University of Virginia Library

Empson and Dudley.

The place where Henry, and Francis I. of France met, was, from the unexampled and prodigal splendor of the two Courts, called “The Field of Cloth of Gold.”

The Reformation was said to be owing to a jest made by Sir Thomas Wyatt, who, when Henry was waiting for the Pope's assent to his divorce, said “Lord! that a man cannot repent him of his sins without leave from the Pope.” Thus Wyatt hinted, Cranmer opened, and the Universities made, the way to the Reformation. Vide “An Englishman's History of England.”

At this period an account was kept of the diabolical mischiefs perpetrated by the armies invading Scotland, with all the regulatity of a tradesman's ledger. The following was the sum total of the ravages from July to November, in 1544, as delivered in by the warden of the marches:—

Towns, towers, steeds, barnekyns, parish churches, bastel houses, cast down or burnt ......................... 192 Scots slain, ...................... 403 Prisoners taken, .................. 816 Nolt (horned cattle) taken, .......10,389 Sheep, ............................12,492 Nags and geldings, ................ 1,296 Goats, ............................ 200 Bolls of corn, .................... 850 By Lord Hertford's invasion into the counties of Berwick and Roxburgh only, and between the 8th and 23d of September, 1545, there were destroyed,— Monasteries and friar-houses, 7 Castles, towers, and piles, ....... 16 Market towns, ..................... 5 Villages, ......................... 243 Milnes, ........................... 13 Hospitals, ........................ 3

John Skelton, Poet Laureat to King Henry VIII. attacked Cardinal Wolsey without mercy, for his upstart insolence, and in his uncouth, but nervous doggrel, did his utmost to render him ridiculous, thus—

Vide J. P. Andrew.

164 suppress'd monasteries, 90 colleges, 2374 chauntrys and chapels, and 110 hospitals produced a revenue of £161,100 to the crown: from which fund some additional colleges and professorships were given to the universities, and 6 new bishopricks were erected. The common people were much displeased with the stoppage of that hospitality the monks were used to exercise: there is an old ballad called “Truth and Ignorance,” the latter, who is represented as a rustic, says—

He desired the Lieutenant of the Tower to see him safe up to the scaffold, and leave him, at coming down, to shift for himself.

“The King's persecution of the Lutherans was savage and inexorable:—at Coventry, six men and a woman were burnt for teaching their children the Lord's Prayer, Commandments, &c. in the vulgar tongue.” J.P. Andrews.

This Lady, whose “beauty raised her to a throne, and whose merit deserved two better husbands,” wrote and published many Psalms, Prayers, Pious Discourses, &c. “wherein,” says the Title page, “the mynde is stirred patiently to suffer all afflictions here, to set at nought the vaine prosperitee of this worlde, and always to long for the everlastynge felicitee.”—She also published several Letters; was not only learned, but a patroness of learning— interceding for, and saving, the University of Cambridge, when an Act passed to throw all Colleges into the King's disposal. Nicholas Udal, Master of Eton, in his time says “it was then a common thyng to see young virgins so nouzled and trained in the studie of letters, that they willingly set all other pastymes at nought for learning's sake.” Vide Catalogue of Royal Authors.

Quail, for Quarrel or Quell.

A Bitterne.

A Jarre, synonimous with Buff and Ale.

Rayle, a Rail.

A Whiting Pout.

He was brought to the block in 1547, on pretence of using the Royal Arms, and proposing to marry the Lady Mary, Daughter of the King.

I would read thei—Horace Walpole.

She was Daughter of Lord Kildare.

He never gained her, she married the Earl of Lincoln.

Sweet.

Mingles.

Past.

Bane.