Chapter IX: REIGN OF HENRY VIII. (concluded) (2)

Catherine Parr, as she still continues to be called, was educated under the care of her mother at Kendal Castle, and received a very learned education for a woman of those times. She read and wrote Latin fluently, had some knowledge of Greek, and was mistress of several modern languages. She is said to have been handsome, but of very small and delicate features. At all times she appears to have been of remarkable thoughtfulness and prudence, extremely amiable, and became thoroughly devoted to Protestantism; and she may, indeed, justly be styled the first Protestant Queen of England, for Anne of Cleves, though educated in the Protestant faith, became a decided Papist in this country. It was not till after the death of Lord Latimer that her Protestant tendencies, however, were known; yet then, she seems to have made no secret of them, for her house became the resort of Coverdale, Latimer, Parkhurst, and other eminent Reformers, and sermons were frequently preached in her chamber of state, which it is surprising did not attract the attention of the king. The marriage took place on the 12th of July, 1543, in the queen's closet at Hampton Court.

The spring of 1544 opened with active preparations for Henry's campaign in France. During the winter, Gonzaga, the viceroy of Sicily, was despatched to London by Charles, to arrange the plan of operations. An admirable one was devised, had Henry been the man to assist in carrying it out. The emperor was to enter France by Champagne, and Henry by Picardy, and, instead of staying to besiege the towns on the route, they were to dash on to Paris where, their forces uniting, they might consider themselves masters of the French capital, or in a position to dictate terms to Francis. In May the Imperialists were in the field, and Henry landed at Calais in June, and by the middle of July he was within the bounds of France, at the head of 20,000 English and 15,000 Imperialists.

But neither of the invaders kept to the original plan. Charles stopped by the way to reduce Luxembourg, Ligne, and St. Didier. Had Henry, however, pushed on with his imposing army to Paris, Francis would have been at the mercy of the allies. But Henry, ambitious to rival the military successes of Charles, and take towns too, instead of making the capital his object, turned aside to besiege Boulogne and Montreuil. The Imperial ambassador, sensible of the fatality of this proceeding, urged Henry with all his eloquence during eleven days to push on: and Charles, to take from him any further excuse for delay, hastened forward along the right bank of the Marne, avoiding all the fortified towns. But when once Henry had undertaken an object, opposition only increased his resolution, and he lost all consciousness of everything but the one idea of asserting his mastery. In vain, therefore, did Charles send messengers imploring him to advance; for more than two months he continued besieging Boulogne, and the golden opportunity was lost.

Francis seized on the delay to make terms with Charles. He sent to him a Spanish monk of the name of Guzman, and a near relative of Charles's confessor, proposing terms of accommodation. Charles readily listened to them, and sent to Henry to learn his demands. These demands were something enormous, and whilst Francis demurred, Charles continued his march, and arrived at Château-Thierry, almost in the vicinity of Paris. The circumstances of both Francis and Charles now mutually inclined them to open separate negotiations. Francis saw a foreign army menacing his capital, but Charles, on the other hand, saw the French army constantly increasing between him and his strange ally, whom nothing could induce to move from the walls of Boulogne. Under these circumstances Charles consented to offer Francis the terms which he had demanded before the war, and which he had refused; but now came the news that the English had taken Boulogne, and the French king at once accepted them. The Treaty of Crépy, as this was called, bound the two sovereigns to unite for the defence of Christendom against the Turks, and to unite their families by the marriage of the second son of Francis with a daughter of Charles. Henry, on his part, having placed a strong garrison in Boulogne, raised the siege of Montreuil, and returned to England, like a great conqueror, as he always did, from his distant campaigns.

By the end of April a scheme to assassinate Cardinal Beaton, of which Henry was cognisant, having failed, he was prepared to pour on Scotland the vial of his murderous wrath. A fleet of a hundred sail, under the command of Lord Lisle, the High Admiral of England, appeared suddenly in the Forth. The Scots seem to have by no means been dreaming of such a visitant, and it threw the capital into the greatest consternation. In four days, such was the absence of preparation, such the public paralysis, that Hertford was permitted to land his troops and his artillery without the sight of a single soldier. He had advanced from Granton to Leith when Arran and the cardinal threw themselves in his way with a miserable handful of followers, who were instantly dispersed and Leith was given up to plunder.

The citizens of Edinburgh, finding themselves deserted by the governor, flew to arms, under the command of Otterburn of Redhall, the provost of the city. Otterburn proceeded to the English camp and, obtaining an interview with Lord Hertford, complained of this unlooked-for invasion, and offered to accommodate all differences. But Hertford returned a haughty answer that he was not come to negotiate, for which he had no power, but to lay waste town and country with fire and sword unless the young queen were delivered to him. The people of Edinburgh, on hearing this insolent message, vowed to perish to a man rather than condescend to such baseness. They set about to defend their walls and sustain the attack of the enemy; but they found that Otterburn, who had tampered secretly with the English before this, had stolen unobserved away. They appointed a new provost, and manned their walls so stoutly that they compelled Hertford to fetch up his battering ordnance from Leith. Seeing very soon that it was impossible to defend their gates from this heavy ordnance, they silently collected as much of their property as they could carry, and abandoned the town. Hertford took possession of it; and then sought to reduce the castle. But finding this useless, he set fire to the city; and, reinforced by 4,000 horse, under Lord Eure, he employed himself in devastating the surrounding country with a savage ferocity, which no doubt had been commanded by the bitter malice of the English king.

(_From the Portrait in the Louvre, attributed to the Elder Clouet._)]

On the 15th of May, Arran, having assembled a considerable force, and liberated Angus and his brother, Sir George Douglas, in the hope of winning them over by such clemency, marched rapidly towards Edinburgh. The English, however, did not wait for his arrival. Lord Lisle embarked a portion of the troops at Leith again, and Lord Hertford led away the remainder by land. Both by land and water the English commanders continued their buccaneering outrages, doing all the mischief and inflicting all the misery they could. Lord Lisle seized the two largest Scottish vessels in the harbour of Leith, and burnt the rest; he then sailed along the coast, plundering and destroying all the villages and country within reach. Lord Hertford, on his part, laid Port Seaton, Haddington, Renton, and Dunbar in ashes, and returned into England, leaving behind him a trail of desolation. Such was the insane and ridiculous manner in which Henry VIII. wooed the little Queen of Scotland for his son. A border war ensued, and Scotland was mercilessly ravaged.

Francis I. could not rest satisfied so long as Boulogne was in the hands of the English, and he resolved in 1545, to make a grand effort to recover not only that town but Calais, which had been for centuries in the possession of England. Large galleys were built at Rouen, and as many vessels were collected as possible from Marseilles and other ports in the Mediterranean for this enterprise. He hired soldiers from the Venetian and other Italian States, and he determined to send a body of troops to Scotland to assist in making a diversion in that country. But he was not contented with endeavouring to regain his own towns; his coasts had often been harassed by the English vessels, and he now ventured to carry the war to Henry's own shores. Henry, aware of his intentions, raised fortifications on the banks of the Thames, and along the shores of Kent, Sussex, and Hampshire. The French fleet, consisting of 130 ships, set sail on the 16th of July, and fell down the Channel. Francis flattered himself that he could seize the Isle of Wight, and perhaps maintain garrisons there, if he should not be able to get possession of Portsmouth. Henry had himself proceeded to Portsmouth, where he had sixty ships lying, under the command of Lord Lisle. The French fleet sailed into the Solent, and anchored at St. Helen's. The sea being very calm, the French admiral put out his flat-bottomed boats and galleys that drew little water, and sailed into the very mouth of Portsmouth Harbour, daring the English admiral to come out. But Henry commanded Lord Lisle to lie still. The French admiral, firing into the port, sank the _Mary Rose_ with her commander, Sir George Carew, and 700 men. On the turn of the tide Lord Lisle bore down on the enemy, and sank a galley with its men, and the French vessels then bore away to the main fleet.

As the French could not provoke the English to come out of harbour, though they burned the villages and farmhouses along the coast, they held a council of war, and resolved to attempt the conquest of the Isle of Wight. The invasion of the island was essayed in three places, but the inhabitants repulsed with great spirit the soldiers as they landed; and, after committing some ravages, the French thought it best to retire. They then sailed along the coast of Sussex, making occasional descents, and finally anchored before Boulogne, to prevent the entrance of supplies for the army there. Another object was to hinder reinforcements of ships from the Thames reaching Portsmouth, but in both these endeavours the superior vigilance of the English prevailed; provisions were conveyed into Boulogne, and a reinforcement of thirty ships arrived at Portsmouth. At length Lord Lisle received orders from Henry to put to sea and attack the enemy; he expressed himself highly delighted, but nothing came of it, for the two fleets manoeuvred for some time in the face of each other, exchanged a few shots, and then retired to their respective ports. And thus ended the boastful enterprise of Francis. Henry, as we have seen, had only succeeded in capturing Boulogne, and was accordingly glad to make peace with Francis in 1546, on terms fairly advantageous to England.

As Scotland was included in the peace with France, the French party appeared to be entirely triumphant. But Beaton's end was near, and it was hastened on by his religious persecutions. Notwithstanding the endeavours of Cardinal Beaton, and the apostacy of Arran, the Reformation had now made great progress in Scotland, and it was while the struggle was going on between the party of Angus and the party of the cardinal, backed by the money and the arms of England, that there came upon the scene the remarkable preacher, George Wishart. Wishart is supposed to have been the son of James Wishart of Pitarro, justice-clerk to James V., and he was patronised by John Erskine, Provost of Montrose. In Montrose he became master of a school, and was expelled for teaching Greek to his boys, avowedly as the original tongue of the New Testament. He fled to England, and in Bristol was condemned as a heretic for preaching against the offering of prayers to the Virgin. He then recanted to avoid death, but remained some years in England, returning to all and more than the opinions he had renounced in sight of the fagot. He boldly preached the insufficiency of outward ceremonies when the heart itself was not touched. He admitted only the sacraments recorded in the Scriptures; derided auricular confession; condemned the invocation of saints and the doctrine of purgatory, though he approved of fasting, and maintained that the Lord's Supper was a Divine and comfortable institution. The doctrines, conduct, and corruptions of his opponents he denounced with unsparing severity.

These traits had made him a welcome agent of opposition to the cardinal with the lords of the English party; and Beaton, at once hostile to his religious views and to him personally, as the ally of those who were seeking his life by the most abominable means, soon turned his resentment upon him. Twice he is said to have escaped from the emissaries of the cardinal lying in wait to seize him. How far he was aware of the plots and mercenary villainy of those about him is uncertain; but living in the very midst of the traitor lords, and often under the very roof of the busy agent of Beaton's proposed murder, Brunston, he was so far cognisant of the preparations for the invasion of Scotland and the destruction of the cardinal's party, that he frequently announced in his sermons the approach of the horrors which at length arrived, and thus acquired the reputation of a prophet. Under the protection of the Angus party, he preached in the towns of Montrose, Dundee, Perth, and Ayr, and produced such a spirit of hostility to the old religion, that at Dundee the houses of the Black and Grey Friars were destroyed, and similar attempts were made in Edinburgh.

While the friends of Wishart were seeking the life of Beaton, Beaton, aware of this, was seeking the life of Wishart, and Wishart in his addresses to the people repeatedly declared that he should perish a martyr to the cause of truth. At length Cassillis and the gentlemen of Kyle and Cunningham sent for him to meet them at Edinburgh, where they proposed that he should have an opportunity for public disputation with the bishop. Wishart proceeded to the capital where, Cassillis and the confederates not having arrived, he soon began to preach to the people, under the protection of the barons of Lothian. At Leith, Sir George Douglas bore public testimony to the truth of his doctrine, and declared his resolution to protect the preacher. There, too, he converted John Knox, who was destined to establish the Reformation in Scotland.

In the midst of these proceedings arrived the cardinal and the governor in Edinburgh, and Beaton lost no time in endeavouring to secure the person of the popular apostle. Brunston removed Wishart to West Lothian to be out of the way till the arrival of Cassillis, who was the chief conspirator against the cardinal; but Wishart was not a man to lie concealed. He preached in the very face of danger, though a two-handed sword was constantly borne before him on these occasions; and at length, after a remarkable sermon at Haddington, where he prognosticated deep miseries about to fall upon the country, he took leave affectionately of his audience, and set out for the house of Ormiston, accompanied by Brunston, Sandilands of Calder, and Ormiston. That night the house of Ormiston was surrounded by a party of horse under the command of the Earl of Bothwell. Wishart, Sandilands, and Cockburn were seized. Cockburn and Sandilands were conducted to the castle of Edinburgh, Wishart to Hailes, the house of Bothwell, who for some time refused to give him up to the cardinal, but at length did so under promise of a great reward. Brunston had managed to escape.

Beaton was anxious to have Wishart tried and condemned on a civil charge; but to this Arran would not consent, and the cardinal was therefore obliged to forego his vengeance, or arraign him as a heretic. He was sentenced to be burnt, and this sentence was carried out at St. Andrews, on the 28th of March, 1546. In this execution the cardinal's malice far outran his usually sound policy. Nothing could be more mischievous to his own cause than the murder of Wishart. Till then, the people, whatever their religious opinions, regarded the political views of Beaton as patriotic, and they supported him as the great bulwark against the power and designs of England. But now they regarded him as a horrible persecutor, and they shrank from him and his power fell. The meekness and patience with which Wishart, whom they now honoured with the name of martyr, bore his horrible fate, made a lasting impression on the public mind.

While the people thus unequivocally condemned this barbarous deed, and only the more eagerly inquired into the principles of the sufferer, the immediate confederates against the cardinal found in this event a grand warrant for carrying out their own murderous intentions. Cassillis, Glencairn, and the rest of the nobles had delayed the desperate deed, because they could not extract from Henry a distinct statement of the pay they were to receive for it. But now Norman Leslie, the Earl of Rothes, and John Leslie, his uncle, began to vow publicly that they would have the blood of Beaton as an atonement for that of the martyred Wishart. They opened anew an active correspondence with England, and associated themselves with a number of others who were exasperated at the cardinal's deed.

On the other hand, the partisans of Beaton lauded him to the skies as the saviour of the Church in Scotland, and strong in the alliance of France and the late ill-success of the English party, the cardinal appeared to enjoy a season of triumph; but it was a triumph quickly quenched in blood. Elated with his temporary success, the cardinal made a progress into Angus, and celebrated the marriage of one of his natural daughters, Margaret Béthune, to David Lindsay, Master of Crawford, at Finhaven Castle, bestowing upon her a dowry worthy of a princess. The cardinal was disturbed in his festivities by the news that Henry VIII. was pushing on his preparations for a new invasion, and he hastened to St. Andrews to put his castle into a perfect state of defence. On his arrival he summoned the barons of the neighbouring coast to consult on the best means of fortifying it against any attack of the enemy. But while thus busily engaged in warding off the assault of a foreign enemy, a domestic foe was eagerly at work close at hand for his destruction. The Laird of Brunston was stimulating Henry to give the necessary assurance to those who were ready at a word to plunge the sword into the body of the cardinal. A quarrel arising between Beaton and the Leslies brought the matter to a crisis. Norman Leslie, the Master of Rothes, had given up to Beaton the estate of Easter Wemyss and, at a meeting in St. Andrews, had found the cardinal indisposed to make the promised equivalent for it. High words arose, and Leslie hastened to his uncle John; and both of them deeming that there was no longer any safety after the words Norman Leslie in his rage had let fall, they immediately summoned their confederates, and resolved to put the cardinal to death without delay.

On the evening of the 28th of May, Norman Leslie, attended by five followers, entered the city of St. Andrews, and rode, without exciting any suspicion, in his usual manner to his inn. Kirkaldy of Grange was awaiting him there, and after nightfall, John Leslie, whose enmity to Beaton was most notorious, stole quietly in and joined them. At daybreak the next morning, Norman Leslie and three of his attendants entered the gates of the castle court, the porter having lowered the drawbridge to admit the workmen who were employed on the cardinal's fresh fortifications. Norman inquired if the cardinal were yet up, as if he had business with him; and while he held the porter in conversation, Kirkaldy of Grange, James Melville, and their followers entered unobserved; but presently the porter, catching sight of John Leslie crossing the bridge, instantly suspected treason, and attempted to raise the drawbridge; but Leslie was too nimble for him; he leaped across the gap, and the conspirators, closing round the porter, despatched him with their daggers, seized the keys, and threw the body into the fosse, without any noise or alarm. They then proceeded to dismiss the workmen as quietly from the castle, and Kirkaldy, who was well acquainted with the castle, stationed himself at the only postern through which an escape could be made. The conspirators then went to the apartments of the different gentlemen composing the household of the cardinal, awoke them, and, under menace of instant death if they made any noise, conducted them silently out of the castle and dismissed them. Thus were 150 workmen and fifty household servants removed without any commotion by this little band of sixteen determined men, and, the portcullis being dropped, they remained masters of the castle.

The cardinal, who had slept through the greater part of this time, at length awoke at the unusual bustle, threw open his chamber window and demanded the cause of it. The reply was that Norman Leslie had taken the castle, on which the cardinal rushed to the postern to escape; but finding it in possession of Kirkaldy, he returned as rapidly to his chamber and, assisted by a page, pushed the heaviest furniture against the door to defend the entrance till an alarm could be given. But the conspirators did not allow him time for that. They called for fire to burn down the door, and Beaton, finding resistance useless, threw open the door, when John Leslie and Carmichael rushed upon him, as he cried for mercy, and stabbed him in several places. Melville, however, with a mockery of justice, bade them desist, saying that though the deed was done in secret, it was an act of national justice not that of mercenary assassins, and must be executed with all due decorum. Then, turning the point of the sword towards the wretched cardinal, he said, with formal gravity, "Repent thee, thou wicked cardinal, of all thy sins and iniquities, especially of the murder of Wishart, that instrument of God for the conversion of these lands. It is his death which now cries for vengeance on thee. We are sent by God to inflict the deserved punishment. For here, before the Almighty, I protest that it is neither hatred of thy person, nor love of thy riches, nor fear of thy power, which moves me to seek thy death; but only because thou hast been, and still remainest, an obstinate enemy to Christ Jesus and His holy Gospel." With that he plunged his sword repeatedly into the prelate's body, and laid him dead at his feet.

The death of Cardinal Beaton was at the same time the death-blow to the Church in Scotland. Though he was a man of corrupt moral life and of a persecuting disposition, he was one of the most able men of his time, and resisted the designs of Henry for the subjugation of his native country, with a vigour and perseverance which made Henry feel that whilst he lived Scotland was independent. The death of Beaton, so ardently desired, and so highly paid for by Henry, did not, however, bring him nearer to the reduction of the country, or the accomplishment of his son's marriage with the queen. On the contrary, so intense was the hatred of him and of England, which his tyrannic and detestable conduct had created in every rank and class of the Scottish people, that these objects were now farther off than ever. Henry's own embarrassments were, in consequence of his Scottish and French wars, become so intolerable, that he was compelled, as we have already seen (p. 198), to make peace with France in the month of June, by a treaty called the Treaty of Boulogne, and to agree to deliver up Boulogne, on condition that Francis paid up the arrears of his pension, and to submit a claim of 500,000 crowns upon him to arbitration. Francis took care to have Scotland included in the peace, and Henry bound himself not to interfere with it except on receiving some fresh provocation.

Henry was now drawing to a close of that life which might have been so splendid, and which he had made so horrible. To the last moment he was employed in base endeavours to elude the peace which he had submitted to with Scotland; in the struggles between the two great religious factions, and in still further shocking executions for treason and heresy. Henry himself was become in mind and person a most loathsome object. A life of vile pleasures, and furious and unrestrained passions, succeeded, as other appetites decayed, by a brutal habit of gormandising, had swollen him to an enormous size, and made his body one huge mass of corruption. The ulcer in his leg had become revoltingly offensive; his weight and helplessness were such that he could not pass through any ordinary door, nor be removed from one part of the house to another, except by the aid of machinery and by the help of numerous attendants. The constant irritation of his festering legs made his terrible temper still more terrible.

Of those about him, his queen, Catherine Parr, had the most miraculous escape. With wonderful patience, she had borne his whims, his rages, and his offensive person. She had shown an affectionate regard for his children, and had assisted with great wisdom in the progress of their education, living all the time as with a sword suspended over her head by a hair. She was devotedly attached to the Reformed principles, and loved to converse with sincere Protestants. She had made Miles Coverdale her almoner, and rendered him every assistance in his translation of the Bible. She employed the learned Nicholas Udal, Master of Eton, to edit the translations of Erasmus's "Paraphrases on the Four Gospels," which, according to Strype, she published at her own cost. Stimulated by her example, many ladies of rank pursued the study of the learned languages and of Scriptural knowledge.

Of this school, and one of Catherine's own pupils, was Lady Jane Grey; and another lovely and noble victim, Anne Askew, whose turn it was to fall under the destroying hand of Henry VIII. at this moment, was highly esteemed and encouraged by her. She was tortured and then burnt (July 6, 1546) for denying the Real Presence, and it is said that the Chancellor Wriothesley assisted in the application of the rack in the hope of wringing a confession from her.

An attempt to involve the Queen in similar charges was a complete failure, and Henry never forgave Gardiner for this attempt to deprive him of his true wife and unrivalled nurse. Catherine is said to have treated these her deadly enemies with great magnanimity; but she seems to have become quite aware that Gardiner's was the daring hand that was lifted to ruin her with the king, and it was probably this clear understanding between the king and queen which destroyed Gardiner's influence with Henry for ever. Henry struck Gardiner's name out of the list of his council, and on perceiving him one day on the terrace at Windsor amongst the other courtiers, he turned fiercely on Wriothesley, and said, "Did I not command you that _he_ should come no more amongst you?" "My Lord of Winchester," replied the chancellor, "has come to wait upon your highness with the offer of a benevolence from his clergy." That was a deeply politic stroke of Gardiner's; he knew that if anything could redeem the lost favour of Henry, it was a sacrifice to his avarice next to his vanity. Henry took the money, but turned away from the bishop without a word or a look, and immediately struck his name from amongst his executors, as well as that of Thirlby, Bishop of Westminster, who, he said, was schooled by Gardiner. A deadly feud had grown up between the house of Seymour and the house of Howard. The house of Howard was old, and proud, not only of its ancient lineage, but of its grand deeds. The glory of Flodden lay like a great splendour on their name. Two queens had been selected from this house during the present reign, and the Princess Elizabeth was a partaker of its blood. The Seymours, on the other hand, were of no great lineage; but the two heads of it, Sir Thomas Seymour and Edward, who had been created Earl of Hertford, and whom we have seen executing the king's sanguinary pleasure more than once in Scotland, were the uncles to the heir-apparent, Prince Edward. They had been lifted into greatness entirely through the marriage of their sister with Henry and the birth of the prince; they had no natural connection, therefore, amongst the old nobility, and were regarded by them with jealousy as fortunate upstarts. But there was a circumstance which gave them power besides the alliance with the Crown and the heir to it, and this was the Protestant faith which they held, and which, therefore, bound the Protestant party in England to their cause, and in hope, through their nephew, the future king. The Howards, on the other hand, held by the ancient faith, and were among its most positive assertors. Thus the feud between these rival houses was not only the feud of the old and new aristocracy, but that of the old and new faith; and the rival factions looked up to them as their natural lords and leaders.

The question, therefore, which of these families should become the guardians and ministers of the new king was every day acquiring a more intense interest. The Howards, from their old standing, and their great employments under the Crown, naturally regarded themselves as entitled to that distinction, and in this view they were, of course, supported by the whole Papist party most anxiously. But the Seymours, as the uncles of the prince, were equally bent on securing the preference. They had little connection, as we have stated, amongst the aristocracy, but had the whole Protestant party in their interest. They therefore regarded the Howards with the deepest jealousy and alarm, and they lost no time or opportunity in securing their ruin during the present king's life. There were many things which they could so bring before Henry's mind as to excite his most deadly fear. The Howards were the determined supporters of the Roman faith. What chance, therefore, was there under them of the preservation of the supremacy? What chance was there that they would leave the young king to his own unbiassed choice in matters of religion and of Church government? But still more, the Howards had not escaped his secret dislike through the conduct of Catherine Howard, the queen. A little thing could stimulate this dislike into something fearful. Again, the Duke of Norfolk was rich, and never were the riches of a subject overlooked or unlonged for by Henry Tudor. All these motives were brought successfully into play. Bishop Gardiner was the man most to be feared in the Howard interest, as it regarded the Church, and this had, unquestionably, much to do with his disgrace and banishment from Court.

A few days after that event, namely, on the 12th of December, the Duke of Norfolk and his son the Earl of Surrey, were, unknown to each other, arrested on a charge of high treason, and sent to the Tower, the one by water and the other by land. Surrey had never forgiven the Earl of Hertford for having superseded him in command of the army at Boulogne; he had in his irritation spoken with biting contempt of the parvenu Seymour, and declared that after the king's death he would take his revenge. But Henry was soon persuaded that the designs of Surrey went further. His fears, in his morbid and sinking state, were easily excited, and he was made to believe that there was a conspiracy of the Howards to seize the reins of government during his illness, and make themselves masters of the person of the prince. Surrey, with all the rash and lofty spirit of the poet, denied every charge of disloyalty or treason with the utmost vehemence, and offered to fight his accuser in his shirt.

The Duke of Norfolk wrote to the king from the Tower, expressing his astonishment at the sudden arrest, and saying, "Sir, God doth know that in all my life I never thought one untrue thought against you, or your succession; nor can no more judge nor cast in my mind what should be laid to my charge, than the child that was born this night." The only thing which he thought his enemies might bring against him was for "being quick against such as had been accused for sacramentaries," that is, Protestants. He prayed earnestly to have a fair hearing before the king or his council, face to face with his accusers. His gifted son, one of the finest poets of the age, and whose fame still makes part of England's glory, was brought to trial first, for he was young and full of talent, and, therefore, more dreaded than his father. On the 13th of December he was arraigned for treason in Guildhall, before the Lord Chancellor, the Lord Mayor, and other Commissioners, and a jury of commoners, and beheaded on the 19th of January. The Seymours pursued Norfolk with relentless ferocity. The king was rapidly sinking, there was no time to lose; a bill of attainder was passed through the Peers on the 26th of January, 1547; on the 27th the Royal assent was given in due form, and an order was despatched to the Tower to execute the Duke at an early hour next morning. Before that morning the soul of the tyrant was called to its dread account, and the life of the old nobleman was saved as by a miracle.

Henry VIII. was fifty-five years and seven months old at his death, and had reigned thirty-seven years, nine months, and six days. His will was dated December 30th, 1546. He was authorised by Act of Parliament to settle the succession by his will, and he now named his son Prince Edward, as his lawful successor, then, in default of heirs, the Princess Mary and her heirs; these failing, the Princess Elizabeth, and her heirs. After Elizabeth, was named the Lady Frances, the eldest daughter of his sister, the Queen of France, and her heirs; and such failing, the Lady Eleanor, the youngest daughter of the late Queen of France. On the failure of all these, then the succession was to be to his heirs-at-law; but no particular mention was made in the succession of his sister Margaret, Queen of Scotland, and of her issue.