1547. { SURREY was brought to trial at the Guildhall on the 13th of January, where he defended himself with singular courage and ability; repelled the charges so insidiously preferred against him; impeached the flimsy evidence set up in support of the trial; appealed to the authority of the heralds for the obnoxious quarterings on his shield; and disclaimed, with all the indignation of conscious innocence, the treasonable imputations so rancorously heaped upon him. In the course of examination, when a witness stated that, in a former conversation with the accused Earl, he repeated some strong expression used by Surrey, with his own insolent reply-which left it to be inferred that Surrey had tamely brooked his defiance-the young noble fixed his penetrating glance for an instant on the speaker, then turning round to the jury"I leave it to you," he said, " to judge whether it be possible that the man before you should so address the Earl of Surrey, and he not strike him on the spot." But the die was cast; the sentence of forfeiture was pronounced; the King was deaf to the supplications of his friends-to the last appeal for mercy. The thirst of blood had increased with the last agonies of dissolving nature; and, on the twenty-first morning of the same month, Surrey was hurried to Tower-hill, and there, under the blow of the executioner, bequeathed that name to posterity, around which, poet, painter, historian, and every lover of his country and her literature, have twined the wreaths of immortality. "Thou jealous ruthless tyrant, Heaven repay On thee, and on thy children's latest line, The gory bridal bed; the plundered shrine; The murdered Surrey's blood; the tears of Geraldine!" Of the lives of Surrey and fair Geraldine, and the tournament in which his knights carried away the prize in the Tuscan capital, we adopt the following short sketch from the "Loves of the Poets:" "In the reign of Cosmo the First, the second Grand Duke of Tuscany o Lorenzo's family, Florence, it is said, beheld a novel and extraordinary spectacle. A young traveller, from a court and a country which the Italians of that day seemed to regard much as we now do the Esquimaux, combining the learning of the scholar, and the amiable bearing of the courtier, with all the rash bravery of youthful romance, astonished the inhabitants of that queenly city, first by rivalling her polished nobles in the splendour of his retinue—the gallantry of his manners; and next, by boldly proclaiming that his 'Ladye-love' was superior to all that Italy could vaunt of beauty. That she was 'Oltre le belle, bella,'-fair beyond the fairest; and maintaining his CASTLE.] TOURNAMENT.-SURREY AT FLORENCE. 71 boast is a solemn tourney, held in her honour, to the overthrow of all his opponents. This was our English Surrey, one of the earliest and most elegant of our amatory poets, and the lover of the fair Geraldine. According to the old tradition repeated by all Surrey's biographers, he visited on his travels the famous necromancer Cornelius Agrippa, who, in a magic mirror, revealed to him the fair figure of his Geraldine, lying dishevelled on a couch, and, by the light of a taper, reading one of his tenderest Sonnets." "Dark was the vaulted room of gramarye,* To which the wizard led the gallant knight, On cross, and character, and talisman, As watchlight by the bed of some departing man. "But soon, within that mirror huge and high, Part lighted by a lamp with silver beam, Placed by a couch of Agra's silken loom, And part by moonshine pale, and part was hid in gloom. "Fair all the pageant-but how passing fair The slender form, which lay on couch of Ind! * Sir Walter Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel. O'er her white bosom stray'd her hazel hair, And, pensive, read from tablet eburine, Within the narrow limits to which this work is necessarily restricted, it is impossible to do justice to this melancholy subject, which of itself has afforded, and would again afford, matter sufficient to form a volume of the deepest interest. It has, however, long since engaged the genius of Campbell and some of the best spirits of our literature, in whose works the name and fame of Henry Howard are embalmed. Thomas, the eldest son of the "murdered Surrey," was restored to the dukedom of Norfolk by Queen Elizabeth. Loaded with many honours and dignities which evinced the entire confidence she reposed in him, all appeared to augur that so brilliant a career would have closed in a tranquil night. But the evil genius, which presided over his worldly destinies, was yet to be appeased. The orders of knighthood; the captain generalship of the forces; the embassies and commissions, with which he was successively honoured by his sovereign, were only preludes to the last sad history of his life: He did but dream on sovereignty, Like one that stands upon a promontory, And spies a far-off shore, where he would tread, And chides the sea that sunders him from thence. KING HENRY VI. Having received his early education under Fox, the martyrologist, then tutor in the family of his aunt, the Duchess of Richmond, he took the degree of master of arts at Cambridge, on the grand reception and entertainment of Queen Elizabeth at that University. After discharging with fidelity and éclat the high posts of trust already mentioned; he was at last entangled by the snares of flattery and overweening ambition, and charged with treasonable designs entered into by him to forward the schemes of Mary Queen of Scots, with the view of allying himself with that ill-fated Princess by marriage,-views in which his ambition or his sympathy had got the better of his deliberate judgment, and in which he appears to have been encouraged by those hollow friends, who sought not his honour but his disgrace. He was accordingly arraigned, tried; and confessing his wilful participation in the plot, expiated his offence on the scaffold with characteristic firmness and composure. CASTLE.] 1572. { PHILIP HOWARD, EARL OF ARUNDEL. 73 By his alliance with Mary Fitzalan of Arundel, whom he lost within a year of their marriage, he had one son-Philip, Earl of Arundel. To detail the circumstances of his life would far exceed our limits; but one or two incidents, taken from his later history, will be neither uninteresting nor uninstructive.-The charges brought against him were-conspiring, with Cardinal Allen, to restore the Roman Catholic faith in England; and concerting measures for quitting the realm without the queen's knowledge and permission. With regard to the conspiracy, the evidence was too much based on party jealousy, vague hearsay, and surmise, to establish anything like conviction in the minds of unprejudiced judges. But of his attempted evasion from the kingdom, the fact is abundantly clear, and is thus related. After his liberation from the Tower, his fears of new prosecutions and imprisonment became so excited, that he hastened from London to his castle of Arundel, and there prepared to join a vessel previously engaged for his service, and then waiting for him at Little Hampton. Walsingham, however, who had his eyes and his spies everywhere, and is proudly recorded to have "out-shot the Jesuits with their own bow, and over-reached them in their equivocation," was already in the secret. Before the Earl could reach the coast, the captain had received private notice from the Council, and was prepared to act in accordance with his instructions. Day after day was consumed in waiting, as the skipper pretended, for “a fair wind." At length, the propitious moment having arrived, Arundel, attended by two domestics, went on board, and the wind being in their favour, the vessel made rapid way, and soon cleared that beautiful coast where the castle and forest of Arundel were among the last objects that faded from his eye, and led him, reflecting on the past, to ejaculate— Quæ regio in terris nostri non plena laboris ! Continuing their course across the channel, his mind now recovered some portion of that serenity, to which he had long been a stranger. The danger of discovery was seemingly past; the treachery of friends and the machinations of enemies were alike forgotten or forgiven; and full of pleasing anticipations of the future, he resigned himself to repose, with this hope Hæc olim meminisse juvabit. His soothing reverie, however, was soon to be dissipated. At midnight, a rocket, or other private signal, previously agreed upon, was let off from the mast-head, whilst the vessel continued her course. But at length they were suddenly hailed by a ship of war-ordered to lay-to-and instantly boarded. VOL. I. L The result is briefly told; the noble fugitive was hurried back to the shore, delivered into safe custody, carried to London, and lodged in the Tower, where, after trial and conviction, he was suffered to drag out an existence of several years under all the harshness of office, the pangs of disappointment, the hourly sorrows of paternal solicitude, and an exhausted constitution. Four years afterwards this nobleman was arraigned of hightreason, brought to his trial in Westminster Hall before twenty-five of his peers, the Earl of Derby being high steward on the occasion. The "Earl appeared in a wrought velvet gown furred with martins, laid about with gold lace, and buttoned with gold buttons, a black satin doublet, a pair of velvet hose, and a high black hat on his head." He was a very tall man, somewhat swarthy, and coming to the bar made two obeisances to the state, and to the nobles, and others present. Being required to hold up his hand, he raised it very high, saying, "Here are as true a man's heart and hand as ever came into this hall." It was urged against him that "he was a traitor, being a Papist; that the Queen of Scots had considered him one of her best friends; that Cardinal Allen had spoken of him as the chief hope of the Roman Catholics in England;" and that his letter to Queen Elizabeth, written on the eve of his intended escape by sea, had plainly accused the national justice, with regard to his father's trial. He was then remanded to the Tower, and there languished till his death, which was evidently accelerated by the cruel suspense in which he was kept as to the final remission or execution of his sentence. 1592. { Thomas Howard, the celebrated Earl, was brought up under the care of his mother, a lady of great and eminent virtues; who "was not negligent," says Sir Edward Walker, "in his education; so that Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, was wont to call him the Winter Pear,' and to say, that, if he lived, he would become a great and a wise man." On the accession of James the First, he was not only restored in blood by act of parliament, but also reinstated in all such titles of honour and precedence as Philip Earl of Arundel had forfeited; and in the honour, state, and dignity of Earl of Surrey, and to such dignity of baronies as Thomas Duke of Norfolk, his grandfather, had lost by his attainder. In Italy, where he delighted to reside, he greatly improved his natural taste and disposition, and became an excellent judge and patron of the fine arts |