up by the waters. He arrived that night at Swineshead Abbey, where he lodged. His vexation for the loss threw him into a violent fever, which he aggravated by eating largely of peaches. On the morrow, he was carried on a litter to Seaford Castle, and thence next day to Newark. Some will have it that he was poisoned by a monk of Swineshead Abbey, and Shakspeare has adopted this tradition; but the contemporary historians have not attributed his end to such a cause, nor is it asserted by any one who wrote within sixty years of that time. The stories of his being poisoned are also various in their particulars; the one attributes the king's death to the poison extracted from a toad put into a cup of wine, the other to a dish of poisoned pears, of which the monk who presented them ate three, which were not poisoned, leaving all the rest for the use of the king.

Thus the curious in obituaries may choose between the fever, the indigestion, the toad-drugged posset, and the monk's pears daintily spiced with the manna of St. Nicholas: we think it pretty clear that King John died of Magna Charta.

When Henry the Third, who succeeded in the tenth year of his age, was crowned at Gloucester, under the auspices of the wise, brave, and honest Earl of Pembroke, who had so faithfully served his miserable master, John, and had been unanimously chosen guardian of the young king, and protector, a portion of the regalia was still at Corfe Castle; and Peter de Maulay, the constable, delivered there for the king's use, on the demand of the new Protector, the crown-a plain circle or chaplet of gold, and probably Saxon-which was placed on his head. Henry's second coronation, at a later period,

was

celebrated in Westminster Abbey. The castle was now delivered to Pembroke, and a fair prisoner, the Princess Eleanora, who had passed many sad years in the custody of her infamous uncle, was found incarcerated. Here, too, were found, in addition to jewels and other valuables, large stores of military engines, which John had collected in the vain hope of subjugating the barons and revoking the Great Charter.

But the Protector died; and then commenced the troubles of the weak Henry. Peter de Maulay forcibly

resumed possession of the castle, which was held in such high consideration by Simon de Montfort and his adherents, that it was the third which they demanded to be ceded as pledges for the future good conduct of the king.

Whether the unfortunate second Edward enjoyed this castle as a residence is uncertain; but there is no doubt that, in his reign, it was put into complete repair at the expense of the crown, and that it be. came his prison when the Queen and her paramour took the fallenmonarch out of the honourable custody of Henry of Lancaster, to hand him over to the tender mercies of those shames to knighthood, Maltravers and Gournay. Those ruflians removed him from Kenilworth Castle, where he had passed the winter under the wardship of his uncle the Earl, and hurried the doomed prisoner from place to place under cloud of night, that no one might with certainty know his whereabout. First they brought him to Corfe Castle, then to Bristol Castle, whence the worthy citizens would have delivered him, but his inhuman keepers got scent of the scheme, and conveyed him to Berkeley Castle, whose roofs soon rung with the

Shrieks of an agonizing king.

Brilliant as was the reign of our third Edward, his early days were gloomy enough. He must soon have discovered the nature of the connexion between his mother and her gentle Mortimer;' and the cruel position in which he was placed in her hands may, as Mr. Bankes chariinto which he was driven; but he tably observes, palliate the crimes days of his triumphant glory, have must always, even in the brightest shuddered when he called to recollection the dark dawn of his splendid career;' and if a public condemnation and execution, the records of which exist, had not taken place, it would have been difficult to find credit for the romantic story of the Earl of Kent.

Of all the mysterious transactions of that day, none will appear more extraordinary than that of which Corfe Castle was the scene. The Earl of Kent, brother to Edward II., had no great genius for public affairs, but was naturally sincere and generous, He

had suffered himself to be deceived by the artifices of Queen Isabella, and joined her against his own brother, never imagining she would have carried matters so far: when once engaged in the rebellious party, the suddenness of the revolution would not permit him to recede. The disorderly behaviour of that queen, the insolence of Mortimer, and general ill conduct of public affairs, which clouded the new reign, now brought a deep conviction to his mind, of repentance for the course he had taken. Too generous to conceal his feelings, Isabella and Mortimer resolved on his destruction, and, in order to accomplish this, they prepared for him a most extraordinary snare. It is probable that they found rumours already rife through the kingdom, to the effect that Edward II. was not dead; and whether they first originated or only cultivated those reports, an opinion to that intent did prevail for a long season.

Two persons, pretended friends, came to the Earl of Kent, and informed him that his brother, Edward II., was still a prisoner in Corfe Castle, strictly guarded, and suffered to be seen by none but his domestics, who were guarded with him. This pretended secret was confirmed by the testimony of several persons of distinction, including two bishops. The Earl of Kent had himself assisted at the private funeral of the King, his brother, but he had not seen the body, and might have been deceived in the obsequies; he determined to release him, if he were still alive. About

this time (says Stow) the Queen Isabella, who bore an inveterate hatred against Edmund Plantagenet, Earl of Kent, one of the King's uncles, chiefly for the Earl of Marche's sake, to whose unreasonable pride the noble Prince's courage scorned to yield, began earnestly to inform the King her son against him, as guilty of matters into which the subtle Mortimer had craftily ensnared the open-hearted gentleman.

It may well excite surprise how any man should now be accused of endeavouring to deliver the murdered king, who had been two years in a bloody grave; but the arts by which the innocent Earl was led to his destruction were worthy of the fiends in human shape who invented them, and might have deluded a less suspicions person.

Mortimer, to carry on the delusion, is said to have appointed several knights to make shows, masks, and other diversions upon the battlements and roofs of Corfe Castle, which the country people observing,

557

could not but imagine that some great prince or king was there, for whose pleasure and honour these pageants The were performed. rumour that the old king was alive soon spread, and at last, as was designed, came with some show of authority to the ears of the Earl of Kent, who, in his desire to sift the truth out, entangled himself more strongly in an error.

The Earl had a confidant, a preaching friar, whom he privily sent to the castle with a charge to dive into the matter.

He, at last, under much caution, with a great to-do, obtaining to be admitted into the castle, was even then, under pretended fear, kept close, all day, in the porter's lodge; but, at night, being, for more security, disguised in lay habit, he was brought into the great hall, where he beheld one clothed in royal habiliments, to personate a king, so that the friar himself, either deceived by the glimmering of the lamps, or the distance which he was forced to keep, or the strength of prejudice working upon his fancy, did really take him for the father of the young King, as he sat, with seeming majesty and princely attendants, at a royal supper.

Whether the friar was an instrument in the plot, or was really persuaded that he had seen the King, certain it is that he convinced the Earl that he had seen his royal brother alive and well, at supper. The generous Earl then declared with an oath that he would rescue the King from that unworthy confinement.

It should be borne in mind that, while the rumours were rife, the Earl, having occasion to be at the court of Rome, had held a conference at Avignon with Pope John XXII. on other matters, and afterwards desired counsel of his Holiness relative to Edward his brother, the late King, since it was current through England that he was alive and well. On hearing this, the Pope commanded him, as he valued his blessing, to help towards the King's deliverance to the utmost of his ability, giving him and all his partakers plenary absolution, promising to bear the charges of the whole undertaking, and threatening him with excommunication if he did not use his best endeavours for his brother's right and liberty.

On the Earl's return he sent his confidential friar to Corfe with the result above stated; and the Earl was further confirmed in his belief by the assertions of another friar, who rejoiced in the name of Dunhead. Magic was as much credited by the aristocracy of that day as table-turning is in this year of grace 1853, so that some of our earls and countesses must not smile if they should chance to hear or read that Dunhead, discoursing' with the chivalrous Earl of Kent, at Kensington, told him that he had conjured up a spirit which assured him that Edward, the late King, was still liv. ing.' That this Dunhead was one of Mortimer's emissaries can hardly be doubted, whatever may be thought of the other friar.

The credulous Earl thus assured went to the castle, and there

Spake with the constable thereof, Sir John Daverill, and, after many rich presents, desired secretly to know of him whether his brother, the late King, was yet alive or dead, and if he were alive, that he might have a sight of him. Now this Sir John Daverill, being Mortimer's creature, answered, that indeed his brother was in health, and under his keeping, but that he durst not show him to any man living, since he was forbid, in behalf of the King that now was, and also of the Queen-mother and of Mortimer, to show his person to any one whatsoever, except only unto them.

No woodcock ever walked into a springe more contentedly than the poor Earl, who was so completely deceived that he delivered to the constable a letter, desiring him to bear it to his brother, which he promised to do, and carried it to Mortimer.

This letter, sealed with the Earl's seal, began thus:

-

To the noble knight, Edward of Caernarvon, Edmund of Woodstock, worship and reverence, with brotherly allegiance and subjection:-Sir knight, worshipfull and dear brother, if it please you, I pray heartily that you be of good comfort, for I shall so ordain for you that you shall soon come out of prison, and be delivered of that trouble which you are in; and may your highness understand that I have unto me assenting almost all the great men of England, with all their apparel that is to say, with armour

and treasure exceeding much, for to maintain and help your quarrel so far forth, that you shall be King again, as you were before, and thereto they have all sworn to me upon a book, as well prelates as earls and barons.

All was accomplished. Mortimer immediately gave the letter to the Queen, who laid it before the King, her son, not without magnifying the peril which awaited him from his uncle's practices, and obtaining his leave to secure that prince's person. The Earl was apprehended at Winchester, where the Parliament was assembled, impeached, brought before his peers, and his own letter, which he could not disown, produced against him. Defence, it seems, he felt to be useless, but said that seve ral lords, among whom were the Archbishop of York and Bishop of London, were concerned in the plot, and that they had assured him of five thousand men to assist in it. He was condemned to lose his head for the treason, and was brought out to die, in his twenty-eighth year, on the 9th of March, in the year 1329. The head was ready, but where was the executioner? The Earl was so much beloved that the headsman who had been engaged slunk secretly away. Hour after hour passed; noon, afternoon, evening came, but no one could be found to do the horrid work. At last, towards nightfall, the old resource of giving a condemned criminal his life upon condition of his taking that of a fellowcreature, was put in action - the Earl's long agony was terminated, and his head rolled on the scaffold.

An uncle and a father! an early death-load that for a young king's conscience; but a mother and her loving friend helped him to bear the burden. Wherever there is mischief, the choicest weapon in the armoury of the prince of darkness is sure to be at the bottom of it, and we have only to ask with Quevedo's honest functionary, Who is she?'*

The beautiful Countess of Kent was the mother of Richard II., and in his time Thomas Holland, Earl of Kent, and Alicia his wife, near relatives of the King, possessed the castle, which they appear to have held unmolested through the

1853.]

troubles that closed their unhappy kinsman's reign. When they died, Henry IV. granted this royal property' to the head of the house of Beaufort, and in that family it continued until the reign of Henry VI., when, though the war of the roses did not reach the castle walls, the owner was at last overwhelmed in the common ruin of the Lancastrians, and the castle, with the rest of the Duke's forfeited estates, was granted to George Duke of Clarence. On his death-Mr. Bankes sticks to the Malmsey butt-the castle and royal domains of Corfe reverted to the Crown.

When the third Richard fell at Bosworth, and

The rose of snow

Entwined with her blushing foe, Henry VII. prepared Corfe Castle for the residence of his mother, the Countess of Richmond and Derby; and a very good countess too. She erected the noble monument to her parents, the Duke and Duchess of Somerset, that still graces Wimborne Minster, and endowed in that town a school which bears, most unrighteously, the name of Queen Elizabeth. The Countess outlived the King, her son, but only for one year; and at her death the castle again reverted to the Crown, and became the property of Henry VIII.

Corfe Castle remained unappropriated by any favoured courtier during the reign of the bluff King. All who had won any favour in his eyes were intent upon the plunder of the bags and lands of hoarding abbots; but at his death, and when the proud and grasping Seymourt became protector, Corfe was added to the vast amount of property, religious and royal, which this most industrious of Earls had accumulated and was accumulating, till his high career terminated in blood on Towerhill, in January, 1553; and so the castle again lapsed to the Crown.

In Elizabeth's time the castle was

* The Earl of Somerset.

559

granted to a fortunate subject, and became a step in the advancement of the handsome Hatton, ere

The seals and maces danced before him.

Born he was of a family more ancient than wealthy in Northamptonshire. Being young and of a comely tallness of body and amiable countenance, he got into such favour that she took him into her band of fifty gentlemen pensioners; and afterwards, for his modest sweetness of condition, into the number of the gentlemen of her Privy Chamber made him captain of her guard, vicechamberlain, and one of her Privy Council; and lastly made him Lord Chancellor of England, and honoured him with the order of George.

;

But he grew old and ailing-her Majesty snubbed him, and, as he died unmarried, the castle passed to his nephew, Sir William, son of a sister of Sir Christopher. Sir William left no children, and the property came ultimately to his widow, the Lady Elizabeth Hatton, daughter of Thomas Cecil, Earl of Exeter, who became the second wife of Lord Chief Justice Coke, to whose domestic happiness she by no means contributed, though she, as well as her beautiful daughter, the Lady Frances,' did, not a little, to the scandalous chronicles of gentle King Jamie the Sixth of Scotland and First of England, and of his unfortunate

son.

This dashing lady was fond of field sports, hawking especially, and, among other fashionable pursuits, was much addicted to necromancy.

The celebrated wizard, Forman, was said to be much in her confidence. Persons of both sexes, and of all ranks of life, resorted to him in large numbers, to consult his art in the marshes of Lambeth, where he dwelt. He adopted a rule which confined the list of his inquiries to those who had some degree of education; for, in no case would he answer any questions, unless the inquirers first wrote with their own hands their names at length in a book, which he kept for this purpose, and thus, by means of these names, he had more than

† Earl of Hertford.

half of the greatest personages of the court in his power. This book was produced in court at the trial of the murderers of Sir Thomas Overbury, those infamous persons having consulted Forman on the subject of their horrible design, also with regard to their own ultimate fate. Sir Anthony Weldon, in his amusing memoir, tells us "There was much mirth made in the court upon the showing this book, for it was reported the first leaf my Lord Coke lighted on he found his own wife's name.'

Upon his death Corfe Castle became the property of Sir John Bankes, of whom Mr. Garrard thus writes, in a letter to the Earl of Strafford, then Lord Wentworth, and Lord Deputy in Ireland :

Shall I tell yourself how Bankes, the Attorney-General, hath been commended unto his Majesty-that he exceeds Bacon in eloquence, Chancellor Ellesmere in judgment, and William Noy in law? High praises. Pray God he answers his expectation that so praised him.

It is not to be wondered at that the widow and daughter of Sir EdIward Coke should have taken advantage of their liberty to dispose of Corfe.

The very entrance of this castle, with its massive barriers and ponderous portcullis, could hardly fail to remind the ladies of the Gatehouse, in which each of them had passed a portion of their time not very agreeably.

The dragon's teeth sown in the last reign began now to spring up into a sufficiently strong crop. The most efficient man in the King's service had received his first blow in the following letter:

Wentworth,-Certainly I should be much to blame not to admit so good a friend as you are to speak with me, since I deny it to none that there is not a just exception against it; yet I must freely tell you that the cause of this desire of yours, if it be known, will rather hearten than discourage your enemies, for if they can once find that you apprehend the dark setting of a storm, when I say no, they will make you leave to care for anything in a short while but for your fears; and, believe it, the marks of my favours that stop malicious tongues, are neither places nor titles, but the little welcome I give to accusers and the willing ear I give to my servants. This is not to disparage those favours (for envy flies most at the fairest mark), but to show their use, to wit, not to quell envy, but to reward service, it being truly so when the

October 27, St. Simon and Jude's Eve. I went into my upper study, to

see

some manuscripts which I was sending to Oxford." In that study hung my picture, taken by the life, and coming in, I found it fallen down upon the face, and lying on the floor, the string being broken by which it hanged against the wall. I am almost every day threatened with my ruin in Parliament. God grant this be no omen!

December 18, Friday.-I was accused by the House of Commons for high treason, without any particular charge laid against me. Mr. Holles was the man who brought up the message to the Lords. Soon after, the charge was brought into the Upper House by Scots commissioners, tending to prove me an incendiary, upon which I was presently committed to the gentleman usher. I was permitted to go in his company to Lambeth, for a book or two to read in. I stayed at Lambeth till the evening, to avoid the gazing of the people.

On the 22nd of March in the next year the Earl of Strafford was brought to trial; all know with what

result:

The populace at first interrupted his dying speech with insults, but his demeanour and his voice so touched upon the generous feeling inherent in the British character, that when he had concluded his speech and his prayer, there did not appear to be one ruffian left in the multitude, except the brutal hireling who performed the execution. "The headsman' (says the True Relation of the Manner of the Execution of Thomas, Earle of Strafford, published at the time), letting fall the fatall axe, caught up his head, and showed it to all the people; his eyes rolled up and downe, but his body stirred very little; but the bloudy executioner is to be ad