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A29737 A chronicle of the Kings of England, from the time of the Romans goverment [sic] unto the raigne of our soveraigne lord, King Charles containing all passages of state or church, with all other observations proper for a chronicle / faithfully collected out of authours ancient and moderne, & digested into a new method ; by Sr. R. Baker, Knight. Baker, Richard, Sir, 1568-1645. 1643 (1643) Wing B501; ESTC R4846 871,115 630

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●●●●ved by famine he so dyed In the meane time Sir Iohn Oldcastle wrote his Beliefe and presented it himselfe to the King which the King would in no wise receive but suffered him in his presence and Privy chamber to be summoned who appearing before the Archbishop after divers examinations he was condemned of Heresie and committed to the Tower of London from whence shortly after he escaped and got into Wales The king by his Proclamation promised a thousand Marks to any that should bring him in but so much was his doctrine generally favoured that the kings offer was not much regarded but he continued foure yeares after undiscovered At last he was taken in the borders of Wales within a Lordship belonging to the Lord Powes who brought him to London before the Duke of Bedford Regent of the Realme where in the end he was condemned and finally was drawn from the Tower to S. Giles field and there hanged in a chaine by the middle and after consumed with fire the gallowes and all At the time of his first conviction foure yeares before it was rumour'd that twenty thousand men in armes were assembled in S. Giles field whereupon the king at midnight himselfe in person went thither where he found many indeed who upon examination confessed that they came to meet their Captaine Sir Iohn Oldcastle but without any intent against the king yet was Sir Roger Acto● and eight and twenty others of them apprehended and executed in Smithfield and all the Prisons in and about London were filled with them In his third yeare the order of Church service throughout England was changed from the use of Pauls to the use of S●lisbury to the great disliking of many in those dayes In his fourth yeare a Councell was holden at Constance whither he sent Ambassadors the Earle of Warwick the Bishops of Salisbury Bath and Hereford the Abbot of Westminster and the Prior of Worcester In which Councell it was decreed that England should have the title of the English Nation and should be accounted one of the five principall Nations in ranke before Spaine which often before had been moved but never granted till then And herein were all Wickliffs positions condemned also Iohn Husse and Hierome of Prague notwithstanding the Emperours safe-conduct were both of them burned In this Councell the Schisme of Anti-popes which had continued the space of nine and twenty yeares was reformed ●e●edict the 13. had been elected by the Spaniard Gregory the 1● by the French Iohn the 24. by the Italians And now in this Councell begun in February 1414 and continued above three yea●es wherein were assembled besides the Emperour the Pope and the Palsgrave of R●●ime foure Patriarks twenty seven Cardinals seven and forty Archbishops one hundred and threescore Bishop● Princes and Barons with their attendants above thirty thousand The foresaid elected Popes were all put down or else resigned and in the place as legitimate Pope was elected Otho Lolo●na by the name of Marti● the fifth In this yeare also fell out an Accident which shews the strict observance of Ecclesiasticall censures in those dayes The wives of the Lord Strange and Sir Iohn Trussell of War●ington in Cheshire striving for place at a Sermon in S. Dunst●●s Church in the East their husbands being present fell themselves to striving in their wives behalf● and great part-taking there was on both sides some slaine and many wounded The delinquents were committed to the Counter the Church suspended and upon examination the Lord Strange being found guilty was by the Archbishop of Canterbury adjudged to this Penance which was accordingly performed The Parson of S. Dunst●●s went before after whom followed all the Lords servants in their shirts after them went the Lord himselfe bare-headed with a waxe taper in his hand then followed the Lady bare-footed and then last came the Archdeacon Reynold R●●●ood in which order they went from Pauls where the sentence was given to S. Dunst●●s Church where at the rehallowing thereof the Lady filled all the Vessels with water and according to the sentence offered to the Altaran ornament of the value of ten pounds and the Lord a Pixe of silver of five pounds A Penance no doubt which the Lord and the Lady would have redemed with a great deale of money if the discipline of the Church had in those dayes allowed it but it seemes the commutation of Penance was not as yet come in use In his ninth yeare in a Parliament at Leicester a hundred and ten Priories alient were suppressed because they spoke ill of his Conquests in France and their possessions were given to the King but by him and King Henry the sixth were afterward given to other Monasteries and Colledges o● learned men Works of Piety by him or others in his time THis King re-edified his Royall Manour which was then called Sheene now Richmond and founded two Monasteries not farre from it the one of Carthusians which he named Bethelem the other of Religious men and women of the Order of S. Bridget which he named Syon He also founded the Brotherhood of Saint Giles without Cripplegate in London In the second yeare of his Reigne Mooregate neere to Colemanstreet was first made by Thomas Fawkener Major of London who caused also the ditches of the City to be cleansed and a common Privy that was on the Moore without the wall to be taken downe and another to be made within the City upon Wallbrooke into the which brooke he caused the water of the City to be turned by grates of iron in divers places In his sixth yeare William of Sevenoak Major of London founded in the Town of Sevenoak a Free schoole and thirteen Almshouses This man was found at Sevenoak in Kent anew-borne infant of unknown Parents but by charitable people was Christned and brought up bound prentise in London and came at last to be Major of the City Also Robert Chic●ely Major of London gave liberally to the Almshouses founded by his brother Henry Chiche●●y Archbishop of Canterbury at Higham-Ferrers in Northamptonshire where they were born But Henry Chicheley the Archbishop founded two Colledges in Oxford one called Bernard Colledge renewed by Sir Thomas White and named S. Iohns Colledge the other called All-Soules which continueth at this day as he left it Also Iohn Kempe Archbishop of Canterbur● converted the Parish-Church of Wye in Kent where he was borne into a Colledge of Secular Priests Casualties happening in his time IN the fift yeere of his Reigne a great part of the City of Norwich was burnt with all the house of the Friers Preachers and two fryers of that Order In his third yeere on the feast of the Purification seaven Dolphins came up the River of Th●mes whereof foure were taken Of his Wife and issue HE married Catherine the daughter of king Charles the sixth of France who was his Queene two yeeres and about three moneths married at Troyes in Champaigne the third day of June 1420. and afterward
whom if the King would be pleased to commit toward till his legall tryall might be had in Parliament he would then not onely dismisse his army but come unto his presence as a loyall subject Hereupon the Duke of Somerset is committed to prison The Duke of Yorke dismisseth his army and commeth in person to the King in whose presence contrary to his expectation he found the Duke of Somerset which so moved him that he could not hold but presently charged him with Treason which the Duke of Somerset not onely denieth but 〈◊〉 a●re the Duke of Yorke to have conspired ●he kings death and the usu●pation of the Crown whereupon the king removeth to London the Duke o● Yorke as a prisoner ryding before him and the Duke of Somerset at liberty which was not a little mervailed at by many And now the king calleth a Councell at Westminster where the two Dukes are earnest in accusing each other but while the Counsell are debating of the matter there comes a flash of lightning out of France which diverted them for the Earl of Kendall and the L' Espar c●me Embassadours from Burdeaux offering their obedience to the Crown of England if they might but be assured to be defended by it but withall at the same time there came a report that Edward Earle of March sonne and heire to the Duke of Yorke with a great power was marching towards London Here was matter for a double consultation and for this latter it was resolved on that the Duke of York should in the presence of the king and his Nobility at the high Altar in Paul● take his Oath of submission and Allegiance to king Henry which he accordingly did and then had liberty to depart to his Castle of Wigmore And for the former the Earle of Shrewsbury with about three thousand men was sent into Gascoigne who ariving in the Isle of Madre passed forth with his power and took Fro●sack and other pieces but having received in the night instructions from Burdeaux of certaine conspiratours he makes all the speed he can thither and was entred the Town before the French had notice of his comming so that many of them were slaine by the Lord L' Espar in their beds Shortly after there arrived the Earle of Shrewsbury's sonne Sir Ioh● Talbot with the bastard of Somerset and two and twenty hundred men by whose means Burdeaux is well manned with English in which time the Earle was not idle but went from place to place to receive the offered submission of all places where he came and having taken Chatillo● he strongly fortified it whereupon the Fre●ch king raiseth an army and besiegeth Chatillon to the rescue whereof the Earle maketh all possible speed with eight hundred horse appointing the Earle of Kendall and the Lord L' Espar to follow with the foot In his way he surprized a Tower the French had taken and put all within it to the sword and meeting five hundred French men that had been forraging many of them he slew and the rest he chased to their Campe. Upon whose approach the French left the siege and retyred to a place which they had formerly fortified whither the Earle followeth them and resolutely chargeth them so home that he got the entry of the Campe where being shot through the thigh with an Harquebuse and his horse slaine under him his sonne desirous to relieve his father lost his own life and therein was accompanied with his bastard brother Henry Talbot Sir Edward Hall and thirty other Gentlemen of name The Lord Nolius with threesco●● other were taken prisoners the rest fled to Burdeaux but in the way a thousand of them were slaine And thus on the last day of July in the yeer 1453. at Chatillo● the most valourous Earle of Shrewsbury the first of that name after foure and twenty yeers service beyond the seas ended his life and was buried at Roa● in Normandie with this Inscription upon his Tombe Here lyeth the right Noble knight Iohn Talbot Earle of Shrewsbury Weshford Waterford and Valence Lord Talbot of Goodrich and Orchenfield Lord Strange of Blackmere Lord Verdon of Acto● Lord Cromwell of Winkfield Lord Lovet●ft of Worsoppe Lord Furnivall of Sh●ffield knight of the Noble Orders of St. George St. Michael and the golden fleece great Marshall to King Henry the sixth of his Realme of France The Earle of Kendall the Lords Montserat Rosaine and D●●gledas entred the Castle of Chatillon and made it good against the French the space of ten dayes but then having no hope of succour they delivered it upon composition to have liberty to depart to Burdeaux and now the Gascoig●●s were as ready to open their gates to the French as they were before to the English by means whereof in short time the French recovered againe all Gascoig●e except Burdeaux and that also at length upon condition that both garrisons and inhabitants with all their substance might safely depart for England or Callice and that the Lords L' Espar and Durant with thirty others upon paine of death should never after be found in the Territories of France At this time upon St. Bartholomews day an ancient custome being that the Major of London and the Sheriffs should be present in giving prizes to the best wrestlers It h●ppened that at the wrestling place neere Moore-fields the Prior of S. Iohns was there to see the sports when a servant of his not brooking the disgrace to be foyled before his Master against the custome of the place would have wrestled againe which the Major denyed whereupon the Prior fetcht Bowmen from Clark●●●ell to resist the Major and some slaughter was committed the Majors Cap was shot through with an Arrow he neverthelesse would have had the spo●t goe on bu● no wrestlers came yet the Major Sr. Iohn Norman told his brethren he would stay awhile to make tryall of the Citizens respect towards him which he had no sooner said but the Citizens with Banners displayed came in great numbers to him and fetcht him home in great triumph Upon the neck of this began the quarrell in Holborne between the Gentlemen of the Inns of Chancery and some Citizens in appeasing whereof the Queens Atturney and three more were slaine And now the Duke of Yorke by all means laboureth to stirre up the hatred of the Commons against the Duke of Somerset repeating often what dishonour England sustained by Somersets giving up the strong Towns of Normandy and how he abuseth the Kings and Queens favour to his own gaine and the Commons grievance then he addresseth himselfe to those of the Nobility that could not well brook his too much commanding over the Kings and Queens affection amongst others he fasteneth upon the two Nevils both Richards the father and the sonne the one Earle of Salisbury the other of Warwick with whom he deales so effectually that an indissoluble knot of friendship is knit betwixt them by whose assistance the King lying dangerously sick at Claringdon the
wrote certaine Rules of Grammar and other things printed by Richard Pinson Robert Fabian a Sheriffe of London and an Historiographer Edmund Dudley the same man whom king Henry used to take the forfeitures of Penall Statu●es who wrote a Booke intituled Arbor Re●-publicae Iohn Bockingham an excellent Schoole-man and William Blackeney a Carmelite Frier a Doctor of Divinity and a Necromancer THE REIGNE OF KING HENRY THE EIGHT KING Henry the seventh being deceased his only sonne Prince Henry Heire by his Father of the house of Lancaster and by his Mother of the house of Yorke by unquestionable right succeeded in the Crowne at the Age of eighteene yeers on the two and twentieth of Aprill in the yeere 1509. who having been trained up in the study of good letters all his Fathers time● he Governed at first as a man newly come from Contemplation to Action as it were by the Booke● in so regular and fair a man●er that as of Neroes Goverment there was said to be Quinquennium Neronis so of this Kings there might as justly be said Decennium Henrici and perhaps double so long a time comparable with so much time of any Kings Reigne that had been before him How he came to alter and to alter to such a degree of change as he did we shall then have a fit place to shew when we come to the time of his alteration King Henry having learned by Bookes that the weight of a Kingdome is too heavy to lie upon one mans shoulders if it be not supported by able Councellours made it his first care to make choice of an able Councell to which he called VVilliam VVarham Archbishop of Canterbury and Chancellour of England Richard Fox Bishop of VVinchester Thomas Howard Earle of Surry and Treasurer of England George Talbot Earle of Shrewsbury and Lord Steward of his Houshold Charles Summerset Lord Chamberlaine Sir Lovell● Sir Henry VVyat Doctor Thomas Ruthall and Sir Edward Poynings by advise of these Councellours his first Act after the care of his Fathers Funerall was the care to performe his Fathers Will in marrying the Lady Katherine of Spaine the Relict of his Brother Prince Arthur to which perhaps but in respect of filiall pierie he had not the greatest devotion and for relinquishing whereof he might no doubt more easily have obtained a Despensation from the Pope then his Father had done for getting it to be allowed but obsequiousnesse to his Fathers desire and respect to his Councels advice so far prevailed with him that he would not be Crowned till that were performed that one Coronation might serve them both and so on the third day of Iune following he married the said Lady at the Bishop of Salisburies house in Fleetstreet where of many great solemnities I will remember but this one that though the Bride were a Widdow yet to shew she was a Virgin Widdow she was attired all in white and had the haire of her head hanging-downe behinde at the full length and then having made in the Tower four and twenty Knights of the Bath two dayes after being Midsomer day he was Crowned at Westminster together with his Queene by the hands of VVilliam VVarham Archbishop of Canterbury with all Circumstances of State in such cases usuall and then all the Nobility Spirituall and Temporall did him Homage and the people being asked whether they would receive him for their King they all with one voice cryed yea yea This done his next Act was another part of performing his fathers Will which was to proclaime Pardons for all offences Treason Murder and Felonie only excepted and to have restitution made of all goods unjustly taken from any and because the Instruments of such injustice are alwayes most odious and nothing gives the people so much contentment as to see their Persecutours punished he therefore caused Empson and Dudley the two chiefe Actours of the late unjust proceedings to be committed to the Tower and divers of their inferiour Agents called Promoters as Canby Page Smith Derby Wright Simpson and Stockton to be set on the Pillory in Cornhill with papers on their heads and then to ride through the City with their faces to the horse tailes with the shame whereof within seven dayes after they all died in Newgate Shortly after a Parliament was called whereof Sir Thomas Ingleby was chosen Speaker and therein Empson and Dudley were attainted of High Treason and after arraigned Edmund Dudley in the Guildhall on the seventeenth of Iuly and Sir Richard Empson at Northampton in October following and on the seventeenth of August the yeere following they were both of them beheaded on the Tower Hill and their Bodies and Heads buried the one at the White Fryers the other at the Black On Midsomer Eave at night King Henry came privily into VVestchester cloathed in one of the Coats of his Guard to behold the same and this first yeer King Henry spent in Justs and Maskes which were almost perpetuall performed with great Magnificence alwayes and sometimes with great Acts of Valour on the Kings part specially In February the same yeer Embassadours came from the Kings Father in law the King of Aragon requiring Ayde against the Moores in which service the Lord Thomas Darcy a Knight of the Garter making suite to be imployd he was sent thither and with him the Lord Anthony Gray brother to the Marquesse Dorset Henry Guilford Wolstan Browne and William Sidney Esquires of the Kings House Sir Constable● Sir Roger Hastings Sir Ralph Elderton and others who on the Mund●y in the Rogation Weeke departed out of Plimot● Haven with four ships Royall and on the first of Iune arrived at the Port of Cadis in south Spaine of whose comming the King of Aragon hearing● sent to bid them welcome but advertising them withall that he had now by reason of new troubles with France taken truce with the Moores and therefore they might returne againe into their owne Country to whom yet he allowed wages for all his souldiers W●ereupon the Lord Darcy and all his men went aboord their ships but Henry Guilford Wol●tan Br●wne and William Sidney desirous to see the Court of Spaine went thither and were honourably entertained Henry Guilford and Wolstan Browne were made Knights by the King who gave to Sir Henry Guil●ord a Canton of Granado and to Sir Wolstan Browne an Eagle of Sicily on a Chiefe to the augmentation of their Armes William Sidney so excused himselfe that he was not made Knight After this they returned to their ships and their ships into England During the time that the Lord Darcy was in Spain the Lady Margaret Dutchesse of Sa●oy Daughter unto Maximilian the Emperour and Governesse of Flande●s and other the Low-countryes pertaining to Charles the young Prince of Ca●tile sent to King Henry for fifteen hundred Archers to aid her against the Duke of Gelders which the King granted and thereupon Sir Edward Poynings Knight of the Garter and Comptroller of the Kings House appointed to goe
please them both The Recorder set forth the complaint of the Lords against the Protectour in such sort that he made many inclinable to favour that side but one named George Stadlow better advised stept up and in a long Speech shewed what mischiefes had come to the City by opposing the King and therefore gave his opinion to suspend giving aide to the Lords at lest for a time His advice was harkened to and thereupon the Court resolved onely to arme a hundred Horsemen and foure hundred foot in defence of the City and to the letters returned submissive but dilatory answers After some other passages betweene the Protectour and the Lords Sir Edward Winkfield Captaine of the Guard was sent from the Lords to Windsor who so well perswaded the King of the Lords loyall affection towards him and of their moderate intention towards the Protectour that the King was contented to have him presently remvoed from him and suffered him within two dayes after to be carried to the Tower In whose absence seven Lords of the Councell and foure Knights were appointed by turnes to attend the Kings person and for affaires of State the government of them was referred to the whole body of the Councell soone after were sent to the Protectour in the Tower certain Lords of the Councell with Articles against him requiring his present Answer whether he would acknowledge them to be true or else stand upon his justifica●ion The chiefe Article was this That he tooke upon him the Office of Protectour with expresse condition that he should doe nothing in the Kings affaires but by assent of the late Kings Executours or the grea●est part of them and that contrary to this condition he had hindered Justice and subverted laws of his owne authority as well by letters as by other command and many other Articles but all much to this purpose The Protectour whether thinking to speed better by submission then by contesting or perhaps finding himselfe not altogether innocent for indeed in so great a place who can beare himselfe with such sincerity but he will commit errours with which he may be taxed subscribed an acknowledgement with his owne hand humbly submitting himselfe to the Kings mercy and desiring their Lordships favour ●owards him Upon this submission three moneths after he had bin imprisoned he was released entertained and feasted by the King and swor●e again to be a Privie Councellour but no more Protectour at which time betweene him and the Lords a shew at lest of perfect amity was made and to make it the more firme the Dukes daughter was afterward married to the Lord Lisle Sonne and heire to the Earle of Warwicke at which marriage the King himselfe was present and perhaps to honour their reconcilement and this marri●ge the Earle of Warwicke was made Lord Admirall of England Sir Iohn Russell Lord Privie Seale was created Earle of Bedford the Lord Saint-Iohn was created Earle of Wiltshire and soone after made Lord Treasurour Sir William Paget Controlour of the Kings House was made Lord Paget Sir Anthony VVinkfield Captaine of the Guard was made Controlour and Sir Thomas Darcye was made Captaine of the Guard But of the other side the Earle of Arundell the Earle of Southampton were put off from the Councell of whom the Earle of Southampton dyed shortly after at Lincolne-Place in Holborne and was buried in Saint Andrewes Church there About this time a Parliament was held at Westminster wherein one Act was made against spreading of Prophesies another against unlawfull Assemblies but for feare of new tumults the Parliament was untimely Dissolved and Gentlemen were commanded to retyre to their Count●ey-habitations and ●or the same cause also Trinity Terme did not hold About this time also Pope Paul the third dyed after whose death the Cardinals being divided about the election of a new Pope the Imperial part which was the greatest gave their voyces for Cardinall Poole which being told him ●e disabled himselfe and wished them to choose one that might be most for the glory of God and good of the Church upon ●his stop some that were no friends to Poole and perhaps looked for the place themselves if he were put off laid m●ny things to his charge amongst other that he was no● withou● suspition of Lutharisme as having bin very conversant with Immanuell Tremellius and Anthonius Flaminius great Lutherans and not altogether without blemish of incontinency there being a young Nunne that was thought to be his daughter But of these criminations Poole so cleered himselfe that he was afterward more importuned to take the place then he was before and thereupon one night the Cardinals came unto him being in bed and sent him word they came to adore him which is one special kind of electing the Pope but he being awaked out of his sleepe and acquainted with it made answer that this was not a worke of darkenesse and therefore required them to forbeare till the next day and then to doe as God should put in their mindes But the Italian Cardinals attributing this putting off to a kinde of stupidity and sloth in Poole looked no more after him but the next day chose Cardinall Montanus Pope who was afterward named Iulius the third And now the King of France upon many just considerations was growne desirous to have a Peace with England and thereupon sent one Guidol●i a Florentine in●o England to make some overture of his desire to the Lords of the Councell who addressing himselfe to the Earle of Warwicke whom he knew to be most prevalent so prevailed that it was concluded foure Embassadours should be sent from the King of England into Franee● and foure from the French King to treat with them The Commissioners for the English were Iohn Earl of Bedford William Lord Paget Sir William Peter and Sir Iohn Mason Secretaries of State For the French were Monsieur Rochpot Monsieur Chatillon Guyllart de Martyer and Rochetelle de Dassie much time was spent to agree about a place of meeting till at last the English to satisfie the French were contented it should be before Bulloigne where were many meetings and m●ny diff●rences about conditions but in conclusion a Peace was concluded upon certaine Articles the chiefe whereof was that Bulloigne and the places adjacent should be delivered up to the French within six weekes after the Peace Proclaimed and that the French should pay for the same two hundred thousand crownes within three dayes after delivery of the Towne and other two hu●dred thousand crowes upon the fifth day of August following hostages were on both sides given for performance and to those Articles the French King was sworne at Amyens and the King of England in London the Lord Clinton who had been Deputy of Bulloigne was made Lord Admirall of England Presently after this Agreement the Duke of Brunswicke sent to the King of England to offer his service in the Kings wars with ten thousand men and to intreat a marriage with the Lady
her inclination being grown so apparent that there was no concealing it she sent Lydington to Queen Elizabeth desiring her consent But she through the suggestions of the Earl of Murray being induced to believe that the Queen of Scots intention was by this Marriage to get the Crown of England and to bring in Popery entred into consultation with her Privy Councell what was fit to be done to hinder the Marriage who all concluded that these were the best wayes First To have a Company of Souldi●rs levyed for terrour ●ake about the Borders towards Scotland then to commit to prison the Countesse of Lenox the Lord Darlies Mother and to recall from Scotland the Earl of Lenox and his ●on Darly upon pain of the losse of all their goods in England then that the Scots who were known to be averse from the Marriage should be relieved and assisted and lastly That Katherine Grey with the Earl of Hertford should be received into some grace about whom onely it was thought the Queen of Scots was most solicitous as being her Rivall to the English Crown Hereupon Sir Nicholas Throgmorton was sent to the Queen of Scots to counsell her in the Queens name not to proceed in this Marriage and to shew her the many inconveniences that would accrew unto her by it But she returned answer That the matter was too far passed to be recalled and that Queen Elizabeth had no cause to be displeased with i● seeing herein she followed her advice Not to match with ● stranger but with an English man born Queen Elizabeth being informed of her answer calleth home the Earl of Lenox and the Lord D●rly his son commanding them upon their Allegiance to return The Father modestly by Letters excu●eth himself the son humbly intrea●eth her not to be a hinderance to his preferment which he vows to employ in her Majesties Service to the uttermost of his power And now to make him the fitter match for her the Queen of Scots honoured him first with Knighthood then with the Dignities of the Lord Armanack Earl of Rosse and Duke of Rothsay which Dukedom by Bir●h pertaineth to the eldest sons of the Kings of Scotland After this when he had not been above five months in Scotland she marryed him and with the consent of most of the Peers declared him King At this the Earl of M●rray and other whom he drew to his pa●ty extremely fretted and fell to moving of turbulent questions Whether it were lawfull to admit a Papist King Whether the Queen of Scots might choose a husband at her own pleasure and whether the Peers of the Kingdom might not out of their Authority impose one upon her But howsoever they raised Arms and had disturbed the Nuptialls but that the Queen levyed an Army to encounter them with which she pursued them so closely that they were fain to fly into Engl●●d for protection where Queen Elizabeth made no ●cruple to receive them seeing the Queen of Scots had received Yareby Sta●don and Walsh that were fled out of England but the Ea●l of Murray especially who had alwayes been found addicted to the English Queen Elizabeth perhaps was not much troubled at this Marriage partly as knowing the milde disposition of the Lord Darly and how little accesse of strength it brought ●o ●he Queen of Scots but most of all 〈◊〉 plain●y ●eeing ●here wo●ld ●●ouble● 〈◊〉 in Scotland upon it and the troubles of Scotland would be the q●i●tnes●e of England which as a good Mother of her Co●●●rey was the ●ark she aymed at yet she made ● shew of being offended with it but rather to co●ceal her aym then that ●he was offended with it indeed At this time the Emperour Maximlian sent to Queen Elizabeth his Embassadour Adam Smiricote renewing the former sute for his brother Charles of Austria for which Marriage the Earl of Sussex was very earnest the Earl of Leicester as much against it so as it grew to a quarrell between them and the Court was divided into factions about it but the Queen who never liked the dissentions of her Peers though it be a Rule with some Divide and Raign made them friends at least in countenance We may now leave Scotland a while and see the Honour done at this time to Queen Elizabeth not much inferiour to the Honour done to Solomon by the Queen of Saba for now Cecile the sister of Errick King of Sweden and wife of Christopher Marquesse of Baden being great with childe came from the farthest part of the North a long Journey thorow Germany of purpose to see her for the great fame she had heard of her Wisedom At her being here she was delivered of a childe to whom in requitall of her kindenesse Queen Elizabeth was God-mother and named him Edward●s Fortunatus giving to her and her husband besides Royall Entertainment a yeerly Pension At this time also for the great Fame of her wisedome Donald mac Carty More a great Potentate of Ireland came and delivered up into her hands all his most ample Territories and then receiving them again from her to hold them to him and his Heirs males lawfully begotten and for want of such Issue to remain to the Crown of England The Queen in requitall invested him with the honour of Earl of Glenkarne and Baron of Valence and besides many Presents given him paid the charges of his Journey It was now the eighth yeer of Queen Elizabeths Raign when Sir Nicholas Arnold a Knight of Gloucestershire Governing Ireland under the title of a Justice was called home and Sir Henry Sidney placed in ●his room And here by the way it is to be noted That the Governours of Ireland after it came under the English were at first called Justices of Ireland afterwards Lievtenants and their Vice-gerents were called Deputies Afterwards at the Princes pleasure sometimes Deputies sometimes Justices and sometimes Lievtenants which last Title though it be of greatest honour yet in power is in a manner but the same Si● Henry Sidney at his coming into Ireland found the Province of Munster in much disorder● by reason of strife between Gyrald Earl of Desmond and Thomas Earl of Ormond whereupon the Queen sending for the Earl of Desmond into England ordained a new Government in that Province appointing a President to administer Justice together with an Assistant on the Bench two Lawyers and a Notary and the first President she made in this place was Sir William Sent-leger And now Queen Elizabeth in a Progresse went to Oxford where she took pleasure in viewing the Colledges in hearing Orations in seeing of Comedies till the Comedy of Palemon and Arcett turned to a Tragedy for by the fall of a wall through the multitude of people that pressed in to see it three men were slain At her coming away she made an Oration in Latine to the Schollars a sufficient recompence for all the Orations they had made to her And this yeer was a call of seven new Serjeants at Law who
her self with all her Forces to compell them While Wilkes in Spain unfoldeth the●e matters Iohn of Austria sendeth to Queen Elizabeth in most grievous manner accusing the States for disobedience and making a large declaration of the causes for which he had taken up Armes again Thus Queen Elizabeth like a fortunate Princesse sate as an Honourable Arbitresse between the Spanish the French and the States insomuch that it was not untrue which one wrote That France and Spaine were Ballances in the Scale of Europe and England the Beame to turne them either way for they still got the better to whome she adhered About this time when the Judges sate at the Assizes in Oxford and one ●owland I●nkes a Book-seller was questioned for speaking approbrious words against the Queen suddenly they were surprised with a pestilent favour whether rising from the noysome smell of the prisoners or from the dampe of the ground is uncertaine but all that were there present almost every one within forty hours died except Women and children and the Contagion went no further There died Robert Bell Lord chief Baron Robert D'Oylie Sir William Babington D'Olye Sheriffe of Oxford-shire Harcourt Weynman Phetiplace the most noted men in this Tract Barham the famous Lawyer almost all the Jurours and three hundred other more or lesse This yeer the title of the Lord Latimer which had flourished in the Familie of the Nevills ever since the dayes of King Henry the sixth was extinct in Iohn Nevill who died without issue male and left a faire estate to four daughters whereof the eldest marryed Henry Earl of Northumberland the second Thomas Cecill who was afterward Earl of Exceter the third Sir William Cornwallis and the fourth Sir Iohn Daverse In Ireland the O-Moores and O-Conors and others whose Ancestours the Earl of Sussex in Queen Maries dayes had for their rebellion deprived of their Patrimonie in Loyse and Oph●li● did now break forth into a new Rebellion under the conduct of Rori● Oge that is Roderick the younger set on fire the village of Naasse assault L●chlin from whence being driven back by the valour of George Care● the Governour he was afterward slain Out of England at this time there went into the Low-countries Iohn North the Lord Norths eldest sonne● Iohn Norris second son to the Lord Norris Henry Cavendish and Thomas Morgan Colonells with many voluntaries to learn Militarie experience Thither also came Caesamire the Elector Palatines sonne with an Army of German Horse and foot at the Queenes charges upon the●e Don Iohn assisted by the Prince of Parma Mondragon and other the best Commanders of Spain confident of victorie flyeth furiously before they expected him yet after a long fight was forced to retreat but then turning again and thinking to breake through the Hedges and Brakes where the English and Scottish voluntaryes had placed themselves was again repulsed for the English and Scottish were so hot upon the matter that casting away their garments by reason of the hot weather they fought in their shirts which they made fast about them In this battell N●●●●● fought most valiantly and had three horses s●ain under him as also 〈◊〉 the Scot Bingham and William M●r●ham Now for comfort ●o the afflicted Provinces there came at that ●●me into the Netherlands the Count Sw●●zenberg from the Emperour M●nsie●● Be●●●●●re from the French King and from the Queen of England the Lord Cobham and Wal●ingham with Commission to procure conditions of Peace but returned without doing any thing for that Don Iohn refused to admit the Pro●estan● Religion and the Prince of Orange refused to return into Holland About this time Egr●m●●d R●●cliffe son to Henry Earl of Susse● by his second wife who had been a prime man in the rebellion of the North and served now under Don Iohn was accused by the English fugitives that he was sent under hand to kill Don Iohn which whether true or false he was thereupon taken and put to death The Spaniards have affirmed That Ratcliffe at his last end confessed voluntarily That he was freed out of the Tower of London and moved by Walsinghams large promises to do this Fact but the English that were present at his death deny that he confessed any such thing though the English Rebells did all they could to wrest this confession from him At this very time Don Iohn in the flower of his age died of the Pestilence or as some say of grief as being neglected by the King of Spain his brother a man of an insatiable Ambition who aymed first at the Kingdom of Tunis and after of England and who without the privity of the French King or King of Spain had made a league with the Guises for the defence of both Crowns Alanson although very busie about the Belgick War yet now began again to pursue the Marriage with Queen Elizabeth for renewing of which suit first was Bachervyle sent to the Queen and soon after Ramboulet from the French King and within a month after that Simier a neat Courtier and exquisitely learned in the Art of Love accompanied with a great number of the French Nobility whom the Queen at Richmond entertained in such loving manner that Leicester began to rage as if his hopes were now quite blasted Certainly a little before when Ashley a Lady of the Queens Bed-chamber mentioned the Earl of Leicester to her for husband she with an a●gry countenance replyed Dost thou think me so unlike my self and so forgetfull of Majestie as to prefer my servant whom I my self have advanced before the greatest Princes of the Christian world But it is now time to return to the Scottish Affairs The Earl of Morton Regent of Scotland though a man of great wisedome and valour yet was now so overcome of covetousnesse that he grew universally hated and thereupon with the joynt consent of the Nobility the Administration of the Common-wealth was translated to the King though he was yet but twelve yeers old and twelve of the chief Lords were appointed to attend him in Councell three of them by course for three months amongst whom the Earl of Morton for one that they might not seem to cast him quite off The King having taken upon him the Administration sent presently the Earl of Dumformelin to Queen Elizabeth acknowledging her great deserts towards him and requesting to have the Treaty of Edinburgh agreed on in the yeer 1559 to be confirmed for the more happy restraining the robbers about the borders and withall That his ancient Patrimony in England namely the Lands granted to his Grand-father Ma●●hew Earl of Lenox and the Countesse his Grand-mother might be delivered into his hands● who was the next Heir The Queen readily promised the former demands but stuck a little at the last concerning the Patrimony For she would not grant That Arbella the daughter of Charles the King of Scots Unkle Born in England was the next Heir to the Lands in England neither would she grant the
Stowre upon the West side of the Towne Upon this bridge the like report runneth stood a stone of some heigth against which king Richard as hee passed ●owards Bosworth by chance strook his spurre and against the same stone as he was brought back hanging by the horse side his head was dashed and broken as a Wise-woman forsooth had fore-told who before his going to battell being asked of his successe said that where his spurre strooke his head should be broken But these are but Repo●●● He had lived seven and thirty yeeres Reigned two and two moneths Of men of Note in his time OF men of Note for wickednesse and villany enough have been mentioned i● the body of the Story and for men of Valour and Learning they will fitte● be placed in a better Kings Reigne THE REIGNE OF KING HENRY THE SEVENTH HENRY Earle of Richmond borne in Pembrooke-Castle sonne to Edmund Earle of Richmond by his wife Margaret sole daughter of Iohn Duke of Somerset which Iohn was sonne of Iohn Earle of Somerset sonne of Iohn of Gaunt Duke of Lancaster by his third wife Katherine Swinford and by this descent Heire of the House of Lancaster having wonne the Battell at Bosworth against King Richard is by publick acclamations saluted King of England on the 22 day of August in the yeere 1485. and this was his first Title And now to take away a Root of danger before his departure from Leicester he sent Sir Robert Willoug●by to the Castle of Sheriffehaton in the County of Yorke for Edward Plantage●et Earle of Warwick sonne and heire to George Duke of Clarence being then of the age of fifteen yeeres whom King Richard had there kept a prisoner all his time who was thence conveyed to London and shut up in the Tower to be kept in safe custodie In the same Castle also King Richard had left residing the Lady Elizabeth eldest daughter to King Edward the Fourth and her now King Henry appoints honorably attended to be brought up to London and to be delivered to the Queene her mother This done he tooke his journey towards London where at his approaching neere the City Thomas Hill the Major Thomas Brittaine and Richard Chester Sheriffs with other principall Citizens met him at Shore-ditch and in great state brought him to the Cathedrall Church of St. Paul where he offered three Standards in the one was the Image of St. George in another was a red fiery Dragon beaten upon white and greene Sarcenet in the third was painted a dun Cow upon yellow Tarterne After Prayers said he departed to the Bishops Palace and there sojourned a season And in the time of his stay here he advised with his Councell and appointed a day for solemnizing his mariage with the Lady Elizabeth before which time notwithstanding he went by water to Westminster and was there with great solemnity Anointed and Crowned King of England by the whole consent as well of the Commons as of the Nobility by the name of Henry the Seventh on the thirtieth day of October in the yeere 1485 and this was his second Title And even this was revealed to Cadwalloder last King of the Britaines seven ●u●dred ninety and seven yeeres past That his off-spring should Raigne and b●a●e Dominion in this Realme againe On the seventeenth day of November following he called his High Court of Parliament where at the first sitting two scruples appea●ed One concerning t●e Burgesses for that many had been returned Burgesses and knights of Shires who by a Parliament in king Richards time stood Attainted still and it was thought incong●uous for men to make Law●● who were themselves out-lawed For remedy whereof an Act was presently passed for their restoring and then they were admitted to sit in the House The other concerning the King himselfe who had been Attainted by king Richard but for this It was resolv●d by all the Judges in the Ch●quer Chamber that the possession of the Crowne takes away all defects yet for Honours sake all Records of hi● Attainder were taken off the File And so these scruples thus removed the Parliament b●ga● wherein were Attainted first Richard late Duke of Glocester calling himselfe Richard the Third Then his Assistants at the Battell of Bosworth Iohn late Duke of Norfolk Thomas Earle of Surrey Francis Viscount Lovell Walter Devereux late Lord Ferrers Iohn Lord Zouch Rober● Harington Richard Cha●leto●● Richar● Rat●liffe● William Ber●ley of Weley Robert Middleton Iames Haringto●●●obert Br●c●enb●●y T●omas Pilkington Wal●er Ho●ton William Catesby Roger W●ke William Sapco●e Humfry Stafford William Clerke of Wenlock Geoffry St. Germaine Richard Watkins Herauld at Armes Richard Revell Thomas Pul●er Iohn Welsh Iohn Ken●all l●te Secretary to the late king Richard Iohn Buck Andrew Rat and William Brampton of Burford But notwithstanding this Attainder divers of the persons aforesaid were afterwards not only by King Hen●y pardoned but restored also to their lands and livings As likewise he caused Proclamation to be made that whosoever would submit themselves and take Oath to be true subjects should have their Pardon whereupon many came out of Sanctuaries and other places who submitting themselves were received to mercy And now King Henry con●idering that ●aena Praemio Respublica contine●uy after Punishing for Offence● he proceeds to Rewarding for Service and first Iasper Earle of Pembrooke his Unkle he created Duke of Bedford Thomas Lord Stanley he created Earle of Darb● the Lord Chendow of Britaine his speciall friend he made Earle of Bathe Sir Giles Dauben●y was made Lord Dawbeney Sir Robert Willoughby was made Lord Brooke and Edward Stafford eldest sonne to Henry late Duke of Buckingham he restored to his Dignity and Possessions Besides in this Parliament an Act was made for se●●ing the Crowne upon the person of king Henry and the heires of his Body successively for ever And then with all speed he sent and redeemed the Marquesse Dorset and Sir Iohn Bourchier whom he had left Hostages in France for money and called home Morton Bishop of Ely and Richard Fox making Morton Archbishop of Canterbury and Fox Lord Keeper of the Privy S●ole and Bishop of Winchester Besides these he made also of his Privy Counsell Iasper Duke of Bedford Iohn Earle of Oxford Thomas Stanley Earle of Darby Iohn Bishop of Ely Sir William Stanley Lord Chamberlaine of his Houshold Sir Robert Willoughby Lord Brooke Lord Steward of his Houshold Giles Lord Dawbeny Iohn Lord Dyn●●m after made Lord Treasurer of England Sir Reginold Bray Sir Iohn Cheyny Sir Richard Guildford Sir Richard Tunstall Sir Richard Edgecombe Sir Thomas Lovell Sir Edmund P●ynings Sir Iohn Risley with some other These things thus done as well in performance of his Oath as to make his Crown sit the surer on his head on the eighteenth day of Ianuary he proceeded to the solemnizing his marriage with the Lady Elizabeth which gave him a third title And indeed this conjunction made a wreath of three so indissoluble that no age since hath
for which boldnesse I humbly intreat ●our Graces pardon The King not onely pardoned him but bestowed presently upon him the Deanery of Lincolne and soone after made him his Almoner In this state King Hen●y the eight found him with whom also he grew into such favour that he made him of his Councell and having won Tourney made him Bishop of that Citie and returning into England the Bishopricke of Lincolne falling void by the death of Doctor Smith made him Bishop of that Diocesse And thus far the story hath now brought him but soone after he was raised higher for Doctor Bambridge Archbishop of Yorke dying he was translated from Lincolne to that See and that he might not be inferiour to the Archbishop of Canter●ury he procured of the Pope to be made Cardinall and Legat a Latere and after by the King was made Lord Chancellour of England and being come to this height of dignity he so carried himselfe in Expences of Houshold in number of Retinve and in all circumstances of State that no Subject before or since hath in any degree come neere him And if we may say it he was the first Debaucher of King Henry for to the end he might have the managing of all matters himself he perswaded the King that he should not need trouble himselfe with frequenting the Councell Table as he did but take his pleasure and leave those things to his Councell whereof himselfe would alwa●es give him ●nie Information This was plausible Councell and no marvaile if it were embraced of a yong King coming from the mouth of so great a Prelate In this fifth yeer of the King the Citizens of London finding themselves grieved with the Inclosures of the common fields about Islington Hogsdon and Sh●rdich and other places adjoyning went one morning and threw downe all the Hedges and filled up all the Ditches whereat though the Kings Councell were at first offended yet the Maior and City shewed them such reaso●s that they rested satisfied and the fields were never since hedged On the nineteenth of May this yeer Pope Iulius the second sent to King Henry a Cap of Maintenance and a Sword and being angry with the King of France transferred by Authority of the Lateran Councell the title of Christianissimo from him upon King Henry which with great solemnity was published the sunday following in the Cathedrall Church of Saint Paul but this solemnity must not passe without Revelling Maskes and Justs wherein the King and the Duke of Suffolke were defendants against all commers who having the Duke of Longuevyle and the Lord of Clermont to be spect●tours spread the fame of their Chivalrie into forreigne Nations And now the great love that had been long between King Henry and the Flemings began to abate upon this occasion King Henry the seventh had concluded a match between his daughter Mary and Charles Prince of Spaine but by reason of her young yeers and for want of assurance of Joynture the match was deferred during his time but now King Henry the eight seeing his sister of convenient yeers began to call upon it and signified so much to the Councell of Flanders but they whether having other ends or out of Spanish delayes put him off with excuses and at last sent him word plainly they could doe nothing in it that yeer The King of France had soone Intelligence how much King Henry distasted these Spanish dealings and meant to make some good use of it for the ends he began to propose to himselfe which were to get the Lady Mary for himselfe and thereby procure peace with England being now old and weary of the War And for this purpose he got the new Pope Leo the tenth to be his mediatour and both of them send Embassadours to King Henry the Pope to perswade him to have peace with France the French King to treat about a Marriage with the Lady Mary upon whose Embassages King Henry partly to satisfie the Pope and partly to advance his sister did not unwillingly hearken to the motions but whilst this was in working Pryor Iohn who knew nothing of these intentions began again to play his Pra●ks and coming with his Gallyes on the coast of Sussex burnt Bhighthem-steed and took away the goods he found in the Village whereupon the Lord Admirall sent Sir Iohn Walloppe to sea with divers ships and eight hundred men who for one Village that Pryor Iohn burnt in England burnt one and twenty Villages and Townes in France to the great honour of himselfe and his countrey And now King Henry by advice of his Councell and specially of Woolsey Bishop of Lincolne concluded both the peace with France and the Marriage of his Sister the Lady Mary with the French King but yet it stuck a while upon some differences King Henry demanding Bulloigne and the King of France Tourney in conclusion these demands were waved and the principall conditions were● first concerning the Ladies Joynture that she should have two and thirty thousand Crownes of yeerly revenues if she survived the King and then concerning ths peace that the French King should pay yeerly to King Henry for five yeers one hundred thousand Crownes and the peace to continue between them during their lives and a yeer after and bound reciprocally to assist each other with ten thousand foot if the warre were by land with six thousand if by sea All things thus concluded the Lady Mary was brought to Dover by King Henry and his Queen and on the second of October taking shippi●g was conducted by the Duke of Norfolke the Marquesse Dorset the Bishop of Durham● the Earle of Surry the Lord De la ware the Lo●d Berners the Lord Monteagle Sir Maurice Berkely Sir Iohn Pechye Sir William Sands Sir Bulleyne● Sir Iohn Carre and many other Knights and Ladies but being not past halfe way over the sea their ships by tempest were dispersed and the Lady with some jeoperdy landed at Bullen where Sir Christopher Garnish was faine to stand in the water and take her in his armes and so set her on shore and there the Duke of Vendosme with a Cardinall and many other great States received her From Bullen the eight of October she came to Abbevyle where the Dolphyn received her on the morrow being Saint Dennis day she came to Saint Dennis where the marriage between the King of France and her was solem●ized though some write it had been solemnized before at Abbevyle The fifth of November she was Crowned Queene of France at which time the Dolphyn held the Crowne over her head as being too massie for her to weare and the day following she was received into Paris in most magnificent manner In honour of whose Marriage and Coronation the Dolphyn had caused a solemne Justs to be proclaimed which should be kept in Paris the seventh of November Upon report of this Proclamation in England the Duke of Suffolke the Marquesse Dorset and his four Brothers the Lord Clinton Sir Edward Ne●●ll
the sixth yeer of his reigne which was the yeer before he died he fel sick of the Measels and being well recovered of them he fell after soon into the smal Pox of them also was so well recovered that the summer following he rode a progresse with a greater magnificence then ever he had done before having in his traine no fewer then four thousand horse In Ianuary following whether procured by sinister practise or growing upon him by naturall infirmity he fell into an indisposition of body which soon after grew to a cough of the Lungs Whereupon a rumour was spread abroad by some that a Nosegay had been given him at Newyeerstide which brought him into this slow but deadly consumption by others that it was done by a Glister how ever it was he was brought at last to so great extremity that his Physicians despared of his life and when Physicians could do him no good a Gentlewoman thought to be prepared for the purpose tooke him in hand and did him hurt for with her applications his legges swelled his pulse failed his skinne changed colour and many other symptomes of approaching death appeared The hour before his death he was overheard to pray thus by himselfe O Lord God deliver me out of this miserable and wretched life O Lord thou knowest how happy it were for me to be with thee yet for thy chosens sake if it be thy will send me life and health that I ma● truly serve thee O Lord God save thy chosen people of England and defend this Realme from Papistrie and maintaine thy true Religion that I and my People may praise thy holy Name for thy Sonne Jesus Christs sake So ●urning his face and seeing some by him he said I thought you had nor been so nigh Yes said Doctor Owens we heard you speak to your selfe then said the King I was praying to God O I am faint Lord have mercy upon me and receive my spirit and in so saying gave up the Ghost the sixth day of Iuly in the yeer 1553. and in the sixteenth yeer of his Age when he had reigned six yeers five moneths and nine dayes It is noted by some that he died the same moneth and the same day of the moneth that his father King Henry the eight had put Sir Thomas Moore to death His body was buried upon the ninth of August in the Chappell of Saint Peters Church in Westminster and laid neere to the body of King Henry the seventh his grandfather At his funerall which was on the tenth of August following his sister Queen Mary shewed this respect to him that though Doctor Day a Popish Bishop preached yet all the service with a communion was in English Men of note in his time THis Kings reigne being short and having but small warres had not many sword-men famous for any acts they did Gowne men there were some as Edward Holl a Councellour in the Law who wrote a notable Cronicle of the union of the two houses of Yorke and Lancaster William Hugh a Yorkeshireman who wrote a notable Treatice called The troubled mans medicine Thomas Sternehold borne in Southampton who turned into English Meete● seven and thirty of Davids Psalmes The Interregnum betweene the death of King Edward and the proclaiming at London of Queene Mary KIng Edward being dead the Duke of Northumberland tooke upon him to sit at the Sterne and ordered all things at his pleasure so two dayes after he with others of the Councell sent to the Lord Major that he with six Aldermen and twelve principall Commons should repaire presently to the Court to whom when they came it was secretly signified that King Edward was dead and that by his last Will to which all the Nobility and Judges had given assent he had appointed the Lady Iane daughter to the Duke of Suffolke to succeede him his Letters Patents whereof were shewed them and therupon they were required to take their Oathes of Allegeance to the Lady Iane and to secure the City in her behalfe which whether dissemblingly or sincerely whether for love or fear yet they did and then departed The next day the Lady Iane in great state was brought to the Tower of London and there declared Queene and by edect with the sound of Trumpet proclaimed so through London at which time for some words seeming to be spoken against it one Gilbert Pot a Vint●ers servant was set in the Pilory and lost both his ears Before this time the Lady Mary having heard of her brothers death and of the Duke of Northumberlands designes removed from Hovesdon to her Mannour of Keninghall in Norfolke and under pretence of fearing infection having lately lost one of her houshold servants of the plague in one day she rode forty miles and from thence afterward to her Castle of Framingham in Suffolke where taking upon her the name of Queene there resorted to her the most part of all the Gentlemen both of Norfolke Suffolke offering their assistance but upon condition she would make no alteration in Religion to which she condiscended and thereupon soone after came to her the Earles of Oxford Bathe and Sussex the Lord Wentworth Thomas Wharton and Iohn Mordant Barrons eldest sonnes and of Knights Cornwallis Drury Walgrave Shelton Beningfield Ierningham Suliard Freston and many others The Lady Mary being thus assisted wrote her letters signed the ninth of Iuly to the Lords of the Councell wherein shee claimed the Crowne as of right belonging to her and required them to proclaime her Queene of England in the City of London as they tendred her displeasure To this letter of hers the Lords answered that for what they did they had good Warrant not onely by King Edwards last Will but by the Lawes of the land considering her Mothers divorce and her owne Illegitimation and therefore required her to submit her selfe to Queene Iane being now her Soveraigne This Letter was written from the Tower of London under the hands of these that follow Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury Thom●s Elye Chancellour William Marquesse of Winchester Iohn Earle of Bedford Henry Duke of Suffolke Francis Earle of Shrewsbury Iohn Duke of North●mberland William Earle of Pembrooke Thomas Lord Darcey Lord Chamberlin Cobham Rich Huntington Cheyney Iohn Gates William Peter William Ce●ill Iohn Clerke Iohn Mason Edward North and Robert Bowes The quarell on both sides being thus begun by Letters is prosecuted by Armes and the Lords for their Generall make choyce of the Duke of Suffolke as a man most likely to be firme and sure in the imployment but the Queen his daughter cannot misse his presence and besides is not willing to hazard his person and thereupon she by intreaties and the Lords by perswasions prevaile with the Duke of Northumb●rland to undertake the charge who before his going having conference with the Lords let them know how sensible he was of the double danger he under-went in this enterprize both in respect of the Lady against whom he went and
in the time of King Edward had refused to signe a writing for disinheriting the Lady Mary and the Lady Elizabeth a fact worthy at least of a kinde remembrance from the Lady Mary now Queene yet now for that at a quarter Sessions in Kent he gave charge upon the statutes of King Henry the eight and King Edward the sixth in derogation of the Primacy of the Church of Rome he was first committed to the Kings Bench then to the Counter and lastly to the Fleet where he grew so troubled in minde that he attempted with a Pen-knife to kill himselfe and being afterward recovered of that hurt and brought to the Queenes presence who gave him very comfortable words yet could never come to be quiet in his minde but in the end drowned himselfe in a River not halfe a mile from his house the River being so shallow that he was faine to lye groveling before he could dispatch him●elfe of life And now another sprinkling of mercy came from the Queene for the Marquesse of Northampton and Sir Henry Gates lately before condemned to dye were now pardoned and set at liberty The Lady Iane also was allowed the liberty of the Tower not without hope of life and liberty altogether if her father the Duke of Suffolke had not the second time been cause of her destruction About this time also a Synod was assembled for consulting about matters of Religion and the point specially of the reall presence in the Sacrament The Prolocutour was Doctor VVeston and of the Protestant side were Iohn Almer and Richard Cheyney both Bishops afterward in Queene Elizabeths time also Iohn Philpo● afterward burnt Iames Haddon and others After long disputation where reasons were not so much weighed as voyces numbred the Papall side as having most voyces carried it and thereupon was that Religion againe restored and the Masse commanded in all Churches to be celebrated after the ancient manner It was now the yeer 1553. when Queene Mary was come to the age of seven and thirty yeers and therefore high time now to thinke of marriage at least if she meant to have issue of her body but a hard ma●ter it was to finde a husband in all points ●itting for her yet three at this time in common fame at least were taken into consideration one was the Lord Courtney M●rquesse of Exceter a goodly Gentleman and of Royall blood but there was exception against him because inclining as was thought to Lutheranisme another was Cardinal ●oole of a dignity not much inferiour to Kings and by his Mother descended from Kings but there was exception against him also because foure and fifty yeers old as old a Batchelour as Queen Mary was a maid and so the lesse hope of issue betweene them but the third if he might be had was without exception and this was Phillip Prince of Spaine the Emperour Charles his eldest sonne with whom being a Spaniard she was the fitter matched as being by the Mother a Spaniard her selfe And now very oppertunely came in the beginning of Ian. Embassadors into England about it amongst others the Cou●● of Egmond Admirall of the L●w Countryes and Iohn of Memorancy Lord of Curryers whose message was so kindely entertained that the marriage in short time was absolutely concluded though it seemed something strange to many that she should now be wife to the sonne who thirty yeers before should have been wife to the father But so it is Queenes are never old so long as they are within yeers of bearing children And indeede the match was concluded with conditions of farre more advantage to Quee●e Mary then they were to King Phillip as on the fourteenth of Ianuary Stephen Gardiner Bishop of Winchester and Lord Chancelour of England openly in the Presence Chamber at Westminster declared to all the Lords and Gentlemen there present for it was agreed that after the mar●iage King Phillip should have the Title of all the Queenes Dominions and be assumed into fellowship of the government but yet with reservation to the Queene of all Priviledges and Customes of the Kingdome and free disposition of all Offices and Honours as likewise the Queene should be assumed into the fellowship of all the Kings Dominions and surviving him should have a Joynture of two hundred thousand Pounds a yeer Then for the issue betweene them if she had a Sonne that he should inherit the Low Countryes and Burgundy and King Phillips sonne Charles which he had by a former wife should inherit all his Dominions in Italie and Spaine but if his sonne Charles should fail without issue then the sonne he should have by Queene Mary should inherit his Kingdomes of Italie and Spaine also And the like good provision was also made for daughters But notwithstanding these great ●dvantage● of the ma●ch yet such was the precipitant rashnesse of some that thinking themselves wiser then the Queene and the Councel they sought by all meanes to oppose the match giving out that it ●ended to bring England under the yoke of Spaine and to make the Countrey a slave to strangers This was the generall murmuring of people but the first that shewed himselfe in Armes was Sir Thomas Wyat of Kent who having communicated the matter with the Duke of Suffolke the Lady Ianes father with Peter Caroe a Knight of Devonshire and divers others intended onely to make secret provision but not to stirre till Prince Phillip should be come that so their cause of taking armes might have the better colour On the fifteenth of Ianuary Robert Dudley sonne to the Duke of Northumberland was arraigned at the Guildhall of high Treason who confessed the indictment and had judgement given by the Earle of Sussex to be drawen hanged bowelled and quartered But now in counsels communicated to many it is a hard matter to have counsell kept and Sir Peter Caroe finding that their plot was discovered fled privily into France where lurking for a time he was afterward taken at Bruxells and brought captive into England as likewise at the same time and place Sir Iohn Cheeke King Edwards Schoolmaster was taken who being drawne by terrours to embrace the Papall Religion with very griefe afterward of his errour pined away and dyed Sir Peter Caroe lived many yeers af●er and dyed in Ireland though it be falsely recorded they were both burnt for Religion in Iune of this yeer Wyatt hearing of Sir Peter Caroes flight and that all their purpose was discovered was driven before his time to enter into armes giving out for the cause that it was not to attempt any thing against the Queene but onely to remove ill Councellours and chiefly to repell Prince Phillip least by this mariage the Kingdome should come in subjection to the Spaniard With Wyatt were joyned Sir Henry Isley Sir George Harper Anthony and William Knevet and divers other Gentlemen of the County against him were the Lord Abuegaveny Sir Thomas Cheyney Lord Warden of the Ports Sir Sobert Southwell Sheriffe of Kent Sir
Nicholas Heath Archbishop of Yorke was made Lord Chancelour And now comes the time of Archbishop Cranmers execution who the yeere before had beene condemned and degraded by Commission from the Pope after which being by the subtiltie of some put in hope of life out of frailty he subscribed to a Recantation which yet did him no good for whether it were that Cardinall Poole would no longer be kept from being Archbishop which he would not be as long as he lived or that the Queen could ●ot be gotten to forget his being the chief instrument of her Mothers di●orce his ex●cution was resolved to be the 14. of Febr. in the same place at Oxford where Ridley and Latimer five month before had bin before the execution D●ct ●●le preached who to make use of Cranmers Recantation told the people they doe well to harken to this learned mans confession who now at his death and with his death wold testifie which was the true religion never thinking that Cranmer wold ha●e denied his former Recantation but Cranmer being brought to the stake contrary to expectation acknowledged that through frailty he had subscribed it praying God hartily to forgive it and now for a punishment that hand which had done it should first suffer and therewithall thrusting his right hand into the fire he there held it till it first and then his whole body was consumed onely which was no small miracle his heart remained whole and not once touched with the fire The same yeer also no fewer then 84. of both sexes were burnt for Religion and it was a cruelty very far extended that the bones of Bucer and Ph●gi●● some time before dead and buried were taken up and publikely burnt in Cambridge No sooner was Cranmer dead but the very same day was Cardinall Poole made Archbishop of Canterbury In the fourth yeere of the Queene exemplar Justice was done upon a great person for the Lord Sturton a man much in the Queens fa●our as being an earnest Papist was for a murther committed by him arraigned and condemned and he with foure of his servants carried to Salisbury was there in the Market-place hanged having this favour to be hanged in a silken halter his servants in places neere adjoyning to the place where the Murther was committed The foure and twentieth of Aprill Thomas Stafford second son to the Lord Stafford with other to the number of two thirty persons set on by the French King attempted to raise Sedition against the Queen for marrying with King Phillip and comming out of France arrived at Scarborough in Yorkeshire where they tooke the Castle but within two dayes were driven out by the Ea●le of VVestmerland and then taken and arraigned the eight and twentieth of May Stafford was beheaded on the Tower-hill and the next day three of his associates Strelley Bradford Proctor were drawn from the Tower to Tyburne and there executed The first of May Thomas Percy was first made Knight after Lord and the next day was created Earle of Northumberland to whom the Queene gave all the Lands that had bin his Ancestours At this time the Queene intangled her selfe contrary to her promise in her husbands quarrell sent a defiance to the French King by Clarenti●● king at Armes and after on the Munday in Whitsonweeke by sound of trumpet proclaimed open warre against him in Cheapside and other places of the Citie and shortly after caused an Army of a thousand Horse and foure thousand foo● to be transported over to the aid of her husband King Phillip under the leading of the Earle of Pembrooke Captain Generall Sir Anthony Bro●ne Viscount Mountague Lievtenant Generall the Lord Gray of VVilton Lord Marshall the Earle of Rutland Generall of the Horse the Earle of Lincolne Coronel of the Foot the Lord Ro●ert Dudley Master of the Ordnance the Lord Thomas Howard the Lord De la VVare the Lord Bray the Lord Chandowes the ●or● Ambrose Dudley the Lord Henry Dudley with divers Knights and Gent●ement who joyning with King Phillips Forces they altogether ●et down before S●int Quint●ns a town of the French Kings of great importance To the res●●● whereof the French King sent an Army under the leading of the Constable 〈◊〉 France which consisted of nine hundred men at armes with as many light 〈◊〉 eight hundred Reystres two and twenty Ensignes of Lancequene●s and 〈◊〉 Ensigns of French footmen their purpose was not to give battell but to 〈◊〉 more succours into the Town which the Philippians perceiving encountred them and in the ●ight slew Iohn of Burbon Duk of Anghien the Viscount of T●●rain the Lo of Ch●denier with many gentlemen of account they took prisoners the Duk of Memorancy Constable of France the Duk of Montpensyer Duk Longuevile the Marshall of Saint Andrewes the Lord Lewis brother to the Duke of Mantova the Baron of Curton the Rhinegrave Colonell of the Almaynes Monsieur d'Obigny Monsieur de Biron and many others and then pursuing the victory under the government of the Earle of Pembrooke on the seven and twentieth of August they tooke the towne of Saint Qintyns in the assault whereof the Lord Henry Dudley yongest sonne to the Duke of Northumberland was with a peece of great Ordnance slaine and some other of account The saccage of the Town King Phillip gave to the English as by whose valour chiefly it was won The joy was not so great for this winning of Saint Qintyns but there will be greater sorrow presently for other losses Many of the Garrison of Callice had beene drawne from thence for this service of Saint Quintyns and no new supply sent which being perceived by the French King a Plot is laid how to surprize it which yet was not so secretly carried but that the Officers of Callice had intelligence thereof who thereupon signified it to the Councell of England requiring speedy succours without which against so great an Army as was raisd against them they should not be able to hold out But whether they gave no credit to their relations or whether they apprehended not the danger so imminent as indeed it was they neglected to send supplies till it was too late For the Duke of Guyse with no lesse speed then Policie tooke such a course that at one and the same time he set both upon Newnambridge and also Ricebanke the two maine Skonces for defence of the Towne and tooke them both and then fell presently to batter the Wals of the Castle it selfe and that with such violence of great Ordnance that the noyse was heard to Ant●erp● being a hundred miles of But having made the wals assaultable the English used this stratagem they laid traines of Powder to blow them up when they should offer to enter but this stratagem succeeded not for the French in passing the Ditch had so wet their cloathes that dropping upon the traine the Powder would take no fire so all things seemed to concurre against the English and thereupon the Castle was taken also
except Anthony Bishop of Landaff● as Nicholas Heath Archbishop of York Edmund Boner Bishop of London Cutbert Tunstall Bishop of Durham Thomas Thursby Bishop of Ely Gilbert Bourn Bishop of Bath and Wells Iohn Christopherson Bishop of Chichester Iohn White Bishop of Winchester Thomas Watson Bishop of Lincoln Ralph Bayne Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield Owen Oglethorp Bishop of Carlile Iames Turbervile Bishop of Exeter and David Pool Bishop of Peterborough And with these Doctor Fecknam Abbot of Westminster All which were at first committed to prison but soon after delivered to the custody of private friends excepting those two sawcie Prelates Lincoln and Winchester who threatned to excommunicate the Queen Three onely namely Cutbert Scot Bishop of Chester Richard Pate Bishop of Worcester and Thomas Goldwel Bishop of Saint Assaph changed their Religion of their own accord as also did certain Noble Personages namely Henry Lord Morley Sir Francis Englefield and Sir Robert Peckham who had been Privie-Councellours to Q. Mary Sir Thomas Shelley and Sir Iohn Gage In the seas of the Prelates removed were placed Protestant Bishops as Matthew Parker was made Archbishop of Canterbury who was consecrated by the Imposition of the hands of three that formerly had been Bishops namely William Barlow of Bath and Wells Iohn Scory of Chichester and Miles Coverdale of Exeter and being consecrated himself he afterward consecrated Edmund Grindall Bishop of London Richard Cox Bishop of Ely Edwyn Sands Bishop of Worcester Rowland Merick Bishop of Bangor Thomas Young Bishop of Saint Davyes Nicholas Bullingham Bishop of Lincoln Iohn Iewell Bishop of Salisbury Richard Davis Bishop of Saint Assaph Edward Guest Bishop of Rochester Gilbert Barkeley Bishop of Bath and Wells Thomas Bentham Bishop of Coventry and Litchfield William Alley Bishop of Exceter Iohn Parkhurst Bishop of Norwich Robert Horn Bishop of Winchester Richard Cheyney Bishop of Gloucester Edmund Scambler Bishop of Peterbo●ough William Barlow Bishop of Chichester Iohn Scory Bishop of Hereford Young Archbishop of York Iames Pilkington Bishop of Durham Iohn Best Bishop of Carlile and William Downham Bishop of Chester Whilest these things were done in England the Treaty of peace at Cambray continued still Wherein King Phillip stood for the restitution of Calice to the English as firmly as if it had been his own interest and without it would agree to no peace with France But when by Messages he understood that his suit for marriage with Queen Elizabeth was rejected and that the Protestant Religion was established in the Kingdom he then left Queen Elizabeth seeing she would not be his to her self and though he became not presently a Foe yet he became presently lesse then a Friend and forbore to do any more good offices in that businesse Queen Elizabeth thus left to her self agreed with the French King to conclude her own peace apart and thereupon Delegates on both sides were appointed to meet at Cambray For the Queen of England were Thursby Bishop of Ely the Lord Williams the Lord Howard of Effingham Chamberlain to the Queen and Doctor Wootton Dean of Canterbury and York For the King of France were Charls Cardinall of Lorrain the first Peer of France Annas Duke of Memorancy Iames Albon Lord of Saint Andrews Iohn Morvilliers Bishop of Orleance and Claude Aubespine Secretary of the Privie Councel The Commissioners meeting the chief point in difference was the restitution of Calice for which the English Commissioners● by the Q●eens appointment offered to remit two Millions of Crowns that by just accompt were due from France to England but the Queen was not more desirous to recover Calice then the French King was to hold it And thereupon at last it was concluded that Calice should remain in possession of the French fo● the term of eight yeers and those expired it should be delivered to the English upon forfeiture of five hundred thousand Crowns● for which hostages were given But all this notwithstanding though the Conditions were sealed and sworn to and though hostages were assigned to remain in England till one or other were performed yet all was frustate and came to nothing About this time Henry King of France married his daughter Isabell to Phillip King of Spain and his sister Margaret to Emmanuel Phylibert Duke of Savoy at the solemnity of which Marriages he would needs be a Tiltor himself and thereupon commended the Earl of Montgomery to run against him who unfortunately breaking his Launce upon the Kings Cuyrasse a splinter thereof his Beaver being somewhat open struck him so deep in the eye that within few dayes he ended his life After whose death Francis his son at the age of sixteen yeers succeeded him in the Crown having by the marriage of Queen Mary the Title of Scotland and upon ground thereof laying claim to the Crown of England also and giving the Arms of England as properly belonging to him And now begins the game of Faction to be play'd wherein the whole estate of Queen Elizabeth lyes at stake a game that will hold playing the most part of her Reign and if not play'd well will put her in jeoparey of losing all seeing all about her are against her Phillip King of Spain hath a quarrell to her for being rejected in his suit the King of France hath a quarrell to her in right of his wife which is now his right The Que●n of Scots hath a quarrell to her for detaining her Inheritance The Pope hath a quarrell to her for excluding his Authority The King of Sweden hath a quarrell to her for slighting his son in the way of marriage And all these being against her whom hath she of her side but onely her own Subjects Papists yesterday and to day Protestants who being scarce setled in their Religion how should they be setled in their Loyalty And not being Loyall where can she finde to cast Anchor for her safety But it is a true saying Nullum numen abest si sit prudentia Wisdom is a s●pply for all defects And indeed the Queen being very wise her self and having a wise Councell about her she passed all these difficulties though not without danger yet with little or no hazard It happened if at least it happened and were not rather plotted of purpose that a Reformation of Religion was pretended in Scotland but was indeed an incroachment upon the Princes Authority for at the preaching of Iohn Knox and other headstrong Ministers not onely Images and Altars were cast down and burnt the Monasteries of Saint Andrews of Stone of Stryveling and of Lynlithew were overthrown but it was further put into the heads of the Nobility that it pertained to them of their own Authority to take away Idolatry and by force reduce th● Prince to the prescript of Laws Whereupon there was presently a bandying of the Lords of Scotland against the Queen Dowager Regent of the Country and in this case each of them ●ought for aid The Queen Dowager had aid out of France the Lords
Steward Earle of Lenox the Kings grandfather and had denomination from Aubigny in France which title Charles the seaventh King of France had antiently conferred upon Iohn Steward of the Familie of Lenox who being constable of the Scottish Army in France vanquished the English in one battile and was slain by them in another and from that time the title belonged to the younger descent of that house This Esme Steward the King embraced with exceeding great love made him Lord Chamberlaine of Scotland and Captain of the Castle of Dumbriton and created him first Earle and then Duke of Lenox The feare from this man was because he was deuoted to the Guises and the Popish religion and that which encreased the feare from this man because he applied himselfe to Mortons adversaries and mediated to have Thomas Carre Lord of Fernishurst called home who of all men was most addicted to the Queen of Scots About this time Queen Elizabeth at the request of William Harbou●ne an Englishman procured a grant from the Turkish Emperour for the English merchants to exercise free traffick in all places of his dominions as well as Venetians Polanders and other neighbouring Nations whereupon they set up first the Companie of Turkie Merchants managing a most gainfull Trade at Constantinople Alexandoria Egypt Aleppo Cyprus and other parts of Asia bringing home Spices Perfumes unwrought Silks Tapistry Indico Corrants and the like This yeer died Sir Nicholas Bacon Lord Keeper of the Great Seal but who by vertue of an Act of Parliament alwayes exercised the Jurisdiction of Lord Chancellor a very fat man but singularly wise and a chief prop of the Queens Privy Councell In whose place succeeded Sir Thomas Bromley the Queens Solicitor with the Title of Lord Chancellor of England In Ireland at this time in the Province of Munster Iames Fitz Morris kindled a new fire of Rebellion for after his former submission upon his knees vowing all Obedience to the Queen he stole away into France and promised the French King if he would lend him assistance to make him King of Ireland But being by him slighted he went into Spain and made the like offer to the King there The King of Spain sent him to the Pope from whom by means of Nicholas Sanders an English Priest and Alan an Irishman both Doctors of Divinity he obtained a little money a Legats Authority for Sanders a consecrated Banner and Letters of Commendation to the Catholike King And returning from Spain with those Divines three Ships and a few men he landed at Smerwick Kerry a Demy Island in the West part of Ireland about the first day of Iuly where the place being first of all consecrated by the Priests he built a Fort and brought the Ships close under it but these were presently set upon and carryed away by Thomas Courtney and thereby the Spaniards deprived of their opportunity of coming thither by Sea But now Iohn and Iames brothers to the Earl of Desmond gathering together a small number of Irish joyn themselves presently with their kinsman Fitz Morris Yet the Spaniards seeing that but a very few Irish and those unarmed came unto them they began to distrust the estate they were in and to cry out That they were undone whom Fitz Morris heartened the best he could telling them that Supplyes were presently to come And going himself to get more company he passed thorow the Land of his Cosin William a Burgh who though he had been a Rebell before yet was now grown loyall so as there fell out a Skirmish between them in which Fitz Morris being strucken thorow with a Pike and shot into the head with a Leaden Bullet died in the place and most of his Company with him but withall two of William Burghs sons were in that Skirmish slain also when the Queen to comfort him for the losse of his sons adorned him with the Dignity of Baron of Castle Conell and rewarded him with a yeerly Pension besides which favours so overwhelmed him with joy that he lived but a short while after And now Sir William Drury the Deputy growing very sick appointed Sir Nicholas Malby then Governour of Connaght to be President of Munster and Generall of the Army at which time the Earl of Desmond who had all this while made a shew of Loyalty breaks openly ou● into Rebellion when now Drury the Deputy dying at Waterford and by his death Malbyes Authority ceasing Sir William Pelham is by the Counsell chosen Justice of Ireland with Authority of Vice-Roy untill such time as a Deputy were appointed and the Earl of Ormond is made President of Munster Pelham goeth into Munster and sendeth for the Earl of Desmond who refusing to come is thereupon proclaymed Traytor and an enemy to the State and this being published the Justice committed the following the War to the Earl of Ormond who slaying most of the Spaniards and adherents to Desmond compelleth him to send his wife to the Justice to beg his pardon The Lord Justice Pelham now certified that Arthur Lord Grey was landed with authority to be Deputy of Ireland at Munster delivereth the Army to George Bour●hier the son of Iohn second Earl of Bathe of that name and himself returneth to Dublin to deliver up the Province to his Successor The Lord Grey at his landing before he received the Sword hearing where the Rebells had their Randevouz marcheth towards them who presently betake themselves to Glandilough a grassie Valley and beset thick with Trees where they who dwell neer scarce know the winding out yet the Deputy taking one C●sbie an old man well acquainted with the place to be is leader entred into it where he lost divers of his men namely Peter Carew the younger George Moore Audeley and Cosbie himself th●t was his Leader A short time after there landed at Smerwick in Kerry under the command of San Ioseph an Italian about seven hundred Italian souldiers who fortifie the place and name it Fort del Or. Whereupon the Deputy sent a Trumpetter to the Fort to demand who they were what they had to do in Ireland and who sent them withall commanding them to depart immediately But they replyed That some of them were sent from his Holinesse other from the Catholike King upon whom the Pope had bestowed the Kingdome of Ireland for that Queen Elizabeth by reason of heresie hath forfeited the Right unto her and therefore what they had gotten they would maintain Upon this the Deputy prepares for Battery le ts flie his Ordnance four dayes together in which time the Spaniards once or twice make sallyes out to their own losse much but not an English-man slain but onely Iohn Cheek a couragious young Gentleman son to Sir Iohn Cheek a learned Knight And now San Ioseph who commanded the Fort a white-liver'd souldier terrified with the continuall Battery and having no hope of relief either from the King of Spain or Desmond contrary to the will of all his souldiers he set
the due Solemnity which he kindely accepted and at Evening Prayer was invested with them At this time a Parliament was assembled at Westminster wherein William Parrie a Welsh-man a Doctor of the Laws when in the Lower House a Bill was read against the Jesuites he alone stood up and exclaimed that it was a cruell and bloody Law and being asked his reason he stoutly refused unlesse he were required by the Lords of the Councell Hereupon he was sent to the Gate-house but upon submission was received into the House again Soon after he was accused by Edward Nevill for holding secret consultations about making the Queen away Who thereupon apprehended upon his examination confessed in effect thus much That out of discontent he went beyond the Sea where by the encouragement of Campegio the Popes Nuntio at Venice and grant of a plenary Indulgence from the Pope he undertook to kill the Queen but coming into England to that intent he altered his minde and disclosed to the Queen the whole matter After this he received a Letter from the Cardinall of Com● perswading him to go forward with the Enterprise and this Letter also he shewed the Queen After this he chanced to see a Book of Doctor Allens written contra Iustitiam Britannicam wherein was declared That Princes who were for heresie excommunicate might lawfully be deprived of their life and Kingdom This book wonderfully confirmed him and he read it to Nevill who though he took an oath of secrecy yet now upon a hope of the Earldom of Westmerland● betrayed him This was his confession before Baron Hunsdon Sir Christopher Hatt●n and Sir Francis Walsingham as likewise in his Letters to the Queen to the Lord Burleigh and the Earl of Leicester acknowledging his fault and craving mercy A few dayes after he was called to the Bar in Westminster-Hall where he confessed himself guilty and thereupon was condemned After the Sentence of death pronounced he furiously cited the Queen to Gods Tribunall five dayes after he was laid upon a Hurdle and dragged thorow the City to Westminster where at the Gibbet he made a vain-glorious boasting of his faithfulnesse to the Queen but not so much as in a word commended himself to God and in the great Palace at Westminster was executed as a Traytor the Nobility and Commons sitting then in Parliament In this Parliament the Association before spoken of was universally approved and enacted in this Form That four and twenty or more of the Queens Privy Councell and Peers of the Realm should be selected and authorized under the Great Seal of England To make enquiry of all such persons as shall attempt to 〈◊〉 the Kingdom or raise Rebellion or shall attempt any evill against the Queens Person f●r whomsoeve● and by whomsoever that layeth any claim to the Crown of England and that person for whom or by whom they shall ●ttempt ●ny such thing shall be altogether uncapable of the Crown and more to this purpose Laws also for the Queens safety were enacted against Jesuites and Popis● Priests and against all that shall receive or relieve them These Laws ter●ified many and particularly out of fear of them Philip Ea●l of Arundel the Duke of Norf●lks eldest son purposed with himself to travell beyond Seas● for having been once or twice cited before the Lords of the Councell and confined to his house and after six months set at liberty he ●hereupon wrot● a Letter to the Queen That for the Service of God and hi● souls health he purposed to leave his Countrey but not his loyall ●ffection towards her● but as he was taking Shipping by his own servants treachery he was discovered apprehended and laid in the Tow●r At the same time lay in the Tower Henry Percy Earl of Northumberland● a man of a lofty spirit being suspected by rea●on of secret consultation 〈◊〉 Throgmorton the Lord Paget and the Guises about the invading of Eng●●●●● and freeing of the Queen of Scots whose cause he ever highly favou●●d but in the m●neth of Iune he was found dead in his bed shot into the body with three bullets under his right pappe and the door bolted on the ●●de The Corroners Inquest examining the matter found and pronoun●●d that he had killed himselfe Three dayes after the Lords meeting in ●he Star-chamber Bromeley Lord Chancellor declared this fact of the Earls ●nd then commanded the Atturney Generall to shew the causes of his im●●●sonment and the manner of his death whereupon Popham first and then Egerton the Queens Solicitor in long Orations lay open all his Treasons and how for feare of the Law he had layd violent hands upon himselfe And now the Queen knowing that the seeds of these Treasons proceeded from the Duke of Guise and his adherents she sought for the strengthning of her selfe to enter into League with the Princes of Germany and to this end she sent Sir Thomas B●dley to the King of Denmarke to the Count Elector Palatine of the Rhine to the Duke of Saxony Wittenberg Brunswicke L●●ceburg the Marquesse of Brandenburg and the Lant grave of Hessia and into Scotland she sent Sir Edward Wootton to let the King understand how sincerely she was affected towards him and withall to draw the King if he could into a League of mutuall defence and offence and to commend to him the Match of the King of Denmarks Daughter The King was very inclinable to the matter of the League but for the present the businesse was interrupted by the death of Francis Russell Son to the Earl of Bedford slain at a meeting to compound a difference between the Borderers by a sudden tumult of the Scots but who it was that slew him was not known The English layd it upon the Earl of Arran and the Lord Fernihurst Governour of the middle Borders whereupon at the Queenes complaint the Earl of Arran was confined and Fernihurst committed to prison at Dundee where he dyed a man of great valour and resolution and one that was alwayes f●rm for the Queen of Scots But Queen Elizabeth not thus satisfied gave leave by way of connivance to the Scottish Lords that were fled into England namely the Earl of Angus the Hamiltons Iohn and Cladius the Earl of M●rre Glames and other that they should steal away into Scotland she sup●lying them with money there to master and subdue the Earl of Arran For Maxwell who was lately made Earl of Bothwell Baron Humes Coldingkn●lls and other in Scotland had already promised them their assistance even ●n the very Court Sir Patrick Grey Arrans great Rivall for the Kings favour Belenden and Secretary Maitland by Woottons craft were made against Arran These men upon their first entry into Scotland command all persons in the Kings name to ayd them for conserving the truth of the Gospell for freeing the King from corrupt Councellors and for maintaining of Amity with the English so as there presently joyned with them ●bout eight thousand men The Earle of Arran hearing hereof
makes haste to the King and accuseth Patricke Grey as author of this commotion but whiles Arran was making provision for defence of the Town the enemies were ready to scale the Walls whereupon Arran being advised that only his life was sought gets secretly away with only one servant the rest betook themselves to the King in the Castle Then the Rebels get into the Market-place and display their Banners against the Castle the King sends Grey to know the reason of their comming they answer to submit themselves and in humble manner to kisse the Kings hands the King offereth restitution of all their goods if they would depart They desire to be admitted to his Pre●ence which upon these conditions the King granted That they should not attempt any thing against his li●e or those whom he should nominate nor make any innovation in the Government They protest They are ready to sacrifice their lives for the Kings safety and of any Innovation they had not so much as a thought onely they request to have their adversaries and the Fortifications of Scotland delivered up into their hands Hereupon after a dayes Consultation they are admitted into the Kings Presence and forthwith the Earls of Mount Rosse Crawford and Rothsay Colonell Arran's brothers and others were delivered to them The Earl of Arran who was fled into the Western Islands is called home the assaulters were pardoned and pronounced good subjects Hamilton is set over Dumbriton Castle Goldingknolls over Edinburgh the Earl of Angus over Tantallon the Earl of Marre over Stelyn and Glames is made Captain of the Guard Upon this all Proscriptions and Outlaries whatsoever against all persons since the Kings Inauguration sa●ing some few proscribed for the murder of the Kings Father are called in and with an unanimous consent of all parties the Treaty of a League with the Queen of England is agreed upon and Delegates nominated to that purpose In Ireland likewise was a Combustion this yeer first the Burkes descended of the ancient Family of the Burroughs in England provoked by the severe Government of Richard Bingham Governour of Conn●ght raise Rebellion but this was soon suppressed for Thomas Burk dyed fighting M●yler and Theobald Burke were taken and hanged After this the Clan-Gibbons Clan-Donells and Ioyes combined together in great numbers and say plainly They will have a Mac-William of their own one of the Burks to rule over them or some other Lord out of Spain they will admit of no Sheriff into their Countrey nor appear before the English Courts of Justice and thereupon harryed all the Countrey with Fire and Sword and neither by the perswasions of the Arch-bishop Tuan nor by the intreaties of the Earl of Clan-ricard the chief of the House of the Burks would be quieted till Iohn Bingham the Presidents brother following them into the Woods drave away five thousand Head of their Cattell so as after forty dayes half starved they came forth and submitted themselves But this was not yet an end for now the President understood That two thousand Scottish Islanders were landed and ready to break into Connaght whereupon he Musters his men to give them Battell but they flying to Bogs and Woods he retires back as though in fear thereby to draw them from the Bogs to firm ground and then with his whole Forces set upon them slew three thousand of them indeed all but fourscore amongst whom were Donell Garmy and Alexander Garmy the sons of Iames Mac-Conell who had long disquieted this part and those Burkes who were the first authors of this Rebellion This was a famous Victory for the good of the present and future times for hereby the name of the Mac-Williams in Connaght was utterly extinct and the insolent attempts of the Scottish Islanders absolutely crushed In the Low-Countries at this time the States were very hard beset so as they held a Consultation Whether to flie for protection either to the French King or to the Queen of England Monsieur Prunie the French Ambassadour shewed many advantages and gave many reasons why they should flie rather to the French King the English on the other side alleadged many reasons why they should flie rather to the Queen of England but in conclusion they have first recourse to the King of France and afterward being by him neglected to the Queen of England But then in England it was consulted Whether it were meet to protect them wherein the Councell was divided some were of opinion That it were good to receive and aid them lest the Spaniard first conquering them might have the better way to annoy England other again thought They were to be held no better then Rebells to their lawfull Soveraign and therefore unworthy of assistance After long deb●●ing the matter the Queen refuseth to take into protection much lesse to exercise Soveraignty over them Neverthe●esse to raise the Siege of Antwerp which was then beleaguer'd by the Prince of Parma she was content to supply them with four thousand Souldiers so as the Town of Sluce and the Ordnance belonging to it were given up into their hands but while this matter was discussing● the Town of Antwerp was fain to yeeld it self But the Queen better bethinking herself partly as fearing the growth of the King of Spain's power and partly as commiserating the afflicted of her own Religion at last resolves to undertake their protection upon condition of her part to supply them with five thousand Foot and a thousand Horse under a sufficient Generall paying them during the War And afterward the expences to be payed back upon condition on their part by way of Pledge to deliver Flushing and the Fort of Ramekyn the Town of Brill with the two neighbouring Forts and for the justifying of this her action ●he set forth a large Declaration And knowing that herein she incensed the King of Spain she thought best to turn his anger further from home and thereupon sent out Sir Francis Drake and Christopher Carlile with a Navy of one and twenty Ships wherein were two thousand Voluntaries and Marriners toward the West Indies who first surprized the Town of St. ●ago afterwards St. Dominick where five and twenty thousand Crowns were given them to spare the Town from burning afterward Cartagena which they held seven weeks till the Spaniards redeemed it for a hundred and ten thousand Crowns After this the Calenture waxing hot and diminishing their Forces they returned homewards passing by Virginia a Colony which Sir Walter Raleigh had there planted from whence Drake brings hom● with him Ralph Lane who was the first that brought Tobacco into England which the Indians take against crudities of the Stomack At this Expedition were lost about seven hundred men who for the most part died of Calentures their Booty amounted to the value of threescore thous●nd pounds Sterling besides two hundred and forty Brasse and Iron Pieces These things were done under the Torrid Zone in America when in the mean while Captain Iohn
Davis with two Ships at the charges of William Sanderson and other Citizens of London found out away to the East-Indies ●y the higher part of America under the Frigid Zone At the end of this yeere the Earle of Leicester is sent Generall of the Queenes Forces into Holland accompanied with the Earle of Essex the Lords Audley and North Sir William Russell Sir Thomas Shirley Sir Arthur Basset Sir Walter Waller Sir Gervase Clifton and divers other Knights besides five hundred Gentlemen Landing at Flushing he was first by Sir Philip Sidney the Governour his Nephew and after by the Townes of Zeland and Holland entertained in most magnificent manner ●nd comming to the Hague in Ianuary the States by Patent committed to him the command and absolute authority over the united Provinces with the Titles of Governour and Captain Generall of Holland Zeland and the Confederate Provinces So as being now saluted with the Title of his Excellency he began to assume unto him Princely spirits But the Queene tooke him soone off from further aspiring Writing to him in most peremptory manner That she wondred how a man whom ●he had raised out of the dust could so contemptuously violate her commands and therefore charged him upon his Allegiance to put in ●xecution the Injunctions she sent him by HENNAGE her VICE-CHAMBERLAINE Withall in Letters apart She expostulateth with the States that to her great disparagement they had cast upon the ●arle of Leicester her Subject the absolute command over the united PROVINCES without her privity which she her selfe had utterly refused and therfore willeth them to Devest him of that absolute authority to whom she had set bounds which he should not passe The States returne Answer That they are heartily sorry they should incurre her displeasure by conferring upon the Earle that absolute Authority not having first made her acquainted but they beseeched her to consider the necessity of it seeing that for avoyding of confusion that Authority must needs be cast upon some one or other Neither was there any great matter in the word Absolute seeing the Rule and Dominion resided still in the people By these Letters and Leicesters own submissive writing the Queen was soon satisfied Leicester all this while receiveth Contributions and Rewards from all Provinces maketh Martiall Laws and endeavouring likewise to raise new Customs upon Merchandizes incurred great dislike amongst the common people His first service was to relieve Grave a Town in Brabant which the Prince of Parma by Count Mansfield had besieged Hither he sent the Count Hohenlo a German and Norris Generall of the English Foot but notwithstanding all the great service they did there the Town in the end was taken but Hemart the Governor for his cowardly yeelding it up lost his head From hence the Prince of Parma marched into Gelderland and pitched his Tents before Venlow where Skenkic a Friezlander and Roger Williams a Welshman performed great service yet that Town in a short time was taken also But in the mean while the Lord Willoughby Governor of Bergen ap Zome cut off the enemies Convoyes and took away their victualls and Sir Philip Sidney and Maurice the Prince of Oranges Son upon a sudden on-set took Axale a Town in Flanders From Venl● the Prince of Parma goes to Berke where there were twelve thousand English under the command of Colonell Morgan he notwithstanding layd Siege to the Town which the Earl of Leicester came to raise but finding his Forces to weak to raise it he seeks to divert it by Beleaguering Duisbourgh which before the Prince of Parma could come to relieve he tooke And now the Prince of Parma fearing least Zutphin should come in danger commandeth victualls to be carried thither which the Spaniards carrying along in a fogge the English by chance lighted on them vanquished a Troop of their Horse slew Hannibal Gonzaga and divers other bat then on the English side was one slain more worth than all the English and Spaniards put together Sir Philip Sidney who having his horse slain under him and getting upon another was shot into the thigh and 25 dayes after in the ●loure of his age dyed A man of so many excellent parts of Art and Nature of Valour and Learning of Wit and Magnanimity that as he had equalled all those of former Ages so future Ages wil hardly be able to equal him His Funeralls were in sumptuous manner solemnized at St. Pauls Church in London Iames King of Scotland made his Epitaph and both Universities celebrated his death with Funerall Verses After this Leicester assaulteth Zutphen where setting upon a Fort he takes it in this manner Edward Stanley of the Stanlies of Elford catching hold of a Spaniards Launce which was brandished at him held it so fast that by it he was drawn into the very Fort whereupon the Spaniards being affrighted as thinking all the enemies were comming up forsook the place Leicester knighted Stanly for this act gave him forty pounds in present money and yeerly Pension of an hundred Marks during his life And now though in this forwardnesse to winne the Town yet winter being already come on he thought it unseasonable to besiege it any longer especially so many English Garrisons lying round about it which were in nature of a siege but returned to the H●g●e where the States entertained him with complaints that their money was not carefully husbanded that the number of the English supplies was not full that forreign souldiers were levyed without their consent that the priviledges of the united Provinces were set at nought and new devises for contribution invented for all which evills they entreat him to provide some present remedy To which complaints having a purpose to go for England he gave a friendly answer but upon the very day in which he was to depart he committeth the government of the Province to the deliberation of the States and the same day made another private instrument of writing where he reserved to himself the whole authority over the Governours of the severall Provinces Cities and Forts and more than this taketh away the wonted jurisdiction ●rom the States Councell and Presidents of the Provinces and came into England the third day of December And thus passed the affairs of the Nether-lands for this yeare But in England Philip Earle of Arundel who had lyen in Prison a whole year was at last brought to the Starchamber and being charged with fostering of Priests and having correspondence with Allen and Parsons the Jesuit and offering to depart the Kingdom without licence was fined ten thousand pounds and imprisonment during the Queens p●easure At this time the Queen by Sir Horatio Palavicino supplied with a large summe of money the King of Navarr● thorow whose side the Guyses opposed the reformed Religion in Scotland but her most intentive care was how to unite England and Scotland in a solid friendship To which end she sent Thomas Randoll into Scotland who making Propositions to the King
touching a League offensive and defensive though the King at first required some additions and though the French Ambassador infinitely opposed it yet at last he consented to it and in Iuly following there met at Barwick Edward Earle of Rutland William Lord Euer and Thomas Randoll for the Queen of England Francis Earl of Bothwell Robert Lord Boyde and Humes for the King of Scots and there the League which was called the League of strict Amity for that the word offensive liked not the Scots was upon certain points concluded First for the maintenance of the reformed Religion and then other such Articles as commonly in Leagues are usuall The very same moneth that this League was agreed on a most dangerous conspiracy against the Queen was discovered For first one Iohn Savage was by the perswasions of Gifford Doctor in Divinity induced to believe that it was a meritorious work to take away the lives of Princes Excommunicate who thereupon vowed to kill Queen Elizabeth but to make the Queen and her Councell secure at the very same time they wrote a book● exhorting the Papists in England to attempt nothing against their Prince and to use only the Christian weapons of Tears Prayers Watching and Fasting About Whitsuntide one Ballard a Seminary Priest of Rheims acquainted with the vow of Savage having dealt in France with Mendoza and Charles Paget about invading of England arrived here in a souldiers habit and by a counterfeit name called Captain Fos●● with these matters he acpuaints one Anthony Babington a gentleman of Darbyshire who by the Bishop of Glasco the Queen of Scots Ambassador in France had been commended to her as one worthy of her love so as between them there passed often letters in unknown characters In short time Babington had drawn into the Plot other gentlemen as zealous of the Romish Religion as himselfe namely Edward Windsor brother to the Lord Windsor Thomas Salisbery of a good Family in Devonshire Charles Tilney one of the Queens Pensioners Chydiock Tichburne of Hamshire Edward Abington whose father was Coferer to the Queen Robert Gage of Surrey Iohn Travers● and Iohn Charnock of Lancashire Iohn Iones● Savage formerly spoken of Barnwell of a noble Family in Ireland and Henry Dunne a Clerk in the Office of First-fruits and Tenths one Pollie also serued himselfe into their company a fellow throughly acquainted with the affairs of the Queen of Scots who was thought to have revealed all their consultations to Walsingham day by day To these Gentlemen Babington communicateth his affairs but not every particular to every one but to Ballard Tichburne and Dunn● he sheweth the Letters which passed between him and the Queen of Scots with Tilney and the rest he dealeth to be the Assassinates of whom some at first loth at last consented and in a foolish vaingloriousnesse a picture of the Assassinates was made to the life and Babington in the midst with these words Quorsum haec alio properentibus This Picture they say was gotten and privately shewed to the Queen who knew none of them by face but only Bernwell who had oftentimes come to her in the causes of the Earl of Kildare whose servant he was Certain it is that the Queen one day walking abroad spyed this Bernwell and turning to Hatton sayd Am not I well Guarded that have not so much as one man in the company with a sword by his side Thus much Bernwell himselfe told the rest of his confederacy and how easie a matter it had bin to have dispatched her at that time if the rest had been present The chief discoverer of the Plot was the aforesayd Gifford This man was a gentleman of a good Hou●e at Chellington in Staffordshire not far from Chartley where the Queen of Scots was kept prisoner and was now sent by the English fugitives in France under the counterfeit name of Luson to put Savage in minde of the vow he had made and to convey letters between them and the Queen of Scots But he whether pricked in conscience or dismayed in minde came to Walsingham privately revealing who he was and for what end and by whom sent into England Walsingham courteously entertained him and sent him down into Staffordshire to do the work he had undertaken Here Gifford bribing the Brewer of the House where the Queen of Scots lay contrived the matter in such sort with him that by a hole in the wall in which a loose stone was put he should give in and receive forth Letters the which by messengers purposely layd by the way came evermore to Walsinghams hands who broke them open copied them out and by the rare cunning of one Thomas Philips found out the meaning of the private Characters and by the singular Art of Arthur Gregory sealed them again so curiously that no man would imagine them to have been opened and ever sent them to the parties to whom the superscription directed them In like manner were the former letters from the Queen of Scots to Babington intercepted as also other letters written at the same time to Mendoza the Spanish Ambassador Charles Paget the Lord Paget the Archbishop of Glasco and Francis Englefield The Queen as soon as she understood by these letters of the storm hanging over her head both at home and abroad commanded Ballard to be apprehended who on a sodain is taken in Babingtons house Babington hereupon goeth to Walsingham with whom he had long been a suiter for licence to go into France promising to do great matters in discovering the practises of the Fugitives Walsingham with fair promises drives him off from day to day and now perswades him that for a small space till he could get his license sealed he would lodge at his house in London where they might have secret conference without suspition This Web Walsingham himselfe had spun hitherto and no other of the Queens Councell were made acquainted and longer yet he would have drawn the thread out but that the Queen was unwilling least as she sayd by not avoyding danger when she might she should seem rather to tempt God than to trust in him Whereupon Walsingham sent a Note to his man Scudamore from the Court to looke carefully to Babington This Note was delivered in such manner that Babington sitting by at Table when Scudamore read it overlooked him and read it likewise Hereupon suspecting that all was discovered the next night he and Scudamore and one or two more of Walsinghams servants supping at a Tavern and being very merry he made an excuse that he must needs step aside and rose up leaving his Cloak and his sword and so made haste through the dark to Westminster where Gage and he changed apparel and then together withdrew themselves 〈◊〉 S. Iohns wood neer the City whether Barnwell also and Dun betook them●●●ves In the mean space they were proclaimed Traytors all England over● Hereupon they lay lurking in Woods and by-places they shave Babingtons 〈◊〉 disfigure the beauty of
his countenance for he was of an extraord●●ary beauty with the husks of green Wall-nuts and when they were hal● starved went to the houses of the Bellamies neer Harrow on the hill who were great Papists There they were hid in Barns and put into a Coun●●ey habit but notwithstanding all their shifting within ten dayes after they were discovered and brought to London The other Complices were soon after taken most of them in the Suburbs of the Citie Salisbury and Trav●●se in Cheshire and Iones in Wales who harboured them in his house after he knew they were Proclaimed Traitors Windsor only was never heard of Many dayes were spent in the examination of them who cut one the others throats with their own confessions All this while the Queen of Soits and her servants are so narrowly looked to by Pawlet that she knew nothing of all these passages Assoon as they were apprehended Thomas Gorge was sent to acquaint her with the whole matter which yet he did not do till she was got on horse-back to Ride a hunting and was not then suffered to return bu● in shew of curtesie was carried up and down to see the Houses of the Gentry thereabouts In which mean while Iohn Manners Edward Acton Richard Bagot and Sir William Waad took Nave and Curle the Queen of Sc●●s Secretaries and the rest of her servants and delivered them to Keepers apart that they might have no speech between themselves nor with their Lady the Queen of Scots Then they break open all doors and such Desks and Boxes as they found with any papers in them they set their seals upon and sent them to the Court In which being broken open before the Queen were found a number of Letters from Forreign parts the copies likewise of Letters sent to severall persons and threescore Alphabets at least of private Characters as also Letters to her from some of the English Nobility containing great proffers of love and service which the Queen notwithstanding took no notice of but passed over in silence according to her Motto Video Taceo I see and say nothing Gifford now who had all this while served their turn is sent into France but ere he went hence left an Indenture with the French Ambassador here in England with instructions that he should deliver no Letters to the Queen of Scots or the Fugitives in France but to him that exhibited an Indenture matching with that the which he sent underhand to Sir Francis Walsingham The twentieth o● September seven of the forenamed Conspirators were Arraigned and pleading guilty were condemned of High-treason Two dayes after seven other were called to the Bar who pleaded not guilty but notwithstanding were found guilty by their own confessions and condemned Pollie only though he were privie to all passages yet because he had disclosed many things to Walsingham was not called in question The twentieth day of the moneth the first seven in St. Giles Fields where they were wont to meet were hanged cut down instantly their privy members cut off and themselves yet living and beholding it were in cruell manner bowelled and quartered namely Ballard Babington Savage who the roap breaking fell dowd from the Gibbet and was presently taken by the hangman his privie members cut off and bowelled while he was perfectly living Barnwell Tichburne Tilney And Abbington The next day the other seven were drawn to the same place and executed in the same fashion but in a more gentle manner by the Q●eens speciall charge who detested the former cruelty for they were to hand till they were quite dead Salisbery first then Dun then Iones Cherno●k Traverse Gage and with them Hierome Bellam● who had concealed Babington after he was Proclaimed Traytor whose brother being guilty of the same fact had strangled himselfe in Prison When these men were executed Nave a Frenchman and Curle a Scots-man Secretaries to the Queen of Scots were examined concerning the Letters the copies of Letters and priviate Characters found in the Queen of Scots Closet who under their own voluntary subscriptions acknowledged that they were their own hand writings dictated in French by the Queen her self taken by Nave turned into English by Curle and copied out in secret Characters Hereupon Sir Edward Wootton was sent out of hand into France to make known to the King the order of the Treason and to shew him the copies of the Queen of Scots Letters confirmed by the testimony of sundry of the English Nobility that the French King might see what dangerous plots were by Charls Paget and the English Fugitives contrived against the Queen of England And now what should be done with the Queen of Scots was a great consultation wherein the Councellours were not all of one minde some conceived That it were not good to take any rigorous course against her but only to hold her in fast custody both for that she was not Authour of the Treason but only conscious to it and because she was crazie and not likely to live long Others out of a care of Religion were of opinion To have her forthwith Arraigned and put to death according to the Law Leicester thought it better to have her poisoned and sent a Divine to Walsingham to prove it lawfull but Walsingham protested against that course A difference then arose amongst them by what Law to proceed against her Whether by the Law of the 25. of Edward the Third In which they are Pronounced guilty of Treason who plot the destruction of the King or Queen raise War in his Dominions or adhere to his Adversaries Or else by the 27. of the Queen Enacted a year since Their opinion at last prevailed who thought best to proceed against her by this latter Law as being indeed in this case provided Whereupon divers of the Lords of the Privie Councell and other of the Nobility are Authorized by the Queens Letters to enquire by vertue of that Law and passe sentence against all such as raised Rebellion Invaded the Kingdome or attempted any violence against the Queen These Commissioners therefore upon the 11. day of October repaired to Fotheringay Castle in Northamptonshire where the Queen of Scots was then held prisoner and the next day sent unto her VValter Mildmay Pawlet and Edward Barker publick Notary who delivered her the Queens Letters which having with a setled countenance read She sayd It seems to me strange● that the Queen should lay her Command upon me to hold up my hand at the Bar as though I were a Subject seeing I am an absolute Queen no lesse than her selfe but howsoever I will never do any thing prejudiciall to Princes of my degree nor to my Son the King of Scotland After many meetings she standing still upon her innocency and upon her exemption from answering as being an absolute Prince and specially for yeelding to be tryed by the English Laws of which One she sayd had lately been made of purpose for her destruction It was at last told her
where the Inhabitants crave mercy and obtained it here Essex would have tarried in expectation of the Indian fleet but that Graves the Pilot disswaded because the harbour was not good and now see the unluckinesse of ill counsell for the English were not gone above an houre or two ●rom this place when loe the American fleete wherein were forty Ships and seven of them loaden with treasure cometh thither which hearing that the English were there abouts directed their course to Tezcera where they gained the haven all but three ships indifferent wealthy which English tooke and then were minded to set upon the rest in the Port but finding the attempt not forcible they passed from hence to Saint Michaells where Southampton Rutland Evers Bredon and Dockwray were Knighted● and then Essex landed within six miles of the Towne nigh unto Villa Franca a faire Towne and well furnished with marchandize wine wood and corne where they tarried six dayes and the common souldiers found good booty And now a Caraque was espied coming out of the east Indies which by a warning peece shot off in a Dutch ship perceiveing that the English were there run herselfe a shoare unloaded her merchandize and then fiered herselfe Thus the English had ill lucke every where in this expedition And the ninth of October they hoysted sayle for England but within two dayes a terrible tempest from the northward dispersed them and the Spanish Fleete also at the same time so as they never came in view of one another one Spanish shippe was cast upon Dertmouth the Marriners and souldiers halfe starved in her who intimated that the Spanish fleete intended to seize upon some haven in Cornwall which being nigh the mouth of the channell might be convenient to receive forces from Spaine but the divine providence frustrated the designes both of the Spaniard and the English But now at his returne the Earle of Essex found that done in England in his absence which infinitly discontented him Sir Robert Cicill made Chancelour of the Dutchy of Lancaster which was more Charles Lord Howard created Earle of Nottingham with relation in his patent to the Victory in eighty eight and his good service at Cales This glory he envyed him and besides stomacked it that he must now take place of him It being enacted in the Raigne of Henry the eighth that the chiefe Officers of the Kingdome should have Presidence of all men of their degree Whereupon the Queen to give him content was faine to create him Earle Marshall of England by which he recovered his place againe About this time an Embassadour came into England from the KING of Poland who when the Queen expected he should give her thanks for having procured a Peace between the King his Master and the Turke he cleane contrary expostulated unkindnesse for breach of Priviledge in trading with Spaine requiring a present remedy or else the King would otherways right himselfe The Queen not a little offended suddenly replyed ●ow was I deceived I expected an Embassadour and behold a Herauld such a speech I never heard in all my life time And after some further checking of him for his boldnesse she referred him to her Councell and then retired into her Closett The Embassadour afterward in private conference with some of the Councell excused himselfe saying that his speech was penned by others and then given him in wrighting To his Message the Councell gave the like answer as they had given before the Hanse-Townes upon the like occasion though now againe the Hanse-Townes obtaine of the Emperour to prohibite the English from trading in Germany which made the Queen to prohibit the Hause towns from trading in England and put them out of the Stilyard till this difference was accorded This yeer the Chancellor of Denmarke came into England to restore the Garter which she had bestowed upon the Kings Father and withall offering the Kings helpe to make a peace for the Queen with the Spaniard The Queen thanked him but meant not to use his helpe for that which shee did not desire and especially not now when he had newly molested the King of France her Allye and had taken Amyens the strongest Town of Picardie Though why should the Queen be so tender of the French King when now to get an aid of four thousand Souldiers from her he fell to Devises intimating unto her that he was now offered by the Popes Nuntio a very commodious peace if he would but forsake her But while these things were in Treaty Amyens was recovered againe by the valour of Baskervile who dyed at the seige and of Sir Arthur Savage as the King in His Letters to the Queene thankfully acknowledged About this time a Parliament was holden at Westminster where Subsidies were willingly granted and to this Parliament was called the Lord La Ware and restored to his blood which by Act of Parliament in the Raigne of King Edward the sixth was tainted Also to this Parliament was called Thomas Lord HOVVARD by the Title of Baron Howard of Walden In Ireland at this time a great part of Ulster and almost all Connacht was in Rebellion Whereupon Russell the Deputy was called home and Thomas Lord Burrough sent in his place a man very stout and couragious but no souldier This infinitely discontented Norris who thought himselfe sure of the place himselfe and now to see his Rivall preferred before him and himselfe to be under him President of Munster drave him into such a melancholly that in a very short time and as he thought to himselfe with much disgrace he ended his life And now the Farle of Tir-Oen craveth and obtaineth a moneths Truce of the new Deputy at the moneths end the Deputy marcheth against the Rebels and gaineth the Fort at Blackwater when suddenly the Rebells sl●w themselves upon a hill hard by against whom the Earle of Kildare marcheth and puts them to flight but yet with some losse of his owne side as Francis Vaughan the Deputies brother in Law Turner a Sergeant Major and two Fosters brothers of the Earle of Kildare whole death hee tooke so heavily that within a few dayes he dyed himself As soon as the people had fortified the Castle at Blackwater and withdrawne his Army the Rebels began to besiege it againe for this was the main place of their strength which caused the Deputy with all possible speed to make thither but unhappily dyed by the way Whereupon the Rebells set upon the Fort more fiercely then before but being still reppelled they comforted themselves with this that there was not many dayes provision left in the Fort yet the admirable fortitude of Thomas Williams the Captain and the Garrison Souldiers saved the place who when their horse-flesh was all spent fedde upon weeds growing within the Trenches and endured all kinde of misery And now the Lord Burrough the Deputy being dead the Army by direction from England was committed to the Earle of Ormond and the Government to two
was yet doubtfull The Earl content that Popham only should be freed but he refused unlesse the Keeper also might be dismissed Then Gorge freeth them all and goeth along with them to the Court by water Now when Essex thought to return he found a Chain fastened crosse the street at the West end of Pauls and men in Arms on the other side then he began to draw his sword and having once given the word Blunt letteth fly at them slew one of them incontinent himself being sorely wounded and taken Essex himself had his Hat shot thorow whereupon retiring he took Boat at Queen Hythe and went to Essex House where finding the Counsellors all dismissed he grew extreme angry and dismayed and cast certain papers into the fire saying They should tell no tales By and by the Admirall besiegeth the house commanding them to yeeld Southampton offereth if the Admirall would give Hostages to secure them they would present themselves to the Queen The Admirall answereth him by Sidney That Rebells are not to profer Conditions Within an hour Essex finding the case desperate resolved to rush forth and the Lord Sands the most aged in the company greatly urged it saying It were better to die valiantly than by the hands of a Hang-man But Essex his minde upon a little deliberation altering they fell upon their knees and deliver their weapons to the Admirall when it was ten a clock at night Owen Salisbury and one or two more were slain with Musket Shot and as many of the Besiegers The next day Thomas Lea Commander of a Company of Souldiers in Ireland who to one Crosse a Sea-Captain that detected him intimated how noble an exploit it were for six stout fellows to go to the Queen and compell her forceably to release Essex and Southampton was presently apprehended examined found guilty and executed Essex and Southampton were carryed first to Lambeth to the Archbishops house because it was a dark night but anon were sent to the Tower by the Queens direction and with them Rutland Sands Cromwell Mounteagle Danverse and Bromley the rest were put in common prisons On the nineteenth of February Essex and Southampton were called to their Arraignment before their Peers in Westminster-Hall where Buckhurst Lord Treasurer was appointed Lord High Steward of England for that time The Peers being severally called by their names Essex demanded If it were not lawfull for them to except against some of the Pee●s as private persons might do against the Jurors The Judges made answer That the credit and fidelity of the Peers of England was presumed to be such that in Tryalls they were not bound to take an Oath nor are they lyable to any exception Then were they joyntly indited of High Treason namely That they plotted to deprive the Queen of her life and Kingdom To surprize her in her very Palace And that they brake forth into open Rebellion by imprisoning the Counsellors of the Kingdom By exciting the Londoners to Re-bellion with vaine Fictions By assaulting the Queens loyall Subjects in the City and by defending of Essex House against the Queens Forces Hereunto they pleaded Not guilty Essex withall averring That they had done nothing but of necessity and the Law of Nature Yelverton aggravateth the specialties and Edward Cook Atturney argueth That the Earl could not excuse himself from the Law of Nature seeing Majesty is not to be affronted for private revenge The Earl of Essex with great confidence made answer That to his Prince and Countrey he alwayes had and would bear a loyall affection The Francis Bacon one that was little expected to speak against Essex by whom he had been raised in defence of Cobham Cecill and Raleigh aggravateth his crying out That the Crown of England was sold to the Spaniard wherto Essex replyed that he heard indeed that Cecill the Secretary should say to one of the Lords of the Councell That the Right of the Infanta of Spain to the Kingdom of England was as good as any of the Competitors Upon this Cecill who stood by as an Auditor steppeth in and falling upon his knees beseecheth the Steward that with his good leave he might quit himself from this foul aspersion which leave being granted him he provoked Essex if he durst to name the Counsellor but he would not therefore saith Cecill It is a Faction still Essex averreth it Then Cecill turning himself to Southampton besought him by all manner of Obtestations to name the man He referreth it to the Honorable Assembly and to Cecill himself if in Honour and good Reason he ought to do it they affirming He might Southampton nameth Sir William Knolles Essex his Unkle He being sent for at Cecills intreaty said That Cecill two yeers since told him that one Dolman in a Book had asserted the Right of the Infanta and had spoken no otherwise than so Now after the Judges had delivered their opinion what was Law in the matters alleadge● the Earls by the Stewards direction were taken aside Then the Peers rose and went apart and having consulted about an hour returned to their seats and in their order pronounced the Earls guilty of high Treason Then the high Steward advising Essex to implore the Queens mercy giveth Sentence and that done brake his Staff and departed The next day Sir Robert Vernon Sir William Constable Sir Edmund Baynham Littleton Cluff Captain Whitlock Iohn and Christopher Wright and Orell an old Souldier were called to their Tryall but the Queen informed by Sir Fulk Grevill That most of them were drawn unwittingly into the danger commanded that onely Littleton Baynham and Orell should have their Tryall the rest to be sent back to prison These were all condemned but their lives spared which favour Raleigh for a good sum of money received of Baynham procured Essex in the mean while requested he might speak with some of the Counsellors to whom he reconciled himself and to Cecill especially and then intimated That the Queen could not be in safety while he lived he requesteth he might be executed privately in the Tower He grievously inveigheth against some of the Conspiracy and wished to speak with some of them but specially with Blunt and Cuffe whom as soon as he saw he brake forth into these words O Cuffe ask pardon of God and the Queen for thou hast chiefly provoked me to this disloyalty Also he intimated Sir Henry Nevill ordinary Ambassadour in France to have been acquainted with the Conspiracy and that other in Scotland France the Netherlands and the Lord Mountjoy Deputy of Ireland knew of his purpose and other in England who being many in number and the Lord Mountjoy ordering the Affairs of Ireland in good fashion the Queen wisely would take no notice of it The five and twentieth day of February which was to be the fatall day there were sent to the Earl divers Ministers to give him ghostly comfort The Queen now wavering in her self one while remembring the ●●ci●nt kindenesse she had shewed
the like whereof had not been known in former Ages should not be drawn into Example In her fortieth yeer in a Parliament at Westminster were granted her by the Clergy three entire Subsidies and by the Laity as many with six fifteenths and Tenths In her two and fortieth yeer to furnish her self with money towards the Irish War she delegated certain Commissioners to confirm the Crown Lands to the possessors that held any of controverted Titles and to take money for the Confirmation thereby to take away the troubles by concealers who at this time were very busie Of her LAVVS and ORDINANCES IN a Parliament holden in her first yeer an Act was made That every person should go to Divine Service upon Sundayes and Holy-dayes or else pay twelve pence to the poor Also it was enacted That Bishops should not let the Lands of the Church longer then for one and twenty yeers or three Lives except to the Queen or her Successors In her third yeer Proclamation was made That the Teston coyned for twelve pence and in the Raign of King Edward embased to six pence should not be currant but for four pence the Groat but for two pence and the piece of two pence but for a penny And not long after all the said base Moneyes were called in and fine Sterling money was allowed for them after the Rate For Ireland also she coyned Sterling money where nine pence in England went for twelve pence there The Queen was the first that brought certain Counties to deliver Provision at a certain rate that so they might be freed from the Purveyors Also the first that granted allowance to Judges for their Circuit In her sixth yeer in a Parliament then holden it was made Treason to refuse taking the Oath of Supremacy yet with this limitation That by it the blood should not be dishonoured nor goods confiscate nor the Oath to be required of any Baron of the Kingdom Also this yeer by a Common Councell in London It was enacted That all such Citizens as from thenceforth should be constrained to sell their houshold-stuff Leases of houses or such like should first cause the same to be cried thorow the City by a man with a Bell and then to be sold by the common Outcryer appointed for that purpose and he to receive one farthing upon the shilling for his pains In her three and twentieth yeer she represseth by Proclamation excesse in apparell Gold Chayns and Clokes which men wore down to their heels The length of Swords was limitted to three Foot and Daggers to twelve Inches besides the Hilts. Buildings likewise in the Suburbs were restrained In-mates forbidden and expresse charge set forth That no dwelling house should be new built within three miles of any of the City Gates under pain of imprisonment and losse of the materialls In her time was set on foot by Sir Thomas Smith the Law made for the serving of Colledges with provision to the great benefit of those Scholasticall Societies In her two and fortieth yeer she setteth forth Proclamations against the Transportation of Gold or Silver wrought or unwrought according to the former Acts of Parliament in that case provided This yeer also she founded the Company of the East India Merchants and allowed them ample Priviledges In her three and fourtieth yeer all Monopolies are called in by Proclamation In her four and twentieth yeer severe Laws are made against Papists some inflicting death some fine and imprisonment In her eight and twentieth yeer a Proclamation was set forth prohibiting to sow Wo●d within eight miles of any of the Queens Houses and four miles off any Cities or Towns Corporate AFFAIRS of the CHURCH in her time ON Sunday the first of Ianuary next after the Queens coming to the Crown by vertue of her Proclamation the English Letany was read accordingly as was used in her Graces Chappell in all Churches thorow the City of London and likewise the Epistle and Gospel of the day begun to be read at Masse-time in the English To●gue Also in a Parliament holden in her first yeer the first Fruits and Tenths were restored to the Crown and the Supreme Government over the State Ecclesiasticall and the book of Common-Prayer and Administration of the Sacraments in the English Tongue was restored and by degrees the Protestant Religion was established The Bishops that refused the Oath of Supremacy were all removed and Protestant Bishops placed in their room It was enacted also That all persons should go to Divine Service upon Sundayes and Holy-dayes and a Fine of twelve pence imposed upon every one that should be absent and the same to be given to the poor In her fourth yeer the Queen was solicited by Pope Pius to send her Orators to the Councell of Trent which she refused as not acknowledging it a lawfull Councell In a Parliament holden in her eighth yeer it was enacted and by a generall consent declared That the Election of the Arch-bishops and Bishops in England together with their Consecration Confirmation and Investiture which some persons slanderously called in question was lawfull and Canonicall and that they were rightly and according to the Acts and Statutes of the Kingdom chosen and consecrated In her eleventh yeer there arose in England two contrary factions in Religion on the one side Thomas Harding Nicholas Sanders and other Divines that had fled out of England began to exercise the Episcopall Jurisdiction upon the Queens Subjects which they had derived from the Sea of Rome On the other side Colman Burton Hallingham Benson and other making profession of the pure Religion would allow of nothing but what was directly taken out of the Scriptures openly condemning the received Discipline of the Church of England together with the Church Liturgy and the very Calling of Bishops as savouri●g too much of the Romish Religion protesting in the Pulpi●s That it was an impious thing to hold any thing common with the Church of Rome and used all diligence to have the Church of England reformed in every point according to the Rule of the Church of Geneva These although the Queen commanded to be committed to prison yet it is incredible how upon a sudden their followers encreased known by the envious name of Puritans This sect so mightily encreased that in her sixteenth yeer the Queen and Kingdom was extremely troubled with some of the Clergy who breathing out nothing but Evangelicall parity cryed down the Ecclesiasticall Form of Government as a thing polluted with Romane dr●ggs and setting forth Books likewise Intituled The Admonition to the Parliament and the Defence of the Admonition they refused to resort to the Divine Service publikely in use and framed to themselves other Rites Whereupon the Queen to suppresse them whom by no means she liked commanded every where the severity of the Law touching the Uniformity of Common-Prayer to be put in execution and those books upon pain of Imprisonment to be delivered into the hands of the Bishops or some