished not to avoid the death he expected, and on the loud 
 outcry of ' Where is the murderer ?' he coolly confronted 
 the enraged inquirers with ' I am the man !' His life was 
 with difficulty saved, and he was conveyed under guard to 
 the house of the governor of Portsmouth. 
 
 He had performed his journey to Portsmouth ' partly on 
 horseback and partly on foot,' says Wotton ; ' for he was 
 indigent, and low in money.' But before leaving London, 
 ' in a bye cutler's shop on Tower Hill, he bought a ten- 
 penny knife (so cheap was the instrument of this great 
 attempt), and the sheath thereof he sewed to the lining of 
 his pocket, that he might at any moment draw forth the 
 blade alone with one hand, for he had maimed the other.' 1 
 
 1 A different tale is told by the historians of Sheffield, who say : ' In 
 1626, Thomas Wild, cutler, living in the Crooked-bill Yard, High
 
 ASSASSINATED BY JOHN FELTON. 151 
 
 Felton was conveyed to the Tower in September ; and 
 Charles would have had him put upon the rack to discover 
 if he had any accomplices, but that the judges decided that 
 ' torture was not justifiable according to the law of England.' 
 He constantly affirmed that he did it of his own will, ' not 
 maliciously, but out of an intent for the good of his country.' 
 He was hanged at Tyburn, and his body conveyed to Ports- 
 mouth, and hung there in chains. 
 
 Buckingham was buried at Westminster secretly on the 
 iyth of September, and a public funeral, with an empty coffin, 
 paraded on the next night, guarded by soldiers with raised 
 pikes and muskets, as if the people's well-known dislike was 
 expected to be vented on his remains. His heart is affirmed 
 to have been placed in the marble urn which forms the 
 centre of the monument in Portsmouth church. It was at 
 first, ' greatly in contravention of religious decorum,' erected 
 within the communion rails, but has been removed to the 
 north aisle of the chancel. 
 
 That Buckingham's unpopularity outlived him, is evident 
 from the fears of the Court at his funeral ; and the sympathy 
 of the populace was more with Felton than with the mur- 
 dered Minister. Such was his love of truth and rigid honour, 
 
 Street, made Lieutenant Felton the knife with which he stabbed the 
 Duke of Buckingham. The knife was found in the Duke's body, and 
 had a corporation mark upon it, which led to the discovery of the 
 maker, who was immediately taken to the Earl of Arundel's house in 
 London, when he acknowledged the mark was his, and that he had 
 made Lieutenant Felton two such knives when he was recruiting at 
 Sheffield, for which he charged him tenpence.'
 
 152 THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 
 
 that Felton obtained amongst his acquaintances the nick- 
 name of ' honest Jack,' one which, after his assassination, 
 became extremely popular throughout the nation. 
 
 D'Israeli remarks : ' The assassination was a sort of theo- 
 retical one ; so that when the king's attorney furnished the 
 criminal with an unexpected argument, which appeared to 
 him to have overturned his own, he declared that he had 
 been in a mistake; and lamenting that he had not been 
 aware of it before, from that instant his conscientious spirit 
 sank into despair.' Meade also tells us that Sir Robert 
 Brook and others who were present at the murder ' affirm, 
 that when Felton struck the Duke, he exclaimed, " God 
 have mercy upon thy soule ;" which occasioned a friend of 
 mine wittily to say, There was never man murdered with so 
 much gospell.' 
 
 The strong public feeling in favour of Felton may be 
 gathered from another anecdote. On the departure of the 
 fleet, which Buckingham came to Portsmouth to command, 
 in September 1628, after the king had made ' a gratious 
 speech, they shouted, and, for a farewell, desired his Ma- 
 jestic to be good to John Felton, their once fellow-souldier.' 
 
 But it was not the rude populace and rough sailors only 
 who lauded the act of the assassin. Meade, in a letter 
 dated November 15, 1628, says : ' On Friday sennight was 
 censured in the Star Chamber, Alex. Gill, B.D., at Oxford, 
 and usher in Paul's school under his own father, for saying 
 in Trin. Coll. that our king was fitter to stand in a Cheapside 
 shop with an apron on, and say, " What lack you ? " than
 
 ASSASSINATED BY JOHN FELTON. 153 
 
 to governe a kingdome ; zd, that the Duke was gone down 
 to hell to meet King James there ; 3^, for drinking a health 
 to Felton, saying he was a sorry fellow, and had deprived 
 him of the honour of doing that brave action, etc. His 
 censure was, to be degraded both from his ministrie and 
 degrees taken, to lose one ear in London and the other at 
 Oxford, and be fined ^2000.' In another letter, dated 
 November 22, we are told, 'Gill is degraded;' but the fine 
 there was mitigated, etc. 
 
 A collection of poems and songs relating to Buckingham 
 and his assassination has been printed for the Percy Society, 
 edited by the careful hand of the late Mr. Fairholt, F.S.A. 
 Buckingham was so despised by the large majority of 
 Englishmen, that his foul murder was hailed as a national 
 deliverance ; and the condemnatory poems which followed 
 the Duke to the grave could only be exceeded by the lauda- 
 tions which were showered on Felton. In one of these 
 poems, ' Felton's Epitaph,' the ignominy of his fate is most 
 ingeniously construed into a triumph by the author of the 
 lines ensuing. There is another copy of this poem in Ash- 
 mole MS., where it is said to have been 'made by D. 
 Donn.' It varies a little in words, and is less pure than the 
 following from the Sloane MS. ; but the sense is the same. 
 This is one of the best and most remarkable poems in the 
 collection : 
 
 ' Here uninterr'd suspends (though not to save 
 Surviving Trends th' expences of a grave) 
 Felton's dead earth, which to the world must bee 
 It's owne sadd monument, his elegie ;
 
 154 THE DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM 
 
 As large as fame, but whether badd or good 
 I say not : by himselfe 'twas writt in blood; 
 For which his body is entomb'd in ayre, 
 Archt o'er with heaven, sett with a thousand faire 
 And glorious diamond Starrs. A sepulchre 
 That time can never ruinate, and where 
 Th' impartiall worme (which is not brib'd to spare 
 Princes corrupt in marble) cannot share 
 His flesh ; which if the charitable skies 
 Embalme with teares, doeing those obsequies 
 Belong to men, shall last, till pittying fowle 
 Contend to beare his bodie to his soule.' 
 
 While the vicious character of the Duke held him up to 
 popular odium, his mismanaged and crooked dealings as a 
 politician made him amenable to the denunciations of the 
 satirists, who were unsparing in their coarsest lampoons. 
 The whole is a strongly coloured picture of popular feeling, 
 which can only be reproduced to the modern eye in 
 the apologetic words of the transcriber of the Visions of 
 Twiddle: 
 
 ' Be it trowe, or be it fals, 
 It is as the copie was.' 
 
 An addition to this strange eventful history will be found 
 in Mr. Forster's Life of Sir John Eliot; namely, that on the 
 day preceding Felton's attack there had been a mutiny 
 among the seamen at Portsmouth, of which the stir had not 
 yet subsided. In an unpublished letter of Nethersole's, 
 Mr. Forster found: 'At Portsmouth, the day before, a 
 sailor was certainly killed in a kind of mutiny there ; some 
 say by a servant of the Duke, others by his own hand.' 
 Rous's Diary (Camden Society, 1856) gives from a letter
 
 ASSASSINATED BY JOHN FELTON. 155 
 
 of the Captain of the Guard, to whose custody Felton was 
 committed after killing the Duke, an account of the above 
 mutiny, when a sailor who had offended Buckingham was 
 by a court-martial condemned to die. A rescue was at- 
 tempted, when the Captain of the Fleet drew upon the 
 sailors with great fury ; and next the Duke himself, with 
 a great company on horseback, drove the sailors on the 
 port point, when . many were dangerously hurt, and two 
 killed outright. The captain saw the first mutineer carried 
 with a guard to the gibbet, where he was hanged by 
 another mutinous sailor. Thus Buckingham personally 
 superintended the execution of the man who had merely 
 ' affronted him,' and who could have had no part in the 
 subsequent outbreak. That a long course of unbridled 
 power and profligacy had produced insanity in Buckingham, 
 is suggested as the only solution of his profanity and gross- 
 ness. Retribution was but unworthily represented in the 
 individual vengeance of Felton ; but there can be little 
 doubt that, had Buckingham evaded or survived the attack 
 of the assassin, the long defied justice of England would 
 at no distant period have consigned him to the executioner. 
 (See Notes and Queries, 3d series, No. 189.)
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 is a curious class of household tales, the 
 genuine appendices to the history of ancient 
 families, long occupying the same ground and 
 stations ; and perhaps no other certain deduction can be 
 drawn from such legends, except that the families to which 
 they relate are of ancient popular repute, against whose gentle 
 condition ' the memory of man runneth not to the contrary.' 
 'As to the matter-of-fact contained in these legends,' 
 says Sir Bernard Burke, ' it is impossible to deny that, when 
 a great part of England lay in moor, morass, and forest, 
 wolves and bears must have been troublesome neighbours.' 
 Wolves were by no means exterminated by King Edgar. 
 The monks of Fors, in Wensleydale, about 1180, had a 
 dangerous grant from Alan Earl of Richmond, of the flesh 
 of all wild animals torn by wolves within their own dale. 
 King James i. and vi. sometimes took the diversion of 
 wolf-hunting in Scotland, in which kingdom the last wild 
 wolf was killed as late as 1680 ; and in Ireland proclama- 
 tions were issued against wolves in Antrim in the reign 
 of Anne.
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 157 
 
 It is, however, much more difficult to .account for ser- 
 pents of a magnitude to require the intervention of a hero 
 to rid the country of their terrors. These became magni- 
 fied into dragons, which are thought to have been an 
 exaggeration of the crocodile by old naturalists ; for the 
 pictured dragon resembles a huge lizard more than any 
 other animal. In the Apocalypse the devil is called the 
 dragon, on which account St. George, the patron saint of 
 England, is usually painted on horseback, and killing at 
 a dragon under his feet, as emblematical of the saint's faith 
 and fortitude. The term Dragon was often applied alle- 
 gorically, as to a Danish rover, a domestic tyrant, or, as in 
 the well-known case of the Dragon of Wantley, a villanous 
 overgrown lawyer, endowed with all the venom, maw, and 
 speed of a flying eft, whom the gallant More of More Hall 
 ' slew with nothing at all' but the aid of a good conscience, 
 and a fair young maid of sixteen, ' to 'noint him o'ernight 
 when he went to fight, and to dress him in the morning.' 
 Of him we shall presently speak more at length. 
 
 How the idea of the crocodile could reach our villages 
 centuries ago is a mystery but it has been surmised that the 
 real history of these crocodiles or alligators, if they are such, 
 may be, that they were brought home by crusaders as speci- 
 mens of dragons, just as Henry the Lion Duke of Brunswick 
 brought from the Holy Land the antelope's horn, which 
 had been palmed upon him as a specimen of a griffin's 
 claw ; and that they should be afterwards fitted with appro- 
 priate legends, is not surprising. At the west door of the
 
 158 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 Cathedral of Cracow are hanging some bones said to have 
 belonged to the dragon which inhabited the cave at the 
 foot of the rock (the Wawel) on which the cathedral and 
 royal castle stand ; and this creature is said to have been 
 destroyed by Kratz, the founder of the city. Others think 
 that the dragon of the Crusaders must have been the boa 
 constrictor. St. Jerome mentions the trail of a dragon seen 
 in the sand in the desert, which appeared as if a great beam 
 had been dragged along. Now, it is not likely that a 
 crocodile would have ventured so far from the bank of the 
 Nile as to be seen in the desert. 
 
 Recently an ingenious attempt has been made to identify 
 the dragon with the crocodile. M. de Freminville cites 
 many known facts of natural history, to prove that there is 
 no reason to believe that crocodiles never inhabited Western 
 Europe, merely because we do not now find them there. 
 And, above all, he adduces the fact that, in the sand at the 
 mouth of the Seine, at Harfleur, and Quillebceuf, entire 
 skeletons of crocodiles have been found in a state only 
 half fossilized. From all which he concludes, that the 
 continual battles of the heroes of the middle ages were, in 
 truth, real encounters with crocodiles. 
 
 A correspondent of Notes and Queries, No. 6r, passing 
 through the city of .Briinn, in Moravia, had his attention 
 drawn to the Lindwurm, or Dragon, preserved there from 
 a very remote period. This monster, according to tradi- 
 tion, was invulnerable, like his brother of Wantley, except 
 in a few well-guarded points ; and from his particular pre-
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 159 
 
 dilection in favour of veal and young children, was the 
 scourge and terror of the neighbourhood. The broken 
 armour and well-picked bones of many doughty knights, 
 scattered around the entrance to the cave he inhabited, 
 testified to the impunity with which he had long carried on 
 his depredations, in spite of numerous attempts to destroy 
 him. The lindwurm at length fell a victim to the crafti- 
 ness of a knight, who, to deceive his opponent, stuffed, as 
 true to nature as possible, with unslaked lime, the skin of 
 a freshly killed calf, which he laid before the dragon's cave. 
 The monster, smelling the skin, is said to have rushed 
 out instantly, and to have swallowed the fatal repast ; and 
 feeling afterwards, as may be readily expected, a most insa- 
 tiable thirst, hurried off to a neighbouring stream, where he 
 drank, until the water, acting upon the lime, caused him to 
 burst. The inhabitants, on learning the joyful news, carried 
 the knight and the lindwurm in triumph into the city of 
 Briinn, where they have ever since treasured up the memento 
 of their former tyrant. The animal or reptile thus pre- 
 served is undoubtedly of the crocodile or alligator species, 
 though any attempt to count the distinguishing bones would 
 be fruitless, the scaly back having been covered too thickly 
 with pitch as protection from the weather. May not the 
 legendary dragons have their origin from similar circum- 
 stances to those of this Briinn lindwurm ? 
 
 Of all dragons, that of Wantley is the most celebrated. 
 ' This famous monster had, according to old story, forty- 
 four teeth of iron ; and some historians say he used to
 
 160 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 swallow up churches full of people, fat parson and all, and 
 pick his teeth with the steeple ; but this was probably only 
 scandal. Little children, however, it is certain, he used 
 to munch up as we would an apple. He had eyes like 
 live coals, with a long sting in his tail ; and his sulphurous 
 breath poisoned the country for ten miles round. The 
 knight who went to fight this monster very wisely got him- 
 self a suit of armour stuck all over with iron spikes, so that 
 he looked like a great hedgehog; and when the dragon 
 tried to worry him, he was obliged to leave go again. Then 
 the knight gave him some proper kicks in the ribs with the 
 spikes at the end of his iron boots, and once ran his sword 
 right into him, and killed him ; but the dragon, forgetting 
 he was dead, still fought on, till a great part of his tail 
 being lopped off, and his blood pouring out by bucketsful, 
 he cried out " Murder !" most lustily, and afterwards fainted 
 away, and groaned, and kicked, and died. But, after all, 
 the knight ran his sword into him several times, rightly 
 conceiving that such a villain could never be too dead ! 
 If this story should not be true, it's founded on truth, and 
 that's all the same thing. An overgrown rascally attorney 
 at Wantley, near Rotherham, in Yorkshire, cheated some 
 children out of a large estate; but a gentleman in the 
 neighbourhood, arming himself with the spikes of the law, 
 recovered their property for them ; and the attorney having 
 lost it and his character for ever, sickened, grieved, and 
 died. But what would such a dry, every-day story of villany 
 be worth without some poetical flourishes about it ? or, as
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 161 
 
 Flutter says, " Really the common occurrences of this little 
 dirty world are hardly worth relating without some embel- 
 lishment."' 1 
 
 * Old Wortley Montague (Lady Mary's husband),' says 
 Walpole, ' lived on the very spot where the dragon of 
 Wantley did, only, I believe, the latter was much better 
 lodged : you never saw such a wretched hovel lean, un- 
 painted, and half its nakedness barely shaded with harateen 
 stretched till it cracks. Here the miser hoards health and 
 money his only two objects ; he has chronicles in behalf 
 of the air, and battens on tokay, his single indulgence, as 
 he has heard it is particularly salutary. But the savage- 
 ness of the scene would charm your Alpine taste : it is 
 tumbled with fragments of mountains, that looked ready 
 laid for building the world. One scrambles over a huge 
 terrace, on which mountain ashes and various trees spring 
 out of the very rocks ; and at the brow is the den, but 
 not spacious enough for such an inmate. However, I am 
 persuaded it furnished Pope with this line, so exactly it 
 answered to the picture : 
 
 " On rifted rocks, the dragon's late abode." ' 
 
 St. Leonard's Forest had, some two centuries and a half 
 since, a prodigy which ranks amongst Sussex traditions. 
 Concerning this monster there was published a tract, en- 
 titled ' True and Wonderful: a discourse relating to a 
 strange and monstrous serpent or dragon lately discovered, 
 
 1 Percy's Reliques of Ancient Poetry. 
 L
 
 1 62 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 and yet living, to the great annoyance and divers slaughters 
 both of men and cattle, by this strong and violent Poyson, 
 in Sussex, two miles from Horsham, in a wood called St. 
 Leonard's Forest, and thirtie miles from London, this pre- 
 sent month of August 1614, with the true generation of 
 serpents.' 
 
 The monster was ' nine feet or rather more in length, 
 and shaped almost in the form of an axle-tree of a cart, 
 a quantitie of thickness in the middest, and somewhat 
 smaller at both ends !' He was blackish upon the back, and 
 red under the belly ; and besides having large feet, he was 
 furnished with two large bunches ' so big as a footeball, 
 which, as some think, will grow to wings.' ' I hope,' adds 
 the narrator, ' that God will so defend the poor people in 
 the neighbourhood, that he shall be destroyed before he 
 growe to fledge? He left a track behind him, ' as by a small 
 similitude we may perceive in a snail.' His ' former part' 
 he could ' shoote forth as a necke, supposed to be about an 
 ell long.' He was ' of countenance very proud,' and carried 
 himself 'with great arrogancie.' He cast his venom 'about 
 four roddes,' thereby killing a man, a woman, and two 
 mastiffs. He did not, however, devour his victims, either 
 human or canine, but lived chiefly upon the conies of a 
 neighbouring warren, which was found to be ' much scanted 
 and impaired in the increase it had been wont to afford.' 
 
 This monster was perhaps, after all, nothing more than 
 some misshapen log of wood that superstition had con- 
 verted into a dragon.
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 163 
 
 A more romantic legend makes St. Leonard himself, 
 after the pattern of the earlier saints Michael and George, 
 the slayer of the dragon ; and it may be reckoned as the 
 prettiest relic of the legendary lore of Sussex, that wherever 
 the blood of the saint was spilled during the dread en- 
 counter, there sprang up abundance of ' lilies of the valley,' 
 which still adorn and perfume various spots in the forest. 
 The legend goes on to state that the saint, on being asked 
 what reward he would like for his meritorious service, de- 
 manded the eternal silence of the nightingale, which was 
 granted ; and hence it was predicted of the forest, that in it 
 
 ' &lje ^Utters tuber stnnge, 
 Jtor EC $Bgf)itngaIea 
 
 The belief in monstrous serpents lurking among the 
 woods of the Weald of Sussex was not quite extinct in 
 the writer's boyhood, and it might very possibly be traced 
 up through the middle ages to the period of Scandinavian 
 and Teutonic romance ; and when a great part of the 
 county yet remained in a condition of forest, it would 
 always be the interest of smugglers, gamekeepers, wood- 
 men, and such like, to invest their several spheres with 
 terrors for the young and the weak-minded, and to ' breathe 
 a browner horrour o'er the woods ' (M. A. Lower Old 
 Speech and Words). 
 
 It is curious to find that the district wherein we have 
 been tracing these Dragon legends, has in our time 
 yielded to the geologist gigantic evidences of a former 
 world. In the beds of the Wealden series, in Tilgate
 
 1 64 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 Forest, Dr. Mantell has found fragments of the most 
 remarkable reptilian fossils yet discovered. In the grounds 
 of the Crystal Palace at Sydenham are restorations of these 
 animals, sufficiently perfect to illustrate this reptilian epoch. 
 They include the Iguanodon, a herbivorous lizard, ex- 
 ceeding in size the largest elephant, accompanied by the 
 equally gigantic and carnivorous great Saurian (Megalo- 
 saurus), and by the two yet more curious reptiles, the forest 
 or Weald Saurian (Pyl(Bosaurus\ and the Pterodactyl, an 
 enormous bat-like creature, now running upon the ground 
 like a bird ; its elevated body and long neck not covered 
 with feathers, but with skin, naked or resplendent with 
 glittering scales, its head like that of a lizard or crocodile, 
 and of preposterous size, with its long fore extremities 
 stretched out, and connected by a membrane with the body 
 and hind legs. Suddenly this mailed creature rose in the 
 air, and realized or even surpassed in strangeness the 
 flying dragon of fable; its fore-arms and its elongated wing- 
 finger furnished with claws; hand and fingers extended, 
 with the interspace filled up by a tough membrane ; and 
 its head and neck stretched out like that of the heron in 
 its flight. When stationary, its wings were probably folded 
 back like those of a bird ; though perhaps, by the claws 
 attached to its fingers, it might suspend itself from the 
 branches of trees. In times when the belief in dragons 
 was strong, these colossal remains, when unearthed, were 
 not understood, and philosophers had yet to learn how to 
 reconstruct an extinct animal, starting with a single bone.
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 165 
 
 It would therefore be a stretch of speculation to identify 
 the dragons of the Sussex peasantry with the above fossil 
 remains ; but the association is very suggestive of the 
 axiom, that truth is stranger than fiction. 
 
 A curious legend lingers about 'Tees-seated Sockburn, 
 county Durham, where, by long descent, Conyers was 
 lord.' The hall has disappeared, and the legend alone 
 connects the deserted spot with a recollection of its early 
 owners. Sir John Conyers, a doughty knight, is recorded 
 have slain a venomous wyvern, which was the terror of 
 ic country round, and to have been requited by a royal 
 gift of the manor of Sockburn, to be held by the service 
 of presenting a falchion to each bishop of Durham on his 
 first entrance into the Palatinate. Truly could the Conyers 
 
 say: 
 
 ' By this sword we hold our land.' 
 
 The Norman name of Conyers may not be, as thought, 
 the veritable style of the dragon-slaying knight of Saxon 
 times ; much less probable is it that the falchion of Coeur- 
 de-Lion's days, still preserved in the modern house at 
 Sockburn, belonged to him. But the sword of the Conyers 
 was the title-deed to their estate. In compliance with the 
 tenure, when each new bishop of Durham first comes to 
 his diocese, the lord of Sockburn, meeting him in the 
 middle of Neashamford or Croft Bridge, presents him with 
 a falchion, addressing him in these words : ' My Lord 
 Bishop, I here present you with the falchion wherewith 
 the champion Conyers slew the worm, dragon, or fiery-
 
 1 66 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 flying serpent, which destroyed man, woman, and child ; 
 in memory of which, the king then reigning gave him the 
 manor of Sockburn to hold by this tenure, that, upon 
 the first entrance of every bishop into the county, this 
 falchion should be presented.' The bishop returns it, 
 wishing the Lord of Sockburn health and long enjoy- 
 ment of the manor. 
 
 THE WORM OF LAMBTON HALL. 
 
 THIS strange story has often been told, but by none so 
 well as by Surtees, the able historian of the county, in 
 these words : 
 
 ' The heir of Lambton fishing, as was his profane custom, 
 in the Wear on a Sunday, hooked a small worm or eft, 
 which he carelessly threw into a well, and thought no more 
 of the adventure. The worm (at first neglected) grew till 
 it was too large for its first habitation, and, issuing from 
 the Worm Well, betook itself to the Wear, where it usually 
 lay a part of the day coiled round a crag in the middle 
 of the water. It also frequented a green mound near 
 the well (the Worm Hill), where it lapped itself nine 
 times round, leaving vermicular traces, of which grave 
 living witnesses depose that they have seen the vestiges. 
 It now became the terror of the country; and, amongst 
 other enormities, levied a daily contribution of nine 
 cows' milk, which was always placed for it at the green
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 167 
 
 hill; and in default of which, it devoured man and 
 beast. 
 
 ' Young Lambton had, it seems, meanwhile totally re- 
 pented him of his former life and conversation, had bathed 
 himself in a bath of holy water, taken the sign of the cross, 
 and joined the Crusaders. On his return home, he was 
 extremely shocked at witnessing the effects of his youth- 
 ful imprudences, and immediately undertook the adventure. 
 After several fierce combats, in which the Crusader was 
 foiled by his enemy's power of self-itnion, he found it 
 expedient to add policy to courage ; and not perhaps pos- 
 sessing much of the former, he went to consult a witch, 
 or wise woman. By her judicious advice he armed him- 
 self in a coat of mail, studded with razor-blades ; and thus 
 prepared, placed himself on the crag in the river, and 
 awaited the monster's arrival. At the usual time the 
 Worm came to the rock, and wound himself with great 
 fury round the armed knight, who had the satisfaction to 
 see his enemy cut to pieces by his own efforts, whilst the 
 stream, washing away the severed parts, prevented the 
 possibility of reunion. 
 
 'There is still a sequel to the story. The witch had 
 promised Lambton success only on one condition that 
 he should slay the first living thing which met his sight 
 after the victory. To avoid the possibility of human 
 slaughter, Lambton had directed his father, that as soon 
 as he heard him sound three blasts on his bugle, in token 
 of the achievement performed, he should release his
 
 1 68 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 favourite greyhound, which would immediately fly to the 
 sound of the horn, and was destined to be the sacrifice. 
 On hearing his son's bugle, however, the old chief was so 
 overjoyed that he forgot the injunction, and ran himself 
 with open arms to meet his son. Instead of committing 
 a parricide, the conqueror again repaired to his adviser, 
 who pronounced, as the alternative of disobeying the 
 original instructions, that no chief of the Lambtons should 
 die in his bed for seven or (as some accounts say) for nine 
 generations, a commutation which, to a martial spirit, 
 had nothing probably very terrible, and which was willingly 
 complied with.' 
 
 It is hardly worth while to add anything as to the veri- 
 fication of the alleged prophecy. Some thirty years ago, 
 it was shown that both the father and the grandfather of 
 the then Lord Durham died in their beds, when it was 
 remarked that ' the period embraced in the supposed pre- 
 diction must long since have expired.' 
 
 The Lambtons were a family of good and valorous 
 repute long before the date of their family legend (which 
 only ascends to the fourteenth century) ; and it does not 
 appear that the hero of the tale reaped anything from 
 his adventure, except the honour of the achievement, and 
 a very singular curse on his descendants till the ninth 
 generation. 
 
 The Worm Hill is not within the domain of Lamb ton 
 in the county of Durham, but on the north bank of the 
 Wear, in the estate of North Biddick, a mile and a half
 
 DRAGON LEGENDS. 169 
 
 from old Lambton Hall. The hill is a small artificial cone 
 of common earth and river gravel. The Worm Well lies 
 between the hill and the Wear. Half a century ago the 
 Worm Well was in repute as a wishing we//, and was one 
 of the scenes dedicated to the festivities and superstitions 
 of Midsummer Eve. A crooked pin may sometimes be still 
 discovered sparkling amongst the clean gravel at the 
 bottom of the basin. 
 
 This legend and its traditions are thought to have been 
 represented under the form of a gigantic snail. Mr. 
 Halliwell records having seen, in Pynson's edition of Kalen- 
 der of Shepherdes, a curious woodcut representing a snail 
 defying the attacks of armed men. It was accompanied 
 by the following lines : 
 
 ' I am a beast of right great mervayle, 
 Upon my backe my house reysed I here ; 
 I am neyther flesshe ne bone to auv'ayle : 
 As well as a great oxe two homes I were : 
 If that these armed men approche me nere, 
 I shall then soone vaynquysshe every chone ; 
 But they dare not, for fere of me alone. ' 
 
 Upon this Mr. Riley observes that the above words 
 ' may bear reference to the Laidly Worm, a fabulous 
 monster which in remote times is said to have devastated 
 the county of Durham, slaughtering men, women, and 
 children, and setting armed troops at defiance. It is, I 
 believe, supposed by antiquaries at the present day, 
 that by the word worm a serpent or dragon was meant ; 
 but it is not improbable that the author of the Kalender
 
 170 DRAGON LEGENDS. 
 
 of Shepherdes may have understood the word in a some- 
 what more literal sense, and, by a stretch of the imagina- 
 tion, adapted the story to a snail' (Notes and Queries, 
 2d series, Nos. 53, 62). Snails, we know, have been 
 used in love divinations, and in various other forms of 
 superstition.' 
 
 * The Serpent in the Sea ' was at one time a very general 
 superstition among the heathens ; for we find it in Isaiah 
 xxvii. i : * In that day the Lord, with His sore, and great, 
 and strong sword, shall punish leviathan the piercing ser- 
 pent, even leviathan that crooked serpent ; and He shall 
 slay the dragon that is in the sea. 1
 
 LEGENDS OF 'THE RED HAND.' 
 
 'ERALDRY has been stigmatized as 'the science 
 of fools with long memories;' but it should 
 rather be designated as a science which, pro- 
 perly directed, would make fools wise, for it is a key to 
 history which may yet unlock stores of information. Its 
 study has been so confused with the fantastic absurdities of 
 its professors, that in the lapse of centuries it has become 
 clogged with popular errors as to the significance of its 
 badges and other distinctions. 
 
 The badge of Ulster King-at-Arms in Ireland is a red 
 hand, the origin of which is as follows : 
 
 In an ancient expedition of some adventurers to Ireland, 
 their leader declared that whoever first touched the shore 
 should possess the territory which he reached. O'Neil, from 
 whom descended the princes of Ulster, bent upon obtaining 
 the reward, and seeing another boat likely to land, cut off 
 his hand and threw it on the coast. Hence the traditionary 
 origin of ' The Red Hand of Ulster.' ' The Red Hand ' 
 was assigned to King James i. as the badge of the baronets, 
 the design of the institution of the order being the coloniza-
 
 172 LEGENDS OF 'THE RED HAND.' 
 
 tion of Ulster and Ireland. The arms of that province 
 were deemed the most appropriate insignia. 1 
 
 But there is a superstition connected with this honourable 
 badge of baronetcy, which is too deeply rooted in the minds 
 of the vulgar to be eradicated without great difficulty, as the 
 following instance will show : In the year 1856, Mr. C. J. 
 Douglas being at Hagley, and conversing with a villager 
 about the Lyttelton family, was gravely informed that, on 
 account of the misdeeds of Thomas Lord Lyttelton (con- 
 cerning whom the story is told that he foretold his own 
 death, being informed thereof in a dream), the Lord Lyttel- 
 tons were compelled to have a * bloody hand' in their arms, 
 and that their arms being painted on a board, with the 
 bloody hand very conspicuous thereon, were placed over the 
 door of the hall at Hagley ; and Mr. Douglas was moreover 
 informed that his lordship dare not remove it for twelve 
 months. This board, which was placed there just after the 
 death of the late lord, was nothing more or less than a 
 hatchment ; and Mr. Douglas was told that the hand was to 
 be smaller every generation, until it entirely disappeared. 
 
 Mr. Douglas adds another instance of this absurd belief. 
 In one of the windows of Aston Church, near Birmingham, 
 are the arms of the Holts, baronets of Aston ; and there, 
 unfortunately, the hand has been painted minus one finger ; 
 to explain which, it is told that one of the Holts, having 
 committed some evil deed, was compelled to place the 
 
 1 Communication from Sir Bernard Burke, Ulster, to Popular Errors 
 Explained and Illustrated, new edition, 1858.
 
 LEGENDS OF 'THE RED HAND.' 173 
 
 bloody hand in his arms, and transmit the same to his de- 
 scendants, who were allowed to take one finger off for each 
 generation, until all the fingers and thumb being deducted, it 
 might at length be dispensed with altogether (Notes and 
 Queries, 2d series, No. 12). 
 
 The tradition to which this, strange insertion is said to 
 refer is, that one of the family ' murdered his cook, and was 
 afterwards compelled to adopt the red hand in his arms.' 
 The tradition adds, that Sir Thomas Holt murdered the 
 cook in a cellar at the old family mansion, by ' running him 
 through with a spit,' and afterwards buried him beneath the 
 spot where the tragedy was enacted. In 1850, the ancient 
 family residence where the murder is said to have been 
 committed, was levelled with the ground ; and among per- 
 sons who, from their position in society, might be supposed 
 to be better informed, considerable anxiety was expressed 
 to ascertain whether any portion of the skeleton of the mur- 
 dered cook had been discovered beneath the flooring of 
 the cellar, which tradition, fomented by illiterate gossip, 
 pointed out as the place of his interment. 
 
 The ancient family residence was situated at Duddeston, 
 a hamlet adjoining Birmingham. Here the Holts resided 
 until May 1631, when Sir Thomas took up his abode at 
 Aston Hall, a noble structure in the Elizabethan style of 
 architecture, which, according to a contemporary inscrip- 
 tion, was commenced in April 1618, and completed in 
 1635. Sir Thomas was a decided royalist, and maintained 
 his allegiance to his sovereign, although the men of Bir-
 
 i/4 LEGENDS OF 'THE RED HAND.' 
 
 mingham were notorious for their disaffection, and the 
 neighbouring garrison of Edgbaston was occupied by Par- 
 liamentarian troops. When Charles i., of glorious or un- 
 happy memory, was on his way from Shrewsbury to the 
 important battle of Edgehill, on the confines of Warwick- 
 shire, he remained with Sir Thomas as his guest from the 
 1 5th to the 1 7th of October ; and a closet was long pointed 
 out to the visitor where he is said to have been concealed. 
 A neighbouring eminence is to the present day called 
 ' King's Standing,' from the fact of Charles having stood 
 thereon while addressing his troops. By his acts of loyalty, 
 Sir Thomas Holt acquired the hostility of his rebellious 
 neighbours. Accordingly, we learn that on the i8th of 
 December 1643 he had recourse to Colonel Levison, who 
 ' put forty muskettiers into the house ' to avert impending 
 dangers ; but eight days afterwards, on the 26th of Decem- 
 ber, 'the rebels, 1200 strong, assaulted it, and the day fol- 
 lowing took it, kill'd 12, and ye rest made prisoners, though 
 with lose of 60 of themselves.' The grand staircase, de- 
 servedly so entitled, bears evident marks of the injury occa- 
 sioned at this period, and an unoffending cannon-ball is 
 still preserved. 
 
 Edward, the son and heir of Sir Thomas, died at Oxford 
 on the 28th of August 1643, anc ^ was buried in Christ 
 Church. He was an ardent supporter of the king. The old 
 baronet was selected as ambassador to Spain by Charles i., 
 but was excused on account of his infirmities. He died in 
 1654, in the eighty-third year of his age. His excellence
 
 LEGENDS OF 'THE RED HAND.' 175 
 
 and benevolence of character would afford presumptive evi- 
 dence of the falsehood of the Red-Hand tradition, if it were 
 not totally exploded by the absurdity of the hypothesis 
 upon which it is grounded. Sir Thomas was succeeded in 
 the baronetcy by his grandson Robert, who, in compliance 
 with his will, built an almshouse, or hospital, for five men 
 and five women. It is unnecessary to trace the family 
 further, except to state that nearly at the close of the last 
 century the entail was cut off. The family is now unknown 
 in the neighbourhood, except in its collateral branches. 
 The mansion was next occupied by James Watt, Esq., son 
 of the eminent mechanical philosopher. 
 
 With reference to the former residence of the Holts at 
 Duddeston, it will be sufficient to state, that in the middle 
 of the last century the house and grounds were converted 
 into a tavern and pleasure-gardens, under the metropolitan 
 title of Vauxhall, and for a century continued to afford 
 recreation to the busy inhabitants of Birmingham ; but in 
 1850 the house was taken down, and the site and the 
 gardens cleared for building purposes. 
 
 Here we may mention that the Red Hand in a hatch- 
 ment at Wateringbury Church, Kent, and on the table in 
 the hall of Church-Gresley in Derbyshire, has found expla- 
 nation similar to the preceding. Indeed, there is scarcely 
 a baronet's family in the country respecting which this 
 Red Hand of Ulster has not been the means of raising 
 some tale, of which murder and punishment are the leading 
 features.
 
 176 LEGENDS OF ' THE RED HAND.' 
 
 In the case of the armorial bearings of Nelthorpe of Gray's 
 Inn, Middlesex, a sword erect in the shield, a second 
 sword held upright in the crest, and a red hand held up in 
 the angle of the shield, would, as naturally expected, in the 
 absence of better information, lead to the supposition of 
 some sanguinary business in the records of the family. 
 
 Of interest akin to the preceding is the Legend of Sir 
 Richard Baker, surnamed ' Bloody Baker,' who lies interred 
 in the Church of Cranbrook, in Kent, where a handsome 
 monument is erected to his memory. The gauntlet, gloves, 
 helmet, and spurs, were (as is often the case in monuments 
 of Elizabeth's date) suspended over the tomb. The colour 
 of the gloves was red, denoting the blood Baker had shed 
 in his lifetime, of which the following strange tale is told. 
 
 The Baker family had formerly large possessions in Cran- 
 brook, but in the reign of Edward vi. great misfortunes fell 
 on them : by extravagance and dissipation they gradually 
 lost all their lands, until an old house in the village (after- 
 wards used as the poorhouse) was all that remained to them. 
 The sole representative of the family remaining at the acces- 
 sion of Queen Mary was Sir Richard Baker. He had spent 
 some years abroad, in consequence of a duel ; but when 
 Queen Mary reigned, he thought he might safely return, as 
 he was a Papist. On coming to Cranbrook, he took up his 
 abode in his old house ; he only brought with him a foreign 
 servant, and these two persons lived alone. Very soon 
 strange stories began to be whispered of unearthly shrieks
 
 LEGENDS OF ' THE RED HAND.' 177 
 
 having been heard frequently to issue at nightfall from his 
 house. Many persons of importance were stopped and 
 robbed in the Glastonbury woods ; and many unfortunate 
 travellers were missed, and never after heard of. 
 
 Richard Baker still continued to live in seclusion, but he 
 gradually repurchased his alienated property, although he 
 was known to have spent all he possessed before he left 
 England. But wickedness was not always to prosper. He 
 formed an apparent attachment to a young lady in the 
 neighbourhood, remarkable for always wearing a great 
 number of jewels. He often pressed her to come and see 
 his old house, telling her he had many curious things he 
 wished to show her. She had hitherto always evaded fixing 
 a day for her visit; but happening to walk within a short 
 distance of the house, she determined to surprise Baker 
 with a call. Her companion, a lady older than herself, 
 endeavoured to dissuade her from doing so ; but she would 
 not be turned from her purpose. They knocked at the 
 door, but no one answered them : they, however, discovered 
 it was not locked, and determined to enter. At the head 
 of the staircase hung a parrot, which, on their passing, cried 
 out : 
 
 ' Peapot. pretty lady, be not too bold, 
 Or your red blood will soon run cold.' 
 
 And cold did run the blood of the adventurous damsel, 
 when on opening one of the room doors she found it nearly 
 filled with the bodies of murdered persons, chiefly women. 
 Just then they heard a noise, and on looking out of the
 
 178 LEGENDS OF 'THE RED HAND.' 
 
 window saw Bloody Baker and his servant bringing in the 
 body of a lady. Paralyzed with fear, they concealed them- 
 selves in a recess under the staircase. 
 
 As the murderers with their dead burden passed by 
 them, the hand of the murdered lady hung in the baluster of 
 the stairs : with an oath Baker chopped it off, and it fell 
 into the lap of one of the concealed ladies. They ran 
 away, having the presence of mind' to carry with them the 
 dead hand, on one of the fingers of which was a ring. On 
 reaching home, they told the story, and, in confirmation of 
 it, displayed the ring. All the families in the neighbour- 
 hood who had lost relatives mysteriously were then told 
 of what had been found out ; and they determined to ask 
 Baker to a party, apparently in a friendly manner, but to 
 have constables concealed ready to take him into custody. 
 He came unsuspectingly, and then the lady told him all she 
 had seen, pretending it was a dream. ' Fair lady,' said he, 
 ' dreams are nothing ; they are but fables.' ' They may be 
 fables,' replied she ; ' but is this a fable ?' And she produced 
 the hand and ring ! Upon this the constables rushed in, 
 and took Baker into custody ; and the tradition further says 
 that he was burnt, notwithstanding Queen Mary tried to 
 save him on account of his professing the Roman Catholic 
 religion. 
 
 A somewhat similar legend is connected with a monument 
 in the Church of Stoke d'Abernon, Surrey, the appearance 
 of a ' bloody hand ' upon which is thus accounted for. Two
 
 LEGEND OF THE BODACH GLASS. 179 
 
 young brothers of the family of Vincent, the elder of whom 
 had just come into possession of his estate, were out shooting 
 on Fairmile Common, about two miles from the village. 
 They had put up several birds, but had not been able to 
 get a single shot, when the elder swore with an oath that 
 he would fire at whatever they next met with. They had 
 not gone much further before the miller of a mill near at 
 hand (and which was standing a few years ago) passed them, 
 and made some trifling remark. As soon as he had passed 
 by, the younger brother jokingly reminded the elder of his 
 oath, whereupon the latter immediately fired at the miller, 
 who fell dead upon the spot. Young Vincent escaped to 
 his home, and through the influence of his family, backed 
 by large sums of money, no effective steps were taken to 
 apprehend him. He lay concealed in the ' Nunnery ' build- 
 ing on his estate for some years, when death put a period 
 to the insupportable anguish of his mind. To commemorate 
 this rash act, and his untimely death, the ' bloody hand ' 
 was placed on his monument in Stoke Church ; but the 
 narrator of the story conjectures that the hand might be 
 only the Ulster badge. 
 
 LEGEND OF THE BODACH GLASS. 
 
 AMONG the warnings or notices of death to be found in 
 the dark chronicle of superstition, the omens peculiar to 
 certain families are not the least striking. Pennant tells 
 us that many of the great families in Scotland had their 
 demon or genius, who gave them monitions of future events.
 
 i8o LEGEND OF THE BODACH GLASS. 
 
 Thus, the family of Rothmurchan had the Bodac au Dun, 
 or Ghost of the Hill ; and Kinchardines, the Spectre of the 
 Bloody Hand ; Gartnibeg House was haunted by Bodach 
 Gartin ; and Tulloch Gorus by Manch Monlach, or the 
 Girl with the Hairy Left Hand. Bodach signifies, from the 
 Saxon, Bode, a messenger, a tidings-bringer. 
 
 The Bodach Glass is introduced in the novel of Waverley 
 as the family superstition of the Maclvors, the truth of 
 which has been traditionally proved by three hundred years' 
 experience. It is thus described to Waverley by Fergus : 
 
 * You must know, then, that when my ancestor, Ian nan 
 Chaistel, wasted Northumberland, there was appointed with 
 him in the expedition a sort of Southland chief, or captain 
 of a band of Lowlanders, called Halbert Hall. In their 
 return through the Cheviots they quarrelled about the divi- 
 sion of the great booty they had acquired, and came from 
 words to blows. The Lowlanders were cut off to a man, 
 and their chief fell the last, covered with wounds, by the 
 sword of my ancestor. Since that time his spirit has crossed 
 the Vich Ian Vohr of the day when any great disaster was 
 impending. My father saw him twice : once before he was 
 made prisoner at Sheriff Muir, another time on the morning 
 of the day on which he died.' 
 
 Fergus then relates to Waverley the appearance of the 
 Bodach : * Last night,' said Fergus, ' I felt so feverish that 
 I left my quarters, and walked out, in hopes the keen frosty 
 air would brace my nerves. I cannot tell how much I dis- 
 like going on, for I know you will hardly believe me.
 
 LEGEND OF THE BODACH GLASS. 181 
 
 However, I crossed a small foot-bridge, and kept walking 
 backwards and forwards, when I observed, with surprise, by 
 the clear moonlight, a tall figure in a grey plaid, such as 
 shepherds wear in the south of Scotland, which, move at 
 what pace I would, kept regularly about four yards before 
 me.' 
 
 ' You saw a Cumberland peasant in his ordinary dress, 
 probably.' 
 
 ' No ; I thought so at first, and was astonished at the 
 man's audacity in daring to dog me. I called to him, but 
 received no answer. I felt an anxious throbbing at my 
 heart ; and to ascertain what I dreaded, I stood still, and 
 turned myself on the same spot successively to the four 
 points of the compass. By heaven, Edward, turn where 
 I would, the figure was instantly before my eyes at precisely 
 the same distance ! I was then convinced it was the Bodach 
 Glass. My hair bristled, and my knees shook. I manned 
 myself, however, and determined to return to my quarters. 
 My ghastly visitor glided before me (for I cannot say he 
 walked) until he reached the foot-bridge ; there he stopped, 
 and turned full round. I must either wade the river, or 
 pass him as close as I am to you. A desperate courage, 
 founded on the belief that my death was near, made me 
 resolve to make my way in despite of him. I made the 
 sign of the cross, drew my sword, and uttered, " In the 
 name of God, evil spirit, give place !" " Vich Ian Vohr," 
 it said, in a voice that made my very blood curdle ; " beware 
 of to-morrow.' It seemed at that moment not half a yard
 
 1 82 THE WHITE-BREASTED BIRD. 
 
 from my sword's point ; but the words were no sooner 
 spoken than it was gone, and nothing appeared further 
 to obstruct my passage.' 
 
 THE WHITE-BREASTED BIRD OF THE OXEXHAM FAMILY. 
 
 HOWELL, the letter-writer, relates that he saw, in a stone- 
 cutter's shop in Fleet Street, a marble slab, with the epitaphs 
 of four persons of the Oxenham family ; when at or near 
 death, ' a bird with a white breast was seen fluttering about 
 their beds.' The last appearance of this kind is stated to 
 have been in 1794. In 1641 there was published a tract, 
 with a frontispiece, entitled ' A True Relation of an Appari- 
 tion, in the Likeness of a Bird with a White Breast, that 
 appeared hovering over the Death-bed of some of the 
 Children of Mr. James Oxenham,' etc. And in an account 
 of Sydenham is a statement of a similar appearance at the 
 death of one of the family of Oxenham, in that parish. 
 The inscription upon the marble seen by Howell was : 
 ' Here lies John Oxenham, a goodly young man, in whose 
 chamber, as he was struggling in the pangs of death, a bird 
 with a white breast, was seen fluttering about his bed, and 
 so vanished.'
 
 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 
 
 F the castle of Donington, near Newbury, in 
 Berkshire, only a small ruin remains. Of the 
 castle of Donington, in Leicestershire, the 
 remains are more extensive. In its entirety, this strong- 
 hold, situated on a commanding eminence, rose abruptly 
 from the valley of the Trent, which it proudly looked over 
 and threatened. The character of this fortress was unques- 
 tionably castellated, of the eleventh century ; and the bal- 
 lium or court is still distinctly defined. Each of these 
 castles has been assigned as the abode of Chaucer. 
 
 The castle in Leicestershire, built by Eustace Baron of 
 Haulton and Constable of Chester, was demolished by order 
 of King John about the year 1216 ; its owner, John de Laci, 
 having taken too prominent a part with the rebel barons. 
 But the castle was evidently rebuilt by his grandson, 
 Henri Laci Earl of Lincoln, who died in 1360. The 
 fortress then came into the possession of Thomas Earl of 
 Lancaster, who married Alice, Lincoln's daughter. This 
 prince was cousin to Edward n. ; and he joined a confede- 
 racy of barons who took up arms against the king because
 
 1 84 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 
 
 of the profligacy of his favourites. After the battle of 
 Borough Bridge, being taken prisoner, he was beheaded 
 in the year 1322 ; and, immediately afterwards, the castle 
 was given to the favourite Despencer. Speed thus alludes 
 to this transaction : ' He had not long before created the 
 elder Spencer Earl of Winchester, and deckt the plume of 
 his fortunes with a toppe-feather taken out of the said late 
 Earl of Lancaster's estate, that is to say, with the castle 
 and honour of Donington, parcell of the earldom e of 
 Lincoln.' However, the Despencers did not wear this 
 ' toppe-feather ' long, for in 1325 they were both executed 
 by the capricious Edward's command. 
 
 In 1327, Edward Earl of Kent, uncle of Edward in., 
 was owner of the castle; but in 1330, through the base 
 machinations of Mortimer and the infamous Queen Isa- 
 bella, this good Earl was put to death. An old historian 
 speaks of this event as follows : ' From noone till five at 
 night he [the Earl] stood at the place of death without 
 the castle gates, none being found to behead him, till a 
 base wretch of a marschal-sea was sent and did it ; so little 
 conscience did the malice and ambition of his potent 
 adversaries make of shedding the royal blood, which, by 
 God's juster judgment, was not long unavenged.' 
 
 In 1352 the castle belonged to John Plantagenet Earl 
 of Kent, and Joan his sister was his heir. This Joan was 
 daughter of Earl Edmund, who was brother by the father's 
 side to Edward n. She is reputed to have been the most 
 beautiful woman of the age, and the troubadours and
 
 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 185 
 
 minstrels of the time celebrated her beauty in their songs. 
 She married three times : first the valiant Earl of Salisbury, 
 from whom she was divorced (this first marriage being 
 nothing more than a contract of betrothal) ; secondly, Lord 
 Thomas Holland, who in 1352, in right of his wife, was 
 created Earl of Kent ; third, after his death, the Prince of 
 Wales, her cousin. ' Edward the Black Prince,' says Speed, 
 ' passionately loving her, did marry her, and by her issue 
 had two sons,' one of whom, Richard, afterwards became 
 King of England. In 1385, Joan, Richard the Second's 
 mother, held the town and castle of Donington, with the 
 et cetera of the king, as of the honour of Chester. 
 
 Towards the latter part of the reign of Richard n., and 
 about 1396, according to some historians, Geoffrey Chaucer, 
 the prince of English poetry, resided at Castle Donington. 
 This statement is, however, open to discussion, as there is 
 another Castle Donington which claims the like distinction. 
 John of Gaunt, the powerful Duke of Lancaster, married, 
 for his third wife, Lady Catherine Swinford. This took 
 place in 1396, and her sister Philippa had been previously 
 married to the poet in 1369. ' Shortly after this marriage,' 
 says Clarke (Riches of Chaucer], ' we find Geoffrey in 
 possession of Castle Donington Park and Castle, the noble 
 presentation for life of his princely brother-in-law.' Ashmole 
 the antiquary says of Donington Castle that it was built 
 by a general of King Stephen's, and in course of time 
 became the residence of Geoffrey Chaucer. Camden, in 
 his Britannia, who calls it Dennington or Dunnington,
 
 1 86 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 
 
 describes it as a small but elegant castle, on the top of a 
 woody hill, commanding a pleasant prospect, and lighted 
 by windows on every side; the ruins are visible on the 
 right hand of the road from London to Bath. 
 
 It is quite probable that, if Chaucer did not reside here 
 during much of the last four years of his valuable life 
 namely, from 1396 to 1400 he repeatedly visited the 
 place. Evelyn says, in his Sylva, that at Castle Donington 
 is a famous oak called ' Chaucer's Oak,' under which he 
 wrote several poems ; and, moreover, that Chaucer planted 
 three oaks 'The King's Oak,' 'The Queen's Oak,' and 
 ' Chaucer's.' Osterre says that Chaucer and Wickliffe fre- 
 quently met, and that the abbot and monks of Leicester 
 dreaded Chaucer's poetry more than Wickliffe's preaching ; 
 that a famous hunter was abbot in those days at Leicester, 
 Sir William de Clowne by name, and that his skill as a 
 hare-hunter was so great that the king and his nobles paid 
 him an annual pension that they might hunt with him, 
 and that he is one of the characters intended in The Monk 
 and the Friar. 
 
 The subject is surrounded with obscurity. We find 
 Chaucer in 1359 at Woodstock at that time a royal 
 residence, and the birthplace of the Black Prince. He 
 was banished there because of his Lollard tendencies ; and 
 in that pleasant retreat he wrote the Romaient of the Rose, 
 containing bitter invectives against priestcraft. There he 
 resided upwards of thirty years, and during that time must 
 have had frequent opportunities of meeting the Princess
 
 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 187 
 
 Joan. Both her sons by Thomas Holland were then 
 residing at Castle Donington, where she herself, no doubt, 
 would occasionally resort after the death of the Black 
 Prince in 1376, as she is described by an old chronicle 
 ' passionately fond of her first-born sons.' What so likely 
 as that she would invite Chaucer to Castle Donington, 
 and thereby facilitate his intercourse with Wickliffe, whose 
 convert she was, and who at that time preached all over 
 the country? Wickliffe died in 1384, the Princess Joan 
 in 1385, and the poet Chaucer in 1400; and after a lapse 
 of nearly five hundred years, the recollection of these three 
 personages, who occupy such distinguished and prominent 
 places in the page of history, as the greatest reformer, the 
 greatest beauty, and the greatest poet of that age, imparts 
 an interest to the spot they may all have inhabited or 
 visited together. 
 
 Godwin, in his Life of Chaucer, in two quarto volumes 
 (1803), improves upon the several details of his abode at 
 Castle Donington, by telling us that the Duke of Lancaster 
 purchased the castle, and bestowed it upon Chaucer, being 
 ' determined in the feudal sense to ennoble him !' although 
 he elsewhere suggests that * the circumstances of Chaucer 
 himself might be considered as rendering it somewhat im- 
 probable that he had made such an acquisition toward the 
 close of his life.' 
 
 Mr. Robert Bell, in his annotated edition of the poet, 
 says that, ' even if Chaucer's necessities throughout the 
 period when he is supposed to have kept up the costly
 
 1 88 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 
 
 establishment at Castle Donington were not conclusive 
 against its probability, it is discredited by other circum- 
 stances. Donington Castle became the property of Sir 
 John Phelip, the first husband of Chaucer's granddaughter. 
 This gentleman died in 1415 ; and there is no evidence of 
 any previous connection of any member of Chaucer's family 
 with Donington Castle; nor is there any ground for supposing 
 that Sir John Phelip's tenure commenced till after Chaucer's 
 death. Upon the subsequent marriage of Sir John Phelip's 
 widow, it passed into the possession of her second husband, 
 the Duke of Suffolk. 
 
 ' The story of his residence in Berkshire is further shown 
 to be groundless, by the ascertained fact that Chaucer was 
 unquestionably living in London during the last three years 
 of his life; and that on Christmas Eve, 1399, he entered 
 upon the lease of a house in Westminster for a term of 
 fifty-three years, at the annual rent of 2, 135. 4d. Had 
 he been residing in Berkshire, it is not likely that at his 
 advanced age he would have come up to London and 
 encumbered himself with another establishment. The 
 tenement was situated in the garden of the Chapel of the 
 Blessed Mary of Westminster, said to be very nearly the 
 same spot on which Henry vn.'s chapel stands ; and it was 
 devised to Chaucer by Robert Hermodesworth, a monk, 
 with the consent of the abbot and convent of that place.' 
 
 Chaucer died here, 25th October 1400. Soon after 
 Chaucer's death, Sir Hugh Shirley was appointed governor 
 of the castle, and it was incorporated with the Duchy of
 
 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 189 
 
 Lancaster. During the Wars of the Roses, the castle and 
 town were true to the Red Rose, and the Lancastrian party 
 held it. Edward iv., being in peaceable possession of the 
 throne, granted the stewardship, in 1461, of the castle and 
 manor to Sir William Hastings for distinguished services : 
 he was chamberlain to Edward iv. 
 
 After passing through various hands, a descendant of 
 this Sir William Hastings (George Hastings, Earl of Hun- 
 tingdon) purchased, in 1505, from Robert Earl of Essex 
 and others, the Castle and Park of Donington, with all the 
 herbage, pannage, and agistments thereof. The castle ' he 
 quite ruined,' but built a 'fair house' in the neighbourhood. 
 Many martial trophies have been found at different times 
 among the ruins, such as chain-armour, daggers, a battle- 
 axe, cannon-balls, etc. 
 
 In Domesday Book, there was 'at Dunitone' a mill 
 of i os. 8d. value, and a wood twelve furlongs long and 
 eight broad. No doubt the present park and king's mills 
 are a portion of the property thus named in the Conqueror's 
 survey. Many of the early Saxon writers refer to immense 
 forests of oak-trees which covered this part of England ; 
 and there are individual trees standing in Donington Park 
 which must have formed part of these forests. One which 
 goes by the name of ' Daniel Lambert' is fifteen yards in 
 circumference fifteen feet above its base. This giant of 
 the forest has no doubt flourished in vigour and beauty 
 for a thousand years. 
 
 The offices of constableship, etc., of Donington Castle
 
 1 90 DONINGTON CASTLE AND CHAUCER. 
 
 appear to have been hereditary in the family of De .Staunton. 
 Thomas de Staunton, in the time of Richard n., was high 
 steward. His descendant Robert de Staunton, it is pro- 
 bable, was slain in battle. His granddaughter, and sole 
 heiress of his son, was married in 1423 to Ralph Shirley, 
 Esq., son of Sir Ralph Shirley, Knight, a distinguished 
 commander at the battle of Agincourt ; and from this union 
 of the Stauntons and Shirleys have sprung many mighty men 
 of renown, amongst the rest Sir Robert Shirley, Baronet, 
 
 ' Whose singular praise it is 
 To have done the best things in the worst times, 
 And hoped them in the most calamitous.' 
 
 The son of this Sir Robert, in reward for his special services 
 rendered to King Charles by his father, was in 1677 created 
 Lord Ferrers, and in 1711 Viscount Tamworth and Earl 
 Ferrers. 1 
 
 1 See Dr. Wilson Pearson ; in the Journal of the BritisJi Archae- 
 ological Association, 1863.
 
 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 
 
 !HE calamities which befell the ducal House of 
 Howard, within the lapse of a century, may be 
 ^HyLym cited as impressive instances of the instability 
 of pride and place and human grandeur ; and these in the 
 history of a house whose greatness has almost passed into 
 the proverbial distich : 
 
 ' What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards ? 
 Alas ! not all the blood of all the Howards. ' 
 
 This ducal house stands next to the blood-royal, at the 
 head of the peerage of England, and is the chief of the 
 honourable and large-spreading family of Howard. Sir 
 John Howard was an eminent Yorkist, not only on account 
 of his princely birth (maternally) and magnificent fortune, 
 but from the stations of high trust which at different periods 
 had devolved upon him. After distinguishing himself very 
 early in life in the French wars of Henry vi., Sir John was 
 constituted by Edward iv., in 1461, Constable of the Castle 
 of Norwich, appointed Sheriff of the counties of Norfolk and 
 Suffolk, and granted some of the forfeited manors of James 
 Butler, Earl of Wiltshire, in England, and of Ormonde in
 
 192 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 
 
 Ireland. In 1468, being treasurer of the king's household, 
 Sir John Howard obtained a grant of the whole benefit that 
 should accrue to the king by the coinage of money in the 
 City and Tower of London, or elsewhere in the realm of 
 England, so long as he should continue in that office. In 
 1470, when he was summoned to Parliament under the title 
 of Lord Howard, he was made captain-general of all the 
 king's forces at sea for resisting the attempts of the Lan- 
 castrians, then rallying under Nevil Earl of Warwick, the 
 Duke of Clarence, and others. In 1471 his Lordship was 
 constituted Deputy-Governor of Calais and the marches 
 adjacent ; and his summons to Parliament as a Baron con- 
 tinued until he was created Earl Marshal of England and 
 Duke of Norfolk, 28th June 1483, when his son and heir, 
 Thomas Howard, was created Earl of Surrey. The Duke 
 had previously been invested with the insignia of the Order 
 of the Garter. As Earl Marshal his Grace was empowered 
 (in the king's presence or absence) to bear a golden staff, 
 tipped at each end with black, the upper part thereof to be 
 adorned with the royal arms, and the lower with those of 
 his own family ; and for the better support of the dignity of 
 this office, he obtained a grant to himself and his heirs for 
 ever of 20 annually, payable half-yearly, out of the fee- 
 farm rent of Ipswich, in Suffolk. His Grace was subse- 
 quently constituted Lord Admiral of England, Ireland, and 
 Aquitaine for life, and obtained grants of divers manors 
 and lordships. 
 
 But he did not long enjoy these great possessions ; for
 
 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 193 
 
 the next year, being with Richard at Bosworth Field, he fell 
 in leading the van of that prince's army. His Grace was 
 urged by some of his friends to refrain from attending his 
 sovereign on the field ; and the night previous to the battle, 
 this doggerel warning was found in his tent : 
 
 ' Jockey of Norfolk, be not too bold, 
 For Dickon thy master is bought and sold.' 
 
 Yet he would not desert his royal master ; but as he had 
 faithfully lived under him, so he manfully died by his side. 
 
 Next, Catherine Howard, niece of the second Duke of 
 Norfolk, became the fifth wife of Henry vin. In this 
 marriage Henry considered himself perfectly blessed : the 
 agreeable person and disposition of Catherine had entirely 
 captivated his affections ; and in the height of his transport, 
 he publicly in his chapel returned solemn thanks to Heaven 
 for the unspeakable felicity the conjugal state afforded him. 
 His bliss was soon fated to terminate ; and in the bitter dis- 
 appointment he experienced in Catherine, Heaven seemed 
 to revenge upon him the cruelty with which he had sacrificed 
 his former wives. Her transition from the throne to the 
 scaffold occupied but eighteen months (Kings of England}. 
 
 Next, Thomas Howard, aspiring to the hand of Lady 
 Margaret Douglas, daughter of Margaret Queen of Scotland, 
 and niece of Henry VIIL, was attainted of treason, and died 
 a prisoner in the Tower of London in 1536. 
 
 Henry Earl of Surrey, son of the third Duke, was one of 
 the brightest ornaments of the House of Howard ; and as 
 statesman, poet, and warrior, he is thus characterized by
 
 194 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 
 
 Sir Egerton Brydges : ' Excellent in arts and in arms, a 
 man of learning, a genius, and a hero, of a generous 
 temper and a refined heart, he united all the gallantry and 
 unbroken spirit of a rude age with all the elegance and 
 grace of a polished era. With a splendour of descent, in 
 possession of the highest honours and abundant wealth, he 
 relaxed not his efforts to deserve distinction by his personal 
 worth. Conspicuous in the rough exercises of tilts and 
 tournaments, and commanding armies with skill and bravery 
 in expeditions against the Scots under his father, he found 
 time, at a period when our literature was rude and bar- 
 barous, to cultivate his mind with all the exquisite spirit of 
 the models of Greece and Rome, to catch the excellences 
 of the revived muses of Italy, and to produce in his own 
 language compositions which, in simplicity, perspicuity, 
 graceful ornament, and just and natural thought, exhibited 
 a shining contrast with the works of his predecessors, and 
 an example which his successors long attempted in vain to 
 follow.' The iniquitous execution of this gifted nobleman 
 was the last tyrannical act of Henry vm. The Earl of 
 Surrey underwent the penalty of his unjust sentence during 
 the lifetime of his father (whom the death of the king pre- 
 served from the same fate), 2ist January 1547. 
 
 Thomas, the fourth Duke, shared the fate of his dis- 
 tinguished father, being implicated in the affairs of Mary 
 Queen of Scots. Partly from accident, and partly from the 
 treachery of the Duke's secretary, the conspiracy was dis- 
 covered. It was soon traced by the terror of tJie rack ;
 
 
 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 195 
 
 and there is in existence a warrant from the queen for putting 
 two of the Duke's servants to this torture. The body of 
 the warrant is in the handwriting of Lord Burghley, and the 
 torture was actually inflicted. 
 
 The Duke was arraigned for high treason, i6th January 
 1571 ; and being condemned, his execution was deferred 
 until June 2 following, when he was beheaded upon a scaffold 
 on Tower Hill. There can be little doubt that efforts then 
 making to procure the liberty of the Queen of Scots, and 
 re-establish the supremacy of Catholicism, had much in- 
 fluence over his fate ; for it is known that no fewer than 
 four warrants which had been issued for his execution were 
 successively revoked by Elizabeth. Her last revocation, 
 entirely in her own handwriting, is preserved in the Ash- 
 molean Museum at Oxford. Elizabeth wrote, soon after her 
 discovery of the Duke's entanglement in the Queen of Scots' 
 scheme, the following lines : 
 
 * The doubt of future woes exiles my present joy ; 
 And wit me warns to shun such snares as threaten mine annoy ; 
 For falsehood now doth flow, and subjects' faith doth ebb, 
 Which would not be, if reason ruled, or wisdom weaved the web. 
 But clouds of toys untry'd do cloak aspiring minds, 
 Which turn to rain of late repent, by course of changed winds. 
 The top of hope supposed, the root of ruth will be ; 
 And fruitless all their graffed guiles, as shortly ye shall see. 
 Those dazzled eyes with pride, which great ambition blinds, 
 Shall be unsealed by worthy wights, whose foresight falsehood binds. 
 The daughter of Debate, that eke Discord doth sow, 
 Shall reap no gain, where former rule hath taught still peace to flow. 
 No foreign banish'd wight shall anchor in our port : 
 Our realm it brooks no stranger's force ; let them elsewhere resort.
 
 196 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 
 
 Our rusty sword with rest, shall first the edge employ 
 
 To poll their tops that seek such change, and [thereto] gape with joy.' 
 
 Granger mentions an extremely rare print of the above 
 nobleman, in which he is represented under an arch, whilst 
 under a correspondent arch are displayed thirty coats of 
 arms quartered in one shield. All his honours became 
 forfeited; but his eldest son Philip inherited, in right of 
 his mother, the feudal Earldom of Arundel, as owner of 
 Arundel Castle in Sussex, and was summoned to Parlia- 
 ment as Earl of Arundel; but being attainted in 1590, he 
 was committed to the Tower in 1595. He was styled 'the 
 Renowned Confessor ; ' and we find of his life an impres- 
 sive narrative, edited from the original MSS. by Henry 
 Granville, fourteenth Duke, and published in 1857. The 
 Earl's piety was remarkable. He constantly rose in the 
 morning at five o'clock ; and ' as soon as he was risen out 
 of bed, he fell down upon his bare knees, and breathed 
 forth in secret his first devotions to Almighty God, his eyes 
 and hands lifted up to heaven. With his kneeling in that 
 manner then and at other times, his knees were grown 
 very hard and black.' .... In those times which were 
 allotted to walking or other recreation, his discourse and 
 conversation either with his keeper or the lieutenant, or his 
 own servants, was either tending to piety or some profitable 
 discourse, as of the lives of holy men, of the sufferances 
 and constancy of the martyrs of ancient times, from 
 which he would usually deduce some good document 
 or other, as of the facility of a virtuous life after a man
 
 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 197 
 
 had once overcome his sensuality ; of the happiness of 
 those that suffered anything for our Saviour's sake, 
 with such like ; to which purpose he had writ with his 
 own hand, upon the wall of his chamber, this Latin 
 sentence : Quanta plus afflictionis pro Christo in hoc 
 sceculo, tanto plus gloria cum Christo in futuro. [The 
 more affliction we endure for Christ in this world, 
 the more glory we shall obtain with Christ in the 
 next.] 
 
 The Earl's last moments are thus pathetically described. 
 The last night of his life he spent, for the most part, in 
 prayer, sometimes saying his beads, sometimes such psalms 
 and prayers as he knew by heart ; and oftentimes used 
 these holy aspirations : O Lord, into Thy hands I commend 
 my spirit. Lord, Thou art my hope and life. Very fre- 
 quently, moreover, indicating the holy names of Jesus and 
 Mary. 
 
 ' Seeing his servants in the morning stand by his bedside, 
 weeping in a mournful manner, he asked them what o'clock 
 it was. They answered that it was eight, or thereabout. 
 " Why then," said he, " I have almost run out my course, 
 and come to the end of this miserable and mortal life ; " 
 desiring them not to weep for him, since he did not doubt, 
 by the grace of God, but all would go well with him. 
 Which being said, he returned to his prayers upon 
 his beads again, though then with a very slow, hollow, 
 and fainting voice, and so continued as long as he 
 was able to draw so much breath as was sufficient to
 
 198 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 
 
 sound out the names of Jesus and the glorious Virgin, 
 which were the last words he was ever heard to speak. 
 
 ' The last minute of his last hour being now come, lying 
 on his back, eies firmly fixt towards heaven, and his long, 
 lean consumed arms out of the bed, his hands upon his 
 breast laid in cross, one upon the other, about twelve 
 o'clock at noon, in which hour he was also born into this 
 world, arraigned, condemned, and adjudged unto death 
 upon Sunday the igth of October 1595 (after almost eleven 
 years' imprisonment in the Tower), in a most sweet 
 manner, without any sign of grief or groan, only turning 
 his head a little aside, as one falling into a pleasing 
 sleep, he surrendered his happy soul into the hands of 
 Almighty God, who to His so great glory had created it. 
 
 ' Some have thought, and perhaps not improbably, that 
 he had some foreknowledge of the day of his death ; be- 
 cause, about seven or eight days before making certain 
 notes, understood only by himself, in his calendar, what 
 prayers and devotions he intended to say upon every 
 day of the week following, on Monday, Tuesday, etc., 
 when he came to the Sunday on which he dy'd, he there 
 made a pause, saying, Hitherto, and no further: this is 
 enough ; and so writ no more, as his servants, who 
 then heard his words and saw him write, have often tes- 
 tified.' 
 
 In the chapter following occurs this curious record : ' I 
 forgot to note in the due place, that upon the night pre- 
 cedent to the Earl's arraignment and condemnation, a
 
 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 199 
 
 nitingale was heard to sing with great melody in a jessamine 
 tree all ye night long in the garden of Arundel House [in 
 the Strand, London], where his Countess and children did 
 then remain ; the which may seem the more strange, in 
 regard the like was neither before nor since that time 
 ever heard in that place. Another thing as strange did 
 happen in the Tower soon after his death ; for two 
 tame stags, which the lieutenant kept there for his pleasure, 
 falling into a fury, never desisted knocking their horns 
 against the wall, till, their brains being beaten out, they 
 dy'd.' 
 
 This nobleman's son, best known as the Earl of Arundel, 
 who in 1621 was constituted Earl Marshal of England 
 for life, fell under the displeasure of King Charles i., on 
 account of the marriage of his eldest son, Henry Frederick 
 Lord Maltravers, with the Lady Elizabeth, eldest daughter 
 of Esme Stuart, Duke of Lennox ; whose hand, as his own 
 ward, his Majesty had intended to bestow on Lord Lome, 
 afterwards Marquis of Argyle. For this offence the Earl 
 and his Countess were at first restricted to their seat at 
 Horsley, in Surrey; and afterwards committed to the 
 Tower, but shortly after liberated. This Earl's successor 
 idhered steadily to Charles i. at the time of the Civil Wars, 
 and served in his army as a volunteer until he was sent 
 for to Padua, on the illness of his father in 1646. During 
 his absence the Parliament took possession of his estates ; 
 and on his return to England he found it difficult to sub- 
 sist ; the composition of his estates, ^"6000, was paid for
 
 200 THE HOUSE OF HOWARD. 
 
 the use of the Navy. The Earl then retired to his mansion 
 in the Strand, and lived there in great privacy until his 
 death in 1652. 
 
 At the Deepdene, near Dorking, in Surrey, which for 
 centuries formed a portion of the Howards' possessions, 
 lived the Hon. Charles Howard, son of the above Earl of 
 Arundel. He was an accomplished chemist, and built here 
 a laboratory ; ' and in subterranean grots, formed for that 
 purpose, had furnaces of different kinds,' of which some 
 remains existed to our time ; he was also styled ' the Chris- 
 tian philosopher,' and built here an oratory. Aubrey was so 
 enchanted with the Deepdene garden, or ' solitaire recess,' 
 that he could ' never expect any enjoyment beyond it, but 
 the kingdom of heaven.' Henry Charles Howard of Grey- 
 stokes, son and heir of the above, who resided at the Deep- 
 dene, is spoken of as having ' a fine taste for the polite 
 arts ; ' thus inheriting the genius of the famous Earl of 
 Arundel, who presented to the University of Oxford the 
 Arundelian Marbles. 1 
 
 1 At the classic Deepdene, too, were written Anastasius, by Thomas 
 Hope ; and Coningsby, a novel of political life, by Benjamin Disraeli.
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 the West Riding of Yorkshire, on the southern 
 bank of the Calder, in the district formerly 
 comprising the Forest of Hardwyke, stands, on 
 an eminence, the ancient town of Eland, or more properly 
 Ealand. Opposite to the town, and on the north bank of 
 the river, on the opening of the wood, stands the timber- 
 built mansion of Eland Hall, for several generations the 
 seat of the ancient and honourable family of the Elands ; 
 and memorable on account of the deadly feud that arose 
 in the reign of Edward in. between Sir John Eland and 
 some of the neighbouring gentry. The family of Eland 
 was of great antiquity, and had large possessions in this 
 Riding, as also in the townships of Spotland and White- 
 worthe, in Lancashire. They were liberal benefactors to 
 the great abbey at Whalley. Sir William de Eland was 
 Constable at Nottingham Castle, and was the same who 
 betrayed Earl Mortimer by showing the secret passage in 
 the rock. Early in the fourteenth century Sir John Eland 
 was the representative of this powerful family, and he re- 
 sided at Eland Hall, the seat of his ancestors. The origin
 
 202 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 of the sanguinary quarrel is not very clearly stated. The 
 ballad which relates the story is thought to have been written 
 for the use of the minstrels, and was sung or recited at the 
 entertainments of the gentry in those parts ; and Brady, in 
 his History of the Reign of King Stephen, says that this rriode 
 of taking private revenge was brought by the Normans into 
 England. Those lawless times are glanced at in the ballad: 
 
 ' For when men live in worldlie wealth, 
 
 Full few can have that grace 
 Long in the same to keep themselves 
 Contented with their place. 
 
 ' The squire must needs become a knight, 
 
 The knight a lord would be : 
 Thus shall you see no worldlie wight 
 Content with his degree.' 
 
 Sir John Eland, being sheriff, was disobeyed in some 
 respect by his neighbour Sir Robert Beaumont of Cross- 
 land Hall, who had thus incurred his resentment. Another 
 account states that one Exley, an adjoining proprietor, had 
 killed the nephew of Sir John in a fray ; and flying from 
 his vengeance, was received and sheltered by Sir Robert 
 Beaumont. As usual in those days, compensation was ac- 
 cepted ; and all might have ended, had not one Lockwood of 
 Lockwood, and Sir Hugh Quarmby, stirred the strife anew. 
 Sir John, having mustered his tenants and friends, came sud- 
 denly in the night, and having first met Sir Hugh Quarmby 
 and Sir John Lockwood, friends of Sir Robert Beaumont, 
 at their houses at Quarmby and Lockwood, proceeded with 
 his men to Crossland Hall, the seat of Sir Robert Beau-
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 203 
 
 mont; and lying in ambush till the drawbridge over the 
 moat that surrounded the house was let down in the 
 morning, he rushed in and entered the knight's chamber. 
 Sir Robert made a courageous resistance, but being un- 
 armed, was soon overpowered and slain ; and with him fell 
 all his servants who had come to his defence. The tradi- 
 tion says : ' The knight was driven back into his chamber, 
 where his faire ladye, hanging upon him, besought for his 
 life, and placed her precious body so as to shield her 
 bleeding lord. But all in vain, for faint with loss of blood, 
 they bound his arms ; and heedless of the cries and shrieks 
 of his terrified ladye, drew him into his own hall, and there 
 cut off his head. 
 
 ' And so, after this wicked deed, they bethought to regale 
 themselves. And the cloth was spread, and the meat was 
 brought, and the cellar furnished abundance of good wine ; 
 and that stern knight, Sir John Eland, sitting at the head of 
 the table, on the dais, sent for the two sons of the slain Sir 
 Robert ; and when they came, ordered them to eat and drink 
 with them. The younger, who was of a mild and gentle 
 nature, overcome with fear, did as he was bidden ; but 
 Adam, the elder, looking angrily at his brother, sturdily 
 refused to eat or drink with the slayers of his father.' Lady 
 Beaumont, stealing away in the dead of the night from 
 Crossland Hall, escaped with her children, and found a 
 secure asylum with the Townleys of Townley. She sub- 
 sequently took up her residence at Brereton, as most remote 
 from her deadly foe. Thither also retired the young Lock-
 
 204 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 wood and Quarmby, with another youth named Lacie, who 
 was likewise on some account an object of Sir John Eland's 
 resentment. These young gentlemen were brought up at 
 Brereton by Lady Beaumont, where they employed their 
 time acquiring skill and address in the martial exercises of 
 that age, and with a continual sense of the wrong inflicted 
 by the knight of Eland. As we do not find that he was 
 called to any account for these outrages, it seems that he 
 must have obtained the king's pardon. The young brood 
 of Eland's enemies still abode at Brereton Hall : 
 
 ' The feats of fence they practised 
 To wield their weapons well, 
 Till fifteen years were finished ! 
 And then it so befell. ' 
 
 Then the young Beaumont, Lockwood, Quarmby, and 
 Lacie having grown up to manhood, resolved to avenge the 
 death of their parents. Having learnt from two of their 
 spies the day on which Sir John Eland held the sheriffs 
 turn at Brighouse, a village on the Calder, about three 
 miles from Eland Hall, they took measures for waylaying 
 him as he returned home : 
 
 ' The day was set, the turn was kept 
 
 At Brighouse by Sir John : 
 Full little wist he was beset 
 
 Then at his coming home. 
 Dawson and Haigh had played their parts, 
 
 And brought from Brereton Green 
 Young gentlemen with hardy hearts, 
 
 As well were known and seen.' 
 
 They gathered such of the retainers of the families as they
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 205 
 
 could rely upon, to meet them on the previous night in 
 Strangstrighte Wood, on the left bank of the river, and at 
 different places made their way to Cromwellbotham Wood, 
 through which the road ran from Brighouse to Eland Hall. 
 Being near Lacie's house, they rested and refreshed, and 
 then took their station in a glen, close to which the road 
 wound, sometimes on its very margin, and sometimes many 
 yards above, where the smooth front of the cliff, protruding 
 to the water's edge, forced the road over the steep ascent. 
 For so dark a purpose a fitter place could not be conceived. 
 The men, occupying each side of the glen, concealed them- 
 selves in the fissures of the rocks behind, or in the hollows 
 of the ancient and decayed oaks : 
 
 ' Adam of Beaumont there was laid, 
 
 And Lacie with him also ; 
 And liegemen who were not afraid 
 To fight against the foe. 
 
 And Lockwood, too, so eager was, 
 
 That close by the road he stood, 
 And Quarmby stout, who quailed not 
 
 To work the deed of blood. ' 
 
 ' The day was far spent,' saith the tradition, ' when Adam 
 Beaumont, from his high seat, saw a distant company wind 
 round the hill, and crossing the river, take the road towards 
 Cromwellbotham Wood. Giving the signal, he hastened 
 down, and planting himself athwart the road awaiting the 
 arrival of the fierce knight, who, little wotting what was 
 prepared for him, had ridden forward apart from his 
 company :
 
 206 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 ' From the lane end then Eland came, 
 
 And spied these gentlemen ; 
 And wondered he who they could be, 
 And val'd his bonnet then.' 
 
 Adam Beaumont was the first to speak, rudely seizing 
 the bridle of Sir John Eland's horse, and throwing him back 
 upon his haunches : 
 
 ' Thy courtsey vails thee not, Sir Knight, 
 
 Thou slew my father dear, 
 Sometime Sir Robert Beaumont hight, 
 And slain thou shalt be here.' 
 
 It was a valiant defence that bold knight made ; for, 
 throwing himself off his horse when Adam Beaumont seized 
 the reins, he drew his short sword, and laid about him 
 stoutly. * False loon art thou, and cowardly traitor,' 
 shouted he to Quarmby, who had already wounded him 
 sore ; ' had I had thee but single-handed, or even with 
 Beaumont only to back thee, I would send ye both to rot 
 with your fathers.' ' How many swords hadst thou, false 
 knight, to back thee, when thou earnest on our kin, and 
 like a craven fox slew them in the night ? ' quoth Quarmby. 
 As soon as Sir John was slain outright, and his bloody corpse 
 lay in the road, pierced with many wounds, besmeared 
 too with dust and dirt for in his death-throws he had 
 struggled on the ground with Lockwood, whose foot had 
 slipped in the dreadful fray the party quickly dispersed. 
 And the retinue of the proud sheriff now found him upon 
 the bare road a stiffened corpse, and conveyed him, upon 
 a bier made hastily of oaken boughs, to Eland Hall. And
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 207 
 
 all his friends and servants resorted thither, and greatly 
 bemoaned him ; for, though relentless and fierce to his 
 foes, he was ever generous and kind to those who lived 
 under him, and showed himself at all times a steady and 
 bounteous friend to our Holy Church, as the monkes of 
 Whalley can certify right well : 
 
 ' They tolled the bell, and the mass was said, 
 
 And the lady sorely wept her lord : 
 " But, mother," the young heir questioned, 
 " When may I draw my father's sword ?" 
 
 ' " Forbear, my child," the mother said, 
 
 ' ' That sword hath brought us ill ; 
 Four noble heads are now laid low, 
 More blood we may not spill." ' 
 
 The friends of the late Sir John Eland made for many 
 days diligent search for his murderers ; but Beaumont and 
 his company had fled, and passing over into Lancashire, 
 had crossed the dangerous sands of Morecambe Bay, and 
 hid themselves among the dark Fells of Furness, where 
 Beaumont had friends. Here they openly boasted of their 
 misdeeds, and how they had avenged the death of their 
 fathers. They also plotted more mischief, had spies to 
 inform them of all that passed, and laid their plans openly. 
 
 Meanwhile, the lady of Eland Hall and her family lived a 
 life of quiet, surrounded with her faithful dependants. Years 
 passed on ; and as Beaumont and his friends never appeared 
 in the country, it was thought that the feud was now at an 
 end, and nothing further need be feared. The young 
 knight grew up brave and good; he lived in his father's
 
 2o8 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 halls and among his father's kin ; and he too was a friend 
 of the Holy Church. 
 
 But Adam Beaumont and his fierce and relentless com- 
 pany among the dark Fells of Furness, not satisfied with 
 the blood of their powerful and wicked foe, thirsted even 
 more for the blood of his good and knightly son, together 
 with his loving wife and darling babes, living in fancied 
 security in Eland Hall. So many years had now passed 
 away, that much of the former caution was laid aside, and 
 occasionally the young knight and his lady would venture 
 abroad unarmed and unprotected. Their enemies, by 
 means of spies, heard of this : 
 
 ' Adam of Beaumont then truly, 
 
 Lacie and Lockwood eke, 
 And Quarmby, came to their countrie, 
 Their purpose for to seek. ' 
 
 They again repaired to their haunt in Cromwellbotham 
 (the foot of the winding spring) Wood, and there lay in that 
 very glen where they had shed the blood of Sir John Eland. 
 And here, receiving food and sustenance from Lacie's house 
 close by, they lay in ambush till the eve of Palm Sunday, 
 having spies to keep a close watch upon the family at 
 Eland Hall, and their movements. On this holy eve they 
 stole from their hiding-places ; and it being ' mirke mid- 
 night,' made their way to Eland Mill, on the further bank 
 of the Calder stream, just below the hill on which the 
 town stood. Stealthily forcing their way into the mills, they 
 hid themselves there till early dawn; when the miller's
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 209 
 
 wife, going into the mill for some meal, was seized, and 
 bound hand and foot, and her mouth gagged. The miller, 
 vexed at the delay, took his cudgel and went to the mill, 
 where he was soon felled with his own weapon, bound 
 fast and gagged, and laid beside his wife. 
 
 We will now return for a while to Eland Hall, where 
 )n the eve of Palm Sunday the young knight retired to 
 rest with his fair wife and their family. A fearful storm 
 disturbed their rest, and the young knight had a terrific 
 ream of armed men grinning horribly, and threatening to 
 slay him and those most dear to him. He rose early in 
 the morning, but still disturbed in mind, fearing that some 
 evil accident was about to befall him. His lady bade him 
 take courage, saying, ' It is the morn of Palm Sunday, and 
 to church we must go, as is our wont ; and surely no evil 
 can betide good Christians on such a holy day, and going 
 forth, too, for so holy a purpose.' The knight was per- 
 suaded to keep his church, as was ever his wont, and left 
 the hall with his fair lady, and his young son and heir 
 closely following, with several of his household. They 
 thus arrived at the river-bank, where a long weir was 
 carried transversely to conduct the waters to the large 
 wheel of the mill. Below this weir was a ford, over which 
 was a passage by large stepping-stones ; which road, lead- 
 ing round the back of the mill, conducted the passenger 
 up the hill to the church and to the town. Scarcely had 
 the knight and his lady reached the river-brink, when a 
 sad and fearful scene, thus told in the ballad, met their eyes :
 
 210 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 ' The drought had made the waters small, 
 
 The stakes appeared dry ; 
 The knight, his wife, and servants, 
 Came down the dam thereby. 
 
 ' When Adam Beaumont this beheld, 
 Forth of the milne (mill) came he ; 
 His bown in hand with him he held, 
 And shot at him sharply. 
 
 ' He hit the knight on his breastplate, 
 
 Whereupon the bolt did glide ; 
 William of Lockwood, wroth thereat, 
 Said, " Cousin, you shoot wide." 
 
 ' Himself did shoot, and hit the knight, 
 
 Who nought was hurt with this ; 
 Whereat the knight had great delight, 
 And said to them, " I wis 
 
 ' " If that my father had been clad 
 
 With armour such certaine, 
 Your wicked hands escaped he had, 
 And had not so been slaine. 
 
 ' " Oh, Eland Town, alack," said he, 
 
 " If thou but knew of this, 
 These foes of mine full fast would flee, 
 And of their purpose miss. " 
 
 ' William of Lockwood was a dread, 
 
 The town would rise indeed ; 
 He shot the knight right through the head, 
 And slew him thus with speed. 
 
 ' His son and heir was wounded there, 
 
 But dead he did not fall : 
 Into the house conveyed he was, 
 And died in Eland Hall.' 
 
 But if these vengeful men thought to escape from the 
 second misdeed as they did from the first, they counted
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 211 
 
 their chances ill. The domestics who had escaped the 
 slaughter instantly gave the alarm, and the town and neigh- 
 bourhood were roused to arms by the sound of the horn, 
 and by the backward ringing of the bells. The whole 
 parish being assembled, 
 
 ' All sorts of men showed their good will ; 
 
 Some bows and shafts did bear ; 
 Some brought forth clubs and rusty bills, 
 That saw no sun that year. ' 
 
 Beaumont, Lockwood, and Quarmby, seeing the Eland 
 men approach, made a halt, and kept them at bay with 
 their arrows, until these being exhausted, they were com- 
 pelled to betake themselves to flight, and thought to make 
 good their retreat into the thick copse of Aneley Wood : 
 but Quarmby who was, in truth, the hardiest of them, and 
 one who had never ceased stirring up the less deadly 
 vengeance of his companions refused ' to turn his face,' 
 and was soon mortally wounded by his foes : 
 
 ' Lockwood, he bare him on his back, 
 
 And hid him in Aneley Wood, 
 To whom his purse he did betake 
 Of gold and silver good.' 
 
 They did not leave Quarmby until the breath was out of 
 his body; they then continued for some time the pursuit 
 of the other assassins in the direction of Huddersfield. The 
 fate of Lacie is not known, as he is not mentioned in the 
 story after his coming with the others from Furness Fells. 
 Adam Beaumont, deprived of his lands, made his escape into
 
 212 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 
 
 foreign parts, became a Knight of Rhodes, and after greatly 
 distinguishing himself, was killed fighting against the Turks. 
 Another version of the story is, that Lockwood took refuge 
 in a solitary retreat, then called Camel, but now Canon 
 Hall, five miles from Barnsley. This retreat becoming 
 known, he fled to Ferrybridge, and next to Crossland Hall. 
 The sheriff with a great company of men beset the house, 
 and summoned him in the king's name to surrender. He 
 refused to obey, and defended himself for a time, but was 
 induced by fair promises to surrender to the sheriff, who no 
 sooner had him in his power than he put him to death. 
 By this catastrophe the ancient family of the Lockwoods of 
 Lockwood was utterly extirpated. The name of Beaumont 
 still continued to exist, as it appears that Adam de Beau- 
 mont had a younger brother, from whom descended a race 
 that flourished to the reign of Charles i. 
 
 Dr. Bentley has annexed the history of Sir John Eland 
 to his account of Halifax; and from the investigation of 
 MSS., the whole tragedy here related appears not only pro- 
 bable, but supported by collateral evidence. The deadly 
 feud commenced by Sir John Eland, ended in the murder 
 of the knight and his son, and the extinction of the male 
 line of his family. All the broad lands became the inherit- 
 ance of the sole surviving child and daughter, Tsobel, who, 
 being placed under the guardianship of Sir John Saville 
 of Tankersley, afterwards became his wife, and founded 
 the great and puissant house of Saville, now represented 
 by the Earls of Scarborough, who still hold the manor.
 
 THE TRAGEDY OF SIR JOHN ELAND. 213 
 
 The ballad already quoted concludes with an injunction 
 to this Saville, who married the heiress, as follows : 
 
 ' Learn, Saville, here, I you beseech, 
 
 That in prosperitie 
 
 You be not proud, but mild and meek, 
 And dwell in charitie. 
 
 ' For by such means your elders came 
 
 To knightly dignitie ; 
 But Eland he forsook the same, 
 And came to miserie.' 
 
 It may be added, that the house where lived Exley, from 
 whose foul deed this tragedy originated, is still standing in 
 the village of the same name. In its style of building, 
 security sets at defiance convenience, but was fitted for 
 those lawless times when might was right. 1 
 
 1 Burke's Anecdotes of the Aristocracy, second series, vol. i.
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 fONTEFRACT, one of the most notable his- 
 toric sites of England, lies about two miles 
 south-west from Ferrybridge, nine miles nearly- 
 east from Wakefield, and fifteen miles north-west from 
 Doncaster, in Yorkshire. The town was a burgh in the 
 time of Edward the Confessor. Ilbert de Lacy must be 
 regarded as the founder of the castle, which subsequently 
 became the scene of many events which have conferred 
 upon it opprobrious repute in English history. Judging 
 from the character of the position, on an elevated rock, 
 commanding extensive and picturesque views, and the form 
 of the surrounding earthworks, this fortress was evidently 
 the work of that great Earl whose devotion and services 
 had attached him to the Conqueror, by whom Ilbert de 
 Lacy had made to him large grants of land ; and accord- 
 ing to the custom of the age, he enriched as well as 
 founded several religious houses. Kirkstall Abbey and St. 
 Oswald's still exhibit in their ruins a testimony of his muni- 
 ficence. Of the castle which he built at Pontefract in 
 twelve years, there exist but slight architectural vestiges.
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 215 
 
 The remains of his monastic institutions are of greater 
 extent. 
 
 We pass over the several possessors of the castle to Henry 
 de Lacy, who built the castle of Denbigh. His son was 
 drowned in a deep well in this castle, when Pontefract 
 devolved upon his daughter Alicia; and by her marriage 
 with Thomas Plantagenet, nephew of Edward i., the vast 
 estates of the De Lacys were transferred to the Earl of 
 Lancaster. 
 
 Upon examining the remains of the round towers still 
 visible at Pontefract, it appears that whilst their foundation 
 may belong to Thomas Earl of Lancaster, all the walling 
 above the set-off is later not unlikely the work of Henry 
 Duke of Lancaster, who died in 1382. The three sieges 
 the castle underwent in the civil war of the Commonwealth, 
 and the work of demolition ordered by the Parliament, 
 have reduced it to a deplorable state of ruin. Originally it 
 must have been a very grand, though never a very extensive 
 structure. It is difficult to show the real intention of the 
 mysterious subterranean passages. A heated imagination 
 would at once mark them as places ' with many a foul and 
 midnight murder fed ;' but the more practical ideas of those 
 accustomed to examine those singular contrivances, would 
 rather ascribe their purpose to a secret means of passing 
 under the fosse, or as the approach to a well. The soft 
 stone through which these passages are cut rendered the 
 work easy. One of these passages to the north or upper 
 portion of the castle descends for several feet by steps in a
 
 2l6 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 direct line. At the bottom it terminates in three or four 
 small chambers, hollowed out of the solid rock. This work 
 seems to have been executed in the reign of Edward n. 
 
 The names of several of the towers have been preserved : 
 as the Round Tower, Clifford Tower, the Treasurer Tower, 
 Gascoyne's Tower, Swillington Tower, the Red Tower, the 
 Queen's Tower, the King's Tower. All these towers have 
 been assigned in old plans of the castle, but the site can 
 now only be traced, as they were taken down in 1649. 
 Originally, Pontefract was built according to the usual plan 
 of a Norman castle. There was a keep at the western end, 
 and a large bailey below it. The towers were built at equal 
 distances in the curtain-wall of the enclosure. There was a 
 barbican and drawbridge at the south-west angle, and the 
 whole was encircled by a deep fosse. At the north-east 
 angle was a chapel, served by five priests. This building, 
 which owes its erection to Ilbert de Lacy, still retains a 
 portion of masonry belonging to his original foundation. 
 
 Amongst the records of the Duchy of Lancaster is a roll 
 of household expenses of the Earl of Lancaster rendered 
 (Edward n.) 1315, showing the Earl's magnificent scale of 
 living. Thus, there was expended ^604, 175. 6id. in 184 
 casks and 2 pipes of wine, allowances for barrels of sturgeon 
 and stockfish; 1713 pounds of wax, with vermilion and 
 turpentine for making red wax costs of the Earl's horses, 
 table-cloths, towels, etc. ; almonds, figs, pepper, nutmegs, 
 and various spices the whole allowance, ^"5230, i8s. 7^d. 
 Then come the livery of cloth, skins, and saddles, and
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 2I/ 
 
 clothes for the knights, ^1079, i8s. 3d.; then allowance 
 for the purchase of horses, fees, gifts, alms, jewels, and 
 payment of debts, ^"1207, 73. nfd. From these entries it 
 is abundantly clear that the Earl of Lancaster lived sump- 
 tuously, spending more than ; 100,000 a-year, according to 
 the present value of money. 
 
 There are great differences of opinion as to the justice 
 of beheading Thomas Earl of Lancaster. Those who 
 hurried on this bloody deed can scarcely find in the official 
 document of his arraignment, words sufficiently strong to 
 express his misdemeanours and crimes. We must recollect 
 that the wretched King Edward's attachment to Gaveston, 
 and his affection for the Despencers, rendered him con- 
 temptible in the eyes of the people, and encouraged the 
 Earl of Lancaster to endeavour to check the misgovern- 
 ment of the country; thus he became the leader of a popular 
 cause, and the instrument by which reforms were eventually 
 established. The turf upon Blacklow Hill was still moist 
 with the blood of Gaveston. His death continued to rankle 
 in the heart of Edward. It was unavenged. Though the 
 favourite's end was alike cruel and contrary to the law as 
 then established, few perhaps none but the king himself 
 looked upon' it as an illegal act. Yet, without question, 
 such was the eagerness for Gaveston's death, that the 
 formal proceedings of justice were set aside. He had a 
 kind of judicial trial ; but the officers of justice authorized 
 by the Crown were not summoned to it. He was con- 
 demned without the full assent of Parliament. These pro-
 
 2l8 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 ceedings must always leave a stain upon the Earl of Lan- 
 caster's character ; though his enemies have loaded his 
 memory with many unfounded charges, as shown by the 
 high reputation he obtained immediately after his death. 
 Queen Isabella believed him to be deserving of canoniza- 
 tion, which she sedulously besought the Pope to grant, 
 pleading in recommendation the numberless miracles that 
 were wrought at his tomb, and being fully impressed, as 
 people were in the middle ages, with these supernatural 
 works. 
 
 Attempts were made to effect a reconciliation between 
 the king and the confederate barons, at the head of whom 
 was Lancaster. The friendship was renewed, but the king 
 was detected in breaking the conditions. A knight who 
 had once served the Earl of Lancaster, was taken near 
 Pontefract with a blank charter under the royal seal, directed 
 to the King of Scotland, offering him any conditions he 
 pleased, provided he would compass the death of his relative. 
 Both parties now flew to arms, but Lancaster soon found 
 himself ill supported by his compeers ; and marching north- 
 ward for reinforcements from Bruce King of Scotland, the 
 king in the meantime sent the Earl of Surrey and Kent 
 to besiege the castle at Pontefract, which surrendered at 
 the first summons. Lancaster was next closely pursued by 
 the king with great superiority of numbers. The Earl, 
 endeavouring to rally his troops, was taken prisoner at 
 Boroughbridge, with ninety-five barons and knights, and 
 carried to the castle of Pontefract, where he was imprisoned
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 219 
 
 in a tower which Leland says he had newly made. This 
 tower had a wall 10^- feet thick and 25 feet square : the 
 only entrance was by a hole or trap-door in the floor of the 
 turret ; so that the prisoner must have been let down into 
 this abode of darkness, from whence there could be no 
 possible mode of escape. 
 
 A few days after, the king being at Pontefract, ordered 
 Lancaster to be arraigned in the hall before a small number 
 of peers, among whom were the Despencers, his mortal 
 enemies. A series of articles of impeachment was drawn 
 up. The process was exaggerated and diffuse ; the accu- 
 sation feebly made ; and the sentence unjust, and wickedly 
 executed. Lancaster was condemned to be hanged, drawn, 
 and quartered ; but the punishment was changed to de- 
 capitation. After sentence was passed, he said, ' Shall I ' 
 die without answer ? ' He was not, however, permitted to 
 speak ; but a certain Gascoygne took him away, and having 
 put an old hood over his head, set him on a lean mare, 
 without a bridle. Attended by a Dominican friar as his 
 confessor, he was carried out of the town amidst the insults 
 of the people, and there beheaded. Thus fell Thomas Earl 
 of Lancaster, the first prince of the blood, and uncle to 
 Edward 11., who condemned him to death. Several of the 
 Earl's adherents were hanged at Pontefract. The rolls of 
 Parliament, and the wretched king's subsequent conduct, 
 show how the Earl's accusers endeavoured to repair the wrong 
 they had committed. The self-reproaches of the monarch 
 proved his remorse. The Parliament revoked their judg-
 
 220 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 ment, and restored the son the estates and honours of which 
 the father had been unjustly deprived. ' It is pitiable to 
 contemplate at this moment the abject state of the king 
 in consequence of the Earl of Lancaster's death. He was 
 keeping his Christmas at York the year following, when a 
 retainer of his late noble relative was taken and condemned 
 to die. One of those about the court, knowing he had 
 formerly occupied a place similar to his own, being touched 
 with compassion at his fate, offered to speak on his behalf 
 to the monarch. He had, however, no sooner begun to 
 implore for his life, than Edward broke into a violent 
 passion, and exclaimed, " Begone, wicked and malicious 
 detractors ! you can plead for this worthless fellow, but 
 none of you would so much as open your mouth in behalf 
 of my cousin of Lancaster, who, if he had lived, might have 
 been useful both to myself and to the whole kingdom." 
 Whilst this incident proves that Edward n. was not naturally 
 cruel, it also shows that he repented the crime he had been 
 urged by his advisers to commit.' l 
 
 After this fearful tragedy, it might be supposed that the 
 walls of Pontefract could never again become so deeply 
 stained with crime ; but we are detained by the recital of 
 other deeds, less unprovoked, and perhaps more atrocious. 
 It was on the 23d of October 1399, that Arundell Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury, acting on the behalf of Henry of 
 Lancaster, took the first steps for deposing King Richard n. 
 
 1 'The Honour and Castle of Pontefract,' by the Rev. C. H. Harts- 
 horne ; Jourjial of the British Archaological Association, 1864.
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 221 
 
 He began by charging the Lords Spiritual and Temporal to 
 keep his propositions regarding his dethronement a pro- 
 found secret ; and this might have been directly carried out, 
 had not Percy Earl of Northumberland put some questions 
 to the assembled Parliament, which, interfering with the 
 projected plan, caused it to be deferred a little longer. 
 When the unhappy monarch tendered his resignation of the 
 crown, he showed that if he had failed to discharge them 
 with ability, he was nevertheless fully conscious of the 
 duties a sovereign owes to his people. He declared that 
 he would rather that ' the commonwealth should rise by his 
 fall, than that he should stand upon its ruins.' So that what- 
 ever his private faults may have been, it can never be truly 
 laid to his charge that he oppressed his subjects. 
 
 At the Parliament which held its sitting in October, it 
 was decreed that the king should be perpetually impri- 
 soned ; that a place should be selected which should be 
 unfrequented by any concourse of people ; that none of 
 his friends should be permitted to visit him ; and that 
 he should be under secret and unknown restraint. The 
 dungeons of ' London's lasting shame ' were deemed too 
 cheerful for the captive monarch. 
 
 In the 'dolorous castell' of Flint was Richard deposed. 
 Thither he was inveigled by the Earl of Northumberland, 
 with the assurance that Bolingbroke wished no more than 
 to be restored to his own property, and to give the kingdom 
 a Parliament. Northumberland with a small train first met 
 Richard at Conway, then on his return from Ireland. The
 
 222 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 king distrusted the Earl, who, to remove all suspicion, went 
 with him to mass, and at the altar took an oath of fidelity. 
 The king fell into the snare, and proceeded with the Earl 
 for some time, till he perceived about the precipice of 
 Renmaen Rhos a large band of soldiers with the Percy 
 banners. Richard would then have retired ; but Northum- 
 berland, seizing hold of his bridle, forcibly directed his 
 course onward. Richard was hurried to Rhuddlan, where 
 he dined, and reached Flint the same night. The mock 
 homage of Bolingbroke there, the devotion of the king's 
 favourite greyhound, which fawned on his rival, must be in 
 recollection. The king's prison was one of the rooms of 
 the upper floor. As the railway traveller proceeds along 
 the Holyhead line from Chester to Rhyl, the keep of Flint 
 Castle is conspicuous. A portion of the fortress has been 
 pulled down for building a county jail on the castle lands : 
 it is a mercy that any of this interesting historic memorial 
 was spared. Even its cold chambers were deemed too com- 
 fortable a place for Richard's wasting life ; and the council 
 decreed that he should slowly pine away in the Castle of 
 Pontefract. 
 
 Richard had been, however, previously conveyed to the 
 Tower of London, where the formal deposition took place. 1 
 
 1 In Act v. sc. i. of Shakspeare's Richard the Second, the line, ' You 
 must to Pomfret, not unto the Tower,' says Mr. Staunton in his Illus- 
 trative Comments, is not historically correct. In the prose manuscript 
 preserved in the National Library of Paris, is an extremely interesting 
 and characteristic narrative of an interview which took place between 
 the king and Henry of Lancaster while the former was confined in the
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 223 
 
 There is a tradition that it was merely given out that 
 Richard had starved himself to death, and that he escaped 
 from Pontefract to Mull, whence he shortly proceeded to 
 the mainland of Scotland, where for nineteen years he was 
 entertained in an honourable but secret captivity. This 
 tradition has been wrought into a tale, entitled ' The White 
 Rose in Mull,' in the Chameleon, 1832. Here we may 
 remark that a large mass of contradictory evidence has 
 exercised the ingenuity of many historical writers con- 
 cerning the death of Richard n. The question is full of 
 difficulty, as may be seen in the Chronicque de la Traison et 
 Mort de Richart deux Roy Dengleterre, published by the 
 Historical Society in 1846. 
 
 The Rev. Mr. Hartshorne observes, upon the vague and 
 
 Tower. This manuscript records that when the Dukes of Lancaster 
 and York went to the Tower to see the king, Lancaster desired the 
 Earl of Arundel to send the king to them. When this message was 
 delivered to Richard, he replied : ' Tell Henry of Lancaster from me 
 that I will do no such thing, and that, if he wishes to speak with me, 
 he must come to me. ' On entering, none showed any respect to the 
 king except Lancaster, who took off his hat, and saluted him respect- 
 fully, and said to him, ' Here is our cousin the Duke of Aunarle, and 
 our uncle the Duke of York, who wish to speak to you.' To which 
 Richard answered, 'Cousin, they are not fit to speak to me.' 'But 
 have the goodness to hear them,' replied Lancaster; upon which 
 Richard uttered an oath, and turning to York, ' Thou villain, what 
 wouldst thou say to me ? And thou traitor of Rutland, thou art neither 
 good nor worthy enough to speak to me, nor to bear the name of earl, 
 duke, or knight ; thou and the villain thy father have both of you 
 foully betrayed me ; in a cursed hour were ye born ; by your counsel 
 was my uncle of Gloucester put to death. ' The Earl of Rutland replied 
 to the king, that in what he said he lied, and threw down his bonnet 
 at his feet ; on which the king said, ' I am king and thy lord, and will
 
 224 POXTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 conflicting accounts of Richard's death : 'It is perhaps 
 hopeless to expect that we shall gain any fresh information. 
 Under the deficiency of any circumstantial narrative of the 
 king's last few days, we must accept for our guidance the 
 statement of those persons who took a leading part in the 
 transactions of the time. Thus it has been stated by some 
 that Richard was brutally murdered by Sir Piers of Exton ; 
 and this story has obtained almost general belief. On the 
 other hand, we have the credible testimony of Archbishop 
 Scroop, an eye-witness of what was passing in public affairs. 
 From his elevated position he must have been cognizant of 
 what measures were adopted ; whilst, living at no great 
 distance from Pontefract, he must have become acquainted 
 with what was actually going on. By way of palliating the 
 
 still continue king, and will be a greater lord than I ever was, in spite 
 of all my enemies. ' Upon this Lancaster imposed silence on Rutland. 
 Richard, turning then with a fierce countenance to Lancaster, asked 
 why he was in confinement, and why under a guard of armed men. 
 ' Am I your servant or your king ? What mean you to do with me ?' 
 Lancaster replied : ' You're my king and lord, but the council of the 
 realm have ordered that you should be kept in confinement till full 
 decision (jugement} in Parliament. ' The king again swore, and desired 
 he might see his wife. ' Excuse me,' replied the Duke ; ' it is forbidden 
 by the council.' Then the king, in great wrath, walked about the 
 room, and at length broke out into passionate exclamations and appeals 
 to Heaven ; called them 'false traitors,' and offered to fight any four of 
 them ; boasted of his father and grandfather, his reign of twenty-two 
 years ; and ended by throwing down his bonnet. Lancaster then fell 
 on his knees, and besought him to be quiet until the meeting of Par- 
 liament, and then every one would bring forward his reason. See Notes 
 by the Rev. John Webb, to his translation of the French Metrical 
 History, etc. ; Archaologia, vol. xx.
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 22$ 
 
 mode of the king's death, it has been stated that it was his 
 voluntary act. But there is no reason to dispute the Arch- 
 bishop's account, which positively declares that Richard 
 lingered for a space of fifteen days, and died under starva- 
 tion. He perished, says this prelate, by hunger, thirst, and 
 cold ; he died the basest death any one in England had 
 ever undergone. Doubtless, if divine vengeance would 
 follow this holy man's excommunication, those who insti- 
 gated this merciless act would not escape a just reward for 
 their guilt. In the succeeding reign of Henry iv., Arch- 
 bishop Scroope being taken prisoner, was in Pontefract 
 Castle condemned to death. 
 
 Yet again we are compelled to listen, and to shudder 
 
 as we listen, to other tragic acts that stained the walls of 
 
 Pontefract with blood. The next noble victim who suffered 
 
 a violent death within the castle was Anthony Woodville, 
 
 the gallant Earl of Rivers. He was the most accomplished 
 
 person of the age, himself an author, and the liberal patron 
 
 of that illustrious artisan who first practised the art of printing 
 
 in England. No ostensible reason has been assigned for 
 
 lis execution ; and it was the more unjust, because the Pro- 
 
 sctor, afterwards Richard in., hurried Lord Rivers, his 
 
 incle, and his half-brother Sir Richard Grey, with Sir 
 
 ^homas Vaughan, to the scaffold, without the usual form 
 
 of a trial. Shakspeare makes Richard in. to whine forth 
 
 these lines : 
 
 ' O Pomfret, Pomfret ! O thou bloody prison ! 
 Fatal and ominous to noble peers ! 
 P
 
 226 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 Within the guilty closure of thy walls 
 Richard the Second here was hack'd to death ; 
 And for more slander to thy dismal seat, 
 We give to thee our guiltless blood to drink. ' 
 
 ' In reviewing the three great tragedies that we have wit- 
 nessed at Pontefract, we must have been struck with the 
 immunity under which these flagrant acts of barbarity and 
 injustice were perpetrated. Even the person of the sove- 
 reign was as little respected as that of the nobility. The 
 principles of sound government were in their infancy. The 
 obedience due to monarchical power was little regarded, 
 or indeed understood ; whilst the nobility on their part 
 coerced, as they had the opportunity, the sovereign and 
 their vassals alike. There was no real security for property 
 or life ; the exigencies of the crowd excited it to violence, 
 and the fear of opposition from the barons first led the 
 Plantagenets to appeal to the people in their own defence. 
 Thus, step by step, our constitution became formed out of 
 the pressure of circumstances.' l 
 
 We now pass over matters of minor importance in the 
 history of Pontefract to the time of Charles i. In the king's 
 contest with his Parliament, this was the last fortress that 
 held out for the unfortunate monarch. At Christmas 
 1644 Sir Thomas Fairfax laid siege to the castle, and on 
 1 9th January following, after an incessant cannonade of 
 three days, a breach was made. The brave garrison would 
 not surrender; the besiegers mined, but the besieged 
 1 The Rev. Mr. Hartshome, ut ante.
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 22/ 
 
 countermined, and the work of slaughter went on till the 
 garrison were greatly reduced. At length, the Parliamen- 
 tarians were attacked and repulsed by a reinforcement of 
 Royalists from Oxford ; and thus ended the first siege of 
 Pontefract. 
 
 In March 1645 the enemy again took possession of the 
 town ; and after three months' cannonade, the garrison, 
 being reduced almost to a state of famine, surrendered the 
 castle by an honourable capitulation on 2oth June. Sir 
 Thomas Fairfax was appointed governor ; and he, thinking 
 the Royal party to be subdued, appointed a colonel as his 
 substitute, with a garrison of 100 men. The Royalists next 
 by stratagem recovered Pontefract, of which Sir John Digby 
 was appointed governor. 
 
 The third and final siege of this fine castle commenced 
 in October 1648. General Rainsborough was appointed to 
 the command of the army ; but he being previously inter- 
 cepted at Doncaster, Oliver Cromwell undertook to con- 
 duct the siege. After having remained a month before the 
 fortress without making any impression upon its massive 
 walls, Cromwell joined the grand army under Fairfax ; and 
 General Lambert, being appointed commander-in-chief of 
 ic forces before the castle, arrived at Pontefract on the 
 j.th of December. He raised new works, and vigorously 
 iushed the siege : but the besieged held out. On 3oth 
 January 1649 the King was beheaded ; and the news no 
 sooner reached Pontefract than the Royalist garrison pro- 
 claimed his son Charles n., and made a vigorous and
 
 228 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 slaughtering sally against their enemies. The Parliamen- 
 tarians, however, prevailed; and on 25th March 1649, the 
 garrison, being reduced from 500 or 600 to 100 men, sur- 
 rendered by capitulation. Six of the principal Royalists were 
 excepted from mercy : two escaped, but were retaken, and 
 executed at York ; the third was killed in a sortie ; and 
 the three others, concealing themselves among the ruins of 
 the castle, escaped after the surrender; two of the last 
 lived to see the Restoration. 
 
 This third siege was most destructive to the castle : the 
 tremendous artillery had shattered its massive walls ; and 
 its demolition was completed by order of Parliament. 
 Within two months after its reduction, the buildings were 
 unroofed, and all the materials sold. Thus was this 
 princely fortress reduced to a heap of ruins. During the 
 siege the fine church of All Saints was greatly damaged : 
 the roof was almost destroyed, and the fine lantern sur- 
 mounting the tower was battered down. The lantern was, 
 however, rebuilt in its present form, in consequence of a 
 vote of Parliament, which allotted ^"1000 for that purpose 
 out of the money accruing from the sale of the materials 
 of the castle. 
 
 Pontefract Castle, by its situation as well as by its 
 structure, was rendered almost impregnable. It was not 
 commanded by any contiguous hills, and could only be 
 taken by blockade. The whole area occupied by the 
 fortress was about seven acres. 
 
 The north-west prospect from the castle heights takes
 
 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 22Q 
 
 in the beautiful vale watered by the Aire, skirted by woods 
 and plantations ; it is bounded only by the hills of Craven. 
 The north and east prospects are more extensive ; the 
 scenery is less striking, but the towers of York Minster are 
 distinctly seen. To the east, whilst the eye follows the 
 course of the Aire towards the Humber, the fertility of the 
 country, the spires of churches, and the hills Brayton, Barf, 
 and Hambleton Haugh, one covered with wood, add to 
 the beauty and variety of the scene. The south-east view 
 includes part of the counties of Lincoln and Nottingham. 
 To the south and south-west the towering hills of Derby- 
 shire, stretching towards Lancashire, form the horizon ; 
 while the foreground is a picturesque country, variegated 
 with handsome residences. In a Topographical Excursion 
 in the Year 1634, Pomfret is described as 'a high and 
 stately, famous and princely, impregnable castle and cittadel, 
 built by a Norman upon a rock ; which, for the situation, 
 strength, and largenesse (?), may compare with any in the 
 kingdom.' The highest of the seven towers is the Round 
 Tower, in which that unfortunate prince (Richard n.) was 
 ' enforc'd to flee round a poste till his barbarous butchers 
 inhumanly depriv'd him of life. Upon that poste the 
 cruell hackings and fierce blowes doe still remaine. We 
 view'd the spacious hall, which the gyants kept, the large 
 fayre kitchen, which is long, with many wide chimneys 
 in it,' etc. 
 
 The origin and etymology of the name of the town are 
 alike unknown. According to Camden, its name was
 
 230 PONTEFRACT CASTLE AND ITS ECHOES. 
 
 changed to Pontefract by the Romans. The place was 
 called Kirkby in the time of the Saxons, and it is not im- 
 probable that it was one of the first places in England at 
 which a church was erected and Christianity preached. 
 William the Conqueror is said to have called the name of 
 the town Pomfrete, from some fancied resemblance to a 
 place so called in Normandy, where he was born. For 600 
 years, the castle was the ornament and terror of the sur- 
 rounding country. At the present day, little even of its 
 ruins remains. The area is now chiefly occupied by gardens, 
 and a quarry of filtering stones, which are in great request 
 in all parts of the kingdom. 
 
 Pontefract must be numbered in our recollections of 
 childhood ; since here were grown whole fields of liquorice 
 root, from the extract of which were made Pontefract cakes, 
 impressed with the town arms three lions passant gardant, 
 surmounted with a helmet, full-forward, open-faced, and 
 garde-visure. We have likewise seen these cakes impressed 
 with the celebrated castle, and the motto, ' Post mortem 
 patris, pro filio' (after the death of the father, for the son) 
 bespeaking the loyalty of the Pontefract royalists in pro- 
 claiming Charles n. after the death of his father.
 
 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 
 
 Radcliffes of Derwentwater were one of the 
 oldest families in Cumberland. In that county, 
 through the mountains called Denvent Falls, the 
 river Derwent spreads itself into a spacious lake, wherein 
 are three islands : one was the seat of the family of Rad- 
 cliffe, knight, temp. Henry v., who married Margaret, 
 daughter of Sir John de Derwentwater, knight ; another 
 island was inhabited by miners ; and the third is supposed 
 to be that wherein Bede mentions St. Herbert to have led a 
 hermit's life. James, the Earl of Derwentwater, who died 
 the victim of his stedfast though misguided loyalty in 1716, 
 was greatly lamented. He was a perfect cavalier, and a 
 fine exemplar of an English nobleman ; he was amiable, 
 brave, open, generous, hospitable, and humane. He gave 
 bread to multitudes of people whom he employed on his 
 estate : the poor, the widow, the orphan, rejoiced in his 
 bounty. He was only twenty-eight years of age when he 
 was brought to the scaffold ; and he left a young and beauti- 
 ful widow, Anne Maria, the daughter of Sir John Webb, 
 baronet, and two infant children, to lament his death, and
 
 232 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 
 
 suffer by his attainder. That exquisitely touching ballad, 
 ' Farewell to Lochaber,' is said to have been written by the 
 Earl, and addressed to his wife on the eve of his departure 
 for the miserable venture wherein he forfeited life, lands, 
 and nobility. 
 
 The end of the ill-starred Charles Radcliffe, titular Earl 
 of Derwentwater, was summary. After his conviction for 
 treason in 1716, he received several reprieves from time to 
 time on account of his youth ; and the Government wish- 
 ing to shed no more of the blood of his house, he would 
 have been pardoned ; but he and thirteen others made 
 their escape from Newgate, nth December 1716, and thus 
 placed themselves beyond the benefit of the general Act of 
 Grace, which was passed about that time. 
 
 Radcliffe, on reaching the Continent, went to Rome, and 
 obtained a small pension from the Chevalier. He then 
 settled in Paris, and there married Lady Newburgh. He 
 twice during his exile came to London ; and though his 
 presence was known to the Government, his visits passed 
 unmolested. The rising of 1745 brought him again into 
 action. He sailed from Calais in the November of that 
 year on board a French man-of-war, with his son and other 
 officers, and a quantity of ammunition of war. The vessel, 
 no doubt bound for Scotland in aid of the insurgents 
 (though there was no legal proof given of the fact), was 
 seized in the open sea by the Sheerness man-of-war, and 
 brought to Deal. Radcliffe and his son were committed 
 to the Tower. The son being deemed a foreigner, was
 
 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 233 
 
 exchanged on the first cartel ; but Radcliffe himself was 
 confined until the rebellion was over, when, in Michaelmas 
 term 1746, he was brought to the bar of the Court of 
 King's Bench, to have execution awarded against him on 
 his former sentence. He pleaded that he was not the same 
 person as the party convicted, and prayed time to bring 
 witnesses ; but as he would not deny, in his affidavit re- 
 lative to ,the absence of witnesses, that he was the attainted 
 Charles Radcliffe, the court proceeded, and decided against 
 his plea. He then wished to plead the general pardon 
 of 1716; but the court (one judge, Sir Michael Forster, 
 dissenting) would hear no further plea, and the prisoner 
 was ordered for execution. Though then legally no noble- 
 man, regard was so far paid to the rank and station of his 
 family, that he did not undergo the then ordinary punish- 
 ment for treason ; but, like his brother the Earl of Derwent- 
 water, he was decapitated on Tower Hill. He died, as he 
 had lived, one of the most devoted and unbending adherents 
 of the house of Stuart, and behaved at his execution with 
 dignified calmness and courage. Charles Radcliffe was the 
 mainspring of the support his house gave to the Chevalier : 
 he and his brother, besides their lives, lost in the cause 
 ^300,000 in real value. (Notes to Burke's Peerage, 1865.) 
 Walpole writes to Sir Horace Mann, November 29, 1745 : 
 ' A small ship has taken the Soldi, privateer from Dunkirk, 
 going to Montrose, with twenty French officers, sixty others, 
 and the brother of the beheaded Lord Derwentwater, and 
 his son, who at first was believed to be the second boy.
 
 234 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 
 
 News came yesterday of a second privateer, taken with arms 
 and money; of another lost on the Dutch coast, and of 
 Vernon being in pursuit of two more. All this must be a 
 great damp to the party, who are coming on fast, fast to 
 their destruction. Last night they were to be at Preston. 
 The country is so far from rising for them, that the towns 
 are left desolate on their approach, and the people hide and 
 bury their effects, even to their pewter. Warrington bridge 
 is broken down, which will turn them some miles aside.' 
 
 In another letter, dated December 9, Walpole describes 
 the advance of the rebels to Derby, where they got ^19,000, 
 plundered the town, and burnt a house of the Countess of 
 Exeter. Though they marched thus into the heart of the 
 kingdom, there. was not the least symptom of a rising. In 
 London the aversion to them was amazing. ' But the 
 greatest demonstration of loyalty appeared on the prisoners 
 being brought to town from the Soleil prize. The young 
 man is certainly Mr. RadclifFe's son ; but the mob, per- 
 suaded of his being the youngest Pretender, could scarcely 
 be restrained from tearing him to pieces all the way on the 
 road, and at his arrival. He said he had heard of English 
 mobs, but could not conceive they had been so dreadful, 
 and wished he had been shot at the battle of Dettingen, 
 where he had been engaged. The father, whom they call 
 Lord Derwentwater, said, on entering the Tower, that he 
 never expected to arrive there alive. For the young man, 
 he must only be treated as a French captive ; for the father, 
 it is sufficient to produce him at the Old Bailey, and prove
 
 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 235 
 
 that he is the individual person condemned for the last 
 rebellion, and so for Tyburn.' 
 
 Amidst the romantic scenery of Hexham in Northum- 
 berland, near the Devil-water stream, are the remains of 
 Dilston, or Devilstone Hall, the desolate appearance of 
 which is sadly in unison with the brief and melancholy 
 history of the devoted and unfortunate Earl of Derwent- 
 water. Dilston, the baronial seat of the ancient family of 
 Devilstone, is about two miles distant from Hexham. It 
 stands on an eminence at the entrance to a deep, woody 
 dell, near the confluence of the Devil-water and the river 
 Tyne. The hall was rebuilt in 1768, but has fallen to ruin, 
 except the chapel belonging to it, which is kept in repair, 
 and whose vault contains the remains of the Radcliffe family. 
 The baronial tower of the ancient lords of Devilstone still 
 exists near the ruins of the comparatively modern edifice 
 of the RadclifFes. About two miles higher up the stony 
 course of the river, is a spot called the Linnels, where the 
 Lancastrian army encamped previously to the battle of 
 Hexham ; and not far from this historic site, opposite a 
 farm called the Black Hill, is ' The Queen's Cave,' tradi- 
 tionally the place where the fugitive Queen Margaret and 
 her infant son were protected by the robber after the dis- 
 astrous battle of Hexham. It is a recess in the rock, 31 
 feet long and 14 feet broad, but so low as scarcely to allow 
 a person of ordinary height to stand upright within it. 
 
 The barony of the Devylstounes passed from the family 
 of that name in succession to the Tyndales, a family which
 
 236 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWEXTWATER. 
 
 produced William Tyndale, one of the first translators of 
 the Scriptures into the English language, and who was burnt 
 for heresy at Antwerp in 1536. Another member of the 
 family is recorded under the remarkable denomination of 
 ' Jock Fitz Jolilock,' otherwise ' John about the Pan.' 
 From this family the barony was transmitted to the Claxtons, 
 one of whom married Sir Edward Radcliffe, a knight of the 
 body to Henry vin., and who became heir in remainder to 
 the estates, failing issue of his brother Sir Richard. 
 
 The fortunes of the ill-fated Earl, who devoted himself to 
 a forlorn cause, urged by a principle of romantic honour, 
 and paid the penalty upon the scaffold at Tower Hill, have 
 scarcely at this day ceased to be deplored in Northumber- 
 land, where his gracious and amiable qualities have endeared 
 his memory to popular remembrance. Strange tales have 
 been narrated of the superstitions of the simple inhabitants 
 of the Devil-water and the neighbourhood of Corbridge, 
 relating to the portents which preceded the death of the 
 unfortunate nobleman and the downfall of an ancient 
 family ; and the aurora borealis, which made an extra- 
 ordinarily vivid appearance in Northumberland on the night 
 of the execution, is still called by old persons Lord Derwent- 
 water's Corpse Lights. 
 
 The Earl was denied his last request, to be laid with his 
 ancestors, embodied in a ballad well known in the north 
 country as ' Derwentwater's Farewell :' 
 
 ' Albeit that here, in London town, 
 It is my fate to die,
 
 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 237 
 
 Oh, carry me to Northumberland, 
 
 In my father's grave to lie. 
 There chant my holy requiem 
 
 In Hexham's holy towers, 
 And let six maids of fair Tynedale 
 
 Scatter my grave with flowers.' 
 
 His remains were ostensibly interred in the churchyard of 
 St. Giles-in-the-Fields, where is a stone to his memory, 
 bearing his arms and an inscription, both nearly obliterated. 
 It is on the north side of the churchyard, not far from the 
 tomb of the Pendrells, famous for their devotion to an earlier 
 member of the Stuart family, in whose cause the Earl fell 
 a sacrifice. But either the above funeral was a mock cere- 
 mony, or the corpse was subsequently disinterred ; for, on 
 an examination of the family vault in 1805, made by the 
 Commissioners of Greenwich Hospital, the body was capable 
 of being recognised, not only by the mark of decapitation, 
 but also, from being remarkably preserved, by the open 
 countenance and regular features, which were still found 
 to correspond with the portrait of the ill-starred nobleman. 1 
 It is traditionally said that the Earl's body was conveyed 
 privately by night to this place, and that by day it was 
 deposited in different houses on the road belonging to 
 persons of the Roman Catholic Church, where solemn 
 obsequies were performed over it. The chapel at Dagen- ' 
 
 1 We may here add, that among the funds by means of which Green- 
 wich Hospital is supported are the forfeited estates of the Earl of 
 Derwentwater, given by Act of Parliament in 1735, deducting an 
 annual rent-charge of ^2500 to the Earl of Newburgh and his heirs- 
 male.
 
 238 THE RADCLIFFES OF DERWENTWATER. 
 
 ham Park, in Essex, is said to have been one of those 
 resting-places ; and at Ingatestone, in the same county, 
 there was, some twenty years ago, in an almshouse, an 
 aged woman, whose mother, as she stated, assisted in 
 sewing on the Earl's head. At Thorndon, the seat of Lord 
 Petre, is preserved an oaken chest, bearing an inscription 
 in brass, engraved by Lady Derwentwater's order : it con- 
 tains the dress worn by the Earl at his execution, the neck 
 of the shirt being cut away; also the black serge which 
 covered the block, stiffened with blood, and cut through 
 by the fatal blow which severed the head. 1 
 
 These interesting details possess additional value from 
 their being contributed by one familiar with the locality, 
 namely Mr. Wykeham Archer, the sound antiquary and 
 topographer, especially of the historic ground of Northum- 
 berland, where sites of Roman fame are better remembered 
 by their association with stirring scenes and events in our 
 own history. 
 
 1 The fourth Earl of Derwentwater, John, son of the decapitated 
 Earl, married Elizabeth Countess of Walsten, in her own right, in the 
 Cathedral of Frankfort-on-the-Maine, 1740. He attained the age of 
 86, and died 1 798. His body was buried at Ashaffenburg, but in 1 799 
 his heart was conveyed by his two sons secretly, to be placed below the 
 body of his decapitated father, in the little ruinous family chapel at 
 Devilstone in Northumberland. These two sons served with distinc- 
 tion at Waterloo. The fifth Earl died without issue. The sixth Earl 
 married Princess Sobiesky ; he died in 1833. His son, the seventh 
 Earl, died in 1854, unmarried. The representative of this old, distin- 
 guished, noble family, is Amelia, the present Countess of Derwent- 
 water, so well known for her artistic talents. Communication to the 
 ' Times' by ' A Genealogical Historian,' 1868.
 
 THE BRAVE EARL OF LEVEN. 
 
 | HIS renowned person, one of the most noted 
 soldiers of his time, remarkable for his cool- 
 ness and courage, and his great knowledge of 
 the military art, was of high birth, his family being a branch 
 of the very ancient and historic house of Lesley, or Leslie, 
 Earls of Rothes. He was the only son of George Lesley, a 
 brave soldier, who had the command of the garrison in the 
 Castle of Blair in the reign of King James vi. He (Sir 
 Alexander Lesley) first acted as a volunteer in Lord Vere's 
 regiment in Holland, where he soon rose to the degree of 
 a captain. He then went to Sweden, and entered into the 
 service of Gustavus Adolphus, and behaved so gallantly, 
 that that warlike monarch raised him to the rank of a lieu- 
 tenant-general, and then to that of field-marshal of his 
 armies. In 1628, when the town of Stralsund was besieged 
 by a victorious army under the command of Count Walsten, 
 and reduced almost to the last extremity, the king sent 
 General Lesley to take upon him the command of the garri- 
 son ; and he there acted with such singular resolution and 
 conduct, that he obliged the Count to raise the siege. The
 
 240 THE BRAVE EARL OF LEVEN. 
 
 burghers were so sensible of the service Lesley had done 
 them, that they struck several medals in his honour, some 
 of which have been preserved in the family. In 1630, 
 Lesley drove the Imperialists entirely out of Rugen. He 
 continued in the Swedish service with high distinction, 
 until the troubles in Scotland brought him home. He was 
 in 1638 invited by the Covenanters to take upon him the 
 command of their army, which he accepted ; and he was 
 made governor of the Castle of Edinburgh in March 1639. 
 In 1640 he invaded England at the head of the Scotch 
 arrriy, and defeated a party of the king's troops under the 
 command of Lord Conway at Newburn, and took posses- 
 sion of Newcastle. At the treaty with the king at Ripon, 
 General Lesley was one of the Parliament's commissioners ; 
 and the king was so well pleased with the General's be- 
 haviour, that he created him Lord Balgony and Earl of 
 Leven by patent dated 1641. After going in 1642 to Ire- 
 land to suppress the insurrection there, Lesley Earl of 
 Leven had again in 1643 the command of the Scotch 
 army that was sent to the assistance of the Parliament's 
 forces against the king ; and the victory of Marston Moor 
 in 1644 was chiefly ascribed to him. He was appointed in 
 1647 Lord-General of Scotland. 
 
 Notwithstanding his support of the Parliamentarians, 
 Lesley showed himself afterwards more loyal than other- 
 wise, owing to his disapproval of the king's murder. After 
 that event, none appeared more forward than the Earl of 
 Leven in raising an army and restoring King Charles n.
 
 THE BRAVE EARL OF LEVEN. 241 
 
 He served as a volunteer against Oliver Cromwell at the 
 battle of Dunbar, and heartily joined and concurred with 
 the Royalists in every measure for the Restoration ; but 
 when he, with others of the royal party, had a meeting in 
 Angus to concert matters for their future conduct, General 
 Monk, who then besieged Dundee, having got intelligence 
 of their meeting, sent a strong party in the night, surprised 
 and took them prisoners at Alyth, in Angus, and transferred 
 the veteran Leven, with several others, prisoners to London, 
 where they were confined in the Tower. The Earl remained 
 incarcerated there, and suffered sequestration and many 
 other hardships, till, by the mediation of the Queen of 
 Sweden, he obtained his liberty; and was so sensible of 
 the service her Majesty had done him, that he went over 
 to Sweden to make his acknowledgments, and was there 
 received and entertained with great respect in honour of 
 his former services. He at last returned to his own country, 
 retired to his seat, Balgony, in Fife, and died there at a 
 very advanced age in 1662.
 
 FYNDERN AND THE FYNDERNES. 
 
 JHE picturesque little village of Fyndern, about 
 five miles south-west of Derby, was for many 
 centuries the seat of the Fyndernes, probably 
 from the time of the Norman Conquest. There they con- 
 tinued until the family became extinct in the middle of the 
 sixteenth century, when the sole heiress, Jane Fynderne, 
 became the wife of Chief-Justice Harpur of Swarkestone, 
 the ancestor of the present owner of the estates, Sir John 
 Harpur Crewe, Bart, of Calke Abbey. The name of Walter 
 Fynderne occurs as one of the attesting witnesses to a charter 
 of Ranulph sixth Earl of Chester, to Repton Priory, about 
 1 1 go, which shows their early connection with this place. 
 The Fyndernes were also of Staffordshire, Warwickshire, 
 Essex, Berkshire, etc. 
 
 One sad episode in the history of the family of the 
 Fyndernes and it is not the only one is brought to light 
 by the singular will of Henry, the last Lord Gray of Codnor, 
 in Derbyshire. By this document it appears that one of the 
 daughters of this honourable house, Katherine Fynderne, 
 had fallen from the path which the others had trodden so
 
 FYNDERN AND THE FYNDERNES. 243 
 
 virtuously and so well, and had become the mistress of this 
 nobleman, and borne him several sons, who survived him. 
 There is, however, reason to believe that she belonged to 
 the Nottinghamshire branch of the Fyndernes, and was not 
 a daughter, but a cousin, of the Fyndernes of Fynderne. By 
 this will it appears that Henry Lord Gray of Codnor (who, 
 being much devoted to chemistry, procured a licence for the 
 transmutation of metals, and had grants of lands for his 
 great services from Edward iv. and Richard in.) was thrice 
 
 married: first, to Margaret ; secondly, to Katherine, 
 
 daughter to the Duchess of Norfolk ; and thirdly, to Kathe- 
 rine, said to be the daughter to the Earl of Devonshire. It 
 would seem that he had a liking for the name of Devon- 
 shire, having two wives and a mistress all bearing that 
 name-. 
 
 Jane Fynderne, the last of the family, in whose lovely 
 person were brought together all the virtues and all the 
 possessions not only of the original Derbyshire stock, but 
 of the Nottinghamshire branch of the Fyndernes, became 
 the wife of Lord Chief-Justice Harpur, to whom she brought 
 the ample estates for so many generations held and enjoyed 
 by her ancestors. She became the mother of two knights, 
 Sir John Harpur of Swarkestone, and Sir Richard Harpur 
 of Littleover, from the first of whom the present family ot 
 Harpur-Crewe is lineally descended ; the name of Crewe 
 having been taken in 1808, by sign-manual, by the then 
 Sir Henry Harpur. 
 
 Mr. Llewellyn Jewitt, F.S.A., in a very interesting paper
 
 244 FYNDERN AND THE FYNDERNES. 
 
 in the Reliquary, 1863, thus sketches the sad scene of long 
 decay, in one of his visits to the spot : 
 
 The seat of the De Fyndernes was at some little distance 
 from the church, on rising ground, at the other side of the 
 village green. It was once a stately mansion of great 
 extent. In the croft where it stood the foundations of 
 the walls may still be traced, as may also remains of ter- 
 races and outer waitings of considerable extent ; while on 
 the opposite side of the churchyard are also foundations 
 of other buildings, of ' fish-ponds,' and other appliances, 
 in the midst of these turf-grown remains, which are all 
 that are left to show where the princely hospitality of 
 the Fyndernes had been kept for generation after genera- 
 tion. 
 
 From the times of Edward i. to those of Henry VIIL, the 
 house of Fyndern was one of the most distinguished in 
 Derbyshire. Members of it had won their spurs in the 
 Crusades, and at Cressy, and at Agincourt. The territorial 
 possessions of the Fyndernes were large. The Fyndernes 
 were High Sheriffs, occasionally Rangers of Needwood 
 Forest, and Custodians of Tutbury Castle; 1 and they matched 
 
 1 ' Stout Ferrers there kept faithless ward, 
 And Gaunt perform'd his castle-guard. 
 There captive Mary look'd in vain 
 For Norfolk and her nuptial train ; 
 Enrich'd with royal tears the Dove, 
 But sigh'd for freedom, not for love.' 
 
 Needwood Forest, by Mundy. 
 
 Mary Queen of Scots was a prisoner in Tutbury Castle at the time of
 
 FYNDERN AND THE FYNDERNES. 245 
 
 with some of the best families of their times. The present 
 church, then the family chapel, had rows of monumental 
 brasses, and altar-tombs, all memorials of the Fyndernes. 
 
 Of the ' Fynderne flowers,' and the poetic tradition which 
 connects them with the Fyndernes, Sir Bernard Burke thus 
 touchingly writes in his Vicissitudes of Families : 
 
 ' In 1850 a pedigree research caused me to pay a visit to 
 the village. I sought for the ancient hall. Not a stone 
 remained to tell where it had stood ! I entered the church. 
 Not a single record of a Finderne was there ! I accosted 
 a villager, hoping to glean some stray traditions of the Fin- 
 denies. " Findernes ! " said he ; " we have no Findernes 
 here, but we have something that once belonged to them : 
 we have Findernes' flowers." " Show me them," I replied. 
 And the old man led me into a field which still retained 
 faint traces of terraces and foundations. " There," said he, 
 pointing to a bank of " garden flowers grown wild," " there 
 are the Findernes' flowers, brought by Sir Geoffrey from the 
 Holy Land ; and do what we will, they will never die ! " 
 Poetry mingles more with our daily life than we are apt to 
 acknowledge ; and even to an antiquary like myself, the 
 old man's prose and the subject of it were the very essence 
 of poetry. 
 
 ' For more than three hundred years the Fyndernes had 
 been extinct, the mansion they had dwelt in had crumbled 
 
 the Duke of Norfolk's intrigues. She listened to his proposals of mar- 
 riage as the only means of obtaining her liberty, declaring herself other- 
 wise averse to further matrimonial connections.
 
 246 FYNDERN AND THE FYNDERNES. 
 
 into dust, the brass and marble intended to perpetuate the 
 name had passed away, and a little tiny flower had for 
 ages preserved a name and a memory which the elaborate 
 works of man had failed to rescue from oblivion. The 
 moral of the incident is as beautiful as the poetry. We 
 often talk of "the language of flowers;" but of the elo- 
 quence of flowers we never had such a striking example as 
 that presented in these flowers of Fynderne : 
 
 ' ' ' Time, Time, his withering hand hath laid 
 
 On battlement and tower; 
 And where rich banners were displayed, 
 Now only waves a flower." ' 
 
 ' This tradition, which has given inspiration to more than 
 one poet, is very general among the villagers. It is said 
 that the flowers brought from the Holy Land, and planted 
 there by the hands of the Crusader himself, can never die. 
 This belief has, I regret to say, had a sad check in the 
 circumstance to which I have alluded, as related to me by 
 many of the inhabitants of the village. A former tenant of 
 the field where they grew the flowers I have seen were 
 the narcissus, but other kinds also bloomed there dug 
 them up wherever seen, and removed them to his garden, 
 where they died away. Their memory, however, will never 
 die.'
 
 THE GOLDSMITH OF LEEDS: 
 A TRAGIC TALE. 
 
 mace or civic sceptre of the Leeds Corpora- 
 tion has a very curious historical association. 
 It bears an engraved inscription, which states 
 that it was made by a goldsmith of the name of Maingee : 
 ' Arthur Maingee de Leeds- fecit.' This revered emblem 
 of municipal loyalty was made in 1694, and the goldsmith 
 who made it was hanged for high treason two years after- 
 wards. The circumstances of his trial and execution are very 
 extraordinary. Mr. Maingee was arraigned at the summer 
 assizes held at York, in 1696, before the Lord Chief-Justice 
 Turton. The charge was for high treason, in counter- 
 feiting the lawful coin of the realm. The chief witness 
 against Maingee was an approver of the name of George 
 Norcross, a supposed accomplice. The late Mr. Norrison 
 Scatcherd, of Morley, has left us a long detailed account 
 of this trial in manuscript. From this document it would 
 appear that the prosecution was conducted as much by 
 the Chief-Justice who tried the case, as by the counsel for
 
 248 THE GOLDSMITH OF LEEDS : 
 
 the Crown. Norcross proved that he was employed by 
 Maingee as a clipper at 55. a-day, and that he saw him 
 not only clip the sheets of base metal into the size and 
 form of the intended shilling or half-crown, with shears, 
 but that he also saw him stamp it on both sides by striking 
 it heavily with a forge hammer, on a balk in the roof of his 
 house, in a secret chamber. This witness was supported 
 in his statement by a man and woman whose stories were 
 very incoherent. In summing up, his Lordship concluded 
 thus : ' Gentlemen, if you believe what has been proved 
 against Mr. Maingee to be true, you are to find him guilty. 
 But, on the contrary, if you believe what Maingee and his 
 witnesses tell you, and discredit the evidence for the king, 
 you are to find him not guilty. But as far as I see, gentle- 
 men, it appears otherwise. Still it is not I, but you, who 
 must be his judges in this case. I have no more to say to 
 you, gentlemen.' Most persons will agree in thinking that 
 his Lordship had said quite enough. The jury, of course, 
 under such direction brought in a verdict of guilty, and 
 Maingee was sentenced the same evening (26th August) 
 to be drawn on a hurdle to the common place of execution, 
 and there to be hanged as a traitor. Urgent applications 
 were made in Maingee's behalf to the Government, and 
 he was actually twice reprieved. But in the end the Chief- 
 Justice's influence prevailed, and the unfortunate jeweller 
 was executed on the 3d of October following. Norcross 
 then accused Alderman Ibbetson, Mr. Blayds, Mr. Totty, 
 Mr. Walker, and several other respectable burgesses, of
 
 A TRAGIC TALE. 249 
 
 being concerned in this extensive system of coining base 
 money, and selling clippings to Maingee. But in these 
 cases his testimony was unsupported and discredited, and 
 the bills were thrown out by the grand jury. After this 
 break-down Norcross disappeared from Leeds. It was 
 reasonably supposed that Maingee was most unjustly con- 
 victed upon such disreputable testimony, especially as he 
 made a solemn asseveration of his innocence, after receiving 
 the sacrament on the morning of his execution. At the 
 same time he entirely exonerated those fellow-citizens who 
 were included in the same accusation by Norcross. Main- 
 gee, in fact, was universally considered a murdered man, 
 if not a martyr. 
 
 Now comes a curious sequel to this tragic story. It 
 happened that it became necessary to pull down Maingee's 
 old house in Briggate in 1832, just 136 years after his exe- 
 cution. The site of this house is at present occupied by 
 three new houses, a few doors below Kirkgate, nearly 
 opposite to Green and Buck's, the grocers. Well, in strip- 
 ping off the roof of this old house, the workmen came 
 upon a small secret chamber; and on the floor of this 
 chamber they found these two pairs of shears or clippers, 
 these being the very tools with which Norcross swore 
 Maingee and himself used to clip the coins. Here we have 
 two dumb witnesses brought forward after this long lapse of 
 time to corroborate the discredited evidence of this approver 
 of infamous reputation. How very fortunate for the worthy 
 Alderman Ibbetson, Messrs. Blayds, Totty, Walker, and Co.,
 
 250 THE GOLDSMITH OF LEEDS. 
 
 that this concealed chamber was not more carefully examined 
 before their indictments were quashed by the grand jury 
 at York; for it is otherwise quite possible (with the san- 
 guinary laws by which especially forgeries were punished 
 in those days indeed, even up to the present century) that 
 Alderman Ibbetson, and several other respectable burgesses, 
 before whom this identical mace was often borne in im- 
 posing civic procession to the old parish church, might 
 have been all hanged as accomplices of the unlucky gold- 
 smith. 
 
 The guilt of the goldsmith has, however, been questioned. 
 The finding of common tools, without the discovery of dies, 
 coins, base or otherwise, effects of hammering on a balk, etc., 
 136 years after the occurrence, can scarcely, it is thought, 
 be deemed sufficient evidence to confirm his iniquity. The 
 whole appears to rest upon the value of the testimony of 
 the principal witness, who swore to having seen the opera- 
 tions performed.
 
 A COUNTRY GENTLEMAN OF THE 
 SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. . 
 
 the year 1638 lived Mr. Henry Hastings, by 
 his quality son, brother, and uncle to the Earl 
 of Huntingdon. He was peradventure an 
 original in his age, or rather the copy of our ancient 
 nobility in hunting, not in warlike times. He was low, 
 very strong and very active, with a reddish flaxen hair; 
 his clothes always green cloth, and never worth, when new, 
 five pounds. 
 
 His house was perfectly of the olden fashion, in the 
 midst of a large park well stocked with deer; and near 
 the house, rabbits for his kitchen ; many fish-ponds ; great 
 store of wood and timber ; a bowling-green in it long but 
 narrow, full of high ridges, it being never levelled since it 
 was ploughed. They used round sand-bowls, and the green 
 had a banqueting-house like a stand, a large one built in 
 a tree. He kept all manner of sport-hounds that ran 
 buck, fox, hare, otter, and badger; and hawks, long and 
 short winged. He had all sorts of net for fish. He had 
 a walk in the New Forest and manor of Christchurch :
 
 252 A COUNTRY GENTLEMAN OF 
 
 this last supplied him with red deer, sea and river fish ; 
 indeed, all his neighbours' grounds and royalties were free 
 to him, who bestowed all his time on these sports, but 
 what he borrowed to caress his neighbours' wives and 
 daughters. This made him very popular ; always speaking 
 kindly to the husband, brother, or father, who was, to boot, 
 very welcome to his house. Whenever he came there, he 
 found beef, pudding, and small-beer in great plenty; the 
 house not so neatly kept as to shame him or his dirty 
 shoes ; the great hall strewed with marrow-bones ; full of 
 hawks, perches, hounds, spaniels, and terriers; the upper 
 side of the hall hung with fox-skins of this and the last 
 year's killing ; here and there a polecat intermixed ; game- 
 keepers' and hunters' poles in great abundance. 
 
 The parlour was a large room as properly furnished ; 
 on a great hearth, paved with bricks, lay some terriers, 
 and the choicest hounds and spaniels. Seldom but two 
 of the great chairs had litters of cats in them, which were 
 not to be disturbed, he having always three or four 
 attending him at dinner, and a little white stick of four- 
 teen inches long lying by his trencher, that he might defend 
 such meat that he had no mind to part with to them. 
 The windows, which were very large, served for places to 
 lay his arrows, cross-bows, stone-bows, and such like 
 accoutrements. The corners of the room full of the best 
 chosen hunting or hawking poles. His oyster table at the 
 lower end, which was of constant use twice a day all the 
 year round; for he never failed to eat oysters at both
 
 THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 253 
 
 dinner and supper time all seasons. The neighbouring 
 town of Poole supplied him with them. 
 
 The upper part of the room had two small tables and 
 a desk, on thq one side of which was a church Bible, and 
 on the other side the Book of Martyrs. On the table 
 were hawks' hoods, bells, and such like ; two or three old 
 hats, with their crowns thrust in so as to hold ten or a 
 dozen eggs, which were of the pheasant kind of poultry : 
 these he took much care of, and fed himself. , Tables, dice, 
 cards, and bones were not wanting. In the hole of the 
 desk were stores of tobacco-pipes that had been used. 
 One side of this end of the room was the door of a closet : 
 therein stood the strong beer and wine, which never came 
 from thence but in single glasses, that being the rule of 
 the house, exactly observed ; for he never exceeded in 
 drink, or permitted it. On the other side was the door of 
 an old chapel, not used for devotion. The pulpit, as the 
 safest place, was never wanting of a cold chine of beef, 
 venison pasty, gammon of bacon, or a great apple-pie with 
 thick crust, extremely baked. His table cost him not 
 much, though it was good to eat at. His sports supplied 
 all but beef and mutton, except Fridays, when he had the 
 best of salt fish, as well as other fish he could get; and 
 this was the day his neighbours of best quality visited him. 
 He never wanted a London pudding, and always sung it 
 in with ' My part lies therein.' He drank a glass or two 
 of wine at his meals, very often put syrup of gillyflowers 
 in his sack, and had always a tunglass without feet placed
 
 254 A COUNTRY GENTLEMAN. 
 
 by him, holding a pint of small beer, which he often stirred 
 with rosemary. He was well-natured, but soon angry. He 
 lived to be a hundred, and never lost his eye-sight, but 
 always wrote and read without spectacles, and got on 
 horseback without help. Until past fourscore he rode to 
 the death of a stag as well as any. He died on the 5th 
 of October 1650. (Extracted from the Works of Lord 
 Chancellor Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury.} 
 
 A FOUNDLING KNIGHT. 
 
 Sir William de Sevenoake, a person of distinction in the 
 fifteenth century, rose from beggary to opulence. According 
 to Lambarde, in his Perambulation of Kent, De Sevenoake 
 was deserted by his parents when a boy, and found lying 
 in the street of the town of Sevenoaks. By some charitable 
 persons he was brought up and apprenticed to a grocer 
 in London, and became alderman of Tower Ward, and 
 'maior and chief majistrate of that citie' in 1418. He was 
 knighted by Henry vi., and represented the city in Parlia- 
 ment. After accumulating great wealth, he died in 1432, 
 and was buried in the old church of St. Martin, Ludgate, 
 which was taken down in 1436. Sir William de Sevenoake 
 has perpetuated his name and philanthropy by founding 
 and endowing a grammar school and almshouse in the 
 town wherein he was found as above.
 
 THREE EARLS STANHOPE. 
 
 barony of Stanhope has been filled in succes- 
 sion by three remarkable men of independent 
 character and eminent public services. The 
 first Earl was the eldest son of the Honourable Alexander 
 Stanhope, a distinguished diplomatist in the reigns of King 
 William and Queen Anne. His son became eminent as a 
 soldier, and carried arms under .King William in Flanders, 
 and under the Duke of Schomberg and Earl of Peter- 
 borough. He was appointed to the command of the British 
 forces in Spain in 1708, and obtained considerable renown 
 by the reduction of the celebrated Port Mahon, in the 
 island of Minorca. At the close of his military career he 
 became an active Whig leader in Parliament, took office 
 under Sunderland, and soon after was raised to the peerage. 
 His death was very sudden. He was of a constitutionally 
 warm and sensitive temper. In the course of the discus- 
 sion of the South Sea Company's affairs, which so unhappily 
 involved some of the leading members of the Government, 
 the Duke of Wharton (Feb. 4, 1721) made some severe 
 remarks in the House of Lords, comparing the conduct of
 
 256 THREE EARLS STANHOPE. 
 
 Ministers to that of Sejanus, who made the reign of Tiberius 
 hateful to the old Romans. Stanhope, in rising to reply, 
 spoke with such vehemence in vindication of himself and 
 his colleagues, that he burst a blood-vessel, and died the 
 next day. ' May it be eternally remembered,' says the 
 British Merchant^ 'to the honour of Earl Stanhope, that 
 he died poorer in the king's service than when he came 
 into it. Walsingham, the great Walsingham, died poor; 
 but the great Stanhope lived in the time of the South Sea 
 temptations.' 
 
 Philip, the second Earl Stanhope, died in 1786, aged 
 seventy-two. His eldest son Charles (the third Earl) mar- 
 ried Lord Chatham's eldest daughter, Hester Pitt, of which 
 marriage was born the eccentric Lady Hester Stanhope. 
 Both the above Earls were exceedingly liberal in their 
 political opinions, and both were excellent mathematicians. 
 The first was so in spite of his guardian, the celebrated 
 Earl of Chesterfield, who prohibited him when a boy from 
 the pursuit of his favourite study. He was also an accom- 
 plished linguist, a sound classical scholar, with so retentive 
 a memory that he could repeat the whole of the Iliad and 
 Odyssey by rote. Earl Philip was a munificent patron of 
 learning and learned men. As a statesman, he was one of 
 the most independent of his day. That day was one of 
 splendid extravagance ; but Earl Philip did not follow the 
 mode. On one of his occasional visits to the House of 
 Lords from Geneva, where he long resided, a new door-
 
 THREE EARLS STANHOPE. 257 
 
 keeper seeing him about to pass into the House in a dress 
 of extreme simplicity, impeded his entrance, with the 
 remark, ' Now, then, honest man, go back ! You can 
 have no business in such a place as this, honest man ! ' 
 The Earl was a determined republican,- and made his son 
 (Lord Mahon) offer himself to the citizens of Westminster 
 in 1774, engaging to promote all popular causes, and to 
 declare for all Wilkes's self-denying articles in their largest 
 latitude. He was then only twenty-one years of age. 
 
 Earl Charles was a more advanced republican than his 
 father; and when the French Revolution burst forth, he 
 laid aside all the external ornaments of the peerage. But 
 he is remembered for better things than this. When a 
 young man, he gained a prize from the Society of Stock- 
 holm for a Memoir on the Pendulum. He was, perhaps, 
 too universal a genius to be very useful to mankind ; and 
 among his projects, rather than his achievements, may be 
 mentioned his arithmetical machine ; his plan for securing 
 buildings from fire ; his new printing-press ; his monochord 
 for tuning musical instruments ; and his designs for a vessel 
 to sail against wind and tide (Dr. Doran's Notes to Walpole's 
 Last Journals).
 
 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 
 
 UTLAND, the smallest county in England, 
 little more than half the size of Middlesex, 
 has its excellences thus sung by Drayton : 
 
 ' Love not thyself the less, although the least thou art ; 
 What thou in greatness wants, wise Nature doth impart 
 In goodness of thy soil ; and more delicious mould, 
 Surveying all this isle, the sun did ne'er behold. 
 Bring forth that British vale, and be it ne'er so rare, 
 But Catmose with that vale for richness shall compare. 
 What forest nymph is found, how brave soe'er she be, 
 But Lyfield shows herself as brave a nymph as she ? 
 What river ever rose from bank or swelling hill 
 Than Rutland's wandering Wash, a delicater rill ? 
 Small shire that canst produce to thy proportion good, 
 One Vale of special name, one Forest, and one Flood.' 
 
 In our fine old author's Alexandrines we do not, how- 
 ever, find certain odd things for which this small shire is or 
 has been noted as Stilton cheese, trenchers, and Jeffrey 
 Hudson, the dwarf of Oakham, served up at table in a 
 cold pie ; to which must be added the curious custom of 
 nailing a horse-shoe on the castle-gate, which dates some 
 seven centuries back.
 
 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 259 
 
 Oakham, the county town, had anciently a Hall, which 
 had been taken by the Conqueror into his own hands; 
 since Edward the Confessor beoueathed the demesne in 
 this county to his wife conditionally, that after her death 
 it should descend to the Monastery of St. Peter at West 
 minster, which donation was confirmed by a charter dated 
 1064. A Hall was the usual appendage to a manor, 
 and differed in its architectural character as well as in its 
 nature from a castle. These Halls answer to the manor- 
 houses of a later period; and in the Conqueror's record 
 they are denominated caput matierii, thus marking the con- 
 nection between the demesne and the residence and the 
 feudal chief before he had received the king's licence to 
 build an embattled dwelling. A Ferrers crossed the sea 
 with the Conqueror, and upon his descendant Henry n. 
 bestowed the manor of Oakham. Robert Ferrers was 
 settled in Derbyshire, and in the 3d of Stephen (1137) 
 created the first Earl. His son, Walkeline de Ferrers, 
 held the barony of Oakham by the service of one knight's 
 fee and a half in 12 Henry n. ; and in 22 Henry n. 
 he paid 100 marks for trespassing in the king's forests in 
 these parts. His ancestors bore arms semee of horse- 
 shoes, as designative of Master of the Horse to the Duke 
 of Normandy. It is to him that the erection of the Hall, 
 still existing, has been attributed ; and upon evidence, says 
 the Rev. C. H. Hartshorne, which there seems no reason- 
 able ground for disputing. The style of architecture alone 
 affords the strongest presumption that the building was
 
 266 HORSErSHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 
 
 erected towards the close of the twelfth century from 
 1 1 80 to 1190. Matthew Paris says that Walkeline de 
 Ferrers was at the siege of Acre, in the Holy Land, with 
 the English king, in the third year of his reign (1191). 
 In 1 20 1 he died, and was succeeded by his son Hugh, 
 who dying in 1204 without issue, Isabella, his only sister, 
 wife of Roger Lord Mortimer, became his heir ; and this 
 ended the connection of the Ferrers family with the town 
 of Oakham. 
 
 The peculiar custom existing in this place, of compelling 
 every Peer of Parliament, the first time he passes through 
 the town, to give a horse-shoe, ' to be nailed upon the 
 castle gate,' is of ancient standing, since it is mentioned 
 by Camden as existing in his time. It is supposed to have 
 come as a liberty from the Ferrers, who were early lords 
 of the demesnes, though there seems no other warrant for 
 this conjecture than the fanciful play upon the words 
 De Ferreriis. By an inquisition found in the hundred rolls, 
 made at Stamford before twelve jurors of the hundred of 
 Martinsley, in the 3d Edward i. (1257), it seems that a 
 custom analogous was then in existence. The jurors 
 declare on their oath, that it appears to them that the 
 manor and castle of Oakham were formerly in the hands of 
 William the Conqueror, and were worth ^100 a-year and 
 upwards ; that the king gave them to Hugh, who held that 
 manor for him till Normandy was lost. The successors 
 of Hugh at that time rebelled against King John, who 
 thereupon granted the manor and castle to Isabella de Mor-
 
 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 261 
 
 timer for her life by the same service and after her death 
 the manor came into the hands of Henry, father of King 
 Edward, who conveyed it with the castle, in fee-dowry, to 
 Senchia, wife of Richard Earl of Cornwall, to hold it for 
 him in chief by the aforesaid service. The jurors at 
 Stamford also found that every bailiff of Richard Earl of 
 Cornwall took at Oakham, as well in the time of King 
 Henry as now, toll of carriages bought or sold, and of all 
 other things there, to the damage of 10 per annum, by 
 what warrant they know not, and this unjustly. They also 
 said that Peter de Nevil took ten marcs unjustly from the 
 men of Oakham and Langham, by virtue of his office, that 
 they should not have their dogs lawed. In the following 
 year the jurors returned that the county of Rutland formerly 
 belonged to the county of Northampton, until Henry in. 
 granted it to the King of Germany (Richard Earl of Corn- 
 wall), whom they found had right of gallows, assize of bread 
 and ale, pillory, and ducking-stool. And they said that 
 the bailiffs of Oakham, in the reigns of Henry in. and 
 Edward i., took toll of carriages, horses bought or sold, 
 and all other merchandize at Oakham they know not by 
 what warrant. The transition to a commutation of a shoe 
 for a money payment, or the reverse, is easily to be 
 accounted for. 
 
 By these inquisitions is seen what was the origin of de- 
 manding a horse-shoe at Oakham ; at least an insight is 
 gathered into the practice, which has at various periods 
 been countenanced by English monarchs and the highest
 
 262 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 
 
 judicial functionaries. In the second year of Richard n., 
 Edward Plantagenet, second Duke of York, on being 
 created Earl of Rutland, had granted to him the castle, 
 town, and lordship of Oakham, and the whole forest of 
 Rutland. This prince was trampled to death at the battle 
 of Agincourt. By his will, made at Harfleur, 22d of August 
 1415, he directed the interment of his remains in the 
 College of Fotheringhay, which he had founded. In 1399 
 the Duke of York was suspected of being concerned in an 
 abortive conspiracy against his relative Henry iv., the Lin- 
 colnshire-born king, for which offence Sir John Holland, 
 second son of the Earl of Kent, was beheaded. Another 
 possessor of the castle, the Duke of Buckingham, in the 
 reign of Richard in., was beheaded ; as were a second 
 Duke of Buckingham in the reign of Henry vin., and 
 Lord Thomas Cromwell in the year 1540. 
 
 The manor and castle repeatedly reverted to the Crown, 
 and were again repeatedly granted. Among the possessors 
 of them were Richard King of the Romans, brother of 
 Henry in. ; Edward Earl of Kent, brother of Edward n. ; 
 De Vere Earl of Oxford and Duke of Ireland, favourite of 
 Richard n. ; Thomas of Woodstock, uncle to the same king ; 
 the two Dukes of Buckingham already named; Thomas 
 Cromwell Earl of Essex ; and George Villiers Duke of 
 Buckingham, the witty and profligate favourite of Charles n. 
 
 The architecture of the Hall is late Norman, or very 
 early English. It is divided by three shafts on either side 
 into four bays. It is smaller though earlier than the Hall at
 
 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 263 
 
 Winchester, but in its sculpture and detail more beautiful. 
 Nothing can exceed the spirit and gracefulness of the sculp- 
 tured heads under the brackets. Those of Henry n. and his 
 wife Margaret of Guienne are strikingly fine. The present 
 position of the door is not the original one. When Buck 
 published his view in 1720, the door was at the east end, 
 like that in the refectory at Dover. The ancient roof was 
 probably semicircular, like that existing still in the Bishop's 
 palace at Hereford. The oldest portions of the present roof 
 are two red beams put up by Villiers Duke of Buckingham, 
 who also built the gateway. Altogether, this is one of the 
 most perfect specimens of domestic architecture (twelfth 
 century) in existence. 1 
 
 With respect to the Horse-shoe custom, a contributor to a 
 periodical work, writing at the latter end of the last century, 
 says : ' The lord of this castle and manor claims by pre- 
 scription a franchise of a very uncommon kind, viz. that the 
 first time any peer of this kingdom shall happen to pass 
 through the precincts of this lordship, he shall forfeit as a 
 homage a shoe from the horse whereon he rideth, unless he 
 redeems it with money ; and according to the liberality of 
 the nobleman who incurs the forfeit, a shoe is made in size, 
 gilt, decorated, and inscribed with his title, and the date 
 when compounded for, which is placed in the castle, or on 
 
 1 Abridged in the main from a Lecture delivered in the Castle Hall, 
 Oakham, by the Rev. Thomas James, M.A., Hon. Canon of Peter- 
 borough, and one of the Secretaries of the Architectural Society for the 
 Archdeaconry of Northampton, which includes the county of Rutland.
 
 264 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 
 
 the gate, in a conspicuous point of view. Five and sometimes 
 ten guineas is the douceur on these occasions, which, the 
 clerk of the market informed me, the Earl of Winchilsea 
 (lord of the manor) permits him to have for a perquisite. 
 When I was at Oakham, I copied such of the inscriptions 
 of the shoes as were legible. Many are gone, for I find the 
 late clerk of the market used to take down several old ones 
 when a new one was fixed, which he gave in exchange to 
 save himself expense. The gentleman who now holds the 
 office rescued a number from the hands of a smith, which 
 he caused to be fixed against the jury-box within the castle.' 
 The ceremony of giving possession of lands or offices was, 
 by the feudal law, accompanied with the delivery of certain 
 symbols. In conformity to this practice, princes conferred 
 bishoprics and abbeys by the delivery of a crozier and a 
 ring, which was called their investiture. It seems to have 
 been on this principle that the Lords de Ferrers were en- 
 titled to demand from every baron, on his passing through 
 this lordship, a shoe from one of his horses, to be nailed 
 upon the castle gate the bailiff of the manor being em- 
 powered to stop the horses until service was performed. 
 Although there are some very ancient shoes still on the 
 walls of the castle, a great many have disappeared from 
 time to time. The number of shoes now in the castle is 89, 
 and there are two on the entrance-gates. The largest is 4 
 feet 8 inches by 4 feet 7 inches, and the smallest is 43 
 inches by.4i inches. The inscription on some of the shoes 
 is effaced. In speaking of the horse-shoes, Mr. Wright,
 
 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 265 
 
 writing in 1684, says: 'The true original of this custom I 
 have not been able, on my utmost endeavour, to discover ; 
 but that such is, and time out of mind hath been, the usage, 
 appears by several monumental horse-shoes, some gilded 
 and of curious workmanship, nail'd upon the castle-hall door.' 
 
 The following are the latest additions : 
 
 Richard Henry Fitzroy Baron Raglan, 1859; James Lord 
 Talbot de Malahide, July 25, 1861 ; Lord Camperdown, Nov. 
 28, 1861; The Earl of Ilchester, 1862; G. W. R. Fermor Earl 
 of Pomfret, 1862; The Earl of Granville, 1864; The Earl of 
 Carrick, 1866; Charles George Earl of Gainsborough, 1867; 
 The Marquis of Exeter, Nov. 28, 1867. 
 
 THOMAS GARTON, Governor of the Castle. 
 THOMAS WAKELING, Castle Keeper. 
 July 1868. 
 
 The following is a list of those shoes on which inscrip- 
 tions are now legible : 
 
 Against the wall above the Judge's Bench on the east end 
 of the Castle. Henry Montague, May 12, 1607 ; Henry Lord 
 Grey, 1614; William Earl Berners, 1704; Edward Earl of 
 Lincoln, 1680; Edward Earl of Dudley; Elizabeth Baroness 
 Percy, 1771 ; Heneage Earl of Aylesford, 1779; Charles Lord 
 Barham, 1809; Heneage Earl of Aylesford, 1815 ; William Earl 
 of Dartmouth, 1815; John Earl Brownlow, August 28, 1818; 
 Brownlow Marquis of Exeter, K.G., Nov. 15, 1827 ; John Earl 
 of Chesterfield, March 29, 1829; Robert Earl of Roden, Jan. 22, 
 1829 ; George Lord Calthorpe, 1831 ; Hugh Percy, Lord Bishop 
 of Carlisle, June 1832 ; George Marquis of Cholmondeley, 1838 ; 
 Arthur Duke of Wellington, K.G., 1838; Thomas Lord Den- 
 man, L.C.J.Q.B., March 8, 1839 ; Charles Lord Barham, Jan. 7, 
 ^39 ; John Charles Earl Spencer, 1840. 
 
 Fixed to the wall on the side of the Castle. Baptist Earl of 
 Gainsborough, Dec. 17, 1604; Robert Earl of Cardigan, April
 
 266 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 
 
 30, 1667 ; Edward Earl of Gainsborough, April 10, 1687 ; 
 Edward Viscount Ipswich, 1687; Francis Lord Guilford, 1690; 
 George Earl of Hertford, September 1703 ; Lewis Earl of 
 Rockingham, May 30, 1733; Philip Lord Hardwick, August 6, 
 1736; Augustus Frederick Duke of Leinster, March 29, 1807; 
 George Lord Bishop of Peterborough, 1810; Albemarle Earl of 
 Lindsey, Nov. n, 1811; R. W. P. Earl Howe, Jan. 9, 1832; 
 Robert Earl of Cardigan, 1815 ; Marquis of Tweeddale, 
 K. P. C. B., 1832; Charles Earl Fitzwilliam, 1841; Baron 
 Methuen, Dec. i, 1853; James Lord Wensleydale, 1856; Lord 
 Vivian, 1856. 
 
 Inscriptions on the Shoes fixed on the south wall. Henry 
 Earl of Exeter, March 22, 1794; Gilbert John Lord Aveland, 
 1856. 
 
 Against the wall above the Judge's seat at the west end of 
 the Castle. His Royal Highness Frederick Duke of York and 
 Albany, March 30, 1778 (a splendid shoe coronet over it); His 
 Royal Highness Ernest Augustus Duke of Cumberland, K.G., 
 Sept. 1808; His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, Jan. 7, 
 1814 (an elegant shoe coronet over it); Her Royal Highness 
 Victoria, Duchess of Kent, Sept. 21, 1833; Her Royal High- 
 ness Princess Alexandrina Victoria (the Queen), Sept. 21, 1833; 
 His Royal Highness Adolphus Frederick Duke of Cambridge, 
 1843; Bennet Earl of Harborough, 1753; Brownlow Earl of 
 Exeter, 1759; William Lord Mansfield, L.C.J., 1763; Lewis 
 Lord Sondes, 1766; Charles Lord Camden, 1766; John Fre- 
 derick Duke of Dorset, 1782; Alexander .Lord Loughborough, 
 L.C.J., 1782; John Earl of Westmoreland, 1782; John George 
 Earl Spencer, 1784; John Lord Clifton Earl of Darnley, of 
 Ireland, 1791 (an elegant shoe has his Lordship's crest over 
 it); Thomas James Viscount Bulkeley, Oct. 10, 1793; Henry 
 Earl of Exeter, March 27, 1794; William Earl of Lonsdale, 
 K.G., 1807; G. C. Weld Lord Forester, 1829; John Singleton 
 Lord Lyndhurst, March 4, 1830. 
 
 Against the wall above the Judge's Bench. Elizabeth 
 Baroness Percy, 1771; Heneage Earl of Aylesford, 1779.
 
 HORSE-SHOES AT OAKHAM CASTLE. 267 
 
 Fixed on the outer gate. Brownlow Earl of Exeter, April 10, 
 J 7335 John Earl of Exeter, 1774. 
 
 The following list of shoes appears in Wright's History 
 and Antiquities of Rutland : 
 
 Henry Lord Mordant, 1602; Edward Lord Dudley; William 
 Earl of Pembroke; Philip Earl of Montgomery; Henry Lord 
 Clifford, 1607; Lancelot Andrews, Lord Bishop of Ely, 1614; 
 Lord Noel, 1617; Henry Earl of Huntington, 1620; Ferdinando 
 Lord Hastings, 1621 ; John Lord Vaughan, 1621 ; Spencer Lord 
 Compton, 1621; Thomas L. Cromwell Vic Le Cale, 1631; 
 Nicholas Earl of Banbury, 1655; John L. Bellasis, Bar. of 
 Worleby, 1667. 
 
 The following are from a list printed in 1796 : 
 
 John Earl of Exeter, Aug. 7, 1714; Brownlow Earl of Exeter, 
 April 10, 1755; Henry Earl of Gainsborough, 1764; Robert Earl 
 of Harborough, 1772; Edward Earl Dudley; P. L. Wharton; 
 George E. Cumberland ; E. Wiloughby ; Philip Earl of Mount- 
 norris; 1602, * * Septein, Heri L. Mordant, I2th May 1607* 
 Henri Montegle; Henry Lord Grey, 1614; Edward Earle of 
 Lincoln, May 20, 1680; April 8, 1687, Thomas Earle of Stam- 
 ford ; Robert Earle of Cardigan, April 30, 1667 ; April 10, 1687, 
 Edward of Gainsborough; Aug. 14, Edward Viscount Ipswich, 
 1687. 
 
 A curious story is told of ' the Golden Shoe,' presented 
 by Lord Willoughby De Eresby, but stolen by some per- 
 son who probably thought it was made of the precious 
 metal. Still the shoe was much prized, it having been 
 taken off his Lordship's favourite horse Clinker. The 
 shoe was returned to Oakham in a parcel, by railway, on 
 May 8, 1858, the day on which Lord Chief-Justice Camp- 
 bell's shoe was placed in the Hall.
 
 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS IN THE 
 OLDEN TIME. 
 
 iNE of the most lasting things in the world is 
 custom. To this day we celebrate Christmas 
 with mumming, which our ancestors borrowed 
 from the Roman Saturnalia ; and its name from the Danish 
 mvmme, or Dutch momme disguise in a mask or the paint- 
 ing of faces. We can trace the Lord of Misrule, or master 
 of merry disports, from the King's house to the house of 
 every nobleman of honour or good worship spiritual 
 or temporal down to the Mayors' and Sheriffs' feast, to 
 the farmer's fireside, and the roystering in the highways 
 and byways. Prince, peer, and peasant have for ages 
 commemorated our great festival by the same rnerry 
 means. 
 
 The ancient mumming, however, took this strange turn : 
 It consisted in changing clothes between men and women, 
 who were dressed in each other's habits ; went from one 
 neighbour's house to another, partaking of Christmas 
 cheer, and making merry with them in disguise. Mr. 
 Sandys, in his ingenious Christ 'mastide, remarks that 'the
 
 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS. 269 
 
 mummeries or disguises were known here as early as the 
 time of Henry IL, if not sooner. They were not confined 
 to the diversions of the king and his nobles ; but a ruder 
 class was in vogue among the inferior orders, where, no 
 doubt, abuses were occasionally introduced in consequence. 
 Even now, our country geese or guise dancers are a 
 remnant of the same custom ; and in some places a horse's 
 head still accompanies these mummers.' 
 
 A more rational phase of mumming was the ludi, or 
 plays, exhibited at court in the Christmas holidays, to be 
 traced back as far as the reign of Edward in., though they 
 are thought to be much older. The dresses appropriated in 
 1348 to one of these plays show that they were mummeries, 
 and not theatrical divertissements. The king then kept his 
 Christmas at his castle at Guildford, the picturesque keep 
 of which remains to this day. The dresses consisted of 80 
 tunics of buckram of various colours ; 42 vizors 14 faces 
 of women, 14 of men, and 14 heads of angels, made with 
 silver; 28 crests; 14 mantles, embroidered with heads of 
 dragons; 14 white tunics wrought with the heads and wings 
 of peacocks, 14 with the heads and wings of swans; 14 
 tunics painted with the eyes of peacocks ; 14 tunics of 
 English linen, painted; and 14 other tunics embroidered 
 with stars of gold. The magnificent pageants and dis- 
 guisings frequently exhibited at Court in the succeeding 
 reigns, and especially in the reign of Henry vin., were 
 mummeries destitute of character and humour, their chief 
 aim being, to surprise the spectators ' by the ridiculous
 
 270 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS. 
 
 and exaggerated oddity of the vizors, and by the singu- 
 larity and splendour of the dresses : everything was out of 
 nature and propriety.' Such a strange scene will be re- 
 membered in Mr. Charles Kean's getting up of Shakspeare's 
 'Henry vm.' at the Princess' Theatre, upon which much 
 research was expended. 
 
 In a beautiful manuscript in the Bodleian Librdry, 
 written and illuminated in the reign of Edward in., are 
 some spirited figures of mummers wearing the heads of 
 animals, among which the stag, with branching horns, is 
 most prominent. Some of the heads are very grotesque, 
 and remind one of the strange head-masks worn in the 
 opening of pantomimes in the present day. The olden 
 performance seems to have consisted chiefly in dancing, 
 and the mummers were usually attended by the minstrels 
 playing upon different kinds of musical instruments. 
 
 Stow describes a remarkable mummery in 1377, made by 
 the citizens of London for the disport of the young Prince 
 Richard, son to the Black Prince. They rode disguised 
 and well horsed 130 in number with minstrels and torch- 
 lights of wax to Kennington, beside Lambeth, where the 
 young Prince remained with his mother. These maskers 
 alighted, entered the palace-hall, and set to the Prince and 
 his mother and lords cups and rings of gold, which they 
 won at a cast, after which they feasted, and the Prince 
 and lords danced with the mummers ; * which jollitie being 
 ended, they were made to drink,' etc. Henry iv., in the 
 second year of his reign, kept his Christmas at Eltham,
 
 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS. 271 
 
 whither ' twelve aldermen of London and their sonnes rode 
 a-mumming, and had great thanks.' 
 
 The Cornish miracle-plays, which were not performed in 
 churches, but in an earthen amphitheatre in some open 
 field, continued to be exhibited long after the abolition of 
 the miracles and moralities in other parts of the kingdom. 
 Accordingly, we find them lingering in Cornwall 'to our 
 time ; and in Cornwall, Devon, and Staffordshire, the old 
 spirit of Christmas is kept up more earnestly than in most 
 other counties. In Cornwall they exhibit the old dance of 
 St. George and the Dragon ; and in the Staffordshire halls 
 a band of bedizened actors perform the whole of the ancient 
 drama. This famous mummery is imagined to refer to the 
 time of the Crusades, and to have been invented by the 
 warriors of the Cross on their return from Palestine. Mr. 
 Sandys gives this Christmas play ' as represented in the 
 West of England.' Hone, in his Every-Day Hook, gives 
 an extended version of ' St. George,' under the title of 
 'Alexander and the King of Egypt, a Mock Play, as it 
 is acted by the Mummers every Christmas : Whitehaven.' 
 In a scarce work, written in 1737, we find this record of 
 ' St. George : ' 
 
 ' England's Heroe Saint George for England. At Christ- 
 mas are (or at least very lately were) fellows wont to go 
 about from house to house, in Exeter, a-mumming ; one of 
 whom, in a (borrow'd) Holland shirt, more gorgeously 
 beribboned over his waistcoat, etc., flourishing a faulchion 
 very valiantly, entertains the admiring spectators thus :
 
 272 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS. 
 
 ' Oh ! here comes I, Saint George, a man of courage bold, 
 And with my spear I winn'd three crowns of gold. 
 I slew the Dragon, and brought him to the slaughter, 
 And by that very means I married Sabra, the beauteous King 
 of Egypt's daughter. ' 
 
 All the versions have evidently sprung from one original. 
 The Worcestershire mumming is played by boys. The 
 Valiant Soldier wore a real soldier's coat ; Old Father 
 Christmas carried holly ; the Turkish Knight had a turban ; 
 and all of them were decked out with ribbons and scarves, 
 and had their faces painted. Little Devil Doubt had a 
 black face, and carried a money-box, a basin, and a 
 bladder; with the bladder he thwacked the performer 
 whose turn it was to speak. Beelzebub is identical with 
 Old Father Christmas, who sings : 
 
 ' In comes I, old Father Beelzebub ; 
 And on my shoulder I carry a club, 
 And in my hand I carry a can, 
 Don't you think I'm jolly old man ? 
 As jolly as I am, Christmas comes but once a-year; 
 Now's the time for roast beef, plum-pudding, mince-pies, and 
 strong beer.' 
 
 Miss Baker, in her Glossary, published in 1854, describes 
 the mummers as young men, generally six or eight, who 
 during the Christmas holidays, commencing on St. Thomas's 
 Eve, go about in the rural districts of Northamptonshire, 
 disguised, personating different characters, and performing 
 a burlesque tragedy at such houses as they think will 
 recompense them for their entertainment. Brackley is 
 the only market-town where Miss Baker heard of the
 
 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS. 273 
 
 custom being observed. Some years since she witnessed 
 the representation of a mock play by eight mummers, all 
 masked, at the seat of Michael Woodhull, Esq., Thenford. 
 The characters were Beelzebub, Activity, Age on the 
 Stage, Doctor, Doctor's Horse, Jem Jacks, the Doctor's 
 Man, Fool, and Treasurer, who carried a box for contri- 
 butions. The fight is between Age and Activity; the 
 Doctor is called in to assist Activity ; the finale is the Fool 
 playing the hurdy-gurdy, and knocking them all down ; 
 and the whole concludes with a general scuffle on the 
 floor. The mummers are most frequently disguised with 
 discolorations of red, white, and black on their faces, and 
 any grotesque attire they can procure. 
 
 Mr. Joseph Nash, in his splendid work, Mansions of 
 England in the Olden Times, has given us a splendid illus- 
 tration of how Christmas was kept by our ancestors when 
 the lord of misrule was let loose where morris-dancers, the 
 hobby-horse, the dragon, the giant, the salvage-man, etc. 
 are enjoying their Christmas festivities. He has chosen for 
 his scene the banqueting-hall of Haddon, near Bakewell, 
 in Derbyshire, so well known from its picturesque situation 
 in a country celebrated for its enchanting scenery. This is 
 probably the most perfect of the ancient mansions remain- 
 ing, and is certainly better calculated than any other to 
 convey an idea of the large establishment and extensive 
 hospitality of the old English baron. It has been untenanted 
 more than a century, but has escaped the fate which under 
 such circumstances usually befalls the residences of the old
 
 274 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS. 
 
 nobility there, to suit the more moderate household and 
 private style of living of their successors, being gradually 
 pared down, until a very small portion of the once princely 
 mansion can be traced in the dilapidated farm-house. This 
 may be regarded the * sixth age ' of the decaying mansion 
 previous to its ruined state, when the ivy-mantled walls 
 afford shelter only to owls, forming the 
 
 ' Last scene of all 
 That ends this strange eventful history. ' 
 
 Haddon Hall was erected at various periods, and affords 
 excellent examples of the several styles of domestic archi- 
 tecture, from the Early Pointed to the Tudor and Eliza- 
 bethan. Haddon was originally a ' barton,' or farm, 
 appertaining to the lordship of Bakewell, which was given 
 by William the Conqueror to his natural son William 
 Peverell. It became forfeited to the Crown, and passed 
 to the Avenell family; and in the reign of Richard i. it 
 came into the possession of Sir Richard de Vernon by mar- 
 riage, thenceforth becoming the chief residence of the 
 Vernon family, until, by the marriage of Dorothy Vernon 
 with Sir John Manners, second son of Thomas the first Earl 
 of Rutland, which title he inherited, it came into the posses- 
 sion of the Manners family, through whom it has descended 
 to the Duke of Rutland. His Grace, with good taste and 
 laudable reverence for a noble relic, has preserved the Hall 
 intact, for the gratification of the admirers of our national 
 antiquities. The tapestry, panelings, and cornice in the 
 drawing-room, and the shields in the dining-room, yet remain.
 
 CHRISTMAS MUMMERS. 275 
 
 The long gallery retains its carved wainscoting and orna- 
 mented ceiling of the Elizabethan period. It was probably 
 used as a ball-room, as well as for promenading ; and from 
 hence we may suppose Dorothy Vernon eloped with her 
 lover on the day of her sister's nuptials. The chapel is a 
 good specimen of the Early Pointed style, and is one of the 
 most ancient portions of the building remaining. 
 
 It is impossible to visit this fine old place without echoing 
 these sentiments : 
 
 ' How many a Vernon thou hast seen, 
 Kings of the Peak, thy walls within ; 
 
 How many a maiden tender ; 
 How many a warrior stern and steel'd, 
 In burganet, and lance, and shield, 
 
 Array'd with martial splendour ! 
 
 The grandeur of the olden time 
 Mantled thy towers with pride sublime, 
 
 Enlivening all who near'd them ; 
 From Hippocras and Shevris sack 
 Palmer or pilgrim turn'd not back, 
 
 Before thy altars cheer'd them. 
 
 Since thine unbroken early day, 
 How many a race hath pass'd away, 
 
 In charnel vault to moulder ! 
 Vet Nature round thee breathes an air 
 Serenely bright, and softly fair, 
 
 To charm the awed beholder.'
 
 LOVE PASSAGE FROM THE DIARY OF 
 LADY COWPER. 
 
 JADY COWPER, whose charming Diary was 
 published in the year 1864, was the wife of 
 Lord Chancellor Cowper, and a Lady of the 
 Bedcamber to Caroline Princess of Wales during a part 
 of the reign of George i. She was originally a Miss 
 Clavering, one of a Jacobite family in the north of 
 England. She became acquainted with Lord Cowper 
 by going to his chambers to consult him upon certain 
 law business; whereupon, as she was pretty, clever, and 
 accomplished, a toast of the Kitcat Club, and otherwise 
 a highly attractive person, it is not surprising that Lord 
 Cowper fell in love with her, and that they were forth- 
 with married ; though, for reasons with which we are not 
 made acquainted, their marriage was for some time kept 
 secret from their friends. The following story is told 
 by Lady Cowper of a design upon her lord's affection, 
 carried on by Lady Harriet Vere with much assiduity 
 and craft, while his marriage with herself remained un-
 
 PASSAGE FROM LADY COWPER'S DIARY. 277 
 
 known. This amusing embroglio is thus told by her lady- 
 ship in her Diary : 
 
 ' My lord being a widower when the late queen gave him 
 the seals, it was no wonder the young women laid out all 
 their snares to catch him. None took so much pains as 
 Lady Harriet Vere, whose poverty and ruined reputation 
 made it impossible for her to run any risk in the pursuit, 
 let it end as it would. She had made several advances 
 to my lord by Mrs. Morley, her kinswoman, and finding 
 nothing came of it, they immediately concluded my lord 
 must be pre-engaged to somebody else ; so they set a spy 
 upon him, and found that he had country lodgings at 
 Hammersmith, where he lay constantly ; and upon inquiry 
 they found I was the cause of this coldness to Lady H. 
 Upon this they settled a correspondence under a feigned 
 name with him, and in those letters (which were always 
 sent by a fellow dressed up in woman's clothes, who could 
 never be overtaken) they pretended to be some great 
 person that threatened him, if he married me, to hinder 
 the passing of his title. The first of these letters came 
 the day before I was married. However, it did not hinder 
 our marriage, though my lord thought it advisable to keep 
 it a secret ; and so he removed the next day to London. 
 His correspondents seeing they had made him leave the 
 place, thought it would be no hard matter to break the 
 match ; and from that time to the beginning of January, 
 which was almost four months, my lord had a letter every
 
 278 LOVE PASSAGE FROM THE 
 
 day ! some of whole sheets of paper filled with lies about 
 me, to say that I was a mean wretch, that I was coquette, 
 and should be more so, that my playing so well was and 
 would be a temptation to bring all the rakes in town about 
 me, that it had been so thus far of my life, and that I 
 was treated so familiarly by the rakish part of the town, 
 that one night at a play, my Lord Wharton said to my 
 Lord Dorchester, " Now that the opera is done, let's go 
 and hear Molly Clavering play it over again " (which was 
 all a plain lie, for I never did play in any public company, 
 and only at home, when anybody that visited my Aunt 
 Wood, with whom I lived, asked me ; and for those two 
 lords, I had never been in a room with either of them in 
 my whole life). 
 
 ' These,' continues the Diarist, ' are only specimens of 
 what lies they invented to hurt me. At last, when they 
 thought they had routed me by the ill impressions they had 
 falsely given of me, upon a day when my lord was at the 
 House of Lords, one Mr. Mason, of the House of Commons, 
 came to him and told him that Mrs. Weedon (a client of 
 my brother's that had a foul cause in the Court of Dele- 
 gates) desired to speak with him. My lord at first refused, 
 but at length she teased him so much, that he consented 
 to see her ; and by her appointment, and saying she had 
 a very fine lady to recommend to him (which gave him a 
 thought he should find out his correspondent), he waited 
 upon her at Mrs. Kirk's, which was the place appointed. 
 He had some little jealousy before he went that the fine
 
 DIARY OF LADY COWPER. 279 
 
 lady was Lady Harriet Vere, for she and Mrs. Kirk had 
 always been in a hackney-coach every Sunday for at least 
 a month to ogle him, and pass and repass his coach when 
 he went and came from the chapel. He found he was 
 right ; for there she was, set out in all her airs, with her 
 elbow upon a table that had two wax-candles on it, and 
 holding her head, which she said ached. There she dis- 
 played herself, and so did her two artificers, and not a 
 word said of the cause. This interview brought on several 
 others, and those visits from my lord to Mrs. K. and Mrs. 
 W., to try to make this match. They told him that the 
 queen had promised Lady H. ; 100,000 when she married. 
 He said upon that score he durst not presume to marry 
 her, for he had not an estate to make a settlement answer- 
 able to so great a fortune ; and at last they pressed him 
 so much, that he owned he was engaged to me, and that 
 it would be barbarous to ruin an innocent young woman, 
 who had no fault but receiving his visits so long. They 
 could not agree with him that it was barbarous, for it was 
 only serving me in my own kind, for I was contracted to 
 Mr. Floyd, whom I had left for him. My lord said they 
 were mistaken in that affair (which he knew full well). 
 However, this did not discourage them ; and once, when 
 he seemed to yield, he brought Mrs. Kirk to confess the 
 pains they had been at to bring this about ; and she men- 
 tioned particularly the letters, which were contrived and 
 writ at her house, and copied afterwards by Lady H. V. 
 herself. As soon as my lord had got this confession, he
 
 280 LOVE PASSAGE FROM THE 
 
 \vrote to Lady H., in answer to a love-letter from her (for 
 she pretended to be terribly in love with him), to excuse 
 himself, and say that he resolved to marry me, for now 
 he was assured that he had met with a wife whose conduct 
 was unblemished ; for that the greatest enemy I had in 
 the world had been writing every day an invective against 
 me, which was duly sent to him ; and that, now all the 
 letters were laid out before him, he did not find anything 
 I was accused of but of playing the best upon the harpsi- 
 chord of any woman in England, which was so far from 
 being a fault, that it was an argument to him that I had 
 been used to employ many of my hours alone, and not 
 in the company of rakes, as they would suggest. But they 
 thought there was hope, since they did not believe that 
 we were actually married ; and my lord could never get 
 quit of their importunity till he owned our marriage to 
 them, though it was before he owned it publicly ; and 
 even after that both Mrs. K. and Lady H. V. wrote fre- 
 quently to him. This I had not inserted but as a justifi- 
 cation for my endeavouring to hinder her coming into the 
 princess's bedchamber.' 
 
 The history of the Diary is singular. It was commenced 
 by Lady Cowper, in her own capacity of Lady of the Bed- 
 chamber, and she undertook to write down all the events 
 worth remembering while she was at court, as a corrective 
 to ' the perpetual lies that one hears ' there. Had this 
 Diary remained complete as written, and still more if re-
 
 DIARY OF LADY COWPER. 281 
 
 vised and digested as she intended, it would have been a 
 still more valuable contribution to history, and still more 
 important as a record of the social aspects of the time. If 
 Lady Cowper does not fill up this blank completely, it is 
 simply because the greater portion of her Diary was de- 
 stroyed by herself, under a misplaced apprehension, at the 
 time when Lord Cowper was falsely accused of complicity 
 in Layer's plot. What remains, however, which is some- 
 what more than Lord Campbell had before him when he 
 was writing the life of the Lord Chancellor himself, never- 
 theless covers the two principal passages in the reign of the 
 first George, and the most critical perils of the Hanoverian 
 dynasty. The rebellion of 1715 on the one hand, and on 
 the other the quarrel between the king and the prince, 
 which jeopardized the ' interests ' of the Revolution by 
 shaking the stability of the throne, are both included and 
 illustrated in this Diary. Moreover, Lord Campbell, who 
 saw the major part of it in MS., justly describes it as a 
 charming production, and adds that it well deserves to be 
 printed, for it gives a more lively picture of the Court ot 
 England at the commencement of the Brunswick dynasty 
 than he had ever met with ; in which sense we ourselves 
 regard it, though unhappily, for the reasons we have men- 
 tioned, it is so brief and fragmentary.
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 | HIS ancient manor-house, which became the 
 scene of one of the most memorable sieges 
 recorded in our history, was situated in the 
 township of Chapelrig of Lathom, which, at the Domesday 
 survey, belonged to Orm, a Saxon, from whom the parish 
 of Ormskirk, in the county of Lancaster, derives its name. 
 His descendant, Robert Fitzhenry of Lathom, founded the 
 Priory of Burscough in the reign of Richard i., and may be 
 regarded as the Rodolph of the race of Lathom. His 
 grandson, Sir Robert de Lathom, greatly augmented his 
 inheritance by his marriage with Arnicia, sister and co-heir 
 of Thomas Lord of Alfreton and Norton ; and his son and 
 successor, a knight like his father, still further added to his 
 patrimony by winning the rich heiress of Sir Thomas de 
 Knowsley, who brought him the fair lordship which to this 
 day continues to be the princely residence of her descend- 
 ants, the Earls of Derby. The eventual heiress of the 
 Lathoms, Isabella, daughter of Sir Thomas de Lathom, 
 married Sir John Stanley; and henceforward, for several
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 283 
 
 hundred years, and during the period of its chief historic 
 distinction, Lathom House was held by the Stanleys. 
 
 Sir John Stanley, who thus acquired the hand and in- 
 heritance of the heiress of Lathom, became Lord-Deputy of 
 Ireland, and received a grant of the manor of Blake Castle, 
 in that kingdom. In 1405 he had a commission in con- 
 junction with Roger Leke, to serve on the city of York 
 and its liberties ; and also upon the Isle of Man, on the 
 forfeiture of Henry Percy Earl of Northumberland ; and in 
 the 7th of Henry iv., being then treasurer of the house- 
 hold to the king, he obtained licence to fortify a house at 
 Liverpool (which he had newly built) with embattled walls. 
 In the same year, having taken possession of the Isle of 
 Man, he obtained a grant in fee of the said isle, castle, and 
 pile anciently called Holm Town and of all the isles 
 adjacent, as also all the regalities, franchises, etc., to be 
 holden of the said kings, his heirs and successors, by 
 homage, and the service of two falcons, payable on the 
 days of their coronation. On the accession of Henry v. 
 he was made a Knight of the Garter, and constituted Lord- 
 Lieutenant of Ireland for six years, in which government 
 he died 6th January 1414. The grandson of this famous 
 knight, Sir Thomas Stanley, also Chief Governor of Ireland, 
 and Chamberlain to Henry vi., was summoned to Parlia- 
 ment as Lord Stanley in 1456. He married Joan de 
 Gonshill, a lineal descendant of King Edward i., and had 
 four sons : the eldest, Thomas, second Lord Stanley and 
 first Earl of Derby, celebrated for his participation in the
 
 284 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 victory of Bosworth Field ; and the second, Sir William 
 Stanley of Holt, the richest subject of his time : he was 
 beheaded for his adherence to Perkin Warbeck. 
 
 The Earls of Derby continued to possess Lathom House, 
 and to reside there in such magnificence, that Camden 
 says, ' With them the glory of hospitality seemed to fall 
 asleep.' And the Stanleys were regarded with such venera- 
 tion and esteem, that ' God save the Earl of Derby and 
 the King' was a familiar, harmless inversion. 
 
 On the death of William Richard George, ninth Earl, 
 his daughter and co-heiress, Henrietta Lady Ashburnham, 
 sold the estate to Henry Furness, Esq., from whom it was 
 purchased, in 1724, by Thomas Bootle of Melling, Chan- 
 cellor to Frederick Prince of Wales. He died without 
 issue, having bequeathed his property to his niece Mary, 
 only daughter and heir of his brother Robert Bootle, Esq., 
 and wife of Richard Wilbraham, Esq. of Rode, M.P. for 
 Chester. 
 
 By this devise, the ancient and historic seat of Lathom 
 vested in the Wilbrahams, and is now possessed by Edward 
 Bootle Wilbraham Lord Skelmersdale, the son and suc- 
 cessor of the heiress of Bootle. His Lordship's daughter 
 is married to Edward Geoffrey Stanley, present Earl of 
 Derby; and thus the name of its former possessors has 
 become again associated with the ancient manor-house. 
 
 At the period of its memorable siege in 1644, Lathom 
 was under the government of the famous Charlotte de la 
 Tremouille Countess of Derby. This heroic lady was
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 285 
 
 daughter of Claude Duke de Tremouille; and, by her mother, 
 Charlotte Brabanton de Nassau, was granddaughter of 
 William Prince of Orange, and of Charlotte de Bourbon of 
 the royal house of France. Thus highly born, and allied 
 besides to the kings of Spain and Naples and the Dukes of 
 Anjou, Charlotte de la Tremouille did not sully the renown 
 of her illustrious descent. After the battle of Nantwich, 
 the united forces of the Parliament, under Sir Thomas 
 Fairfax, accompanied by the regiments of Colonels Rigby, 
 Egerton, Ashton, and Holcroft, marched to Lathom House, 
 where they arrived on the 28th of February. The house 
 was well calculated for defence, standing in a boggy flat, 
 and being defended by a wall six feet thick, strengthened 
 by nine towers, on each of which were mounted six pieces 
 of ordnance, and surrounded by a moat twenty feet broad. 
 In the defence, the Countess of Derby had the assistance 
 of Major Farmer, and the Captains Ffarington, Charnock, 
 Chisenhall, Rawstorne, Ogle, and Molyneux. 
 
 ' Twas there they raised, 'mid sap and siege, 
 The banner of their righted liege 
 
 At their she-captain's call, 
 Who, miracle of womankind, 
 Lent mettle to the meanest hind 
 
 That mann'd her castle wall.' 
 
 On his arrival before Lathom, Sir Thomas Fairfax ob- 
 tained an audience of the Countess, who had disposed her 
 soldiers in such an array as to impress the Parliamentary 
 General with a favourable opinion of their numbers and 
 discipline. The offer made by Sir Thomas was, that on
 
 286 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 condition of her surrendering the house to the troops under 
 his command, herself, her children, and servants, with their 
 property, should be safely conducted to Knowsley, there to 
 remain, without molestation, in the enjoyment of one-half 
 of the Earl's estates. To this alluring proposal the Countess 
 mildly but resolutely replied, that a double trust had been 
 confided to her, faith to her lord, and allegiance to her 
 sovereign; and that, without permission, she could not 
 order the required surrender in less than a month, nor then, 
 without their approbation. The impetuous temper of the 
 Parliamentary army could not brook this delay ; and after 
 a short consultation, it was determined to besiege the for- 
 tress rather than attempt to carry it by storm. At the end 
 of fourteen days, while the works were being constructed, 
 Sir Thomas Fairfax sent a renewed summons to the 
 Countess, but with no better success; the reply of the 
 Countess being, that she had not forgotten her duty to 
 the Church of England, to her prince, and to her lord, 
 and that she would defend her trust with her honour and 
 with her life. 
 
 Being ordered into Yorkshire, Sir Thomas Fairfax con- 
 fided the siege to Colonel Peter Egerton and Major 
 Morgan, who, despairing of success by negotiation, pro- 
 ceeded to form their lines of circumvallation with all the 
 formality of German tactics. The progress of the besiegers 
 was continually interrupted by sallies from the garrison, 
 which drove the soldiers from their trenches, and destroyed 
 their works. At the end of three months a deep breach
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 287 
 
 was cut near the moat, on which was raised a strong 
 battery, where a mortar was planted for casting grenades. 
 In one of these discharges the ball fell close to the table 
 where the Countess and her children were sitting, and 
 broke part of the furniture to atoms. A gallant sally de- 
 stroyed the enemy's works, killed a number of the besieging 
 army, and captured the mortar. The Countess not only 
 superintended the works and commanded the operations, 
 but frequently accompanied her gallant troops to the 
 margin of the enemy's trenches. The Parliament, dis- 
 satisfied with all this delay, superseded Colonel Egerton, 
 and confided the command to Colonel Rigby. Fresh 
 works were now erected, but they shared the same fate 
 as the former; and Colonel Rigby, on the approach of 
 Prince Rupert into Lancashire, was obliged to raise the 
 siege at the end of four months, and to seek shelter for 
 himself and his army in Bolton. 
 
 The capture of that town, which followed soon after, 
 under the combined operations of Prince Rupert and the 
 Earl of Derby, yielded numerous trophies to the victorious 
 army ; and. all these were presented to the heroic defender 
 of Lathom House, in testimony of the memorable triumph 
 achieved under her command, by a gallant band of three 
 hundred soldiers, assailed as they had been by ten times 
 their own number. 
 
 After the siege was raised, the Countess accompanied 
 her lord to the Isle of Man, leaving Lathom House to the 
 care of Colonel Rawstorne. In July in the following
 
 288 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 year, the siege was renewed by Colonel Egerton at the 
 head of four thousand men, who took up their quarters at 
 Ormskirk. The garrison made a gallant and successful 
 stand for some time; but being at length reduced to ex- 
 tremities for want of the munitions of war, and disappointed 
 in the expectation of a reinforcement from the king, who 
 was in the month of September in that year at Chester, 
 the commander was obliged to surrender his charge into 
 the hands of the Parliamentary forces upon bare terms of 
 mercy, on the ad of December. The besiegers soon con- 
 verted the most valuable effects of the house into booty. 
 The towers, from whence so many fatal shots had been 
 fired, were thrown down, the military works were destroyed, 
 and the sun of Lathom seemed for ever to have set. 
 
 In the fruitless enterprise of 1651 the Earl of Derby 
 again raised the royal standard ; but being defeated by 
 Lilburne at Wigan Lane, and subsequently taken, he was 
 executed at Bolton. The Countess and her children were 
 for a time rigorously imprisoned, and actually subsisting on 
 the alms of their impoverished friends. Thus she languished 
 till the Restoration, when the family estates returned into 
 the possession of her eldest son. She passed the short 
 remainder of her days at Knowsley Hall, and, dying there 
 on 2ist March 1663, was buried at Ormskirk. Lord Derby 
 has the famous Vandyke portrait of the Countess, and 
 another of her painted when she was advanced in life, both 
 of which were sent to the National Portrait Exhibition at 
 South Kensington. James Stanley, the seventh Earl of
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 289 
 
 Derby, met with the lady at the Hague, upon his return 
 from his travels ; and though she was very young, they 
 were married June 25, 1626. After their marriage they 
 appear to have participated in the gaieties of the Court of 
 Charles I. Bassompierre mentions his house being the 
 resort of foreigners of distinction ; and the name of the 
 Countess is found frequently with those who, with the 
 Queen Henrietta Maria, took part in the masques and 
 other diversions of the palace. At Shrovetide 1630 was 
 presented at Court Ben Jonson's masque Chloridia; and 
 Charlotte de la Tremouille was one of the fourteen nymphs 
 who sat round the goddess Choris (the Queen) in the 
 bower: 'their apparel white, embroidered with silver, 
 trimmed at the shoulders with great leaves of green, 
 embroidered with gold, falling one under the other.' 
 
 Of the ancient house at Lathom, that stood such stout 
 sieges, not a vestige now remains. 'The ramparts,' says 
 Mr. Heywood, 'along whose banks knights and ladies 
 have a thousand times made resort, hearkening to stories 
 as varied as those of Boccaccio ; the Maudlin Well, where 
 the pilgrim and the lazar devoutly cooled their parched 
 lips ; the mewing-house ; the training-ground ; every appen- 
 dage to antique baronial state, all now are changed, and 
 a modern mansion and a new possessor fill the place.' 
 
 The siege of Lathom House is so full of chivalrous and 
 dramatic effect, from the intrepid valour and heroic spirit 
 displayed by the Countess, that it has been fully chronicled. 
 In Seacombe's History of the House of Stanley, is an
 
 290 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 account attributed to Samuel Butler, Bishop of Sodor and 
 Man. The MS. of Captain Edward HalsalPs account of 
 the siege is among the A. Wood MSS. in the Ashmolean 
 Museum, and has been twice printed in accessible books. 
 Sir Walter Scott has set his own impress upon the great 
 subject in his popular novel of Peveril of the Peak. 
 
 There are some traditional stories of Lathom which are 
 interesting. Sir Bernard Burke mentions a tradition little 
 known : that when Henry viu., subsequently to the execu- 
 tion of Sir William Stanley, visited Lathom, the Earl, 
 after his royal guest had viewed the whole house, con- 
 ducted him up to the leads for a prospect of the 
 country. The Earl's fool, who was among the company, 
 observing the king draw near to the edge, not guarded by 
 a balustrade, stepped up to the Earl, and pointing down 
 to the precipice, said, ' Tom, remember Will.' The king 
 understood the meaning, and made all haste down-stairs 
 out of the house ; and the fool long after seemed mightily 
 concerned that his lord had not courage to take the 
 opportunity of avenging himself for the death of his 
 brother (Seats of Great Britain, vol. i.). 
 
 A curious instance of the retention of a proverbial 
 saying, long after the occasion of it has passed away, 
 is, that it is a very common expression in Lancashire to 
 say of a person having two houses, even if temporarily, 
 that he has ' Lathom and Knowsley.' Formerly, the Earl 
 of Derby had two splendid residences in Lancashire, both 
 which passed as already described. Though separate pos-
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 291 
 
 sessions for above 150 years, the expression 'Lathom and 
 Knowsley ' still survives. 
 
 Another Lancashire proverb is, ' There's been worse 
 stirs than that at Lathom,' alluding, no doubt, to the 
 havoc made there when the Parliamentary forces took it 
 in 1645. This saying comes in when a 'flitting' or white- 
 washing, or any other occurrence of an unpleasant nature 
 makes an apology needful on the score of untidiness and 
 confusion. 
 
 The legend of a Child being borne away by an Eagle, 
 and thus having greatness thrust upon it, is common to 
 many lands. It is associated with the De Lathom family ; 
 but Baines, in his History of Lancaster, gives the following 
 passage respecting King Alfred the Great, quoting from 
 a Saxon chronicle : 
 
 ' Of the many humane traits in his character, one is 
 mentioned which serves to show that our popular Lan- 
 cashire tradition of the Eagle and Child is of the date of 
 several centuries earlier than the time of the De Lathoms : 
 " One day, as Alfred was hunting in a wood, he heard the 
 cry of a little infant in a tree, and ordered his huntsmen 
 to examine the place. They ascended the branches, and 
 found at the top, in an eagle's nest, a beautiful child dressed 
 in purple, with golden bracelets, the marks of nobility, on 
 his arms. The king had him brought down, and baptized 
 and well educated ; from the accident he named the found- 
 ling Nestingum." ' 
 
 In a poem written by Bishop Thomas Stanley 200 years
 
 292 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 after the supposed event, this marvellous tale, in its epis- 
 copal form, may be condensed thus : Once upon a time 
 there was a certain Lord Lathom dwelling at Lathom House, 
 who had attained the patriarchal age of fourscore years 
 without having had children. All hope had long been past, 
 for his wife was as old as himself. Without Providence 
 interposed by a miracle, he was destined to go down to the 
 grave childless, and be buried by the unloving hands of 
 strangers in blood and affection. With his mind filled with 
 these bitter reflections, the spring months of his eightieth 
 year passed slowly onward, the last spring, as he thought, 
 that Lathom House and its fair domain should belong to 
 one of his name. He was, however, destined to a happy 
 surprise ; for one day an eagle which had built its nest in 
 Terleslowe wood a portion of the Lathom domain was 
 seen to have something uncommon in its nest. An exami- 
 nation was made; and the wonder of the simple-minded 
 serfs may be imagined when, as well as the ordinary inmates 
 of an eagle's nest, they found a male infant clad in a red 
 mantle. The Lord of Lathom was at once informed of this 
 strange discovery, and he concluded without hesitation that 
 his prayers had been answered, and that to him, as to the 
 patriarch of old, an infant heir had been sent for the solace 
 of his declining years. The child, men thought, was un- 
 baptized, for salt was found bound around its neck in a 
 linen cloth ; so a solemn christening was had, and no doubt 
 the good old man feasted his neighbours as joyously as if 
 the * little stranger ' had indeed been of his own lineage.
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 293 
 
 This boy, in process of time, became the father of Isabella 
 Lathom, who was in after days the wife of Sir John Stanley. 
 From this time the crest of ' the Eagle and Child ' was 
 assumed. It is in the vernacular ' the Bird and Bairn,' and 
 is a common sign in Lancashire. 
 
 The close of the career of ' the Great Stanley,' as the 
 seventh Earl was styled, is a narrative of touching interest, 
 and should be told in fuller detail. In 1651, Charles n. 
 being at Worcester, and hoping to be joined by the English 
 Royalists, issued invitations to his friends to support him 
 with all the force they could raise. To the Earl of Derby, 
 who was in the Isle of Man, Charles sent the Order of the 
 Garter. The Earl hastily arranged his affairs, and set off to 
 join the king, committing his noble Countess and three of 
 his children to the care of the Receiver-General. He took 
 with him from the Isle of Man 300 Royalists. Before he 
 arrived in Lancashire Charles had quitted the county, but left 
 Major-General Massey to confer with the Earl. They met 
 at Warrington, where, not agreeing as to the dismissal of 
 the Papists, Derby, with only his 300 followers from the 
 Isle of Man, and 300 more who joined him out of Lan- 
 cashire and Cheshire, gathered together at Preston. Ad- 
 vancing to Wigan (on 25th August), they were set upon in 
 a narrow lane by 1800 dragoons under Colonel Lilburne, 
 and the foot militia, whom Cromwell had detached to hang 
 upon the king's rear. Derby performed prodigies of valour. 
 He received seven shots in his breastplate, thirteen cuts
 
 294 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 in his beaver, five or six wounds in his arms and shoulders, 
 and had two horses killed under him. Twice he made his 
 way through the whole body of the enemy ; but being over- 
 whelmed with numbers, mounting a third horse, he, with 
 Governor Greenhalgh and five others, fought his way through, 
 and, with his wounds green and sore, he was enabled to 
 join his Majesty in the fatal field of Worcester, September 
 3d. From this battle Derby conducted the king to the 
 Whiteladies and Boscobel ; thence making his way into 
 Cheshire with about forty others, he fell in the way of a 
 regiment of foot and a troop of horse, to whom he surren- 
 dered on quarter for life and conditions for honourable 
 usage. These terms of surrender were most disgracefully 
 violated; the Earl was tried by court-martial on a charge 
 of high treason, and sentence of death was passed upon him, 
 directing his execution to take place in four days at his own 
 town of Bolton. Meanwhile, he wrote a long and affec- 
 tionate letter to his wife. Derby had nearly escaped from 
 the leads of the castle at Chester by means of a long 
 rope thrown up to him from the outside of the fortress : he 
 fastened this securely, slid down, and got down to the banks 
 of the river Dee, where a boat was waiting to convey him 
 away. He was here discovered, seized, conveyed back to 
 the castle, and more securely guarded, until his removal to 
 Leigh, and thence to Bolton for execution. The Earl, after 
 his attempt to escape, wrote another sorrowful letter to his 
 wife, and one to his children in the Isle of Man. His two 
 daughters, Lady Catherine and Lady Amelia, who were in
 
 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 295 
 
 Chester, had their last interview with him on the i4th of 
 October, as he set out on his way to Leigh. 
 
 The execution of the Earl took place at Bolton on the 
 1 5th of October, amidst the tears, groans, and prayers of 
 the townspeople. Just before he suffered, Derby requested 
 that the block might be so placed that he could face the 
 church ; and this having been done, he said, ' I will look 
 to thy sanctuary while here, as I hope to live in thy heavenly 
 sanctuary hereafter.' Then laying himself with his neck on 
 the block, and his arms stretched out, he said, ' Blessed be 
 God's glorious name for ever and ever. Amen. Let the 
 whole earth be filled with His glory.' He then gave the 
 signal to the executioner by lifting up his hands ; but the 
 executioner blundering, the Earl gently upbraided him with 
 not at once discharging his office when he was so ready to 
 depart. Repeating the same words of Scripture, the Earl 
 a second time lifted up his hands, ' the executioner did his 
 work, and Derby passed away.' When the body was put 
 into the coffin to be carried to Ormskirk for burial, the 
 following lines, by an unknown hand, were thrown into it : 
 
 ' Wit, Beauty, Courage, all in one lie dead, 
 A Stanley's hand, Vere's heart, and Cecil's head.' 
 
 Within eight days after his execution, his Manx subjects 
 rose in rebellion against the authority of his Countess and 
 her family. 
 
 We have selected and abridged these details of the closing 
 scene from a work of remarkable interest and value for its 
 authenticity, entitled The Great Stanley ; or, James Seventh
 
 296 THE SIEGE OF LATHOM HOUSE. 
 
 Earl of Derby ', and his Noble Countess Charlotte de la Tre- 
 mouille, in their Land of Man. A Narrative of the Seven- 
 teenth Century. By the Rev. J. C. Gumming, M.A., F.G.S. 
 1867. The work is cleverly illustrated from Manx scenery 
 and antiquities, and is dedicated, by permission, to the 
 present Earl of Derby. 
 
 The narrative is modestly acknowledged to be compiled 
 from documents existing in the Rolls Office at Castletown 
 and in the registers of the Isle of Man, from the Manx 
 Statute-book and State papers, and from private family 
 records. ' At the same time,' continues the preface, ' an 
 endeavour is made to elucidate the Manx popular feeling 
 existing at that period of history in connection with their 
 ancient and dearly-cherished " Tenure of the Straw," 1 their 
 struggles for the maintenance of which against the great 
 Stanley led to disaffection towards the Government, the 
 betrayal of his Countess to the Parliament, the execution 
 as a traitor of the celebrated William Christian, and ulti- 
 mately to the Act of Settlement of 1703 the Manx Magna 
 Charta, procured from James the tenth Earl of Derby, 
 through the exertions of the Apostolic Bishop Thomas 
 Wilson.' 
 
 1 By stipulation, or delivery of the stipula, or straw, the Manx held 
 their estates, which they were consequently said to hold by ' the tenure 
 of the straw.'
 
 Manor of Wakefield, we learn from Domesday 
 Book, is very extensive, including that of Hali- 
 fax, and stretching from Normanton to the 
 boundaries of Lancashire and Cheshire. It is more than 
 thirty miles in length from east to west, and comprises 
 more than one hundred and eighteen towns, villages, and 
 hamlets: of these Wakefield and Halifax are the chief; 
 and the two churches mentioned in Domesday are Wake- 
 field and Sandal churches. 
 
 It is probable that the manor of Wakefield was granted, 
 in the reign of William Rufus, between the years 1091 and 
 1097, to William de Warren, second Earl of Surrey, who 
 by charter granted to God and St. Pancras of Lewes, 
 besides other churches, the church of Wakefield, with its 
 appurtenances. William, the first Earl of Warren, standing 
 nearly allied to the Conqueror, viz. nephew to the Countess 
 his great -.grandmother, accompanied the Conqueror to 
 England; and having distinguished himself at the battle 
 of Hastings, obtained an immense portion of the spoil.
 
 298 THE MANOR OF WAKEFIELD 
 
 He had large grants of land in several counties : so exten- 
 sive, indeed, were those grants, that his possessions more 
 resembled the dominions of a sovereign prince than the 
 estates of a subject. He was married to Gundred, the 
 daughter of the Conqueror. This potent noble founded 
 the priory of Lewes in Sussex, and endowed it with the 
 church of Wakefield and Sandal Magna, besides lands. 
 He died in 1089, and was buried in the chapter-house of 
 his priory at Lewes. His wife Gundred died in 1085, about 
 three years before him, and was also buried in the chapter- 
 house at Lewes. 1 
 
 The great Earl was succeeded by his son William between 
 1091 and 1097 ; and he gave the churches of Conisboro 
 
 1 In October 1845, in the formation of the Brighton and Hastings 
 Railway, the workmen had to cut through the site of Lewes Priory, 
 the principal Cluniac monastery in England. At about two feet from 
 the surface they met with an oblong leaden coffer, or chest, surrounded 
 with Caen stones, upon removing which appeared legibly inscribed 
 upon the upper end of the coffer-lid the name Gundrada. Next the 
 workmen brought to light a second coffer, inscribed Willelm, which 
 was at once assigned to William de Warrene. The lids of the coffers 
 were not fastened, but merely flanged over the edges. Both were 
 ornamented externally with a sort of lozenge or network pattern in 
 relievo, such as our plumbers to this day ornament coffins with. The 
 bones of both skeletons, and the teeth, were in fine preservation. The 
 height of the Earl must have been from six feet one inch to six feet two 
 inches, and that of the Countess from five feet seven inches to five feet 
 eight inches. Mr. Lower, F.S.A., suggests that the letters are not of 
 later date than the earlier part of the thirteenth century. Now the 
 characters in the name of Gundrada tally exactly with those in the 
 same word on her marble tomb extant in Southover church ; thus 
 establishing two facts : viz. first, that, after a separation of two cen-
 
 AND SANDAL CASTLE. 299 
 
 and Wakefield to his father's monastery. The Earl was 
 slain in the Holy Land in 1147, and left only one daughter, 
 his heiress ; and this great lady could be given to no hus- 
 band but one of royal extraction. She was first married to 
 William of Blois, one of the sons of King Stephen, who 
 died without issue in 1159. She was afterwards given by 
 Henry n. to his half-brother Hameline, an illegitimate son 
 of Geoffrey Earl of Anjou. 
 
 In charters of this date, we find a grant of pannage or 
 liberty of hogs feeding in all the Earl's woods there, reserv- 
 ing only the rent of zd. for every hog, and id. for every 
 pig. That there was an immense wood upon Wakefield 
 Heath in ancient times, is evident from these deeds ; so 
 
 turies, the bones of the noble Gundreda and her tomb were again 
 brought into juxtaposition ; and secondly, the coffers, or cists, and the 
 tomb are unquestionably coeval. 
 
 An interesting inquiry (says Mr. Lower) arises out of this discovery. 
 The remains had certainly been removed from their original resting- 
 place, and re-interred in the coffers, in conformity with a practice not 
 unusual in early times. Gundrada died at Castle Acre, in Norfolk 
 vi part&s cruciata on the 27th of May 1085, and was buried at 
 Lewes Priory, as proved by the charter of De Warrene, made shortly 
 prior to his own decease, in which he expresses his desire to be interred 
 by her side. The church is believed to have been the place of inter- 
 ment. As the convent increased in affluence, a new church was com- 
 menced building in 1243, but not finished until 1268 ; and Mr. Lower 
 assumes, therefore, that the bodies of the founders were in this interval 
 exhumed from the old church (which would then be dismantled) and 
 deposited in the coffers for re-interment in the chapter-house, upon the 
 site of which, there is reason to believe, the bones were found. The 
 two coffers were subsequently placed in a tomb erected for their recep- 
 tion in Sou thover church. (See Curiosities of History, 1857, pp. 116-7.)
 
 300 THE MANOR OF WAKEFIELD 
 
 thick a wood, that a person was employed in directing 
 travellers over that very place where now is the full road 
 between Leeds and Wakefield. 
 
 We now pass over the manorial history, to Edward 
 the eldest son of Edmund Langley Duke of York, who 
 succeeded to the manor after his father's death, and was 
 slain at Agincourt in 1415. Dying without issue, his 
 estates came to his nephew, Richard Duke of York. 
 Sandal Castle appears to have been a favourite residence 
 of his. We find from William of Worcester, that the lords 
 of the party of Lancaster were laying waste his lands in 
 Yorkshire, when he hastened to Sandal Castle, and arrived 
 there the 2ist of December 1460. The battle of Wake- 
 field ensued, in which he lost his life. 1 
 
 This battle was fought on the 3oth of December, and 
 was indeed a fight of brother against brother ; for on the 
 side of the Yorkists there fell Sir John Harrington, who 
 had married the sister of the Lord Clifford, who made him- 
 self but too conspicuous on the side of the Lancastrians. 
 Sir Thomas (Sir John's father) also died of his wounds on 
 the following day. As to the site of the battle of Wake- 
 
 1 Although Shakspeare assigns a prominent part in the battle of 
 Wakefield to Richard, where his father, the Duke of York, was taken 
 and put to death, after exclaiming : 
 
 ' Three times did Richard make a lane to me, 
 And thrice cried, Courage, father, fight it out ! ' 
 
 Richard (born 2d October 1452) was only in his ninth year when that 
 battle was fought.
 
 AND SANDAL CASTLE. 301 
 
 field, it has been supposed by some writers to have been 
 fought on the flat meadows called the Pugneys, which 
 stretch from the castle to the banks of the Calder; but, 
 unluckily for those who have imagined the name to have 
 been derived from the Latin pugna (a battle), and there- 
 fore indicative of the exact site of the bloody engagement, 
 Mr. Lumb, the keeper of the Rolls Office at Wakefield, has 
 discovered that the fields in that direction bore the name 
 of Pukenall at least forty-seven years prior to the battle of 
 Wakefield. 
 
 It is much more probable that the battle took place in 
 front of the castle, and on the open space of ground which 
 is even at the present day called Sandal Common. The 
 spot where the Duke of York was killed upon the green 
 is about four hundred yards from the castle, close to the 
 old road from Barnsley, now called, from the sign of a 
 public-house, Cock and Bottle Lane. It is a triangular 
 piece of ground, in size about a rood or ten feet, with a 
 fence about it, which the tenant of the place is bound by 
 his lease to maintain ; and it has been ever since the 
 Duke's death free from taxes. Camden says that there 
 was a cross erected on it to the memory of the Duke, 
 which was destroyed in the Civil Wars. There have been 
 two rings found on the site of the battle. The first, on the 
 inside, bore an inscription, ' Pur bon amour;' and outside 
 were delineated the figures of three saints. Camden gives 
 a print of it. The other ring had on it inscribed the letter 
 R, and very probably belonged to the Duke of York.
 
 302 THE MANOR OF WAKEFIELD 
 
 Between the Calder and a place called Bellevue, there 
 have been found a quantity of old horse-shoes, which very 
 probably belonged to some of the horses of the men slain 
 in the battle of Wakefield. The spot where the Duke of 
 Rutland was slain still goes by the name of the Fall Ings, 
 and lies on the left-hand side of the bridge going to Heath. 
 There was an old house standing a few years ago close to 
 the chapel on the bridge ; and there was a tradition that 
 the Duke of Rutland died in it. 
 
 By the death of Richard Duke of York, the manor of 
 Wakefield again came to the Crown in the person of 
 Edward iv., who by the battle of Towton 1 had become 
 firmly seated on the throne. It is a remarkable circum- 
 stance, that two of the possessors of Wakefield, Thomas 
 Earl of Lancaster and Henry Earl of Holland, were 
 beheaded, the latter by sentence of the High Court of 
 
 1 Proclamations forbidding quarter were issued before the battle of 
 Towton. Like Leipsic, it reached over the night ; but, unlike Leipsic, 
 even the hour of darkness brought no rest. They fought from four 
 o'clock in the afternoon throughout the whole night on to noon next 
 day. Like Waterloo, it was fought on a Sunday ; and the accounts 
 of contemporary writers state, in words very like those letters from 
 Mont St. Jean, that for weeks afterwards the blood stood in puddles 
 and stagnated in gutters, and that the water of the wells was red. 
 No inaccuracy is more frequent in ancient authors than that of numbers, 
 and generally on the side of exaggeration. But on this occasion we 
 can form a more correct estimate of the carnage by the concurrence of 
 unusually respectable testimonies ; and perhaps, in these times, it will 
 give the best idea of it to say, that the number of Englishmen slain 
 exceeded the sum of those who fell at Vimeira, Talavera, Albuera, 
 Salamanca, Vittoria, and Waterloo. English Review, No. 2.
 
 AND SANDAL CASTLE. 303 
 
 Justice for attempting to restore Charles i. to the throne ; 
 whilst three others were slain in the battle-field. Such is 
 the eventful history of the possessors of this extensive 
 manor. 
 
 Leland describes Wakefield as 'a very quik market 
 towne, so that al vitail is very good and chepe there : a 
 right honest man shal fare wel for two pens a meale.' 
 The bridge over the Calder was built about 6 Edward in. 
 On the east side is 'a chapel of our lady :' a few years ago 
 the pointed Gothic arch was widened. An extraordinary 
 legend is related by Roger de Hoveden, which shows 
 the antiquity of the Wakefield mills: 'In the year 1201, 
 Eustace, abbot of Flaye, came over into England, preach- 
 ing the duty of extending the Sabbath from three o'clock 
 P.M. on Saturday to sunrising on Monday morning, plead- 
 ing the authority of an epistle written by Christ Himself, 
 and found on the altar of St. Simon at Golgotha. The 
 shrewd people of Yorkshire treated the fanatic with con- 
 tempt, and the miller of Wakefield persisted in grinding 
 his corn after the hour of cessation ; for which disobedience,' 
 says the historian gravely, ' his corn was turned into blood, 
 while the mill-wheel stood immoveable against all the 
 water of the Calder. Again, in 1452, we find the miller 
 fined for taking too much mulcture.' 
 
 Pindar Fields, which by tradition are said to have 
 been the site of Robin Hood's exploit with the valiant 
 Pindar George of the Green, lie at the east end of the 
 town. In the court-rolls of the manor of Wakefield of
 
 304 THE MANOR OF WAKEFIELD 
 
 the reign of Edward IL, tftere appears a Robertus Hode 
 living in the town, and having business in that court. 
 In a parcel of deeds of Edward m.'s reign, relating to 
 Coldhindley, which is about eight miles from Wakefield, 
 we find a Robert, William, and Adam Hode mentioned. 1 
 It will be remembered that Barnsdale Forest, where Robin 
 Hood is said to have lived, lies at no great distance from 
 Coldhindley. 
 
 We now pass on to Sandal Castle, which is probably 
 of earlier date than the Conquest. In 1317, John the 
 eighth and last Earl of Warren, who was a man of licentious 
 character, while residing at Sandal Castle, was involved in 
 a scandalous intrigue with Alice de Lacey, wife of his 
 neighbour Thomas Earl of Lancaster ; she, on the Monday 
 before Ascension Day, was carried off by violence, and 
 conveyed to a castle of the Earl of Warren at Reigate, 
 in Surrey. The Earl of Lancaster proceeded to avenge 
 himself by laying siege to the Earl's castle, and Sandal 
 was demolished by him in revenge for this; but it was 
 rebuilt by the Earl of Warren in 1321. In the year 1318 
 the Earl of Lancaster obtained a grant from the Earl of 
 Warren of his manor of Wakefield, probably as a make- 
 peace for the offences committed against him by the Earl ; 
 but he only enjoyed it for three years, being attainted for 
 high treason, and beheaded at his Castle of Pontefract. 
 
 There is an inquisition of Sandal Castle taken in the 
 
 1 The name of Robin Hood was common in the thirteenth and four- 
 teenth centuries.
 
 AND SANDAL CASTLE. 305 
 
 time of the last Earl, in which are some curious particulars. 
 First, there was a fish-pond, valued at nothing, because all 
 the fish died, probably on account of some mineral 
 impregnations ; second, the meadow-ground lay in open 
 field, and was worth five shillings per acre the pasture- 
 ground was inclosed, and only worth one-tenth of that 
 sum ; lastly, the fishery, a mill-pond of four acres, was 
 worth one-third more than the best meadow-ground. 
 
 Richard Duke of York lay at the castle before the battle 
 of Wakefield ; and the fortress seems to have been of 
 some note in the reign of Richard in. John Wodrove, 
 receiver of Wakefield for Edward iv., had a warrant by 
 privy seal, dated 3d of June, 2d Richard in., for an allow- 
 ance of such sums of money as he should employ in making 
 a tower in the castle in Someshall or Sandal ; also, a warrant 
 granting him a tun of wine yearly for the use of the said 
 castle ; and on the 20th of June following, the king being 
 then at York, assigned the manors of Ul version and 
 Thornham in support of the expenses of his household 
 appointed. In October following, orders were given for 
 building a bakehouse and brewhouse within Sandal Castle 
 by the advice of John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, and 
 others of the king's council lying therein. The por- 
 trait of John Wodrove and his wife, with his arms and 
 his crest, were formerly in the window of Wakefield old 
 church. In the reign of Queen Elizabeth we find that the 
 fees in the castle were, per day : captain, i6d. ; porter, 8d. ; 
 guns, 6, fee, 6d. ; footmen's fee, 6d.
 
 3o6 THE MANOR OF WAKEFIELD 
 
 Sandal Castle was garrisoned for the king in the time 
 of the Civil Wars under Colonel Bonivant, and surrendered 
 after a siege of three weeks, a few days after Pontefract 
 Castle. Boothroyd, the historian of Pontefract, informs 
 us that the governors of Sandal and Pontefract Castles 
 were accustomed to light fires on their towers as a signal 
 to each party that good news had been received ; and on 
 April 30, 1646, it was resolved by the House of Commons 
 that, being an inland castle, it should be made untenable, 
 and no garrison kept or maintained in it; it was then 
 completely demolished. The moat of the castle may yet 
 be traced, and the masonry of the central keep, or round 
 tower, is visible. There are several hewn stones, quite 
 fresh and square, lodged at the foot of a tree at the bottom 
 of a broad walk which appears to have crossed the draw- 
 bridge. There seems to have been a park at Wakefield 
 and Sandal Castle from very early times. 
 
 In the 5th Edward iv., Sir John Saville had a grant 
 from the king of the herbage of Wakefield Park. Sir 
 Thomas Wentworth had a grant from Henry vui. of 
 the keepership. In the ist of Queen Elizabeth, Henry 
 Saville is mentioned as the queen's keeper of it; there 
 being some dispute between him (the plaintiff) and 
 Anthony Wilson for hunting and destruction of deer there. 
 In the 2d of Elizabeth we also find Sir John Tempest, 
 steward of the lordship of Wakefield, and constable of 
 Sandal Castle, disputing with Henry Saville, in the court 
 of Lancaster, for the office of keepership of the game in
 
 AND SANDAL CASTLE. 307 
 
 the New Park of Wakefield and Sandal Castle Park, the 
 paling and the office of bow-bearer there. A farm-house, 
 standing on the left bank of the Calder, and looking up 
 the stream, is still called Lodge-gate, and was undoubtedly 
 an entrance to the park which extended over the neigh- 
 bouring hills. Another entrance also bears the name of 
 the Deer-gate. 1 
 
 1 The substance of this narrative is condensed from an excellent paper 
 by George Wentworth, Esq., in the Journal of the British Arch&ologi- 
 cal Association, 1864; with considerable additions. 
 
 The chapel on Wakefield Bridge was rebuilt in 1847, save one small 
 piece at the east end. The ancient beautiful west fa9ade is now built 
 up as the front of a boat-house or summer-house, on the margin of a 
 lake in the grounds of Kettlethorpe Hall, two miles distant. A brass- 
 plate inscription tells : ' This structure is built with the remains of the 
 original west front and other fragments of St. Marie's, Chantry, which 
 stood on Wakefield Bridge.' It was built in the reign of Edward in., 
 about 1357 5 ar >d restored by Edward IV. after the battle of Wakefield, 
 1400, who dedicated the chapel to the memory of his father the Duke of 
 York. It was defaced by unseemly repairs in 1794. In 1847 the ancient 
 portion was purchased by the Hon. George Chappie Norton, and re- 
 erected by him at Kettlethorpe. The so-called restoration on Wakefield 
 Bridge is reclaimed to an ecclesiastical purpose, a weekly service being 
 performed in it every Thursday evening. See a paper in the above- 
 quoted Journal by F. R. Wilson, Esq.
 
 MIDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. 
 
 iN a rocky eminence near the small market town 
 of Middleham, in the North Riding of York- 
 shire, are the ruins of the ancient castle, built 
 about 1190 by Robert Fitz-Ranulph. In the reign of 
 Henry vi. it belonged to the Earl of Salisbury, who 
 marched hence with 4000 men towards London to demand 
 redress for his son's grievances. Here, also, according to 
 Stow, the bastard Falconbridge was beheaded in 1471. 
 Edward' iv. was confined for a time in Middleham Castle 
 by Richard Nevill, Earl of Warwick, after he had been 
 taken prisoner at Wolvey, but he subsequently escaped 
 while hunting in the park. 
 
 After defeating the Earl of Warwick at Barnet, Edward 
 rv. gave Middleham Castle to his brother, the Duke of 
 Gloucester, afterwards Richard in., who took a great liking 
 to the place, and who was preparing to found a college 
 in Frodingham Field when he died. The church of St. 
 Mary and St. Alkeld, at Middleham, had been made col- 
 legiate by Richard when Duke of Gloucester. 
 
 His only son Edward was born here j but since that time
 
 MlDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. 309 
 
 hardly anything is known of the history of the castle, 
 except that it was inhabited in 1609 by Sir Henry Linley. 
 Tradition says that it was reduced to ruins by Cromwell ; 
 but there is no historical evidence to prove it. 
 
 The character of Richard the Third has been so vili- 
 fied by party historians, that only of late years has the 
 general reader given the short-lived monarch credit for' 
 any qualities likely to render him popular. In seeking to 
 clear him of great crimes, however, he is proved to have 
 possessed patriotism and integrity. After the victory of 
 Towton, the title of Duke of Gloucester, with an ample 
 appanage in the shape of lordships and manors, were at 
 once conferred on Richard, who, at an unusually early 
 age, was also appointed to three or four offices of the 
 highest trust and dignity; and he amply justified the 
 confidence reposed in him. That he was brave we are 
 assured. The chief glory of the well-fought field of Barnet 
 belonged to Richard ; but unluckily it was the scene of a 
 tragedy in which the part of the first villain has been 
 popularly assigned to him. 
 
 Richard's superiority to all sordid considerations was 
 strikingly displayed during the invasion of France in 1475, 
 when Edward, at the head of one of the finest armies that 
 ever left the English coast, was cajoled and out-manoeuvred 
 by Louis xi. into doing worse than nothing. The expedi- 
 tion ended in a disgraceful treaty, by which Edward was 
 to receive certain sums of money which he wanted for his 
 personal pleasures. Richard alone refused to barter Eng-
 
 310 MlDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD TIL 
 
 lish honour for French gold. ' Only the Duke of Gloucester, 
 who stood aloof on the other side for honour, frowned at 
 this accord, and expressed much sorrow, as compassionating 
 the glory of his nation blemished in it.' Habington, from 
 whom we quote, suggests that the Duke had a further and 
 more dangerous aim : ' As who, by the dishonour of his 
 brothers, thought his credit received increase ; and by how 
 much the king sank in opinion, he should rise.' Bacon 
 adopts the same method of depreciation : ' And that out 
 of this deep root of ambition it sprang that, as well as the 
 treaty of peace, as upon all other occasions, Richard, then 
 Duke of Gloucester, stood ever upon the side of honour, 
 raising his own reputation to the disadvantage of the king 
 his brother, and drawing the eyes of all (especially of the 
 nobles and soldiers) upon himself.' We have here, from 
 his worst calumniators, the admitted fact that, down to 
 1475, hi s means were noble, be his end and motives what 
 they may. 
 
 Richard was for several years Lord Warden, or Keeper 
 of the Northern Marches ; and while residing in a sort of 
 royal capacity at York, he so ingratiated himself with the 
 people of that city and neighbourhood, that they stood by 
 him to the last. On the death of his brother he was in 
 the fulness of his fame as a soldier and statesman. He 
 was also the first prince of the blood ; and he must have 
 been endowed with an amount of stoical indifference and 
 self-denial, seldom found in high places at any time, if no 
 ambitious hopes dawned upon him.
 
 MlDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. $11 
 
 The received accounts of Richard's mode of ascending 
 the throne are contradictory ; and it is difficult to believe 
 that he laid much stress on the voices of the rabble in 
 Guildhall, although here again Shakspeare is supported by 
 More. Richard must have been sure of a powerful party, 
 or he never would have ventured to present himself as 
 king before the very Parliament which he had summoned 
 in the name of the nephew he deposed. This important 
 fact is made clear by Mr. Gairdner, who, admitting that 
 this Parliament was not formally called together, asserts 
 that it did meet, and that the petition to Richard to assume 
 the crown was presented by a deputation of the lords and 
 commons of England, accompanied by another from the 
 city of London, on the very day that had been originally 
 appointed for its meeting. 
 
 From this mock election in June, says More, Richard 
 commenced his reign, and was crowned in July with the 
 same provision that was made for the coronation of his 
 nephew. The day before the ceremony, he and his queen 
 rode from the Tower through the city to Westminster, with 
 a train comprising three dukes, nine earls, and twenty-two 
 barons. There was a large attendance of peers, lay and 
 spiritual, and great dignitaries at the ensuing ceremony 
 in Westminster Hall; and More records as most observ- 
 able, that the Countess of Richmond, mother to King 
 Henry VIL, bore up the queen's train in the procession. 
 Richard soon afterwards left London on a royal progress 
 towards York, where he was crowned a second time.
 
 312 MlDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. 
 
 Richard laid himself out from the commencement of 
 his reign to found a reputation for moderation, equity, 
 and forgiveness of private injuries. 'The day after his 
 acceptance of the crown,' says More, ' he went to West- 
 minster, sat himself down in the court of King's Bench, 
 made a very gracious speech to the assembly there present, 
 and promised them halcyon days. He ordered one Hog, 
 whom he hated, and who was fled to sanctuary for fear of 
 him, to be brought before him, took him by the hand, and 
 spoke favourably to him, which the multitude thought was 
 a token of his clemency, and the wise men of his vanity.' 
 He formally enjoined the great barons to see to the equal 
 administration of justice in their provinces ; and a con- 
 temporary sketch of his progresses speaks of ' his lords 
 and judges in every place sitting determining the com- 
 plaints of poor folks, with due punition of offenders 
 against the laws.' In a circular letter to the bishops, he 
 expresses his fervent desire for the suppression of vice. 
 His legislative measures are admitted to have been valu- 
 able additions to the statute-book. 
 
 Edward iv. was always in want of money, and was in 
 the habit of personally appealing to his wealthiest subjects 
 for contributions. Richard went on an opposite tack. 
 When the citizens and others offered him a benevolence, 
 he refused it, saying, 'I would rather have your hearts 
 than your money.' 
 
 He disafforested a large tract of country at Witchwood, 
 which his brother had cleared for deer ; and showed at the
 
 MlDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. 313 
 
 same time his wish to promote all manly and popular 
 amusements by liberal grants and allowances to the 
 masters of his hounds and hawks. There is, moreover, 
 extant a mandate to all mayors and sheriffs, not to vex 
 or molest John Brown, ' our mater-guider, and ruler of all 
 our bears and apes to us appertaining.' Richard is com- 
 mended by contemporaries for his encouragement of archi- 
 tecture ; and the commendation is justified by a list of the 
 structures which he completed or improved. 
 
 His love of music is inferred from the extreme measures 
 he adopted for its gratification. Turner quotes a warrant 
 ' empowering one of the gentlemen of his chapel to take 
 and seize, for the king's use, all such singing men and 
 children expert in the science of music, as he could find 
 and think able to do the king service, in all places in the 
 kingdom, whether cathedrals, colleges, chapels, monas- 
 teries, or any other franchised places, except Windsor.' 
 He was visited by minstrels from foreign countries, and 
 gave annuities to several professors of the gentle science, 
 ' and also,' adds Turner, ' perhaps for his fondness for their 
 sonorous state music, to several trumpeters.' Mr. Jesse, 
 in his Memoirs, will have it that Richard's nature was 
 originally a compassionate one ; and he appeals to the 
 pensions considerately bestowed by him on the widows 
 of his enemies, Lady Hastings, Lady Rivers, Lady Oxford, 
 and the Duchess of Buckingham. 
 
 The shortness of Richard's reign favours the idea that 
 the nation, exasperated beyond endurance by his villanies,
 
 314 MlDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. 
 
 rose and threw him off like an incubus. But nothing of 
 the kind occurred. The people at large were too much 
 inured to scenes of blood and acts of cruelty to be shocked 
 by them. They cared little or nothing whether a few 
 princes or lords more or less were put to death, so long 
 as they were not fleeced by a tax-gatherer, or oppressed 
 by a local tyrant ; and Richard, like Cromwell at a later 
 period, took good care that there should be no usurped or 
 abused authority besides his own. He was not weighed 
 in the balance, and found wanting, till two discontented 
 nobles, the Stanleys, threw their whole weight into the 
 opposing scale. The numerical inferiority of Richard's 
 army is a conclusive proof that his cause was not a pre- 
 eminently popular one. 
 
 The pair who contended on Bosworth Field for a king- 
 dom are thus portrayed : ' Richard was better versed in 
 arms ; Henry was better served. Richard was brave ; 
 Henry a coward. Richard was about five feet four, rather 
 runted, but only made crooked by his enemies, and wanted 
 six weeks of thirty-three ; Henry was twenty-seven, slender, 
 and near five feet nine, with a saturnine countenance, 
 yellow hair, and grey eyes.' 
 
 As to the person of Richard : ' the truth,' says Walpole, 
 ' I take to have been this : Richard, who was slender, and 
 not tall, had one shoulder a little higher than the other, a 
 defect, by the magnifying-glasses of party, by distance of 
 time, and by the amplification of tradition, easily swelled 
 to a shocking deformity.' The impression left by a marked
 
 MlDDLEHAM CASTLE AND RICHARD III. 315 
 
 personal peculiarity may be unconsciously heightened and 
 transmitted till it becomes inextricably woven into the web 
 of history. 
 
 The strongest argument in favour of Richard's personal 
 appearance is that drawn from Dr. Shaw's address to the 
 citizens of London preparatory to the usurpation : ' My 
 Lord Protector, that very noble prince, the pattern of all 
 heroic deeds, represents the very face and mind of the 
 great Duke his father. His features are the same, and the 
 very express likeness of that noble Duke.' At these words 
 the Protector was to enter as if by chance ; and although 
 the point was missed by his non-appearance till a few 
 minutes later, such a coup de theatre would hardly have 
 been hazarded if Richard either presented no resemblance, 
 or a miniature and caricature one, of his father. 
 
 Richard lost nothing of his vigilance or unrelenting 
 sternness in his last hours. Going the rounds at Bosworth, 
 he found a sentinel asleep, and stabbed him, with the 
 remark : ' I found him asleep, and have left him as I found 
 him.' x 
 
 1 This narrative of the personal history of Richard in. is in the main 
 condensed from a very able paper in the Edinburgh Review, No. cxv. 
 1862, with additions.
 
 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 
 
 the railway traveller passes through the middle 
 district of the Great Western line, he will, 
 doubtless, remark that the sky-line of the chalk- 
 down, as seen from the valley, is continually broken by 
 the elevation of some earthwork, carrying the mind's eye 
 back to times of war and bloodshed, spoliation and con- 
 quest. This earthwork is known as Uffington Castle, and 
 occupies the summit of White Horse Hill, 700 feet in 
 diameter from east to west, and 500 feet from north to 
 south. It is surrounded by a double vallum or embank- 
 ment, the inner one high, and commanding an extensive 
 view in every direction, the outer one slighter. On the 
 steep escarpment of the hill, just below the entrenchment, 
 our traveller will see the rude outline figure of a horse at 
 full gallop, formed by removing the thin layer of turf 
 and exposing the white surface beneath of the chalk. 
 Hence the figure is called the White Horse. This is 
 believed to have been cut as a memorial of the battle of 
 ^Escesdun, or Ash-tree Hill, in which the West Saxons, 
 under Ethelred and Alfred in 871, defeated the Danes
 
 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 317 
 
 with great slaughter on this spot. Be this as it may, the 
 Horse is either of Saxon origin or of higher antiquity. 
 Asser minutely describes how 'the Pagans (Danes) had 
 got the higher ground, and how the battle was begun upon 
 a spot where grew a single thorn-tree, which he himself 
 had afterwards seen, the whole account having been given 
 him by a faithful eye-witness. After a bloody and obstinate 
 dispute, one king and five counts were killed on the Pagan 
 side, with many thousands of common men ; and the rest 
 were dispersed all over the wide plain of Ashdown, and 
 pursued all that night and the next day as far as to their 
 castle at Reading.' 
 
 The White Horse is a rude figure about 374 feet in 
 length, and is said to cover an acre of ground. The face 
 of the chalk-down is 893 feet above the sea-level; and 
 when the afternoon sun shines upon the figure, it may be 
 seen ten, twelve, and even fifteen miles distant ; and from 
 its immense size it forms a remarkable object. Wise, 
 the antiquary, is in raptures with the skill displayed in the 
 Horse, and in the admirable choice of a situation where 
 it is little exposed to injury or decay. The inhabitants of 
 the neighbourhood had an ancient custom of assembling 
 to scour the Horse, i. e. to clear away the turf where it has 
 encroached upon the outline of the Horse. On such 
 occasions a rural festival was formerly held, and the 
 people were regaled by the lord of the manor; but they 
 do not appear to have observed that custom since 1780; 
 it may possibly have dwindled to a common, purposeless
 
 318 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 
 
 fair. We remember to have been at Englefield Green 
 in the summer of 1833, and there to have heard of a 
 custom, then common in Berkshire, of boys 'going up to 
 chalk-pits ' annually : may not this be a relic of the White 
 Horse scouring 1 We need hardly remind the reader of Mr. 
 T. Hughes's very popular story of 'The Scouring of the 
 White Horse,' published a few years since. 
 
 The site of yEscesdun, or Ashdown, has, however, been 
 much disputed. Wise, in a letter to Dr. Mead, contends 
 for the ridge of the chalk-hills extending from Wantage 
 into Wiltshire, and thinks that the White Horse cut on 
 the hill is a memorial of the victory. Aston, a village near 
 Wallingford, and Ashampstead, a village about equally 
 distant from Wallingford, Newbury, and Reading, have 
 each their partisans. Mr. Sharon Turner, in his History 
 of the Anglo-Saxons, inclines to the opinion that Merantune, 
 (where shortly afterwards the Saxons sustained a severe 
 defeat, in which Ethelred was mortally wounded,) was 
 Moreton, near Wallingford. 
 
 Leland, Camden, and Aubrey take but passing notice 
 of the White Horse, as does the author of A Tour through 
 England, published in 1738; and 'they,' Wise observes, 
 ' leave us much in the dark about the antiquity and design 
 of it, with the curiosity, but at the same time with the haste, 
 of travellers.' Wise expected better things of Camden, 
 who might surely have inquired into the origin of the 
 ceremony of scouring the horse, ' which, from time imme- 
 morial, has been solemnized by a numerous concourse of
 
 THE VALE OF WHITE' HORSE. 319 
 
 people from all the villages round about.' This writer 
 is not, however, surprised at ' the custom being lost in the 
 mazes of antiquity, though the festival was of a more 
 general nature than wakes, or feasts of the dedication of 
 churches, which are traced to the origin of fairs ; now the 
 latter are confined to single parishes, whereas, though the 
 Horse stands in the parish of Uffington, yet other towns 
 claimed, by ancient custom, a share of the duty upon this 
 occasion, which distinction should render the White Horse 
 Festival more important and memorable.' 
 
 The White Horse was the standard of the Saxons before 
 and after their coming into England; it was a proper 
 emblem of victory and triumph, as we read in Ovid and 
 elsewhere. The position of the Horse is not rampant or 
 prancing, as represented in the arms of Savoy, whose princes 
 are descended from those of Saxony; but the Horse is 
 current, or galloping, as described in the arms of the House 
 of Brunswick to this day. Wise, in his pamphlet upon 
 this point, 1738-42, says: 'If any disputes should arise 
 among heralds about these different bearings of the horse, 
 as likewise whether he ought to be current for the dexter 
 part or sinister, which, I believe, is a point not entirely 
 settled, I think, till some other more ancient record shall 
 be produced, they may be fairly denominated from this 
 authentic one of 867 years' standing.' 
 
 The White Horse is to this day the ensign of the county 
 of Kent, where it is a favourite inn-sign. The White 
 Horse of Hanover dates from the House of Hanover sue-
 
 320 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 
 
 ceeding to the throne of these realms the White Horse 
 being the badge of that house. 
 
 Just under the White Horse Hill is a knoll of chalk 
 called the Dragon Hill, described as a mound or barrow, 
 intended to cover the dead, the horse being supposed to 
 commemorate the victory. This would be a plausible link 
 in the chain of the antiquary's theory, were it certain that 
 the mound is artificial ; but this is supposititious. At all 
 events, the neighbouring downs are thickly strewn with 
 tumuli and other marks of an early population. 
 
 The entrenchments, too, are very interesting ; and the 
 advantage which has been taken of the natural ravines to 
 aid in forming camps, is very striking to the student of 
 military antiquities. On the chalk hills north of Lambourn 
 many barrows are found, especially one covered irregularly 
 with large stones. Three of the stones have a fourth laid 
 on them, in the manner of the British cromlechs. By the 
 country people this is called Wayland Smith; and they 
 have a tradition of an invisible smith, residing here, who 
 would shoe a traveller's horse, if it was left here for a short 
 time, with a piece of money by way of payment. How 
 pleasantly this strange tradition is introduced in the 
 romance of Kenilworth, by Sir Walter Scott, must be re- 
 membered. 
 
 Wise leaves the entire story to lovers of the fancies of 
 fiction, and concludes with these matter-of-fact remarks : 
 ' These stones are, according to the best Danish antiquaries, 
 a burial-altar. Their being raised in the midst of a plain
 
 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 321 
 
 field near the great road, seems to indicate some person 
 there slain and buried; and such person was probably a 
 chief or king, there being no monument of this sort near 
 that place, perhaps not in England beside. If it be allowed 
 me likewise that King Ethelred lay encamped at Hardwell, 
 this will afford another argument for its being raised for the 
 king slain, whose troops were opposed to King Ethelred's 
 division, as those of the Count's were to Alfred's, for the 
 stones are about half a mile from Hardwell Camp.' About 
 a mile from Wayland Smith, a succession of barrows have 
 been traced, which Wise concluded to denote the burial- 
 places of certain of the Danish counts. 
 
 Wayland Smith has been lucidly described in the large 
 History of the Great Western Railway, published in 1846 : 
 ' Wayland Smith's Cave is a combination of a cromlech with 
 a regular Druidical circle. The circle is composed of be- 
 tween thirty and forty stones, some of which are overthrown 
 and partially buried, while all are more or less displaced. 
 Within the circle, three stones are set on edge, so as to 
 form a chamber, which is roofed by a fourth. This is the 
 cave. In front of the cave is a sort of cruciform alley of 
 stones, two areas of which are closed at the ends, while the 
 third is open, and forms the entrance to the cromlech. 
 This curious relic stands by the side of the old Ridge Way. 
 The stones are all grey-wethers, and similar to those of 
 Abury and the Trilithons of Stonehenge. The modern pro- 
 prietor of this curious Druidical remain has had the good 
 taste to plant a small wood of fir-trees around it, throwing
 
 322 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 
 
 the whole into a deep gloom, well suited to its ancient 
 character.' 
 
 We are induced to extend our antiquarian ramble to 
 another relic of kindred interest, namely, the noted Blowing 
 Stone, which is situated at Kingston Lisle, five miles due 
 north of Lambourn, and the same distance from Wantage. 
 At the back of the stone grows an old elm- tree. The stone 
 itself is a species of red sandstone. It is about three feet 
 high, three feet six inches broad, and two feet thick ; but it 
 is of rough and rather irregular surface. It has several 
 holes in it of various sizes. There are seven holes in the 
 front, three at the top, a large irregular broken hollow at 
 the north end (as it stands north and south), and one if not 
 more holes at the back. If a person blows in at any one of 
 three of the holes, an extremely loud noise is produced 
 something between a note upon a French horn and the 
 bellowing of a calf ; this can be heard in a favourable state 
 of weather at Farringdon Clump, a distance of about six 
 miles ; and a person standing at about a yard distant from 
 either end of the stone while it is blown into, will distinctly 
 feel the ground shake. The holes in the stone are of 
 various sizes ; but those which, if blown into, produce the 
 sound, easily admit a person's finger. The hole most com- 
 monly used to produce the sound is at the top of the stone ; 
 and if a small stick, eighteen inches long, be pushed in at 
 this hole, it will come out at a hole at the back of the stone, 
 about a foot below the top, and almost immediately below 
 the hole blown into. It is evident that this is the place at
 
 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 323 
 
 which the air finds its exit, as, after the stone has been 
 blown into at the top for a considerable time, this hole 
 becomes wet. There seems, however, no doubt that there 
 are chambers in the stone, as the irregular broken hollow 
 at the north end of it has evidently formed a part of another 
 place, at which a similar sound might have been produced. 
 In the neighbourhood there exists a tradition that this stone 
 was used for the purpose of giving an alarm on the approach 
 of an enemy. In the Penny Cycloptzdia, whence the above 
 description has been abridged, the belief is stated that there 
 is no account of the Blowing Stone in any other publication. 
 Its position is marked in the Ordnance map. 
 
 The Vale of White Horse to this day presents to the 
 curious observer the earthworks and other relics of war- 
 like times the means of our early civilisation. Here may 
 be traced the camp and the castle, the rude trophy of 
 triumph cut upon the face of the lofty hill, and the grave of 
 the victor ' the desolator desolate ' in the peaceful valley. 
 There are the works of centuries since of the early Briton, 
 the Roman, the Saxon, and the Dane, whose ancient roads, 
 in their directions, afford abundant studies for the patient 
 antiquary and topographer. Through this long lapse of ages, 
 defaced by the struggles for the mastery among war-tribes, . 
 the Vale of White Horse has maintained its fame for con- 
 taining some of the most fertile lands in England ; in- 
 cluding rich pastures and corn-lands, and a belt of rich 
 lands along the Thames, whose pent-up waters and tribu- 
 tary streams must have fed considerable lakes in past ages.
 
 324 THE VALE OF WHITE HORSE. 
 
 On the hills which border the Thames may be enjoyed 
 extensive views over the Vale of White Horse into Oxford- 
 shire ; and in general the aspect of the country from any 
 considerable hill is that of great richness and variety. The 
 contrast is suggestive. Here ' Decay's effacing fingers ' 
 have spared us studies of the past, which luxuriant Nature, 
 in her reproductiveness, invests with picturesque beauty; 
 the Roman road of centuries ago is almost obliterated by 
 the railway of to-day ; and the green turf was once the site 
 of the tower'd city, with its ' busy hum of men.'
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 3ANY are the memorials which exist to this day 
 of 'the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth,' the 
 natural son of Charles n. ; and whose popu- 
 larity with the nation, still more than the presumed par- 
 tiality of his father, made him a somewhat formidable 
 competitor for the succession in the actual circumstances 
 of the legitimate heir. 
 
 Somerset and Dorset were the closing scenes of Mon- 
 mouth's career. In 1680 he made a memorable progress, 
 accepting the hospitality of his distinguished friends, and 
 visiting the estates of the country party ; but the gentlemen 
 of the court shrank from contact with one whose connec- 
 tion with the opposition and democratic members of Parlia- 
 ment was so notorious. In August, when Monmouth started 
 on his progress, incredible numbers flocked to see this 
 great champion of the English nation who had been so 
 successful against the Dutch, French, and Scots. He first 
 went into Wiltshire and honoured the worthy Squire 
 Thynne, of Longleate House, with his company for some 
 days. From Longleate, Monmouth journeyed into Somer-
 
 326 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 set, caressed with the joyful acclamations of the country 
 people, who cried, ' God bless King Charles and the 
 Protestant Duke ! ' In some towns and parishes through 
 which he passed they strewed the streets and highways 
 with herbs and flowers, especially at Ilchester and South 
 Petherton ; others presenting him with bottles of wine. 
 When the Duke came within ten miles of White Lacking- 
 ton House, the seat of George Speke, Esq., one mile 
 distant from Ilminster, he was met by two thousand per- 
 sons on horseback, whose number increased to twenty 
 thousand. To admit so large a multitude, several perches 
 of the park paling were taken down. His Grace, his 
 party, and attendants, took refreshment under the famed 
 sweet Spanish chestnut-tree, now standing, which measures 
 at three feet from the ground upwards of twenty-six feet 
 in circumference. The old branches have been mostly 
 removed by the ravages of time ; but there are others 
 attached to the stock which produce large timber, as well 
 as a quantity of fruit every year. White Lackington 
 House is now a farm : a great part of the edifice has been 
 pulled down. 
 
 It was in the village of Norton St. Philip's, between 
 Bath and Frome, that the ill-fated Duke was attacked on 
 June 27, 1685, by the Royalists, whose advanced guard 
 had marched from Bath under the Duke of Grafton, Mon- 
 mouth's half-brother. Colonel Holmes, who was at the 
 head of Monmouth's army, had an arm nearly shot off in 
 the engagement; and it is related that the brave soldier,
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 327 
 
 unassisted, completed the amputation with the cook's knife 
 in the kitchen of the George Inn at the village. This 
 large old mansion was formerly a granary belonging to 
 Hinton Abbey : its capacious porch, the designs of some 
 of its windows, its overhanging upper storeys (upon rude 
 corbels), and its inner gallery leading to what once were 
 bed-chambers, all denote the pile to have been erected 
 in the early portion of the fifteenth century. 
 
 Macaulay has thus vividly described the capture of Mon- 
 mouth : ' On Cranbourne Chase the strength of the horses 
 failed. They were, therefore, turned loose. Monmouth 
 and his friends disguised themselves as countrymen, and 
 proceeded on foot towards the New Forest. They passed 
 the night in the open air ; but before morning they were 
 surrounded on every side. At five in the morning Grey 
 was seized by two of Lumley's scouts. It could hardly 
 be doubted that the chief rebel was not far off. The pur- 
 suers redoubled their vigilance and activity. The cottages 
 scattered over the heathy country on the boundaries of 
 Dorsetshire and Hampshire, were strictly examined by 
 Lumley, and the clown with whom Monmouth had changed 
 clothes was discovered. Portman came with a strong body 
 of horse and foot to assist in the search. Attention was 
 soon drawn to a place well fitted to shelter fugitives. It 
 was an extensive tract of land separated by an inclosure 
 from the open country, and divided by numerous hedges 
 into small fields. In some of these fields the rye, the peas, 
 and the oats were high enough to conceal a man ; others were
 
 328 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 overgrown by fern and brambles. A poor woman reported 
 that she had seen two strangers lurking in this covert. 
 The near prospect of reward animated the zeal of the 
 troops. . . . The outer fence was strictly guarded, the 
 space within was examined with indefatigable diligence, 
 and several dogs of quick scent were turned out among 
 the bushes. The day closed before the search could be 
 completed ; but careful watch was kept all night. Thirty 
 times the fugitives ventured to look through the outer 
 hedge, but everywhere they found a sentinel on the alert : 
 once they were seen and fired at. They then separated, 
 and concealed themselves in different hiding-places. 
 
 'At sunrise the next morning the search was recom- 
 menced, and Buyse was found. He owned that he had 
 parted from the Duke only a few hours before. The corn 
 and copsewood were now beaten with more care than ever. 
 At length a gaunt figure was discovered hiding in a ditch. 
 The pursuers sprang on their prey. Some of them were 
 about to fire, but Portman forbade all violence. The 
 prisoner's dress was that of a shepherd. His beard, pre- 
 maturely grey, was of several days' growth. He trembled 
 greatly, and was unable to speak. Even those who had 
 often seen him were in doubt whether this were the brilliant 
 and graceful Monmouth. His pockets were searched by 
 Portman, and in them were found, among some raw peas 
 gathered in the rage of hunger, a watch, a purse of gold, 
 a small treatise on fortification, an album filled with songs, 
 receipts, prayers, and charms, and the George with which,
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 329 
 
 many years before, King Charles ir. had decorated his 
 favourite son.' 
 
 The incidents and circumstances of the capture have been 
 described with more particularity as to the names of the 
 places. The decisive battle of Sedgemoor was fought on 
 the 5th of July, after which Monmouth and his friends fled 
 across the boundaries of Wiltshire ; at Woodyates' Inn, 
 near Salisbury, on the road to Blandford, they turned their 
 horses adrift ; and thence crossed the country, nearly due 
 south, to ' the Island ' in the parish of Horton, in Dorset- 
 shire, where, in a field called to this day ' Monmouth Close,' 
 was found the would-be king. An ash-tree, at the foot 
 of which he was found crouched in a ditch, and half-hid 
 under the fern, is standing, and bears the carved initials of 
 persons who had visited it : it was propped up for pre- 
 servation. 
 
 In one of the fields of peas, tradition tells that the 
 Duke dropped a gold snuff-box. It was picked up some 
 time afterwards by a labourer, who carried it to Mrs. 
 Wedale of Horton probably the proprietor of the field 
 and received in reward fifteen pounds, which was said 
 to be half its value. 
 
 On his capture, the Duke was first taken to the house 
 of Anthony Etterick, Esq., a magistrate, who resided at 
 Holt, which adjoins Horton. Tradition, which records 
 the popular feeling rather than the fact, reports that the 
 poor woman who informed the pursuers that she had seen 
 two strangers lurking in the Island her name was Amy
 
 330 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 Farrant never prospered afterwards; and that Henry 
 Parkin, the soldier who, spying the skirt of the smock-frock 
 which the Duke had assumed as a disguise, recalled the 
 searching party just as they were leaving the Island, burst 
 into tears, and reproached himself bitterly for his fatal 
 discovery (Notes and Queries). 
 
 The late Earl of Shaftesbury, many years ago, took some 
 pains to identify the localities of the capture, and the Close, 
 which latter is on his lordship's estate, St. Giles's. What 
 he learned upon the spot convinced him that the Duke 
 was not going to Christchurch, but to Bournemouth, where 
 he expected to find a vessel. Monmouth Close, as the 
 inclosure has been called since the capture in July 1685, 
 is in the direct line from Woodyates to Bournemouth. 
 Lord Shaftesbury had printed, for the information of per- 
 sons visiting the spot, an account of the Close and the 
 capture, in which it is stated that when the Duke's pur- 
 suers came up, an old woman gave information of his 
 being in the Island, and of her having seen him filling 
 his pockets with peas. The Island was immediately sur- 
 rounded by soldiers, who passed the night there, and 
 threatened to fire the neighbouring cots. The Duke, when 
 taken, was quite exhausted with fatigue and hunger, having 
 had no food since the battle but the peas which he had 
 gathered in the field. The family of the woman who 
 betrayed him were ever after holden in the greatest de- 
 testation, and are . said to have fallen into decay, and to 
 have never thriven afterwards. The house where she lived,
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 331 
 
 which overlooked the spot, has fallen down : it was with 
 the greatest difficulty that any one could be got to inhabit 
 it. The Duke being asked what he would do if set at 
 liberty, answered, that if his horse and arms were restored, 
 he only desired to ride through the army, and he defied 
 them all to take him again. 
 
 Monmouth was brought to London on July i5th, and had 
 on the same day an interview with the king, who obdurately 
 refused to grant him his life, or even the briefest respite. 
 'Though,' says Hume, 'he might have known, from the 
 unrelenting severity of James's temper, that no mercy 
 could be expected, he wrote him the most submissive 
 letters, and conjured him to spare the issue of a brother 
 who had ever been so strongly attached to his interests. 
 James finding such symptoms of depression and despon- 
 dency in his prisoner, admitted him to his presence, in 
 hopes of extorting a discovery of his accomplices; but 
 Monmouth would not purchase life, however loved, at the 
 price of so much infamy. Finding all efforts vain, he 
 assumed courage from despair, and prepared himself for 
 death with a spirit better suited to his rank and character.' 
 Having been attainted shortly after his landing, he was 
 delivered to the executioner, and beheaded on Tower-hill 
 the same day. The Duke is stated, in the folio dictionary 
 of Pierre Richelet, to have given six guineas to the execu- 
 tioner to do his work well. 
 
 The statute of Monmouth's attainder is one of the 
 briefest on record. It runs thus : ' Whereas James Duke
 
 332 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 of Monmouth has, in a hostile manner, invaded this king- 
 dom, and is now in open rebellion, levying war against the 
 king, contrary to the duty of his allegiance, Be it enacted 
 by the King's most excellent Majesty, by and with the 
 advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, 
 and Commons, in this Parliament assembled, and by the 
 authority of the same, That the said James Duke of 
 Monmouth stand and be convicted and attainted of high 
 treason, and that he suffer pains of death, and incur all 
 forfeitures, as a traitor convicted and attainted of high 
 treason.' This was passed and received the royal assent 
 in a single day, on the strength of a letter from Gregory 
 Alford, the Mayor of Lyme, announcing the landing of 
 Monmouth at that port. 
 
 The Duke landed on the lyth of June with only 150 men ; 
 but the whole kingdom was alarmed, fearing that the dis- 
 affected would join them, many of the train-bands flocking 
 to him. At his landing he published a declaration, charg- 
 ing his Majesty with usurpation, and several horrid crimes, 
 on pretence of his own title, and offering to call a free 
 Parliament. The declaration was ordered to be burned 
 by the hangman, the Duke proclaimed a traitor, and a 
 reward of ^5000 to any one who should kill him. 
 
 Monmouth's followers exhibited more courage than their 
 leader, and seemed determined to adhere to him in every 
 fortune. The negligent disposition made by Feversham 
 invited Monmouth to attack the king's army at Sedgemoor, 
 near Bridgewater ; and his men in this action showed what
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS 333 
 
 a native courage and a principle of duty, even when un- 
 assisted by discipline, is able to perform. They threw the 
 veteran forces into disorder, drove them from their ground, 
 continued the fight till their ammunition failed them, and 
 would at last have obtained a victory, had not the miscon- 
 duct of Monmouth and the cowardice of Grey prevented it. 
 After a combat of three hours the rebels gave way, and were 
 followed with great slaughter. About 1500 men fell in the 
 battle and pursuit. 
 
 It is traditionally related that on the 8th of July Mon- 
 mouth was brought a prisoner to Ringwood, and halted at 
 an inn there. The narrator, who was a native of Ringwood, 
 used to tell that her grandmother was one of the spectators 
 when the royal prisoner came out to take horse ; and she 
 never failed to recount how he rejected any assistance in 
 mounting, though his arms were pinioned ; but placing his 
 foot in the stirrup, sprang lightly into his saddle, to the 
 admiration of all observers. 
 
 Hume's account of the execution is thus minute : 
 ' This favourite of the people was attended to the scaffold 
 with a plentiful effusion of tears. When he saw the axe, he 
 touched it, and said it was not sharp enough. He gave 
 the hangman only half the usual fee, and told him that if he 
 cut off his head cleverly, and not so butcherly as he did the 
 unfortunate Russell's, his man would give him the rest.' 
 [This differs from the anecdote already quoted from the 
 French dictionary.] ' This precaution served only to dismay 
 the executioner ; he struck a feeble blow on Monmouth,
 
 334 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 who, raising his head from the block, looked him in the 
 face, as if reproaching him for his failure. He gently 
 laid down his head a second time, and the executioner 
 struck him again and again to no purpose. He then threw 
 aside the axe, and said he was incapable of finishing the 
 bloody office. The sheriff obliged him to renew the 
 attempt, and at two blows more the head was severed from 
 his body. 
 
 ' He was executed, in the thirty-sixth year of his age, 
 on the 26th July 1685. He possessed many good 
 qualities, and some that were bad. Had he lived in less 
 turbulent times, he might have been an ornament to the 
 court, and of service to his country. But the indulgence of 
 Charles, the caresses of faction, and the allurements of 
 popularity, seduced him into an enterprise which exceeded 
 his capacity. The goodwill of the people followed him 
 even after his death ; and such was their fond attachment, 
 that many believed he was still alive, and that some person 
 resembling him had suffered in his stead.' 
 
 Soon after his execution Monmouth was buried in the 
 Tower, beneath the communion-table, in the chapel of St. 
 Peter's, from whence it is believed to have been removed. 
 In the year 1852, in taking down the old chapel at Nune- 
 ham Regis, in Warwickshire, was found a decapitated body, 
 which was surmised to be that of Monmouth. The chapel 
 was the property of the Buccleuch family. Monmouth 
 married Ann, the daughter and heir of Francis Scott, Earl 
 of Buccleuch, who was in some measure estranged from
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 335 
 
 him by his improper connection with Lady Ann Wentworth. 
 Yet the tender interview that is recorded between Mon- 
 mouth and his wife previous to his execution, gives counte- 
 nance to the idea that she may have procured his remains 
 for deposit privately within her own family receptacle ; and 
 under such circumstances it may readily be conceived that 
 such secrecy would be used as not to leave any memento 
 along with the corpse, as to whom it might belong, the very 
 circumstance of decapitation being thought probably quite 
 sufficient now as then for designation. Such is the con- 
 jecture of a Correspondent to Notes and Queries. Another 
 Correspondent shows that Nuneham Regis did not be- 
 long to the Duke and Duchess of Monmouth at all, but 
 descended to the family of Buccleuch from the Dukes of 
 Montague. Then the peaked beard, which this corpse is 
 described to have had, could not have belonged to Mon- 
 mouth, for at the time of the capture his beard was of 
 several days' growth ; and within the week between his 
 capture and execution, it could hardly have become a 
 peaked beard. 
 
 Again, says this Correspondent, it may be doubted 
 whether Monmouth's widow would have cared to show 
 much respect to his remains, when it is remembered that 
 after his last interview and parting with her, which some 
 have spoken of as very tender, even on the scaffold, ' he went 
 on to speak of his Henrietta,' and maintained that she, with 
 whom he had been living illicitly, was ' a young lady of virtue 
 and honour.' The Duchess certainly showed much feeling
 
 336 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 during her interview ; but she must soon have recovered 
 her composure, if it be true, as stated by Dalrymple, that she 
 breakfasted with the king the morning after the execution. 
 Though Nuneham Regis did not belong to the Duke of 
 Monmouth, it is worthy of remark that it was the property 
 of another illustrious man, who lost his life on the scaffold 
 for an attempt precisely similar to that of Monmouth, viz. 
 John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland. There can be no 
 doubt that Monmouth was buried in the Tower. Holm- 
 shed accurately describes the position of his grave as being 
 between the two queens, Catherine Howard and Anne 
 Boleyn, and next to the Duke of Somerset. Do they still 
 repose there ? 
 
 The Duke of Monmouth lived in a magnificent mansion 
 built by Wren, and which formed the south side of Soho 
 Square. After the Duke's death the house was purchased 
 by Lord Bateman. In 1717 a principal saloon was used 
 as an auction-room. 
 
 J. T. Smith, in Nollekens and his Times, describes the 
 pulling down of Monmouth House, which he witnessed. 
 The gate entrance was of massive iron-work, supported by 
 stone piers, surmounted by the crest of the Duke of Mon- 
 mouth ; and within the gates was a court-yard for carriages. 
 The hall was ascended by steps. There were eight rooms 
 on the ground-floor. The principal one was a dining-room 
 towards the south, the carved and gilt panels of which had 
 contained whole-length pictures. At corners of the orna- 
 mented ceiling, which was of plaster, and over the chimney-
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 337 
 
 piece, Monmouth's arms were proudly displayed. The 
 staircase was of oak, the steps very low, and the landing- 
 places were tessellated with woods of light and dark colours. 
 Upon ornamented brackets were busts of Seneca, Caracalla, 
 Trajan, Adrian, etc. The principal room on the first floor 
 was lined with blue satin, superbly decorated with pheasants 
 and other birds in gold. The chimney-piece was richly 
 ornamented with fruit and foliage ; in the centre, within a 
 wreath of oak-leaves, was a circular recess for a bust. 
 The beads of the panels of the brown window-shutters, 
 which 'were very lofty, were gilt ; and the piers between the 
 windows had been filled with looking-glasses. The paved 
 yard was surrounded by a red brick wall, with heavy stone 
 copings, twenty-five feet in height. 
 
 Among the memorials left by the unfortunate Duke are 
 some MSS., which are interesting in establishing several 
 points referred to by historians. After Monmouth was 
 beheaded, the articles found on his person were given to 
 the king. At James's deposition, three years afterwards, 
 all his manuscripts, including those that had belonged to 
 Monmouth, were carried into France, and they remained 
 till the Revolution in that country, a century afterwards. 
 Among them was the manuscript volume of 157 pages, 
 'filled with songs, recipes, prayers, and charms,' already 
 mentioned. It was purchased at a book-stall in Paris in 
 1827, afterwards brought to England, and is now in the 
 British Museum. This book shows the remains of silver 
 clasps that have been destroyed, and part of the leather
 
 338 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 cover at each side torn away, seemingly for receiving some 
 name or a coat of arms ; it being dangerous to possess at 
 that period of the French Revolution books with royal arms 
 on them. The several books were sent to St. Omer's; the 
 larger ones were burned, and some small ones were saved ; 
 but all trace of them was lost. The Abbe Waters a colla- 
 teral descendant of Lucy Waters, the Duke of Monmouth's 
 mother was the person with whom George iv. negotiated 
 for the Stuart Papers, and from whom the volumes which 
 have since appeared as Clarke's Life of James the Secojid 
 were obtained ; and it is from the Abbe Waters we have the 
 account of the destruction of King James's autograph papers. 
 The book just named has on the inner cover the words 
 ' Baron Watiers,' or ' Watrers,' and is believed to be that 
 referred to in the following note, by Lord Dartmouth, to 
 the modern editions of Burnet's Own Time: 'My uncle, 
 Colonel William Legge, who went in the coach with him 
 [Monmouth] to London as a guard, with orders to stab 
 him when he was taken, and his table-book, which was 
 full of astrological figures that nobody could understand ; 
 but he told my uncle that they had been given to him 
 some years before in Scotland, and he now found they 
 were but foolish conceits.' The most curious passages in 
 this book are the Duke's memorandums of his journeys 
 on two visits to the Prince of Orange in the year previous 
 to his last rash adventure. There is an entry naming 
 Toddington, a place remarkable in the history of the 
 Duke. Near it was the residence of Lady Henrietta Maria
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 339 
 
 Wentworth, Baroness (in her own right) of Nettlestead. 
 Five years before the execution, her mother observed 
 that, despite the Duke being a married man, her daughter 
 had, while at court, attracted his admiration, and she was 
 hurried away to Toddington. In 1683, after the failure 
 of the Rye House Plot, Monmouth was banished from 
 the royal presence; and it was to Toddington that he 
 retired. When, on retracting the confession which he had 
 made on the occasion, he was banished the kingdom, 
 the companion of his exile was Lady Henrietta Wentworth. 
 In Macaulay's History we find that the latest act of 
 the Duke on the scaffold, before submitting to the stroke 
 of the executioner, was to call his servant, and put into 
 the man's hand a toothpick-case, the last token of ill- 
 starred love. 'Give it,' he said, l to that person!' 1 After 
 the description of Monmouth's burial occurs this affecting 
 passage : ' Yet a few months, and the quiet village of Tod- 
 dington, in Bedfordshire, witnessed a yet sadder funeral. 
 Near that village stood an ancient and stately hall, the seat 
 of the Wentworths. The transept of the parish church 
 had long been their burial-place. To that burial-place, 
 in the spring which followed the death of Monmouth, was 
 borne the coffin of the young Baroness Wentworth, of 
 Nettlestead. Her family reared a sumptuous mausoleum 
 over her remains ; but a less costly memorial of her was long 
 contemplated with far deeper interest : her name, carved 
 by the hand of him she loved too well, was, a few years 
 ago, still discernible on a tree in the adjoining park.'
 
 340 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 The charms and recipes, conjurations and incantations in 
 the pocket-book, are very curious ; extracts from old recipe- 
 books are mixed in the oddest way with abridgments of 
 English history, and memorandums, chiefly of a private 
 and personal kind. 'Altogether, this commonplace work 
 is highly indicative of the weakness, vanity, and supersti- 
 tion which stood forward so prominently in the character 
 of the rash but unfortunate Duke of Monmouth.' Sir 
 Frederick Madden has ascertained, by a careful comparison 
 of the above manuscript and pocket-book 'with several 
 undoubted letters of the Duke of Monmouth,' that the 
 whole of the volume (or nearly so) is certainly in the 
 Duke's handwriting. Some lines written on the fly-leaf 
 of the volume confirm the fact beyond all cavil. They 
 are the autograph of King James himself, and are as 
 follows : ' This book was found in the Duke of Monmouth's 
 pocket when he was taken, and is most of his owne hand- 
 writing.' Among the verses are the following, conjectured 
 to be composed by Monmouth : 
 
 ' O how blest and how innocent 
 And happy is a country life ! 
 Free from tumult and discontent ; 
 Heer is no flattery, nor strife, 
 For 'twas the first and happiest life, 
 When first man did injoie him selfe. 
 This is a better fate than king's. 
 Hence jentle peace and love doth flow, 
 For fancy is the rate of things. 
 I am pleased because I think it so ; 
 For a hart that is nobly true, 
 All the world's arts can ne'er subdue. '
 
 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 341 
 
 The prayers breathe a spirit of the most humble and ardent 
 piety, and if composed by the Duke himself, exhibit the 
 weakness of his character in a more favourable light than 
 the remainder of the volume. One paragraph is striking : 
 ' Mercy, mercy, good Lord ! I aske not of Thee any 
 longer the things of this world ; neither power, nor honour, 
 nor riches, nor pleasures. No, my God, dispose of them 
 to whom Thou pleasest, so that Thou givest me mercy.' 
 
 Of greater historical value is the Diary of the Duke, 
 mentioned by Wellwood in the sixth edition of his Memoirs, 
 printed in 1718, and of which he says : ' A great many dark 
 passages there are in it, and some clear enough, that shall 
 be eternally buried for me ; and perhaps it had been for 
 King James's honour to have committed them to the flames.' 
 
 ' It is curious to remark the complete subjugation in 
 which Charles at this period stood towards his brother ; 
 occasioned, perhaps, by the foreign supplies which he 
 scrupled not to receive, being dependent on his adhesion 
 to the policy of which the Duke of York was the avowed 
 representative. Shortly before his death, Charles appears 
 to have meditated emancipation from this state of thraldom ; 
 and Hume says : " He was determined, it is thought, to send 
 the Duke to Scotland, to recall Monmouth, to summon a 
 Parliament, to dismiss all his unpopular ministers, and to 
 thro>v himself entirely upon the goodwill and affections of 
 his subjects." This passage accords with the entries in 
 Monmouth's pocket-book, dated Jan. 5, and Feb. 3.' 
 
 There has also been preserved a curious and richly orna-
 
 342 THE DUKE OF MONMOUTH'S LAST DAYS. 
 
 mented sword, left, as it is believed, by the Duke of Mon- 
 mouth among the villagers of Dorsetshire on his flight from 
 the field of Sedgemoor. It was found in 1844 in the hands 
 of a knot of rustic mummers at Woodyates Inn, and was 
 purchased from them for the sum of eighteenpence. The 
 guard and pommel of the sword are chased with royal 
 emblems, portraits, and military subjects, and the whole 
 has been richly plated. Among these ornaments we have 
 the Rose and Crown, the Prince of Wales's Feathers, and 
 Charles i. and his queen. In this view it is clear that the 
 sword could not have been made for Monmouth. He never 
 claimed to be Prince of Wales. Mr. Hewitt is inclined to 
 believe that the sword belonged originally to Monmouth's 
 father, Charles n., when Prince of Wales ; this would be 
 during his residence at the Hague; and the weapon is 
 thought to be Dutch. 
 
 [Among our national documents are preserved the following : 
 ' An order under the royal sign manual, signed with a trem- 
 bling hand, for the commitment of the Duke of Monmouth's 
 children, July 9, 1685 ; warrant for the delivery of the body of 
 James Duke of Monmouth to the Sheriff of London on the I5th 
 of July, between the hours of 9 and n in the forenoon, for exe- 
 cution on Tower Hill, July 13, 1685; the king's order to allow 
 the Duke of Monmouth and Lord Grey to have each a servant; 
 that the Bishop of Ely is to acquaint the Duke of Monmouth 
 " that he is to dy to-morrow," and that he may see his children, 
 I4th July 1685 ; the king's order for the Duchess of Monmouth to 
 have access to the Duke, either this day, "or to-morrow morning," 
 I4th July 1685 ; the king's order to permit the Duchess of Mon- 
 mouth " to dispose of the body of her daughter, that is now dead 
 in the Tower, as shee shall think fitt," I2th of August 1685.']
 
 THE LADY ALICE LISLE. 
 
 will be remembered that, after the overthrow 
 of the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth at Sedge- 
 moor, near Bridgewater, his scattered partisans 
 sought protection and relief; some in the hovels of the poor 
 and naked like themselves, and others at the mansions of 
 the gentry in the neighbourhood, whose principles were not 
 unfavourable to Monmouth, or whose humane feelings led 
 them to offer still more readily an asylum to the fugitives. 
 Of the latter class was the venerable hostess of Miles Court, 
 whose husband had distinguished himself among those who 
 sat in judgment on Charles i. Her own better feelings had 
 always attached her to the House of Stuart ; and her son 
 had displayed his courage in favour of James n. at that very 
 battle which had just blasted the hopes of his antagonist. 
 The only rebel of her kindred, the Colonel himself, had long 
 ago retired an outlaw from his country, and was ' shot dead 
 at Lausanne, in Switzerland, by three ruffians engaged for 
 that purpose by some of the royal family.' Nevertheless, 
 the widow of the regicide had been marked out by the 
 Government for destruction.
 
 344 THE LADY ALICE LISLE. 
 
 It was at that notorious tribunal, in horrible mockery 
 nicknamed ' The Merciful Assize ' of Winchester, and 
 before Chief-Justice Jeffreys, that the infirm yet stately 
 Lady Alice Lisle, now past her seventieth year, stood ar- 
 raigned for high treason, in having concealed and supported 
 two of Monmouth's followers in a cell or vault at Moyles 
 Court, originally constructed to secure the persecuted priest- 
 hood of either party from the malice of their pursuers. The 
 aspect of the judge and prisoner presented a remarkable 
 contrast. The countenance of the former betrayed nothing 
 of that pride or ferocity which might be imagined from the 
 character of the man. From continued habits of intoxica- 
 tion and sensuality, his face and demeanour were indicative 
 rather of sottish indolence and brutal doggedness than of 
 active cruelty or revenge. 
 
 Few witnesses were called in the present case, yet their 
 hasty evidence seemed too dilatory for the judge's petulance; 
 he declared the charge to be established, and directed the 
 jury to find their verdict accordingly. But the spirit of the 
 indignant matron was not so tamely to be extinguished. 
 She rose majestically from the seat which her infirmities had 
 demanded, rather than her wishes entreated. She raised 
 her lofty form to its full proportions, and cast around, for a 
 moment, her wan yet impressive features, maintaining in 
 wrinkles and fatigue the serenity if not the fire of youth. 
 Then, with an air which awed even the heartless judge upon 
 the bench, she warned the jury of their duty, reminding 
 them that ' the services her son had just performed should
 
 THE LADY ALICE LISLE. 345 
 
 now exonerate her from regal animosity, had any accrued 
 to her name from the disloyalties of her husband ; that her 
 crime amounted to no more than this : that in ignorance 
 both of the condition of the fugitives and of the law, which 
 now pretended to condemn her, she had opened her doors 
 to the hungry, the naked, and the forlorn ; that even this 
 offence, if offence it were, must rest upon her own confession 
 alone, as no evidence had proved the fact upon her trial ; 
 that she had been allowed neither notice of the accusation, 
 nor counsel, nor defences; and that the safety of his Majesty's 
 subjects was far more endangered by one unjust trial and 
 condemnation than by conspiracies or treason of his people ; 
 and that their own bodies had better be given over to the 
 anger of a bigoted taskmaster than their minds to the fangs 
 of conscious iniquity, and their souls to that place of torment 
 whither the curses of a murdered woman would irrevocably 
 consign them.' 
 
 The effect of this appeal was visible even on the judge : 
 he leaned forward, with his eyes half raised from the ground, 
 and without suppressing a malicious smile, he motioned the 
 jury to withdraw. They remained absent an unusual time, 
 during which intense anxiety pervaded all except the judge 
 himself, who rolled about from side to side with manifest 
 uneasiness and displeasure. At length the foreman ap- 
 peared, and pronounced ' Not guilty.' An indistinct murmur 
 of approbation followed, whilst the mortified judge, lifting 
 his unwieldy limbs from the chair, his eyes swollen with 
 rage, his mouth foaming, his hands clenched, and stamping
 
 346 THE LADY ALICE LISLE. 
 
 with rage, yet with the impotence of a child, gave vent to 
 a loud, rapid, and unconnected volley of oaths ; whilst, 
 shaking his fist with frightful vehemence, he drove back the 
 terrified jurymen by the menace of his gesture. 
 
 Again he sat down ; wrath and disappointment gave way 
 at length to a smile of contempt, which indicated that some 
 scheme was at hand to prevent the recurrence of a like 
 rebuff. Again the door opened ; the same messenger of 
 justice returned, and commenced an apologetic preface, 
 which was speedily interrupted by a demand of their deci- 
 sion. The same verdict was delivered as before ; and every 
 one expected from the judge a still more terrible burst of 
 fury. But their expectations were baulked : he merely 
 nodded in sarcasm, and beckoning to a sergeant, who 
 attended with some score of that barbarous troupe dis- 
 tinguished by the title of ' Kirke's Lambs,' l whispered him 
 to keep guard at the door of the jury-room till the verdict 
 was a third time brought in. The very mention of this 
 merciless brigade, the recollection of the horrid cruelties 
 practised by the Colonel and themselves, was sufficient to 
 
 1 After the death of Monmouth, and the suppression of the revolt, 
 the Earl of Feversham hanged twenty-two men at Bridgewater, on the 
 evening of the battle of Sedgemoor, without any form of trial ; and on 
 the Earl leaving the command to Colonel Kirke, the severity and 
 violence of the soldiery were increased, so that Kirke's name was long 
 the object of popular execration hi the west of England. Between 
 Kirke and Jeffreys, in their 'campaign,' as the king jocularly called 
 it, the south-western counties were strewed with the carcases and the 
 dismembered limbs of human beings, women as well as men, butchered 
 by the sword or the axe.
 
 THE LADY ALICE LISLE. 347 
 
 subdue a stouter heart than that of a juryman in the days 
 of Jeffreys. He alone could feast his eyes upon them ; and 
 as he sat in delightful anticipation of success, he reached 
 down the black cap which hung above his head, and handled 
 it and examined it with evident satisfaction. A third time 
 the door opened ; and the verdict having been first com- 
 municated to the sergeant, and by him, with a smile of 
 approbation, to the judge, 'Guilty; death,' was recorded. 
 Four judges sat the silent witnesses of these proceedings ; 
 and the jury, finding themselves rudely shut out from all 
 means of saving the prisoner, at length consented, rather 
 than have a further collision with the court, to deliver the 
 prey to the destroyer. The strange scene in court has 
 been painted by Mr. E. M. Ward, R.A., and is one of his 
 finest historical works. A slight tumult succeeded ; but a 
 few brandished swords restored silence. The Lady Alice 
 remained totally unmoved. She listened to her doom with 
 firmness and composure, and seemed, in one glance towards 
 the bench, to bid farewell to her enemies for ever. 
 
 On the following morning she was placed at the bar, 
 when Jeffreys, having pronounced sentence, issued his 
 orders that the prisoner should be burnt alive in the after- 
 noon of the same day. Lady Lisle suffered death on the 
 2d of September in the market-place at Winchester, her 
 sentence being changed by the king, at her own request, 
 from burning to decapitation. She appeared at the place 
 of execution with great composure, and delivered a paper 
 to the sheriff, in which she observed : ' My defence was
 
 348 JUDGE JEFFREYS. 
 
 such as might be expected from a weak woman ; but such 
 as it was, I did not hear it repeated again to the jury. But 
 I forgive all persons who have done me wrong, and I de- 
 sire that God will do likewise.' A plain slab inscribed to 
 her memory is in Ellingham Churchyard. 
 
 By the above special commission, having Chief-Justice 
 Jeffreys at its head, a great number of persons were con- 
 demned and executed at Dorchester, Exeter, and especially 
 Taunton and Wells. The prisoners for trial in Somerset- 
 shire alone were above 1000 ; and of these at least 239 
 were executed, and probably more. The sentences were 
 carried into effect in thirty-six different towns and villages, 
 among which they were distributed. At Dorchester, in the 
 Town Hall, they have still the chair in which Jeffreys sat 
 at the Assizes. 
 
 Jeffreys, who is scarcely over-coloured in the above nar- 
 rative, is thus described by Burnet : ' All people,' he says, 
 ' were apprehensive of very black designs when they saw 
 Jeffreys made Lord Chief-Justice, who was scandalously 
 vicious, and was drunk every day, besides a drunkenness of 
 fury in his temper, that looked like enthusiasm. He did 
 not consider the decencies of his post, nor did he so much 
 as affect to seem impartial, as became a judge, but ran out 
 upon all occasions into declamations that did not become 
 the bar, much less the bench. He was not learned in his 
 profession ; and his eloquence, though viciously copious, 
 yet was neither correct nor agreeable.' 
 
 Long after the judge had gone to his grave, his infamous
 
 JUDGE JEFFREYS. 349 
 
 memory outlived him ; and persons sixty years of age can 
 remember his name in frequent mention, coupled with 
 epithets of truculent notoriety, and of even traditionary 
 influence. In Devonshire and the neighbouring counties, 
 the children playing at the game called ' Tom Tiddler's 
 Ground' (and which consists in making forays into the 
 ground of Tom Tiddler for the purpose of ' picking up gold 
 and silver,' until Tom can catch one of the marauders, who 
 then takes his place), instead of calling the territory ' Tom 
 Tiddler's Ground,' style it ' Judge Jeffreys's Ground ;' and 
 as the holder is supposed to be an ogre of vindictive and 
 sanguinary habits, is it supposing too much that the memory 
 of the terrible judge of ' The Merciful Assize ' is still retained 
 in the very sports of the children in the districts over which 
 he exercised his fearful sway ? (See Notes and Queries, 
 No. 158.)
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE AND THE WESTONS. 
 
 'EARLY in the centre of the county of Surrey 
 lies one of its oldest historic estates West 
 Horsley Place where the very ancient family 
 of Weston of Weston have been seated from the time of 
 the Norman Conquest. The present mansion is partly of 
 the time of James i. ; but the memories of the old place, 
 and its noble possessors, extend long beyond that period. 
 
 From Domesday Book it appears that Walter Fitz-Otho 
 de Windsor held this manor, then called Orseld. He was 
 then Governor of Windsor Castle, whence his descendants 
 took their name. William de Windsor, and his son Walter, 
 accompanied King Richard on an expedition to Normandy 
 in 1194; and William probably died there. Hugh de 
 Windsor, who lived in the reign of Henry in., dying with- 
 out male heirs, the estate passed to Christiana called in 
 some pedigrees his sister, but in others his daughter and 
 heiress. Whichever degree of kinship should be assigned 
 to her, she conveyed the estate in marriage to Sir Ralph 
 Berners; but upon his death, in 1297, it reverted to Chris- 
 tiana as his widow. Among the curious memorial entries,
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 351 
 
 we find, in the reign of Edward in., Sir John Berners paid 
 to the heirs of Hugh de Windsor ' half a pound of cumin- 
 seed at Easter.' 
 
 James, the son and heir of Sir John Berners, was one 
 of the obnoxious favourites of Richard n. ; and he was 
 involved in the ruin that befel Richard himself in 1388, 
 when his folly and tyranny had incited the principal 
 nobility (headed by his uncle the Duke of Gloucester) 
 to an insurrection against his government. Sir James 
 Berners was arrested, and committed a prisoner to the 
 castle at Bristol ; and having been attainted by the Par- 
 liament, he was beheaded, and his estates were forfeited 
 to the crown. Stow, after mentioning the decollation of 
 Lord Beauchamp of Holt, on Tower Hill, says : ' Sir James 
 Berners, Knight of the King's Court, a lustie young man, 
 was in the same place beheaded.' 
 
 Juliana Barnes, or Berners, Abbess of Sopewell, near 
 St. Albans, in 1460, and authoress of the celebrated work 
 generally called The Boke of Seynt Allans, containing tracts 
 on hawking, hunting, fishing, etc., is said to have been 
 the daughter of Sir James Berners ; but the statement is 
 doubtful. 
 
 King Richard, in 1393, granted the manor of West 
 Horsley, with the park and warrens, to the widow of Sir 
 James Berners. Henry iv., in the first year of his reign, 
 made a grant in fee of the estate to her son Sir Richard 
 Berners ; and three years afterwards he obtained a licence 
 from the king to put this manor in feoffment, that he
 
 352 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 
 
 might be enabled to make a settlement on his wife Philippa, 
 the daughter and heiress of Edmund Dalyngruge. This 
 lady survived her husband, and was married to Sir Thomas 
 Lewknor ; but Margery, the only daughter of Sir Richard 
 Berners, on his death in 1421, succeeded to the possession 
 of his estates, including the manor, park, warrens, and 
 advowson of West Horsley. She married Sir John Feriby ; 
 and he dying without issue, she was married a second time 
 to Sir John Bourchier, a knight of the garter, and Constable 
 of Windsor Castle. He died in 1474; and, agreeably to 
 his own directions, was interred in the Chapel of the Holy 
 Rood within the Abbey of Chertsey, to whose monks he 
 gave a silver cross, and other articles, valued at forty 
 pounds. 
 
 Sir Humphrey Bourchier, K.B., the eldest son of Sir 
 John, lost his life in the service of King Edward iv. at the 
 battle of Barn et in 1471 ; and the succession to the family 
 estates devolved on John Bourchier, the eldest son of 
 Humphrey, who, on the death of his grandfather, became 
 Lord Berners, and sat in several Parliaments in the reigns 
 of Henry vn. and Henry vin. He distinguished himself 
 at the battle of Blackheath in 1497, where the Cornish 
 insurgents were defeated ; and he served as captain of the 
 pioneers at the siege of Terouanne in 1535, when the 
 king, Henry vin., commanded in person. 
 
 But Lord Berners is most advantageously known as the 
 translator of the Chronicles of Froissart, by command of 
 the king. This work was published in folio in 1525 ; and
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 353 
 
 in 1528 he had a grant of the manors of Ockham, Effing- 
 ham, Woldingham, and Titsey (part of the forfeited estates 
 of Edward Duke of Buckingham), which may have been 
 designed by his royal master as the reward of his learned 
 labour. 1 
 
 Lord Berners had previously received many especial 
 marks of the monarch's favour. He held the office of 
 Chancellor of the Exchequer for life ; was Lieutenant- 
 General of the town and marches of Calais ; and was ap- 
 pointed, with other persons of rank, to attend the Princess 
 Mary on her voyage to France, to become the queen of 
 Louis xn. in 1514. Lord Berners died at Calais in 1532-3, 
 
 1 Froissart has been happily styled the Herodotus of the Middle Ages. 
 ' More important than the poems of Dante and Chaucer, or the prose 
 of Boccaccio, was the introduction of the new literature represented by 
 Froissart. Hitherto chronicles had for the most part consisted of the 
 record of such wandering rumours as reached a monastery, or were 
 gathered in the religious pilgrimages of holy men. But at this time 
 there came into notice the most inquiring, enterprising, picturesque and 
 entertaining chronicler that had ever appeared since Herodotus. John 
 Froissart, called by the courtesy of the time Sir John, in honour of his 
 being priest and chaplain, devoted a long life to the collection of the 
 fullest and most trustworthy accounts of all the events and personages 
 characteristic of his time. From 1326, when his labours commenced, 
 to 1400, when his active pen stood still, nothing happened in any part 
 of Europe that Froissart did not rush off to verify on the spot. If he 
 heard of an assemblage of knights going on at the extremities of France, 
 or in the centre of Germany ; of a tournament at Bordeaux, a court gala 
 in Scotland, or a marriage festival at Milan, his travels began whether 
 in the humble guise of a solitary horseman, with his portmanteau behind 
 his saddle and a single greyhound at his heels, as he jogged wearily 
 across the Border till he finally arrived in Edinburgh ; or in his grander 
 style of equipment, gallant steed, with hackney led beside him, and four 
 dogs of high race gambolling round his horse, as he made his dignified 
 
 Z
 
 354 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 
 
 leaving by his wife Catherine, daughter of John Duke of 
 Norfolk, two daughters, one of whom Joan, the wife of 
 John Knyvet, Esq. became the sole heiress of his estates, 
 but held them for only two years. She died in 1561 ; but 
 long before that period West Horsley Manor, and other 
 estates in Surrey which had been granted to Lord Ber- 
 ners, were transferred to other proprietors, though in what 
 manner is uncertain. In 1536 we find the manor in the 
 hands of Henry Courtenay, Marquis of Exeter, who in 
 1538, with his lady, was attainted of high treason for an 
 alleged conspiracy to dethrone the king, and raise to the 
 throne Reginald Pole, afterwards Cardinal, and in the reign 
 of Queen Mary, Archbishop of Canterbury. Their estates 
 escheated to the Crown. The Marquis, with some other 
 conspirators, were beheaded on the gih of January follow- 
 ing on Tower Hill, and the Marchioness was punished by 
 imprisonment. 
 
 journey from Ferrara to Rome. Wherever life was to be seen and 
 painted, the indefatigable Froissart was to be found. From palace to 
 palace, from castle to castle, the unwearied pursued his happy way, 
 certain of a friendly reception when he arrived, and certain of not losing 
 his time by negligence or blindness on the road. If he overtakes a 
 stately cavalier, attended by squires and men-at-arms, he enters into 
 conversation, drawing out the experiences of the venerable warrior by 
 relating to him all he knew of things and persons in which he took an 
 interest. And when they put up at some hostelry on the road, and 
 while the gallant knight was sound asleep on his straw-stuffed couch, 
 and his followers were wallowing amid the rushes on the parlour floor, 
 Froissart was busy with pen and note-book, scoring down all the old 
 gentleman had told him, all the fights he had been present at, and the 
 secret history (if any) of the councils of priests and kings.' Abridged 
 from Eighteen Christian Centuries by the Rev. J. White.
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 355 
 
 The manor of West Horsley was granted to Sir Anthony 
 Browne, his Master of the Horse. Upon his death the 
 estate of Horsley devolved for life to his widow, the Fair 
 Geraldine. She was twice married ; but upon her demise 
 West Horsley descended to Sir Anthony Browne, the son 
 of her first husband. He dying in 1592, left this estate to 
 his grandson; after his decease, in 1629, it was sold to one 
 of the Carevvs of Beddington, in Surrey, by which sale was 
 discharged the mortgage made on the estate to John Evelyn. 
 The purchaser must have been Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, 
 Knt, the adopted heir of his uncle, Sir Francis Carew, 
 son of Sir Nicholas Carew, K.G., beheaded in 1539. He 
 was Master of the Horse to King Henry vm. From Sir 
 Nicholas it would seem that, either by gift or devise, West 
 Horsley passed to his nephew Carew Raleigh, the son of 
 his sister Elizabeth, by the ill-fated Sir Walter Raleigh. 
 Carew was born in the Tower during his father's imprison- 
 ment there, about 1604-5. Soon after his father's decapita- 
 tion he was introduced at Court by his kinsman the Earl 
 of Pembroke ; but the conscience-smitten King James not 
 liking his presence, and saying that ' he appeared to him 
 like his father's ghost ' (so like he was in face and figure), 
 the Earl advised him to travel, which he did until the 
 death of the king, when he returned to England. 1 He soon 
 
 1 See ' Sir Anthony Browne and his Descendants,' ante, p. 66 et seq. 
 The story of Geraldine, though promulgated by the grave Anthony 
 Wood, and, as he affirms, upon the authority of Drayton, has been 
 stoutly contested as a mere fiction borrowed by the antiquary from a
 
 356 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 
 
 afterwards petitioned Parliament to be restored in blood, 
 with a view to obtain restitution of the estate and castle of 
 Sherborne in Dorsetshire, 1 which had belonged to Sir 
 Walter, and had been granted by the Crown to Digby Earl 
 of Bristol ; but the new king, Charles i., having (when 
 Prince of Wales) received a bribe of ten thousand pounds 
 to secure that property to the Earl, although he received 
 him with civility, plainly told him that unless ' he would 
 quit all his right and title to Sherborne, he neither could 
 nor would pass the bill of restoration.' At first Mr. Raleigh 
 refused to forego his claims, yet he was eventually prevailed 
 on to do so, on receiving promises of courtly advancement, 
 which were never fulfilled ; but an Act to restore him in 
 blood was passed in the king's third year. He was aftenvards 
 made one of the gentlemen of the Privy Chamber. He 
 
 little romance written by Nash, and published in 1 593, containing the 
 adventures of an imaginary hero, whom he calls Jack Wilton. 
 
 1 Sherborne Castle, frequently called Sherborne Lodge, was built by 
 Sir Walter Raleigh, and was his favourite residence. Notwithstanding 
 the restorations and additions which have been made, Raleigh's house 
 has been preserved in the centre. In the house are many portraits, and 
 the famous picture of the procession of Queen Elizabeth to Lord 
 Hunsdon's, which has been engraved by Virtue, and lithographed for 
 Nicholi's Progresses of Elizabeth. In the fine pleasure-grounds which 
 surround the Lodge is a grove planted by Raleigh, which still bears his 
 name. Here also is ' Raleigh's Bower, ' in which, tradition says, he 
 smoked the first pipe of tobacco in England. A Roman tessellated 
 pavement has been discovered in the grounds. Here, too, are the re- 
 mains of an early Norman castle, built by Roger, Bishop of Sarum, in 
 the reign of King Stephen, and which changed hands once or twice in 
 the civil war of Stephen and the Empress Maude. In the castle is a 
 little chapel, with just room for the priests to officiate; but it was so
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 357 
 
 married the Lady Philippa, relict of Sir Anthony Achley, a 
 young and rich widow. By her he had several children, 
 three of whom were born at West Horsley, which he had 
 made his principal residence ; and he continued to reside 
 there many years. During Cromwell's supremacy, Raleigh 
 was twice returned to Parliament. He was appointed 
 Governor of Jersey by the favour, as reported, of General 
 Monk. After the Restoration, Charles n. would have con- 
 ferred on him some personal honour ; but this was declined, 
 on which the king knighted his eldest son, Walter, who died 
 soon after at West Horsley, and was interred in the parish 
 church, where also two others of his family Carew and 
 Henrietta were buried. 
 
 In 1665 Mr. Raleigh sold this estate to Sir Edward 
 Nicholas for ,9750. According to Oldys, Mr. Raleigh 
 
 arranged that those in the adjoining apartment could see the elevation 
 of the host. It is a valuable example of similar arrangements in the 
 houses and castles of the middle ages. In the great civil war the castle 
 was held for the king by the Marquis of Hertford. It was taken by 
 the Parliamentarians in 1642. In 1645 the Royalists held it again, 
 until it was stormed by Cromwell and Fairfax with their forces, not- 
 withstanding the gallant defence of Sir Louis Dives, the governor. 
 After this the castle was demolished. The whole area comprehends 
 four acres, and is surrounded by a deep ditch, on the inner bank of 
 which the foundations and fragments of the walls (six or seven feet 
 thick), enclosing the greater ballium or court, may be traced. The gate- 
 tower, and some parts of the buildings in the centre of the ballium, 
 also remain. 
 
 At Bingham Melcombe is the ancestral house of Colonel Bingham, 
 a specimen of the small country squire's residence of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, with its handsome apartments, rich paintings, heraldic-stained 
 windows, and bowling-green, enclosed by a stupendous yew-hedge.
 
 358 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 
 
 died in 1666 ; and although he says it was thought by 
 Anthony Wood that he was buried at (St. Margaret's) 
 Westminster, in the same grave with his father, ' it is 
 asserted at West Horsley, in Surrey, which was his seat, 
 that the son was buried there ; and they have a tradition 
 that when he was interred, the head of Sir Walter Raleigh, 
 which had been kept by him, was put into the grave with 
 his corpse.' 1 
 
 With reference to this tradition, Oldys quotes a letter he 
 had seen, written by William Nicholas, Esq. (the last posses- 
 sor of West Horsley of his family), in which he writes, he 
 'verily believes' the head he saw dug up there in 1703 
 (most probably on the occasion of his mother's funeral) from 
 the side of a grave where a Carew Raleigh had been buried, 
 was that of Sir Walter Raleigh, there being no bones of a 
 body to it, nor room for any, the rest of that side of the grave 
 being firm chalk. Notwithstanding the current opinion 
 that the body of Sir Walter was interred in St. Margaret's 
 Church, Westminster, the following short note, recorded by 
 Manning from the Carew papers at Beddington, gives 
 cause to believe that he was interred at Beddington, though 
 privately, and at night : 
 
 1 Cayley says : ' The head (of Sir Walter Raleigh), after being shown 
 on either side of the scaffold, was put into a leather bag, over which 
 Sir Walter's gown was thrown, and the whole conveyed away in a 
 mourning-coach by Lady Raleigh. It was preserved by her in a case 
 during the twenty-nine years which she survived her husband, and 
 afterwards, with no less piety, by their affectionate son Carew, with 
 whom it is supposed to have been buried at West Horsley, in Surrey.'
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 359 
 
 ' To my best b[rother] 
 Sur Nicholas 
 Carew, at 
 beddington. 
 
 ' I DESIAR, good brother, that you will be pleased to let me 
 berri the worthi boddi of my nobell husban, Sur Walter Ralegh, 
 in your chorche at beddington, wher I desiar to be berred. 
 The lordes have give me this ded boddi, though they denied me 
 his life. This nit hee shall be brought you, with two or three of 
 my men. Let me her presently, 
 
 ' E. R.' 
 
 ' God hold me in my wites.' 
 
 Unfortunately there is no date to this note, yet no reason- 
 able cause can be assigned for any refusal by Sir Nicholas 
 of his sister's request. 
 
 Sir Edmond Nicholas, who settled at West Horsley soon 
 after the above purchase, was secretary to Villiers Duke of 
 Buckingham when Lord High Admiral. He also filled 
 other appointments, adhered to the party of the king during 
 the Civil War, and followed Charles n. into exile. After 
 the Restoration, Sir Edmond Nicholas was reinstated as 
 Secretary of State. He resigned in 1663, having declined 
 a peerage offered him by the king, as a cheap reward for 
 his long and faithful services. He then retired from public 
 life, and passed his few remaining years at West Horsley. 
 He died in 1669, aged 77. He was succeeded by his eldest 
 son John, who, like his father, attended Charles n. in exile. 
 He died in 1704, at the age of 81. He married the Lady 
 Penelope, daughter of Spencer Compton, Earl of North-
 
 360 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 
 
 ampton, who was slain during the Civil Wars at Hopton 
 Heath, near Stafford. Lady Nicholas also met with a 
 violent death, being killed at Horsley by the falling of a 
 chimney during the great storm of 1703. Sir John, who 
 entered all his expenses and memoranda in small alma- 
 nacks, thus records the accident : ' Nov. 26th. This night 
 was the dreadful storm and tempest, wherein my deare wife 
 was killed in our bed by the fall of the chimney, and I was 
 wonderfully preserved by God's providence. Vas ! vse ! vse ! 
 A little after three on Saturday morning this sad affliction 
 befel me.' 
 
 In An Exact Relation of t/ie late Dreadful Tempest, quarto, 
 1704, are the following particulars: 'My Lady Penelope 
 Nicholas, living at Horsley with Sir John Nicholas, a 
 learned and antient gentleman, was, as it was conceived, 
 killed by the fall of a stack of chimneys ; and her husband, 
 Sir John, was taken out of the rubbish very dangerously 
 hurt. But the chirurgeons, who viewed the body, gave in 
 their opinion, " That her ladyship, being between So and 
 90, was killed by the fright of that most terrible storm ; and 
 though her leg was broke, yet no blood, nor matter flowing 
 from it, [that] she was dead before the fall of the chimney.'" 
 
 The last of Sir John Nicholas's three sons, coming into 
 the possession of West Horsley, and dying a bachelor, be- 
 queathed the estate, by will, to Henry Weston, Esq. He 
 formed a design of rebuilding the mansion of West Horsley; 
 and he one day showed the plan for a new house to the 
 Duke of Marlborough, who looked at him, and said, ' Pray,
 
 WEST HORSLEY PLACE. 361 
 
 Mr. Weston, how old are you ? ' 'I was so struck,' said he, 
 ' at the question, that I laid aside all thoughts of building, 
 and only made some alterations.' He died in 1759. 
 
 In the pedigree of the Weston family, its origin is traced 
 to Radulphus de Wistaneston, who held certain lands under 
 the Lord de Braose, in the twentieth year of William the 
 Conqueror. The pedigree is entered on a roll of vellum. It 
 enumerates all the lands and estates that have belonged to 
 different branches of the family, down to 1624, and has the 
 arms blazoned of all the families which the Westons have 
 intermarried with. The pedigree fills eight pages in Bray- 
 ley's History of Surrey. 
 
 West Horsley Place, the family mansion of the Westons, 
 is a gabled brick edifice of the time of James i., but with 
 alterations in the reigns of George i. and n. The house 
 is thought to have been originally erected 'by Sir Anthony 
 Browne, after his marriage with the Fair Geraldine ; and a 
 plan of the old drawing-room ceiling bears the crest of the 
 Earl of Kildare, the father of the Fair Geraldine ; also the 
 initials A. B., and various crests, all known to have belonged 
 to the Browne family. 
 
 Here is preserved a collection of portraits (many of the 
 Westons) originally formed by Sir Edward Nicholas, in- 
 cluding Sir Walter Raleigh, apparently an original ; Jerome 
 Weston, Earl of Portland, by Vandyke ; Sir Richard Fan- 
 shawe, ambassador to Spain ; Sir William Perkins of 
 Chertsey; and his brother, Captain Matthew Perkins. 
 Among the papers of Sir William Perkins, at West Horsley,
 
 362 SUTTON PLACE. 
 
 are documents relating to his having sold to the Crown a 
 precious stone, which he calls ' a carbuncle, more valuable 
 than a diamond,' for which he received the sum of ^12,000. 
 At Horsley, too, is a collection of papers of curious things, 
 ' as well during the troubles, as since,' the Restoration, the 
 Popish Plot, and the Revolution, and its Parliaments and 
 journals, all which, if digested into a method, ' would form 
 an authentic record of transactions for near one hundred 
 years past.' 
 
 SUTTON PLACE AND THE WESTONS. 
 
 The Westons of Sutton (Sudtone^ in Domesday), are also 
 a family of considerable antiquity. The manor descended 
 to Margaret Countess of Richmond, the mother of Henry 
 the Seventh; and on her decease, in 1509, it came into 
 the possession of her grandson, Henry the Eighth. This 
 prince granted the manor of Sutton, with its appurtenances, 
 to Sir Richard Weston, Knt., with licence to impark land 
 and pasture, wood, heath, and furze, with free warren within 
 the limits of the forest. The grantee, Sir Richard Weston, 
 was the founder of Sutton Place, and the elder brother of 
 William Weston, the last Prior of the house of the Knights 
 Hospitallers of St. John of Jerusalem, at Clerkemvell. Sir 
 Richard was a gentleman of the Privy Chamber to Henry 
 VIIL, Master of the Court of Wards and Liveries, Treasurer 
 of Calais, and Under-Treasurer of England. He had an only
 
 SUTTON PLACE. 363 
 
 son, named Francis, who was made a Knight of the Bath at 
 the coronation of Anne Boleyn. He was one of the five 
 unfortunate persons involved in the fate of that queen ; for, 
 being accused of high treason, in holding an alleged criminal 
 intercourse with her, he was convicted on trial, and be- 
 headed on Tower Hill, on the i7th of May 1536, whilst 
 his father was still living. 
 
 Among his descendants was Sir Richard Weston, re- 
 membered for his valuable improvements in agriculture and 
 commerce. In 1782, Mrs. Melior Mary Weston dying 
 unmarried, devised the estate and manor of Sutton to 
 John Webb, Esq., of Sarsfield Court, when he assumed the 
 name and arms of Weston ; this gentleman being a mater- 
 nal descendant of Robert Weston of Prested, in Essex, 
 who lived in the reign of Henry vr., and was the brother 
 of John Weston of Bolton, the ancestor of the Westons 
 of Sutton. 1 
 
 Sutton Place was so named to distinguish it from the 
 more ancient manor-house called Sutton House, the re- 
 
 1 Humphrey Weston, who resided at Prested, in Richard the Second's 
 reign, was, by different wives, the founder of two different families. 
 The Westons of Sutton descended from his son John, by his first wife, 
 Catherine ; whilst the ancestor of those who continued at Prested was 
 Robert, his son by Joan, his second wife ; and from a younger branch 
 of which sprang Richard Weston, created Earl of Portland by Charles I. 
 John Weston, who was Prior of St. John's, Clerkenwell, in the years 
 1477 and 1485, and William, his nephew, who was also Prior of the 
 same house on the eve of its dissolution, were both of this family. The 
 latter is represented to have died of grief on the very day when the Act 
 was passed for dissolving his monastery, viz. on the 7th of May 1540* 
 32d of Henry vill.
 
 364 SUTTON PLACE. 
 
 mains of which were wholly removed in the last century. 
 The present mansion was erected by Sir Richard Weston 
 in the reign of Henry VIIL, probably in 1529 or 1530, and 
 is situated about three miles north-east of Guildford. Origi- 
 nally the buildings formed an entire quadrangle, enclosing 
 an open court. It consisted of three storeys, surrounding a 
 Tudor-arched gateway, and lit by square-headed windows ; 
 at each angle was a projecting tower, which rose to a con- 
 siderable height. The entrance gateway was taken down 
 in 1786. The interior of the south-east side was rebuilt 
 about 1721, it having previously lain in ruins from the time 
 of Queen Elizabeth, who was entertained here in a gallery 
 upwards of 140 feet in length, when on her way to Chi- 
 chester, in September 1591. Shortly after her 'departure the 
 gallery took fire, either from the extraordinary quantity of 
 fuel used on that occasion, or the neglect of the servants to 
 see it properly extinguished, when a great part was reduced 
 to ashes. The structure is mostly of red brick, with finish- 
 ings of brick of light, warm ochre colour, resembling Caen 
 stone. Most of the larger bricks are marked, or charged, 
 alternately with the initials Q. %j&., and a tun and bunches 
 of grapes, within Gothic borderings; they are thus evidently 
 intended as a rebus on the name of the founder, Richard 
 Weston. 
 
 The present interior of the mansion is in plain modern 
 style. The great hall, forming the entire centre, measures 
 nearly 51 feet in length, 25 feet in breadth, and 31 feet in 
 height. Its windows contain many curious specimens of
 
 SUTTON PLACE. 365 
 
 ancient stained glass; shields of arms and other armorial 
 cognizances and devices of former ages, brought from the 
 older manor-house. 
 
 ' Among them is the White Hart, collared \vith a branch of 
 oak, fructed, and on the body a crescent, sable ; the Red Rose 
 for Lancaster ; the arms of England, with the Rose en soleil, 
 Edward the Fourth's cognizance; the Red and White Roses 
 conjoined, denoting the union of the rival houses of York and 
 Lancaster; the Crown in a Hawthorn Bush, with initials H. and 
 <. on either side, for Henry the Seventh and Elizabeth his 
 queen ; the Falcon and Tower for Anne Boleyn ; a Saracen's 
 Head, the crest of Weston, boldly executed ; a Daisy springing 
 from a Tun; the letters II. . |). and a Tun (possibly for Sep- 
 ton) ; the initials j-^, with the date 1 567 entwined by a double 
 knot ; a Fleur-de-lis under a Crown, with the initials <. $. 
 at the sides for Queen Elizabeth; a Wolf; a Grasshopper; 
 a Shield (several times repeated) containing quarterly, ist and 
 4th, Erm. on a Chief, Az. five Bezants, Weston; 2d and 3d, Arg. 
 three Camels, Sab., Dister; a small portrait of King Charles 
 the First ; and a Book charged with a hart, stars, and key ; over 
 the book a crown, and below, the motto Respice Suspice, 1630.' 
 
 Among the devices of a different character are, a negro 
 playing on a lute ; a village festival at sheep-shearing time ; 
 a goose playing on the bagpipes ; a woman holding an 
 infant swathed in cross bandages ; and a clown crossing a 
 brook. The latter is arrayed as a fool in a yellow coat, 
 and wears a cap and hood, with apes' ears, a cock's comb, 
 and bells ; under his belt are thrust five goslings, confined 
 by their necks, and he grasps two others tightly in his hand. 
 Mr. A. J. Kempe states this design to be evidently copied 
 from the rare old book, George Withers' Emblems, 1635.
 
 366 SUTTON PLACE. 
 
 The fact is, that the clown being sent by his mistress to 
 fetch home some goslings, a river being in the way, he 
 took up the birds under his girdle (by which means they 
 were strangled) lest they should be drowned. The tale 
 is thus moralized by Withers : 
 
 ' The best good turn that fools can do us, 
 Prove disadvantages unto us. ' 
 
 The verses annexed to the picture in the book are : 
 
 ' A fool sent forth to fetch the goslings home, 
 When they unto a river's brink were come, 
 (Through which their passage lay,) conceived a fear 
 His dame's best brood might have been drowned there ; 
 Which to avoyd, he thus did show his wit, 
 And his good nature in preventing it : 
 He underneath his girdle thrusts their heads, 
 And then the coxcomb through the water wades. 
 
 Here learn that when a foole his helpe intends, 
 He rather does a mischief than befriends ! ' 
 
 The upper walls of the apartment are nearly covered 
 with large pictures, chiefly landscapes ; and at the lower 
 end is a rude picture of the Deluge, with this explanatory 
 inscription on the frame : 
 
 ' In the Deluge, the most powerful of the Human race, and 
 the strongest of the Animal creation, may be supposed to Perish 
 last, and the most likely thing to be rescued from the wreck of 
 the Universe is a beautiful little Female. In this picture, there- 
 fore, while the Solitary summit of the last Mountain remains 
 uncovered by the Waters, one of the Gigantic Antediluvian 
 Princes gains his last refuge with His little Daughter; and a 
 hungry Lion, who had swam thither for shelter, Springing on the 
 Maiden, the Father, conscious of his own Strength and supe- 
 riority, expresses Indignation rather than Terror.'
 
 SUTTON PLACE. 367 
 
 At the sides of the staircase are old portraits and land- 
 scapes, and some of the rooms are lined with embossed 
 leather, richly gilt. 
 
 The Westons of Sutton have been uniformly distinguished 
 by their stedfast adherence to the principles of the Romish 
 Church j and there is now a Catholic chapel in the south- 
 east gallery of the mansion, but much dilapidated ; its mul- 
 lioned windows are ivy-mantled. Over the marble altar 
 is a small gilt crucifix, and in the lumber-room is a small 
 bell, dated 1530. Such are a few of the decaying glories 
 of Sutton Place. 
 
 Sutton Park and its attached grounds are about three 
 miles in circuit. On the Wey, near the southern extremity 
 of the demesne, is one of the ' Tumbling Bays,' of which 
 Aubrey speaks. This is a strong dam formed of loose 
 stones, aggregated on each other, across the bed of the 
 river, and continued obliquely down the stream for some 
 distance. When the river is full, the scene here is very 
 picturesque ; the rushing and foaming of the stream over 
 its irregular bed forming an animated waterfall.
 
 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 
 
 'HERE is no district in England which abounds 
 in more beautiful and romantic scenery than 
 the remote and rarely-visited district of Craven, 
 in Yorkshire. Its long ridge of low and irregular hills, 
 terminating in the enormous masses of Pennigent and 
 Ingleborough ; its deep and secluded valleys, containing 
 within their hoary ramparts of grey limestone fertile fields 
 and pleasant pasturages ; its wide-spreading moors, covered 
 with the different species of moss and ling, and fern and bent 
 grass, which variegate the brown livery of the heath, and 
 break its sombre uniformity ; its crystal stream of unwearied 
 rapidity ; its indigenous woods of yew and beech, and ash 
 and alder, which have waved in the winds of centuries ; 
 its projecting crags, which fling additional gloom over the 
 melancholy tarns that repose in dismal grandeur at their 
 feet; its hamlets and towns, and ivy-mantled churches, which 
 remind the visitor of their antiquity by the rudeness, and 
 convince him of their durability by the massiveness, of their 
 construction, these are all features which require to be seen 
 only once to be impressed upon the recollection for ever.
 
 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 369 
 
 But it is not merely for the lovers of the wild and beau- 
 tiful and picturesque that the localities of Craven possess 
 a powerful charm. The antiquary, the novelist, and the 
 poet, may all find rich store of employment in the tradi- 
 tions which are handed down from father to son respecting 
 the ancient lords and inhabitants of the district. In Dr. 
 Whitaker's History of Craven there is a groundwork laid 
 out for at least a dozen ordinary novels. To say nothing 
 of the legendary tales which the peasantry relate of the 
 minor families of the district of the Bracewells, the Tem- 
 pests, the Lysters, the Romilys, and the Nortons, whose 
 White Doe, however, has been immortalized by the poetry 
 of Wordsworth can anything be more pregnant with 
 romantic adventure than the fortunes of the successive 
 chieftains of the lordly line of Clifford? their first intro- 
 duction to the North, owing to a love-match made by a 
 poor knight of Herefordshire with the wealthy heiress of 
 the Viponts and the Veseys ! their rising greatness, to 
 the merited disgrace and death of Piers de Gaveston and 
 his profligate minions ! and their final exaltation to the 
 highest honours of the British peerage, which they have 
 now enjoyed for five hundred years, by the strong hand 
 and unblenching heart with which they have always wel- 
 comed the assaults of their most powerful enemies ! 
 
 Of the first ten lords of Skipton Castle, four died on the 
 field and one upon the scaffold. ' The black-faced Clifford ' 
 who sullied the glory which he acquired by his gallantry 
 
 at the battle of Sandal, by murdering his youthful prisoner 
 
 2 A
 
 370 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 
 
 the Earl of Rutland in cold blood at the termination of 
 it has gained a passport to an odious immortality from 
 the soaring genius of the Bard of Avon. But his real fate 
 is far more striking, both in a moral and in a poetical point 
 of view, than that assigned to him by our great dramatist. 
 On the evening before the battle of Towton Field, and 
 after the termination of the skirmish which preceded it, 
 an unknown archer shot him in the throat as he was put- 
 ting off his gorget, and so avenged the wretched victims 
 whose blood he had shed like water upon Wakefield Bridge. 
 The vengeance of the Yorkists was not, however, satiated 
 by the death of ' the Butcher,' as Leland informs us that 
 they called him ; for they attainted him in the first year of 
 the reign of Edward iv., and granted his estates a few 
 years afterwards to the Duke of Gloucester, who retained 
 them in his iron grasp till he lost them, with his crown and 
 life, at the battle of Bosworth. 
 
 The history of his son is a romance ready made. His 
 relations, fearing lest the partisans of the House of York 
 should avenge the death of the young Earl of Rutland on 
 the young Lord Clifford, then a mere infant, concealed him 
 for the next twenty-five years of his life in the Fells of 
 Cumberland, where he grew up as hardy as the heath on 
 which he vegetated, and as ignorant as the rude herds 
 which bounded over it One of the first acts of Henry 
 viz., after his accession to the throne, was to reverse the 
 attainder which had been passed against Clifford's father ; 
 and immediately afterwards the young lord emerged from the
 
 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 371 
 
 hiding-place where he had been brought up in ignorance 
 of his rank, and with the manners and education of a mere 
 shepherd ! Finding himself more illiterate than was usual 
 even in an illiterate age, he retired to a tower which he 
 built in the beautiful forest of Barden ; and there, under 
 the direction of the monks of Bolton Abbey, gave himself 
 up to the forbidden studies of alchemy and astrology. 
 
 His son, who was the first Earl of Cumberland, embittered 
 the conclusion of his life by embarking in a series of adven- 
 tures which, in spite of their profligacy, possess a very strong 
 romantic interest. Finding that his father was either un- 
 willing or unable to furnish him with funds to maintain his 
 inordinate riot and luxury, he became the head of a band 
 of outlaws, and, by their agency, levied aids and benevo- 
 lences upon the different travellers on the king's highway. 
 A letter of the old lord, his father, is extant, in which 
 he complains in very moving terms of his son's degeneracy 
 and misconduct. The young scapegrace, wishing to make 
 his father know from experience the inconvenience of being 
 scantily supplied with money, enjoined his tenantry in Craven 
 not to pay their rents, and beat one of them, Henry Popely 
 who ventured to disobey him so severely with his own 
 hand, that he lay for a long while in peril of death. He 
 spoiled his father's houses, etc., ' feloniously took away his 
 proper goods,' as the old lord quaintly observes, ' apparelling 
 himself and his horse all the time in cloth-of-gold and gold- 
 smith's work, more like a duke than a poor baron's son.' 
 He likewise took a particular aversion to the religious orders,
 
 372 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 
 
 ' shamefully beating their tenants and servants, in such wise 
 as some whole towns were fain to keep the churches both 
 night and day, and durst not come at their own houses.' 
 
 Whilst engaged in these ignoble practices less dissonant, 
 however, to the manners of his age than to those of ours 
 he wooed and won and married a daughter of the Percy of 
 Northumberland ; and it is conjectured, upon very plausible 
 grounds, that his courtship and marriage with a lady of the 
 highest rank, under such disadvantages on his part, gave 
 rise to the beautiful old ballad of * The Nut-Brown Mayde.' 
 
 The poem opens with a declaration of the author, that 
 the faith of woman is stronger than is generally alleged ; 
 in proof of which he proposes to relate the trial to which 
 the ' Nut-Brown Mayde ' was exposed by her lover. What 
 follows consists of a dialogue between the pair, and ends 
 thus : 
 
 ' He. Ye shall not need further to dread ; 
 
 I will not disparage 
 You (God defend !) sith ye descend 
 
 Of so great a lineage. 
 Now, understand ; to Westmoreland, 
 
 Which is mine heritage, 
 I will you bring ; and with a ring, 
 
 By way of marriage, 
 I will you take, and lady make, 
 
 As shortly as I can : 
 Thus have you won an earl's son, 
 
 And not a banished man.' 
 
 The lady becoming very unexpectedly the heiress of her 
 family, added to the inheritance of the Cliffords the exten-
 
 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 373 
 
 sive fen which the Percys held in Yorkshire ; and by that 
 transfer of property, and by the grant of Bolton Abbey, 
 which he obtained from Henry vm. on the dissolution of 
 the monasteries, her husband became possessed of nearly 
 all the district which stretches between the castles of Skipton 
 on the south, and of Brougham (or, as the Cliffords, to whom 
 it belonged, always wrote it, Bromeham) on the north. 
 
 The second Earl of Cumberland, who was as fond of 
 alchemy and astrology as his grandfather, was succeeded by 
 his son George, who distinguished himself abroad by his 
 buccaneering expeditions in the West Indies against the 
 Spaniards. Among the numerous children of whom he was 
 the father, the most celebrated was the Countess of Pem- 
 broke and Montgomery, whose long life of virtuous exertion 
 renders her well qualified to figure as the heroine of a tale 
 of chivalry. The anecdotes which are told of this high- 
 spirited lady in the three counties of York, Westmoreland, 
 and Cumberland, are full of heroic interest and adventure. 
 Her defence of Bromeham Castle against the intrusion of 
 her uncle of Cumberland ; her riding cross-legged to meet 
 the judges of assize, when she acted in person at Appleby 
 as high-sheriff by inheritance of the county of Westmore- 
 land ; her hairbreadth escapes and dangers during the 
 Great Rebellion, are the romantic characteristics of the 
 woman. Her courage and liberality in public life were 
 only to be equalled by her order, economy, and devotion 
 in private. ' She was,' says Dr. Whitaker, ' the oldest and 
 most independent courtier in the kingdom ' at the time of
 
 374 THE CLIFFORDS OF CRAVEN. 
 
 her death. ' She had known and admired Queen Eliza- 
 beth ; she had refused what she deemed an iniquitous 
 award of King James,' though urged to submit to it by her 
 first husband, the Earl of Dorset ; ' she rebuilt her dis- 
 mantled castles in defiance of Cromwell, and repelled with 
 disdain the interposition of a profligate minister under 
 Charles the Second.' A journal of her life, in her own 
 handwriting, is still in existence at Appleby Castle. She 
 was a girl in the reign of James i. ; and she says, what will 
 no doubt shock modern notions, that when she went with 
 her mother to Theobalds, in Hertfordshire, on the occasion 
 of that king's coming from Scotland, their clothes were 
 covered with vermin, simply because they had sat for a 
 while in Sir Thomas Erskine's chamber. 
 
 The family mansion of the Cliffords was situated on 
 Clerkenwell Green at that period. Anne Clifford lived also 
 in the days of the Commonwealth ; and to her is attributed 
 the spirited reply to Cromwell's secretary, Williamson : ' I 
 have been neglected in a court, and baulked by an usurper ; 
 but I shall not be dictated to by a subject : your man shan't 
 stand.' The reply, however, must be classed with popular 
 errors. It was in all probability never uttered or written, 
 but was invented as the subject of a paper in The World, not 
 far short of a century subsequent to her death. 1 
 
 1 Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, 1829.
 
 SCRIVELSBY AND THE QUEEN'S 
 CHAMPIONSHIP. 
 
 HE family of Dymoke ranks, in point of antiquity, 
 male and female, with the most ancient in the 
 kingdom. It derives the celebrated office of 
 Champion from the baronial house of Marmyun, or Mar- 
 myon, with the feudal manor of Scrivelsby, to which the 
 championship is attached. The village of Scrivelsby lies 
 about two miles south of Horncastle, on the road towards 
 Boston, Lincolnshire. Inherited successively by the Mar- 
 myons, the Ludlows, and the Dymokes, this famed estate is 
 rich in historic associations. It appears in Domesday-book 
 to have been then holden by Robert de Spencer, but by 
 what service is not stated. Shortly after, the Conqueror 
 conferred the manor of Scrivelsby, together with the castle 
 of Tamworth, on Robert de Marmyon, lord of Fonteney, 
 whose ancestors were, it is said, hereditary champions to 
 the Dukes of Normandy previously to the invasion of Eng- 
 land. Scrivelsby was, by the terms of the grant, to be held 
 by grand serjeantry, to perform the office of champion at
 
 3/6 SCRIVELSBY AND THE 
 
 the king's coronation. The lord of Fonteney, thus invested 
 with these extensive possessions in the conquered country, 
 fixed his residence therein, and became a magnificent bene- 
 factor to the church, bestowing on the nuns of Oldbury 
 the lordship of Polesworth, with a request that the donor 
 and his friend Sir Walter de Somerville might be reputed 
 their patrons, and have burial for themselves and their 
 heirs in the abbey the Marmyons in the chapter-house, 
 and the Somervilles in the cloister. 
 
 The direct male line of the grantee expired with his 
 great-grandson Philip de Marmyon, a gallant soldier, who, 
 in requital of his fidelity to Henry in. during the baronial 
 war, was rewarded, after the victory of Evesham, with the 
 governorship of Kenilworth Castle. His death occurred 
 20 Edward i. (1292), and he was then found to have been 
 seised of the manor of Scrivelsby and the castle of Tarn- 
 worth. He left daughters only ; and between them his 
 estates were divided, Scrivelsby falling to the share of Joan, 
 the youngest co-heir, and it was by her conveyed in mar- 
 riage to Sir Thomas de Ludlow. The offspring of the 
 alliance consisted of one son, John de Ludlow, who died 
 issueless; and one daughter, Margaret, the lady of Scrivelsby, 
 who inherited from her brother that feudal manor; and 
 wedding Sir John Dymoke, a knight of ancient Gloucester- 
 shire ancestry, invested him with the championship, which 
 office he executed at the coronation of Richard n. From 
 that period to the present a space of nearly five hundred 
 years the Dymokes have uninterruptedly enjoyed this im-
 
 QUEEN'S CHAMPIONSHIP. 377 
 
 portant estate of Scrivelsby, and continuously performed the 
 duties its tenure enjoins. 
 
 The second champion was Sir Thomas, the son of Sir 
 John Dymoke, who at the coronations of Henry iv. and 
 Henry v. executed the duties for his mother. His son, 
 Sir Philip Dymoke, officiated as champion of Henry vi., who 
 made a mandate to the keeper of his wardrobe to deliver 
 to the champion such furniture, etc., as his ancestors have 
 been accustomed to have on these occasions. His son, Sir 
 Thomas Dymoke, by his connection with the Lords Wells 
 and the Lancastrian interest, was brought to the scaffold 
 in the reign of Edward iv. His son, Sir Robert Dymoke, 
 who was of very tender years at the time of his father's 
 unhappy death, officiated as champion at the coronation of 
 Richard in., Henry vn., and Henry vin. He was one of 
 the principal commanders at the siege of Tournay, and was 
 a knight banneret. His son, Sir Edward Dymoke, offi- 
 ciated at the coronations of Edward vi., Queen Mary, and 
 Queen Elizabeth. The last male representative, Sir Henry 
 Dymoke, Bart., succeeded to the estates and the hereditary 
 championship at the decease of his father, the Rev. John 
 Dymoke, in 1828, he having previously performed the duties 
 as deputy for that reverend gentleman at the coronation 
 of King George iv. 
 
 Sir Walter Scott tells us : ' The champion was performed 
 (as of right) by young Dymoke, a fine-looking youth, but 
 bearing perhaps a little too much the appearance of a 
 maiden knight to be the challenger of the world in a king's
 
 3/8 SCRIVELSBY AND THE 
 
 behalf. He threw down his gauntlet, however, with becom- 
 ing manhood, and showed as much horsemanship as the 
 crowd of knights and squires around him would permit to 
 be exhibited. On the whole, this striking part of the exhi- 
 bition somewhat disappointed me, for I would have had 
 the champion less embarrassed by his assistants, and at 
 liberty to put his horse on the grand pas; and yet the 
 young lord of Scrivelsby looked and behaved extremely 
 well.' Haydon the painter describes Wellington, Howard, 
 and the champion standing in full view as the finest sight 
 of the day : ' The herald read the challenge ; the glove was 
 thrown down ; they then all proceeded to the throne.' Sir 
 Henry Dymoke was the seventeenth of his family who in- 
 herited the ancient office of champion. Sir Henry also offi- 
 ciated as champion at the coronation of William iv. and 
 our present Most Gracious Sovereign ; but the ceremonial 
 was then shorn of its ancient chivalric state. 
 
 Sir Henry Dymoke was created a baronet in 1841. He 
 died 28th April 1865, when the baronetcy became extinct; 
 and the estate of Scrivelsby and the office of champion 
 passed to his only brother, the Rev. John Dymoke, rector 
 of Scrivelsby and Roughton, Lincolnshire, now the Honour- 
 able the Queen's Champion. 
 
 One gentleman, a scion of the house of Dymoke in the 
 female line, Edmund Lionel Welles, Esq. of Grebby Hall, 
 county Lincoln, has, since the death of the baronet, 
 assumed, by royal licence, the additional surname and 
 arms of Dymoke ; no doubt in the contemplation of the
 
 QUEEN'S CHAMPIONSHIP. 379 
 
 championship, in failure of male issue, being one day 
 granted to him or his descendants. 
 
 The greater part of Scrivelsby Court, the ancient baronial 
 seat, was destroyed by fire towards the close of the last 
 century. In the portion consumed was a very large hall, 
 ornamented with panels, exhibiting in heraldic emblazon- 
 ment the various arms and alliances of the family through 
 all its numerous and far-traced descents. The loss, says 
 Sir Bernard Burke, has been in some degree compensated 
 by the addition made to the remnant which escaped the 
 flames ; but the grandeur of the original edifice can no 
 longer be traced. 
 
 The annexed version of an old Anglo-Norman ballad 
 describes with perspicuity and truth the transmission of 
 the lands of Scrivelsby : 
 
 ' The Norman Barons Marmyon 
 
 At Norman Court held high degree ; 
 Knights and champions every one, 
 To him who won broad Scrivelsby. 
 
 Those Lincoln lands the Conqueror gave, 
 That England's glove they should convey, 
 
 To knight renowned amongst the brave, 
 The Baron bold of Fonteney. 
 
 The royal grants, through sire to son, 
 
 Devolved direct in capite 
 Until deceased Phil Marmyon, 
 
 When rose fair Joan of Scrivelsby. 
 
 From London City on the Thames, 
 
 To Berwick Town upon the Tweed, 
 Came gallants all of courtly names, 
 
 At feet of Joan their suit to plead.
 
 380 SCRIVELSBY AND THE 
 
 Yet, maugre, all this goodly band, 
 
 The maiden's smiles young Ludlow won, 
 
 Her heart and hand, her grant and land, 
 The sword and shield of Marmyon. 
 
 Out upon Time, the scurvy knave, 
 Spoiler of youth, hard-hearted churl ; 
 
 Hurrying to one common grave, 
 Good wife and ladie hind and earl. 
 
 Out on Time since the world began, 
 No Sabbath hath his greyhound limb, 
 
 In coursing man devoted man, 
 
 To age and death out, out on him. 
 
 In Lincoln's chancel, side by side, 
 Their effigies from marble hewn : 
 
 The anni written when they died, 
 Repose De Ludlow and Dame Joan. 
 
 One daughter fair, survived alone, 
 One son deceased in infancy ; 
 
 De Ludlow and De Marmyon, 
 United thus in Margery. 
 
 And she was woo'd as maids have been, 
 And won as maids are sure to be, 
 
 When gallant youths in Lincoln green, 
 Do suit, like Dymoke, fervently. 
 
 Sir John de Dymoke claim'd of right 
 The Championship through Margery, 
 
 And 'gainst Sir Baldwin Freville, knight, 
 Prevail'd as Lord of Scrivelsby. 
 
 And ever since, when England's kings 
 Are diadem'd no matter where, 
 
 The Champion Dymoke boldly flings 
 His glove, should treason venture there.
 
 QUEEN'S CHAMPIONSHIP. 381 
 
 On gallant steed, in armour bright, 
 
 His visor closed, and couched his lance, 
 Proclaimeth he the monarch's right 
 
 To England, Ireland, Wales, and France. 
 
 Then bravely cry, with Dymoke bold, 
 
 Long may the king triumphant reign ! 
 And when fair hands the sceptre hold, 
 
 More bravely still Long live the Queen ! ' l 
 
 1 Burke's Visitations of Seats and Arms, vol. i. pp. 188, 189.
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 ' This was thy home, then, gentle Jane ! 
 
 This thy green solitude ; and here, 
 At evening, from thy gleaming pane, 
 
 Thine eye oft watch'd the dappled deer, 
 While the soft sun was in its wane, 
 
 Browsing beneath the brooklet clear. 
 The brook runs still, the sun sets now, 
 The deer yet browseth ; where art thou ? ' 
 
 >N the most sequestered part of the county of 
 Leicester, deserted and solitary, backed by rude 
 eminences, and skirted by romantic and lowly 
 valleys, are the remains of Bradgate, the birthplace and abode 
 of the beauteous Lady Jane Grey, the accomplished but 
 unfortunate daughter of the House of Suffolk. The ap- 
 proach to this spot from the little village of Cropston is 
 strikingly suggestive. On the left is a group of venerable 
 trees, at the extremity of which are the remains of the mag- 
 nificent mansion of the Greys of Groby. A winding trout- 
 stream washes the walls of the edifice, until it reaches the 
 fertile meadow of Swithland. The beautiful vale of New- 
 town adds to the romantic loveliness of the scene ; and in
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 383 
 
 the distance, upon a hill, is a tower called ' Old John,' 
 commanding a magnificent view of the adjacent country, 
 including the far-off Castle of Belvoir, and the remains of 
 Nottingham Castle. 
 
 Leland thus describes Bradgate as it appeared in his 
 time : ' From Leicester to Bradgate, by ground welle 
 wooded, 3 miles. At Brodegate is a fair parke and a. lodge, 
 lately builded there by the Lord Thomas Gray, Marquise of 
 Dorsete, father to Henry that is now Marquise. There is 
 a fair and plentiful spring of water, brought by Master 
 Brok, as. a man would juge, agayne the hille, thoroug the 
 lodge, and thereby it dryvitt a mylle. This park was part 
 of the old Erles of Leicester's landes, and sins by heirs 
 generales it cam to the Lord Ferreres of Groby, and so to 
 the Grayes. The park of Brodegate is a vj. mile's cum- 
 pace.' 
 
 Bradgate lies on the border of the ancient forest of Charn- 
 wood in the hundred of West-goscote, about two miles from 
 Groby, and four from Leicester. A park was enclosed here 
 as early as 1247, as appears from an agreement made be- 
 tween Roger de Quincy, Earl of Leicester, and Roger de 
 Someroy, Baron of Dudley, respecting their mutual hunting 
 in Leicester Forest and Bradgate Park. As a parcel of the 
 manor of Groby, Bradgate formerly belonged to Hugh 
 Grandmeisnell, a Norman, to whom it was given, with 
 other lands in the county, by William the Conqueror ; and 
 who was created Baron of Hinckley and High Steward of 
 England by William Rufus. By the marriage of Hugh
 
 384 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 Grandmeisnell's daughter and co-heir Petronella, Bradgate 
 passed to Robert Blanchmaines, Earl of Leicester ; and after- 
 wards, by marriage also, to Saker de Quincy, Earl of Winton. 
 In the reign of Edward i. it came into the family of the 
 Ferrers by the marriage of Margaret, daughter and co-heir 
 of Roger de Quincy with William de Ferrers, second son of 
 William de Ferrers, Earl of Derby, whose son and heir, 
 William, was in 1293 created Baron Ferrers of Groby. 
 
 In 1444, on the death of William Lord Ferrers of Groby, 
 without any surviving male issue, Bradgate descended to 
 Sir Edward Grey, Knight, in right of his wife Elizabeth, sole 
 daughter and heir of Henry, the son of the last-mentioned 
 William (who had died during his father's lifetime) ; and he 
 was accordingly, in 1446, summoned to Parliament, under 
 the title of Sir Edward Grey, Knight, Lord Ferrers of 
 Groby. Sir John Grey, his son, who succeeded as Lord 
 Ferrers of Groby, was slain at the battle of St. Albans in 
 1460. He married Elizabeth, daughter and co-heir of 
 Richard Widville, Earl of Rivers, who, after his death, be- 
 came the queen of Edward iv. He left two sons Sir 
 Thomas and Sir Richard Grey. Sir Thomas was, in 1471, 
 created Earl of Huntingdon and a Knight of the Garter, and 
 in 1475 was advanced to the dignity of Marquis of Dorset. 
 Henry, his grandson, the third Marquis of Dorset, succeeded 
 to the title in 1530, and married the Lady Ferrers, eldest 
 daughter and co-heir of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk ; 
 and of his illustrious consort Mary, Queen Dowager of 
 France, and youngest sister of Henry vin., by whom he
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 385 
 
 had issue three daughters the Lady Jane Grey, Katherine, 
 and Mary. 1 
 
 The male heir of the family was continued by his younger 
 brother John, ancestor of the present Earl of Stamford and 
 Warrington. The Lady Katherine married Lord Herbert, 
 eldest son of the Earl of Pembroke ; and the Lady Mary, 
 Martin Keyes, Esq., of Kent, sergeant-porter to Queen 
 Elizabeth. 
 
 The family of Grey, we may here mention, was of Nor- 
 man origin. Rollo, or Fulhert, the chamberlain of Rollo 
 Duke of Normandy, was possessed, by gift from Robert, of 
 the castle and lands of Croy in Picardy, from whence he 
 took the name of De Croy, afterwards De Grey. The first 
 notice we find of this family in England is shortly after the 
 Conquest, when Arnold de Grey, grandson of the above- 
 mentioned Rollo, became lord of Water Eaton, Stoke, and 
 Rotherfield, in right of his wife Joan, daughter and heiress 
 of the Baron de Ponte de 1'Arche. The above descent is 
 deduced by a French genealogist and antiquary of great 
 repute, Francis de Belleforest of Cominges. 
 
 Having arrived at that period in the history of Bradgate 
 when it became celebrated as the birthplace of the greatest 
 
 1 Her two brothers dying without issue, the Marquis of Dorset was, 
 in favour to her, though otherwise, for his harmless simplicity, neither 
 misliked nor much regarded, created Duke of Suffolk, fifth Edward vi. 
 On the death of the Duke of Suffolk (who was executed shortly after 
 Lady Jane Grey), the Lady Frances married Adrian Stokes, Esq. She 
 lies buried in St. Edmund's chapel, Westminster Abbey, where an 
 alabaster monument was erected to her memory. 
 
 2 B
 
 386 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 ornament of the age, it behoves us to describe the mansion 
 itself, which became the scene of the childhood and early 
 studies of the incomparable Lady Jane Grey, who was born 
 here in the year 1537. Old Fuller describes the mansion 
 as ' fair, large, and beautiful.' It was erected in the early 
 part of the reign of Henry vm. by Thomas Grey, the second 
 Marquis of Dorset. It was square in plan, with a turret at 
 either corner. It was principally of red brick, and the 
 materials were mostly brought from the manor-house of the 
 Earl of Warwick at Sutton-Coldfield. 
 
 Bradgate became the favourite residence of the Dorset 
 family, more especially that of Henry, the father of Lady 
 Jane. Of him it has been said, that he loved to live in his 
 own way, and was rather desirous to keep up that magnifi- 
 cence for which our ancient nobility were so much distin- 
 guished in the place of his residence in the country, than to 
 involve himself in the intrigues of a court (Howard's Lady 
 fane Grey). 
 
 Of this once princely mansion, which has for many years, 
 with the exception of the chapel and kitchen, been in ruins, 
 scarcely enough of the walls remains to assist the careful 
 observer in designating the several apartments. But a 
 tower yet stands which tradition assigns as that occupied by 
 the Lady Jane. Traces of a bowling-green, which Nichols 
 imagines to have been the tilt-yard, are visible ; and the 
 garden-walls, with a broad terrace, less than thirty years 
 ago were nearly entire. The ruins of the water-mill men- 
 tioned by Leland might then be seen, and also the little
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 387 
 
 stream near which is a group of noble chestnut-trees. The 
 spot occupied by the pleasure-grounds could also be traced ; 
 ' and though,' observes Nichols, ' they have now somewhat 
 the appearance of a wilderness, yet they strongly indicate 
 that once, where the nettle and the thistle now reign in 
 peace, the rose and the lily sprang luxuriantly.' 
 
 The chapel a small building adjoining the Lady Jane's 
 tower, and the only part of the mansion on which any care 
 for its preservation has been bestowed contains a hand- 
 some monument in alabaster, in memory of Henry Lord 
 Grey of Groby (cousin to the Lady Jane Grey) and his wife. 
 Their effigies lie recumbent beneath an arched canopy, sup- 
 ported by composed Ionic columns. The Lord Grey is 
 encased in armour, and robed. The head rests on a helmet, 
 and the gauntlets are placed at the feet. The lady is 
 clothed in a gown and short jacket ; and suspended from 
 her waist-belt is a chain with tassels at the ends ; a long 
 ruff covers the neck. The whole is surmounted by the 
 family arms and supporters. In a vault in the middle of 
 the chapel, made to contain three coffins, repose the re- 
 mains of Lady Diana Grey, daughter of Thomas Earl of 
 Stamford ; Thomas Earl of Stamford, and Mary Countess 
 Dowager of Stamford. The chapel has been repaired and 
 paved; the key is in the charge of the keeper at the lodge. 1 
 
 1 Bradgate is the most famous of the picturesque ruins with which the 
 neighbourhood of Leicester abounds, and which, nearly in the middle 
 of England, has been the scene of many stirring events in its history. 
 In the Illustrated London News of July 18, 1868, appeared a set of views 
 in Leicester, full of Rembrantish effect, from the pencil of Samuel Read,
 
 388 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 The melancholy associations connected with the history 
 of Lady Jane Grey have invested Bradgate with an interest 
 which, notwithstanding its picturesque beauty, the locality 
 would not otherwise have possessed. The story of her 
 'almost infancy' would be incredible were it not well 
 authenticated. 
 
 Burton calls her ' that most noble and admired princess, 
 Lady Jane Grey, who, being but young, at the age of seven- 
 teen years, as John Bale writeth, attained to such excellent 
 learning in the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin tongues, and also 
 in the study of divinity, by the instruction of Mr. Aylmer, 
 as appeareth by her many writings, letters, etc., that, as Mr. 
 Fox saith of her, had her fortune been answerable to her 
 bringing up, undoubtedly she might have been compared 
 to the house of Vespasian, Sempronius, and Cornelia, 
 mother of the Gracchi, in Rome, and in these days the 
 chiefest men of the universities.' 
 
 Old Fuller says, ' She had the innocencie of childhood, 
 the beautie of youth, the soliditie of middle, the gravity of 
 old age, and all at eighteen ; the birth of a princesse, the 
 learning of a clerk, the life of a saint, yet the death of a 
 malefactor for her parents' offences.' 
 
 the well-known painter, of the Old Water-Colour Society. In the 
 accompanying letterpress the writer mentions the ruins of ' Bradgate, 
 the scene of the early life of one whose untimely fate is perhaps the 
 most pathetic episode in English history Lady Jane Grey. At Whit- 
 wick, near Charnwood Forest, is the Abbey of St. Bernard, where the 
 old monastic system is still carried out in its integrity ; and the stranger 
 and the destitute may, as in the olden time, present themselves at the 
 monastery gate for the daily dole.'
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 389 
 
 Aylmer was a clergyman of the Reformed religion, and 
 domestic chaplain to Lady Jane's father. An account of 
 his residence at Bradgate is given in the Jewel 'of Joy, written 
 by Thomas Becon in the reign of Edward vi. Aylmer was 
 afterwards promoted to the see of London by Queen Eliza- 
 beth. 
 
 It was at Bradgate that Roger Ascham, the tutor of the 
 Lady Elizabeth, paid that memorable visit to Lady Jane 
 Grey, the particulars of which interview he has thus affect- 
 ingly described in his Schoolmaster: 
 
 ' Before I went into Germanic, I came to Brodegate, in 
 Leicestershire, to take leave of that noble Lady Jane Grey, 
 to whom I was exceeding much beholding. Her parentes, 
 the Duke and the Dutchesse, with all the householde, 
 Gentlemen and Gentleweemen, were hunting in the Parke. 
 I found her in her chamber reading Phaedon Platonis in 
 Greeke, and that with as much delite as some gentlemen 
 would read a merry tale in Bocase. After salutation and 
 dutie done, with some other talke, I asked her why shee 
 should leese such pastime in the Parke. Smiling, she 
 answered me : I wisse, all their sport in the Parke is but a 
 shadow to that pleasure that I finde in Plato. Alas, good 
 folke, they never felt what true pleasure ment. And how 
 came you, Madame, quoth I, to this deepe knowledge of 
 pleasure; and what did chiefly allure you vnto it, seeing 
 not many women, but very fewe men, have attained there- 
 unto? I will tell you, quoth shee, and will tell you a 
 troth which perchance ye will marvel at. One of the
 
 390 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 greatest benefits that ever God gauve me is, that hee sente 
 so sharpe and seuere parentes, and so gentle a school- 
 master. For when I am in presence of either father or 
 mother, whether I speake, keepe silence, sit, stand, or go, 
 eat, drinke, be mery, or sad, bee swoing, playing, dancing, 
 or anything els, I must doe it, as it were, in such weight, 
 measure, and number, euen so perfectly as God made the 
 world, or ells I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, 
 yea, presently sometimes with pinches, nippes, and bobbes, 
 and other wayes which I will not name, for the honor I 
 beare them, so without measure misordered, that I think 
 myself in hell till time come that I must go to Mr. Elmer, 
 who teaches me so gently, so pleasantly, with such faire 
 allurements to learning, that I thinke all the time nothing 
 while I am with him. And when I am called from him, 
 I fall on weeping ; because whatever I do els but learning 
 is full of greefe, trouble, feare, and whole misliking vnto 
 mee ; and thus my booke hath been so much my pleasure 
 and more, that in respect of it, all other pleasure in very 
 deede bee but trifles and troubles vnto mee. I remember 
 this talke gladly, both because it is so worthy of memory, 
 and because also it was the last talke that ever I had, 
 and the last time that ever I saw that noble and worthy 
 lady.' 
 
 Lady Jane's scholarship was sound. Mildred, the wife 
 of Lord Burghley, is described by Ascham as the best 
 Greek scholar among the young women of England, Lady 
 Jane Grey always excepted. Lord Macaulay, however, con-
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 391 
 
 siders the highly educated ladies of this period to have 
 been unfairly extolled at the expense of the women of our 
 time, through one very obvious and very important circum- 
 stance being overlooked. 'A person who did not read 
 Greek and Latin could read nothing, or next to nothing ; 
 and all the valuable books extant in the vernacular dialects 
 of Europe would hardly have filled a single shelf. In 
 looking round a well-furnished library, how many English 
 or French books can we find which were extant when Lady 
 Jane Grey and Queen Elizabeth received their education ? 
 Chaucer, Gower, Froissart, Rabelais, nearly completed the 
 list. It was therefore absolutely necessary that a woman 
 should be uneducated or classically educated. Latin was 
 then the language of courts as well as of the schools ; of 
 diplomacy, and of theological and political controversy. This 
 is no longer the case ; the ancient tongues are supplanted 
 by the modern languages of Europe, with which English 
 women are at least as well acquainted as English men. 
 When, therefore, we compare the acquirements of Lady 
 Jane Grey with those of an accomplished young woman 
 of our own time, we have no hesitation in awarding the 
 superiority to the latter.' 
 
 To return to Bradgate. On the attainder of the Duke 
 of Suffolk, the family lost all claim to the titles and estates, 
 until James i., by letters patent, bearing date 2ist July 
 1603, bestowed the barony of Groby on Sir Henry Grey of 
 Pergo, nephew of the last-mentioned nobleman. Sir Henry 
 was the son of the Lord John Grey (youngest brother of the
 
 392 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 last Duke of Suffolk) by his wife Mary, daughter of Viscount 
 Montacute, to whom, through the interest of his wife, had 
 been granted, in 1559, the site of a capital messuage in 
 Essex, called Pergo, a part of the ancient and royal manor 
 of Havering-at-Bower (Morant's Essex). 
 
 On returning to the home of his ancestors, Sir Henry 
 Grey immediately disposed of his property in Essex, and 
 settled at the family mansion at Bradgate. Here he lies 
 buried. He was succeeded by his eldest grandson Henry, 
 who married Anne, daughter and co-heir of William Cecil, 
 Earl of Exeter, in whose right he became possessed of the 
 manor, borough, and castle of Stamford, whence he took 
 the title of the earldom on being created a peer, March 6th, 
 1628, by Charles i. ; and from him is lineally descended 
 the present Earl of Stamford and Warrington. 
 
 In 1645 an order was made that the Countess of Stam- 
 ford (being then at Bradgate) should have the protection 
 of the House of Lords, that no soldiers or commanders 
 should be quartered in the house or park. In 1694 the 
 mansion had a narrow escape from destruction by fire, 
 caused, it is said, by the then Countess of Stamford ; and, 
 according to tradition, it was fired in three several places. 
 The cause of this rash attempt has been variously accounted 
 for, but all agree in stating that the Countess had an 
 intrigue with her husband's chaplain. Thoresby says, she 
 set it on fire, or caused it to be set on fire, at the insti- 
 gation of her sister, who then lived in London. The story 
 is thus told : Some time after the Earl had married, he
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 393 
 
 brought his lady to his seat at Bradgate. Her sister wrote 
 to her desiring to know ' how she liked her habitation, and 
 the country she was in.' The Countess wrote for answer 
 that ' the house was tolerable, but that the country was a 
 forest, and the inhabitants all brutes.' The sister, in con- 
 sequence, by letter desired her to 'set fire to the house 
 and run away by the light of it.' The former part of the 
 request, it is said, she put immediately into practice. The 
 burning is now visible. 
 
 A separation immediately afterwards took place, and the 
 Earl married, secondly, Mary, daughter and co-heir of 
 Joseph Maynard, Esq. In the following year, Bradgate 
 was honoured by a visit from King William, when, it is 
 related, that a large room with a bow-window was fitted 
 up for his reception. An old man, who was living in 1804 
 at Anstey, aged 81, remembered the principal part of 
 Bradgate quite entire. He had been in all the rooms, and 
 said there was a door out of the dining-room into the 
 chapel. The same person recollected being told by his 
 father (who was only thirty years older than himself), that 
 he was carried, when a child, to the end of Anstey town, 
 to see King William pass across the fields on his way to 
 Bradgate. 
 
 Shortly after the death of the Countess Dowager of 
 Stamford, in 1722, Bradgate appears to have been deserted 
 by the family as a residence, and to have gradually fallen 
 into a state of dilapidation. Towards the close of the last 
 century, the then Earl disposed of the materials of the
 
 394 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 building, on condition that the purchaser should remove 
 them from the ground within a given period. Luckily, 
 however, for the admirers of history and antiquities, the 
 contract was not fulfilled. Some parts were left standing ; 
 and, with the exception of natural decay, remained in nearly 
 the same state. 
 
 The youthful Lady Jane Grey, who was of the blood- 
 royal of England, being the great-granddaughter of Henry 
 vii., was the delight of all except her parents, whose 
 severity would in modern times be termed brutal, yet did 
 not alienate her willing obedience. Filial obedience proved 
 her ruin. Her father, then created Duke of Suffolk, pre- 
 suming on his own power and favour, and the declining 
 health of Edward vi., undertook, in conceit with the power- 
 ful Duke of Northumberland, to transfer the crown into 
 their own line. With this view a marriage was concluded 
 between Lady Jane Grey and Northumberland's fourth son, 
 Lord Guildford Dudley, in May 1553. Edward vi. was 
 persuaded by his interested advisers to set aside the rights 
 of his sisters Mary and Elizabeth, and, in consideration of 
 her eminent virtues and royal descent, to settle the crown 
 upon Lady Jane Grey and Dudley. The king died July 
 6th ; and it was not until the loth that this unfortunate 
 lady even knew of the plot in which she was involved. 
 She was very reluctant to accept the crown, but was at last 
 over-persuaded by the importunities of her parents, and the 
 entreaties of her husband, whom she dearly loved. The 
 two dukes had no party among the people, and ten days
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 395 
 
 placed Mary in undisputed possession of the throne ; while 
 Queen Jane and her young consort had to bid farewell to all 
 earthly glory. The Tower palace, where they were residing, 
 became almost instantaneously the Tower prison. North- 
 umberland perished at once upon the block; but Lady 
 Jane and her husband would probably have been spared, but 
 for Wyat's ill-managed insurrection, which broke out on the 
 queen's intended marriage with the cruel bigot of Spain, 
 King Philip, and was supported by Lady Jane Grey's father, 
 the Duke of Suffolk. The insurrection failed, and not only 
 involved all those in ruin who had directly promoted it, but 
 those in the Tower, who assuredly desired nothing so much 
 as a peaceable and unambitious life. Indeed, Lady Jane's 
 only error was being persuaded to accept a crown to which 
 she had no good title, and for which she did not wish. 
 She took it rather as a burthen than as a favour, and re- 
 signed it with as much indifference as she would have laid 
 down a garland, when its beauties had faded and its scent 
 had gone. 
 
 Within a week after Wyat's discomfiture, it was deter- 
 mined that Lady Jane and her husband should both die 
 on the same day Monday, the i2th of February 1554. 
 The last evening of her life was employed by her in reli- 
 gious duties. Having taken up a Greek Testament, and 
 attentively perused it for some time, she discovered a few 
 pages of blank paper at the end of the volume, ' which, as 
 it were, awakening and exciting her zeal to some good and 
 charitable office, she took a pen, and in those waste leaves
 
 396 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 wrote a most godly and learned exhortation' to her sister 
 Katherine. 
 
 In the narrative which follows this letter, it is asserted 
 that Lady Jane, even on the evening of her existence, was 
 harassed by the Catholic divines; for no sooner had she 
 finished the letter, than two bishops, with some other priests, 
 entered her chamber, and employed more than two hours 
 in the effort to convert her. Fecknam, the Catholic dean 
 of St. Paul's, was foremost; but he failed with one who 
 was more than his equal in controversy. What a splendid 
 example of female constancy and firmness, in a girl who 
 had not then attained her seventeenth year ! 
 
 Lady Jane, that her fortitude might not be shaken, re- 
 fused a farewell meeting with Lord Guildford, on the 
 morning of the fatal day. It would foment their grief, 
 she said, rather than be a comfort in death, and they 
 would shortly meet in a better place and more happy 
 estate. 
 
 The fatal morning at length arrived. It was originally 
 intended that Lady Jane and Lord Guildford should suffer 
 together on Tower Hill ; but the Council, dreading the 
 effect of their youth and innocence on the populace, changed 
 their orders, and it was determined that Lord Guildford 
 only should be executed on the Hill, and that Lady Jane's 
 death should take place within the verge of the Tower. 
 Lord Guildford was first led to his fate. From the window 
 of ' Master Partridge's house,' where Lady Jane was lodged, 
 she is said to have beheld Lord Guildford going to execu-
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 397 
 
 tion, and exchanged with him her last parting signal. He 
 passed on to Tower Hill, was brought back in a cart to be 
 buried in the Tower Chapel, and she looked upon his 
 headless trunk. ' O Guildford, Guildford !' exclaimed the 
 unhappy lady, rising even in her agony to the highest 
 sublimity of Christian heroism, 'the antepast is not so 
 bitter that thou hast tasted, and which I shall soon taste, 
 as to make my flesh tremble ; it is nothing compared to the 
 feast of which we shall partake this day in heaven.' 
 
 The account states that Lady Jane, when sitting in her 
 apartments awaiting the dreadful summons, heard the cart 
 pass under her window, and rose, notwithstanding the 
 efforts of her attendants to restrain her. This statement is 
 not so probable as the other, for she would scarcely have 
 sought so dreadful a spectacle ; and as she had carefully 
 avoided an interview with Guildford, lest her firmness might 
 have been destroyed, it cannot be believed that she would 
 willingly view an object still more calculated to disturb her 
 thoughts. Grafton, the chronicler, corroborates the other 
 statement, that Lady Jane's meeting the mutilated body 
 of her husband was entirely accidental ; for, he says, Lord 
 Guildford Dudley's ' dead carcas, lying in a carre in strawe, 
 was agine brought into the Tower, at the same instant that 
 the Ladie lane, his wife, went to her death within the 
 Tower; which miserable sight was to her a double sorrow 
 and grief.' Dudley, we are told, exhibited considerable 
 dignity and fortitude. After some time spent in prayer, he 
 addressed the assembled multitude, merely to request them
 
 398 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 to pray for him ; and placing his head on the block, it was 
 in a few minutes separated from his body. 
 
 The Tower, it has been acutely remarked by a German 
 writer of our history, is a remarkable monument of the past, 
 yet not to its advantage ; ' for the images of the children of 
 Edward iv., of Anne Boleyn, and Jane Grey, and of the 
 many innocent victims murdered in times of despotism and 
 tyranny, pass like dark phantoms before the mind.' 
 
 The place of execution within the Tower, on the green, 
 was reserved for putting to death privately ; and the precise 
 spot whereon the scaffold was erected is nearly opposite the 
 door of the chapel of St. Peter, and is marked by si large 
 oval of dark flints. Hereon many of the wisest, the noblest, 
 the best, and the fairest heads of English men and English 
 women, of times long passed away, fell from such a block, 
 and beneath the stroke of such an axe, as may now be seen 
 in the armouries. 
 
 So soon as the closing scene of Lord Dudley's life was 
 over, the sheriff announced to Lady Jane that they were 
 ready to attend her to the scaffold ; nor did this awful 
 summons shake the fortitude which -she had displayed 
 throughout her imprisonment. Howes, in his Chronicle, 
 tells us : ' The Lady being nothing at all abashed, neither 
 with fear of her owne death, which then approached, neither 
 with the sight of the dead carcase of her husband when he 
 was brought into the chapell, came foorth, the lieutenant 
 leading her, with countenance nothing abashed, neither her 
 eyes anything moistened with teares (although her gentle-
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 399 
 
 women, Elizabeth Tylney and Mistress Helen, wonderfully 
 wept), with a book in her hand, wherein she prayed until 
 she came to the said scaffold, whereon, when she was 
 mounted, she was beheaded.' 
 
 Another account describes her conduct on the occasion 
 in the following words : ' And being come down, and de- 
 livered into the hands of the sheriffs, they might behold in her 
 countenance, so gravely settled with all modest and comely 
 resolution, that not the least hair or mote either of fear or 
 grief could be perceived to proceed either out of her speech 
 or motions ; but like a demure body going to be united to 
 her heart's best and longest beloved, so showed she forth 
 all the beams of a well-mixt and temporal alacrity, rather 
 instructing patience how it should suffer, than being by 
 patience any way able to endure the travel of so grievous a 
 journey. With this blessed and modest boldness of spirit, 
 undaunted and unaltered, she went towards the scaffold.' 
 She was entirely occupied in the perusal of a book of prayer, 
 though Fox asserts that her devotions were continually in- 
 terrupted by Fecknam. 
 
 A particular account of her behaviour on the scaffold is 
 to be found in an exceedingly rare tract (neither noticed by 
 Ames nor Herbert), which, though without date, bears in- 
 ternal evidence of having been printed immediately subse- 
 quent to her decapitation. That portion of the tract re- 
 garding the Lady Jane is as follows : 
 
 ' Fyrst, when she was mounted on the scaffolde, she sayd to 
 the people standinge thereabout, " Good people, I com hether to
 
 4OO BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 die, and by a lawe I am condemned to the same. The facte, 
 indede, against the Oueenes highnes was unlawful, and the con- 
 senting thereunto by me, but touching the procurement and de- 
 syre thereof by me, or on my halfe, I doo wash my hands thereof 
 in innocencie before God and the face of you, good Christian 
 people, this day;" and therewith she wrung her handes, in 
 which she had her booke. Then she sayd, " I pray you all, 
 good Christian people, to bear me wytnes that I dye a true 
 Christian woman, and that I looke to be saved by none other 
 mene but only by the mercy of God, in the merites of the blood 
 of His onlye Sonne Jesus Christe ; and I confesse when I dyd 
 know the word of God, I neglected the same, and loved myselfe 
 and the world, and therefore this plagge or punyshment is 
 happely and worthely happened unto me for my sinnes. And 
 yet I thanke God of His goodnes that He hath thus geven me a 
 tyme and respet to repent. And now, good people, while I am 
 alyve, I pray you to assyst me with your prayers." And then 
 she, knelyng downe, she turned to Fecknam, saying, " Shall I 
 say this psalm ? " and he said, " Yea." Then she said the 
 psalm of " Misereri mei Deus," in English, in most devout 
 manner, to thende. Then she stood up, and gave her mayde, 
 Mistres Tylney, her gloves and handkercher, and her booke to 
 Maistre Thomas Brydges, the lyveteuantes brother. Forthwith 
 she untyed her gowne. The hangman went to her to have 
 helped her off therewith; then she desyred him to let her alone, 
 turning towardes the two jentlewomen, who helped her off there- 
 with, and also her Frose paste and neckecher, giving to her a 
 fayre handkercher to knytte about her eyes. Then the hang- 
 man kneled downe and asked her forgevenes, whome she forgave 
 most willingly. Then he willed her to stand upon the strawe, 
 which doing, she saw the blocke. Then she sayd, " I pray thee 
 dispatche me quickly." Then she kneeled downe, saying, ' Wil 
 you take it of before I lay me downe?' And the hangman 
 answered her, " No, Madame." She tyed the kercher about her 
 eyes ; then feeling for the blocke, saide, " What shal I doo ? 
 Where is it ?' One of the standers-by guiding her thereunto, 
 she layde her head downe upon the blocke, and stretched forth
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 401 
 
 her body, and sayd, " Lorde, into Thy handes I commende my 
 spirite." And so she ended.' 1 
 
 The lines which this unfortunate lady is said to have 
 scratched with a pin on the walls of her prison in the Tower, 
 
 viz. 
 
 ' Non aliena putes homini qua obtingere possunt, 
 Sors hodierna mihi eras erit ilia tibi,' 
 
 have been thus diversely translated : 
 
 ' To mortal's common fate thy mind resign, 
 My lot to-day, to-morrow may be thine.' 
 
 ' Think not, O mortal, vainly gay, 
 
 That thou from human woes art free ; 
 The bitter cup I drink to-day, 
 
 To-morrow may be drunk by thee. ' 
 
 Of the following lines, ascribed also to Lady Jane, the 
 annexed translations have been given : 
 
 ' Deo jirvante, nil nocet Ihior malus ; 
 Et non jtivante, nil juvat labor gravis: 
 Post tenebras, spero lucem. ' 
 
 ' Whilst God assists us, envy bites in vain ; 
 If God forsake us, fruitless all our pain. 
 
 I hope for light after the darkness.' 
 
 1 Neither Nichols, in his History of Leicestershire, nor the Chronicle 
 of Queen Jane, nor, it is believed, any other author, mentions the place 
 where the Lady Jane was buried. The general belief is, that her body 
 was interred with that of her husband in the Tower ; but the historian 
 of that fortress was not able to find any conclusive evidence of the 
 place where their remains were deposited. There is a tradition that the 
 body was privately brought from London by a servant of the family,^and 
 deposited in the chapel at Bradgate. 
 
 2 C
 
 402 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 ' Harmless all malice if our God be nigh ; 
 Fruitless all pains if He His help deny. 
 Patient I pass these gloomy hours away, 
 And wait the morning of eternal day ! ' 
 
 See Nicolas's Life of Lady Jane Grey. 
 
 The apartments in which Lady Jane was imprisoned have 
 been much contested. Beauchamp Tower was certainly the 
 place of Lord Guildford's prison. Many years ago, in con- 
 verting an apartment in Beauchamp Tower, which had for- 
 merly been the place in which state prisoners had been 
 confined, into a mess-room for the officers of the garrison 
 there, several inscriptions were discovered on the walls of 
 the room. They appeared to have been made with nails, 
 or some other pointed instrument, and the greater part of 
 them were undoubtedly the autographs of the unfortunate 
 tenants of the place. Amongst them was, ' IANE. IANE,' 
 which, it has been conjectured, was written by herself, and 
 that some latent meaning was contained in the repetition of 
 her signature, by which she at once styled herself a queen, 
 and intimated that not even the horrors of a prison coulc 
 force her to relinquish that title. 1 Sir Harris Nicholas, whc 
 first recorded the above circumstance, does not consider the 
 suggestion entitled to any consideration ; for, independentl) 
 of its having been proved that Lady Jane was placed in 
 different apartment from that where this inscription wa 
 found, her character and conduct render it extremely un- 
 
 1 The document hi the British Museum, bearing Lady Jane's signa- 
 ture as queen, is supposed to have been the immediate cause of Mary's 
 signing the warrant for her execution.
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 403 
 
 likely that motives of vanity should have had any place in 
 her wounded mind. Another antiquary has supposed that 
 it was written by Jane's father-in-law, the Duke of North- 
 umberland ; but the most rational suggestion is that by Mr. 
 Bayley, who considers it to have been inscribed by Jane's 
 unhappy partner, Lord Guildford Dudley; for nothing is 
 more probable than that, in his separation from his wife, he 
 should have solaced himself by marking the walls of his 
 prison with her name. If it could be proved that it was 
 traced by his hand, so affecting a memorial would speak 
 eloquently of his tenderness, and we might feel convinced 
 that the affection which had been attributed to this interest- 
 ing pair unquestionably existed. 
 
 The Brick Tower is commonly said to have been that in 
 which Lady Jane Grey was lodged. Mr. Hepworth Dixon, 
 who read to the Archaeological Institute, in 1866, a very 
 interesting precis of the Tower history, may be supposed to 
 refer to the contested inscription in the following passage : 
 
 ' In the lower room of the Beauchamp Tower you will 
 find among the crowd of Dudley inscriptions the name of 
 JANE. It is probably the work of her husband, Guildford 
 Dudley, who could not think of her even in the Tower as 
 other than the rightful queen. But Jane herself, after her 
 midsummer game of royalty was over, never used that 
 perilous style.' Mr. Dixon adds of the Latin couplet which, 
 it is said, Jane wrote on her prison-wall, and which Fox has 
 preserved (see ante, p. 401) : 'If these lines could be found, 
 they would give the room in which Lady Jane was lodged ;
 
 404 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 but the search has been often made, and always in vain. I 
 am clear that her prison was not the Brick Tower ; for in a 
 contemporary journal, kept by a resident in the Tower, and 
 describing her daily life, it is said that she lodged in the 
 house of Master Partridge, and that her window commanded 
 a view of the Tower-green, so that she could see the cart 
 which brought in for interment her husband's headless 
 corse. Partridge's house and Lady Jane's prison I take to 
 have been the house standing between the lieutenant's lodg- 
 ings and the Bloody Tower.' Still, this conclusion is based 
 upon the identity of the precise spot to which the above 
 anecdote refers, and this point, as we have already seen, is 
 much contested. 
 
 The finest portrait of Lady Jane Grey is the beautiful 
 original by Lucas de Heere, now at Althorpe. There are 
 also a very ugly portrait by Vertue, and an original in the 
 possession of Lord Stamford ; besides a portrait once in the 
 possession of Mr. Harrington of Breaston, Derbyshire, into 
 whose hands it came from the Misses Grey of Risley. 
 
 The substance of this paper relating to Bradgate has 
 been mainly abridged from The Graphic and Historical Illus- 
 trator, 1839, appended to which are some stanzas, entitled, 
 ' The Ladye's Tower,' thus glancing at the historical asso- 
 ciations with which Bradgate is so fraught : 
 
 ' This lone chapelle, whence prayer to heaven arose, 
 
 The Ladye's simple Tower that stands beside ; 
 The nameless limpid rill that gurgling flows, 
 With shadows flitting o'er its foaming tide, 
 Which ever with th' opposing rocks doth chide ;
 
 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 405 
 
 The greensward hills that bound the gazer's ken, 
 
 And seem the stilly spot from all to hide, 
 May well detain the pensive pilgrim, when 
 He quiet lingers here, afar from common men. 
 
 There, in departed days, the gentle maid, < 
 
 The lovely and the good, with infant glee, 
 Along the margin of the streamlet played, 
 
 Or gather'd wild-flowers 'neath each mossy tree ; 
 
 And little recked what cares hers were to be, 
 While listening to the skylark's aerial lay ; 
 
 Or merry grasshopper that caroll'd free, 
 In verdant haunts, throughout the live-long day, 
 The beauteous child, as blithe and sorrowless as they. 
 
 Here from her casement, as she cast a look, 
 
 Oft might she mourn the reckless sport to scan ; 
 
 And well rejoice to find in classic book, 
 
 Solace, withdrawn from all that pleasure can 
 Impart to rude and riot-loving man : 
 Aye, and when at the banquet revels ran 
 
 To loud extreme, she here was wont to haste, 
 And marvel at creation's mighty plan ; 
 
 Or with old bards and sages pleasure taste, 
 
 Unknown to Folly's crowd, whose days all run to waste. 
 
 Beautiful martyr ! widowed by the hand 
 
 That reft thee of thy life ere yet 'twas thine ; 
 Thy grave to find beneath a guilty land, 
 
 Thou had no need of gilded niche or shrine ! 
 
 Fond recollections round thy memory twine 
 A sacred halo circles thy brief years ; 
 
 'Tis thine, redeemed from sin and death, to shine 
 Eternally above this world of fears, 
 Where Christ Himself, thy King, hath wiped away all tears.
 
 406 BRADGATE AND LADY JANE GREY. 
 
 Farewell, thou mouldering relic of the past ! 
 
 An hour unmeetly was not spent with thee : 
 Events, as rapid as the autumn's blast, 
 
 Have hurried onward, since 'twas thine to see 
 
 The fairest flower of England pensively 
 Expand and blossom 'neath thy rugged shade ; 
 
 And here thou stand'st, while circling seasons flee, 
 A monumental pile of that sweet maid, 
 Whom men of blood-stain'd hands within the charnel laid.
 
 ASSASSINATION OF THE HARTGILLS BY 
 LORD STOURTON. 
 
 ^HE scene of this atrocity was Stourton, in North 
 Wiltshire, subsequently celebrated as Stour- 
 head, the seat of Sir Richard Colt Hoare, 
 Bart., the amateur antiquary and topographer. 
 
 Stourton was the family seat of Charles Lord Stourton, 
 who was son and heir of William Lord Stourton, who died 
 at Boulogne while in the service of Edward vi. On Lord 
 Charles taking possession of the family mansion, his mother, 
 Lady Elizabeth, who had survived her husband, placed 
 herself under the roof of William Hartgill, and John Hart- 
 gill, his son, of Kilmington, a village two or three miles 
 from Stourton. These gentlemen had become entitled to 
 the confidence reposed in them, as well by family connec- 
 tion as by their respectability of character. The Lady 
 Elizabeth had not been long in this family when she 
 received a visit from her son, who proposed that she 
 should enter into a bond to a considerable amount never 
 to remarry without his consent; and who, having pressed 
 this measure with little success by his own persuasion,
 
 408 ASSASSINATION OF THE HARTGILLS 
 
 summoned Mr. Hartgill to enforce it with the influence 
 which he had long gained over his mother as a protector 
 and long-tried friend. But Mr. Hartgill, knowing the over- 
 bearing and cruel spirit of Lord Charles, refused to support 
 his demand, unless he would enter into a reciprocal obliga- 
 tion to allow his mother an annuity suitable to her rank ; 
 and on that point he firmly insisted. 
 
 Soon after this proposal was made, and rejected, on a 
 Whitsunday morning, while Mr. Hartgill and his family 
 were at Kilmington Church, their devotions were inter- 
 rupted by the appearance of Lord Stourton, who approached 
 the church-door, followed by his defenders in such num- 
 bers, and with such weapons (bows, guns, etc.) as afforded 
 little doubt of the hostility of their intentions. 
 
 The younger Hartgill, an athletic and courageous young 
 man, who was then at church beside his aged parents, 
 concluding his devotions with an ejaculated petition for 
 the assistance of that ' Lord of Hosts ' in whose house 
 and in whose service he was so unjustly assailed, issued 
 forth to encounter the impious Goliath; and drawing his 
 sword at the church-porch, made his way to his father's 
 house, which was only a few yards distant, and which he 
 happily reached unwounded. But his father, whose arm 
 was enervated by age, and his mother, who tottered with 
 infirmity, durst not venture on so perilous a passage, but 
 took refuge with some of their servants in the church 
 tower. 
 
 Young Hartgill's motive for this movement was not self-
 
 BY LORD STOURTON. 409 
 
 preservation, but a desire to succour his parents ; and, 
 accordingly, having taken his long-bow, and given a cross- 
 bow and a charged gun to a second person, he proceeded 
 again towards the church, and with admirable bravery 
 repulsed Lord Stourton and some of his men from the 
 churchyard and the outskirts of the house ; but as some 
 of them still remained in the church, the descent of the 
 persons in the tower was too hazardous to be attempted. 
 Young Hartgill, however, having devised a method of 
 getting some provisions drawn up into the tower, rode 
 directly for London to procure the interference of the 
 authorities ; and on his arrival in town he succeeded so 
 far as to get Sir Thomas Spark, the high-sheriff of Somerset, 
 despatched to take Lord Stourton into custody, and to 
 liberate those persons who were shut up in the church- 
 tower. For, though Mrs. Hartgill was allowed to go into 
 her house on Sunday evening, her husband and his ser- 
 vants were still kept in their close and comfortless con- 
 finement by a band of his lordship's retainers, who 
 surrounded the church during young Hartgill's absence. 
 
 Meanwhile, the sheriff, as directed by the Lords of the 
 Council, repressed these disorders. Lord Stourton was 
 committed to the Fleet prison, but soon regained his 
 liberty on being bound over to keep the peace. But the 
 desire for revenge continued to rankle in his breast, and 
 he persisted in harassing the Hartgills by destroying their 
 corn and driving away their cattle, till after the accession 
 of Queen Mary, when, on Her Majesty's visit to Basing-
 
 410 ASSASSINATION OF THE HARTGILLS 
 
 end, in Hampshire, they presented a petition for redress. 
 Both parties were now summoned to appear before the 
 Council, when Lord Stourton promised, if the Hartgills 
 would go to his home, and 'deserve his goodwill, they 
 should have not only that, but the value of all the pro- 
 perty he had taken from them during the quarrel.' To 
 this proposition they readily acceded ; and on a stipulated 
 day they proceeded towards Stourton, accompanied by 
 John Dackombe, Esq., who was to be a witness to their 
 submission to his terms. 
 
 But on approaching a house through a lane they were 
 met by half-a-dozen of Lord Stourton's men, who, letting 
 the elder Hartgill and his friend pass, stood before the 
 son with the evident intention of preventing his further 
 progress. He, on observing their number and hostile 
 appearance, turned his horse as if to ride homeward ; but 
 immediately perceived a like number of enemies approach- 
 ing him from that point, and before he could draw his 
 sword, and put himself in a posture of defence, he had 
 received several wounds. He set his back, however, 
 against the hedge, and defended himself for some time 
 against the whole twelve ; but exhausted at length by the 
 unequal contest, and by loss of blood from his numerous 
 wounds, he fell into a state of insensibility, and was left 
 by his assailants as dead. 
 
 After lying some time in this condition, he so far re- 
 covered that, with the assistance of a cook of Lord 
 Stourton's, he got on his horse and rode to the house
 
 BY LORD STOURTON. 411 
 
 of Mr. Richard Mumpeston of Maiden Bradley, under 
 whose care he soon recovered his health. 
 
 At length the matter was brought before the Star Cham- 
 ber, and Lord Stourton was sentenced to pay a consider- 
 able sum of money to the Hartgills, and undergo a second 
 imprisonment in the Fleet. 
 
 Under pretence of having some family business to 
 arrange, which required his presence at Stourton, and after 
 entering into a bond for ^2000 penalty to present himself 
 at the Fleet on the first day of term, he obtained a licence 
 to return into Wiltshire; and, soon after his arrival at 
 Stourton, shortly before Christmas, he sent to the Hartgills, 
 stating that he was prepared to pay them the fine imposed 
 upon him by the Star Chamber, and requesting them to 
 appoint a place and time at which they would meet him 
 to receive it, and settle the differences between them. 
 The Hartgills, who had seriously experienced his treachery, 
 informed his lordship they would meet him on the loth 
 of January, but at no other place than Kilmington Church. 
 On the appointed day, therefore, he went to Kilmington, 
 accompanied by several gentlemen, sixteen of his servants, 
 and several of his tenants, altogether sixty persons ; they 
 went not, however, into the church, but into the church- 
 house, his lordship observing that the church was ' not a 
 fit place in which to talk of worldly matters.' 
 
 Mr. Hartgill, whose suspicions were strengthened by the 
 number of Lord Stourton's retinue, refused to approach 
 him, when he was invited to do so by his lordship, who
 
 412 ASSASSINATION OF THE HARTGILLS 
 
 assured him that he should ' have no bodily hurt.' He 
 received a similar assurance from Sir James Fitzjames 
 Chaffyn, and other gentlemen, and was requested to come 
 into the church-house. But Hartgill, as well as his son, 
 still refused to enter .any covered place except the church. 
 
 It was at length agreed that a table should be set upon 
 the green. This being done, Lord Stourton put down a 
 cap-case and purse, and calling the Hartgills to him, said, 
 the Council had ordered him to pay them ' a certain sum 
 of money, which they should have ; marry (but) he would 
 first know them to be true men.' This was the watchword 
 for Lord Stourton, who, with ten or twelve of his men, 
 seized the Hartgills and dragged them into the church- 
 house, where they took from them their purses, and then 
 bound them with 'two blue bands of inkle' which his 
 lordship had brought with him. One of the purses having 
 been dropped, was picked up by a domestic, Upham ; and 
 a torquoise which it contained was presented to Lady 
 Stourton. This Upham received ' two great blows ' from 
 his master because he was about to pinion the captives 
 instead of tying their hands behind them ; and the younger 
 Hartgill received another blow from the same unmerciful 
 hand because he dared to call the treatment he met with 
 cruel. About this time his lordship, on coming out of the 
 house with his naked sword, and meeting young Mr. 
 Hartgill's wife, ' he kicked at her with his spurs,' says our 
 manuscript, 'also rent a great piece off from one of her 
 hose,' and struck her so violently ' between her neck and
 
 BY LORD STOURTON. 413 
 
 head ' that she was carried away in a state of insensi- 
 bility. 
 
 The captives were taken to the parsonage house of 
 Kilmington, where they were kept bound, and without 
 victuals, till about one o'clock the next morning, when 
 they were removed to a house of Lord Stourton's, called 
 Bonham, about two miles distant, and within half a mile 
 from Stourton. Here they were placed, bound as before, 
 in separate apartments, and without fires, till the next 
 evening. 
 
 About ten o'clock on that evening, his lordship sent to 
 Bonham four of his servants ready to obey their iniquitous 
 master even to commit murder to bring the victims of his 
 revenge to his house, with instructions that if they should 
 offer any resistance, or make any noise by the way, they 
 should be despatched on the spot. On arriving at Bonham, 
 the messengers found another of his lordship's men, who 
 had been stationed there to watch the house, and who was 
 engaged to act in conjunction with them. 
 
 Then the murderous work began. About ten o'clock at 
 night they took their victims to a close adjoining Lord 
 Stourton's house. There they forced them to kneel down, 
 and knocked them on the head with clubs, his lordship 
 ' standing in the meantime at a gallery door, not a good 
 coyte's cast from the place.' This done, the bodies were 
 wrapped up in their gowns, and carried through a garden 
 into the gallery, where Lord Stourton stood, his lordship 
 bearing a candle to light the murderers ! The bearer of
 
 4H ASSASSINATION OF THE HARTGILLS 
 
 old Mr. Hartgill made a false step, and fell into a hole 
 the intended depository of his burthen. Life being 
 not quite extinct, a groan was heard, when one of the 
 murderers swearing they were not yet dead, his lordship 
 ordered that their throats should be cut, lest they should 
 disturb a French priest who was lying in an adjoining 
 room. This order was executed by a servant with a pocket- 
 knife, while his lordship held the candle ; but one of the 
 men relenting, exclaimed, 'Ah, my lord, this is a pitiful 
 sight ! Had I thought what I now think, before the thing 
 was done, your whole lands would not have won me to 
 consent to such an act.' To which his lordship answered : 
 ' What, faint-hearted knave ! is it any more than ridding of 
 two knaves, that living, were troublesome to God's laws and 
 men's? There is no more account to be made of them 
 than of killing two sheep ! ' Their bodies were then let 
 down into a 'dungeon' or pit beneath the floor, and two 
 of the men were let down with cords (for there were no 
 steps), to bury them; his lordship all the time watching 
 their progress from above, and urging them to despatch, by 
 observing that the night wore fast away. 
 
 The bodies were afterwards disinterred by Sir Anthony 
 Hungerford, then high-sheriff of Wiltshire, whose exertions 
 in discovering them received the thanks of the Council. 
 The bodies were fifteen feet below the surface, covered 
 with earth and two layers of paving, on which were thrown 
 two or three cartloads of timber and shavings. 
 
 Lord Stourton was apprehended and committed to the
 
 BY LORD STOURTON. 415 
 
 Tower, charged with the murder, on the 28th of January 
 1556. He was brought up, with one of his men, for exami- 
 nation at Westminster on the loth of February, and was 
 remanded to the 2 6th, when he was arraigned in West- 
 minster Hall, before the Lord Chief-Justice Brooks, the 
 Lord-Steward, and the Lord-Treasurer, appointed by special 
 commission to try him. His four servants were sent to be 
 arraigned in Wiltshire. 
 
 In the course of the examination, some of the atrocities 
 of Lord Stourton came to light. It appeared that he had 
 caused, not long before, a barn of one Thomas Chaffin to 
 be set on fire by three of his servants ; and then against 
 Chaffin, for saying it was not done without the knowledge 
 of the said Lord Stourton, or some of his servants, he 
 brought an action, and recovering one hundred pounds 
 damages, he took for payment out of his pasture, by force, 
 twelve hundred sheep, with the wool upon their backs, 
 besides all the oxen, kine, and horses that he could find. 
 
 Lord Stourton and his four servants were found guilty of 
 the murder. The Hartgills, who had fallen victims to his 
 violent and malicious nature, were Protestants ; and as his 
 lordship had always been a staunch supporter of the Roman 
 Catholic religion, and had rendered many services to the 
 Government, it was hoped by his friends that the Queen 
 would have spared his life. But she left him to the laws ; 
 and there is no act of Mary's reign that is so creditable to 
 her memory as this exercise of justice, and her horror at 
 the atrocity of his crime.
 
 416 ASSASSINATION OF THE HARTGILLS 
 
 On the 28th of February, the Council directed the sheriff 
 of Wiltshire to receive the body of Lord Stourton at the 
 hands of Sir Hugh Paulet, and to see him executed. On 
 the 2d of March, he was taken, under a strong guard, 
 from the Tower on horseback, his arms pinioned behind 
 him, and his legs tied under the horse's belly. 
 
 His lordship, with Sir Robert Oxenbridge, the lieutenant, 
 four of his servants, and other guards, rode from the Tower 
 for Salisbury, the place of execution ; and resting one night 
 at Staines, and a second at Basingstoke, they arrived at 
 Salisbury on the 4th ; and on the 6th he was executed in 
 the market-place. It is said he ' made great lamentation at 
 his death for his wilful and impious deed.' It was directed 
 that his servants should be hanged in chains at Meere ; 
 and the only mark of distinction shown to Lord Stourton's 
 rank, was his being hanged with, instead of a hempen 
 halter, a silken rope, the privilege of a peer. He was 
 buried in Salisbury Cathedral. ' The visitors,' says the 
 Athenczum, ' will not have forgotten the tomb of this most 
 cruel and treacherous of assassins. There formerly dangled 
 above it, from an iron bar, the silken cord in which this 
 savage was hanged. In the manner of his death this 
 treacherous ruffian had regard for his dignity as a peer ; 
 and, disgusted at the idea of dying in hemp like a common 
 felon, he was permitted to swing in a noose of stout twisted 
 silk.' 
 
 The son of this criminal lord, John, eighth Baron Stourton, 
 was restored in blood, by Act of Parliament, in 1575. This
 
 BY LORD STOURTON. 417 
 
 nobleman was one of the peers on the trial of Mary Queen 
 of Scotland. In lineal descent from him is the present 
 Lord Stourton,who is eighteenth Baron. ' This noble family, 
 which derives its name from Stourton, county Wilts, was of 
 considerable rank antecedently to the Conquest ; for we find 
 at that period one of its members, Botolph Stourton, the 
 most active in gallantry, disputing every inch of ground 
 with the foreigner; and finally obtaining from the Duke 
 his own terms. Having broken down the sea-walls of the 
 Severn, and guarded the passes by land, Botolph entered 
 Glastonbury when that victorious Norman had made his 
 appearance in the west; and thus protected, compelled 
 William to grant whatsoever he demanded.' 'Burke' s Peerage. 
 
 2 D
 
 THE RED AND WHITE ROSES. 
 
 N an account of these distinctions we are informed 
 that ' the bages that be beryth by the Castle 
 of Clifford is a white rose ; ' but, as usual, no 
 reason why. It is quite clear that this, the celebrated cog- 
 nizance of the House of York, did not originate in the 
 dispute in the Temple Gardens, so dramatically introduced 
 in the play of Henry vi. ; nor does it follow that Shaks- 
 peare, or whoever wrote it, intended it, as Sir Henry Ellis 
 seems to think, to represent that it did so. There is not 
 a line throughout the scene which can be taken to show 
 an intention on the part of the author to represent that 
 the Lancastrian badges were then for the first time assumed. 
 Richard Plantagenet, as grandson of Edmund of Langley, 
 Duke of York, naturally proposes that those who think 
 with him should signify their opinion by adopting the 
 badge of his house, which is by accident blooming behind 
 him. John of Beaufort, a descendant of John of Gaunt, 
 Duke of Lancaster, as naturally selects the badge of his 
 family the red rose as the token of adherence to his 
 side of the question.
 
 THE RED AND WHITE ROSES. 419 
 
 The scene, if entirely the invention of Shakspeare (which 
 has been disputed), is full of truth and character, and in 
 any case testifies rather to the pre-existence of those signs 
 of company than to their derivation from this incident. 
 Roses red, white, and gold are mentioned as ornaments 
 both of dresses and furniture, possessed by various mem- 
 bers of the Plantagenet family from the time of Edward I., 
 who is said to have given for a badge ' a rose gold, the 
 stalk vert? There is no positive authority for this assertion, 
 which is to be found in a Harleian MS. (No. 304) ; but 
 it is very probable that the white and red roses may have 
 been only chosen as differences, as you will find was the 
 case with the ostrich feathers, which are blazoned and 
 depicted gold, silver, and ermine, to distinguish the King's 
 from the Prince's and the Duke of Lancaster's. 
 
 Tenure of a manor, by presenting a rose on a certain 
 day, was also a common custom in the middle ages. 
 Brook House, Langsett, in the parish of Penistone, in 
 Yorkshire, is said by Beckwith, in his edition of Blount's 
 Ancient Tenures, to have been held even in his day (he 
 died in 1799), by the unseasonable payment of a snowball 
 at Midsummer, and a rose at Christmas ; or, as he pre- 
 sumes, a sum of money in default. We have no evidence 
 of the tenure of Clifford Castle by this sort of service ; 
 but it may have been held by the annual payment of a 
 white rose, although the fact has not transpired. There 
 is also a romantic story associated with the family of 
 Clifford in connection with a rose, as the popular tradition
 
 420 THE RED AND WHITE ROSES. 
 
 of Rosamunda, the ' Rose of the World,' the ' filia pulchra,' 
 of Walter de Clifford, the favourite of Henry 11., and the 
 victim of Queen Eleanor's vengeance. All we know at 
 present is, that the white rose badge is reputed to have 
 belonged to the Castle of Clifford, and that it came into 
 the possession of the House of York by the marriage of 
 Richard of Coningsburgh, son of Edmund of Langley, with 
 his second wife Maud, daughter of Thomas Lord Clifford. 1 
 
 THE OLDEST ROSE-TREE IN THE WORLD. 
 
 Humboldt, in his Aspects of Nature, gives the following 
 account of, probably, the oldest Rose-tree in the world. In 
 the crypt of the Cathedral of Hildesheim grows a wild 
 rose-tree, said to be a thousand years old ; whereas it is 
 the root only, not the stem, which is eight centuries old, 
 according to accurate information derived by Humboldt 
 from ancient and trustworthy original documents. A legend 
 connects the rose-tree with a vow made by the founder of 
 the cathedral, Ludwig the Pious ; and a document of the 
 eleventh century states that ' when Bishop Hezilo rebuilt 
 the cathedral, which had been burned down, he inclosed 
 the roots of the rose-tree with a vault which still exists : 
 raised upon this vault the crypt, which was re-constructed 
 in 1 06 1, and spread out the branches of the rose-tree upon 
 the walls.' The stem was, in 1849, 262 feet high, and the 
 branches covered about 32 feet of the external crypt wall. 
 
 1 Mr. Planche, Somerset Herald ; Journal of the British Archaeolo- 
 gical Association, abridged.
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 PEERAGES PER SALTUM. 
 
 'HEN Lord John Russell was raised to the earldom, 
 he accomplished a feat which has not been per- 
 formed anything like a dozen times in nearly a 
 hundred and twenty years. When he ceased to be 
 a commoner, and entered the House of Peers, he passed clean 
 over the heads of all the barons and viscounts, and took his seat 
 next to the Earl of Dudley, at the bottom of the third rank of 
 the hereditary nobility. 
 
 The feat is one which doubtless was often performed by court 
 favourites under the arbitrary Tudors, and scarcely less arbitrary 
 and more eccentric Stuarts. But from the days of Sir Robert 
 Walpole, when party government first began, down to this pre- 
 sent year, 1861, so far as we are able to learn from the Peerages, 
 Earl Russell has achieved a success which has befallen to the 
 lot of men for the most part of high historic merit. 
 
 In 1742, the all-powerful commoner, Sir Robert Walpole, was 
 created Earl of Oxford ; but it was on resigning the premiership, 
 after a tenancy of two-and-twenty years' duration. Again, in 
 1766, we find another great commoner honoured in the same 
 manner we mean, of course, the elder Pitt, who was then made
 
 422 APPENDIX. 
 
 Earl of Chatham ; but there was a difference in his case, inas- 
 much as his wife had previously been made a baroness, so that 
 in effect it amounted only to a ' step in the peerage.' Again, in 
 1797, so greatly was the popular feeling excited by the victory 
 gained by Sir John Jervis over the Spanish fleet off Cape St. 
 Vincent, that the fortunate admiral was at once elevated to the 
 earldom by which his victory still lives in our memories. No 
 other instance that we can find occurs in the annals of the reign 
 of George ill., or of the Regency, or of King George IV. ; neither 
 Nelson nor Wellington gained an earl's coronet per saltitm; the 
 former, indeed, never wore one, and the latter went through one, 
 at least, of the inferior grades before he was created Earl of 
 Wellington, though, as a matter of fact, he did not take his seat 
 in the House of Peers until he had climbed up to a dukedom. 
 In 1831, a younger son of the Duke of Devonshire, Lord G. 
 Cavendish, was created Earl of Burlington ; but for this act of 
 grace there was the assignable reason that he was ultimately 
 heir to the dukedom, in which his own title must eventually 
 merge. About the same time, King William iv.'s eldest son, 
 by Mrs. Jordan, was raised to the earldom of Munster without 
 passing through the intermediate grades ; and her Majesty, on 
 coming to the throne, bestowed the earldom of Leicester on Mr. 
 Coke of Holkham. Since that date, a similar act of gracious- 
 ness has been extended to no commoners, with the exception 
 of Lord Francis Egerton, on whom her Majesty was advised by 
 Sir Robert Peel to bestow the earldom of Ellesmere in 1846; 
 Sir Maurice Berkeley, the owner of Berkeley Castle, and an 
 ex-Lord of the Admiralty, received at Lord Palmerston's hands 
 the coronet of Fitzhardinge, which his brother obtained from 
 Lord Melbourne, but could not transmit to his successor in 
 the family estates ; and lastly, the wife of the present Duke of 
 Sutherland, the daughter and heiress of Mr. Hay Mackenzie 
 of Cromarty, was created Countess of Cromertie, with remain- 
 der to her younger children, in remembrance of her maternal 
 ancestor the Earl of Cromertie in the peerage of Scotland, 
 whose title was forfeited in the last century. London Review.
 
 APPENDIX. 423 
 
 ' BELL THE CAT.' 
 
 THIS odd name was given to Archibald Douglas, a Scottish 
 nobleman, from an incident that occurred at Lauder, where the 
 great barons of the nation had assembled at the call of the king, 
 James III., to resist a threatened invasion of the country by 
 Edward IV. of England. They were, however, less disposed 
 to advance against the English than to correct the abuses of 
 James's administration, which were chiefly to be ascribed to the 
 influence exerted over him by mean and unworthy favourites, 
 particularly one Cochran, an architect, but termed a mason by 
 the haughty barons. 
 
 Sir Walter Scott thus described the strange scene : ' Many of 
 the nobility and barons held a secret council in the church of 
 Lauder, where they enlarged upon the evils which Scotland sus- 
 tained through the insolence and corruption of Cochran and his 
 associates. While they were thus declaiming, Lord Grey re- 
 quested their attention to a fable. " The mice," he said, " being 
 much annoyed by the persecution of the cat, resolved that a bell 
 should be hung about puss' neck, to give notice when she was 
 coming. But, though the measure was agreed to in full council, 
 it could not be carried into effect, because no mouse had courage 
 enough to tie the bell to the neck of the formidable enemy." 
 This was as much as to intimate his opinion that, though the 
 discontented nobles might make bold resolutions against the 
 king's ministry ; yet it would be difficult to find any one coura- 
 geous enough to act upon them. Archibald, Earl of Angus, a 
 man of gigantic strength and intrepid courage, and head of that 
 second family of Douglas whom I before mentioned, started up 
 when Grey had done speaking. " I am he," he said, " who will 
 bell the cat ; " from which expression he was distinguished by 
 the name of Bell-the-Cat to his dying day.'
 
 INDEX. 
 
 A BBESS of Amesbury, 4. 
 
 ^X Abbess of Lacock, 3. 
 
 Addison and the Duke of Shrewsbury, 
 140. 
 
 Ampthill Park, note, 33. 
 
 Arundel, Earl of, Earl Marshal, 199. 
 
 Arundel, Earl of, ' the Renowned Con- 
 fessor,' 196-199. 
 
 Ascham, Roger, at Bradgate, 389. 
 
 Ashdown, Battle of, 318. 
 
 Assassination of the Duke of Bucking- 
 ham by Felton, 143. 
 
 Assassination of the Hartgills, 407. 
 
 Aston Church Window, and the Holts' 
 Arms, 172-174. 
 
 Attainder of the Duke of Monmouth, 331. 
 
 Aubrey and Britton on the Hungerford 
 Family, 119, 120. 
 
 BAKER Family Legend, 176. 
 Ballad, Ang" " 
 tarnet, Battle of, 
 Gloucester, 309. 
 
 nily Lege 
 
 JD Ballad, Anglo-Norman, 370-381. 
 Barnet, Battle of, and Richard Duke of 
 
 Barnes, Juliana, and the Bake of Seynte 
 
 Albans, 351. 
 
 Basing House, Sacking of, 86. 
 Battle Abbey and Cowdray Castle, 71. 
 Bayntons, the, of Spye Park, 17, 18. 
 Beaumont, Adam, and Sir John Eland, 
 
 205. 
 
 Berners Family, 351. 
 Berners, Lord, translator of Froissart, 
 
 352- 
 
 Blowing Stone described, 322. 
 Bodach Glass Legend, 179-182. 
 Book of Lacock, 7, 8. 
 Bosworth Field, and Buckingham, 91, 
 
 92. 
 
 Bradgate and Lady Jane Grey, 382. 
 Bradgate described, 382, 383 ; 386, 387. 
 Brancepeth Castle, Vicissitudes of, 87. 
 
 Browne Family and Name, 73, 74. 
 
 Browne, Sir Anthony, and his Descen- 
 dants, 65. 
 
 Browne, Mabel, marriage of, 70. 
 
 Buckingham and Bosworth Fieid, 91. 
 
 Buckingham, George Villiers Duke of, 
 attempts on his life, 146. 
 
 Buckingham, Duke of, his funeral, 151. 
 
 Buckingham and Chandos, Dukes of, 97. 
 
 Buckingham and Chandos, second Duke 
 of, 99, 100. 
 
 Buckingham Family, the, 91. 
 
 Buckingham, Villiers, Dukes of, 95, 96. 
 
 Burial of Lady Jane Grey, 401. 
 
 Burton, Sir Charles, 102. 
 
 /^ALVERLEY Family, the, 49 
 
 V_x Calverley, Walter, story of, 49. 
 
 Carews of Beddington, 355. 
 
 Castle of Brancepeth, 87. 
 
 Castle, Donington, and Chaucer, 183. 
 
 Castle, Fotheringhay, 23, 26, 28. 
 
 Castle of Oakham, 258. 
 
 Castle of Pontefract and its Echoes, 214- 
 
 230. 
 
 Castle, Sandal, 304, 305, 306. 
 Castle of Tutbury, 244. 
 Catharine of Aragon at Fotheringhay, 
 
 Champions, the Queen's, 377. 
 Chapel on the Bridge, Wakefield, 303. 
 Charies, Prince, and the Duke of Buck- 
 ingham, 144. 
 
 Charles I. at Southwick Park, 149. 
 Charles n. and the Duke of Monmouth, 
 
 341- 
 Chartley, Tradition of the Ferrers 
 
 Family, 133. 
 
 Chatillon and Fotheringhay, 24. 
 Chaucer, Death of, 188. 
 Chaucer and Donington Castle, 183.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 425 
 
 Christmas Mummers in the Olden Time, 
 
 268-274. 
 
 Church of Fotheringhay, 25, 26. 
 Cicely Duchess of York, 26, 32. 
 Cicely Duchess of York, her Family, 80. 
 Clanricarde, Lord, and the Kildare 
 
 Family, 58. 
 Clavering, Miss (Lady Cowper), 276, 
 
 278. 
 
 Cliffords' Mansion, Clerkenwell, 374. 
 Cliffords and Rose Tenure, 419, 420. 
 Cliffords of Craven, 368. 
 Clifford, shepherd Lord, 370. 
 Constableship of Donington Castle, 190. 
 Conyers Family, reverses of, 103. 
 Conyers, Sir John, the Dragon-slayer, 
 
 165. 
 
 Cornish Miracle Plays, 271. 
 Coronation of George iv., 377. 
 Country Gentleman, ijth Century, 251. 
 Cowper, Lady, her Diary, 276-281. 
 Craven, History of, 368. 
 Craven, Scenery of, 368. 
 Crewe Family, the, 242, 243. 
 Crocodiles and Dragons, 157, 158. 
 Cumberland, Earl of, 371. 
 
 plECORATIONS at Sutton Place, 
 
 JL/ 365, 366. 
 
 Deepdene, the Howards at, 200. 
 Derby, Countess of, at the Siege of 
 
 Lathom House, 284, 285, 286. 
 Derby, Earl of, defeated by Lilburne, 
 
 288. 
 
 Dering, Sir Edward, 88. 
 Derwentwater's Corpse Lights, 236. 
 Derwentwater's Farewell, 236. 
 Derwentwater, James Earl of, 231. 
 Derwentwater, Notes on, 238. 
 Despencers and Gaveston, and Edward 
 
 iv., 217. 
 
 De Vexi, Lord of Kildare, 54. 
 Diary of Lady Cowper, 280. 
 Dilston or Devilstone Hall, 235. 
 Donington Castle and Chaucer, 183. 
 Dragon Hill, 320. 
 Dragon Legends, 156. 
 Dragon of Wantley, 159, 160. 
 Dymoke Family and the Championship, 
 
 375-377- 
 
 EAGLE and Child tradition, 291. 
 Edmund of Langley at Fother- 
 inghay, 24. 
 
 Edward Earl of Kent, execution of, 184. 
 Ela Countess of Salisbury, 2. 
 Eland Hall, Yorkshire, 201. 
 Eland Mill, affray at, 208 
 Eland, Sir John, tragedy of, 201. 
 Elizabeth and Mary Queen of Scots, 36, 
 
 ?7. 4 2 - 
 Elizabeth, Queen, lines by, 195. 
 
 Execution of Lord Ferrers, 129-132. 
 Execution of Lady Alice Lisle, 347. 
 Execution of the Marquis of Exeter, 354. 
 Execution of Mary Queen of Scots at 
 
 Fotheringhay, 38-42. 
 Execution of the Duke of Monmouth, 
 
 Execution of Lord Dudley and Lady- 
 Jane Grey, 395-400. 
 Execution of Lord Stourton, 416. 
 Exeter, Holland, Duke of, begging, 86. 
 
 T7AIRFAX, SIR THOMAS, and the 
 
 JL Siege of Lathom House, 285, 286. 
 
 Farleigh Castle Estate, 104. 
 
 Fatalities in Families, 80. 
 
 Felton assassinates the Duke of Buck- 
 ingham, 147. 
 
 Felton, John, account of, 140. 
 
 Ferrers Family, 384. 
 
 Ferrers Family and Oakham Castle, 259. 
 
 Ferrers, the House of, 121. 
 
 Ferrers, Laurence Earl of, murder by, 
 124. 
 
 Ferrers, Lord, execution of, 129-132. 
 
 Fetterlock, Origin of, 25. 
 
 Fetterlock plan of Fotheringhay Castle, 
 25. 
 
 Feud, deadly, in Yorkshire, 200-213. 
 
 Fitzgerald Earl of Kildare, 54. 
 
 Fitzwilliam, Sir William, at Fothering- 
 hay, 37, 38. 
 
 Fotheringhay Castle, 23, 28, 44, 45. 
 
 Fotheringhay Castle demolished, 45. 
 
 Fotheringhay Church, 26, 27. 
 
 Fotheringhay and its Memories, 23. 
 
 Fotheringhay a prison of State, 34. 
 
 Foundling Knight, 254. 
 
 Froissart's Chronicles, note, 353. 
 
 Froude, Mr., his account of Mary Queen 
 of Scots, 46, 47. 
 
 Fyndern and the Fyndernes, 242. 
 
 Fyndernes' Flowers, the, 245. 
 
 f ENTLEMAN, Country, i?th Cen- 
 VJ tury, 251. 
 
 Geology and Dragon Legends, 163, 164. 
 Gerald the Great, Earl of Kildare, 57. 
 Gerald eleventh Earl of Kildare, 68. 
 Gerald ninth Earl of Kildare, 60. 
 Geraldine, Fair, 66, 67, 355, note. 
 Golden Horse-shoe, story of, 267. 
 Goldsmith of Leeds, a tragic tale, 247. 
 Gooderich Castle described, 136. 
 Great Stanley, close of his career, 293. 
 Great Stanley, execution of, 295. 
 Greenwich Hospital and the Derwent- 
 water Estates, 237. 
 Grey Family, 384. 
 Greys of Groby, 391. 
 Grey, Lady Jane, born, 386. 
 Grey, Lady Jane, character of, 388. 
 
 2 E
 
 426 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Grey, Lady Jane, her scholarship, 390, 
 
 30i. 
 Grey, Lady Jane, and Lord Dudley 
 
 executed, 395-403. 
 Gundreda, finding of her remains, 298. 
 
 TT ADDON HALL at Christmas, 273- 
 
 Tl. 275- 
 
 Haddon Hall described, 274. 
 Hagley, Tradition at, 172. 
 Hall of Oakham Castle, 259. 
 Hartgills, the, 408, 409. 
 Headless Horse Superstition, 52. 
 Henry y. buried at Fotheringhay, 29. 
 Heraldic cognizance at Sutton Place, 
 
 374- 
 
 Hewet, Sir W., the Cloth-worker, 76. 
 Haytesbury, the Hungerfords at, 116. 
 Horse-shoes at Oakham Castle, 258, 263- 
 
 267. 
 
 Howard, Catherine, fate of, 193. 
 Howard, Henry, Earl of Surrey, the 
 
 poet, 193. 
 
 Howard, the Home of. 191. 
 Howard, John, the eminent Yorkist, 191. 
 Howard, Thomas, Earl of Surrey, 192. 
 Howard, Thomas, imprisonment of, 193. 
 Hungerford badge, knots, etc., 113, 114. 
 Hungerford Family, the, 105. 
 Hungerford, Lady, executed at Tybourn, 
 
 106, 108. 
 
 Hungerfords of Cadenham. 107. 
 Hungerfords, the, at Charing Cross, 115, 
 
 116, 118. 
 Hunsden House and the Fair Geraldine, 
 
 66. 
 Hungerfordiaiui, 104. 
 
 TNVENTORY of the Hungerford 
 J. Family, 109, no, in, 112. 
 
 TAMES i. and the Duke of Bucking- 
 
 J hnm, 144. 
 
 Joan Plantagenet and her three mar- 
 riages, 184. 
 
 Jeffreys, Judge, end of, 349. 
 
 Jeffreys, Judge, portrait of, 345, 348. 
 
 Jockey of Norfolk on Bosworth Field, 
 ics, 193. 
 
 ' Judge Jeffreys' Ground,' 348. 
 
 ~\7 ILDARE, three Earls of, fortunes 
 
 Jty of, 54. 
 
 Kilmington Church, affray in, 408-412. 
 Kirkby Moorside and Villiers Duke of 
 
 Buckingham, 96. 
 Kimbolton Castle, 33. 
 Knock Taugh, or the Hill of Axes, 58. 
 
 T ACOCK Abbey, present state of, 
 
 -L' 14, 15. 
 
 Lacock Abbey described, i, 2. 
 
 Lacock Abbey, proprietors of, 13. 
 Lacock Village, i. 
 Laidly Worm, the, 169. 
 Lambe, Dr., death of, 145. 
 Lambton Hall Worm, the, 166. 
 Lancaster, Earl of, beheaded, 219. 
 Lancaster, Earl of, at Pontefract Castle, 
 
 217. 
 Lathom House, ruins and traditions, 
 
 288, 289. 
 
 Lathom House, Siege of, 282-296. 
 Leeds, Dukedom of, 78. 
 Leeds, Goldsmith of, a tragic tale, 247. 
 Legend of the Bodach Glass, 179. 
 Legends of the Red Hand, 171. 
 Legend of Sir Richard Baker, 176. 
 Legend at Stoke d'Abernon, 178. 
 Lesley or Leslie Family, the, 239. 
 Leven, the brave Earl of, 230. 
 Leven, Ear! of, in the Tower, 240. 
 Leicester, old, views of, 387. 
 Lindwurm, or Dragon, in Moravia, 158, 
 
 159. 
 
 Lines by Lady Jane Grey, 401. 
 Lines on Bradgate, 405. 
 Lisle, Lady Alice, 343-349. 
 Longspe, William, Earl of Salisbury, 2. 
 Love Passage from the Diary of Lady 
 
 Cowper, 276-280. 
 Lumley Portraits, the, 19. 
 Lyttelton, Lord, and the Red Hand, 173. 
 
 MABEL BROWNE, romantic career 
 of, 67. 
 
 Magna Charta of Henry III., 14. 
 Marmyons and the Championship, 375, 
 
 37 6 - 
 Marriage of Lord Dudley and Lady 
 
 Jane Grey, 394, 395. 
 Mary Queen of Scots at Fothennghay, 
 
 34- 
 
 Mary of Valence at Fotheringhay, 24. 
 Memorials of the Duke of Monmouth, 
 
 337- 
 
 ' Merciful Assize,' Winchester, 344. 
 Middleham Castle and Richard III., 
 
 308-315. 
 
 Monmouth, Duke of, capture of, 327-329. 
 Monmouth, Duke of, his last days, 325- 
 
 34 2 - 
 
 Monmouth Close described, 330. 
 Monmouth Documents, 342. 
 Monmouth House, Soho Square, 336. 
 Montague, the last Viscount, 72. 
 Montague, Wortley, and the Dragon of 
 
 Wantley, 161. 
 
 Mummers, Christmas, 268-273. 
 Mummers in Northamptonshire, 272. 
 Murder of his Steward by Lord Ferrers, 
 
 124. 
 
 Murder, tragical, 49. 
 Murder at Stourton, 414, 415. 
 Mutiny at Portsmouth, 154.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 427 
 
 N ASH'S Mansions of England, 273. 
 Neville of Brancepeth, 87. 
 Neville, the House of, 80-83. 
 Nicholas, Sir Edmond, at West Hors- 
 
 ' e y. 359- 
 Nichols, J. G., his account of Lady 
 
 Hungerford, no. 
 
 Norfolk, Duke of, at Bosworth, 193. 
 Norfolk, Thomas fourth Duke of, 194, 
 
 195- 
 
 Norton St. Philips, Duke of Monmouth 
 at, 326. 
 
 ,T > 1 
 
 Nuns' Boiler at Lacock, 
 ' Nut-Brown Mayde/ b 
 
 ayde,' ballad, 372. 
 
 OAK, celebrated, at Castle Doning- 
 ton, 189. 
 
 Oakham Castle described, 262. 
 Osborne and Leeds Families, 76. 
 Osborn, the London Bridge Apprentice, 
 
 76. 
 
 Oxenham Family Legend, 182. 
 Oxford, John Earl of, 86. 
 
 T)APER found in Felton's hat, 148. 
 _L Paulets, reverses of the, 84. 
 Peers' Horse-shoe Custom at Oakham, 
 
 260. 
 Pembroke and Montgomery, Countess 
 
 of, 373. 374- 
 
 Percy, the House of, reverses of, 83. 
 Perkin Warbeck at Cork, 58. 
 Photography and Mr. Fox Talbot, 13. 
 Pindar Fields, Wakefie!d, 303. 
 Planche, Mr., his account of the Lumley 
 
 Portraits, 19. 
 
 Plantagenet co-heirs, reverses of, 102. 
 Pocket-book, the Duke of Monmouth's, 
 
 337, 3 88 , 34- 
 
 Poems and Songs on the Duke of Buck- 
 ingham, 153. 
 Pole, Cardinal, and Gerald Earl of 
 
 Kildare, 69. 
 
 Pontefract Castle described, 230. 
 Pontefract Castle demolished, 228. 
 Pontefract Castle and its Echoes, 214- 
 
 230. 
 
 Pomfret and Pontefract, 230. 
 Pontefract, view from, 228, 229. 
 Pope on Villiers Duke of Buckingham, 
 
 96. 
 
 Portraits at West Horsley Place, 361. 
 Portraits, the Lumley, described, 19-22. 
 Portraits of Mary Queen of Scots, 43. 
 
 T) ADCLIFFE, CHARLES, Earl of Der- 
 XV wentwater, 232. 
 Radcliffes of Derwentwater, the, 231. 
 Raleigh, Carew, birth of, 355. 
 Raleigh, Sir Walter, burial of, 357, 358. 
 Raleigh, Sir Walter, head of, 358. 
 
 Rebellion of 1745, 223. 
 
 Red Hand, baronet's hatchment, 175. 
 
 Red Hand Legends, 171. 
 
 Red and White Roses, the, 418. 
 
 Relics of the Derwentwaters, 238. 
 
 Reresbys of Thybergh, reverses of, 101. 
 
 Richard n., death of, 223, 224. 
 
 Richard n. deposed, 220. 
 
 Richard n. in Flint Castle, 221. 
 
 Richard II. in the Tower of London, 223. 
 
 Richard HI., accession of, 311. 
 
 Richard in. born at Fotheringhay, 28, 
 
 29. 
 
 Richard in., character of, 309. 
 Richard in., his love of music, 313. 
 Richard in. and Richmond at Bosworth, 
 
 3H- 
 Richard ill. and Richmond, portraits of, 
 
 .314, 3 J 5- 
 Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan, executions 
 
 of, 226. 
 
 Robin Hood and Barnsdale Forest, 304. 
 Rose Tenures, curious ancient, 419. 
 Rose-tree, the oldest in the world, 420. 
 Ruins of Bradgate, 394, 395. 
 Rutland, county, lines on, 258. 
 
 SALISBURY CATHEDRAL 
 founded, 5. 
 
 Salisbury, Earl and Countess of, 5. 
 
 Sandal Castle, Account of, 304-306. 
 
 Saxon Standard of the White Horse, 319. 
 
 Scouring the White Horse, 317. 
 
 Scrivelsby Court described, 379. 
 
 Scrivelsby and the Queen's Champion- 
 ship, 375. 
 
 Sedgemoor, Battle of, 329, 332. 
 
 Serpent or Dragon in St. Leonard's 
 Forest, 162. 
 
 Serpent in the Sea, 170. 
 
 Sevenoake, Sir-William de, 254. 
 
 Sherborne and Sir Walter Raleigh, 356. 
 
 Shirley Family, the, 121. 
 
 Shrewsbury, Duke of, the statesman, 139. 
 
 Shrewsbury, the Earl of, 135. 
 
 Shrewsbury, the Earl of, and Mary 
 Queen of Scots, 139. 
 
 Shrewsbury, Lady, at Lacock, 16. 
 
 Siege of Lathom House, 282, 296. 
 
 Sieges of Pontefract Castle, 226, 227. 
 
 Silken Thomas, tenth Earl of Kildare, 
 62-64. 
 
 Skipton Castle and its Lords, 369. 
 
 Snail, gigantic, and the Laidly Worm, 
 169. 
 
 Sockburn Falchion, the, 165. 
 
 Spendthrift Sir Edward Hungerford, 
 117, 119. 
 
 Spye Park Legend, 17. 
 
 Stafford, Edward, Duke of Buckingham, 
 
 93- 
 
 Staffords of Penshurst, 89. 
 Stamford, Countess of, 392, 393.
 
 428 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Stanhope, three Earls, 255. 
 
 State Funeral at Fotheringhay, 29-31. 
 
 Storm, Great, of 1703, 360. 
 
 Staunton Harold and Sir Robert Shirley. 
 
 123. 
 
 Stourton described, 407. 
 Stourton Family, 417. 
 Stourton, Lord Charles, 407. 
 Stowe, great sale at, 99. 
 Stowe and the Duke of Buckingham, 97, 
 
 98. 
 
 Surrey, Earl of, the poet, 66. 
 Surrey, Lord, at Flodden Field, 106. 
 Sussex Dragon Legends, 162, 163. 
 Sutton Place described, 363. 
 
 '"PALBOT, the House of, 135. 
 1 Talbot, Sir Gilbert, at Bosworth, 
 
 139- 
 
 Talbot, the valiant Lord, 137, 138. 
 
 Talbot, William, adventures of, 3, 4. 
 
 Talbotype, the, 14. 
 
 Temple Garden and Red and White 
 Roses, 418. 
 
 Thornbury Castle, Gloucestershire, de- 
 scribed, 92-94. 
 
 Toad in the Hungerford Arms, 117. 
 
 Towers of Pontefract Castle, 216. 
 
 Tower of London, Lord Dudley and 
 Lady Jane Grey in, 395-403. 
 
 Towton, Battle of, 302. 
 
 Towton and Waterloo battles compared, 
 302. 
 
 Traditions of Wallington and the Calver- 
 leys, 48. 
 
 Tragedy of Sir John Eland, 201. 
 
 Tresham Family and Rushton Hall, 88. 
 
 Trial of Lady Alice Lisle, 344-347. 
 
 Trial of Lord Ferrers for Murder, 127. 
 
 Trial of Lord Stourton, 419. 
 
 Trial of Mary Queen of Scots at Fother- 
 inghay, 35. 
 
 Tutbury Castle, 244. 
 
 T TFFINGTON Castle, White Horse 
 U Hill, 316. 
 Ulster King-at-Arms, Badge of, 173. 
 
 VALE of White Horse, the, 316, 324. 
 Vavasours of Weston, the, 51. 
 Vere, Lady Harriet, and Lady Cowper, 
 
 277-280. 
 Vicissititdes of Families, by Sir Bernard 
 
 Burke, 245. 
 
 Villiers Duke of Buckingham, 95, 96. 
 Villiers, George, Duke of Buckingham, 
 
 assassinated by Felton, 142. 
 Villiers, John, Earl of Buckingham. 97. 
 
 -\1TAKEFIELD, the Battle of, 300, 
 
 VV 301. 
 
 Wakefield Park, 306. 
 
 Wakefield Manor and Sandal Castle, 
 
 296. 
 
 Wallington Family, 47. 
 Wallington Border Tower, 48. 
 Walpole's Notes on the Rebellion of 
 
 1745, 233, 234. 
 
 Wayland Smith Tradition, 320, 321. 
 Wentworth, Baroness, of Nettlestead, 
 
 339- 
 
 West Horsley Manor, 355. 
 West Horsley Place and the Westons, 
 
 35- 
 
 Weston Family of West Horsley, 361. 
 Weston, Prior of St. John's, Clerken- 
 
 well, 363. 
 
 Westons of Sutton, Family of, 362-367. 
 White Horse, Vale of, 316-324. 
 White Lackington, Duke of Monmouth 
 
 at, 326. 
 
 White-breasted Bird Legend, 182. 
 Will Case, the Great Shrewsbury, 140, 
 
 Wotm Hill and Worm Well, 168, 169. 
 Worm of Lambton Hall, 166. 
 Wyat's Insurrection, 395. 
 
 "\ 7"ORK, House of, at Fotheringhay, 
 I 28. 
 Yorkshire Tragedy, tfte, 51. 
 
 MURRAY AND GIBB, EDINBURGH, 
 PRINTERS TO HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE.
 
 A CATALOGUE OF 
 NEW& POPULAR WOEKS, 
 
 AND OF BOOKS 
 
 SUITABLE FOR PRESENTS AND SCHOOL PRIZES. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY 
 
 GEIFFITH AND FARRAN, 
 
 (SUCCESSORS TO NEWBERY AND HARRIS), 
 
 WEST CORNER OF ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD, 
 LONDON. 
 
 2M. .79. Cancelling all previous Editions of this Catalogue.
 
 PAGE 
 
 New Works and New Editions, 187879 3 
 
 Miscellaneous Books 8 
 
 Stanesby's Illuminated Gift Books 10 
 
 Works by John limbs, F.S.A 10 
 
 Picture Books for Every Child 10 
 
 Six Shilling Books 11 
 
 Five Shilling Books 11 
 
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 Three and Sixpenny Books 14 
 
 Three Shilling Books 19 
 
 Two and Sixpenny Books 20 
 
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 Two Shilling Books 23 
 
 One and Sixpenny Books 25 
 
 The Favourite Library 26 
 
 Durable Nursery Books 27 
 
 Works for Distribution 28 
 
 Educational Works 28 
 
 Needlework Demonstration Sheets 31 
 
 Darnell's Copy Books 32 
 
 Taking Tales for Cottage Homes 32
 
 NEW BOOKS AND NEW EDITIONS. 
 
 PICTURES OF THE PAST : Memories of 
 
 Men I Have Met. and Sights I Have Seen. By FRANCIS H. 
 GRUNDY, C.E. One vol., Crown 8vo., cloth., price 12s. 
 
 Contains personal recollections of Patrick Branwell Bronte, 
 Leigh Hunt and his family, George Henry Lewes, George 
 Parker Bidder. George Stephonson, and many other celebrities, and 
 gives besides descriptions of very varied experiences in Australia. 
 
 "He (Mr. Grundy) impresses the reader with his geniality, his high 
 spirits, his loyalty, and his clear Fense. In certain moments of a life by 
 no means uneventful, he has distinctly done public service by his presence 
 of mind, notably in preventing the asf assin O'Farrell from being lynched 
 when he shot the Duke of Edinburgh in 1868. Mr. Grundy's career as an 
 engineer, if not prosperous, seems to have been stirring and useful, and 
 he has been thrown into the companionship of many great men without 
 feeling or affecting any undue sense of inferiority." Athentram. 
 
 AMONG THE ZULUS: The Adventures of 
 
 Hans Sterk in South Africa. By Lieut. -Col. A. W. DRAYSON, 
 R.A. Crown 8vo., illustrated, paper boards, sixth thousand, 
 price 2s. 6d. ; cloth, gilt edges, price 3s. 6d. 
 
 " "Will be read with peculiar interest . . . much information is 
 conveyed about the coimtry and the people in these strange lands." 
 Naval and Military Gazette. 
 
 STORIES from EARLY ENGLISH LITER- 
 
 ATURE, with some Account of the Origin of Fairy Tales, 
 Legends and Traditionary Lore. Adapted to the use of Young 
 Students. By Miss S. J. VENABLES DODDS. Cr. Svo., price 5s. 
 
 " The author has set herself a task not easy to accomplish, but she has 
 been successful in a highly praiseworthy degree." Schoolmaster. 
 
 " Will assist youthful students, and will also be of interest to the mere 
 reader." Leeds Jfercury,
 
 NEW AND POPULAR WORKS 
 
 THE LIFE MILITANT -. Plain Sermons for 
 
 Cottage Homes. By ELLELL. One vol., crown 8vo., price Gs. 
 
 HOFER: A Drama. By CATHERINE SWAXWICK. 
 Demy 8vo., cloth, gilt edges, price 3s. 6d. 
 
 LITTLE MARGARET'S RIDE TO THE 
 
 ISLE OF WIGHT ; or the Wonderful Rocking Horse. By 
 Mrs. FREDERICK BROWN. With Illustrations by her sister, 
 HELEN S. TATHAM. Crown quarto. [Preparing. 
 
 THE CHURCHMAN'S DAILY REMEM- 
 BRANCER. With Poetical Selections for the Christian Year, 
 with Calendar and Table of Lessons of the English Church, for 
 the use of both Clergy and Laity. Cloth elegant, price 2s. ; or 
 with Photographs, cloth elegant, 4s. 
 
 *.,;* May also be had in various leather Bindings. 
 
 It is founded entirely on the Calendar of the Prayer-book of 
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 well as of lost friends, but to serve as a record of all other events 
 which it may be desirable to chronicle. A small and carefully 
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 HISTORICAL SKETCHES OF THE RE- 
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 " The entire volume .... is well worth reading." Tablet. 
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 THE COMMERCIAL PRODUCTS OF THE 
 
 SEA; or, Marine Contributions to Industry and Art. By P. L. 
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 "A well-arranged and pleasantly- written exposition." Academy. 
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 Nature. 
 
 " The chapters comprise much interesting information, and convey a 
 great many facts which it is useful to know." Daily News.
 
 PUBLISHED BY GRIFFITH AND FAEEAN. O 
 
 A GLOSSARY OF BIOLOGICAL, ANA- 
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 and Students in Schools and Classes connected with the Science 
 and Art Department, and other Examining bodies. By 
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 THE CRIMEAN CAMPAIGN WITH THE 
 
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 I'intetl Service Gazette. 
 
 CHILD LIFE IN JAPAN, and Japanese 
 
 Child Stories. By M. CHAPLIN AYRTON (Bachelier-es-Lottres, 
 et Bachelier-es-Sciences, Paris, Civis Academic Edinensis, and 
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 " People who give it away are likely to be tempted to buy a new copy to 
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 " A genuine success It is, indeed, difficult to say which can be 
 
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 Academy. 
 
 MEMORABLE BATTLES IN ENGLISH 
 
 HISTORY : The Military Lives of the Commanders. By W. 
 H. DAVENPORT ADAMS. New and thoroughly Revised Edition. 
 With Frontispiece and Plans of Battles. Two vols. , Crown 
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 " The materials for these two volumes have been carefully collected and 
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 " Will no doubt prove popular." Athenasum. 
 
 OCEAN AND HER RULERS : A Narrative 
 
 of the Nations which have from the Earliest Ages held Dominion 
 over the Sea, comprising a Brief History of Navigation from 
 the Remotest Periods up to the Present Time. By ALFRED 
 ELWES. New, Enlarged, and thoroughly Revised Edition, with 
 16 Illustrations by WALTER W. MAT. Crown Svo. Price 9s. 
 
 " It is a privilege to read such a book." Art Journal. 
 
 "A spiritedly written narrative." Broad Arrow. 
 
 " An excellent authority on naval matters." Leeds Mtrcury.
 
 NEW AND POPULAR WORKS 
 
 CONFIRMATION: or Called, and Chosen, 
 
 and Faithful. By the Author of " The Gospel in the Church's 
 Seasons " series. With a Preface hy The Very Reverend the 
 DEAN OF CHESTER. Fcap. 8vo., Cloth, Is. 
 
 A cheaper edition for distribution, price ( ,hf. 
 
 A New Novel by the Author of "Bonnie Lesley." 
 
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 By Sirs. HERBERT MARTIN, Author of " Bonnie Lesley," &c. 
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 "Mrs. Martin is to be congratulated on having achieved a fresh success 
 with her new story." John Lv.V. 
 
 " Will not disappoint those readers who remember with pleasure the 
 
 bright freshness and charm of her last story Those who liked 
 
 ' Bonnie Lesley ' may send for its successor with the certainty of finding 
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 " Quite worth reading by old and young alike.'' Graph<<-. 
 
 " Mrs. Martin exhibits in many portions of these two volumes excep- 
 tional talent for writing, and a remarkable amount of world experience." 
 
 Morning Post. 
 
 STORIES FOR DAUGHTERS AT HOME. 
 MY SISTER'S KEEPER: A Story for Girls. 
 
 In one vol. By LACRA M. LANE, Author of " Gentleman 
 Versehoyle," &c. With a Preface by Mrs. TOWNS I;\L>. Presi- 
 dent of the Girls' Friendly Society. Cloth, price 5s. 
 
 ' Written in a bright and pleasing style." Pictorial Worhl. 
 
 'As a professedly religious novel is good of its kind." Atlifntvitm. 
 
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 ' Bright and charming." Ci' : Scotsman . 
 
 ' It is undoubtedly a tale we recommend every girl in England to get 
 
 and read We can cordially recommend (it) to readers old and 
 
 young, and we trust it may have the success it deserves." Dnii>i JV>jcs. 
 
 "Miss Lane has done her work very skilfully, and has made it not a 
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 "BONNIE LESLEY:" A Novelette in One 
 
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 LEFT ALONE ; or, The Fortunes of Phillis 
 
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 PUBLISHED BY GRIFFITH AND FABBAN. 7 
 
 A NAUTICAL NOVEL. 
 THE SECRET OF THE SANDS; or, The 
 
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 Saturdny Review. 
 
 " Brisk and exciting 1 May, in a certain sense, be classed among 
 
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 TRIED BY FIRE. By FEANCIS CAEE, Author of 
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 end by taking a good place among lady novelists." Athenceum. 
 
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 hearts under affliction." Daily Chronicle. 
 
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 who enjoy a good story well told." Morning Post. 
 
 " A rermirkable work." Queen. 
 
 NEEDLEWORK, Schedule III., Exemplified 
 
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 Illustrations, price Is. 
 
 MASTERPIECES OF ANTIQUE ART. 
 
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 Bishop Zen's Approach to the Holy Altar. With an Address to 
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 copy, -with prices for quantities, post free for six stamps, on application. 
 
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 nion. Price 2d. 
 
 A New ' ' In Memoriam ' ' Card. Beautifully printed in silver or gold. 
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 %* A reduction made on taking a quantity of the 
 
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 Short and Simple Prayers, with Hymns for the Use of 
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 Book of Bememhrance (The) FOR EVERY DAY IN TILE YEAR. With 
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 *#* This may also be had in various styles of binding, at prices 
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 Emblems of Christian Life. Illustrated by W. HARRY ROGERS, 
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 Golden Words for Children, FROM THE BOOK OF LIFE. In English, 
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 Asem, the Man Hater : an Eastern Tale by OLIVER GOLDSMITH. 
 With Illustrations and an Editorial Introduction. Quarto. 
 Price 2s.
 
 PUBLISHED BY GEIFFITH AND FAEBAN. 9 
 
 Miscellaneous Books continued. 
 
 A Catechism of the Thirty-Nine Articles of Religion. By .1. "W. 
 Second Edition, corrected and enlarged. Cloth, price 3s. 6d. 
 
 Caxton's Fifteen O's and other Prayers. Printed by command 
 of the Princess Elizabeth, Queen of England and France, and 
 also of the Princess Margaret, mother of our Sovereign Lord 
 the Kfing. By WM. CAXTON. Reproduced in Photo-Litho- 
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 Plaiting Pictures. A NOVEL PASTIME BY WHICH CHILDREN CAN 
 
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 first Series. Juvenile Party Zoological Gardens The Gleaner. 
 Second Series. Birds' Pic-nic Cats' Concert Three Bears. 
 Third Series. Blind Man's Butt Children in the Wood Snow Man. 
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 The Headlong Career and Woeful Ending of Precocious Piggy. 
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 Fifth and cheaper Edition. Fancy wrapper, 4to. price Is. 
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 " The illustrations are intensely humorous." The Critic. 
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 Female Christian Names, AND THEIR TEACHINGS. A Gift Book for 
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 " Well fitted for a gift book.'" Churchman's Magazine. 
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 The Day Dreams of a Sleepless Man : being a series of Papers 
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 " Decidedly clever and full of good humour." Graphic. 
 
 Mission from Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee. WITH A DE- 
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 daughter, Mrs. HALE. With map of the route to Coomassie. 
 Post 8ro. Price 5s. 
 
 Joan of Arc AND THE TIMES OF CHARLES THE SEVENTH. By Mrs. 
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 tion, but with sympathies awakened and elevated." Times. 
 
 The Good St. Louis and His Times. By Mrs. BRAY. With 
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 Sagas from the Far East,, or KALMOUK AND MONGOLIAN TALES, 
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 10 NEW AND POPULAR WOBKS 
 
 STANESBY'S ILLUMINATED GIFT BOOKS. 
 
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 The Birth-Day Souvenir. A Book of Thoughts on Life and 
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 Light for the Path of Life; from the Holy Scriptures. Small 
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 The Wisdom of Solomon ; from the Book of Proverbs. Small 4to, 
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 Skakespeare's Household Words. With a Photograph from the 
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 Aphorisms of the Wise and Good. With a Photographic Portrait of 
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 WORKS BY JOHN TIMES, F.S.A. 
 
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 Ancestral Stories and Traditions of Great Families. Illustrative 
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 Strange Stories of the Animal World. A Book of Curious Con- 
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 PICTURE BOOKS FOR EVERT CHILD. 
 
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 from Drawings by J. ABSOLON, H. K. BROWNE (Phiz), J. 
 GILBERT, T. LANDSEER, J. LEECH, J. S. PROUT, H. WEIR, &c.
 
 PUBLISHED BY GRIFFITH AND FAEEAN. 11 
 
 Six Shillings each, cloth elegant, tvith Illustrations. 
 
 Kingston's (W. H. G.) The Missing Ship, OK NOTES FROM THE 
 Loo OF THE " OUZEL GALLEY," (bevelled boards, gilt 
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 The Three Admirals, AND THE ADVENTURES OF THEIR 
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 TEENTH CENTURY, (bevelled boards, gilt edges, 7s. Gd.) 
 
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 Three Midshipmen (The). New Edition, with 24 
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 Hurricane Hurry, or THE ADVENTURES OF A NAVAL 
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 ,, True Blue; or, The Life and Adventures of a British 
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 Ice Maiden AND OTHER STORIES. By HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN. 
 
 39 Illustrations by ZWECKER. Gilt edges. 
 Journey to the Centre of the Earth. Authorized Translation. 
 
 From the French of JULES VERNE. New Edition. With 
 
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 Five Shillings each, Small Post 8w, cloth elegant; 
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 Chums : A Story for the Youngsters, of Schoolboy Life and 
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 Early Start in Life (The). By EMILIA MARRTAT NORRIS. 
 
 Gentleman Cadet (The): His CAREER AND ADVENTURES AT THE ROYAL 
 ACADEMY, WOOLWICH. By LIEUT.-COLONEL DRAYSON.
 
 12 NEW AND POPULAR WORKS 
 
 Five Shillings each continued. 
 
 Gerald and Harry, or THE BOYS is THE NORTH. By EMILIA 
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 Hair-Breadth Escapes, or THE ADVENTURES OF THREE BOYS IN 
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 Heroes of the Crusades. By BARBARA HUTTON. Post 8vo. 
 
 Home Life in the Highlands. By LILIAS GRAEME. With Illus- 
 trations by C. 0. MURRAY. Post 8vo, price 5s. 
 
 Household Stories from the land of Hofer, or POPULAR MYTH- 
 
 OF TIROL, INCLUDING THE ROSE GARDEN OF KlNG LiARYN. 
 
 John Deane of Nottingham, His ADVENTURES AND EXPLOITS: 
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 Out on the Pampas, or THE YOUXG SETTLERS. By G. A. HENTY. 
 
 Author of " The Young Franc Tireurs," etc. 
 
 Patranas, or SPANISH STORIES, LEGENDARY AND TRADITIONAL. 
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 Swift and Sure, or THE CAREER OF Two BROTHERS. By ALFRED 
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 Tales of the Saracens. By BARBARA HUITON. 
 Tales of the White Cockade. By BARBARA BUTTON. 
 
 Wilton of Cuthbert's: A TALI: OF UNDERGRADUATE LIFE THIRTY 
 YEARS AGO. By the Rev. H. C. Adams. 
 
 Young Franc Tireurs (The), AND THEIR ADVENTURES DURING THE 
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 Fcap. Svo, Illustrated, price Five Shillings, gilt edges. 
 
 Elwes' (A.) Luke Ashleigh, or SCHOOL LIFE IN HOLLAND. 
 
 ,, Paul Blake, or A Boi's PERILS IN CORSICA AND MONTE 
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 Neptune's Heroes, or THE SEA KINGS OF ENGLAND, FROM HAWKINS 
 TO FRANKLIN. By W. H. DAVENPORT ADAMS.
 
 PUBLISHED BY GRIFFITH AND PAEEAN. 13 
 
 A NEW UNIFORM SERIES OF FIVE SHILLING VOLS. 
 
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 The Day of Wonders : A MEDLEY OF SENSE AND NONSENSE. By 
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 Harty the Wanderer ; or, CONDUCT is FATE. A Talc by FAIRLBIGII 
 
 OWEN. 28 Illustrations by JOHN PROCTOR. 
 
 A Wayside Posy. GATHERED FOR GIRLS. By F. LABLACHE. 
 15 Illustrations by A. H. COLLINS. 
 
 Extraordinary Nursery Rhymes ; New, yet Old. Translated from 
 the Original Jingle into Comic Verse by One who was once a 
 Child. 60 Illustrations. Small 4to, price 5s. 
 
 Little Gipsy (The). By ELIE SADVAGE. Translated by ANNA 
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 Merry Songs for Little Voices. Words by Mrs. BRODERIP. Music 
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 Norstone; or, RIFTS IN THE CLOUDS. By M. E. HATTERSLEY. 
 
 One vol., crown 8vo. cloth, 5s. 
 
 This book is chiefly descriptive of chorister life in a cathedral city. 
 Stories from the Old and New Testaments. By the Rev. B. H. 
 
 DRAPER. With 48 Engravings. Fifth edition, price 5s. 
 
 Trimmer's History of the Robins. Written for the Instruction of 
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 Talks about Plants, or ARLY LESSONS IN BOTANY. By Mrs. 
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 16 NEW AND POPULAR WOEK8 
 
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 28 EDUCATIONAL WORKS 
 
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 30 EDUCATIONAL WORKS 
 
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 32 EDUCATIONAL WOKKS BY GRIFFITH AND FABRAN. 
 
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