صور الصفحة
PDF
النشر الإلكتروني

His

to go as ambassador to the Spanish court. situation there was rendered exceedingly difficult, by the mutual insincerity of the negotiating powers, and by his religion, which exposed him to prejudice, and even at one time to danger from the Inquisition. He had to invest Henry's bullying romonstrances with the graces of moderate diplomacy, and to keep terms with a bigoted court while he questioned the Pope's supremacy. In spite of those obstacles, the dignity and discernment of Wyat gave him such weight in negotiation, that he succeeded in expelling from Spain his master's most dreaded enemy, Cardinal Pole, who was so ill received at Madrid that the haughty legate quitted it with indignation. The records of his different embassies exhibit not only personal activity in following the Emperor Charles to his most important interviews with Francis, but sagacity in foreseeing consequences, and in giving advice to his own sovereign. Neither the dark policy, nor the immoveable countenance of Charles, eluded his penetration. When the Emperor, on the death of Lady Jane Seymour, offered the King of England the Duchess of Milan in marriage, Henry's avidity caught at the offer of her duchy, and Heynes and Bonner were sent out to Spain as special commissioners on the business; but it fell off, as Wyat had predicted, from the Spanish monarch's insincerity.

Bonner, who had done no good to the English mission, and who had felt himself lowered at the Spanish court by the superior ascendancy of Wyat, on his return home sought to indemnify himself for the mortification, by calumniating his late colleague. In order to answer those calumnies, Wyat was obliged to obtain his recal from Spain; and Bonner's charges, on being investigated, fell to the ground. But the Emperor's journey through France having raised another crisis of expectation, Wyat was sent out once more to watch the motions of Charles, and to fathom his designs. At Blois he had an inter

view with Francis, and another with the Emperor, whose friendship for the king of France he pronounced, from all that he observed, to be insincere. "He is constrained (said the English ambassador) to come to a show of friendship, meaning to make him a mockery when he has done." When events are made familiar to us by history, we are perhaps disposed to undervalue the wisdom that foretold them; but this much is clear, that if Charles's rival had been as wise as Sir Thomas Wyat, the Emperor would not have made a mockery of Francis. Wyat's advice to his own sovereign at this period, was to support the Duke of Cleves, and to ingratiate himself with the German protestant princes. His zeal was praised; but the advice, though sanctioned by Cromwell, was not followed by Henry. Warned probably, at last, of the approaching downfall of Cromwell, he obtained his final recal from Spain. On his return, Bonner had sufficient interest to get him committed to the Tower, where he was harshly treated and unfairly tried, but was nevertheless most honourably acquitted; and Henry, satisfied of his innocence, made him considerable donations of land. Leland informs us, that about this time he had the command of a ship of war. The sea service was not then, as it is now, a distinct profession.

Much of his time, however, after his return to England, must be supposed, from his writings, to have been spent at his paternal seat of Allington, in study and rural amusements. From that pleasant retreat he was summoned, in the autumn of 1542, by order of the king, to meet the Spanish ambassador, who had landed at Falmouth, and to conduct him from thence to London. In his zeal to perform this duty he accidentally overheated himself with riding, and was seized, at Sherborne, with a malignant fever, which carried him off, after a few days' illness, in his thirtyninth year.

[blocks in formation]
[blocks in formation]

For if I thought it were not so,

Though it were so, it griev'd me not;
Unto my thought it were as thô
I hearkened though I hear not.
At that I see I cannot wink,

Nor from my thought so let it go:
I would it were not as I think;
I would I thought it were not.

Lo! how my thought might make me free,
Of that perchance it needs not :
Perchance none doubt the dread I see ;
I shrink at that I bear not.

But in my heart this word shall sink,
Until the proof may better be:
I would it were not as I think;
I would I thought it were not.

If it be not, shew no cause why
I should so think, then care I not;
For I shall so myself apply

To be that I appear not.

That is, as one that shall not shrink

To be your own until I die ;
And if that be not as I think,
Likewise to think it is not.

HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY.

[Born, 1516. Died, 1547.]

WALPOLE, Ellis, and Warton, gravely inform us that Lord Surrey contributed to the victory of Flodden, a victory which was gained before Lord Surrey was born. The mistakes of such writers may teach charity to criticism. Dr. Nott, who has cleared away much fable and anachronism from the noble poet's biography, supposes that he was born in or about the year 1516, and that he was educated at Cambridge, of which university he was afterwards elected high steward. At the early age of sixteen he was contracted in marriage to the Lady Frances Vere, daughter to John Earl of Oxford. The Duke of Richmond was afterwards affianced to Surrey's sister. It was customary, in those times, to delay, frequently for years, the consummations of such juvenile matches; and the writer of Lord Surrey's life, already mentioned, gives reasons for supposing that the poet's residence at Windsor, and his intimate friendship with Richmond, so tenderly recorded in his verses, took place, not in their absolute childhood, as has been generally imagined, but immediately after their being contracted to their respective brides. If this was the case, the poet's allusion to

The secret groves which oft we made resound
Of pleasant plaint, and of our ladies' praise.

may be charitably understood as only recording the aspirations of their conjugal impatience.

Surrey's marriage was consummated in 1535. In the subsequent year he sat with his father, as Earl Marshal, on the trial of his kinswoman Anne Boleyn. Of the impression which that event made upon his mind, there is no trace to be found either in his poetry, or in tradition. His grief for the amiable Richmond, whom he lost soon after, is more satisfactorily testified. It is about this period that the fiction of Nash, unfaithfully misapplied as reality by Anthony

Wood*, and from him copied, by mistake, by Walpole and Warton, sends the poet on his romantic tour to Italy, as the knight errant of the fair Geraldine. There is no proof, however, that Surrey was ever in Italy. At the period of his imagined errantry, his repeated appearance at the court of England can be ascertained; and Geraldine, if she was a daughter of the Earl of Kildare, was then only a child of seven years oldt.

That Surrey entertained romantic sentiments for the fair Geraldine, seems, however, to admit of little doubt; and that too at a period of her youth which makes his homage rather surprising. The fashion of the age sanctioned such courtships, under the liberal interpretation of their being platonic. Both Sir P. Sydney and the Chevalier Bayard avowed attachments of this exalted nature to married ladies, whose reputations were never sullied, even when the mistress wept openly at parting from her admirer. Of the nature of Surrey's attachment we may conjecture what we please, but can have no certain test even in his verses, which might convey either much more or much less than he felt; and how shall we search in the graves of men for the shades and limits of passions that elude our living observation?

* Nash's History of Jack Wilton.

+ If concurring proofs did not so strongly point out his poetical mistress Geraldine to be the daughter of the Earl of Kildare, we might well suspect, from the date of Surrey's attachment, that the object of his praises must have been some other person. Geraldine, when he declared his devotion to her, was only thirteen years of age. She was taken, in her childhood, under the protection of the court, and attended the Princess Mary. At the age of fifteen she married Sir Anthony Wood, a man of sixty, and after his death accepted the Earl of Lincoln. From Surrey's verses we find that she slighted bis addresses, after having for some time encouraged them; and from his conduct it appears that he hurried into war and public business in order to forget her indifference.

[ocr errors]

Towards the close of 1540, Surrey embarked in public business. A rupture with France being anticipated, he was sent over to that kingdom, with Lord Russell and the Earl of Southampton, to see that everything was in a proper state of defence within the English pale. He had previously been knighted; and had jousted in honour of Anne of Cleves, upon her marriage with Henry. The commission did not detain him long in France. He returned to England before Christmas, having acquitted himself entirely to the king's satisfaction. In the next year, 1541, we may suppose him to have been occupied in his literary pursuits—perhaps in his translation of Virgil. England was then at peace both at home and abroad, and in no other subsequent year of Surrey's life could his active service have allowed him leisure. In 1542 he received the order of the Garter, and followed his father in the expedition of that year into Scotland, where he acquired his first military experience. Amidst these early distinctions it is somewhat mortifying to find him, about this period, twice committed to the Fleet prison; on one occasion on account of a private quarrel, on another for eating meat in Lent, and for breaking the windows of the citizens of London with stones from his cross-bow. This was a strange misdemeanour indeed, for a hero and a man of letters. His apology, perhaps as curious as the fact itself, turns the action only into quixotic absurdity. His motive, he said, was religious. He saw the citizens sunk in papal corruption of manners, and he wished to break in upon their guilty secrecy by a sudden chastisement, that should remind them of Divine retribution!

The war with France called him into more honourable activity. In the first campaign he joined the army under Sir John Wallop, at the siege of Landrecy; and in the second and larger expedition he went as marshal of the army of which his father commanded the vanguard. The siege of Montreuil was allotted to the Duke of Norfolk and his gallant son; but their operations were impeded by the want of money, ammunition, and artillery, supplies most probably detained from reaching them by the influence of the Earl of Hertford, who had long regarded both Surrey and his father with a jealous eye. In these disastrous circumstances Surrey seconded the duke's efforts with zeal and ability. On one expedition he was out two days and two nights, spread destruction among the resources of the enemy, and returned to the camp with a load of supplies, and without the loss of a single man. In a bold attempt to storm the town he succeeded so far as to make a lodgement in one of the gates; but was dangerously wounded, and owed his life to the devoted bravery of his attendant Clere, who received a hurt in rescuing him, of which he died a month after. On the report of the Dauphin of France's

approach with 60,000 men, the English made an able retreat, of which Surrey conducted the movements as marshal of the camp.

He returned with his father to England, but must have made only a short stay at home, as we find him soon after fighting a spirited action in the neighbourhood of Boulogne, in which he chased back the French as far as Montreuil. The following year he commanded the vanguard of the army of Boulogne, and finally solicited and obtained the government of that place. It was then nearly defenceless; the breaches unrepaired, the fortifications in decay, and the enemy, with superior numbers, established so near as to be able to command the harbour, and to fire upon the lower town. Under such disadvantages, Surrey entered on his command, and drew up and sent home a plan of alterations in the works, which was approved of by the king, and ordered to be acted upon. Nor were his efforts merely defensive. On one occasion he led his men into the enemy's country as far as Samerau-Bois, which he destroyed, and returned in safety with considerable booty. Afterwards, hearing that the French intended to revictual their camp at Outreau, he compelled them to abandon their object, pursued them as far as Hardilot, and was only prevented from gaining a complete victory through the want of cavalry. But his plan for the defence of Boulogne, which, by his own extant memorial, is said to evince great military skill, was marred by the issue of one unfortunate sally. In order to prevent the French from revictualling a fortress that menaced the safety of Boulogne, he found it necessary, with his slender forces, to risk another attack at St. Etienne. His cavalry first charged and routed those of the French: the foot, which he commanded in person, next advanced, and the first line, consisting chiefly of gentlemen armed with corselets, behaved gallantly, but the second line, in coming to the push of the pike, were seized with a sudden panic, and fled back to Boulogne, in spite of all the efforts of their commander to rally them. Within a few months after this affair he was recalled to England, and Hertford went out to France as the king's lieutenant-general.

It does not appear, however, that the loss of this action was the pretext for his recal, or the direct cause of the king's vengeance, by which he was subsequently destined to fall. If the faction of Hertford, that was intriguing against him at home, ever succeeded in fretting the king's humour against him, by turning his misfortune into a topic of blame, Henry's irritation must have passed away, as we find Surrey recalled, with promises of being replaced in his command, (a promise, however, which was basely falsified,) and again appearing at court in an honourable station. But the event of his recal (though it does not seem to have been marked by tokens

of royal displeasure) certainly contributed indirectly to his ruin, by goading his proud temper to farther hostilities with Hertford. Surrey, on his return to England, spoke of his enemy with indignation and menaces, and imprudently expressed his hopes of being revenged in a succeeding reign. His words were reported, probably with exaggeration, to the king, and occasioned his being sent, for some time, as a prisoner to Windsor. He was liberated, however, from thence, and again made his appearance at court, unsuspicious of his impending ruin.

It is difficult to trace any personal motives that could impel Henry to wish for his destruction. He could not be jealous of his intentions to marry the Princess Mary-that fable is disproved by the discovery of Surrey's widow having survived him. Nor is it likely that the king dreaded him as an enemy to the Reformation, as there is every reason to believe that he was a Protestant. The natural cruelty of Henry seems to have been but an instrument in the designing hands of Hertford, whose ambition, fear, and jealousy, prompted him to seek the destruction of Norfolk and his His measures were unhappily aided by the vindictive resentment of the Duchess of Norfolk

son.

against her husband, from whom she had been long separated, and by the still more unaccountable and unnatural hatred of the Duchess of Richmond against her own brother. Surrey was arrested on the 12th of December, 1546, and committed to the Tower. The depositions of witnesses against him, whose collective testimony did not substantiate even a legal offence, were transmitted to the king's judges at Norwich, and a verdict was returned, in consequence of which he was indicted for high treason. We are not told the full particulars of his defence, but are only generally informed that it was acute and spirited. With respect to the main accusation, of his bearing the arms of the Confessor, he proved that he had the authority of the heralds in so doing, and that he had worn them himself in the king's presence, as his ancestors had worn them in the presence of former kings. Notwithstanding his manifest innocence, the jury was base enough to find him guilty. The chancellor pronounced sentence of death upon him; and in the flower of his age, in his 31st year, this noble soldier and accomplished poet was beheaded on Tower-hill.

PRISONED IN WINDSOR, HE RECOUNTETH HIS PLEASURE THERE PASSED.

So cruel prison how could betide, alas !
As proud Windsor? Where I in lust and joy,
With a king's son, my childish years did pass,
In greater feast than Priam's sons of Troy;
Where each sweet place returns a taste full sour.
The large green courts, where we were wont to rove,
With eyes upcast unto the maiden's tower,
And easy sighs, such as folk draw in love.
The stately seats, the ladies bright of hue,
The dances short, long tales of great delight;
With words and looks that tigers could but rue,
When each of us did plead the other's right.
The palm playa, where dèsported for the game,
With dazed eyes oft we, by gleams of love,
Have miss'd the ball, and got sight of our dame,
To bait her eyes, which kept the leads above.
The gravell'd ground, with sleeves tied on the helm,
On foaming horse with swords and friendly hearts;
With cheer as though one should another whelm,
Where we have fought, and chased oft with darts.
With silver drops the meads yet spread for ruth;
In active games of nimbleness and strength,
Where we did strain, trained with swarms of youth,
Our tender limbs that yet shot up in length.
The secret groves, which oft we made resound
Of pleasant plaint, and of our ladies' praise;
Recording oft what grace each one had found,
What hope of speed, what dread of long delays.

[blocks in formation]

The wild forest, the clothed holts with green;
With reins avail'de, and swift ybreathed horse,
With cry of hounds, and merry blasts between,
Where we did chase the fearful hart of force.
The void walls eke that harbour'd us each night:
Wherewith, alas! revive within my breast
The sweet accord, such sleeps as yet delight;
The pleasant dreams, the quiet bed of rest ;
The secret thoughts, imparted with such trust;
The wanton talk, the divers change of play;
The friendship sworn, each promise kept so just,
Wherewith we past the winter nights away.
And with this thought the blood forsakes the
face;

The tears berain my cheeks of deadly hue:
The which, as soon as sobbing sighs, alas!
Upsupped have, thus I my plaint renew :
O place of bliss! renewer of my woes!
Give me account, where is my noble fered?
Whom in thy walls thou didst each night
enclose;

To other liefe: but unto me most dear.
Echo, alas! that doth my sorrow rue,
Returns thereto a hollow sound of plaint.
Thus I alone, where all my freedom grew,
In prison pine, with bondage and restraint:
And with remembrance of the greater grief,
To banish the less, I find my chief relief.

[blocks in formation]
« السابقةمتابعة »