Read Ebook: Constance Sherwood: An Autobiography of the Sixteenth Century by Fullerton Georgiana

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A gentleman seated behind me, who had a trick of sleeping in his chair, woke up and cried out, "Not half a one, sirs; not so much as half a one is allowed," meaning the mass, which he did suppose to have been spoken of.

"And if so, deserved all to die,' continued the speaker.

"Ay, and so they do, sir," quoth the sleeper. "I pray you let them all be hanged." Upon which every one laughed, and the aged gentleman also; and then he said,

"Good my friends, I ween 'tis a rash thing to speak in favor of recusants nowadays, and what few could dare to do but such as cannot be suspected of disloyalty to the queen and the country, and who, having drunk of the cup of affliction in their youth, even to the dregs, and held life for a long time as a burden which hath need to be borne day by day, until the wished for hour of release doth come--and the sooner, the more welcome--have no enemies to fear, and no object to attain. And if so be that you will bear with me for a few moments, yea, if ye procure me to be hanged to-morrow" , "I will recite to you some small part of the miseries which have been endured of late years by such as cannot be charged with the least thought of treason, or so much as the least offence against the laws, except in what touches the secret practice of their religion. Women have, to my certain knowledge, been hung up by the hands in prisons , and cruelly scourged, for that they would not confess by which priest they had been reconciled or absolved, or where they had heard mass. Priests are often tortured to force them to declare what they hear in confession, who harbor priests and Papists, where such and such recusants are to be found, and the like questions; and in so strenuous a manner, that needles have been thrust under their nails, and one man, not long since, died of his racking. O sirs and gentle ladies, I have seen with mine own eyes a youth, the son of one of my friends--young Mark Typper, born of honest and rich parents, skilful in human learning, having left his study for a time, and going home to see his friends--whipped through the streets of London, and burnt in the ear, because, forsooth, a forward judge, to whom he had been accused as a Papist, and finding no proof thereof, condemned him as a vagabond. And what think you, good people, of the death of Sir Robert Tyrwit's son, who was accused for hearing of a mass at the marriage of his sister, and albeit at the time of his arrest in a grievous fever, was pulled out of the house and thrust into prison, even as he then was, feeble, faint, and grievously sick? His afflicted parents entreat, make intercession, and use all the means they can to move the justices to have consideration of the sick; not to heap sorrow upon sorrow, nor affliction on the afflicted; not to take away the life of so comely a young gentleman, whom the physicians come and affirm will certainly die if he should be removed. All this is nothing regarded. They lay hold on the sick man, pull him away, shut him up in prison, and within two days next after he dies. They bury him, and make no scruple or regard at all. O sirs, bethink you what these parents do feel when they hear Englishmen speak of the murders of Protestants in France as an unheard of crime. If, in these days, one in a family of recusants doth covet the inheritance of an elder brother--yea, of a father--he hath but to conform to the now established religion , and denounce his parent as a Papist, and straightway he doth procure him to be despoiled, and his lands given up to him. Thus the seeds of strife and bitter enmity have been sown broadcast through the land, the bands of love in families destroyed, the foundations of honor and beneficence blown up, the veins and sinews of the common society of men cut asunder, and a fiendly force of violence and a deadly poison of suspicion used against such as are accused of no other crime than their religion, which they yet adhere to; albeit their fortunes be ruined by fines and their lives in constant jeopardy from strenuous laws made yet more urgent by private malice. My friends, I would that not one hair of the head of so much as one Huguenot had been touched in France; that not one Protestant had perished in the flames in the late queen's reign, or in that of her present majesty; and also that the persecution now framed in this country against Papists, and so handled as to blind men's eyes and work in them a strange hypocrisy, yea and in some an innocent belief that freedom of men's souls be the offspring of Protestant religion, should pass away from this land. I care not how soon ,--I care not how soon I be sewn up in a bag and cast into the Thames, if so be I might first see religious differences at an end, and men of one mind touching God's truth."

Here this noble and courageous speaker ceased, and various murmurs rose among the company. One lady remarked to her neighbor: "A marvellous preacher that of seditious doctrines, methinks."

And one gentleman said that if such talk were suffered to pass unpunished in her majesty's subjects, he should look to see massing and Popery to rear again their heads in the land.

And many loudly affirmed none could be Papists, or wish them well, and be friends to the queen's government, and so it did stand to reason that Papists were traitors.

And another said that, for his part, he should desire to see them less mercifully dealt with; and that the great clemency shown to such as did refuse to come to church, by only laying fines on them, and not dealing so roundly as should compel them to obedience, did but maintain them in their obstinacy; and he himself would as lief shoot down a seminary priest as a wolf, or any other evil beast.

I noticed this last speaker to be one of those who had spoken with most abhorrence of the massacres in France.

One lady called out in a loud voice that Papists, and such as take their part, among which she did lament to see Mr. Roper, should be ashamed so much as to speak of persecution; and began to relate the cruelties practised upon Protestants twenty years back, and the burning at Oxford of those excellent godly men, the bishops of London and Worcester.

Mr. Roper listened to her with an attentive countenance, and then said:

"I' faith, madam, I cannot choose but think Dr. Latimer, if it be he you speak of, did somewhat approve of such a method of dealing with persons obstinate touching religion, when others than himself and those of his own way of thinking were the subjects of it, if we judge by a letter he wrote in 1538 to his singular good friend the Lord Privy Seal Cromwell, at the time he was appointed to preach at the burning at Smithfield of Friar Forest of Greenwich, a learned divine I often did converse with in my young years."

"What wrote the good bishop?" two or three persons asked; and the lady who had spoken before said she should warrant it to be something pious, for a more virtuous Protestant never did live than this holy martyr.

"Marry, if he did not," said one, whom I take to have been Sir Christopher Wray, who had been a silent listener until then, "if his conscience pricked him not thereon, it must needs have been by the same rule as the lawyer used to the countryman, who did put to him this question: 'Sir, if my cow should stray into your field and feed there one whole day, what should be the law touching compensation therefor?' 'Marry, friend, assuredly to pay the damage to the full, which thou art bounden at once to do.' 'Ay,' quoth the countryman; 'but 'tis your cow hath strayed into my field.' Upon which, 'Go to, go to,' cries the lawyer; 'for I warrant thee that doth altogether alter the law.'"

Some smiled, and others murmured at this story; and meanwhile one of the company, who from his dress I perceived to be a minister, and moreover to hold some dignity in the Protestant Church, rose from his place, and crossing the room, came up to Mr. Roper , and, shaking hands with him, said: "I be of the same mind with you, friend Roper, in every word you have uttered tonight. And I pray to God my soul may be with yours after this life, and our end in heaven, albeit I should not sail there in the same boat with thou."

"Good Mr. Dean," quoth Mr. Roper, "I do say amen to your prayer." and then he added somewhat in a low voice, and methinks it was that there is but one ship chartered for safety in such a voyage.

At the which the other shook his head and waved his hand, and then calling to him a youth not more than twelve or thirteen years old, his son, he did present him to Mr. Roper. I had observed this young gentleman to listen, with an eagerness betokening more keenness for information than is usually to be found in youths of his years, to the discourses held that evening. His father told Mr. Roper that this his son's parts and quick apprehension in learning did lead him to hope he should be one day, if it pleased God, an ornament to the church. Mr. Roper smiled as he saluted the youth, and said a few words to him, which he answered very readily. I never saw again that father or that son. The one was Dr. Mathews, whom the queen made Bishop of Durham; and the other, Toby Mathews, his son, who was reconciled some years ago, and, as I have heard from some, is now a Jesuit.

The venerable aspect of the good Mr. Roper so engaged my thoughts, that I asked Lady Tregony, by whose side I was sitting, if she was acquainted with him, and if his virtue was as great as his appearance was noble. She smiled, and answered that his appearance, albeit honorable and comely, was not one half so honorable as his life had been, or so comely as his mind. That he had been the husband of Sir Thomas More's never-to-be-forgotten daughter, Margaret, whose memory he so reverently did cherish that he had never so much as thought of a second marriage; and of late years, since he had resigned the office of sub-notary in the Queen's Bench to his son, he did give his whole substance and his time to the service of the poor, and especially to prisoners, by reason of which he was called the staff of the sorrowful, and sure refuge of the afflicted. Now, then, I looked on the face of this good aged man with a deeper reverence than heretofore. Now I longed to be favored with so much of his notice as one passing word. Now I watched for an opportunity to compass my desire, and I thank God not without effect; for I do count it as a chief blessing to have been honored, during the remaining years of this virtuous gentleman's life, with so much of his condescending goodness, that if the word friendship may be used in regard to such affectionate feelings as can exist between one verging on four-score years of age and of such exalted merit, and a foolish creature yet in her teens, whom he honored with his notice, it should be so in this instance; wherein on the one side a singular reverence and humble great affection did arise almost on first acquaintance, and on the other so much benignity and goodness shown in the pains taken to cultivate such good dispositions as had been implanted in this young person's heart by careful parents, and to guard her mind against the evils of the times, that nothing could be greater.

Mr. Roper chancing to come near us, Lady Tregony said somewhat, which caused him to address me in this wise:

"And are there, then, maidens in these days not averse to the sight of gray hairs, and who mislike not to converse with aged men?"

This was said with so kindly a smile that timidity vanished, and confidence took its place.

"Oh, sir," I cried, "when I was not so much as five years old, my good father showed me a picture of Sir Thomas More, and told me he was a man of such angelic wit as England never had the like before, nor is ever like to have again, and of a most famous and holy memory; and methinks, sir, that you, being his son-in-law, who knew his doings and his mind so well, and lived so long in his house, must needs in many things resemble him."

"As to his doings and his mind," Mr. Roper replied, "no man living knoweth them so well, and if my mean wit, memory, and knowledge could serve me now, could declare so much thereof. But touching resemblance, alas! there was but one in all the world that represented the likeness of his virtues and perfections; one whom he loved in a particular manner, and who was worthiest of that love more than any creature God has made."

Here the good man's voice faltered a little, and he made a stop in his discourse; but in a little while said that he had thought it behoved him to set down in writing such matters concerning Sir Thomas's life as he could then call to remembrance, and that he would lend me the manuscript to read, which I did esteem an exceeding great favor, and one I could not sufficiently thank him for. Then he spoke somewhat of the times, which were waxing every day more troublesome, and told me he often called to mind a conversation he once had with Sir Thomas, walking along the side of the Thames at Chelsea, which he related in these words:

This was the first of many conversations I held, during the years I lived in Holborn, with this worthy gentleman, who was not more pleased to relate, than I to hear, sundry anecdotes concerning Sir Thomas More, his house, and his family.

Before he left me that day, I did make bold to ask him if he feared not ill consequences from the courageous words he had used in a mixed, yea rather, with few exceptions, wholly adverse, company.

"Not much," he answered. "Mine age; the knowledge that there are those who would not willingly see me roughly handled, and have power to prevent it; and withal no great concern, if it should be so, to have my liberty constrained, yea, my life shortened by a few years, or rather days,--doth move me to a greater freedom of speech than may generally be used, and a notable indifference to the results of such freedom."

Having whispered the like fears I had expressed to him to Lady Tregony, she did assure me his confidence was well based, and that he had connexions which would by no means suffer him to be thrown into prison, which should be the fate of any one else in that room who had spoken but one half, yea one tenth part, as boldly as he had ventured on.

It was some time before I could restore myself to my countenance, after so much moving discourse, so as to join with spirit in the sports and the dancing which did ensue among the young people that evening. But sober thoughts and painful themes after a while gave place to merriment; and the sound of music, gay tattle, and cheerful steps lured me to such enjoyment as youth is wont to take in these kinds of pastimes. It was too much my wont to pursue with eagerness the present humor, and drink deeply of innocent pleasure wherein no harm should exist if enjoyed with moderation. But like in a horse on whose neck the bridle is cast, what began in a gentle ambling ends in wild gallopping; so lawful merriment, if unrestrained, often ends in what is unbeseeming, and in some sort blameable. So this time, when dancing tired, a ring was formed for conversation, and the choice of the night's pastime yielded to my discretion; alack, rather to my imprudence and folly, methinks I might style it. I chose that arguments should be held by two persons of the company, turn by turn, and that a judge should be named to allot a reward to the worthiest, and a penance to the worst. This liked them all exceedingly, and by one consent they appointed me to be judge, and to summon such as should dispute. There were there two young gentlemen which haunted our house, and Lady Ingoldby's also. One was Martin Tregony, Lady Tregony's nephew, an ill-favored young man, with manners worse than his face, and so apish and foppish in his dress and behavior, that no young woman could abide him, much less would receive his addresses, or if she did entertain him in conversation, it was to make sport of his so great conceit. He had an ill-natured kind of wit, more sharp than keen, more biting than sarcastic. He studied the art of giving pain, and oftentimes did cause shamefaced merit to blush. The other was Mr. Thomas Sherwood, who, albeit not very near in blood to my father, was, howsoever, of the same family as ourselves. He had been to the English College in Douay, and had brought me tidings a short time back of my father and Edmund Genings' safe arrival thither, and afterward came often to see us, and much frequented Lady Tregony's house. He had exceedingly good parts, but was somewhat diffident and bashful. Martin Tregony was wont to make him a mark, as it were, of his ill-natured wit, and did fancy himself to be greatly his superior in sharpness, partly because Mr. Sherwood's disposition was retiring, and partly that he had too much goodness and sense to bandy words with so ill-mannered a young man. I pray you who read this, could aught be more indiscreet than, in a thoughtless manner, to have summoned these two to dispute? which nevertheless I did, thinking some sport should arise out of it, to see Master Martin foisted in argument by one he despised, and also from his extravagant gestures and affected countenances. So I said:

"Master Tregony, your task shall be to dispute with Master Sherwood; and this the theme of your argument, 'The Art of Tormenting.' He who shall describe the nicest instances of such skill, when exercised by a master toward his servant, a parent to his child, a husband to his wife, a wife to her husband, a lover to his mistress, or a friend to his friend, shall be proclaimed victorious; and his adversary submit to such penance as the court shall inflict."

Master Sherwood shook his head for to decline to enter these lists; but all the young gentlemen and ladies cried, he should not be suffered to show contempt of the court, and forced him to stand up.

Master Martin was nothing loth, and in his ill-favored countenance there appeared a made smile, which did indicate an assurance of victory; so he began:

"The more wit a man hath, the better able he shall be at times to torment another; so I do premise, and at the outset of this argument declare, that to blame a man for the exercise of a talent he doth possess is downright impiety, and that to wound another by the pungency of home-thrusts in conversation is as just a liberty in an ingenious man, as the use of his sword in a battle is to a soldier."

Mr. Sherwood upon this replied, that he did allow a public disputation, appointed by meet judges, to come under the name of a fair battle; but even in a battle generous combatants aim not so much at wounding their adversaries, as to the disarming of them; and that he who in private conversation doth make a weapon of his tongue is like unto the man who provokes another to a single combat, which for Christians is not lawful, and pierces him easily who has less skill in wielding the sword than himself.

"Marry, sir," quoth Master Martin, "if you do bring piety into your discourse, methinks the rules of just debate be not observed; for it is an unfair thing for to overrule a man with arguments he doth not dare to reply to under pain of spiritual censures."

"Now to the point," I cried; "for exordiums be tedious. I pray you, gentlemen, begin, and point out some notable fashion wherewith a master might torment his servant."

Upon which quoth Martin: "If a man hath a sick servant, and doth note his fancy to be set on some indulgence not of strict necessity, and should therefore deny it to him, methinks that should be a rare opportunity to exercise his talent."

"Nay," cried Master Sherwood, "a nicer one, and ever at hand afterward, should be to show kindness once to a dependent when sick, and to use him ten times the worse for it when he is well, upbraiding him for such past favors, as if one should say: 'Alack, be as kind as you will, see what return you do meet with!'"

This last piece of ingenuity was allowed by the court to surpass the first. "Now," I cried, "what should be the greatest torment a parent could inflict on a child?"

Martin answered: "If it should be fond of public diversion, to confine it in-doors. If retirement suits its temper, to compel it abroad. If it should delight in the theatre, to take it to see a good play, and at the moment when the plot shall wax most moving, to say it must be tired, and procure to send it home. Or, in more weighty matters,--a daughter's marriage, for instance,--to detect if the wench hath set her heart on one lover, and if so, to keep from her the knowledge of this gentleman's addresses; and when she hath accepted another, to let her know the first had sued for her hand, and been dismissed."

Here all the young gentlewomen did exclaim that Master Sherwood could by no means think of a more skilful torment than this should prove. He thought for an instant, and then said:

"It should be a finer and more delicate torment to stir up in a young gentlewoman's mind suspicions of one she loved, and so work on her natural passions of jealousy and pride, that she should herself, in a hasty mood, discard her lover; and ever after, when the act was not recallable, remind her she herself had wrought her own unhappiness, and wounded one she loved."

"Yea, that should be worse than the first torment," all but one young lady cried out; who, for her part, could better endure, she said, to have injured herself than to be deceived, as in the first case.

"Then do come husbands," quoth Mr. Martin; "and I vow," he cried, "I know not how to credit there be such vile wretches in the world as should wish to torment their wives; but if such there be, methinks the surest method they may practise is, to loving wives to show indifferency; to such as be jealous, secrecy; to such as be pious, profaneness; and the like in all the points whereon their affections are set."

"Alack!" cried Mistress Frances Bellamy, "what a study the man hath made of this fine art! Gentlewomen should needs beware of such a one for a husband. What doth Master Sherwood say?"

Whereupon he: "Methinks the greatest torment a husband might inflict on a worthy wife should be to dishonor her love by his baseness; or if he had injured her, to doubt her proneness to forgive."

"And wives," quoth Mistress Southwell,--"what of their skill therein, gentlemen?"

"It be such," cried Martin, "as should exceed men's ability thereof to speak. The greatest instance of talent of this sort I have witnessed is in a young married lady, whose husband is very willing to stay in his house or go abroad, or reside in town, or at his seat in the country, as should most please her, so she would let him know her wishes. But she is so artful in concealing them, that the poor man can never learn so much as should cause him to guess what they may be; but with a meek voice she doth reply to his asking, 'An it please you, sir, let it be as you choose, for you very well know I never do oppose your will.' Then if he resolve to leave town, she maketh not much ado till they have rode twenty or thirty miles out of London. Then she doth begin to sigh and weep, for that she should be a most ill-used creature, and her heart almost broken for to leave her friends, and be shut up for six months in a swamp, for such she doth term his estate; and if she should not have left London that same day, she should have been at the Lord Mayor's banquet, and seen the French princes, which, above all things, she had desired. But some husbands be so hard-hearted, if they can hunt and hawk, 'tis little count they make of their wives' pleasures. Then when she hath almost provoked the good man to swear, she hangeth down her head and saith, 'Content you, sir--content you; 'tis your good fortune to have an obedient wife.' And so mopes all the time of the journey."

Whilst Martin was speaking, I noted a young gentlewoman who did deeply blush whilst he spoke, and tears came into her eyes. I heard afterward she had been lately married, and that he counterfeited her voice in so precise a manner, so that all such as knew her must needs believe her to be the wife he spoke of; and that there was so much of truth in the picture he had drawn, as to make it seem a likeness, albeit most unjust toward one who, though apt to boast of her obedience, and to utter sundry trifling complaints, was a fond wife and toward lady to her dear husband; and that this malice in Mr. Tregony, over and above his wonted spite, was due to her rejection of his hand some short time before her marriage. Master Sherwood, seeing the ungracious gentleman's ill-nature and the lady's confusion, stood up the more speedily to reply, and so cut him short. "I will relate," he said, "a yet more ingenious practice of tormenting, which should seem the highest proof of skill in a wife, albeit also practised by husbands, only not so aptly, or peradventure so often. And this is when one hath offered to another a notable insult or affront, so to turn the tables, even as a conjuror the cards he doth handle, that straightway the offended party shall seem to be the offender, and be obliged to sue forgiveness for that wherein he himself is hurt. I pray you, gentlemen and ladies, can anything more ingenious than this practice be thought on?"

All did admit it to be a rare example of ability in tormenting; but some objected it was not solely exercised by wives and husbands, but that friends, lovers, and all sorts of persons might use it. Then one gentleman called for some special instance of the art in lovers. But another said it was a natural instinct, and not an art, in such to torment one another, and likewise their own selves, and proposed the behavior of friends in that respect as a more new and admirable theme.

"Ah," quoth Master Martin, with an affected wave of his hand, "first show me an instance of a true friendship betwixt ladies, or a sincere affection betwixt gentlemen; and then it will be time for to describe the arts whereby they do plague and torment each other."

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