[1549 A.D.] hanged in Norwich castle, his brother on Wymondham steeple, and nine others on "the branches of the oak of reformation," under which Ket was wont to sit on Mousehold Hill, with a sort of imitation of royalty, to administer justice. He had assumed the title of king of Norfolk and Suffolk. This year also the first commissions were issued for lord lieutenants of counties; a species of civil governors and military commanders of whom the late confusions occasioned the appointment.9

The Cornish and Devonshire insurrection, and that of Norfolk, form one of the most striking passages of English history of the sixteenth century. This simultaneous revolt was essentially different in its character from either of the great insurrections of the two previous centuries. The rebellion of Wat Tyler was a protest against the oppressions of the labourers, who belonged to a period when slavery retained many of its severities without its accompanying protection. The insurrection of Jack Cade was in its essential elements political. But the rebellion that came exactly a century after that of 1450 was a democratic or social movement, stimulated by, and mixed up with, hostility to the change of religion. The government was embarrassed by the complexity of the motives upon which these insurrections were founded.

THE FALL OF SOMERSET (1549 A.D.)

During this season of confusion the advocates of rigour loudly cried against the feebleness of Somerset, who dreaded unpopularity too much to be capable of executing justice. To this infirmity they imputed the repetition and prolongation of the late disturbances, which might have been quickly extinguished if the peasantry had not been tempted into them by an almost total impunity of the early rebels. He professed to think "it not safe to hold such a strict hand over the commons, and to press them down and keep them in slavery." But if he pursued the favour of the people, he soon found, when the hour of peril came, that their favour stood him in little stead. The Catholic priesthood, who detested him, still retained a mighty influence, especially over the distant provinces. He retained popularity enough to render him odious to the old nobility. The employment of foreign troops in quelling the insurrection had been unacceptable. His last usurpation of the protectorship dwelt in the minds of many besides his competitors.

He had begun the erection of Somerset House, his palace in the Strand, on a scale of invidious magnificence. Architects had been brought from Italy to construct it, and professors of the fine arts to adorn it. It was said to have been raised out of bishops' houses and churches, of which the surrender had been extorted from the owners by dread of his displeasure. Like many other candidates for the applause of the multitude, he was arrogant and negligent towards his equals. To every cry, to every insinuation against him, was added the formidable question, "What friendship could be expected from a man who had no pity on his own brother?"

A question, whether peace ought to be made with France and Scotland, produced differences of opinion in the council. Somerset disappointed his opponents by giving up his own better opinion for the sake of unanimity; but the dispute had served its most important purpose, by keeping out of view the motives and projects which aimed at the overthrow of the proud protector. Lord Southampton, the son of the late Catholic chancellor Wriothesley, had inherited his father's resentment against the Protestant Somerset.

[1549-1551 A.D.]

Dudley, earl of Warwick, was the soul of the confederacy against him.1 The latter was supposed to have really earned in the Scottish war the laurels which were borne away by his superior officer; and his success in quelling the insurrection contributed to strengthen the opinion of his military desert.

While the protector in his private correspondence was speaking with complacency of his success in quelling these movements, the plot for his own overthrow was ripe for execution. The discontented lords, gradually withdrawing from court, resorted with bodies of armed retainers to London. Sir William Paulet, the treasurer, by his policy (which probably consisted in the seasonable use of money) obtained for them the peaceable possession of the Tower. As soon as the protector learned this intelligence, he carried the king with him. from Hampton Court to Windsor, where he began to strengthen the castle, writing circular letters to his friends, requiring them to repair thither with all their force. Sir Philip Hoby, who had been despatched to Windsor with the answer of the lords, urged their request so effectually, that in a few weeks the vast powers of Somerset were taken from him, and the next day he was brought under an escort to the Tower. Articles were prepared against him

which, from their extreme vagueness, cannot be considered as a judicial charge, but must be regarded either as a popular manifesto, or at best as the materials of an address for his removal from power. The great office of lord high admiral was conferred on his formidable and mortal enemy, the earl of Warwick. After many examinations, he was enlarged, on payment of a fine amounting to a yearly sum of two thousand pounds, charged upon his estates, and his whole personal goods, besides the forfeiture of all his offices. These transactions were afterwards confirmed by act of parliament. So far the circumstances attending this great nobleman's fall from power do not exceed the usual accompaniments of a violent change of administration in the sixteenth century.

Warwick, who was by no very slow degrees attracting to himself all the powers of government, hastened to assure the nation that the Protestant interest would suffer nothing by the protector's removal. His measures were, however, rather the result of Warwick's position than of his inclination. He declared at his death that he himself had always been a Catholic; and the most

["Henry VIII had appointed Dudley admiral for life, which dignity Somerset had taken from him and given to his brother Seymour. Dudley, however, was elevated to the rank of earl of Warwick, and received as an indemnity considerable estates and revenues."-VON RAUMER. P]

[1551-1552 A.D.]

zealous Protestants bewailed the fall of Somerset as dangerous to their cause. Now the undisputed chief of the government, he allowed Somerset to resume his seat in council, and Lord Lisle, his eldest son, was married soon after to the other's daughter. But under a fair surface of friendship the sores of fear and anger still rankled. Somerset could not persuade himself that he could be safe without power.

Warwick apprehended continual schemes on the part of his rival to recover the protectorship. Somerset assembled armed retainers in circumstances where it was very difficult to separate defence from offence. Soon, therefore, his wife and himself, with many of their friends, were committed to the Tower. The duke was brought to trial before the high steward and lords triers for high treason, in conspiring to seize the king, and for felony under the riot act of the preceding session, in assembling to imprison Warwick, a privy counsellor, who had since been raised to the dignity of duke of Northumberland. The lords unanimously acquitted him of the treason. They convicted him, however, of the felony; a verdict of which the strict legality may be questioned.

It is probably true that Somerset meditated a revolution as violent as that by which he had been deposed. His principal anxiety was to vindicate himself from the charge of plotting the death of Northumberland and his colleagues. "On the 22nd of January, 1552," says the diary of his royal nephew, "he had his head cut off upon Tower Hill, between eight and nine o'clock in the morning."g

Like many other unfortunate persons in history, the duke of Somerset was unequal to the situation in which his destiny placed him; his talents were ill matched with his ambition, and he thus fell into errors and even stained himself with a brother's blood. In more tranquil times his mild and humane disposition and his religious feelings might have caused him to pass a life of peace and happiness. Somerset stands almost alone in these times as a nobleman really caring for the rights and interests of the inferior classes of the people.

Four of Somerset's friends were executed. The earl of Arundel and Lord Paget were never brought to trial, but they were obliged to make submissions and confessions, resign their offices and pay fines. 9

WAR WITH SCOTLAND (1547 A.D.)

At the period of Henry's death England was at peace. The pacification of 1546 with France included Scotland; and it was a leading object of Henry's policy, which he held to in his dying hour, that the union of England and Scotland should be cemented by the marriage of his son with the child Mary, the Scottish queen. The attempt to force this marriage upon Scotland had aroused the old national spirit of independence in her nobility; and the proposal of Somerset that the former treaty for this marriage should be renewed and ratified was coldly listened to. Within a month after the accession of Edward the council book shows that a state of active hostility was approaching. On February 27th, 1547, Sir Andrew Dudley is appointed to the command of the ship Pauncy, to cruise in the North Seas, off the English and Scottish coasts. In less than a fortnight Dudley had captured the Scottish vessel Lion. At this juncture an event occurred which materially affected the relations of England with France and Scotland. Francis I died on the 31st of March, at Rambouillet. Twenty days before the death of Francis a treaty had been concluded between France and England. This the new king of France refused

[1547 A.D.]

to ratify. He preferred to cultivate an alliance with the Scots. The duke of Guise and the cardinal of Lorraine were the brothers of the queen-dowager of Scotland, and they were amongst the chief advisers of the French king.

To stay the progress of the reformed opinions in Scotland, and to prevent the marriage of the young Mary with Edward, were sufficient motives to a decided change of policy. The castle of St. Andrews, after the murder of Cardinal Beaton, in 1546, had been held against the regent Arran, by those who were favourable to the English alliance. A truce between the regent and the possessors was concluded in February, 1547; and they subsequently proceeded to make a treaty with Somerset, in which they engaged to forward the projected marriage, and to aid any English force that should enter Scotland for the purpose of obtaining possession of the queen's person. The French government, in the summer of 1547, sent a fleet to assist in the reduction of the castle. It was finally surrendered on the 29th of July, and was afterwards demolished. On the 2nd of September the protector crossed the border at Berwick with a powerful invading army.

It would be injustice to the policy of Somerset to assume that he entered upon the war with Scotland in the arrogant spirit with which Henry VIII had conducted his negotiations and his assaults. There was a treaty under the great seal of Scotland for the marriage of Edward with Mary; but the determination to demand its fulfilment was conducted in a tone of moderation, in the first instance, which shows that the empire of force was gradually yielding to the empire of opinion. The protector addressed a remarkable letter "to the nobility and counsellors, gentlemen and commons and all other the inhabitants of the realm of Scotland," in which, with "greeting and peace," he sets forth the desire of England to establish the amity of the two countries by the union of the crowns.

In this document we recognise the expression of the sagacious statesman rather than that of the ambitious intriguer-of one who saw what was inevitable, but who did not sufficiently estimate the force of national pride and individual interest in retarding a great good. What the statesmen of Queen Anne had the utmost difficulty in accomplishing, the minister of King Edward vainly expected to realise by appeals to great principles which were imperfectly understood even two centuries later. Somerset said to the people of Scotland, that living in one island, speaking the same language, alike in manners and conditions, it was "unmeet, unnatural, and unchristian, that there should be betwixt us so mortal war, who, in respect of all other nations, be and should be like as two brethren." He proposed a solid union by the marriage of King Edward and Queen Mary-the circumstances being so favourable that the Divine Providence manifestly pointed out the road to amity.

In this union of two kingdoms, England was ready "to take the indifferent old name of Britain again, because nothing should be left on our part to be offered. We seek not to take from you your laws nor customs, but we seek to redress your oppressions, which of divers ye do sustain." If eloquent writing could have been more effectual than sturdy blows, such an appeal as this might have prevented the battle of Pinkie: "If we two, being made one by amity, be most able to defend us against all nations, and having the sea for wall, the mutual love for garrison, and God for defence, should make so noble and well-agreeing monarchy, that neither in peace we may be ashamed, nor in war afraid of any worldly or foreign power, why should not you be as desirous of the same, and have as much cause to rejoice at it as we?" But

This letter is given at length in Holinshed r.

[1547 A.D.] the words of peace were not hearkened to. The influence of France prevailed. The priests stirred up the Scottish people to resist the English heretics. Knox was a prisoner in France; and the friends of the reformation were scattered and proscribed.

The Battle of Pinkie

Somerset advanced from Berwick along the shore, whilst a fleet under Lord Clinton kept the sea within view of the coast; and as the army marched by Dunbar the ships were seen sailing into the Firth of Forth. Turning westward the cavalry forded the river Lynn, and the infantry crossed at Linton Bridge. Bands of Scottish horsemen now began to appear; and the earl of Warwick was nearly taken prisoner in a rash advance. On the 8th the English were encamped near Prestonpans; and the fleet was at anchor near Musselburgh. The Scottish army was within a distance of little more than two miles, the ridge of Falside being between the two hosts. On the 9th, after a sharp skirmish, Somerset and Warwick reconnoitred the Scots from this hill. They occupied a strong position, with the sea on their left flank, and a deep marsh on their right. The river Esk protected their front; and the bridge crossing the Esk was held and strongly defended.

On the morning of the 10th of September, 1547, when the English army began to move, it was discovered that the Scots had abandoned their strong position, and had crossed the river. They had taken up an opinion that the English were about to retreat to their ships, and would escape unless attacked in their camp. This belief was fatal to them. Although the Scots fought with the most determined valour, and successfully resisted a furious charge of the English cavalry, their rash movement had placed a portion of their force within the ability of the English "to compass them," says one present in the battle, "in that they should no ways escape us; the which by our force and number we were as well able to do as a spinner's web to catch a swarm of bees." The fight had been very doubtful until this superiority was gained in one portion of the field. A general panic then ensued, and the Scottish army fled before their slaughtering pursuers. We shall not follow Patten,s the "Londoner," in his narrative of the horrible traces of this slaughter, by the sands of Leith, by the high road and King's Park to Edinburgh, and through the marsh to Dalkeith. The pursuit was not ended till nightfall, when the victors returned to plunder the Scottish camp.

This great victory-the last field, most happily, in which England and Scotland were engaged in a quarrel that could be called national-was without any benefit beyond the unsubstantial glory of the victors. Ten thousand Scots perished, and fifteen hundred were taken prisoners, without any serious loss on the part of the English. Leith was set on fire. Several castles were taken. But in three weeks after the battle of Pinkie, Somerset recrossed the Tweed, and entered London on the 8th of October, declining, however, any triumphant reception. The young king congratulated his uncle in a short and sensible letter written on the 18th of September, and the successful general received additional grants of landed estates. Some have ascribed the sudden return of Somerset to the necessity of resisting intrigues that were proceeding against him in the English council. It is probable that he trusted more to the gradual effects of his victory upon the minds of the Scottish nation than to any immediate attempts to control the course of its government.

But the spirit of resistance to the English heretics was excited rather than allayed by the disaster of the black Saturday, as the day of Pinkie was