Court, accompanied out of the city, and brought him onward on his journey, doing him all the honour they could. The next week it is thought the Queen's Majesty will remove; not, as it was first intended, to Greenwich, but to Windsor; and what likelihood there be that her Highness will marry out of hand, and with whom, because this bearer is able to report as much as I can write, I will be so bold in that matter as to refer your Honour unto his credit. About the end of this week the Ambassador of Spain is looked for without fail to return out of Flanders and as Mr. Hobby goes shortly Ambassador into France, so doth one Mr. Man,* of Oxford, go into Spain unto King Philip: the Queen, in that respect, hath presently promoted the said Mr. Man unto the Deanery of Gloucester.

The Marquiss of Baden, being gone home into Germany, has left here behind him in the Court the Lady Cecily + his wife, with whose com

Sir Thomas Hobby, of Bisham Abbey in Berkshire; who died Ambassador at Paris in the following year-John Man, Dean of Gloucester.-The latter made a very poor figure in his embassy, which gave occasion for a pitiful jest from Elizabeth, who said that as the King of Spain had sent Gooseman (Gusman) Dean of Toledo, hither, she had sent Man, Dean of Gloucester, who was a Goose, thither.

†This lady, who was the daughter of Gustavus Ericson, King of Sweden, married in 1564 Christopher, second son of Bernard, first Margrave of Baden in Baden, a Lutheran. The slenderness of their patrimony induced them to court the protection of Elizabeth, not celebrated for her munificence. Their eldest son, from whom the present Margraves are descended, was born in London this year, and the Queen, who was his godmother, named him Edward Fortunatus. He became a Roman Catholic, and inherited the estates of his father and uncle; but, contracting great debts,

pany and conversation the Queen is so much delighted as she doth not only allow her very honourable bouge of Court, * three messes of meat twice a day, for her maids, and the rest of her family, but also her Majesty hath dealt so liberally with her husband that he hath a yearly pension of 2000 crowns, which he is to enjoy so long as he suffers the lady his wife to reside here in England. Her Highness hath of late, whereat some do much marvel, dissolved the ancient office of the Henchmen.+ And thus (remembering no great matter besides, unless it is that my Lord of Arundel means now at the spring, for the better recovery of his health, to go into Italy, having already obtained leave so to do) I most humbly commend me to your good

was forced to take refuge in the Netherlands, where he served under Archduke Albert, and died by an accidental fall in 1600. His mother lived till 1627.

From the Fr. bouche. The diet allowed to certain officers of the household was so called. By a mess of meat was generally meant a fit proportion for four persons.

↑ A certain number of youths, the sons of gentlemen who stood or walked near the person of the Monarch on all public occasions. They are mentioned in the sumptuary statutes of the 4th of Edward IV. and the 24th of Henry VIII., and a patent is preserved in the Fœdera, vol. xv. 242, whereby Edward VI. gives to William Bukley, M.A., propter gravitatem morum et doctrinæ abundantiam, officium docendi, erudiendi, atque instituendi, adolescentulos vocatos Henchmen; with a salary of £40 per ann. Henchman, or Heinsman, is a German word, as Blount informs us in his Glossographia, signifying a domestic; whence our ancient term Hind, a servant in the house of a farmer. Dr. Percy, in a note on the Earl of Northumberland's household book, with less probability, derives the appellation from their custom of standing by the side, or Haunch of their Lord.

Lordship, whom I beseech God long to continue. in health and honour.

At Westminster, the 11th of December, 1565.
Your Honour's to command,

F. ALEN.

Postscript. Your Lordship shall understand that now there is no removing at all, but her Majesty is fully resolved to keep her Christmas here at Westminster. And before the making up of this my letter, while it stayed with me till Mr. Constable should, according to his promise, have sent for the same, I learned further these occurrences following.

From out of France; that the French King,* who hath been brought up from his infancy in the old religion, and rules now absolutely by himself, doth, with the universal consent of his clergy and nobility, all that may be to the settling and establishment thereof throughout all his dominions and countries; insomuch that there is no office, they say, of trust committed to any man unless he be known, and well tried beforehand, to be a Catholic. And that the great part of the nobles being presently assembled at the Court, there is come thither the Cardinal of Guise and Lorraine, and the young Duke of Guise, calling upon justice against Chatillon,+ and others that were suspected for the

Charles IX. now fifteen years of age. The plan for extirpating the Huguenots, which began with the Massacre of Paris, and ended in the bloody war of the League, now occupied all the attention of the French Court.

†The famous Admiral de Coligny. Francis, Duke of Guise,

murdering of his father; which matter, they say, shall now be judicially proceeded withal by order of the law.

From out of Italy; that the Pope has promised to contribute to the defence of Malta the sum of 15,000 crowns, and to find 3000 soldiers besides by the space of five months, at the charge of the church of Rome.

From Constantinople; that the Turk, in his great fury and rage for the late evil success of his army at Malta, has commanded, besides other great preparations, 50 new galleys to be made out of hand; and in great despite hath pulled down all the churches and synagogues, both of the Christians and of the Jews, where before he suffered them to use their own rites and ceremonies.

To the right honourable my very good Lord the Earl of Shrewsbury, one of the Knights of the most honourable order of the Garter.

No. XXV.

(Talbot Papers, Vol. E. fol. 197.)

SIR GEORGE BOWES

TO THE EARL OF SHREWSBURY.

Pleaseth it your good Lordship,

THE whole gentlemen and inhabitants of the North Riding in Yorkshire have appointed and required this bearer, John Layton, a very honest gentleman, to be solicitor for the recovery of the armour and

was treacherously killed in 1563, at the siege of Orleans, by Poltrot, a Huguenot; and the Admiral, who was the leader of the reformed party, was suspected of being privy to the murder.

weapon lately delivered to the Captains at Berwick out of this said North Riding, by virtue of sundry commissions from your Lordship, for the re-delivery whereof it is much doubted that the said Captains will use all the delay they can; so that it will not be obtained unless it please your Lordship to write to the Earl of Bedford, requiring his Lordship to command the said Captains to deliver the said armour and weapon (according to such tripartite indentures, one part whereof remains with your Lordship, and another part with the said Captains, and the third part with the Justices of Peace, whereby the said Captains received the same armour and weapon) which the country fully looks for again by your Lordship's good means. Having addressed this said bearer, for that respect, to your Lordship, unto whom I humbly beseech your Lordship to impart your pleasure; for surely by the delivery hereof your Lordship will obtain great honour, and win great good-will of the gentlemen and inhabitants of the country, which enboldens me to move your Lordship to call earnestly for the said armour.

I am sorry to hear of the death of my Lord Dacre's son and heir; whose death, and the youth of him that is now heir, I fear will break

Thomas, seventeenth Lord Dacre. He left an only son, who not long survived him, and three daughters, to whom the inheritance of the family estates was decreed by Commissioners appointed for that purpose, to the prejudice of Leonard Dacre, their uncle, who claimed under an award made in the reign of Edward IV. Leonard, hereupon, conceived a personal hatred to Elizabeth; and we find him an active party in every conspiracy against her for the remainder of his life.