History of England from the fall of Wolsey to the death of Elizabeth Volume III Part 38

[130] "The said Aske suffered no foot man to enter the city, for fear of spoils."--Manner of the taking of Robert Aske: _Rolls House MS._ A 2, 28.

[131] Earl of Oxford to Cromwell: _MS. State Paper Office_, second series, Vol. III.

[132] Henry VIII. to Lord Darcy, October 13: _Rolls House MS._

[133] Lord Darcy to the King, October 17: _Rolls House MS._

[134] Lord Shrewsbury to Lord Darcy: _Rolls House MS._ first series, 282. Darcy certainly received this letter, since a copy of it is in the collection made by himself.

[135] Manner of the taking of Robert Aske: _Rolls House MS._ A 2, 28.

[136] I believe that I am unnecessarily tender to Lord Darcy's reputation. Aske, though he afterwards contradicted himself, stated in his examination that Lord Darcy could have defended the castle had he wished.--_Rolls House MS._, A 2, 29. It was sworn that when he was advised "to victual and store Pomfret," he said, "there was no need; it would do as it was." Ibid. And Sir Henry Saville stated that "when Darcy heard of the first rising, he said, 'Ah! they are up in Lincolns.h.i.+re.

G.o.d speed them well. I would they had done this three years ago, for the world should have been the better for it.'"--Ibid.

[137] Aske's Deposition: _Rolls House MS._ first series, 414.

[138] Examination of Sir Thomas Percy: _Rolls House MS._

[139] Stapleton's Confession: Ibid. A 2, 28.

[140] Examination of Christopher Aske: _Rolls House MS._ first series, 840

[141] Ibid.

[142] Henry VIII. to the Duke of Suffolk: _Rolls House MS._

[143] Wriothesley to Cromwell: _State Papers_, Vol. I. p. 472.

[144] The Marquis of Exeter, who was joined in commission with the Duke of Norfolk, never pa.s.sed Newark. He seems to have been recalled, and sent down into Devons.h.i.+re, to raise the musters in his own county.

[145] _State Papers_, Vol. I. p. 493.

[146] _State Papers_, Vol. I. p. 519.

[147] _State Papers_, Vol. I. p. 495.

[148] This particular proclamation--the same, apparently, which was read by Christopher Aske at Skipton--I have been unable to find. That which is printed in the State Papers from the Rolls House Records, belongs to the following month. The contents of the first, however, may be gathered from a description of it by Robert Aske, and a comparison of the companion proclamation issued in Lincolns.h.i.+re. It stated briefly that the insurrection was caused by forged stories; that the king had no thought of suppressing parish churches, or taxing food or cattle. The abbeys had been dissolved by act of parliament, in consequence of their notorious vice and profligacy. The people, therefore, were commanded to return to their homes, at their peril. The commotion in Lincolns.h.i.+re was put down. The king was advancing in person to put them down also, if they continued disobedient.

[149] In explanation of his refusal, Aske said afterwards that it was for two causes: first, that if the herald should have declared to the people by proclamation that the commons in Lincolns.h.i.+re were gone to their homes, they would have killed him; secondly, that there was no mention in the same proclamation neither of pardon nor of the demands which were the causes of their a.s.sembly.--Aske's Narrative: _Rolls House MS._ A 2, 28.

[150] Lancaster Herald's Report: _State Papers_, Vol. I. p. 485.

[151] Stapleton's Confession: _Rolls House MS._ A 2, 28. Does this solitary and touching faithfulness, I am obliged to ask, appear as if Northumberland believed that four months before the king and Cromwell had slandered and murdered the woman whom he had once loved?

[152] "We were 30,000 men, as tall men, well horsed, and well appointed as any men could be."--Statement of Sir Marmaduke Constable: _MS. State Paper Office._ All the best evidence gives this number.

[153] Not the place now known under this name--but a bridge over the Don three or four miles above Doncaster.

[154] So Aske states.--Examination: _Rolls House MS._, first series, 838. Lord Darcy went further. "If he had chosen," he said, "he could have fought Lord Shrewsbury with his own men, and brought never a man of the northmen with him." Somerset Herald, on the other hand, said, that the rumour of disaffection was a feint. "One thing I am sure of," he told Lord Darcy, "there never were men more desirous to fight with men than ours to fight with you."--_Rolls House MS._

[155] "Sir Marmaduke Constable did say, if there had been a battle, the southern men would not have fought. He knew that every third man was theirs. Further, he said the king and his council determined nothing but they had knowledge before my lord of Norfolk gave them knowledge." Earl of Oxford to Cromwell: _MS. State Paper Office_.

[156] "I saw neither gentlemen nor commons willing to depart, but to proceed in the quarrel; yea, and that to the death. If I should say otherwise, I lie."--Aske's Examination: _Rolls House MS._

[157] Rutland and Huntingdon were in Shrewsbury's camp by this time.

[158] "They wished," said Sir Marmaduke Constable, "the king had sent some younger lords to fight with them than my lord of Norfolk and my lord of Shrewsbury. No lord in England would have stayed them but my lord of Norfolk."--Earl of Oxford to Cromwell: _MS. State Paper Office._

[159] The chroniclers tell a story of a miraculous fall of rain, which raised the river the day before the battle was to have been fought, and which was believed by both sides to have been an interference of Providence. Cardinal Pole also mentions the same fact of the rain, and is bitter at the superst.i.tions of his friends; and yet, in the mult.i.tude of depositions which exist, made by persons present, and containing the most minute particulars of what took place, there is no hint of anything of the kind. The waters had been high for several days, and the cause of the unb.l.o.o.d.y termination of the crisis was more creditable to the rebel leaders.

[160] Second Examination of Robert Aske: _Rolls House MS._ first series, 838. It is true that this is the story of Aske himself, and was told when, after fresh treason, he was on trial for his life. But his bearing at no time was that of a man who would stoop to a lie. Life comparatively was of small moment to him.

[161] Uncle of Marjory, afterwards wife of John Knox. Marjory's mother, Elizabeth, to whom so many of Knox's letters were addressed, was an Aske, but she was not apparently one of the Aughton family.

[162] Aske's Narrative: _Rolls House MS._ A 2, 28.

[163] Instructions to Sir Thomas Hilton and his Companions: _Rolls House MS._ There are many groups of "articles" among the Records. Each focus of the insurrection had its separate form; and coming to light one by one, they have created much confusion. I have thought it well, therefore, to print in full, from Sir Thomas Hilton's instructions, a list, the most explicit, as well as most authentic, which is extant.

"I. Touching our faith, to have the heresies of Luther, Wickliffe, Huss, Melancthon, colampadius, Bucer's _Confessio Germanica_, _Apologia Melancthonis_, the works of Tyndal, of Barnes, of Marshal, Raskall, St.

Germain, and such other heresies of Anabaptists, clearly within this realm to be annulled and destroyed.

"II. To have the supreme head, touching _cura animarum_, to be reserved unto the see of Rome, as before it was accustomed to be, and to have the consecration of the bishops from him, without any first-fruits or pensions to him to be paid out of this realm; or else a pension reasonable for the outward defence of our faith.

"III. We humbly beseech our most dread sovereign lord that the Lady Mary may be made legitimate, and the former statute therein annulled, for the danger if the t.i.tle might incur to the crown of Scotland. This to be in parliament.

"IV. To have the abbeys suppressed to be restored--houses, lands, and goods.

"V. To have the tenths and first-fruits clearly discharged, unless the clergy will of themselves grant a rent-charge in penalty to the augmentation of the crown.

"VI. To have the friars observants restored unto their houses again.

"VII. To have the heretics, bishops and temporals, and their sect, to have condign punishment by fire, or such other; or else to try the quarrel with us and our partakers in battle.

"VIII. To have the Lord Cromwell, the lord chancellor, and Sir Richard Rich to have condign punishment as subverters of the good laws of this realm, and maintainers of the false sect of these heretics, and first inventors and bringers in of them.

"IX. That the lands in Westmoreland, c.u.mberland, Kendal, Furness, the abbey lands in Ma.s.sams.h.i.+re, Kirkbys.h.i.+re, and Netherdale, may be by tenant right, and the lord to have at every change two years' rent for gressam [the fine paid on renewal of a lease; the term is, I believe, still in use in Scotland], and no more, according to the grant now made by the lords to the commons there under their seal; and this to be done by act of parliament.

"X. The statute of handguns and cross-bows to be repealed, and the penalties thereof, unless it be on the king's forest or park, for the killing of his Grace's deer, red or fallow.

"XI. That Doctor Legh and Doctor Layton may have condign punishment for their extortions in the time of visitation, as bribes of nuns, religious houses, forty pounds, twenty pounds, and so to ---- leases under one common seal, bribes by them taken, and other their abominable acts by them committed and done. "XII. Restoration for the election of knights of s.h.i.+res and burgesses, and for the uses among the lords in the parliament house, after their antient custom.

"XIII. Statutes for enclosures and intakes to be put in execution, and that all intakes and enclosures since the fourth year of King Henry the Seventh be pulled down, except on mountains, forests, or parks.

"XIV. To be discharged of the fifteenth, and taxes now granted by act of parliament.

"XV. To have the parliament in a convenient place at Nottingham or York, and the same shortly summoned.

"XVI. The statute of the declaration of the crown by will, that the same be annulled and repealed.