even life. The men selected for this commission were the Dukes of Nrk and Suffolk; the Earls of Oxford and Westmoreland, Wiltshare and Sussex; Lord Sands; Sirs William Fitz-james, William Paalet, John Fitz-james, John Baldwin, Richard Lyster, John Porte, Jaka Spelman, Walter Luke, Anthony Fitz-herbert, Thomas IngleSand William Shelly, with Audley as Lord Chancellor, and Secretary Cromwell. But what was the character of these men? This is important question, as it will serve to assist us in determining the ant of justice and impartiality to be expected from such judges. All of them were slaves to the will of Henry, and, with one or two ex is, the determined supporters of Popery. "Here was Howard, Dake of Norfolk, who, though her maternal uncle, hated the queen serially as he did 'the new learning? Charles Brandon, Duke Sfolk, Henry's brother-in-law and special favourite, so ready to y him in all his humours; John de Vere, Earl of Oxford, who ported all the measures of the court; Robert Radcliff, who had restored to honour by Henry as Lord Fitz-walter, in 1525, and ax then created Earl of Sussex; William Sands, the Lord Chamberair of the king's household, who had been made a baron, and the Backingham estates. Here we have eleven knights, eight of were compliant judges; and as for another, William Paulett, Comptroller of the king's house, he was a man of the most con politics, who, when asked, at the end of a long life, how he ved himself through so many changes? answered, 'By being w and not an oak.' Audley was always obsequious to his master; and as to Cromwell, the share he took in this business speak for itself, in connection with his future career. But with Par to the Earl of Wiltshire, the father of the queen and of Lord rd, his name being inserted, was a stroke of hand quite ry of Henry's barbarity, and must have been done to save aps. His name never occurs afterwards, and it is certain that not preside at the mock trial.” Anderwa's Annals of the English Bible, vol. i., p. 462. Burnet at first inserted father's name, but he had not then seen, as he afterwards saw, a record of the Coming distressing events often cast back their shadows to the present, and the mind, from causes difficult to be explained, is haunted with forebodings of some inevitable calamity. Henry IV. of France, long before Ravaillac armed himself with the deadly weapon, often thought he heard the tread of the assassin's foot, and felt in his breast as it were the assassin's knife, and the fearful impression would startle him both in his waking and sleeping hours. Anne, too, had presentiments, warning her, like prophetic voices, of something terrible looming in the distance. Notwithstanding the affirmation of most historians to the contrary, she was, it appears, not altogether ignorant of the conspiracy formed for her ruin; and she seems, from her knowledge of Henry's alienation from her, and from rumours communicated to her, to have foreboded but too truly the fatal issue. About a day or two after the appointment of a special commission to inquire into her conduct, she had a long and serious interview with her chaplain, Matthew Parker, to whom she expressed great anxiety about her daughter Elizabeth, of whose religious education she with solemn earnestness besought him to take the charge. To this scene Parker refers in a letter to one of Queen Elizabeth's councillors, in which, while declining the archbishopric of Canterbury, he says, "Yet I would fain serve my sovereign lady in more respects than my allegiance, since I cannot forget what words her grace's mother said to me not six days before her apprehension."2 On the first day of May, called May-day, the court being then at Greenwich, the king had a splendid tilting match or mock fight; and on that day he gave the first public demonstration of his evil intentions against the queen. Though a secret commission was at that very time sitting to collect evidence against her, and the whole plan for the destruction of herself and of her alleged accomplices trial, now lost, from which he was convinced that the earl was not present. He therefore expunged the name from the subsequent edition of his history. 1 Lingard. 2 Burnet's Reformation, vol. iv., p. 492. had been settled,' two of them, her brother Lord Rochfield, and Sir Hecry Norris, were the principal actors in the amusements of the t-yard, the one being the chief challenger, and the other the defendant, while she sat by the side of the king witnessing the Art charging Matthew Parker to take charge of the education of her daughter. ple. In his present state of morbid jealousy he was probably are intent upon discovering, from the conduct of his wife, somegonfirmatory of her guilty intimacy with the combatants, than Of as there can be no doubt. On the 14th of April, 1536, Henry dissolved a Pame whach had sat for six years. On the 27th of that month writs were issued 1er Parament to meet on the 8th of June. And that the conspiracy against Anne had been matured when these writs were issued, that is, four days before the May-day scene, is evident from Sir Thomas Audley, the Lord Chancellor's address at Sespe of the new Parliament; in which he tells them that his majesty's objects ling them so early after the dissolution of last Parliament, were, 1, "To settle -parent to the crown, in case he should die without children lawfully begotten; 2 repeal an act of the former Parliament as to the succession of the crown, to of the king by Queen Anne Boleyn." These objects, it thus appears, were a view on the 27th of April. upon deriving amusement from their feats of arms. The interest she would naturally evince, and the gratification she would naturally express, on witnessing the achievements of an accomplished and beloved brother, and of a gallant knight of her acquaintance, anxious to win her approbation, would almost inevitably rouse the suspicions of Henry. The particular incident upon which he first openly expressed his displeasure is not known with certainty. It is said to have been upon the queen's having dropped a handkerchief to one of the combatants, heated in the course, to wipe his face, a use to which he instantly applied it. This, if true, either excited Henry's jealousy, or afforded him, as he thought, a plausible pretext for giving vent to his pent-up hatred against her, and suddenly rising from his seat, he withdrew from the balcony in great wrath. Extremely alarmed, she immediately hurried after him to inquire the cause; which, however, from rumours previously conveyed to her, she probably conjectured. The king, who had renounced all idea of being ever again reconciled to her, that she might not see him again, which she never did, had mounted his horse for Westminster with only six attendants, one of whom was Sir Henry Norris, leaving orders that she should not quit her apartments. On the way he minutely examined Norris, putting to him a thousand questions with great earnestness, and promising him his freedom provided he would make disclosures; but Norris on no consideration would criminate the queen. was therefore committed to the Tower next day, being the 2d of May, and on the same day, Sir Francis Weston, with Lord Rochford, were also imprisoned in the Tower. Anne had resolved to proceed in the afternoon of that day to Westminster, to meet with the king, and endeavour to allay his irritation. But she had not proceeded far up the river on her way, when her uncle, the Duke of Norfolk, who, throughout the whole of the proceedings against her, acted a very He 1 Sanders is the sole authority, and he is certainly not one of the best, for her dropping the handkerchief. |