council amongst the kings he cannot have aid to obtain this holy work,
then he will desire them that they will agree and consent that certain
pardons may be received in their realms, and that they may give liberty
that the bishops may constrain the commonalty to receive the said
pardons, and it shall be declared that all such money shall be used for
the conquest of Barbary; and that his Holiness will take upon him the
said conquest of Barbary with the accord of the Emperor. If the above
will not suffice, then his Holiness will give order and desire for the
maintenance and defence of the holy faith, to all bishops, archbishops,
cardinals, legates, deans, canons, priests, and curates, and also to all
sorts of monasteries, to help with certain money which may be needful,
to subdue and proceed in this good deed. And he will desire the Most
Christian King of France, and also the King of Scots, to have amongst
them aid in his behalf, inasmuch as they and their kingdoms is nigh to
the said island of Ireland. And immediately that the fleet shall be
together to go for Barbary, then shall the most part go for Ireland unto
the gentleman that hath written to his Holiness to uphold the Holy See,
that his Holiness may sustain Holy Mother Church from that tyrant of
England, the which goes to confound the Holy See of St. Peter and the
governors and ministers of it. And God give unto all good Christians
strength to confound the antichrist of England and the dog Luther his
brother."[383]
Never, perhaps, since the beginning of time had such a provision of
"ways and means" been devised for a military enterprise as was found in
the financial suggestions of this Papal Hibernian war scheme.
Nevertheless, when so many Spanish ships annually haunted the harbours
of Münster, a few thousand men might be thrown on shore there without
particular difficulty. The exchequer was in no condition to endure a
repetition of the insurrection of Lord Fitzgerald, which had cost forty
thousand pounds; and, with the encouragement of an auxiliary force,
another similar rising, with its accompanying massacres, might be easily
anticipated. Though invasion might be confidently faced in England, it
was within the limits of possibility that Ireland might be permanently
lost.
[Sidenote: Dangerous material in the hands of the Pope.]
With such materials in their hands, more skilful antagonists than Paul
III. or Cardinal Pole might have accomplished something considerable;
but Paul's practical ability may be measured by his war budget; and the
vanity of the English traitor would have ruined the most skilful
combinations. Incapable of any higher intellectual effort than
declamatory exercises, he had matched himself against the keenest and
coolest statesman in Europe. He had run a mine, as he believed, under
Henry's throne, to blow it to the moon; and at the expected moment of
his triumph his shallow schemes were blasted to atoms, and if not
himself, yet his nearest kindred and dearest friends were buried in the
ruins.
[Sidenote: Political condition of England.]
Lord Darcy had said that fifteen lords and great men had been banded
together to put down the Reformation. Two peers had died on the
scaffold. Lord Abergavenny, the head of the Nevilles, was dead also; he
was, perhaps, a third. The knights and commoners who had suffered after
the Pilgrimage of Grace had not covered the whole remaining number. The
names revealed by the Nun of Kent, though unknown to the world, had not
been forgotten by the government. Cromwell knew where to watch, and how.
[Sidenote: The Marquis of Exeter a possible pretender to the crown.]
[Sidenote: The Poles and the Nevilles.]
The country was still heaving uneasily from the after-roll of the
insurrection, and Pole's expectations of a third commotion, it is
likely, were as well known to the Privy Council as they were known to
the Pope. Symptoms had appeared in the western counties strikingly
resembling those which had preceded the Yorkshire rising, when
Cromwell's innocent order was issued for the keeping of parish
registers.[384] Rumours were continually flying that the Emperor would
come and overthrow all things; and the busy haste with which the coast
was being fortified seemed to sanction the expectation. The Pope had
made James of Scotland _Defensor fidei_. Fleets were whispered to be on
the seas. Men would wake suddenly and find the Spaniards arrived; and
"harness would again be occupied."[385] Superstition on one side, and
iconoclasm on the other, had dethroned reason, and raised imagination
to its place; and no sagacity at such times could anticipate for an hour
the form of the future.[386]
Pole's treason had naturally drawn suspicion on his family. The fact of
his correspondence with them from Liège could hardly have been a secret
from Cromwell's spies, if the contents of his letters were undiscovered;
and the same jealousy extended also, and not without cause, to the
Marquis of Exeter. Lord Exeter, as the grandson of Edward IV., stood
next to the Tudor family in the line of succession. The Courtenays were
petty sovereigns in Devonshire and Cornwall; and the marquis, though
with no special intellectual powers, was regarded as a possible
competitor for the crown by a large and increasing party. Lady Exeter we
have already seen as a visitor at the shrine of the oracle of
Canterbury; and both she and her husband were on terms of the closest
intimacy with the Poles. The Poles and the Nevilles, again, were drawing
as closely together as mutual intermarriages would allow. Lady
Salisbury, I have said, was regarded as the representative at once of
the pure Plantagenet blood and of Warwick the King Maker.[387] Lord
Montague had married a daughter of Lord Abergavenny; and as any party in
the state in opposition to the government was a formidable danger, so a
union between Lord Exeter, Lady Salisbury, and the Nevilles was, on all
grounds, religious, political, and historical, the most dangerous which
could be formed. It was the knowledge of the influence of his family
which gave importance to Reginald Pole. It was this which sharpened the
eyes of the government to watch for the first buddings of treason among
his connexions.
[Sidenote: Unsatisfactory conduct of Exeter during the Pilgrimage of
Grace.]
[Sidenote: Irregular influence exerted by him in Devonshire.]
Exeter's conduct had been for some time unsatisfactory. He had withdrawn
for an unknown cause from his share in the command of the royal army on
the Pilgrimage of Grace. He had gone down into Devonshire, where his
duty would have been to raise the musters of the county; but, instead of
it, he had courted popularity by interrupting the levy of the
subsidy.[388] The judges on circuit at the same time complained of the
coercion and undue influence which he exercised in the administration of
justice, and of the dread with which his power was regarded by juries.
No indictment could take effect against the adherents of the Marquis of
Exeter; no dependent of the Courtenays was ever cast in a cause.[389]
[Sidenote: The Marquis of Exeter high steward on the arraignment of Lord
Darcy.]
[Sidenote: He quarrels with Cromwell.]
[Sidenote: He defends Lord Montague.]
From this and other causes altercations had arisen between Exeter and
Cromwell at the council-board. High words had passed on Lord Darcy's
arraignment. The marquis had been compelled to sit as high steward; and
Lord Delaware, in an account of the trial, stated that when the verdict
was given of guilty, a promise had been exacted from Cromwell to save
Darcy's life, and even to save his property from confiscation.[390]
Cromwell may have done his best, and Darcy's death have been the act of
the king. With Henry guilt was ever in proportion to rank; he was never
known to pardon a convicted traitor of noble blood. But the
responsibility was cast by the peers on the Privy Seal. Once it was even
reported that Exeter drew his dagger on the plebeian adventurer, who
owed his life to a steel corslet beneath his dress;[391] and that
Cromwell on that occasion ordered the marquis to the Tower. If the story
was true, more prudent counsels prevailed, or possibly there would have
been an attempt at rescue in the streets.[392] The relations between
them were evidently approaching a point when one or the other would be
crushed. Exeter was boldly confident. When Lord Montague's name was
first mentioned with suspicion at the council-board (although, as was
discovered afterwards, the marquis knew better than any other person the
nature of schemes in which he was himself implicated so deeply), he
stood forward in his friend's defence, and offered to be bound for him,
body for body.[393] This was a fresh symptom of his disposition. His
conduct, if watched closely, might betray some deeper secrets. About the
same time a story reached the government from Cornwall, to which their
recent experience in Lincolnshire and the north justified them in
attaching the gravest importance.
[Sidenote: The fishermen of St. Kevern, in Cornwall, will have a
banner.]
[Sidenote: They will rise in Christ's name.]
[Sidenote: Sir William Godolphin places Cromwell on his guard.]
The parish of St. Kevern had already earned a reputation for turbulence.
Here had been born and lived the famous blacksmith Michael Flammock, who
forty-five years before had led the Cornish men to Blackheath; and the
inhabitants were still true to their character--a wild, bold race, fit
instruments for any enterprise of recklessness. A painter from the
neighbourhood came one day to Sir William Godolphin, and told him that
he had been desired by one of these St. Kevern men to "make a banner
for the said parish, in the which banner they would have, first, the
picture of Christ, with his wounds, and a banner in his hand; our Lady
on the one side, holding her breasts in her hand, St. John the Baptist
on the other; the King's Grace and the queen[394] kneeling, and all the
commonalty kneeling, with scrowls above their heads, making petitions to
Christ that they might have their holy-days." The painter said he had
asked what they intended to do with such a banner. The man gave him an
incoherent account of certain people whom he had seen at Southampton,
when he had been up selling fish there, and who had asked him why the
Cornish men had not risen when the north rose; and now, he said, they
had promised to rise, and were sworn upon the book. They wanted the
banner to carry round among the neighbouring parishes, and to raise the
people in Christ's name.[395] Godolphin would not create an alarm by
making sudden arrests; but he despatched a private courier to London,
and meanwhile held himself in readiness to crush any mutinous meetings
on the instant of their assemblage: "If there be stirring among them,"
he said, "by the precious body of God I will rid as many as be about the
banner, or else I and a great many will die for it."[396]
[Sidenote: Intention of declaring Lord Exeter heir-apparent.]
Conspiracies against Henry VIII. met usually with ill luck. Lord Exeter
had traitors among his domestic servants, who had repeatedly warned the
council that all was not right, and that he was meditating some secret
movement.[397] At length particular information was given in, which
connected itself with the affair at St. Kevern. It was stated distinctly
that two Cornish gentlemen named Kendall and Quyntrell had for some time
past been secretly employed in engaging men who were to be ready to rise
at an hour's warning. When notice should be given they were to assemble
in arms, and declare the Marquis of Exeter heir-apparent to the throne.
Here was the key to the high promises of Reginald Pole. The government
were on the eve of a fresh Pilgrimage of Grace--a fanatical multitude
were about to rise again, with a Plantagenet pretender for a leader.
[Sidenote: Private inquiries are made in Cornwall.]
But Henry would not act without clearer proof against a nobleman of so
high blood and influence. Cromwell sent orders to Godolphin to secure
the man who had ordered the banner.[398] The king despatched two
gentlemen of the bedchamber into Cornwall, to make private inquiries,
directing them to represent themselves as being merely on a visit to
their friends, and to use their opportunities to discover the
truth.[399]
[Sidenote: Evident proof of Exeter's intended treason.]
[Sidenote: Possible explanation of the conduct of his adherents.]
The result of the investigation was an entire confirmation of the story.
For several years, even before the divorce of Queen Catherine, a project
was found to have been on foot for a movement in favour of Exeter. The
object had sometimes varied. Originally the enterprise of Blackheath was
to have been renewed under more favourable auspices; and the ambition of
Cornwall and Devonshire was to avenge their defeat by dethroning Henry,
and giving a new dynasty to England. They would be contented now to set
aside the Prince of Wales, and to declare Exeter the next in succession.
But the enlistment was as certain as it was dangerous. "Great numbers of
the king s subjects were found to have bound themselves to rise for
him."[400] We have here, perhaps, the explanation of these counties
remaining quiet during the great insurrection. Exeter himself might have
been willing (if the assistance of the Emperor was contemplated he must
have been willing) to acknowledge the higher claims of the Princess
Mary. But his adherents had possessed themselves of larger hopes, and a
separate purpose would have embarrassed their movements. This difficulty
existed no longer. Mary could have no claims in preference to Prince
Edward; and the fairest hopes of the revolutionists might now be to
close the line of the Tudor sovereigns with the life of the reigning
king.
[Sidenote: October. Arrest of an agent of the Poles.]
[Sidenote: The prisoner is seen by Sir Geoffrey Pole.]
The meshes were thus cast fairly over Exeter. He was caught, and in
Cromwell's power. But one disclosure led to another. At or near about
the same time, some information led to the arrest of a secret agent of
the Poles; and the attitude and objects of the whole party were drawn
fully into light. The St. Kevern fisherman had mentioned two men at
Southampton who had spoken to him on the subject of the new rebellion.
Efforts were made to trace these persons; and although the link is
missing, and perhaps never existed, between the inquiry and its apparent
consequences, a Southampton "yeoman" named Holland was arrested on
suspicion of carrying letters between Cardinal Pole and his mother and
family. There is no proof that papers of consequence were found in
Holland's custody; but the government had the right man in their hands.
He was to be taken to London; and, according to the usual mode of
conveyance, he was placed on horseback, with his feet tied under his
horse's belly. On the road it so happened that he was met and recognized
by Sir Geoffrey Pole, Reginald's younger brother. The worthlessness of
conspirators is generally proportioned to their violence. Sir Geoffrey,
the most deeply implicated of the whole family, except the cardinal,
made haste to secure his own safety by the betrayal of the rest. A few
words which he exchanged with Holland sufficed to show him that Cromwell
was on the true scent. He judged Holland's cowardice by his own; and "he
bade him keep on his way, for he would not be long after."[401]
[Sidenote: A pardon is promised to Exeter if he will make a free
confession.]
Lord Exeter's chances of escape were not yet wholly gone. His treasons
were known up to a certain point, but forgiveness might generally be
earned by confession and submission; and Cromwell sent his nephew
Richard to him, with an entreaty that "he would be frank and
plain."[402] But the accused nobleman would make no revelation which
would compromise others. His proud blood perhaps revolted against
submission to the detested minister. Perhaps he did not know the extent
to which his proceedings had been already discovered, and still less
anticipated the treachery by which he was about to be overwhelmed.
[Sidenote: Sir Geoffrey Pole betrays the conspiracy.]
[Sidenote: Intentions of the Poles.]
Sir Geoffrey Pole made haste to London; and, preventing the accusations
which, in a few days, would have overtaken him, he secured the
opportunity which had been offered to Exeter of saving himself by
confession. He presented himself to the Privy Council, and informed them
that he, with Lord Montague, the Marquis and Marchioness of Exeter, Sir
Edward Neville, and other persons whom he named, were in treasonable
correspondence with his brother Reginald. They had maintained a steady
communication with him from the time of his legacy into Flanders. They
were watching their opportunities. They had calculated the force which
they could raise, the Marquis of Exeter's power in the west forming
their especial reliance. The depositions survive only in portions. It
does not appear how far the Poles would have supported Exeter's ambition
for the crown; they intended, however, this time to avoid Lord Darcy's
errors, and not to limit themselves to attacks upon the ministers.[403]
The death of Lord Abergavenny had been inopportune;[404] but his
brother, Sir Edward Neville, with Lady Salisbury, would supply his place
in rallying the Neville powers. The Yorkshire rising had proved how
large was the material of an insurrection if adequately managed; and the
whole family, doubtless, shared with Reginald, or rather, to them
Reginald himself owed the conviction which he urged so repeatedly on the
Emperor and the Pope, that, on the first fair opportunity, a power could
be raised which the government would be unable to cope with.
[Sidenote: November. Combination of dangers driving the government to
severity.]
If it is remembered that these discoveries occurred when the Bull of
Deposition was on the point of publication--when the "Liber de Unitate"
was passing into print--when the pacification of Nice had restored the
Continent to the condition most dangerous to England--when the Pope was
known to be preparing again a mighty effort to gather against Henry the
whole force of Christendom, this was not a time, it will be understood
easily, when such plottings would be dealt with leniently by a weaker
hand than that which then ruled the destinies of England.
[Sidenote: The king is reluctant to prosecute.]
[Sidenote: Lady Salisbury is examined by Lord Southampton,]
[Sidenote: Whom he finds rather like a strong man than a woman.]
[Sidenote: She is placed under surveillance at Cowdray.]
Exeter, Montague, and Neville were sent to the Tower on the 3d and 4th
of November. Lady Exeter followed with her attendant, Constance
Beverley, who had been her companion on her secret pilgrimage to the
Nun. It is possible that Sir Geoffrey's revelations were made by
degrees; for the king was so unwilling to prosecute, that ten days
passed before their trial was determined on.[405] Lady Salisbury was not
arrested; but Lord Southampton went down to Warblington, her residence
in Hampshire, to examine her. She received his questions with a fierce
denial of all knowledge of the matters to which they referred, and, for
a time, he scarcely knew whether to think her innocent or guilty.
"Surely," he said, in giving an account of his interview, "there hath
not been seen or heard of a woman so earnest, so manlike in countenance,
so fierce as well in gesture as in words; either her sons have not made
her privy to the bottom and pit of their stomachs, or she is the most
arrant traitress that ever lived."[406] But her rooms were searched;
letters, Papal bulls, and other matters were discovered, which left no
doubt of her general tendencies, if they were insufficient to implicate
her in actual guilt; and one letter, or copy of a letter, unsigned, but,
as Southampton said, undoubtedly hers, and addressed to Lord Montague,
was found, the matter of which compromised her more deeply. She was
again interrogated, and this time important admissions were extracted
from her; but she carried herself with undaunted haughtiness. "We have
dealed with such an one," the earl said, "as men have not dealed with
tofore; we may rather call her a strong and constant man than a
woman."[407] No decisive conclusions could be formed against her; but it
was thought well that she should remain under surveillance; and, three
days later she was removed to Cowdray, a place belonging to Southampton
himself, where she was detained in honourable confinement.
The general case meanwhile continued to enlarge. The surviving materials
are too fragmentary to clear the whole circumstances; but allusions to
witnesses by name, whose depositions have not been preserved, show how
considerable those materials were. The world at least were satisfied of
the guilt of the chief prisoners. "They would have made as foul a work,"
says a letter written from London on the 21st of November, "as ever was
in England."[408] Henry made up his mind that they should be proceeded
against. Treason at home was too palpably connected with conspiracies
against England abroad; and the country could not risk a repetition of
the Pilgrimage of Grace.
[Sidenote: Circular issued to the justices of the peace,]
[Sidenote: Directing them to search out all the cankered clergy in their
districts.]
While preparations were made for the trials, the king took the
opportunity of issuing a calming circular to the justices of the peace.
The clergy, as before, had been the first to catch the infection of
disorder: they had been again eager propagators of sedition, and had
spread extravagant stories of the intentions of the government against
the Church. Emboldened by the gentleness with which the late insurgents
had been handled, "these miserable and Papistical superstitious
wretches," the king said, "not caring what danger and mischief our
people should incur, have raised the said old rumours, and forged new
seditious tales, intending as much as in them lyeth a new commotion.
Wherefore, for the universal danger to you and to all our good subjects,
and trouble that might ensue unless good and earnest provision to
repress them be taken thereupon, we desire and pray you that within the
precincts of your charges ye shall endeavour yourselves to enquire and
find out all such cankered parsons, vicars, and curates as bid the
parishioners do as they did in times past, to live as their fathers, and
that the old fashions is best. And also with your most effectual
vigilance try out such seditious tale tellers, spreaders of brutes,
tidings, and rumours, touching us in honour and surety, or [touching]
any mutation of the laws and customs of the realm, or any other thing
which might cause sedition."[409]
[Sidenote: December 3. New trials in Westminster Hall.]
[Sidenote: The Marquis of Exeter arraigned.]
And now once more the peers were assembled in Westminster Hall, to try
two fresh members of their order, two of the noblest born among them,
for high treason; and again the judges sate with them to despatch the
lower offenders. On the 2d and 3d of December Lord Montague and Lord
Exeter were arraigned successively. On the part of the crown it was set
forth generally that "the king was supreme head on earth of the Church
of England, and that his progenitors, from times whereof there was no
memory to the contrary, had also been supreme heads of the Church of
England; which authority and power of the said king, Paul the Third,
Pope of Rome, the public enemy of the king and kingdom, without any
right or title, arrogantly and obstinately challenged and claimed; and
that one Reginald Pole, late of London, Esq^{r.}, otherwise Reginald
Pole, late Dean of Exeter, with certain others of the king's subjects,
had personally repaired to the said Pope of Rome, knowing him to be the
king's enemy, and adhered to and became liege man of the said Pope, and
falsely and unnaturally renounced the king, his natural liege lord; that
Reginald Pole accepted the dignity of a cardinal of the court of Rome
without the king's license, in false and treasonable despite and
contempt of the king, and had continued to live in parts beyond the
seas, and was there vagrant, and denying the king to be upon earth
supreme head of the Church of England."
Caring only to bring the prisoners within the letter of the act, the
prosecution made no allusion to Exeter's proceedings in Cornwall. It was
enough to identify his guilt with the guilt of the great criminal.
Against him, therefore, it was objected--
"That, as a false traitor, machinating the death of the king, and to
excite his subjects to rebellion, and seeking to maintain the said
Cardinal Pole in his intentions, the Marquis of Exeter did say to
Geoffrey Pole the following words in English: 'I like well the
proceedings of the Cardinal Pole; but I like not the proceedings of this
realm; and I trust to see a change of this world.'
[Sidenote: Treasonable language is sworn against him.]
"Furthermore, that the Marquis of Exeter, machinating with Lord Montague
the death and destruction of the king, did openly declare to the Lord
Montague, 'I trust once to have a fair day upon those knaves which rule
about the king; and I trust to see a merry world one day.'
"And, furthermore persevering in his malicious intention, he did say,
'Knaves rule about the king;' and then stretching his arm, and shaking
his clenched fist, spoke the following words: 'I trust to give them a
buffet one day.'"
[Sidenote: December 3. He is condemned.]
Sir Geoffrey Pole was in all cases the witness. The words were proved.
It was enough. A verdict of guilty was returned; and the marquis was
sentenced to die.
[Sidenote: Lord Montague also sentenced to die.]
If the proof of language of no darker complexion was sufficient to
secure a condemnation, the charges against Lord Montague left him no
shadow of a hope. Montague had expressed freely to his miserable brother
his approbation of Reginald's proceedings. He had discussed the chances
of the impending struggle and the resources of which they could dispose.
He had spoken bitterly of the king; he had expressed a fear that when
the world "came to strypes," as come it would, "there would be a lack of
honest men," with other such language, plainly indicative of his
disposition. However justly, indeed, we may now accuse the equity which
placed men on their trial for treason for impatient expressions, there
can be no uncertainty that, in the event of an invasion, or of a
rebellion with any promise of success in it, both Montague and Exeter
would have thrown their weight into the rebel scale. Montague, too, was
condemned.
The date of the expressions which were sworn against them is curious.
They belong, without exception, to the time when Reginald Pole was in
Flanders. That there was nothing later was accounted for by the
distrust which Geoffrey said that soon after they had begun to entertain
towards him. Evidently they had seen his worthlessness; and as their
enterprise had become more critical, they had grown more circumspect.
But he remembered enough to destroy them, and to save by his baseness
his own miserable life.
[Sidenote: Convictions of Sir Edward Neville,]
He was himself tried, though to receive a pardon after conviction. With
Sir Edward Neville and four other persons he was placed at the bar on
charges of the same kind as those against Exeter and his brother.
Neville had said that he "would have a day upon the knaves that were
about the king;" "that the king was a beast, and worse than a beast;"
"machinating and conspiring to extinguish the love and affection of the
king's subjects." Sir Geoffrey Pole, beyond comparison the most guilty,
had been in command of a company under the Duke of Norfolk at Doncaster;
and was proved to have avowed an intention of deserting in the action,
if an action was fought,--real, bad, black treason. Of the others, two
had spoken against the supremacy; one had carried letters to the
cardinal; another had said to Lord Montague, that "the king would hang
in hell for the plucking down of abbeys."
[Sidenote: And of Sir Nicholas Carew.]
[Sidenote: The scaffold on Tower Hill.]
The last case was the hardest. Sir Nicholas Carew, Master of the Horse,
had been on the commission which had taken the indictments against
Exeter, and had said "that he marvelled it was so secretly handled; that
the like was never seen." The expression brought him under suspicion. He
was found to have been intimate with Exeter; to have received letters
from him of traitorous import, which he had concealed and burnt. With
the rest he was brought in guilty, and received sentence as a traitor.
On the 9th of December the Marquis of Exeter, Montague, and Sir Edward
Neville were beheaded on Tower Hill.[410] On the 16th the following
proclamation was issued:--
[Sidenote: Lord Exeter is degraded from the order of the Garter.]
"Be it known unto all men, that whereas Henry Courtenay, late Marquis of
Exeter, knight companion of the most noble order of the Garter, hath
lately committed and done high treason against the king our dread
sovereign lord, sovereign of the said most noble order of the Garter,
compassing and imagining the destruction of his most royal person in the
most traitorous and rebellious wise, contrary to his oath, duty, and
allegiance, intending thereby, if he might have obtained his purpose, to
have subverted the whole good order of the commonwealth of England, for
the which high and most detestable treason the said Henry hath deserved
to be degraded of the said most noble order, and expelled out of the
same company, and is not worthy that his arms, ensigns, and hatchments
should remain amongst the virtuous and approved knights of the said most
noble order, nor to have any benefit thereof,--the right wise king and
supreme head of the most noble order, with the whole consent and counsel
of the same, wills and commands that his arms, which he nothing
deserveth, be taken away and thrown down, and he be clean put from this
order, and never from henceforth to be taken of any of the number
thereof; so that all others by his example, from henceforth for
evermore, may beware how they commit or do the like crime or fault, unto
like shame or rebuke.
"God save the King.[411]
"December 16, 1538."
[Sidenote: Testimony of the event to the wisdom of the executions.]
[Sidenote: Treason has bled to death.]
Executions for high treason bear necessarily a character of cruelty,
when the peril which the conspiracies create has passed away. In the
sense of our own security we lose the power of understanding the
magnitude or even the meaning of the danger. But that there had been no
unnecessary alarm, that these noblemen were in no sense victims of
tyranny, but had been cut off by a compelled severity, may be seen in
the consequence of their deaths. Unjust sentences provoke indignation.
Indignation in stormy times finds the means, sooner or later, of shaping
itself into punishment. But the undercurrent of disaffection, which for
ten years had penetrated through English life, was now exhausted, and
gradually ceased to flow. The enemy had been held down; it acknowledged
its master; and, with the exception of one unimportant commotion in
Yorkshire, no symptom of this particular form of peril was again
visible, until the king had received notice of departure, in his last
illness, and the prospect of his death warmed the hopes of confusion
into life again. The prompt extinction of domestic treason, in all
likelihood, was the cause which really saved the country from a visit
from the Emperor. "Laud be to God," said an Englishman, "we are all now
united and knit with a firm love in our hearts towards our prince. Ye
never read nor heard that ever England was overcome by outward realms,
nor dare any outward prince enterprize to come hither, except they
should trust of help within the realm, which I trust in God none such
shall ever be found."[412] The speaker expressed the exact truth; and no
one was more keenly aware of it than Charles V.
[Sidenote: Henry, on the pacification of Nice, makes advances to the
Lutherans.]
[Sidenote: Lutheran divines are sent to England for a conference with
the bishops.]
[Sidenote: The Landgrave of Hesse warns Henry to repress the
Anabaptists.]
We must once more go back over our steps. The Emperor being on good
terms with France, England, obedient to the necessity of its position,
again held out its hand to Germany. No sooner had the pacification of
Nice been completed, and Henry had found that he was not, after all, to
be admitted as a party contrahent, than, without quarrelling with
Charles, he turned his position by immediate advances to the Smalcaldic
League. In the summer of 1538 Lutheran divines were invited to England
to discuss the terms of their confession with the bishops; and though
unsuccessful in the immediate object of finding terms of communion, they
did not return without having established, as it seemed, a generally
cordial relationship with the English Reformers. Purgatory, episcopal
ordination, the marriage of the clergy, were the comparatively
unimportant points of difference. On the vital doctrine of the real
presence the Lutherans were as jealously sensitive as the vast majority
of the English; and on the points on which they continued orthodox the
Reformers, German and English, united in a bigotry almost equal to that
of Rome. On the departure of the theological embassy, the Landgrave of
Hesse took the opportunity of addressing a letter of warning to Henry
on the progress of heresy in England, and expressing his anxiety that
the king should not forget his duty in repressing and extirpating so
dangerous a disorder.[413]
[Sidenote: England accused of a leaning towards heresy.]
[Sidenote: November. The Anglican Reformers think it necessary to make a
demonstration of orthodoxy.]
[Sidenote: John Lambert is accused of denying the real presence.]
[Sidenote: He is condemned by the bishops, and appeals to the king.]
His advice found Cranmer and Cromwell as anxious as himself. The
Catholics at home and abroad persisted more and more loudly in
identifying a separation from Rome with heresy. The presence of these
very Germans had given opportunity, however absurdly, for scandal; and,
taken in connexion with the destruction of the shrines, was made a
pretext for charging the king with a leaning towards doctrines with
which he was most anxious to disavow a connexion.[414] The political
clouds which were gathering abroad, added equally to the anxiety, both
of the king and his ministers, to stand clear in this matter; and as
Cromwell had recommended, after the Pilgrimage of Grace, that the
Articles of Unity should be enforced against some offender or offenders
in a signal manner--so, to give force to his principles, which had been
faintly acted upon, either he, or the party to which he belonged, now
chose out for prosecution a conspicuous member of the Christian
brotherhood, John Lambert, who was marked with the dreadful reputation
of a sacramentary. Dr. Barnes volunteered as the accuser. Barnes, it
will be remembered, had been himself imprisoned for heresy, and had done
penance in St. Paul's. He was a noisy, vain man, Lutheran in his views,
and notorious for his hatred of more advanced Protestants. Tyndal had
warned the brethren against him several years previously; but his German
sympathies had recommended him to the vicegerent; he had been employed
on foreign missions, and was for the time undergoing the temptation of a
brief prosperity. Lambert, the intended victim, had been a friend at
Cambridge of Bilney the martyr; a companion at Antwerp of Tyndal and
Frith; and had perhaps taken a share in the translation of the Bible.
Subsequently, he had been in trouble for suspicion of heresy; he had
been under examination before Warham, and afterwards Sir Thomas More;
and having been left in prison by the latter, he had been set at liberty
by Cranmer. He was now arrested on the charge preferred by Dr. Barnes,
of having denied the real presence, contrary to the Articles of Faith.
He was tried in the archbishop's court; and, being condemned, he
appealed to the king.
Henry decided that he would hear the cause in person. A few years
before, a sacramentary was despatched with the same swift indifference
as an ordinary felon: a few years later, a sacramentary had ceased to be
a criminal. In the interval, the proportions of the crime had so dilated
in apparent magnitude, that a trial for it was a national event--an
affair of vast public moment.
[Sidenote: November 16.]
On the 16th of November, while London was ringing with the arrest of the
Marquis of Exeter, the court was opened in Westminster Hall. In the grey
twilight of the late dawn, the whole peerage of England, lay and
spiritual, took their seats, to the right and left of the throne. The
twelve judges placed themselves on raised benches at the back. The
prisoner was brought in; and soon after the king entered, "clothed all
in white," with the yeomen of the guard.
[Sidenote: The appeal is heard by Henry in Westminster Hall.]
The Bishop of Carlisle rose first to open the case. The king, he said,
had put down the usurpations of the Bishop of Rome, but it was not to be
thought, therefore, that he intended to give license to heresy. They
were not met, at present, to discuss doctrines, but to try a person
accused of a crime, by the laws of the Church and of the country.
Lambert was then ordered to stand forward.
"What is your name?" the king asked. "My name is Nicholson," he said,
"though I be called Lambert." "What!" the king said, "have you two
names? I would not trust you, having two names, though you were my
brother."
The persecutions of the bishops, Lambert answered, had obliged him to
disguise himself; but now God had inspired the king's mind, enduing him
with wisdom and understanding to stay their cruelty.
"I come not here," said Henry, "to hear mine own praises painted out in
my presence. Go to the matter without more circumstance. Answer as
touching the sacrament of the altar, is it the body of Christ or no?"
"I answer with St. Augustine," the prisoner said; "it is the body of
Christ after a certain manner."
"Answer me not out of St. Augustine," said the king; "tell me plainly
whether it be He."
"Then I say it is not," was the answer.
"Mark well," the king replied, "you are condemned by Christ's own
words--'_Hoc est corpus meum._'" He turned to Cranmer, and told him to
convince the prisoner of his error.
[Sidenote: The bishops' arguments fail.]
The argument began in the morning. First Cranmer, and after him nine
other bishops laboured out their learned reasons--reasons which, for
fifteen hundred years, had satisfied the whole Christian world, yet had
suddenly ceased to be of cogency. The torches were lighted before the
last prelate had ceased to speak. Then once more the king asked Lambert
for his opinion. "After all these labours taken with you, are you yet
satisfied?" he said. "Choose, will you live or will you die!"
"I submit myself to the will of your Majesty," Lambert said.
"Commit your soul to God," replied Henry, "not to me."
"I commit my soul to God," he said, "and my body to your clemency."
[Sidenote: The appeal is rejected,]
"Then you must die," the king said. "I will be no patron of heretics."
It was over. The appeal was rejected. Cromwell read the sentence. Four
days' interval was allowed before the execution. In a country which was
governed by law, not by the special will of a despot, the supreme
magistrate was neither able, nor desired, so long as a law remained
unrepealed by parliament, to suspend the action of it.
[Sidenote: And Lambert dies at the stake.]
The morning on which Lambert suffered he was taken to Cromwell's house,
where he breakfasted simply in the hall; and afterwards he died at
Smithfield, crying with his last breath, "None but Christ--none but
Christ."[415] Foxe relates, as a rumour, that Cromwell, before Lambert
suffered, begged his forgiveness. A more accurate account of Cromwell's
feelings is furnished by himself in a letter written a few days later to
Sir Thomas Wyatt:--
[Sidenote: Nov. 28. Cromwell's opinion of the sentence.]
"The sixteenth of this present month, the King's Majesty, for the
reverence of the holy sacrament of the altar, did sit openly in his
hall, and there presided at the disputation, process, and judgment of a
miserable heretic sacramentary, who was burnt the twentieth of the same
month. It was a wonder to see how princely, with how excellent gravity,
and inestimable majesty, his Majesty exercised the very office of a
superior head of his Church of England; how benignly his Grace essayed
to convert the miserable man; how strong and manifest reason his
Highness alleged against him. I wished the princes of Christendom to
have seen it; undoubtedly they should have much marvelled at his
Majesty's most high wisdom and judgment, and reputed him none otherwise
after the same than in manner the mirrour and light of all other kings
and princes in Christendom. The same was done openly, with great
solemnity."[416]
[Sidenote: Intentions of the Emperor against England.]
The circumstances which accompanied Pole's mission into Spain, and those
which occasioned the catastrophe of the marriage treaties, can now be
understood. The whole secret of the Emperor's intentions it is not easy,
perhaps it is not necessary, to comprehend; but, as it was not till late
in the spring that the threatening symptoms finally cleared, so it is
impossible to doubt that an enterprise against England was seriously
meditated, and was relinquished only when the paralysis of the domestic
factions who were to have risen in its support could no longer be
mistaken.
[Sidenote: Sir Thomas Wyatt protests against the reception of Reginald
Pole in Spain; but the Emperor will not refuse to see him.]
[Sidenote: The French ambassador as well as the Spanish leaves England.]
The official language of the Spanish court through the winter "had waxed
from colder to coldest."[417] On Pole's arrival in the Peninsula, Sir
Thomas Wyatt, by the king's instructions, protested against his
reception. The Emperor, who in 1537 had forbidden his entrance into his
dominions when on a similar errand, replied now that, "if he was his own
traitor, he could not refuse him audience, coming as a legate from the
Holy Father." The next step was the arrest of the English ships in
Flanders, and the recall of the Spanish ambassador; and meanwhile a
mysterious fleet was collected at Antwerp and in other ports, every one
asking with what object, and no one being able to answer, unless it were
for a descent on Ireland or England.[418] Mendoza's departure from
London was followed immediately after by the withdrawal of M. de
Chatillon, the ambassador of France. "It is in every man's mouth,"
reported Wriothesley, "that we shall have war. It has been told me that
the commission that was sent hither for our matters[419] was dispatched
only to keep us in hopes, and to the intent that we might be taken tardy
and without provision."[420]
[Sidenote: Wriothesley demands an explanation of the arrest of the
ships.]
[Sidenote: He can obtain no redress, and threatens reprisals.]
Wriothesley's duty required him to learn the meaning of the arrests. The
ministers at Brussels affected to say that the Emperor required sailors
for his fleet, and, until it had sailed on its mysterious errand, no
other vessels could leave the harbours. The ambassador refused to accept
a reply so insolent and unsatisfactory; he insisted on an interview with
the regent herself, and pointing to the clause in the commercial treaty
between England and Flanders, which stipulated, on behalf of the ships
of both nations, for free egress and ingress, he required an explanation
of the infringement. "You give us fair words," he said to her, "but your
deeds being contrary, the King's Majesty my master shall join words and
deeds together, and see that all is but finesse. If you had declared
open war, by the law of nations merchant ships should have six weeks
allowed them to depart;" while peace remained, they might not be
detained a day. The queen regent, like her council, gave an evasive
answer. The Emperor must be served, she said; the fleet would soon sail,
and the ships would be free. She tried to leave him; his anxiety got the
better of his courtesy; he placed himself between her and the door, and
entreated some better explanation. But he could obtain nothing, She
insisted on passing, and he found himself referred back to the council.
Here he was informed that she could not act otherwise; she was obeying
absolute orders from the Emperor. Wriothesley warned them that the king
would not bear it, that he would make reprisals, and "then should begin
a broiling." It was no matter; they seemed indifferent.
[Sidenote: Rumours in Flanders of the intended invasion of England,]
[Sidenote: Which may be ill-founded, but it will be well to be
prepared.]
From their manner Wriothesley did not believe that they would begin a
war; yet he could feel no security. "I have heard," he wrote to
Cromwell, "that the French king, the Bishop of Rome, and the King of
Scots be in league to invade us this summer: and how the Emperor will
send to their aid certain Spaniards which shall arrive in Scotland;
which Spaniards shall, as it were in fury, upon the arrival in Spain of
the ships here prepared, enter the same, half against the Emperor's
will, with the oath never to return till they shall revenge the matter
of the dowager." "This," he added, "I take for no gospel, howbeit our
master is daily slandered and villanously spoken against. It is possible
that all shall be well; but in the mean season, I pray to God to put in
the King's Majesty's mind rather to spend twenty thousand pounds in
vain, to be in perfect readiness, than to wish it had so been done if
any malicious person would attempt any thing. Weapons biddeth peace; and
good preparation maketh men to look or they leap. The Emperor hath made
great provision. It may yet be that he will do somewhat against the
Turks; but as many think nay, as otherwise. But he maketh not his
preparation in vain. England is made but a morsel among these choppers.
They would have the Duke of Orleans a king;[421] and the Duke of Guise,
they say, will visit his daughter in Scotland. It is not unlike that
somewhat may be attempted; which, nevertheless, may be defeated. God
hath taken the King's Majesty into his own tuition."[422]
[Sidenote: Large fleet in preparation at Antwerp.]
[Sidenote: Warning advices from Spain.]
Each day the news from Flanders become more alarming. The wharves at
Antwerp were covered with ammunition and military stores. Contributions
had been levied on the clergy, who had been taught to believe that the
money was to be spent in the Pope's quarrel against the King of England.
On the 24th of March two hundred and seventy sail were reported as
ready for sea; and the general belief was that, if no attack were
ventured, the preparations to meet it, which Henry was known to have
made, would be the sole cause of the hesitation.[423] Information of a
precisely similar kind was furnished from Spain. The agent of a London
house wrote to his master: "You shall understand that, four days past,
we had news how the Bishop of Rome had sent a post to the Emperor, which
came in seven days from Rome, and brought letters requiring and desiring
his Majesty, jointly with the French king and the King of Scots, to give
war against the king our sovereign lord; and all his subjects to be
heretics and schismatics, and wherever they could win and take any of
our nation by land or sea, to take us for Jews or infidels, and to use
our persons as slaves. We have hope that in this the Emperor will not
grant the request of his Holiness, being so much against charity,
notwithstanding that divers our friends in this country give us secret
monition to put good order for the safeguard of our goods; and they
think, verily, the Emperor will have war with the king our master this
March next, and that the army of men and ships in Flanders shall go
against England."[424]
[Sidenote: March. Danger of a surprise.]
[Sidenote: The king goes down to the coast of Kent to survey the
fortifications.]
[Sidenote: Instructions to Cromwell to place the citizens of London
under arms.]
The thing to be feared, if there was cause for fear, was a sudden
treacherous surprise. The point of attack would probably be the open
coast of Kent. An army would be landed on the beach somewhere between
Sandwich and Dover, and would march on London. Leaving Cromwell to see
to the defence of the metropolis, Henry went down in person to examine
his new fortresses, and to speak a few words of encouragement to the
garrisons. The merchant-ships in the Thames were taken up by the
government and armed. Lord Southampton took command of the fleet at
Portsmouth; Lord Russell was sent into the west; Lord Surrey into
Norfolk. The beacons were fresh trimmed; the musters through the country
were ordered to be in readiness. Sir Ralph Sadler, the king's private
secretary, sent from Dover to desire Cromwell to lose no time in setting
London in order. "Use your diligence," he wrote, "for his Grace saith
that _diligence passe sense_; willing me to write that French proverb
unto your lordship, the rather to quicken you in that behalf. Surely his
Majesty mindeth nothing more than, like a courageous prince of valiant
heart, to prepare and be in readiness, in all events, to encounter the
malice of his enemies; in which part, no doubt, Almighty God will be his
helper, and all good subjects will employ themselves to the uttermost,
both lives and goods, to serve his Highness truly.... All that will the
contrary, God send them ill-hap and short life."[425]
[Sidenote: Sir Thomas Cheyne in command at Dover.]
[Sidenote: Light English vessels watch the Flanders harbours.]
The inspection proving satisfactory, Sir Thomas Cheyne was left at Dover
Castle, with command of the coast from the mouth of the Thames
westward. We catch sight through March and April of soldiers gathering
and moving. Look-out vessels hung about the Channel, watching the
Flanders ports. One morning when the darkness lifted, sixty strange sail
were found at anchor in the Downs;[426] and swiftly two thousand men
were in arms upon the sandflats towards Deal. Cheyne never took off his
clothes for a fortnight. Strong easterly gales were blowing, which would
bring the fleet across in a few hours. "Mr. Fletcher of Rye," in a boat
of his own construction, "which he said had no fellow in England," beat
up in the wind's eye to Dover, "of his own mind, to serve the King's
Majesty." At daybreak he would be off Gravelines, on the look-out; at
noon he would be in the new harbour, with reports to the English
commander. Day after day the huge armada lay motionless. At length sure
word was brought that an order had been sent out for every captain,
horseman, and footman to be on board on the last of March.[427] In a few
days the truth, whatever it was, would be known. The easterly winds were
the chief cause of anxiety. If England was their object, they would come
so quickly, Cheyne said, that although watch was kept night and day all
along the coast, yet, "if evil were, the best would be a short warning
for any number of men to repulse them at their landing." However, his
information led him to think the venture would not be made.
[Sidenote: April. The Flanders fleet is broken up.]
He was right. A few days later the look-out boats brought the welcome
news that the fleet had broken up. Part withdrew to the ports of
Zealand, where the stores and cannon were relanded, and the vessels
dismasted. Part were seen bearing down Channel before the wind, bound
for Spain and the Mediterranean; and Cromwell, who had had an ague fit
from anxiety, informed the king on the 19th of April that he had
received private letters from Antwerp, telling him that the enterprise
had been relinquished from the uncertainty which appeared of
success.[428]
[Sidenote: The Emperor has relinquished the enterprise from a due sense
of Henry's strength.]
[Sidenote: When Germany is composed he will engage to undertake it once
more.]
[Sidenote: Despondency of Reginald Pole.]
Such, in fact, was the truth. The Emperor, longing, and yet fearing to
invade, and prepared to make the attempt if he could be satisfied of a
promising insurrection in his support, saw in the swift and easy
extinction of the Marquis of Exeter's conspiracy an evidence of Henry's
strength which Pole's eloquence could not gainsay. He had waited,
uncertain perhaps, till time had proved the consequences of the
execution; and when he found that the country was in arms, but only to
oppose the invaders whom the English legate had promised it would
welcome as deliverers, he was too wise to risk an overthrow which would
have broken his power in Germany, and ensured the enduring enmity of
England. The time, he told the Pope, did not serve; and to a second more
anxious message he replied that he could not afford to quarrel with
Henry till Germany was in better order. The King of France might act as
he pleased. He would not interfere with him. For himself, when the
German difficulty was once settled, he would then take up arms and
avenge the Pope's injuries and his own.[429] Once more Pole had failed.
He has been accused of personal ambition; but the foolish expectations
of his admirers in Europe have been perhaps mistaken for his own.[430]
His worst crime was his vanity; his worst misfortune was his talent--a
talent for discovering specious reasons for choosing the wrong side. The
deliberate frenzy of his conduct shows the working of a mind not wholly
master of itself; or, if we leave him the responsibility of his crimes,
he may be allowed the imperfect pity which attaches to failure. The
results of his labours to destroy the Reformation had, so far, been to
bring his best friends and Lord Montague to the scaffold. His mother,
entangled in his guilt, lay open to the same fate. His younger brother
was a perjured traitor and a fratricide. In bitter misery he now shrank
into the monastery of Carpentras, where, if he might be allowed, he
wrote to Contarini, that he would hide his face for ever in mourning and
prayer. Often, he said, he had heard the King of England speak of his
mother as the most saintly woman in Christendom. First priests, then
nobles, and now, as it seemed, women were to follow. Had the faith of
Christ, from the beginning, ever known so deadly an enemy?
He went on to bewail the irresolution of Charles:--
[Sidenote: He had supposed the Emperor to have been the chosen
instrument to punish Henry.]
[Sidenote: He is now alarmed for the Emperor himself.]
"Surely," he exclaimed, "if the Emperor had pronounced against the
tyrant, this worse antagonist of God than the Turk, he would have found
God more favourable to him in the defence of his own empire. I the more
dread some judgment upon Cæsar, for that I thought him chosen as a
special instrument to do God's work in this matter. God, as we see in
the Scriptures, was wont to stir up adversaries against those whom he
desired to punish; and when I saw that enemy of all good in his decline
into impiety commencing with an attack on Cæsar's honour and Cæsar's
family, what could I think but that, as Cæsar's piety was known to all
men, so God was in this manner influencing him to avenge the Church's
wrongs with his own? Now we must fear for Cæsar himself. Other princes
are ready in God's cause. He in whom all our hopes were centered is not
ready. I have no consolation, save it be my faith in God and in
Providence. To Him who alone can save let us offer our prayers, and
await his will in patience."[431]
[Sidenote: May 8. The London train bands reviewed by the king.]
A gleam of pageantry shoots suddenly across the sky. Pole delighted to
picture his countrymen to himself cowering in terror before a cruel
tyrant, mourning their ruined faith and murdered nobility. The
impression was known to have contributed so largely to the hopes of the
Catholics abroad, that the opportunity was taken to display publicly the
real disposition of the nation. All England had been under arms in
expectation of invasion; before the martial humour died away, the
delight of the English in splendid shows was indulged with a military
spectacle. On the 8th of May a review was held of the musters of the
city of London.
"The King's Grace," says a contemporary record, "who never ceased to
take pains for the advancement of the commonwealth, was informed by his
trusty friends how that the cankered and venomous serpent Paul, Bishop
of Rome, and the archtraitor Reginald Pole, had moved and stirred the
potentates of Christendom to invade the realm of England with mortal
war, and extermine and destroy the whole nation with fire and sword."
The king, therefore, in his own person, "had taken painful and laborious
journeys towards the sea coast," to prevent the invasion of his enemies;
he had fortified all the coasts both of England and Wales; he had "set
his navy in readiness at Portsmouth," "in all things furnished for the
wars." The people had been called under arms, and the "harness viewed,"
in all counties in the realm; and the Lord Mayor of London was
instructed by the Lord Thomas Cromwell that the King's Majesty "of his
most gentle nature" would take the pains to see "his loving and
benevolent subjects muster in order before his Excellent Highness."
The mayor and his brethren "determined, after long consultation," "that
no alien, though he were a denizen, should muster," but only native-born
English; and "for especial considerations, they thought it not
convenient" that all their able-bodied men should be absent from the
City at once. They would have but a picked number; "such as were able
persons, and had white harness and white coats, bows, arrows, bills, or
poleaxes, and none other except such as bare morris pikes or handguns;"
the whole to be "in white hosen and cleanly shod."
"And when it was known," says the record, "that the king himself would
see the muster, to see how gladly every man prepared him, what desire
every man had to do his prince service, it was a joyful sight to behold
of every Englishman."
White was the City uniform. The lord mayor and the aldermen rode in
white armour, with light coats of black velvet, and the arms of London
embroidered on them. Massive gold chains hung on their breasts. Their
caps were of velvet with plumes; and steel battle-axes were slung at
their side. Every alderman was attended by a body-guard, in white silk,
with gilded halberds. The richer citizens were in white silk also, "with
broaches and owches," and "breast-plates studded with silver." The
remainder had white coats of cotton, worked into a uniform, with the
City arms, white shoes, and long woven, closely-fitting hose; "every man
with a sword and dagger," besides his special arms. The whole number to
be reviewed were fifteen thousand men, divided into battles or
battalions of five thousand each. The aldermen were at the head each of
his ward. The wards were in companies of archers, pikemen, musketeers,
and artillery. A preliminary review was held on the evening of the 7th
of May. The next morning, before six o'clock, "all the fields from
Whitechapel to Mile-end, from Bethnal-green to Radcliffe and Stepney,
were covered with men in bright harness, with glistening weapons." "The
battle of pikes, when they stood still, seemed a great wood."
At eight o'clock the advance began to move, each division being attended
by a hundred and twenty outriders, to keep stragglers into line. First
came thirteen fieldpieces, "with powder and stones in carts," followed
by the banners of the City, the musketeers, "five in a rank, every rank
five foot from another, and every shoulder even with his fellows; "and
next them the archers, five in a rank also, "and between every man his
bow's length."
After the archers came "the pikemen," and then "the billmen"; the five
companies with their officers on horseback, their colours, and their
separate bands.
The other divisions were preceded by an equal number of cannon. At the
rear of the second, the banner of St. George was carried, and the banner
of the Prince of Wales. Behind these, "at a convenient distance," the
sword-bearer of London, in white damask, "upon a goodly horse, freshly
trapped," with the sword of the City, "the scabbard whereof was set full
of orient pearl." Here, too, came the splendid cavalcade of Sir William
Foreman, the lord mayor, with himself in person,--a blaze of white silk,
white satin, gold, crimson, and waving plumes,--the choice company of
the City; the retinue being composed, for their especial worth and
approved valour, of the attorneys, the barristers, their clerks, and the
clerks of the courts of law, with white silk over their armour, and
chains, and clasps.
The first battalion entered the City at Aldgate, before nine o'clock,
and "so passed through the streets in good order, after a warlike
fashion, till they came to Westminster." Here, in front of the palace,
the king was standing on a platform, "with the nobility." As the troops
passed by, they fired volleys of musketry; the heavy guns were
manœuvred, and "shot off very terribly;" "and so all three battles, in
the order afore rehearsed, one after another, passed through the great
Sanctuary at Westminster, and so about the park at St. James's, into a
great field before the same place, where the king, standing in his
gate-house at Westminster, might both see them that came forward and
also them that were passed before. Thence from St. James's fields the
whole army passed through Holborn, and so into Cheap, and at Leaden Hall
severed and departed: and the last alderman came into Cheap about five
of the clock; so that from nine of the clock in the forenoon till five
at afternoon this muster was not ended."
"To see how full of lords, ladies, and gentlemen," continues the
authority, "the windows in every street were, and how the streets of the
City were replenished with people, many men would have thought that they
that had mustered had rather been strangers than citizens, considering
that the streets everywhere were full of people; which was to strangers
a great marvel.
"Whatsoever was done, and whatsoever pains was taken, all was to the
citizens a great gladness; as to them also which with heart and mind
would serve their sovereign lord King Henry the Eighth, whose High
Majesty, with his noble infant Prince Edward, they daily pray unto God
Almighty long to preserve in health, honour, and prosperity."[432]