The Reign of Mary Tudor Part 11

"You cannot set aside the dispositions of King Henry in favour of Elizabeth without danger of rebellion. To recognise her as heir-presumptive without providing her with a husband, who can control her, will be perilous to the queen. The mean course between the extremes, will be therefore, for your highness to bring about her marriage with the Prince of Savoy. It will please the English, provided that her rights of inheritance are not interfered with; and although they will not go to war for our quarrel, they will not in that case be unwilling to a.s.sist in expelling the French from Piedmont.

"If your majesty approve, the thing can be done without delay. At all events, before you leave the country, you should see the princess yourself; give her your advice to be faithful to her sister, and, on your part, promise that you will be her friend, and a.s.sist her where you can find opportunity."(Back to Content)

CHAPTER IV.

THE MARTYRS.

The protests of Renard against the persecution received no attention.

The inquisition established by the legate was not to commence till Easter; but the prisons were already abundantly supplied with persons who had been arrested on various pretexts, and the material was ready in hand to occupy the interval. The four persons who had first suffered had been conspicuous among the leaders of the Reformation; but the bishops were for the most part prudent in their selection of victims, and chose them princ.i.p.ally from among the poor and unfriended.

On the 9th of February, a weaver named Tomkins (the man who had held his hand in the candle), Pigot, a butcher, Knight, a barber, Hunter, an apprentice boy of 19, Lawrence, a priest, and Hawkes, a gentleman, were brought before Bonner in the Consistory at St. Paul's, where they were charged with denying transubstantiation, and were condemned to die. The indignation which had been excited by the first executions caused a delay in carrying the sentence into effect; but as the menace of insurrection died away the wolves came back to their prey. On the 9th of March, two more were condemned also, Thomas Causton and Thomas Higbed, men of some small property in Ess.e.x. To disperse the effect, these eight were scattered about the diocese. Tomkins died at Smithfield on the 16th of March; Causton and Higbed, Pigot and Knight, in different parts of Ess.e.x; Hawkes suffered later; Lawrence was burnt at Colchester. The legs of the latter had been crushed by irons in one of Bonner's prisons; he was unable to stand, and was placed at the stake in a chair. "At his burning, he sitting in the fire, the young children came about and cried, as well as young children could speak, Lord strengthen thy servant, and keep thy promise-Lord, strengthen thy servant, and keep thy promise."[457]

Hunter's case deserves more particular mention. The London apprentices had been affected deeply by the Reforming preachers. It was to them that the servant of Anne Askew "made her moan," and gathered subscriptions for her mistress. William Hunter, who was one of them, had been ordered to attend ma.s.s by a priest when it was re-established; he had refused, and his master, fearing that he might be brought into trouble, had sent him home to his family at Brentwood, in Ess.e.x.[458] Another priest, going one day into Brentwood Church, found Hunter reading the Bible there.

Could he expound Scripture, that he read it thus to himself? the priest asked. He was reading for his comfort, Hunter replied; he did not take on himself to expound. The Bible taught him how to live, and how to distinguish between right and wrong.

It was never merry world, the priest said, since the Bible came forth in English. He saw what Hunter was-he was one of those who disliked the queen's laws, and he and other heretics would broil for it before all was over.

The boy's friends thought it prudent that he should fly to some place where he was not known; but, as soon as he was gone, a Catholic magistrate in the neighbourhood required his father to produce him, on peril of being arrested in his place; and, after a struggle of affection, in which the father offered to shield his son at his own hazard, young Hunter returned and surrendered.

The magistrate sent him to the Bishop of London, who kept him in prison three quarters of a year. When the persecution commenced, he was called up for examination.

Bonner, though a bigot and a ruffian, had, at times, a coa.r.s.e good-nature in him, and often, in moments of pity, thrust an easy recantation upon a hesitating prisoner. He tried with emphatic anxiety to save this young apprentice. "If thou wilt recant," he said to him, "I will make thee a freeman in the city, and give thee forty pounds in money to set up thy occupation withal; or I will make thee steward of mine house, and set thee in office, for I like thee well."

Hunter thanked him for his kindness; but it could not be, he said; he must stand to the truth: he could not lie, or pretend to believe what he did not believe. Bonner said, and probably with sincere conviction, that if he persisted he would be d.a.m.ned for ever. Hunter said, that G.o.d judged more righteously, and justified those whom man unjustly condemned.

He was therefore to die with the rest; and on Sat.u.r.day, the 23rd of March, he was sent to suffer at his native village. Monday being the feast of the Annunciation, the execution was postponed till Tuesday. The intervening time he was allowed to spend with his friends "in the parlour of the Swan Inn." His father prayed that he might continue to the end in the way that he had begun. His mother said, she was happy to bear a child who could find in his heart to lose his life for Christ's sake. "Mother," he answered, "for my little pain which I shall suffer, which is but a short braid, Christ hath promised me a crown of joy. May you not be glad of that, mother?"

Amidst such words the days pa.s.sed. Tuesday morning the sheriff's son came and embraced him, "bade him not be afraid," and "could speak no more for weeping." When the sheriff came himself for him, he took his brother's arm and walked calmly to the place of execution, "at the town's end, where the b.u.t.ts stood."

His father was at the roadside as he pa.s.sed. "G.o.d be with thee, son William!" the old man said. "G.o.d be with thee, good father," the son answered, "and be of good comfort!"

When he was come to the stake, he took one of the f.a.ggots, knelt upon it, and prayed for a few moments. The sheriff read the pardon with the conditions. "I shall not recant," he said, and walked to the post, to which he was chained.

"Pray for me, good people, while you see me alive," he said to the crowd.

"Pray for thee!" said the magistrate who had committed him, "I will no more pray for thee than I will pray for a dog."

"Son of G.o.d," Hunter exclaimed, "shine on me!" The sun broke out from behind a cloud and blazed in glory on his face.

The f.a.ggots were set on fire.

"Look," shrieked a priest, "how thou burnest here, so shalt thou burn in h.e.l.l!"

The martyr had a Prayer-book in his hands, which he cast through the flames to his brother.

"William," said the brother, "think on the holy pa.s.sion of Christ, and be not afraid of death."

"I am not afraid," were his last words. "Lord, Lord, Lord, receive my spirit!"

Ten days later another victim was sacrificed at Carmarthen, whose fate was peculiarly unprovoked and cruel.

Robert Ferrars, who twenty-seven years before carried a f.a.ggot with Anthony Dalaber in High Street at Oxford, had been appointed by Somerset Bishop of St. David's. He was a man of large humanity, justice, and uprightness-neither conspicuous as a theologian nor prominent as a preacher, but remarkable chiefly for good sense and a kindly imaginative tenderness. He had found his diocese infected with the general disorders of the times. The Chapter were indulging themselves to the utmost in questionable pleasures. The church patronage was made the prey of a nest of Cathedral lawyers, and, in an evil hour for himself, the bishop endeavoured to make crooked things straight.

After three years of struggle, his unruly canons were unable to endure him longer, and forwarded to the Duke of Northumberland an elaborate series of complaints against him. He was charged with neglecting his books and his preaching, and spending his time in surveying the lands of the see, and opening mines. He kept no manner of hospitality, it was said, but dined at the same table with his servants; and his talk was "not of G.o.dliness," "but of worldly matters, as baking, brewing, enclosing, ploughing, mining, millstones, discharging of tenants, and such like."

"To declare his folly in riding (these are the literal words of the accusation), he useth a bridle with white studs and snaffle, white Scottish stirrups, white spurs; a Scottish pad, with a little staff of three quarters [of a yard] long.

"He said he would go to parliament on foot; and to his friends that dissuaded him, alleging that it was not meet for a man in his place, he answered, I care not for that; it is no sin.

"Having a son, he went before the midwife to the church, presenting the child to the priest; and giving the name Samuel with a solemn interpretation of the name,[459] appointed two G.o.dfathers and two G.o.dmothers contrary to the ordinance, making his son a monster and himself a laughing-stock.

"He daily useth whistling of his child, and saith that he understood his whistle when he was but three years old; and being advertised of his friends that men laughed at his folly, he answered, They whistle their horses and dogs: they might also be contented that I whistle my child; and so whistleth him daily, friendly admonition neglected.

"In his visitation, among other his surveys, he surveyed Milford Haven, where he espied a seal-fish tumbling, and he crept down to the rocks by the water-side, and continued there whistling by the s.p.a.ce of an hour, persuading the company that laughed fast at him, he made the fish to tarry there.

"Speaking of the scarcity of herrings, he laid the fault to the covetousness of fishers, who in time of plenty took so many that they destroyed the breeders.

"Speaking of the alteration of the coin, he wished that what metal soever it was made of, the penny should be in weight worth a penny of the same metal."

Such were the charges against Ferrars, which, notwithstanding, were considered serious enough to require an answer; and the bishop consented to reply.

He dined with his servants, he said, because the hall of the palace was in ruins, and for their comfort he allowed them to eat in his own room. For his hospitality, he appealed to his neighbours; and for his conversation, he said that he suited it to his hearers. He talked of religion to religious men; to men of the world, he talked "of honest worldly things with G.o.dly intent." He saw no folly in having his horse decently appointed; and as to walking to parliament, it was indifferent to him whether he walked or rode. G.o.d had given him a child, after lawful prayer, begotten in honest marriage; he had therefore named him Samuel, and presented him to the minister as a poor member of Christ's Church; it was done openly in the cathedral, without offending any one. The crime of whistling he admitted, "thinking it better to bring up his son with loving entertainment," to encourage him to receive afterwards more serious lessons. He had whistled to the seal; and "such as meant folly might turn it to their purpose." He had said that the destruction of the fry of fish prevented fish from multiplying, because he believed it to be true.

Answered or unanswered, it is scarcely credible that such accusations should have received attention; but the real offence behind, and is indicated in a vague statement that he had supposed himself to a premunire. The exquisite iniquity of the Northumberland administration could not endure a bishop who had opposed the corrupt administration of patronage; and the explanation being held as insufficient, Ferrars was summoned to London and thrown into prison, where Mary's accession found him.

Cut off in this way from the opportunities of escape which were long open to others, the bishop remained in confinement till the opening of the persecution. He was deposed from his see by Gardiner's first commission, as having been married; otherwise, however, Ferrars was un.o.bnoxious politically and personally. Being in prison, he had been incapable of committing any fresh offence against the queen, and might reasonably have been forgotten or pa.s.sed over. But he had been a bishop, and he was ready caught to the hands of the authorities; and Mary had been compelled unwillingly to release a more conspicuous offender, Miles Coverdale, at the intercession of the King of Denmark. Ferrars was therefore brought before Gardiner on the 4th of February. On the 14th he was sent into Wales to be tried by Morgan, his successor at St. David's, and Constantine, the notary of the diocese, who had been one of his accusers. By these judges, on the 11th of March, he was condemned and degraded; he appealed to the legate, but the legate never listened to the prayer of heretics; the legate's mission was to extirpate them. On Sat.u.r.day the 30th of March, Ferrars was brought to the stake in the market-place in Carmarthen.[460]

Rawlins White, an aged Cardiff fisherman, followed Ferrars. In the course of April, George Marsh, a curate, was burnt at Chester; and on the 20th of April, a man named William Flower, who had been once a monk of Ely, was burnt in Palace-yard, at Westminster. Flower had provoked his own fate. He appeared on Easter day in St. Margaret's Church, while ma.s.s was being said; and provoked, as he persuaded himself, by the Holy Spirit, he flew upon the officiating priest, and stabbed him with a dagger in the hand; when to the horror of pious Catholics, the blood spurted into the chalice, and was mixed with the consecrated elements.

Sixteen persons had now been put to death, and there was again a pause for the sharp surgery to produce its effects.

While Mary was destroying the enemies of the church, Julius the Third had died at the end of March, and Reginald Pole was again a candidate for the vacant chair. The courts of Paris and Brussels alike promised him their support, but alike gave their support to another. They flattered his virtues, but they permitted Marcellus Cervino, the Cardinal of St. Cross, to be elected unanimously; and the English legate was told that he must be contented with the event which G.o.d had been pleased to send.[461] An opportunity, however, seemed to offer itself to him of accomplishing a service to Europe.

For thirty-five years the two great Catholic powers had been wrestling with but brief interruption. The advantage to either had been as trifling as the causes of their quarrel were insignificant. Their revenues were antic.i.p.ated, their credit was exhausted, yet year after year languid armies struggled into collision. Across the Alps in Italy, and along the frontiers of Burgundy and the Low Countries, towns and villages, and homesteads were annually sacked, and peasants and their families destroyed-for what it were vain to ask, except it was for some poor shadow of imagined honour. Two mighty princes believed themselves justified in the sight of Heaven in squandering their subjects' treasure and their subjects' blood, because the pride of each forbade him to be the first in volunteering insignificant concessions. France had conquered Savoy and part of Piedmont, and had pushed forward its northern frontier to Marienbourg and Metz: the emperor held Lombardy, Parma, and Naples, and Navarre was annexed to Spain. The quarrel might have easily been ended by mutual rest.i.tution; yet the Peace of Cambray, the Treaty of Nice, and the Peace of Crepy, lasted only while the combatants were taking breath; and those who would attribute the extravagances of human folly to supernatural influence might imagine that the great discord between the orthodox powers had been permitted to give time for the Reformation to strike its roots into the soil of Europe. But a war which could be carried on only by loans at sixteen per cent. was necessarily near its conclusion. The apparent recovery of England to the church revived hopes which the Peace of Pa.s.sau and the dissolution of the Council of Trent had almost extinguished; and, could a reconciliation be effected at last, and could Philip obtain the disposal of the military strength of England in the interests of the papacy, it might not even yet be too late to lay the yoke of orthodoxy on the Germans, and, in a Catholic interpretation of the Parable of the Supper, "compel them to come in."

Mary, who had heard herself compared to the Virgin, and Pole, who imagined the Prince of Spain to be the counterpart of the Redeemer of mankind, indulged their fancy in large expectations. Philip was the Solomon who was to raise up the temple of the Lord, which the emperor, who was a man of war, had not been allowed to build: and France, at the same time, was not unwilling to listen to proposals. The birth of Mary's child was expected in a few weeks, when England would, as a matter of course, become more decisively Imperialist, and Henry, whose invasion of the Netherlands had failed in the previous summer, was ready now to close the struggle while it could be ended on equal and honourable terms.

A conference was, therefore, agreed upon, in which England was to mediate. A village in the Calais Pale was selected as the place of a.s.sembly, and Pole, Gardiner, Paget, and Pembroke were chosen to arrange the terms of a general peace, with the Bishop of Arras, the Cardinal of Lorraine, and Montmorency. The time pitched upon was that at which, so near as the queen could judge, she would herself bring into the world the offspring which was to be the hope of England and mankind; and the great event should, if possible, precede the first meeting of the plenipotentiaries.

The queen herself commenced her preparations with infinite earnestness, and, as a preliminary votive offering, she resolved to give back to the church such of the abbey property as remained in the hands of the crown. Her debts were now as high as ever. The Flanders correspondence was repeating the heavy story of loans and bills. Promises to pay were falling due, and there were no resources to meet them, and the Israelite leeches were again fastened on the commonwealth.[462] Nevertheless, the sacrifice should be made; the more difficult it was, the more favourably it would be received; and, on the 28th of March, she sent for the Lord Treasurer, and announced her intention. "If he told her that her estate would not bear it, she must reply," she said, "that she valued the salvation of her soul beyond all earthly things."[463] As soon as parliament could meet and give its sanction, she would restore the first-fruits also to the Holy See. She must work for G.o.d as G.o.d had worked for her.

About the 20th of April she withdrew to Hampton Court for entire quiet. The rockers and the nurses were in readiness, and a cradle stood open to receive the royal infant. Priests and bishops sang Litanies through the London streets; a procession of ecclesiastics in cloth of gold and tissue marched round Hampton Court Palace, headed by Philip in person; Gardiner walked at his side, while Mary gazed from a window.[464] Not only was the child a.s.suredly coming, but its s.e.x was decided on, and circulars were drawn and signed both by the king and queen, with blanks only for the month and day, announcing to ministers of state, to amba.s.sadors, and to foreign sovereigns, the birth of a prince.[465]

On the 30th, the happy moment was supposed to have arrived; a message was sent off to London, announcing the commencement of the pains. The bells were set ringing in all the churches; Te Deum was sung in St. Paul's; priests wrote sermons; bonfires were piled ready for lighting, and tables were laid out in the streets.[466] The news crossed the Channel to Antwerp, and had grown in the transit. The great bell of the cathedral was rung for the actual birth. The vessels in the river fired salutes. "The regent sent the English mariners a hundred crowns to drink," and, "they made themselves in readiness to show some worthy triumph upon the waters."[467]

But the pains pa.s.sed off without result; and whispers began to be heard, that there was, perhaps, a mistake of a more considerable kind. Mary, however, had herself no sort of misgiving. She a.s.sured her attendants that all was well, and that she felt the motion of her child. The physicians professed to be satisfied, and the priests were kept at work at the Litanies. Up and down the streets they marched, through city and suburb, park and square; torches flared along Cheapside at midnight behind the Holy Sacrament, and five hundred poor men and women from the almshouses walked two and two, telling their beads in their withered fingers: then all the boys of all the schools were set in motion, and the ushers and the masters came after them; clerks, canons, bishops, mayor, aldermen, officers of guilds.[468] Such marching, such chanting, such praying was never seen or heard before or since in London streets. A profane person ran one day out of the crowd, and hung about a priest's neck, where the beads should be, a string of puddings; but they whipped him, and prayed on. Surely, G.o.d would hear the cry of his people.

In the midst of the suspense the papal chair fell vacant again. The pontificate of Marcellus lasted three weeks, and Pole a third time offered himself to the suffrages of the cardinals. The courts were profuse of compliments as before. Noailles presented him with a note from Montmorency, containing a.s.surances of the infinite desire of the King of France for the success of so holy a person.[469] Philip wrote to Rome in his behalf, and Mary condescended to ask for the support of the French cardinals.[470] But the fair speeches, as before, were but trifling. The choice fell on Pole's personal enemy, Cardinal Caraffa, who was French alike in heart and brain.