FAMILY LETTERS
The following letters carry on the story of the Shrewsburys in domestic
and official detail for the next year. The second stepson of Bess was by
this time not only a married man, but a member of Parliament and a
courtier. He and his eldest stepbrother and brother-in-law, Henry
Cavendish, represented their own county. His brother, Francis Talbot,
the Earl’s heir, who was also at Court, had been entrusted with
diplomatic duties, and had already managed to get into mischief. Neither
he nor Gilbert, who survived him, ever took such an important social or
official position as that achieved by their father and stepmother. But
in youth they were about the Court, and they held their parents in
proper awe. Their occasional letters imply a strong sense of family duty
and kinship in little things as in great. The first letter touches on a
purely domestic matter. It is curious that, seeing his wife was his
stepmother’s eldest daughter, Gilbert should not have referred to the
Countess for advice and approval.
“My Lord,—My brother told me of the letter your Lordship sent him for
the putting away of Morgan and Marven; and said he rejoiced that your
Lordship would so plainly direct and command him what to do, and he
trusteth hereafter to please your Lordship in all his doings; whereunto,
according to my duty, I prayed him to have care above all manner of
things, and advised him to keep secret your Lordship’s directions.
“I have found out a sober maiden to wait on my wife, if it shall please
your Lordship. She was servant unto Mrs. Southwell, now Lord Paget’s
wife, who is an evil husband, and will not suffer any that waited on his
wife before he married her to continue with her. As it behoves me, I
have been very inquisitive of the woman, and have heard very well of her
behaviour; and truly I do repose in her to be very modest and well
given, and such a one as I trust your Lordship shall not mislike; but if
it be so that she shall not be thought meet for my wife, she will
willingly repair hither again. Her name is Marget Butler; she is almost
twenty-seven years old. Mr. Bateman[18] hath known her long, and
thinketh very well of her: she is not very beautiful, but very cleanly
in doing of anything chiefly about a sick body, to dress anything fit
for them. I humbly pray your Lordship to send me word whether I shall
make shift to send her down presently, for she is very desirous not to
spend her time idly. Thus, most humbly desiring your Lordship’s daily
blessing, with my wonted and continual prayer for your Lordship’s
preservation in all honour and health, long to continue, I end.
“At the Court this Monday, the 25th of May, 1573.
“Your Lordship’s most humble and obedient son,
“GILBERT TALBOT.”
[Illustration:
_Photo by Richard Keene, Ltd., Derby, from the picture at Hardwick
Hall_
_By permission of his Grace the Duke of Devonshire_
GILBERT TALBOT, SEVENTH EARL OF SHREWSBURY
Page 100
]
The next letter is largely given up to gossip, and places the Earl of
Leicester, who constantly writes wise and appreciative letters to the
Shrewsburys, in the gay, vivid light in which he is best known to
posterity. It is exhaustive, and touches on all the reports the writer
can gather as to public criticism of Shrewsbury as gaoler, besides
making allusion to the Earl’s financial difficulties.
“My most humble duty remembered, right honourable, my singular good Lord
and father; because of the convenience of the bearer hereof, I have
thought good to advertise your Lordship of the estate of some here at
the Court, as near as I have learned by my daily experience. My Lord
Treasurer, even after the old manner, dealeth with matters of the State
only, and beareth himself very uprightly. My Lord Leicester is very much
with her Majesty, and she shows the same great, good affection that she
was wont; of late he has endeavoured to please her more than heretofore.
There are two sisters now in the Court that are very far in love with
him, as they have been long—my Lady Sheffield and Frances Howard;[19]
they (of like striving who shall love him better) are at great wars
together, and the Queen thinketh not well of them and not the better of
him; by this means there are spies over him. My Lord of Sussex goes with
the tide, and helps to back others; but his own credit is sober,
considering his estate; he is very diligent in his office, and takes
great pains. My Lord of Oxford is lately grown into great credit; for
the Queen’s Majesty delighteth more in his personage and his dancing and
valiantness than any other. I think Sussex doth back him all that he
can; if it were not for his fickle head he would pass any of them
shortly. My Lady Burghley unwisely has declared herself, as it were,
jealous, which is come to the Queen’s ear; whereat she has been not a
little offended with her, but now she is reconciled again. At all these
love matters my Lord Treasurer winketh, and will not meddle anyway.
Hatton is sick still; it is thought he will very hardly recover his
disease, for it is doubted it is in his kidneys; the Queen goeth almost
every day to see how he doth. Now are there devices (chiefly by
Leicester, as I suppose, and not without Burleigh’s knowledge) to make
Mr. Edward Dyer as great as ever was Hatton; for now, in this time of
Hatton’s sickness, the time is convenient. It is brought thus to pass:
Dyer lately was sick of a consumption, in great danger; and, as your
Lordship knows, he has been in displeasure these two years, it was made
the Queen believe that his sickness came because of the continuance of
her displeasure towards him, so that unless she would forgive him he was
like not to recover, and hereupon her Majesty has forgiven him and sent
unto him a very comfortable message; now he is recovered again, and this
is the beginning of the device. These things I learn of such young
fellows as myself. Two days since Dr. Wilson told me he heard say that
your Lordship, with your charge, was removed to Sheffield Lodge, and
asked me whether it was so or not: I answered I heard so also; that you
were gone thither of force till the castle could be cleansed. And,
further, he wished to know whether your Lordship did so by the consent
of the Council, or not: I said I knew not that, but I was certain your
Lordship did it on good ground. I earnestly desired him, of all
friendship, to tell me whether he had heard anything to the contrary;
which he sware he never did, but asked because, he said, once that Lady
should have been conveyed from that house. Then I told him what great
heed and care you had to her safe-keeping; especially being there that
good numbers of men, continually armed, watched her day and night, and
both under her windows, over her chamber, and of every side her; so
that, unless she could transform herself to a flea or a mouse, it was
impossible that she should escape. At that time Mr. Wilson showed me
some part of the confession of one (but who he was, or when he did
confess it, he would in no wise tell me), that that fellow should say he
knew the Queen of Scots hated your Lordship deadly because of your
religion, being an earnest Protestant; and all the Talbots else in
England, being all Papists, she esteemeth of them very well; and this
fellow did believe verily all we Talbots did love her better in our
hearts than the Queen’s Majesty: this Mr. Wilson said he showed me
because I should see what knavery there is in some men to accuse. He
charged me of all love that I should keep this secret, which I promised;
and, notwithstanding, considering he would not tell me who this fellow
was, I willed a friend of mine, one Mr. Francis Southwell, who is very
great with him, to know, amongst other talk, who he had last in
examination; and I understood that this was the examination of one at
the last session of Parliament, and not since, but I cannot learn yet
what he was. Mr. Walsingham is this day come hither to the Court; it is
thought he shall be made Secretary. Sir Thomas Smith and he both
together shall exercise that office. He hath not yet told any news; he
hath had no time yet for being returned home; as soon as I hear any your
Lordship shall have them sent. Roulsden hath written to your Lordship as
he saith, by this bearer; he trusteth to your Lordship’s satisfaction. I
have been very importunate of him for the present payment of his debt to
your Lordship. He cannot anyways make shift for money unless he sell
land, which he vows to do rather than to purchase your Lordship’s
displeasure. I have moved my Lord Treasurer two sundry times as your
Lordship commanded me for the mustering within your Lordship’s offices.
The first time he willed me to come to him some other time, and he would
give me an answer, because then he had to write to Berwick in haste;
this he told me before I half told him what I meant. The second time,
which was on Saturday last, my Lord Leicester came unto him as I was
talking; but to-morrow, God willing, I will not fail to move him
thoroughly. For other matters I leave your Lordship to the bearer
himself. And so, most humbly desiring your Lordship’s daily blessing,
with my wonted prayer for the continuance of your Lordship’s honour, and
health long to continue, I end, this 11th of May, 1573.
“Your Lordship’s most humble and obedient son,
“GILBERT TALBOT.”
This letter is packed with suggestions of Court intrigue.
Hatton—afterwards Sir Christopher Hatton—it will be remembered, was one
of the many young courtiers whose polish, culture, and elegant dancing
excited Elizabeth’s romantic interest. He rose from the post of
Gentleman of the Privy Chamber to the captaincy of the Guard, and, by
way of the successive posts of Vice-Chamberlain and Privy Councillor,
reached the Chancellorship and received a Garter.
Edward Dyer, Hatton’s rival, matched him to some extent in honours, for
he too was subsequently knighted and invested with the Garter. As for
the Dr. Wilson named, he afterwards became a Secretary of State, while
the Earl of Oxford, who is shown as trying to outdo all other courtiers
in favour, was a son-in-law of Lord Burghley. He was an adherent of the
fifth Duke of Norfolk, and when Burghley refused to intercede for the
Duke’s life, the Earl vowed that he would revenge himself on his
father-in-law by destroying the happiness of his daughter. This he
achieved satisfactorily, and when she died of a broken heart he finished
his work of destruction by dissipating the whole of his fortune. The
jealousy of “my Lady Burghley,” named in the above letter, evidently
refers to the torture which his wife suffered while he was paying
addresses to the Queen.
In the midst of this motley Court group one discerns the figure of
Burghley himself, a pillar of discretion, while unable to shield his own
daughter from distress and scandal.
We see that the Earl of Leicester was a person to be cultivated so long
as his love affairs did not incur the Queen’s anger, and so long, in
fact, as the love-making was not on his side. It must have been with a
chuckle of satisfaction that the Earl received a letter from the
favourite about this time, in which he specially commends the behaviour
of the young Talbots and records the Queen’s high approval of them. All
this was very soothing to their parents. The political situation was
less acute. Many traitors were dead, and the banner of Mary of Scotland
lay in the dust. Her chief stronghold had fallen. France was in very bad
odour, though the memory of the horror of the Bartholomew Massacre was
beginning to fade from English minds. Spain had enough to do with her
affairs in the Netherlands. Elizabeth could afford to dance, practise on
the virginals, play off one of her Court lovers against another, and
invent nicknames for them. Domestic happiness and a merrier aspect of
things came also nearer to the Talbots. My Lady absented herself for a
while, and the Earl writes to her as of old like a lover, and tells her
of his dangers and longings:—
“My dear none,—Of all joys I have under God the greatest is yourself: to
think that I possess so faithful, and one that I know loves me so
dearly, is all and the greatest comfort that this earth can give.
Therefore God give me grace to be thankful to Him for His goodness
showed unto me, a vile sinner.
“And where you advise in your letter you willed me to ...[20] which I
did that I should not be ...[20] to this lady nothing of the matter: my
stomach was so full, I asked her in quick manner, where she writ any
letters to any her friends that I would stand in her title. She affirms
in her honour she hath not. But howsoever it is she hath written
therein, I may safely answer I make small account thereof.
“I thank you, my sweetheart, that you are so willing to come when I
will. Therefore, dear heart, send me word how I might send for you; and
till I have your company I shall think long, my only joy: and therefore
appoint a day, and in the meantime I shall content me with your will,
and long daily for your coming. I your letters study very well; and I
like them so well they could not be amended: and I have sent them up to
Gilbert. I have written to him how happy he is to have such a mother as
you are. Farewell, only joy. This Tuesday evening.
“Your faithful one,
“G. SHREWSBURY.
“To my wife.”[21]
The next letter, from one of her own boys, is one which Bess evidently
sent on to her “juwell” of a husband:—
_Henry Cavendish to the Countess of Shrewsbury._
“May it please your honour, I thought it good to let your La. understand
of a misfortune that happened in my house. On Thursday night last at
supper two of my men fell out about some trifling words, and to all
their fellows’ judgment that heard their jangling we made good friends
again, and went and lay together that night, for they had been
bedfellows of long before, and loved one another very well, as everybody
took it in the house. On Friday morning, very early, by break of day,
they went forth, by name Swenerto and Langeford, with two swords apiece,
as the sequel after showed; and in the fields fought together, and in
fight Swenerto slew Langeford, to my great grief both for the sudden
death of the one and for the utter destruction of the other, whom I
loved very well. Good Madam, let it not trouble you anything; we are
mortal, and born to many and strange adventures; and therefore must
temper our minds to bear such burdens as shall be by God laid on our
shoulders. My greatest grief, and so I judge it will be some trouble to
your La. that it should happen in my house. Alas! mada, what could I do
with it: altogether right sorrowful for it, and it hath troubled and
vexed me, more than in reason it should have done a wise man. I would to
God I could forget that there never had been any such matter. Upon the
fight done I sent for Mr. Adderley, and used his counsel in all things.
Swenerto fled presently and is pursued, but not yet heard of. Thus
humbly craving your La. daily blessing I end, more than sad to trouble
your La. thus long with this sorrowful matter. Tut: this present
Saturday.
“Your La. most bounden, humble, and obedient son,
“HENRY CAVENDISH.
“To my lady.
“Return this.”
“My ‘juwell,’ this Saturday at night I received this letter, much to my
grief for the mishap. Yet was ever like that Swenerto should commit some
great fault; he was a vain, lewd fellow. Farewell, my dear heart.
“Your faithful wife,
“E. SHREWSBURY.”
The Earl writes again, impatient for his wife’s return:—
“My dear none,—I see how careful you are of my health, which if I were
sick would relieve me again. I received a letter from Gilbert sent by
Nykle Clark. You may see the time approaching near that a new alarm will
be given me. When you have read his letter I pray you to write to me
again, for I mind of Monday to write by Antony Barlow; he will be glad
of the pursuivantship if he can get it: he shall have my good will
therein. If you will write up ... he may safely deliver it, therefore I
pray you fail not, but send me your advice concerning this matter.
Farewell, my only joy. This Saturday I pray you keep promise; you said
you would be with me within a fortnight at the furthest; therefore let
me hear from you when I shall send for your horses, my sweetheart.
“Your faithful husband and assured,
“G. SHREWSBURY.”
At the beginning of the year following, 1574, the Earl indites a very
touching and dignified little New Year letter to the son in whom he
always seems to take the most interest—Gilbert:—
“I have received your letter of New Year’s Eve, and this New Year’s day
I begin to use my pen first to yourself wishing you to use yourself this
New Year and many years after to God’s glory and fear of Him, and to
live in that credit your ancestors have hitherto done, and so doing, as
I hope you will, be faithful, loyal, and serviceable to the Queen’s
Majesty, my Sovereign, who to me, under God, is King of Kings and Lord
of Lords. Your New Year’s gift shall be I will supply all your needful
wants; and so long as I see that carefulness, duty, and love you bear me
which hitherto I see in you, my purse and all that I have shall be as
free to you as to myself.[22] Time is so short and I have so many come
to me with New Year’s gifts I can write no more, but thank you for your
perfumed doublet you sent me: and so praying God to bless you.
“Sheffield Castle this New Year’s Day 1574.
“Your loving father,
“G. SHREWSBURY.”
The whole tone of the letter is one of domestic security, and one has a
vivid glimpse of the New Year celebrations and the flow of gifts. These
_étrennes_ were important affairs. A good courtier always paid this dole
to his queen under the guise of a handsome gift, while the nobles and
country gentry in their turn were the recipients from their tenants and
friends of heterogeneous articles varying from capons, wine, and
foodstuffs to gloves, clothes, or furniture.
No one in that great and rich family group, so full of promise, had any
notion of the events which would call down upon the Countess the wrath
of the Queen, or the fresh accusations which would be hurled against the
Earl.
Life just now was as easy as Shrewsbury could ever hope to find it. He
had managed to satisfy his prisoner and give her plenty of change. She
was in the autumn of 1573 transferred to Chatsworth, _en route_ for
Buxton. Ultimately, by dint of scouring the place of strangers and
preventing access to the springs of any save specified persons—a thing
the more easy of accomplishment since the waters were the property of
Shrewsbury’s family—it was made possible to give her five weeks here.
After this came a stay at Chatsworth and then the return to Sheffield.
Freedom from outside attacks did not last very long. Before the spring
had fairly set in Elizabeth and Burghley were once more on the warpath
against the Shrewsburys. Never was George Talbot sure of his Queen’s
trust. It must be remembered here that at the close of 1572 she had
deliberately written thus by Burghley: “The Queen’s Majesty has in very
good part accepted your last letter to herself, and has willed me to
ascertain your Lordship that she doth no wise alter her former good
opinion of your approved fidelity and of the care you have of such
service as is committed to you, the same being such as none can in her
land compare with the trust committed to your Lordship, and yet she
would have your Lordship, as she says, not to mislike that when she hath
occasion to doubt or fear foreign practices reaching hither into her
realm, even to the charge which your Lordship hath, she do warn you
thereof; and, in so doing, not to imagine that she findeth such
informations to proceed from any mistrust that she hath of your
Lordship, no more than she would have if you were her son or brother.
This she wills me to write effectually to your Lordship ... with my most
hearty commendations to your Lordship and my good Lady.”
In spite of this the least thing afforded Elizabeth an excuse for a
nagging letter to Sheffield Castle. On this occasion the matter was
innocent enough. Gilbert’s young wife expected her first child, and it
was not surprising that my Lord and Lady should prefer that the event
should take place under their roof. Yet the Queen thought it necessary
to worry them with mistrust, forcibly expressed. Shrewsbury replies to
Burghley: “The mislike her Majesty ... of my son Gilbert’s wife brought
to bed in my house, as cause of women and strangers repair hither, makes
me heartily sorry; nevertheless, the midwife excepted, none such have,
or do at any time, come within her sight; and at the first, to avoid
such resort, I myself with two of my children christened the child. What
intelligence passeth for this Queen to and from my house I do not know;
but trust her Majesty shall find my service while I live both true and
faithful. Yet be you assured, my Lord, this lady will not stay to put in
practice, or make enquiry by all means she can devise, and ask me no
leave, so long as such access of her people is permitted unto her.... My
Lord, where there hath been often bruits of this Lady’s escape from me,
the 26th of February last there came an earthquake, which so sunk
chiefly her chamber as I doubted more her falling than her going, she
was so afraid. But God be thanked she is forthcoming, and grant it may
be a forewarning unto her. It hath been at the same time in sundry
places. No hurt was done and the same continued a very small time. God
grant us all grace to fear Him.”
That the very Derbyshire ground which bore him should fail his feet
while his Queen’s faith in him fell away seems adding insult to injury.
For some time past he appears to have been torn between the longing to
rid himself of a now intolerable responsibility and the fear of
misconstruction to which his retirement from his post would expose him.
“The truth is, my good Lord,” as he is driven at last to say to
Burghley, “if it so stand with the Queen Majesty’s pleasure I could be
right well contented to be discharged ... and think myself therewith
most happy, if I could see how the same might be without any blemish to
my honour and estimation.” He begs that Burghley “will have respect that
such consideration may be had of my service as shall make it manifest to
the world how well her Majesty accepteth the same. My Lord Scroop, and
others, were not unconsidered of for their short time of service.” And
so in this condition of mind he waits for Burghley’s advice. He would
have done better to risk the Queen’s displeasure and to lay down his
gaoler’s warrant on the plea of illness, even if in those days medical
certificates were not so easy to procure and might not have been so
potent. As for disfavour at Court, he could, as a strong and powerful
private gentleman, take up his stand and keep up his vast property,
though Elizabeth might wreak her annoyance on the young Cavendishes and
Talbots. Had he summed up the courage to decide the matter after his own
heart he would have lost nothing in the world’s esteem, been far better
off in pocket, and possibly the barque of the Shrewsburys would have
escaped the shoals and rocks of domestic bickerings, which in later
middle-life led to such woeful wreckage of the vessel and the
magnificent family crew.
George Talbot did not foresee all this. He was not an imaginative man.
He was a typical Government official, precise, sententious, cautious,
faithful, anxious, hypersensitive. One imagines that his countess—who
was not in the least _au fond_ the typical discreet wife of a high
official—spent a good deal of time goading him to revolt. He has
admitted in a previous letter that she was not at all anxious for him to
continue with his present duties. Of course, it was the business of
Burghley to keep him at them. Shrewsbury was the most useful of all
English nobles in this respect. All the conditions about him suited the
Queen’s purposes in every way. The way in which she and Burghley put him
off with fair promises and bamboozled him with vague promises of reward
makes one gasp. As to current outlay—the £52 per week allowed him for
this by the Council was far too little—one of the most ingenious
suggestions Elizabeth ever made was that Mary should “defray her own
charges with her dowry of France.” Shrewsbury adds: “She seemed not to
dislike thereof at all, but rather desirous ... so she asked me in what
sort and with what manner of liberty she should be permitted to same.”
He urges that these details should be settled at once. “Assure yourself
if the liberty and manner thereof content her as well as the motion, she
will easily assent to it; and so I wish it, as may be without peril
otherwise; and for the charges in safe-keeping her, I have found them
greater many ways than some have accounted for, and than I have made
show of, or grieved at; for in service of her Majesty I can think my
whole patrimony well bestowed.”
How the wary official, loyal and somewhat crushed, speaks in that last
sentence! How irritating to his Bess with her superabundant business
instinct and her ambitions for her family! He was ever on the watch, his
conscience agog. She was continually “on the make,” seeking the quickest
road to family aggrandisement which was compatible with decency.
The following letter belongs to this period, and shows Gilbert Talbot
back in London. He had been previously there in communication with Court
officials apropos of the accusations brought originally against his
father and subsequently against himself by an ex-chaplain of the Earl,
named Corker, in combination with another priest called Haworth. The
letter roused the whole family. The Earl literally lashes out. It
remains as the chief evidence of the first published imputations against
the Earl’s honour. It evidently embodies the attitude of wife as well as
husband. This is a very important point because of the dissension which
arose later on this very question.
“_To the right honourable my very good Lord, my Lord Burghley, Lord
Treasurer of England._
“Your Lordship’s friendly letters I accept in as friendly ways as I know
to be meant to me. For Corker’s proceedings against my son Gilbert, I
partly understand of his false accusation; which, in my conscience, is
utterly untrue and thereupon I dare gage my life. The reprobate’s
beginning was against me and now turned to Gilbert. His wicked speeches
of me cannot be hid; I have them of his own hand, cast abroad in London,
and bruited throughout this realm, and known to her Majesty’s Council.
Her Majesty hath not heard of him ill of me, so it pleaseth her Majesty
to signify unto me by her own gracious letters, which I must believe,
notwithstanding his dealing against me is otherwise so notoriously known
that if he escape sharp and open punishment dishonour will redound to
me. This practice hath a further meaning than the varlets know of....
For mine own part I have never thought to allow any title, nor will,
otherwise than as shall please her Majesty to appoint.... How can it be
supposed that I should be disposed to favour this Queen for her claim to
succeed the Queen’s Majesty? My dealing towards her hath shown the
contrary. I know her to be a Stranger, a Papist, and my enemy; what hope
can I have of good of her, either for me or my country? I see I am by my
own friends brought in jealousy, wherefore I wish with all my heart that
I were honourably read, without note or blemish, to the world of any
want in me.”
Though the Earl’s enemy was satisfactorily condemned to the pillory and
the Fleet, the scandal proved many-headed, and again the poor official
(accused, among other things, of being as much of a credulous fool as a
knave in regard to Mary of Scotland) thunders protest.
“Wherefore as touching that lewd fellow, who hath not only sought by
unlawful libels extant, so much as in him lay, to deface my dutiful
heart and loyalty, but also the rooting up of my house, utter overthrow
and destruction of my lineal posterity, I neither hold him a subject nor
yet account him worthy the name of a man, which with a watery submission
can appease so rigorous a storm;[23] no, if loss of my life, which he
hath pretended would have fully contented him, I could better have been
satisfied than with these, his unspeakable vilenesses.... I might be
thought hard-hearted if, for Christianity’s sake, I should not freely
forgive as cause shall require, and desire God to make him a better
member, being so perilous a caterpillar in the Commonwealth. For I have
not the man anywise in contempt, it is his iniquity and Judas dealing
that I only hate.”
In other words, “Reptile! But I forgive thee.” It is almost a parallel
to the anecdote of a certain little girl with an over-stern nurse of
gloomy religious tendencies, to whom the child, waking alone in the
dark, called, “Nurse, nurse, come, come! I dreamed that the devil was
here tempting me to call you a duffer—_but I resisted the temptation_!”
The Corker affair, of course, provided fresh food for the imaginings and
reports of Mary’s adversaries. People thought that it would necessarily
mean the removal of Mary into fresh custody. Mary herself dreaded this.
She did not love Shrewsbury, but she believed her life to be safe with
him, though she may not have entirely trusted his wife. She heard that
poison was to be used against her, and that there was a suggestion at
Court “to make overtures to the Countess of Shrewsbury.” She was assured
that if anyone poisoned her without Elizabeth’s knowledge, the latter
“would be very much obliged to them for relieving her of so great a
trouble.”
There is nothing on the Countess’s side to corroborate this wild
statement. This horrible fear, however, was so implanted in Mary’s mind
that she sent to France for “some genuine terra sigillata, as antidote.”
But she did not apply to her sinister mother-in-law Catherine De Medici.
“Ask M. the Cardinal my uncle,” she writes, “or if he has none, rather
than have recourse to the Queen my mother-in-law, or to the King, send a
bit of fine unicorn’s horn, as I am in great want of it.”
The year 1574 travelled onward without realisation of her fears. The
“caterpillar,” Corker, had not prevailed in the overthrow of the Earl’s
house or of his “lineal posterity,” and Gilbert Talbot in this little
note writes affectionately enough to his stepmother:—[24]
“My most humble duty remembered unto your good Ladyship, to fulfil your
La. commandment, and in discharge of my duty by writing, rather than for
any matter of importance that I can learn, I herewith trouble your La.
Her Majesty stirreth little abroad, and since the stay of the navy to
sea here hath been all things very quiet.... I have written to my Lord
of the bruit which is here of his being sick again, which I nothing
doubt but it is utterly untrue: howbeit, because I never heard from my
L. nor your La. since I came up, I cannot choose but be somewhat
troubled, and yet I consider the like hath been often reported most
falsely and without cause, as I beseech God this be. My Lady Cobbam
asketh daily how your La. doth, and yesterday prayed me, the next time I
wrote, to do her very hearty commendation unto your La., saying openly
she remaineth unto your La. as she was wont, as unto her dearest friend.
My La. Lenox hath not been at the Court since I came. On Wednesday next
I trust (God willing) to go hence towards Goodrich; and shortly after to
be at Sheffield. And so most humbly craving your La. blessing with my
wonted prayer, for your honour and most perfect health long to continue.
From the Court at Greenwich this 27th June, 1573.
“Your La. most humble and obedient son,
“GILBERT TALBOT.
“To my Lady.
“I received a letter from my Lord since this letter was sealed, and then
I had no time by this messenger to write again unto your La. which came
in a comfortable season unto me.”