1553-4. tongue, at the end of the Testament which she bequeathed as AN. Dom. a legacy to her sister the Lady Katherine; which, being such a lively picture of the excellent lady, may well deserve to be continually kept in remembrance of her, and is this that followeth1: sister. "I HAVE here sent you (good sister Katherine) a book, Letter to her which, although it be not outwardly trimmed with gold, yet inwardly it is more worth than precious stones. It is the book (dear sister) of the law of the Lord. It is his Testament and last will, which he bequeathed unto us wretches; which shall lead you to the path of eternal joy, and, if you with a good mind read it, and with an earnest mind do purpose to follow it, shall bring you to an immortal and everlasting life. It shall teach you to live, and learn you to die. It shall win you more than you should have gained by the possession of your woeful father's lands. For as, if God had prospered him, you should have inherited his lands; so, if you apply diligently this book, seeking to direct your life after it, you shall be an inheritor of such riches as neither the covetous shall withdraw from you, neither thief shall steal, neither yet the moths corrupt. Desire with David (good sister) to understand the law of the Lord God. Live still to die, that you by death may purchase eternal life and trust not that the tenderness of your age shall lengthen your life; for as soon, if God calls, goeth the young as the old and labour always to learn to die. Defy the world, deny the devil, and despise the flesh; and delight yourself only in the Lord. Be penitent for your sins, and yet despair not. Be strong in faith, and yet presume not; and desire, with St Paul, to be dissolved, and to be with Christ, with : have been the person to whom it was addressed, as it was written before Lady Jane's marriage, whereas Harding did not avow his apostasy until after the accession of Mary. (Remains of Lady J. Gray, lxxvii.). But were there any defections to Romanism before the accession of Mary? Is it not more likely that there may be some error in the signature of the letter as printed, which is the only ground of the argument as to its date? Banks, writing in March 1554, refers the letter to the time of Lady Jane's imprisonment.-Epp. Tigur. 201. 1 The letter here given from Fox, vi. 423, agrees in the main with a MS. in the British Museum, printed by Nicolas, Rem, of Lady J. Gray, 44-5 in which work another copy is also given. 1553-4. AN. DOM. whom even in death there is life. Be like the good servant, and even at midnight be waking; lest, when death cometh and stealeth upon you, like a thief in the night, you be with the evil servant found sleeping; and lest for lack of oil you be found like the five foolish women, and like him that had not on the wedding-garment; and then ye be cast out from the marriage. Rejoice in Christ, as I do. Follow the steps of your master Christ, and take upon you1 your cross. Lay your sins on his back, and always embrace him. And, as touching my death, rejoice as I do (good sister) that I shall be delivered of this corruption and put on incorruption. For I am assured that I shall, for losing of a mortal life, win an immortal one. The which I pray God to grant you, and send you of his grace, to live in his fear, and to die in the true Christian faith; from the which in God's name I exhort you that you never swerve, neither for hope of life nor fear of death. For if you will deny his truth, to lengthen your life, God will deny you, and yet shorten your days: and if you will cleave unto him, he will prolong your days to your comfort, and to his glory. To the which glory God bring me now, and you 167 hereafter, when it pleaseth him to call you! Fare you well (good sister) and put your only trust in God, who only must help you. Execution of Feb. 12. 33. The fatal morning being come, the Lord Guilford ford Dudley, earnestly desired the officers that he might take his farewell of her. Which though they willingly permitted, yet, upon notice of it, she advised the contrary; assuring him, "that such a meeting would rather add to his afflictions than increase that quiet wherewith they had possessed their souls for the stroke of death; that he demanded a lenitive which would put fire into the wound, and that it was to be feared her presence would rather weaken than strengthen him; that he ought to take courage from his reason, and derive constancy from his own heart; that if his soul were not firm and settled, she could not settle it by her eyes, nor confirm it by her words; that he should do well to remit this interview to the other world; that there indeed friendships were happy, and unions undesolvable2; 2 Sic in edd. 1 For "upon you" Fox reads "up." 1553-4. and that theirs would be eternal, if their souls carried nothing AN. DOM. with them of terrestrial, which might hinder them from rejoicing." All she could do was to give him a farewell out of a window, as he passed toward the place of his dissolution; which he suffered on the scaffold on Tower-hill with much Christian meekness. His dead body being laid in a car, and his head wrapped up in a linen cloth, were carried to the chapel within the Tower; in the way to which they were to pass under the window of the Lady Jane, where she had given him his farewell1: a spectacle sufficient to disanimate a courageous heart, not armed with the constancy and resolution of so brave a virtue. The spectacle endured by her with the less astonishment, because she knew she was upon the point of meeting with him in a better conjuncture, where they should never find the like intermission of their joys and happinesses. 34. It was once resolved on by the court that she should die on the same scaffold with her husband; but it was feared that, being both pitied and beloved by the common people, some sudden commotion might be raised if she were publicly brought forth to her execution. It was therefore held the safer course that a scaffold should be erected for her within the verge of the Tower, on which she might satisfy the greatest severity of the law without any danger to the state. Towards which being to be led by Sir John Gage2 (who was then Constable of the Tower), he desired her to bestow some small gift upon him, to be kept as a memorial of her. To gratify which desire, she gave him her table-book, in which she had written three sentences in Greek, Latin, and English, as she saw her husband's body brought unto the chapel; which she besought him to accept as her last bequest. The Greek to this effectthat "if his executed body should give testimony against her before men, his most blessed soul should give an eternal proof of her innocence in the presence of God." The Latin added that "human justice was against his body, but the divine mercy would be for his soul." And then concluded thus in English, that "if her fault deserved punishment, her youth, at least, 1 Speed, 844. 2 Others mention Sir John Brydges, lieutenant of the Tower.Nicolas, xcix. AN. DOM. and her imprudence, were worthy of excuse; and that God and 1553-4. posterity would shew her favour1." Execution of the Lady Jane. 35. Conducted by Fecknam to the scaffold, she gave not much heed unto his discourses, but kept her eyes upon a prayer-book of her own. And, being mounted on the throne from which she was to receive a more excellent crown than any which this vile earth could give her, she addressed herself in some few words to the standers by, letting them know that "her offence was not for having laid her hand upon the crown, but for not rejecting it with sufficient constancy; that she had less erred through ambition than out of respect and reverence to her parents:" acknowledging nevertheless that "her respect was to be accounted as a crime, and such reverence to deserve a punishment; that she would willingly admit of death, so to give satisfaction to the injured state-that by obedience to the laws she might voluntarily take off the scandal which she had given by her constrained obedience to her friends and kindred:" 16 concluding finally, that "she had justly deserved this punishment, for being made the instrument (though the unwilling instrument) of another's ambition; and should leave behind her an example, that innocence excuseth not great misdeeds, if they any way tend to the destruction of the commonwealth." Which said, and desiring the people to recommend her in their prayers to the mercies of God, she caused herself to be disrobed by some of her women, who, with wet eyes and heavy hearts, performed that office, which was no more unwelcome than if it had been nothing but the preparation to the death of sleep, and not unto the sleep of death. And being now ready for the block, with the same clear and untroubled countenance wherewith she had acted all the rest of her tragedy, she said aloud the Psalm of Miserere mei, Deus, in 1 On the improbabilities of this account, (which does not appear in Fox, and only in part in Godwin, 175), see Nicolas, xciv. seqq. He denies altogether that Lady Jane wrote any epigram or sentence on her husband, and considers that the evidence preponderates against her having written any on herself. He believes that the only writing on this occasion consisted of some words inscribed, at the request of Sir J. Brydges, in a book of devotions, which is preserved in the British Museum. 2 Thuan. xiii. 4, (T. 1. p. 450); Godwin, 175, (but both less fully). the English tongue1, and so submitted her pure neck to the AN. DOM. executioner. 1553-4. deeds naming 36. Touching the bonds, recognizances, grants, convey- Validity of ances, and other legal instruments, which had been made in her as Queen. the short reign of this Queen, a doubt was raised amongst our lawyers whether they were good and valid in the law or not. The reason of which scruple was, because that interval of time which passed betwixt the death of King Edward, on the 6th of July, and the proclaiming of Queen Mary in all parts of the realm, was in the law to be esteemed as a part of her reign, without any notice to be taken of the interposing of the Lady Jane; in the first year of whose reign the said bonds, recognizances, grants, &c. had their several dates. And thereupon it was enacted in the following parliament, that "all statutes, recognizances, and other writings whatsoever, knowledged or made by or to any person or persons, bodies politic or corporate, being the Queen's subjects, since the 6th day of July last past, until the 1st day of August then next following, under the name of the reign of any other person than under the name of the said Queen's Majesty, with the style appropriated or united to her Majesty's imperial crown, shall be as good and effectual in the law, to all intents, purposes, constructions, and meanings, as if upon the making thereof the name of the said Queen Mary, with her style appropriated, had been fully and plainly expressed in the same." With a proviso notwithstanding, that "all grants, letters patents, and commissions made by the said Lady Jane, to any person or persons whatsoever, should be reputed void and of none effect." Which proviso seems to have been added, not only for making void of all such grants of the crown-lands as had passed in the name of the said Queen Jane-(if any such grants were ever made) but for invalidating the commission granted to the Duke of Northumberland for raising arms in her behalf: the pleading whereof, though it could not be allowed for his indemnity when he stood at the bar, might possibly have raised some reproach or trouble to his peers and judges, if the integrity of their proceedings had been called in question. 37. Such was the end of the short life, but far shorter reign, of the Lady Jane: her reign but of nine days, and no 1 Holinshed, iv. 22. 21 Mary, Sess. 2, c. 4. |