Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth Part 8

Not long, however, were these dismal abodes suffered to remain unpeopled. The failure of the criminal enterprise of Northumberland first filled the Tower with the a.s.sociates, or victims, of his guilt.

Nearly the whole of the Dudley family were its tenants for a longer or shorter time; and it was another remarkable coincidence of their destinies, which Elizabeth in the after days of her power and glory might have pleasure in recalling to her favorite Leicester, that during the whole of her captivity in this fortress he also was included in the number of its melancholy inmates.

The places of Tonstal, Gardiner, and Bonner, were soon after supplied by the more zealous of Edward's bishops, Holgate, Coverdale, Ridley, and Hooper; and it was not long before the vehement Latimer and even the cautious Cranmer were added to their suffering brethren.

The queen made no difficulty of pardoning and receiving into favor those n.o.blemen and others, members of the privy-council, whom a base dread of the resentment of Northumberland had driven into compliance with his measures in favor of Jane Grey; wisely considering, perhaps, that the men who had submitted to be the instruments of his violent and illegal proceedings, would feel little hesitation in lending their concurrence to hers also. On this principle, the marquis of Winchester and the earls of Arundel and Pembroke were employed and distinguished; the last of these experienced courtiers making expiation for his past errors, by causing his son, lord Herbert, to divorce the lady Catherine Grey, to whom it had so lately suited his political views to unite him.

Sir James Hales on the contrary, that conscientious and upright judge, who alone, of all the privy-counsellors and crown-lawyers, had persisted in refusing his signature to the act by which Mary was disinherited of the crown, found himself unrewarded and even discountenanced. The queen well knew, what probably the judge was not inclined to deny, that it was attachment, not to her person, but to the const.i.tution of his country, which had prompted his resistance to that violation of the legal order of succession; and had it even been otherwise, she would have regarded all her obligations to him as effectually cancelled by his zealous adherence to the church establishment of the preceding reign. For daring to urge upon the grand juries whom he addressed in his circuit, the execution of some of Edward's laws in matter of religion, yet unrepealed, judge Hales was soon after thrown into prison. He endured with constancy the sufferings of a long and rigorous confinement, aggravated by the threats and ill-treatment of a cruel jailor. At length some persons in authority were sent to propound to him terms of release.

It is suspected that they extorted from him some concessions on the point of religion; for immediately after their departure, retiring to his cell, in a fit of despair he stabbed himself with his knife in different parts of the body, and was only withheld by the sudden entrance of his servant from inflicting a mortal wound. Bishop Gardiner had the barbarity to insult over the agony or distraction of a n.o.ble spirit overthrown by persecution; he even converted his solitary act into a general reflection against protestantism, which he called "the doctrine of desperation." Some time after, Hales obtained his enlargement on payment of an arbitrary fine of six thousand pounds. But he did not with his liberty recover his peace of mind; and after struggling for a few months with an unconquerable melancholy, he sought and found its final cure in the waters of a pond in his garden.

No blood except of princ.i.p.als, was shed by Mary on account of the proclamation of Jane Grey; but she visited with lower degrees of punishment, secretly proportioned to the zeal which they had displayed in the reformation of religion, several of the more eminent partisans of this "meek usurper." The three tutors of king Edward, sir Anthony Cook, sir John Cheke and Dr. c.o.x, were sufficiently implicated in this affair to warrant their imprisonment for some time on suspicion; and all were eager, on their release, to shelter themselves from the approaching storm by flight.

Cheke, after confiscation of his estate, obtained permission to travel for a given time on the continent. Strasburgh was selected by Cook for his place of exile. The wise moderation of character by which this excellent person was distinguished, seems to have preserved him from taking any part in the angry contentions of protestant with protestant, exile with exile, by which the refugees of Strasburgh and Frankfort scandalized their brethren and afforded matter of triumph to the church of Rome. On the accession of Elizabeth he returned with alacrity to re-occupy and embellish the modest mansion of his forefathers, and "through the loopholes of retreat" to view with honest exultation the high career of public fortune run by his two ill.u.s.trious sons-in-law, Nicholas Bacon and William Cecil.

The enlightened views of society taken by sir Anthony led him to extend to his daughters the n.o.blest privileges of the other s.e.x, those which concern the early and systematic acquisition of solid knowledge. Through his admirable instructions their minds were stored with learning, strengthened with principles, and formed to habits of reasoning and observation, which rendered them the worthy partners of great statesmen, who knew and felt their value. The fame, too, of these distinguished females has reflected back additional l.u.s.tre on the character of a father, who was wont to say to them in the n.o.ble confidence of unblemished integrity, "My life is your portion, my example your inheritance."

Dr. c.o.x was quite another manner of man. Repairing first to Strasburgh, where the English exiles had formed themselves into a congregation using the liturgy of the church of England, he went thence to Frankfort, another city of refuge to his countrymen at this period; where the intolerance of his zeal against such as more inclined to the form of worship inst.i.tuted by the Genevan reformer, embarked him in a violent quarrel with John Knox, against whom, on pretext of his having libelled the emperor, he found means to kindle the resentment of the magistrates, who compelled him to quit the city. After this disgraceful victory over a brother reformer smarting under the same scourge of persecution with himself, he returned to Strasburgh, where he more laudably employed himself in establishing a kind of English university.

His zeal for the church of England, his sufferings in the cause, and his services to learning, obtained for him from Elizabeth the bishopric of Ely; but neither party enjoyed from this appointment all the satisfaction which might have been antic.i.p.ated. The courage, perhaps the self opinion, of Dr. c.o.x, engaged him on several occasions in opposition to the measures of the queen; and his narrow and persecuting spirit involved him in perpetual disputes and animosities, which rendered the close of a long life turbulent and unhappy, and took from his learning and gray hairs their due reverence. The rapacity of the courtiers, who obtained grant after grant of the lands belonging to his bishopric, was another fruitful source to him of vexation; and he had actually tendered the resignation of his see on very humiliating terms, when death came to his relief in the year 1581, the eighty-second of his age.

If in this and a few other instances, the polemical zeal natural to men who had sacrificed their worldly all for the sake of religion, was observed to degenerate among the refugees into personal quarrels disgraceful to themselves and injurious to their n.o.ble cause, it ought on the other hand to be observed, that some of the firmest and most affectionate friendships of the age were formed amongst these companions in adversity; and that by many who attained under Elizabeth the highest preferments and distinctions, the t.i.tle of fellow-exile never ceased to be regarded as the most sacred and endearing bond of brotherhood.

Other opportunities will arise of commemorating some of the more eminent of the clergy who renounced their country during the persecutions of Mary; but respecting the laity, it may here be remarked, that with the exception of Catherine d.u.c.h.ess-dowager of Suffolk, not a single person of quality was found in this list of conscientious sufferers; though one peer, probably the earl of Bedford, underwent imprisonment on a religious account at home. Of the higher gentry, however, there were considerable numbers who either went and established themselves in the protestant cities of Germany, or pa.s.sed away the time in travelling.

Sir Francis Knowles, whose lady was niece to Anne Boleyn, took the former part, residing with his eldest son at Frankfort; Walsingham adopted the latter. With the views of a future minister of state, he visited in succession the princ.i.p.al courts of Europe, where he employed his diligence and sagacity in laying the foundations of that intimate knowledge of their policy and resources by which he afterwards rendered his services so important to his queen and country.

CHAPTER VII.

1554 AND 1555.

Arrival of Wyat and his a.s.sociates at the Tower.--Savage treatment of them.--Further instances of Mary's severity.--Duke of Suffolk beheaded.--Death of lady Jane Grey--of Wyat, who clears Elizabeth of all share in his designs.--Trial of Throgmorton.--Bill for the exclusion of Elizabeth thrown out.--Parliament protects her rights--is dissolved.--Rigorous confinement of Elizabeth in the Tower.--She is removed under guard of Beddingfield--carried to Richmond--offered liberty with the hand of the duke of Savoy--refuses--is carried to Ricot, thence prisoner to Woodstock.--Anecdotes of her behaviour.--Cruelty of Gardiner towards her attendants.--Verses by Harrington.--Marriage of the queen.--Alarms of the protestants.--Arrival of cardinal Pole.--Popery restored.--Persecution begun.--King Philip procures the liberation of state prisoners.--Earl of Devon travels into Italy--dies.--Obligation of Elizabeth to Philip discussed.--She is invited to court--keeps her Christmas there--returns to Woodstock--is brought again to court by Philip's intercession.--Gardiner urges her to make submissions, but in vain.--She is brought to the queen--permitted to reside without guards at one of the royal seats--finally settled at Hatfield.--Character of sir Thomas Pope.--Notice of the Harringtons.--Philip quits England.--Death of Gardiner.

It is now proper to return to circ.u.mstances more closely connected with the situation of Elizabeth at this eventful period of her life.

Two or three weeks before her arrival in the Tower, Wyat with some of his princ.i.p.al adherents had been carried thither. Towards these unhappy persons, none of those decencies of behaviour were observed which the s.e.x and rank of Elizabeth had commanded from the ministers of her sister's severity; and Holinshed's circ.u.mstantial narrative of the circ.u.mstances attending their committal, may be cited as an instructive example of the fierce and brutal manners of the age.

"Sir Philip Denny received them at the bulwark, and as Wyat pa.s.sed by, he said, 'Go, traitor, there was never such a traitor in England.' To whom sir Thomas Wyat turned and said, 'I am no traitor; I would thou shouldest well know that thou art more traitor than I; it is not the point of an honest man to call me so.' And so went forth. When he came to the Tower gate, sir Thomas Bridges lieutenant took in through the wicket first Mantell, and said; 'Ah thou traitor! what hast thou and thy company wrought?' But he, holding down his head, said nothing. Then came Thomas Knevet, whom master Chamberlain, gentleman-porter of the Tower, took in. Then came Alexander Bret, (captain of the white coats,) whom sir Thomas Pope took by the bosom, saying, 'O traitor! how couldst thou find in thy heart to work such a villainy as to take wages, and being trusted over a band of men, to fall to her enemies, returning against her in battle?' Bret answered, 'Yea, I have offended in that case.' Then came Thomas Cobham, whom sir Thomas Poins took in, and said; 'Alas, master Cobham, what wind headed you to work such treason?' And he answered, 'O sir! I was seduced.' Then came sir Thomas Wyat, whom sir Thomas Bridges took by the collar, and said; 'O thou villain! how couldst thou find in thy heart to work such detestable treason to the queen's majesty, who gave thee thy life and living once already, although thou didst before this time bear arms in the field against her?[22]... If it were not (saith he) but that the law must pa.s.s upon thee, I would stick thee through with my dagger.' To the which Wyat, holding his arms under his sides and looking grievously with a grim look upon the lieutenant, said, 'It is no mastery now;' and so pa.s.sed on."

[Note 22: It is plain that Wyat is here accused of having taken arms for Jane Grey; but most wrongfully, if Carte's account of him is to be credited, which there seems no reason to disbelieve.]

Other circ.u.mstances attending the suppression of this rebellion mark with equal force the stern and vindictive spirit of Mary's government, and the remaining barbarity of English customs. The inhabitants of London being for the most part protestants and well affected, as the defection of their trained bands had proved, to the cause of Wyat, it was thought expedient to admonish them of the fruits of rebellion by the gibbeting of about sixty of his followers in the most public parts of the city. Neither were the bodies suffered to be removed till the public entry of king Philip after the royal nuptials; on which festal occasion the streets were cleared of these noisome objects which had disgraced them for nearly half a year.

Some hundreds of the meaner rebels, to whom the queen was pleased to extend her mercy, were ordered to appear before her bound two-and-two together, with halters about their necks; and kneeling before her in this guise, they received her _gracious_ pardon of all offences; but no general amnesty was ever granted.

That the rash attempt of the duke of Suffolk should have been visited upon himself by capital punishment, is neither to be wondered at nor censured; but it was a foul act of cruelty to make this the pretext for taking away the lives of a youthful pair entirely innocent of this last design, and forgiven, as it was fondly hoped, for the almost involuntary part which they had taken in a former and more criminal enterprise. But religious bigotry and political jealousy, each perhaps sufficient for the effect, combined in this instance to urge on the relentless temper of Mary; and the lady Jane Grey and Guildford Dudley her husband were ordered to prepare for the execution of the sentence which had remained suspended over them.

Every thinking mind must have been shocked at the vengeance taken on Guildford Dudley,--a youth too insignificant, it might be thought, to call forth the animadversion of the most apprehensive government, and guilty of nothing but having accepted, in obedience to his father's pleasure, the hand of Jane Grey. But the fate of this distinguished lady herself was calculated to awaken stronger feelings. The fort.i.tude, the piety, the genuine humility and contrition evinced by her in the last scene of an unsullied life, furnished the best evidence of her guiltlessness even of a wish to resume the sceptre which paternal authority had once forced on her reluctant grasp; and few could witness the piteous spectacle of her violent and untimely end, without a thrill of indignant horror, and secret imprecations against the barbarity of her unnatural kinswoman.

The earl of Devonshire was still detained in the Tower on Wyat's information, as was pretended, and on other indications of guilt, all of which were proved in the end equally fallacious: and at the time of Elizabeth's removal hither this state-prison was thronged with captives of minor importance implicated in the designs of Wyat. These were a.s.siduously plied on one hand with offers of liberty and reward, and subjected on the other to the most rigorous treatment, the closest interrogatories, and one of them even to the rack, in the hope of eliciting from them some evidence which might reconcile to Mary's conscience, or color to the nation, the death or perpetual imprisonment of a sister whom she feared and hated.

To have brought her to criminate herself would have been better still; and no pains were spared for this purpose. A few days after her committal, Gardiner and other privy-councillors came to examine her respecting the conversation which she had held with sir James Croft touching her removal to Donnington Castle. She said, after some recollection, that she had indeed such a place, but that she never occupied it in her life, and she did not remember that any one had moved her so to do. Then, "to enforce the matter," they brought forth sir James Croft, and Gardiner demanded what she had to say to that man? She answered that she had little to say to him or to the rest that were in the Tower. "But, my lords," said she, "you do examine every mean prisoner of me, wherein methinks you do me great injury. If they have done evil and offended the queen's majesty, let them answer to it accordingly. I beseech you, my lords, join not me in this sort with any of these offenders. And concerning my going to Donnington Castle, I do remember that master Hobby and mine officers and you sir James Croft had such talk;--but what is that to the purpose, my lords, but that I may go to mine own houses at all times?" The earl of Arundel kneeling down said, "Your grace sayeth true, and certainly we are very sorry that we have troubled you about so vain matter." She then said, "My lords, you do sift me very narrowly; but I am well a.s.sured you shall not do more to me than G.o.d hath appointed, and so G.o.d forgive you all."

Before their departure sir James Croft kneeled down before her, declaring that he was sorry to see the day in which he should be brought as a witness against her grace. But he added, that he had been "marvellously tossed and examined touching her grace;" and ended by protesting his innocence of the crime laid to his charge[23].

[Note 23: Fox's narrative in Holinshed.]

Wyat was at length, on April 11th, brought to his death; when he confounded all the hopes and expectations of Elizabeth's enemies, by strenuously and publicly a.s.serting her entire innocence of any partic.i.p.ation in his designs.

Sir Nicholas Throgmorton was brought to the bar immediately afterwards.

His trial at length, as it has come down to us in Holinshed's Chronicle, is one of the most interesting doc.u.ments of that nature extant. He was esteemed "a deep conspirator, whose post was thought to be at London as a factor, to give intelligence as well to them in the West, as to Wyat and the rest in Kent. It was believed that he gave notice to Wyat to come forward with his power, and that the Londoners would be ready to take his part. And that he sent a post to sir Peter Carew also, to advance with as much speed as might be, and to bring his forces with him.

"He was said moreover to be the man that excited the earl of Devon to go down into the West, and that sir James Croft and he had many times consulted about the whole matter[24]."

[Note 24: Strype's Ecclesiastical Memorials.]

To these political offences, sir Nicholas added religious principles still more heinous in the eyes of Mary. He, with two other gentlemen of his family, had been of the number of those who attended to the stake that n.o.ble martyr Anne Askew, burned for heresy in the latter end of Henry's reign; when they were bid to take care of their lives, for they were all marked men. Since the accession of Mary also he had "bemoaned to his friend sir Edward Warner, late lieutenant of the Tower, his own estate and the tyranny of the times, extending upon divers honest persons for religion, and wished it were lawful for all of each religion to live safely according to their conscience. For the law _ex-officio_ he said would be intolerable, and the clergy discipline now might rather be resembled to the Turkish tyranny than the teaching of the Christian religion. Which words he was not afraid at his trial openly to acknowledge that he had said to the said Warner[25]."

[Note 25: Strype's Ecclesiastical Memorials.]

The prosecution was conducted with all the iniquity which the corrupt practice of that age admitted. Not only was the prisoner debarred the a.s.sistance of counsel on his trial, he was even refused the privilege of calling a single witness in his favor. He defended himself however under all these disadvantages, with surprising skill, boldness and presence of mind; and he retorted with becoming spirit the brutal taunts of the crown lawyers and judges, who disgraced themselves on the occasion by all the excesses of an unprincipled servility. Fortunately for Throgmorton, the additional clauses to the treason laws added under Henry VIII. had been abolished under his successor and were not yet re-enacted. Only the clear and equitable statute of Edward III. remained therefore in force; and the lawyers were reduced to endeavour at such an explanation of it as should comprehend a kind of constructive treason.

"If," said they, "it be proved that the prisoner was connected with Wyat, and of his counsel, the overt acts of Wyat are to be taken as his, and visited accordingly." But besides that no partic.i.p.ation with Wyat after he had taken up arms, was proved upon Throgmorton, the jury were moved by his solemn protest against so unwarrantable a principle as that the overt acts of one man might be charged as overt acts upon another.

They acquitted him therefore with little hesitation, to the inexpressible disappointment and indignation of the queen and her ministers, who then possessed the power of making their displeasure on such an occasion deeply felt. The jury were immediately committed to custody, and eight of them, who refused to confess themselves in fault, were further imprisoned for several months and heavily fined.

The acquitted person himself, in defiance of all law and justice, was remanded to the Tower, and did not regain his liberty till the commencement of the following year, when the intercession of king Philip obtained the liberation of almost all the prisoners there detained.

Throgmorton, like all the others called in question for the late insurrections, was closely questioned respecting Elizabeth and the earl of Devon; "and very fain," we are told, "the privy-councillors employed in this work would have got out of him something against them. For when at Throgmorton's trial, his writing containing his confession was read in open court, he prayed the queen's serjeant that was reading it to read further, 'that hereafter,' said he, 'whatsoever become of me, my words may not be perverted and abused to the hurt of some others, and especially against the great personages of whom I have been sundry times, as appears by my answers, examined. For I perceive the net was not cast only for little fishes but for great ones[26]."

[Note 26: Strype's Memorials.]

This generous concern for the safety of Elizabeth in the midst of his own perils appears not to have been lost upon her; and under the ensuing reign we shall have the satisfaction of seeing the abilities of sir Nicholas displayed in other scenes and under happier auspices.

All manifestations of popular favor towards those whom the court had proscribed and sought to ruin, were at this juncture visited with the extreme of arbitrary severity. Two merchants of London, for words injurious to the queen, but princ.i.p.ally for having affirmed that Wyat at his death had cleared the lady Elizabeth and the earl of Devonshire, were set in the pillory, to which their ears were fastened with large nails.

It was in fact an object of great importance to the catholic party to keep up the opinion, so industriously inculcated, of the princess being implicated in the late disturbances; since it was only on this false pretext that she could be detained close prisoner in the Tower while a fatal stroke was aimed against her rights and interests.

Gardiner, now chancellor and prime minister, the most inveterate of Elizabeth's enemies and the most devoted partisan of the Spanish interest, thinking that all was subdued to the wishes of the court, brought before the new parliament a bill for declaring the princess illegitimate and incapable of succeeding:--it was indignantly rejected, however, by a great majority; but the failure only admonished him to renew the attack in a more indirect and covert manner. Accordingly, the articles of the marriage treaty between Mary and the prince of Spain, artfully drawn with great seeming advantage to England, had no sooner received the a.s.sent of the two houses, than he proposed a law for conferring upon the queen the same power enjoyed by her father; that of naming a successor. But neither could this be obtained from a house of commons attached for the most part to the protestant cause and the person of the rightful heir, and justly apprehensive of the extinction of their few remaining privileges under the yoke of a detested foreign tyrant. n.o.body doubted that it was the purpose of the queen, in default of immediate issue of her own, to bequeath the crown to her husband, whose descent from a daughter of John of Gaunt had been already much insisted on by his adherents. The bill was therefore thrown out; and the alarm excited by its introduction had caused the house to pa.s.s several spirited resolutions, one of which declared that her majesty should reign as a sole queen without any partic.i.p.ation of her authority, while the rest guarded in various points against the antic.i.p.ated encroachments of Philip, when Mary thought good to put a stop to the further discussion of the subject by a prorogation of parliament.

After these manifold disappointments, the court party was compelled to give up, with whatever reluctance, its deep-laid plots against the unoffending princess. Her own prudence had protected her life; and the independent spirit of a house of commons conscious of speaking the sense of the nation guarantied her succession. One only resource remained to Gardiner and his faction:--they judged that a long-continued absence, while it gradually loosened her hold upon the affections of the people, would afford many facilities for injuring or supplanting her; and it was determined soon to provide for her a kind of honorable banishment.

The confinement of the princess in the Tower had purposely been rendered as irksome and comfortless as possible. It was not till after a month's close imprisonment, by which her health had suffered severely, that she obtained, after many difficulties, permission to walk in the royal apartments; and this under the constant inspection of the constable of the Tower and the lord-chamberlain, with the attendance of three of the queen's women; the windows also being shut, and she not permitted to look out at them. Afterwards she had liberty to walk in a small garden, the gates and doors being carefully closed; and the prisoners whose rooms looked into it being at such times closely watched by their keepers, to prevent the interchange of any word or sign with the princess. Even a child of five years old belonging to some inferior officer in the Tower, who was wont to cheer her by his daily visits, and to bring her flowers, was suspected of being employed as a messenger between her and the earl of Devonshire; and notwithstanding the innocent simplicity of his answers to the lord-chamberlain by whom he was strictly examined, was ordered to visit her no more. The next day the child peeped in through a hole of the door as she walked in the garden, crying out, "Mistress, I can bring you no more flowers!" for which, it seems, his father was severely chidden and ordered to keep his boy out of the way.

From the beginning of her imprisonment orders had been given that the princess should have ma.s.s regularly said in her apartment. It is probable that Elizabeth did not feel any great repugnance to this rite:--however this might be, she at least expressed none; and by this compliance deprived her sister of all pretext for persecuting her on a religious ground. But some of her household were found less submissive on this head, and she had the mortification of seeing Mrs. Sands, one of her ladies, carried forcibly away from her under an accusation of heresy and her place supplied by another.

All these severities failed however of their intended effect: neither sufferings nor menaces could bring the princess to acknowledge herself guilty of offending even in thought against her sovereign and sister; and as the dying a.s.severations of Wyat had fully acquitted her in the eyes of the country, it became evident that her detention in the Tower could not much longer be persisted in. Yet the habitual jealousy of Mary's government, and the apparent danger of furnishing a head to the protestants rendered desperate by her cruelties, forbade the entire liberation of the princess; and it was resolved to adopt as a middle course the expedient sanctioned by many examples in that age, of committing her to the care of certain persons who should be answerable for her safe keeping, either in their own houses, or at some one of the royal seats. Lord Williams of Thame, and sir Henry Beddingfield captain of the guard, were accordingly joined in commission for the execution of this delicate and important trust.