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 I
 
 STUDIES FROM COURT AND 
 CLOISTER
 
 Photo by 
 
 Emery Walker. 
 
 MARGARET TUDOR (Daughter of Henry VII., and Queen of 
 
 James IV. of Scotland). 
 From a Portrait by Van Orley in the National Portrait Gallery. 
 
 [frontispiece.
 
 STUDIES FROM COURT 
 ' 'AND CLOISTER . 
 
 BEING ESSAYS, HISTORICAL AND LITERARY, 
 
 DEALING MAINLY WITH SUBJECTS RELATING 
 
 TO THE XVI TH AND XVII TH CENTURIES 
 
 BY J. M. STONE 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 MARY THE FIRST, QUEEN OF ENGLAND," "REFORMATION AND RENAISSANCE, 
 
 ETC. 
 
 SANDS & CO. 
 
 EDINBURGH: 13 BANK STREET 
 
 LONDON: 23 BEDFORD STREET, STRAND 
 
 1905
 
 TO 
 
 IN HONOUR OF 
 A LONG AND LOYAL FRIENDSHIP
 
 PREFACE 
 
 THESE studies on various crucial points connected with the 
 history of religion in Europe at the close of the Middle Ages, 
 its decline, revival, and the causes which led to both, have 
 already appeared in print as regards their general outline, 
 although they have for the most part been rewritten, added to, 
 and in each case subjected to a careful revision. 
 
 Three of them were originally published in the Dublin 
 Review, four in the Scottish Review, two in BlackwoocPs 
 Magazine, and three in the Month. One was a contribution to 
 the American Catholic Quarterly Review. By the courtesy of 
 the respective editors of these publications I am enabled to 
 gather them together in this volume. 
 
 It will be seen at a glance that a certain cohesion, historical 
 and chronological, exists in their present arrangement, especially 
 with reference to Part I. 
 
 The two first studies concern Henry VIII. and his sister the 
 Queen of Scots, the significance of their matrimonial affairs, and 
 the relations which their policy created between England, 
 Scotland, France, and the Empire. The third study has for its 
 subject the distinguished and much-maligned Lieutenant of the 
 Tower of London, who contributed so largely to the accession 
 of the rightful sovereign, and who was appointed to be governor 
 of the Princess Elizabeth during her captivity at Woodstock. 
 His subsequent persecution for the sake of religion was the
 
 viii PREFACE 
 
 consequence of Henry VHIth's rupture with Rome, and 
 Elizabeth's repudiation of England's Catholic past And as we 
 can only gain an intelligible view of any historical movement by 
 studying its context, its broad outlines, and its connection with 
 foreign nations, the fourth essay describes the condition to which 
 the religious revolution had reduced Germany in the sixteenth 
 century, and the reconversion of a great part of that country, as 
 well as of Austria and Switzerland, to the Catholic faith. This 
 was the work of the Jesuit, Peter Canisius, and we are thus led 
 to a consideration of the newly-founded Society of Jesus and its 
 methods. Its members soon became noted for sanctity and 
 learning, and emperors, kings, and royal princes clamoured for 
 Jesuits as confessors. The manner in which these acquitted 
 themselves of the difficult and unwelcome task imposed on them, 
 is unconsciously revealed by themselves, in the private corre- 
 spondence of members of the old Society, which has now been 
 given to the world by one of their Order. Selections from this 
 correspondence are contained in the fifth study. As a further 
 result of the revolution that had been effected in the casting off" 
 of old beliefs and traditions, we note the revival of Pantheism, 
 an ancient, atheistic philosophy, whose modern apostle was the 
 celebrated Giordano Bruno. His otherwise fruitless visit to 
 England left a deep impression on certain minds, learned and 
 ignorant, and we begin for the first time to hear of examinations 
 and prosecutions for atheism in this country. And this forms 
 the subject of the sixth essay. The recoil that invariably takes 
 place after any great political, social, or religious upheaval was 
 not wanting to the Reformation in England, and, in the reign of 
 Charles I. High-Churchism, under Archbishop Laud, was thought 
 to indicate a desire on the part of the royalists for a return to 
 Catholic unity. A Papal agent was dispatched to England to 
 negotiate between the Catholic Queen, Henrietta Maria and 
 Cardinal Barberini, with a view to the conversion of her 
 husband, which would, it was hoped, ultimately issue in the 
 corporate reunion of the country with Rome.
 
 PREFACE ix 
 
 Thus, Part I. deals with some of the persons who had " their 
 exits and their entrances," who made history during this 
 interesting period. Part II. treats more especially of the 
 books and manuscripts connected with it. The theme is 
 therefore the same. 
 
 Even before England was England, she was the Isle of 
 Saints, and throughout the Middle Ages religion was her chief 
 care, in a manner almost incredible in this secular and material- 
 istic age. She not only covered the land with magnificent 
 churches and cathedrals, to the architecture of which we cannot 
 in these days approach, even by imitation, distantly, but she 
 also built huge monasteries, and these monasteries were the 
 cradles, the homes of vast stores of ever-accumulating know- 
 ledge. A system of philosophy, to which the world is even now 
 returning, recognising that there is no better training for the 
 human intellect, is so distinctly mediaeval, that all that savoured 
 even remotely of St Thomas Aquinas or Duns Scotus in the 
 University was utterly destroyed in a great bonfire made at 
 Oxford in 1549. At the dissolution of the monasteries by 
 Henry VIII., the labour, the learning, the genius of centuries 
 were as nought. Exquisitely written and illuminated Bibles, 
 missals and other choice manuscripts, displaying a wealth of 
 palaeographic art to which we have lost the key, were torn from 
 their jewelled bindings, and were either thrown aside to spoil 
 and rot, or to become the prey of any who needed wrappers for 
 small merchandise. It is a marvel that so many should have 
 escaped destruction, to be collected when men had returned to 
 their sane senses, and formed again into libraries for the 
 delight and instruction of posterity to the end of time. And 
 almost as strange as this circumstance, is the fact that so few 
 among us know of the existence of these treasures which have 
 become our national inheritance. Otherwise, how could the 
 reviewer of one of our foremost literary publications, in his 
 notice of the exhibition of mediaeval needlework at the 
 Burlington Fine Arts Club, in the spring of 1905, have
 
 x PREFACE 
 
 discovered in it a surprising revelation of the " refinement " of 
 the Middle Ages? 
 
 The three last studies in the present volume are, therefore, 
 devoted to a description of some of the precious spoils of 
 mediaeval refinement. Where all is so splendidly beautiful, so 
 deeply erudite, or so tenderly naif, choice is difficult ; but at all 
 events, here are a few of the priceless gems with which the Dark 
 Ages have endowed a scornful after-world. 
 
 And lest it should be supposed that all this mediaeval piety 
 and devotion sprang up suddenly, with no apparent raison d'etre, 
 I have gone further back, and have shown that with the first dawn 
 of Christianity over these Islands, religion was no other than in 
 the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries. The Arthurian 
 legends, which Sir Thomas Malory wove into one consecutive 
 whole, had been handed down from generation to generation for 
 many hundreds of years. Sometimes they had been written in 
 the French language, but they lived in the minds of the people, 
 and Sir Lancelot, who died " a holy man," was as vivid and real 
 to them as was Richard, the troubadour king. With the story 
 of his sharp penance, his fasting and prayers for the soul of 
 Guinevere, was also handed down incidentally the tradition of 
 Britain's obedience to the " Apostle Pope." 
 
 Some time after the Anglo-Saxon conquest, in the eighth 
 century, was set up a wonderful churchyard Cross at Ruthwell 
 in Scotland, a " folk-book in stone," alluded to in the Act passed 
 by the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in 1642, 
 "anent the Idolatrous Monuments in Ruthwell," and already 
 two years previously condemned by that enlightened body to 
 be " taken down, demolished, and destroyed." The story of this 
 ancient Cross, and that of the runes carved upon it, form the 
 subject of the opening study of Part II. 
 
 Little need be said here of Foxe, the great calumniator of 
 Queen Mary's bishops. His book, which so long deceived the 
 world, is no more the power it once was, but in it lay the 
 venom which poisoned the wells, as far as the ill-fated reign of
 
 PREFACE xi 
 
 Mary was concerned ; and the essay which deals with it could 
 scarcely have been omitted. 
 
 In the hope that I have been enabled to throw a faint ray of 
 additional light on some vexed but interesting questions, this 
 volume is put forward. 
 
 J. M. S. 
 
 September 1905.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PART I 
 
 CHAP. PAOE 
 
 I. MARGARET TUDOR ...... 3 
 
 II. NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW ..... 35 
 
 III. A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN ..... 52 
 
 IV. THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY ... 95 
 V. JESUITS AT COURT . . . . . .131 
 
 VI. GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND . . . .158 
 
 VII. CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT . . 178 
 
 PART II 
 
 I. THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA . . . 207 
 
 II. A MISSING PAGE FROM THE "IDYLLS OF THE KING" . 223 
 
 III. FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS ..... 250 
 
 IV. THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES .... 277 
 V. THE ROYAL LIBRARY ...... 309 
 
 VI. THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS . . 335 
 
 INDEX ....,,,, 369 
 
 XiH
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 MARGARET TUDOR, Daughter of Henry VII., and Queen 
 of James IV. of Scotland (from a Portrait by Van 
 Orley, in the National Portrait Gallery) . Frontispiece 
 
 ANNE OF CLEVES, Fourth Wife of Henry VIII. (from a 
 
 Portrait by Hans Holbein, in the Louvre) . To face page 35 
 
 KATHARINE HOWARD, Fifth Wife of Henry VIII. (from 
 
 a Portrait in the National Portrait Gallery) . 42 
 
 SIR HENRY BEDINGFELD, Lieutenant of the Tower of 
 
 London (from a Portrait at Oxburgh) . 52 
 
 SIR WALTER RALEIGH (from a Portrait by F. Zucharo, 
 
 in the National Portrait Gallery) . 164 
 
 THE RUTHWELL CROSS IN ITS PRESENT CONDITION 
 
 (from a Photograph) . . . . 207 
 
 SIR ROBERT COTTON (from a Portrait by Thornhill, in 
 
 the National Portrait Gallery) ... 277 
 
 HENRY, PRINCE OF WALES, Eldest Son of James I. 
 (from a Portrait by Van Somers, in the National 
 Portrait Gallery) .... 309
 
 PART I
 
 STUDIES FROM COURT AND 
 CLOISTER 
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 
 
 NOTWITHSTANDING the spy-system which was brought to 
 so great a perfection under the Tudors, the study of human 
 nature was in their days yet in its infancy. The world had 
 long ceased to be ingenuous, but nations had not yet learned 
 civilised methods of guarding themselves against their 
 enemies. At a time when distrust was general, it was easier, 
 like Machiavelli, to erect deceit and fraud into a science, 
 and to teach the vile utility of lying, than to scrutinise 
 character and weigh motives. It was then generally under- 
 stood that opponents might legitimately be hoodwinked to 
 the limits of their gullibility ; but it was reserved for Lord 
 Chesterfield, two centuries later, to show how a man's passions 
 must be studied with microscopic intensity in order to 
 discover his prevailing passion, and how, that passion once 
 discovered, he should never be trusted where it was concerned. 
 The study of men's characters and motives as we understand 
 it, formed no part of the policy of sixteenth-century statecraft, 
 or Wolsey would not have been disgraced, or Thomas 
 Cromwell's head have fallen on the block. Wolsey and 
 Cromwell were the subtlest statesmen of their age; indeed, 
 
 in them statecraft may be said to have had its dawn; yet 
 
 s
 
 4 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Henry VIII., by the sheer force of his tyranny and despotic 
 will, baffled them both. While Cromwell, the greatest genius 
 in Europe, thought he held all the threads of intrigue in his 
 own hands, his royal master by the dogged pursuit of one 
 end overthrew the minister's entire scheme. Saturated 
 though he was with Machiavellian theories, a man of one 
 book, and that book The Prince, Cromwell lost all by his 
 inability to read the bent of Henry's mind and purpose. 
 
 Henry VIII. and his elder sister, Margaret, were strik- 
 ingly alike in character. Both proved themselves to be cruel, 
 vindictive, unscrupulous, sensual, and vain. Both were 
 extraordinarily clever, but Henry being far better educated 
 than his sister, contrived to cut a much more imposing, if 
 not a more dignified, figure. In the matter of intrigue, there 
 was nothing to choose between them. That Henry succeeded 
 where Margaret failed, was owing to the fact that circum- 
 stances were in his favour and not in hers. Given two such 
 characters, the only parts that were possible to them were 
 dominating ones. Henry was master of the situation all 
 through the piece ; Margaret was not, but she could play no 
 other part. Had she been differently constituted, had she 
 been barely honest, true, constant, and pure, there is no 
 limit to the love and loyalty she would certainly have 
 inspired. 
 
 But, for want of insight into Margaret Tudor's disposition, 
 the Scottish people were repeatedly betrayed by one whose 
 interests they fondly hoped had become, by marriage with 
 their king, identical with their own. She had come among 
 them at an age when new impressions are quickly taken and 
 experiences of every kind have necessarily been very limited, 
 but to the end of her days she remained an alien in their 
 midst 
 
 From the moment that she set foot in Scotland, as a 
 bride of thirteen, she began to sow discord ; but although 
 it was soon apparent that she would seize every occasion to
 
 MARGARET tubott 5 
 
 turn public events to her own profit, James IV. had so 
 mistaken a belief in her one day becoming a good Scots- 
 woman, that when he went to his death on Flodden Field, 
 he left the whole welfare of his country in her hands. Not 
 only did he confide the treasure of the realm to her 
 custody, but by his will he appointed her to the Regency, 
 with the sole guardianship of his infant son. 
 
 Such a thing was unprecedented in Scotland, and it 
 needed all the fidelity of the Scottish lords to their chivalrous 
 sovereign, as well as their enthusiasm for his young and 
 beautiful widow, to induce them to tolerate an arrangement 
 so distasteful to them all. Had Margaret cared to fit herself 
 for the duties that lay before her, her lot might have been 
 a brilliant one. Instead of the wretched wars which made a 
 perpetual wilderness of the Borders, keeping the nation in a 
 constant state of ferment, an advantageous treaty would have 
 secured prosperity to both England and Scotland, while the 
 various disturbing factions, which rendered Scotland so 
 difficult to govern by main force, would gradually have 
 subsided under the gentle influence of a queen who united 
 all parties through the loyalty she inspired. Fierce and 
 rebellious as were so many of the elements which went to 
 make up the Scottish people at that time, Margaret had a 
 far easier task than her grand-daughter, Mary Stuart, for at 
 least fanatical religious differences did not enter into the 
 difficulties she had to encounter. But such a queen of 
 Scotland as would have claimed the respect and won the 
 lasting love of her subjects was by no means the Margaret 
 Tudor of history, as she stands revealed in her corre- 
 spondence. 
 
 While James IV. lived she had comparatively few oppor- 
 tunities of betraying State secrets, but from the disaster of 
 Flodden to her death, her history is one long series of 
 intrigues, the outcome of her ruling passions vanity and 
 greed. Her first short-sighted act of treachery after the
 
 6 STUDIES FkOM COURT AKt> CLOISTER 
 
 death of James was to appropriate to her own use the 
 treasure which he had entrusted to her for his successors, 
 the queen thereby incurring life-long retribution in her in- 
 effectual attempts to wring her jointure from an exchequer 
 which she had herself wantonly impoverished. Hence the 
 tiresome and ridiculous wrangling in connection with her 
 "conjunct feoffment," neither Margaret nor Henry being 
 conscious, in the complete absence of all sense of humour on 
 their part, that the situation was occasionally grotesque. 
 Stolidly unmindful of the effect they produced on the minds 
 of others in the pursuit of their own selfish ends, they 
 pursued the tenor of their way with bucolic doggedness. 
 The doggedness ended in the defeat of all Henry's enemies ; 
 in Margaret's case it ended in her own. 
 
 The eleven months which elapsed between the gth 
 September 1513 to the 4th August 1514, were the most 
 eventful of her whole life. The catastrophe of Flodden left 
 her, perhaps not without cause, the least mournful woman in 
 Scotland, for James IV., with all the heroism that attaches 
 to his name, had little claim to be called a faithful husband. 
 Unhindered, therefore, by any excess of grief, she was the 
 better able to attend to the affairs of State, and to hasten 
 the coronation of her little son, a baby of one year and five 
 months. In December she convened the Parliament of 
 Scotland to meet at Stirling Castle, and formally took up 
 the dignity of regent with the consent of the assembled 
 nobility of the realm. At this sitting the greatest unanimity 
 prevailed. In the Acts of the Privy Council of Scotland, 
 under date I2th January 1514, occurs the following entry: 
 " To advise of the setting up of the Queen's household, and 
 what persons and officers are necessary thereto, and to 
 advise of the expenses for the supportation of the same, and 
 by what ways it shall be gotten." 
 
 All was peace for a short time, and the most friendly 
 relations existed between the queen and her Council, till the
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 7 
 
 first high-handed attempt of Henry VIII. to interfere 
 through his sister in the government of Scotland, resulted 
 in her temporary banishment, and the removal of the infant 
 king from his mother's care. 1 
 
 On the 3<Dth April Margaret gave birth to a posthumous 
 son, who received the title of Duke of Rothesay ; and scarcely 
 had she reappeared in public after the birth of this child, when 
 an envoy from the Emperor Maximilian brought overtures of 
 marriage. About the same time, she received a like proposal 
 from Louis XII. of France, who afterwards married her younger 
 sister Mary. Dismissing both aspirants to her hand, before 
 the first year of her widowhood had run its course, she married 
 Archibald, Earl of Angus, Margaret being in her twenty-fifth, 
 he in his nineteenth year. The union was equally unfortunate 
 for the queen herself and for her wretched husband, who, 
 when the first charm of novelty had passed, was disdainfully 
 flung aside, and never restored to favour. 
 
 There was an ancient custom of the realm, which placed 
 the executive power and the person of the king, should he 
 be a minor at the death of the preceding sovereign, in the 
 hands of the next male heir, and the appointment of James's 
 widow to the regency and the guardianship of his son was 
 made in distinct disregard of all recognised precedent. The 
 consent of the Scottish lords to the innovation had been given 
 entirely from a sense of loyalty to their beloved and un- 
 fortunate monarch James IV. But a proviso had been made 
 in his will, that in the event of the queen's remarriage, the 
 regency, as well as the guardianship of the king, should pass 
 to John, Duke of Albany, the next heir to the throne. 
 
 But Margaret, who had not scrupled to make away with 
 the royal treasure, was scarcely likely to be very conscientious 
 
 1 P. Martyr, Ep. 535. For a detailed account of the state of Scotland 
 for the first nine years after the disastrous defeat at Flodden, see vol. xiv. 
 of the Exchequer Rolls of Scotland^ edited by George Burnett, LL.D., Lyon 
 King-of-Arms, and A. Y. G. Mackay, M.A. (Oxon.), LL.D. (Edin.), etc., 
 His Majesty's General Register House, Edinburgh.
 
 8 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 in regard to the duty of laying down a sceptre, the pleasant- 
 ness of which she had only just begun to taste. She was 
 already at variance with her Council, who, in despair of any 
 order being established, had invited Albany, then in France, 
 to come over and take up the reins of government. As early 
 as April 1514, a Bill for his recall had been read in Parliament, 
 and it was formally enacted that all the fortresses in Scotland 
 should be given up, a blow aimed primarily at Stirling, the 
 queen's chief stronghold. 1 Here she and Angus had shut 
 themselves up, on hearing that Beaton, Archbishop of Glasgow, 
 was marching on Edinburgh. They were captured, but 
 escaped and returned to Stirling, where they were besieged 
 by John Hepburn, Prior of St Andrews. 
 
 Margaret, assuming a tone of injured innocence, wrote to 
 Henry VI II., telling him that she and her party are in great 
 trouble till they know what help he will give them ; that her 
 enemies continue to usurp the king's authority in Parliament, 
 holding her and her friends to be rebels ; and she entreats 
 him to hasten his army against Scotland by sea and by 
 land. 2 This was clearly as much an act of treason as if she 
 had deliberately invited any other foreign enemy to come 
 and take possession of the realm ; for although her object 
 was merely to regain the powers she had lost by her own 
 acts, she could estimate the ruin which would have resulted 
 to Scotland, if Henry had really been in a position to invade 
 the country. His answer to her appeal was to send the 
 most urgent instructions to his sister to prevent Albany's 
 landing by every means at her disposal. In the meanwhile 
 she waited impatiently, but in vain, for both troops and 
 money from Henry, who did not think it necessary to inform 
 her that the French king had agreed to detain Albany in 
 France, on condition that his dear cousin should send his 
 
 1 Brewer Preface to Cal. 2, part i. (note). 
 
 2 Queen Margaret to Henry VIII., 23rd November 1514; MS. Cott., 
 Calig. B I, 164 ; Brit. Mus.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 9 
 
 sister no help, but leave the various parties in Scotland to 
 fight out their quarrels alone. 
 
 As a result of this policy, Margaret at last began to find 
 her position intolerable, and she, no less than her enemies 
 looked forward to the duke's arrival as a means of extricating 
 herself from a labyrinth of difficulties. This was perhaps 
 what Francis I. had foreseen ; notwithstanding his promise 
 to Henry, he had no intention of permanently preventing 
 Albany, who was more than half a Frenchman, from assum- 
 ing a dignity that would result in a strong bond of union 
 between Scotland and France. Albany was therefore quietly 
 allowed to escape at a given moment ; and when, after running 
 the gauntlet of Henry's ships, which were watching for him, 
 he landed in Scotland, Margaret resolved, for once wisely, to 
 be friends with him. 1 
 
 But Henry instructed Lord Dacre, the formidable chief 
 of the Marches, to stir up all the strife possible between his 
 sister, the new regent, and the Scottish lords, and accord- 
 ingly, whenever there was a sign of a better understanding 
 between the three parties, Dacre was always careful to 
 insinuate to the queen that her brother was her best friend. 
 Finding that Albany had escaped the vigilance of his fleet, 
 Henry wrote a high-handed letter to the Scottish Council 
 requesting that he might be sent back to France forthwith. 
 Their reply was as dignified as Albany's own conduct 
 throughout, and in strong contrast to Margaret's attitude. 
 They have, they say, received Henry's letter, dated 1st July 
 1516, desiring them to remove John, Duke of Albany, the 
 regent from the person of their king, in order to promote 
 the amity of the two realms. The duke was chosen Protector 
 by the unanimous voice of the Three Estates, and was sent 
 for by them from France ; he left his master, his lady, his 
 living ; he has taken great pains in the king's service ; he has 
 
 1 Seb. Giustinian to the Doge, London, 5th August 1515 ; Venetian 
 Archives.
 
 lo STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 given, and proposes to give, no cause for dissatisfaction, and 
 if he would leave, they would not let him. Moreover, it is in 
 exact conformity with their laws that the nearest in succession 
 should have the governance ; security has been taken by the 
 queen and others to remove all cause of suspicion, and they 
 will spend their lives if any attempt be made against his 
 Highness. 1 This document was signed and sealed by twenty- 
 eight spiritual and temporal lords, whose names are still 
 legible. Ten other names are mutilated beyond recognition, 
 although their seals remain. 
 
 Albany had meanwhile written to Lord Dacre, denying 
 that he had usurped the king's authority, and declaring that 
 he had done nothing but by order of the Estates of the 
 realm. But Henry was bent on picking a quarrel with him, 
 and Dacre's letter to the King of England's Council shows 
 the part which Dacre was instructed to play in the troubles 
 of Scotland, fomenting feuds between Albany and every 
 member of his government, in the hope of driving him out 
 of the country. 2 Difficult, however, as Henry's policy made 
 it, the regent was bent on maintaining peace, and would 
 probably have succeeded but for Margaret. 3 
 
 The good understanding between the regent and the queen 
 was first broken by his summons to her to deliver up the 
 royal children into his custody, a cruel but necessary proceed- 
 ing, since the regency was inseparable from the governorship 
 of the king and the next heir. 
 
 A true and tender chord is struck at last, when Margaret, 
 appealing to Henry, exclaims, " God send I were such a 
 woman as might go with my bairns in mine arms. I trow 
 I should not be long fra you ! " Nor is it possible to feel 
 aught but sympathy for her, when she allows herself to be 
 stormed in Stirling Castle before she suffers her children to 
 
 1 Scottish lords to Henry VIII., 4th July 1516 ; Record Office. 
 
 2 Cotton MS., Calig. B 2, 341 ; Brit. Mus. 
 
 3 Albany to Dacre, loth August 1515 ; R.O.
 
 MARGARET tubofc 11 
 
 be torn from her. Dacre professed to believe, and perhaps 
 caused Margaret to fear, that they would be destroyed if they 
 fell into the Duke of Albany's power. But the very day 
 on which Dacre wrote to Henry's Council, advising that 
 money should be sent to enable her to hold out, the regent 
 prepared to bombard her, and it was not till her friends had 
 forsaken her, flying for their lives and in terror of Albany's 
 proclamation, that placing the keys of the fortress in her 
 little son's hands, she desired him to give them to the 
 regent, and to beg him to show favour to himself, to his 
 brother, and to her husband. The regent answered that 
 he would be good to the king, to his brother, and to their 
 mother ; but that as for Angus, he " would not dalye with 
 no traitor." 1 
 
 No sooner had Margaret given up her children, than she 
 began to manoeuvre how to steal them back and spirit them 
 over the Border. While pretending to be too ill to leave 
 her palace at Linlithgow, where she gave out she had 
 "taken her chamber" in anticipation of her approaching 
 confinement, she effected her escape into England, but her 
 plan for capturing the king and his brother failed. Nothing 
 could now exceed her desolate condition, as, wandering from 
 place to place, alone, ill, and worse than friendless, she 
 sought in vain a refuge in all that wild Border region 
 where she might await her hour of peril. Angus, seeing 
 the turn affairs had taken, had thought it prudent to 
 abandon her to her fate, and, after helping her to escape, 
 returned to Scotland in the hope of coming to terms with 
 Albany. His wife was at last thankful to accept Lord 
 Dacre's rough hospitality in his gloomy castle of Harbottle. 
 Here in the midst of a brutal soldiery, with no woman to 
 render her the most needful service, she gave birth to a 
 daughter, the Lady Margaret Douglas, on the 5th October 
 1515. On the loth she wrote to Albany to announce her 
 1 Cotton MS., Calig. U 2, 369 ; B.M.
 
 12 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 delivery "of a cristen sowle beying a young lady," and 
 miserably ill though she was, did not omit to demand "as 
 tutrix of the young king and prince, her tender children, 
 to have the whole rule and governance of Scotland." 
 
 To this letter Margaret received an answer written by 
 the Council, stating that the governance of the realm had 
 expired with the death of her husband, and had devolved 
 to the Estates ; that with her consent they had appointed 
 the Duke of Albany ; that she had forfeited the tutelage of 
 her children by her second marriage, and that in all temporal 
 matters the realm of Scotland had been immediately subject 
 to Almighty God, not recognising the Pope or any superior 
 upon earth. 
 
 Herewith the queen was forced to content herself; further 
 words would have proved as unavailing as reeds against the 
 tempest, and even words were soon beyond her power to 
 write, for the birth of her daughter was succeeded by a long 
 and painful illness which nearly proved fatal to the unhappy 
 woman. To add to the bitterness of her trials, at the moment 
 when she was beginning slowly to recover, came the news 
 of the illness and death of the little Duke of Rothesay. 
 Grief, anger, and anxiety for the safety of the king served 
 naturally to increase the gravity of her condition, and for 
 months she lay hovering between life and death, loudly 
 accusing Albany of having murdered her child. 
 
 This accusation was reiterated to Albany himself as soon 
 as her unsteady hand could grasp a pen ; but the regent 
 took no heed of her stinging words, continued to invite 
 her to return to Scotland, in spite of her persistent refusal, 
 and apparently succeeded at last in convincing her of his 
 innocence. 
 
 On her recovery she wrote to him from Morpeth, to 
 announce her departure for the south, Henry having invited 
 her to his court, accompanying his invitation with presents 
 of costly stuffs, and money, and clothing for the baby.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 13 
 
 A letter from Margaret to the regent at this moment 
 is significant of a sudden change in her demeanour towards 
 him, and to judge by her subsequent behaviour, the change 
 meant treachery. Instead of the fierce denunciations she 
 had lately indulged in, she acknowledged that she had often 
 received goodly and pleasant words as well as letters from 
 him, and "though his conduct has not always corresponded 
 to them, yet as matters are being accommodated " she hopes 
 he will reform it. The meaning of this change of tactics 
 became clear to all but the regent himself who seems to 
 have been of a singularly unsuspicious nature as soon as 
 Margaret reached London. 
 
 Albany was still hoping for a permanent peace with 
 Henry, and more than once expressed a wish to pay him 
 a friendly visit. This both Henry and Margaret encouraged 
 him to do, and writing to Wolsey about this time, the 
 Scottish queen expressed the most fervent hope that the 
 regent would come, counterbalanced by the fears that he 
 would not 1 Had the matter rested entirely with himself, 
 the visit would certainly have taken place, but his Council 
 having some reason to doubt Henry's fair and plausible 
 words, were urgent in dissuading him. All things con- 
 sidered, it is probable that the duke would have repented 
 of his temerity if he had placed his head within the lion's 
 jaws. 
 
 Having failed to inveigle the regent into their power, the 
 brother and sister instructed Dacre to " sow debate " between 
 him and his Council, but this scheme failed also. Dacre 
 wrote, however, to show that he was not wanting in zeal in 
 this behalf, saying that, being unable to interfere with Scottish 
 affairs in any other way, he had given rewards to four hundred 
 outlaws for burnings in various parts of the kingdom. 2 No 
 means proved too vile, no instrument unworthy, to be employed 
 
 1 Cotton MS., Vesp. F 3, 36 ; B.M. 
 
 2 Dacre to Wolsey ; Calig. B i, 150 ; B.M.
 
 14 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 in the work of destroying the regent and advancing Tudor 
 interests. The queen even condescended to use her truant 
 husband, and the part played by Angus is scarcely less 
 reprehensible than Margaret's own, for while he pretended 
 to be loyal to Albany and to Scotland, he possessed himself 
 of every important State secret and transmitted it to his 
 wife, in the hope of appeasing her for his desertion. She, 
 of course, passed on all that she thus learned to Henry and 
 Wolsey. 
 
 Margaret was entertained for a whole year in pomp and 
 splendour at the English court, feasts and revels succeeding 
 each other in bewildering magnificence luxury in vivid 
 contrast to the misery which she had undergone during the 
 first months after her flight from Scotland. Pageants, 
 tournaments, and banquets now took the place of privation 
 and suffering ; all that met the eye was changed, but the dark 
 and treacherous under-currents known to but few of her con- 
 temporaries remained the same, and were the realities that 
 shaped her course. In spite, however, of plots and intrigues, 
 Margaret's position was not improving. Her visit to England 
 could not be prolonged indefinitely, and as the queen was 
 evidently not to return to Scotland in triumph, it was 
 desirable to make as good terms for herself as she possibly 
 could. 
 
 The regent promised that her jointure should be paid, 
 and that Angus should be allowed to join her if he were 
 willing to do so a somewhat doubtful alternative, as he had not 
 availed himself of the leave that had already been given him- 
 As for Albany himself, he declared that it had always been his 
 desire to gratify the queen, and to advise the best for her and 
 for her son. 1 Reluctantly, therefore, she at last prepared to 
 turn her face northwards, having obtained permission to 
 take with her a suite befitting her station, safe-conduct being 
 granted, except in the case of any person among them plotting 
 1 Calig. B 2, 262 ; B.M.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 15 
 
 harm to the kingdom ; and to these conditions Henry set his 
 great seal. 
 
 A letter from the Venetian envoy to the Doge, dated 
 1 3th April 1517, says: "The truce between England and 
 Scotland has been arranged. The queen is to return, but is 
 not to be admitted to the administration of the kingdom. 
 She may take with her twenty-four Englishmen, and as many 
 Scotch as she pleases, provided they be not rebels " ; and he 
 adds that he has been assured of these facts by Albany's 
 secretary. 
 
 All was done to make her journey as easy as possible ; 
 but when Margaret arrived at Berwick, it needed all Dacre's 
 powers of persuasion to induce her to enter Scotland. At 
 Lamberton Kirk, contrary to the regent's expectation, she 
 was met by Angus, accompanied by Morton and others of 
 the Scottish nobility, with three hundred men, chiefly 
 Borderers. Albany had left for France, taking with him as 
 hostages the heirs or younger brothers of the principal men 
 in the country, whom he had bound over to keep the peace 
 during his absence, which he then did not intend to prolong 
 beyond five months. 
 
 There was now an excellent opportunity for beginning a 
 new and better life, had the queen been so minded ; but events 
 proved her to be in a more querulous, treacherous, and 
 discontented mood than ever. " Her Grace considereth now, 
 the honour of England, and the poverty and wretchedness of 
 Scotland," wrote Magnus to Wolsey, " which she did not 
 afore, but in her opinion esteemed Scotland equal with 
 England," 1 and her complaints to Henry were frequent and 
 loud. 
 
 She complained of her husband, of her poverty, of the bad 
 
 faith of the Scottish nation who still left her jointure unpaid, of 
 
 not being allowed free access to her son. She had, she said, 
 
 been obliged to lay in wed (pawn) the plate given to her by 
 
 1 June 19, 1517 ; Calig. B 2, 253 ; B.M.
 
 16 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Henry, and was likely to be driven to extreme want, as 
 Wolsey would learn by her messenger. She would have been 
 still worse off, she caused her friends to write, had not Magnus 
 and Dacre drawn up a book at Berwick, the day before her 
 entry into Scotland, by which Angus, signing it, renounced all 
 claim to her "conjunct feoffment" * 
 
 But Margaret did not stop at complaints; Henry must 
 begin the war again. He may, she declares, reasonably cause 
 Scottish ships to be taken ; for she has suffered long and 
 forborne to do evil, although she knew she would never get 
 good from Scotland by fair means. 
 
 When by dint of constant urging to renewed contests 
 the Borders had become one vast battlefield in her quarrel, 
 she wrote to the Marquis of Dorset to beg him to spare the 
 convent of Coldstream, whose abbess had done her good 
 service in times past. 2 The motive for this intercession was 
 no mere charitable one, the abbess being "one of the best 
 spies for England." 
 
 And now, for the first time, Margaret ventures to express 
 the wish that has for long been forming itself in her mind. 
 She has been much troubled by Angus since her coming to 
 Scotland, and is so more and more daily. They have not met 
 this half year, and after some hovering of the word on her 
 lips, she pronounces it boldly she will part with him, if she 
 may by God's law, and with honour to herself, for he loves her 
 not. Unlike Henry, when seeking a pretext to divorce his 
 first wife, Margaret was at no pains to disguise the motive 
 which inspired her, and a possibility of a flaw in the marriage 
 is openly but a pretext for getting rid of a husband of 
 whom she was weary. We are at least spared the nausea 
 caused by Henry's conscientious scruples. She first puts 
 forward frankly her wish to be free from Angus, and 
 then her determination to divorce him if she may lawfully. 
 
 1 Dacre to Wolsey, Harbottle, 5th March, 1518 ; R.O. 
 
 ? Thomas, Marquis of Dorset, to Henry VIII. ; Calig. B 3, 255,
 
 MARGARET TUDOR i? 
 
 But it was the only piece of honesty in the whole business, 
 for the suit itself was one long, dreary series of misrepre- 
 sentation and falsehood, without which her cause could by no 
 possibility have been gained. 
 
 The usual plea of pre-contracts was brought forward, but 
 as these were of too flimsy a nature to bear investigation, 
 Margaret declared that the late King of Scots, her husband, 
 was still living three years after the battle of Flodden, and 
 that consequently he was alive when she was married to the 
 Earl of Angus. 1 As the king's body had never been found, 
 this assertion could not be disproved, though there was no 
 reasonable doubt as to James having fallen on that calamitous 
 day. 
 
 However, in spite of her bold swearing, Margaret was not 
 so certain of success, but that she was anxious for Henry's 
 support, and she not only entreated her brother to befriend 
 her, but promised him that she would consult only his wishes 
 in taking another husband, and that this time she would 
 not part from him. 2 If she thought that a fellow-feeling 
 would make him wondrous kind in this matter, she was 
 disappointed. It was no part of Henry's policy that his 
 sister should put Angus away, for although she had not 
 consulted him in the choice of her second husband, Henry was 
 very well satisfied with him. He could to a certain extent 
 control him, and at all events, while married to him the queen 
 could not contribute by any foreign alliance to the power 
 and greatness of Scotland. 
 
 But Angus was making himself obnoxious to his wife 
 beyond her very limited capacity for endurance. Not only had 
 he proved a faithless husband, but what was infinitely worse 
 to her mind, he refused to give up the income of her Ettrick 
 Forest estate, which she had made over to him in the days 
 when his handsome face and figure had first struck her fancy, 
 
 1 Magnus to Wolsey ; State Papers, vol. iv., p. 385 ; R.O. 
 * Calig. B i, 232 ; B.M. 
 
 JJ
 
 18 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and when she thought nothing too costly to lavish upon him. 
 She had made him great, to her own and the country's 
 misfortune, and it was a difficult matter to make him small 
 again ; but all Scotland felt the evil effects of his power, of his 
 ascendancy over the young king, and of the feuds which 
 resulted therefrom. So great was the scourge felt to be, that 
 the Council appealed to Margaret to recall the Regent Albany, 
 that he might restore order. 
 
 Margaret was aware that Albany's return was the thing 
 of all others that Henry wished to avoid, but it suited her 
 for the nonce to act the part of a good Scotswoman, and 
 she wrote an imploring letter to the duke, begging him to 
 come back and take pity on his unhappy country. 1 Notwith- 
 standing this, her complaints to Henry through Lord Dacre 
 of her bad treatment, and her supplications to be allowed 
 to return to England, did not cease. She had "liever be 
 dead than live among the Scots," and she entreats that no 
 peace may be renewed, unless "some good may be taken," 
 that she may live at ease. 2 
 
 Wolsey was not sparing in his remarks on the queen's 
 double-dealing, the facts of which had all been disclosed to 
 him by spies. He has, he says, represented to the king her 
 brother " the folly of Queen Margaret in leaning to her 
 enemies, and departing from her husband," notwithstanding 
 what Dacre has already written to her. Dacre, by the king's 
 desire, is to tell her that if she persists in her dishonourable 
 course she can expect no favour. 8 
 
 Meanwhile the Earl of Surrey had been dispatched with 
 an army to the Borders, and threatened to invade Scotland, 
 unless the Duke of Albany were abandoned, and Margaret 
 reinstated as regent On the i6th September 1523, he 
 wrote two letters to the queen, one intended for her eyes 
 alone, the other to be shown to her son's Council. In the 
 first he says that the King of England would approve of 
 i Calig. B I, 232. z Ibid. B 2, 195. 3 Ibid. B 3, 106.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 19 
 
 her son's "coming forth," and shaking off all tutelage but 
 his mother's, for Surrey is about to waste Scotland, and the 
 young king's plea for emancipating himself should be that 
 he cannot suffer his realm to be laid waste. Margaret 
 is to summon the lords to take up arms in her son's 
 defence, and she will then be in a position to command 
 Surrey to retire. She will thus form a party for her 
 son, and be enabled to send Albany and his Frenchmen back 
 to France. Then Surrey will turn his arms against her 
 enemies. 
 
 If Margaret keeps her promise, money will be forthcoming. 
 In the event of her causing James V. to "come forth" to 
 Edinburgh, he has no doubt that if the king will command 
 his subjects on their allegiance to take his part, the most 
 of them will do so, especially the Commons, who must be 
 roused to drive the French to Dunbar. The Earl of Surrey 
 will be ready to give assistance. 1 
 
 The second letter was to the same effect, though more 
 cautiously worded. The King of England would be glad 
 to hear of his nephew's prosperous estate, but would certainly 
 be dissatisfied that his nobles suffered their monarch and 
 themselves to be kept in subjection by Albany. Surrey was 
 ready to help with men and money all who would come 
 forward to protect their natural sovereign ; but peace could 
 never be between the two realms, if the Scots did not give 
 up the duke. As for Margaret's hope that Henry would be 
 a better friend to Scotland on her account, Surrey had been 
 ordered to desist from doing any more hurt at her request. 
 He had now waited a long time, he wrote, hoping that the 
 Scottish lords would have shown themselves more natural 
 loving subjects than they now appeared, seeing that the 
 day appointed for the Duke of Albany's arrival had passed, 
 and that their king was in no greater safety than he was 
 before. All the world would see that the fault was not 
 
 1 Calig. B 4, 196.
 
 20 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Henry's, but that of the Scots, who refused to put him out of 
 the realm who meant to destroy the king and usurp the 
 crown. Henry would never refrain from making war upon 
 Scotland until they forsook Albany, and sued to him for 
 peace. On their doing this, Surrey had full authority to 
 treat with them, and to assist them with money and troops. 1 
 
 This advice produced no effect whatever on the Scottish 
 lords, whose loyalty to the regent remained unshaken. 
 But Margaret did not consider herself hampered by any 
 pledges given to Albany, and two days after the receipt of 
 the letters, she urged Surrey to come to Edinburgh, or 
 somewhere near it, at once, declaring that the lords would 
 certainly do as she desired. As for the threatened laying 
 waste, however, "they laughed at injuries done only to the 
 poor people." A thousand men with artillery would have 
 Edinburgh at their mercy if they came suddenly. Surrey 
 must go at it at once, or let it be. Failing this, she desired leave 
 to come to England with her true servants, adding, "for 
 I will come away and I should steal out of it" 2 
 
 The truth was, that, far from being certain that the lords 
 would agree to any part of the scheme, Margaret knew well 
 that she had but a handful of friends in Scotland, and that 
 her sole hope of regaining the regency lay in Henry's power of 
 coercion. Trusting that Surrey would really march on 
 Edinburgh, she did all she could to persuade the Council to 
 allow the young king to be brought to that place, and to 
 appoint new guardians, friendly to her interests. In both 
 these endeavours she failed, and James remained at Stirling. 
 
 " The lords are all fallen away from the queen, and 
 adhere to the governor," wrote the Abbess of Coldstream 
 to Sir John Bulmer, and Surrey passed on the information 
 to Wolsey, telling him that Margaret had no credit with 
 
 1 State Papers, iv. 21 "Copy of my letter to be showed to the lords 
 of Scotland ; in Surrey's hand" ; R,O. 
 
 2 Ibid. 26.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 21 
 
 the Scotch, and that they looked hourly for Albany's 
 arrival. 
 
 As for Lord Surrey, even if he had been willing to besiege 
 Edinburgh, he would have been frustrated by the want of 
 sufficient means of transport for his victuals. Had he not 
 caused his soldiers to carry their food in wallets, and their 
 drink in bottles, it would not have been possible for him to 
 have reached the North, and a raid into the enemy's country 
 necessitated a far ampler stock of provisions than could be 
 carried in this way. The queen's desire that he should take 
 Edinburgh, arose, he thought, from her anxiety to provide 
 herself with a way of escape from her difficulties. 1 
 
 In England it was commonly believed that the Scottish 
 lords were in so great a fear of Albany, who was hourly 
 expected to arrive, that they would break their covenant with 
 him even though they had each given him four of the best 
 of their sons as hostages. But Surrey declared vehemently 
 that although they might deceive Margaret, they should not 
 deceive him. 
 
 The suspense was ended at last, and Margaret wrote to 
 inform him of the regent's arrival. Surrey replied at once, 
 desiring to know further what number of horse and foot 
 soldiers had come with him, and what countrymen they were. 
 He could give her no advice about coming away, but would 
 meet her in any given part of the Marches, and at whatever 
 time she pleased. Margaret in return was to let him know 
 when the Duke of Albany intended to invade England. In 
 conclusion, hoping to prevent any rapprochement between her 
 and the regent, he warned her that Albany would most 
 certainly be king if the king were not well guarded, " for the 
 Frenchmen can empoison one, and yet he shall not die for a 
 year after." 2 
 
 The slippery nature of Margaret's friendship was well 
 
 1 Surrey to Wolsey, Berwick, 2ist Sept. 1523 ; R. O. 
 
 8 Surrey's Letterbook ; Tanner MS. 90, f. 47 ; Bodleian Library,
 
 22 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 known to Surrey, and he kept up the fiction of Albany's 
 nefarious intentions, in the hope of making her faithful to 
 English interests. Unluckily for his schemes, he did not 
 sufficiently study the springs of her actions, which would have 
 taught him to be more lavish with his bribes. The end of 
 her next letter ought to have opened his eyes to the necessity 
 of striking a bargain with her if he would hope to draw her 
 into the English net. After telling him that the duke has 
 held a council at Glasgow, and that he means to march into 
 England in a fortnight, she goes on to warn him that 
 Scotland was never before made so strong, and says that it 
 is still a secret whether Albany intends to attack the east or 
 west Border, but she thinks both. She gives him a detailed 
 account of the numbers and condition of his soldiers, and 
 estimates his French contingent at 6000 men, adding that 
 German reinforcements are expected by the first fair wind. 
 They trust to win Berwick, and if they succeed, she and her 
 son are undone. Then she begs to know how she is to get 
 away, and have some money. If Henry will not help her, 
 she must perforce ask help of Albany ; and she declares 
 significantly, "and he will cause me to do as he will, or else 
 he will give me nothing." He has not yet come to her, but 
 he writes " very good writings of his own hand, and as many 
 fair words as can be devised," to which however she professes 
 to give no credence. 1 
 
 Surrey was of the opinion that Margaret should remain 
 in Scotland, as her coming to England would cause embarrass- 
 ment and expense. Two thousand marks would hardly 
 satisfy her in England, whereas she would be content with 
 three or four hundred pounds a year in Scotland, to say 
 nothing of the loss Henry would incur if she came away, in 
 being deprived of the information she sent. 
 
 But it was just this haggling over bribes that prevented 
 Margaret from being altogether on Henry's side, and threw 
 1 Calig. B 6, 379 ; State Papers, iv. 40.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 23 
 
 her into the arms of the more generous Albany whenever 
 there was the least hope of gain. Thus, a month later, after 
 the somewhat hasty retreat from Wark, she told Surrey that 
 she had been obliged to take what money the duke would 
 give her; that she would do her best to keep her son, but 
 that she could not displease Albany without Henry's support. 
 She implored Surrey to plead with the king for her, and in 
 return for his help she would inform him of all she knew ; 
 but he must keep it secret 1 
 
 At the same time, she gave the duke to understand that 
 she had incurred her brother's displeasure for his sake, 2 and 
 the same legend was repeated to the lords of the Council. 
 Complaining to them of the bad treatment she had received 
 in Scotland, she begged them to bear in mind the loyalty 
 she had always shown to her son, to the lord governor, and 
 to the realm, incurring for the last three or four years her 
 brother's displeasure, for Albany's sake, at whose desire she 
 was always ready to write the best she could. 3 Immediately 
 upon this remarkable statement came Henry's answer to her 
 last appeal, in the guise of one hundred marks for information 
 received, together with the refusal of the truce which Albany 
 had repeatedly solicited. 4 The smallness of the sum prompted 
 Margaret to write a diplomatic letter to the Earl of Surrey, 
 in which she declared that she had promised before the lords 
 to be a good Scotswoman, and to agree to whatever was 
 for the good of her son, with whom she was resolved to bide 
 as long as she might, although the lords were bent on 
 separating them. They cannot, they say, help her to her 
 "conjunct feoffment " while her brother makes war on them, 
 and she knows not where any other help may be got. If she 
 is to live with her son, Henry must contribute to her support, 
 as he has done to a certain extent already. She will do as 
 he commands her, and have as few servants as possible. She 
 
 1 Calig. B i, 281. 2 Ibid. 159. s Ibid. B 2, 268. 
 
 * State Papers, iv. 60, 26th Nov. 1523 ; R,O,
 
 24 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 had asked the governor and lords in Council why she was 
 " holden suspect," and not allowed to be with her son ; and 
 the answer she received was that she was Henry's sister, and 
 would perhaps take the king into England, and they knew 
 well her brother would do more for her than any other. She 
 had answered that her deeds had shown otherwise, and that 
 she could prove the malice of such an accusation ! Thus 
 Henry would see how she suffered for his sake. 1 
 
 The next scene in the comedy is Margaret's anger on 
 hearing that Albany is treating with Henry for peace, without 
 her intervention. " It is hard," she complains, " to be out 
 with the governor here, and not to know what the king will 
 do for me ! " If she had flattered Albany, she asserts, she 
 might have had "'great profits," but she will not take them 
 till she knows Henry's mind. She has not spoken with 
 Albany since Surrey left, and would not do so as long as 
 he remained in Scotland, so discontented were they with 
 each other. 2 Upon this follows an astounding revelation. 
 Surrey had received a dispatch from the queen containing 
 another document, the seals of which had been broken and 
 closed again. It was a copy of an agreement between Margaret 
 and the Duke of Albany, but the manner in which it came 
 to be enclosed in her letter never transpired, though it was 
 thought that the packet had been opened by a spy, and the 
 paper inserted, in order to ruin her prospects with her 
 brother. 
 
 The enclosed document ran thus : 
 
 The queen promises that during the minority of her son, 
 she will never suffer anything contrary to the duke's authority, 
 and will inform him of it, and hinder as much as she can any 
 wrong intended against him ; she will not consent to a truce 
 or peace with England without the comprehension of her 
 
 1 Queen Margaret to the Earl of Surrey, Dec. 1523 ; R,O, 
 
 2 Calig. B i, 209, 2 rst April 1524,
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 25 
 
 son's allies ; she will assist to keep him securely, according to 
 the decree of the last Parliament ; she will do all she can to 
 hinder any practice against him of which she may hear, and 
 will inform the governor of it if he be in the country, and if 
 not, those who have charge of the king ; she will not consent 
 to anything contrary to the alliance with France, or to the 
 treaty of Rouen, and will further a marriage between her son 
 and one of the daughters of the King of France. The 
 governor promises to do the like, and to obtain for her an 
 honourable reception by the King of France, if she incurs the 
 enmity of her brother, and is forced to quit the country in 
 consequence of the assistance he may give to Angus, or 
 other evil-disposed persons who may interfere with her goods 
 and conjunct feoffment ; he will if she requests, send some 
 of his servants with her, and will maintain her against every- 
 one except the king her son. Both parties swear to keep 
 these promises upon the Holy Gospels. 1 
 
 Wolsey, upon receipt of this information, at once addressed 
 instructions to Dacre, charging him to find out whether such 
 an agreement had really been made, and if so, how the copy 
 of it had found its way into the queen's letter. 
 
 Dacre therefore wrote to tell her of the discovery, and 
 recapitulating the contents of the enclosed document, added 
 that the king desired to know whether she had consented to 
 it of her own free will, why it was done, whether she herself 
 sent the copy, or if not who did send it, and with what intent. 
 
 Margaret replied by an indignant but weak denial. The 
 instrument in question was one, she averred, which the duke 
 had desired her to execute, but which she had declined at 
 all costs to meddle with. 
 
 This explanation was too improbable for Wolsey to accept, 
 the whole course of Margaret's actions tending to show that had 
 Albany tried and failed to draw her into such a compact, she 
 l Add, MS. 24, 965, ff. 231 and 234 ; B.M,
 
 20 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 would unhesitatingly have disclosed the negotiation in order 
 to make capital out of her refusal. The opportunity for 
 demanding large sums as a reward for her fidelity to Henry's 
 interests would have proved irresistible ; while as a matter 
 of fact the transaction had never been so much as hinted 
 at in any of her letters. Vague allusions, to the effect that 
 Albany was continually outbidding Henry, had been her 
 refrain for years ; but whereas she sent minute and circum- 
 stantial details of every other secret likely to prejudice the 
 country and the regent, she had been silent as to any 
 definite overtures such as those contained in the document 
 referred to. 
 
 The alternative was to believe that, while pretending to 
 be false, for once she was true to Scotland ; and yet she stands 
 so deeply "rooted in dishonour," that her acquittal puts but 
 little to her credit. Her only resource, when Dacre persisted 
 in his accusation, was a feeble complaint of the bad treatment 
 she was receiving at her brother's hands, pleading that he 
 neither regarded herself nor her writing ; that she had not 
 failed, and did not mean to fail, but that if others had been 
 in her place they would have acted very differently. 1 
 
 To this Dacre replied ruthlessly, that it was well known 
 both in Scotland and in England, not only that she had 
 assented to the bond found in her letter, but that it had 
 passed her sign manual and seal, in return for which, the 
 Duke of Albany had given her the wardship and marriage 
 of the young Earl of Huntly and of others, together with 
 other gifts and rewards a proceeding which, declared Dacre, 
 was a great dishonour to her brother, and would perhaps 
 after all avail her but little. He marvelled also greatly at 
 her pretended ignorance of the negotiations pending between 
 Albany and himself, because in his last letter he had informed 
 her of all the proceedings. 2 
 
 1 Add. MS. 24, 965, f. 223, igth May 1524 ; B.M. 
 3 Ibid. 965, f. 244, 27th May 1524.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 27 
 
 For some time, Margaret continued to deny feebly having 
 formally allied herself with the regent, murmuring at Dacre's 
 "sharpness" towards her, notwithstanding which Dacre con- 
 tinued to bring fresh proofs of her duplicity before her, till 
 Henry at last ordered him to let the matter drop, whereupon 
 she was willing to do the same. 1 
 
 Having failed in the past to secure Margaret's undivided 
 favour, Henry now took a more persuasive line, and sought 
 to convince his sister how much good might in future accrue 
 to her if she would but " go the fruitful way." The unfortunate 
 Angus, who had taken refuge in England, was now sent back, 
 in the hope that a possible reconciliation with her husband 
 might detach her from Albany. But this was far from succeed- 
 ing. Margaret could with difficulty be induced to receive 
 him, and all the money that Henry sent to her went to 
 strengthen the hands of her husband's enemies, so that Angus 
 was obliged to entreat that no further supplies might be 
 provided. Margaret then veered round, and said that Albany 
 had sent to her with great offers if she would join his party, 
 adding that perhaps the duke would marry her after getting 
 her divorced. How this could be possible, considering that 
 Albany had a wife already, might puzzle a mind more fettered 
 by the logic of facts than was the queen's. 
 
 That she was seriously anxious to be agreeable to the 
 duke is seen by the instructions which she delivered to John 
 Cantely, who was to tell the regent of her goodwill towards 
 him and the kingdom of France. And lest he should interpret 
 unfavourably the circumstance of her having sent ambassadors 
 to England, she assured him that she would do nothing without 
 including France. Finally, she wished to know his intentions 
 towards her and what he would give her. In the event of 
 her taking his part against England, which she will certainly 
 do if Henry continues to help Angus, Albany must secure 
 for her the protection of the French king. If this king desires 
 1 Add. MS. 24, 965, f. 253 ; B.M,
 
 p 
 38 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 to have her and her son on his side, he must support 
 them. 
 
 But Albany must keep the matter secret, and not allow 
 her letters to be sent into England, as has been done formerly, 
 and she will take his part against everyone except her 
 son. 1 
 
 This was written on the 22nd February 1525, but on the 
 3ist March following, Margaret, in a stormy interview with 
 Angus, angrily denied having negotiated with Albany at all. 
 She swore that she had always sought to please Henry, and 
 complained of his letters being "sore and sharp." She had 
 taken a great matter on hand at his request, and had had 
 much trouble with the duke for his sake, yet now that she 
 had plainly told the regent that she followed Henry's pleasure, 
 Henry would have no more to do with her. If he will not 
 be kind to her, she hopes at least that he will not cause 
 Angus to trouble her in her living. She has a plea against 
 Angus before the Pope, and he cannot interfere with her by 
 law. 2 
 
 It was clearly to Henry's interest to persuade Margaret 
 to take her husband back, for Angus belonged with the whole 
 Douglas family to Albany's bitterest enemies. The recon- 
 ciliation between him and the regent had been but a short 
 interlude brought about solely from self-interest on the part 
 of Angus, and followed by a deep and lasting feud. Added 
 to this claim on Henry's friendship was the fact that he 
 possessed a powerful influence over the young King James. 
 But with the page of Henry's own domestic history open 
 before us, it is not possible to repress a smile at the arguments 
 against her divorce which Henry put before Margaret, at 
 the very moment when he was trying to force the Pope's hand, 
 in order to obtain from him a sentence against his own 
 
 1 Double de la credence de la Royne et mtmoire de Mr John Cantely \ 
 R.O. 
 
 8 . B 7, 3.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 29 
 
 marriage. The following substance of a letter, written it is 
 true by Wolsey, but dictated by his master, applies in every 
 detail as well to Henry's own case as to Margaret's. If we 
 change the pronoun, substitute London for Rome, king for 
 queen, Katharine for Angus, all that he causes Wolsey to say 
 becomes as applicable to himself as to his sister. 
 
 After desiring her to accept favourably Henry's message, 
 which, he says, much concerns the wealth of her son and 
 her own repute, the cardinal urges her brother's hope that 
 the " undeceivable spirit of God, which moved him to send 
 to her, will effectually work." Amid the cares of his govern- 
 ment he has never forgotten her, and he hopes she will turn 
 to God's word, "the vyvely doctrine of Jesus Christ, the 
 only ground of salvation" (i Cor. 3). He. reminds her of 
 the divine ordinance of inseparable matrimony, first instituted 
 in Paradise, and hopes her Grace will perceive how she was 
 seduced by flatterers to an unlawful divorce from "the right 
 noble Earl of Angus," etc., upon untrue and insufficient 
 grounds. Furthermore, " the shameless sentence sent from 
 Rome " plainly showed how unlawfully it was handled, judg- 
 ment being given against a party neither present in person 
 nor by proxy. He urges her further, for the weal of her 
 soul, and to avoid the inevitable damnation threatened 
 against " advoutrers," to reconcile herself with Angus as her 
 true husband, or out of mere natural affection for her 
 daughter, whose excellent beauty and pleasant behaviour, 
 nothing less godly than goodly, furnished with virtuous and 
 womanly demeanour, should soften her heart That she 
 should be reputed baseborn cannot be avoided, except the 
 queen will relinquish the " advoutrous " company with him that 
 is not, nor may not be, of right her husband. 1 
 
 The individual here mentioned was Harry Stuart, with 
 whom Margaret had contracted a secret marriage, having by 
 dint of perjury and a tissue of lies, obtained a declaration of 
 
 1 Calig. B 6, 194.
 
 30 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 invalidity against her union with Angus. She does not 
 appear to have been in the least affected by Henry's hypo- 
 critical reasoning, but the manner in which her son received 
 the news of her third marriage caused her some inconveni- 
 ence. In his displeasure, James sent Lord Erskine to besiege 
 his mother and her new husband in Stirling Castle ; but 
 what promised to be a tragedy had a somewhat ridiculous 
 end, for Margaret, in terror of what might follow, at once 
 gave up her husband, who after a short imprisonment was 
 allowed to escape. He promptly rejoined the queen, and 
 James subsequently forgave him, and created him Lord 
 Methven. 
 
 But not even when her son had come to his own did 
 Margaret cease to plot and intrigue. Henry's suspicious 
 character imperatively demanded that all that was going on in 
 Scotland should be known without delay at the English court, 
 and his sister was the only possible agent for the purpose. 
 It does not appear that her treachery, now doubly odious, 
 ever cost her the least qualm. The climax was, however, 
 reached, when after persuading James to confide to her his 
 private instructions to the Scottish ambassador residing in 
 London, she contrived that the information thus obtained 
 should be in Henry's hands at the same moment that it reached 
 its legitimate destination. 
 
 Fortunately for the affairs of Scotland, the treasonable 
 correspondence was discovered ; and Margaret narrowly 
 escaped imprisonment. The immediate result was to put an 
 end to the more friendly intercourse that had sprung up 
 between the two countries, and to prevent a meeting between 
 the two sovereigns, in process of negotiation. 
 
 At this interview, which was to have taken place at York, 
 Henry hoped to convert his nephew to his own views 
 regarding the Pope ; and in order to pave the way to a good 
 understanding between them, he sent Barlow and Holcroft 
 to Scotland with a lengthy document containing, with much
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 31 
 
 fulsome flattery of James, all Henry's choice vocabulary of 
 epithets hurled against the "Bishop of Rome." 1 
 
 Margaret, ignorant that her son had discovered her 
 treachery, continued to urge him to proceed to York ; but 
 her eagerness only roused his suspicions that worse treason 
 lay behind. 
 
 "The Queen, your Grace's sister," wrote Lord William 
 Howard to Henry, " because she hath so earnestly solicited in 
 the cause of meeting, is in high displeasure with the King, her 
 son, he bearing her in hand that she received gifts of your 
 Highness to betray him, with many other unkind and 
 suspicious words." 2 
 
 Enough has been already seen of Margaret's methods to 
 make it quite clear what her next step would be. Out of 
 favour with James, she of course threw the whole brunt of 
 her misfortune on Henry, for whose sake she had incurred so 
 much danger and expense, having lived for the last six months 
 at court for the sole purpose of advancing his affairs. 3 But 
 Henry was beginning to weary of his sister's complaints and 
 appeals for money. Besides, James would in future guard 
 his secrets better, and Margaret almost cease to be useful as a 
 spy. So she must not expect him to disburse notable sums, 
 merely because she is his sister, and must henceforth learn to 
 be content with the entirely sufficient provision made for her 
 on her marriage with the King of Scots. 4 
 
 This was all the consolation he could afford her for some 
 time to come, for besides his other reasons for disregarding 
 the letters which she, nothing daunted by his silence, continued 
 to send him, Henry was too much occupied with his own 
 concerns to bestow much thought on a sister whose power 
 of helping him was now small. It was the moment of Anne 
 
 1 Hamilton Papers Instructions to Barlow and Holcroft, 3rd Oct. 1535, 
 fol. 27. 
 
 a State Papers^ iv. 46 ; R.O. 
 
 3 Add. MS. 32, 616, f. 87 ; B.M. 
 
 4 State Papers, v. 56 ; R.O.
 
 32 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Boleyn's fall, and he was engrossed with the list of crimes 
 of which he was about to accuse the unhappy woman. 
 
 On the subject of Margaret's various marriages, her 
 brother had ever failed to manifest that sympathy which a 
 similarity of tastes would seem to justify. He had assumed 
 the tone of a moralist on her separation from Angus, and 
 had treated Lord Methven in his letters with scant respect, 
 and when in the course of time she began to be weary of 
 her new spouse, and to complain of him with increasing 
 bitterness, it was long before Henry could be roused to 
 express any interest in the subject At last, however, he 
 found a convenient season for attending to her. She had 
 written to inform him that whereas she did Lord Meffen 
 (sic) the honour to take him as her husband, he had spent 
 her lands and profits upon his own kin, and had brought 
 her into debt, to the sum of 8000 marks Scots, and would 
 give her no account of it She trusted the king her son 
 would treat her to his and her own honour ; but if not, she 
 had no refuge but in Henry, and she begged him not to 
 suffer her to be wronged. 
 
 To this, Henry deigned to reply that he should be sorry 
 if his good brother and nephew treated her otherwise than 
 a son should treat his mother. As it appeared from certain 
 evidence, she was well-handled, and had grown to much 
 wealth and quiet; but according to other reports, quite the 
 contrary, so that he was in doubt which to believe. " Also," 
 he continues, " having heard at other times from you of your 
 evil-treatment by your son and Lord Muffyn (sic), and as 
 we are sending the bearer into those parts, on our business, 
 we desire you to show him the points wherein you note 
 yourself evil-handled, and whether you desire us to treat 
 of them with your son, or only generally to recommend your 
 condition." l 
 
 Margaret had remained faithful to Lord Methven for 
 1 State Papers, v. 63, 65.
 
 MARGARET TUDOR 33 
 
 about ten years, and it was not till 1537 that she thought 
 of formally applying for a divorce, her chief plea being that 
 he wasted her money, although she said she had "forty 
 famous proofs" against him. 1 
 
 James was furious, and ordered that the divorce, whether 
 obtained at the cost of more false oaths, or whether Margaret's 
 so-called third husband really had a wife living when the 
 union was contracted, should not be proclaimed in Scotland. 
 
 This constituted Margaret's famous grievance against 
 James, his objection to her divorce being, his mother declared, 
 the fear lest she should pass into England and remarry the 
 Earl of Angus. "And this Harry Stuart, Lord of Methven, 
 causes him to believe this of me /" she exclaimed contemptu- 
 ously. 2 One plea for getting rid of the now despised Harry 
 Stuart is too amusing to be omitted. James was in France, 
 whither he had gone to bring home his bride, the young and 
 beautiful Magdalene, daughter of the French king, and 
 Margaret thought to induce Henry to interest himself in 
 her divorce through his jealousy of the French. 
 
 After begging him to send a special messenger to the 
 king her son, to know his " utter mind," she says : " For now, 
 dearest brother, your Grace I trust will consider that now 
 the queen his wife is to come into this realm soon after 
 Easter, as he hath sent word here, to make ready for the 
 same, and that being, it will be great dishonour to him that 
 I, his mother, having a just cause to part, can nought get 
 a final end ; and I trust your Grace will consider I may do 
 your Grace and my son more honour to be without him 
 (Lord Methven) than to have him, considering that he is 
 but a sober man, and if the Queen that is to come, see me 
 not entreated as I should be, she will think it arj evil 
 example." 3 
 
 1 Hamilton Papers, I3th Oct. 1537, f. 105. 
 
 2 State Papers, v. 119. 
 
 3 Hamilton Papers, , f. 109.
 
 34 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 But all her efforts were fruitless ; Henry could not be 
 persuaded to take up her quarrel, and James was obdurate. 
 His mother, however, then in her forty-ninth year, dispensed 
 with legal formality altogether, and allied herself to a certain 
 John Stuart, who, according to some, is identical with the 
 adventurous Earl of Arran, so notorious in the reign of 
 James VI. 
 
 A few more miserable years of petty intrigues, it being 
 no longer in her power to carry on important ones, and 
 Margaret came to the close of her faithless, undignified life. 
 But before the end, a ray of sorrow for her mis-spent days 
 brightened the hitherto unrelieved gloom of her career. 
 Henry's messenger, sent after her death to gather up the 
 details of her last moments, and above all, to find out whether 
 she had made a will, wrote to the king as follows : 
 
 "When she did perceive that death did approach, she 
 did desire the friars that was her confessors, that they should 
 sit on their knees before the King, and to beseech him that 
 he would be good and gracious unto the Earl of Angwische, 
 and did extremely lament and ask God mercy that she had 
 offended unto the said Earl as she had." 
 
 The friars were also to plead with her son for the Lady 
 Margaret Douglas, the daughter whom she had so remorse- 
 lessly abandoned, and to beg him that she might have some 
 of her mother's goods. And thus, making what reparation 
 she could, with penitent words on her lips, Margaret Tudor 
 passed away.
 
 Photo 
 
 A. W. Mnnsell & Co. 
 
 ANNE OF CLEVES (Fourth Wife of Henry VIII.). 
 
 From a Portrait by Hans Holbein in the Louvre. 
 
 [To Jacc page 35.
 
 II 
 
 NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW 
 
 THE history of the first two marriages of Henry VIII. is of 
 such vital importance, affecting as they did the whole course 
 of religion in England, from the first whisperings of the 
 divorce down to the present day, that it is not to be wondered 
 at if the royal Bluebeard's subsequent matrimonial alliances 
 have been considered negligeable quantities. And yet, at 
 least one of them was of extreme political, and even religious, 
 importance, and was fraught with so much mystery that 
 until the most recent investigations, the true inwardness of 
 the matter has been totally misapprehended. The story of 
 Anne of Cleves' portrait, and Henry's supposed disappoint- 
 ment when he saw the lady herself for the first time, is 
 authentic in so far as it was exactly what the king chose to 
 have circulated about his fourth marriage. But- if it con- 
 tained half the truth, it was the other half that really 
 mattered. 
 
 After the fall of Wolsey, Thomas Cromwell had by his 
 astute policy succeeded in bringing about a religious state of 
 things in England that approached very nearly to Lutheran- 
 ism. Taking advantage of Henry's pique and anger at the 
 Pope's refusal to grant him a divorce from Katharine of 
 Arragon, Cromwell set about widening the breach between 
 England and Rome. After weakening the power of the 
 bishops and lower clergy, he was able to force the oath of 
 
 16
 
 36 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 supremacy upon the nation, and having thus satisfied his 
 master's pride and vanity, his next step was by the dissolu- 
 tion of the monasteries to pander to Henry's greed, while 
 at the same time he filled his own pockets. 
 
 In pursuit of these ends he had covered the land with 
 gibbets, and caused the noblest heads in England to fall 
 upon the block. He had branded the king's own daughter 
 with the stigma of infamy, and to obtain her consent thereto 
 had kept the axe suspended over her. He had been able 
 to accomplish all this because thus far he had taken Henry's 
 measure correctly, working upon his worst passions, and 
 suggesting ever fresh means of satisfying them. Then 
 came a point at which his interests and those of the king 
 diverged. 
 
 Cromwell was deeply pledged to the Lutheran cause, and 
 his plan was to throw Henry into the arms of the Lutheran 
 princes of Germany. He had already flooded the country 
 with foreign heretics, using them as his tools to protestantise 
 the Church in England. 
 
 Jane Seymour died in 1537, and Cromwell at once 
 negotiated a marriage between Henry and Anne, daughter 
 of the Duke of Cleves, Henry consenting for the reason that 
 it behoved him to fortify himself by an alliance that would 
 enable him to make a stand against a possible combination 
 of forces between the Pope, the Emperor, and the French 
 King. But at the very moment when Cromwell, believing 
 himself to be at the point of realising all his desires, was 
 pledging his master to marry Anne of Cleves, a reaction 
 had set in which he so completely disregarded as to seem 
 in utter ignorance of it. 
 
 Nothing annoyed Henry more than to be twitted with 
 being a heretic, and whenever Henry was annoyed a blow 
 might be expected. The loathed epithet was now very 
 frequently used in reference to him by the emperor and 
 others, and he was bent on showing Europe that he could
 
 NOR WIPE NOR WIDOW 3? 
 
 be a very good Catholic without the Pope. It irritated him 
 to think that Cromwell had laid him open to retort in this 
 contention by a formal alliance with the Lutherans, who 
 were undeniably heretics. It served his purpose very well to 
 play them off against the emperor and even Francis I., but 
 it was not his will to be bound irrevocably by any contract. 
 When Cromwell thought to put the finishing touch to his 
 triumphant scheme, he only effected his own doom. He 
 boasted to the Lutherans that he would soon bring England 
 over to their forms of faith, and on this promise the match 
 between Henry and Anne was concluded ; but he failed to 
 rouse the German princes to a contest with the emperor, 
 which was all that Henry, apart from his minister's policy, 
 had aimed at from the beginning. With Henry the whole 
 scheme was tentative, and the proposed marriage but a detail 
 of that scheme. When it fell through, he desired to turn 
 his back upon Cleves and the rest of the German princes ; 
 moreover, he had no further need of Cromwell himself, who 
 was rather in the way of his new plans, unless the minister 
 could find a means to disentangle the imbroglio he had 
 created with regard to Anne. 
 
 Like a child with a new toy, Henry was now engrossed 
 in the fun of being Pope in his own dominions ; and as Head 
 of the Church of England whom it behoved to reprobate 
 heresy in every shape and form, he conducted a trial against 
 one John Nicholson, who, refusing to recant his heretical 
 opinions, was burned at Smithfield. After this he felt 
 confident of being as Catholic as the real Pope, and safe 
 from opprobrium. He proceeded to bring forward delibera- 
 tions in Parliament on the subject of religion, with the result 
 that the famous Act of the Six Articles was passed. This 
 Act, nicknamed by the Lutherans " the whip with six cords," 
 brought in a reaction in favour of the old religion, which 
 lasted till Henry's death, but matters between England and 
 Rome remained as they were.
 
 38 STUDIES FROM COURT AKD CtOISTEft 
 
 Meanwhile, the lady Anne of Cleves had made her un- 
 welcome appearance. One of the most curious and indeed 
 incomprehensible facts concerning Henry VIII., is the admiring 
 awe and grovelling gratitude with which he was adored by 
 most of the women whom he had the privilege of ill-treating. 
 After the year 1527, when he first conceived the desire o 
 raising Anne Boleyn to the throne, and of divorcing Katharine, 
 except for the short period during which he was married to 
 Jane Seymour, there were always two rival claimants for his 
 hand. Not only was Katharine ever generously ready to 
 forget past insults if he would graciously extend his clemency 
 towards her, and send Anne away, but every other woman 
 with whom he came in contact, addressed him in words more 
 suited to a divinity than to an earthly king. His daughter 
 Mary, after having been spurned as the most degraded 
 and abject creature of the realm, longed for nothing more 
 ardently than "to attain the fruition of his most desired 
 presence." 
 
 Although the personal appearance of Anne of Cleves did 
 not bear out the exaggerated reports of the German agent 
 Mont, who had told Henry that her beauty exceeded that of 
 the Duchess of Milan " as the sun outshines the silver moon," 
 she was found on her arrival in England to be "tall, bright, 
 and graceful," her liveliness making amends for any defect 
 as to regularity of feature. Comparing her claim to beauty 
 with that of the other wives of Henry VIII., it does not 
 appear that she contrasted unfavourably with any, not even 
 with Katharine Howard, who was very generally admired. The 
 king himself observed to Cromwell that Anne was "well and 
 seemly, and had a queenly manner," but that he found it 
 difficult to converse with her as she knew no word of any 
 language but German. 
 
 He had first met her privately at Rochester, and had 
 dined with her, their public meeting taking place about half 
 a mile from the foot of Shooter's Hill, where she rested in a
 
 NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW 39 
 
 gorgeous pavilion prepared for the occasion. Henry came 
 marching through Greenwich Park with a brilliant escort, 
 and the bride and bridegroom met full merrily. The king 
 embraced the lady ceremoniously, and the chronicler Hall, 
 some time afterwards, in describing their entry into Greenwich, 
 breaks out into one of his eulogistic periods : 
 
 "O what a sight was this, to see so goodly a Prince and 
 so noble a King to ride with so fair a lady, of so goodly a 
 stature, and so womanly a countenance, and in especial of 
 so good qualities. I think no creature could see them but 
 his heart rejoiced ! " 
 
 Nevertheless, Henry's moody question, " What remedy ? " 
 which obviously had its origin in no mere disappointment in 
 the matter of Anne's beauty or power to charm, was calculated 
 to strike terror into Cromwell's soul, the chancellor knowing 
 full well that all this bravery was but an appearance, and 
 that his great scheme of Lutheranising England to the greater 
 glory of himself was irrevocably wrecked, and his own fate 
 sealed. The king went on to say that if it were not that the 
 lady had come so far, and for fear of making a ruffle in the 
 world, and of driving her brother into the emperor's arms 
 and those of the French king, he would not go through with 
 the marriage ceremony. 
 
 As a forlorn hope of escape, the bride was asked to make 
 a declaration that she was free from all pre-contracts, which 
 she did without the least hesitation, and there was nothing to 
 be done but for Henry "to put his head into the yoke," and 
 to make an insignificant political alliance, which would thence- 
 forth serve no political end. As a Catholic king, Head of 
 the Church and Defender of the Faith, there was no room in 
 his plans for a Lutheran queen. However, he no longer 
 regarded the marriage tie as a knot that could not be undone 
 at a pinch. Cranmer could be counted on to be pliable in 
 that matter, and if Cromwell made difficulties, a sword was 
 hanging over him that could be made to 1 at any moment,
 
 40 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and Henry knew that the death of the man who had been the 
 terror of England for ten years would be hailed with 
 enthusiasm by the whole nation. Henry's foreign policy 
 had always been a non-committal one, and Cromwell's daring 
 intrigues had carried his master further than he intended to 
 go. As the chancellor could find no means of getting him 
 out of the mess, he lost his life, and Anne of Cleves her 
 barely assumed dignity. 
 
 The disgusting letters which Cromwell wrote from the 
 Tower, in the hope that his tardy playing into the king's 
 hands would obtain him a pardon, were of immense use to 
 Henry in confusing the public mind as to the real reason for 
 his repudiation of Anne, for he was anxious in breaking off 
 from Protestant Germany not to turn the Duke of Cleves into 
 an enemy. The want of decency and the unchivalrous sacrifice 
 of Anne's honour and dignity are perhaps not surprising between 
 such men as Henry and Cromwell, but it is startling to find 
 the lady's brother swallowing the insult calmly. Nevertheless, 
 Henry's diplomatic insight had correctly gauged the coarsening 
 effect of Luther's moral code on a mind that could see less 
 offence in a stain of this kind than in a frank rupture of the 
 marriage-treaty before Anne had been allowed to set foot 
 in England. There is this, however, to be said, that the 
 possession of the lady gave Henry a decided advantage over 
 her brother. 
 
 A few weeks after the marriage, or what passed for such, 
 Anne was sent to Richmond on the pretext of being out of 
 reach of the plague, but there was no talk at that time of 
 any plague, and if there had been, Henry would certainly 
 have gone away also, for no one feared the epidemic more 
 than he. On her departure, a commission was appointed 
 under the Great Seal to inquire into the validity of her 
 marriage, and in an incredibly short space of time it was 
 declared null, by reason of a pre-contract with the son of the 
 Duke of Lorraine. Henry then endowed his ex-queen with
 
 NOR WIFJE NOfc WIDOW 41 
 
 lands to the value of ^4000 annually, with a house at 
 Richmond, and another at Bletchingly. 
 
 Whatever she may have felt, Anne expressed herself 
 willing to be divorced perhaps she was thankful to escape 
 with her head and desired the Duke of Cleves' messenger 
 "to commend her to her brother, and say she was merry 
 and well entreated." He reported of her that she said this 
 " with such alacrity and pleasant gesture, that he might well 
 testify that he found her not miscontented. After she had 
 dined she sent the King the ring delivered unto her at their 
 pretended marriage, desiring that it might be broken in 
 pieces as a thing which she knew of no force or value." 
 Henry sent her many gifts and tokens "as his sister and 
 none otherwise," and told her that she was to be the first 
 lady in the realm next after the queen and the king's 
 children. He exhorted her to be "quiet and merry," and 
 subscribed himself "your loving brother and friend." After 
 his fifth marriage she was designated as " the old Queen, the 
 King's sister." 
 
 The French ambassador, in a letter of the 6th August 
 1 540, wrote : 
 
 " The King being lately with a small party at Hampton 
 Court, ten miles hence, supped at Richmond with the 
 Queen that was so merrily that some thought he meant 
 to reinstate her, but others think it was done to get 
 her consent to the dissolution of the marriage, and make 
 her subscribe what she had said thereupon, which is not 
 only what they wanted, but also what she thinks they 
 expected. The latter opinion is the more likely, as the 
 King drew her apart, in company with the three first 
 councillors he had, who are not commonly called in to 
 such confidence." 
 
 Marillac goes on to say that he thinks it would be great 
 inconsistency to take her back now, and that moreover she 
 did not sup with him as she did when she was queen, but at
 
 42 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 another table adjoining his, as other ladies who are not of 
 the blood do, when he eats in company. 
 
 On the 1 5th he wrote to the Duke de Montmorency : 
 
 "As for her who is called Madame de Cleves, far from 
 pretending to be distressed, she is as joyous as ever, and 
 wears new dresses every day, which argues either prudent 
 dissimulation or stupid forgetfulness of what should so 
 closely touch her heart. Be it as it may, it has thrown the 
 poor ambassador of Cleves into a fever, who sends every day 
 to ask if I have no news of his master." 
 
 Even if Anne's first feeling had been one of relief that a 
 worse fate had not befallen her, her gaiety was obviously 
 forced, and no doubt the lady did "protest too much," 
 but she had been ordered to be "quiet and merry," and if 
 after such a mandate she had ventured to put on a sorrowful 
 countenance, or to express a vain regret, her quondam 
 husband would probably have been such was his disposition 
 less flattered by the compliment than irritated by the 
 command disobeyed. And so she prudently accepted her 
 fate and "sate like patience on a monument smiling at 
 grief," as it afterwards transpired, and in her efforts to 
 please, imposed upon herself what must have been the most 
 trying ordeals. 
 
 Her marriage had taken place on the feast of the 
 Epiphany, 1540, and in July of the same year Henry was 
 united to Katharine Howard, grand-daughter of the Duke of 
 Norfolk. This young woman's reputation was already so 
 notoriously bad, that it is impossible to believe that the king 
 could be in ignorance of the fact. Nevertheless, for the time 
 being, he was deeply in love, and his scruples and righteous 
 anger were wont to come afterwards. Marillac describes the 
 new queen "as rather graceful than beautiful, and of short 
 stature." He says : 
 
 " The King is so amorous of her that he' cannot treat her 
 well enough, and caresses her more than he did the others.
 
 .1. II'. Miuisi'll <(' Co. 
 
 KATHARINE HOWARD (Fifth Wife of Henry VIII.). 
 
 From a Portrait in the National Portrait Gallery. School of Holbein. 
 
 [To JMC payi- 42.
 
 NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW 43 
 
 She and all the Court ladies dress in the French style, and 
 her device is Non autre volonte que la sienne. Madame de 
 Cleves is as cheerful as ever, as her brother's ambassador 
 says." 
 
 But others besides Anne of Cleves had reason to mourn, 
 and Melancthon complained that atrocious crimes were 
 reported from England, that the divorce with the lady of 
 Juliers was already made, and another married, and that 
 " good men of our opinion in religion are murdered." 
 
 On the 27th September, the papal nuncio wrote grimly to 
 Cardinal Farnese, that "so far" the King of England was 
 pleased with his new wife, and the other, " sister of Cleeves 
 has retired and ' lives' " Rumours, however, were persistently 
 current that Henry intended to take back Anne, until in 
 November, Marillac informed his master that the new queen 
 had " completely acquired the King's grace," and that the other 
 was " no more thought of than if she were dead." 
 
 But Marillac had soon reason to see that in making this 
 statement he had somewhat exaggerated. The Princess Mary 
 seems to have been well informed of the loose character and 
 behaviour of Katharine Howard, and contrived to find pretexts 
 for a long time for absenting herself from court, so that the 
 queen complained to Henry that his daughter did not treat 
 her with the respect she had shown to the two former 
 queens. 
 
 But Anne of Cleves had no scruples about associating with 
 Katharine, and was perhaps keen to note every detail concern- 
 ing her brilliant rival, who had been more successful than herself 
 in capturing the king's roving fancy. She was probably as 
 much in the dark as most people, as to the politico-religious 
 embarrassment she constituted. 
 
 The French ambassador gives an amusing description of 
 her New Year's visit to the court : 
 
 " Sire, to omit nothing that may be written about this 
 country, Madame Anne, sister of the Duke of Cleves, formerly
 
 44 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Queen of England, passed the recent festivities at Richmond, 
 four miles from Hampton Court, to which place the King and 
 also the Queen sent her, on the first day of the year, rich 
 presents of clothes, plate and jewels, valued at six or seven 
 thousand crowns. And on the second day she was summoned 
 to appear at Hampton Court, where she was very honourably 
 conducted by several of the nobility, and being arrived, the 
 King received her very graciously, as did also the Queen, with 
 whom she remained nearly the whole afternoon. They danced 
 together, and seemed so happy that neither did the new 
 Queen appear to be jealous or afraid that the other had come 
 to raise the siege, as it was rumoured, nor did the said lady 
 of Cleves show any sign of discontent at seeing her rival in 
 her place. Moreover, Sire, if it please you to hear the end of 
 this farce, that evening, and the next, the two ladies supped 
 at the King's table together, although the lady of Cleves sat 
 a little backward, in a corner, where the Princess of England, 
 Madame Mary, is wont to be ; and the following day, the 
 said lady of Cleves returned with the same escort to Richmond, 
 where she is visited by all the personages of the court, which 
 makes people think she is about to be reinstated in her 
 former position." 1 
 
 Eustace Chapuys, the imperial ambassador, also wrote an 
 account of this strange visit He says : 
 
 "On the 3rd [January 1541], the lady Anne of Cleves sent 
 the King a New Year's present of two large horses, with 
 violet velvet trappings, and presented herself at Hampton 
 Court, with her suite, accompanied only by Lord William, 
 the Duke of Norfolk's brother, who happened to meet her 
 on the road to this city. She was received by the Duchess 
 of Suffolk, the Countess of Hertford, and other ladies, who 
 conducted her to her lodgings and then to the Queen's apart- 
 ments. She insisted on addressing the Queen on her knees, 
 for all the Queen could say, who showed her the utmost kind- 
 1 De Marillac, Correspondance Politique, p. 258
 
 NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW 45 
 
 ness. The King then entered, and after a low bow to Lady 
 Anne, embraced and kissed her. She occupied a seat near 
 the bottom of the table at supper, but after the King had 
 retired, the Queen and Lady Anne danced together, and 
 next day all three dined together. At this time the King 
 sent his Queen a present of a ring and two small dogs, which 
 she passed over to Lady Anne. That day Lady Anne returned 
 to Richmond." 1 
 
 The public rumour of the likelihood of Anne's restoration 
 arose probably as much from the common talk of the queen's 
 immoral conduct as from the circumstance of Anne's appear- 
 ance at court. The reports at length reached Katharine's 
 ears, and it was possibly her accusing conscience that betrayed 
 itself in her visible depression of spirits. 
 
 " Some days ago [wrote Chapuys to the Queen of Hungary 
 on 6th May 1541], this Queen being rather sad, the King 
 wished to know the cause, and she said it was owing to a 
 rumour that he was going to take back Anne of Cleves. The 
 King told her that she was wrong to think such things, and 
 [that] even if he were in a position to marry, he had no mind 
 to take back Anne ; which is very probable, as his love never 
 returns for a woman he has once abandoned. Yet many 
 thought he would be reconciled to her for fear of the King 
 of France making war on him at the solicitation of the Duke 
 of Cleves and the King of Scotland." 
 
 This was the first intimation of the storm that was soon 
 to burst When it suited Henry to give ear to the scandals 
 afloat about the queen, his grief and indignation, or what it 
 pleased him should pass for such, knew no bounds. 
 
 The palace at Hampton Court where Katharine was 
 imprisoned, was so strictly guarded that none but certain 
 officers could enter or leave it. The Princess Mary, who 
 had spent the last few months with her stepmother, pre- 
 senting a strange contrast to her surroundings, was now 
 1 Chapuys to the Emperor ; Gairdner, Cal. 16, No. 436.
 
 46 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 sent to join Prince Edward, and her father announced 
 that he was heartbroken at the queen's immorality and 
 perfidy. Anne was thought by Chapuys to rejoice greatly 
 at Katharine's fall, but her execution caused little com- 
 ment throughout the country. Either the nation was 
 indifferent or it had become accustomed to the disgrace of 
 queen consorts. 
 
 Marillac, writing to Francis I. on the nth November, 
 says : 
 
 " The way taken is the same as with Queen Anne who 
 was beheaded. She has taken no kind of pastime, but kept 
 in her chamber, whereas, before, she did nothing but dance 
 and rejoice ; and now when the musicians come, they are told 
 that this is no more the time to dance. ... As to whom 
 the King will take, everyone thinks it will be the lady he has 
 left, who has conducted herself wisely in her affliction, and is 
 more beautiful than she was, and more regretted and com- 
 miserated than Queen Katharine [of Arragon] was in like 
 case. Besides, the King shows no inclination to any other 
 lady, and will have some remorse of conscience, and no man 
 in England dare suggest one of such quality as the lady in 
 question, for fear, if she were repudiated of falling en quelque 
 gros inconvenient" 
 
 The imperial ambassador had, it is seen, estimated Henry's 
 character more correctly than Marillac did, for as to " remorse 
 of conscience," we do not find throughout the whole length of 
 his life that the royal miscreant ever made an attempt to 
 expiate any one of his crimes, or to make amends to a single 
 individual for wrong done. 
 
 According to Marillac, the king was so shocked and 
 grieved at Katharine's behaviour, that he proposed never to 
 take another wife ; but when it was suggested that in spite of 
 her outrageous conduct the queen might possibly escape the 
 punishment of death, on account of her beauty and her sweet- 
 ness of disposition, the Duke of Norfolk said that she must of
 
 NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW 47 
 
 necessity die, because the king could not marry again while 
 she lived. 
 
 Francis I. does not seem to have taken his envoy's account 
 of Henry's grief very seriously (he had known the King of 
 England longer than Marillac had), and replied with some 
 apparent cheerfulness, that he was sorry for his cousin's 
 misfortune, and would soon send a gentleman to condole with 
 the king. 
 
 Chapuys, as usual, had with greater discernment, hit the 
 more probable mean. 
 
 " This King has wonderfully felt the case of the Queen, his 
 wife, and has certainly shown greater sorrow at her loss than 
 at the fault, loss, or divorce of his preceding wives. It is like 
 the case of the woman who cried more bitterly at the loss of 
 her tenth husband than at the deaths of all the others together, 
 though they had all been good men ; but it was because she 
 had never buried one of them before without being sure of the 
 next, and as yet it does not seem that he has formed any new 
 plan." 
 
 Katharine was beheaded on the i$th October 1542, on 
 the same spot on the Tower Green where Anne Boleyn had 
 been executed. Her end, and that of Lady Rochester who 
 had encouraged her in her evil life, was penitent, and even 
 edifying. After the execution it was remarked that the king 
 was in better spirits, and during the last few days before 
 Lent there was much feasting at Court. 
 
 Chapuys describes the state of affairs thus : 
 
 " Sunday was given up to the Lords of his Council, and 
 Court ; Monday to the men of law ; and Tuesday to the ladies, 
 who all slept at the Court. He himself in the morning did 
 nothing but go from room to room to order lodgings to be 
 prepared for these ladies, and he made them great and hearty 
 cheer, without showing particular affection to any one. 
 Indeed, unless Parliament prays him to take another wife, he 
 will not I think be in a hurry to marry ; besides, few if any
 
 48 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 ladies now at Court would aspire to such an honour, for a 
 law has just been passed, that should any King henceforth 
 wish to marry a subject, the lady will be bound on pain of 
 death to declare if any charges of misconduct can be brought 
 against her, and all who know or suspect anything of the kind 
 against her, are bound to reveal it within twenty days, on pain 
 of confiscation of goods and imprisonment for life." 
 
 Perhaps it was this general indictment of the women of 
 Henry's court, most certainly the echo of public opinion, that 
 had caused the people to persist in the belief that Anne of 
 Cleves would regain Katharine's strangely coveted place. 
 Where the reputation of a whole class was so bad as to make 
 the above kind of declaration impossible, virtue, such as that 
 attributed to the Lady Anne, was at a premium, and as it was 
 useless to think of a suitable foreign alliance in the state 
 of Henry's religious opinions, justice and necessity had alike 
 seemed to point to the reinstatement of the discarded queen. 
 But Henry was exceedingly annoyed at these repeated 
 suggestions which, forsooth, had almost appeared to dictate 
 to him, and he determined to put a stop to the free wagging 
 of tongues on the subject of his matrimonial affairs. 
 
 After the fall of Katharine Howard, and before her exe- 
 cution, a State Paper records that Jane Rattsay was 
 " examined of her words to Elizabeth Bassett, viz., ' What if 
 God worketh this work to make the Lady Anne of Cleves queen 
 again ? ' She answered that it was an idle saying suggested 
 by Bassett's ' praising the Lady Anne, and dispraising the 
 Queen that now is.' She declared that she never spoke at 
 any other time of the Lady Anne, and she thought the King's 
 divorce from her good." Examined as to her exclamation 
 " What a man is the King ! How many wives will he have ? " 
 she answered that she said it " upon the sudden tidings 
 declared to her by Bassett, when she was sorry for the change> 
 and knew not so much as she knows now." 
 
 But for all Anne's prudence, and the bold front the brave
 
 NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW 49 
 
 woman presented to her misfortunes, she had been secretly 
 hoping that when the inevitable crash came, she would be 
 restored to the rights which she had only renounced, because 
 she had no alternative. Henry, however, made no sign, and 
 in 1543 Katharine Parr appeared on the scene. The first 
 mention of the king's sixth wife in the public records is a 
 tailor's bill for numerous items of cotton, linen, buckram, etc., 
 and the making of Italian gowns, pleats, and sleeves, kirtles, 
 French, Dutch, and Venetian gowns, Venetian sleeves, French 
 hoods, etc., of various materials, the total amount of the bill 
 being 8, 95. 5d. This bill was delivered "to my Lady 
 Latymer," and was copied into the book of Skutt the 
 tailor. 
 
 Katharine Parr had been first married as a mere child 
 to the old Lord Borough of Gainsborough, and had been 
 left a widow before she was seventeen. She then married 
 Lord Latimer, who died in 1543, and was immediately 
 sought in marriage by Sir Thomas Seymour, brother of the 
 king's third wife, who became Lord High Admiral in Edward's 
 reign. Katharine undoubtedly intended to become his wife, 
 but as she afterwards wrote, her "will was over-ruled by a 
 higher power." 
 
 On the 2Oth June of the same year, Lady Latimer and 
 her sister Mrs Herbert were at court " with my Lady Mary's 
 Grace and my Lady Elizabeth," and the next mention of 
 her is in a licence of Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 "authorised thereto by parliament to Henry VIII. (who has 
 deigned to marry the Lady Katharine, late wife of Lord 
 Latimer deceased) to have the marriage solemnised in any 
 church, chapel, or oratory, without the issue of banns." It 
 took place on the I2th July following, in an upper oratory 
 called the Queen's Privy Closet, within the honour of Hampton 
 Court, Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, officiating. 
 
 "Anne of Cleves [wrote Chapuys to Charles V.], would 
 like to be in her sherte [shroud] so to speak, with her mother, 
 
 D
 
 50 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 having especially taken great grief and despair at the king's 
 espousal of this last wife, who is not nearly so beautiful as 
 she, besides that there is no hope of issue, seeing that she 
 had none with her two former husbands." 
 
 Others, besides the poor, discarded Lady Anne were also 
 in tribulation, and a letter from one of the Lutherans in 
 England to Henry Bullinger, the reformer, reports that "the 
 king has within these two months burnt three godly men 
 in one day. For in July he married the widow of a nobleman 
 named Latimer, and he is always wont to celebrate his nuptials 
 by some wickedness of this kind." 
 
 But Katharine herself was glad exceedingly, and told Lord 
 Parr that " it having pleased God to incline the king to take 
 her as his wife, which is the greatest joy and comfort that 
 could happen to her, she informs her brother of it as the 
 person who has most cause to rejoice thereat, and requires 
 him to let her sometimes hear of his health, as friendly as if 
 she had not been called to this honour." 
 
 Wriothesley, in forwarding this letter from the queen, 
 Lord Parr's "gracious lady and kind sister," doubts not but 
 that he will thank God, and frame himself to be more and 
 more an ornament to Her Majesty. 
 
 The marriage was in every way satisfactory. Katharine 
 was twenty-six, about one year younger than the Lady Mary, 
 and was by universal fame reported "a prudent, beautiful, 
 and virtuous lady." The royal family had reason to be grateful 
 for her influence over the king, whom she persuaded to 
 restore both Mary and Elizabeth to their rank. To Edward 
 she was a second mother, and Henry seems to have looked 
 upon her with something akin to respect, appointing her 
 regent when he crossed the Channel to invade France 
 in 1544. 
 
 She offended him, however, on one occasion, by venturing to 
 express a difference of opinion on a religious question, and it 
 was said that articles of heresy were drawn up against her. " A
 
 NOR WIFE NOR WIDOW 51 
 
 good hearing it is," exclaimed Henry, "when women become 
 such clerks ; and a thing much to my comfort to come in 
 mine old days to be taught by my wife ! Her prudence and 
 tact saved her life, if it was ever seriously in danger." 
 
 Henry's sordid tragedy was played out on the 28th January 
 1547, when the tyrant breathed his last, and left his two 
 wives and two daughters to unravel the skein which he 
 had so persistently entangled for them. Katharine Parr took 
 her fate immediately into her own hands, and thirty-five days 
 after Henry's death, secretly married her former admirer, 
 Sir Thomas, now Lord Seymour, who was described by 
 Hayward as " fierce in courage, courtly in fashion, in personage 
 stately, in voice magnificent, but somewhat empty in matter." 
 The union was not a happy one, owing mainly to Seymour's 
 intrigues with the Princess Elizabeth, a circumstance that was 
 thought to have shortened Katharine's life. The ci-devant 
 queen died at Sudeley Castle, after having given birth to 
 a daughter, in August 1548, aged thirty^sjx. 
 
 After the one tragic episode in her life, the course of 
 Anne of Cleves ran smoothly enough. Mary befriended her 
 always, and made her quondam stepmother a prominent 
 figure at her coronation. She frequently paid her visits, and 
 treated her with all the respect imaginable. Anne never left 
 England after her ill-starred arrival, ending her days peacefully 
 in 1557-
 
 Ill 
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 
 
 WHILE Edward's Council thought that they had effectually 
 closed every issue through which news of the king's death 
 might transpire, before their seditious plans were completed, 
 the Princess Mary was already on her way into Norfolk, 
 calling all loyal men and true to rally round her standard 
 Two Norfolk gentlemen were mainly instrumental in placing 
 her on the throne. These were Sir Henry Jerningham and the 
 subject of this memoir, Sir Henry Bedingfeld of Oxburgh, 
 who came in to her assistance at Framlingham, with 140 
 well-armed men. 
 
 Bedingfeld proclaimed the queen at Norwich, and was 
 afterwards rewarded for his loyalty with an annual pension 
 of iOO out of the forfeited estates of Sir Thomas Wyatt 
 Mary made him a Privy Councillor and Knight Marshal of 
 her army, and subsequently Lieutenant of the Tower of 
 London ; and Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard, vice Sir 
 Henry Jerningham. She appointed him custodian of Elizabeth, 
 when that princess was confined in the Tower and at Wood- 
 stock, on suspicion of being concerned in Wyatt's rebellion ; 
 and so little did Elizabeth resent his severity during the time 
 of her imprisonment, that after her accession, she addressed 
 him as her "trusty and well-beloved," employed him in 
 her service, and granted to him the manor of Caldecot in 
 Norfolk, which still forms part of the Oxburgh estate at the 
 present day. 
 
 52
 
 SIR HENRY BEDINGFELD (Lieutenant of the Tower of London). 
 From a Portrait at Oxburgh. 
 
 [To /ace page 52.
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 53 
 
 He was undoubtedly one of the foremost Englishmen of 
 his day, respected by two sovereigns, and occupying prominent 
 and honourable positions, his loyalty being unimpeachable ; 
 yet Foxe, the martyrologist, with his wonted dishonesty, has 
 without the slightest foundation, and so effectually, blackened 
 his fame, that almost every subsequent writer on this period 
 has reproduced the calumnies set forth with malice prepense 
 in the Acts and Monuments. 
 
 Strype was the first unquestioning copyist of Foxe ; Burnet 
 was the second ; and Sir Reginald Hennell is the most recent. 1 
 
 Tennyson, in his dramatic poem Queen Mary, also went 
 to Foxe for his historical data, with the result that, while 
 discarding the more malicious interpretation of Bedingfeld's 
 character, he has, nevertheless, passed on to posterity a coarse 
 and grotesque caricature as though it were a portrait. 
 
 A fire broke out at Woodstock in May 1554, and Tennyson 
 choosing to suppose that Elizabeth suspected foul play, invented 
 the following absurd dialogue : 
 
 LADY. 
 
 I woke Sir Henry and he's true to you 
 I read his honest horror in his eyes. 
 
 ELIZABETH. 
 Or true to you ? 
 
 LADY. 
 
 Sir Henry Bedingfeld ! 
 I will have no man true to me, your Grace, 
 But one that pares his nails ; to me ? the clown ! 
 For like his cloak, his manners want the nap 
 And gloss of court ; but of this fire he says, 
 Nay swears, it was no wicked wilfulness, 
 Only a natural chance. 
 
 ELIZABETH. 
 
 A chance perchance 
 
 One of those wicked wilfuls that men make, 
 Nor shame to call it nature. 
 
 1 In his volume The History of the King's Bodyguard of the Yeomen of 
 the Guard"
 
 54 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 At the end of a long speech Elizabeth cries 
 God save the Queen. My jailor 
 BEDINGFELD. 
 
 One, whose bolts, 
 
 That jail you from free life, bar you from death. 
 There haunt some Papist ruffians hereabout 
 Would murder you. 
 
 ELIZABETH. 
 
 I thank you heartily, sir, 
 But I am royal, tho' your prisoner, 
 And God hath blest or cursed me with a nose 
 Your boots are from the horses. 
 
 This libel did not, however, pass unchallenged, and the father 
 of the present baronet wrote to the Poet Laureate the following 
 protest : 
 
 " SlR, As a great admirer of your genius, I eagerly read 
 your drama Queen Mary, but was so surprised and pained at 
 the ignoble part which is allotted to Sir Henry Bedingfeld, 
 that I cannot refrain from addressing you on the subject. I 
 feel justified in doing so, as I am the direct descendant of Sir 
 Henry, and date from the house which was his home. 
 
 "The millions who will read Mary Tudor, or witness the 
 play on the stage, will carry away the impression that my 
 ancestor was a vulgar yeoman, in some way connected with 
 the stables, whereas he was a man of ancient lineage, a 
 trusted friend and servant of the queen, who confided to him 
 in time of danger the Lieutenancy of the Tower, and the 
 custody of the Princess Elizabeth. This princess so respected 
 Sir Henry, that although she complained of his severity 
 during her captivity, she visited him at Oxburgh after her 
 accession to the throne, and treated him with the greatest 
 consideration. Numerous documents in my possession, in- 
 cluding letters from the Sovereign, from the Privy Council, 
 and from the most eminent men of the time, would prove,
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 55 
 
 were such proof required, the high position held by Sir 
 Henry. 
 
 " I trust, therefore, to your feeling of justice that you will, 
 if possible, either strike out Sir Henry's name from future 
 editions, or allot to him a more dignified part on the stage, 
 and one which will convey a more correct view of his character 
 and position. I am, Sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 "HENRY BEDINGFELD." 
 
 Tennyson's answer to the above, dated from the Isle of 
 Wight, six months later, though courteous, left the matter 
 almost where it was, so far as historical accuracy was 
 secured : 
 
 "SIR, Your letter arrived when I was abroad, else would 
 have been answered at once ; and therefore I waited till the 
 play should be announced for acting. I had made your ancestor 
 an honest gentleman though a rough one, as I found him 
 reported to be, whether true or no; and I regret that you 
 should have been pained by my representation of him. Now, 
 in deference to your wishes, his name is not once mentioned 
 on the stage, and he is called in the play-bill merely ' Governor 
 of Woodstock.' Moreover, I have inserted a line in Elizabeth's 
 part : ' But, girl, you wrong a noble gentleman.' I have the 
 honour to be, Sir, your obedient servant, 
 
 "A. TENNYSON." 
 
 In spite, however, of the best intention on the part of the 
 author, the American edition of the play, priding itself on 
 being "the only unmutilated version," preserves the exact 
 wording of the poem. 1 Thus has history ever been medicated 
 to suit the prejudices of the uncritical and the ignorant. 
 
 Sir Henry Bedingfeld, who was born in the year 1509, 
 
 1 De Witt's acting plays, No, 181, Queen Afary ; a drama, Edited by 
 John M- Kingdom,
 
 56 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 was the grandson of Sir Edmund Bedingfeld, the favourite of 
 three successive kings, Edward IV., Richard III., and Henry 
 VII. This same Sir Edmund had served in the Wars of the 
 Roses, and Edward IV., by letters patent of the twenty-second 
 year of his reign, granted to him, "for his faithful service, 
 licence to build towers, walls, and such other fortifications as 
 he pleased in his manors of Oxburgh, together with a market 
 there weekly, and a court of pye-powder." He also bestowed on 
 him his own royal badge the Falcon and Fetterlock. Richard 
 III. made him a Knight of the Bath, and Henry VII. visited 
 him at Oxburgh. In the third year of his reign this king 
 granted three manors in Yorkshire, Wold, Newton, and 
 Gaynton to him and his heirs male for ever, in return for 
 his help in crushing the rebellion in the north, which patent 
 was renewed and confirmed by Henry VIII. Sir Edmund 
 died in 1496, and was succeeded by his only son, another 
 Edmund, who attended Henry VIII. in his foreign wars, and 
 was knighted for valour by Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, 
 on the battle-field, after the taking of Montdidier in 1523. 
 The king appointed him steward to Katharine of Arragon at 
 Kimbolton. He married Grace, daughter of Henry, Lord 
 Marny, and by her had four sons, Henry, Edmund, Anthony, 
 and Humphrey. Henry, who succeeded him in 1533, was 
 the famous Lieutenant of the Tower, and the " jailor " of the 
 Princess Elizabeth. Henry's wife was Katharine, daughter of 
 Sir Roger Townshend, one of the judges of the Court of 
 Common Pleas, and ancestor of the present Marquis Town- 
 shend. 
 
 Sir Henry Bedingfeld kept up some state at Oxburgh, 
 having twenty servants in livery, besides those employed in 
 husbandry. When he was away on the queen's business, the 
 management of his estate devolved on Dame Katharine, and 
 a letter from this lady addressed "To the right worshipful, 
 my very good husband," and dated Oxburgh, October 1554, 
 is a compte rendu of all she had done for his property
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 57 
 
 during his absence. This document which has had a 
 chequered career, has lately, with some others, found its way 
 back to the Oxburgh archives. Another, the draft of which 
 has lately been discovered among the muniments of this 
 venerable old house, strikes a more pathetic note, and testifies, 
 to the affectionate dependence with which Lady Bedingfeld 
 leaned on her lord. 
 
 " Lady Bedingfeld to the lords of the Council, praying to Jiave 
 her husband with Jur during tier confinement : 
 
 "MY LORDS, Being very near the time of my being 
 brought to bed, and Sir Henry Bedingfeld in the country, who 
 is very tender in giving any offence to the Queen's Majesty, 
 this is humbly to beg your Lordships will be pleased to con- 
 firm the order as he may have leave to be with me till the 
 time of my approaching danger be over, and I shall acknow- 
 ledge it as a very great favour done to your Lordships' most 
 humble servant." 
 
 On the reverse side of this draft is a recipe for "Lime 
 drinks against the King's Evil, or any sharp humours." 
 
 Although a man does not necessarily write himself down 
 angel or devil, it is true of most people that their correspond- 
 ence is a fair indication of their character, tastes, and habits. 
 The letters written by and addressed to Sir Henry Bedingfeld 
 reveal him as of the usual type of country gentlemen of the 
 period, interested in sport and agriculture, but having also 
 some experience of soldiering. He could be counted on to 
 raise a troop of horse or foot in an emergency, provided it 
 were in the service of the lawful sovereign. He made it his 
 business to become acquainted with the condition of Marsh- 
 land, in order to account to the queen for the fealty of those 
 around him ; and Elizabeth, no less than Mary, knew that 
 she could rely on him to uphold her authority in the eastern 
 counties. His letters to Mary show that notwithstanding his,
 
 58 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 frankness, and his freedom from diplomatic subtlety, his 
 manners did not lack the polish of the courtier. In the 
 fulfilment of his charge he was ever prudent, cautious, and 
 almost timid in the matter of accepting responsibility ; in no 
 sense covetous of office, he was yet so scrupulous in the dis- 
 charge of duty, that he scarcely ever acted on his own 
 judgment if he could possibly wring instructions from the 
 Privy Council. His loyalty, uprightness, courtesy, and 
 modesty, stood him in lieu of more brilliant parts, and his 
 severity was at all times tempered by that quality of mercy 
 which " is not strained." To all this must be added his fidelity 
 to his religion in difficult and dangerous times. 
 
 His life after Mary's accession, to which he had materially 
 contributed, falls naturally into three parts: I. The period 
 during which he had the care of the Princess Elizabeth. 
 2. His term of office as Lieutenant of the Tower. 3. The 
 twenty-five years after Mary's death, which he spent for the 
 most part in retirement in Norfolk. 
 
 On the 1 8th March 1554, this portentous missive was 
 delivered to him : 
 
 " My duty remembered, these shall be to advise you that 
 on Friday my lady Elizabeth was sent to the Tower at 10 of 
 the clock. The Parliament shall be holden at Westminster 
 on the day aforesaid ; and the Queen is in good health, 
 thanks be to God, who preserve you in much worship. This 
 Good Friday riding by the way. Your servant to command, 
 
 "THOMAS WATERS. 
 
 " To the right worshipful Sir Henry Bedyngfeld give 
 these, written in haste." 
 
 The causes of Elizabeth's arrest were far-reaching. Circum- 
 stantial evidence of her connection with Wyatt's rebellion was 
 not wanting, and if Mary had been willing to have her sister 
 convicted on that evidence alone, her head would undoubtedly
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 59 
 
 have fallen on the block. Elizabeth herself in numerous in- 
 stances caused blood to flow on far less certain grounds. But 
 her guilt could not otherwise be brought home, and in her first 
 Parliament Mary had restored the ancient, constitutional law 
 of England, by which overt or spoken acts of treason must 
 be proved, before any English person could be convicted as 
 a traitor. 
 
 The case against Elizabeth was this. The French Ambas- 
 sador, de Noailles, whose instructions were that he should play 
 upon the popular discontent in regard to the queen's proposed 
 marriage to Philip of Spain, in the interest of France, 
 encouraged Elizabeth to associate herself with the factious, 
 and to become, as it were, the stalking-horse of the disaffected. 
 She was far too clever to commit herself to any direct act of 
 rebellion, but de Noailles was prodigal of her; name in all the 
 intrigues that he fostered, and the plot organised by means 
 of Sir Peter Carew, in Devonshire and Cornwall, had for its 
 declared object the marriage of Elizabeth to Courtenay, Earl 
 of Devon, and the placing of these two on the throne. Sir 
 Thomas Wyatt had meanwhile raised the standard of revolt 
 in the home counties, but before leaving London for that 
 purpose, he had written a letter to Elizabeth, urging her for 
 greater safety to retire to her castle of Donnington. This 
 letter fell into the hands of the Council, as did also three 
 letters from de Noailles to the French king, directly implicating 
 Elizabeth in the insurrection, and a copy of the letter which she 
 had written to Mary, refusing on the plea of illness to obey 
 the queen's summons to the Court. Lord Russell confessed 
 to having carried communications between the princess and 
 Wyatt, and that traitor, being brought to trial, owned that 
 the object of his rising was to secure the crown for Elizabeth 
 and Courtenay. He subsequently repeated the statement, 
 adding that the French king had promised them men and 
 money, and was to attack Calais and Guisnes the moment 
 the rebels were in possession of London, Whether he really
 
 60 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 withdrew this accusation of Elizabeth on the scaffold must 
 always remain doubtful, the testimony of the sheriffs being in 
 direct contradiction to that of Lord Chandos, who was also 
 present 
 
 It was not until Wyatt had formerly declared Elizabeth to 
 be conspiring with Henry II. of France, that Mary was at 
 length convinced of the necessity of securing her person. She 
 repeated her summons, but not, as Foxe would have us believe, 
 with inconsiderate cruelty and rough haste. Elizabeth's uncle, 
 Admiral Lord William Howard, Sir Edward Hastings, and 
 Sir Thomas Cornwallis, were sent to escort her from Ashridge 
 to Westminster, with two physicians who were to decide 
 whether she were well enough to travel. She was treated 
 with uniform courtesy and consideration, and the journey of 
 thirty-three miles, originally intended to occupy five days, was 
 actually made to cover a whole week. The imperial ambassador 
 thus describes her arrival : l 
 
 " The lady Elizabeth arrived here yesterday, clad completely 
 in white, surrounded by a great assemblage of servants of the 
 Queen, besides her own people. Her countenance was pale, 
 her look proud, lofty, and superbly disdainful, an expression 
 which she assumed to disguise the mortification she felt The 
 Queen declined seeing her, and caused her to be accommodated 
 in a quarter of her palace from which neither she nor her 
 servants could go out without passing through the guards. 
 Of her suite, only two gentlemen, six ladies, and four servants 
 are permitted to wait on her, the rest of her train being 
 lodged in the city of London. The queen is advised to send 
 her to the Tower, since she is accused by Wyatt, named in 
 the letters of the French ambassador, suspected by her own 
 councillors, and it is certain that the enterprise was under- 
 taken in her favour." 2 
 
 1 State Papers (Domestic), 1554, vol. xxi. ; R.O. 
 
 2 Record Office Transcripts (Belgian Archives), printed by Tytler in his 
 England under the reigns of Edward VI. and Mary.
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 61 
 
 When charged with complicity in the plot, Elizabeth replied 
 that she knew nothing of it. The members of the Council 
 were divided concerning her, some maintaining that the legal 
 proof against her was insufficient to justify her being sent to 
 the Tower, while others were for giving her short shrift. 
 Mary availed herself of this loophole, and caused each lord 
 of the Council in succession to be asked to undertake the 
 custody of the princess in his own house. Not one was 
 willing to accept the perilous office, and a warrant was there- 
 fore made out for her committal. There was a very general 
 impression at the time, that her life would have been in danger, 
 but for Mary's determination that the law should not be 
 infringed at her trial. Nothing could be adduced that was 
 not already known, and in spite of the emperor's reiterated 
 demands for her execution, Mary would not have her convicted 
 on the only evidence obtainable. 
 
 It was for Elizabeth's greater safety that the queen 
 appointed Sir Henry Bedingfeld to be her custodian, and 
 Foxe's absurd description of Bedingfeld's arrival with his 
 hundred soldiers in blue-coats, and Elizabeth's terror at the 
 sight, is manifestly a fabrication of the martyrologist's brain. 
 We have already had a glimpse of Sir Henry's antecedent 
 history. He had materially contributed to Mary's triumph 
 over her enemies, and may be said to have been one of the 
 main instruments in placing the Queen on the throne ; he was 
 a distinguished member of her Privy Council, therefore a public 
 personage, and it is inconceivable that Elizabeth should have 
 asked who he was, as being " a man unknown to her Grace," 
 or that her attendants and friends should have answered that 
 " they were ignorant what manner of man he was." Foxe 
 himself had betaken himself to foreign parts on Mary's accession, 
 and may perhaps be pardoned for not knowing, although we 
 find it hard to forgive him for the baseless fabrication by 
 which he sought to discredit the queen and all those who 
 served her faithfully.
 
 02 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 " About that time," romances Foxe, " it was spread abroad 
 that her Grace should be carried from thence by this new jolly 
 Captain and his soldiers ; but whither it could not be learned, 
 which was unto her a great grief, especially for that such a 
 company was appointed to her guard, requesting rather to 
 continue there still, than to be led thence with such a sort 
 of rascals. At last plain answer was made by the Lord 
 Chandos, that there was no remedy but from thence she must 
 needs depart to the manor of Woodstock." 
 
 He goes on to say that on iQth May she was removed 
 from the Tower, " where Sir Henry Benifield [being appointed 
 her jailor] did receive her with a company of rake-hells to 
 guard her, besides the Lord Derby's band, wafting in the 
 country about for moonshine in the water. Unto whom at 
 length came my Lord of Thame, joined in commission with 
 the said Sir Henry for the safeguarding of her to prison, and 
 they together conveyed her Grace to Woodstock, as hereafter 
 followeth. The first day they conducted her to Richmond, 
 where she continued all night, being restrained of her own 
 men which were laid in out-chambers, and Sir Henry Benifield's 
 soldiers appointed in their rooms to give attendance on her 
 person. Whereat she being marvellously dismayed, thinking 
 verily some secret mischief to be a-working towards her, called 
 her gentleman-usher, and desired him with the rest of his 
 company to pray for her. ' For this night,' quoth she, ' I think 
 to die.' Wherewith, he being stricken to the heart, said, ' God 
 forbid that any such wickedness should be pretended against 
 your Grace.' So comforting her as well as he could, at last 
 he burst out into tears, and went from her down into the 
 court, where were talking the Lord Thame and Sir Henry 
 Benifield." 
 
 We may now dismiss Foxe and his egregious insinuations 
 of foul play, together with his monstrous inventions of 
 boorishness on the part of Elizabeth's custodian. In spite 
 of his calumnies, it remains perfectly clear that Elizabeth had
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 63 
 
 every reason to be thankful that her " jailor " was faithful to his 
 trust, and that firmness and caution, rather than weak 
 indulgence, characterised all his conduct towards her. As for 
 his alleged want of courtesy towards her, there is not a shadow 
 of evidence to support it ; he frequently knelt to address her, 
 and even in speaking or writing of her, maintained the same 
 deferential mode of expression as that which he used in her 
 presence. 
 
 Each incident of the journey from the Tower to Wood- 
 stock is detailed in Sir Henry's report to the Privy Council. 
 Elizabeth apparently seized every opportunity of making his 
 difficult task yet more difficult ; but wayward and imperious 
 as her temper often was, nothing in his demeanour towards 
 her ever approached to disrespect or even impatience. Even 
 she herself brought no other complaint against her custodian 
 than that of " scrupulousness " in the discharge of his duty, 
 a charge which is in itself a magnificent vindication, for the 
 Elizabeth of history was not one to forgive a man who had 
 failed in the smallest degree to pay her the homage due to 
 her rank. Moreover, in regard to Sir Henry's soldiers, no 
 single instance is recorded on either side of misbehaviour or 
 want of decorum on their part. 
 
 In his first letter to the queen after their arrival at Wood- 
 stock, Sir Henry says : 
 
 " My lady Elizabeth's Grace did use [? peruse] the letter 
 which your Highness sent her, wherein she was right weary, 
 to my judgment, the occasion rising of the stark style of the 
 same letter, being warpen and cast. This present day she 
 hath not been very well at ease, as your Highness's women 
 did declare unto me, and yet at the afternoon she required to 
 walk, and see another lodging in the house. In the which, 
 and other her like requests, I am marvellously perplexed to 
 grant her desire, or to say nay, seeing it hath been your 
 Highness's pleasure to remove her person from and out of the
 
 64 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Tower of London where I was led to do upon more certainty 
 by the precedent of ray good Lord Chamberlain [Sir John 
 Gage] and also by certain articles, by me exhibited unto my 
 lords of the Council and by them ordered, which were to me 
 a perfect rule at that time, and now is very hard to be observed 
 in this place. Wherefore I most lowly and heartily do desire 
 your Highness to give me authority and order in writing from 
 your Majesty or your Council, how to demean myself in this 
 your Highness's service, whereby I shall be the more able to do 
 the same, and also receive comfort and heart's ease to be your 
 Highness's daily beadsman to God for persuasion of your 
 most princely and sovereign estate long to endure to God's 
 honour. 
 
 "The 21 of May, I554." 1 
 
 In answer to this letter the Council wrote approving his 
 doings, and thanking Sir Henry on the part of the queen. A 
 number of instructions for his further conduct were also 
 sent, the purport of which will be gathered from his 
 reply : 
 
 " My letter answering to the former ; the Council's letters. 
 
 " So it is, most honourable lords, that upon the return of 
 my brother Humphrey, I received instructions signed with the 
 Queen's Majesty's hand, and enclosed in a letter signed by 
 your Lordships as a warrant to direct my service how to be 
 used during the Queen's Majesty's pleasure, trusting only 
 in God to make me able to do and accomplish the same. 
 
 1 This and the next following letters are taken from the fourth volume 
 of the publications of the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society, 
 State Papers relating to the custody of the Princess Elizabeth at Woodstock 
 in 1554, being letters between Queen Mary and her Privy Council and 
 Sir Henry Bedingfeld, Knight, of Oxburgh, Norfolk, communicated by the 
 Rev. C. R. Manning, M.A., Hon. Sec. The originals were formerly in 
 Mr Manning's possession, but have now disappeared The present writer 
 has modernised the spelling.
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 65 
 
 I travail and shall do to the best of my power till God and her 
 Highness shall otherwise dispose for me, wishing that shortly 
 it should come to pass, if it may so stand with her Highness's 
 good contentation and your honour. As touching the fifth 
 article, which purported this in effect that I should not suffer 
 the lady Elizabeth's Grace to have conference with any suspect 
 person out of my hearing, that she do not by any means either 
 receive or send any message, letter or token, to or from any 
 manner of person, which, under your honourable corrections, 
 I must thus answer to that, as touching conference with 
 suspected persons, if your Lordships mean strangers, and such 
 as be not daily attending upon her person by your assents and 
 privities, with the help above said, I dare take upon me that 
 to do. But if you mean general conference with all persons, 
 as well within her house as without, I shall beseech you of 
 pardon, for that I dare not take upon me, nor yet for message, 
 letter or token, which may be conveyed by any of the three 
 women of her privy chamber, her two grooms of the same or 
 the yeomen of the robes, all which persons and none others 
 be with her Grace at her going to her lodging, and part of them 
 all night, and until such time as her grace cometh to her dining- 
 chamber, the grooms always after going abroad within the 
 house, having full opportunity to do such matter as is pro- 
 hibited. And hereunto I beseech your honours ask my Lord 
 Chamberlain whether it will be within possibility for me to do 
 it or no, whose order in all things I have and do, according 
 to my poor wit and endeavour put in use; and upon his 
 declaration to direct order possible. At the present writing 
 hereof one Marbery, my lady Grace's servant, brought his 
 wife, Elizabeth Marbery, to have been received to have 
 wait upon her Grace, in the stead of Elizabeth Sands, and 
 because I received no manner of warrant from you my 
 Lords, to do it, I have required the said Marbery to stay him- 
 self and his wife hereabouts, till I might receive the same, 
 which I pray you to do with all speed, for they been 
 
 E
 
 r>6 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 very poor folks, and unable to bear their own charge as I 
 perceive. 
 
 " Her Grace, thanks be to God, continueth in reasonable 
 health and quietness, as far as I can perceive ; but she claimeth 
 promise of the mouth of my Lords Treasurer and Chamberlain 
 to have the liberty of walk within the whole park of Woodstock. 
 This, she hath caused to come to mine ear by my Lady Gray, 
 but never spoke of it to me by express words. . . . Her Grace 
 hath not hitherto made any request to walk in any other place 
 than in the over and nether gardens with the orchard, which, 
 if she happens to do, I must needs answer I neither dare nor 
 will assent unto it, till by the Queen's Highness and your 
 honours I be authorised that to do. . . . Cornwallis, the gentle- 
 man-usher, did move me to assent that the cloth of estate should 
 be hanged up for her Grace, whereunto I directly said nay, till 
 your Lordships' pleasures were known therein. 
 
 "Postscript. There was some peril of fire within the house, 
 which we have without any loss to be regarded, escaped. 
 Thanks be to God." 
 
 In answer to the above the Council thanked and com- 
 mended Sir Henry for all that hej had hitherto done, 
 adding : 
 
 "Where ye desire to be resolved of certain doubts which 
 you gather upon your instructions, ye shall understand that 
 although we well know ye cannot meet such inconvenience 
 as may happen by those that attend upon the lady Elizabeth, 
 in bringing unto her letters, messages or tokens, yet if ye 
 shall use your diligence and wisdom there as ye shall see 
 cause, it shall be your sufficient discharge. As for strangers, 
 ye must foresee that no persons suspect have any conference 
 with her at all, and yet to permit such strangers whom ye 
 shall think honest and not suspicious, upon any reasonable 
 cause to speak with her in your hearing only. As for placing
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 
 
 Elizabeth Marbery in lieu of Sands, letters be already sent 
 from the Queen's Highness unto you therefore, which we 
 pray you to see executed accordingly. Where she claimeth 
 promise of the Lord Treasurer and me the Lord Chamberlain 
 to walk in the park, as we have heard nothing before this 
 time thereof, so do not I the Lord Chamberlain remember 
 any such promise." 
 
 The queen's letter was as follows : 
 
 " MARYE THE QUENE. By the Quene. 
 
 "Trusty and right well-beloved, we greet you well. And 
 where we be informed that Sands, one of the women presently 
 attending about our sister the Lady Elizabeth, is a person of 
 an evil opinion, and not fit to remain about our said sister's 
 person, we let you wit, our will and pleasure is, you shall 
 travail with our said sister, and by the best means ye can 
 persuade her to be contented to have the said Sands removed 
 from her, and to accept in her place, Elizabeth Marbery, 
 another of her women, who shall be sent thither for that 
 purpose : whom at her coming we require you to be placed 
 there, and to give order that the said Sands may be removed 
 from thence accordingly. 
 
 "Given under our signet, at our manor of St James, the 
 26th day of May, the first year of our reign." 
 
 It was soon found necessary to cancel the permission for 
 strangers to have access to the captive princess, and the 
 Council accordingly wrote to Sir Henry : 
 
 "And forasmuch as it appeareth hereby that such private 
 persons as be disposed to disquiet will not let to take occasion 
 if they may, to convey messages or letters in and out by 
 some secret practice, her Majesty's further pleasure is for the 
 avoiding hereof, that ye shall henceforth suffer no manner
 
 68 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 person other than such as are already appointed to be about 
 the Lady Elizabeth, to come unto her or have any manner, 
 talk, or conference with her, any former instructions or letters 
 heretofore sent you to the contrary notwithstanding." 
 
 Elizabeth made difficulties with regard to every detail of 
 her custody, and the substitution of Marbery, although she 
 was one of her own women, for Sands, was not effected 
 without a struggle ; but on the 5th June Sir Henry was able to 
 report that : " The same was done this present day, about 2 
 of the clock in the afternoon, not without great mourning 
 both of my Lady's Grace and Sands. And she was conveyed 
 into the town by my brother Edmund, and by him de- 
 livered to Mr Parry, who at my desire yesternight did 
 prepare horse and men to be ready to convey her either 
 to Clerkenwell beside London to her uncle there, or else 
 into Kent, to her father, towards the which he promised she 
 should go. This I do signify unto your lordships, because I 
 think her a woman meet to be looked unto for her obstinate 
 disposition." 
 
 In another very long letter he certifies that the princess 
 has asked for an English Bible "of the smallest possible 
 volume," desiring that he would send to her cofferer for one. 
 But the cofferer replied that he had none at all, but sent a 
 servant with three books, one of which contained the Psalms 
 of David and the Canticles. Leave was given for her to have 
 an English Bible, and for her to write to the Queen as she 
 desired. 
 
 On the 1 2th June Sir Henry wrote to the Council a letter 
 highly informative as to the difficulties of his position : 
 
 " Pleaseth it your honourable lordships to be advertised, 
 that the same day I last wrote unto you, my lady Elizabeth's 
 Grace demanded of me whether I had provided her the book of 
 the Bible in English of the smallest volume, or no. I answered,
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 69 
 
 because there were divers Latin books in my hands ready 
 to be delivered if it pleased her to have them, wherein as I 
 thought she should have more delight, seeing she understandeth 
 the same so well ; therefore I had not provided the same, which 
 answer I perceived she took not in good part, and within 
 half-an-hour after that, in her walking in the nether garden, 
 in the most unpleasant sort that ever I saw her since her 
 coming from the Tower, she called me to her again, and said 
 in these words : ' I have at divers times spoken to you to 
 write to my lords of certain my requests, and you never make 
 me answer to any of them. I think (quoth she) you make 
 none of my lords privy to my suit, but only my Lord 
 Chamberlain, who, although I know him to be a good gentle- 
 man, yet by age, and other his earnest business, I know he 
 hath occasion to forget many things.' To this I answered 
 that I did never write in her Grace's matter to any of you 
 my lords privately, and said unto her Grace further, that I 
 thought this was a time that your lordships had great business 
 in, 1 and therefore her Grace could not look for direct answer 
 upon the first suit. ' Well,' said she, ' once again I require 
 you to do thus much for me, to write unto my said lords, 
 on my behalf to be means unto the Queen's Majesty, to grant 
 me leave to write unto her Highness with mine own hand, 
 and in this I pray you let me have answer as soon as you 
 can.' To this I answered : ' I shall do for your Grace that I 
 am able to do, which is to write to my said Lords, and 
 then it must needs rest in their honourable considerations 
 whether I shall have answer or no,' since which time her 
 Grace never spoke to me. Surely, I take it that the remem- 
 brance of Elizabeth Sands' departing, and the only placing 
 Marbery in her room, clearly against her late desire, is some 
 cause of her grief [grievance]." 
 
 The effect produced by the princess's letter to Mary may 
 1 On account of the Queen's approaching marriage.
 
 70 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 be gathered from the following reply, written by the Queen 
 to Sir Henry : 
 
 "MARYE THE QUENE. By the Quene. 
 
 "Trusty and well-beloved, we greet you well. And where 
 our pleasure was of late signified unto you for the Lady 
 Elizabeth to have licence to write unto us, we have now 
 received her letters, containing only certain arguments devised 
 for her declaration in such matters as she hath been charged 
 withal by the voluntary confessions of divers others. In which 
 arguments she would seem to persuade us, that the testimony 
 of those who have opened matters against her, either were 
 not such as they be, or being such should have no credit. 
 But as we were most sorry at the beginning, to have any 
 occasion of suspicion, so when it appeared unto us, that the 
 copies of her secret letters unto us were found in the packet of 
 the French ambassador, that divers of the most notable traitors 
 made their chief account upon her, we can hardly be brought 
 to think that they would have presumed to do so, except they 
 had had more certain knowledge of her favour towards their 
 unnatural conspiracy than is yet by her confessed. And 
 therefore, though we have for our part, considering the matter 
 brought to our knowledge against her, used more clemency 
 and favour towards her than in the like matter hath been 
 accustomed ; yet cannot these fair words so much abuse 
 [deceive] us, but we do well understand how these things have 
 been wrought. Conspiracies be secretly practised, and things 
 of that nature be many times judged by probable conjectures, 
 and other suspicions and arguments, where the plain, direct 
 proof may chance to fail ; even as wise Solomon judged who 
 was the true mother of the child by the woman's behaviour 
 and words, when other proof failed and could not be had. By 
 the argument and circumstances of her said letter with other 
 articles declared on your behalf by your brother to our Privy 
 Council, it may well appear her meaning and purpose to be
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 71 
 
 far otherwise than her letters purported. Wherefore our 
 pleasure is not to be hereafter any more molested with such 
 her disguise and colourable letters, but wish for her that it 
 may please our Lord to grant her His grace to be towards 
 Him as she ought to be ; then shall she the sooner be towards 
 us as becometh her. This much have we thought good to 
 write unto you, to the intent ye might understand the effect 
 of those letters, and so continue your accustomed diligence 
 in the charge by us committed to you. 
 
 " Given under our signet at the Castle of Farnham, the 
 25th day of June, the first year of our reign." 
 
 The gist of this letter was communicated to Elizabeth by 
 Sir Henry in the manner he himself describes : 
 
 " Yesterday I went to hear Mass in her Grace's chamber ; 
 that being ended, in the time of doing my duty, thinking to 
 have departed from her Grace, she called me, and asked 
 whether I had heard of any answer that was or should be made 
 by the Queen's Majesty to her late letters. Upon which 
 occasion, fitly as I took it, I made her Grace answer that I had 
 to declare unto her an answer on the Queen's Majesty's behalf, 
 whensoever she should command me. ' Let it be even now,' 
 said her Grace. 'If you will,' I answered, 'because I was 
 fearful to mis-report ; therefore I have scribbled it as well as I 
 can with mine own hand, and if you will give me leave to fetch 
 it,' and, being ready to go in to her Grace with it, I received 
 word from her Grace by one of the Queen's Majesty's women 
 to stay till her Grace had dined, and then she would hear it. 
 Within a mean pause after dinner she sent for me, and having 
 Mr Tomiou in my company, who going with me into the outer 
 chamber, there staying, I went in to her Grace, and required her 
 if it so stood with her pleasure that he might hear the doing 
 of the message. She granted it, and I called him in, and 
 kneeling by with me, I read unto her Grace my message
 
 72 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 according to the effect of the Queen's Majesty's letter. After 
 once hearing of it she uttered certain words, bewailing her own 
 chance in that her Grace's letter, contrary to her expectations, 
 took no better effect, and desired to hear it once again, which 
 I did. And then her Grace said : ' I note especially to my 
 great discomfort [which I shall, nevertheless, willingly obey] 
 that the Queen's Majesty is not pleased that I should molest 
 her Highness with any more of my colourable letters, which, 
 although they be termed colourable, yet not offending the 
 Queen's Majesty, I must say for myself that it was the plain 
 truth, even as I desire to be saved afore God Almighty, and 
 so let it pass. Yet, Mr Bedyngfeld, if you think you may do so 
 much for me, I would have you to receive an answer which I 
 would make unto you touching your message, which I would at 
 the least way, my Lords of the Council might understand, and 
 that ye would conceive it upon my words, and put it in writing, 
 and let me hear it again. And if it be according to my 
 meaning, so to pass it to my lordships for my better comfort in 
 mine adversity.' To this I answered her Grace : ' I pray you, 
 hold me excused that I do not grant your request in the same.' 
 Then she said : ' It is like that I shall be offered more than ever 
 any prisoner was in the Tower, for the prisoners be suffered to 
 open their mind to the Lieutenant, and he to declare the same 
 unto the Council, and you refuse to do the like.' To this I 
 answered her Grace that there was a diversity where the 
 Lieutenant did hear a prisoner declare matters touching his 
 case, and should thereof give notice unto the Council, and 
 where the prisoner should, as it were, command the Lieutenant 
 to do his message to the Council. Therefore, I desired that her 
 Grace would give me leave with patience not to agree to her 
 desire herein, and so departed from her Grace. 
 
 " Yesterday morning again, about x of the clock, in the time 
 of her walk, she called me to her in the little garden, and said : 
 ' I remember yesterday ye refused utterly to write on my behalf 
 unto my Lords of the Council, and therefore, if you continue in
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 73 
 
 that mind still, I shall be in worse case than the worst prisoner 
 in Newgate, for they be never gainsaid in the time of their 
 imprisonment by one friend or Bother to have their cause 
 opened or sued for, and this is and shall be such a conclusion 
 unto me, that I must needs continue this life without all hope 
 worldly, wholly resting to the truth of my cause, and that 
 before God to be opened, arming myself against whatsoever 
 shall happen, to remain the Queen's true subject as I have done 
 during my life. It waxeth wet, and therefore 1 will depart to 
 my lodging again ; ' and so she did. Thus much concerning 
 her Grace, I thought it my duty to give your lordships 
 advertisement of, to be considered as it shall please your 
 honours, clearly omitting any part of the message, and such 
 which my lady's Grace would have had me to have taken upon 
 me, and shall do so, unless I have the Queen's Majesty's 
 warrant for the same." 
 
 This report had the desired effect, and the Council gave Sir 
 Henry leave " to write those things that she shall desire you, 
 and to signify the same to us of her Majesty's Council, sending 
 your letters touching that matter enclosed in some paper 
 directed to her Highness, so as she may herself have the first 
 sight thereof" 
 
 Mary's next letter was personal to Sir Henry himself : 
 
 "Trusty and right well-beloved, we greet you well. And 
 where we understand that by occasion of certain our instruc- 
 tions lately given unto you, ye do continually make your 
 personal abode within that our house at Woodstock, without 
 removing from thence at any time, which thing might, perad- 
 venture in continuance, be both some danger to your health, 
 and be occasion also that ye shall not be so well able to under- 
 stand the state of the country thereabouts, as otherwise ye 
 might; we let you wit that in consideration thereof; we are 
 pleased ye may at any time, when yourself shall think con-
 
 ?4 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 venient, make your repair from out of our said house, leaving 
 one of your brethren to look to your charge, and see to the good 
 governance of that house in your absence, so as, nevertheless, 
 ye return back again yourself at night, for the better looking to 
 your said charge. And for your better ease and recreation, we 
 are, in like manner pleased that ye and your brethren may, at 
 your liberties, hawk for your pastime at the partridge, or 
 hunt the hare within that our manor of Woodstock, or any 
 of our grounds adjoining to the same, from time to time, 
 when ye shall think most convenient ; and that also ye may, 
 if ye shall so think good, cause your wife to be sent for, 
 and to remain there with you as long as yourself shall think 
 meet. 
 
 " Given under our signet at our Castle of Farnham, ye 7th of 
 July, ye second year of our reign." 
 
 Elizabeth was not slow to profit by the permission obtained 
 for her to write to the Council through the intermediary 
 allowed, and Sir Henry's letter-book contains the following 
 transcript of his report written in his own hand. 
 
 " My lady Elizabeth's Grace's suit : 
 
 " My lady Elizabeth, this present 3Oth of July, required me 
 to make report of her Grace's mind as her suit to your honours 
 to be means to the Queen's Majesty on her behalf to this 
 effect. To beseech your lordships all to consider her woeful 
 case, that being but once licensed to write as an humble 
 suitress unto the Queen's Highness, and received thereby no 
 such comfort as she hoped to have done, but to her further 
 discomfort in a message by me opened, that it was the Queen's 
 Highness's pleasure not to be any more molested with her 
 Grace's letters, that it may please the same, and that upon 
 very pity, considering her long imprisonment and restraint 
 of liberty, either to charge her with special matter to be 
 answered unto and tried, or to grant her liberty to come
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 75 
 
 unto Her Highness's presence, which she saith she would 
 not desire, were it not that she knoweth herself to be clear, 
 even before God, of her allegiance. And if also by your 
 good mediations she might not enjoy the Queen's Highness's 
 most gracious favour without any scruples or suspicions of 
 her truth, she had rather willingly suffer this that she doth, 
 and much more, than her Majesty should in any case be 
 troubled or disquieted, touching her whose honour surely and 
 preservation she saith she doth desire above all things in 
 this world. Requiring me further to move chiefly as many 
 of you my lords as were a Council, parties, and privy to and 
 for the execution of the will of the King's Majesty her father, 
 to further this her Grace's suit above said. And if neither of 
 these two her suits may be obtained by your lordships for 
 her, that then it might please the Queen's Highness to grant 
 that some of you my lords may have leave to repair hither 
 unto her, and to receive her suit of her own mouth to be opened. 
 Whereby she may take a release not to think herself utterly 
 desolate of all refuge in this world." 
 
 To this the Council made reply on the /th August that 
 " the Queen's Highness " would " take a time to consider, 
 and at convenient leisure make such answer thereunto as shall 
 be necessary " ; but Elizabeth's imperious temper brooked no 
 delay, and Sir Henry was soon prevailed on to jog their 
 lordship's memories : 
 
 " Upon Friday last," he wrote, " my lady Elizabeth's 
 Grace, in the time of her walk in the over garden here, in the 
 forenoon of the same day, said unto me, ' I have very slow 
 speed in the answer of any of my suits, and I know it is ever 
 so when that there is not one appointed to give daily attend- 
 ance in suit-making for answer. And therefore,' saith she, 
 ' I pray you let me send a servant of mine own to whom I 
 will do the message in your hearing that he shall do by my 
 commandment ; and this I think,' said she, ' is not against the
 
 76 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 order and service appointed unto you.' To which I answered 
 requiring her Grace to be contented, for I neither could nor 
 would assent to any such her request. ' Then,' said she, ' I 
 am at a marvellous afterdeal [disadvantage], for I have known 
 that the wife hath been received to sue for her husband, the 
 kinsman, friend or servant for them that hath been in the 
 case I now am, and never denied.' To that I answered : ' I 
 myself am of small experience in such case ; that notwith- 
 standing, I trust ye shall not be long, or my lords of the 
 Council will remember your suit, and answer the same.'" 
 And so her Grace ended. 
 
 Harsh as this refusal may appear at first sight, it must be 
 admitted that Sir Henry, in reporting his conversations with 
 Elizabeth to the Council often obtained for her if not exactly 
 what she had asked for, at least some concession, which, had 
 she been entirely in good faith, would have served her purpose 
 as well. But in spite of her jailor's " scrupulousness " she con- 
 trived to communicate pretty freely by means of Parry, her 
 cofferer, and others, with the outside world. Bolts and bars 
 were ineffectual so long as those who surrounded her were 
 willing intermediaries between her and the enemies of the 
 queen, and Sir Henry knew it well. He desired nothing more 
 than to be rid of his onerous charge, as is seen by the following 
 letter to Thirlby, Bishop of Ely : 
 
 " After my hearty commendations to your good lordship, 
 so it is that as you do know, I have continued this service by 
 the space of fifteen weeks, in care of mind and some travail of 
 body, which I would be glad to make suit to be relieved of, 
 if I might know it should be taken- in good part And having 
 no friend whom I believe myself to be so assured of as your 
 lordship, even thereupon I am bold by these heartily to 
 desire your travail in my behalf [if it so stand with your 
 good opinion] to the Queen's Majesty, to grant me my 
 discharge from the same. Wherein I trust my Lord
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 77 
 
 Chancellor l will join with you, if it content you to move him 
 thereunto, who, by words of marvellous effect comprising both 
 the Queen's commandment that I should enter into it, and 
 his earnest request at that time also, did cause me to take in 
 hand the same. And lest my said Lord should forget, I pray 
 you put him in remembrance that he had this talk with me 
 upon the causeway betwixt the house of Saint James and Charing 
 Cross. And what it shall content you to do for me herein, 
 I shall desire you to be ascertained by your letters, upon the 
 return of the messenger. I made late a suit to you for your 
 house at Blackfriars, and received answer that you had other- 
 wise disposed the same ; yet remembering that you had an 
 house of my Lord of Bath in Holborn, which, as the case now 
 standeth, I think your Lordship will have little pleasure to 
 use, and if, by your good mean, I might obtain the same at 
 my Lord of Bath's hands, you should do unto me a great good 
 turn, which have no house of refuge in London, but the common 
 inn, and would be glad to give large money to be avoided of 
 that inconvenience. And thus remaining at the Queen's 
 Majesty's house of Woodstock [out of which I was never, by 
 the space of six hours, sith my coming into the same], I leave 
 to trouble your Lordship with this my rude writing. 
 
 " At the house aforesaid, the i6th day of August 1554." 
 
 But nothing came of his efforts to get himself released, 
 and the unequal contest between his "scrupulousness," and 
 Elizabeth's astute, unfathomable diplomacy was still to be 
 waged for many months. Her request to be allowed to send a 
 verbal message to the Council by one of her servants was 
 indeed declined, but she received permission to commit her 
 petition to paper. On the 2Oth September, Sir Henry wrote 
 to the Council : 
 
 " Upon the return of my brother Edmund with your 
 honourable letters dated at Hampton Court the i$th of 
 1 Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester.
 
 78 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 this present month, I did take knowledge that your 
 lordships had obtained of the Qjieen's Majesty that my lady 
 Elizabeth's Grace might write unto your lordships, deliver- 
 ing the same unto me to be addressed unto your honours, 
 inclosed in my letter, by one of her grace's extraordinary 
 servants; whereupon the Monday, being the I7th day in the 
 forenoon of the same, I declared that your lordships had 
 granted her Grace's late desire in form above said, which 
 was glad tidings as I took it. Yet her Grace at that time 
 did neither command me to prepare things for her Grace 
 to write with nor named who should be her messenger, and 
 so I departed. Her Grace never spake words of that matter 
 more till the Sunday following, in the time of her Grace's 
 walk at the afternoon, at which time her Grace commanded 
 to prepare her pen and ink and paper against the next day > 
 which I did. Upon Monday in the morning her Grace sent 
 Mistress Morton, the Queen's Highness's woman for the 
 same, to whom I delivered a standsel [an inkstand] with 
 five pens, two sheets of fine paper and one coarse sheet, 
 enclosing the same with this request unto the said Mistress 
 Morton, that she should make suit to my lady's Grace on 
 my behalf, that it would please her Grace not to use the 
 same but in the sight of Mistress Tomio or her. And the 
 same Mistress Morton did this, and brought me word that 
 her Grace had consented to my said suit, and that I should 
 also send word unto Francis Verney, her Grace's ordinary 
 servant lying in the town of Woodstock, with her cofferer 
 to be messenger. Where I perceive they use as much privy 
 conference to her Grace and from her as they list, even as 
 I advertised your lordships long ago. The house also being 
 a common inn wherein they do lie, and they so politic as they 
 be, I can get no knowledge of their doings by any espyal ; 
 this only I am sure of they meet not together in person. 
 At the afternoon, in her Grace's going to walk, I heard her 
 say she had such pain in her head that she could write no
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 79 
 
 more that day. Tuesday in the morning, as I learned of 
 Mistress Morton, she washed her head." 
 
 On the 4th October he wrote to the queen : 
 
 "May it please your Highness to be advertised that this 
 great lady, upon whose person ye have commanded mine 
 attendance, is and hath been in quiet state for the health of 
 her body this month or six weeks, and of her mind declareth 
 nothing outwardly by word or deed that I can come to the 
 knowledge of, but all tending to the hope she saith she hath 
 of your clemency and mercy towards her. Marry, against 
 my lords of your most honourable Council I have heard her 
 speak, words that declare that she hath conceived great 
 unkindness in them, if her meaning go with her words, 
 whereof God only is judge." 
 
 His task grew daily more complicated, and the next letter 
 is a key to the situation : 
 
 "My humble duty remembered unto your honourable 
 lordships, these shall be to advertise the same, that this 
 present 2ist day of October, my lady Elizabeth's Grace 
 commanded me to prepare things necessary for her to write 
 unto your lordships, whereupon I took occasion to declare 
 unto her Grace that the express words of your honourable 
 letters, dated at Hampton Court, the i$th of September, did 
 not bear that the Queen's Majesty was pleased that her Grace, 
 upon any occasion from time to time moving, and as often 
 as it pleased her, might write unto you. And therefore I 
 prayed her Grace to stay her determination therein until I 
 might signify this my doubt unto your lordships, and receive 
 your full and plain determination therein for my discharge ; 
 which my suit she took in so ill part that her Grace of 
 displeasure therein did utter, with more words of reproach of
 
 80 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 this my service, about her by the Queen's commandment 
 than ever I heard her speak afore : too long to write. At 
 afternoon her Grace sent for me by Mrs Pomeyow, and then 
 in a more quieter sort, required me to write unto your 
 honours, and thereby to desire the same to be means for her 
 unto the Queen's Highness to grant that Drs Wendy, Owen, 
 and Huick, or two of them, may be licensed with convenient 
 speed to repair hither, for to minister unto her physic, 
 bringing of their own choice one expert surgeon to let her 
 Grace's blood, if the said doctors or two of them shall think 
 it so good, upon the view of her suit upon their coming. . . . 
 Most heartily desiring your honours to return with the same 
 your absolute opinions to the first matter which shall be 
 done accordingly, with our Lord's leave and help, to under- 
 stand your pleasures and commandments aright, which this 
 great lady saith may have good meaning in me, but it 
 lacketh knowledge, experience, and all other accidents in 
 such a service requisite, which I must needs confess. The 
 help only hereof resteth in God and the Queen's Majesty, 
 with your honourable advice ; from whence to receive the 
 discharge of this my service, without offence to the Queen's 
 Majesty or you my good lords, were the joyfullest tidings 
 that ever came to me, as our Lord Almighty knoweth, to 
 whom no secrets be hidden." 
 
 The physicians were sent to Woodstock, and Elizabeth 
 was "let blood," Sir Henry testifying that "by her own 
 commandment " he saw it done " by the bleeding of her 
 arm " ; and some hours later he saw her foot " stricken 
 and bled, since which time, thanks be to God, as far as 
 I see or hear she doeth reasonably well as that case 
 requireth." 
 
 Some months later " the joyfullest tidings that ever came " 
 were conveyed in a letter from the queen, It was the herald 
 of his longed-for " discharge " :
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 81 
 
 " MARYE THE QUENE. By the Quene. 
 
 " Trusty and well-beloved, we greet you well. And for as 
 much as we have resolved to have the lady Elizabeth to repair 
 nearer unto us, we do therefore pray and require you to 
 declare unto her that our pleasure is she shall come to us to 
 Hampton Court in your company with as much speed as 
 you can have things in order for that purpose ; wherein you 
 shall not need to make any delay for calling of any other 
 numbers than these, which be yourself and those now there 
 attendant upon her. And of the time of your setting forwards 
 from thence, and by what day you shall think you may be 
 there, we require you to advertise us by your letters with 
 speed. 
 
 " Given under our signet at our honour of Hampton Court, 
 the 1 7th of April the 1st and 2nd of our reign." 
 
 On their arrival at court Sir Henry Bedingfeld was 
 relieved, Sir Thomas Pope being appointed to replace him. 
 Elizabeth was soon afterwards allowed to retire to Hatfield, 
 where she remained under supervision till her accession. In 
 the meanwhile, Bedingfeld was appointed Lieutenant of the 
 Tower, and the following selection of letters from the family 
 archives at Oxburgh not only affords us a further insight 
 into his character, but shows at the same time in what 
 manner the State prisoners were treated by the Queen, the 
 Council, and the Lieutenant. 
 
 The two first letters relate to Sir John Cheke who, together 
 with Sir Peter Carew, had been arrested in Flanders, and 
 brought to the Tower for implication in Wyatt's rebellion. 
 Carew was released in October 1555. 
 
 " Sir Robert Rochester to Sir Henry Bedingfeld. 
 
 "MR LIEUTENANT, My Lord Cardinal his Grace 1 being 
 gone to Lambeth of express purpose, there to have before him 
 
 1 Cardinal Pole. 
 
 F
 
 ' 
 82 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Mr Cheke, hath required me to write unto you, and to 
 require you that the said Mr Cheke may be sent unto him 
 unto Lambeth, in the company and with the Dean of Paul's. 
 Wherefore I pray you take order with the said Dean so as 
 he may convey him thither accordingly. The meaning is 
 that no officer of the Tower should be troubled with his 
 conveyance thither, but only the Dean to be charged by 
 you with his person to bring to my Lord Cardinal's presence, 
 and he to bring him again when it shall please my said Lord 
 to command him, who hath the whole order and disposition 
 of this case. This must be done when Mr Dean he cometh 
 to you for the man. And so bids you most heartily well to 
 fare, from the Court this present morning, your assured 
 friend, R. ROCHESTER." 
 
 " Sir John Feckenham^ Priest^ to Sir John CJteke. 
 
 "GENTLE MR CHEKE, It was this day somewhat past 
 10 of the clock before I could have any determinate answer 
 of your coming unto the Court, which is now appointed to be 
 at 2 of the clock in the afternoon. I shall send two of my 
 servants to wait upon you from the Tower unto my house, 
 at i of the clock, and from thence I will go with you unto 
 the Court myself. I do think that Mr Lieutenant is already 
 put to knowledge thereof, but if it be forgotten give unto 
 him this my letter, and he will not stay you. Your sub- 
 mission is very well liked, and the Queen's Highness hath 
 seen the same, with which her Majesty has found no fault, 
 but only that you had forgotten to make mention in the 
 latter end thereof of the King's Majesty. And therefore you 
 must write it all whole again, and in the latter end add 
 these words which I have added touching the King's 
 Majesty, or else everything is as it was in your own copy 
 save that I added in one place the real presence of Christ's 
 
 1 Abbot of Westminster, who was appointed to examine Cheke in 
 matters of religion.
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 83 
 
 Body and Blood. I pray you leave not out these words, and 
 at your coming I shall hear your cause, where notwithstand- 
 ing your few lines which is wrote unto me thereof, be you of 
 good comfort ; all things are well, and imagined best for 
 your furtherance. You have more friends than you be ware 
 of. Thus fare you well, this present 5 of Sep. 1556, by your 
 assured friend, JOHN FECKNAM, Priest. 
 
 " I pray you fail not to write it all again, and that as 
 large and plain as you can, for I am commanded to request 
 you that you duly so do." 
 
 Dr Cheke, having proved his innocence of conspiracy to 
 the satisfaction of the Council, and having recanted his heresy, 
 was released, and " through the efficacy of his language," about 
 thirty others followed his example, and saved their lives. He 
 died the next year, the heretics said, of remorse for what he 
 had done against the reformed religion. 
 
 Edward Lewkner, who according to Machyn's Diary had 
 been groom-porter to Edward VI. and Mary, "was cast to 
 suffer death " in the third year of Mary's reign for participation 
 in the Dudley conspiracy. While in the Tower he fell so 
 grievously ill as to excite the Lieutenant's compassion, and Sir 
 Henry appears to have interceded with the Queen on his 
 behalf. 
 
 " To tJte Right Worshipful Sir Henry Bedingfeld, Knight, Lieu- 
 tenant of the Queen's Highnesses Tower of London. Francis 
 Malet, Priest. 
 
 "RIGHT WORSHIPFUL, After my hearty commendations 
 these shall be to certify your Mastership that where your 
 charity was declared in that it pleased you to take pains to 
 declare by your wise and discreet letters the piteous state of 
 Lewkner, your prisoner, I was thereby the more ready and 
 yet not wanting the counsel of a counseller to move the Queen's 
 goodness in the matter. And her Grace being content to take
 
 84 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 into her hands your letter, and going with it into her privy 
 chamber, said she would consider the matter, and that I should 
 learn what her Grace's resolute mind will be therein. And 
 therefore to tarry this messenger any longer at this time I 
 thought but folly, for that I shall be ready sooner at night 
 if it please her Highness to understand what answer she will 
 make to my suit ; or if it will not be known this night, as I 
 doubt, for her Grace is as it were ever defatigate with her late 
 business in dispatching the King of Bohemia's ambassadors, 
 I shall know as soon as I may what her Grace's determination 
 shall be ; and that known, I shall with all expedition intimate 
 the same unto you, that so the poor man may be certified of 
 her Grace's pleasure. And in the meantime I shall most 
 heartily beseech your Mastership to continue your favour 
 towards the man ; and divers of those that be most nigh unto 
 her Grace's person desire the same at your hands, and saith 
 plainly that the Queen's Grace will not be discontent that he 
 may have all the commodity that may be showed him for the 
 recovery of his health within the Tower. I pray God show 
 His will mercifully upon him, and I trust the Queen's goodness 
 shall be extended withal unto him to his great comfort, as 
 knoweth Almighty Jesus, who send you with much worship 
 long to live and well to live in both soul and body. Scribbled 
 in haste with the running hand of yours to command, 
 
 FRANCIS MALET, Priest" 
 
 The above letter is undated, but the sequel to the story 
 is related by the Lieutenant himself in the minutes of a letter 
 to the Council. 
 
 " Please it your Grace and my Lords to be advertised that 
 this present Sunday, the 6th September, Edward Lewkner, 
 prisoner, attainted by long sickness, departed this transitory 
 life to God, about the hour of eight of the clock of the night. 
 Who was a willing man in the forenoon of this day to have
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 7 85 
 
 received the blessed Sacrament, but the priest that did serve 
 in the absence of the . . . l did think him so well that it 
 was meet to be ministered to him but after he had heard his 
 confession. He did minister unto him the Sacrament of 
 Oiling, or Extreme Unction, at the which I was present To- 
 morrow I intend by God's grace to see him buried in form 
 appertaining to his condition in life, as I have learned of those 
 that have seen the like order. Instead of a will he charged 
 me with his service to the Queen's Majesty, that it might 
 please her Highness, after forgiveness of his offences towards 
 the same, to vouchsafe to have pity of his wife and ten poor 
 children, which I promised to do upon my next waiting upon 
 her Majesty, humbly beseeching your Lordships all in time 
 most meet to be good lords to the same his petition. And 
 so as your poor beadsman I take my leave of you. 
 
 "From the Queen's Majesty's Tower of London 1556, the 
 night aforesaid, about 1 1 of the clock. 
 
 " HENRY BEDYNGFELD." 
 
 Many other letters among this collection give evidence of 
 the kindness and pity bestowed by the Lieutenant on the 
 prisoners in the Tower, and the consideration with which their 
 friends were treated, these being admitted to see them when- 
 ever it was practicable. His relations with nearly all the 
 members of the Privy Council were intimate and cordial, but 
 perhaps his closest friend was Sir Henry Jerningham, who was 
 not only a colleague, but the chosen companion of the rare 
 occasions that were devoted to recreation and pleasure. Their 
 two families had always been on terms of affectionate intimacy, 
 although it was not until two generations later that they 
 became allied by marriage, when Thomas Bedingfeld of 
 Oxburgh, Sir Henry's grandson, married Frances, daughter 
 and co-heir of John Jerningham of Somerleyton. 
 
 On the 1 6th February 1557, Sir Henry Jerningham, having 
 1 Illegible in the manuscript.
 
 86 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTKR 
 
 occasion to write to the Lieutenant of the Tower on business, 
 ended his letter thus : 
 
 " I do and will labour all that I can to have your company 
 into Norfolk this Lent, to course the hare and hawk the heron. 
 And thus I commit you to God, praying Him to send us our 
 prosperity. Your assured friend, HENRY JERNINGHAM." 
 
 During the years 1553, 1554, and 1557, Sir Henry Bedingfeld 
 sat in Parliament as one of the knights of the shire for Norfolk. 
 In 1557 he succeeded Sir Henry Jerningham as Captain of the 
 Yeoman of the Guard, at which time he was also made vice- 
 Chamberlain. But Mary's death in 1558 closed his public 
 career, and he retired to Oxburgh, which, hemmed in on the 
 south side by miles of fen country, was in those days for all 
 practical purposes entirely cut off from the world. It was 
 probably during a temporary absence, and when he was pur- 
 posing to entertain guests in his beautiful Norfolk home, that 
 the following letter was written to him presumably by his 
 
 steward : 
 
 s 
 
 " To the right worshipful and my especial good friend Sir Henry 
 Bedingfeld, Knight, be this delivered. 
 
 " Pleaseth it your Mastership that according to your Master- 
 ship's commandment, I did write to Mr R and he was 
 
 not at home. I shall go to him again, and you shall know 
 by the next messenger ; you shall understand what plate and 
 bedding may be had at his hand. What number of capons 
 and hens your Mastership would have me to provide I would 
 desire to know by the next messenger. I doubt fat capons are 
 hard to be gotten in these parts, therefore if you had any that 
 were ready fed, or could get any that were fed in Suffolk they 
 might be stayed till the time you should require them, and have 
 them killed, and carried dead, and have again instead of them
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 87 
 
 fine lean capons. Lean capons are at 8d. the piece, and 9d. 
 and rod. and I2d. Geese are at 6d. and /d. a piece. Lean 
 hens 4d. and 5d. Wild fowl was never so hard to be gotten. 
 There is little taken ; the fowlers do say the cause is the 
 weather is so rainy, and there is as much wait laid for the 
 getting of it as ever there was for my Lady's Grace and for 
 divers others. I have done as much as I could to have gotten 
 some for your Mastership, and for my masters your sons, and 
 could get but six teals. Since Christmas there is sent you of 
 your own hawk's killing, eleven teals, two mallards, and eleven 
 bitterns. And I humbly take my leave of your Mastership. 
 From Oxburgh, 20 of December 1563, by your poor servant, 
 
 "WM. DEYE." 
 
 It would not have been surprising if Sir Henry Bedingfeld 
 had fallen more or less into disgrace at this time, for Elizabeth 
 might now, if she had wished, made him feel the effects of his 
 " scrupulousness " during the period of her captivity. The 
 following letter from the queen shows, however, that such was 
 not the case : 
 
 " To our trusty and well-beloved Sir Henry Bedingfeld^ 
 
 Knight. 
 
 " ELIZABETH R. By the Quene. 
 
 " Trusty and well-beloved, we greet you well. Like as we 
 doubt not, but by the common report of the world, it appeareth 
 what great demonstrations of hostility the French make towards 
 this realm, by transporting great powers into Scotland, upon 
 the pretence only of their going about the conquest of the same, 
 so have we thought meet upon more certainty to us of their 
 purpose, to have good regard thereto in time. And being very 
 jealous of our town of Berwick, the principal key of all our 
 realm, we have determined to send with speed, succours both 
 thitherwarcj and to our frontier, as wejl horsemen as footmen,
 
 88 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and do also send our right trusty and entirely beloved cousin, 
 the Duke of Norfolk, to be our Lieutenant-General of all the 
 North, from Trent forward. For which purpose we have 
 addressed our letters to sundry our nobility and gentlemen in 
 like manner as we do this unto you, willing and requiring you 
 as you tender and respect the honour of us and surety of your 
 country, to put in readiness, with all speed possible, one able 
 man, furnished with a good strong horse or gelding, and armed 
 with a corselet, and to send the same to Newcastle by such day, 
 and with such further order for the furniture as shall be 
 appointed to you by our trusty and well-beloved Sir Edward 
 Wyndham, Knight, and Sir Christopher Heydon, Knight, whom 
 we have advertised of our further pleasure in that behalf. And 
 at the arriving of the said horseman at Newcastle, he shall not 
 only receive money for his route and conduct, but also beside 
 his wage shall be, by the discretion of our said cousin of 
 Norfolk, so used and entreated as ye shall not need to doubt of 
 the safe return of the same, if the casualty of death be not 
 impeached. And herein we make such sure account of your 
 forwardness as we thereupon have signified among others to 
 our said cousin this our appointment and commandment. So 
 shall we make account of you in that behalf, whereof we pray 
 you fail not. 
 
 " Given under our signet at our Palace of Westminster, the 
 2$th day of September, in the second year of our reign." 1 
 
 It was in consideration of this or of some other service 
 rendered about this time that Elizabeth granted to Sir Henry 
 Bedingfeld and to his heirs for ever, the manor of Caldecot, in 
 Norfolk " with the impropriation thereof." 
 
 An undated manuscript, preserved at Oxburgh, containing 
 
 a plan of an itinerary for the queen's progress into Norfolk, 
 
 would seem to support the tradition that Elizabeth visited that 
 
 place. Perhaps she intended to visit it, for immediately after 
 
 1 The original letter is at Oxburgh,
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 89 
 
 Walsingham, which then belonged to the Sidneys, occurs the 
 sentence : " Thence to Oxburgh, Sir Henry Bedingfelds." * 
 This document is printed in Blomefield's History of Norfolk, 
 and the date assigned to it is 1578, presumably because this 
 was the only time at which Elizabeth visited Norfolk. There 
 are, however, no details of any visit to Oxburgh, and Dr 
 Jessopp, considering that the place was quite out of the 
 line of progress, is of the opinion that she never went there 
 at all. 2 
 
 But there are other and more weighty reasons than those of 
 distance for arriving at this conclusion. From the year 1569, 
 when the foremost English Catholics attempted to liberate Mary 
 Queen of Scots, the penal laws against Papists were redoubled 
 in severity, and those who still clung to the old religion fell 
 into disfavour. Elizabeth did indeed visit Euston Hall, near 
 Thetford, in 1578, and Mr Rookwood presumed to kiss her 
 hand. But the Lord Chamberlain severely reprimanded him 
 for so doing, sternly bade him stand aside, and charged him 
 with being a recusant, unfit to be in the presence, much 
 less to touch the sacred person, of his sovereign. He was 
 required to attend the Council, under surveillance, and when 
 he reached Norwich, in the queen's train, was committed to 
 jail. 
 
 Many other recusants were treated in 1578 as Rookwood 
 was. Two of the Lovells, Humphrey Bedingfeld of Quidenham, 
 Sir Henry's brother, one Parry, and two others, "not worth 
 memory for badness of belyffe," were confined in Norwich 
 Castle " for obstinate papystrie." 8 
 
 " At Norwich, the Queen lodged at the bishop's palace, and 
 
 1 The so-called Queen's room, a large apartment above that in which 
 Henry VII. undoubtedly slept may, it appears to the present writer, have 
 been occupied by Elizabeth of York, wife of Henry VII., who, it is well 
 known, accompanied him on, at least, one pilgrimage to Walsingham. A.S 
 she also was Queen Elizabeth, this may account for the tradition, 
 
 2 One Generation of a Norfolk House, p. 61, 
 
 3 Mason, History of Norfolk^ p. 1 50,
 
 90 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 spent her time, as far as the bad weather would allow, in 
 listening to absurd speeches and witnessing grotesque pageants, 
 but on the iQth August, she suddenly resolved to go a-hunting 
 in the park of Cossey, five miles from Norwich, which belonged 
 to Mr Henry Jerningham, ancestor of the present Lord 
 Stafford. Once more her host was a recusant, but this time it 
 would have been too shameless to proceed against him. Mr 
 Jerningham had made himself very conspicuous in opposing 
 the abominable attempts to set aside Mary and Elizabeth as 
 heirs to the Crown at the death of Edward VI., and in return 
 for his loyalty, had received this very domain of Cossey at 
 Queen Mary's hands ; but for him and his gallantry twenty 
 years before, Elizabeth herself might never have been on the 
 throne. So Mr Jerningham was left unmolested at present, 
 though his time was to come by-and-bye, and when three days 
 after, the Council met and made order for the committal to jail 
 of such of the Norfolk gentry as had not kept their church, and 
 upon whom the hand of power had been so astutely laid, Mr 
 Jerningham's name was omitted, though his kinsman's, Mr 
 Bedingfeld's, name figures on the list, only to appear again and 
 again hereafter." l 
 
 Among the Acts of the Privy Council for 1578, it is stated 
 that : 
 
 " This day [August 24th], there appeared before their lord- 
 ships, as warned by the Sheriff of Norfolk, amongst persons 
 refusing to come to the church within that county, Sir Henry 
 Bedingfeld, Knight, and Edmund Wyndham, Doctor of the 
 Civil Law, who, standing in their obstinacy in refusing to come 
 to the church in time of prayer, sermons, and other divine 
 service, were ordered, as others of the same sort before, at 
 
 1 One Generation of a Norfolk House, p. 62. Dr Jessopp is mistaken in 
 identifying this Mr Jerningham with the friend and ally of Sir Henry 
 Bedingfeld, who was associated with him in placing Mary on the throne. 
 Sir Henry Jerningham died in 1572, aged 63, and Elizabeth's host at Cossey 
 was his son.
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 91 
 
 Norwich : Sir Henry Bedingfeld to be bound in 500, and Mr 
 Wyndham in 200, with the like conditions as they that were 
 bound to remain in their lodgings at Norwich, as by their 
 obligations remaining in the Council Chest it may appear. 
 And for that their lordships were informed that divers of the 
 household servants of Sir Henry Bedingfeld did and do refuse 
 likewise to come to the church, it was ordered that the Lord 
 Bishop of Norwich, or some person appointed by him, should 
 visit his household, and so many of his said servants as should 
 refuse to conform themselves to come to the church should be 
 discharged by the said Bishop or his visitors, in that case, from 
 his service." 
 
 The Council then wrote to two justices of the peace in 
 Norfolk, ordering them to discharge Sir Henry's servants " that 
 will not come to church as is above said, and that they be 
 not maintained by the said Sir Henry Bedingfeld nor any 
 other of their friends with any exhibition or otherwise, where- 
 soever they shall bestow themselves, nor that there be not 
 any other servants admitted to serve Sir Henry Bedingfeld 
 in any place or office about him that shall be suspected to be 
 of that disposition in religion." On receiving an order to 
 present himself before the Privy Council, Sir Henry, although 
 suffering from illness, set out for London. This letter, signed 
 by five of the members, met him on the road : 
 
 " To our loving friend, Sir Henry Bedingfeld, Knight. 
 
 " After our hearty commendations. Whereas we are 
 given to understand that upon some letters heretofore 
 written, you are on the way repairing hither, forasmuch as 
 we are informed by your son-in-law, Henry Seckford, that 
 your sickness and infirmity is such as without danger you 
 may not travel, we are very well contented if you shall not 
 like to repair up, that you return again to the place where 
 you were committed, there to remain until such time as
 
 92 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 further order shall be taken with you. And so fare you 
 well. 
 
 "From Richmond, the ist Dec. 1578." 
 
 Further relief was extended to him, as appears by another 
 letter from the Council, allowing him to remain in his house 
 till Lady Day, when he was to appear and answer to the 
 charge of papistry, "unless in the meantime God shall turn 
 his heart otherwise." 
 
 Slight as were the penalties inflicted on Sir Henry when 
 compared with those which his brothers were called upon to 
 endure, troubles were not wanting to him in his old age 
 He was not only a prisoner within five miles of his own 
 house, subject to heavy fines for the privilege of absenting 
 himself from the new service, but he was liable at any time 
 to have his house searched 1 for priests and church-stuff, to 
 have his household dismissed, and to be called on to endure 
 religious conferences. He was, moreover, in feeble health, and 
 to complete his misfortunes, his devoted wife was taken from 
 him. On this occasion a letter from eight members of the 
 Privy Council was delivered to him : 
 
 " To our loving friend, Sir Henry Bedingfeld. 
 
 "We commend us unto you. Whereas about three years 
 past, when you were sent for to have appeared before us, 
 touching your disobedience in Religion, we were then moved 
 in consideration of your sickness and infirmity, and the 
 humble suit of Henry Seckford, your son, you being then in 
 the way hitherward, to licence you to return back unto your 
 own house, whither you were before committed, there to 
 
 1 For " the search at Mr Bedingfeld's house," and the anonymous letter 
 which led to it, see Calendar of State Papers, Dom. Eliz. 1581-1590, p. 648, 
 No. 76. A copy of a letter found directed to Cromwell accused Sir Henry 
 of treasonable designs in conjunction with papists and recusants. " Dili- 
 gent searches have been made at the house of Mr Henry Bedingfelde, but 
 nothing suspicious found,"
 
 A NOTABLE ENGLISHMAN 93 
 
 remain until further order should be taken with you. And 
 whereas at this time your son has made like humble suit 
 unto us that you may be suffered to remove from your 
 said house unto St Mary's, Wignollen, in Marshland, a 
 house of your daughter Seckford, there to remain for a 
 season until you may pass over the grief and remembrance 
 of the lady, your wife, lately deceased, these are in that 
 respect to give you licence so to do. And therefore you 
 may, at your liking remove to that place, continuing 
 yourself in like degree of restraints as you did in your 
 own house, and these shall be your warrant in that behalf. 
 So fare you well. 
 
 "From the Court at Whitehall, 28 of Dec. 1581. Your 
 loving friends." 1 
 
 Sir Henry Bedingfeld succumbed to his infirmities in 1583, 
 
 1 Exactly the same treatment was endured by his descendant Sir Henry 
 Arundell Bedingfeld in 1713. The following instance affords a proof of the 
 extraordinary persistence with which the penal laws against Catholics were 
 enforced no years after Elizabeth's death. 
 
 " Licence from the Justices^ August 10, iji^for Sir Henry Bedingfeld to go 
 from home for a month. 
 
 "Whereas Sir Henry Bedingfeld of Oxburgh, Bart, being a recusant, 
 and confined to the usual place of his abode, or within the compass of five 
 miles from the same, and whereas it has been represented to us on the part 
 of the said Sir Henry Bedingfeld that he has very necessary and urgent 
 business, which does require his attention at this time, and whereas the said 
 Sir Henry Bedingfeld has made an oath before us of the truth of the same, 
 and that he will not make any causeless stay from his said place of habita- 
 tion, we therefore, four of his Majesty's Justices of the Peace for the said 
 county upon examination taken by us as of the premisses, do give this our 
 licence to the said Sir Henry Bedingfeld to travel out of the precincts or 
 compass of five miles from the place of his abode limited by the statute at 
 all times, from the 13 of this instant August, until the thirteenth of September 
 following, by which time he is to return again to his place of abode at the 
 parish of Oxburgh, aforesaid. Given under our hand and seal this loth of 
 August 1713." Signed in the margin, "E. BACON, T. DE GREY, THO. 
 WRIGHT, NATH. LIFE, H. PARTRIDGE, Dep. Lieut. I do assent to this 
 licence? 
 
 I
 
 94 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and was buried in the Bedingfeld chapel in Oxburgh church, 
 where an elaborate monument to his memory may still be 
 seen. It is to be regretted that the loss of the Privy 
 Council Registers for the year 1583 entails also the loss of 
 any mention of the last days of this celebrated Englishman.
 
 IV 
 
 IN spite of the valiant efforts of isolated Catholic reformers 
 in Germany, to stem the tide of corruption which threatened 
 to sweep the Church into a vortex of ruin, for a long time 
 little impression was made on the vast sea of abuses, and 
 but little permanent good was effected. It almost seemed 
 as though the Poor Clares of Nuremburg, the brave Domini- 
 canesses of Strassburg, Johannes Busch, Johannes Geiler, 
 Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa, St John Capistran, the Brethren 
 of the Common Life, and the celebrated author of the 
 Imitation of Christ had lived and fought, suffered and 
 preached, in vain. They, and some few others were like 
 brilliant meteors, only making the darkness of the night 
 more apparent. 
 
 The nations were as little responsive to preachers of 
 reform as were the princes of Europe to the appeals of the 
 Pope for a crusade against the infidel Turk, who menaced, 
 after his conquest of Constantinople, the very centre of 
 Christendom. While the citadel was in danger, those who 
 should have assembled vast cohorts in its defence were 
 either suffering from the inertia that follows on some kinds 
 of disease, or were actively employed in spreading the new 
 heresies. Then at last struck the hour for the dawning of 
 a new day. And here perhaps lies the solution to the problem 
 why so much energy, self-denial, penance on the part of the 
 
 05
 
 96 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 preachers of reform, produced so little result ; why such 
 brave efforts failed to restore, renew and edify the Church. 
 Was she then incapable of rising to a new life ? The answer 
 lies in the words of her Divine Founder : " My hour is not yet 
 come." Until then, all reformers preached more or less in the 
 wilderness ; for few had ears to hear. God's hour was assuredly 
 winging its flight, but it would not come till the Church 
 was almost in extremis; till decay of faith following on 
 decay of morals threatened her very existence. The catas- 
 trophe was hastened by the fatal pouring of the new wine 
 of the later Renaissance into the old, now worn-out bottles of 
 Mediaevalism, thereby paganising Rome and corrupting the 
 College of Cardinals to so large an extent, that the election 
 to the papacy of a Rodrigo Borgia was made possible. 
 
 Neither the fiery denunciations of Fra Girolamo Savonarola, 
 nor the cold sarcasms of Erasmus of Rotterdam had a more 
 lasting effect on the world than had Busch's missionary zeal 
 or Geiler's ascetic discourses. Then arose Martin Luther, 
 and centered in himself all those scandals and floating 
 heresies, which for a hundred years had poisoned the 
 spiritual and intellectual atmosphere. Insidious disease 
 lurking in dark places was now become a stalking pestilence 
 that braved the daylight unabashed. Faith was all but 
 moribund. But the Church's extremity was God's oppor- 
 tunity ; His hour had struck at last, and the spirit of the 
 Lord brooded on the face of the waters. 
 
 Then the whole situation was changed. The enemy was 
 not yet crushed, but formidable hosts were everywhere set in 
 opposition to him. Instead of isolated efforts there was an 
 almost universal movement towards reform. Begun in Italy, 
 it spread into every country of Europe. Seminaries sprang 
 up for the education of priests ; St Philip Neri became 
 the Apostle of Rome, St Charles Borromeo that of Milan. 
 The Order of Theatines was founded, and the Barnabite Order, 
 devoted to the education of youth was ready to send its
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 97 
 
 members wherever the need was greatest. Above all, the 
 long-deferred General Council, assembled at Trent in 1545, 
 gave cohesion to all the various movements that were set on 
 foot by defining disputed doctrines, and by drawing up a 
 formula which declared the belief of the Catholic Church on 
 all points attacked by the new sectaries. The Church was 
 threatened with a dozen heresies, but so completely did she 
 vindicate her doctrines at the Council of Trent, that for more 
 than three hundred years no further General Council was 
 needed. If Italy may boast of the victories achieved by her 
 great Catholic reformers, France, though somewhat later in 
 the field had her Bossuet, Bourdaloue, St Francis of Sales, 
 St Vincent of Paul, and many other Catholic champions. To 
 Spain were given St Ignatius of Loyola, St Francis Borgia, 
 St Francis Xavier, St Peter of Alcantara, St John of the 
 Cross, St John of God, St Joseph Calasanctius, St Teresa, 
 and others whose names have first added a splendour to 
 their native land, and have then gone forth to illumine the 
 uttermost ends of the earth. 
 
 St Ignatius died in 1556, but the effect of the Society 
 of Jesus on the Church was only just beginning. One of 
 the earliest and most important tasks of his immediate 
 disciples was the formation of the Carmelite nun Teresa, 
 and her spiritual guidance in the unusual paths she was called 
 to tread. Even in Catholic Spain hearts had grown cold 
 and minds lax. The religious houses had long fallen from 
 their first fervour. During the space of sixteen years St 
 Teresa founded seventeen convents, all following the original 
 strict Carmelite rule. As early as 1474 Pope Eugenius 
 IV. had formed the project of re-establishing the strict 
 observance of the rule in all religious communities, but the 
 times were not then favourable for carrying it out. He had 
 therefore approved provisionally of a mitigated rule for 
 all Carmelite houses, by means of which discipline was to be 
 restored. The Carmelite general, John Soreth, made great 
 
 G
 
 5fi SfUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 efforts to enforce it, but his success was partial and short- 
 lived. 
 
 In 1524, when Teresa de Ahumeda was still a child, 
 Clement VII. addressed a brief to the General Chapter of 
 the Carmelites, assembled at Venice, commanding them to 
 reform their order. The brief was cordially received, and 
 the Chapter passed many resolutions all aiming at the 
 removal of abuses, such as the careless and hasty admission 
 of members, so that thenceforth no person might be received 
 into the order without the consent of the provincial, or before 
 the age of fifteen. Another resolution passed in this Chapter 
 referred to the private property of the friars ; but lest more 
 harm than good should be done by sudden and violent 
 measures, it was decreed that in every province certain 
 houses should be set apart for those members who had 
 received the mitigated rule of Pope Eugenius, and who were 
 therefore considered as reformed. But together with these 
 houses others should be tolerated for a season, while the 
 religious were gradually accustomed to a state of discipline. 
 Those who had not accepted the mitigated rule were to be 
 allowed temporarily to enjoy their patrimony, as also the 
 emoluments accruing to them from teaching, preaching, and 
 other services rendered. There was to be no difference in 
 their treatment, and the religious habit was to be the same 
 for the reformed and the unreformed brethren. Subsequent 
 Chapters-General continued to pass similar wise regulations, 
 but they were by no means promptly carried out ; and at 
 Vicenza, in 1539, it was decreed that provincials and friars 
 must undertake the reform of their convents in the course of 
 one year, in default of which their subjects were to be released 
 from the obedience they owed them. Only reformed friars 
 might be elected superiors. 1 
 
 At this assembly, the representatives of the Lower Rhine 
 Province were Theodoric of Gouda, Martin Cuperus, and 
 1 Monsignanus, Bullarium, ii. 59 c, 47 b.
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 99 
 
 Eberhard Billick. They presented a petition praying that 
 the Universities of Mainz and Trier might be included in 
 the course open to Carmelite students, the reason being that 
 in order to successfully combat the Lutheran heresies, great 
 need was felt of men of wide knowledge, possessing degrees 
 high enough to inspire respect in their opponents. Many 
 students, by reason of the evil times, were not in a position 
 to meet the expenses attendant upon a sojourn at Cologne 
 and Louvain, and the living at Mainz and Trier was cheaper. 
 To this petition the Carmelite general answered by ranking 
 Cologne first, Louvain second, Mainz third, and Trier fourth, 
 in the curriculum of studies. 
 
 But the progress made in Germany was the reverse of 
 rapid ; opposition was encountered at every step ; neverthe- 
 less, the resolutions passed at the Chapter-General at Venice 
 in 1524, had introduced the thin end of the wedge, and it is 
 apparent from the decrees of the Provincial Chapter held at 
 Mechlin in 1531, and presided over by the general himself, that 
 nearly all the houses of the Lower Rhine Province had by 
 that time accepted the mitigated rule. It was enforced in 
 this Chapter that if a convent fell away from the reform, the 
 provincial was to appoint a reformed prior, and to send thither 
 reformed brethren. Friars who refused the reform were to 
 be banished for ten years. Another accentuated point was 
 the rule which forbade the possession of private property. 
 One common purse only was allowed, and thenceforth, no 
 Carmelite might, under pain of excommunication, keep money 
 in his possession for more than twenty-four hours. Absolution 
 for an infringement of this rule could only be obtained from 
 the provincial or general. Those religious, who at their death 
 were found to possess property were to be buried in unconse- 
 crated ground. When, a year later, Theodoric of Gouda pre- 
 sented himself at the Chapter-General held at Padua, he was 
 able to state that the Lower Rhine Province had joined the 
 observance, and was entitled to the privileges belonging thereto,
 
 100 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 But another and more insidious danger had arisen. In 
 many of the Carmelite houses of Germany the new doctrines 
 had been more than favourably received ; and at Strassburg, 
 the rector, Tilmann Lyn had been deprived of his office for 
 having openly preached the Lutheran heresy. Three other 
 friars of the same house who with him had gone astray were 
 imprisoned. In vain the friars were forbidden, under pain of 
 excommunication, to possess or to read books that had been 
 condemned by the Holy See. Heretical writings continued to 
 find entrance into many of the religious houses, and were 
 even read aloud in refectories, and used as text-books by the 
 professors. It must, however, be admitted that some of these 
 books, including several works of Erasmus which were also 
 prohibited, would now scarcely come into the category of 
 heretical writings. Still, many of the diatribes which Erasmus 
 permitted himself against the religious orders were not in any 
 sense edifying, though there was much truth in his pungent 
 satire; so that the papal legate Aleander did not hesitate 
 to declare that the Dutch scholar had done more to undermine 
 faith than even Luther, and he accused him of being the fomenter 
 of all the troubles, of subverting the Netherlands, and all the 
 Rhine district. This may indeed have been the truth indirectly 
 in spite of the certainty that Erasmus had no intention of 
 playing into the hands of the Lutherans, whom he hated. 
 But he was a cynic, and a cynic's eyes are not the best 
 through which to see things. The monks offended him, and 
 he poured out upon them, not the vials of his wrath but the 
 sharp vinegar of sarcasm. His favourite, oft-recurring themes, 
 the ignorance, immorality, and greed to be found in monasteries, 
 the quarrelsomeness and worldliness of the friars would lead 
 the unwary to suppose that there was not a religious community 
 left where the rule was kept and the religious led commonly 
 respectable lives. But even a slight acquaintance with Erasmus 
 shows us that he is incapable of justice towards monks and 
 friars. They loved scholasticism, the enemy which he con-
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 101 
 
 sidered himself born to slay, and there was war to the knife 
 between him and all upholders of Scotus and Aquinas. The 
 monks of the Charterhouse, who died the death of martyrs 
 rather than perjure themselves, win no meed of praise from 
 Erasmus they were, forsooth, schoolmen ; and the noble 
 Friars-Observants who, when threatened with a living tomb in 
 the river Thames, for the same cause, calmly replied that the 
 road to heaven was as near by water as by land, are nothing 
 to him, for did they not learn their theology of Duns Scotus ? 
 Even Henry VIII. himself at one time begged the Pope's 
 favour for the Observants, saying that he could not sufficiently 
 express his admiration for their strict adherence to poverty, 
 for their sincerity, their charity, their devotion ; l but they were 
 Scotists, and Erasmus could not therefore admire them. 
 
 From his own showing it appears that the Canons Regular 
 of St Augustine at Emmaus in Holland led a good life, but 
 he makes no honourable exception of them when he denounces 
 other houses. He complains of all monks that they are 
 gluttons and wine-bibbers, utterly careless of their rule ; yet 
 his own plea for returning to the world after taking his vows 
 is that his health would not stand the fasts and vigils, the 
 long prayers and the fish diet, things which accord ill with a 
 reputation for laxity. In a letter to his former prior, he says : 
 " I left my profession, not because I had any fault to find 
 with it, but because I would not be a scandal to the order." 
 And again, " My constitution was too weak to bear your 
 rule." 2 These are either empty phrases, or they mean that 
 the life was a strict one. 
 
 Nevertheless it would be idle to say that there was not 
 or had not ;been a great falling-off in the fervour of monks 
 and friars generally at this period. As the new doctrines 
 
 1 Henry VIII. to Leo X., Add. MS. 15,387, f. 17; B.M. Printed by 
 Ellis, 3, ist series, 165. 
 
 2 Life and Letters of Erasmus, lectures delivered at Oxford by J. A. 
 Froude, pp. 24, 162,
 
 102 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 spread, so did also the distaste for the religious life, and the 
 number of those who renounced their vows increased yearly. 
 But many, from various causes, soon repented, and desired to 
 return to the cloister, and it became necessary to legislate for 
 such contingencies also. Moreover, it was made obligatory on 
 every prior to arrest notorious apostates, and all those who, 
 without letters of obedience, or who, abusing them, were 
 found wandering about the country. They were to be 
 punished conformably to the rule, and if necessary were to 
 be imprisoned. 
 
 One good effect at least resulted from Erasmus's attacks 
 on the ignorance of monks, and this was the revival of learning 
 in most of the religious orders. Every inducement was offered 
 by the Carmelite superiors in the Lower Rhine Province to 
 cultivate a taste for study. Those who had gone through a 
 three or four years' course of theology creditably had a distinct 
 right to a post of some dignity, and took rank immediately 
 after those priests of the order who had celebrated their 
 jubilee, and before all conventuals who had an inferior record 
 as to studies. The faithful discharge of offices for a prolonged 
 period was also rewarded by honourable recognition. The 
 sentiments thus appealed to may not have been of the loftiest, 
 but it must be remembered that the reform was to be gradual, 
 and higher motives could be suggested when the subject was 
 ready for them. The superiors of this province were supported 
 in all their efforts by the general, who was bent on a thorough 
 renewal of the religious spirit throughout the Order; but in 
 the midst of all these righteous aspirations it is a little startling 
 to find that a decree of the Chapter-General was needed to 
 put down drinking-bouts in sundry houses of the Rhine 
 Province. 1 
 
 In 1541, Eberhard Billick was appointed provincial, and 
 almost immediately began to visit the houses in his jurisdiction. 
 
 1 Dr Alois Postina, Der Karmelit Eberhard Billick. Ein Lebensbild 
 aus dem 16, Jahrhundert, Freiburg im Breisgau, 1901, p. 25.
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 103 
 
 At Cologne he found a condition of things sufficient to make 
 the boldest reformer quail. The Lutherans had entirely gained 
 the upper hand, and a certain Count William of Neuenar 
 and Mors, who had been for some time a follower of the new 
 doctrines, was bent on introducing them by force into Mors. 
 He first forbade the practise of the Catholic religion among 
 his tenants, and then tried to seduce the religious. They 
 were forbidden to say Mass except on Sundays, and then 
 even none outside the convent were to be admitted to it. 
 Their church was given over to the Lutherans, and the friars 
 were forced into being present at the Protestant sermons. 
 Not content with this, Count William inflicted seven Lutheran 
 beneficiaries upon them, obliging them to lodge and feed 
 them gratis. Lutheran preachers and school teachers were 
 salaried out of the convent revenues, which the Count 
 managed by fraud and cunning to confiscate. That portion 
 of the convent buildings which bordered on his property 
 he turned into stables for his own horses, so that entrance 
 to the friar's quarters was open to his servants, while the 
 Carmelites were themselves forbidden to go in and out on that 
 side. 
 
 The new Provincial succeeded in time by dint of courage 
 and firmness, in getting back all that the Count had seized 
 by force ; but other houses were in as deplorable a condition, 
 and little could be done to improve matters. Billick appealed 
 to the Emperor, who had taken all the Carmelite convents 
 in Lower Germany under his protection ; but the Emperor's 
 goodwill surpassed his power to help, the whole of his 
 money and energy being needed to oppose the Turks, the 
 French, and the Duke of Cleves. 
 
 The greatest danger and difficulty lay in the behaviour of 
 Count Hermann of Wied, Archbishop and Elector of Cologne. 
 From the outset his rule had been detrimental to the Church. 
 The best that could be said of him in his youth was that 
 he was " kind and peace-loving, fond of hunting, but not
 
 104 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 particularly learned." Charles V., in a letter to the landgrave 
 Philip of Hessen, who had joined the Lutherans, says : " How 
 should the good man be able to reform his diocese ? He has 
 no Latin, and has never said more than three Masses in his 
 life. He does not even know the Confiteor" Philip replied : 
 " I can assure your Majesty that he reads German industriously, 
 and interests himself in religious questions." 
 
 Unfortunately, these " religious questions " threw the arch- 
 bishop into the arms of the Lutherans, and already in 1536, 
 Aleander considered him as much lost to the Church as Philip 
 of Hessen himself, who made no secret of his apostasy. 
 Melancthon was his dear friend already when he made the 
 acquaintance of Martin Bucer at the Diet of Hagenau in 
 1540. 
 
 Two years later, Archbishop Hermann invited this violent 
 and notorious heretic to preach in the minster at Bonn. 
 Immediately, Cologne rose up in protest, and the Cathedral 
 Chapter, the clergy and the Magistral presented the arch- 
 bishop with a remonstrance. Hermann replied by sending 
 Melancthon to support Bucer at Bonn, and thus, by entrusting 
 the work of reform to men whose sole aim was to subvert 
 Catholic doctrine and to disorganise Christian society, proved 
 himself faithless to the solemn promise he had made neither 
 to introduce religious novelties into his diocese, nor to abolish 
 customs founded on Catholic tradition. 
 
 The Chapter, fully alive to the critical nature of the situation, 
 drew up a memorandum, dated 5th February 1543, in which 
 they showed good reasons why Bucer could not be tolerated 
 as a minister of religion in the diocese. His broken vows, his 
 marriage, his open profession of Luther's doctrines, proved 
 sufficiently that he was no longer a member of the Catholic 
 Church. Further, his preaching at Strassburg had resulted 
 directly in the wholesale destruction of images and altars, and 
 ultimately in the abolition of the Mass in that place. The 
 memorandum wept on to affirm that, in patronising such a man.
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 105 
 
 the Archbishop was acting in direct disobedience to the Pope 
 and to the Emperor. 
 
 Bucer's answer to these objections was devised in such a 
 manner as to cause his opponents some embarrassment. It 
 was written in the Swiss dialect, an unknown tongue to the 
 clergy of Cologne, as well as to the university. Nevertheless, 
 before long, an epitome of its purport was furnished to the 
 Chapter, and the refutation of the doctrines therein set forth 
 was entrusted to the Carmelite provincial, Billick. 
 
 The two champions were personally not unknown to each 
 other, as they had met at the Diets of Worms and Regensburg, 
 where Billick had made a point of studying the Strassburg 
 heresiarch carefully. The Carmelite now skilfully exposed the 
 weakness of Bucer's arguments, together with his frequent 
 misinterpretation of Scripture and the Fathers, Billick showing 
 himself to be an experienced polemical writer ; but the taste 
 and tone of his book are repugnant to modern ideas, and 
 betray the same acrimony which characterises the writings of 
 Luther against Erasmus, and vice versA. Accusations of 
 hatred, cunning, lying, slandering, and double-dealing, are 
 cast like a hail of bullets, with no especial aim at any of Bucer's 
 arguments in particular. Interspersed with much able criticism 
 are choice epithets of abuse and reflections on Bucer's 
 personal character, which, although perfectly in accordance 
 with sixteenth century methods of controversy, are quite beside 
 the mark, and certainly not such as to promote peace in any 
 age. 
 
 What the Church in Germany needed at this juncture, was 
 not so much a fiery defender of the faith, or a scholar to taunt 
 the heretics in finely-pointed sarcasm with their want of learning, 
 as a saint, demonstrating in his own life the beauty of holiness, 
 while laying aside polemics, he expounded the philosophy of 
 Catholic doctrine. The need for reform was patent to all ; many, 
 like the zealous Carmelite provincial, were already putting 
 their hands to the plough. The movement had been set on
 
 100 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 foot, but it lacked an apostle to lead and govern it. Such a 
 man was at that moment being formed at the University of 
 Cologne the second apostle of Germany, as St Boniface had 
 been the first Blessed Peter Canisius. 
 
 Canisius was a native of Nymwegen in the Low Countries, 
 and was born on 8th May 1521. Having studied at Paris and 
 Orleans, he became tutor to the sons of Ren6, Duke of 
 Lorraine, whose wife was Philippine of Guelderland. From 
 an early age Peter had desired to consecrate himself to God 
 in the priesthood, and his father having given his consent, the 
 young man proceeded to Cologne for his course of theology 
 and civil and canon law. No sooner did he appear in the 
 lecture rooms than he attracted universal attention. It was 
 not merely the clearness and conciseness of his reasoning, nor 
 altogether the humility of his bearing, but perhaps the mingled 
 charm of each that roused the interest of professors and 
 students alike. That interest led them to watch him closely, 
 and they not only noticed that he seemed altogether 
 unconscious of the plaudits which he excited, but they dis- 
 covered that he was in the habit of imposing privations on 
 himself, in order to have money to give to poor students, 
 that these might be better fed and clothed, and more amply 
 furnished with books. It was soon related of him that he 
 frequently went out of his way to instruct, counsel, and rescue 
 those (and there were many of them at Cologne) who had fallen 
 upon evil ways. Broad-minded, large-hearted, enlightened 
 beyond his companions, and possessing a strong and well- 
 balanced character, it needed no great gift of prophecy to 
 foresee that Peter Canisius would do great things in the 
 future. 
 
 In the meanwhile, Father Peter Faber, the first associate 
 of St Ignatius, was at Mainz, whither he had been sent by 
 Pope Paul III. to counteract the spread of the new doctrines 
 by all the means in his power. His reputation for holiness 
 was so great in the Society of Jesus, that St Francis Xavier
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 107 
 
 invoked him when in danger from a storm at sea, and inserted 
 his name in the Litany of the Saints while he was yet living. 
 At Mainz Father Faber gave the Spiritual Exercises of St 
 Ignatius, and obtained many wonderful conversions. 
 
 His fame soon reached Cologne, where Canisius, yet 
 uncertain as to his future, was praying, studying, and exercising 
 himself in all good works. Suddenly, it became clear to him 
 that his vocation would be made known to him through Father 
 Peter Faber. He hastened to Mainz, and at their first interview 
 Canisius was convinced that he was called to join the new 
 Society. He made the Spiritual Exercises, and on the fourth 
 day bound himself by a vow to do so. He returned to Cologne 
 as a novice, and continued to live much as before, pursuing 
 his theological studies and making a deep impression on all 
 those with whom he came in contact. Associated with two 
 other novices, also university students the Spaniards Alfonsus 
 Alvarez and John of Arragon he received a common rule of 
 life from Faber, and in their zeal they soon exceeded it. They 
 preached, instructed children in Christian doctrine, begged alms 
 for the poor from door to door, nursed the sick in the hospitals, 
 and, in short, seized every opportunity of self-denial and 
 humiliation. 
 
 When Faber heard of all this he wrote to Canisius, com- 
 mending the charity of the trio, but reminding them at the 
 same time that study was their paramount duty, and would 
 lead to more valuable work in the future than anything they 
 could then do for souls. 
 
 " As obedience requires you to finish your course of 
 theology," he wrote, " you must not neglect it, thinking to do 
 more by succouring your neighbour in his temporal neces- 
 sities." 
 
 Soon Faber came himself to Cologne, and lodged with the 
 Carthusians, those valiant sons of St Bruno, whose boast it 
 is never to have quite departed from the spirit of their 
 founder,
 
 108 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 On the 8th May 1545, his twenty-fourth birthday, Peter 
 Canisius made the three simple vows of the Society and the 
 same year was ordained priest By this time his reputation as 
 a Catholic reformer was as great as his reputation for learning. 
 His capacity for work was prodigious. He lectured twice 
 daily ; every Sunday he preached in one of the churches, great 
 crowds flocking to hear him. At home, every hour was 
 occupied either in teaching or in receiving those who came to 
 him for advice and help in their doubts. He answered them 
 all with so much insight, wisdom, gentleness, and humility, that 
 even Lutherans dropped the usual epithets, and spoke of him 
 with respect. Every free moment was devoted to literary 
 work, which also obtained a certain celebrity. 
 
 But to all these strenuous efforts the Archbishop Elector 
 Hermann von Wied persistently remained a stranger. Rela- 
 tions between himself and his Chapter were strained to the 
 utmost. A deputation of his clergy had waited upon him and 
 solemnly entreated him to retrace his steps, and to cancel the 
 novelties he had introduced. On his refusal, they declared that 
 they would with a clear conscience, and for fear of incurring 
 the divine wrath if they further delayed, proceed by all legiti- 
 mate means to remove so grievous a scandal. Then the 
 Chapter, including representatives of the lower ranks of the 
 clergy and the university, made a public protest, and drew up 
 appeals to the Pope and the Emperor. They at once informed 
 the archbishop of these measures, and again attempted before 
 taking irrevocable steps to bring about a peaceful solution. But 
 all was useless ; and, forced to extremities, they solicited for their 
 appeal the support of other dioceses and learned academies, 
 in order to obtain more speedy relief. The best and most 
 distinguished of the bishops and clergy, as well as the univer- 
 sities of the whole province, joined in the appeal, and the 
 University of Ingolstadt also signified its intention of seconding 
 them. 
 
 fhe archbishop on his part was also careful to procure
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 109 
 
 himself allies. As Elector of Cologne he summoned the 
 Landtag, and its members declared themselves in his favour. 
 The landgrave, Philip of Hessen, to whom Luther had given 
 licence to commit bigamy, and other Protestant princes natur- 
 ally promised him their support, and the Schmalkaldian League 
 did likewise. 
 
 The Catholics of Cologne agitated that the case might be 
 brought before the Reichstag at Worms, to which they had 
 sent their representative, the Dominican, Johann Pessel. 
 
 But the archbishop appealed to a General Council, or rather 
 to a National Synod, to be held in Germany and to be entirely 
 independent of the Pope. 
 
 At this juncture Eberhard Billick wrote one of his most 
 violent letters to Pessel, attacking the counter appeal of the 
 archbishop which would shortly be presented to the Reichstag, 
 and which was calculated by its affectation of piety to deceive 
 even the elect But let them be on their guard. It would be 
 seen that Hermann despised the Pope, the Emperor, and the 
 CEcumenical Council already assembled at Trent. He set his 
 own authority above all councils, although they had been 
 instituted by the common consent of Christendom, and he 
 appealed to a lawless, headless council which might only meet 
 at Bonn or at Schmalkald, in order that it might be unrestrained 
 by any authority whatever. There was, continued the Carmelite, 
 no end to the archbishop's innovations. In defiance of all 
 justice and precedent he had transferred the Chapter to Bonn, 
 where people and preachers were split up into parties, and 
 persecuted each other with persistent malice. This he had 
 done, not because there was any greater safety at Bonn than 
 at Cologne, where senate, clergy, and people lived in peace 
 and unity as before, and where his friends in the Chapter 
 might act with all freedom, 1 but because at Bonn he was sure 
 of a majority in his favour, for loyal Catholics, in spite of his 
 
 1 Others maintained, however, that some of the canons known to be 
 inclined towards Lutheranism had been threatened with death.
 
 110 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 safe-conduct, would not go there. By this stratagem it would 
 appear as if all ranks in the diocese had consented to his 
 measures. 
 
 Billick went on to complain bitterly that the sentence 
 against the archbishop announced by the papal nuncio, Verallo, 
 as imminent, had not yet been passed. " Every postponement 
 of the imperial mandate," he wrote, " means a weakening of 
 our cause and a strengthening of that of our opponents. At 
 Worms they speak fair, and assume a supplicating attitude; 
 but at Cologne they go about their business boldly. Paintings 
 are scratched off the walls of the churches, statues are hurled 
 from their pedestals, heretical preachers are multiplied and 
 forced upon the Catholics against their will. Four days ago, 
 the archbishop attacked the parish priest of Briihl, because he 
 still said Mass, and forbade him to do so in future. And 
 much more is done in this enormous diocese which entirely 
 escapes our notice." In conclusion, Billick implored the 
 Dominican to do his utmost with the Emperor, the Cardinal 
 of Augsburg, the Apostolic Nuncio, and the other Catholic 
 authorities in order that the mandate might be issued without 
 further delay, adding, " Cropper, the indefatigable champion 
 of our cause, is ill, otherwise he would have sent a learned and 
 luminous disquisition on this subject." 
 
 At last, the Emperor was moved to abandon the passive 
 and procrastinating attitude he had hitherto assumed ; and 
 towards the close of the Reichstag he answered the Cologne 
 appellants by citing the archbishop to appear within thirty 
 days, and answer the charges of innovation brought against 
 him. In the meanwhile he was to cancel all the novelties he 
 had introduced into the diocese. 
 
 Charles V. on his way to the Netherlands stopped at 
 Cologne, and in a personal interview with Hermann, repre- 
 sented to him the terrible consequences that would ensue if 
 he persisted in his disobedience. 
 
 The archbishop demanded a short time to consider and to
 
 consult with his advisers. His answer, written on ipth August, 
 after the Emperor's departure, was to the effect that he 
 could not change his opinions. He was then cited to 
 appear at Brussels within the space of thirty days. At the 
 same time Paul III. sent him a brief, commanding him and 
 his adherents to justify their conduct at Rome within sixty 
 days. 
 
 Hermann paid no attention to either of these citations, but 
 with renewed zeal continued to advance the Protestant refor- 
 mation. On the 8th January 1546, Verallo suspended him, and 
 confiscated the revenues of the diocese. The archbishop made 
 a solemn protest, but showed no sign of yielding, and on the 
 i6th April, the Pope proceeded to his ex-communication, at the 
 same time depriving him of all his ecclesiastical dignities, 
 offices and benefices. 
 
 By a special brief of 3rd July, Hermann's coadjutor, Adolf 
 von Schauenburg, was made administrator of the archdiocese, 
 and Cropper and Billick were appointed to examine the 
 deposed archbishop with regard to his attitude towards the 
 Catholic religion. The result was unsatisfactory, but the 
 Emperor could not be induced to take any immediate steps 
 against Hermann, his whole attention being directed towards 
 crushing the Schmalkaldian League. It was not till November 
 that the archbishop was officially informed of his ex-communi- 
 cation, when he made a further protest, declared the Pope 
 incompetent to judge him, and again appealed to a German 
 Council. The time now seemed ripe for putting pressure on 
 Charles V. to carry out the Pope's sentence. The imperial 
 arms had been victorious over the league, and the Catholics 
 of Cologne commissioned Billick to proceed to the camp, 
 and to petition the emperor to formally depose the arch- 
 bishop. 
 
 The biographers of Blessed Peter Canisius for the most 
 part claim him as the hero of this expedition, which was in 
 fact entrusted to several delegates, of whom the principals were
 
 112 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 the veteran Carmelite provincial, and Johann von Isenburg. 
 Canisius was deputed to go first to Liege, and to beg that 
 its bishop, George of Austria, son of Maximilian I., and uncle 
 to the Emperor, would facilitate their journey, the country 
 through which they would have to pass being invested with 
 the enemy's troops. During the time which he spent at Liege, 
 Canisius completely won the heart of the prince-bishop, who 
 ordered him to preach in his cathedral and in his private 
 chapel, expressing himself greatly edified with what he had 
 heard. His visit being unavoidably prolonged, Canisius gave 
 the Spiritual Exercises, took part in theological conferences with 
 the Lutherans, visited the sick in the hospitals, and catechised 
 the children. Crowds followed him wherever he went, and 
 there was but one opinion of his learning, eloquence, and 
 charity. 
 
 It is probable that on his return to Cologne, having given an 
 account of his mission, he started with the other delegates for 
 Worms. 
 
 Writing to the coadjutor Adolf, on 6th December, Billick 
 says that at Mainz they heard that all the roads were occupied 
 by the enemy. In order to avoid all appearance of an embassy 
 they left their baggage behind them at Mainz, and being 
 advised by the vicar-general, Scholl, the Carmelite separated 
 from his companions, and hastened on alone to Worms to 
 present his letters to the Dean of St Andrew's. Here he lay 
 hidden for four days, in the greatest anxiety and doubt as to 
 his further progress. Neither he nor his advisers could hit on a 
 safe mode of continuing the journey, as it was known that 
 separate parties of defeated Schmalkaldians were making their 
 retreat good by various roads back to the Rhine. To add to his 
 alarm and embarrassment Billick discovered that his horse had 
 been rendered useless by a mysterious wound, so that he had 
 reason to think he had been betrayed. Just then, however, he 
 received information that the imperialists were in hot pursuit of 
 the Schmalkaldians, and having bought another horse from a
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 113 
 
 Jew, he set out for Speyer. At Speyer he fell in with a noble- 
 man belonging to the imperial army on his way back to the 
 camp, and Billick joined him, without however revealing his 
 name or his mission, so necessary was it to regard every 
 stranger as a possible enemy. 
 
 At last the road to the Emperor was open, and the 
 delegates, who all arrived simultaneously at Krailsheim on 
 1 5th December, were received by Cardinal Granvelle. The 
 object of their embassy was then speedily attained. Charles 
 V. issued a mandate, ordering the Landtag to assemble at 
 Cologne on the 24th January following ; and at the date 
 fixed two imperial commissioners appeared to conduct the 
 proceedings. 
 
 On the same day the coadjutor Adolf was inducted as 
 archbishop, in spite of the opposition of a large number of the 
 representatives of the Landtag, who, however, gave in their 
 adhesion by the end of the month. Hermann still offered a 
 futile resistance, but on 28th February 1547 was at last forced 
 from a position that had become untenable. He died on 
 the 1 5th August 1552. 
 
 During these proceedings Peter Canisius had atttracted the 
 attention of Cardinal Otto Truchsess, who desired to have him 
 as his second theologian at the Council of Trent, Father Le Jay 
 having already been sent there as first theologian to that prelate. 
 The cardinal, in a letter to St Ignatius, laid stress on the 
 circumstance of Peter's intimate acquaintance with the state of 
 religion in Germany, and on his being able therefore to suggest 
 to the Council the best means of meeting the prevalent evils. 
 These reasons had great weight with St Ignatius, and scarcely 
 had the young Jesuit returned to Cologne, when he received 
 orders to set out for Trent. Great was the lamentation among 
 the burghers of Cologne. All whom he met in the streets 
 greeted him with tears and supplications not to depart out of 
 their midst His leaving, they declared, would mean triumph 
 to the enemies of the Church. The university conferred on him 
 
 H
 
 114 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 unanimously the title of doctor of divinity as a proof of their 
 gratitude, esteem, and regret at his loss. The clergy and 
 senate presented him with two precious relics the heads of two 
 of the martyred companions of St Ursula. 
 
 At Trent Canisius found four of his religious brethren, and 
 joined them at their lodgings in the hospital. Here the five 
 Jesuits followed the special rule of life which St Ignatius had sent 
 to them. " Three things I wish you to bear in mind," he wrote : 
 "(i) at the sessions of the Council the greatest glory of God, 
 and the general good of the Church ; (2) outside the Council 
 your fundamental principle to labour for the salvation of souls, a 
 matter that lies especially near my heart in this your journey ; 
 (3) when at home not to neglect yourselves." He recommended 
 them to behave as prudently as possible at the Council, not to 
 speak hastily, and to be ever on the side of peace. Every 
 evening they were to confer with each other on the day's pro- 
 ceedings, and to make resolutions for the morrow. " Moreover," 
 he continued, " you will allow no opportunity to escape you of 
 acquiring merit in the service of your neighbour. You must 
 always be on the watch to hear confessions, to preach to the 
 people, to instruct the little ones, to visit the sick." In their 
 sermons they were to avoid controverted dogmas, and to lay 
 stress on all that appertained to the reform of morals, and 
 obedience to the Church. 
 
 The meetings of the Council being adjourned till 1550, 
 Canisius was called to Rome, where he remained for five 
 months, under the personal guidance of St Ignatius himself, 
 who submitted him to the most humiliating trials in order to 
 prove his virtue. He sent him to beg and to preach in the 
 most frequented parts of the city, and to nurse the sick in the 
 hospitals, where he was day and night at the beck and call of 
 exacting officials, who set him to perform the most loathsome 
 tasks, and often curtailed his sleep and food. St Ignatius 
 would then cause inquiries to be made at the hospitals concern- 
 ing the behaviour of his novice under this kind of treatment.
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 115 
 
 In the spring of 1548, Canisius was sent with eleven com- 
 panions to Messina, where the Viceroy, Don Juan de Vega, had 
 founded a college. On the eve of their departure St Ignatius 
 put to them four questions in writing. Canisius answered the 
 questions thus : 
 
 1. " I am ready, with the help of God's grace, to remain here 
 or to go to Sicily, to India, or wherever it may be that obedience 
 requires me. 
 
 2. " If I am sent to Sicily I affirm that I will accept with 
 joy whatever office is conferred on me, even should it be that of 
 porter, cook, or gardener. 
 
 3. " I am ready to learn or to teach in any department of 
 science, although hitherto I may have been quite unskilled 
 in it. 
 
 4. " I will regard as best for me whatever my superiors 
 may decide to do with me, whether they entrust me with any 
 office or with none. I promise this day, the 5th February, for 
 my whole life never to demand anything for myself concerning 
 my lodging, office or any other similar thing, but once for all I 
 leave the guidance of my soul, and every care for my body in 
 the complete submission of my judgment and will, to my father 
 in God, the Rev. Father General, 1548. Peter Canisius of 
 Nymwegen." 
 
 Hereupon St Ignatius appointed him professor of rhetoric at 
 Messina, and Canisius wrote to his friends at Cologne : " As I 
 am useless for any spiritual office I am entrusted with the insipid 
 department of belles lettres. I teach rhetoric for which I have 
 little aptitude, but I take pains to form these good youths, and 
 am always ready, with God's help, to do all that obedience 
 requires of me." 
 
 After a fruitful year, during which he had learned Italian, 
 and having preached in that language, had obtained some 
 wonderful conversions from sin, he was recalled to Rome, where
 
 116 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 he laid his four solemn vows 1 in the hands of St Ignatius. 
 Immediately afterwards he was told to prepare for his 
 apostolate in Germany. 
 
 William IV., Duke of Bavaria, surnamed the valiant, on 
 account of his faithful adherence to the Catholic Church, at a 
 time when so many of the reigning princes of Germany fell 
 away, saw, with distress and alarm, the daily increasing dangers 
 to which his beloved fatherland was a prey. Even in the 
 college which he had himself founded at Ingolstadt, heresies 
 were steadily gaining the upper hand, and he besought St 
 Ignatius to send him learned men, imbued with the apostolic 
 spirit, to stay the progress of error. 
 
 The Church was not wanting at this time in men of learning 
 and piety. Theologians, such as Cardinal Cajetan, Cropper of 
 Cologne, Eck of Ingolstadt, Cochlaeus, and others, had a 
 European reputation. The first members of the Society of 
 Jesus were all saints and scholars. Lainez, Salmeron, Lefevre, 
 Faber, Le Jay, Bobadilla, were formed for the exigencies of the 
 time ; but for the special work required of him, Canisius 
 effaces them all, or rather, gathers up in his own character 
 each of the great qualities which they possessed. His 
 strength, moreover, was equal to his enormous task. West- 
 phalia, Bavaria, Saxony, Bohemia, Austria, Franconia, Suabia, 
 Moravia, Tirol, Switzerland, from the falls of the Rhine to its 
 source in the Alps, both banks of the Danube, from Freiburg- 
 im-Breisgau to Pressburg, the banks of the Main and of the 
 Vistula all this was the scene of his labours during a period of 
 fifty-four years ; and within these limits, it is an incontrovertible 
 fact that there is no city or district still remaining Catholic but 
 owes its faith to him. 
 
 St Ignatius answered the demand of the Duke of Bavaria 
 by sending Fathers Le Jay, Salmeron, and Peter Canisius, the 
 
 1 The first three of the solemn vows taken by the Jesuits are those of 
 poverty, chastity, and obedience. The fourth vow is the promise to go 
 wherever the Pope may send them.
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 117 
 
 three most distinguished men of his Society. On the way to 
 Germany they stopped at Bologna, in order that the two first 
 might receive the degree of doctor, Canisius, as we know, being 
 already a graduate of Cologne. The German heretics prided 
 themselves so much on the few individuals in their ranks who 
 had attained to it, that it was important to provide them with 
 opponents whom they might meet in controversy on equal 
 grounds. At Munich Duke William welcomed them, assuring 
 them that nothing lay nearer to his heart than the maintenance 
 of the Catholic religion in his states, but that heresy had already 
 taken possession of many of his towns and villages, and had 
 even ventured to lift its head in the University of Ingol- 
 stadt. The three missionaries proceeded at once to that 
 place, where they were received by the principal dignitaries of 
 the University. 
 
 A few days later they began their lectures : Salmeron, with a 
 commentary on the Epistle of St Paul to the Romans ; Canisius, 
 with a dissertation on the Sentences of Peter Lombard ; Le Jay, 
 with an exposition of the Psalms. From the beginning their 
 success was assured, but in a few months the whole work 
 devolved on Canisius, Le Jay being sent to the Diet of 
 Augsburg, Salmeron going to support Lainez, at the re-opened 
 Council of Trent, as the Pope's theologian. 
 
 So great was the confidence which Canisius inspired, that 
 already, in 1550, the University, by unanimous consent, elected 
 him its rector. Humility prompted him to refuse the office, but 
 St Ignatius bade him accept it. The need for drastic changes 
 in various departments was only too apparent ; Canisius not 
 only secured the good he aimed at, but by his tact escaped the 
 odium which so frequently attaches to the crusader against 
 time-honoured abuses. As he accepted none of the emoluments 
 belonging to his offices, he was the more free to insist on the 
 perfect probity with which the administration of the funds of all 
 offices should be conducted. 
 
 He next took away from the students all heretical books,
 
 118 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and obtained from Duke William a mandate, forbidding the 
 booksellers to sell such. He abolished gambling, to which the 
 students had been much addicted. He settled disputes between 
 them and their professors, and the ancient rules and regulations 
 concerning studies ceased to be a dead letter. His words 
 animated his hearers with a love of work, creating a stimulus 
 and a desire to excel. He re-established the unjustly dis- 
 credited syllogistic form of argument, and reverted to the 
 learning of the Schools in its primitive purity, deprived of the 
 excrescences with which would-be scholars had disfigured it 
 Lastly, he succeeded in freeing the University from every 
 reproach of immorality and license, and this was, perhaps, 
 his most signal victory at Ingolstadt. The annals of the 
 University abundantly testify to the greatness of the work 
 accomplished. 
 
 At the end of his six months' rectorship, Canisius gave an 
 account of his administration, and declined the chancellorship 
 then offered to him. Ingolstadt, in that short space of time, 
 had been transformed, and in order to perpetuate the benefits 
 conferred on it, the Duke resolved to found a college to be 
 handed over to the sons of St Ignatius. 
 
 Next to Bavaria, Austria was to share in the blessings which 
 the very presence of Canisius seemed to draw down from Heaven, 
 but the whole German-speaking world clamoured for his 
 possession. The Bishop of Saxony entreated him to come 
 and change the deplorable state of his diocese. Duke Albert, 
 son and successor of William IV., stoutly maintained that he 
 was needed at Ingolstadt, and that he could not suffer him to 
 leave it ; while St Ignatius was besieged with demands for the 
 services of his most learned disciple. The Prince-Bishop of 
 Freising and the Bishop of Eichstadt each claimed him as his 
 theologian at the Council of Trent. Ferdinand, King of the 
 Romans, urged that "the Light of Germany" should be 
 instantly sent to the capital of the Austrian dominions, then 
 plunged in the darkness of heresy. Pope Julius III. solved the
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 119 
 
 difficulty by desiring that he should proceed at once to Vienna, 
 and St Ignatius softened the blow to Duke Albert in these 
 words : " The formal demand of his Holiness obliges me to 
 send Father Canisius to Vienna, but without taking him 
 absolutely from your Highness ; I am merely lending him to 
 the King of the Romans for a time, after which he shall return 
 to Ingolstadt." 
 
 The capital of Austria had fallen a complete prey to heresy. 
 For twenty years not a single priest had been ordained there ; 
 religious vocations were no longer heard of. Scarcely the 
 twentieth part of the population had remained Catholic. Three 
 hundred country parishes near the city were entirely without 
 priests. The University, instead of providing a remedy, 
 aggravated the existing evils by a teaching that was more 
 or less heterodox. Society, moreover, was rotten to the 
 core, and needed to be entirely reconstructed. Such was the 
 condition of things when, at the call of the feeble but devout 
 Ferdinand I., Blessed Peter Canisius arrived at Vienna in 
 March 1552. Thirteen of his religious brethren had preceded 
 him by nearly a year, and had opened a college which already 
 promised well. 
 
 Canisius began by preaching sermons at court, and to the 
 people, by catechising children, and by seizing every possible 
 opportunity of doing good. Then the plague broke out, and 
 he devoted himself to the stricken. The Pope proclaimed 
 a jubilee, and Canisius profited by the occasion to vindicate 
 the honour of indulgences. His method everywhere seems 
 to have been to do the next, the obvious thing, whatever it 
 might be, and to throw himself heart and soul into it. Not 
 content with his work in the city, he evangelised the country 
 places. The poorest hamlets attracted him most, and as he 
 went on his way, he instructed, consoled, heard the confes- 
 sions of a life-time, gave the sacraments to the living and 
 the dying, and brought back many hundreds of lost sheep to 
 the fold. He continued to work thus without a break during
 
 120 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 the winter months, among people who were Christian but in 
 name, intemperance, ignorance, and long neglect, having 
 brutalised them almost beyond human reach. But where he 
 passed, every village changed its aspect ; conversions little 
 short of miraculous marked his progress everywhere. Words 
 that from the mouth of another might have returned unto 
 him void, uttered by Canisius carried compunction into the 
 hardest hearts. It was his sanctity, his entire abnegation of 
 self and whole-hearted dependence on the Divine Will, far 
 more than his learning, vigour, or energy that gave his words 
 wings, and worked wonders among this forsaken and 
 degraded country folk ; and his charity was such that he 
 would have been well content to have laboured among them 
 for the rest of his life. 
 
 But meanwhile Vienna was suffering from his absence, 
 and all sorts and conditions of men clamoured for his return. 
 The episcopal see having become vacant, the king besought 
 the Pope and St Ignatius that it might be conferred on 
 Father Canisius. But the utmost he could obtain after long 
 importunity was that Canisius should administer the affairs 
 of the diocese for one year, pending the election of a bishop, 
 with the proviso that he should not touch a single farthing of 
 the rich revenues belonging to the see, which he was to 
 govern as a simple religious. 
 
 The arrangement was one admirably adapted to the 
 restoration of order in the existing state of chaos, while 
 no sacrifice of its discipline was forced on the Society 
 by the promotion of one of its members to rank and 
 dignity. 
 
 Canisius was afterwards made Dean of the University, in 
 the hope that he would do for it what he had already done 
 for Ingolstadt, and he set about the work in the same 
 masterly fashion that distinguished all his schemes of reform. 
 His first act was to obtain a royal decree, limiting the 
 admission of professors to those who had submitted them-
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 121 
 
 selves to a rigorous examination in religious doctrine, and 
 had given irrefragable proofs of orthodoxy. The same con- 
 ditions were in future to be exacted of all who presented 
 themselves for degrees. The university teemed with Lutheran 
 literature ; it was swept away by the same inexorable root- 
 and-branch measures that had been so successfully employed 
 at Ingolstadt. 
 
 The next care of the reformer was to petition the king 
 for a seminary wherein the ranks of the clergy, thinned 
 almost to extinction, might be reinforced by men carefully 
 trained to a due appreciation of their high calling. The 
 result was the foundation of the seminary of priests of noble 
 family, recruited mainly from the college which the Jesuits 
 had opened at Vienna, and to which had flocked students 
 from all the great families of Hungary, Bohemia, Poland, 
 etc. In conjunction with this seminary, St Ignatius, about 
 the same time, founded the celebrated German College 
 in Rome, for the regeneration of Germany by means of 
 a clergy that should be as learned as it was morally 
 irreproachable. 
 
 In the midst of his multifarious occupations, Canisius 
 continued his sermons at court, in the Cathedral, and in the 
 principal churches of Vienna. Lutherans frequented them 
 largely, and some, touched by the power of his doctrine and 
 eloquence, asked him for conferences, which he gladly accorded 
 them. Among these were two preachers of some celebrity, 
 pillars of Protestantism, who defied him to answer their 
 arguments in a public disputation. He accepted the challenge, 
 and the day, place, and hour were fixed. A great concourse 
 of people, composed largely of the new sectaries, were 
 assembled, prepared to swell the expected triumph of their 
 champions. The two heretical doctors held their dissertations, 
 one after the other, and sat down amid the applause of their 
 sympathisers. Then Canisius stood up with religious modesty 
 and humility, his bearing expressive of the calmness and
 
 122 STUDIES FROM COURT AKD CLOISTER 
 
 benevolence of one who has the whole Catholic Church, past 
 and present, on his side. His prodigious memory and 
 profound knowledge enabled him to refute easily every charge 
 brought by his adversaries, whom he completely crushed with 
 the overwhelming consistency of his logic. They both ac- 
 knowledged themselves defeated ; one returned to the Catholic 
 Church, and a few months later entered the Society of 
 Jesus, of which he remained an edifying member till his 
 death ; the other became a more determined advocate of 
 heresy than before, and swore to avenge his defeat by a 
 persistent persecution of the Jesuits. 
 
 Nor were enemies wanting on any side ; the more converts 
 the Jesuits made, the greater was the hatred they inspired. 
 Calumnies were sown broadcast, and the life of Father 
 Canisius was in constant danger. Ferdinand, warned of a 
 plot to murder the holy man, obliged him, greatly to his 
 discomfiture, to accept a bodyguard whenever he went out. 
 But the work of reform and conversion went on steadily, and 
 from all parts of Germany, bishops, princes, and governors 
 sought to obtain the presence of the illustrious apostle. " I 
 am ready," he wrote in this regard to St Ignatius, "to go 
 wherever obedience calls me, and to work for the salva- 
 tion of souls however abandoned they may be, whether in 
 Poland, Lithuania, Russia, Tartary, or China, wherever I am 
 sent" 
 
 He was sent to Prague, perhaps the most God-forsaken 
 spot in the whole empire. Every imaginable sect had 
 accumulated in Bohemia during the preceding twenty years. 
 Scarcely a vestige of Catholicism remained, and Hussites, 
 Wicklifites, Vaudois, Lutherans, Zwinglians, and various other 
 offshoots of the principal sects, were busy relegating each 
 other in eloquent terms to eternal damnation, when the 
 arrival of Catholic missionaries gave the signal for a coalition 
 against the common enemy of them all At Prague itself, 
 where Canisius was charged to found a college with the
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 123 
 
 injunction not to leave Bohemia until it should be solidly 
 established and in a flourishing condition, the Hussites out- 
 numbered the others. Scarcely had he arrived and set to 
 work, when the Duke of Bavaria, reminding St Ignatius 
 that Canisius had only been lent to Austria, claimed him, 
 at least temporarily, for the foundation of the college which 
 the Society was to establish at Ingolstadt. The claim was 
 admitted to be just, and accordingly the affairs of Prague 
 could only be proceeded with four months later, when 
 Canisius returned from Germany, having been made pro- 
 vincial. 
 
 It was the beginning of Lent 1555, and on the 2ist April 
 twelve priests sent to him from Rome by St Ignatius, 
 arrived to second him in his perilous undertaking. The first 
 time the Jesuits appeared in the streets they were saluted 
 with handfuls of mud cast at them by the city urchins, who 
 had been bribed to insult them. The cry " Dogs of Jesuits " (a 
 play upon the word Canisius) followed them wherever they 
 went. Father Peter was himself assailed with a large stone 
 hurled through the window of the church as he stood at 
 the altar saying Mass. A plot was formed to throw the 
 whole community one by one into the Moldau, as they 
 passed over the bridge that connected the old and the new 
 town ; and ruffians, who had received a part of their reward 
 in advance, were stationed in the middle of the bridge to 
 waylay them. But a timely edict issued by the Archduke of 
 Bohemia threatened with the most severe penalties whoever 
 should raise a hand against any member of the Society, or 
 even treat any one of them disrespectfully. He went 
 still further, and sent a detachment of guards to the 
 college daily, with orders to accompany each of the priests 
 wherever he went, and in sufficient numbers to prevent any 
 attack. 
 
 Added to the open enmity and fierce hatred which they 
 inspired, the Jesuits had to encounter the jealousy of the
 
 124 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 University professors, who would have been willing enough 
 that they should preach, but who, on the opening of their 
 college, did all they could to hamper them and prejudice 
 people against them. 
 
 The reputation of the Society for teaching was great all 
 over Germany. Wherever a college was established by them, 
 it immediately attracted students from all parts, and it was 
 perhaps natural that other educational institutions should fear 
 for their own existence. But the pettiness and meanness 
 with which this fear was expressed at Prague resulted for 
 the Jesuits in a penury so abject, that for many months they 
 had nothing to eat but bread and cheese, and nothing to 
 drink but water from their own well. For several days 
 they were even prevented from going out for want of suitable 
 garments. Nevertheless, however much they might have to 
 suffer in any one place, struggling through a painful 
 existence to the end in view, the work of reform went steadily 
 forward. 
 
 About this time, the cathedral at Regensburg was in need 
 of a preacher ; the Diet was about to assemble in that city, 
 all the princes and electors of the empire were to take part 
 in it, and the new sectaries were expected in great numbers, 
 in order to wrench, if it might be, such concessions from 
 the authorities as they had not yet been able to obtain. 
 The chapter therefore appealed to Father Canisius, and 
 besought him to throw himself into this important breach. 
 Realising all that was at stake, he started at once for 
 Regensburg. 
 
 His first appearance in the cathedral pulpit was a splendid 
 testimony to the opinion in which he was held. The vast 
 building was filled with a brilliant throng, on the fringe of 
 which the people hung in dense crowds overflowing into the 
 streets. In a letter to Father Lainez (who had succeeded 
 St Ignatius as General of the Society) in September 1556, 
 Canisius describes his efforts as successful in supporting and
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 125 
 
 strengthening the persecuted Catholics, but he goes on to 
 say that the Lutheran representatives at the Diet let loose 
 a string of calumnies against him, and did all they could to 
 poison the minds of the weak and simple. But for the 
 States of the Empire they would have cast him out of the 
 city as one so dangerous to the Protestant cause that they 
 declared it would be wrecked altogether if Canisius continued 
 to preach there. 
 
 However, continue he did during the whole of the sessions, 
 save for a short interval of absence. In this interval he 
 visited Innsbruck, in which town a college of the Society was 
 nearing completion ; and Augsburg, whose bishop, his old 
 friend the celebrated Otto Truchsess, desired to consult him 
 on the affairs of his diocese. There, overwhelmed with his 
 almost superhuman labours, Canisius fell ill. He desired to 
 be taken to the college at Ingolstadt, and Cardinal 
 Truchsess accompanied him thither, while the Duke of 
 Bavaria sent him his physicians. Thanks to their skill and 
 to the enforced rest of his mental and physical powers, he 
 soon recovered, and was able on the ist December to return to 
 his post at Regensburg. On all the Sundays of Advent he 
 preached at the cathedral, but as it could not contain the 
 vast concourse of people who crowded to hear him, he was 
 obliged to preach three times in the week also. From the 
 pulpit he went to the confessional, and when he returned to 
 his lodging he was besieged by those who came to seek his 
 advice princes, concerning the interests of religion in their 
 dominions, prelates, in regard to the reform of their dioceses, 
 or to their own spiritual needs. The King of the Romans, 
 and the Duke of Bavaria often sent for him to confer with 
 him, and all admired the humility, simplicity, and patience 
 with which he listened, no less than the frankness and 
 freedom from human respect with which he proffered his 
 advice. But time was wanting for all the demands made 
 upon him ; and that all might be satisfied he drew up for
 
 126 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 the use of bishops a short treatise on the means of 
 reforming the clergy, and of introducing good morals among 
 their flocks. 
 
 The Diet of Regensburg ended in nothing but resolutions 
 to continue the controversy at Worms, and fearing the 
 objections of Canisius, who was known to feel great repug- 
 nance towards these public conferences with heretics which 
 never came to any practical conclusion, Ferdinand sought 
 to anticipate his refusal by obtaining a promise from 
 Father Lainez that so able a defender of Catholic doctrine 
 should also be present 
 
 Canisius had already written to the general thus: 
 
 " Knowing as I do my poverty of intellect, my great want of 
 aptitude, and my incapacity, I confess that I should like to run 
 away from this place, and would rather go and beg in India 
 than involve myself in those dangerous disputes, out of which 
 nothing can come but perpetual disgrace to religion, and great 
 harm to the rights of the Church. But the Lord God will make 
 known to me His will by His servant my Superior, and when 
 I know it I shall have no further fear, but shall appear with 
 boldness in the enemy's camp ; for all my confidence and 
 all my strength are in obedience. I can be nothing else but a 
 beast of burden in the house of the Lord all the days of my 
 life." 
 
 Father Lainez shared to the full the opinion of Canisius as 
 to the uselessness of these conferences, which were exacted by 
 the Lutherans in the hope of wresting something to their own 
 temporal advantage, and the Pope differed from neither in his 
 estimation of the small amount of good to be hoped from them. 
 But as the Emperor was not to be restrained from granting 
 concessions which all Catholics agreed were futile, it was 
 extremely important that the interests of religion and 
 the rights of the Holy See should be ably defended ; and
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 127 
 
 Father Lainez therefore insisted that Canisius should not only 
 remain at the Diet of Regensburg to the bitter end, but that 
 he should hold himself in readiness to reopen the campaign 
 at Worms. 
 
 In the interval Canisius went to Rome to pay his respects 
 to the new General, and on his return to Germany visited 
 Munich. The capital of Bavaria was also a hot-bed of heresy, 
 and after a brief sojourn there he wrote to Father Lainez, 
 entreating that he would send some Fathers capable of attract- 
 ing people by their sermons and of edifying them by the holiness 
 of their lives. He then went to Ingolstadt, and was greatly 
 consoled by the results that had been obtained by the newly- 
 founded college. Heresy no longer ventured to raise its head 
 where formerly it had flaunted its colours unabashed, and in 
 every respect the university was worthy of the care that had 
 been bestowed upon it. The place was naturally dear to his 
 heart, as the magnificent first-fruits of his labours for Germany, 
 but tearing himself reluctantly from the piety and peace which 
 he had so successfully planted there, he proceeded to confront 
 the enemy at Worms. 
 
 The greater number of the Lutheran disputants had already 
 arrived, but of the six Catholic theologians deputed to enter the 
 lists against them, the most celebrated, Johann Gropper, Arch- 
 deacon of Cologne, was conspicuous by his absence. Canisius 
 wrote to entreat him to come, but Gropper was so thoroughly 
 convinced of the uselessness of the disputations, that he per- 
 sistently refused to take part in them. The organisation of the 
 whole matter therefore devolved on Canisius, who prepared the 
 plan of defence, and appointed to each Catholic theologian the 
 subject of which he was to treat. Besides this, he continued to 
 preach, to hear confessions and to take counsel with his col- 
 leagues daily. At night he allowed himself but a brief interval 
 of sleep, the rest of the time being spent in prayer and 
 study. 
 
 He had stipulated before the opening of the conferences
 
 128 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 that none but those Protestants who belonged to the Confession 
 of Augsburg, and who were the only regular, and to some extent, 
 disciplined body among them should take part in the disputa- 
 tions. This condition had been accepted, but from the very 
 beginning, Anabaptists, Sacramentarians, and heretics of every 
 imaginable sect appeared, and claimed the right of speech. 
 Those of the Augsburg Confession were furious, and refused to 
 make common cause with the new arrivals. Recriminations, 
 invectives, and threats were hurled about the Protestant camp 
 till a formidable tumult ensued. The Augsburg Lutherans at 
 last succeeded in turning out the other sects, but ashamed of the 
 spectacle they had presented to the eyes of the Catholics who 
 were all united, they left Worms secretly, and contented 
 themselves with attacking each other in the usual vituperative 
 terms. 
 
 " It was," wrote Canisius, " as if the giants of old were 
 seeking to rebuild the Tower of Babel. God visited them with 
 the same spirit of confusion which prevented their understand- 
 ing one another, so that Melancthon was punished by the work 
 of his own hands, like those who are devoured by the wild beasts 
 which they have themselves bred up with great pains and 
 difficulty." 
 
 Cologne, Strassburg, and his own native Nymwegen next 
 came in for a share in the apostles' labours. The Bishop 
 of Trent begged him to come and found a college in his 
 diocese ; the Duke of Bavaria called upon him to organise 
 the one he had already set on foot at Munich, and to 
 establish another at Landshut But Straubing, by reason 
 of its extreme need, detained him longer than any of these 
 places. 
 
 Charles V. had himself been mainly responsible for the worst 
 of the difficulties and complications that existed at Straubing, 
 on account of his famous interim, which granted to all, on his 
 own personal authority, permission to communicate under both 
 kinds, pending the decision of the Council of Trent on this
 
 THE CATHOLIC REFORMATION IN GERMANY 129 
 
 point. Straubing had availed i itself without exception of the 
 permission, and even after the decision of the Council persisted 
 in retaining the custom. A few priests had attempted resist- 
 ance, but numberless apostasies and half an insurrection had 
 followed on their action, and now the position had come to be 
 regarded as impregnable. 
 
 Canisius made no attempt to storm the fortress ; he arrived, 
 and was gentleness itself. He had scarcely passed a week in 
 the town when he was regarded as the friend and adviser of all 
 its principal citizens. His sermons drew crowds as usual, and 
 his instructions on the subject of Holy Communion, of which 
 his hearers proved to be strangely ignorant, were continued 
 in the confessional, and on every possible occasion. At 
 Easter nearly the whole population approached the sacra- 
 ments, and communicated without making the least diffi- 
 culty, under one kind. The apostle, broken with fatigue, 
 for he had preached throughout Lent, three times a week, 
 besides catechising, visiting the sick, hearing confessions, 
 and answering the objections of all who came to him, was 
 yet beaming with joy, so markedly had his labours been 
 blessed. 
 
 It would be superfluous to follow Canisius in his journey to 
 Poland, in his fruitful sojourn at Augsburg, in his campaign 
 against the ignorance of the clergy at Wiirzburg, against the 
 Calvinism of the Swiss Protestants. Everywhere the story is 
 the same : ignorance, vice, and heresy fled before the bright 
 light of his presence, and his wisdom provided, that where he 
 had planted the good seed, others should follow him, to keep it 
 watered, so that there should be no return to the former errors. 
 Long after his death, the colleges of the Society which he 
 had founded continued his work, and formed an efficient 
 barrier against the modern spirit of revolt from authority and 
 order. 
 
 If in a sense the old ages of faith were dead, the new age 
 witnessed a wonderful resurrection, the effect of which is still 
 
 I
 
 130 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 going on in our own day. And the scourge of heresy wherewith 
 the Church in Germany was scourged to its ultimate salvation 
 in the sixteenth century, lies now a thing of nought, effete and 
 all but lifeless, while the Bride of Christ has renewed her youth 
 like the eagle.
 
 V 
 JESUITS AT COURT 
 
 LACORDAIRE once wrote in a letter to Madame Swetchine 
 these remarkable words concerning the disciples of St 
 Ignatius: 
 
 " Tout ce qui m'a tombe sous la main m'a toujours revolte 
 par 1'emphase ridicule de 1'eloge, ou par 1'impudeur du blame. 
 II semble que cette nature d'hommes ait toujours ote la raison 
 a ses amis et a ses ennemis. Je voudrais leur consacrer dix 
 annees d'etudes, ne fut ce que pour mon plaisir propre ; mais 
 Dieu nous donne et nous prepare une bien autre besogne, et 
 il faut dire avec 1'auteur de ^Imitation, ' relinque curiosa! Les 
 Jesuites continueront a faire du bien, et a le faire mal 
 quelquefois ; ils auront des amis fr6netiques et des ennemis 
 furieux, en attendant le jour du jugement dernier, qui sera 
 pour bien des raisons un tres-inteYessant et tres-curieux 
 jour." 
 
 At no time has the world been more occupied with the 
 Jesuits than at the present moment, and the prophecy of the 
 celebrated Dominican above quoted seems more than ever 
 likely to be fulfilled. If their friends are indeed still as 
 extravagant in their praise as Lacordaire found them, perhaps 
 on the other hand criticism is even louder, hatred more pro- 
 found, accusation more wild and general. Most of the 
 
 131
 
 132 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 governments of Europe have banished them, on the ground 
 that they are the enemies to progress, to liberal ideas, that 
 they have meddled in politics, and constitute a danger to 
 the State, by seeking to grasp the helm of public affairs, 
 secretly stirring up the nations against their rulers. 
 
 The subject appears to be of perennial and universal 
 application, since even in this twentieth century, and in so 
 tolerant a country as England, people have been moved to 
 some apprehension lest we should be incurring a danger in 
 suffering the Jesuit to live unmolested in our midst But it 
 is not our present ambition to settle so burning a question as 
 the right of members of the Society of Jesus to exist any- 
 where ; rather would we make an excursion into the domain of 
 history, and inquire what have been the rules and regula- 
 tions, and what has been the practice of the Society concern- 
 ing politics in the past, what has been the attitude of 
 its members, prescribed and actual towards kings, potentates, 
 and dynasties. 
 
 Certain facts have recently come to light, bearing on the 
 history of the Jesuits at the various German courts in the 
 sixteenth century, and the scattered remains of the private 
 correspondence belonging to the archives of the old Society 
 before its suppression have been gathered together. What 
 was done more or less in secret is now proclaimed on the 
 housetops, and the result, as might be expected, is in many ways 
 interesting and instructive. 1 
 
 This correspondence consists of communications between 
 the rank and file, and the superiors at Rome, and vice versd, and 
 includes the letters which passed between the General and 
 the kings, archdukes and other reigning princes, who were 
 ostensibly friends of the Society, but who did their best to 
 put frequent spokes in the wheels of the Constitutions. 
 
 1 Die Jcsuiten an den deutschen Fiirstenkofen des \6ten Jahrhunderts. 
 Auf Grand ungedruckter Quellen. Von Bernhard Duhr, S.J., Freiburg 
 im Breisgau, 1901.
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 133 
 
 The great dearth of learned preachers and confessors that 
 prevailed about the middle of the sixteenth century appealed 
 strongly to the Jesuits to throw themselves into the breach, 
 and thus against the original intention of their founder, they 
 became the spiritual guides of those who made the history of 
 Europe for the next hundred years and more. It was a 
 delicate and an onerous task, fraught with temptations from 
 without and from within. 
 
 Ignatius of Loyola, being a man of the world as well as a 
 saint, was well aware of the perils to which he exposed his 
 sons, in sending them forth into the midst of vanities, while 
 at the same time, having had some experience of courts, he 
 knew that princes love not contradiction. But he decided after 
 mature deliberation that after all his "least Society" was 
 created to do a certain work in the Church and in the world, 
 the need of which work was only too apparent in the decayed 
 state of faith and morals. It was not by turning his 
 back on courts that he could hope to regenerate them ; but 
 it would be interesting could we discover whether by a con- 
 trary decision he would have averted some of the odium 
 which the name Jesuit has accumulated in the course of 
 ages. 
 
 John III. of Portugal was the first king to demand a Jesuit 
 confessor, and to him Ignatius sent Father Luis Gonzalez de 
 Comara, much against the desire of the said individual. To his 
 entreaties and objections the first General of the Society made 
 answer, on the 9th August 1552, that he was indeed edified by 
 the humility which caused Father de Comara to shrink from 
 a position which many envied ; nevertheless, he was of the 
 opinion that he should obey his Highness in this, as in other 
 things, " for the honour of God our Lord." St Ignatius went 
 on to say that he need not occupy himself with any but good 
 and pious objects, neither had he reason to fear that the 
 king would, against the will of the Society, confer upon 
 him those honours and dignities with which it was the
 
 134 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 custom to distinguish other confessors. If moreover, his 
 remaining at court was a cross to him, he must bear it with 
 patience as he would all else that obedience required of 
 him. 
 
 At the second General Congregation held in 1565, the 
 question arose whether Cardinal Otto of Augsburg might 
 have a member of the Society attached to his court, as 
 theologian. The Congregation decided not to allow any 
 member to reside permanently at the court of any prince, 
 spiritual or secular, or to consent to his following the said 
 court on its travels, either in the capacity of preacher, 
 theologian or confessor, and that no appointment of such a 
 kind should be permissible for longer than one month or double 
 that period at the most. 
 
 Ten years later, the Provincial Congregation of North 
 Germany was reminded of this decree in drawing up pro- 
 positions to be placed before the third General Congregation, 
 and it was expressly stated that none but the General of the 
 Society himself should have the power to make such appoint- 
 ments, that they should be made as rarely as possible, 
 experience having proved that more harm was done to the 
 confessor by his residing at court than good to the penitent 
 by his ministrations. The reply to this proposition was 
 to the effect that with the General alone should rest the 
 appointment. 
 
 By degrees, further legislation became imperative, and the 
 fifth General Congregation, held in 1593, forbade in the most 
 solemn form every member of the Society to interfere in 
 politics or any public affairs whatever. The decree was so 
 absolute that not only did it ensure the imprudent from 
 taking part in the questions of the day, but timid confessors 
 were thereby prevented by their scruples from giving counsel, 
 when appealed to on matters that could scarcely be supposed 
 to border on politics. 
 
 lr\ order therefore, to correct all misapprehension, the
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 135 
 
 General, Father Aquaviva, issued an Instruction for the con- 
 fessors of princes, which was formally approved by the General 
 Congregation of 1608. This was considered so important a 
 document that it was incorporated into the Institute, a sort 
 of code, containing the Constitutions which St Ignatius drew 
 up, as well as the decrees of General Congregations. The 
 Instruction was in fact a summary of all previous experience 
 on the subject. It provided, first of all, that in cases where 
 the Society could not avoid compliance with the demand for 
 a confessor at court, great care should be taken in the choice 
 of the individual member to fill the office, so that he might 
 conduce to the welfare of the prince, the edification of the 
 people, and the avoidance of all injury to the Order. The 
 last clause bore reference to the fact that not infrequently 
 the Society was called upon to suffer in one place for wounds 
 inflicted on it in another. Rules for the said confessor were 
 then laid down, to fit every possible emergency, and in minute 
 detail. 
 
 For instance, the king's confessor, although attached to 
 the royal chapel, must not only lodge exclusively in a college 
 of his Order, but he must remain subject to the rule, like 
 any other member of the Society. Even when travelling with 
 the court he was obliged to sleep in a house of his Order, 
 or if passing through a town where no such house existed, 
 he must beg hospitality of any other religious community, 
 preferably to passing the night at court. 
 
 It was again solemnly impressed upon him not to allow 
 himself to be drawn into any secular concerns, which rule 
 the king was humbly petitioned to enforce. 
 
 Neither must the confessor undertake to be an emissary 
 between the prince, his penitent, and any of his ministers, or 
 other officials. 
 
 As regarded the prince himself, he was bound to listen to 
 his confessor, not merely when he exhorted him on the subject- 
 matter of his confessions, but also jn matters relating to the.
 
 136 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 prevention of injustice, oppression, or other scandals such as 
 often came about through the fault of officials, and which 
 were unknown to the sovereign. 
 
 None might undertake the office of permanent confessor 
 at court without the consent of his provincial. It was, 
 moreover, the duty of the provincial before according such 
 permission, to hand this Instruction to the prince in order 
 that he might thoroughly understand what the Society was 
 willing to bestow upon him. The prince was further to be 
 reminded in modest but decided terms, that superiors retained 
 the right to the obedience of the individual who became his 
 confessor, as absolutely as to that of any other member of 
 the Society. 
 
 At first there seemed no great need for these precautions. 
 The emperor, Charles V., chose Dominicans for his confessors, 
 and his successor, Ferdinand, followed his example. But 
 Ferdinand held the Society in great esteem, and at his death 
 Father Lainez, who was then General, ordered that each 
 priest in the college at Dillingen should offer twelve 
 Masses for the repose of his soul, and the lay - brothers 
 were to say certain prayers with the same intention. 
 The Society was not only indebted to him for his unvary- 
 ing friendship, but owed to his munificence the foundation of 
 four colleges, viz., those of Vienna, Prague, Innsbruck, and 
 Tyrnau. 
 
 Ferdinand's son and successor, Maximilian, having Pro- 
 testant leanings, dispensed with a confessor altogether, but 
 his wife, Dona Maria, sister of Philip II. of Spain, was pro- 
 vided with a Spanish Franciscan, who was chosen for her 
 by her brother. Maximilian's sons all chose Jesuit confessors, 
 as did also his daughter, the Queen of Bohemia. 
 
 At that time the Lutherans thought that Catholicism was 
 at its last gasp, and they eagerly anticipated the banishment 
 of the Jesuits. But Maximilian, in spite of his Protestant 
 tendencies, was well disposed towards them, and their college
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 137 
 
 at Vienna received many marks of his favour, to the great 
 disgust of his Lutheran subjects. The Protestant nobles 
 assembled at the Landtag held in Vienna, attached three 
 conditions to their votes of supplies for his war against the 
 Turks : The abolition of the procession of Corpus Christi, 
 the confirmation of the Confession of Augsburg, and the 
 banishment of the Jesuits. They declared that if the emperor 
 refused to grant these requests, they would not furnish him 
 with the required subsidy for the war. Maximilian replied 
 that it was his business to repulse the Turks ; the other 
 things did not concern him, but the Pope. 1 
 
 Disappointed in their hopes, the Lutherans, allying them- 
 selves with the enemies of the Jesuits within the Church, 
 began to circulate false reports against the Society. At one 
 moment they accused Father Peter Canisius of prejudicing 
 the Pope against the emperor, at another, the whole com- 
 munity at Vienna were declared guilty of openly insulting 
 the Protestants. Reiterated complaints poured into the 
 emperor's ears ended by alienating Maximilian from his 
 former friends, and it was difficult, almost impossible for 
 them to obtain a hearing. But the empress remained loyal 
 to them, and would perhaps have been termed by Lacordaire 
 frenttique. 
 
 Father Maggio, who was then court preacher, seems to 
 have been a man of great prudence and mildness, thoroughly 
 imbued with the spirit of religion. By degrees he not only 
 convinced Maximilian of the injustice of the attacks made upon 
 the Society, but the two became fast friends, so that when he 
 was made Provincial of Austria in 1566, the appointment gave 
 much satisfaction at court. He was frequently summoned to 
 private audiences, and the emperor treated him with so much 
 confidence that Father Maggio would sometimes venture to 
 address to him written words of exhortation, words which 
 Maximilian invariably took in good part. The empress., 
 * Orig. G. Epist, 6, 48 seq,
 
 138 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 observing the affection of her husband for the Jesuit would 
 consult Father Maggio as to the best means of confirming 
 him in the Catholic religion. 
 
 - When Father Maggio was made provincial, Father Antonio, 
 a Portuguese Jesuit, became court preacher, but so little to his 
 own satisfaction that he repeatedly appealed to the empress 
 and to the General for his release. He bewailed his unfitness 
 for a post requiring so much exceptional virtue, and expressed 
 his desire to be sent to foreign missions. If such were 
 not the will of his superiors, he entreated that he might 
 have some humble office in a house of novices, where he 
 might live unnoticed by the world, and labour for his soul's 
 health. 
 
 The General, Father Mercurian, replied, on the i8th March 
 1576, that he had no one to replace him at court, and that he 
 must perforce remain where he was. Previously to this, Father 
 Antonio had besought the empress to dismiss him, but she had 
 answered that she counted on his ministrations at the hour of 
 death. A month after Father Mercurian's refusal to remove 
 him, he again wrote to the General, begging that he might 
 apply to the empress for, at least, a year's leave of absence, 
 during which time a locum tenens might be dispensed with. 
 Two days later, he followed up this letter with another, giving 
 the General his opinion why it was inexpedient for any member 
 of the Society to remain at court for more than a short term, 
 such as a month or two. There was, he said, no bishop, 
 ambassador, or person of consequence who did not desire to 
 have several of the Fathers about him ; the door which, at their 
 profession, they had shut on the world, seemed in a certain 
 sense to be reopened by a residence at court ; unfortunately, 
 men were not wanting who aspired to such offices, and great 
 inconveniences ensued thereby. Some grew accustomed to a 
 certain independence, little in accordance with the rules of the 
 Society, some were altogether spoiled, and brought disgrace on 
 the Order. It was, perhaps, not astonishing that after this
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 139 
 
 letter the General showed even less inclination than before to 
 remove Father Antonio. One who thus appreciated the 
 dangers of the world would be less likely than another to fall a 
 prey to them, and was as safe at court as in fulfilling the 
 humblest duties of the noviceship. 
 
 But when all was said and done, the influence of the Jesuits 
 at the Court of Vienna was not very great Their El Dorado 
 was the Archducal Court at Gratz, where reigned Ferdinand's 
 son, Charles II. Here their power was at least supposed to be 
 so great that their enemies declared that they possessed the 
 master-key of all the doors in the palace, and could pass through 
 all the rooms composing the apartments of the Archduchess at 
 will This, however, with other things, she declared solemnly to 
 be nothing but lies nur lautere Liigen and an attack on her 
 honour. 1 
 
 Apart from these unpleasant calumnies, the Society flourished 
 at Gratz as hardly anywhere else, and was able to train its 
 novices, give the Spiritual Exercises, and administer the sacra- 
 ments undisturbed. The only difficulties that arose were in 
 connection with the right of the provincial to move his men 
 about as he chose, the archduke, like the emperor, being 
 inclined to regard his confessors as his own property. This 
 was notably the case with the celebrated Father Blyssem, who 
 received marching orders in 1578. The Archduke at once 
 wrote to the General, declaring that Father Blyssem's removal 
 would be extremely inconvenient, and was not to be contem- 
 plated. If the General were on the spot he would be of the 
 archduke's opinion. First, Father Blyssem was his and the 
 archduchess's confessor, and they both wished above all things 
 to keep him. Secondly, he was not only a vigilant rector of the 
 college under him, and an experienced confessor, but he was 
 also an excellent preacher. And finally, he was beloved by 
 all, was well acquainted with the idiosyncracies of the country, 
 enjoyed a good reputation, and inspired respect even in the 
 1 flurter, Ferdinand II., 3, 578,
 
 140 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 opponents of the Catholic religion. His sudden departure 
 could not therefore but be injurious to the temporal and 
 spiritual welfare of the college, and detrimental to the general 
 good. 
 
 Not alone the archduke, the papal legate, Bishop Ringuarda, 
 also appealed to the General of the Jesuits in the same interest, 
 saying that he had already sought the intervention of the Pope 
 and the Cardinal of Como, to prevent the removal of Father 
 Blyssem. As he now heard that, in spite of his efforts, Father 
 Blyssem was to go to Rome, at least for three months, Bishop 
 Ringuarda begged most urgently that this order might be 
 cancelled, the Father's absence for even a week, to say nothing 
 of a month, being likely to entail serious harm to the Church 
 in Austria. His daily presence was so necessary, that if he 
 were not already at Gratz, he must be sent there without delay. 
 The legate then went on to enumerate all the wonderful 
 qualities possessed by the rector, and ended his letter with 
 the solemn entreaty that the General would on no account 
 remove him. 1 
 
 Pressure such as this being frequently brought to bear on 
 superiors, they could scarcely be said to exercise undivided 
 control over their own subjects. 
 
 Driven into a corner, Aquaviva was obliged to leave the 
 archduke's confessor where he was, accommodating matters 
 by making him Provincial of Austria, in place of Father Maggio, 
 Father Emerich Torsler replacing Father Blyssem as rector of 
 the college at Gratz. The archduke expressed himself content 
 with the arrangement, provided that Father Blyssem did not 
 absent himself on the business of the province when he required 
 him at his side. 
 
 The new provincial had occasion, in January 1582, to write 
 
 to the General about the sermons of a certain Father John 
 
 Reinel, which were, he complained, too lengthy and too violent. 
 
 In regard to the first fault he had improved somewhat, but no 
 
 i Orig. G. Epist., 3, 298,
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 141 
 
 admonition had succeeded in causing him to desist from his 
 biting attacks on the heretics. His Paternity was, therefore, 
 requested to command him to observe more moderation and 
 gentleness, and instead of handling the heretics angrily and 
 roughly, to teach and exhort them with Christian charity. In 
 this manner he would convert a far greater number, as every 
 one maintained. But if he continued as heretofore, Father 
 Blyssem would be obliged to send him to another college, where 
 he would have to adopt a different style or give over preaching 
 altogether, and take up another occupation. 
 
 But the removal of Father Reinel was not so simple a 
 matter as it at first appeared. Towards the end of the year, 
 Father Blyssem again wrote to Aquaviva on the same subject 
 It had been decided during the preceding summer to send the 
 unmanageable preacher to another sphere of activity, he having 
 been already so long a time at Gratz, where he was too much 
 engrossed in the court, which he had recently, against the 
 wishes of his superiors, accompanied in its journey of several 
 months through Bavaria and Suabia, to the neglect of the 
 pulpit at Gratz. Moreover, his harsh and aggressive manner 
 of preaching was as repulsive to the Catholics as to the 
 Lutherans, but when, according to his instructions, he was on 
 the point of starting for Vienna, the archduchess, whose con- 
 fessions he sometimes heard in Father Blyssem's temporary 
 absence, was so much aggrieved at the change, that she 
 entreated her husband with many arguments and tears to 
 prevent his departure. Accordingly, the archduke begged the 
 provincial to defer Father Reinel's removal on account of his 
 consort's distress, and this he apparently did, but he wrote to 
 the General asking him to insist on the order being carried out, 
 and to persuade the archduke to agree to it. 
 
 Sometimes varying reports were sent to the General con- 
 cerning the behaviour of certain Fathers at court. Thus, the 
 rector of the college at Gratz wrote somewhat severely of 
 Father Saxo, who also was a favourite in the most exalted circle.
 
 142 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 But Father Blyssem in a letter to Aquaviva, dated 2ist 
 December 1585, defended him, saying: 
 
 " Your Paternity appears to be incorrectly informed as to 
 Father Saxo. In my judgment, and in that of other Fathers of 
 consideration, he has very greatly improved in his manner and 
 conduct towards others. When I was at Gratz last year he was 
 in possession of a costly little alarum, which he had received as 
 a present from a nobleman. He was well pleased that the 
 clock should be taken from him, and sold for the benefit of the 
 noviceship. The seal which he used at missions, and which he 
 would willingly have kept afterwards, he gave up at once at the 
 instance of his superior. He had received a great many books 
 as presents in the course of his missions, to assist him in preach- 
 ing, and these he delivered up for the common use, after very 
 little delay. The Fathers whom I questioned answered that 
 they had noticed nothing in Father Saxo that might give 
 scandal, nor had they ever heard anything of the kind about 
 him." 
 
 The complaints against Father Viller were less easily 
 answered. He had filled the office of Austrian Provincial 
 between the years 1589 and 1595, and in the latter year was 
 appointed rector of the college at Gratz. During this time the 
 Archduke Ferdinand chose him as his confessor. Not long 
 afterwards he was accused to the General of being a courtier, an 
 imputation so vague as to need a discursive reply. But his 
 long letter of self-justification addressed to Father Aquaviva is 
 interesting on account of the vivid scenes it lays before us. Its 
 main contents are these : 
 
 " Already fifteen or sixteen years ago, when Father Maggio 
 had left the province, certain Fathers in Vienna complained 
 bitterly to the new provincial, Father Blyssem, that I had a 
 courtier-like mind, because people about the court came to me,
 
 JESUITS AT COURT H3 
 
 and I associated with them. I was, it is true, in favour with 
 the imperial council, with the bishops and the Hungarian 
 nobles, also with the apostolic nuntios Delphin and Portia, and 
 I laboured to the extent of my power in the interests of religion. 
 Father Provincial removed me from my office, and I became 
 his secretary and admonitor. Two years later, when a visitor, 
 Father Oliver came, he reinstated me as Master of the alumni, 
 discipline among them having become relaxed. When I had 
 been another two years in this office, I was again accused to the 
 provincial. I was deposed, but in the meantime, the baseless- 
 ness of the charges brought against me having been proved, I 
 was appointed rector at Olmiitz, and Father Provincial assured 
 me with tears that I had been unjustly treated. Five years 
 afterwards I was elected provincial, and the Father Visitor was 
 able to testify that I suffered much, even to the danger of losing 
 my life, in discharging the duties of this office in Bohemia and 
 Hungary. The next provincial (Father Ferdinand Alber) 
 evinced dislike of me immediately on his taking up office, the 
 reason of which was, I believe, merely that we do not share the 
 same opinions. He, like Fathers Bader, Reinel, and Scherer, is 
 for public penitential exercises in the refectory daily ; I, on the 
 contrary, am for a milder proceeding, such as I have learned of 
 Fathers Maggio, Everard (Mercurian) Goudan, Canisius, and 
 Lanoy. Therefore, I am called a courtier, even when I am 
 not at court. The whole college will bear witness that I 
 go there less often than Father Reinel, who at least went 
 once a day, whereas I go on an average but once a 
 week. 
 
 " If it be objected that I suffer the princes to come frequently 
 to the college, I reply, as I replied to the Father Provincial, that 
 I will undertake they shall come no more, but the responsibility 
 for this must rest with others. 
 
 " I am further reproached with having invited the princes 
 to dinner at the vineyard, and also at the college, and that 
 I even played with them at the vineyard. As for the invi-
 
 144 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 tation, the princes themselves asked to be invited, and 
 the Apostolic Nuntio, and the Bishop of Laibach, were present 
 at the games, which were, in my judgment, honourable and 
 modest. 
 
 " I have begged to be removed from both my offices, in order 
 to remove suspicion, and to obtain peace, for I see that I am 
 not agreeable to my provincial, he having forbidden me to hear 
 the confessions of the archduke and those of the dowager 
 archduchess, who with her daughters insists on confessing 
 to me. 
 
 "If any one has told the provincial that the college is in a 
 bad state, ocular demonstration will prove the contrary ; every- 
 thing goes on in an orderly way. The archduke receives Holy 
 Communion every Sunday. He is burning with desire to rein- 
 state the Catholic religion, and he labours for the conversion of 
 the nobility. Only yesterday a man in a very high position was 
 received into the Church. As for your Paternity's exhortation 
 to guard against the spirit of the world, I thank you, but I do 
 not see how I am to do it, unless I flee from the court and from 
 those about it. I will take pains to satisfy my conscience and 
 obedience, but I fear that I shall not content those who look on 
 the dark side. If your Paternity thinks that I seek the favour 
 of princes more for my own sake than that of the Society, it is a 
 bitter reproach, for I would rather die than be guilty of such a 
 fault. The archdukes will bear me out how often I have 
 spoken to them on this subject, and how I have begged them to 
 write nothing on my behalf to the General or to the provincial ; 
 but they insist that if I lay down the rectorate I must retain the 
 confessorship." l 
 
 In the end, this suggested compromise was effected. Father 
 Viller was no longer rector of Gratz, but remained confessor 
 to the archducal family. Nevertheless, complaints of him did 
 
 1 Orig. G. Epist., 35, 479-
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 145 
 
 not cease, and he had to defend himself against the charge of 
 clinging inordinately to the worldy advantages of his position. 
 In a confidential letter to the German Resident in Rome he 
 wrote : 
 
 " I call God to witness that I do not value the court and 
 my present office more than any other service which my 
 superiors may call upon me to render to the Society. I am 
 cheerfully ready to leave the court at any moment, and at the 
 risk of losing the prince's favour, whenever my superior expresses 
 a wish that I should do so, to say nothing of receiving a decided 
 order. I have not so high an opinion of my person that I seek 
 consideration on account of the favour and affection of the 
 prince." 
 
 Still the attacks on Father Viller did not cease. Those 
 who were for unmitigated austerity looked on his broad views 
 with horror. Father Scherer, one of the most rigid, called him 
 "the synagogue of Libertines." The provincial, and the 
 Spaniard, Father Ximenes, were among those who judged him 
 most severely. He was, moreover, involved and this is perhaps 
 less to his credit than any supposed laxness with which he was 
 charged in the squabbles between the Hapsburg and 
 Wittelsbach royal families, concerning the bishopric of Passau. 
 This had for long been an apple of contention between Austria 
 and Bavaria, and the new rector of the college at Gratz, Father 
 Haller, in describing the situation to the General, wrote : 
 " Outsiders on either side naturally throw oil on the flames, 
 and as regards Ours, I doubt whether they do their best to 
 extinguish them, exercising the necessary charity and prudence. 
 Father Viller does the reverse, blaming and condemning 
 everything Bavarian, while he praises and defends the Austrians 
 indiscriminately. Both parties have their adherents, who 
 publish everything from their own point of view. As this 
 one-sided material is all that is laid before Ours, the danger 
 
 K
 
 146 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 is that the advice given is not in favour of investigation. It 
 is taken for granted that all that comes before their eyes is 
 true, and the other side is condemned unheard. But as it is 
 clear that the Christian cause in Germany would be greatly 
 benefited by a union of the two parties, it would be well worth 
 the trouble, seeing the immense influence which the Society 
 has over the princes and their advisers, for the members of 
 the Order to labour with more zeal than heretofore, to bring 
 about this reconciliation, particularly at Prague, Vienna, 
 Munich, and Gratz." He concludes with the wish that not 
 alone the Society, but the rulers of the Church also, might 
 advance the cause of union. 
 
 In a postscript Father Haller returns to his charge against 
 Father Viller, who, he declares, has disregarded the rules of 
 the fifth General Congregation. At Ferrara, for instance, 
 he engaged in a violent controversy with the Bavarian agent, 
 Sper, about the Passau question, as well as that of the 
 bishopric of Salzburg, which the Bavarians were supposed to 
 covet Besides this, Father Viller, blinded by prejudice, 
 disapproved of the contemplated marriage between the 
 Austrian Archduke and the Princess Maria Anna of Bavaria, 
 " which he would prevent if he could. In short," wrote the 
 provincial, "the good Father has extravagant and dangerous 
 notions, and gives no good example to the college." 
 
 In his own defence Father Viller wrote that he was by no 
 means averse from the alliance, that he had himself secretly 
 applied for, and obtained, the necessary dispensation at Rome, 
 and had frequently expressed his earnest desire that the 
 marriage might take place, considering that a union between 
 the two princely houses would conduce to the honour of both, 
 and to the protection and defence of the Catholic religion in 
 Germany. 
 
 Only, the health of the bride must be considered no less 
 than her great and remarkable piety, as it was important to 
 provide for the continuation of the line of the august house,
 
 .JESUITS AT COURT 147 
 
 into which it was proposed she should enter. He had thought 
 that as marriage was so delicate an affair, foresight was needful, 
 in order that no want of physical health and beauty might in 
 course of time change affection into aversion, such as was to 
 be daily observed in the marriages of so many illustrious 
 persons. This, Father Viller declared, was his whole mind on 
 the subject, and such as he had in all humility expressed it 
 to the prince. With his whole heart he wished both exalted 
 personages the tenderest love, firm union, and continuous 
 happiness. He believed that the Archduke Ferdinand could 
 not form a more suitable alliance with any other family in 
 Europe, but at the same time, no one should quarrel with him, 
 Father Viller, for wishing that the bride might possess sufficient 
 corporal health and beauty to ensure the well-being of their 
 issue, and the continuance of conjugal affection. For this 
 reason he trusted in the great piety and noble character of 
 the duke and duchess that they would not endanger the 
 future of their daughter, and that of her children, as well as 
 the happiness of their prospective son-in-law, by concealing a 
 want of health on the part of their most devout and admirable 
 daughter. 1 
 
 But Duke William of Bavaria was deeply offended with the 
 Archduke Ferdinand's confessor, and even after the marriage 
 which took place on the 23rd April 1600, at Gratz, Father Viller 
 having indiscreetly reopened the subject of the bride's want 
 of health, complaints of him reached the General. But, in spite 
 of all this, he did not lose the archduke's favour, retaining his 
 entire confidence to the end. 
 
 An incident connected with the jealousy with which the 
 Society guarded its rule of non-interference in politics, is 
 furnished by the same Father Viller, who, in 1599, was 
 
 1 The reports as to the condition of the Princess Maria Anna's health 
 appear not to have been without foundation. Hurter mentions her 
 delicacy, and Koch says that she was unhealthy. She died on the 8th 
 March 1616.
 
 148 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 appointed to go to Rome on a mission from the Austrian arch- 
 duke. On this occasion the General, Father Aquaviva, wrote 
 to Father Viller as follows : 
 
 " As at the present time general suspicion is aroused, 
 especially in Venice, by any semblance even of politics, it will 
 be difficult to avoid remarks, when it is seen that your reverence 
 is charged with an embassy from the archduke to the Pope. 
 And as the good prince has deserved so well of the Church and 
 of the Society, and especially as your reverence has resisted so 
 long, excusing yourself in prudent and religious fashion, it 
 appears to me that a via media is possible, and an exception 
 may be made. That is to say, that if the mission has nothing 
 whatever to do with politics, but has merely regard to matters 
 of faith, concerning heretics or the Turks, your reverence is at 
 liberty to undertake it, and may set out as soon as is desired. 
 But if the business is a political one, you must entreat the 
 archduke, appealing to his love for the Society, to send some 
 one more suitable in your place. This will be better for the 
 archduke himself, and will confer a benefit on the Society." l 
 
 It cannot be denied that during the reigns of the Archdukes 
 Ferdinand, Charles, and Rudolph, the Court of Gratz was a 
 model of purity, uprightness, and activity. As the Jesuits were 
 all-powerful there during the whole of this period, it is obvious 
 that this satisfactory condition must, in a large measure, be 
 attributed to their influence. 
 
 The introduction of the Society into Innsbruck was the 
 work of the Emperor Ferdinand, and the first Jesuit to labour 
 in the new field was the Tyrolese, Father Charles Grim. At 
 Innsbruck, in 1561, lived the five so-called queens, daughters of 
 the emperor, who lived a semi-religious life, and who desired to 
 be confessed, directed, and preached to by members of the 
 Society. In 1 563 the emperor paid a visit to his daughters, and 
 1 Ad. Austr., 1573-1600.
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 149 
 
 inspected the new college at Innsbruck. He expressed his 
 satisfaction with it, and presented the community with a 
 garden. 
 
 The five "queens," Magdalen, Margaret, Barbara, Helena, 
 Joanna, had a great reputation for piety and charity. A 
 young girl, who had received severe injuries from a fire, was 
 received into their palace and nursed with the most loving 
 care. Certain persons were charged by them to inform them 
 of cases of need as they arose. Father Edmund Hay told 
 the General that three of the "queens" had dedicated them- 
 selves to God by a vow, and had resolved to remove as soon 
 as possible from the turmoil and luxury of the court into 
 greater solitude. One of them was especially pious, frequented 
 the sacraments once a month and oftener, and would practise 
 very great austerities if her confessor would allow her. In 
 1565 people already declared that the court of these arch- 
 duchesses was like a convent ; every sign of pomp and 
 splendour had disappeared, and humility and modesty reigned 
 in their stead. 
 
 On the nth January 1566, Father Dirsius wrote to the 
 General, St Francis Borgia, in behalf of the " queens " 
 Margaret, Magdalen, and Helena, telling him that their 
 brothers, the emperor, and the Archdukes Ferdinand and 
 Charles, fully concurred in their making the above-mentioned 
 vow. They had wished, he said, to remove to Munich, with 
 their attendants, and to live there in a convent of Poor 
 Clares, apart from the world. But this plan their brothers 
 opposed, and desired them to remain in Austria. The 
 emperor had even offered them deserted convents in Corinthia, 
 but in those parts there were too many heretics to please the 
 princesses. Everyone advised them to remain at Innsbruck, 
 where they already edified the faithful by their virtuous 
 example, and prevented apostasy. They themselves were 
 willing to remain ; at least they wished to be in a place 
 where there was a college of the Society, and were thinking
 
 150 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 of taking the newly-built Franciscan convent, the Italian 
 Franciscans for whom it had been constructed being unlikely 
 to remain on account of the climate and the difficulties they 
 experienced in mastering the German language. In case the 
 archduchesses did not get possession of this convent they had 
 also in view a house in the neighbourhood of Innsbruck. In 
 this event they humbly begged for fathers to direct them 
 spiritually, and to undertake the care of other souls in the 
 place. 
 
 In answering this letter St Francis Borgia said that the 
 Society was ready to help the archduchesses spiritually, if 
 only out of gratitude to their father and brother, but that it 
 was contrary to the Institute for the members of the Society 
 to live for any length of time apart from their colleges or 
 houses, and it would in any case be displeasing to the Fathers 
 themselves to forego the company and edifying example of 
 their religious brethren. It seemed, therefore, advisable that 
 the three princesses should take up their abode where there 
 was a college or house of the Society, and preferably at 
 Innsbruck, where they might inhabit the house built by 
 their father, or some other of the same description, where 
 they might observe the rule of life they had adopted, and 
 keep the vow they had taken before God. The Fathers 
 might hear the confessions of the princesses and preach to 
 them. A proviso was afterwards made that, in the event of 
 the "queens" founding a convent, the Jesuits should no 
 longer be their confessors, as this would be directly con- 
 trary to the intention of St Ignatius, as expressed in the 
 Institute. 
 
 The General then sent Father Canisius to Innsbruck to 
 arrange matters, and the holy apostle of Germany formulated 
 the opinion that " Ours should not easily receive permission 
 to direct women, even the most exalted in position, for we 
 have experienced to our detriment and the detriment of this 
 college in particular, that Ours are liable in such matters to
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 151 
 
 suffer in their vocation, and as a consequence to become 
 unbearable." l 
 
 The next year (i6th August 1567), Father Peter Canisius 
 reiterated his apprehension : " I consider it extremely difficult 
 to keep Fathers to their obedience and religious disci- 
 pline when they are in any way bound to the court," he 
 said. 
 
 Meanwhile, the " queens " had chosen Hall, a little town near 
 Innsbruck, as their residence, and Father Dirsius announced 
 the circumstance to the General in these terms : 
 
 "The Queens have purposed for years to withdraw from 
 the world. Now, with the consent of their brothers, they 
 have decided to reside at Hall, and there with some of their 
 ladies and attendants who wish to imitate them, to lead a 
 religious life in common, but without adopting a habit or the 
 rule of any religious order. They need priests, however, and 
 wish for Fathers of the Society. They beg, therefore, that 
 the church to be built at Hall with all its treasures may be 
 taken over by the Society, for which they also wish to found 
 a novitiate there." 
 
 But Father Borgia again objected, foreseeing nearly all 
 the difficulties which arose later on. The Society might not 
 undertake the direction of a community of women, even 
 though these were not leading a thoroughly conventual life. 
 It was not advisable for the Fathers to accept the church 
 offered to them at Hall, because the college they were to 
 establish in that place would have its own church connected 
 with it, which would suffice. Further, it was not convenient 
 that a church, communicating with the house where the 
 archduchesses lived with their suite, should be handed over 
 to them, and lastly, it was not the custom of the Fathers to 
 go daily from their own to another church at a distance, to 
 conduct divine service there. The General concluded his 
 letter with the remark that, as the project of the " queens " was 
 
 1 Kroess, p. 177.
 
 152 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 directly opposed to the Institute, nothing further need be 
 said about such a foundation. 
 
 In a second letter he instructed Blessed Peter Canisius to 
 impress upon the archduchesses that they should be content 
 with the confessor chosen by the Society as the one best 
 suited to them. Canisius was then to name Father Lanoy, 
 whom the General was sending to Innsbruck from Vienna, 
 the empress having been very well contented with him. If 
 they demurred, it was to be represented to them that it was 
 not becoming for " Ours " to frequent palaces much. The less 
 frequently they were seen there the better, and the less 
 people testified their affection for them by sending them food 
 and clothes, the better would they be enabled to live a 
 community life, and observe the Institute. The better also 
 would they be able to render spiritual service. 
 
 Father Borgia communicated this instruction to the rector 
 of Innsbruck College also, and added that he feared the Fathers 
 were too much spoiled by presents from the "queens," who 
 were in the habit of sending meals daily from their palace 
 to them. In answer to the rector's question as to what was 
 to be done with the food thus sent, the General replied that 
 it was to be given to the sick, or to those in need. It was 
 to be desired that the " queens " might be persuaded to send 
 no more things of the sort. If they wished to bestow an 
 alms on the college, they should do so in a more useful way. 
 On no consideration should their confessor be allowed to take 
 his meals in his own room ; sickness being the only excep- 
 tion to this rule. 
 
 It was some time before the princesses could be induced 
 to give up sending delicacies to their confessors, two lackeys 
 being daily told off to carry the various dishes from the 
 palace to the college. At last, however, the unwelcome 
 favours were stopped by the rector declaring that the dinners 
 thus sent did not reach the destination intended, but were 
 distributed to the sick members of the community and
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 153 
 
 others, the " queens' " confessors partaking of the ordinary 
 fare. 
 
 Nevertheless, the archduchesses gained their point as 
 regarded the other matter, for in the end, the General gave 
 an unwilling consent to their choosing their own confessors, 
 but he told Canisius that this arrangement only held good 
 during the lifetime of the "queens," and was to form no 
 precedent After their death the Society would not continue 
 to direct the community of ladies which they had founded, 
 such work not being in accordance with the rules of the 
 Institute, which, in this particular as in others, had been 
 approved by the Holy See. 
 
 In order to secure the Jesuits permanently as their directors, 
 the pious archduchesses determined to found a novitiate at 
 Hall, and to offer it to the General of the Society. St Francis 
 Borgia accepted the offer, but on condition that no responsi- 
 bility was to accrue to the Society respecting the future of 
 the community, and he wished it to be impressed on the 
 princesses how much he had condescended in allowing their 
 confessors to associate with their court, such frequent inter- 
 course with seculars, especially with ladies, being undesirable 
 for religious, and giving occasion to idle and frivolous remarks. 
 
 In the meanwhile, the Archduchess Magdalen had given 
 notice that the whole machinery of her court would be broken 
 up in six months. Those of her ladies, ladies' maids, and 
 attendants who desired to do so might follow her and her 
 two sisters into their spiritual solitude at Hall, no longer as 
 servants, but as companions in the service of God. Accord- 
 ingly, by the end of October 1569, all was in readiness, and 
 the three princesses, accompanied by six of their suite who 
 had resolved to share their penance, removed to Hall, where 
 they themselves performed nearly the whole of the house- 
 work, two servants only being engaged for the roughest 
 portion of the labour. Hereupon, a storm of abuse broke 
 over the heads of the Innsbruck Jesuits, who had, of course,
 
 154 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 originated the whole affair, seeking their own advantage. It 
 was they who had persuaded Magdalen to found a novitiate, 
 and it was their fault that the " queens " washed the clothes, 
 plates, and dishes of the new community with their own 
 imperial hands, cooking also the meals of which they partook. 
 Rumours were afloat to the effect that the emperor and the 
 archdukes were furious. 1 All this was, however, but the 
 malicious invention of enemies, and the facts communicated 
 to the General by the Fathers at Innsbruck reveal nothing 
 but satisfaction on all sides. The archduke concurred in all 
 that was done, and the princesses were brought to acquiesce 
 in the arrangement by which the Fathers were to live at 
 some distance from their house, and the Jesuits rejoiced, 
 inasmuch as they were left free to use the building handed 
 over to them as a school or a novitiate, or to put it to any 
 use they thought fit Father Hoffaus wrote that the archduke 
 had accorded him a long and very gracious audience, and 
 had assured him of his affection and esteem for the Society. 
 On the 5th December, High Mass had been sung in their 
 church at Innsbruck, and on the preceding day he had 
 announced a plenary Indulgence to all who should assist at 
 it, on account of the departure of the " queens." The archduke, 
 the " queens," and the whole of the nobility had been present. 
 The archduke had shown himself extremely gracious and kind, 
 and had paid a visit to Father George Scharich, who was 
 sick, and had sent him costly waters. By his kindness he 
 had consoled the whole community. The same day he had 
 conducted the "queens," his sisters, solemnly to their retreat 
 at Hall, and on the next had left for Prague, upon which 
 Father Hoffaus had taken possession of the new college. 
 
 On the 3ist January 1570, the same Father wrote from 
 Innsbruck : 
 
 "The college at Hall is going on quietly. The queen 
 1 Orig. G. Epist., 9, 133.
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 155 
 
 scarcely worries us at all ; she has not yet entered our house 
 since we went there, and she seldom sends for us. In short, 
 she leaves us in peace, and if this continues, no one can 
 complain of her, except that she generally detains her confessor 
 for nearly two hours after Mass. But this can be borne, as 
 there is no danger, and as I have often called her attention 
 to it and have blamed her for it, she is now rather more 
 considerate." 
 
 The following extracts from " Queen " Magdalen's statute- 
 book for her community show somewhat amusingly that the 
 continual exhortations of the superiors of the Society had made 
 some impression : 
 
 " Jesuits are to be chosen as confessors. Out of confession 
 none must speak with her confessor without the permission 
 of her superioress, who shall not give leave unless there be 
 sufficient reason for it. For although one may have a scruple 
 or a temptation, this can be deferred to the next confession. 
 An exception must be made for the superioress herself, for 
 it is needful that she speak often with him, but not always 
 necessary for her to take him up to the house ; sometimes 
 she can confer with him in the lodge or in the lower corridor. 
 They must not make acquaintance with any other of the 
 Fathers, or invite them to the house, neither must they send 
 food to any sick Father, except in cases of great need, and 
 only for a short time, say for a week, but not longer. Neither 
 must they give them money daily to buy milk, butter, and 
 such like things, but now and again, if necessary, they may 
 give them the wherewithal to procure cheese and lard." 
 
 Notwithstanding these regulations, none must suppose that 
 the archduchess is devoid of confidence or regard for the 
 Fathers or for priests in general. All her life she has " loved 
 them in God, and will continue to do so to the end ; but 
 there are many things good in themselves, and agreeable to 
 God, which must nevertheless be avoided for the sake of a
 
 156 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 better thing still." If her spiritual daughters are careful to 
 avoid exaggeration, and observe her precepts faithfully, they 
 will find the Society better disposed towards them, will help 
 them to save their souls, and will be less likely to change 
 their confessors. 
 
 But in spite of her natvete, and of the excellent advice 
 she gave to others, there were, for several years, innumerable 
 difficulties with regard to the Archduchess Magdalen's con- 
 fessor, Father Hezcovaus. He was infirm in health, and 
 needed much waiting upon, day and night. Moreover, he 
 observed the rule as little as possible, and his august penitent 
 unwisely took his part against his superior far more than 
 was desirable. It was at last decided that he should be dis- 
 pensed altogether from keeping the rule, that he need only 
 obey the General, and his confessor, and that he might receive 
 from the Archduchess Magdalen all that he needed for his 
 support. But even this was not enough, and sometimes it 
 was debated whether Father Hezcovaus should still be included 
 in the list of those belonging to the college. 
 
 On the 1 2th October 1584, the provincial, Father Bader, 
 ordered that the servants of this Father should not come and 
 go, and run in and out, as he and they pleased. If he 
 required anything in the night, the other Fathers should be 
 ready to assist him charitably and patiently. 
 
 But there were still other difficulties at Hall, in connec- 
 tion with the quasi-religious community, such as St Francis 
 Borgia had predicted, and these rose to such a pitch, that in 
 1596, Father Hoffaus expressed his opinion to the General, 
 that it would be better to give up their college there, and 
 so once for all get rid of the burden imposed on the Society 
 by " Queen Magdalen." 
 
 The whole trend of this correspondence shows the tre- 
 mendous obstacles which the Jesuits encountered, not merely 
 at Innsbruck but throughout Austria and Bavaria, in their 
 efforts to abstain from all that was alien to their vocation.
 
 JESUITS AT COURT 157 
 
 It is curious in these days to note how much the old Society 
 suffered from a superabundance of favour on the part of 
 princes. And far from being stereotyped reproductions of 
 one unvarying pattern or spiritual automata turned out of 
 one mould, the Jesuits, as represented in their own private 
 correspondence, which was never intended for the public eye, 
 reveal a considerable amount of individuality. The interpreta- 
 tion of the rule was elastic enough to give scope to much 
 diversity of opinion, and if superiors were jealous guardians 
 of the Institute, they encountered sufficient idiosyncrasy 
 among their subjects to prevent any rigidity in apply- 
 ing it 
 
 It seems more than likely that if Lacordaire had had his 
 wish, and had been able to dedicate ten years of his life to 
 the study of the Jesuit character, he would have found on 
 the whole that he had, after all, set himself the very ordinary 
 task of watching a perpetual conflict between a high ideal 
 and that frailty which is inseparable from human nature.
 
 VI 
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 
 
 THE revolt from Scholasticism in the sixteenth century, led by 
 Erasmus of Rotterdam, John Colet, and other apostles of the 
 new learning, reached farther, and was productive of other results 
 than these had intended or anticipated. 
 
 Erasmus was called an infidel by the friars, but he always 
 stoutly protested his adherence to the Church of which the Pope 
 was the head ; and Colet has been considered by many as a 
 herald of the Reformation, although he died a Catholic. Erasmus, 
 by his own showing, was no infidel, and there are sufficient 
 indications that Colet, even had his life been prolonged, would 
 never have gone over to the enemy ; but both had given 
 cause for apprehension by opening doors to a profound dissatis- 
 faction, to novel theories and extravagant systems, which many 
 friends of Erasmus carried on to a denial of all revealed 
 religion. 
 
 In throwing discredit on the schoolmen, Erasmus had pre- 
 pared the way for a contempt of Aristotle himself, and when the 
 ex-friar Giordano Bruno of Nola appeared as a leader of revolt, 
 distinct from Luther and Calvin, he found in Italy and France 
 a small band of intellectual revolutionists clamouring for a 
 philosophy that should emancipate them from the thraldrom of 
 Christianity, and yet save them from the dishonourable name of 
 atheists. 
 
 They wished to be called deists ; not because they favoured 
 
 158
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 159 
 
 any particular form or system of religion, but as a sign that 
 they acknowledged, in some vague and undefined sense, a 
 Supreme Being, and were content to follow the light and law of 
 nature, rejecting revelation, and placing themselves in opposi- 
 tion to Christianity. 
 
 Bruno gave them a philosophical system that was neither 
 platonic nor peripatetic, nor was it mystic, but a confused 
 jumble of all three systems, and, according to Bayle, " the most 
 monstrous that could be devised, and directly opposed to all 
 the most evident ideas of our intelligence." He goes on 
 to say that Bruno, in his war against Aristotle, invented 
 doctrines a thousand times more obscure than the most 
 incomprehensible things written by the disciples of Aquinas or 
 Scotus. 1 
 
 The new philosopher was accused among other heresies of 
 teaching that there is no such thing as punishment for sin ; that 
 the soul of man is a product of nature differing in no sense 
 from the soul of a brute, and that God is not its author. In his 
 deposition at his trial, Bruno begged the question of the im- 
 mortality of the soul in these words : " I have held and do hold 
 that souls are immortal, and that they are subsisting substances 
 (that is the intellectual souls), and that speaking in a Catholic 
 manner, they do not pass from one body to another, but 
 they go either to Paradise, to Purgatory, or to Hell. Never- 
 theless, in philosophy I have reasoned that the soul subsist- 
 ing without the body, and non-existent in the body, may in 
 the same way that it is in one body be in another ; the which, 
 if it be not true, at least appears to be the opinion of 
 Pythagoras." 2 
 
 His disciples aver that, although Bruno did not enforce the 
 doctrine of metempsychosis, he held it to be very well worthy 
 of consideration. There is perhaps a distinction without a 
 
 1 Bayle, Dictionnaire, Historique et Critique, article " Bruno," vol. i. 
 
 2 Doc. XII.
 
 100 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 difference between the terms " immortality of the soul," and 
 the "indestructibility of the monad," an expression dear to 
 Bruno's followers, and frequently to be met with in his writings ; 
 but we are accustomed to associate the latter term with the 
 worship of nature according to the pantheistic gospel which 
 recognises a soul in every leaf that stirs ; and (this brings us to 
 the very essence of Bruno's philosophy, in so far as it is possible 
 to arrive at any definite conclusion, amid the obscure maze of 
 words with which he surrounded his ideas. 
 
 None of his disciples repudiate for him the title of pantheist, 
 but Mrs Besant, 1 an ardent defender of the Nolan philosopher, 
 went a step further, and declared pantheism itself to be " veiled 
 atheism." Moreover, she says, " So thoroughly does pantheism 
 strike at the root of all idea of God, as taught by theists, that 
 we can scarce think that Bruno was unfairly judged when called 
 atheist by his contemporaries ; the conception of the pantheist 
 cannot be called a God in the commonly accepted sense of that 
 term." 
 
 Having arrived thus far, the panegyrist breaks out into 
 eulogy of "the grandest hero of free-thought," and claims for 
 Bruno the proud distinction of materialist. 
 
 Others of his admirers, and notably his English biographer, 
 Frith, declare that the aim of the Nolan philosophy is to over- 
 come the fear of death, and to fill the soul with noble aspira- 
 tions, while they maintain that its author forestalled Darwin 
 and Herbert Spencer in their theory of evolution. " Nobody is 
 to-day the same as yesterday. All things, even the smallest, 
 have their share in the universal intelligence, or universal 
 thinking power. For without a certain degree of sense or 
 cognition, the drop of water could not assume the spherical 
 shape which is essential to the preservation of its forces. All 
 things participate in the universal intelligence, and hence come 
 attraction and repulsion, love and hate. Nature shows forth 
 
 1 In her Giordano Bruno, p. 5. London, 1877.
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 161 
 
 each species before it enters into life. Thus each species is the 
 starting-point for the next." These are some of the ideas, the 
 conception of which is supposed to shadow forth Bruno's antici- 
 pation of modern thought. 
 
 Landseck, his principal German biographer, makes him the 
 link between antiquity and the celebrated thinkers of the 
 nineteenth century. He considers the doctrine of the indes- 
 tructibility of the monad to be that belief in the immortality of 
 the soul which was professed by the Druids, the Egyptians, the 
 Brahmins, and the Buddhists, the belief of Pythagoras and Plato, 
 of Plotinus, of Lessing, and of Goethe, in unison with the evolu- 
 tion of Darwin and Haeckel. 1 
 
 It is not our purpose to consider here all Bruno's articles of 
 faith or unfaith, but rather to show the general tendency of his 
 teaching, in order to trace its effect upon his contemporaries in 
 England. His philosophy, itself a travesty of various systems, 
 was in its turn caricatured and vulgarised in a manner which 
 would, perhaps, had he lived to see it, have gone far to persuade 
 him of the risk to popular order and morality which he incurred, 
 in taking from people their belief in a personal God, and fear of 
 the consequences of sin. 
 
 Some years ago a statue was raised to his honour on the 
 Campo dei Fiori in Rome, on the alleged spot of his execu- 
 tion, as a vindication of those principles for which he chose 
 to die. In his own day they were held to be dangerous to 
 the State, and subversive of public morality, and he was 
 forced to fly before the opposition they aroused from almost 
 every place in which he attempted to propagate them. The 
 enmity of the Calvinists drove him from Geneva ; at Toulouse 
 the Huguenots made his life unbearable; the Oxford of 
 Elizabeth, as intolerant as Rome, proved no agreeable sojourn, 
 but he left traces of his passage through England, which 
 Elizabeth, however much she favoured him at the time of 
 his visit, was afterwards at great pains to efface. 
 
 1 Landseck, Bruno der Mdrtyrer der neuen Weltanschauung, p. 37. 
 
 L
 
 162 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 The period of his stay in this country extended over two 
 years, from 1583 to 1585, and although in general he met 
 with little encouragement from the learned, he succeeded in 
 making some proselytes. In London, he lodged at the house 
 of the French ambassador, and went frequently to court, where 
 he maintained his footing by pretending to be smitten by 
 the mature charms of the queen. Among his English friends 
 were Sir Philip Sidney, Sir Fulke Greville, Dyer, Spenser, 
 and Temple, and it has even been asserted that his system 
 to a certain degree influenced Bacon, and may be traced in 
 the Novum Organon. 1 This is, however, an erroneous view, 
 for Bacon's term " form " means no more than law, for the 
 form of a substance is its very essence, whereas with Bruno, 
 form and matter are expressions which stand for forces. 2 
 According to St Thomas Aquinas, who followed Aristotle, 
 form is the determining principle in the constitution of 
 bodies. 
 
 Sidney's biographer, 3 while jealous lest any taint of error 
 should be supposed to infect his hero, nevertheless admits 
 unwillingly that Giordano Bruno, Sir Fulke Greville, and Sir 
 Philip Sidney, were wont to discuss philosophical and meta- 
 physical subjects "of a nice and delicate nature with closed 
 doors." 
 
 Dr Joseph Warton, editor of Pope's works, says that, 
 among many things related of the life of Sir Philip Sidney, 
 it does not seem to be much known that he was the intimate 
 friend and patron of the famous atheist, Giordano Bruno, who 
 was in a secret club with him and Sir Fulke Greville in 
 1587. The date is incorrect, but the intimacy is confirmed 
 by Bruno's dedication to the English poet of two of his 
 works, the one being entitled Spaccio de la Bestia Trionfaute, 
 a book which is admittedly blasphemous and obscene, where 
 
 1 Book ii., Aphors. I, 4, 13, 15, 17. 
 
 2 Frith, Life of Giordano Bruno, p. 107. London, 1887. 
 
 3 Zouch, Memoirs of Sir Philip Sidney ', p. 337, note.
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 163 
 
 it is not so obscure as to be unintelligible, the other the no 
 less notorious Heroici Furori. 
 
 Soon after Bruno's departure from England, the result of 
 his teaching began to appear in many places throughout the 
 country. Elizabeth's Council became alarmed. State in- 
 differentism to religion was as yet unknown, and the new 
 sectarianism appealing strongly to the ignorant and the profane, 
 politicians were not slow to take cognisance that questions of 
 the highest moment were being introduced into tavern brawls 
 and gutter oratory. Others besides Catholics began to 
 absent themselves from the new English Church service and 
 sermons; and fragments of conversation that savoured of 
 " atheism " were frequently reported to the local magistrates. 
 An investigation into the causes and authors of the dis- 
 turbances was set on foot, and it was felt that a scapegoat 
 was needed to create a wholesome fear of the long arm of 
 the law in the minds of would-be atheists among the 
 people. 1 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney was too much the world's darling, too 
 elegant a figure in the Elizabethan pageant, too ethereal a 
 poet, to be burdened with the brunt of so serious an ac- 
 cusation, and he was passed by for one who, with all his 
 brilliant gifts and attainments, had ever been the child of 
 misfortune. 
 
 Perhaps no one ever excited more jealousy and ill-will 
 among his contemporaries than Sir Walter Raleigh. His life 
 at court alternated between magnificent success and the most 
 crushing defeat He was successively the friend, the rival, the 
 enemy of Essex, and when that favourite's star was in the 
 ascendant, his waned, until a change in the queen's fickle 
 fancy made him again, for a short period, an object of 
 admiration and envy. A soldier of fortune, a planter of 
 
 1 Bruno's latest biographer, Mr L. Mclntyre (Giordano Bruno, London, 
 1903), entirely ignores the effect of his hero's teaching in England.
 
 164 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 colonies, an admiral, a courtier, a statesman, a wit, a scholar, 
 a chemist, an agriculturist, he was eminent as each of these, 
 and his exploits in Guiana read like some fantastic tale of 
 fictitious adventure. His History of the World, although 
 but a fragment of what he intended it to be, is never- 
 theless a monument of prodigious learning, sobriety, and 
 patience. 
 
 Edwards, in his Life of Sir Walter Raleigh, says that in 
 his graver hours he had strong theological convictions which 
 agreed in many points with those of the leading Puritans. Such 
 was probably in all sincerity his frame of mind towards the end 
 of his strange career; but up to the time of his trial in 1603, 
 he seems to have been active in disseminating the doctrines 
 which had become popular since the baneful sojourn of 
 Bruno in this country. Raleigh's biographer admits that his 
 attempt on his own life in the Tower, subsequent to his 
 trial, is in favour of the unhappy prisoner's atheism at that 
 time. 1 
 
 The first apparently to accuse Raleigh of atheism in a 
 formal manner was the Jesuit provincial, Robert Parsons, who, 
 in a book published in 1592 and now very rare, mentions 
 " Sir Walter Raleigh's school of atheism . . . and of the 
 diligence used to get young gentlemen to this school, wherein 
 both Moses and our Saviour, the Old and New Testament, 
 are jested at, and the scholars taught among other things to 
 spell God backwards. 2 Cayley treats this accusation as a 
 calumny, 3 and Birch describes its author as the "virulent but 
 
 1 " Sir Walter Raleigh is said to have declared that his design to 
 kill himself arose from no feeling of fear, but was formed in order that 
 his fate might not serve as a triumph to his enemies whose power to 
 put him to death, despite his innocency, he well knows" (The Count of 
 Beaumont to Henry IV., I3th August 1603. Copy in Hard wick MS., 
 p. 18). 
 
 2 An advertisement concerning the Responsio ad Elizabeths edictum, 
 1592. 
 
 3 Life of Sir Walter Raleigh, i. 140,
 
 Photo l>y Eim-nj Walker. 
 
 SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 
 
 From a Portrait by F. Zucharo in tlie National Portrait Gallery. 
 
 [To Jacc jx/rjc 164.
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 165 
 
 learned and ingenious Father Parsons " ; l but Osborn, in the 
 preface to his Miscellany of Sundry Essays, Paradoxes, etc, in 
 speaking of Raleigh, says that Queen Elizabeth "chid him 
 who was ever after branded with the title of an atheist, 
 though a known asserter of God and Providence." 
 
 The year after the appearance of Father Parsons' little 
 book, steps were taken for proving the truth of the reports 
 which had now become common, and it is remarkable that 
 none of Sir Walter Raleigh's biographers seem to have been 
 aware of an elaborate interrogatory that was drawn up and 
 administered for the purpose of eliciting from sworn witnesses 
 evidence concerning his religious opinions, and those of his 
 family, dependents, and friends. The original seems to have 
 disappeared, but a contemporary copy of this document is to 
 be found among the Harleian papers in the British Museum, 
 together with the evidence obtained by means of the inter- 
 rogatory. As it is extremely pertinent to the subject in 
 question, and has hitherto escaped notice, the nine questions 
 administered with a selection of the most interesting deposi- 
 tions of the witnesses are here given in detail. For a com- 
 plete account of the examinations the reader is referred to 
 the manuscript 2 
 
 Dorset. 
 
 Interrogatory to be ministered unto such as are to be 
 examined in her Majesty's name, by virtue of her Highness's 
 commission for causes ecclesiastical. 
 
 i. Imprimis. Whom do you know or have heard to be suspected 
 of atheism or apostasy ? And in what manner do you 
 know or have heard the same ? And what other notice 
 can you give thereof? 
 
 1 Life of Sir Walter Raleigh, \. 140. 
 
 2 Harl. 6849, f. 183.
 
 166 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 2. Whom do you know or have heard that have argued or 
 
 spoken against, or as doubting the Being of any God, or 
 what or where God is, or to swear by God, adding if 
 there be a God or such like ; and when and where was 
 the same ? And what other notice can you give of any 
 such offender ? 
 
 3. Whom do you know or have heard that hath spoken 
 
 against God, His Providence over the world ? or of the 
 world's beginning or ending? or of predestination, or of 
 Heaven or of Hell, or of the Resurrection, in doubtful 
 or contentious manner? When and where was the 
 same ? and what other notice can you give of any such 
 offender ? 
 
 4. Whom do you know or have heard that hath spoken against 
 
 the truth of God His holy Word, revealed to us in the 
 Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, or of some 
 places thereof? or have said those Scriptures are not 
 to be believed and defended by her Majesty for 
 doctrine, and faith, and salvation, but only of policy 
 or civil government, and when and where was the same ? 
 And what other notice can you give of any such 
 offender ? 
 
 5. Whom do you know or have heard hath blasphemously cursed 
 
 God ; as in saying one time (as it rained when he was a- 
 hawking), " if there be a God, a pox on that God which 
 sendeth such weather to mar our sport," or such like ? or 
 do you know or have heard of any that hath broken 
 forth into any other words of blasphemy, and where was 
 the same ? 
 
 6. Whom do you know or have heard to have said that when 
 
 he was dead, his soul should be hanged on the top of a 
 pole and " run God, run Devil, and fetch it that would 
 have it," or to like effect, or that hath otherwise 
 spoken against the being or immortality of the soul of 
 men, or that a man's soul should die and become like
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 16? 
 
 the soul of a beast, or such like, and when and where 
 was the same ? 
 
 7. Whom do you know or have heard hath counselled, pro- 
 
 cured, aided, comforted, or conferred with any such 
 offender? When, where, and in what manner was the 
 same? 
 
 8. Do you know or have heard of any of those offenders to 
 
 affirm all such that were not of their opinions touching 
 the premises, to be schismatics and in error. And whom 
 do you know hath so affirmed ? And when and where 
 was it spoken ? 
 
 9. What can you say more of any of the premises, or whom 
 
 have you known or heard can give any notice of the 
 same ? And speak all your knowledge therein. 
 
 Hereupon follows the report of the Royal Commissioners on 
 the depositions of witnesses examined by them with the above 
 formulary : 
 
 " Examinations taken at Cearne, co. Dorset, 2 1 March, 
 36 Eliz., before us, Tho. Lord Howard, Viscount Howard of 
 Bindon, Sir Ralph Horsey, knt, Francis James, Chancellor, 
 John Williams, and Francis Hawley, esquires, by virtue of a 
 commission to us and others, directed from some of her 
 Majesty's High Commissioners in causes ecclesiastical." 1 
 
 From the two first witnesses examined, John Hancock, 
 parson of South Parrot, and Richard Bagage, churchwarden of 
 Lo, no information was obtained. The third witness, John 
 Jesopp, minister, of Gillingham, "said nothing of his own 
 knowledge, but had heard that one Herryott, of Sir Walter 
 Rawleigh his house, had brought the Godhead in question, and 
 the whole course of the Scriptures, but of whom he so heard it 
 he did not remember. [Thomas Harriot was an acknowledged 
 
 1 On the last page is written : " These examinations are the trew copies 
 taken at Cearne, 21 March 1593."
 
 168 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 deist, and Raleigh had taken him into his house to study 
 mathematics with him.] He heard his brother, Dr Jesopp, say 
 that Mr Carew Rawleigh, reasoning with Mr Parry and Mr 
 Archdeacon about the Godhead [as he conjectureth], his said 
 brother, thinking that Mr Archdeacon and Mr Parry would 
 take offence at that argument, desired the Lord Bishop of 
 Worcester [then being there] that he might argue with the 
 said Mr Rawleigh, for, said he, your Lordship shall hear him 
 argue as like a pagan as ever you heard any. But the 
 matter was so shut up, as this examinate heard his brother 
 say, and proceeded not to argument, and further he saith 
 that he hath heard one Allen, now of Portland Castle, 
 suspected of atheism, but of whom he heard it he remembereth 
 not." 
 
 William Hussey, churchwarden of Gillingham, corro- 
 borated the report of Sir Walter Raleigh's suspected 
 atheism. 
 
 John Davis, curate of Motcomb, " to the first interrogatory 
 saith that he knoweth of no such person directly, but he hath 
 heard Sir Walter Raleigh, by general report, hath had some 
 reasoning against the deity of God and His omnipotence ; and 
 hath heard the like of Mr Carew Raleigh, but not so directly. 
 Also he saith he heard the like report of one, Mr Thinn, of 
 Wiltshire, which he heard from a barber in Warminster, 
 dwelling in a by-lane there, who told this deponent he did 
 marvel that a gentleman of his condition should deliver words 
 to so mean a man as himself, tending to this sense, as though 
 God's Providence did not reach over all creatures, or to like 
 effect. 
 
 " To the second, third, fourth, and fifth interrogatory he saith 
 he hath heard that Sir Walter Raleigh hath argued with one 
 Mr Ironside, at Sir George Trenchard's, touching the being or 
 immortality of the soul, or such like ; but the certainty thereof 
 he cannot say further, saving asking the same of Mr Ironside 
 upon the report aforesaid ; he hath answered that the matter
 
 169 
 
 was not as the voice of the country reported thereof, or to the 
 like effect." 
 
 The next witness, Nicholas Jefferies, declared that he did 
 not know personally any atheist in the county of Dorset, 
 but testified to the report of many " that Sir Walter Raleigh 
 and his retinue are generally suspected of atheism," and he 
 quoted the above-mentioned Allen, Lieutenant of Portland 
 Castle, as " a great blasphemer and light esteemer of religion, 
 and thereabout cometh not to divine service or sermons." 
 He also mentioned the circumstance that " Herryott, at- 
 tendant on Sir Walter Raleigh, hath been convened before 
 the Lords of the Council for denying the resurrection of the 
 body." 
 
 This witness also gave a circumstantial account of the 
 conversation between Sir Walter, his brother Carew, and 
 Mr Ironside at Sir George Trenchard's table, but as Mr 
 Ironside was himself subsequently sworn and examined, it 
 is better to quote his own words. It is significant of the 
 credibility of these witnesses, that the evidence of Jefferies, 
 although he merely reported what Mr Ironside had told him 
 of the conversation, and could not remember all that had 
 been said, tallies completely with the evidence of the other 
 witnesses. 
 
 Ironside's examination comes last in the manuscript, but 
 it is more convenient to insert it here : 
 
 "Ralph Ironside, minister of Winterbor, sworn and examined. 
 To the first interrogatory, he saith that for his own know- 
 ledge he will answer, but for that he hath heard and knoweth 
 no author to justify the same, he is persuaded by counsel 
 that he is in danger to be punished, and therefore refuseth 
 to say anything upon uncertain report, unless he could bring 
 in his author in particular. 
 
 "The relation of the disputation had at Sir George 
 Trenchard's table, between Sir Walter Raleigh, Mr Carew
 
 170 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Raleigh, and Mr Ironside, hereafter followeth, written 
 by himself and delivered to the commissioners upon his 
 oath. 
 
 "Wednesday, sevennight before the Assizes, summer last, 
 I came to Sir George Trenchard's in the afternoon, accom- 
 panied with a fellow-minister and friend of mine, Mr Whittle, 
 vicar of Forthington. There were then with the knight Sir 
 Walter Raleigh, Sir Ralph Horsey, Mr Carew Raleigh, Mr 
 John Fitzjames, etc Towards the end of supper, some loose 
 speeches of Mr Carew Raleigh's being gently reproved by 
 Sir Ralph Horsey with the words Colloquia prava corrumpunt 
 bonos mores, Mr Raleigh demanded of me what danger he 
 might incur by such speeches, whereunto I answered 'The 
 wages of sin is death' and he, making light of death as 
 being common to all, sinner and righteous, I inferred further 
 that as that life which is the gift of God through Jesus 
 Christ is life eternal, so that death which is properly the 
 wages of sin is death eternal both of the body and of the 
 soul also. 
 
 " ' Soul,' quoth Mr Carew Raleigh, ' what is that ? ' Better 
 it were, said I, that we would be careful how the soul might 
 be saved, than to be curious in finding out the essence. 
 
 "And so, keeping silence, Sir Walter requested me that 
 for their instruction, I would answer to the question that 
 before by his brother was proposed unto me. ' I have been,' 
 saith he, ' a scholar sometime in Oxford ; I gave answer under 
 a bachelor of arts, and had talk with divers; yet hitherunto 
 in this point (to wit, what the reasonable soul of man is) 
 have I not by any been resolved. They tell me it is primus 
 motor, the first mover in a man, etc.' Unto this, after I had 
 replied that howsoever the soul were fans et principium, the 
 fountain, beginning and cause of motion in us, yet the first 
 mover was the brain or heart, I was again urged to show 
 my opinion, and hearing Sir Walter Raleigh tell of his 
 dispute and scholarship some time in Oxford, I cited the
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 171 
 
 general definition of Anima out of Aristotle (De Anima, 
 cap. 2), and thence a subjecto proprio, deduced the special 
 definition of the soul reasonable, that it was Actus primus 
 corporis organici agentis humanam vitam. 
 
 " It was misliked of Sir Walter as obscure and intricate. 
 And I withal, that though it could not unto him, as being 
 learned, yet it might seem obscure to the most present, and 
 therefore had rather say with divines plainly, that the reasonable 
 soul is a spiritual and immortal substance, breathed into man 
 by God, whereby he lives and moves and understandeth, and 
 so is distinguished from other creatures. 'Yea, but what is 
 that spiritual and immortal substance breathed into man?' 
 saith Sir Walter. The soul, quoth I. ' Nay then,' said he, 
 'you answer not like a scholar.' Hereupon I endeavoured to 
 prove that it was scholarlike, nay, in such disputes as this, 
 usual and necessary to run in circulum, partly because definitio 
 rei was primum et immediatum principium, and seeing prime 
 non est prius, a man must of necessity come backward, and 
 partly because definitio and definitum be natures reciproc&, the 
 one convertible, answering unto the question made upon the 
 other. As for example, if one asked : ' What is a man ? ' you 
 will say : ' He is a creature reasonable and mortal ' ; but if 
 you ask again : ' What is a creature reasonable and mortal ? ' 
 you must of force come backward and answer : ' It is a man,' 
 et sic de cceteris. ' But we have principles in our mathematics,' 
 saith Sir Walter, ' as totum est majus qua libet sua parte ; 
 and ask me of it, and I can show it in the table, in the 
 window, in a man, the whole being bigger than the parts 
 of it.' 
 
 " I replied first that he showed quod est, not quid est, that 
 it was, but not what it was ; secondly, that such demonstra- 
 tion was against the nature of a man's soul, being a spirit ; 
 for as a thing, being sensible, was subject to the sense, so 
 man's soul, being insensible, was to be discerned by the spirit. 
 Nothing more certain in the world than that there is a God,
 
 172 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 yet being a spirit, to subject him to the sense otherwise than 
 perfectum, it is impossible. 
 
 "'Marry!' quoth Sir Walter, 'these two be like, for 
 neither could I learn hitherto what God is.' 
 
 " Mr Fitzjames answering that Aristotle should say he was 
 Ens Entium, I answered, that whether Aristotle, dying in a 
 fever, should cry : Ens Entium, miserere met ; or drowning 
 himself in Euripum, should say : Quia ego te non capio, tu me 
 capies, it was uncertain, but that God was Ens Entium, a thing 
 of things, having being of Himself, and giving being to all 
 creatures, it was most certain, and confirmed by God Himself 
 unto Moses. 
 
 " ' Yea, but what is this Ens Entium ? ' saith Sir Walter. 
 
 " I answered it is God, and being disliked as before, Sir 
 Walter wished that grace might be said, ' for that,' quoth he, 
 is better than his disputation.' Thus supper ended and grace 
 said, I departed to Dorchester with my fellow-minister, and 
 this is to my remembrance the substance of that speech with 
 Sir Walter Raleigh I had at Wolverton." 
 
 "RALPH IRONSIDE." 
 
 Turning to the remaining depositions, we find that Francis 
 Scarlett, minister of Sherborne, sworn and examined, relates 
 how that "a little before Christmas, one Robert Hyde, of 
 Sherborne, shoemaker, seeing this deponent passing by his 
 door, called him, and desired to have some conversation with 
 him, and after some speeches, he entered into these speeches. 
 " Mr Scarlett, you have preached unto us that there is a God, 
 a Heaven, a Hell, and a resurrection after this life, and that 
 we shall give an account of our works, and that the soul is 
 immortal; but now, saith he, here is a company about this 
 town that say that Hell is no other but poverty and penury 
 in this world, and Heaven is no other but to be rich and 
 enjoy pleasures ; and that we die like beasts, and when we 
 are gone there is no more remembrance of us, and such like.
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 173 
 
 But this examinate did neither then demand who they were, 
 neither did he deliver any particulars unto him, and further 
 saith that it is generally reported in Sherborne, that the 
 said Allen and his men are atheists. And also he saith 
 there is one Lodge, a shoemaker in Sherborne, accounted an 
 atheist." 
 
 John Deuch, churchwarden of Weeke Regis : " To the 
 sixth interrogatory this deponent saith that he hath heard 
 one Allen, Lieutenant of Portland Castle, when he was like 
 to die, being persuaded to make himself ready to God for 
 his soul, to answer that he would carry his soul to the top 
 of an hill, and run God, run devil, fetch it that will have it, 
 or to that effect. But, who told this deponent of it, he 
 remembereth not. To the rest of the interrogatory he can 
 say nothing." 
 
 What punishment followed on these examinations does 
 not appear. A fine was probably imposed on all those con- 
 victed of speaking and propagating atheism ; but in spite of 
 the investigations and the discredit thrown on the sect, it 
 did not by any means die out 
 
 Essex was accounted at that time the only nobleman who 
 cared for religion. His manner was to censure all men as 
 "cold professors, neuters, or atheists." In the declaration of 
 W. Masham before the Lord Treasurer Buckhurst, he said 
 that Essex told the people when he incited them to rise, 
 that he acted " for the good of the Queen, city, and crown, 
 which certain atheists, meaning Raleigh, had betrayed to the 
 Infante of Spain." At his execution he thanked God that he 
 was never atheist nor papist." 1 
 
 On the accession of James I. the Catholics presented a 
 petition to parliament, begging to be allowed to practise 
 their religion, at least in secret, and they went on to say 
 that there were " four classes of religionists in England : 
 Protestants, who domineered all the late reign ; Puritans, who 
 1 Dom. Eliz., February 1601, vol. 278 ; R.O.
 
 174 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 have crept up amongst them ; atheists, who live on brawls ; 
 and Catholics." 1 
 
 The stigma of atheist clung to Raleigh long after he had 
 ceased to deserve it. In his trial for high treason in 1603, 
 it considerably damaged his cause, and gave another handle 
 to his many enemies. The king's attorney, in addressing him, 
 exclaimed : " O damnable atheist ! " and the Lord Chief 
 Justice Coke, in his address to the prisoner after his con- 
 demnation, harangued him in these words : 
 
 "Your case being thus, let it not grieve you if I speak a 
 little out of zeal and love to your good. You have been 
 taxed by the world with the defence of the most heathenish 
 and blasphemous opinions, which I list not to repeat, because 
 Christian ears cannot endure to hear them, nor the authors 
 and maintainers of them be suffered to live in any Christian 
 commonwealth. You know what men said of Harpool. 2 You 
 shall do well before you go out of the world to give 
 satisfaction therein, and not to die with these imputations 
 upon you. Let not any devil persuade you (the Harleian 
 version adds, ' Hariot or any such doctor ') to think there is 
 no eternity in Heaven ; for if you think thus, you shall find 
 eternity in hell-fire." 3 
 
 Between Raleigh's sentence and its execution fifteen years 
 were allowed to elapse, during which time the prisoner in 
 
 1 Dom. James I., vol. i., 1603 ; R.O. 
 
 2 A mistake probably for Harriot. The name is variously spelt. Edwards, 
 in his Life of 'Raleigh ', corrects it and says, " Either he applied to the illustrious 
 mathematician Thomas Harriot, the epithet ' devil,' or he said that Harriot's 
 opinions were devilish " (p. 436). The judge's words are variously reported, 
 but their purport is always the same. Stebbing, in his monograph Sir Walter 
 Raleigh, says that Harriot was accused by zealots of atheism, because his 
 cosmogony was not orthodox, and that his ill-repute for free-thinking was 
 reflected on Raleigh, who hired him to teach mathematics (probably in what 
 Father Parsons tenned his school of atheism) and engaged him in his 
 colonising projects. Harriot was the friend whose society he chiefly craved 
 when he was in the Tower, and is doubtless the " Herryott " of the examina- 
 tions. 
 
 3 Dom. James I., vol. 4, f. 83.
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND 175 
 
 the Tower occupied himself with the compilation of his 
 famous History of the World, and with chemical experiments. 
 And as if all should be exceptional in the life of this 
 remarkable man, he was allowed an interval during this 
 period in which to flash once more upon the world in 
 another expedition to Guiana, in search of the gold mine 
 which he had declared to be there. After the ill-fated voyage 
 he returned into durance vile, and when at last the time came 
 for the axe which had so long hung over him, to fall, his 
 words showed that at least in adversity he had learned, like 
 the great Aii^ chieftain Clovis, to burn what he had 
 adored, and to adore what he had burned. His device, Ubi 
 dolor ibi amor is significant of the change that suffering had 
 wrought in him. His last words on the scaffold were these : 
 " I have many sins for which to beseech God's pardon. Of a 
 long time my course was a course of vanity. I have been a 
 seafearing man, a soldier, and a courtier, and in the tempta- 
 tions of the least of these there is enough to overthrow a 
 good mind and a good man." Presently he added, " I die in 
 the faith professed by the Church of England. I hope to be 
 saved and to have my sins washed away by the Precious Blood 
 and merits of our Saviour Jesus Christ." 
 
 Then, says his biographer, 1 he asked to be shown the 
 axe, and kissing the blade, he said : " This gives me no fear. 
 It is a sharp and fair medicine to cure me of all my 
 disease." 
 
 After Raleigh's death, the Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 writing to Sir Thomas Roe, ambassador of Great Britain 
 with the Great Mogul, loth February 1618, said: "Sir Walter 
 Raleigh amongst us did question God's being and omnipotence, 
 which that just judge made good upon himself in over- 
 tumbling his estate, but last of all in bringing him to an 
 execution by law, where he died a religious and Christian 
 
 1 Edwards, Life of Sir Walter Raleigh, \. 704.
 
 176 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 death, God testifying his power in this, that he raised up of a 
 stone a child unto Abraham." 
 
 His doom had been from the first a foregone conclusion. 
 James having been fatally prejudiced against him before that 
 royal pedant ever set foot in England, to which fact the 
 secret correspondence of Sir Robert Cecil with James VI. of 
 Scotland amply testifies. 
 
 But curiously enough Sir Walter's brother Carew, although 
 more deeply dyed in atheism, never ceased to be a persona grata 
 with the government He was knighted in 1601, on the occasion 
 of the visit to England of the French Marshal de Biron. 1 He 
 held several honourable and lucrative public offices under James 
 I., and was Lieutenant of the Isle of Portland in 1608. During 
 his brother's long imprisonment in the Tower, Sir Carew Raleigh 
 was living in prosperity at Dounton. 2 
 
 Atheists did not as a sect entirely disappear from England 
 after the execution of their scapegoat, but they do not seem to 
 have been further molested for their opinions. The persecution 
 of the Catholics was at its height, and at no time did professed 
 atheism provoke the fierce hatred that Catholicism inspired. 
 For obvious reasons many Catholics at this period were but 
 indifferently instructed in their religion. Some to escape at- 
 tendance at the English Church service unlawfully feigned 
 infidelity. One man having written a seditious book, called 
 Balaam's Ass, against the king, for which he was condemned to 
 death, was accused at his execution of having professed atheism. 
 He denied being an infidel, expressed contrition for his " saucy 
 meddling in the king's matter," and declared himself a Catholic. 3 
 
 The Bishop of Exeter reported that " John Lugge, organist, 
 retains none of his popish tendencies, though his religion is as 
 the market goes," and he added that there were very few 
 papists in his diocese, but an infinity of sectaries and atheists. 
 
 1 Stebbing, Sir Walter Raleigh, p. 157. 
 
 2 Ibid., p. 248. 
 
 3 Dom. James I., vol. 109, May 1619 ; R.O.
 
 GIORDANO BRUNO IN ENGLAND \W 
 
 Many of these latter may have been secret Catholics, either 
 extremely ignorant, or too timid to suffer for their faith. A book 
 published in 1602, entitled The Unmasking of the Politique 
 Atheist is a violent attack upon Catholicism. Another, called A 
 Perfect Cure for Atheists, Papists, Arminians, etc., published in 
 1649, is of a like nature. It is a far cry from Aristotle to 
 atheism, but no sooner did the votaries of the new learning dis- 
 card a system of philosophy which, however exaggerated by 
 pedants, was still a guarantee of exact reasoning, than their 
 disciples and followers fell a prey to the vagaries of their own 
 bewildered intellects. 
 
 It was the reductio ad absurdum of the reformed religion, 
 when weak-kneed Catholics sheltered themselves from its pains 
 and penalties under the fairly secure roof-tree of atheism. 
 
 \\
 
 VII 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 
 
 " A FINE rare show arrives from Rome, and it is all a present 
 for the Queen, and the news of it reaches London, and the 
 King is impatient to see it ; and the Queen is lying in, and 
 Mr Panzani brings all the fine things to the Queen's bed- 
 chamber ; and all the ladies of quality crowd in to see them ; 
 and the King with all his nobles hastens to the Queen's 
 palace ; and the boxes are opened, and the pieces are viewed 
 one by one; and Mr Conn comes in (though still without a 
 red hat) to satisfy the Queen's curiosity, and Mr Conn brings 
 more fine pictures . . . and sees the King, and the Queen 
 of France ; and Mr Panzani takes leave of the Queen of 
 England (for how could he omit it?) and the Queen begs 
 a red hat for Mr Conn, and Mr Conn must first do some 
 signal service to the Church; and the King talks about Mr 
 Conn's red hat ; and the Queen gives Mr Panzani a fine 
 diamond ring ; and Mr Panzani takes leave of all the ministers ; 
 and he pays his respects to all the ladies of the court ; and 
 the ladies send their compliments to the Pope, and they all 
 beg Mr Panzani's blessing. It was the end of the year 
 1636." 
 
 This Sevign6-like description was written in 1794, by 
 the Rev. Charles Plowden, in his " Remarks on a Book entitled 
 Memoirs of Gregorio Panzani" Panzani, a priest of the Roman 
 
 178
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 179 
 
 Oratory, had been about two years in England, with a secret 
 mission to report to Cardinal Barberini, nephew of Pope 
 Urban VIII., on the condition of the Catholics, the condition 
 of the court, and on the prospects regarding an ultimate 
 reunion of the Anglican Church with Rome. He was to 
 pave the way for an openly accredited envoy to the queen, 
 was to conciliate the ministers, disarm the Puritans, and to 
 do what he could for the Catholics, who were still smarting 
 severely under the penal laws. Executions, it is true, had 
 become less frequent, but the royal coffers were still replenished 
 with the fines imposed on Catholics for their pertinacity in 
 assembling to hear Mass by stealth. If a priest were caught, 
 he was thrown into prison, tried, and punished with death. 
 In dealing with the Catholic laity, Charles I. was never in 
 favour of enforcing the extreme rigour of the law, but he 
 was so often in want of money that he found it useful to be 
 very severe in the matter of fines. 
 
 Panzani's mission to England falls about midway between 
 the domestic storms which had troubled the early days of 
 the royal marriage, and the Revolution which finally cost 
 the most shifty of monarchs his throne and his life. Henrietta 
 Maria had ceased to resent the expulsion of her French 
 favourites, had consented at last to learn English and to 
 tolerate the English people. She had thrown herself heart 
 and soul into her husband's interests, and since the death 
 of Buckingham was in possession of his entire confidence. If, 
 later on, any cloud arose over their mutual relationship, it 
 was the king's half expressed suspicion that she thought little 
 of his powers of governing, and that however much she 
 loved her husband, she did not admire his policy or trust 
 his royal word as implicitly as he could wish. This is 
 evident from one or two affectionate but querulous letters 
 which he wrote to her when he was in the hands of the 
 Parliamentarians. 
 
 Of the court, as well as of the private life of the king
 
 180 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and queen, Panzani could report but favourably. The Catholics 
 were to be helped by the queen's influence, and as to reunion 
 with Rome, he thought he had some reason to be sanguine. 
 A letter from Panzani to Cardinal Barberini, of which the 
 following is a translation, is to be found among the Stevenson 
 and Bliss transcripts of Vatican documents in the Record 
 Office. It is dated June 10/25, 1635 : 
 
 "According to your Eminence's instructions, I have had a 
 long talk with Father Philip (an English Capuchin and the 
 Queen's confessor), regarding the reconciliation of this kingdom 
 with Rome, and the means of bringing it about. He told me 
 that there were unmistakeable signs of a desire for such a 
 reconciliation, not only in the King, but among the clergy and 
 laity as well, and the question is mooted almost daily. It is 
 well, however, to be slow in drawing inferences, because those 
 who are most in favour of a reunion do not venture to manifest 
 their desire, but rather dissemble it under the appearance of 
 a contrary way of thinking, on account of the severity of the 
 law against Catholics. This same fear possesses the King also, 
 he being of a timid nature ; hence the great misfortune of not 
 being able to count on his prudence and judgment, seeing how 
 changeable and uncertain he and his advisers are. Moreover, 
 if by ill-luck the present rumours of war oblige the King to 
 arm himself, we may expect some persecution of the Catholics, 
 for money being required, before he can go to war, it will be 
 necessary to assemble Parliament, and the Lower House, 
 composed mainly of Puritans, will grant no supplies unless the 
 King makes some show of cruelty towards Catholics. For 
 the same reason all the bishops and ministers of moderate 
 views, and favourable to a reunion, begin to be harsh and 
 intolerant when the time approaches for the meeting of 
 Parliament, and do nothing but inveigh against the Pope in 
 their sermons, solely from fear of losing their lives or their 
 places. Father Philip says that there is no need to be alarmed
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 181 
 
 at the difficulties we may encounter ; but that we should be 
 determined to overcome them, and that after God, the envoys 
 may greatly facilitate the business, if they study with all their 
 might how to make themselves agreeable to the King and 
 the State. 
 
 " He who comes here should be all things to all men, in 
 order to win all, and should take everything he can in good 
 part, and find excuses for the King and his officers, if some- 
 times they do not grant the Catholics all the favours they ask. 
 He should throw the blame on the poursuivants and the 
 informers, and should adroitly petition for redress. He should 
 keep Windebank (Secretary of State), considered by the Puritans 
 to be ' Popishly affected,' and others, well informed of all that 
 passes in Rome, and should manage to keep up communication 
 with the papal legates, in order to have news, and at the same 
 time to make himself agreeable to them, for they like above 
 all things to receive marks of confidence. He must be careful, 
 however, in publishing the facts he thus learns, to give no 
 offence to any of the crowned heads, nor bring our religion 
 into bad odour. 
 
 " The envoy should distribute some gifts, and in fine, use 
 every means to make himself beloved. He ought to be about 
 thirty-five years old, and to have attained a certain solidity 
 rarely met with before that age. He should also be noble 
 and rich, and of a good presence, furnished with all qualities 
 proper to a gentleman ; and, above all, his life should be 
 exemplary, without affectation or hypocrisy. . . . On the 
 arrival of such an agent in London, speaking French well, 
 which language is understood by the whole court, he should 
 first of all contrive to please the Queen, who, being young, 
 delights in perfumes and fine clothes, and likes people to be 
 lively and merry. His next object should be to ingratiate 
 himself with the court ladies and others, as much is done here 
 by the influence of women ; but he should on no account allow 
 familiarity with the Queen and other ladies to degenerate into
 
 182 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 lightness or worse, for that would involve the ruin of 
 the whole undertaking. It is customary to say here, ' if 
 a man's life is good, his religion must be a good one ' ; but 
 the English are shocked at every little thing. The King 
 is extremely modest, and the Queen such, that Father 
 Philip told me her conscience has never lost its baptismal 
 innocence. 
 
 " Having gained the good opinion of the Queen and her 
 ladies, the agent may aspire to greater things. The court is 
 very accessible to bribes ; it is therefore quite possible to 
 purchase its goodwill ; and to this end it will be well to send 
 the Queen jewels of some value, ostensibly as presents to her, 
 but in reality that she may distribute them among those 
 ministers from whom the greatest help may be expected. The 
 envoy should not make very valuable presents himself, but 
 only through the Queen, lest he be suspected of ulterior views, 
 or cause danger to the recipients of them. 
 
 " When the ministers have been won over, the Queen, 
 instructed by the envoy how great a reputation she may 
 acquire by the conversion of this kingdom, must try to per- 
 suade the King to abolish poursuivants and informers. This 
 he may not be able to effect immediately, being powerless to 
 repeal parliamentary laws, but he may be able to procure that 
 the poursuivants and informers shall do nothing without an 
 express and written order from the Privy Council, and only 
 then in a manner conformable to the instructions of the same. 
 In this way, Catholics would have nothing more to fear, 
 because as soon as the Council resolved to proceed against 
 any individual, the Queen would bring her influence to bear 
 on any one of its members already on her side, and the 
 threatened Catholic would be helped, either to fly or to elude 
 the officials. 
 
 " This point gained, an almost tacit liberty of conscience 
 would follow ; the Catholics would take courage, and the 
 moderate Protestants would no longer fear to declare them-
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 183 
 
 selves openly their protectors. Then would be the time to 
 treat with the King, through the Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 for the concession of religious liberty, as far as possible. This 
 once conceded, Father Philip believes that in less than three 
 years the whole country would become Catholic. Parliament 
 might then safely be assembled to repeal the laws against 
 Catholics, and re-union with the Holy See would soon 
 follow. 
 
 " But how to obtain liberty of conscience it is not easy to 
 say at present ; neither does it yet concern us, not having 
 arrived so far. 
 
 " This is all that Father Philip said, and whatever else he 
 may tell me I will write to your Eminence, having nothing 
 further to add now, except that the envoy should be guided 
 in all things by Father Philip, who has a great reputation for 
 prudence, and is respected by the whole court." 
 
 Nevertheless, Father Philip's ingenious structure soon 
 proved to be only a house of cards. He understood the 
 Queen, and was not far wrong in his estimation of Charles, 
 but he was mistaken in thinking the king's party to be 
 in earnest about Catholicism, and was as wide of the 
 mark in grasping the archbishop's bent as any Puritan in the 
 realm. 
 
 Laud was in some respects wiser than Buckingham had 
 been ; he was content to govern through the King, throwing 
 what power he could into the hands of the prelates. All the 
 great offices of State were filled by churchmen. Far from 
 contemplating any submission to the Pope, he aimed at being 
 a species of independent Pope on his own account. Both he 
 and Juxon, the Lord Treasurer, refused to see Panzani. 
 
 Laud's greatest passion was ambition, if anything in a nature 
 so contracted could be said to assume the proportions of a full- 
 blown passion. He had a marvellous capacity for dealing with 
 small things, and all that came under his ken he studied to
 
 184 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 the minutest detail. He was a believer in dreams, and 
 owned to being greatly troubled by them. " Thursday, 
 I came to London," he once wrote in his diary ; " the night 
 following, I dreamed that I was reconciled to the Church of 
 Rome. This troubled me much, and I wondered exceedingly 
 how it should happen. Now was I aggrieved with myself (not 
 only by reason of the errors of that Church, but also) upon 
 account of the scandal which from that my fall would be cast 
 upon many eminent and learned men in the Church of England. 
 Going with this resolution, a certain priest met me, and 
 would have stopped me. But moved with indignation 
 I went on my way. And while I wearied myself with 
 these troublesome thoughts I awoke. Herein I felt such 
 strong impressions that I could scarce believe it to be a 
 dream." 
 
 To a becoming gravity the archbishop failed to unite a 
 saving sense of humour. His temper was hasty, but also 
 vindictive, and he never forgot an injury, to which fact the 
 notorious Puritan, William Prynne, was well able to testify. 
 Laud first incurred the enmity of this man and his friends by 
 his attempts to introduce some measure of ceremonial into 
 the churches under him. When he began his reform, the 
 places of public worship were nothing but buildings where 
 discourses and diatribes against Popery were to be heard in 
 luxuriously upholstered seats. " There wants nothing but 
 beds to hear the Word of God on," said Bishop Corbet. The 
 notion of a priesthood had died out of people's minds. They 
 looked upon their clergy as preachers merely the cure of 
 souls was an obsolete term. 
 
 Archbishop Grindal had caused the altars to be destroyed, 
 and the places where they had stood whitewashed, so that 
 no trace of them might remain. 1 Laud had the communion 
 
 1 Articles to be inquired of in the Archdiocese of York " Whether in 
 your churches and chapels, all altars be utterly taken down and clean removed 
 even unto the foundation ; and the place where they stood paved, and the
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 185 
 
 tables removed from the middle of the churches into the place 
 formerly occupied by the altar, railed in, and distinguished by 
 altar-like adornments. Finally, it became customary to 
 designate them by the ancient name of altar, while the 
 officiating minister resumed the name of priest. The 
 people, now become thoroughly Protestantised, murmured, 
 and thought they saw indications of a return to Rome. 1 
 Some protested that all this superabundant care for externals 
 was eating the life out of Protestantism ; the bugbear of 
 others was the appeal, now becoming customary, to the 
 Fathers of the Church, rather than to the Protestant divines 
 of the continent. 2 St Augustine was suspect, Calvin they 
 knew to be orthodox. 
 
 The sequel proved that a very real source of danger lay 
 among Laud's own familiar friends. The archbishop could 
 not restrain the lengths to which they would go, in following 
 up the track which he himself had laid open. Burning 
 questions were discussed in the pulpits. Thus, Panzani, in 
 a letter to Cardinal Barberini, dated March 13/23, 1636, 
 says : 
 
 " Last Sunday, one of the bishops preached before the King, 
 on the necessity of Sacramental Confession, saying that the 
 Church has never been in a good state wherever it was 
 not practised." 
 
 Panzani, continuing, went on to say that reconciliation with 
 Rome was an event anticipated by all, and that many people 
 thought the clergy refrained from marrying, in order that 
 they might still hold their parishes in case of reunion. " This," 
 he adds, " is what I hear, but whether it is true or not, God 
 only knows, who sees the hearts of men." 
 
 wall whereunto they joined whited over, and made uniform with the rest, 
 so as no breach or rupture appear." In case any altars remained, the 
 churchwardens were " to remove them and certify." 
 
 1 Calendar of State Papers, 1635-36; Dom. Charles I. 
 
 ? Gardiner, Fall of the Monarchy of Charles ^
 
 186 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 In the same letter he mentioned another sermon, which 
 had lately been preached before the king and the court 
 "touching confession, and the preacher said that its origin 
 could be traced to the Gospel better than that of any other 
 doctrine; wherefore he exhorted his hearers to practise it. 
 All the court are now talking of this sermon," he continued, 
 "and the King himself at supper afterwards spoke highly of 
 the practise of confession, saying that one ought to mention 
 all the circumstances of a sin. Someone who was present 
 said he could not think it right to take away another person's 
 reputation by naming him, if he were concerned in a sin. The 
 King at once replied that it was not permitted to name 
 accomplices, and turning to Father Philip, who is always 
 present at supper, he asked him if he were not right. Father 
 Philip answered that he was. The Earl of Carlisle, a Puritan, 
 who was also there, assured Father Philip that he agreed 
 with us in everything, except that the Pope had power to 
 depose kings. ' We do not believe that either,' replied Father 
 Philip, ' we only say that the Pope may do it in extraordinary 
 cases, such as heresy for instance.' The Earl of Carlisle replied : 
 ' You are not all of the same opinion, because I know that some 
 among you maintain that he has.' 
 
 " Here the subject dropped. A lady conversing with 
 Father Philip on the same occasion said that if confession 
 were to be practised, Protestant ministers ought to be like 
 ours. ' Why ? ' asked Father Philip. ' Because,' answered 
 the lady, ' if they have wives, no one will confess to them for 
 fear of their repeating to their wives, straight off, the sins 
 confided to them.'" 
 
 In a former letter, Panzani had written : " A preacher 
 said lately that the Pope was the true Vicar of Christ, 
 successor of St Peter, and Chief Patriarch, and he proceeded to 
 enlarge on Papal jurisdiction, when a tumult arose among the 
 congregation, and afterwards the preacher was censured." 
 
 And again, " On the 6rst day, and also the first; Sunday in
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 187 
 
 Lent, the Bishop of London, preaching before the King, took 
 for his subject the preparation for our Lord's Passion, and 
 said that it was not only needful to mortify the spirit, but 
 also the flesh, teaching which is opposed to the doctrine of 
 the greater number of Protestants." 
 
 Thus, the Puritans had some ground for murmuring, and 
 it was not altogether unnatural, that they and the Catholics 
 also should imagine that the Church of England had set its 
 face Romewards. The above were not doctrines such as 
 Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, and Hooper would have owned, 
 nor would they recognise the churches in which such language 
 was held. 
 
 Greater still would have been the wrath of such men as 
 Prynne, Bastwick, and Burton, had they known that the 
 Bishop of Gloucester had applied to Panzani for permission to 
 have a Catholic priest in his house secretly, to say Mass daily 
 for him ; and that he was strongly in favour of re-union. 
 
 William Prynne, barrister-at-law by profession, by reputa- 
 tion a vituperative pamphleteer, was always ready to denounce, 
 cavil, and rail. The list of his philippics fills nearly a whole 
 folio volume of the British Museum Library Catalogue. He 
 had what Wharton, more graphically than politely, describes as 
 " the eternal itch of scribbling." The subject of Sabbath-breaking 
 to which he attributed the fresh outbreak of the plague in 1636, 
 was to him as a red rag to a bull. Encouraged by his example 
 a whole mass of literature appeared on the observance of 
 the Sabbath not the modern Sunday which was decried 
 as an invention of Rome, but of the old Jewish Sabbath, 
 considered by the Puritans to have a far better claim to be 
 observed. 
 
 Prynne had no perception of the relative value of things. 
 Sabbath-breaking, predestination, and the supreme wickedness 
 of curls, or love-locks as they were then called, were of 
 equal importance in his mind. Laud's innovations put him 
 into a state of frenzy, and he declared that the Church of
 
 188 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 England was now " as full of ceremonies " as a dog was " full of 
 fleas." 
 
 Giles Widdowes, entering the lists for the archbishop, argued 
 that " men should take off their hats on entering a church, 
 because it was the place of God's presence, the chiefest place of 
 his honour amongst us, where His ambassadors deliver His 
 embassage, where His priests sacrifice their own and the militant 
 Church's prayers, and the Lord's Supper, to reconcile us to 
 God, offended with our daily sins." " Ergo," answered Prynne, 
 " the priests of the Church of England are sacrificing priests, 
 and the Lord's Supper a propitiatory sacrifice, sacrificed by 
 those priests for men's daily sins ! " 
 
 Widdowes also wrote in defence of the practice of bowing at 
 the name of Jesus ; and considering doubtless that men should 
 be fought with their own weapons, took a leaf out of Prynne's 
 book and belaboured soundly " the lawless, kneeless, schismatical 
 Puritan." 
 
 Prynne retorted promptly, entitling his reply, " Lame Giles 
 his Haltings." Soon afterwards, being cited to appear and 
 defend himself for having used intemperate language in a book 
 against plays and players, he was sentenced to have his ears 
 shorn off. As many copies of his book as were forthcoming 
 were burned by his side as he sat in the pillory. He was de- 
 graded and prevented from pleading as a lawyer. He only 
 wrote the more. The titles of his book are ingenious, and would 
 ensure their sale at any time. As for their contents, odious as 
 was the language he used, Prynne always hit the nail he in- 
 tended, and was very good at a blow. In Rome's Masterpiece, 
 he declared that the archbishop was a " middle-man, between 
 an absolute Papist and a real Protestant, who will far sooner 
 hug a Popish priest in his bosom than take a Puritan by the 
 little finger." 
 
 Prynne's fellow pamphleteers, Bastwick and Burton, were not 
 far behind him in the violence of their invectives, but the lawyer 
 rqust be admitted to bear the palm for sharp sayings.
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 189 
 
 In John Bastwick's Litany, instead of " from plague, pes- 
 tilence, and famine," we have " from bishops, priests, and deacons, 
 good Lord, deliver us." 
 
 In 1637, Laud summoned the three men before the Star 
 Chamber, to answer to a charge of libel. Bastwick's crime was 
 for writing against the " Pope of Canterbury." They were all 
 three found guilty, fined .5000 each, condemned to lose their 
 ears, and to be imprisoned for life, an astoundingly heavy 
 sentence. But in addition Prynne was to be branded on both 
 cheeks with the letters S L for slanderous libeller. Chief Justice 
 Finch ordered the scars left by his former punishment to be laid 
 bare. " I had thought," said he, " that Mr Prynne had no ears 
 but methinks he hath ears." Three years before, the executioner 
 had only clipped off the outer rims ; but now Prynne was to 
 suffer the full rigour of the sentence. A contemporary thus 
 describes the process: 
 
 " Having burnt one cheek with a letter the wrong way, the 
 hangman burnt that again, and presently a surgeon clapped on 
 a plaster to take out the fire. The hangman hewed off Prynne's 
 ears very scurvily, which put him to much pain, and after, he 
 stood long in the pillory before his head could be got out, but 
 that was a chance." 1 
 
 He seems to have borne this martyrdom with great coolness, 
 for on his way back to prison, he composed a Latin distich on 
 the letters S L, which he interpreted " Stigmata Laudis " the 
 scars of Laud. 
 
 Although the sentence had been imprisonment for life, 
 Prynne and Burton entered London in triumph three years later ; 
 and if revenge is sweet, Prynne was yet to swim in a sea of 
 sweetness. When by a strange irony of fate he was hired to 
 search the imprisoned archbishop for papers, he carried off 
 Laud's diary. 
 
 If Panzani could have seen this strange record of the arch- 
 bishop's dreams, desires, and impressions, he would doubtless 
 1 Documents relating to Prynne, Camden Papers.
 
 190 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 have ceased to look upon Laud as an important factor in his 
 scheme of the corporate re-union of the nation with Rome. 
 
 Under date I4th August 1634, Prynne read and gloated over 
 those remarkable entries : 
 
 "That very morning at Greenwich there came one to me 
 seriously, and that avowed ability to perform it, and offered me 
 to be a cardinal," and two days later : 
 
 " I had a serious offer made me to be a cardinal. I was then 
 from court, but so soon as I came hither (2ist August) I ac- 
 quainted His Majesty with it. But my answer again was that 
 somewhat dwelt within me, which would not suffer that, till 
 Rome were other than it is." 
 
 No doubt, in declining the cardinalate, if indeed the offer were 
 not a figment of his own brain, Laud would have been diplo- 
 matic enough not to allow his reasons to transpire, and probably 
 the Pope never knew them. The importance of the statement 
 lies for posterity entirely in the anti- Roman tendency which he 
 expressed in his diary. For the archbishop himself, to have 
 committed the matter to writing, whether it were true or im- 
 aginary, proved fatal, the entries serving his enemies as the text 
 of one of the chief indictments against him, when he was brought 
 to trial. Nothing he could plead made any impression on the 
 minds of his accusers. His refusal of the purple ought to have 
 vindicated him ; but they maintained that for the offer to have 
 been made to him at all, he must have been friends with the 
 Pope. Moreover, had he not objected to the term " Idol of 
 Rome " ? and had he not expressed doubt if not denial of the 
 Pope's being anti-Christ? These things were more than 
 enough for fanatics whose piety consisted chiefly in denun- 
 ciations and impolite epithets. It was as clear as daylight 
 to their minds that the archbishop had "a damnable plot 
 to reconcile the Church of England with the Church of 
 Rome." 
 
 Presumably, Mr Prynne's ears were for something in the 
 overwhelming potency of the argument. But another and 
 
 \
 
 CHAfcLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 191 
 
 scarcely less important article of the indictment related to some 
 pictures of the Life and Passion of our Lord, which Laud had 
 once had bound up in Bibles. He had been so greatly pleased 
 with the result that he ordered them to be called the Arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury's Bibles. The Puritans thought they 
 saw in this strong proof of his " popish and idolatrous affection," 
 their ignorance of human nature actually leading them to 
 imagine that on seeing an image or picture of a divine person 
 men would be forthwith moved to prostrate themselves in 
 adoration of the material of which it was composed, no other 
 explanation of the word " idolatrous " being possible in this 
 connection. 
 
 But we must now return to the year 1636, when popular 
 passion ran so high that the opinion of an onlooker is our only 
 means of arriving at a fairly accurate appreciation of events. 
 Panzani, who although wrong in his inferences was correct as 
 to facts, describes the archbishop and his works with great 
 moderation. In his letters to Cardinal Barberini, he tells him 
 that Laud is " short in stature, aged about sixty, is unmarried, 
 and is first in the privy council. His views are moderate, and 
 he is not unfriendly to the Catholic religion. He has the 
 King's interests thoroughly at heart ; he studies to increase the 
 revenue, and perhaps for this reason is preferred by the King 
 to all his other advisers. He is ready for any amount of work, 
 and all ecclesiastical affairs receive his personal attention. He 
 is reputed an Arminian, and in nearly all dogmas approaches 
 nearly to the Roman Church. With the King's permission he 
 has made innovations in the Scotch as well as in the English 
 churches, has erected altars, and put sacred pictures in many 
 places. He has the honour and glory of the clergy extremely 
 at heart. Many think his aim is to reconcile this Church with 
 Rome, others hold quite opposite views, and both extremes have 
 some show and reason, for on the one hand, one sees in him 
 great ambition to imitate Catholic rites, and on the other, what 
 looks almost like a positive hatred of Catholics and their
 
 192 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 religion. Sometimes he persecutes them, but this is interpreted 
 by many to mean only prudence, and a way of escape from the 
 murmurs and quarrels of the Puritans." 
 
 The Queen and Panzani were on excellent terms. Cardinal 
 Barberini had sent Henrietta Maria some very costly presents, 
 and she was anxious to show him a similar attention. Father 
 Philip considered that English horses would form a most 
 suitable gift, but the Queen asked him to consult Panzani. " If 
 her Majesty wants to send a really acceptable present to Rome, 
 let her send the heart of the King," said the envoy, smiling. 
 Father Philip replied that this treasure she wished to keep 
 entirely for her own. 
 
 " I make no doubt," answered Panzani, " that in sending the 
 King's heart to Rome, the Queen would only possess it the 
 more entirely, and without danger of rivalry from conflicting 
 religious sects." 
 
 Father Philip then told her that if it pleased the Father 
 of Mercy, she should send this truly precious gift, and that his 
 Eminence cared for no horses. 
 
 Soon after this, Panzani returned home, and was made 
 Bishop of Miletus. Meanwhile George Conn, a Scotchman, had 
 been chosen to replace him, the papal court considering that 
 he possessed the rare qualities described by Panzani as neces- 
 sary for the delicate position of papal envoy to the Catholic 
 queen of a non-Catholic country. 
 
 Panzani being an Italian, and possessing no language but his 
 own, could only communicate with the Queen and the secretaries 
 of State through an interpreter. As he was a priest, he was 
 liable to cause irritation to such of the court and nation who 
 were not " popishly inclined." 
 
 Conn had passed twenty-four years in Italy, had courtier- 
 like manners and bearing. He was a layman, although a 
 canon of one of the great Roman basilicas, and as we have 
 already seen, was a candidate for a red hat. With his brilliant 
 parts, great capacity, urbanity, and zeal, it is not surprising to
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 193 
 
 learn that he was declared to be a Jesuit, a generic term not 
 only in his own days, but down to our own, for all who have 
 laboured diligently to restore the old religion. 
 
 We find it quite gravely asserted in the records of the reign 
 of Charles L, that Jesuits were of three degrees, and were to be 
 found among politicians, merchants, and the professed Fathers 
 living in religious houses. It would be obviously superfluous 
 to refute this ridiculous statement which seems destined to 
 crop up at intervals to the end of time, quite regardless of the 
 fact that it has been repeatedly shown to affirm an impos- 
 sibility. 
 
 Conn had no sooner arrived in England than the report 
 was spread that he was a disguised Jesuit, come to receive the 
 King into the Catholic Church. Charles, in terror of the 
 Puritans, declared that it was a purely malicious invention, but 
 none the less he continued to temporise, and the court to 
 regulate its conscience according to his vacillating example. 
 Some of the nobility were received into the Church, and among 
 them Lord Boteler and Lady Newport. Mass was again said 
 in the houses of the Catholic gentry. 
 
 In a letter to the Cardinal, written soon after his arrival, 
 Conn gave an account of a long conversation he had had with 
 Charles, in the course of which he "remarked to his Majesty 
 that the other powers of Christendom were extremely jealous 
 of the relations which had begun to exist between the Apostolic 
 See and Great Britain. They know," he continued, "that a 
 perfect union between the two must necessarily tend to check 
 their extravagances, and restore to Christ His lost patrimony 
 in the west." 
 
 To this the King replied with some emotion, saying : 
 
 " May God pardon the first authors of the rupture." 
 
 " Sire," I answered, " the greater will be your Majesty's 
 glory, when by your means so great an evil is remedied." To 
 which the King made no further response. 
 
 Not long afterwards, Charles asked Conn whether he 
 
 N
 
 194 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 considered it an easy thing for a man to change his 
 religion. 
 
 " I told him," said Conn, " that when a man applied himself 
 without passion or prejudice to find out the truth, God never 
 failed to enlighten him." The which the King took in good 
 part 
 
 " I am obliged to proceed very cautiously," he added, " that 
 they may not think the rumour of my coming here to receive 
 the King into the Church had its origin in my presumption. 
 It was a truly diabolical invention, and calculated to spoil 
 everything." 
 
 If the Puritans were angry before, Conn's sojourn in England 
 lashed them into fury. Rome's Masterpiece was written when 
 his service had come to an end, and in the first flush of Puritan 
 triumph. On its title-page it styles the mission "The Grand 
 Conspiracy of the Pope and his Jesuited instruments to 
 extirpate the Protestant religion, re-establish Popery, subvert 
 laws, liberties, peace, parliaments by kindling a civil war in 
 Scotland and all his Majesty's realms ; and to poison the 
 King himself, in case he comply not with them in these their 
 execrable designs." 
 
 This is how the "conspiracy" is said to have been dis- 
 covered : 
 
 " Revealed out of conscience to Andreas ab Habernfeld by 
 an agent sent from Rome into England by Cardinal Barberini, 
 as an assistant to Conn, the Pope's late Nuncio, to prosecute 
 this most execrable plot (in which he persisted a principal actor 
 several years), who discovered it to Sir William Boswell, his 
 Majesty's agent at the Hague, 6th September 1640. He, under 
 an oath of secrecy to the Archbishop of Canterbury, among 
 whose papers it was casually found by Mr Prynne, May 31, 
 1643, who communicated it to the king, as the greatest business 
 that ever was put to him." 
 
 Events had succeeded each other with alarming significance. 
 Nothing was too wild for the Puritans to invent or to believe,
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 195 
 
 and it had been found impossible to uphold Conn in the 
 position of papal envoy to the Queen. After nearly three 
 years' service, he had consequently been withdrawn, and in 
 August 1639, Count Carlo Rosetti was sent to lead the forlorn 
 hope of the English Catholics. His first impression of the 
 state of the country and of the future of Catholicism in England 
 was hopeful. " I have found," he wrote to Cardinal Barberini, 
 " in all persons a better disposition and a readiness towards the 
 affairs of religion in general, and an obedience full of reverence 
 towards the particular person of his Holiness our Sovereign, 
 and of your Eminence." Windebank was fairly amenable, but 
 Laud had pinned his faith to the Church of England, and was 
 no more favourable to the Catholics than to the Puritans. He 
 opposed Rosetti in every possible way, burned Catholic books 
 publicly, and threw all his weight and influence in Parliament 
 on the side that favoured the enforcing of the penal statutes. 
 Meanwhile, the Queen was not idle, and had pleaded successfully 
 with the King for her persecuted co-religionists, so that Rosetti 
 was able to report, " Through the grace of God, all the priests 
 and Catholics are at last released from prison, to their extreme 
 consolation." 
 
 Nevertheless, there was scarcely any further talk of the 
 nation's return to the bosom of the Church ; all that was now 
 hoped for was, that if the King could be got to act with some 
 degree of firmness and consistency, the cause of the unhappy 
 Catholics might not yet be altogether lost. Rosetti drew, as 
 far as it went, a life-like portrait of Charles in one of his 
 letters : 
 
 " The King," he says, " is very high-minded ; but having no 
 sincere, experienced, and capable persons to assist him, he is 
 often either agitated or changeable, and undecided in the 
 administration of affairs. He has great parts, and much 
 benevolence, is by nature gentle and moderate, and with regard 
 to morals, is singular among princes. It is not possible to 
 exaggerate his love of justice ; in the exercise of this virtue he
 
 196 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 is little accessible to compassion, but at the same time, he is no 
 friend of capital punishment. Honesty is one of the strongest 
 points in his character, but not being surrounded with trust- 
 worthy ministers, it often happens that he neglects the interests 
 of the State, and gives himself up to hunting, which is his 
 favourite occupation and amusement" 
 
 But the Puritans were fast gaining the upper hand ; 
 Parliament haggled with the King over the supplies, and 
 frightful scenes were enacted in the churches. 
 
 " Last Sunday morning," wrote Rosetti, " many Protestants 
 and Puritans being assembled at church to celebrate their 
 sacrament, it came to a great contest between them ; 
 some were determined to communicate sitting, others 
 kneeling. From words they passed to blows, causing much 
 disturbance." 
 
 The other day, a large number of Puritans went into a 
 Protestant Church, and upset the altars which stood against the 
 wall with rails in front of them, where people were going to 
 Communion in the Catholic manner. They took possession of 
 twelve statues representing the twelve apostles, and carried 
 them with cries and tumult into the Parliament" 
 
 On another occasion he wrote : 
 
 "The Archbishop of Canterbury persecutes the Catholics 
 more than ever. On the vigil of Pentecost, I am told by a 
 trustworthy person, he threw himself at the King's feet, beseech- 
 ing him to proceed against the Catholic religion, at least from 
 political interests, if not from conscientious motives." 
 
 Laud was terrified. All that he had done to imitate 
 Catholicism he now undid, as far as he was able, in order, if 
 possible, to pacify the Puritans. The order to bow at the holy 
 Name was revoked, the communion-tables were replaced in the 
 middle of the churches, and from being called altars were 
 renamed tables. The altar rails were abolished, and the 
 people communicated after the Calvinist manner. A quantity 
 of Catholic books were ostentatiously burned in a public square,
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 197 
 
 and the state of affairs looked less like reunion with Rdme than 
 ever. 
 
 But all that Laud did availed him nothing ; the disturbances 
 continued in the churches, and scarcely a service was held 
 without a quarrel arising as to the manner of conducting it, 
 some fighting for one posture, some for another. 
 
 Neither did the Archbishop become more popular with the 
 multitude. A courageous stand against the Puritans might 
 have inspired them with some respect for their enemy ; yielding 
 to them from fear only made them more formidable. Some- 
 times the High Church party would still score a victory here 
 and there. A Puritan holding forth one day in Westminster 
 Abbey, with the usual flow of epithets, on the difference 
 between the Catholic religion and that of the Puritans, the 
 Bishop of Lincoln rose, and declared that his language was 
 unbecoming in a pulpit, put an end to the sermon, and forced 
 the preacher to come down. 
 
 But these triumphs were rare ; few of the king's men were 
 as bold as the Bishop of Lincoln. All seemed to be painfully 
 busy in saving their skins, while the Parliamentarians com- 
 plained loudly and efficaciously that Charles had allowed the 
 primate to foist a new religion upon them. Through the 
 primate they proceeded to attack the King. Placards began to 
 appear all over London, with declarations to the effect that the 
 people were determined to enjoy the liberty with which they 
 were born, and to maintain the integrity of their religious 
 worship. One of these placards was discovered one morning 
 nailed to the gate of the royal palace at Whitehall. On it were 
 these words : " Charles and Maria, doubt not but that the arch- 
 bishop must die ! " 
 
 Charles's authority had disappeared with his dignity, and 
 the parsimony of successive Parliaments had impoverished the 
 royal family to so great an extent that the want of money was 
 not the least of their troubles. At one time they were reduced to 
 such straits that hunger would have stared them in the face but
 
 198 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 for the alternative of pawning their jewels. In these circum- 
 stances it is scarcely surprising that Charles should have turned 
 to the Pope for help. 
 
 The following letter from Rosetti to the Cardinal, if some- 
 what discursive, is interesting as the record of a kind of 
 sommation respectueuse which he now made to the King : 
 
 "Oatlands, August 10/25, 1640. 
 
 " Your Eminence's letters of the 3Oth June and the 7th 
 July having reached me, I did not omit to speak to Mr 
 Windebank on the subject of his Majesty's conversion, and of 
 the succour in the shape of men and money that will be sent 
 to him from Rome in the event of its taking place. After some 
 talk about the present state of the King's affairs, Mr Windebank 
 asked me whether I had received letters from Rome relating 
 to the proposal he had already made me. I replied that I 
 had, and that your Eminence was extremely well-disposed 
 towards this country, sympathising deeply with his Majesty 
 in his troubles, caused by the disobedience and faithlessness 
 of the Puritans. This led to my saying that a State could 
 not possibly be either happy or secure unless united, and that 
 unity was impossible without one uniform religion. I then 
 put forward the indisputable fact, that a prince whose subjects 
 profess one faith alone is beyond compare more powerful than 
 a sovereign whose people are split up into various religions, 
 and that the many sects in this realm, opposed to every form 
 of political government, ought to make his Majesty pause, and 
 reflect on the remedy. 
 
 " I added that in reality there was no other remedy than 
 for the King, with all his Protestants, to embrace our holy 
 religion, when forming one body with the Catholic party, 
 they would be strong enough to keep the Puritans in 
 check. 
 
 " On the other hand, it was, I said, only too evident, that 
 if measures were not taken to repress them, they would grow
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 199 
 
 so powerful as to imperil one day the very existence of 
 monarchy in England. Every hour it became, I held, more 
 apparent how little they were in touch with the King, and 
 how determined they were never to rest till they had intro- 
 duced popular government in some form or other. 
 
 " Here I digressed, in order to point out how often King 
 James, his Majesty's father, had found himself in danger of 
 losing his life by the machinations of the Puritans, having 
 been menaced by them even before he saw the light of day. 
 I then went on to point out that King Charles was placed 
 in the very same danger, and his kingdom reduced to such a 
 state of discord and weakness, that he must fear daily to find 
 himself and his crown the prey of his worst enemies. 
 
 "The Puritans have always been, and ever will be, intent 
 on upsetting all kingly authority. Such is the rebellious 
 spirit of their Calvinism, that it aims at nothing less than 
 the total destruction of the King and of the Catholic 
 religion. 
 
 " I then spoke of the greatness which would accrue to 
 England if the King's conversion were brought about, dwelling 
 not only on the advantageous relationships he might form, in 
 disposing of the Prince and Princess in marriage, but also on 
 the disputes perpetually taking place between France and 
 Spain, in which his Majesty would be the recognised arbitrator 
 and peacemaker. Neither country would have the temerity 
 to offend him, on account of the power he would possess to 
 harm them, having the supreme Pontiff on his side." 
 
 Rosetti here proceeds to define, somewhat lengthily, the 
 exact position of a Catholic King of England in European 
 politics, and the kind of prestige he would acquire if he 
 embraced a religion to which he was already partially inclined. 
 Then, speaking of the King more personally, he went on : 
 
 " If, having considered all these things, his Majesty comes 
 to a decided resolution, he should not delay putting it into
 
 200 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 effect from fear of the consequences. Henry VIII. risked more 
 in his unholy determination to destroy the Catholic religion, 
 which had flourished in this country with such pious results 
 for so many centuries. I insisted that it was time his 
 Majesty made an end of his ambiguousness and hesitation, 
 and that he should once for all fix his mind, there being 
 nothing more injurious than leisurely deliberation when a 
 man has need of prompt decision and action. I told Mr 
 Windebank further, that the King's procrastination was simply 
 putting the sceptre into the hands of the Puritans, was 
 ruining the State, his children, and himself, and that a really 
 wise prince not only provides for the safety of his kingdom 
 during his own life-time, but orders things in such a 
 manner that at his death he secures his inheritance to his 
 posterity. 
 
 " His Majesty, I declared, could take no step more just 
 and more pleasing to God than by restoring to this country 
 its ancient religion, professed by his ancestors, and I believed 
 that this King, so good, so just, and so virtuous in many 
 ways, was appointed by divine Providence for the great work. 
 
 " The King was, I said, already armed ; help might 
 confidently be expected to flow in from Ireland, through the 
 devotion and loyalty of that people, and his Holiness would 
 moreover assist him with men and money. 
 
 " Finally, I showed the necessity of this union, for the salva- 
 tion of souls, a point which I ought to have begun with, it 
 being certain that none can be saved out of the bosom of the 
 Catholic Church. Of this the Nicaean Council speaks in the 
 great creed, in unam sanctam Catholicam Ecclesiam et Apostoli- 
 cam, in which Protestants believe as we do, and yet it is not 
 said that there are two or more churches. 
 
 " Confessing as they do that ours is the Catholic Church, 
 they contradict their own belief in the said creed ; and not 
 only this, but the ancient Fathers, and the Holy Scriptures 
 agree that the Church of God is one.
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POLISH PLOT 201 
 
 " Having added many other things to this proposition, I 
 said that if one examined the reasons which induced Henry 
 VIII. to give up the Church, one would find that they had 
 no other origin than in sensuality and spleen false and 
 unworthy pretexts. 
 
 " I ended by declaring that whoever considers a matter so 
 important as is the salvation of souls, ought to have his eyes 
 well open, and not consent to the errors of that king, whose 
 actions are condemned and abhorred by all. 
 
 " Mr Windebank replied that he had listened to me with 
 pleasure, and had weighed all my reasons, finding them very 
 true ; but that for the accomplishment of an undertaking so 
 momentous, a large heart and a strong will were indispens- 
 able, and these he could not at present promise me. He 
 told me in confidence that never until now had negotiations 
 of such importance passed through his hands, to be followed 
 by so few results. One day the King would have recourse 
 to an expedient, and the next would stultify it, with the 
 greatest inconstancy imaginable. Nevertheless, he assured me 
 that he would not fail to repeat all I had said, to his Majesty 
 at the first opportunity. 
 
 "... The matter is indeed so grave, that one rather 
 hopes in the sovereign power of God than in any human 
 help. Still, we must be ready, for His Divine Majesty often 
 makes use of us creatures to bring forth works which shall 
 redound to His service. 
 
 " I observed both with Father Philip and Mr Windebank all 
 the caution that such an important undertaking demands. May 
 God who gives and who takes away realms, who changes and 
 governs them as He pleases, enlighten the King's mind, that he 
 may know what he should do for the salvation of his own soul 
 and the souls of all his people." 
 
 In 1641 many letters were written and received by Count 
 Rosetti, relating to the freedom of conscience to be granted to 
 Catholics, in return for a sum of 600 scudi. But freedom of
 
 202 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 conscience was still one of the unfulfilled conditions of the king's 
 marriage settlement, and the Pope, it was objected, could not 
 treat with an heretical sovereign. 
 
 " Only in the event of the King's conversion," wrote Cardinal 
 Barberini, 2ist February 1641, "would it be possible for me to 
 entreat His Holiness to send a considerable sum of money." 
 
 On the iQth July of the same year, Rosetti wrote : 
 
 " I told him (Father Philip) that the only way to obtain help 
 from the Holy See was by His Majesty's return to the Catholic 
 Church. He answered that such a step would be extremely 
 difficult at present, not because the King had any dislike to 
 Catholicism, neither did he wish to prevent Catholics from 
 saving their souls ; but that it was evident if he changed his 
 religion just now, he would run great risk of losing his crown 
 and his life. But if he were enabled to recover his power and 
 authority, the Catholic cause would be strengthened by support- 
 ing him, and his conversion might then be confidently looked 
 forward to. 
 
 "The Queen Mother told me that in speaking of certain 
 miracles performed by the saint in whose honour the proces- 
 sions are being made just now at Antwerp, she observed the 
 King listening attentively, seeming! to have a decided taste for 
 the Catholic religion. She however admitted, that although he 
 appears to have great natural capacity, and to understand the 
 critical state of his affairs, he is, as they say, timid, slow, and 
 irresolute." 
 
 Charles I. never went any further than the cultivation of " a 
 decided taste for the Catholic religion," and what would have 
 happened had he really thrown himself into the arms of the 
 Pope must remain one of those curious and unsolvable historical 
 problems with which the world is full. 
 
 Would the Papacy, still a great force in Europe, have been 
 able to save him from the terrible fate that awaited him ?
 
 CHARLES THE FIRST AND THE POPISH PLOT 203 
 
 Obliged to act from definite, logical principles in the place of his 
 mischievous theory of the royal prerogative, would he have 
 gained in moral weight as well as in the material advantages 
 held out to him ? 
 
 It may be answered that the Puritans were as little inclined 
 to tolerate an infallible Pope whom they hated and feared, as an 
 infallible king whom they could drive into a corner ; and pos- 
 sibly the King would only have died in another cause. 
 
 Under a portrait of Charles I., painted in the fortieth year of 
 his age, in which he is represented as grave, troubled, and with a 
 scared and hunted look in his eyes, Prynne wrote these lines : 
 
 " All flesh is grass, the best men vanity, 
 This, but a shadow, here before thine eye, 
 Of him whose wondrous changes clearly show 
 That God, not man, sways all things here below."
 
 PART II
 
 THE RUTHWELL CROSS IN ITS PRESENT CONDITION. 
 
 [To face page 207
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA 
 
 THERE is at the Victoria and Albert Museum at South 
 Kensington a remarkable plaster cast, the facsimile of one of 
 the two beautiful obelisks of Anglo-Saxon workmanship, which 
 like far-reaching voices speak to us across the gulf of at least 
 nine centuries. 
 
 The interest which surrounds these ancient crosses is of 
 a twofold nature. There is the marvellous art expressed in 
 the sculptured stones themselves, and there is the mysterious 
 charm of the runes with which the stones are inscribed. The 
 art is of a very high order, and in the opinion of archaeologists 
 such as Haigh, Kemble, Professor Stephens, and others, better 
 than anything of the kind produced in mediaeval times, before 
 the beginning of the thirteenth century. 
 
 The kingdom of Northumbria extended at its most flourish- 
 ing period as far north as Edinburgh, so named after the great 
 Northumbrian King, Edwin, its southern limit being, as its 
 name implied, the river Humber. Thus, the Ruthwell Cross 
 in Dumfriesshire, and the Bewcastle Cross in Cumberland, 
 belonged alike to Anglia ; for although Dumfries formed part 
 of the kingdom of Strathclyde, the territory to the east of 
 Nithsdale was generally reckoned a part of Northumbria, and 
 if we were less hampered by our modern geographical limits 
 and boundaries, we should better realise that the land north 
 and south of the Tweed was one and the same country, 
 
 207
 
 208 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 without distinction of race or language. And as if in solemn 
 protest of the political barriers, which were set up in the 
 course of ages, these two obelisks, the one now in Scotland, the 
 other in England, continue to point heavenwards, each bear- 
 ing upon their faces the same grand old Northumbrian 
 language, which is the mother-tongue of all English speaking 
 people. 
 
 Both crosses have been, down to the present day, the 
 subject of much diversity of opinion among antiquaries, 
 first with regard to their respective ages, and secondly as 
 to the authorship of the inscriptions on the Ruthwell 
 Cross. 
 
 The celebrated Danish antiquary, Dr Miiller, considered that 
 the Ruthwell Cross could not be older than the year 1000, and 
 he arrived at this conclusion by a study of the ornamentation, 
 which he placed as late as the Carlovingian period, the style 
 having been imported from France into England. Miiller, 
 however, though a good archaeologist, was not a runic scholar, 
 and Professor George Stephens maintained l that not ornamenta- 
 tion merely, but a variety of other things must also be taken 
 into consideration, and that these are often absolute and 
 final, so that sometimes the object itself must date the 
 ornamentation. Then Dr Haigh, who had passed his life 
 in the study of the oldest sculptured and inscribed stones 
 of Great Britain and Ireland, stepped in and pronounced 
 "this monument (the Ruthwell Cross) and that of Bew- 
 castle to be of the same age and the work of the same 
 hand ; and the latter must have been erected A.D. 
 
 664-5-" 
 
 He was led to this conclusion not by the ornamentation, 
 but rather in spite of it; and in consideration of the runic 
 inscriptions, which he declared had not only passed out of 
 date on funeral monuments as late as the year 1000, but as 
 he read the name of Alcfrid on the Bewcastle Cross, he 
 1 Old Northern Runic Monuments, Afterwrit, p. 431.
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA 209 
 
 inferred both that and the Ruthwell Cross to be produc- 
 tions of the latter half of the seventh century. The in- 
 scription, of which we will treat more particularly later on, 
 is to the effect that the obelisk was raised to the memory 
 of Alcfrid, son of that King of Northumbria, who decided 
 to celebrate Easter according to the Roman precept. Alcfrid 
 died about the year 664, and thus when we consider the 
 similarity of the ornamentation, and the character of the runes 
 on both obelisks, there seemed good reason for the above 
 inference. 
 
 Dr Haigh further remarked that the scroll-work on the 
 east side of the Bewcastle monument, and on the two sides 
 of that at Ruthwell was identical in design, and differed very 
 much from that which he found on other Saxon crosses. In 
 fact, he knew of nothing like it, except small portions on a 
 fragment of a cross in the York museum, on another fragment 
 preserved in Yarrow Church, and on a cross at Hexham. There 
 are, however, several other such stones which were unknown to Dr 
 Haigh, and engravings of them may be seen in Dr John 
 Stuart's magnificent work on The Sculptured Stones of 
 Scotland. 
 
 At Carew, in Pembrokeshire, runic crosses of the Saxon 
 period without figures may be seen, and there is a runic cross 
 at Lancaster with incised lines and a pattern in relief, supposed 
 to be of the fifth or sixth century. The sculptured stones of 
 Meigle in Scotland have no runes. Runes were, as it is well 
 known, the characters used by the Teutonic tribes of north- 
 west Europe before they received the Latin alphabet. They 
 are divided into three principal classes, the Anglo-Saxon, the 
 Germanic, and the Scandinavian, bearing the same relation to 
 each other as do the different Greek alphabets. Their likeness 
 to each other is so great that a common origin may be ascribed 
 to all. They date from the dim twilight of paganism, but 
 were for a time employed in the service of Christianity, when 
 after being imported into this country where they were first 
 
 O
 
 2io STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 used in pagan inscriptions cut into the surface of rocks, or 
 on sticks for casting lots, or for divination, they were at last 
 made to express Christian ideas on grave crosses or sacred 
 vessels. 
 
 " In times," says Kemble, 1 "when there was neither pen, ink, 
 nor parchment the bark of trees and smooth surfaces of wood or 
 soft stone were the usual depositaries of these symbols or runes 
 hence the name run-stafas, mysterious staves answering to 
 the Buchstaben of the Germans. 
 
 We may observe in passing, that the word Buchstaben, 
 beech-staves, is a direct descendant of these wooden runes. 
 
 As early as 1695 antiquaries were busy with the Ruthwell 
 Cross, but at the beginning of the nineteenth century profound 
 ignorance still reigned in regard even to the language which the 
 runes were intended to convey. Bishop Gibson, in his additions 
 to Camden's Britannia, described the cross vaguely as " a pillar 
 curiously engraven with some inscription upon it" In a second 
 edition this reads, "with a Danish inscription." Later it 
 was thought to be Icelandic, and it was Haigh who first 
 thought that Caedmon and no other was the author of the 
 runic verses which he deciphered, considering that there was 
 no one living at the period to which he assigned the monu- 
 ment, who could have composed such a poem but the first of all 
 the English nation to express in verse the beginning of created 
 things. 
 
 In 1840, Kemble published his Runes of the Anglo-Saxons, 
 showing that the Ruthwell Cross was a Christian monument, 
 and that the inscription was nothing less than twenty lines of a 
 poem in Old Northumbrian or North English. 
 
 Meanwhile, in 1822, a German scholar, Dr Friedrich Blume, 
 had discovered in the cathedral library at Vercelli in the 
 Milanese six Anglo-Saxon poems of the early part of the 
 eleventh century, which discovery aroused great interest both in 
 Germany and in England. Blume copied the manuscript, and 
 
 ia, vol. xxviii. On Anglo-Saxon Runes,
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA 211 
 
 Mr Benjamin Thorpe printed and published it. The learned 
 philologist Grimm again printed the longest of the poems in 
 1840, but it was Kemble who identified the fourth poem of 
 the series The Dream of the Rood with the runic inscription 
 on the Ruthwell Cross, and it was he who first suggested that 
 all the poems in the Vercelli Codex, consisting of 135 leaves, 
 were by Cynewulf, who like Caedmon was a Northumbrian, and 
 lived in the second half of the eighth century. It was Kemble 
 also who first gave The Dream of the Rood a modern English 
 rendering. 1 
 
 So far steady progress had been made, except one step 
 which is now stated by modern Anglo-Saxon scholars to have 
 been a false one. Professor Stephens following Haigh thought 
 he could decipher on the top stone of the cross the words 
 Cadmon Mcz Fawed, and inferred therefrom that the Cross Lay 
 of which fragments were inscribed on the Ruthwell monument 
 was the work of Caedmon, "the Milton of North England in 
 the seventh century." But according to the evidence of the 
 latest expert who has examined the cross, Caedmon's name has 
 never been on it, and both linguistic and archaeological con- 
 siderations assign the inscription to the tenth century, and 
 probably to the latter half of it. This critic declares that there 
 is "no shadow of proof or probability that the inscription 
 represents a poem written by Caedmon." 
 
 Sweet, on the other hand 2 describes The Dream of the Rood, 
 in the Vercelli Book, as an introduction to the Elene or Finding 
 of the Cross which is unmistakably claimed as Cynewulf's own 
 by an acrostic introduced into the runic letters which form his 
 
 1 A translation of the fragment in Old Northumbrian had indeed been 
 attempted at the beginning of the nineteenth century by Mr Repp and also 
 by a disciple of the great Fin Magnusen, Mr J. M. M'Caul, but the least said 
 about these versions the better, both being wide of the mark. Being 
 imperfectly acquainted with Old English they made the most absurd 
 statements regarding the purpose the monument was supposed to have 
 served. 
 
 * Anglo-Saxon Reader, p. 1 54, ;th edition,
 
 212 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 name, and goes on to assert that the Ruthwell Cross gives a 
 fragment of the poem in the Old Northern dialect of the seventh 
 or eighth century, "of which the MS. text is evidently a late 
 West Saxon transcription differing in many respects from the older 
 one" He considers that The Dream belongs to the age of 
 Caedmon, and that the poetry of Cynewulf was an adaptation 
 of older compositions. 
 
 There can be now no possible doubt but that the poems in 
 the Vercelli Codex are by Cynewulf, the controversy henceforth 
 being as to whether Tlu Dream of the Rood or the inscription on 
 the cross is the older. Cynewulf, being a Northumbrian, presum- 
 ably wrote in the old Northumbrian language such as is inscribed 
 on the cross, but all his poems as they have come down to us have 
 passed into the West Saxon tongue, and if the fragment on the 
 Ruthwell Cross is, as modern archaeologists aver, later than the 
 Dream in the Vercelli Codex it must be a re-translation into 
 the dialect in which it was first written. A further difficulty lies 
 in the fact stated by Haigh that runes had passed out of date 
 on funeral monuments as late as the year 1000, and we can 
 indeed scarcely conceive of their use at the very eve of the 
 Norman Conquest when the written language had long become 
 general. 
 
 Nevertheless, as far back as 1890, Mr A. S. Cook, professor 
 of the English language and literature in Yale University, sug- 
 gested that the inscription on the Ruthwell Cross must be as 
 late as the tenth century and subsequent to the Lindisfarne 
 Gospels. " A comparison of the inscription with the Dream of 
 the Rood shows that the former is not an extract from an earlier 
 poem written in the long Caedmonian line which is postulated 
 by Vigfusson and Powell, and by Mr Stopford Brooke, since the 
 earliest dated verse is in short lines only, and since four of the 
 lines in the cross inscription represent short lines in the Dream 
 of the Rood, it shows that the latter is more self-consistent, more 
 artistic, and therefore more likely to be or to represent the 
 original ; and it shows that certain of the forms of the latter
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA 213 
 
 seem to have been inadvertently retained by the adapter, 
 who selected and re-arranged the lines for engraving on the 
 
 cross." l 
 
 The theme both of the Dream and of the Elene, another of 
 the poems in the Vercelli Book, is the Cross, and Cynewulf, says 
 Mr Cook, is the first old English author, of whom we have any 
 knowledge, to lay emphasis upon the Invention of the Cross, and 
 Constantine's premonitory dream. " If," he continues, " we 
 consider Bede's account of Caedmon, we are struck by one 
 analogy at least : in each case a command is imparted to the 
 poet to celebrate a particular theme in the first, the creation 
 of the world ; in the second, the redemption of mankind by 
 the death of the cross. As the one stands at the beginning 
 of the Old Testament, the other epitomises the New. The 
 later poet may have had the earlier in mind, and may not 
 have been unwilling to enter into generous rivalry with him ; 
 but there is this notable difference, Caedmon does not re- 
 late his own dream, while Cynewulf, if it be Cynewulf, 
 does." 2 
 
 Elsewhere he says The Dream of the Rood, apart from its 
 present conclusion, represents Cynewulf (as we believe) in the 
 fullest vigour of his invention and taste, probably after all his 
 other extant poems had been composed. Admirable in itself 
 and a precious document of our early literary history, it 
 gains still further lustre from being indissolubly associated 
 with that monument which Kemble has called the most 
 beautiful as well as the most interesting relic of Teutonic 
 antiquity." 
 
 And again, " So far from the Cross-inscription representing 
 an earlier form of the Dream of tlie Rood, it seems rather to 
 have been derived from the latter, and to have been corrupted 
 in the process." 3 
 
 Thus the controversy remains in 1905, and until some 
 
 1 The Dream of the Rood, by A. S. Cook, p. xv., Oxford, 1905. 
 
 2 Ibid.) p. Ivii. 3 Ibid.) p. xvj.
 
 214 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 further light is shed upon the difficult question for it is 
 impossible to regard Mr Cook's solution as in all points 
 satisfying we must be content with the results obtained. 
 
 Let us now consider the poem itself by the help of 
 Professor Stephens' admirable translation. Essentially a 
 Christian composition, it preserves all the Gothic strength and 
 virile beauty of the old pagan forms. The modern words, 
 Saviour, Passion, Apostles, etc, do not once appear. Christ is 
 the " Youthful Hero," He is the " Peace-God," the " Atheling," 
 the " Frea of mankind." He is even identified with the 
 white god, Balder the Beautiful. His friends are " Hilde-rinks " 
 or " barons." In His crucifixion He is less crucified than shot 
 to death with "streals," i.e., all manner of missiles which the 
 " foemen " hurl at Him. The Rood speaks and laments ; it 
 tells the story of the last dread scene of Christ's suffering, His 
 entombment in the " mould-house," the triumph of the Cross in 
 His resurrection, and the entry of the " Lord of Benison " into 
 his " old home-halls." 
 
 The doctrine is as sober as an orthodox, theological treatise, 
 though the poem is essentially a work of the most fertile imagina- 
 tion, a drama with all the rich accessories that tradition offered 
 in the matter of colouring and effect. And it is withal 
 exquisitely simple, devout, and noble, breathing a spirituality 
 strangely at variance with the semi-barbaric people with whom 
 the poetry had originated. 
 
 Stephens' translation is full of poetry, the translator having 
 retained the lilt of the original, together with many of the old 
 English words which, if they need a glossary, is only because 
 we have gradually lost the meaning in the substitution of 
 weaker terms. 
 
 It is interesting to compare the fragments still legible on 
 the Ruthwell Cross with the South Saxon rendering in the 
 Vercelli Codex. Where the lines are worn away or mutilated 
 the MS. may supplement them :
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA 
 
 215 
 
 Northumbrian version on the Cross. 
 
 Girded Him then 
 
 God Almighty 
 When He would 
 Step on the gallows 
 Fore all Mankind 
 Mindfast, fearless 
 
 Bow me durst I not 
 
 Rich King heaving 
 
 The Lord of Light-realms 
 
 Lean me I durst not 
 
 Us both they basely mockt and 
 
 handled 
 
 Was I there with blood bedabbled 
 Gushing grievous from . . . 
 
 Christ was on Rood-tree 
 But fast from afar 
 His friends hurried 
 Athel to the Sufferer. 
 Everything I saw. 
 Sorely was I 
 With sorrows harrow'd 
 I inclin'd 
 
 South Saxon version according to the 
 Vercelli Codex. 
 
 For the grapple then girded him 
 
 youthful hero 
 
 lo ! the man was God Almighty. 
 Strong of heart and steady-minded 
 stept he on the lofty gallows ; 
 fearless spite that crowd of faces ; 
 free and save man's tribes he would 
 
 there. 
 Bever'd I and shook when that baron 
 
 claspt me 
 
 but dar'd I not to bow me earthward 
 Rood was I reared now. 
 Rich king heaving 
 The Lord of Light-realms 
 Lean me I durst not. 
 Us both they basely mockt and 
 
 handled 
 
 all with blood was I bedabbled 
 gushing grievous from his dear side, 
 when his ghost he had uprendered. 
 How on that hill 
 have I throwed 
 dole the direst. 
 All day viewed I hanging 
 the God of hosts 
 Gloomy and swarthy 
 clouds had cover'd 
 the corse of the Waldend. 1 
 O'er the sheer shine-path 
 shadows fell heavy 
 wan 'neath the nelkin 
 wept all creation 
 wail'd the fall of their king. 
 Christ was on Rood -tree 
 But fast from afar 
 his friends hurried 
 To aid their Atheling 
 Everything I saw. 
 Sorely was I 
 with sorrows harrow'd 
 yet humbly I inclin'd 
 to the hands of his servants, 
 
 Wielder, Lord, Ruler, Monarch,
 
 216 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 striving with might to aid them. 
 
 Straight the all-ruling God they've 
 
 taken 
 
 . . . .- ,. ^j v . . heaving from that haried torment : 
 t' . . : ., . . . . Those Hilde-rinks 1 now left me 
 . . .,:..*,< . . to stand there streaming with blood- 
 drops ; 
 
 With streals all wounded with streals 2 was I all wounded. 
 
 Down laid they Him limb-weary Down laid they him limb-weary, 
 
 O'er His lifeless Head then stood O'er his lifeless head then stood 
 
 they they, 
 
 Heavily gazing at Heaven's . . . heavily gazing at heaven's Chieftain. 
 
 Kemble's rendering of the poem, wonderfully correct and 
 conscientious as a translation, is inferior in poetical merit to that 
 of Stephens, who, as we see, instead of choosing modern words, 
 is careful to retain many of the picturesque old rune equivalents. 
 This we perceive at once if we compare Stephens' four lines, 
 beginning " Christ was on Rood tree " with Kemble's : 
 
 " Christ was on the Cross 
 but thither hastening 
 men came from afar 
 to the noble one." 3 
 
 The runes are sharply and beautifully cut into the margin of 
 two sides of the Cross, the inside spaces being filled with 
 sculptured ornaments, representing a conventional, clambering 
 vine, with leaves and fruit. Entwined among the leaves are 
 curious birds and animals devouring the grapes. On the south- 
 east and south-west sides are figures taken chiefly from the 
 Bible, with Latin inscriptions instead of runes. In the middle 
 compartment of each of these sides is the figure of our Lord 
 with a cruciform halo. On the south-west side of the Cross He 
 is represented as treading on the heads of two swine, His right 
 arm upraised in blessing, a scroll being in His left hand. 
 
 1 Hero, from Hilde the war god. Battle brave, captain 
 a Anything strown or cast a missile of any kind. 
 * Poetry of the Vercelli Codex.
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA 217 
 
 Around the margin is a legend in old Latin uncial letters, 
 " Jesus Christ the Judge of equity. Beasts and dragons knew 
 in the desert the Saviour of the world." 
 
 In the corresponding panel on the south side, St Mary 
 Magdalen washes the feet of our Lord, who is standing nearly 
 in the same position. The remaining subjects are a figure 
 which has been sometimes described as that of the Eternal 
 Father, and again as St John the Baptist, with the Agnus Dei ; 
 St Paul and St Anthony breaking a loaf in the desert ; the 
 Flight into Egypt ; two figures unexplained ; a man seated on 
 the ground with a bow, taking aim ; the Visitation ; our Lord 
 healing the man born blind ; the Annunciation ; and traces 
 almost obliterated, of the Crucifixion, on the bottom panel of 
 the south-west side. 
 
 On the top stone is a bird, probably meant for a dove, 
 resting on a branch with the rune which Stephens took to be 
 Cadmon M<z Pawed. On the reverse side of this stone are St 
 John and his eagle, with a partly destroyed Latin inscription, 
 In princ'ipio erat verbum. All the subjects are explained by a 
 legend running round the margin, but which is in parts scarcely 
 legible. 
 
 Sir John Sinclair, in his account of the parish of Ruthwell, 
 mentions a tradition, according to which, this column having 
 been set up in remote times at a place called Priestwoodside 
 (now Priestside), near the sea, it was drawn from thence by a 
 team of oxen belonging to a widow. During the transit inland 
 the chain broke, which accident was supposed to denote that 
 heaven willed it to be set up in that place. This was done, and 
 a church was built over the Cross. 
 
 But opposed to this story is the fact that the obelisk is 
 composed of the same red and grey sandstone which abounds 
 in that part of Dumfriesshire, and it seems far more likely that 
 the Cross was here hewn and sculptured than that it should 
 have been brought from a distance after having been adorned 
 Jn so costly a manner and with a definite purpose. It was held
 
 218 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 in great veneration till the middle of the sixteenth century, and 
 being specially protected by the powerful family of Murray of 
 Cockpool, the patrons and chief proprietors of the parish, it 
 escaped the blind fury of the iconoclasts till 1644. Then, 
 however, it was broken into three pieces as " an object of 
 superstition among the vulgar." 
 
 For more than a century the column apparently lay where 
 it fell, on the site of what had once been the altar of the church, 
 and was made to serve as a bench for members of the congre- 
 gation to sit upon. 
 
 In 1722, Pennant saw it still lying inside the church, 
 but soon after this, better accommodation being required for 
 the congregation, it was turned out into the churchyard to 
 make room for modern improvements ! Here it suffered 
 greatly from repeated mutilations, the churchyard being then 
 nearly unenclosed. 
 
 In 1802, the weather-cock of opinion having again veered 
 round, the then incumbent, Dr Duncan, desiring to preserve 
 this "object of superstition," now become a precious relic, 
 had the main shaft removed to his newly-enclosed manse 
 garden where it remained till 1887, when an apse being 
 added to the church, the Cross was again enclosed within the 
 building. Meanwhile two other fragments had entirely dis- 
 appeared. The cross-beam has never been recovered, 1 but 
 the top - stone suddenly reappeared in the following curious 
 manner : 
 
 A poor man and his wife having died within a few days of 
 each other, it was decided to bury them both in one grave. 
 For this it was necessary to dig deeper than usual, and in 
 doing so, the grave-digger came upon an obstacle which proved 
 to be a block of red sandstone with sculptured figures upon it. 
 This block was found to be the missing top-stone of the 
 Cross. 
 
 1 Transverse arms were supplied in 1823. A. S. Cook, The Dream of 
 the Rood,
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBRIA 219 
 
 One point still needs explanation. When Pennant saw the 
 Cross in the early part of the eighteenth century, before the 
 buried fragment had been excavated, it measured 20 feet 
 in height. At the present day, although the top has been 
 replaced, the height of the column does not exceed 17 feet 
 6 inches, a circumstance that can only be accounted for 
 by the supposition that the obelisk may have sunk several feet 
 into the ground in the interval. 
 
 The spirit that breathes in The Dream of the Rood is strongly 
 imbued with national elements. The doctrine and sentiments 
 are strictly Catholic, but the poem is at the same time an 
 epitome of what St Cuthbert and the monks of Lindisfarne, the 
 royal Abbess Hilda, Caedmon, and now it appears Cynewulf 
 also had been long doing for Northumbria, in taking what was 
 grand and heroic in the old heathen traditions, and leading up 
 through them to Christianity. But if this influence can be 
 distinctly traced in the runes on the Ruthwell Cross, yet another 
 element is seen in its ornamentation, which carries us back to 
 the Christian tombs in the Roman catacombs where its proto- 
 types are to be found. 
 
 On the Bewcastle Cross there is less of the national element 
 and more of the Roman, fewer runes and more of this kind of 
 sculpture. A few feet from the parish church, and within the 
 precincts of a large Roman station, guarded by a double vallum, 
 stands the shaft of what was formerly an Anglo-Saxon funeral 
 cross of most graceful shape and design. This column, 14 feet 
 in height, is quadrangular, and formed of one entire block 
 of grey freestone, inserted in a broader base of blue stone. 
 The side facing westward has suffered most from storm and 
 rain. It bears on its surface two sculptured figures, and the 
 principal runic inscription. The lower figure, that representing 
 our Lord, has been much mutilated by accident or design. He 
 stands as He is seen on the Ruthwell Cross, with His feet on the 
 heads of swine, as trampling down all unclean things. His 
 right hand is uplifted in blessing, in His left hand is a scroll.
 
 220 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Above is St John the Baptist holding the Agnus Dei, and near 
 the top are the remains of the Latin word Christus. 
 The runic inscription has been translated thus : 
 
 " This slender sign-beacon 
 set was by Hwoetred, 
 Wothgar, Olufwolth, 
 after Alcfrith 
 Once King 
 eke son of Oswin 
 Bid (pray) for the high sin of his soul." 
 
 Beneath these runes is the figure of a man in a long robe 
 with a hood over his head, and a bird, probably a falcon, on his 
 left wrist This figure is supposed to represent Alcfrid himself. 
 Immediately below the falcon is an upright piece of wood with 
 a transverse bar at the top, possibly meant for the bird's perch. 
 On the east side there are no runes, but a vine is sculptured in 
 low relief within a border. Dr Haigh observed that the design 
 on this side was the same as on the two sides of the Ruthwell 
 Cross. 1 The north and the south sides are in a state of good 
 preservation, and are covered with a beautiful design in knot- 
 work, and alternate lines of foliage, flowers, and fruit. On the 
 north side there is a long panel fitted with chequers, which have 
 given rise to a good deal of controversy among antiquaries. 
 Camden thought them to be the arms of the De Vaux family, 
 and when this theory was exploded, Mr Howard of Corby 
 Castle reversed it, and suggested that the chequers on the De 
 Vaux arms were taken from this monument But the Rev. 
 John Maughan, B.A., rector of Bewcastle, in a note to his tract 
 on this place, cites instances of chequers or diaper-work in 
 Scythian, Egyptian, Gallic, and Roman art, and proves from 
 the Book of Kings that there were " nets of chequered work " 
 in the Temple of Solomon. After remarking that this is a 
 natural form of ornamentation he calls attention to the frequent 
 use made of it in mediaeval illuminations. 2 
 
 1 Archaologia Aeliana, p. 169. 
 
 2 Arckaologtcal Journal, vol. xi.
 
 THE RUNIC CROSSES OF NORTHUMBR1A 221 
 
 Above this panel are the words " Myrcna Kiing," and over 
 the next piece of knot-work is seen the name "Wulfhere" 
 (King of the Mercians). Then follows another vine, and above 
 all are three crosses and the holy name " Jesus." On the south 
 side runs a runic inscription thus : 
 
 "In the first year 
 of the King 
 of ric (realm) this 
 Ecgfrith," 
 
 The last line of the inscription is so broken that it can only 
 be guessed at 1 
 
 Fine as this obelisk is, we should be at a loss to make out 
 that it was ever a cross, but for a slip of paper which was found 
 in Camden's own copy of his Britannia (ed. 1607), now in the 
 Bodleian Library. On the slip of paper was written this 
 memorandum : " I received this morning a ston from my lord 
 of Arundel, sent him from my lord William. It was the head 
 of a cross at Bucastle : and the letters legable are these on one 
 line, and I have sett to them such as I can gather out of my 
 alphabetts : that like an A I can find in non. But wither this 
 may be only letters or words I somewhat doubt" 
 
 Neither Camden nor any one else got much further than 
 this for many years ; and the general ignorance of runes is the 
 more to be deplored since it led to a carelessness and want of 
 interest in the preservation of priceless relics, even among 
 antiquaries. The stone which thus came into Camden's posses- 
 sion has utterly disappeared, and the inscription which he tried 
 in vain to decipher, and which might have thrown light on a 
 mysterious subject, is thus lost to us. 
 
 In conclusion, we may, for the sake of clearness, recapitulate, 
 first : that although there can no longer be any reasonable 
 doubt that the runes on the Ruthwell obelisk are by the 
 Northumbrian poet, Cynewulf, it has by no means been 
 
 1 Cumberland and Westmoreland Antiquarian and Archaeological 
 Society. Bewcastle and its Cross, by W. Nanson, p. 215.
 
 222 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 satisfactorily proved that these runes are of a subsequent date 
 to the West-Saxon version of the poem in the Vercelli Codex, 
 but that probability seems rather to point to an earlier 
 date than the second half of the tenth century ; and secondly, 
 that so close a resemblance between the two Crosses does not 
 necessarily imply that they date from absolutely the same 
 period. The royal obelisk at Bewcastle must have been a 
 famous monument in its day, known and celebrated far and 
 wide, and it would not be unlikely that even a hundred years 
 later it might be called upon to serve, to some extent, as a 
 model for that Cross which was to immortalise the Dream of 
 which Northumbrians were naturally proud. If, however, the 
 runes on the Bewcastle Cross fix its date as the latter part of 
 the seventh century, those on the Ruthwell Cross cannot be 
 earlier than the eighth century. 
 
 Had the zeal, directed nearly four hundred years ago against 
 our national treasures, been bestowed on their preservation, we 
 should have reason indeed to congratulate ourselves on the 
 beauty of many of our public monuments. Instead of mutilated 
 remains, we should have works of art which, but for the gentle 
 hand of time, would be as perfect as when they left the master's 
 hand. 
 
 But there has never been a period when the intelligent 
 study of the past, whether in palaeography, philology, or history, 
 has been so highly cultivated as in the present day. If we have 
 lost the inspiration that creates, we have, at least, learned to 
 venerate and cherish the noble works of our progenitors.
 
 II 
 
 A MISSING PAGE FROM THE IDYLLS OF 
 THE KING 
 
 ALTHOUGH the Morte cf Arthur was one of the first books 
 printed in the English language, the great semi-historical 
 figure of Arthur, together with his Knights of the Round Table, 
 and all their romantic exploits, had well-nigh died out of the 
 memory of the English people when Tennyson published his 
 Idylls of the King. 
 
 The Morte d 'Arthur was translated, according to Caxton, 
 by Sir Thomas Malory, who took it "out of certain books of 
 French and reduced it into English." But it is no mere 
 translation of the older romances, which Malory rather 
 adopted as the basis of his work, moulding them to suit his 
 more refined taste and fancy, much as Chaucer used 
 Boccaccio's tales, and Shakespeare a century after Malory 
 adopted the plots and outlines of inferior playwrights. 
 
 Placed midway between the works of Chaucer and Shake- 
 speare, the book, which has been aptly described as a prose- 
 poem, is one of the happiest illustrations possible of the 
 language, manners, modes of thought and expression prevalent 
 in England in the fifteenth century. Chivalry was not yet dead, 
 ideals were still cherished, the feudal system still obtained, 
 Gothic architecture had not yet said its last word, Englishmen 
 were papal to the backbone, and religion was a potent factor 
 in their lives, in spite of much that was harsh, crude, and 
 
 223
 
 224 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 violent " Herein," said Caxton, " may be seen noble chivalry, 
 courtesy, humanity, friendliness, hardiness, love, friendship, 
 cowardice, murder, hate, virtue, sin. Do after the good, and 
 leave the evil, and it shall bring you to good fame and 
 renomm^e." 
 
 The Morte d 1 Arthur was finished in the ninth year of 
 Edward IV., that is in 1470, and Caxton printed the first 
 edition of the book in black letter, in 1485. Of this edition, 
 now almost priceless, only two copies are known to exist, 
 both of which are in private collections. One of these is in 
 the United States, the other, slightly defective, is in the 
 possession of Lord Spencer, who has also in his library at 
 Althorp the only known copy of the second edition, printed 
 in 1498 by Wynkyn de Worde, who took over Caxton's 
 presses at his death. Of the third edition (1529), also printed 
 by Wynkyn de Worde, a copy is in the British Museum. It 
 is incomplete inasmuch as the title, preface, and part of the 
 table of contents are wanting. 
 
 The British Museum possesses two other copies, one 
 printed by William Copland in 1557, the other a folio without 
 date, published by East All these editions are in black 
 letter. 
 
 Whether we agree with Caxton that " it might full well 
 be aretted great folly and blindness to say or think that 
 there was never such a king called Arthur," or whether we 
 are of those "divers men who hold opinion that all such 
 books as be made of him be but fayne matters and fables, 
 because that some chronicles make of him no mention, nor 
 remember him nothing, nor of his knights," we must admit 
 that at least incidentally, the Morte d Arthur is a picture of 
 British faith and pious practices. Its composition is mediaeval, 
 and represents the tone of thought common in the world 
 as distinct from the cloister, in the Middle Ages ; but it is 
 also a true exponent of an earlier period still, when Lucius, 
 the British chief, sent messengers to Rome to beg Pope
 
 A MISSING PAGE 225 
 
 Eleutherius to admit him into the Fold of Christ, and to send 
 missionaries to instruct his people in the Faith. Comparing 
 the Idylls of the King with Malory's book, we are irre- 
 sistibly reminded of certain Catholic books of devotion " expur- 
 gated " or " adapted " for members of the Church of England. 
 All that savours too much of popery is left out. There is, no 
 doubt, a strong Protestant prejudice in Tennyson, struggling 
 with his sense of artistic beauty, and repeatedly Protestantism 
 wins the day. We cannot always quarrel with him for his 
 selection, because, although the modern mind is not a whit 
 cleaner than the mediaeval mind, there is an unwritten conven- 
 tion, that at all events a spade shall not now be called a spade, 
 at least in polite society, and Tennyson wrote exclusively for 
 the polite. In the Middle Ages evil was spoken of plainly 
 as in Scripture ; there was no blinking of facts, no dressing-up 
 of vice to make it look like virtue, and consequently much 
 " bowdlerising " was necessary before Malory's outspoken 
 language should be sufficiently veiled to suit the suscepti- 
 bilities, to which we have a perfect and legitimate right in so 
 far as they are genuine, and no cloak for an hypocrisy that 
 delights in the loathsome indecencies and disgusting sugges- 
 tiveness of the modern problem novel. 
 
 But what we do regret is that apart from the coarseness, 
 and even from a mere dramatic point of view, much that 
 Tennyson rejected is finer than anything he took. His 
 Lancelot is a grand conception, as mournfully, but with noble 
 self-abasement, he says : 
 
 " .... in me there dwells 
 No greatness, save it be some far-off touch 
 Of greatness to know well I am not great." 
 
 He is the very knight of courtesy, in chivalry above all 
 other knights save Arthur so strong that "whom he smote 
 he overthrew " ; he is brave, noble, scornful, and " falsely true,' 
 but he is not the Lancelot of the Morte cf Arthur. 
 
 P
 
 226 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 The story of Lancelot is incomplete in the Idylls, and by 
 incompleteness we do not mean only that it is deprived of 
 its denouement, of the climax up to which it has been work- 
 ing from the beginning, but that there is also to be noted 
 the conspicuous absence of a refrain that should be there 
 throughout. It is true that at the end of "Lancelot and 
 Elaine," one single line hints vaguely at the penance 
 that was to atone for his sad and sin-stained life, where he is 
 described as 
 
 " Not knowing he should die a holy man." 
 
 And in another place the long account of his confession, 
 absolution, contrition, and the exhortation of the priest is 
 slurred over in these words relating to the poisonous weeds 
 that twined and clung round the wholesome flowers of his 
 life : 
 
 " Then I spake 
 
 To one most holy saint, who wept and said 
 That save they could be plucked asunder all 
 My quest were but in vain ; to whom I vowed 
 That I would work according as he willed." 
 
 If we compare this with what Malory said, we shall see 
 the total inadequacy of Tennyson's treatment of the episode 
 which left out the whole root of the matter : 
 
 How Sir Lancelot was shriven, and what sorrow he made, 
 and of the good examples that were showed him. 
 
 Then Sir Lancelot wept with heavy cheer and said, " Now 
 I know well ye say me sooth." " Sir," said the good man, " hide 
 none old sin from me." " Truly," said Sir Lancelot, " that were 
 me full loth to discover. For this fourteen years I never 
 discovered one thing that I have used and to that may I now 
 blame my shame and my misadventure." And then he told 
 there, that good man, all his life, and how he had loved a 
 queen unmeasurably, and out of measure long ; " and all my 
 great deeds of arms that I have done I did the most part for
 
 A MISSING PAGE 227 
 
 the queen's sake, and for her sake would I do battle, were it 
 right or wrong, and never did I battle all only for God's 
 sake, but for to win worship and to cause me to be the 
 better beloved, and little or nought I thanked God of it." 
 Then Sir Lancelot said, " I pray you counsel me." " I will 
 counsel you," said the hermit, " if ye will ensure me that ye 
 will never come in that queen's fellowship, as much as ye 
 may forbare." And then Sir Lancelot promised him he would 
 not, by the faith of his body. " Look that your heart and 
 your mouth accord," said the good man, "and I shall ensure 
 you ye shall have more worship than ever ye had." . . . Then 
 the good man enjoined Sir Lancelot such penance as he 
 might do, and to sue knighthood, and so he assoiled him, 
 and prayed Sir Lancelot to abide with him all that day. 
 " I will well," said Sir Lancelot, " for I have neither helm, nor 
 horse, nor sword." " As for that," said the good man, " I 
 shall help you to-morn at even of an horse and all that 
 longeth unto you." And then Sir Lancelot repented him 
 greatly. 
 
 After this he meets with another hermit who gives him a 
 hair shirt to wear as a penance, and riding on in pursuit of 
 his quest, the Holy Grail, Lancelot next comes to a Cross, " and 
 took that for his host as for that night. And so he put his 
 horse to pasture, and did off his helm and his shield, and made 
 his prayers unto the Cross that he never fall in deadly sin 
 again. And so he laid him down to sleep." Further on, we 
 are told, as a sign of his sincerity and perseverance that " the 
 hair pricked so Sir Lancelot's skin that it grieved him full 
 sore, but he took it meekly and suffered the pain." 
 
 Tennyson records no fights with conscience, no turning 
 towards the light, no sorrowful confessions at all. He has 
 given us a great deal, but it is not too much to say that 
 what he rejected, a Catholic poet would have seized with 
 delight as the purplest patches of his epic, and the climax to 
 which the whole story led.
 
 228 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 The same remarks do not altogether apply to Tennyson's 
 conception of Arthur's character. Although there is much 
 that is fine and beautiful in him, as he is portrayed in the 
 older legends, although, when pierced with many wounds, he 
 fought on valiantly, because he was " so full of knighthood 
 that knightly he endured the pain," it is Tennyson who has 
 exalted him into " the blameless king," 4< the highest creature 
 here," and if it had only been for what he has given us in 
 King Arthur, the Idylls would have been worth writing. 
 Still even here he leaves out all those Catholic touches which 
 went to make up the life and soul of British Christianity, the 
 custom of beginning each day with the hearing of Mass, 
 the frequent allusions to the Pope as the Head of Christen- 
 dom, the mention of prayers for the dead, of penance, and 
 so on. 
 
 When Arthur had defied the Roman Emperor, who had 
 sent to claim tribute, and had carried his victorious arms to 
 the gates of the Eternal City, the legend says that senators 
 and cardinals came out and sued for peace. They invited 
 him in, and there he was crowned emperor "with all the 
 solemnity that could be made, and by the Pope's own 
 hands." King Mark of Cornwall, for reasons of his own, 
 wanted to rid himself of Tristram, and set about it in this wily 
 manner : 
 
 He let do counterfeit letters from the Pope, and made 
 a strange clerk for to bear them unto King Mark, the 
 which letters specified that King Mark should make him 
 ready upon pain of cursing, with his host for to come to the 
 Pope, to help to go to Jerusalem for to make war upon the 
 Saracens. 
 
 Mark, pretending that he could not leave home, proposed 
 that Sir Tristram should go in his place, since the command of 
 the Pope must be obeyed. " But," said Sir Tristram, " sythen 
 the apostle Pope hath sent for him, bid him go thither himself." 
 "Well," said King Mark, "yet shall he be beguiled," and
 
 A MISSING PAGE 229 
 
 counterfeited other letters, and the letters specified that the 
 Pope desired Sir Tristram to come himself to make war upon 
 the Saracens. But Tristram began to suspect the King of 
 Cornwall of treachery, and at last Mark was obliged to walk 
 into the trap which he had set for his enemy, and to take an 
 oath " that he would go himself unto the Pope of Rome for to 
 war upon the Saracens." 
 
 Malory's book abounds in such illustrations and side lights 
 as these, but enough has been said to show how entirely the 
 modern poet has suppressed the part played by the Pope 
 in the lives of Englishmen, at least, up to the time of 
 Edward IV. 
 
 One other instance of this pre-reformation doctrine belongs 
 to the story of Lancelot, and will be given in its proper place. 
 We may remark here that whatever the shortcomings of some 
 of Arthur's knights, they one and all evinced a lively faith, 
 profound veneration for holy things, and a truly Catholic 
 desire for reconciliation with God, through the reception of 
 the Sacraments, whenever they fell into sin. Thus, the 
 knights who were convened to assist at Arthur's coronation 
 "made them clean of their lives, that their prayers might be 
 the more acceptable unto God." And when Balan fought 
 with his brother, Balyn, by mistake, and both were mortally 
 wounded, Balan entreated the lady of the Tower to send for 
 a priest : " Yea," said the lady, " it shall be done," and so she 
 sent for a priest to give them their rights. " Now," said Balyn, 
 " when we are buried in one tomb, and the mention made over 
 us how two brethren slew each other, there will never good 
 knight nor good man see our tomb but they will pray for 
 our souls." 
 
 Wherever the knights-errant slept, they never set out on 
 their journey on the morrow without first hearing Mass ; and 
 if they had been riding all night and came to a chapel in the 
 morning they " avoided their horses and heard Mass." There 
 are many allusions to devotion to the Blessed Virgin, and on
 
 230 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 one occasion a tournament was proclaimed in honour of her 
 Assumption. 
 
 In the poem " Lancelot and Elaine," Tennyson has followed 
 closely on the lines of the original story, both as to general 
 design and detail. The idyll " Geraint and Enid " does not, 
 of course, belong to this history at all, but is taken from the 
 " Mabinogian," a collection of Welsh legends translated into 
 English by Lady Charlotte Elizabeth Guest. 
 
 The " Coming of Arthur," as related in the idyll, is through- 
 out an invention of Tennyson's, or culled from other sources, 
 and differs entirely from the story of Arthur's origin as told 
 by Malory. 
 
 But the legend that has suffered the most from poetical 
 license is that of the " Holy Grail." 
 
 When the young Galahad, Lancelot's son, had been brought 
 to Arthur's court, had been dubbed knight, and had sat in the 
 mystical " siege perilous," fashioned by the wizard Merlin, he 
 drew the sword from the magic stone that hovered over the 
 water, and which no other knight could take. Then the queen, 
 hearing of these marvels, and of his great exploits and chivalry, 
 desired greatly to see Sir Galahad, and as he was riding by, 
 " the king, at the queen's request, made him to alight and to 
 unlace his helm, that Queen Guinevere might see him in the 
 visage. And when she beheld him she said : Sothely, 
 I dare well say that Sir Lancelot begat him, for never two 
 men resembled more in likeness. Therefore it is no marvel 
 though he be of great prowess. So a lady that stood by the 
 queen said, Madam, for God's sake, ought he of right to be so 
 good a knight ? Yea, forsooth, said the queen, for he is 
 of all parties come of the best knights of the world, and of the 
 highest lineage. For Sir Lancelot is comen of the eighth degree 
 from our Lord Jesu Christ, and Sir Galahad is of the ninth 
 degree, therefore I dare well say that they ben the greatest 
 gentlemen of all the world." 
 
 After the meeting between Sir Galahad and the queen, the
 
 A MISSING PAGE 231 
 
 book goes on to say that the king and all the estates went home 
 to Camelot, and that as they sat at Supper, the Holy Grail 
 appeared. 
 
 Tennyson relates the vision almost in Malory's own words. 
 
 Sir Perceval, having retired from the world, tells the monk, 
 Ambrosius, the history of the quest : 
 
 "And all at once, as there we sat, we heard 
 A cracking and a riving of the roofs, 
 And rending, and a blast, and overhead 
 Thunder, and in the thunder was a cry. 
 And in the blast there smote along the hall 
 A beam of light seven times more clear than day : 
 And down the long beam stole the Holy Grail, 
 All over covered with a luminous cloud, 
 And none might see who bare it, and it past. 
 But every knight beheld his fellow's face. 
 As in a glory, and all the knights arose, 
 And staring each at other like dumb men 
 Stood, till I found a voice and sware a vow. 
 I sware a vow before them all that I, 
 Because I had not seen the Grail would ride 
 A twelvemonth and a day in quest of it, 
 Until I found and saw it, as the nun 
 My sister saw it ; and Galahad sware the vow, 
 And good Sir Bors, our Lancelot's cousin sware, 
 And Lancelot sware, and many among the knights, 
 And Gawayn sware, and louder than the rest." 
 
 It was, in fact, Sir Gawayn who spoke first : 
 " Certainly [said he] " we ought greatly to thank our Lord 
 Jesu Christ, for that he hath shewed us this day of what meats 
 and drinks we thought on, but one thing beguiled us, we might 
 not see the Holy Grail, it was so preciously covered. Wherefore 
 I will make here a vow, that to-morrow, without any longer 
 abiding, I shall labour in the quest of the Sancgreall, that I 
 shall hold me out a twelvemonths and a day, and more if need 
 be, and never shall I return again unto the court, till I have 
 seen it more openly than it hath been seen here." When they 
 of the Round Table heard Sir Gawayn say so, they arose, the 
 most part of them, and avowed the same.
 
 232 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 As the knights rode out of Camelot to begin their quest 
 there was weeping of the rich and of the poor at their departure. 
 " The queen made great moan and wailing, and the king might 
 not speak for weeping." After some adventures Sir Perceval 
 comes to a chapel to hear Mass, and there he sees a sick king 
 lying on a couch behind the altar ; and he was covered with 
 wounds : 
 
 " Then he left his looking and heard his service, and when it 
 came to the sacring, he that lay within the perclose dressed him 
 up and uncovered his head. And then him beseemed a passing 
 old man, and he had a crown of gold on his head, and ever he 
 held up his hands and said on high : Fair, sweet father, Jesu 
 Christ, forget not me. And so he laid him down. But always 
 he was in his prayers and orisons. And when the Mass was 
 done, the priest took our Lord's body and bare it unto the sick 
 king. And when he had received it he did off his crown, and 
 he commanded the crown to be set on the altar." 
 
 This king's name was Evelake. He had been converted by 
 Saint Joseph of Arimathaea, who was sent by our Lord "to 
 preach and teach the Christian faith." " Evelake," says the 
 legend, " followed Joseph of Arimathaea into England, to which 
 country he brought the Holy Grail, the cup in which our Lord 
 celebrated the institution of the Blessed Sacrament" This cup 
 or chalice is said to have contained some drops of the Precious 
 Blood. 
 
 And ever Evelake was busy to be there as the Sancgreall 
 was. And upon a time he nighed it so nigh that our Lord was 
 displeased with him. But ever he followed it more and more, 
 till that God struck him almost blind. Then this king cried 
 mercy, and said : " Fair Lord, let me never die till that the 
 good knight of my blood of the ninth degree be comen, that I 
 may see him openly, when he shall achieve the Sancgreall, that 
 I may once kiss him." 
 
 This " good knight " was, of course, Sir Galahad. Meanwhile, 
 " Sir Lancelot rode overthwart and endlong in a wild forest,
 
 A MISSING PAGE 233 
 
 and held no path but as wild adventure led him. And at the 
 last he came to a stony Cross which departed two ways in waste 
 land, and by the Cross was a stone that was of marble, but it 
 was so dark that Sir Lancelot might not wit what it was. Then 
 Sir Lancelot looked by him, and saw an old chapel, and there 
 he wend to have found people. And Sir Lancelot tied his horse 
 till a tree, and there he did off his shield and hung it upon a 
 tree. And then he went to the chapel door, and found it waste 
 and broken. And within he found a fair altar full richly arrayed 
 with cloth of clean silk, and there stood a fair clean candlestick 
 which bare six great candles, and the candlestick was of silver. 
 And when Sir Lancelot saw this light he had great will for to 
 enter into the chapel, but he could find no place where he might 
 enter ; then was he passing heavy and dismayed. Then he 
 returned and came to his horse, and did off his saddle and 
 bridle, and let him pasture ; and unlaced his helm, and ungirded 
 his sword, and laid him down to sleep upon his shield tofore the 
 Cross. And so he fell on sleep, and half waking and half sleep- 
 ing he saw, come by him, two palfreys all fair and white, the 
 which bare a litter, therein lying a sick knight. And when he 
 was nigh the Cross he there abode still. All this Sir Lancelot 
 saw and beheld, for he slept not verily, and he heard him say : 
 Oh sweet Lord, when shall this sorrow leave me, and when 
 shall the holy vessel come by me, wherethrough I shall be 
 blessed, for I have endured thus long for little trespass. And 
 thus a great while complained the knight, and always Sir 
 Lancelot heard it. With that Sir Lancelot saw the candlestick 
 with the six tapers come before the Cross, but he could see 
 nobody that brought it And then came a table of silver, and 
 the holy vessel of the Sancgreall, the which Sir Lancelot had 
 seen tofore. And there withal the sick knight set him upright 
 and held up both his hands and said : Fair, sweet Lord, which 
 is here within this holy vessel, take heed to me that I may be 
 whole of this great malady. And therewith, upon his hands 
 and upon his knees, he went so nigh that he touched the holy
 
 234 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 vessel and kissed it. And anon he was whole, and then he said : 
 Lord God, I thank thee for I am healed of this malady. So 
 when the holy vessel had been there a great while, it went unto 
 the chapel again with the candlestick and the light, so that Sir 
 Lancelot wist not where it became, for he was overtaken with 
 sin that he had no power to arise against the holy vessel. 
 Wherefore afterwards many men said of him shame. But he 
 took repentance afterwards. 
 
 " Then the sick knight dressed him upright and kissed the 
 Cross. Then anon his squire brought his arms, and asked his 
 lord how he did. Certes, said he, I thank God right well 
 through the holy vessel I am healed. But I have great marvel 
 of this sleeping knight which hath neither had grace nor 
 power to awake during the time that this holy vessel hath been 
 here present. I dare it right well say, said the squire, that 
 this knight is defouled with some manner of deadly sin, whereof 
 he was never confessed. By my faith, said the knight, 
 whatsoever he be, he is unhappy, for, as I deem, he is of the 
 noble fellowship of the Round Table, the which is entered 
 into the quest of the Sancgreall. Sir, said the squire, 
 here I have brought you all your arms save your helm and 
 your sword, and therefore, by mine assent now may ye take 
 this knight's helm and his sword, and so he did. And 
 when he was clean armed he took Sir Lancelot's horse, for 
 he was better than his own, and so they departed from the 
 Cross. 
 
 " Then anon Sir Lancelot awaked and sat himself upright, 
 and bethought him what he had there seen, and whether it were 
 dreams or not. Right so heard he a voice that said, Sir 
 Lancelot, more harder than is the stone, and more bitter than is 
 the wood, and more naked and barer than is the leaf of the 
 fig-tree, therefore go thou from hence, and withdraw thee from 
 this holy place. And when Sir Lancelot heard this he was 
 passing heavy and wist not what to do, and so departed sore 
 weeping, and cursed the time that he was born. For then he
 
 A MISSING PAGE 23o 
 
 deemed never to have had worship more. For those words 
 went to his heart till that he knew wherefore he was 
 called so. 
 
 " Then Sir Lancelot went to the Cross, and found his helm, 
 his sword, and his horse taken away. And then he called 
 himself a very wretch, and most unhappy of all knights. And 
 there he said, My sin and my wickedness have brought me 
 unto great dishonour. For when I sought worldly adventures 
 for worldly desires I ever achieved them, and had the better 
 in every place, and never was I discomfited in no quarrel, were 
 it right or wrong. And now I take upon me the adventure of 
 holy things, and now I see and understand that mine old sin 
 hindreth me and shameth me, so that I had no power to stir nor 
 to speak when the holy blood appeared afore me. So thus he 
 sorrowed till it was day, and heard the fowls of the air sing. Then 
 was he somewhat comforted, and departed from the Cross on foot 
 in a wild forest, and there he found a hermitage, and a hermit 
 therein that was going to Mass. And then Sir Lancelot kneeled 
 down on both his knees, and cried our Lord mercy for his 
 wicked works that he had done. When Mass was done, Sir 
 Lancelot called the hermit to him and prayed him for charity 
 to hear his life. With a good will, said the good man. Sir, 
 said he, be ye of King Arthur's court, and of the fellowship of 
 the Round Table? Yea, forsooth, and my name is Sir 
 Lancelot du Lake that hath been right well said of, and now my 
 good fortune is changed, for I am the most wretched and caitiff 
 of the world. 
 
 " Then the hermit beheld him, and had great marvel how he 
 was so sore abashed. Sir, said the good man, ye ought to 
 thank God more than any knight living, for He hath caused you 
 to have more worldly worship than any, and for your presumption 
 to take upon you in deadly sin for to be in His presence where 
 His flesh and His blood was, that caused you ye might not see 
 it with your worldly eyes. For He will not appear where such 
 sinners be, but it be unto their great hurt and shame. And
 
 236 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 there is no knight living now that ought to give unto God so 
 great thank as ye. For He hath given to you beauty, seemliness, 
 and great strength above all other knights, and, therefore, ye are 
 the more beholden to God than any man, to love Him and to 
 dread Him ; for your strength and manhood will little avail you, 
 and God be against you." 
 
 Then Lancelot makes his confession to the hermit as we 
 have already related, is assailed, and repents him greatly. He 
 remained three days with the hermit, and being then newly pro- 
 vided with a horse, helmet, and sword, he took his leave and rode 
 away. After this occurs the episode at the Cross, and his 
 receiving the hair shirt. On the morrow he jousted with many 
 knights, and for the first time was thrown and overcome, all 
 which he endured patiently as penance for his sins. That 
 night he laid himself down to sleep under an apple-tree and 
 dreamed a strange dream. At dawn he arose, armed himself 
 and went on his way. He next came to a chapel " where was a 
 recluse which had a window that she might look up to the altar, 
 and all aloud she called Sir Lancelot, and asked him whence he 
 came, what he was, and what he went to seek." He told her all 
 his dreams and visions, which she expounded, and gave him 
 pious counsel, but told him that he was " of evil faith and poor 
 belief." 
 
 About this time he met Sir Galahad, and knew that he 
 was his son. Then, after various adventures, he came as 
 near the Holy Grail as it was given to him to come. As 
 he was kneeling before a closed door in a castle "he 
 heard a voice which sang sweetly, that it seemed none 
 earthly thing. And him thought that the voice said, Joy 
 and Honour be to the Father of Heaven. Then Sir 
 Lancelot wist well that there was the Sancgreall in that 
 chamber." Then he prayed. 
 
 " And with that the chamber door opened, and there came 
 out a great clearness, that the house was so bright as though all 
 the torches of the world had been there. And anon he would
 
 A MISSING PAGE 237 
 
 have entered, but a voice said, Flee, Sir Lancelot, and enter 
 not, for and if thou enter thou shalt forethink it. Then he 
 withdrew him aback, and was right heavy in his mind. Then 
 looked he up in the midst of the room and saw a table of silver, 
 and the holy vessel covered with red samite, and so many 
 angels about it, whereof one of them held a candle of wax 
 burning, and the other held a Cross and the ornaments of the 
 altar. And before the holy vessel he saw a good man, clothed 
 like a priest, and it seemed that he was at the sacring of the 
 Mass. 
 
 " And it seemed unto Sir Lancelot that, above the priest's 
 hands, there were three men, whereof the two put the youngest 
 by likeliness between the priest's hands, and so he lift it 
 upright high, and it seemed to show unto the people. And 
 then Sir Lancelot marvelled not a little, for him thought 
 the priest was so greatly charged of the figure that him 
 seemed he should have fallen to the ground ; and when he 
 saw none about him, he came to the door a great pace, and 
 said : 
 
 "Fair sweet Father, Jesu Christ, me take it for no sin, 
 though I help the good man, which hath great need of help. 
 Right so he entered into the chamber, and came toward the 
 table of silver. And when he came nigh he felt a breath that 
 him thought it was intermeddled with fire, which smote him 
 so sore in the visage that him thought it all to brent his 
 visage." 
 
 This is the culminating point of Lancelot's quest ; he 
 swooned away, and lay as one dead for twenty-four days. 
 Nearer he might not come to the Holy Grail, and the sequel 
 shows why, for after a time he returned to the court and fell 
 into sin again, and forgot his good resolutions : 
 
 " For, as the French book saith, had not Sir Lancelot 
 been in his privy thoughts and in his mind set inwardly 
 to the queen, as he was in seeming outward unto God, 
 there had no knight passed him in the quest of the Sane-
 
 538 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 greall ; but ever his thoughts were privily upon the 
 queen." 
 
 But soon there arose a bitter quarrel between Lancelot 
 and Guinevere, and she banished him from her sight. During 
 his absence from the court she made a dinner, at which one 
 of the guests, Sir Modor, was poisoned, and the queen 
 accused of the crime. Guinevere was therefore impeached, 
 and so truly did all the Round Table believe in her guilt, 
 that at first no knight would come forward to defend 
 her. 
 
 Ultimately, however, the " good Sir Bors," Lancelot's kins- 
 man, was prevailed on to be her champion, provided that at 
 the moment of the contest a better knight did not appear, to 
 answer for her. Of course, when Sir Bors is about to enter 
 the lists in the meadow before Winchester, where there is a 
 great fire and an iron stake, at which Guinevere is to be burned 
 if her champion is overcome, a strange knight appears in 
 unknown armour, and turns out to be Lancelot, fights for 
 the queen, and overthrows her accuser. 
 
 Here comes in the exquisite story of Elaine, to which 
 Tennyson has done ample justice. 
 
 Soon after the death of the "lily maid of Astolat," Sir 
 Agravaine, moved by jealousy of Arthur's greatest knight, 
 discloses the story of Lancelot's treacherous love for the 
 queen, and extracts from the king a reluctant permission to 
 take the miscreant. But Sir Modred is the real instigator 
 of the plot, working upon Agravaine's weakness, and Tennyson 
 has altered little in the dramatic situation which immediately 
 follows. His description of the parting scene between Lancelot 
 and Guinevere is fine : 
 
 " And then they were agreed upon a night 
 (When the good King should not be there) to meet 
 And part for ever. Passion pale they met 
 And greeted : hands in hands, and eye to eye, 
 Low on the border of her couch they sat 
 Stammering and staring ; it was their last hour,
 
 A MISSING PAGE 239 
 
 A madness of farewells. And Modred brought 
 
 His creatures to the basement of the tower 
 
 For testimony ; and crying with full voice, 
 
 ' Traitor, come out, ye are trapt at last,' aroused 
 
 Lancelot, who rushing outward lion-like 
 
 Leapt on him, and hurled him headlong, and he fell 
 
 Stunned, and his creatures took and bare him off, 
 
 And all was still ; then she, 'The end is come, 
 
 And I am shamed forever ; ' and he said, 
 
 ' Mine be the shame ; mine was the sin ; but rise, 
 
 And fly to my strong castle over seas : 
 
 There will I hide thee till my life shall end, 
 
 There hold thee with my life against the world.' 
 
 She answered, ' Lancelot, wilt thou hold me so ? 
 
 Nay, friend, for we have taken our farewells. 
 
 Would God that thou coulds't hide me from myself ! ' " 
 
 Lancelot will not yield himself up lightly to his enemies ; 
 Sir Agravaine and another knight fall in the struggle with 
 him ; but it is not now that Guinevere betakes herself to 
 Almesbury, and the whole beautiful scene between her and 
 Arthur, and his most touching farewell to her are weavings of 
 the modern poet's imagination. Beautiful the scene surely is, 
 although wanting in one supreme touch, which a more 
 Catholic-minded poet would have given to it. Guinevere's sin, 
 according to Tennyson, is merely her sin against her 
 husband ; according to Malory it is her sin against God, 
 and this is the very essence of the true Guinevere's 
 repentance. 
 
 What really happens is this : Lancelot takes counsel with 
 Sir Bors and his other friends, as to how he may save the 
 queen, and it is decided that if on the morrow she is brought 
 to the fire to be burned, Lancelot and all his kinsmen shall 
 rescue her. 
 
 Accordingly, Arthur's nephews, Gawayn, Gahers, and Gareth, 
 lead Guinevere forth "without Caerleyell, and there she was 
 despoiled unto her smock, and so then her ghostly father was 
 brought to her to be shriven of her misdeeds." But Lancelot's 
 messenger gives the alarm duly, and Lancelot appears with
 
 240 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 all his friends. There is much fighting and bloodshed, and 
 Sir Gahers and Sir Gareth are slain. 
 
 " Then Sir Lancelot rode straight unto the queen, and made 
 a kirtle and a gown to be cast upon her, and then he made 
 her to be set behind him, and rode with her unto his castle of 
 Joyous Garde, and there he kept her as a noble knight should, 
 and many lords and kings send Sir Lancelot many good 
 knights. When it was known openly that King Arthur and 
 Sir Lancelot were at debate, many knights were glad of their 
 debate, and many knights were sorry. But King Arthur 
 sorrowed for pure sorrow, and said, Alas, that ever I bare 
 any crown upon my head." 
 
 Gawayn, mourning the death of his brothers, incites the 
 king to besiege Lancelot in Joyous Garde, and at length, 
 reluctantly, Arthur consents to make war. 
 
 " Of this war was noise throughout all Christendom. And 
 at last it was noised before the Pope, and he, considering the 
 great goodness of King Arthur and Sir Lancelot, which was called 
 the most noble knight of the world, wherefore the Pope called 
 unto him a noble clerk that at that time there was present : 
 the French book saith it was the Bishop of Rochester. And 
 the Pope gave him Bulls under lead, unto King Arthur of 
 England, charging him upon pain of interdiction of all England, 
 that he take his queen, Dame Guinevere, to him again, and accord 
 with Sir Lancelot." 
 
 Arthur would have made peace at once, but at first Gawayn 
 prevented him. Then the bishop went to Lancelot and charged 
 him to bring back the queen : 
 
 " And the bishop had of the king his great seal and assur- 
 ance, as he was a true anointed king, that Sir Lancelot should 
 go safe and come safe, and that the queen should not be 
 reproved of the king nor of none other, for nothing done before 
 time past" 
 
 To Lancelot the bishop ended his exhortation in these 
 words :
 
 A MISSING PAGE 241 
 
 " Wit ye well, the Pope must be obeyed." 
 
 And Lancelot answered that it was never in his thoughts to 
 withhold the queen from his lord, King Arthur, " but in so much 
 as she should have been dead for my sake, me seemeth it was 
 my part to save her life, and put her from that danger till 
 better recover might come. And now I thank God that the 
 Pope hath made her peace, for God knoweth I would be a 
 thousandfold more gladder to bring her again than I was of 
 her taking away." 
 
 So he brought Guinevere to the king, and when they had 
 both knelt before him, he said : 
 
 " My most redoubted lord ye shall understand that, by the 
 Pope's commandment and by yours, I have brought unto you 
 my lady the queen, as right requireth." Then King Arthur and 
 all the other kings kneeled down and gave thankings and louings 
 (praises) to God and to his Blessed Mother. 
 
 But Gawayn would not be reconciled to Lancelot, who in 
 vain offered to do penance for the death of Gahers and Gareth. 
 In vain he said : 
 
 " This much shall I offer you if it may please the king's good 
 grace, and you my lord Sir Gawayn. And first I shall begin at 
 Sandwich, and there I shall go in my shirt and barefoot, and at 
 every ten miles' end I will found and cause to make a house of 
 religion, of what order ye will assign me, with a whole convent, 
 to sing and to read day and night, in especial for Sir Gareth's 
 sake and Sir Gahers ; and this shall I perform from Sandwich 
 unto Caerleyell. And this, Sir Gawayn, me thinketh, were more 
 fairer and better unto their souls than that my most noble lord 
 Arthur and you should war on me, for thereby ye shall get none 
 avail." 
 
 But Gawayn answered him with hard words ending 
 thus : 
 
 " And if it were not for the Pope's commandment I should 
 do battle with my body against thy body, and prove it unto 
 thee that thou hast been false unto mine uncle, King Arthur, 
 
 Q
 
 242 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and to me both, and that shall I prove upon thy body, when 
 thou art departed from hence, wheresoever I find thee. Then 
 all the knights and ladies that were there wept as they had been 
 mad, and the tears fell upon King Arthur's cheeks. Then Sir 
 Lancelot kissed the queen before them all, took his leave, and 
 departed with all the knights of his kin." 
 
 He went to his estates over the sea ; but Gawayn gave Arthur 
 no rest till he had made ready an army and crossed the sea to 
 make war on him. Modred, in Arthur's absence, seized the 
 kingdom, and would have wedded the queen by force, had not 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury threatened to curse him with bell, 
 book, and candle. When Modred defied him, the archbishop 
 departed, and "did the curse in the most orgulous wise that 
 might be done." 
 
 But Arthur, receiving tidings of Modred's conduct, returned 
 to Dover, where the usurper met him, and " there was much 
 slaughter of gentle knights." Here Sir Gawayn was mortally 
 wounded, and Arthur " made great sorrow and moan." Two 
 hours before his death, Gawayn wrote a letter to Lancelot, 
 telling him of Modred's crime and beseeching him, " the most 
 noblest knight," to come back to the realm : 
 
 " And so at the hour of None, Sir Gawayn betook himself 
 into the hands of our Lord God, after that he had received his 
 Saviour. And then the king let bury him within a chapel 
 within the castle of Dover, and there, yet to this day, all men 
 may see the skull of Sir Gawayn, and the same wound is seen 
 that Sir Lancelot gave him in battle." 
 
 In the " Passing of Arthur " Tennyson has kept mainly to 
 the original, though he omits Arthur's command to Sir Bedevere 
 to pray for his soul. 
 
 The king, overcome by his enemies, receives his deadly 
 wound, and sails away in the barge, with the three queens, to the 
 island valley of Avilion. But, according to Malory, Sir Bedevere 
 finds him on the morrow, lying dead in a little chapel on a 
 rock :
 
 A MISSING PAGE 243 
 
 " And when Queen Guinevere understood that her lord King 
 Arthur was slain, and all the noble knights, Sir Modred and all 
 the remnant, she stole away, and five ladies with her, and so she 
 went to Almesbury, and there she let make herself a nun, and 
 wore white clothes and black, and great penance she took as 
 ever did sinful lady in this land, and never creature could make 
 her merry, but lived in fastings, prayers, and alms-deeds, that 
 all manner of people marvelled how virtuously she was changed. 
 Now leave we Queen Guinevere in Almesbury, a nun in white 
 clothes and black, and there she was abbess and ruler as reason 
 would, and turn me from her and speak me of Sir Lancelot du 
 Lake." 
 
 Meanwhile, Sir Lancelot had returned to England to avenge 
 King Arthur's death : 
 
 " Then the people told him how that he was slain, and Sir 
 Modred and a hundred thousand died on a day, and how Sir 
 Modred gave King Arthur there the first battle at his landing, 
 and there was good Sir Gawayn slain, and on the morn Sir 
 Modred fought with the king upon Barham Down, and there 
 the king put Sir Modred to the worse. Alas, said Sir 
 Lancelot, this is the heaviest tidings that ever came to me. 
 Now fair Sirs, said Sir Lancelot, shew me the tomb of Sir 
 Gawayn. And then certain people of the town brought him 
 into the castle of Dover and showed him the tomb. Then Sir 
 Lancelot kneeled down and wept and prayed heartily for his 
 soul. And that night he made a dole, and all they that would 
 come had as much flesh, fish, wine, and ale as they would, and 
 every man and woman had twelve pence come who would. 
 Thus with his own hand dealt he his money in a mourning 
 gown ; and ever he wept, and prayed them to pray for the soul 
 of Sir Gawayn. And on the morn all the priests and clerks 
 that might be gotten in the country were there and sung Mass 
 of Requiem. And there offered first Sir Lancelot, and he 
 offered an hundred pound, and then the seven kings offered 
 forty pound apiece, and also there was a thousand knights, and
 
 244 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 each of them offered a pound, and the offering dured from morn 
 till night. And Sir Lancelot lay two nights on his tomb in 
 prayers and in weeping. Then on the third day Sir Lancelot 
 called the kings, dukes, earls, barons, and knights, and said thus : 
 My fair lords, I thank you all of your coming into this country 
 with me : but we come too late, and that shall repent me while 
 I live, but against death may no man rebel. But sithen it is so, 
 said Sir Lancelot, I will myself ride and seek my lady Queen 
 Guinevere, for as I hear say she hath great pain and much 
 disease, and I heard say that she is fled into the west country, 
 therefore ye all abide me here, and but if I come not again 
 within fifteen days, then take your ships and your fellowship, 
 and depart into your country. 
 
 "Then came Sir Bors de Ganis, and said, My lord Sir 
 Lancelot, what think ye for to do, now to ride in this realm ? 
 wit thou well ye shall find few friends. Be as it may, said 
 Sir Lancelot, keep you still here, for I will forth on my 
 journey, and no man nor child shall go with me. So it was no 
 boot to strive, but he departed and rode westerly and sought 
 seven or eight days, and at the last he came to a nunnery. And 
 then was Queen Guinevere ware of Sir Lancelot as he walked 
 in the cloister. And when she saw him there she swooned 
 thrice, that all the ladies and gentlewomen had work enough to 
 hold the Queen up. So when she might speak she called the 
 ladies and gentlewomen to her and said, Ye marvel, fair ladies, 
 why I make this cheer. Truly, she said, it is for the sight of 
 yonder knight which yonder standeth, wherefore I pray you all 
 call him to me. And when Sir Lancelot was brought unto her 
 she said, through this knight and me all these wars been 
 wrought, and the death of the most noblest knights of the world. 
 For through our love that we have loved together is my most 
 noble lord slain. Therefore, wit ye well, Sir Lancelot, I am set 
 in such a plight to get my soul health ; and yet I trust through 
 God's grace after my death to have a sight of the blessed face of 
 Christ, and at the dreadful day of doom to sit on His right
 
 A MISSING PAGE 245 
 
 side, for as sinful creatures as ever was I are saints in heaven. 
 Therefore, Sir Lancelot, I require and beseech thee heartily, for 
 all the love that ever was betwixt us, that thou never see me 
 more in the visage. And furthermore I command thee on 
 God's behalf right straightly that thou forsake my company, 
 and to thy kingdom thou turn again, and keep well thy 
 realm from war and wrack. For as well as I have loved 
 thee, mine heart will not serve me to see thee ; for both 
 through me and thee is the flower of kings and knights 
 destroyed. Therefore, Sir Lancelot, go to thy realm, and there 
 take thee a wife, and live with her in joy and bliss, and I 
 pray thee heartily pray for me to our Lord, that I may amend 
 my mis-living. 
 
 "Now, sweet madam, said Sir Lancelot, would ye that I 
 should return again unto my country, and there to wed a 
 lady ? Nay, madam, wit you well, that shall I never do : for 
 I shall never be so false to you of that I have promised, 
 but the same destiny that ye have taken you unto, I will 
 take me unto, for to please God and specially to pray for 
 you. 
 
 " If thou wilt do so, said the Queen, hold thy promise. 
 But I may not believe but that thou wilt turn to the world 
 again. 
 
 " Ye say well, said he, yet wish ye me never false of my 
 promise, and God defend but that I should forsake the world 
 like as ye have done. For in the quest of the Sancgreall I had 
 forsaken the vanities of the world had not your lord been. And 
 if I had done so at that time, with my heart, will, and thought, 
 I had passed all the knights that were in the Sancgreall, except 
 Sir Galahad, my son. And therefore, lady, sithen ye have taken 
 you to perfection, I must needs take me unto perfection of 
 right. For I take record of God, in you have I had mine 
 earthly joy, and if I had found you so disposed, I had cast 
 me for to have had you into mine own realm. But sithen 
 I find you thus disposed, I ensure you faithfully that I will take
 
 246 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 me to penance, and pray while my life lasteth, if that I may 
 find any hermit, either grey or white, that will receive me. 
 Wherefore, madam, I pray you kiss me once and never 
 more. 
 
 " Nay, said the Queen, that shall I never do, but abstain 
 you from such works. And they departed. But there was 
 never so hard a hearted man but he would have wept to see 
 the dolour that they made. For there was lamentation as 
 though they had been stung with spears, and many times they 
 swooned. And the ladies bare the Queen to her chamber. 
 And Sir Lancelot awoke, and went, and took his horse, and 
 rode all that day and all that night in a forest, weeping. And 
 at the last he was ware of an hermitage, and a chapel stood 
 betwixt two cliffs ; and then he heard a little bell ring to Mass, 
 and thither he rode and alighted, and tied his horse to the gate, 
 and heard Mass. So he that sang the Mass was the Bishop 
 of Canterbury. There was also Sir Bedevere, and both the 
 bishop and Sir Bedevere knew Sir Lancelot, and they spoke 
 together after Mass. But when Sir Bedevere had told his tale 
 all whole, Sir Lancelot's heart almost braste for sorrow, and Sir 
 Lancelot threw his arms abroad and said, Alas, who may trust 
 this world! And then he kneeled down on his knees, and 
 prayed the bishop to shrive him and assoil him. And then he 
 besought the bishop that he might be his brother. Then the 
 bishop said, I will gladly, and there he put an habit upon Sir 
 Lancelot, and there he served God day and night with prayers 
 and fastings." 
 
 Bedevere followed Lancelot's example, and within half a 
 year seven other knights joined themselves to these two and : 
 " endured in great penance six year, and then Sir Lancelot took 
 the habit of priesthood, and in twelve months he sang Mass. 
 And there was none of these other knights but they read in 
 books and holp to sing Mass, and rang bells, and did lowly all 
 manner of service. And so their horses went where they 
 would for they took no regard of no worldly riches. For when
 
 A MISSING PAGE 247 
 
 they saw Sir Lancelot endure such penance, in prayers and 
 fasting, they took no force what pain they endured, for to see 
 the noblest knight of the world take such abstinence that he 
 waxed full lean. And thus upon a night there came a vision 
 to Sir Lancelot, and charged him in remission of his sins, to 
 haste him unto Almesbury and by then thou come there, thou 
 shalt find Queen Guinevere dead, and therefore take thy fellows 
 with thee, and purvey thee of an horse-bier, and fetch thou the 
 corpse of her, and bury her by her husband, the noble King 
 Arthur. So this vision came to Lancelot thrice in one 
 night. 
 
 " Then Sir Lancelot rose upon day and told the hermit 
 It were well done, said the hermit, that ye make you ready, 
 and that ye disobey not the vision. Then Sir Lancelot took 
 his seven fellows with him, and on foot they went from 
 Glastonbury to Almesbury, the which is little more than thirty 
 miles. And thither they came within two days, for they were 
 weak and feeble to go. 
 
 " And when Sir Lancelot was come to Almesbury, within the 
 nunnery, Queen Guinevere died but half an hour before. And 
 the ladies told Sir Lancelot that Queen Guinevere told them all 
 ere she passed, that Sir Lancelot had been priest near a twelve- 
 month. And hither he cometh as fast as he may to fetch my 
 corpse, and beside my lord King Arthur he shall bury me. 
 Wherefore the Queen said, in hearing of them all, I beseech 
 Almighty God that I may never have power to see Sir Lancelot 
 with my worldly eyes. And this, said all the ladies was ever 
 her prayer these two days till she was dead. Then Sir Lancelot 
 saw her visage, but he wept not greatly, but sighed. And so 
 he did all the observance of the service himself, both the 
 Dirige, and on the morn he sang Mass. And there was 
 ordained an horse-bier, and so with an hundred torches ever 
 burning about the corpse of the Queen, and ever Sir Lancelot 
 with his eight fellows went about the horse-bier singing and 
 reading many an holy orison, and frankincense upon the corpse
 
 248 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 incensed. Thus Sir Lancelot and his eight fellows went on foot 
 from Almesbury unto Glastonbury, and when they were come 
 to the chapel and the hermitage, there she had a Dirige with 
 great devotion. And on the morn the hermit that was some- 
 time Bishop of Canterbury, sang the Mass of Requiem with 
 great devotion ; and Sir Lancelot was the first that offered, and 
 then all his eight fellows. And then she was wrapped in cered 
 cloth of Raines, from the top to the toe in thirty-fold, and after 
 she was put in a web of lead, and then in a coffin of marble. 
 And when she was put in the earth, Sir Lancelot swooned, and 
 lay long still, while the hermit came out, and awaked him and 
 said, Ye be to blame, for ye displease God with such manner 
 of sorrow-making. Truly, said Sir Lancelot, I trust I do 
 not displease God, for He knoweth mine intent, for my sorrow 
 was not, nor is not, for any rejoicing of sin, but my sorrow may 
 never end. For when I remember of her beauty and of her 
 noblesse that was both with her king and with her, so when I 
 saw his corpse and her corpse so lie together, truly mine heart 
 would not serve to sustain my careful body. Also when I 
 remember me, how by my default, mine orgule, my pride, that 
 they were both laid full low that were peerless that ever was 
 living of Christian people, wit you well, said Sir Lancelot, 
 this remembered of their kindness and mine unkindness, sank 
 so to my heart that I might not sustain myself." 
 
 Not long after the death of Guinevere, Lancelot " began to 
 wax sick, and for evermore, day and night he prayed ; but 
 needfully, as nature required, sometimes he slumbered a broken 
 sleep. And within six weeks he lay in his bed and called the 
 bishop and said, Sir Bishop, I pray you that ye will give me 
 all my rights that belongeth unto a Christian man." Then 
 Malory goes on to say that " when he was houseled and eneled, 
 and had all that a Christian man ought to have, he prayed 
 the bishop that his fellows might bear his body unto Joyous 
 Garde." 
 
 That night the bishop dreamed he saw Sir Lancelot with
 
 A MISSING PAGE 249 
 
 two angels, "and he saw the angels heave up Sir Lancelot 
 towards heaven, and the gates of heaven opened against him. 
 And then they went to Sir Lancelot's bed, and there they found 
 him dead, and he lay as he had smiled; and the sweetest 
 savour about him that ever they felt."
 
 Ill 
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 
 
 To take the Acts and Monuments, and as far as it might be 
 possible after upwards of three hundred years, test the 
 accuracy of each circumstance which Foxe proposes for the 
 edification of his readers, would necessitate a work as volu- 
 minous as his own immense undertaking. To sift the chaff 
 from the wheat, and to bind up the latter into one acceptable 
 whole would perhaps result in a book not larger than one of 
 his own eight thick octavo and closely printed volumes. All 
 that can be done here is to indicate some of the most 
 flagrant instances of the unfair and uncritical spirit in which 
 he has written, of the carelessness, wilful misrepresentation, 
 and neglect to rectify errors pointed out to him, by which 
 the martyrologist has exposed his book to everlasting 
 reproach. 
 
 On the death of Foxe's last descendant the greater part 
 of his MSS. were either given to the annalist, Strype, or 
 were allowed to remain in his hands till his death in 1737, 
 when many of them were purchased by Lord Oxford for the 
 Harleian collection now in the British Museum. A few of 
 them found a refuge in the Lansdowne Library, and these 
 also are now in the possession of the nation. They include a 
 mass of heterogeneous documents of the most unequal value 
 and interest such as the stories, often palpably coloured, 
 of persons who profess to have been eye-witnesses of the
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 251 
 
 scenes depicted, minutes of the examinations of prisoners, 
 apparently taken down on the spot, wild statements written 
 with the obvious purpose of pandering to Puritan intolerance 
 and prejudice, and fantastic tales of the martyrologist's 
 supposed judgments of God upon those who persecuted the 
 followers of the reformed doctrines. They include also 
 several counter-statements sent to Foxe for the express 
 purpose of giving him an opportunity to correct portions 
 of his work, but of which, although he preserved them, 
 he never made any use. Some of these latter have been 
 utilised by Gough in his Narratives of the Days of the 
 Reformation. 
 
 In his preface to this book, Gough admits, 1 as indeed he 
 was obliged to admit that, "as a general history of the 
 Church in its earlier ages, Foxe's work has been shown to 
 be partial and prejudiced in spirit, imperfect and inaccurate 
 in execution," and Leach 2 asserts that, while its compiler 
 had recourse to some early documents, even here he depended 
 largely on printed works, such as Crespin's Actiones et Monu- 
 menta Martyrum, which was published at Geneva in 1560. 
 He notes, moreover, that Foxe's chapter on the Waldenses 
 is nothing but a translation of the untrustworthy Catalogus 
 Testium Veritatis> published at Basle by Illyricus in 1556, 
 although Foxe himself does not acknowledge Illyricus as 
 his authority, but claims to have consulted " parchment docu- 
 ments," which he only knew from the transcriptions in that 
 book. " It has been conclusively shown," says Mr Sidney 
 Lee in the Dictionary of National Biography, " that his chapter 
 on the Waldenses is directly translated from the Catalogus 
 of Illyricus, although Illyricus is not mentioned by Foxe 
 among the authorities whom he acknowledges to have con- 
 sulted. . . . This indicates a loose notion of literary morality 
 
 1 P. 23, edited by the Camden Society. 
 
 2 Sir George Croke's Reports^ edited by Thomas Leach, ii. 91. London, 
 1790-92,
 
 252 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 which justifies some of the harshest judgments passed on 
 Foxe." 
 
 Matthias Flach-Franconitz, better known as Flacius Illyricus, 
 from the place of his birth (in Istria, a part of Illyria) was 
 a voluminous writer on most of the controverted doctrines 
 in the sixteenth century. Having become a disciple of Luther 
 he was for ever raising fresh disputes on religious subjects, 
 and was noted for the violence and exaggeration he brought 
 into their discussion, so that, according to a German 
 historian, "he seemed to have been created for an ecclesi- 
 astical Procurator General." On his death in 1575, Jacques 
 Andreas, one of his friends, admitted that, taken alto- 
 gether, his Illyricus was the devil's Illyricus, and that, 
 in the opinion of Andreas, he was then "supping with 
 devils." l 
 
 Such then being Foxe's authority, although unacknowledged, 
 for his Waldensian chapter, we can scarcely expect him to 
 be more conscientious in his evidence concerning matters 
 closely connected with the passions, prejudices, and burning 
 questions of his own day. 
 
 Nearly, if not quite all the material for that part of the 
 Acts and Monuments which deals with the reign of Mary was 
 collected by others for Foxe and Grindal during their absence 
 from England. Grindal handed over to Foxe the accounts 
 of the various prosecutions for heresy sent to him by his 
 correspondents at home, taking care, however, at the same 
 time to warn the martyrologist against placing too much 
 confidence in them, he himself suspending his judgment "till 
 more satisfactory evidence came from good hands." He 
 advised him for the present, only to print separately the acts 
 of particular persons of whom they had authentic accounts, 
 and to wait for a larger and more complete history until they 
 
 1 Hoefer, Nouvelle Biographic Qertfrale, Art, Flach - Franconite 
 (Matthias^
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 253 
 
 had trustworthy information concerning the " martyrs." 1 
 The letters, which Grindal wrote to Foxe on this subject in 
 1557, were published by the Parker Society, in Grindal 's 
 Remains, and show that the future archbishop believed not 
 too implicitly in the truth of all the stories which he passed 
 on to his friend. He constantly urged him to delay writing 
 in order to gain " more certain intelligence." But the careful 
 investigation which he recommended did not fall in with the 
 particular genius and uncritical methods of Foxe, who, perhaps 
 on account of his necessitous condition, worked away with a 
 will on the unsifted tales and reports as they came to hand, 
 so that the book in its Latin form was completed, almost 
 to the end of the reign of Mary, and was published at Basle, 
 before his return to England in 1559. He afterwards made an 
 English translation of the work, but without seeing fit to 
 revise his material. It bore the title Acts and Monuments, 
 but it was at once popularly styled the Book of Martyrs. 
 When he was attacked by Alan Cope (Nicholas Harpsfield) 
 for his inaccuracy, Foxe replied : " I hear what you will say : 
 I should have taken more leisure and done it better. I grant 
 and confess my fault, such is my vice, I cannot sit all the day 
 (Maister Cope) fining and mincing my letters, and comb- 
 ing my head, and smoothing myself all the day at the 
 glass of Cicero. Yet, notwithstanding, doing what I can, 
 and doing my good will, methinks I should not be repre- 
 hended, at least not so much be railed of at M. Cope's 
 hand." 2 
 
 But it is not for his want of scholarly writing that Foxe 
 has been blamed. Father Robert Persons, in his Three 
 Conversions of England? begins one of his chapters with " a 
 note of more than a hundred and twenty lies uttered by John 
 Foxe, in less than three leaves of his Acts and Monuments" 
 
 1 Strype, Life of Archbishop Grindal, p. 25. 
 Acts and Monuments, i. 691. Edited 1570. 
 ;i Part iii., p. 412.
 
 254 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and he proceeds to point them out, beginning with the 
 misstatement concerning John Merbeck and some others, 
 whom Foxe counts among the martyrs, although they were never 
 burned at all. As, in consequence of Father Persons' remarks 
 concerning John Merbeck, Foxe acknowledged the error in 
 his second edition, we may hold him excused thus far, but 
 his delinquencies in this respect were by no means unfrequent, 
 and gave rise to the saying that " many who were burnt in 
 the reign of Queen Mary, drank sack in the reign of Queen 
 Elizabeth." l 
 
 Two similar misstatements, which he was in a position 
 to correct and did not, relate to the supposed death 
 by the vengeance of God, of Henry Morgan, Bishop of 
 St David's, and of one Grimwood, another "notorious 
 Papist" 
 
 Anthony a Wood, the famous antiquary and historian, 
 who wrote his History of the Antiquities of Oxford about a 
 hundred years after Foxe had become celebrated as a 
 martyrologist, and who in his youth spoke with people 
 who remembered the days of persecution under Mary, tells us 
 that : 
 
 " Henry Morgan was esteemed a most admirable civilian 
 and canonist ; he was for several years the constant Moderator 
 of all those that performed exercise for their degrees in the 
 civil law in the scholar schools, hall and church pertaining to 
 that faculty, situated also in the same parish. . . . He was 
 elected Bishop of St David's, upon the deprivation of Robert 
 Ferrar. ... In that see he sate till after Queen Elizabeth 
 came to the Crown, and then being deprived . . . retired 
 among his friends, and died a devoted son to the Church of 
 Rome, on the 23rd of December following (1559) of whose 
 death, hear I pray what John Foxe saith in this manner : 
 Morgan, Bishop of St David's, who sate upon the condemnation 
 
 1 Quoted in Fuller's Worthies^ under " Berkshire," p. 92.
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 255 
 
 of the blessed Martyr and Bishop Ferrar, and unjustly usurped 
 his room, was not long after stricken by Gods hand, but after 
 such a strange sort, that his meat would not go down, but rise 
 and pick up again, sometimes at his mouth, sometimes blown out 
 of his nose, most horrible to behold, and so he continued till his 
 death. Thus Foxe, followed by Thomas Beard in his Theatre 
 of God's Judgments. But where or when his death happened, 
 they tell us not, nor any author hitherto, only when, which 
 Bishop Godwin mentions. Now, therefore, be pleased to know 
 that the said Bishop Morgan, retiring after his deprivation to 
 and near Oxen, where he had several relations and acquaint- 
 ance living, particularly the Owens of Godstow, in the parish 
 of Wolvercote, near to the said city, did spend the little 
 remainder of his life in great devotion at Godstow, but that 
 he died in the condition which Foxe mentions there is no 
 tradition among the inhabitants of Wolvercote. True it is 
 that I have heard some discourse, many years ago, from some 
 of the ancients of that place, that a certain bishop did live 
 for some time, and exercised his charity and religious counsel 
 among them, and there died ; but I could never learn anything 
 of them of the manner of his death, which being very miser- 
 able, as John Foxe saith, methinks that they should have a 
 tradition of it, as well as of the man himself; but I say 
 there is now none, nor was there any thirty years ago, 
 among the most aged persons then living at that place, and 
 therefore, whether there be anything of truth in it may justly be 
 doubted." 
 
 The evidence of this negative tradition is certainly more 
 convincing, than Foxe's unsupported allegation of a circum- 
 stance, as unlikely to have occurred, as it was likely to be 
 concocted by a man of his propensity and unscrupulousness. 
 If, however, there should be any doubt of Foxe's ability 
 to concoct such a story, it will perhaps be removed by the 
 history of the drastic refutation, which befell the similar 
 story of the end of Grimwood. This, Anthony a Wood
 
 256 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 proceeds to record in a passage immediately after the one 
 above quoted. 
 
 "In the very same chapter and leaf concerning the severe 
 punishment upon persecutors of God's People, he hath com- 
 mitted a most egregious falsity in reporting that one Grimwood, 
 of Higham, in Suffolk, died in a miserable manner, for swearing 
 and bearing false witness against one John Cooper, a carpenter 
 of Watsam in the same county, for which he lost his life. 
 The miserable death of the said Grimwood was, as John Foxe 
 saith thus : That when he was in his labour, staking up a gosse 
 of corn, having his health, and fearing no peril, suddenly his 
 bowels fell out of his body, and immediately most miserably he 
 died. Now it so fell out that in the reign of Elizabeth, one 
 Prit * became parson of the parish where the said Grimwood 
 dwelt, and preaching against perjury, being not acquainted 
 with his parishioners, cited the said story of Foxe, and it 
 happened that Grimwood being alive, and in the said church, 
 he brought an action upon the case, against the parson, but 
 Judge Anderson, who sate at the Assizes in the county of 
 Suffolk, did adjudge it not maintainable, because it was not 
 spoken maliciously." 2 
 
 That the action was not maintainable on the ground of 
 malice, as against the parson, may have been true, but Foxe 
 cannot reasonably be acquitted, for although he went into 
 Suffolk professedly to investigate the matter, he never made 
 any alteration in his story in subsequent editions, and the 
 very latest impression of the Acts and Monuments perpetuates 
 the lie and slander. 
 
 Thirty years after the death of Sir Thomas More, Foxe 
 undertook to collect all the traditional gossip afloat concern- 
 ing the Chancellor's alleged treatment of John Tewkesbury 
 and James Bainham, for heresy. Tewkesbury was a leather- 
 
 1 Or Prick. 
 
 2 Anthony k Wood, Athena: Oxoniensis, vol. L, p. 691.
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 257 
 
 seller of London, and Foxe says that he was sent to Sir 
 Thomas More's house at Chelsea to be examined, and that 
 "there he lay in the porter's lodge, hand, foot, and head in 
 the stocks, six days without release. Then was he carried to 
 Jesus' Tree in his privy garden, where he was whipped, and 
 also twisted in his brows with a small rope, that the blood 
 started out of his eyes, and yet would not accuse no man. 
 Then was he let loose for a day, and his friends thought to 
 have him at liberty the next day. After this he was sent to 
 be racked in the Tower, till he was almost lame, and there 
 promised to recant. 1 
 
 The truth of the matter was, however, that as Tewkes- 
 bury was examined for the first time on the 8th May 
 1529, and immediately afterwards recanted, the event 
 occurred several months before Sir Thomas More became 
 Lord Chancellor ; and therewith falls to the ground the story 
 of Tewkesbury's being tortured in More's garden, the punish- 
 ment of heretics being part of the Lord Chancellor's office. 
 
 James Bainham was a lawyer, and Foxe declares that he 
 was whipped at the Tree of Truth in More's garden, and was 
 then sent to the Tower to be racked, "and so he was, Sir 
 Thomas More being present himself, till in a manner he had 
 lamed him." Bainham, like Tewkesbury, recanted, and both of 
 them bewailed and retracted their recantations, first before 
 their friends in a Protestant gathering in Bow Lane, and 
 afterwards in a Catholic Church, in consequence of which, 
 according to Foxe, both were burned. But a part of what 
 Foxe wrote about Tewkesbury in one edition of the Acts and 
 Monuments he omitted in another, patching it on to Bain- 
 ham's story, thus stultifying himself as regards both stories, 2 
 and affording us another signal illustration of the irresponsible 
 and unscrupulous way in which he could deal with evidence. 
 
 He further attributed to More the death of John Frith, who 
 
 1 Acts and Monuments, vol. iv., p. 689 ; Pratt's ed. 
 a Vol. iv., p. 702 ; and Appendix, p. 769 ; Pratt's ed. 
 
 R
 
 258 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 suffered death in 1533, a year after Sir Thomas had laid down 
 his office, although in his Apology, the ex-chancellor referred to 
 Frith as being then in the Tower, not committed by him but by 
 " the King's Grace and his Council." * 
 
 Foxe might easily, had he been so inclined, have veri- 
 fied these things by reference to the thirty-sixth chapter 
 of the above-mentioned Apology, in which More answered 
 the lies "neither few nor small that many of the blessed 
 brethren have made and daily yet make by me." He goes on 
 to say : 
 
 " Divers of them have said that of such as were in my house 
 while I was chancellor, I used to examine them with torments, 
 causing them to be bound to a tree in my garden, and there 
 piteously beaten. And this tale had some of those brethren so 
 caused to be blown about, that a right worshipful friend of mine 
 did of late, within less than this fortnight, tell unto another near 
 friend of mine that he had of late heard much speaking thereof. 
 What cannot these brethren say that can be so shameless to say 
 thus ? For of very truth, albeit that for a great robbery, or a 
 heinous murder, or sacrilege in a church, with carrying away the 
 pix with the Blessed Sacrament, or villainously casting it out, I 
 caused sometimes such things to be done by some officers of the 
 Marshalsea, or of some other prisons, with which ordering of 
 them, and without any great hurt that afterwards should stick 
 by them, I found out and repressed many such desperate 
 wretches, as else had not failed to have gone farther ; yet 
 saving the sure keeping of heretics, I never did cause any such 
 thing to be done to any of them in all my life except only 
 twain." 
 
 Of these two instances he first records one relating to a child 
 who was a servant in his house. The boy's father had taught 
 him " his ungracious heresy against the Blessed Sacrament of 
 
 1 Apology, p. 887.
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 259 
 
 the Altar," which heresy the boy began to teach another child in 
 More's house. Thereupon, More caused a servant of his "to 
 stripe him like a child " before the whole household, " for amend- 
 ment of himself and example of such others." The other case 
 was that of a man who, " after that he had fallen into that frantic 
 heresy, fell soon after into plain open frenzy besides." The 
 man was confined in Bedlam, and when discharged went about 
 disturbing public service in churches, and committing acts of 
 great indecency. Devout, religious folk besought the Chancellor 
 to restrain him, and accordingly, one day when he came wander- 
 ing by More's door, he caused him to be taken by the con- 
 stables, bound to a tree in the street before the whole town, 
 " and there they striped him with rods till he waxed weary, 
 and somewhat longer." More ends by saying, " And verily, 
 God be thanked, I hear none harm of him now. And of 
 all that ever came in my hands for heresy, as help me God, 
 saving [as I said] the sure keeping of them, had never any of 
 them stripe or stroke given them, so much as a fillip on the 
 forehead." 
 
 He then goes on to disprove the truth of a story spread 
 about by Tindal, concerning the beating in his garden of a man 
 named Segar. This story Foxe evidently confused with the 
 fable of Tewkesbury, which thus completely crumbles to pieces ; 
 for as Sir James Mackintosh in his Life of More says : 
 
 " This statement [More's Apology] so minute, so easily con- 
 tradicted if in any part false, was made public after his fall from 
 power, when he was surrounded by enemies, and could have no 
 friends but the generous. He relates circumstances of public 
 notoriety, or at least so known to all his household, which it 
 would have been rather a proof of insanity than of imprudence 
 to have alleged in his defence if they had not been indisputably 
 and confessedly true . . . Defenceless and obnoxious as More 
 then was, no man was hardy enough to dispute his truth. Foxe 
 was the first, who, thirty years afterwards, ventured to oppose it
 
 260 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 in a vague statement, which we know to be in some respects in- 
 accurate." l 
 
 The story of the death of Robert Packington, mercer, of 
 London, has also provided Foxe with fertile soil for raising his 
 usual crop of calumny. The man was shot dead one very misty 
 morning, in Cheapside, according to most chroniclers in 1556, 
 Foxe says in 1558, as he was crossing the road from his house 
 to a church on the opposite side, where he intended to hear 
 Mass. Many persons were suspected of the murder, but none 
 were found guilty. Hall, Grafton, and Bale all tell the story, 
 but the martyrologist added thereto an accusation against an 
 innocent person, which, although satisfactorily refuted by Holin- 
 shed, remains in the pages of the Acts and Monuments to this 
 day. Foxe says : 
 
 " The murtherer so covertly was concealed, till at length by 
 the confession of Doctor Incent, Dean of St Paul's, in his death- 
 bed it was known, and by him confessed that he was the author 
 thereof, by hiring an Italian for sixty crowns or thereabouts to 
 do the feat. For the testimony whereof, and also of the 
 repentant words of the said Incent, the names, both of them 
 which heard him confess it, and of them which heard the 
 witnesses report it, remains yet in memory to be produced if 
 need required." 2 
 
 But Holinshed, a far more credible witness tells us 
 that : 
 
 " At length the murtherer indeed was condemned at Banbury, 
 in Oxfordshire, to die for a felony which he afterwards com- 
 mitted ; and when he came to the gallows in which he suffered, 
 he confessed that he did this murther [that of Robert Packing- 
 ton], and till that time he was never had in any suspicion there- 
 of." 3 
 
 1 Pp. 101, 105. 2 P. 525, edited 1563. 
 
 3 Chronicle, fol. ed., 1586, p. 944. Answer to Foxe's assertion. Also 
 Appendix to Cough's Narratives, pp. 296, 297.
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 261 
 
 There is another class of anecdote in the Acts and Monu- 
 ments, the errors of which do not lie so much in the facts of the 
 story as in the oblique vision of Foxe himself, in regarding the 
 dramatis persona as heroes. Thus, a madman named Collins, 
 who, entering a church during Mass, seized his dog at the Eleva- 
 tion, and held it over his head, showing it to the people in 
 derision, is accounted " as one belonging to the holy company of 
 saints." l 
 
 Cowbridge, who was burned at Oxford, was one who would 
 in these days be called a criminal lunatic, but Foxe regarded him 
 as a holy martyr. The horrible story of the " martyrdom " of 
 three women of Guernsey rests entirely on Foxe's authority. 
 It was immediately contradicted. Foxe replied, and Father 
 Persons refuted his reply. It transpired on investigation that 
 all three women were hanged as thieves, their bodies being 
 afterwards burned ; one of them had led an openly immoral 
 life. 
 
 Machyn and Wriothesley chronicle an outbreak of fanaticism 
 on Easter Sunday 1555. An ex-monk named Flower rushed 
 into St Margaret's Church, Westminster, while the priest, Sir 
 John Sleuther, was administering Communion to his parishioners. 
 Foxe tells the tale succinctly : 
 
 " The said Flower, upon Easter Day last past, drew his wood 
 knife, and strake the priest upon the head, hand, and arm, who 
 being wounded therewith, and having a chalice with consecrated 
 hosts therein in his hand, they were sprinkled with the said 
 priest's blood." 2 
 
 The only mistake which Foxe here makes is in saying that 
 the priest was Sir John Cheltham. The would-be assassin 
 harangued his victim before dealing the blow, and then struck 
 home so forcibly that the priest fell as if dead. A tumult arose, 
 the multitude thinking that the Spaniards were attacking them. 
 Flower was apprehended, tried, and burned for heresy and 
 
 1 Acts and Monuments, vol. v., p. 25 ; Pratt's ed. 
 - Ibid., vol. vii., p. 75.
 
 262 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 sedition, on the spot now called the Broad Sanctuary. His 
 claim to swell Foxe's calendar of " martyrs " rests solely on the 
 motive of his murderous assault, namely, outrage of the Blessed 
 Sacrament. 
 
 Another martyr of Flower's kidney was William Gardiner, 
 who was living at Lisbon in 1552 as agent of an English 
 mercantile house. 
 
 Foxe describes his exploits and the consequences thereof as 
 " The history, no less lamentable than notable, of William 
 Gardiner, an Englishman suffering most constantly in Portugal 
 for the testimony of God's truth." Gardiner's admiring 
 biographer relates that his hero twice entered a church (probably 
 Lisbon Cathedral) with intent to do some notable thing in the 
 king's sight and presence. The first time was on the occasion 
 of a royal marriage, but the throng was so great that he could 
 not get near the altar. However, on the following Sunday, 
 "the said William was present early in the morning, very 
 cleanly apparelled, even of purpose, that he might stand near 
 the altar without repulse. Within a while cometh the king with 
 all his nobles. Then Gardiner setteth himself as near the altar 
 as he might, having a Testament in his hand, which he diligently 
 read upon and prayed, until the time was come that he had 
 appointed to work his feat." This time was just before the 
 Communion of the priest, who was the Cardinal Archbishop of 
 Lisbon. Gardiner sprang forward, snatched the consecrated 
 Host from his hand, trod it underfoot, and overturned the 
 chalice. The first effect of this outrage was to strike the clergy 
 and congregation dumb with amazement, horror, and consterna- 
 tion. In Foxe's words, "this matter at first made them all 
 abashed." But on recovering their senses, the people gave vent 
 to their indignation in shouts and cries of vengeance. A dagger 
 was drawn, and Gardiner was wounded in the shoulder. The 
 man who struck him was about to deal another blow, when 
 he was prevented by the king himself. Gardiner thereupon, 
 being in the hands of the guards, impudently harangued the
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 263 
 
 people, and told them that " if he had done anything which 
 were displeasant unto them, they ought to impute it unto 
 no man but unto themselves, who so irreverently used 
 the Holy Supper of the Lord unto so great idolatry, not 
 without great ignominy unto the church, violation of the 
 sacrament, and the peril of their own souls, except they 
 repented." 
 
 The Portuguese, entirely inexperienced in this kind of fana- 
 ticism, thought that Gardiner must be a political agent, with 
 designs on the safety of the realm. As he would confess 
 nothing of this sort, they put him on the rack, in order to 
 extract from him secrets of a seditious nature. At length, as 
 it was clear that heresy and sacrilege were the crimes in which 
 he exulted, they burned him as a heretic, he maintaining, 
 according to Foxe, his " godly mind " to the end, declaring even 
 in the flames that " he had done nothing whereof he did repent 
 him." i 
 
 Foxe incidently bears witness to the edifying manner in 
 which the Portuguese assisted at Mass, the people standing 
 "with great devotion and silence, praying, looking, kneeling, 
 and knocking [beating their breasts in token of compunction], 
 their minds being fully bent and set, as it is the manner, upon 
 the external sacrament" 2 
 
 The story of Bertrand Le Bias, the silk-weaver of Dornick, 
 who signalised himself in the same riotous manner in 1555, is 
 said to have ended in the same way, Le Bias declaring " that if it 
 were a thousand times to be done he would do it ; and if 
 he had a thousand lives he would give them all in that 
 quarrel." 3 
 
 But these are all ex parte statements of Foxe. He is 
 thinking of nothing but of pointing his own particular moral and 
 of adorning his own tale. Historically, his evidence is valueless 
 
 1 Acts and Monuments, vi. 277 ; Cattley's ed. 
 
 2 Ibid. 
 
 3 Acts and Monuments, vi. 393.
 
 264 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 unless supported by more careful witnesses. He professes to 
 chronicle the martyrdom at Newent, on the 25th September 
 1556, of "John Home and a woman " ; but Deighton, a friendly 
 critic, pointed out that this story was nothing more or less than 
 an amplification of the burning of Edward Home, which Foxe 
 had already recorded as having taken place on the 25th 
 September 1558, and that no woman suffered at either of 
 these times. Such instances might be pointed out ad 
 infinitum. 
 
 The detestation in which most Englishmen hold the names 
 of Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, and of Edmund 
 Bonner, Bishop of London, is entirely owing to Foxe's 
 calumnies. 
 
 Although Gardiner had been deprived of his see for his 
 belief in Transubstantiation in Edward's reign, and had been 
 sent to the Tower by a court presided over by Cranmer, it is 
 certain that he bore the archbishop no ill-will, but even did his 
 best to save Cranmer's life and that of the other reformers who 
 refused to conform to the old religion which Mary had brought 
 back. It was his duty as chancellor to enforce the law of the 
 land, in the matter of exterminating heresy, as in all else, but he 
 only once sat on a commission, gave Cranmer ample opportunity 
 to escape if he had so minded, furnished Peter Martyr with 
 funds to take him abroad, shielded Thomas Smith, King 
 Edward's secretary, from persecution on account of his heretical 
 opinions, and even allowed him a yearly pension of ;ioo 
 for his support. 1 Of Gardiner's kindness to Roger Ascham, 
 the latter said, " Stephen, Bishop of Winchester, High Chancellor 
 of England, treated me with the utmost humanity and favour, 
 so that I cannot easily decide whether Paget was more ready 
 to commend me or Winchester to protect and benefit me ; 
 there were not wanting some, who, on the ground of religion, 
 attempted to stop the flow of his benevolence towards me, but 
 to no purpose. I owe very much to the humanity of Winchester, 
 
 1 Dictionary of National Biography, article, " Stephen Gardiner."
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 265 
 
 and not only I, but many others also have experienced his 
 kindness." l 
 
 One of the " many others " was John Frith, whom Gardiner 
 did his best to save from a painful death ; 2 and even 
 Northumberland would have escaped had Gardiner's voice 
 prevailed in the council. Again, Gardiner's patriotism 
 prompted him to oppose boldly the project of the queen's 
 marriage with Philip of Spain, seeing that it was distaste- 
 ful to the bulk of the nation ; yet, when he recognised 
 that it was inevitable, he did his best to make it more 
 popular. 
 
 For some reason known doubtless to himself, but quite 
 unknown to history, the martyrologist represents Gardiner as 
 keenly desirous to hear that the sentence passed on Latimer 
 and Ridley had been carried out. He says : 
 
 " The same day, when Bishop Ridley and Master Latimer 
 suffered at Oxford [being about the 19 day of October], there 
 came into the house of Stephen Gardiner the old Duke of 
 Norfolk, with the foresaid Master Munday, his secretary, above 
 named reporter hereof. The old aged duke, there waiting and 
 tarrying for his dinner, the bishop being not yet disposed to dine, 
 deferred the time to three or four o'clock at afternoon. At 
 length about four of the clock cometh his servant, posting in all 
 possible speed from Oxford, bringing intelligence to the bishop 
 what he had heard and seen ; of whom the said bishop, 
 inquiring the truth of the matter, and learning by his man that 
 fire most certainly was set unto them, cometh out rejoicing to 
 the duke. " Now," saith he, " let us go to dinner." Whereupon 
 they being set down, meat immediately was brought, and the 
 bishop began merrily to eat. But what followed ? The 
 bloody tyrant had not eaten a few bits, but the sudden stroke 
 of God's terrible hand fell upon him in such sort, as immediately 
 
 1 Epis. p. 51 ; Oxford ed., 1703. 
 
 - Grenville, MS. 11,990; Letters and papers, 6,600.
 
 266 STUDIES FROM COURT AMD CLOISTER 
 
 he was taken from the table, and so brought to his bed in such 
 intolerable anguish and torments, that . . . whereby his body 
 being miserably inflamed within (who had inflamed so 
 many good martyrs before) was brought to a miserable 
 end." 
 
 Foxe relates this story at third hand, as was his wont, but 
 it fitted in so admirably with his favourite theory in regard to 
 the temporal judgments of God on miscreants and Gardiner 
 to his way of thinking was certainly a miscreant of the first 
 rank that he could not afford to be fastidious as to its 
 veracity. For he must surely have known that "the old 
 Duke of Norfolk could not have dined with Gardiner on or 
 about the igth October 1555, having been in his grave since 
 August 1553 ; and as for "the sudden stroke of God's terrible 
 hand," by which the Bishop of Winchester was "brought to 
 a miserable end," the following extract from a letter of the 
 Venetian ambassador, resident in England, to the Doge and 
 Senate, written on the i6th September 1555, gives a totally 
 different account of the illness from which Gardiner died on 
 the 1 2th November: 
 
 "After the chancellor's return from the conference at 
 Calais," writes the Venetian chronicler of current events, "he 
 fell into such a state of appilation [sic] that besides having 
 become [as the physicians say] jaundiced, he by degrees got 
 confirmed dropsy, and had it not been for his robust constitu- 
 tion, a variety of remedies prescribed for him by the English 
 physicians having been of no use, he would by this time be 
 in a bad way, his physiognomy being so changed as to astound 
 all who see him. The Emperor had sent him the remedy he 
 used when first troubled with dropsical symptoms, on his 
 return from the war of Metz, which remedy. cured him, and 
 should God grant that it take the same effect on the Bishop of 
 Winchester, it will be very advantageous for England, he 
 being considered one of the most consummate chancellors
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 267 
 
 who have filled the post for many years, and should he die, 
 he would leave few or none so well suited to the charge as 
 himself." 1 
 
 On the 2 1st October, the queen opened Parliament in 
 person, and Gardiner mortally ill, rose from the bed to which 
 he had been for weeks confined, in order to introduce a Bill 
 for the granting of much needed supplies to the Crown. 
 Michiel, the Venetian envoy, continuing his letter says : 
 
 " After the Mass of the Holy Ghost, sung by the Bishop 
 of Ely, and the sermon preached by the Bishop of Lincoln, 
 her Majesty proceeded into the great hall, where, in the presence 
 of all those officially summoned, the Lord Chancellor, having 
 rallied a little, choosing at anyrate to be there, in order not 
 to fail performing his office on this occasion, made the usual 
 proposal, stating the cause for assembling Parliament, which 
 was in short solely for the purpose of obtaining pecuniary 
 supply." 
 
 Mary had succeeded to a treasury rich only in debt, and 
 her need of money to carry on the government was urgent. 
 Gardiner made a long and effective speech, the result of which 
 was, that Parliament at once voted a million of gold to be levied 
 in two years from the laity, in four from the clergy. But 
 exhausted by his effort, and so weak that he was unable to 
 return to his own house, the dying chancellor was accommodated 
 at Whitehall, where he met his end peacefully three weeks 
 later. He desired during his last days that the Passion of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ might be read to him, and when the 
 reader came to the contrition of St Peter, Gardiner exclaimed, 
 " Negavi cum Petro, exivi cum Petro, sed nondum flevi amare 
 cum Petro /" alluding to his weakness and fall in Henry VIII. 's 
 reign. 2 
 
 1 Giovanni Michiel to the Doge and Senate, Calendar of State Papers, 
 Venetian, vol. vi., part, i., 215 ; edited by Rawdon Brown. 
 
 2 Wardword, 48 ; Lingard, History of England, vol. v., p. 243, note, 
 6th ed.
 
 268 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 The view which Foxe presents of Bonner, Bishop of London, 
 in the administration of his office, is as distorted and malicious 
 as his libellous picture of Gardiner. The pages of the Acts 
 and Monuments, which describe Bonner's examination of those 
 brought before him on charges of heresy, teem with such 
 picturesque epithets as " this bloody wolf," the " Bishop was in a 
 marvellous rage " or " in a great fury," but when we read what 
 Bonner really said, we find nothing to justify these exaggerated 
 expressions. 
 
 On one occasion, when Bonner was supposed by the 
 martyrologist to be in such " a raging heat " that he appeared 
 " as one clean void of humanity," we read on, expecting to find 
 some brutal and heartless words whereby he crushed the meek 
 spirit of the martyr before him. The scene was Cranmer's 
 degradation at Oxford, with which solemn and painful act 
 Bonner was charged; but the strongest words used by the 
 bishop in answer to Cranmer's continued protests and recrimi- 
 nations were, according to Foxe himself, merely that " for his 
 inordinate contumacy, he denied him to speak any more, 
 saying that he had used himself very disobediently." 1 
 
 By Foxe's own showing, when brought before the bishops, 
 the " marytrs " frequently twitted their judges, gave them home- 
 thrusts and " privy nips," and behaved themselves generally in 
 a very provocative and irritating manner. It is surprising, 
 nevertheless, to find how very seldom the examiners lost their 
 tempers, bearing with a considerable amount of insolence in 
 a singularly good-humoured spirit, doing their best to give 
 the accused a chance of escape. Of the six who came under 
 Bonner's examination on the 8th February 1555, Foxe affirms 
 that the Bishop of London sentenced them the day after they 
 were charged, and killed them out of hand without mercy, 
 " such quick speed these men could make in dispatching their 
 business at once " a terrible indictment if there were a shadow 
 of truth in it. But Bonner not only knew all about the six 
 1 Acts and Monuments, vol. v., p. 765 ; Cattley's ed.
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 269 
 
 heretics long before the 8th February, three of them having 
 been in prison for months, where he had again and again 
 reasoned with them ; but after sentence had been passed, an 
 interval of five weeks was the shortest respite granted to them 
 for reflection before any one of them was executed. The 
 others suffered consecutively on the 26th, 28th, and 29th 
 March, the last of the six on the roth June. 
 
 With as little regard for truth did Foxe pen the remarkable 
 distich, which well served his purpose of villifying Bonner in 
 the minds of his confiding and credulous readers : 
 
 " This cannibal in three years' space three hundred martyrs slew, 
 They were his food, he loved so blood, he spared none he knew." 
 
 Lingard estimates that about two hundred persons suffered 
 for their religious opinions during the reign of Mary. The fact 
 is no doubt an appalling one, and horrifies us with a sense of the 
 barbarism that prevailed so recently as three and a half centuries 
 ago in England. But when we consider the outrages of which 
 numbers of them were guilty, the danger which they constituted 
 to the realm, we cannot help agreeing with Cobbett when he 
 says that " the real truth about these martyrs is that they were 
 generally a set of most wicked wretches who sought to destroy 
 the queen and her government, and under the pretence of con- 
 science and superior piety, to obtain the means of again preying 
 upon the people." l 
 
 Moreover, portentous as the numbers appear to us, they are 
 small compared with those which represented Henry's ruthless 
 severity after the Northern Rising, when the whole country 
 was covered with gibbets, and with those of Elizabeth's victims 
 who were hanged, cut down alive, drawn and quartered, for 
 practising the religion that had been taught in England since 
 it was a Christian country. Nor did the persecution of Catholics 
 cease at the death of Elizabeth, and the reigns of the Stuart 
 kings, the Commonwealth, and even the Hanoverian regime 
 1 History of the Reformation, edited by Abbot Gasquet, p. 207.
 
 270 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 testify to the cruel insistance with which Catholic priests were 
 hunted to death, and the Catholic laity imprisoned and im- 
 poverished for their loyalty to the oldest faith of Christendom. 
 
 Bonner had had nothing whatever to do with the revival of 
 the statute De Heresia, but good or bad, it was the law of the 
 land, and he could no more help sitting on the bench in his own 
 diocese to examine offences against it, than could any other 
 judge refuse to sit in any court over which he had jurisdiction. 
 Of the two hundred who were condemned on this statute during 
 Mary's reign, about one hundred and twenty were sent to 
 Bonner's court for judgment, the city of London being the 
 centre and hot-bed of the new, revolutionary doctrines. Thus, 
 Foxe's assertion that " this cannibal three hundred martyrs 
 slew," must be reduced to nearly one-third of that number. His 
 supposed thirst for blood was also as much a lie as that other 
 figment of the martyrologist's brain which represented both 
 Gardiner and Bonner as having a violent personal grudge 
 against those who were brought before them for examination. 
 Bonner, as well as Gardiner, laboured, and not unsuccessfully in 
 many instances, in causing heretics to recant, upon which they 
 were restored to liberty. 
 
 A striking yet dispassionate portrait of Edmund Bonner, 
 from the pen of the late Dr S. R. Maitland, one of the most 
 scholarly and painstaking historians of the last century, 
 forms a vivid contrast to Foxe's caricature of the Bishop of 
 London. 
 
 " Setting aside declamation, and looking at the details of facts 
 left by those who may be called, if people please, Bonner's 
 victims and their friends, we find very consistently maintained 
 the character of a man, straightforward and hearty, familiar 
 and humorous, sometimes rough, perhaps coarse, naturally hot- 
 tempered, but obviously [by the testimony of his enemies] 
 placable and easily entreated, capable of bearing most patiently 
 intemperate and violent language, much reviling and low abuse 
 directed against himself personally, against his order, and against
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 271 
 
 those peculiar doctrines and practices of his church, for main- 
 taining which he had himself suffered the loss of all things, and 
 borne long imprisonment. At the same time, not incapable of 
 being provoked into saying harsh and passionate things, but 
 much more frequently meaning nothing by the threatenings 
 and slaughter which he breathed out, than to intimidate those 
 on whose ignorance and simplicity, argument seemed to be 
 thrown away ; in short, we can scarcely read with attention any 
 one of the cases detailed by those who were no friends of 
 Bonner, without seeing in him a judge who [even if we grant 
 that he was dispensing bad laws badly] was obviously desirous 
 to save the prisoner's life." l 
 
 We have disposed at some length elsewhere of Foxe's 
 shameless calumny of Sir Henry Bedingfeld, Lieutenant of the 
 Tower of London, and custodian of the Princess Elizabeth at 
 Woodstock when she was suspected of connivance in Wyatt's 
 rebellion. In espousing Elizabeth's cause, and in casting asper- 
 sions on one who was responsible for her safe custody, Foxe was 
 but following his general plan of campaign, the not very subtle 
 plan of representing all those of his own party to be saints and 
 martyrs, the enemy deserving every abusive term that came to 
 his facile pen. This simple method attained its object pro- 
 bably beyond the wildest dreams of its author. All along the 
 ages the Protestant world has believed implicitly in the fables 
 invented by Foxe, and even in these days of critical analysis, 
 although innumerable experts have given him the lie, the effect 
 of his calumnies remain in the deeply rooted prejudice of the 
 nation. 2 Moreover, like every other succes de scandale, the 
 
 1 Essays on Subjects connected with the Reformation, by S. R. Maitland, 
 D.D., F.R.S., F.S.A., sometime librarian and keeper of the MSS. at 
 Lambeth, p. 423. 
 
 2 The late Dr Littledale lecturing at Liverpool on Innovations in 1868 
 said : " Two mendacious partizans, the infamous Foxe and the not much 
 more respectable Burnet have so overlaid all the history of the Reformation 
 with falsehood, that it has been well-nigh impossible for readers to get at 
 the facts," p. 16. And later on he refers to the Book of Martyrs as " that 
 magazine of lying bigotry," p. 21.
 
 272 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 book brought a rich harvest to its author. He was a.most 
 penniless when he returned to England in 1559, but the English 
 version of his work, first published in 1563, made his fortune. 
 The Catholics called it derisively Foxe's Golden Legend. In 
 1570 a second edition was printed in two volumes folio, and 
 Convocation decreed that the book, designated by the canon as 
 Monumenta Martyrum, should be placed in cathedral churches, 
 and in the houses of the great ecclesiastical dignitaries. This 
 decree, although never confirmed by parliament, was so much in 
 accordance with the Puritan tone of the whole Church of 
 England at that time, that even parish churches far and wide 
 were furnished with copies of the work, chained side by side 
 with the Bible. In the vestry minutes of St Michael's Church, 
 Cornhill, of nth January 1571-72, it is ordered "that the booke 
 of Martyrs of Mr Foxe, and the paraphrases [of the gospel] of 
 Erasmus [pace Erasmus] shalbe bowght for the church and tyed 
 with a chain to the Egle bras" A few years ago, mutilated 
 copies of the Acts and Monuments might still be seen chained 
 in the parish churches of Apethorpe (Northamptonshire), 
 Arreton (Isle of Wight), Chelsea, Eustone (Oxfordshire), Kniver 
 (Staffordshire), Lussingham (Norfolk), Stratford-on- Avon, (War- 
 wickshire) Waltham, St Cuthbert (Wells) ; x also in that of 
 Lutterworth and many other places. At Cheddar not very long 
 ago was a great black-letter copy of the Acts and Monuments 
 chained to the reading desk, and it is stated in the Life of Lord 
 Macaulay that as a child, the sight of it used to fascinate him as 
 he sat on Sunday afternoons in the family-pew, longing to get 
 at the bewitching pages. 
 
 No more potent means could have been devised for saturat- 
 ing the national mind with the principles of the Reformation 
 than the diffusion of the Book of Martyrs on this gigantic scale. 
 In a few years there was scarcely a parish church in England 
 that did not possess a chained copy of the work. The illiterate 
 might frequently be seen standing in a group round the lectern, 
 1 Dictionary of National Biography, article "John Foxe,"
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 273 
 
 while one among them better instructed than the rest read to 
 them aloud its graphic and lying legends. Added to this, in 
 many churches a chapter was read to the assembled congrega- 
 tions every Sunday evening along with the Bible, and the clergy 
 constantly made its dubious martyrdoms the subject of their 
 sermons. No wonder that it assumed an importance equal to 
 that of the Scriptures themselves. One of the indictments 
 against Archbishop Laud at his trial was the fact that he had 
 ordered it to be removed from some churches in his diocese. 1 
 
 The secret of its charm for Puritan England did not 
 altogether lie in its Anti-Marian character, or in the partisan- 
 ship of its garbled facts and fictitious heroisms. The simplicity 
 of its vigorous English, the picturesque though minute circum- 
 stances which it detailed, the very boldness with which it lied, 
 in league with the primary passions to which it appealed, made 
 it one of the most powerful engines in the revolution that 
 gradually changed the face of the whole country. Its deadly 
 work of destruction has been effectually accomplished, and it is 
 almost useless to attempt to convince a people into whose frame 
 and tissue its stories have been woven, that the Protestant 
 Reformation in which they so implicitly believe is but a fairy- 
 tale for the invention of which John Foxe is mainly responsible. 
 Gairdner, in his History of the English Church in the Sixteenth 
 Century, a book of the very first importance for any serious 
 study of the period, has again and again expressed his opinion 
 of the worthlessness of the Acts and Monuments as history ; and 
 the Rev. John Gerard 2 has been at the pains of collecting 
 the learned historian's remarks on Foxe's compilation. He 
 says : 
 
 "But more damaging than any other is the criticism which 
 Foxe receives at the hands of Mr James Gairdner, the 
 fullness of whose knowledge is matched only by the calm 
 
 1 Dictionary of National Biography, article "John Foxe." 
 
 2 In his pamphlet, John Foxe and his Book of Martyrs, Catholic Truth 
 Society. 
 
 S
 
 274 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 judicial manner in which he deals with the martyrologist's 
 stories as he encounters them in his own history. Discussing 
 each case on its merits, and giving full weight to the 
 evidence on either side, Mr Gairdner finds charges of untruth- 
 fulness and dishonesty established at every turn. Foxe, he 
 declares, ignores or misrepresents evidence that tells against 
 him [p. 38] ; he manipulates it to suit his purpose [56] ; he 
 counts as martyrs offenders of all kinds [i29n]; he 'was 
 above all things credulous' [131] ; he tells stories, the falsehood 
 of which may be gathered from his own relation [ibid] ; he 
 suppresses facts furnished by the authorities upon whom he 
 draws [133]; he insinuates what is utterly false [135]; he 
 evidently wishes his readers to understand what he does not 
 venture openly to say [220-21]; he prejudices readers by 
 irrelevant gibes [271]; he has made people believe what is 
 untrue [333] ; he was quite as prejudiced and unfair as the 
 notorious Bishop Bale [342] ; his narrative has been exposed 
 as untrustworthy by reason of its bias, but has not even yet 
 been subjected to complete and thorough criticism [352]. In 
 consequence of all this, says Mr Gairdner, Foxe has given a 
 false colour to the history of the times, and especially to the 
 sentiments and motives of the persecutors. ' It is quite untrue, 
 as Foxe and his school have made the world believe, that 
 the authorities were savage or ferocious. . . . The burning of 
 heretics was a barbarous old-fashioned remedy, but it is not 
 true that either the bishops or the government adopted it 
 without reluctance' [349, 355]. And again, a royal commission, 
 issued on 8th February 1557, is printed by Foxe with the 
 title, ' A bloody commission giver! forth by K. Philip and Q. 
 Mary to persecute the poor members of Christ.' If we read 
 the preamble, however, we find that it was provoked by the 
 assiduous propagation of a number of slanderous and seditious 
 rumours, along with which the sowing of heresies and heretical 
 opinions was merely a concurrent' [387]." 
 
 Nevertheless, that the influence of Foxe is not by any
 
 FOXE'S BOOK OF ERRORS 275 
 
 means extinct in our own day, is proved by the successive 
 republications of his book during the nineteenth century. In 
 1836 the plea for a new edition was put forward in a letter 
 to the editor of the Record in these astounding terms : 
 
 "When we consider the high character of the work for 
 accuracy of detail ; its full exhibition of the Gospel in all its 
 holy and triumphant efficacy ; the bulwark it has proved to 
 our Protestant faith ; its peculiar seasonableness to meet all 
 the fresh dangers from Popery in the present times ; and its 
 intrinsic value, as forming a sound standard of Reformation 
 divinity, we find it an exercise of Christian charity to call 
 the public attention to it. We might further adduce the 
 imprimatur of our own Church, by her act of Convocation 
 appending it to all the ecclesiastical establishments in the 
 land, as giving to Foxe's work, an additional claim of 
 regard." 
 
 Between the years 1836-41, therefore, a new edition was 
 published by the Rev. S. R. Cattley, with a Life and Vindica- 
 tion of John Foxe, by Prebendary Townsend of Durham. 
 
 The Rev. Josiah Pratt reprinted it in 1 846-49 ; another 
 edition, purporting to be corrected by the Rev. Josiah Pratt, 
 the younger, appearing in 1853. But the Life and Vindication 
 had been so greatly discredited in the attack made upon it 
 by Dr S. R. Maitland, that when the Religious Tract Society 
 published an edition of the Acts and Monuments in 1877, 
 mainly from the stereotype plates of that of 1853, tne 7 thought 
 it prudent to omit that part altogether, Dr Stoughton, one 
 of the honorary secretaries of the Society, substituting an 
 Introduction, a work which is, however, as much open to 
 criticism as Townsend's. 
 
 A cheap edition had already appeared in 1868 with a 
 preface by the Bishop of Carlisle in which his lordship said 
 that : 
 
 " The Convocation of the English clergy did wisely, when 
 in the days of Elizabeth, they enacted that every parish
 
 276 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Church [sic] in this land should be furnished with a copy of 
 Foxe's Book of Martyrs" 
 
 There is also an illustrated edition published by Messrs 
 Cassell ; and the Religious Tract Society still continues to 
 make the Acts and Monuments the subject of a quiet but 
 active propaganda in evangelical interests, offering the book 
 at a reduced price to students, teachers, and public libraries, 
 sometimes even presenting it as a free gift.
 
 Photo by Kwry Walker. 
 
 SIR ROBERT COTTON. 
 
 From a Portrait by Thornhill, in the National Portrait Gallery. 
 
 [To face page 277.
 
 IV 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 
 
 THE great, perhaps the sole repositories of the early historical 
 and topographical records of England, Scotland, and Ireland, 
 from the introduction of Christianity until the introduction of 
 printing, were the monasteries. Throughout the middle ages 
 these libraries were the homes, in many instances the birth- 
 places of treasures which would have been hopelessly lost 
 or destroyed in those rough times but for the shelter thus 
 afforded them. The monks were constantly employed in 
 writing, copying, and ornamenting manuscripts, while State 
 papers and parliamentary rolls were deposited in their archives 
 for safety. Moreover, as they were known to be rich, and to 
 care for such things, books were brought to them from time to 
 time for sale by those in need of money. There was 
 scarcely any religious house but had a library, and many 
 of them were very good ones. Some data have come down 
 to us by which we can form an estimate of their bulk and 
 value. 
 
 The books which St Augustine brought with him from 
 Rome, together with those of Theodore, formed the nucleus 
 of the well-known monastic library at Canterbury. In the 
 library at Peterborough there were no fewer than 170x3 MSS. 
 That of the Grey Friars in London was 129 feet long by 31 
 feet broad, and was well filled with books. That the Abbey
 
 278 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 of Leicester and the Priory of Dover had no mean libraries 
 appears from the catalogues of their books yet remaining in 
 the Bodleian. Ingulf tells us that when the library at Croyland 
 was burned in 1091, the monks lost 700 books. The great 
 library at Wells had twenty-five windows on each side, a fact 
 which gives us some notion of the space required to contain 
 all the volumes possessed by this monastery. 1 
 
 In the English preface to Dugdale's Monasticon mention 
 is made of the " incredible number of books written by the 
 monks," and it would be easy to multiply illustrations of this 
 kind, and to collect notes of the indiscriminate destruction 
 that took place at the dissolution of the monasteries under 
 Henry VIII., when the contents of these libraries were sold 
 as waste paper. 
 
 " I know a merchant man," wrote Bale, Bishop of Ossory 
 as quoted by Leland, "which at this time shall be nameless, 
 that bought the contents of two noble libraries for forty 
 shillings apiece. A shame it is to be spoken. This stuff 
 hath he occupied, instead of grey paper, by the space of more 
 than these ten years, and yet he hath store enough for as 
 many years to come. A prodigious example is this, and to 
 be abhorred of all men which love their nation as they should 
 do. Yea, what may bring our realm to more shame and 
 rebuke than to have it noised abroad that we are despisers 
 of learning ? I judge this to be true, and utter it with heavi- 
 ness, that neither the Britons under the Romans, nor yet 
 the English people under the Danes and Normans had ever 
 such damage of their learned monuments as we have seen 
 in our time. Our posterity may well curse this wicked fact 
 of our age, this unreasonable spoil of England's most noble 
 antiquities." 
 
 Centuries had been spent in collecting that which a few short 
 months had sufficed to scatter abroad, and Bishop Tanner 
 also mentions with sorrow the loss of a great number of 
 1 Tanner, Notitia Monastic^ preface, p. xl., edited 1744.
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 279 
 
 excellent books, to the unspeakable detriment of the learned 
 world. 
 
 For a time, this havoc of the monastic libraries went on 
 unchecked, but during the reign of Elizabeth a reaction set 
 in, and there arose a little knot of men who had the good 
 sense to recognise the value of these memorials of the past, 
 and to treasure up what still remained ; and the next genera- 
 tion produced such men as Thomas Bodley, and Robert Cotton. 
 These were followed by others of kindred tastes, to whom 
 more golden opportunities of acquiring valuable treasure-trove 
 were afforded. 
 
 We shall confine ourselves here to the most illustrious 
 of these collectors, Sir Robert Cotton, whose library now 
 forms the basis of the national collection in the British 
 Museum. 
 
 The era of English libraries began with Matthew Parker's 
 gift to Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, a collection of 
 books which has preserved from destruction more materials 
 relating to the civil and ecclesiastical history of this country 
 than had ever before been gathered into one library. Fuller 
 styled this munificent bequest " the Sun of English antiquity, 
 before it was eclipsed by that of Sir Robert Cotton." 
 
 Sir Thomas Bodley was one of the first men in Europe 
 to conceive the notion of a great public library, and the rich 
 collection of books which he made at Oxford on the ruins of 
 Duke Humphrey's library, and which he bequeathed to the 
 University, is not merely of European, but of world-wide 
 celebrity. Living as he did at Oxford in a learned atmosphere, 
 he naturally turned his chief attention to Latin manuscripts, 
 while Cotton made English history his special study, and was 
 ever on the alert for material to throw fresh light upon its 
 annals. Hence the numerous Anglo-Saxon MSS. in his 
 library, and the splendid collection of State papers, relating 
 to England, Scotland, and France, contained in the press 
 marked Caligula, and in many other places,
 
 280 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Cotton and Bodley were good friends, and not only shared 
 the same tastes, but sympathised actively with each other's 
 work. In 1595 Bodley wrote to Cotton, asking him whether 
 he held to his " old intention for helping to furnish the Universitie 
 librarie," and in 1601 he acknowledges having received from 
 Cotton a contribution of manuscripts for that purpose. These 
 manuscripts were eleven in number, the titles of which may 
 be seen in Smith's manuscript notes to his catalogue in the 
 Bodleian library. 
 
 Bodley on his part was no less generous. A folio volume 
 on vellum, containing the four Gospels, the four Dialogues of 
 St Gregory, and some other articles, the whole in Saxon, 
 and consisting of 290 leaves, was a part of his contribution to 
 the Cottonian collection. 1 The contents of this volume, as 
 described by Wanley, show it to have been of exceeding great 
 value, but since his time twenty-five folios have been lost. 
 When Planta compiled his catalogue he affixed a note to 
 the effect that the manuscript was so burnt and contracted 
 as to render the binding of it impracticable, and that it was 
 preserved in a case. Later on it passed through the restoring 
 hands of Sir Frederick Madden. 
 
 Cotton was neither a great scholar, nor did he produce 
 any original work of special value, but he seems to have 
 possessed the tact and the taste to divine, and also encourage 
 talents superior to his own, thereby deserving no less well 
 of his country than those who served her with higher gifts. 
 His friend Gondomar, the Spanish ambassador, once called 
 him an "engrosser of antiquities." If we add that he did 
 not merely " engross," but that he liberally shared his acquisitions 
 with others, we shall perhaps best describe his special place and 
 work in the world of letters. To judge by his correspondence 
 it would seem that all the learned men in the kingdom applied 
 to him for the loan of some rare manuscript or other, and that 
 
 1 Otho, C. i. The notes furnished by Smith also prove the identity of the 
 Cotton MS. Otho, C. ix. with Bodley's gift, 

 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 281 
 
 hardly a scientific, political, historical, or heraldic work was 
 produced in the early part of the seventeenth century, but 
 owed something to his labours as an antiquary. 
 
 Selden asks for a sight of his Peterborough books, his 
 Book of Monies his Historia Jorw allensis. Camden writes for a 
 treatise on Heraldry, and for a ledger of the Abbey of Meaux. 
 George Carew, afterwards Earl of Totness, needs his Chronicle 
 of Peter the Cruel. Crashaw, the poet, sends for volumes 
 treating of the Council of Florence, and of the excommunication 
 of the emperor at the Council of Lyons. Sir John Dodderidge, 
 judge and antiquary, asks leave to keep Cotton's maps (perhaps 
 for his work " Of the Dimensions of the Land of England "). 
 Speed requires a note of all the monasteries in the realm, as well 
 as the Book of Henry IV., and craves help in his Life of Henry 
 V., signing himself " Your loving friend, troublesome and 
 troubled." 
 
 All these demands on Cotton's library and Cotton's liberality, 
 together with many more, may be seen in the collection of 
 letters contained in the volume, the press-mark of which is 
 Julius C 3. 
 
 The fame of the Cottonian library was great among the 
 learned at the beginning of the seventeenth century ; in 1612 it 
 was spoken of with enthusiasm. The following letter from 
 Edmund Bolton, poet and antiquary, is, despite its somewhat 
 florid and inflated style, a proof of the high estimation in which 
 the collection was held. 
 
 " Sir, The world sees that worthy monument of witt and 
 learning 1 come forth, but with honourable acknowledgements of 
 speciall helps from you. But we that are somewhat privie to 
 the truth of things, do also knowe that without your assistance, 
 it is in vain to pretende to weightie works in the antiquities of 
 
 1 Probably a reference to Bacon's History of Great Britain under the 
 Conquests of the Romans, Saxons, Danes, and Normans, published in
 
 282 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 this kingdom. For your studie, if we respect the glories of 
 saints there carefully preserved in authentic registers, it is a 
 Pantheon and all Hallowes. If the memorials of the honourable 
 deceased, it is a mausolae. If the tables and written instruments 
 of Empire, it is a Capitol. If the whole furniture of Cyclopaedia, 
 it is a mart. If matters marine, it is an arsenal if martial, a 
 camp and magazine. Briefly it is the Arck, where all noble 
 things which the deluges of impious vastitic and sacriligious 
 furie have not devoured, are kept to bee the seminaries of better 
 plantations." 
 
 He goes on to compare Cotton's library with that of Paulus 
 Jovius, the pride and glory of Italy, which, he declares, " will 
 seem perhaps little better than a beauteous charnel-house, filled 
 with skeletons, and the rotten timbers of clay-built tenements 
 dissolved into dust, by the side of this exquisitely instructed 
 studie." 
 
 Exaggerated as this praise may seem, the fact remains that 
 the Cottonian collection was unique, and that scholars owed 
 more to it than to any other sources of information. There is 
 no account of any visit of Cotton's to the Continent, although in 
 one of his early pamphlets mention is made of his having 
 visited Italy ; but people were busy in different parts of Europe 
 seeking for what was valuable in the shape of parchments and 
 old coins, to add to his treasures. 
 
 England was, however, at that time the best hunting-ground 
 for manuscripts, so short a time having elapsed since our great 
 monastic libraries had been scattered to the winds. Chronicles, 
 chartularies, State Papers, treaties, family pedigrees, documents 
 of every kind were floating about the country, often in the 
 possession of strange owners, almost always to be had for gold. 
 To acquire these was Cotton's chief delight from the age of 
 eighteen ; and as a natural consequence, this taste surrounded 
 him with learned friends. At his house at Westminster the 
 literati of the day were wont to meet. Josceline, Camden, Noel,
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 283 
 
 Speed, Sir John Davis, and others formed, together with himself, 
 the then Society of Antiquaries, which Matthew Parker had 
 founded. 
 
 But James I., although so great an amateur of antiquities, 
 did not regard the society with a favourable eye. He was 
 eminently cautious, and fancied that these meetings might lead 
 to a political association, and he accordingly suppressed 
 them. 
 
 In recognition, however, of Cotton's merit the king knighted 
 him at his coronation honours ; he called him " cousin," and 
 acknowledged his claim to be descended from the Scottish 
 family of Bruce. From that time Cotton quartered the royal 
 arms of Scotland with his own, and adopted the name of Bruce, 
 " not," says Collins in his Baronetage^ " in arrogance and 
 ostentation, but in distinction to those of the name of Cotton of 
 other families . . . and in a grateful sense of the divine favour 
 for that extraction, and to excite an emulation in his issue to 
 follow the virtues of such glorious ancestors." His descent is 
 clearly traced in the history of Connington Castle in Huntingdon- 
 shire, which had been the home of his family for centuries. The 
 house had been rebuilt at various times. When it came into 
 Sir Robert Cotton's hands he completely restored it, embellish- 
 ing the north front with richly moulded arches which he had 
 purchased and brought from Fotheringhay Castle, together with 
 the room in which Queen Mary had been executed. 1 
 
 Cotton's friendship with Camden began at Westminster 
 School, where Cotton was educated Camden being at that time 
 second master. In the last year of the century, the two friends 
 made an antiquarian journey into the North, where they explored 
 the old Roman wall, built to keep out the marauding Picts, and 
 returned to Connington laden with trophies. These were 
 afterwards presented to Trinity College, Cambridge, where they 
 are still preserved. Camden's Britannia contains more than 
 
 1 Neale. Views of the Seats of Noblemen and Gentlemen, vol. ii, 
 For Cotton's pedigree, see Julius F 8, f. jSb.
 
 284 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 one allusion to this journey. His History of Queen Elizabeth 
 was long supposed to be their joint work ; and it is 
 probable that, although he only acknowledged the loan of 
 autograph letters, the part relating to Mary Queen of Scots 
 was at least inspired by Cotton. It is certain that Camden 
 obtained nearly all his materials from his friend's library. In 
 one of his letters he speaks of Cotton as " the dearest of all my 
 friends"; and in this profession he was constant till his death, 
 directing in his will that Sir Robert should have the first 
 view of his books and manuscripts ; " that he may take such as I 
 borrowed of him ; " and then he goes on to bequeath to him his 
 entire collection, except his heraldic and ancient seals, which he 
 left to the Herald's College. 
 
 About the year 1614 it began to be whispered that Sir Robert 
 Cotton had unlawfully come by some of the State Papers in his 
 library, and the low murmurs soon grew into a loud argument 
 to the effect that the Public Record Office was injured 
 " by his having such things as he hath cunningly scraped 
 together." 1 The general feeling of jealousy and suspicion is 
 expressed in the following extract from a contemporary letter 
 which was prompted by the fact that Arthur Agard, keeper 
 of the Public Records, had left his private collection to 
 Cotton : 
 
 " The late Mr Agard has left some manuscripts, the labour 
 of most of his life, including a book on the exemption of the 
 Kings of England from the power of the Pope, abstracts of 
 treaties, and other State matters, which Sir Robert Cotton 
 claims, on pretext that they were left to him by will ; but tie 
 was at the making of the will. It is important that such things 
 be kept in possession of the King's officers, as otherwise they 
 may be suppressed when most wanted." 2 
 
 1 J. Wilson to Ambrose ; Randolph State Papers, Dom. James I., 
 1615 ; R.O. 
 
 2 Pom. James I., vol. Ixxxiii., 69* ; R.O,
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 285 
 
 After this, charge after charge was brought against Cotton, 
 till the life, that had so usefully been spent in the service of 
 learning, closed in sadness and gloom. James, however, whether 
 he gave credence to the accusations of enemies or not, 
 never quite abandoned him. He made him a member of the 
 " new order of hereditary knights called baronets," which 
 Cotton had himself advised the king to create, as a means of 
 replenishing the State coffers, without burdening his subjects 
 with taxes. (The fee was fixed at ;iooo.) 
 
 Disraeli, in his Curiosities of Literature, quoting from a 
 Lansdowne MS., says that it appeared, "by the manuscript 
 book of Sir Nicholas Hyde, Chief Justice of the King's Bench, 
 from the second to the third year of Charles I., that Sir Robert 
 Cotton had, in his library, records, evidences, ledger-books, 
 original letters, and other State papers belonging to the King ; 
 for the Attorney-General of that time, to prove this, showed a 
 copy of the pardon which Sir Robert had obtained from King 
 James for embezzling records, etc." 
 
 James had the greatest regard for Cotton's historical 
 acumen, and in the last year of his reign he ordered that no 
 more copies of the life of his mother, Mary Queen of Scots, 
 should be published till Sir Robert Cotton had enlarged it, 
 and made it more authentic by the aid of two ample histories 
 which had lately come out. 1 The similarity of their tastes 
 always ensured a certain sympathy between the antiquary 
 who was also in some sense a Scotchman, being descended 
 from the Bruces, and the first Stuart King of England. But 
 James's successor never took him into favour, and henceforth 
 there was little in his worldly prosperity to divert him from 
 his beloved library a perennial source of joy to him till his 
 enemies turned it into a weapon for his destruction. He 
 never ceased to add to it while he lived, and casual con- 
 tributions continued to flow in from various sources. 
 
 1 Secretary Conway to the Wardens, etc., of the Stationer's Company, 
 25th June 1624, Dom. James I. ; R.O.
 
 286 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Thus, in 1627, Sir James Ware sent a manuscript register 
 of St Mary's Abbey, Dublin ; and the year after Archbishop 
 Ussher presented a Samaritan Pentateuch (Claudius, B 8). 
 Already in 1625 he had mentioned this book in a letter to 
 Cotton : 
 
 "Touching the Samaritan Pentateuch, the copye which I 
 have is (as I guess) about three hundred years old, but the 
 work itself commeth very short of the tyme of Esdras and 
 Malachy. I have compared the testymonyes cited out of it 
 by the ancient Fathers, Eusebius, Jerome, Cyrill, and others, 
 and find them precisely to agree with my booke, which makes 
 me highly to esteeme of it." 
 
 In 1628 he writes apologetically for his long silence and 
 his delay in returning books lent to him by Cotton : 
 
 "A farre longer time than good manners would well 
 permitt, for which fault yett I hope to make some kinde of 
 expiation by sending you shortlye, together with your own 
 my ancient copye of the Samaritan Pentateuch, which I have 
 long since destinated unto that librarye of yours, to which I 
 have been beholden for so many good things no where else 
 to be found. I shall [God willing] ere long finish my collation 
 of it with the Hebrew text, and then hang it up ut votivam 
 Tabulam at that Sacrarium of yours." 
 
 A correspondent, signing his letter Jo Scudamore, gave him 
 a whole edition of Chaucer " in a fair ancient written hand." 
 This manuscript has unfortunately disappeared from the 
 collection. 
 
 Nicholas Saunder sent a history by Helinandus, a Cistercian 
 monk, written in the time of William the Conqueror, 1 and many 
 other donations are recorded. 
 
 Of the constant activity going on in the formation of this 
 wonderful library, and of the great generosity with which the 
 
 1 Claudius, B 9. The donor of this MS. was not the Nicholas 
 Saunders so well-known in Elizabeth's reign.
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 287 
 
 books were lent the following letters are eloquent. Archbishop 
 Ussher writes thus : 
 
 "WORTHY SIR, I have received from you the history of 
 the Bishops of Durham, together with your ancient copies of 
 the Psalmes, whereof that which hath the Saxon interlineary 
 translation inserted is the old Romanum Psalterium, the 
 other three are the same with that which is called Gallicum 
 Psalterium. But I have not yet received that which I stand 
 most in need of, to wit the Psalter in 8vo which is distinguished 
 with obeliskes and asteriskes. I pray you, therefore, send it 
 unto me by my servant, this bearer, as also the life of Wilfrid, 
 written in prose by a nameless author that lived about the 
 time of Bede ; the other written in verse by Fredegodus I 
 received from Mr Burnett ; together, with William Malms- 
 buriensis de vitis Pontificum Angliae et S. Aldhelmus. 
 Before you leave London I pray you do your best to get 
 master Crashaw's MS. Psalter conveyed unto me. I doubt 
 not but before this time you have dealt with Sir Peter Vanlore 
 for obtaining Erpenius his Hebrew, Syriach, Arabick, and 
 Persian books, and the matrices of the letters of the Oriental 
 languages. If he interpose himself seriously herein, it is not 
 to be doubted, but he will prevayle before any other. But what 
 he doth he must do very speedilye, because the Jesuites of 
 Antwerp are already dealing for the Oriental presse, and 
 others for the Arabick, Syriac, Hebrew, and Persian bookes. 
 It were good you took some order before you went, how Sir 
 Peter may signify unto you, when you are in the countrye, 
 what is done in this businesse. If he send to Mr Burnett at 
 any time [who dwellith at the signe of the three swannes in 
 Lombard Street] he will finde some means or other to com- 
 municate what he pleaseth unto me. I thank you very hartilye 
 for the care which you have taken in causing my Samaritan 
 Bible to be so faire bound. I have given order to Mr Burnett 
 to content the workman for his paynes, and so with remem-
 
 288 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 brance of my best affections unto yourself and the kinde 
 ladye your wife, 1 I committ both of you to God's blessed 
 protection, and rest your own most assured, 
 
 " JA ARMACHANUS." 
 
 Sir Edward Bering writes in 1630: 
 
 " SIR, I received your very welcome letter, whereby I find 
 you abundant in courtesies of all natures. I am a great debtor 
 to you, and those obligations likely still to be multiplied. As 
 I confess so much to you, so I hope to witnesse it to posterity. 
 I have sent up two of your bookes which have much pleasured 
 me. I have here the charter of King John, dated at Running 
 Meade. 2 By the first safe and sure messenger it is yours, so 
 are the Saxon charters, as fast as I can copy them, but in the 
 meantime I will enclose King John in a boxe and send him. 
 I shall much long to see you at this place, where you shall 
 command the heart of your affectionate friend and servant, 
 
 "E. BERING." 
 DOVER CASTLE, May 10, 1630. 
 
 It would be extremely interesting were Cotton's own letters 
 extant, to have some account from his pen of the manner in 
 which he came by many manuscripts, the history of which is 
 a blank to us from the time of the dissolution of the monasteries 
 till they found a safe haven in his library. But his letters are 
 very rare ; two only have been preserved in the Record Office. 
 They are addressed to his brother, Thomas, in the years 1623 
 and 1624, and they begin "Loving Bavid," and end "Thy 
 Jonathon." One is much stained, and difficult to read ; both 
 treat of political matters. 
 
 1 Sir Robert Cotton had married Elizabeth, daughter and co-heiress of 
 William Brocas of Thedingworth, Leicestershire, by whom he had several 
 sons, the eldest Thomas, alone surviving him. 
 
 2 There are two original drafts of Magna Charta in the Cottonian 
 Library.
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 289 
 
 In 1629 the origin of a seditious pamphlet, entitled, " How 
 to bridle the impertinency of Parliaments," which was handed 
 about in London, causing some commotion, was traced to the 
 Cottonian library. In spite of all that Cotton could put forward 
 to exculpate himself, an order was issued by the Privy Council 
 for the sequestration of his books, on the ground that they 
 were not of a nature to be exposed for public inspection. And 
 this was not all. Once before he had been deprived of access 
 to them for a time, and now again he was himself debarred 
 from entering his own library, a privation which affected him 
 so seriously, that from the moment of sequestration his health 
 visibly declined, and he declared to his friends that they 
 had broken his heart, who had locked up his books from 
 him. 
 
 Disraeli, in his Amenities of Literature, says that, 
 " Tormented by the fate of a collection which had consumed 
 forty years, at every personal sacrifice to form it for ' the use 
 and services of posterity,' he sank at the sudden stroke. In 
 the course of a few weeks he was so worn by injured feelings 
 that, from a ruddy-complexioned man, his face was wholly 
 changed into a grim blackish paleness, near to the resemblance 
 and hue of a dead visage." 
 
 Cotton made two separate petitions to have his rights over 
 his own property restored. In the first he signified to the Privy 
 Council that their detaining his books without rendering any 
 reason for the same had been the cause of the mortal malady 
 from which he suffered. In the second, in which his son joined, 
 he merely complained that the documents were perishing for 
 lack of airing, and that no one was allowed to consult them. 
 The Lord Privy Seal was at last sent to him with a tardy message 
 from the king, but too late to avail him anything. Within 
 half an hour of his death the Earl of Dorset came to condole 
 with his son, now Sir Thomas Cotton, bearing the somewhat 
 ambiguous assurance that, " as his Majesty loved his father, so 
 he would continue his love to him." Sir Robert Cotton died 
 
 T
 
 290 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 on the 6th May 1631, and was buried at Connington. Long 
 afterwards it was discovered that the author of the fatal pamphlet, 
 that had done so much to kill him, was Sir Robert Dudley, who 
 had written it when in exile at Florence. 
 
 Before tracing the subsequent history of the Cottonian 
 library we will pause and consider some of the most import- 
 ant manuscripts which it contained at the death of its famous 
 originator. 
 
 It has been said that he turned his attention largely towards 
 collecting materials for every period of English history. Those 
 materials are particularly rich as regards the Anglo-Saxon 
 period. 
 
 Beginning chronologically we find here (in Vitellius, A 15) 
 the story of Beowulf, the oldest monument of Anglo-Saxon 
 literature, reaching back into the ages of heathendom. It is 
 a pagan war-song which, in being handed down from minstrel 
 to minstrel, has lost nothing of its wild, exultant beauty, while 
 it has received many Christian inflexions from the bards of a 
 better religion than that in which it was originally conceived, 
 through whose minds it passed before being committed to 
 parchment When the Saxons had embraced Christianity 
 they carefully weeded out from their national poetry all 
 allusion to personages of pagan mythology, so that, in an 
 antiquarian sense, their literature suffered. But the forcible 
 and picturesque imagery of half-barbaric tribes still remained. 
 The coarseness of the beer-hall is, however, subdued by the 
 gold and silken embroideries with which it is adorned. In 
 a vivid description of a battle, in the midst of lurid flames, 
 of blood and carnage, the enemy is " put to sleep with 
 the sword." When a hero dies in peace, "he goes on his 
 way." 
 
 The poem of Beowulf has been variously edited. It was 
 first noticed by Wanley, in his catalogue of Saxon MSS. in 
 1705. It was printed with a Latin translation by Thorkelin, 
 at Copenhagen, in 1815. Conybeare, in his Illustrations of
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 291 
 
 Anglo-Saxon Poetry, points out several errors into which the 
 Dane, Thorkelin, and the Englishman, Turner fell ; and Thorpe, 
 in his Anglo-Saxon Poems of Beowulf, differs from all preceding 
 editors, who considered the heroes as mythical beings of a 
 divine order, he suggesting that they were kings and chieftains 
 of the North, within the pale of authentic history. 1 This 
 opinion had been shared by Kemble, but under the influ- 
 ence of Grimm perhaps the greatest authority on these 
 matters he ended by regarding the poem as mythic. Later 
 critics have, however, considered that it deals with historical 
 persons. 
 
 Only secondary to the romance of Beowulf must once have 
 been the fragment of a poem on the death of Beorhtnoth. 2 It 
 was printed by Hearne in the appendix to his edition of 
 Johannis Glastoniensis Chronicon, but without a translation. 
 
 " It constitutes," says Conybeare, " a battle-piece of spirited 
 execution, mixed with short speeches from the principal 
 warriors, conceived with much force, variety, and character ; 
 the death of the hero is also very graphically described. The 
 whole approximates much more nearly than could have been 
 expected to the war-scenes of Homer." 
 
 Of the poem of Judith, one of the finest specimens of Anglo- 
 Saxon songs, a fragment is preserved in the same volume which 
 contains the story of Beowulf. 
 
 The type of the Anglo-Saxon poets in Christian times is 
 Caedmon, whom Professor George Stephens called " the Milton 
 of North England in the seventh century," and who, according 
 to the legend told by Bede, being singularly unblessed with 
 the power of song, received the gift miraculously in sleep. He 
 is represented in the Cottonian library only by a few prayers 
 in Anglo-Saxon (Julius, A 2) which Junius printed from this 
 MS. at the end of his edition of Caedmon's paraphrase. The 
 
 1 Preface, p. xvii. 
 
 2 Formerly Otho A 12, in the Cottonian Library ; the original perished 
 in the fire of 1731.
 
 292 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 interesting collection, which goes by Csedmon's name in the 
 Bodleian library, is a series of pieces on Scriptural subjects, 
 with beautifully painted illustrations. 
 
 A manuscript of the tenth century (Cleopatra, B 13) contains 
 a short hymn on the conversion of the Anglo-Saxons ; and in 
 the same volume is a life of St Dunstaa 
 
 Two important volumes (Tiberius, B 5, and Titus, D 27), 
 one of which appears to have been written for the use of nuns, 
 formed part of the material for a history of mathematics in 
 England, during the Middle Ages. 1 
 
 Alcuin and Aldhelm were the chief Anglo-Latin poets. 
 Some of Alcuin's letters are to be found in this collection. St 
 Aldhelm, Abbot, afterwards Bishop of Malmesbury, was regarded 
 by King Alfred as the prince of Anglo-Latin poets. His chief 
 work, The Praises of Virginity, is at Cambridge, but his metrical 
 treatise on the monastic life and one of his letters are here 
 preserved. 
 
 Alfred is well represented in his Laws, and in his Saxon 
 versions of Augustine's soliloquies. 
 
 Of the works of the venerable Bede we have the Ecclesiastical 
 History, the Life and Miracles of St Cuthbert, and nine other 
 manuscripts. 
 
 It was probably between 1615 and 1621 that Sir Robert 
 Cotton became possessed of the celebrated manuscript known 
 as the Utrecht Psalter. Its early history is obscure, and 
 experts have differed widely as to its probable date and 
 origin. Sir Thomas Hardy, who summarised its contents, and 
 drew up a report upon the intrinsic arguments in favour of 
 its remote antiquity, called attention to the fact that it could 
 not have been written in England, because it contains certain 
 liturgical pieces which were not in use in this country, at the 
 time assigned for its age by other internal evidence. He 
 suggested that it was brought into England by the Christian 
 
 1 Rara Mathematica from inedited MSS., by J. O. Halliwell.
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 293 
 
 princess, Bertha, daughter of Charibert the Prankish king, who 
 became the Queen of Ethelbert. He based this supposition 
 on the costliness of the manuscript which would point to its 
 having belonged to a royal personage. He next considered 
 the probability that this Psalter was presented by Queen 
 Bertha to the monastery of Reculver, in Kent, where the king 
 had built a new palace, and where Bertha attended the services 
 of her religion, Hardy drew this inference from the coinci- 
 dence that at the time when the volume came into Cotton's 
 hands there was bound up with it a charter, recording the 
 gift of certain lands by Lothair, King of Kent, to Bercwald, 
 Abbot of Reculver, and to his monastery. The charter is 
 dated Reculver, May 7, 679, and it seems to have been the 
 custom in smaller monasteries to place royal and other charters 
 inside valuable books for preservation, in default of any 
 more suitable depositary. This charter, which Cotton took 
 to be an original document, he separated from the 
 Utrecht Psalter, preserving it in another part of his library. 
 It is still to be found where he placed it (in Augustus, 
 B 2). 
 
 Mr Birch, however, disposed summarily of Sir Thomas 
 Hardy's ingenious theory, and pronounced Cotton's opinion 
 that the charter was an original document, as not worth much. 
 After giving all the evidence for and against the probability 
 of Queen Bertha, having presented the Psalter to Reculver 
 Abbey, he showed reasons for the charter being a copy of 
 the original, and for its having been made at Christ Church, 
 Canterbury, a religious house very closely allied to Reculver, 
 which was secularised centuries before the dissolution of the 
 monasteries by Henry VIII. 
 
 But the most recent authority on illuminated manuscripts, 
 Sir Edward Maunde Thompson, considers that the actual date 
 of the Utrecht Psalter may be placed about the year 800, and 
 he maintains with Sir Thomas Hardy, judging by internal 
 palasographical evidence, that without doubt, the manuscript
 
 294 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 is of Prankish workmanship, and he assigns its origin to the 
 north, or north-east of France. 1 This carries us back to Queen 
 Bertha and Cotton's suggestion that she brought the book over 
 with her. 
 
 Shortly after the suppression of Christ Church, which, in 
 all probability, inherited the treasures of Reculver, the Utrecht 
 Psalter, together with its incorporated charter, fell into the 
 hands of the Talbot family ; and in Mr Bond's report on 
 the manuscript he said that the name Mary Talbot could, 
 with some difficulty, be deciphered on the lower margin of 
 folio 6ob, in a sixteenth century hand. Various suggestions 
 have been made in regard to this name, but in Mr Birch's 
 opinion and here there is good reason for following him 
 it belonged to the wife or daughter of " Master Talbot of 
 Norwich, a most ingenious and industrious antiquary." He 
 made a collection of rare manuscripts, most of which are now 
 in Corpus Christi College at Cambridge, and it was from 
 this collection that the Utrecht Psalter passed into Sir Robert 
 Cotton's possession, but whether by gift or purchase is not 
 recorded. 
 
 The manuscript is entered in the catalogue of the library 
 written by Cotton himself in 1621, under the press-mark 
 Claudius C 7, but it is not to be found in any subsequent 
 catalogue. An entry occurs among the Notes of such books 
 as have been lent out by Sir Robert Cotton to divers persons, 
 and are abroad in their hands att this daye, the \yh of January 
 1630, which entry is to the effect that the Psalter was lent 
 "to my lord the Earle of Arundel." Birch gave it up as lost 
 to the Cotton library from the time that it passed into 
 Lord Arundel's hands ; but he must have been unaware of 
 the existence of Smith's own copy of his printed catalogue, 
 which contains his manuscript notes of books borrowed from 
 
 1 See a Paper on " English Illuminated Manuscripts, A.D. 700-1066, by 
 Mr, now Sir Edward Maunde Thompson, Bibliographica, part ii., London : 
 Kegan & Co.
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 295 
 
 the Cotton collection, and in which these words are written : 
 "Borrowed by Mr Ashmole, on the i/th February 1673, 
 Claudius, C. 7." Smith's folio catalogue, published in 1696, 
 has the word Deest, marking its absence from the library. 
 Nothing further can be discovered till 1718, when the book 
 appears to have become the property of Monsieur de Ridder, 
 a Dutchman, who presented it to the University of Utrecht 
 where it still remains. 1 Sir Robert Cotton's signature is on 
 the first page. 
 
 The great charm of this manuscript, a facsimile of which 
 is to be seen in the Cottonian library, lies in its pen-and-ink 
 illustrations, as forcible and appealing as are the scenes of 
 the Last Judgment on the walls of the Campo Santo at Pisa. 
 Among the Harleian MSS., moreover (No. 603), there is 
 an illuminated Psalter so like it, that it seems impossible 
 that the artist should not have had the Utrecht Psalter before 
 him as he drew ; unless, as Sir Edward Thompson supposes, 
 the older manuscript is itself a copy of a still more ancient 
 one, which leads him to infer that other versions of this 
 Psalter were in existence in England at an early date. This 
 would account also for the Eadwine Psalter at Cambridge, a 
 twelfth-century imitation of the Harleian manuscript. Neither 
 of these Psalters can be described as an absolute copy of the 
 Utrecht Psalter. 
 
 We are here led to deplore the loss of another valuable manu- 
 script of a totally different kind, which, although not in the 
 collection at the time of Sir Robert's death, once belonged 
 to this library, and was lost in the same way. We refer to 
 to the " Enconium Emmae " an eleventh century MS. which 
 Cotton sent to Duchesne, and which the latter used in writing 
 his Histories Normanorum, but never returned. It has entirely 
 disappeared. 
 
 We now come to what is perhaps the noblest monument 
 
 1 The History, Art, and Paleography of the Utrecht Psalter, by W. de 
 Gray Birch, F.R.S.L., Keeper of the Manuscripts in the British Museum.
 
 296 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 of Anglo-Saxon times in the Cottonian library namely, the 
 famous Lindisfarne Gospels also known as the Durham Book, 
 a marvel of palaeographic art. It is indisputably the finest 
 production of the school of Lindisfarne. The Latin text, 
 written in double columns, was transcribed by Eadfrith, Bishop 
 of Lindisfarne, while still a simple monk, in honour, some say 
 for the use, of St Cuthbert. It was finished after the saint's 
 death, at the end of the seventh, or beginning of the eighth 
 century. This we learn from intrinsic evidence, in the form 
 of a brief note in Anglo-Saxon at the end of the Gospel of St 
 Matthew, and a longer one at the end of the volume. These 
 notes have thus been translated by Mr Waring : * 
 
 " Thou, O living God, bear in mind Eadfrith and ALthel- 
 wald, and Billfrith and Aldred, the sinner. These four 
 with God's help were employed upon (or busied about) this 
 book." 
 
 And- 
 
 " Eadfrith, Bishop over the Church of Lindisfarne, first wrote 
 this book in (honour of) God and St Cuthbert, and all the 
 company of saints in the Island ; and yEthelwald, Bishop of 
 Lindisfarne, made an outer cover, and adorned it as he was well 
 able ; and Billfrith, the anchorite, he wrought the metal-work 
 of the ornaments on the outside thereof, and decked it with 
 gold, and with gems, overlaid also with silver and unalloyed 
 metal ; and Aldred, an unworthy and most miserable priest, by 
 the help of God and St Cuthbert, over-glossed the same in 
 English, and domiciled himself with the three parts. Matthew, 
 this part for God and St Cuthbert ; Mark, this part for the bishop ; 
 and Luke, this part for the brotherhood ; with eight ora of silver 
 (as an offering) on entrance ; and St John's part for himself i.e., 
 for his soul ; and (depositing) four silver ora with God and 
 St Cuthbert, that he may find acceptance in heaven through 
 the mercy of God ; good fortune and peace on earth, promotion 
 1 Prolegomena, Lindisfarne, and Rushworth Gospels, part iv.
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 29? 
 
 and dignity, wisdom and prudence through the merits of 
 St Cuthbert 
 
 "Eadfrith, ^Ethelwald, Billfrith, and Aldred have wrought 
 and adorned this Book of the Gospels for (love of) God and 
 St Cuthbert." 
 
 Old as it is, neither vellum nor illumination shows the least 
 sign of decay. The writing is exquisitely beautiful, and points 
 to a degree of refinement and cultivation which we do not 
 usually associate with a rough life, such as was led by the 
 monks of sea-girt Lindisfarne. There are to be seen 
 wonderful initial letters, geometrical and tesselated designs, like 
 the most delicate and intricate mosaics, and above all, beauti- 
 fully devout representations of the four evangelists, all evidently 
 drawn by the same loving and reverent hand, and the whole 
 colouring as fresh now as if it had been painted yesterday. 
 
 The evangelists, each accompanied by the symbolic animal, 
 usually assigned to him, occupy nearly the whole of their 
 respective pages. They are taken from Byzantine models, of 
 which, as Westwood points out, 1 nothing remains but the 
 attitudes, the fashion of the dress and the form of the seats. 
 There can be little doubt that these illuminations were copied 
 from a MS. brought into England by the missionaries sent from 
 Rome by St Gregory in the seventh century. 
 
 Sir Edward Thompson, following Dom Germain Morin, 2 
 shows that the Capitula, or tables of sections which accompany 
 each gospel are according to the Neapolitan use, and that 
 Adrian, the companion of the Greek, Theodore, Archbishop of 
 Canterbury in his mission to Britain in 668, was abbot of a 
 monastery in the Island of Nisita, near Naples. 
 
 Bede tells us that these missionaries were both at Lindisfarne, 
 and Sir Edward Thompson gives it as his opinion that the 
 
 1 Facsimiles of the Miniatures and Ornaments of Anglo- Saxon and Irish 
 Manuscripts, p. 35. 
 
 2 See his articles in the Revue BenSdictine, Nov. and Dec. 1891, pp. 481 
 and 529.
 
 298 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Neapolitan MS. from which the Durham Book or Lindisfarne 
 Gospel derived its text, had been brought a few years previously 
 from Naples by the Abbot Adrian. 1 
 
 The interlineary Saxon gloss was a later addition by the 
 monk, Aldred, and Billfrith, as we have seen, made the 
 sumptuous metal cover. This binding, needless to say, has long 
 since disappeared, and for many years a shabby morocco 
 covering replaced the gorgeous shrine in which the monks of 
 Holy Island had deposited their treasure. About sixty years 
 ago, Bishop Maltby of Durham, at the suggestion of Mr John 
 Holmes, provided a worthy substitute, the design for which 
 was copied from one of the ornamented pages in the book 
 itself. 
 
 This magnificent manuscript has been published by the 
 Surtees Society, together with the very inferior Rushworth 
 Gospels, but only one illumination has been reproduced. 2 
 
 Of absolutely authentic history there is little to relate 
 concerning this celebrated manuscript, but Simeon of Durham, 
 or rather Turgot, whose account he copied (and both men lived 
 in the neighbourhood), is responsible for a story which says that 
 it remained at Holy Island till the ravages of the Danes forced 
 the monks to fly, carrying with them their two greatest treasures, 
 the body of St Cuthbert, and this volume. But in their 
 flight across the narrow strip of sea which divides the 
 Island from the coast of Northumbria, their boat was thrown 
 so much on one side that the book fell overboard. They 
 arrived safely on the opposite shore, but could not make up 
 their minds to continue their journey till they had done what 
 they could to recover the precious relic. So they waited at the 
 peril of their lives till the tide went out, leaving, as it does to 
 
 1 English Illuminated Manuscripts, " Bibliographica," part ii. 
 
 2 The Lindisfarne Gospels or Durham Book is described in Planta's 
 Catalogue (Nero, D 4), as "Liber prseclarissimus, elegantissimis characteri- 
 bus et curiosissimus pro istius seculi arte picturis et delineationibus 
 ornatus." See also Wanley's Catalogue, Codd. MS. (Anglo- Sax.) 
 p. 250.
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 29d 
 
 this day, a stretch of bare sand between the Island and the 
 mainland. To the inexpressible joy of the monks, they then 
 found the book lying unharmed on the sand. 
 
 Archbishop Eyre, in his Life of St Cuthbert, following the 
 story as it is contained in the Rites of Durham?- places this 
 incident in the sixth or seventh year of their wanderings. 
 
 " And so, the bishop, the abbot, and the rest, being weary of 
 travelling, thought to have stolen away, and carried St 
 Cuthbert's body into Ireland, for his better safety. And being 
 upon the sea in a ship, by a marvellous miracle three waves of 
 water were turned into blood. The ship that they were in was 
 driven back by the tempest and by the mighty power of God 
 as it would seem, upon the shore or land. And also the said 
 ship that they were in, by the great storm and strong raging 
 walls of the sea as is aforesaid, was turned on the one side, and 
 the Book of the Holy Evangelists fell out of the ship into the 
 bottom of the sea." 
 
 This account says that the monks found the volume about 
 three miles from the shore, and that their landing-place was 
 Whithorn in Galloway, opposite Belfast. 
 
 When Lindisfarne became a priory cell to Durham, this 
 famous manuscript still remained in the city of St Cuthbert, and 
 in the History of North Durham by Raine, it is mentioned in the 
 year 1637, as " the Book of St Cuthbert which had fallen into 
 the sea." We, indeed, notice a brown stain on several of its 
 leaves, which might be accounted for by their having been 
 saturated with salt water, did we but know what would be the 
 effect of a sea-water mark after so long a period. At the time 
 of the dissolution it was still at Durham, and no record of what 
 then befel it has been preserved. 2 
 
 Sir Robert Cotton discovered it in the possession of Robert 
 Bowyer, clerk of Parliament under James I. 
 
 1 Surtees Society. 
 
 2 Brayley's Graphic and Historical Illustrator, \ 834 ; article " The 
 Durham Book," by the Rev. Joseph Stevenson.
 
 300 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 The resemblance between the artistic and palaeographic 
 peculiarities of the Book of Kells and the Durham Book is 
 accounted for by the fact that Lindisfarne was founded from 
 lona, which had been given to St Columba and his Irish 
 companions in the sixth century. The monks, who settled at 
 Holy Island, continued the Scoto-Irish traditions which they 
 had brought with them, and perpetuated them in their 
 manuscripts. 
 
 A brief notice of one other remarkable MS. may be made. 
 It is to be found in the press Claudius, B 4, and a careful 
 description of it is given by Westwood in his Palceographia 
 Sacra Pictoria, and in his Miniatures and Ornaments of Anglo- 
 Saxon and Irish MSS. An early tradition declares it to be 
 one of the volumes sent to St Augustine by Pope Gregory. 
 However that may be, it is known as the Augustine Psalter, and 
 the style of its ornamentation is of Roman origin. This 
 ornamentation consists of initial letters in the Celtic manner ; 
 but gold, which was hardly ever used in the Lindisfarne school, 
 and never in Irish MSS., is here seen in profusion, and this 
 detail betrays a foreign influence. It belonged to the Abbey 
 of St Augustine at Canterbury, and may be a copy executed 
 in that house of one of the books sent from Rome. 
 
 The Paraphrase of the Pentateuch and the Book of Joshua, 
 by >Elfric, the grammarian, in this collection, is the finest 
 known copy of the work. It is ornamented with 397 drawings, 
 illustrating the text of the early books of the Bible. The 
 largest miniature represents the building of the Tower of 
 Babel. 
 
 The Psychomachia of Prudentius is very beautifully written 
 in red and black ink. There are 83 drawings. A replica of 
 this manuscript, which belonged to the monks of Malmesbury, 
 is now at Cambridge. 
 
 Scarcely less interesting historically than the Lindisfarne 
 Gospels is the Book of the Benefactors of Durham Cathedral. 
 Their names are written in alternate lines of gold and silver,
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 301 
 
 the binding being also originally of gold and silver, to which fact 
 a Latin couplet in verse testifies. As time went on it was 
 carelessly kept by the monks of Durham, but entries were 
 made up to the eve of the dissolution of the monastery. The 
 book has been published by the Surtees Society under its 
 name si Liber Vita, and edited by the Rev. Joseph Stevenson who 
 also wrote a preface. The meaning of Liber Vitas was that the 
 fact of the benefactor's name being inscribed in this book was 
 coupled with the hope and the prayer that the same name might 
 at last find a place in the Book of Life, in which those are 
 enrolled, who shall be faithful unto death. 1 Later on it became 
 a sort of memorandum-book, in which together with the names 
 of benefactors, was entered a brief account of the nature of their 
 donations. Copies of charters were also inserted, and other 
 matters of an historical character. 
 
 As far as folio 42, it is written in a beautiful ninth century 
 hand, but from this point onwards, the gold and silver lines are 
 omitted, and it is continued in varied and less elegant writing. 
 This manuscript remained at Durham till the dissolution, and 
 it is not known what then became of it, nor in what manner 
 it passed finally into the Cottonian library. It is thus quaintly 
 described : 
 
 "There did lie on the High Altar an excellent fine book, 
 very richly covered with gold and silver, containing the names 
 of all the benefactors towards St Cuthbert's Church, from the 
 very original foundation thereof, the very letters of the book 
 being for the most part all gilt, as is apparent in the said book 
 till this day. The laying that book on the High Altar did 
 show how highly they esteemed their founders and benefactors ; 
 and the quotidian remembrance they had of them in the time 
 of Mass and divine service. And this did argue not only their 
 gratitude, but also a most divine and charitable affection to 
 the souls of their benefactors as well dead as living, which 
 1 Preface to the published volume, p. 8.
 
 302 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 book is yet extant, declaring the said use in the inscription 
 thereof." l 
 
 These examples may suffice as a glimpse into the nature 
 of this treasure-house, but where so much is rare and 
 costly, it is not easy to make a selection that shall be fairly 
 representative. 
 
 With regard to the peculiar designation of the places 
 occupied by the books, Sir Robert Cotton arranged them in 
 fourteen presses, each press being surmounted by a bust of 
 one of the twelve Roman emperors, the two last supporting 
 those of Cleopatra and Faustina. The contents of each press 
 were placed in boxes or portfolios, or were bound up in volumes, 
 each box, portfolio, or volume being designated by a letter of 
 the alphabet, each document having a special number. 
 
 After the death of its founder the library remained for 
 some time in sequestration, to the great annoyance of the 
 new baronet, Sir Thomas Cotton, who complained bitterly that 
 he was shut out from his study, the best room in his house. 
 A schedule was at length drawn up, consisting of a large 
 vellum roll still extant in the collection, showing that it 
 contained nothing that did not belong to him, and ultimately 
 he gained admission. 
 
 Sir Symond D'Ewes made no secret of his opinion that 
 Sir Thomas was " wholly addicted to the tenacious increasing 
 of his worldly wealth, and altogether unworthy to be master 
 of so inestimable a library." We cannot altogether agree 
 with this verdict, since Sir Thomas avenged himself by lending 
 D'Ewes his father's collection of coins ; and it is but fair to add 
 that he appears in general to have been no less liberal, one 
 might almost say careless, in lending than his father. Rancour 
 may, however, have set in later on, for Dugdale, writing to 
 D'Ewes in 1639 says, " I am in despair to obtain the books of 
 
 1 The Ancient Rites and Monuments of the Monastical and Cathedral 
 Church of Durham, collected out of ancient manuscripts about the time of 
 the Suppression,
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 303 
 
 Sir Thomas Cotton which you desire." Richard James, librarian, 
 fell under the same condemnation as his master, for D'Ewes 
 describes him as "a wretched mercenary fellow." 
 
 Sir Thomas Cotton died in 1662, and was succeeded by 
 his eldest son, John, who was somewhat of a scholar. Some 
 respectable Latin verses written by him occur among Smith's 
 MSS. at Oxford. He married Dorothy, daughter and co- 
 heiress of Edmund Anderson, of Stratton in Bedfordshire, and 
 it appears that during the civil war the library was removed 
 to that place for greater safety. This was the beginning of its 
 wanderings and vicissitudes, which lasted nearly a hundred 
 years. 
 
 The first regular catalogue of the Cottonian library was 
 made and printed at Oxford by Dr Thomas Smith in 1696. 
 This catalogue is defective in many ways, especially as regards 
 State Papers and detached tracts, of which there are no fewer 
 than 170 volumes, which are here severally entered under one 
 head only, although they each contain on an average as many 
 as a hundred separate documents on different subjects. 
 Dugdale, who was allowed to make what use he liked of the 
 library, discovered 80 of these volumes in loose bundles, and 
 had them bound. But they were still practically useless for 
 want of proper descriptions and indices, till Planta, keeper of 
 the MSS. in the British Museum, published his descriptive 
 catalogue in 1802. Although not without faults, it has never 
 been superseded. 
 
 It is to the third baronet that we are mainly indebted for 
 the magnificent project of bequeathing the Cottonian library 
 to the nation. He died in 1702, before the final steps had been 
 taken in this direction ; but his grandson and immediate suc- 
 cessor carried out his wishes which had also been those of his 
 father and grandfather. 
 
 The statute, drawn up in the year 1700 (12 and 13 William 
 III.) is entitled, "An Act for the better settling and preserving 
 the library kept in the house at Westminster, called Cotton
 
 304 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 House, in the name and family of the Cottons for the benefit of 
 the public." 
 
 The next step was to have the books carefully inspected, 
 and compared with Smith's catalogue, now found to be in- 
 adequate. Many of the manuscripts were reported to be in a 
 state of decay, the place where they were kept not being 
 suitable. In 1706, Sir Christopher Wren was commissioned to 
 fit up the study for public use, but he declared that Cotton 
 House was in a ruinous condition ; and in consequence of his 
 report, in the following year, another Act of Parliament decreed 
 that to increase the public utility of the library, Cotton House 
 should be purchased of Sir John Cotton for 4500, and a new 
 building erected for the collection of books. Still, nothing was 
 done, till the house, actually threatening to tumble down, the 
 books were removed to Essex House, in the Strand, where they 
 remained for twenty -eight years. In 1730, Ashburnham House, 
 Westminster, was purchased by the nation for the reception of 
 the Cottonian, together with the Royal library. It was here, 
 in 1731, that the terrible fire broke out in which so many 
 valuable manuscripts were destroyed. 
 
 At about 2 o'clock in the morning of the 23rd October, Dr 
 Bentley, the librarian, and his family, who lived at Ashburnham 
 House, were roused from sleep by a suffocating smoke which 
 soon afterwards burst into flames. The outbreak was caused 
 by a wooden mantelpiece taking fire, in the room immediately 
 under the two libraries. It was at first hoped that the flames 
 might be extinguished by throwing water upon the woodwork 
 of the room actually on fire, so that they did not begin to 
 remove the books as soon as they should have done. But 
 seeing that this was useless, Mr Casley, deputy librarian, 
 hastened to rescue the famous Alexandrian MS. in the Royal 
 library, and the books in the Cottonian press named Augustus, 
 as being considered the most valuable. These are principally 
 charts, maps, grants, and papal bulls, all relating to early 
 English history. Several of the presses were then removed
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 305 
 
 bodily, but as the fire spread with alarming rapidity, and there 
 was a delay in the arrival of the engines, it was discovered 
 none too soon, that the backs of some of the presses were on 
 fire. Then the books were seized and thrown out of windows, 
 after which they were carried into Westminster School and 
 the Little Cloisters. By permission of the Dean and Chapter 
 they subsequently found a temporary home in a new building 
 that had been erected as a dormitory for the school. 
 
 A committee was at once appointed by the House of 
 Commons to inquire into the amount of injury sustained. It 
 was found that a great number of manuscripts had suffered from 
 the engine-water, as well as from fire, and the report of the 
 commissioners stated, that out of 958 volumes of MSS. 746 were 
 unharmed, and 98 partially injured. 
 
 The press named Otho had suffered the most In the table 
 drawn up by Casley in his appendix to the Royal library, not 
 one volume in Otho is seen to be intact; 16 are marked defec- 
 tive, 55 as lost, burnt, or defaced so as not to be distinguishable. 
 Vitellius was the next greatest sufferer, 46 volumes being pre- 
 served, 28 defective, and 34 seriously damaged. Vespasian, with 
 its fine collection of historical materials for the history of 
 England and Scotland, its dramas in Old English verse, and 
 the famous Coventry Mystery Plays and others happily escaped 
 altogether. 1 Casley's figures differ slightly from those of the 
 commissioners: out of a total of 958 volumes, he notes 748 as 
 uninjured, 99 as defective, and 1 1 1 as lost, burnt, or defaced. 
 
 On the ist November the work of restoration began, and 
 was carried out by Bentley, Casley, three clerks from the Record 
 Office, a bookbinder, and others. The Speaker of the House 
 of Commons was frequently present. Some of the MSS. in- 
 clined to mildew were dried before a fire. Some would have 
 rotted if they had not been taken out of their bindings, so 
 
 1 Narrative of the Fire which happened at Ashbumham House, 23rd 
 October 1731. Report of the committee appointed by the House of 
 Commons. 
 
 V
 
 306 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 thoroughly had the water permeated. The paper books which 
 had received stains were taken to pieces and plunged into the 
 softest cold water that could be procured, and when the stains 
 disappeared they were put into alum and water, and then hung 
 upon lines to dry. 
 
 The best means of stretching vellum to its original dimen- 
 sions, after it has been shrivelled and contracted, had not at that 
 time been discovered, but the restorers did what they could. It 
 was first softened in cold water, then those leaves, which had 
 become glued together by the heat melting all kinds of extrane- 
 ous matter, were separated by means of an ivory cutter, and the 
 glutinous substances carefully removed with the fingers, the 
 parchments smoothed with the palm of the hand, and their 
 backs pressed with a clean flannel. Fragments were also care- 
 fully cleaned and preserved, and upon many of these with which 
 the original restorers could do nothing, Sir Frederick Madden 
 afterwards worked wonders. By his method, 100 volumes were 
 repaired on vellum, and 97 on paper. 
 
 Among these mutilated fragments was the priceless fourth 
 century manuscript of Genesis, Otho, B 6, which was thought to 
 have been taken abroad as it could not be found after the fire. 
 For a while it was given up as irrevocably lost, but Sir Frederick 
 Madden discovered the much burnt remains and pieced them 
 together. This Book of Genesis was at one time thought to be 
 the oldest Greek MS. in England. It is now known that the 
 four leaves of the gospel in Greek, Titus, C 15, are as old or 
 even older. The Oxford librarian, Thomas James, wrote in the 
 beginning of the volume that it was brought into this country 
 by two Greek bishops as a present to Henry VIII. They told 
 him that according to an old tradition it had belonged to Origen, 
 and there was nothing in the text to make the supposition in- 
 credible. This, if true, would carry the manuscript back 1 500 
 years at least, with a possibility of its being much more ancient. 
 It had been the subject of a dispute in the time of the first Sir 
 John Cotton, when it was supposed to have been lost. All at
 
 THE SPOILS OF THE MONASTERIES 307 
 
 once it was discovered in the possession of Lady Stafford, who 
 stoutly maintained that it had belonged to the late earl, her 
 husband, who had lent it to Sir Thomas Cotton ; and that 
 while it was in his hands he caused it to be newly bound, and 
 his coat of arms fixed upon it. She said, however, that Sir John 
 might have it for 40, but that she would not take a farthing 
 less, adding that he had already offered her 30 in her own 
 house, but that she had refused the sum. Mr Gilbert Crouch, 
 who was negotiating for Sir John, in explaining the matter to 
 Dugdale, said that if Sir John Cotton had " so great a mind to 
 the book, he were better give this other 10 than run the 
 charge and hazard of a suit." 1 
 
 All that now remains of this uniquely beautiful MS., painted 
 on every page, are eighteen melancholy scraps of no use but as 
 a monument of the ingenuity with which they have been pieced 
 together, mended, and preserved. 
 
 The Chronicle of Wendover, which was also believed to have 
 perished, was found and repaired in the time of Sir Frederick 
 Madden. 
 
 A fragment of another MS., marked as missing in Planta's 
 catalogue, has found its way to the Bodleian library. It con- 
 sists of ten folios of the Life of St Basil, and a note by Hearne 
 says that it came from a Cottonian MS. 
 
 Grand and imposing as the Cottonian library still is, it is 
 painful to consider how incomparably finer it must have been 
 during the life of its founder, before it suffered from the ravages 
 of the fire, and from the carelessness or dishonesty of so many 
 borrowers. Sir John Cotton avowed that many books lent to 
 Selden were never returned ; the Duke of Buckingham was also 
 guilty in the same respect. A manuscript now in the Bodleian 
 library (Barlow 49) was borrowed from the Cottonian by Dr 
 Prideaux, and never returned. It was afterwards exposed for 
 sale at Worcester, and bought by Dr Barlow, who presented it 
 to the Bodleian. Parliamentary rolls often suffered a like fate, 
 1 Life, Diary, and Correspondence of Sir William Dugdale.
 
 308 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and instances of similar losses could be largely multiplied. 
 The loss of the Utrecht Psalter is, however, perhaps the most 
 grievous that the library has sustained from borrowers. 
 
 Some of the manuscripts, injured by the fire at Ashburnham 
 House, were further mutilated by another fire which occurred 
 on the premises of a bookbinder on the loth July 1865. 
 
 In 1753 th e government purchased the large Natural History 
 and Art Collection of Sir Hans Sloane, together with a library of 
 50,000 volumes, which were deposited in Montague House, 
 Bloomsbury, on the site of the present British Museum Build- 
 ings. Hither the Cottonian and Royal libraries were brought, 
 forming, together with the Sloane manuscripts, the nucleus of the 
 great national collections of which we are justly proud, and 
 which, under their present efficient and courteous management, 
 are rendered so useful to students. 
 
 The British Museum was formally opened to the public at 
 Montague House in 1759. But it grew so rapidly that soon 
 more space was needed, and in 1823 the eastern wing of the 
 present building was erected to receive the library of George 
 III. presented to the museum by George IV. The whole build- 
 ing was completed in 1847.
 
 Photo by Emiry Walkrr. 
 
 HENRY, PRINCE OF WALES (Eldest Son of James I.). 
 
 From a Portrait by Van Somers in the National Portrait Gallery. 
 
 [To face I'ege 309.
 
 V 
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 
 
 THE Royal library is in many ways the most splendid of 
 our national manuscript collections. Had it been fortunate 
 enough, like the Harleian library, to number a Wanley 
 among its custodians and biographers, the history of its 
 formation would read like a fairy-tale. But, unhappily, we 
 have to depend for our chief data on what Casley, the " dry 
 as dust" par excellence of librarians could tell us, and though 
 his knowledge of the age of MSS. was admirable, he was 
 remarkably uncommunicative regarding their pedigree, meagre 
 in his descriptions, and apparently insensible to palaeographic 
 beauty. There is scarcely, in the whole British Museum, a 
 less satisfactory book than his catalogue of the Royal library. 
 Thus, the student is hampered by the want of a guide, and 
 must hew paths for himself through the luxuriant growth and 
 accumulations of many centuries. In point of mere size, the 
 Royal library ranks third among the four great collections 
 acquired by the British Museum at the time of its foundation 
 the Harleian numbering 7639 MSS. ; the Sloane, 4001 ; the 
 Royal, 1950; the Cottonian, 900. 
 
 Of the three others we have ample details ; their hoards 
 have been thoroughly ransacked, and there are scarcely 
 any surprises for the student. We can, without much trouble
 
 310 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 lay our hands on any fact, beauty, or excellence to be 
 found in them, for there are hardly any hidden gems. 
 But with the Royal library it is different. Each student 
 is his own pioneer, and must make voyages of discovery 
 if he would know something of the riches which it 
 contains. 
 
 Its history is scarcely more complete than its catalogue, 
 although the nucleus of the collection must be almost coeval 
 with the monarchy. Before the reign of James I., however, 
 there were no records except the strangely anomalous ones 
 contained in the Privy Purse Expenses, and in the Wardrobe 
 and Household Accounts of the various English kings who 
 have added to the library. It is curious to light, among the 
 sums disbursed for such items as feather-beds and four-post 
 bedsteads, on the price paid for a rare manuscript, or for 
 the binding of a choice codex. Queen Elizabeth's "Keeper 
 of the Books " was also " Court Distiller of Odoriferous Herbs," 
 and received a better salary as perfumer than as librarian. 
 But in times when books were more costly, the office of 
 custodian was considered an honourable one, and a Close 
 Roll of the year 1252 makes mention of the Custos librorum 
 Regis. 
 
 Impossible though it be to fix the exact date or even 
 reign when the English kings began to collect books, we 
 shall not be wrong if we infer that the Royal library had 
 already a very real existence in the reign of Henry II., when 
 a great literary revival took place. Although the movement 
 originated in the cloister, the court followed in its wake, and 
 William of Malmesbury had his secular counterpart in Alfred 
 of Beverley. A favourite of the king's, Walter de Map, who 
 had been a student in Paris, and Gerald de Barri (Giraldus 
 Cambrensis) divided the honours between courtly and popular 
 themes, while a number of poets and romanticists sprang up 
 and wove fantastic myths and legends out of such material as 
 the Crusades, the Arthurian traditions, and the feats of
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 311 
 
 Charlemagne. King John, with scarcely a quality which men 
 cared to praise, was, strangely enough, fond of books and 
 of scholars. A taste for learning was gradually leavening the 
 barbarous Normanic lump, spreading downwards from monarch 
 to people. Two years before John's death Roger Bacon 
 was born, whose opus Ma/us embraced every branch of science, 
 and whose life is the whole intellectual life of the thirteenth 
 century. Matthew Paris, the last of the great monastic 
 historians, was the intimate friend of Henry III., who delighted 
 in his scholarship, and loved to visit him in the scriptorium 
 at St Alban's where he himself contributed to the famous 
 chronicle, which would alone have sufficed to make the 
 reputation of the learned Benedictine. Thus, indirectly, we 
 are led to the Royal library. 
 
 In 1250, a French book is mentioned in a State Paper 
 as belonging to the king, but being actually in the keeping 
 of the Knights Templars, who are commanded to hand it 
 over to an officer of the Wardrobe, with the apparent object 
 that the king's painters might copy from it when painting 
 a room called the Antioch Chamber. 
 
 In the reign of Edward I. a part of the Royal library 
 was kept in the Treasury of the Exchequer, and a few of 
 the books are mentioned in the Wardrobe Accounts of the 
 year 1302. These included Latin service books, treatises on 
 devotional subjects, and romances. One book is described 
 as " Textus, in a case of leather on which magnates are wont 
 to be sworn." 
 
 All through the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries there 
 are occasional allusions to the king's books in the Wardrobe 
 Accounts, and the Exchequer Inventory of Edward II. 
 enumerates " a book bound in red leather, De regimine Regum ; 
 a small book on the rule of the Knights Templars, De regula 
 Templariorum ; a stitched book, De Vita sancti Patricii ; and 
 a stitched book in a tongue unknown to the English which 
 begins thus : Edmygaw dorit doyrmyd dinas" and other books
 
 312 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and rolls " very foreign to the English tongue," the scribe, 
 not knowing Welsh even by sight, whereas, although he 
 might not be able to read them, he would probably know 
 the look of Greek or Hebrew manuscripts. The list closes 
 with the Chronicle of Roderick de Ximenez, Archbishop of 
 Toledo, "bound in green leather." 1 
 
 A document, belonging to the year 1419, and printed 
 by Sir Francis Palgrave, relates to the delivery into the 
 King's Treasury of five volumes, consisting of a Bible, a 
 copy of the Book of Chronicles, a treatise, De conceptione Beatce 
 Maria, a compendium of theology, and a volume entitled 
 Libellus de emendatione vita. But in the following year these 
 manuscripts were given to the monastery at Sheen. In 1426 
 a book described as Egesippus, another as Liber de observantia 
 Papa, were borrowed from the library in the Treasury by 
 Cardinal Beaufort, and there are subsequent notices of the 
 return and re-loan of the same volumes to the same borrower. 
 It is interesting to note that a manuscript called Hegesippus 
 De Bello Judaico, etc., still in the Royal library, is ascribed 
 by Casley to the eleventh century, and may be identified with 
 the former of these two books. 
 
 In the following years entries occur of works on Civil Law, 
 and of some others being lent to the Master of King's College, 
 Cambridge, and of their subsequent presentation to that house, 
 with the assent of the Lords of the Council 
 
 In the Wardrobe accounts of Edward IV. (Royal MS. 14, 
 C 8), there are entries relating to " the coveryng and garnysh- 
 ing of the bookes of oure saide Souverain Lorde the Kinge," 
 which mark his possession in 1480 of certain choice MSS., and 
 the same document shows that these were bound by Piers 
 Bauduyn for the king. Among them were a Froissart, the 
 binding, gilding, and dressing of which cost 2Os., and 
 a Biblia Historians (now marked 19 D 2 in the Royal library), 
 
 1 Stapleton's Exchequer Inventory, Edward II,
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 313 
 
 bound and ornamented for the same sum. On a fly-leaf is an 
 inscription recording its purchase for 100 marks by William de 
 Montacute, Earl of Salisbury, after the battle of Poitiers. It 
 had been taken as loot among the baggage of the French 
 king. On his death in 1 397, the Earl of Salisbury bequeathed 
 it to his wife, who, in her will, ordered that it should be sold for 
 forty livres. 
 
 When the king went from London to Eltham his books 
 went with him, and some were put into " divers cofyns of fyrre," 
 and others into his carriage. They were bound in " figured 
 cramoisie velvet, with rich laces and tassels, with buttons of silk 
 and gold, and with clasps bearing the king's arms." The 
 only reference to books in the will of Edward IV. is in 
 regard to such as appertained "to oure chapell," which 
 he bequeathed to his queen, such only being excepted "as 
 we shall hereafter dispose to goo to oure saide Collage of 
 Wyndesore." l 
 
 Henry VII. stands between the Middle Ages and modern 
 times, but his additions to the Royal library consisted chiefly 
 of Renaissance literature. Notwithstanding his parsimony in 
 most matters, his Privy Purse Expenses contain a remarkable 
 series of entries of payments for books, for copying manuscripts, 
 and for binding them. On one occasion the sum of 2$ was 
 spent on a single book, and there is an item of 2 paid to a 
 clerk for copying The Amity of Flanders. He bought a great 
 number of romances in French as well as the grand series of 
 volumes printed on vellum by the famous Antoine Verard. 
 Bacon describes Henry VII. as " a prince, sad, serious, and full of 
 thoughts and secret observations, and full of notes and memorials 
 of his own hand . . . rather studious than learned, reading most 
 books that were of any worth, in the French tongue. Yet he 
 understood the Latin." 2 
 
 He had also a taste for finely illuminated books of devotion, 
 
 1 Add. MS., Transcript by Rymer, No. 4615. 
 
 2 Life and Reign of Henry VII,, i., 637.
 
 314 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 and presented a beautiful Missal to his daughter Margaret, 
 Queen of Scots, in which he inscribed his own name in enormous 
 letters several times. This book is now in the possession of the 
 Duke of Devonshire. In the Royal collection is another Missal 
 which belonged to the same king, written in a late Gothic 
 hand. 
 
 Henry VII. was careful to have his children well instructed, 
 and his second son, being intended for the Church, received an 
 education fitting him for an ecclesiastical career. In his youth 
 Henry VIII. displayed considerable literary talent, posed as a 
 patron of scholars, and smiled benignly on such geniuses as 
 Erasmus, More, Linacre, and Grocyn ; but in after years he 
 was more keen to destroy other peoples' libraries than to build 
 up his own. The accounts of his Privy Purse Expenses contain 
 few entries of disbursements for books, and to take one short 
 period as a specimen, we find that the whole sum spent on his 
 library between 1530 and 1532, including not merely all moneys 
 paid for binding, but also an indefinite amount " to the taylour 
 and skynner for certeyn stuff, and workmanship for my 
 lady Anne," was only 124, i6s. 3d. These figures become 
 still more insignificant if we compare them with those repre- 
 senting the money spent during the same period for jewels 
 alone, exclusive of plate, which amounted to the prodigious sum 
 of 10,800. 
 
 But although Henry VIII. did not buy books extensively, 
 he sometimes borrowed them, and several entries chronicle the 
 lending of books to him by monastic and other libraries, when 
 he was pestering Christendom for arguments in favour of his 
 divorce from Katharine of Arragon. 
 
 Nevertheless, in spite of adverse circumstances, the Royal 
 library had been steadily growing in the course of ages, and 
 had by this time assumed notable proportions. Henry VIII. 
 found himself the possessor of a collection of books at Windsor, 
 comprising 109 volumes in bindings of velvet and leather, with 
 silver and jewelled clasps ; of another a.t Westminster, consisting
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 315 
 
 of Latin primers, some richly ornamented, of a few Greek 
 authors, Latin classics, and English chronicles, " bokes written in 
 tholde Saxon tongue." He had another library at Beaulieu 
 (now New Hall) in Essex, with about 60 volumes of Latin 
 authors, besides works of the Fathers, dictionaries, and histories. 
 At Beddington in Surrey he had many chronicles and romances, 
 and "a greate boke of parchment written and lymned with 
 gold of graver's work De Confessione Amantis, which may be 
 identified as the MS., now marked 18 C 22, in the Royal 
 library. At Richmond was a small collection made by his 
 father, consisting chiefly of missals and romances. At St 
 James's Palace were, among others, works described vaguely 
 as " a boke of parchment containing divers patterns ; a 
 white boke written on parchment ; one boke covered with 
 green velvet contained in a wooden case ; a little boke 
 covered with crimson velvet," and so on, a curious method of 
 cataloguing and utterly useless for the purpose of identifica- 
 tion after so long an interval. Here and there a distinctive 
 title occurs, such as the Foundation Book of Henry VIItKs 
 Chapel. 
 
 All these different small collections together represented 
 the Royal library in the early part of the sixteenth century. 
 Henry VIII. had the greater number of the books removed to 
 Greenwich, where there were already some printed volumes and 
 a few manuscripts. That part which remained at Westminster 
 was enriched with some of the spoils of the monasteries, placed 
 there perhaps by Leland to save them from destruction. 1 
 Among these was a Latin Evangelia of the eleventh century 
 (i D 3), which belonged to the monks of Rochester, and which 
 had been given to them by a certain Countess Goda, according 
 to an inscription in the book itself. From Christ Church, 
 Canterbury, came a fine copy of the gospels (i A 18), 
 presented to that monastery by King Athelstan, and from St 
 
 1 E. Edward's Memoirs of Libraries^ i., 364 et seq.
 
 316 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Alban's several choice historical and theological works from the 
 pen of Matthew Paris. 
 
 It is a question whether the attention bestowed on the 
 Royal library during the reign of Edward VI. was an advantage 
 to it or the reverse. It is true that the energy of Sir John 
 Cheke, and Roger Ascham, King's librarian, secured for it 
 the manuscripts that had belonged to Martin Bucer; but on 
 the other hand, the rabid intolerance of Edward's Council 
 deprived it of many of its valuable contents. On the 2 5th 
 January 1550, a so-called king's letter, sent from the Council 
 Board, authorised certain commissioners to make a descent 
 upon all public and private libraries, and to "cull out all 
 superstitious books, as missals, legends, and such like, and 
 to deliver the garniture of the books, being either gold or 
 silver, to Sir Anthony Aucher. 1 The havoc thus wrought 
 was irremediable, and not even the king's own library was 
 spared the terrible perquisitions. But at the same time we 
 cannot but marvel that still so many of the condemned books 
 should have escaped the notice of the commissioners. In the 
 same year the libraries at Oxford were also "purged of a 
 great part of Fathers and Schoolmen," and great heaps of 
 books set on fire in the market-place were watched with 
 delight by the younger members of the university, who named 
 the conflagration " Scotus's funeral." 
 
 The short and troubled reign of Mary afforded no scope 
 for literary activity, and Elizabeth was far too busy outwitting 
 her enemies abroad, and controlling the factious tendencies of 
 her friends at home, to be able to cultivate her taste for books. 
 Nevertheless, although in the course of a hundred years the 
 Royal library had suffered as much as it had gained, it was 
 even then a goodly sight. Paul Hentzner, the German literary 
 tourist, who visited it in 1598, says that it was "well stored 
 with Greek, Latin, and French books, bound in velvet of 
 
 1 Council Book of Edward Vf,
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 317 
 
 different colours, although chiefly red, with clasps of gold and 
 silver, the corners of some being otherwise adorned with gold 
 and precious stones." l Perhaps the custodians vouchsafed him 
 but a glance at these outer splendours, for he tells us nothing 
 of the treasures within, of which all this magnificence was only 
 the antechamber. 
 
 But the golden age of the Royal library was in the reign 
 of James I., and its greatest benefactor a youth who died at 
 the age of eighteen. It were idle to speculate on what 
 might have been the future of Henry, Prince of Wales, had 
 he lived to fulfil the bright promise of his boyhood. To a 
 singularly well-balanced mind, he appears to have joined an 
 amiability of character that endeared him to all save the 
 crotchety doctrinaire who sat upon the throne. He loved 
 hunting and hawking and all healthy open-air pursuits no 
 less than he loved books, and the society of men, who were 
 the history-makers of his day. He would visit Sir Walter 
 Raleigh in his prison in the Tower, and listen to his brilliant 
 projects for the future greatness of England in the development 
 of her colonies, and the annexation of still barbarous lands, 
 the fabulous wealth of which was the life-long dream of the 
 veteran explorer. 
 
 But Raleigh was not a mere dreamer, as his History of the 
 World shows a work which, written during his long years of 
 captivity, became the text-book and standard authority for 
 the next two hundred years. Whatever his faults, and he 
 had perhaps grave ones, it was his misfortune to be in some 
 ways in advance of the age in which he lived, in consequence 
 of which his finer qualities were misunderstood by most of his 
 contemporaries. Prince Henry was not, however, among their 
 number ; he lent a fascinated ear to Raleigh's grand, patriotic 
 schemes, and had they both lived, the one to reign, the other 
 to counsel and guide, England might not only have been 
 
 1 P. Hentzner, Itinerarium Germania, Angltce, etc., p. 188.
 
 318 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 spared the most disgraceful blot on her escutcheon, but have 
 anticipated by more than two hundred years her subsequent 
 achievements. It was without doubt Sir Walter Raleigh who 
 inspired the young prince to take the Royal library under 
 his protection, and his pupil threw himself heart and soul into 
 the work, so that rightly or wrongly he has been considered 
 its real founder. 
 
 On the death of John, Lord Lumley, Prince Henry secured 
 his fine collection of MSS., by which means he more than 
 made up for the loss which the Royal library had sus- 
 tained by his father's incomprehensible warrant to Sir Thomas 
 Bodley to choose any of the books in any of his houses or 
 libraries. 1 
 
 Lord Lumley had not only been a diligent collector himself, 
 but had inherited a valuable library from his wife's father, Henry 
 Fitzalan, Earl of Arundel, who had begun to collect at the 
 most propitious moment for acquiring rare MSS., and had 
 obtained a portion of Archbishop Cranmer's library. The 
 prince's Privy Purse Expenses have unfortunately been 
 destroyed, but one single entry of the year 1609, bearing 
 reference to his books, has survived : " To Mr Holcock, for 
 writing a catalogue of the library which his Highness hade 
 of my Lord Lumley, 8, 135. od." This catalogue has un- 
 fortunately disappeared. 
 
 Edward Wright, the mathematician, and the learned 
 Patrick Young were both candidates for the post of librarian, 
 and Wright was appointed with a salary of 30 a year. 
 
 Besides purchasing Lord Lumley's books, the young prince 
 acquired the entire collection of the erudite Welshman, William 
 Morice, and an unprecedented stir and activity began to 
 animate the affairs of the Royal library. Scholars saw in 
 the Prince of Wales their future stay and protector, and 
 looked forward to his reign as to that of the first English 
 
 1 Reliquia Bodleiana, p. 205.
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 319 
 
 king in modern times, who would not merely patronise, but 
 also extend learning by his inherent love of, and zeal for, 
 letters. But this fair prospect was doomed to fade, even as 
 they were contemplating it, and the hope of England died in 
 the very midst of all his literary labours. The books which 
 he had collected were mainly incorporated into the Royal 
 library, but many were dispersed after his death. Scattered 
 up and down the country may still be seen volumes in private 
 collections bearing the tell-tale conjoined names, "Tho. 
 Cantuariensis Arundel Lumley." 
 
 James I., aptly styled by Henry IV. of France " the wisest 
 fool in Christendom," dabbled in books as in most other things, 
 but does not appear to have succeeded in doing much harm to 
 his library beyond the suicidal carte blanche to Sir Thomas 
 Bodley. He appointed Patrick Young to be custodian of the 
 different sections of it distributed throughout the various royal 
 palaces, and this really great scholar retained the post till the 
 Revolution. 
 
 That part of the collection which was lodged at Richmond 
 went by the name of Henry Vllth's library, and was shown to 
 Johann Zingerling, a German scholar who came to England 
 while Patrick Young was librarian. The only MS. which he 
 singled out for mention was the Genealogia Regum Anglia 
 ab Adamo, a roll of the fifteenth century (14 B 8). The 
 Richmond collection was removed to Whitehall by Charles 
 I., and the Genealogia appears in a catalogue made after the 
 Restoration. 
 
 The reign of Charles I. is almost barren of events in the 
 Royal library, save at the very beginning, for the acquisition 
 of one MS., which may, however, be regarded as the piece de 
 resistance of the whole collection. This was the famous Codex 
 Alexandrinus, one of the three oldest MSS. of the whole Bible 
 in Greek. Before describing this venerable codex, it will be 
 well to relate what little is known of its history. In 1624, Cyril 
 Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople, formally presented it t
 
 320 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 James I., through his ambassador, Sir Thomas Roe. Writing to 
 Lord Arundel, in December of that year, Roe says : " One 
 book he (the Patriarch) hath given me to present his Majestic, 
 but not yet delivered, being the Bible intire, written by the hand 
 of Tecla, the protomartyr of the Greeks, that lived with St Paul, 
 which he doth aver it to be authentical, and the greatest relique 
 of the Greek Church." In 1626, he wrote to the Archbishop of 
 Canterbury : " The Patriarch also, this New Year's tide, sent 
 me the old Bible formerly presented to his late Majesty, which 
 he now dedicates to the king, and will send it with an epistle. 
 What estimation it may be of is above my skill, but he values 
 it as the greatest antiquity of the Greek Church. The letter is 
 very fair, a character I have never seen. It is entire, except the 
 beginning of St Matthew. He doth testify under his hand that 
 it was written by the virgin Tecla, daughter of a famous Greek, 
 called Stella Matutina, who founded the monastery in Egypt, 
 upon Pharaoh's Tower, a devout and learned maid, who was 
 persecuted in Asia, and to whom Gregory Nazianzen hath 
 written many epistles. At the end whereof, under the same 
 hand, are the epistles of Clement. She died not long after the 
 Council of Nice. The book is very great, and hath antiquity 
 enough at sight ; I doubt not his Majesty will esteem it for the 
 hand by whom it is presented." 1 
 
 Sir Thomas Roe certainly did not overestimate the value of 
 the manuscript, and it would be extremely interesting could we 
 trace the evidence by which it came to be believed that it was 
 written by the hand of St Tecla. A note in Arabic at the foot 
 of the first page of Genesis says that it was " made an inalienable 
 gift to the patriarchal cell of Alexandria. Whoever shall re- 
 move it thence shall be accursed and cut off. Written by 
 Athanasius the humble." z 
 
 1 Negotiations of Sir Thomas Roe, London, 1740. 
 
 2 "Probably," says Sir Edward Maunde Thomson, "Athanasius, the 
 Melchite Patriarch, who was still living in 1308." Description of Ancient 
 Manuscripts in the British Museum.
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 321 
 
 Before his translation to Constantinople, Cyril Lucar had 
 been Patriarch of Alexandria, and possibly he himself risked 
 the threatened curse and excommunication in taking the Bible 
 away with him, though his deacon asserted that he had obtained 
 it from Mount Athos. 
 
 But besides the above-mentioned note there is another also 
 in Arabic, with a Latin translation at the back of the table of 
 books. This note says : " Remember that this book was written 
 by the hand of Tecla the martyr." The tradition is recalled by 
 Cyril Lucar at the beginning of the manuscript. He states that 
 the name of Tecla was originally to be found inscribed at the 
 end of the volume, but that when Christianity practically be- 
 came extinct in Egypt, the few remaining Christians and their 
 books were doomed, and for this reason the name was erased, 
 Tecla's memory and the legend being perpetuated notwith- 
 standing. 
 
 Tregelles accounts for the tradition that St Tecla was the 
 writer of the MS. by the supposition that the Arabic note was 
 ignorantly added by some scribe who had observed the name of 
 Tecla written in the now mutilated margin of the first leaf of 
 the New Testament, which contains the lesson appointed by the 
 Greek Church for the feast of St Tecla. Sir Edward Thompson 
 points out, however, that this would infer that in the fourteenth 
 century the Gospel of St Matthew was in its present mutilated 
 state, and that then as now, the New Testament formed a 
 separate volume apart from the Old ; and he shows that the 
 Arabic numeration of the leaves, which is of about the same age 
 as the inscription, is carried continuously through both Testa- 
 ments, and by a calculation of the numbers which have not been 
 cut away in trimming the edges, it appears that the twenty-five 
 leaves which contained the greater portion of St Matthew were 
 lost at a later period, the last leaf of the Old Testament bearing 
 the number 641, and the present first leaf of the New Testa- 
 ment 667. 
 
 Cobet and other experts fixed the date of the two codices,
 
 322 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 the Codex Sinaiticus and the Codex Alexandrinus, as not earlier 
 than the fifth or sixth century, the principal reason for assigning 
 to them so late a date being the generally accepted theory that 
 uncials were not in use until vellum had entirely superseded 
 papyrus as the medium for precious manuscripts. But the 
 latest authority in this department, Mr F. G. Kenyon, has thrown 
 light on the whole question of early Christian Greek MSS., by 
 the discovery of a large uncial round hand on a papyrus dated 
 Anno Domini 88. 1 Thus it is quite possible, palaeographically, 
 that the Codex Vaticanus, which has been hitherto supposed to 
 date from the fourth century, may be much older, and there is 
 now no conclusive evidence to prove that the Alexandrinus was 
 not written by St Tecla, whatever the probabilities may be to 
 the contrary. 
 
 The three above-named codices, the Vaticanus, the Sinaiticus, 
 and the Alexandrinus have certain points in common, but the 
 MS. in the Royal library is written in double columns, that of 
 the Vatican in triple columns, and the Codex Sinaiticus, some 
 leaves of which are in the public library at Leipzig, the main 
 body of the work being in the imperial library at St Petersburg, 
 in quadruple columns. 
 
 Besides being numerically imperfect, the leaves of the Codex 
 Alexandrinus have suffered from the clipping of the outer edges 
 by the binder, and several of its priceless pages have been other- 
 wise spoiled and mutilated. 
 
 The MS. is austere in its simplicity, being totally unadorned, 
 save for the red ink used in the opening lines of each book, and 
 occasionally in superscriptions and colophons. The letters are 
 uncials (or capitals) without break, their form proving that the 
 book was written in Egypt 
 
 Patrick Young was librarian when this celebrated codex 
 was added to the Royal library, and duly conscious of its value, 
 he did his utmost to get a facsimile of it printed. But the king 
 
 1 The Paleography of Greek Papyri, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1899.
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 323 
 
 could not be induced to take up the matter. In 1644 Young 
 prevailed on the assembly of divines to present a petition to 
 the House of Commons, praying " that the said Bible may be 
 printed, for the benefit of the Church, the advancement of God's 
 glory, and the honour of the kingdom." A committee was found 
 to confer with him on the subject, but nothing was done, owing 
 to the troubled state of the country. 
 
 During the Revolution and under the commonwealth the 
 Royal library was in extreme peril. Hugh Peters, successor 
 to Young, although he belonged to the iconoclastic faction, 
 practically saved the books, but was unable to protect the unique 
 collection of medals and coins. After a few months the cus- 
 todianship was transferred to Ireton, and ultimately a per- 
 manent librarian was appointed in the person of Bulstrode 
 Whitelocke, first commissioner of the Great Seal. He 
 accepted the office from patriotism and reverence for the 
 antiquities which were in such imminent danger, but he wrote 
 deprecatingly : 
 
 " I knew the greatness of the charge, . . . yet being informed 
 of a design to have some of them (the books) sold, and trans- 
 ferred beyond sea (which I thought would be a disgrace and 
 damage to our nation, and to all scholars therein), and fearing 
 that in other hands they might be more subject to embezzling 
 ... I did accept the trouble of being library-keeper at St 
 James's, and therein was much persuaded by Mr Selden, 
 who swore that if I did not undertake the charge of them, 
 all those rare monuments of antiquity, those choice books 
 and MSS. would be lost, and there were not the like 
 of them except only in the Vatican, in any other library in 
 Christendom." 
 
 At the Restoration, Thomas Rosse was made royal librarian, 
 but his offices were already so numerous that he was unable 
 to bestow much attention on the books. Nevertheless, he 
 revived the project of printing the Alexandrian MS., and 
 urged the king to interest himself in bringing it about, saying
 
 324 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 that, although it would cost 200, it would " appear glorious 
 in history after your Majesty's death." " Pish," replied Charles 
 II., characteristically, "I care not what they say of me in 
 history when I am dead," and there was an end of the matter 
 till our own day. 
 
 The year 1678 is noteworthy in the annals of the Royal 
 library as the period at which it acquired the series of 
 valuable MSS. known as the Theyer collection. They had 
 been bought from Theyer's executors by Robert Scott, a 
 famous bookseller, who offered them to the king for 841. 
 He subsequently got them for 560. Next to the Alexandrian 
 Codex this is the most important addition to the library 
 in comparatively modern times. It consisted of 336 volumes, 
 including 700 rare treatises, a whole series of Roger Bacon's 
 works, and the celebrated autograph collection formerly 
 belonging to Cranmer, and long mourned as lost Many of 
 these manuscripts could be traced back to the library of 
 Llanthony Abbey, having passed into Theyer's possession by 
 the marriage of one of his ancestors with a sister of the last 
 prior of Llanthony. Nearly the whole of the Theyer collec- 
 tion is described in the Catalogi Librorum Manuscriptorum of 
 1697, but without the least hint that it then formed part of 
 the Royal library. The great Richard Bentley was at that 
 time librarian, and was responsible for the amazing omission, 
 having prohibited any mention of the Royal library in that 
 work, his reason perhaps being the disgraceful condition into 
 which the books had fallen. Bentley was by far the most 
 distinguished of the royal librarians during any part of its 
 history, and he would, no doubt, have accomplished wonders 
 if he had not been so outrageous a pluralist, so busy a 
 scholar, and so pugnacious a litigant Not only was he 
 Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, Regius Professor of 
 Divinity, Rector of Haddington, Rector of Wilburn, and 
 Archdeacon of Ely, but he was immersed in numberless law- 
 suits, and in classical studies which would alone have sufficed
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 325 
 
 to fill the whole life of an ordinary man. What he, in 
 spite of these multifarous occupations, attempted to do 
 for the Royal library at least testifies to the grandeur 
 of his conceptions and the boldness of his schemes. 
 His failure to place the library within the reach of 
 students was as much due to the stultifying effects of red- 
 tapeism as to the disorganised condition of the library 
 itself. 
 
 Bentley's first care on taking office was to enforce the 
 Copyright Act, which, although passed in 1663, had been 
 carelessly ignored. By this means about 1000 printed books 
 were added to the collection, but no bindings were provided, 
 or shelves on which to put them. In a famous controversy 
 with Charles Boyle, who complained that difficulties were 
 placed in the way of his access to one of the royal manuscripts, 
 Bentley answered : " I will own that I have often said and 
 lamented that the library was not fit to be seen," and pro- 
 ceeding to exulpate himself, he added : " If the room be too 
 mean, and too little for the books ; if it be much out of 
 repair; if the situation be inconvenient; if the access to 
 it be dishonourable, is the library - keeper to answer 
 for it?" 
 
 A proposal was made, during Bentley's tenure of office, 
 to erect a suitable building for the books, establishing it by 
 Act of Parliament. But nothing was done, and in the course 
 of nineteen years the collection was four times removed. In 
 1712 it migrated from the much abused quarters at St 
 James's to Cotton House, and from thence to Essex House 
 in 1722. It was next lodged, together with the Cottonian 
 library at Ashburnham House, and after the disastrous 
 fire in 1731, from which the Cotton MSS. suffered so severely, 
 it gained with them a temporary refuge in the old Westminster 
 dormitory. 
 
 Bentley resigned his office of librarian in 1724, in favour 
 of his son, another Richard Bentley ; but Casley, who, as
 
 326 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 deputy custodian, had been for many years the only working 
 librarian, continued to fill that post. 
 
 In 1757, George II. presented the Royal library to the 
 nation, handing it over by Letters Patent to the custody of 
 the trustees of the British Museum, and thus its hitherto 
 chequered career was turned into prosperous channels. All 
 that is henceforth left to desire is a descriptive catalogue 
 worthy of its unique contents. 1 
 
 The Greek MSS. in the British Museum are not very 
 numerous, but are widely renowned. Of those in the Royal 
 library the Codex Alexandrinus is by far the most interesting, 
 not only as being the one Greek MS. of the whole Bible in 
 the library, but also as surpassing all the other existing Greek 
 fragments of the Scriptures in point of antiquity. The next 
 earliest MS., containing the Books of Ruth, Kings, Esdras, 
 Esther, and the Maccabees (i D 2), is of the thirteenth 
 century. The Books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song 
 of Solomon (i A 15), are of the fifteenth century. Nearest 
 in antiquity to the Alexandrian Bible in the British Museum 
 is the Cotton MS. (Titus, C 15), the Codex Clarmontanus, 
 a purple-dyed fragment of the sixth century, written on vellum 
 of so subtle and delicate a texture that even experts have 
 sometimes mistaken it for Egyptian papyrus. 
 
 A few words will not be out of place here respecting the 
 writing materials of the ancients, and their custom of staining 
 leaves of vellum. Skins of animals were probably one of the 
 most ancient mediums, as being the most durable. There 
 exists in the British Museum a ritual, written on white leather, 
 which dates from about the year 2000 B.C. But the custom 
 of writing on leather is known to have been much older 
 
 1 The Royal Library must not be confused with the King's Library belong- 
 ing to George III., and presented to the British Museum by George IV. 
 The King's Library included, however, a few important MSS. which had 
 been?retained by George II. when he made over the Royal collection to 
 the nation.
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 327 
 
 still. The commonest mode of keeping records in Assyria and 
 Babylonia was on prepared bricks, tiles, or cylinders of clay, 
 baked after the inscription had been impressed on them. But 
 a wood-cut of an ancient sculpture from Konyungik l illustrates 
 scribes in the act of writing down the number of heads and the 
 amount of spoil taken in battle, on rolls of leather, which the 
 Egyptians used as early as the eighteenth dynasty. At the 
 close of the commercial intercourse between Assyria and Egypt, 
 rolls of leather may have been the only material employed for 
 writing on. Parchment, so prepared that both sides could be 
 used, was doubtless the development of this custom, but was 
 a much later invention. Together with the use of the rough 
 skins, and of the more or less carefully prepared surfaces of 
 the leather, papyrus became one of the most frequent vehicles 
 for written words, and was used for some time after the 
 beginning of the Christian era. Leaves of palm or mallow 
 led up to the first forms of papyrus used hence, perhaps, the 
 word leaf of a book. Bark was next pressed into the service 
 of literature and, it has often been suggested, possibly gave 
 rise to the word book, although it seems more likely that 
 book was of runic origin and derived from the beech-staves 
 Buch-staben, on which the runes were expressed. 
 
 Eventually vellum entirely took the place of papyrus, but 
 papyrus was used not only in Egypt, but in imperial Rome 
 before vellum became common, and even biblical manuscripts 
 were written on rolls of this material. It was, however, too fragile 
 and perishable to remain the receptacle of writing and illumina- 
 tion intended to last for all time, and therefore, by the middle 
 of the tenth century A.D. it was altogether discarded. Only a 
 few tattered fragments of the New Testament written on 
 papyrus are still extant. 
 
 The oldest manuscripts belonging to the Christian era 
 were written on the thinnest and whitest vellum. The parch- 
 
 1 Nineveh and its Remains, by Sir Henry Layard, ii., 185.
 
 328 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 ment of later times is more coarsely grained, and less well 
 finished, manuscripts a thousand and more years old showing 
 no signs of decay or discoloration, unlike many which date 
 from the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Scrivener, basing 
 his authority on Tischendorf, observes that the Codex Sinaiticus 
 is made of the finest skins of antelopes, the leaves being so 
 large that a single animal could furnish but two of them. 
 The Codex Vaticanus is greatly admired for the beauty of 
 the vellum ; and the whiteness of the Codex Alexandrinus 
 can be seen by all who visit the British Museum, although the 
 exquisite thinness, softness, and delicacy of the texture can 
 only be appreciated by touching it. The beautiful fabric of 
 the Codex Clarmontanus has already been mentioned. 
 
 But not only was the vellum finer and more durable in 
 the earliest days of our era than at a comparatively recent 
 date, but the ink was better, and the colours used in illuminat- 
 ing were far more beautiful. The ancients laid on the gold 
 very thickly, and the ink which they prepared is still black, 
 so that the text can be easily read, while the ink used in the 
 Middle Ages is now generally of a greyish brown. Red ink 
 is very ancient, and often seen in early Egyptian papyri. The 
 instrument for writing on papyrus was the reed growing in 
 the marshes formed by the Tigris and the Euphrates, and on 
 the banks of the Nile. It was also used for writing on vellum, 
 but quills, admirably adapted for this kind of material, came 
 gradually into use with parchment By degrees the roll form 
 was abandoned for the codex or book form, as being more 
 convenient, the leaves being stitched into gatherings or quires ; 
 but for a long time both forms were used together. 
 
 It is uncertain when the custom of staining the most 
 precious MSS. purple came into vogue, but it did not obtain 
 after the tenth century. St Jerome and his contemporaries 
 practised it, using letters stamped rather than written, in 
 silver and gold. Writing in gold ceased to be common in 
 the thirteenth century, and in silver when the fashion of
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 329 
 
 staining the vellum died out The value of a manuscript does 
 not depend on its purple colour, but this is chiefly interesting 
 as serving to show one phase of the reverence paid to the 
 Scriptures. It may also help to fix the date of a MS. 1 
 
 One of the most beautiful specimens of early palaeographic 
 art in the Royal library is the Latin MS. of the gospels, 
 known as the Evangelia of King Canute (i Dp). Westwood 
 indeed considers that it will not bear comparison with the 
 Gospels of Trinity College, Cambridge, though he admits 
 that it exceeds them in interest owing to the Anglo-Saxon 
 entries relating to Canute at the beginning of St Mark's 
 Gospel. 2 Wanley has described these entries as a certificate 
 or testimonial of Canute's reception into the family or society 
 of the Church of Christ at Canterbury. One leaf bears this 
 inscription : " In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Here 
 is written Canute the King's name. He is our beloved Lord 
 worldwards, and our spiritual brother Godwards ; and Harold, 
 this King's brother ; Thorth, our brother ; Kartoca, our brother ; 
 Thuri, our brother." On the next leaf is a charter by the 
 same king, confirming the privileges of Christ Church, Canter- 
 bury. The book was probably the gift of Canute to the 
 monks of that house. There are no miniatures, but an 
 illuminated page with a grand border, heavily gilt, contains 
 small figures of the evangelists in medallions. Written in ink 
 at the bottom of the illuminated page is the name Lumley, 
 showing that the MS. formed part of that collection acquired 
 by Prince Henry. 
 
 The Gospels of St Augustine's Abbey, Canterbury (i E 6), 
 written in England in the eighth century, are probably the 
 remains of the so-called Biblia Gregoriana. But if this codex 
 was really among the books sent by Pope Gregory to St 
 
 1 Scrivener, A plain Introduction to the Criticism of the New Testament, 
 P-23- 
 
 2 Facsimiles of the Miniatures and Ornaments of Anglo-Saxon and, 
 Irish AfSS,
 
 330 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Augustine, it must first have been sent to Rome from England, 
 but internal evidence points to a much later date. It contains 
 four very dark-purple or rather rose-coloured stained leaves, 
 with inscriptions in letters of gold and silver an inch long, the 
 silver being oxidised by age. It is one of the most precious 
 examples of Anglo-Saxon caligraphy and illumination now 
 existing. The half-uncial letters of English type are by 
 different hands, and the miniatures are of different dates, that 
 of the Lion of St Mark being probably of the tenth century. 
 It is also supposed that the missing verses at the beginning of 
 the gospels were all written on purple-stained vellum, and that 
 there may have been a miniature of the evangelist before 
 each gospel. An inscription on the fly-leaf states that it 
 belonged to the monastery of St Augustine at Canterbury, 
 and that it formed part of that library in the fourteenth 
 century. 
 
 The fine manuscript, designated 2 A 20, is a book of 
 prayers and lessons on vellum, of the eighth century. It 
 belonged to the Theyer collection, and several notes are inserted 
 in the handwriting of John Theyer. It is very much stained 
 and spoiled, the binder, as was so often the piteous case, having 
 barbarously cut off some of the edges, and with them a 
 portion of the marginal writing, to the great detriment of the 
 book. 
 
 2 A 22 is a magnificent Latin Psalter of the twelfth century, 
 the best period of penmanship. Sir Edward Thompson draws 
 attention to the fact that this volume originated at Westminster, 
 as may be inferred by the prominence given in the calendars 
 and prayers to St Peter and St Edward, even without its 
 identification with an entry in the Abbey Inventory. 1 A 
 further proof of this is furnished by the miniatures of the two 
 saints, one of which begins the series ; the other leads up to 
 the beautiful Salvator Mundi. Between are St George and 
 
 1 English Illuminated MS S., pp. 34, 35,
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 331 
 
 St Christopher. Instead of being dispersed throughout the 
 book, the illustrations are all at the beginning and end, 
 indicating by the colourless faces, and by what for want of 
 a better word may be styled their Gothic outlines, that they are 
 of English origin. Some of the capital letters are very 
 interesting. One of these quaintly represents the Saviour of 
 the world enthroned in glory, on a gold background. His hand 
 is raised in blessing, while a Benedictine monk, floating on the 
 wings of prayer, clasps a scroll, one end of which disappears 
 under the rainbow-hued throne. On the scroll are the words 
 Domine, exandi orationem meant. At the end of the Psalter 
 are Litanies and other prayers. 
 
 The broad manner in which these illuminations are treated, 
 with foliage boldly designed, and animals of various kinds 
 disporting themselves among the branches, is indicative of the 
 period. There is a striking contrast between this large, bold 
 treatment and the minute style of the next century, although 
 the period of transition occupied but a few years. The change 
 began with the development of the initial letter, which was the 
 starting-point of the border and of the miniature. 
 
 The Royal MS. I D I, a Latin Bible of the middle of the 
 thirteenth century, forms an excellent example of this develop- 
 ment. It is written on fine vellum, and in a perfect style of cali- 
 graphy. The paintings are few if we except those connected with 
 the initial letter, which serves admirably to illustrate the growth 
 of the border from its pendants, cusps, and graceful finials, show- 
 ing how the initial and miniature came to be combined. Writing 
 about this same MS. Sir Edward Thompson says : "In the 
 large initial we see the combination of the miniature with the 
 initial and partial border, a combination which is typical of 
 book decoration of the thirteenth century. In MSS. of earlier 
 periods the miniature was a painting which usually occupied a 
 page, independently of the text ... or if inserted in the text 
 it was not connected with the decoration of the page. It was, 
 in fact, an illustration and nothing more. But now, while the
 
 332 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 miniature is still employed in this manner, independently of 
 the text, the miniature initial also comes into common use, the 
 miniature therein, however, continuing to hold for some time a 
 subordinate place, as a decoration rather than as an illustrative 
 feature. In course of time, with the growth of the border, 
 the two-fold function of the miniature, as a means of illustration 
 and also of decoration, is satisfied by allowing it to occupy part 
 or even the whole of a page as an independent picture, but at 
 the same time, set in the border, which has developed from the 
 pendent of the initial. This development of the border it is 
 extremely interesting to follow, and so regular is its growth, 
 and so remarkable are the national characteristics which it 
 assumes, that the period and place of origin of an illuminated 
 MS. may often be accurately determined from the details of 
 its border alone." l 
 
 The distinguished writer goes on to show that in tracing this 
 development one sees how the initials first terminate in simple 
 buds or cusps, and how, in the next stage, characteristic of the 
 thirteenth century, they put out little branches, the buds 
 growing into leaves and flowers, and how thus gradually the 
 border comes to surround the whole page. 
 
 The Royal MS. 263, commonly known as Queen Mary's 
 Psalter, is a good specimen of fourteenth century art. This is 
 a large octavo volume of 320 leaves of vellum, almost everyone 
 being magnificently illuminated on both sides, with daintily 
 executed drawings, lightly sketched, and slightly tinted in green, 
 brown, and violet. One richly-decorated page represents the 
 Last Judgement. At the top, a miniature within the border 
 shows forth the Judge of all mankind. Angels with green- 
 tipped wings hover on either side. Before the Saviour as 
 Judge kneel the Blessed Virgin and St John, and on the other side 
 is a group of monks. The background is of pure gold. Under- 
 neath, enclosed in a blue and white border, the dead rise to 
 
 1 English Illuminated MSS., p. 37.
 
 THE ROYAL LIBRARY 333 
 
 judgment Angels blow long trumpets and the graves open. 
 Below this again is a lovely initial, with more figures on a gold 
 background. The letter begins the words of the Litany Kyrie 
 eleison. A drawing at the bottom of the page represents Saul 
 receiving the letter to Damascus for the persecution of the 
 Christians. This page, as elaborate and glowing with colour as 
 it is rich in design and fine in execution, is, however, not more 
 striking than many others in the same manuscript, which may, 
 without too much praise, be described as a gem of palaeographic 
 art. A note on the last leaf explains that the MS. was on the 
 point of being carried beyond seas, when a customs officer, one 
 Baldwin Smith, in the port of London seized and presented 
 it to the Queen, in October 1553, the first year of her 
 reign. 
 
 The writer does not record whether the hapless owner was 
 indemnified for his loss. It was probably Queen Mary herself 
 who caused the book to be bound as we now see it, in the worn 
 crimson velvet binding, with the remains of large pomegranates 
 embroidered at each corner, pomegranates being her own 
 badge. 
 
 The MS. 2 B 7 is an extremely beautiful piece of workman- 
 ship of the fourteenth century. Its delicate outline drawings, 
 mostly in mauve and green, are reminiscent of the Guthlac roll. 
 They represent mainly an illustrated Martyrology of Saints, 
 popular in England, i A 18 is the copy of the Latin Gospels 
 presented to Christ Church, Canterbury, by King Athelstan, 
 with the name Lumley on the first page of the Eusebian 
 canons, and Umfridus me fecit on a fly-leaf. 
 
 The beautiful French version of the Apocalypse, written in 
 England about 1330 (19 B 15), contains drawings of great 
 refinement, though scarcely to be compared with those which 
 adorn Queen Mary's Psalter. 
 
 The very large Bible of the end of the fourteenth century 
 measuring twenty-four by seventeen inches, is splendidly illumi- 
 nated and profusely adorned with miniatures.
 
 334 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 But choice and variety are infinite, and to the devout lover 
 of these things, the Royal library resembles a gold-mine with 
 nuggets of immense value lying in profusion wherever his 
 adventurous footsteps lead him. If his object be delight he will 
 find that every step leads him there.
 
 VI 
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF 
 MANUSCRIPTS 
 
 WHEN Robert Harley laid the foundation of his magnificent 
 library in 1705, so many collectors were already in the field 
 that the prospect of getting together any large number of 
 choice manuscripts did not seem promising. But contrary to 
 expectation, this very fact proved fortunate, for whereas Cotton 
 had built up his library, book by book, laboriously, Harley had 
 the advantage of forming his, to a great extent, by the purchase 
 of other well-known collections, either at the death of their 
 original owners, or after the manuscripts had passed through suc- 
 cessive hands. Of these larger acquisitions may be mentioned : 
 the library which had belonged to the famous antiquary, Sir 
 Symonds D'Ewes, Cotton's friend ; the greater number of the 
 Graevius MSS. ; the 23 bulky volumes of the Baker collec- 
 tion ; many of the papers originally belonging to Nicholas 
 Charles, Lancaster Herald, which, at his death, Camden had 
 purchased for 90, and the collection of Stow, the historian of 
 London. 
 
 Charles's library consisted chiefly of epitaphs, drawings of 
 monuments and arms, and an historical catalogue of the officers 
 of the College of Arms. Some of these are now at the Herald's 
 College, one of the manuscripts is in the Lansdowne collection, 
 and the others were bought by Harley. 
 
 335
 
 336 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 On Strype's death in 1737, the majority of the papers, 
 collected by Foxe the martyrologist, which had been in the 
 annalist's possession, also passed with others into Harley's 
 hands ; they form vols. 416 to 428, and vol. 59x5 of this collection. 
 Some of Foxe's papers are in the Lansdowne library. 
 
 By means of great exertion and a lavish expenditure, Harley 
 became within ten years the possessor of about 2500 old MSS., 
 and in 1721 had collected 6000 volumes, 1400 charters, and 500 
 rolls, besides about 350,000 pamphlets. His entire library after- 
 wards numbered over 20,000 volumes. 
 
 Robert Harley, afterwards Earl of Oxford, was descended 
 from an ancient family, existing, it is pretended, in Shropshire 
 at the time of the Norman Conquest, and closely allied to the 
 French family of de Harlai. He was the eldest son of Sir 
 Edward Harley, member for the county of Hereford, in the 
 Parliament which restored Charles II. ; was born in 1661, rose to 
 a high position in public affairs, and was created, by Queen 
 Anne, a peer of the realm by the style and title of Baron 
 Wigmore, in the county of Hereford, Earl of Oxford, and 
 Mortimer. 1 Soon afterwards he was made Lord High Treasurer 
 of Great Britain, and Prime Minister. He was twice married 
 first to Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas Foley of Whitley Court, 
 Worcestershire, by whom he had three children a son, Edward, 
 who succeeded him, and two daughters. His second wife was 
 Sarah, daughter of Simon Middleton, of Hurst Hill, Edmonton, 
 who survived him some years. 
 
 Swift drew attention to the circumstance that Robert Harley 
 was educated at Shilton, a private school in Oxfordshire, re- 
 markable for having produced at the same time a Lord High 
 Treasurer (the Earl of Oxford), a Lord High Chancellor (Lord 
 Harcourt), a Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas (Lord 
 
 1 The Earldom of Mortimer was added, because, although Aubrey de 
 Vere, twentieth Earl of Oxford had died without leaving male issue in 1702, 
 it was necessary to guard against possible claimants among remote 
 descendants of the de Veres.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 337 
 
 Trevor), and ten members of the House of Commons, who were 
 all contemporaries as well at school as in Parliament. From 
 both his father and grandfather he had inherited a taste for 
 books, and as Speaker of the House of Commons, had taken 
 considerable part in organising the Cottonian library when it 
 was bequeathed to the nation. It was on this occasion that his 
 notice was first drawn to Humphrey Wanley, who offered some 
 valuable hints in regard to the arrangement of the Cotton 
 manuscripts, and subsequently proved himself to be the model 
 of librarians. 
 
 Humphrey Wanley was the son of a country parson; he 
 had received a university education, and had already achieved 
 success and some fame as a scholar by his catalogue of the 
 Anglo-Saxon MSS., preserved in the principal libraries of Great 
 Britain. He would gladly have undertaken the custody of the 
 Cotton library vice Dr Smith, and wrote to Robert Nelson, a 
 learned writer and philanthrophist, who apparently possessed 
 some influence with the government, to solicit his good offices 
 in procuring him that post. Nelson's answer, interpolated by 
 a remark in Wanley's beautiful, scholarly hand, is interesting as 
 an illustration of the rivalry that existed between the two fore- 
 most librarians of the day. 
 
 " Were I as able to advise Mr Wanley as I am desirous to 
 offer what might be most advantageous for his interest," wrote 
 Nelson, " I should immediately have answered your last 
 letter which requires some queries to be resolved before I 
 can well determine how you ought to proceed. For if 
 there is any friendship between you and the Dr [Smith] it 
 will give a different aspect to your endeavours to supplant 
 him." 
 
 Here there is a mark in the original letter referring to a 
 note written across the margin by Wanley as follows : 
 
 " This is about the Cottonian Library, the custody whereof 
 I did then, and many years after, most ardently desire. As to 
 friendship between Dr Thomas Smith [here meant] and me
 
 338 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 there was but little, his conversation being not suitable to mine, 
 by reason of his jealousies and peevishness extreme. I always 
 allowed the Doctor's pretensions to be much better grounded 
 than mine ; but if he, being a non-juror, could not swear to the 
 Queen's government, or being much in years should happen to 
 decease, as he did after some time, I desired that employment 
 when the trustees should please to regulate that noble collec- 
 tion. 
 
 " Otherwise," continues Nelson, " I can see no reason why a 
 man that is qualified for an employment may not fairly offer 
 himself as a candidate for it, without injury to others that may 
 pretend to it, and if you should want success, it no way 
 diminishes those qualifications you were endowed with, for the 
 discharge of the employment. If the Sir Robert Cotton you 
 mention be of the Post Office, I believe I can find a way of 
 applying to him, I am your faithful friend and servant, 
 
 " NELSON. 
 
 "2nd October 1702." 
 
 Wanley's ardent desire was not destined to be satisfied, but 
 a still more honourable position was in store for the distinguished 
 scholar and man of letters, for he not only became ultimately 
 custodian of the Harleian manuscripts, but as we shall presently 
 see, he deserved by his zeal, learning, and discrimination to be 
 considered together with Lord Oxford, the joint-founder of the 
 Harleian library. 
 
 Thus, it was entirely owing to Wanley that the D'Ewes 
 collection, purchased for 6000, was secured by Sir Robert 
 Harley, and it formed the basis of what is now one of 
 our greatest national collections of manuscripts. The acqui- 
 sition of this celebrated library was the determining point 
 in Wanley's career and in that of the Harleian library 
 itself. 
 
 Sir Symonds D'Ewes, the antiquary, had by his will left all 
 his books and manuscripts to his grandson, another Sir 
 Symonds, but without antiquarian or literary tastes. Wanley,
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 339 
 
 having discovered that although, according to the antiquary's 
 will, his collection might not be dispersed, it might still possibly 
 be bought, wrote to Harley and suggested that he should be the 
 purchaser : 
 
 " Sir Symonds D'Ewes, being pleased to honour me with a 
 peculiar kindness of esteem, I have taken the liberty of inquiring 
 of him whether he will part with his library ; and I find that he 
 is not unwilling to do so, and that at a much easier rate than I 
 could think for. I dare say that it would be a noble addition to 
 the Cotton Library ; perhaps the best that could be had any- 
 where at present. ... If your Honour should judge it im- 
 practicable to persuade Her Majesty to buy them for the Cotton 
 Library in whose coffers such a sum as will buy them is 
 scarcely conceivable then Sir, if you have a mind of them 
 yourself, I will take care that you shall have them cheaper than 
 any other person whatsoever. I know that many have their 
 eyes on this collection. I am desirous to have this collec- 
 tion in town for the public good, and rather in a public 
 place than in private hands, but of all private gentlemen's 
 studies first in yours. I have not spoken to anybody as yet, 
 nor will not till I have your answer, that you may not be 
 forestalled." 
 
 The D'Ewes collection was a curiously miscellaneous one, 
 containing much trivial matter side by side with learned 
 treatises, transcripts of important cartularies, monastic registers, 
 public and private muniments of the most varied description. 
 A list of them is to be found in the Harleian MS. 775. No 
 subject seems to have been void of interest for the great 
 antiquary : he treasured up his school exercises as carefully as 
 he did any ancient Greek or Roman charter, or mediaeval 
 palaeographic gem. 
 
 With the purchase of this rich medley of books begins 
 Wanley's term of office as librarian to Lord Oxford, which con- 
 tinued till his death in 1726. By his knowledge and literary 
 acumen the librarian supplied what was lacking in his patron, for
 
 340 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 like Sir Robert Cotton, Harley, despite his love of books, was by 
 no means a scholar or man of letters. Even the insignificant 
 pamphlets, once ascribed to his pen, have since been proved to 
 be the work of others. His verses, some of which were 
 printed in the sixteenth volume of Swift's works, were con- 
 demned by Macaulay as being "more execrable than the 
 bellman's." But with Wanley at his side he surpassed even 
 Cotton as a collector, for the librarian possessed an intimate 
 acquaintanceship with the contents of every foreign library of 
 note, and Harley was always ready to spend in princely 
 fashion whenever Wanley considered that a manuscript was 
 worth buying. On the sumptuous bindings with which he 
 adorned these acquisitions he expended as much as .18,000. 
 His principal binders were Thomas Elliott and Christopher 
 Chapman, of Duck Lane, who called forth some severe 
 remarks in Wanley's Diary, on the subject of their negligence 
 and extravagant prices. On inspecting Mr Elliott's bill he 
 finds him "exceeding dear in all the works of Morocco, 
 Turkey, and Russia leather, besides those of velvet," and he is 
 constantly reprimanding both book-binders for their "negli- 
 gence in executing my Lord's work." 
 
 Perhaps the best-merited praise that has ever been 
 bestowed on the founder of this celebrated library is 
 Macaulay's tribute to his " sincere kindness for men of genius." 
 And, however much the first Earl of Oxford may have 
 transgressed politically (he is accused of having been 
 unscrupulous, weak, and incapable as a minister), his services 
 to literature in the protection which he accorded to the learned, 
 have won for him a high place in the estimation of his 
 countrymen. Even as a politician he acquired some literary 
 fame, as being the first minister who employed the Press for 
 ministerial purposes ; and it redounds to his honour that, 
 amid the cares and passions of public life, and aims more 
 or less worthy of a statesman, he occupied his scanty 
 leisure with the altogether laudable endeavour to gather
 
 together under his own roof for the benefit of students and 
 scholars as much as possible of the lore and erudition of past 
 ages. 
 
 The correspondence between Harley and Defoe, pre- 
 served at Welbeck Abbey, and now published by the 
 Historical MSS. Commission, reveals the intimate relations 
 which existed for public purposes between these two remarkable 
 men. 
 
 Of Edward, second Earl of Oxford, much praise and very 
 little blame have been recorded. He has been quaintly 
 described as " indeed rich but thankful, charitable without 
 ostentation, and that in so good-natured a way as never to 
 give pain to the person whom he obliged in that respect." 
 He was, in truth, indolent and extravagant, faults which did 
 not, however, detract from his popularity. He was the prey 
 of adventurers, and the providence of impecunious poets such 
 as Pope and Swift. All the literati of the day were allowed 
 access to his library. Oldys drew therefrom the materials for 
 his Life of Sir Walter Raleigh ; Joseph Ames and Samuel Palmer 
 had recourse to it in their black-letter studies. Pope was his 
 adored friend and kept up a lively correspondence with him ; 
 Swift was always welcome at his table. He had many tastes, 
 of which book-collecting was not the least expensive, and of 
 the fortune of 500,000 which his wife brought him, the 
 greater part is said to have been sacrificed to " indolence, 
 good-nature, and want of worldly wisdom." 
 
 In 1740 he was obliged to sell his estate of Wimpole, in 
 order to clear off a debt of 100,000, a sacrifice which failed 
 to appease his creditors, and a prey to carking care, he found 
 the downward path from conviviality to . inebriety a rapid 
 one. 
 
 It was during the lifetime of the second Lord Oxford that 
 the Rev. Thomas Baker bequeathed his works in manuscript 
 to the Harleian library. A memorandum prefixed to these 
 papers states that, in consideration of one guinea (to satisfy
 
 342 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 his executors) paid by Mr Humphrey Wanley, he bequeaths 
 the twenty-three above-mentioned volumes to his friend and 
 patron the Earl of Oxford, being a part of his collection 
 towards a history of the University of Cambridge, of which he 
 was a member. The remaining volumes he left to the 
 university. For industry and observation of men and manners 
 as shown in these materials, Thomas Baker is not unworthy 
 to be compared with Anthony a Wood the historian of 
 Oxford. 
 
 Another important addition to the Harleian library 
 was made in 1716 by the purchase of Dr John Covel's 
 books. 
 
 The bequest of Matthew Prior, who died at Wimpole 
 in 1721, consisted of nearly three hundred books from his own 
 library, to be chosen by Lord Oxford himself. The selection 
 which he made, speaks for his (or Wanley's) extensive knowledge 
 of rare editions. It included among other choice specimens the 
 Ausonius printed at Bordeaux in 1575, and the Aldine Com- 
 mentary of Aristotle issued in 1504, Blackwood's Martyre de 
 la Royne d'Ecosse, Douairiere de France, 1587, and the Apologia 
 ou Defense de F Honorable Sentence et Tres-juste Execution de 
 Marie Stuard, 1593, besides many other scarce books, the whole 
 being valued at the absurdly low price of >J\. 
 
 The Harleian, like the Cottonian library, was originally 
 intended by its founders to furnish materials illustrating the 
 history of Great Britain. It contains valuable copies of Gildas, 
 Nennius, Alfred of Beverley, the Abbot Benedict, Florence of 
 Worcester, and of many other early writers. It is rich in 
 chronicles and histories of abbeys ; in documents relating to the 
 domestic policy of the kings of England, beginning with Edward 
 the Confesssor ; in lives of the English saints, Anselm, Aidan, 
 Alban, Thomas of Canterbury, Cuthbert, David, Dunstan, the 
 venerable Bede, etc. There are many letters from kings and 
 other royal personages ; there are papers relating to the dis- 
 solution of the monasteries and the establishment of the
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 343 
 
 Protestant religion ; there are statutes, charters, letters patent, 
 heraldic, and armorial books, maps, original manuscripts of works 
 which mark the dawn of English literature, such as unique copies 
 of Chaucer and Lydgate, and of those intermediate poets who 
 led up to Shakespeare. Volume 2278 contains Lydgate's 
 Life of St Edmund, with many miniatures, which, if somewhat 
 crudely executed, are of great interest on account of their 
 subject. The collection is extremely well provided with subject- 
 matter for a history of the domestic policy of Queen Elizabeth ; 
 volume 6998 comprises letters from Topclyffe, the notorious spy 
 in the pay of the government, and from William Lee, the 
 foreman of the jury who sat on Campion's trial, depositions of 
 witnesses, lists of persons suspected or denounced as recusants 
 and warrants from the Archbishop of Canterbury, and the Lord 
 Keeper to apprehend them. There is in the same volume an 
 account of the state of Wisbeach prison, teeming with " seminary 
 priests and Jesuits," to whom the Catholics of the neighbourhood 
 had free access, so that the writer complains that the prison 
 resembles "a Catholic commonwealth in the midst of a 
 Protestant country," and that Popery was spread instead of 
 being extinguished. Volume 6265 contains letters from Sir 
 Francis Walsingham, the arraignment of Edmund Campion, 
 an account of Babington's conspiracy, and other interesting 
 papers belonging to that period. Volume 5106 consists mainly 
 of notes made by Sir Francis Bacon, from the year 1594 to 1596 
 or thereabouts. They form the chief basis on which rests the 
 theory that Bacon wrote Shakespeare's works. Five large 
 volumes of letters from most of the learned men of his day are 
 addressed to Wanley ; the greater number of them are in Latin. 
 The numbering in the catalogue is, however, misleading, the 
 letters being now arranged alphabetically, according to the 
 names of the writers. 
 
 The Harleian library abounds, moreover, in materials relating 
 to the civil and ecclesiastical history of Scotland. It possesses 
 a remarkable transcript of the Scotichronicon of John Fordun ;
 
 344 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 an original copy of Baston's verses on the battle of Bannockburn ; 
 a fine one of the Chronicle of Mailros ; the Life of King David, 
 written by the Abbot of Rievaulx ; copies of charters between 
 Scottish and French kings ; and transcripts overlooked by 
 Rymer and John Harding touching the lordship of England 
 over Scotland. A contemporaneous document relates to the 
 marriage of Mary Queen of Scots to the Dauphin, and there are 
 various letters from the same queen. We also notice Papal 
 Bulls, enjoining the Scottish bishops to render obedience to the 
 Archbishop of York as their metropolitan, and the king's 
 recognition of that archbishop's rights ; besides many other 
 important papers too numerous to mention. Wales and Ireland 
 are also well represented. 
 
 But like the Cottonian, the Harleian library spread its 
 borders far beyond the limits of British history. As early as 
 1697 it had been Wanley's opinion that it would conduce very 
 much to the welfare of learning in this country if some fit 
 person or persons were sent abroad to make it their business 
 to visit the libraries of France, Italy, and Germany, and to 
 give a good account of the most valued manuscripts in them. 
 " The Papists," he adds in his memorandum to this effect, " are 
 communicative enough, for love or money, of any book that 
 does not immediately concern their controversies with Protes- 
 tants," x a somewhat cryptic utterance which Wanley does not 
 concern himself to explain, controversy not being one of the 
 sciences to which his attention was turned. But his letter of 
 instructions to Mr Andrew Hay, who was commissioned by 
 Lord Oxford 1720 to proceed to France and Italy in order to 
 purchase MSS. for him, shows such an intimate knowledge of 
 the contents of the great continental libraries, that long as it 
 is we cannot forbear transcribing the whole : 
 
 " Mr Andrew Hay, you being upon your departure towards 
 1 Harl. MS., vol. 5911, f. 2.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 345 
 
 France and Italy by my noble Lord's order, I give you this 
 commission, not now expecting that you can execute every 
 part of it in this journey, but yet hoping that you will dispatch 
 those articles which are of the greatest importance, and put 
 the others into a proper posture against the time of your 
 next return thither. 
 
 "In Paris Fr. Bernard Montfaucon has some Coptic, Syriac, 
 and other MSS. worth the buying. Among them is an old 
 leaf of the Greek Septuagint, written in uncial or capital 
 letters. Buy these and the leaden book he gave to Cardinal 
 Bouillon if he can procure it for you or direct you to it. In 
 the archives of the Cistercian monastery of Clervaulx, I am 
 told there are some original letters or epistles written by the 
 hand of St Hierome upon phylira or bark. One or more of 
 these will be acceptable if not too outrageously valued. The 
 Duke of Savoy has many Greek MSS., as also the Egyptian 
 board or table of Isis, adorned with hieroglyphics, being those 
 which have been explained by Pignorius, Richerus, etc. Let 
 me have some account of these. 
 
 " At Venice buy a set of the Greek liturgical books printed 
 there I mean a set of the first edition if they may be had ; 
 if not let us have the other. Buy also Thomassini Bibliothecae 
 Venetae in 4to. Get a catalogue of Mr Smith's MSS. there, 
 and inquire how matters go about Giustiniani's Greek MSS. 
 In the bookseller's shops, etc., you may frequently pick up 
 Greek MSS., which the Greeks bring from the Morea and 
 other parts of the Levant. Remember to get the fragments 
 of Greek MSS. you left with the bookseller who bought 
 Maffeo's library. The family of Moscardi at Verona have 
 many valuable antiquities, and among the rest four instru- 
 ments of the Emperor Theodosius, junior [now imperfect] 
 written upon phylira. These must be bought, and especial 
 care taken of them, etc. The first begins ' dem relectis ' ; the 
 second ' ius vir in ast ' ; the third ' ius vir in ' ; the fourth ' ni 
 Siciliensis.' At Florence, the Dominicans or Franciscans
 
 346 
 
 have a large collection of Greek MSS. You may see them 
 and get a catalogue of them if you can. Buy Ernstius or 
 some other catalogue of the Grand Duke's MSS. 
 
 "At Milan in the Ambrosian Library is a very ancient 
 Catullus, part of Josephus in Latin, written upon bark ; a 
 Samaritan Pentateuch in octavo, part of the Syriac Bible in 
 the ancient or Estrangele characters ; divers Greek MSS. in 
 capital letters, being parts of the Bible, with other books of 
 great antiquity, both Greek and Latin. You may look upon 
 them and send me some account. 
 
 "At Monza [about ten miles from Milan] is an imperfect 
 Antiphonarium Gregorii Papae. It is all written upon purple- 
 coloured parchment, with capital letters of gold. Buy this if 
 you can. 
 
 "The family of Septata at Milan have a Latin writing upon 
 bark. Buy this if it will be parted with. 
 
 " In the archives of the Church of Ravenna are divers 
 instruments written upon bark. You may see them. 
 
 " At Rome the Greek monks of St Basil have very many 
 old Greek MSS. written in capitals, particularly a book of the 
 four Gospels, and some pieces of St Gregory Nazianzen upon 
 St Paul's Epistles. Buy as many as you can, for I hear they 
 are poor, and therefore, they may sell the cheaper. They 
 have likewise a Greek charter of Roger, King of Sicily, 
 in five pieces, with some other instruments in Greek, 
 written upon bark or vellum. Buy these also if you 
 can. 
 
 " The Fathers of the Oratory at Rome have many very 
 ancient MSS., both Greek and Latin. See them at least, 
 even supposing that they will not sell. In the Cathedral 
 library at Pisa are many ancient MSS. Let me have some 
 account of these also. 
 
 "The monks of Bovio, near, if not in Pavia, have many 
 very ancient MSS., and among the rest a book of the 
 Gospels in Latin, wherein St Luke is written Lucanus.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 34? 
 
 They have many old deeds in their archives. Buy what you 
 can. 
 
 " At Cava [about a day's journey from Naples], is a 
 Benedictine monastery. In the archives or treasury is a Greek 
 deed of Roger, King of Sicily, with his golden seal appendant. 
 Buy this if you can. In the library are some old MSS. ; see 
 these at least, if you cannot buy. 
 
 " At Naples, in the library of the Augustin Friars of St 
 John de Carbonara is a Greek MS. of the Gospels [or of 
 homilies upon the Gospels] all written in capitals, with letters 
 of gold upon purple parchment. This must be bought. There 
 is also a Dioscorides in Greek capitals, being a large work with 
 figures of the planets, etc. This must also be bought. There 
 is also a good number of other ancient MSS., both Greek 
 and Latin. Among the latter is an Hieronimus de Scrip- 
 toribus Ecclesiasticis, in Saxon letters, and the Gospels in 
 Latin, where St Luke is called Lucanus. Buy of these what 
 you can. 
 
 " If the Greek MSS. of the monastery of St Saviour, near 
 Messina in Sicily, or any of them do remain there yet, or in 
 that neighbourhood, as it is probable they may, they will 
 doubtless come exceeding cheap. You will inquire, however, 
 how this matter stands. 
 
 " Pray Sir, all along in your journey endeavour to secure 
 what Greek MSS. and Latin classical MSS. you can, provided 
 they come at reasonable prices, and let me be favoured with 
 an account of your proceedings as often as may be 
 convenient." 
 
 And he adds : 
 
 " Mr Hay, in executing this commission, my noble Lord 
 cannot give you positive directions how to bid upon every 
 occasion, by reason of this his great distance from those parts, 
 and must therefore rely upon your fidelity, your prudence, 
 your usual dexterity in business, and your personal affection
 
 348 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 to him. You will be sure always to buy as cheap as you can, 
 for I foresee that some of the things his Lordship chiefly wants 
 or is desirous of, will not come for a small matter. In most 
 of the monasteries you will be able to buy for ready money ; 
 but it may be at a cheaper rate with the Greek monks at St 
 Basil's monastery at Rome, whose MSS. are good, and them- 
 selves in want. 
 
 " I beseech God to bless and prosper you all along in this 
 so long a journey, and to bring you back again with safety and 
 good success ; and you may be sure that you will be more 
 welcome to but very few than to, good Sir, your very hearty 
 well-wisher and most humble servant, 
 
 " HUMPHREY WANLEY. 
 
 " 2(>th April 1720" l 
 
 Mr Hay's expedition was not entirely successful. Some of 
 the manuscripts mentioned in the above letter, which Wanley 
 insisted "must be bought," are clearly not in the Harleian 
 collection, and notably the Greek and Latin MSS. written in 
 letters of gold upon purple parchment. For this library 
 contains among its choicest treasures no manuscript entirely 
 written upon purple vellum, the Codex Aureus being only 
 partially thus stained. As we have already seen, during the 
 early ages of Christianity, the Greeks and Romans were in the 
 habit of writing their most precious books in letters of gold and 
 silver on purple-stained vellum, that colour being the distinguish- 
 ing sign of royalty and greatness. Purple was only worn by 
 princes, and in this manner of distinguishing the Scriptures was 
 shown the high degree of reverence in which they were held. 
 The practice was continued during the fifth and three following 
 centuries, although it was so little known in England that when, 
 towards the end of the seventh century, St Wilfrid, Archbishop 
 of York, gave a copy of the Gospels ornamented in this manner 
 
 1 Printed in the Preface to the Catalogue of the Harleian MSS.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 349 
 
 to York Minster, his biographer described the book as a thing 
 almost miraculous. Manuscripts entirely composed of leaves of 
 purple vellum are of the greatest rarity, and many are described 
 by palaeographers as purple-stained when they are only partially 
 so. The age of a manuscript may sometimes be determined 
 among other characteristics by the fineness and whiteness of the 
 vellum, and sometimes by its purple colour. The MSS. 
 numbered 2788, 2820, and 2821 in the Harleian library are 
 described by Astle as purple-stained, whereas they are only thus 
 painted in places intended to receive the golden letters. 
 Frequently, only the most important parts, such as the title- 
 pages, prefaces, or a few pages at the beginning of each gospel 
 or the Canon of the Mass, were written on vellum which had 
 been prepared in this manner. 
 
 Wanley, as may be seen from the foregoing letter, added to 
 his knowledge of manuscripts a certain fondness for driving 
 a bargain. He was extremely desirous of obtaining the 
 treasures which he describes so accurately, but he was almost as 
 much bent on getting them cheap as on getting them at all. 
 This may have been the result of solicitude for his patron's 
 pocket, for Lord Oxford was ruining himself to enrich his library ; 
 but at all events in this matter nature and grace seem to have 
 gone amicably hand in hand. Wanley's only comment on the 
 death of the Earl of Sunderland in 1722 is to the effect that it 
 will make rare old books more accessible from the fact of their 
 being less in demand, " so that any gentleman may be permitted 
 to buy an uncommon old book for less than forty or fifty 
 pounds." 
 
 Number 2788 is the wonderful Codex Aureus or Golden 
 Gospels. Its acquisition by Lord Oxford is chronicled in 
 Wanley's Diary in the year 1720. On the I4th May he 
 wrote : 
 
 "Yesterday Mr Vaillant (a bookseller) brought me a 
 specimen of the characters of that Latin MS. of the Gospels, 
 which is to be sold at the approaching auction of Menare's
 
 350 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 books at the Hague. These characters are all uncials, gilded 
 over with gold, and appear to be formed in very elegant 
 manner. Among them I observe A, G, V, M and E so shaped, 
 which is not commonly seen in the body or text of old MSS., 
 although frequent in the title or Rubrics. In my opinion this 
 most ancient and valuable book should be purchased at any 
 rate." 
 
 Lord Oxford gave orders for the Golden Manuscript to be 
 secured, and commissioned Mr Vaillant to buy it with all 
 secrecy and prudence. There are several entries in Wanley's 
 Diary concerning the negotiations for this purchase, and on the 
 2/th June all was brought to a happy conclusion. 
 
 " This day the Codex Aureus Latinus was cleared out of the 
 king's warehouse, and delivered into my custody." On the 
 2Qth its solemn entry into the Harleian library is recorded, and 
 on the 1 3th July of the following year, we find that " Mr Elliot, 
 having clothed the Codex Aureus in my Lord's morocco leather, 
 took the same home this day, in order to work upon it with his 
 best tools, which he can do with much more conveniency at his 
 own house than here." Wanley makes a note of this circum- 
 stance because of his "speedy journey to Oxford in case any ill 
 accident should happen." 
 
 This celebrated MS. is written throughout in gold letters upon 
 vellum, with the exception of the first lines of chapters in the 
 Gospels and the first lines of the subsidiary articles, which are 
 in red ink. The paintings of the four evangelists are extremely 
 interesting, and the title-pages are stained purple. This codex 
 is described by Sir Edward Maunde Thompson as French, of 
 the time of Charlemagne, and we may add that its position in 
 the Harleian may be compared to that of the Durham or 
 Lindisfarne Gospels in the Cottonian library. 
 
 The manuscripts numbered 2820 and 2821 are further 
 examples of partially purple-stained vellum, in imitation of 
 earlier work. They are of German workmanship of the eleventh 
 and twelfth centuries. The execution of the miniatures is
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 351 
 
 condemned by Sir Edward Thompson as " very rude " and 
 " hard," but with all deference to so great an authority "we 
 must put in a plea for them, on the score of their extreme 
 nalvet and candour. 
 
 A mediaeval roll of immense interest, one of the greatest 
 treasures of this collection, consists of a series of beautiful outline 
 drawings, known as the Guthlac Roll, representing scenes from 
 the life of St Guthlac. These drawings, which are of the twelfth 
 century, are contained in eighteen rondeaux, intended, perhaps, 
 as a design for a stained-glass window in honour of the saint at 
 Croyland. They quaintly describe, in exquisite delicacy of form 
 and colour, how the young Guthlac, after taking leave of his 
 parents, renounces the profession of arms, and receives the 
 tonsure at the hands of Bishop Hedda. Then, sailing away in 
 a boat to Croyland, he builds an oratory with the help of two 
 companions, Becelin and Tatwin, and an angel converses with 
 him. No sooner is he launched on his new career of prayer, 
 good works, and bodily mortification, than demons assail him, 
 carry him to the roof of his oratory, and scourge him with 
 knotted cords. But he scares them away with the white 
 scourge given to him by St Bartholomew. He is then ordained 
 priest, instructs Ethelbald in the Christian religion, and 
 prophecies that he will be king. The last six rondeaux show 
 forth the death of Guthlac, the burial of his body by his sister 
 Pega, his appearing to Ethelbald and his attendants who are 
 weeping round his tomb, and his blissful state in heaven among 
 the benefactors of Croyland Abbey. 
 
 Reference has already been made to Wanley's Diary, 1 a 
 chronicle of the purchases made by Lord Oxford during the 
 greater part of Wanley's custodianship, and of the principal 
 events which happened in the library. It begins on the 2nd 
 March 1714, when Wanley had been librarian for about six 
 years, Many of the entries are exceedingly curious, as de- 
 
 1 Lansdoivne MSS. y 771, 772.
 
 352 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 monstrating the energy with which old manuscripts were traced, 
 discovered, and purchased, and the tact and discretion employed, 
 in order to induce their owners to part with them. A fine 
 manuscript of part of Bede's Ecclesiastical History in Saxon, 
 and two other valuable Saxon MSS. King Alfred's trans- 
 lation of Ossian and a copy of ./Elfrick's Grammar were 
 discovered in private hands, besides the Psalterium Galli- 
 canum of St Jerome " with the # and -f- , written about the 
 time of the last King .dSthelred, with the Litany and some 
 prayers, being one of the most beautiful books that can be 
 seen." 
 
 There was, moreover, a constant movement in the library 
 itself. All those who had any kind of manuscript for sale came 
 to Wanley, and he notifies in his diary the arrival of books in 
 Chinese, Armenian, Samaritan, Hebrew, Chaldee, ^Ethiopic, and 
 Arabic (both in Asiatic and African letters), in Persian, Turkish, 
 Russian, Greek (ancient and modern), Latin, French, Italian, 
 Spanish, Provencal, High German, Low German, Flemish, 
 Anglo-Saxon, English, Welsh, and Irish, in all about 940 manu- 
 scripts, 
 
 " Which is," he remarks, " a great parcel, besides which my 
 Lord hath got many other MSS. remaining at Wimpole. . . . 
 My Lord hath not only other MSS. in this room, written in 
 almost all those [languages] above enumerated, but also in 
 those that follow, which I call to mind on the sudden viz., 
 Chinese, Japanese, Sanscrit or Hanscrit, Malabaric, Syriac, in 
 the Nestorian, as well as in the common characters (some few 
 specimens of Coptic letters), Slavonian, Wallachian, Hungarian, 
 Courlandish, Francic or old Teutonic, Biscayan, Portuguese." 
 On another occasion, a person who had some books for sale, 
 which he was anxious that Lord Oxford should buy, offered 
 Wanley a douceur, in the hope that the librarian would press 
 their purchase, " not knowing," he says simply, " the kind of 
 man I am." Wanley refused the bribe, but advised his patron 
 to buy the books, which he did.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 353 
 
 At another time 
 
 " A French sort of droll came to my lodging, saying he was 
 sent to me by Mr Bu-Pis, of Long Acre. He pulled out a 4to 
 paper MS., dedicated to Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria, treating 
 of Geomancy, and other like nonsense, being written mostly in 
 German. Monsieur stumped up the value of it, and often swore 
 it was the finest thing in the world. I asked him the price of it, 
 and looked grum and gravely, which he saw with satisfaction ; 
 but as soon as his answer of fifty guineas was out, I replied 
 that was the book mine he should have it for the hundredth 
 part of a quart d'ecu. The droll would, however, have made 
 remonstrances, but I would hear none ; il ne vaut rien being my 
 word. So I waited on him downstairs, which he took as a piece 
 of ceremony ; but indeed it was to see him out of the house 
 without stealing something." 
 
 One of the most important negotiations chronicled by 
 Wanley relates to the purchase of the Graevius MSS. in 1724-25. 
 Johann Graevius was a German classical scholar, born in 1632, 
 and chiefly known by his Thesaurus Antiquitatum Romanorum, 
 and his Antiquitatum et Historianum Italia, in 45 volumes. His 
 library, one of the most remarkable in Europe, was sold at his 
 death in 1703 to the elector, Johann Wilhelm, for 6000 Reichs- 
 thaler. The elector presented all the printed books in this 
 collection to the University of Heidelberg, but kept the manu- 
 scripts, 119 in number, in his own library at Diisseldorf. They 
 were accounted such treasures, that travellers, interested in 
 antiquities, were taken to see them. The German scholar 
 Uffenbach, who visited the elector's library in i7 :I > sa y s f 
 them : 
 
 " Among the few MSS. that were shown to me, the most 
 remarkable was a beautiful old quarto codex of Horace, which 
 Graevius once lent to Mr Bentley, who could not be prevailed on 
 to restore it till forced into it by the threat that the elector 
 would appeal to the Queen. There were several volumes of 
 autograph letters from learned men, collected by Graevius, and 
 
 z
 
 354 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 several very beautiful breviaries, among which was one in 
 duodecimo, bound in silver, and containing as many beautiful 
 figures as I have ever seen in such books. Mr Le Roy also 
 showed me the 'Officia Ciceronis,' printed by Scheffer in 1466 
 namely the books De Amicitia et Senectute." 
 
 The above books, together with others not mentioned by 
 Uffenbach, subsequently found their way into the Harleian 
 library, and have been identified by Mr A. C. Clark, who has 
 made a careful study of them aided by the dates written in 
 Wanley's hand on the first page. 1 
 
 The manner of their disappearance from the elector's library 
 illustrates the more than questionable dealings to which book- 
 collectors were often subjected at the hands of their librarians. 
 There is a curious correspondence preserved in the Bodleian 
 library, consisting of autograph letters which passed between 
 Biichels, the elector's librarian at Diisseldorf, and Zamboni, the 
 resident at the court of Great Britain for the Landgraf of Hessen 
 Darmstadt. In appearance the correspondence is innocent 
 enough : Zamboni has manuscripts for sale on behalf of persons 
 abroad. But there is far more than meets the eye, and the 
 letters contain almost beyond doubt the disguised and detailed 
 account of how the elector was robbed of his manuscripts, and 
 how Zamboni defrauded the fraudulent librarian Biichels. In- 
 deed the whole history of the Graevius manuscripts seems to be 
 one of peculation, until .they came into Lord Oxford's posses- 
 sion. Graevius himself was by no means irreproachable in 
 the matter of restoring borrowed books ; Biichels, a Latin 
 scholar and bibliograph of some merit, had a suspicious 
 tendency to appropriate his master's goods ; and Zamboni, 
 had he lived in these days, would certainly have been pro- 
 secuted for criminal bankruptcy, if, indeed, the greater part of 
 the transaction were not considered too dishonest to risk 
 exposure. 
 
 1 See his interesting paper in the "Classical Review," October 1891, The 
 Library of J. G. Grcevius.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 355 
 
 Biichels, in writing to Zamboni, I3th August 1717, maintains 
 an air of mystery about the books which he offers to him for 
 sale, professing to get them from various monasteries, and de- 
 scribing the difficulties which he has in obtaining them. There 
 are English dealers about, too, who raise the price of everything. 
 By degrees he sends lists of what he has to dispose of, and 
 shelters himself behind a mysterious friend, who is obliged to 
 sell such and such a manuscript. Sometimes this friend is 
 travelling about, sometimes he is in the country, but he is 
 always the source of difficulties. But Zamboni is not deceived 
 to the extent to which Biichels wishes to deceive him, and he 
 knows full well that the manuscripts offered to him all formed 
 part of the Codices Graeviani, and he tells Wanley so, but does 
 not of course mention Biichels. Meanwhile there is much 
 bargaining between Buchels and Zamboni ; but it is certain, 
 from the correspondence in the Bodleian library, that Zamboni 
 never paid for the MSS. which he sold to Lord Oxford in 
 anything but promises. The bills which he gave were never 
 met, and if the elector was the loser, his librarian cannot 
 be said to have profited by the fraud which he undoubtedly 
 committed. 
 
 Wanley's part in the transaction, a strictly honourable one, is 
 fully recorded in the Diary. On the 26th December 1724, he 
 wrote : 
 
 " The last night Mr Mattaire came to me and said that he 
 had seen Signor Zamboni, and nine MSS. which are lately come 
 to him from Italy that they will soon be sent to his house 
 without being shown to any other, and that then I shall see them 
 forthwith. And further, that this Signor expects a little parcel 
 of Greek MSS., not yet arrived." Three weeks later he again 
 wrote : 
 
 " This morning I went to Mr Mattaire, with whom I saw 
 fifteen old Latin MSS., or fragments of MSS., belonging now 
 to Signor Zamboni, but formerly to the Dutch Professor 
 Graevius."
 
 356 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 He opened a negotiation, and after some months wrote 
 thus : 
 
 " Signor Zamboni, sending a very kind letter to me, desiring 
 to visit me, either here or at my lodgings, I desired he would 
 please to call here, my lodgings being out of order, by reason 
 of my maid's being married yesterday. Signor Zamboni came 
 hither about 2, and I showed him many more of my Lord's 
 MSS. to his great satisfaction. At length he desired that I 
 would go along with him to an ordinary, where he was to 
 dine with some foreign persons of distinction. I complied 
 with his request, as thinking I might do my Lord some 
 service; and after dinner was over, and the rest of the 
 company gone, he assured me that as to the price of the 
 MSS. which he hath sent hither, he will leave it entirely to my 
 regulation, and accept of whatever I shall think an equitable 
 price for them ; only, he desires a dispatch as speedy as may 
 be, lest the owner should send for them back. He further 
 said that the owner chiefly values the two volumes of learned 
 men's Letters, the Saxon Spieghel, and the Prayer-book of 
 Solyman the Magnificent." 
 
 Three days later, 27 September 1725, the Diary further 
 records : 
 
 "Yesterday Signor Zamboni came to me, and was enter- 
 tained to his own content and satisfaction. He conferred 
 with me about the MSS. here in my custody, and will stand 
 to my award, between my Lord and him. He says that as 
 to the things my Lord formerly had of him, that he was no 
 gainer, but that in one of the parcels, he of himself lowered 
 the price twenty pounds less than his commission ran for. 
 I hope I shall be able to separate the two volumes of Letters, 
 the Saxon Spieghel and Solyman's Prayer-book, although 
 they are very curious and valuable things, and so my Lord 
 may have the others very cheap. This done, I believe that 
 the same Letters and two MSS. may in time fall into my 
 Lord's hands at a price far lower than they are now held up
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 357 
 
 at Signer Zamboni, who proves to be a good-natured and is 
 [I believe] an honest gentleman, mentioned 4000 more 
 original Letters in the possession of his correspondent, which 
 may soon be brought over into England." 
 
 On the 2nd October he added : 
 
 " I waited on Signer Zamboni yesterday, who is daily 
 teased by his Dutch correspondent about the chest of MSS. 
 lying here." 
 
 There was a further delay of nearly a fortnight, and then 
 Wanley wrote to the rogue Zamboni to the effect that Lord 
 Oxford had at last seen many of his manuscripts, which he 
 was not unwilling to buy at a reasonable price, and that he 
 would willingly forego the two volumes of letters, the 
 Saxon Spieghel and Sultan Solyman's Prayer-book, " if held 
 up too dear." He asked for the Greek MS. of Hesiod which 
 he formerly saw among them, but which had since been 
 withdrawn. Ultimately he sent back some of the books for which 
 "this most greedy Signor" asked "the most horrible price." 
 Wanley's hope that they might subsequently come to the 
 library for less money was fulfilled as far as the letters were 
 concerned ; these are now to be found in volumes 4933, 4934, 
 493 5> an d 4936. Among them are a few other letters which 
 were already in the Harleian library when the Diisseldorf 
 manuscripts were purchased. Wanley had them all bound 
 up together. 
 
 The manuscripts bought by Wanley from Zamboni number 
 eighty-four, and comprise nearly all the important books 
 mentioned in the Graevius catalogue. The Hesiod is the only 
 valuable Greek MS. missing, and the principal Latin MS. of 
 this collection, which did not pass into the Harleian library, is 
 a Terence. It is also to be regretted that Wanley did not 
 secure the prayers of Solyman and the celebrated Saxon 
 Spieghel. Of the eighty-four other MSS., two have a special 
 historical interest : the Cicero (2682) and the Quintilian (2664), 
 both of which can be traced to the Cathedral library at Cologne.
 
 358 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 Graivius borrowed the Cicero in 1663 from the authorities, but 
 never returned it. The elector, Johann Wilhelm, bought it 
 among other books which were sold at his death. It consists 
 of a folio of 192 leaves of coarse vellum written in a German 
 hand of the latter part of the eleventh century, and has been 
 the subject of much learned criticism. It was collated by Mr 
 A. C. Clark, but until he identified it as one of the books 
 that had formed part of the Graevius collection, very little 
 attention had been paid to it. There is no trace of it before 
 the sixteenth century, beyond the fact that its first collator 
 was Modius of Cologne, who was allowed to use the Cathe- 
 dral library, to which the Cicero then belonged. The ac- 
 quisition of these manuscripts was the last important purchase 
 made by Wanley ; he died a few months later, aged fifty- 
 three. 
 
 Besides the above-mentioned treasures from the Diisseldorf 
 library the Harleian possesses, among other Greek classical 
 manuscripts, some that are unique in character. Sir Edward 
 Thompson, in his " Catalogue of Ancient Greek MSS. in the 
 British Museum," calls attention to three in the Harleian 
 collection which appear to him to be of superior merit. These 
 are: (i) The Greek-Latin glossary of the seventh century. 
 This manuscript is of singular interest both for language and 
 palaeography, and consists of 277 leaves of vellum varying 
 in thickness, some of it being very coarse. At the end, on 
 a fly-leaf is some scribbling in what is described as " a Mero- 
 vingian hand." (2) The Greek MS. of the ninth or tenth 
 century, imperfect in the beginning, and in several other 
 places, described by Wanley as the Codex Prusensis. The 
 initial letters, some of which are ornamented, are generally 
 red. (3) A volume numbered 5694 in the catalogue, and 
 containing a part of Lucian's works, on 134 leaves of fine 
 vellum of the tenth century. On the second fly-leaf are 
 these words in an Italian fifteenth-century hand : " Libro de 
 Jo. Chalceopylus, Constantinopolitanus," and at the bottom
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 359 
 
 of the page, " Antonii Seripandi ex Henrici Casolle amici 
 optimi munere." Wanley says that this MS. was supposed 
 to have been carried from the old imperial library at 
 Constantinople to the monastery of Bobi near Naples. He 
 considered it "|the finest old Greek classical MS. now in 
 England." The library of Seripandus was preserved in the 
 Augustinian monastery of St John of Carbonara at Naples, 
 but a part of it was sold to Jan de Witt, who took it to 
 Holland, and this manuscript was among the number, and was 
 included in the sale catalogue of De Witt's library in 1701. 
 It was bought by Jan van der Mark of Utrecht, and on this 
 account it is described in the Amsterdam edition of the work 
 as the Codex Mardanus. Later on it came into the possession 
 of John Bridges of Northamptonshire, who sold it to the 
 second Lord Oxford. 
 
 The earliest Latin MS. in the Harleian library is a copy of 
 the four Gospels of the sixth or seventh century No. 1775. It 
 was bought by the founder of the library from Jean Aymon, 
 who stole it, together with eight other manuscripts, from the 
 Bibliothique Royale in Paris, in 1707. It still bears on folio 2 
 its original press-mark. Another MS. in Lord Oxford's 
 possession having been identified as one of these, was restored 
 to its rightful owners in 1729. This relic of early Christian 
 times consists of 35 leaves of the Epistles of St Paul, the 
 canonical Epistle, and the Apocalypse, written in gold letters on 
 vellum. The adventure through which it found itself in the 
 Harleian library together with the precious No. 1775, may be 
 thus briefly related : 
 
 Jean Aymon was a renegade French priest who had retired 
 to the Hague, married, and become a Lutheran pastor. He 
 enjoyed a considerable reputation for learning and piety among 
 the Dutch ; but wearying of his monotonous, uneventful life, he 
 resolved on returning to France under pretext of offering to 
 Monsieur Clement, the king's sub-librarian, a certain book which 
 he had discovered. He accordingly wrote to Clement asking
 
 360 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 him to procure him a passport, in order that he might present 
 the book in question, and reveal some important matters to 
 the king. Clement obtained the passport, and Aymon returned 
 to France, where, in order to ingratiate himself with the 
 librarian, he declared that he wished to be restored in religion. 
 He was advised to retire for a time to the seminary of 
 Foreign Missions, in order to study his position and to 
 prepare for his rehabilitation as a priest. But he complained 
 bitterly of the treatment which he received at the seminary, and 
 paid frequent visits to C16ment, who, with astounding simplicity, 
 allowed him to remain for hours, often quite alone, in the Royal 
 library. Here he employed himself in making selections from 
 priceless manuscripts, sometimes cutting out pages from the 
 middle of a volume where the theft would be less easily detected. 
 When he had gathered in a considerable harvest, he cleverly 
 obtained another passport, and escaped back to the Hague with 
 his ill-gotten gains. He accounted for his absence by saying 
 that he had been to seek documents, important for the defence 
 of religion, and made no secret of having brought back rich 
 trophies. It was thus through public rumour that Clement first 
 became aware that the king's library had been robbed. But 
 Aymon's method of pilfering had so far succeeded that it was 
 some time before it could be ascertained what number of 
 manuscripts he had carried off. By degrees, however, the list 
 was completed and sent to Holland. The Abbe" Bignon was the 
 king's librarian at the time when it was discovered that one at 
 least of the stolen treasures was in the Harleian library. As 
 soon as Edward, Lord Oxford became aware of the fact, he 
 hastened to restore it, and received in exchange a very polite 
 acknowledgement of his courtesy from Cardinal Fleury on 
 behalf of the king. 1 
 
 In 1725 Wanley enumerated the Greek MSS. in the Harleian 
 collection as 173. Among the illuminated ones, that which bears 
 
 * L. V. Delisle, Le Cabinet des Manuscrits de la Bibliothlque Imperials.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 361 
 
 the number 1810 demands special attention. It is an Evangelia 
 executed in Greece in the twelfth century, and written in black 
 and red characters on the finest vellum. Some of the miniatures 
 have suffered woefully, the paint having cracked in parts, but 
 the faces are still full of beauty and life. One of the least 
 damaged represents the death of the Blessed Virgin. The 
 apostles surround the bed on which she lies extended ; the aged 
 St Peter lifts up his hands in an attitude of grief; St John is 
 leaning over her left side ; another bends forward and embraces 
 her feet. In a lozenge-shaped medallion on a gold background 
 our Lord holds her soul in His arms, in the form of a little child. 
 A crowd of people form the background, and a figure at the head 
 of the bed swings a censer. Three women contemplate the scene 
 from a small window. 
 
 Another remarkable miniature, the last in the volume, is a 
 good deal cracked, but still extremely interesting for the force and 
 delicacy of touch which it displays. Our Lord appears to the 
 apostles after His Resurrection. St Thomas is in the act of 
 placing his finger in the wounded side. The print of the nails is 
 seen in the hands and feet. Sir Edward Thompson distinguishes 
 this manuscript with his by no means frequent encomium, 
 " very good." 
 
 The Greek Evangelium of the ninth or tenth century (5787), 
 with its ornamental initials and borders, and St Jerome's Latin 
 version of the Psalter (2793), with a preface addressed to 
 Sophronius, and written in a tenth-century hand, should not 
 be passed over. 
 
 Another Psalter (2904), executed in England at the end of 
 the tenth or beginning of the eleventh century, has a fine 
 drawing of the Crucifixion, and grand initial letters. Westwood, 
 in his Facsimiles and Miniatures, considers this drawing to be 
 the finest of the kind, and the initial B (Beatus vir qui non abiit 
 in consilio impiorum), the noblest with which he is acquainted. 
 This manuscript has most of the characteristics of the later 
 Anglo-Saxon school the hunched-up shoulders to express grief,
 
 362 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 the attenuated lower limbs, and the manner in which prominence 
 is given to the central figure by drawing the others much 
 smaller. On a scroll which St John holds are the words, " Hie 
 est discipulis qui testimonii perhibet" The arrangement of 
 Pilate's superscription " Hie est Nazaren IHC rex judaeor " is 
 unusual but not without precedent 
 
 The Harleian library contains no fewer than 300 MSS. of the 
 Bible or parts of the Bible, written and illuminated between the 
 seventh and the fourteenth centuries. Of the later copies we 
 may note one of the whole Bible, written in the thirteenth 
 century, and described in the " Catalogue of Ancient MSS. in 
 the British Museum," as remarkable ; and a Psalter, written 
 before 1339, splendidly illuminated, and further interesting as 
 having belonged to Philippa of Hainault, and as bearing the arms 
 of England without those of France. 
 
 There is also a fine series of Talmudical and Rabbinical 
 books ; nearly 200 volumes of Fathers of the Church, as well as 
 liturgical books of the different Latin and Greek rites. 
 
 The polite literature of the Middle Ages is admirably 
 represented, among other examples by the famous Roman de la 
 Rose, with its brilliant fourteenth-century miniatures, its wonder- 
 ful figures gorgeously dressed, its broad borders richly decorated 
 with fruit, birds, insects, and flowers, of which the rose is the 
 most salient feature. One fascinating miniature shows 
 
 " Comment Narcissus se mira 
 A la fontaine et souspira " ; 
 
 and after a long but delightful pilgrimage by flowery meads 
 and limpid streams, amid curious mediaeval gardens 
 
 " La conclusion du rommant 
 Est que vous voiez ez lemant 
 Qui prent la rose a son plaisir 
 En qui estait tout son desir." 
 
 This glimpse of the treasures of the Harleian library will at
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 363 
 
 least account for the great celebrity it attained within a compara- 
 tively short time of its foundation. Wanley was careful to enter 
 into his Diary the names of visitors, and any interesting details 
 connected with them, and their motives for an inspection. On 
 the 1 5th January 1719/20 he observed : 
 
 " Dr Fiddes came, and communicated to me his intention of 
 writing the life of Cardinal Wolsey at large ; and desired me to 
 transcribe for him all such materials in this library as I 
 should find for his purpose. I showed him divers things 
 here, and gave him notice of many others in the Cottonian 
 library, etc., but as to transcribing for him, begged his excuse, 
 etc." 
 
 On the 22nd December 1721, 
 
 " Mr Bowles, the Bodleian library-keeper, came, and I spent 
 most of the time showing him some of the rarities here, to his 
 great wonder and satisfaction." 
 
 And on the 28th 
 " Mr Bowles came and saw more of the rarities here." 
 
 Two more visits from Mr Bowles are chronicled, when he 
 saw " yet more of the curious books, papers, and parchments 
 here " ; and shortly after Wanley wrote, " many come and tarry 
 long." A visit from David Casley, keeper of the Cottonian and 
 Royal libraries, on the 4th November 1725, is suggestive of a 
 certain amount of friction between the two rival librarians. It 
 is nearly the last entry in Wanley's record : 
 
 " Mr Casley came to collate my Lord's MSS. of Titus Livius 
 for Mr D'Orville, by my Lord's order. I am civil to him, but 
 when just now he offered me a South Sea bond as security to 
 let him carry one of the said MSS. home to collate it there, I 
 would by no means hearken to such a proposal." 
 
 Perhaps Wanley would have regarded him with still greater 
 suspicion if he had known that Casley was to be his successor in 
 cataloguing the MSS. which he kept with so jealous a care. 
 The talents of the two men were very different, as the catalogue 
 itself shows. That part of it for which Wanley was responsible
 
 364 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 contains a description and an abstract of each manuscript. 
 Casley, whose knowledge of the age of manuscripts has never 
 been surpassed, contented himself with fixing their dates without 
 any reference to their contents. 
 
 The work of building up the library does not seem to have 
 flagged or deteriorated after Wanley's death. The search for 
 precious MSS. was still actively carried on, and copies of a 
 large collection of original, royal, and other letters and State 
 Papers in the Lansdowne library furnish us with an example 
 of Lord Oxford's unabated zeal in the pursuit of books. 
 Appended to these papers is a note written on the first leaf by 
 Mr J. West, and dated 2nd May 1742 : 
 
 " Mem. I went with Edward, Earl of Oxford, to view these 
 MSS. at a barber's shop next door to the Bull Head Tavern, in 
 Lincoln's Inn Fields, when we were carried up two pair of 
 stairs, and an old woman asked 300 for the MSS., which was 
 thought exorbitant, but which would have been given, if she 
 would have declared any lawful title to us as owner of 
 them." 
 
 After Casley, Hocker, deputy-keeper of the records in the 
 Tower, undertook to continue the catalogue, but only completed 
 it as far as the number 7355. When the collection was brought 
 to the British Museum, after the death of the second Lord 
 Oxford, Dr Brown, Professor of Arabic at Oxford, and Dr 
 Kennicott, Fellow of Exeter College, added titles to such of the 
 Arabic and Hebrew MSS. as needed them. Gomez, a learned 
 Jew, was employed to do the same for the rabbinical books that 
 were without titles. In 1800 the Rev. Robert Nares was ap- 
 pointed to continue and revise the catalogue. In a letter to 
 Bishop Percy, dated British Museum, igth January 1801, Nares 
 wrote : 
 
 " I am just now deep in old MSS., correcting all that 
 part of the Harleian catalogue which was left unfinished by 
 Humphrey Wanley, and very imperfectly executed by Mr 
 Casley."
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 365 
 
 The work done by Nares was supplemented by Stebbing 
 Shaw, and Douce. The Rev. T. Hartwell Home added a series 
 of indexes, and published the catalogue in I8I2. 1 
 
 On the death of Edward, Earl of Oxford, in 1741, his widow, 2 
 who is described as a "dull, worthy woman," cared to retain 
 few of her husband's treasures. His various curiosities were 
 sold by auction ; his printed books, pamphlets, and engravings 
 were disposed of to Thomas Osborne, a bookseller of Gray's 
 Inn, for .13,000 several thousand pounds less than the cost of 
 their bindings. A selection of scarce pamphlets found in the 
 library was made by Oldys, and printed in 8 volumes, in 1746, 
 under the title of the " Harleian Miscellany." Dr Samuel 
 Johnson wrote a preface to this work. The best edition of the 
 " Harleian Miscellany" is that of Thomas Park, in 10 volumes, 
 published between 1808-13. 
 
 There still remained the precious manuscripts, and it had 
 been the wish of Lord Oxford that books so carefully collected 
 might not be dispersed. In accordance with this wish, Lady 
 Oxford sold them to the nation in 1753 f r tne inconsiderable 
 sum of 10,000. They then consisted of 7639 volumes, besides 
 14,236 original rolls, charters, deeds, and other documents, and 
 these were removed to the British Museum, where they found a 
 safe and suitable resting-place. 
 
 But although fortunately the Harleian MSS. have been 
 preserved from the fate of so many choice volumes in the 
 Cottonian library, they have suffered to some extent from the 
 carelessness or dishonesty of borrowers. The second Lord 
 Oxford was generous to a fault in lending, with the inevitable 
 result. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, the only one of his 
 literary friends whom Lady Oxford tolerated, 3 wrote the follow- 
 
 1 Nichol's Literary Illustrations, vol. vii., p. 591. 
 
 2 She was Lady Henrietta Cavendish Holies, only daughter of John, 
 fourth Earl of Clare, created Duke of Newcastle. 
 
 3 " It is a common remark that people of brilliant parts often have no 
 objection to relax or rest their understandings in the society of those whose
 
 366 STUDIES FROM COURT AND CLOISTER 
 
 ing letter to her husband from Avignon in 1745, at the time 
 when probably, the MSS. having been removed to the British 
 Museum, attention was directed to the fact that some were 
 missing : 
 
 " I perfectly remember carrying back the manuscript you 
 mention, and delivering it to Lord Oxford. I never failed 
 returning to himself all the books he lent me. It is true I 
 showed it to the Duchess of Montague, but we read it together, 
 and I did not even leave it with her. I am not surprised in 
 that vast quantity of manuscripts, some should be lost or mis- 
 laid, particularly knowing Lord Oxford to be careless of them, 
 easily lending and as easily forgetting he had done it. I re- 
 member I carried him once one very finely illuminated that 
 when I delivered he did not recollect he had lent it to me, 
 though it was but a few days before. Wherever this is, I think 
 you had need be in no pain about it" l 
 
 Two years after the removal of the Harleian library to the 
 British Museum, Lady Oxford died, leaving an only daughter, 
 Margaret Cavendish, married to William Bentinck, second Duke 
 of Portland. She was the " noble, lovely little Peggy " sung by 
 Prior. As she had inherited none of her father's and grand- 
 intellects are a little more obtuse. Here was an instance : the gods never 
 made anybody less poetical than Lady Oxford ; and yet Lady Mary Wortley, 
 though in general not over tolerant to her inferior's incapacity, appears upon 
 the whole to have loved nobody so well. And there was an exception 
 equally striking in her favour ; for Lady Oxford, heartily detesting most of 
 the wits who surrounded her husband, yet admired Lady Mary with all her 
 might pretty much as the parish clerk reverences the rector for his Greek 
 and Hebrew. Lady Bute confessed that she sometimes got into sad dis- 
 grace by exclaiming, ' Dear mama ! how can you be so fond of that stupid 
 woman?' which never failed to bring upon her a sharp reprimand and a 
 lecture against rash judgments, ending with ' Lady Oxford is not shining, 
 but she has much more in her than such giddy things as you and your com- 
 panions can discern.'" The Letters and Works of Lady Mary Wortley 
 Montagu, edited by her great-grandson, Lord Wharncliffe, 2nd ed., vol. i., 
 p. 66. Introduction. 
 
 1 Letters, vol. ii., p. 147.
 
 THE HARLEIAN COLLECTION OF MANUSCRIPTS 367 
 
 father's tastes, it was fitting that the grand collection of MSS., 
 for the sake of which they had impoverished themselves, should 
 enrich an innumerable multitude of scholars and students of all 
 nations and for all time.
 
 INDEX 
 
 ADOLF, Coadjutor Bishop of Cologne, 
 in, 112, 113 
 
 ^Elfric, the Grammarian, 300 
 
 ^thelwald, Bishop of Lindisfarne, 296, 
 297 
 
 Agard, Arthur, 284 
 
 Albany, John, Duke of, Regent of 
 Scotland, and Protector, 7-15, 18- 
 20 
 
 Alber, Ferdinand, S.J., 143 
 
 Albert, Duke of Bavaria, 118, 119, 125, 
 128 
 
 Alcantara, St Peter of, 97 
 
 Alcfrid, 208 
 
 Alcuin, 292 
 
 Aldhelm, Bishop of Malmesbury, 292 
 
 Aldred, 296, 297, 298 
 
 Aleander, papal legate, 100 
 
 Alfred of Beverley, 342 
 
 Alfred, King, 292 
 
 Allen, Lieutenant of Portland Castle, 
 168, 169, 173 
 
 Alvarez, Alphonsus, 107 
 
 Ames, Joseph, 341 
 
 Anderson, Dorothy, daughter and co- 
 heiress of Edmund Anderson, of 
 Stratton, Bedfordshire, 303 
 
 Anderson, Judge, 256 
 
 Andreas, Jacques, 252 
 
 Angus, Archibald, Earl of, second 
 husband of Margaret, Queen of 
 Scots, 7, 8, u, 14, 15, 16, 17, 25, 
 27, 28, 29, 32, 33, 34 
 
 Anne of Cleves, fourth wife of Henry 
 
 VIII., 35-41 
 her portrait, 35 
 
 the political and religious import- 
 ance of her marriage, 35 
 her arrival in England, 38 
 her marriage declared null, 40 
 the king sups with her at Richmond, 
 
 4i 
 
 she visits the new queen at Hampton 
 Court, and dances with her, 44, 
 
 45 
 reports as to her restoration to 
 
 favour, 45, 48 
 her grief at the king's sixth marriage, 
 
 49 
 
 her friendship with Mary, 51 
 Antonio, a Portuguese Jesuit, 138, 139 
 Aquaviva, Claudius, S.J., 135, 140, 141, 
 
 142, 148 
 
 Aquinas, St Thomas, 101, 159, 162 
 Aristotle, 159, 162, 177 
 Arragon, John of, 107 
 
 Katharine of, see Katharine 
 Arundel, Henry Fitzalan, Earl of, 294, 
 
 318, 319, 320 
 Ascham, Roger, 264, 316 
 Athanasius, the Melchite Patriarch, 
 
 320, and note 
 Athelstan, King, 315, 333 
 Aucher, Sir Anthony, 316 
 Augustine, St, 185, 277, 329 
 Aymon, Jean, 359 
 
 2 A
 
 370 
 
 INDEX 
 
 BACON, Sir Francis, 313, 343 
 Bacon, Roger, 311, 324 
 Bader, George, S.J., 143, 156 
 Bagage, Richard, 167 
 Bainham, James, 256, 257 
 Baker, Rev. Thomas, 341, 342 
 Bale, Bishop of Ossory, 260, 278 
 Barbara, Archduchess of Austria, one 
 
 of the five "queens," daughters 
 
 of the Emperor Ferdinand I., 
 
 149 
 Barberini, Cardinal, nephew of Pope 
 
 Urban VIII., 179, 180, 185, 191, 
 
 193, 194, 195. 196, 198, 202 
 letters to, 180, 185, 191, 195, 196, 
 
 198 
 
 Barlow, Dr, 307 
 Barri, Gerald de (Giraldus Cambren- 
 
 sis), 310 
 
 Bassett, Elizabeth, 48 
 Bastwick, John, Puritan pamphleteer. 
 
 187, 1 88, 189 
 Bath, Earl of, 77 
 Beard, Thomas, 255 
 Bede, the Venerable, 287, 292, 297, 
 
 342 
 
 Bedingfeld, Sir Edmund, 56 
 Dame Grace, daughter of Lord 
 Marny, and wife of the above, 56 
 younger sons of the above Anthony, 
 56 ; Edmund, 56, 68, 74, 77 ; 
 Humphrey, 56, 74, 89 
 Sir Henry, Lieutenant of the Tower 
 of London, etc., eldest son of 
 Sir Edmund, 52-94, 271 
 Tennyson, following Foxe, per- 
 petuates the libel on his person, 
 
 53 
 
 protest of the seventh baronet, 54 
 Tennyson's reply, 55 
 real character of Sir Henry, 57 
 he is charged with the custody of 
 
 the Princess Elizabeth, 61 
 his letters from Woodstock, 63, 64, 
 
 66, 68, 71, 74, 75, 76, 79, 84 
 letters to him, 58, 67, 70, 73, 81, 83, 
 
 86, 87, 91, 92 
 
 Bedingfeld, Sir Henry, is appointed 
 
 Lieutenant of the Tower, 81 
 in Parliament as knight of the shire 
 
 for Norfolk, 86 
 succeeds Sir Henry Jerningham as 
 
 Captain of the Yeomen of the 
 
 Guard, 86 
 retires to Oxburgh on the death of 
 
 Queen Mary, 86 
 receives as a grant, the manor of 
 
 Caldecot, 88 
 is summoned before Elizabeth's 
 
 Council for recusancy, and 
 
 fined ^500, 90 
 his servants dismissed by the 
 
 Council for refusing to attend 
 
 the new Protestant service, 91 
 his death, 93 
 Sir Henry, seventh baronet, letter 
 
 from, 54 
 letter to, 55 
 Dame Katharine, daughter of Sir 
 
 Roger Townshend, wife of the 
 
 Lieutenant of the Tower, 56, 
 
 57,92 
 
 Thomas, of Oxburgh, 85 
 Benedict, Abbot, 342 
 Bentley, Richard, Royal librarian, 324, 
 
 325, 353 
 son of the above, Royal librarian, 
 
 34, 305 
 
 Bercwald, Abbot of Reculver, 293 
 Bertha, Queen, wife of King Ethelbert, 
 
 293, 294 
 
 Besant, Mrs, 160 
 
 Bignon, Abbe", 360 
 
 Billfrith, monk of Lindisfarne, 297, 298 
 
 Billick, Eberhard, Carmelite Pro- 
 vincial, 99, 102, 103, 105, 109, in, 
 112, 113 
 
 Birch, Mr W. De Gray, F.R.S.L., 
 keeper of the MSS. in the British 
 Museum, 293, 294 
 
 Biron, Marechal de, 176 
 
 Blume, Dr Friedrich, 210 
 
 Blyssem, Henry, S.J., 139, 140, 141, 142 
 
 Bobadilla, Nicholas, S.J., 116
 
 INDEX 
 
 371 
 
 Bodley, Sir Thomas, 279, 280, 319 
 Boleyn, Anne, second wife of Henry 
 
 VIII., 38 
 
 Bolton, Edmund, 281, 282 
 Bond, Mr, 294 
 Boniface, St, 296 
 Bonner, Edmund, Bishop of London, 
 
 264, 267, 268, 269, 270, 271 
 Borgia (Borja), St Francis, 97, 149, 
 
 150, 151, 152, 153 
 Rodrigo, Pope Alexander VI., 96 
 Borough, Lord, of Gainsborough, 
 
 49 
 
 Borromeo, St Charles, 96 
 Bossuet, 97 
 
 Boswell, Sir William, 194 
 Boteler, Lord, 193 
 Bourdaloue, 97 
 Bowles, Mr, librarian of the Bodleian, 
 
 363 
 
 Bowyer, Robert, 299 
 Boyle, Charles, 325 
 Brandon, Charles, Duke of Suffolk, 56 
 Bridges, John, 359 
 Brocas, Elizabeth, wife of Sir Robert 
 
 Cotton, 288 note 
 Brooke, Mr Stopford, 212 
 Browne, Dr, Professor of Arabic at 
 
 Oxford, 364 
 
 Bruno, Giordano, 158-163 
 Bruno, St, 107 
 Bucer, Martin, 104, 105, 316 
 Biichels, librarian to the Elector of 
 
 Bavaria, 354 
 
 Buckhurst, Lord Treasurer, 173 
 Buckingham, Duke of, 183, 307 
 Bullinger, Henry, Protestant reformer, 
 
 5 
 
 Bulmer, Sir John, 20 
 Burnet, Gilbert, 53 
 Burnett, Mr, bookseller, 287 
 Bu-Pis, Mr, 353 
 
 QEDMON, 211, 213, 219, 291 
 Cajetan, Cardinal, 116 
 Calasanctius, St Joseph, 97 
 Calvin, John, 185 
 
 Camden, William, archaeologist, 220, 
 
 221, 281, 283, 335 
 Campion, Edmund, S.J., 343 
 Canisius, Peter, S.J., 106, 107, 108, 
 
 in, 112-130, 137, 143, 150, 151, 
 
 152, 153 
 his youth, 106 
 
 he enters the Society of Jesus, 107 
 at the Council of Trent, 113 
 at Rome, 1 14 
 is sent to Messina, 115 
 the apostle of Germany, 116-130 
 Cantely, John, 27 
 Canute, King, 329 
 Capistran, St John, 95 
 Carew, George, afterwards Earl of 
 
 Totness, 281 
 Carew, Sir Peter, 50, 81 
 Carlisle, Earl of, 186 
 Casley, David, deputy, afterwards 
 sole, custodian of the Royal and 
 Cottonian libraries, 304, 305, 325, 
 
 363, 364 
 
 Cattley, Rev. S. R., 275 
 
 Cavendish, Margaret, wife of the 
 second Duke of Portland, 366 
 
 Caxton, William, 224 
 
 Cecil, Sir Robert, 176 
 
 Chandos, Lord, 62 
 
 Chapman, Christopher, 340 
 
 Chapuys, Eustace, imperial ambas- 
 sador, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49 
 
 Charles, Archduke of Austria, 139, 148 
 
 Charles V., Emperor of Germany, 36, 
 37, 64, 103, 104, 108, 109, 1 10, in, 
 112, 126, 128, 136, 266 
 
 Charles I., King of England, 178-203, 
 
 319 
 Charles II., King of England, 323, 324, 
 
 336 
 
 Chaucer, Geoffrey, 223 
 Cheke, Sir John, 81, 316 
 
 letters to, 81, 82 
 Clark, Mr A. C., 354, 35^ 
 Clement, Monsieur, sub-librarian of 
 
 the Bibliothique Royale, Paris, 
 
 359, 36o
 
 372 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Cleves, Anne, see Anne of Cleves 
 
 Duke of, 36, 39,40 41, 103 
 Cobet, 321 
 Cochlasus, 116 
 
 Coke, Lord Chief Justice, 174 
 Coldstream, Abbess of, 16, 20 
 Colet, John, 158 
 Collins, author of the Baronetage, 
 
 283 
 
 Collins, a madman, 261 
 Comara, F., Luis Gonzalez de, 133 
 Conn, George, papal agent at the 
 
 court of Henrietta Maria, 178, 
 
 192, 193, 194 
 Conybeare, 290, 291 
 Cook, Mr, A. S., 212, 213, 214 
 Cope, Alan (Nicholas Harpsfield), 253 
 Copland, William, 224 
 Cornwallis, gentleman-usher to the 
 Princess Elizabeth, 66 
 
 Sir Thomas, 60 
 Cotton, Sir John, 303, 306, 307 
 
 Sir Robert, founder of the Cottonian 
 library, 277-308, 335, 338, 340 
 
 Thomas, brother of the above, 288 
 Cowbridge, 261 
 Cranmer, Thomas, Archbishop of 
 
 Canterbury, 49> 3 l8 , 3 1 9 
 Crashaw, Richard, the poet, 281 
 Crespin, 251 
 
 Cromwell, Thomas, 3, 4, 35-40 
 Crouch, Mr Gilbert, 307 
 Cuperus, Martin, 98 
 Cuthbert, St, 219, 292, 296, 297, 298, 
 
 299, 301, 342 
 Cynewulf, 211, 212, 213, 219, 221 
 
 DACRE, Lord, 9, 10, 11, 13, 15, 16, 18, 
 
 25,26 
 
 Darwin, Professor, 161 
 Davis, John, 168 
 Davis, Sir John, 282 
 Defoe, Daniel, 341 
 Deighton, 264 
 
 Delphin, apostolic nuncio, 143 
 Derby, Earl of, 62 
 Dering, Sir Edward, letter from, 288 
 
 Deuch, John, 173 
 
 D'Ewes, Sir Symonds, antiquary, 335, 
 
 338, 339 
 
 Deye, William, letter from, 86 
 Dirsius, John, S.J., 149, 151 
 Disraeli, Isaac, 285, 289 
 Dodderidge, Sir John, 281 
 Dorset, Marquis of, 16 
 Dorset, Earl of, 289 
 D'Orville, Mr, 363 
 Douglas, the Lady Margaret, daughter 
 
 of the Queen of Scots, 1 1, 12, 29, 
 
 34 
 
 Duchesne, 295 
 Dudley, Sir Robert, 290 
 Dugdale, 278, 307 
 Duncan, Dr, 218 
 Duns Scotus, 316 
 Dunstan, St, 292 
 Dyer, 162 
 
 EADFRITH, Bishop of Lindisfarne, 296, 
 
 297 
 
 Eck, Johann, of Ingolstadt, 116 
 Edward L, King of England, 311 
 Edward II., King of England, 311 
 Edward IV., King of England, 56, 224, 
 
 3^2, 313 
 Edward VI., King of England, 46, 
 
 316 
 
 Edwin, King of Northumbria, 207 
 Elizabeth, Princess, afterwards Queen 
 of England, 49, 51, 52, 53, 54, 57- 
 63,65-81, 87-90, 161, 310,316 
 is sent to the Tower for implication 
 
 in Wyatt's rebellion, 58 
 the case against her, 59 
 her journey from Ashridge to the 
 
 court, 60 
 Sir H. Bedingfeld appointed her 
 
 custodian, 61 
 her removal from the Tower to 
 
 Woodstock, 62 
 her treatment and behaviour as a 
 
 prisoner, 63-81 
 
 retires to Hatfield till her accession, 
 81
 
 INDEX 
 
 373 
 
 Elizabeth, Princess, her letter to Sir 
 
 Henry Bedingfeld, 87 
 grants him the manor of Caldecot, 
 
 88 
 
 her progress into Norfolk, 88 
 Elizabeth of York, Queen of Henry 
 
 VII., 89 note 
 Elliott, Thomas, 340, 350 
 Erasmus of Rotterdam, 96, 100, 101, 
 
 102, 105, 158 
 Erskine, Lord, 30 
 Essex, Earl of, 173 
 
 Eyre, Dr, Archbishop of Glasgow, 
 299 
 
 FABER, Peter, S.J., 106, 107, 116 
 
 Feckenham, Sir John, Abbot of West- 
 minster, letter from, 82 
 
 Ferdinand, King of the Romans, 118, 
 119, 125 
 
 Ferdinand I., Emperor, 136, 148, 149 
 
 Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria, after- 
 wards Emperor Ferdinand II., 
 147, 148, 149, 154 
 
 Fiddes, Dr, 363 
 
 Fitzjames, Mr John, 170, 172 
 
 Florence of Worcester, 342 
 
 Flower, 261 
 
 Foley, Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas 
 Foley of Whitley Court, first wife 
 of Robert, Lord Oxford, 336 
 
 Fordun, John, 343 
 
 Foxe, John, the martyrologist, 60, 61, 
 62, 250-276 
 
 Francis I., King of France, 36, 37, 46, 
 47 
 
 Franconitz, Matthias Flach- (Flacius 
 Illyricus), 251, 252 
 
 Frith, John, 258, 265 
 
 Frith, Mr, 1 60 
 
 GAGE, Sir John, Lord Chamberlain, 
 
 64, 65, 67, 69 
 
 Gairdner, Mr James, 273, 274 
 Gardiner, Stephen, Bishop of Win- 
 chester, Lord Chancellor, 77, 264, 
 265, 266, 267, 270 
 
 Gardiner, William, 262 
 
 Geiler, Johannes, Catholic reformer, 
 
 95,96 
 George, Prince of Austria, Bishop of 
 
 Liege, 112 
 George II., King of England, yz^and 
 
 note 
 
 George III., King of England, 308 
 George IV., King of England, 308 
 Gerard, Rev. John, S.J., 273 
 Gibson, Bishop, 210 
 Gildas, 342 
 Goethe, 161 
 Gomez, 364 
 
 Gondomar, Spanish ambassador, 280 
 Goudan, S.J., 143 
 Gough, 251 
 
 Graevius, Johann, 353,354, 355, 357, 35& 
 Grafton, continuer of Hall's Chronicle, 
 
 260 
 
 Gray, Lady, 66 
 Greville, Sir Fulke, 162 
 Grim, Charles, S.J., 148 
 Grimm, 291 
 Grimwood, 256 
 Grindal, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 
 184, 252, 253 
 Cropper, Johann, Archdeacon of 
 
 Cologne, no, m, 116, 127 
 Guest, Lady Charlotte Elizabeth, 230 
 
 HABERNFELD, Andreas ab, 194 
 Haeckel, Professor, 161 
 Haigh, Dr, 208, 209, 212, 220 
 Hall, chronicler, 260 
 Haller, Richard, S.J., 145, 146 
 Hancock, Rev. John, 167 
 Harcourt, Lord, 336 
 Hardy, Sir Thomas, 292, 293 
 Harley, Sir Edward, second Earl of 
 Oxford and Mortimer, 336, 341, 
 342, 344, 348, 349, 350, 352, 354, 
 
 357, 360, 363, 364, 365 
 Sir Robert, first Earl of Oxford 
 and Mortimer, founder of the 
 Harleian library, 335, 336, 338, 
 339, 340, 34i
 
 374 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Harriot or Herryott, Thomas, 167, 174 
 
 Hastings, Sir Edward, 60 
 
 Hawley, Francis, Esq., 167 
 
 Hay, Mr Andrew, 344, 348 
 
 Hay, Edmund, S.J., 149 
 
 Hearne, 307 
 
 Helena, Archduchess of Austria, one 
 
 of the five " queens," daughters of 
 
 the Emperor Ferdinand I., 149 
 Hennell, Sir Reginald, 53 
 Henrietta Maria, wife of Charles I., 
 
 178, 179, 180, 181, 182, 192, 195, 
 
 197 
 
 Henry II., 310 
 Henry III., 311 
 Henry VII., 56, 89 note 
 Henry VIII., 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 13, 14, 16, 
 
 17, 18, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 26-35, Si, 
 
 56, 101, 200, 293, 306, 314, 3IS 
 
 Henry, Prince of Wales, 317, 318 
 
 Hepburn, John, Prior of St Andrews, 8 
 
 Hentzner, Paul, 316 
 
 Hertford, Countess of, 44 
 
 Heydon, Sir Christopher, 88 
 
 Hezcovaus, S.J., 156 
 
 Hilda, St, 219 
 
 Hocker, deputy-keeper of the records, 
 
 364 
 
 Hoffaus, Paul, S.J., 154, 156 
 Holinshed, 260 
 Holmes, Mr John, 298 
 Home, John alias Edward, 264 
 Home, Rev. T. Hartwell, 365 
 Horsey, Sir Ralph, 167, 170 
 Howard, Katharine, fifth wife of 
 
 Henry VIII., 38, 42-48 
 Howard, Thomas, Viscount, of Bindon, 
 
 167 
 
 Lord William, 31, 44, 60 
 Mr, of Corby Castle, 220 
 Huick, Dr, 80 
 Humphrey, Duke, 279 
 Huntley, Earl of, 26 
 Hussey, William, 168 
 Hyde, Sir Nicholas, Chief Justice of 
 
 the King's Bench, 285 
 Hyde, Robert, 172 
 
 IGNATIUS, St, of Loyola, 97, 113, 
 
 114, 115, 116, 118-123, 133, 135, 
 
 150 
 Incent, Dr, Dean of St Paul's, 
 
 260 
 
 Ingulf, 278 
 Ireton, General, 323 
 Ironside, Ralph, 168, 169, 170, 171, 
 
 172 
 Isenburg, Johann von, 112 
 
 JAMES I., King of England, 173, 176, 
 199, 283, 285, 310, 317, 319, 
 320 
 
 James IV. of Scotland, 5, 6, 7, 10, n, 
 
 12, 17, 3i 
 
 James V. of Scotland, 6, 7, 10, u, 12, 
 19, 24, 25, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 
 
 45 
 James, Francis, Chancellor of Dorset, 
 
 167 
 Thomas, librarian of the Bodleian, 
 
 306 
 
 JeflTeries, Nicholas, 169 
 Jerningham, Sir Henry, 52, 85, 86 
 Henry, son of the above, 90 
 John of Somerleyton, 85 
 Jerome, St, 328 
 Jesopp, Rev. John, 167, 168 
 Jessopp, Dr, 89, 90 note 
 Johanna, Archduchess of Austria, one 
 of the five "queens," daughters 
 of the Emperor Ferdinand I., 149 
 Johann Wilhelm, Elector of Bavaria, 
 
 353, 358 
 
 John, St, of the Cross, 97 
 John, St, of God, 97 
 John, King of England, 311 
 John III., King of Portugal, 133 
 Johnson, Dr Samuel, 365 
 Josceline, 282 
 Jovius, Paulus, 282 
 
 KATHARINE of Arragon, first wife of 
 
 Henry VIII., 35, 38, 56, 314 
 Kemble, 210, 211, 213, 216, 291
 
 375 
 
 Kennicott, Dr, 364 
 Kenyon, Mr F. G., 364 
 
 LACORDAIRE, Henri Dominique, 131, 
 
 137, 157 
 Lainez, James, S.J., 116, 117, 124, 126, 
 
 127 
 
 Landseck, 161 
 
 Lanoy, Nicholas, S.J., 143, 152 
 Latimer, Bishop, 265 
 
 Lord, 49, 50 
 Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury, 183, 
 
 184, 185, 187, 189, 190, 191, 194, 
 
 195, 196, 197, 273 
 Leach, Thomas, 251 
 Le Bias, Bertrand, 263 
 Lee, Mr Sidney, 251 
 
 William, 343 
 Lefevre, S.J., 116 
 Le Jay, S.J., 113, 116, 117 
 Leland, 278 
 Le Roy, Mr, 354 
 Lessing, 161 
 
 Lewkner, Edward, 83, 84 
 Lingard, Dr, 269 
 Littledale, Dr, 271 note 
 Lothair, King of Kent, 293 
 Louis XII., King of France, 7 
 Lucar, Cyril, Patriarch of Constanti- 
 nople, 319, 321 
 Lugge, J nn > *76 
 Lucius, British chief, 224 
 Lumley, John, Lord, 318, 319, 
 
 329 
 
 Luther, Martin, 96, 100, 105 
 Lyn, Tilmann, 100 
 
 MACAULAY, Lord, 272, 340 
 M'Caul, Mr J. M., 211 note 
 Machyn, 261 
 Madden, Sir Frederick, keeper of the 
 
 MSS. in the British Museum, 
 
 280, 305 
 Magdalene, daughter of Francis I., 
 
 King of France, first wife of 
 
 James V. of Scotland, 33 
 
 Magdalene, Archduchess of Austria, 
 one of the five "queens," 
 daughters of the Emperor 
 Ferdinand I., 149-156 
 
 Maggio, Laurentius, S.J., 137, 138, 
 140, 142, 143 
 
 Magnusen, 2 1 1 note 
 
 Maitland, Dr S. R., 270, 275 
 
 Malet, Sir Francis, letter from, 83 
 
 Malory, Sir Thomas, 223, 226, 229, 
 230, 231, 242, 248 
 
 Maltby, Dr, Bishop of Durham, 298 
 
 Map, Walter de, 310 
 
 Marbery, Elizabeth, 65, 66, 67, 68, 
 69 
 
 Margaret, Archduchess of Austria, 
 one of the five "queens," 
 daughters of the Emperor 
 Ferdinand I., 149 
 
 Marie de Medicis, mother of Henrietta 
 Maria, 202 
 
 Marillac, Monsieur de, French 
 ambassador, 41, 42, 43 
 
 Mark, van der, 359 
 
 Mary, Princess, daughter of Henry 
 VIII., afterwards Queen of 
 England, 36, 38, 44, 45, 49, 50, 51, 
 52, 57-61, 63, 64, 66, 67, 69-86, 90, 
 254, 274, 3i6, 332, 333 
 letters from, 67, 70, 73, 81 
 
 Mary, Queen of Scots, 89, 283, 284, 
 285, 344 
 
 Masham, W., 173 
 
 Mattaire, Mr, 355 
 
 Maughan, Rev. John, 220 
 
 Maximilian, Duke of Bavaria, 353 
 Emperor, 136, 137 
 
 Melancthon, Philip, the Protestant 
 reformer, 43, 104, 128 
 
 Merbeck, John, 254 
 
 Mercurian, Everard, S.J., 138, 143 
 
 Middleton, Sarah, daughter of Simon 
 Middleton of Hurst Hill, Edmon- 
 ton, second wife of Robert, Earl 
 of Oxford, 336 
 
 Milan, Duchess of, 38 
 
 Modius of Cologne, 358
 
 376 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Montagu, Lady Mary Wortley, 365, 
 
 366 
 
 Montague, Duchess of, 366 
 Montmorency, Due de, 42 
 More, Sir Thomas, 256, 257, 258, 
 
 259 
 Morgan, Henry, Bishop of St David's, 
 
 254, 255 
 
 Morice, William, 318 
 Morin, Dom Germain, 297 
 Morton, Mrs, 78 
 Murray of Cockpool, 218 
 
 NARES, Rev. Robert, 364, 365 
 
 Nelson, Robert, 337, 338 
 
 Neri, St Philip, 96 
 
 Neuenar, Count William of, 103 
 
 Newport, Lady, 193 
 
 Nicholson, John, burned at Smithfield 
 in 1540, 37 
 
 Noailles, Monsieur de, French ambas- 
 sador, 59, 60, 70 
 
 Noel, 282 
 
 Norfolk, Duke of, 265, 266 
 
 Northumberland, Duke of, 265 
 
 I 
 
 OLDYS, 341 
 Oliver, S.J., 143 
 
 Osborne, Thomas, bookseller, 365 
 Owen, Dr, 80 
 Oxford, Lady, 365, 366 
 
 PACKINGTON, Robert, 260 
 
 Palgrave, Sir Francis, 312 
 
 Palmer, Samuel, 341 
 
 Panzani, Gregorio, papal agent at the 
 
 court of Henrietta Maria, 178-183, 
 
 185, 186, 191, 192 
 letters from, 180, 185, 186, 191 
 Paris, Matthew, 279, 283, 316 
 Park, Thomas, editor of the " Harleian 
 
 Miscellany," 365 
 Parr, Katharine, sixth wife of Henry 
 
 VIII., 49, 50, 51 
 Lord, 50 
 Parry, the Princess Elizabeth's cofferer, 
 
 68, 76, 78 
 
 Parry, a recusant, confined in Norwich 
 
 jail, 89 
 Mr, 1 68 
 Parsons or Persons, Robert, S.J., 164, 
 
 165, 253, 261 
 Pennant, 218, 219 
 Percy, Bishop, 364 
 Pessel, Johann, 109 
 Peters, Hugh, custodian of the Royal 
 
 library, 323 
 Philip, Landgrave of Hessen, 104, 
 
 109 
 
 Philip, Father, an English Capuchin, 
 confessor to Henrietta Maria, 18, 
 182, 183, 186, 192, 201, 202 
 Philippa of Hainault, 362 
 Philippine of Guelderland, 106 
 Planta, 30 
 Plato, 161 
 Plotinus, 161 
 
 Plowden, Rev. Charles, 178 
 Pope, Alexander, 341 
 Pope Alexander VI., 96 
 Clement VII., 98 
 Eleutherius, 225 
 Eugenius IV., 97 
 Julius III., 118, 119, 120 
 Paul III., 106, in 
 St Gregory, 297, 300, 329 
 Urban VI 11., 179 
 
 Pope, Sir Thomas, successor to Sir 
 Henry Bedingfeld as custodian of 
 the Princess Elizabeth, 81 
 Portia, Bishop, papal nuncio, 143 
 Pratt, Rev. Josiah, 275 
 Prideaux, Dr, 307 
 Prior, Matthew, 342, 366 
 Prynne, William, Puritan, barrister-at- 
 law and pamphleteer, 184, 187, 
 1 88, 189, 190, 194, 203 
 Pythagoras, 159, 161 
 
 RAINE, Rev. , 299 
 
 Raleigh, Sir Walter, 163, 164, 165, 
 
 167-172, 174, 175, 176, 317 
 Carew, brother of the above, 168, 
 169, 170, 176
 
 INDEX 
 
 377 
 
 Rattsay, Jane, 48 
 
 Reinel, John, S.J., 140, 141, 143 
 
 Rene, Duke of Lorraine, 106 
 
 Repp, Mr, 211 note 
 
 Ridder, Monsieur de, 295 
 
 Ridley, Bishop, 265 
 
 Richard II., King of England, 56 
 
 Richard III., King of England, 56 
 
 Ringuarda, Bishop, papal legate, 140 
 
 Rochester, Sir Robert, letter from, 
 81 
 
 Roe, Sir Thomas, British ambassador 
 at Constantinople, 175, 320 
 
 Rookwood, Mr, of Euston Hall, prose- 
 cuted for recusancy, 89 
 
 Rosetti, Count Carlo, papal agent at 
 the court of Henrietta Maria, 
 195, 201 
 
 letters from, 195, 196, 198, 199, 201, 
 202 
 
 Rosse, Thomas, Royal librarian, 323 
 
 Rothesay, Duke of, 7, 10, 11, 12 
 
 SALMERON, S.J., 116, 117 
 Sands, Elizabeth, 65, 67, 68, 69 
 Saunder, Nicholas, 286 
 Savonarola, Fra Girolamo, 96 
 Saxo, John, S.J., 141, 142, 145 
 Scarlett, Rev. Francis, 172 
 Schauenburg, Adolf von, Coadjutor 
 
 Bishop of Cologne, in, 112, 113 
 Scherer, George, S.J., 143 
 Scrivener, 328 
 
 Scholl, Vicar-General of Mainz, 112 
 Scott, Robert, a famous bookseller, 
 
 324 
 
 Scudamore, John, 286 
 Seckford, Henry, 91, 92 
 Segar, 259 
 
 Selden, 281, 307, 323 
 Seripandus, 359 
 Seymour, Jane, third wife of Henry 
 
 VIII., 36 
 Sir Thomas, Lord High Admiral, 
 
 49, 5i 
 
 Shakespeare, 223 
 Sidney, Sir Philip, 162, 163 
 
 Simeon of Durham, 298 
 Sinclair, Sir John, 217 
 Sleuther, Sir John, 261 
 Sloane, Sir Hans, 308 
 Smith, Baldwin, 333 
 
 Dr Thomas, 294, 295, 303, 304, 
 
 337 
 
 Soreth, John, Carmelite General, 97 
 Spain, the Infante of, 173 
 Speed, 281, 282 
 Spenser, Edmund, 162 
 Sper, a Bavarian agent, 146 
 Stafford, Countess of, 307 
 Stella Matutina, a famous Greek, 320 
 Stephens, Professor George, 211, 216, 
 
 217, 291 
 
 Stevenson, Rev. Joseph, 301 
 Stoughton, Dr, 275 
 Stow, historian of London, 335 
 Strype, the annalist, 53, 250, 336 
 Stuart, Dr John, 209 
 John, Earl of Arran, fourth husband 
 
 of Margaret, Queen of Scots, 34 
 Harry, Lord Methven, third husband 
 
 of Margaret, Queen of Scots, 
 
 29> 3, 32, 33 
 Suffolk, Duchess of, 44 
 Sunderland, Earl of, 348 
 Surrey, Earl of, 18, 24 
 Sweet, 2ii 
 Swift, Jonathan, 336, 341 
 
 TALBOT, Master, of Norwich, 294 
 
 Talbot, Mary, 294 
 
 Tanner, Bishop, 278 
 
 Tecla, St, 320, 321, 322 
 
 Temple, 162 
 
 Tennyson, Alfred Lord, Poet Laureate, 
 
 53, 223, 225, 226, 227, 228, 230, 
 
 231, 238, 239, 242 
 letter to, 54 
 letter from, 55 
 Teresa, St, 97, 98 
 Tewkesbury, John, 256, 257, 259 
 Thane, Lord, 62 
 Theodore, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 
 277, 297
 
 378 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Theodoric of Gouda, 98, 99 
 
 Theyer, John, 324, 330 
 
 Thinn, Mr, of Wiltshire, 168 
 
 Thirlby, Bishop of Ely, letter to, 76 
 
 Thompson, Sir Edward Maunde, 293, 
 295, 297, 321, 330, 331, 350, 35i, 
 358 
 
 Thorkelin, 290, 291 
 
 Thorpe, Benjamin, 211, 291 
 
 Tindal, John, 259 
 
 Tischendorf, 328 
 
 Tomio or Tomeyow, Mr, 71 ; Mrs, 
 78, 80 attendants on the Prin- 
 cess Elizabeth at Woodstock 
 
 Topclyffe, the spy, 343 
 
 Torsler, Emerich, S.J., 140 
 
 Townsend, Prebendary, 275 
 
 Tregelles, 321 
 
 Trenchard, Sir George, 168, 169 
 
 Trevor, Lord, 337 
 
 Truchsess, Cardinal Otto, 113, 125, 
 
 134 
 
 Tudor, Margaret, 3-34 
 her character, 4, 5 
 her marriage to James IV. of Scot- 
 land, 4 
 
 becomes a widow, 6 
 her "conjunct feoffment," 6, 14, 15, 
 
 23, 34 
 
 convenes a parliament, 6 
 gives birth to a posthumous son, 7 
 her marriage to the Earl of Angus, 7 
 fortifies herself in Stirling Castle, 
 
 and invites the king of England 
 
 to invade Scotland, 8 
 delivers her children into the Duke 
 
 of Albany's hands, 10 
 escapes into England, and gives 
 
 birth to a daughter at Harbottle, 
 
 II 
 takes refuge at the English court, 
 
 12 
 
 tries to lure Albany into a trap, 13 
 returns to Scotland, 14 
 stirs up strife between the two 
 
 countries, 16, 17 
 her double dealing, 18, 19, 20, 24, 25 
 
 Tudor, Margaret, obtains a decree of 
 invalidity against her second mar- 
 riage, 29 
 contracts a secret marriage with 
 
 Harry Stuart, 29, 30 
 divorces Lord Methven, 33 
 marries John Stuart, 34 
 her penitent end, 34 
 Tudor, Mary, younger daughter of 
 Henry VII., married to the 
 King of France, 7 
 Turgot, 298 
 Turner, 291 
 
 UFFENBACH, a German scholar, 353, 
 
 354 
 Ussher, James, Archbishop of Armagh, 
 
 286, 287 
 letter from, 287 
 
 VAILLANT, Mr, a bookseller, 349, 
 
 350 
 
 Vanlore, Sir Peter, 287 
 Verallo, papal nuncio, 1 10, 1 1 1 
 Verney, Francis, one of the servants 
 
 of the Princess Elizabeth at 
 
 Woodstock, 78 
 Viller, Bartholomew, S.J., 142, 144, 145, 
 
 146, 147, 148 
 Vincent of Paul, St, 97 
 
 WALSINGHAM, Sir Francis, 343 
 
 Wanley, Humphrey, librarian to 
 Lord Oxford, and custodian of 
 the Harl. MSS., 290, 309, 329, 
 337, 338, 340, 342, 343, 344, 348- 
 36o, 363, 364 
 
 Ware, Sir James, 286 
 
 Waring, Mr, 296 
 
 Warton, Dr Joseph, 162 
 
 Waters, Thomas, letter from, 58 
 
 West, Mr, 364 
 
 Westwood, 297, 300, 329 
 
 Whitelocke, Bulstrode, Royal librarian, 
 
 323 
 Widdowes, Giles, 188
 
 INDEX 
 
 379 
 
 Wied, Hermann von, Archbishop and 
 
 Elector of Cologne, 103, 104, 108, 
 
 109, no, in, 113 
 
 Wilfrid, St, Archbishop of York, 287 
 William IV., Duke of Bavaria, 116, 
 
 117, 118, 147 
 
 William of Malmesbury, 287, 310 
 Williams, John, Esq., 167 
 Windebank, Secretary of State in the 
 
 reign of Charles I., 181, 195, 198, 
 
 200, 20 1 
 
 Wolsey, Cardinal, 3, 13, 14, 15 
 Wood, Anthony k, 254, 255, 342 
 Worde, Wynkyn de, 224 
 Wren, Sir Christopher, 304 
 Wright, Edward, mathematician, 318 
 
 Wriothesley, 50, 261 
 Wyatt, Sir Thomas, 52, 58, 59, 60 
 Wyndham, Edmund, 90 
 Wyndham, Sir Edward, 88 
 
 XAVIER, St Francis, S.J., 97, 106 
 Ximenez, Peter, S.J., 145 
 Ximenez, Rodrigo, Archbishop of 
 Toledo, 312 
 
 YOUNG, Patrick, Royal librarian, 318, 
 322, 323 
 
 ZAMBONI, Signer, 354, 355, 356, 357 
 Zingerling, Johann, 319
 
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