Adrian Gilbert is also charged with having, at the complainant's house, assaulted the servant of a tailor who would not furnish any further clothes till the last were paid for, and having forcibly pulled off some of his clothes; He said in greate fuerey (such was his savage crewelty and blasphemy) that he wolde accordinge to the old lawe have an eye for an ey and tooth for tooth, and so tourned him starke naked (savinge his shert) owt of your said subject's howse into the open markett, beinge the markett daye, before many people, to the poore man's great greefe, and kept his cloathes by longe space after lockt in the said castell, although many of worshipp and others prayed him to delyver the same. The complainant then details other misdeeds of Gilbert, in riding his horse all covered with dirt through a heap of winnowed barley, and assaulting the owner's wife who interfered with him. Meere also alleges that he farmed all Raleigh's lands in Sherborne at the rent of 7007. a-year, together with the park and deer there, and yet Sir Walter's servants had entered complainant's park, and his deer there being did chase, slay, and carry away. A recapitulation of the grievances is then made, which are all said to have been done "sythens your Majesties most gracious generall and free pardon, and so doe remayne unpardoned;" and they are summed up to be "to the iminente daunger of your good and lovinge subjectes, tendinge to great oppression and wronges and to a very ill exampell, and are like to norishe and bringe fourth great incouragement of disorder in such as are illdisposed persons, if some sharpe and severe punishment may not be inflicted on the said offenders for the same." And a necessity is said to exist for the interference of the council, as Raleigh has threatened that he would do again what he had done, "yf that yt should cost him a million for committing the same." Some considerations arise out of the circumstances detailed in Meere's lengthy complaint. The very fact of his having maintained his ground at all against a man of Raleigh's mark and position shews not only that Meere must have had some position too, and certainly considerable nerve, but also that he had friends who supported him. Among the common people of the town such would, of course, from various motives, be readily found; but he could have scarce held his ground without the favour of the sheriff, and the Lord Howard, with whose name Raleigh's servants are said to have mocked him. The sheriff, by continuing to direct writs to Meere as bailiff of Sherborne, effectually maintained him in his legal position till he had been judicially deprived of it, and so made it in vain that Raleigh recalled his appointment and nominated another. The Lord Howard Viscount Bindon, was Thomas, the younger son of Thomas first Viscount Bindon, who succeeded to the title in the year 1590, on the decease of his brother Henry (the second Viscount) without issue. The first possessor of the title was the second son of Thomas Duke of Norfolk, and brother of Henry Earl of Surrey the poet, who having married the heiress of the Newburghs of Lulworth and thereby obtained the greater part of the possessions of the Cistertian house of Bindon (of which a Newburgh was the founder), was created Viscount Bindon 13 January, 1 Eliz. It is with reference to the Lord Howard that the most really important point in these proceedings presents itself. Five years before the disputes *We have here a reference to an important document intimately concerning Raleigh, which has never yet been known to exist. The only offence supposed to have been committed by him is the connection and marriage with Elizabeth Throckmorton. No formal pardon is noticed by Raleigh's biographers. The discovery of the document here alluded to would most probably throw some light upon this point. The persons against whom process is prayed are Sir Walter Raleigh, William Gybbes, Adryan Gylbert esquier, William Sweet, John Phillopes, Barnaby Sawle, William Floyer, John Shelberey, Edward Standen, Henry Starr, John Lynsey, William Deane, Robert Dobberey, Lawrence Michell, Thomas Knowell, Richard Foster, George Morgayne, Richard Masters, Rice Sudderey, John Sudderey, Robert Addams, Raynold Ryves otherwise Wymond, John Johanes, John Allambrige, Peeter Deane, William Stagg, Gylbert Speed, John Plucknett, William Plucknett, Edward Clench, and William Clench." John Stocker, Esq. of Poole, was sheriff of Dorset 43 Elizabeth. GENT. MAG. VOL. XL. 3 L now under notice Raleigh had complained that Lord Bindon (it could be no other) had "exalted Mere's suits against him in his absence;" and in that letter he speaks of the Viscount in terms of the bitterest enmity. By the other familiar letter to Lord Cobham* about the "rogges the Meers," it is clear that our complainant had no difficulty, doubtless through Lord Bindon, in getting into direct communication with Secretary Cecil, by means of "the Lord Thomas," and making out his story to him. It would be in vain, perhaps, to suggest a cause for Lord Bindon and Raleigh's mutual hatred, but they were in circumstances with respect to each other which have at all times engendered such feelings; both were possessors of forfeited ecclesiastical property; and during Raleigh's absence, Lord Bindon might have had dealings with his bailiff in which his master's interest was not the first consideration, and then "have exalted his suits against him." Now Mr. Tytler has adduced some strong arguments and evidence in support of his opinion of "Cecil's enmity to Raleigh," and showing how his fall was owing to Cecil's jealousy. The Lord Henry Howard (brother of the Duke of Norfolk, then lately beheaded) was the principal agent of Cecil in his correspondence with Scotland preparatory to James's accession, and he was one of the Commissioners for inquiring into the so-called "Raleigh" plot in 1603, and took an active part in that inquiry. He was moreover first cousin to the Lord Viscount Bindon of the case" Meere v. Raleigh," and as Raleigh says in the postscript previously referred to, that "he forbore him in respect of my Lord Thomas, and chiefly because of Mr. Secretory, who in his love to my Lord Thomas hath wisht me to it:" it is more than probable that the secretary's chief agent, a near relation both of Lord Thomas and Lord Bindon, should also have been well informed by Meere (whom his kinsman continued to support) of Raleigh's al leged misconduct, and been influenced by it. It would be too much to say that the struggle for the bailiwick of Sherborne involved the ruin of the writer of the "History of the World;" but there can be no doubt that a powerful abettor of Raleigh's contumacious officer was intimately connected with a principal agent in his fall. Among the persons mentioned by Meere as assistants of Raleigh, is one whose name presents so strong a resemblance to that of one of our great dramatist's creations as to call for some comment. The man who Raleigh put up as bailiff in opposition to Meere was named Robert Dolberry. He is stigmatised by our complainant as "an attorney of the Court of Common Plees, and a very bare fellow, not worth an execution of vi yf any escape shold be when any shall come to his handes;" he took a very active part in the attempt to oust Meere from his office, and it is not improbable that he had been so engaged from the commencement of the disputes. Have we here the original of the immortal Dogberry? It is without any at present. The difference in the name is that of one letter only; the character and circumstances are well adapted for it. But the date of the proceedings detailed in our complainant's bill preclude the possibility of these being known to Shakspere when "Much Ado about Nothing" was written. The play was printed in 1600, and was probably written in the preceding year. Still, considering that the quarrel had been going on for some time, and that Dolberry was much concerned in it, this difference of date is not an entire bar to such a circumstance. And, supported as Meere was by several members of the powerful Howard family, it is by no means improbable that an unfavourable report of some proceedings, similar perhaps to those recorded above, might have been put into circulation against Raleigh and his friends. His own version might * See preceding note as to the "Mere" family. The "Meers of Chaldon Boys " were on Viscount Bindon's property. This was Lord Thomas Howard, son of Lord Howard of Effingham, Lord High Admiral. He was a near relation of the Viscount Bindon, and was associated with Raleigh in naval command. Tytler's Life of Sir Walter Raleigh. Appendix E. COTELE; AND THE EDGCUMBES OF THE OLDEN TIME. BY MRS. BRAY. AMONGST those knights devoted to the House of Lancaster who, since the success of Richard of York, thought proper to retire for awhile from public life to the limits of their own domains, was Sir Richard Edgcumbe. Of a noble person and a high spirit, gifted by nature with many good and generous qualities, he could ill brook the inaction and obscurity into which he was forced by the head of the adverse Yorkists having achieved the crown. His mind became the prey of dissatisfaction, secret repinings, and discontent. There is nothing more destructive to happiness than once to admit the idea that something ought to be possessed which cannot be attained; to suffer such to gain an ascendancy over the mind, is to embitter and render distasteful every other blessing which a good Providence has bestowed. This feeling was for a time the bane of Sir Richard Edgcumbe. He was the representative of an ancient house, the master of a fair estate; enjoying health, youth, friends, he was both honoured and esteemed. But all these blessings were overlooked in the thoughts of what he had not, in the want of that power and influence in the service of his prince which must have been his had the cause of Lancaster prevailed. But Richard wore the crown, and under him an Edgcumbe could never rise to distinction in the chamber of council nor in the career of arms, for he would never bear them for one he held to be no other than a usurper, and foreign service he scorned, for an Edgcumbe had never been a mercenary, had never drawn the sword but in a quarrel for England's rightful sovereign or England's defence. The church was open to him, but bell, book, and candle had little charms for Sir Richard; and the law, to his dissatisfied view, seemed a juggle, since a Catesby was one of its chief officers. There was, he fancied, no honourable way of life open to him, and he was unhappy. Neither hawk, nor hound, nor “dappled deer" afforded occupation enough for his active mind; and the listless indolence which weighed upon his spirits found little relief in the monkish gloom of an old chamber, where a few vellum manuscripts, then a valuable library, offered him the chief if not the only mental recreation to be found within the walls of Cotele. If he sometimes endeavoured to forget his grievances in the legendary tales of saints and their miracles, in the tomes of some venerable chronicler, or the romaunts of a Norman poet, his eye would often wander from the page to rest on the stained window that presented to his view the arms and alliances of his ancient house; and then would busy recollections of other days force themselves upon him, as he pictured to his fancy the acts and glories of his ancestors, which to his imagination shone with a lustre brilliant as that of "their blazonry" in the glittering hues of the glass. And then again and again would the fear that his name would never be enrolled with theirs, in the annals of glorious achievement, so prey upon his heart that, at length, he became ready and anxious to make any effort, however hazardous, to escape from his obscure destiny, and to take the most desperate steps to revive a fallen cause. In such a frame of mind was Sir Richard Edgcumbe when the friends of Henry of Lancaster once more became active in carrying on their secret plans and devices to bring about the overthrow of the tyrant Richard, and the succession of Henry to the throne. Sir Richard Edgcumbe was too well known, and too highly estimated, to be overlooked in such a crisis by the friends to the Lancastrian line. He was sought out in his obscurity; and most gladly did he become once more not merely a partisan but a leader in their cause. For a while all went on prosperously; but at length king Richard, who had well-paid spies and informers in every part of the nation, received some intimation of what was going on, and no time was lost in taking steps for the arrest of Sir Richard Edgcumbe. Yet so cautiously was the matter both arranged and conducted, that the unfortunate Edgcumbe had not even the slightest suspicion of his danger, till the persons entrusted with the management of his arrest, and the men-at-arms of the King, were actually arrived at Cotele to secure their prisoner. But to tell what followed, other than in the phrase of Prince, would be to injure the most interesting circumstance in the story of this brave knight; I give it therefore in his own quaint words. In King Richard the 3d days, Edgcumbe being suspected of favouring the Earl of Richmond against that King, was driven to hide himself in those thick woods which overlook the river Tamar, and belonging to his house at Cuttail. Being hotly pursued, and narrowly searched for, extremity taught him a suddain policy, to put a stone in his cap and tumble the same into the water, while these rangers were at his heels: who, looking down after the noise, and seeing his cap swimming thereon, supposed he had desperately drowned himself. Hence they gave over their farther pursuit, and left him the liberty to shift over into Britany, and there to join himself to the Earl of Richmond. The dangers thus incurred in the service of his friend were not forgotten when, as Henry the Seventh, he mounted the throne of England. Sir Richard Edgcumbe was speedily appointed Comptroller of the Royal Household, a member of the Privy Council, and in 1488 Ambassador to France. Nor were marks of favour even more substantial than these wanting; for on the attainder of John lord Zouch for his adherence to the discomfited tyrant, Henry gave to Sir Richard Edgcumbe that nobleman's forfeited lands and castle of Totness, "an ancient honor unto which were attached no less than 36 knights' fees." Sir Richard took to himself a wife from one of the old families of Devon, a daughter of Thomas Tremayne of Collacoms, esq. by whom he became the father of a son, who, in process of time, "Nor was Sir Richard Edgcumbe cler, "of his duty towards God, for unmindful," says the good old chronihis signal providence to him; for at his return in peace, in thankful remembrance of his deliverance, he builded a (in his thick woods of Cuttail), to celefair chappel in that his lurking place brate his great name." Amongst other honours conferred upon him was that of being chosen sheriff for his native county, in the second year of Henry's reign. And such was the estimation in which he was held for his wisdom treating with foreign powers, that beand his policy and manly bearing when sides being sent as ambassador to the court of France, he was employed on whilst engaged in one of these, to the many other embassies to foreign princes; Duke of Britany, he died. The grandson of this worthy, also named Richard, was no less eminent than himself, though he lived in less stormy times; and as the record of his merits is not a little curious, from the scattered information which may be gleaned from it respecting the domestic manners and customs of his day, I trust it will not be altogether uninof his story. teresting to the reader to add a sketch work on Cornwall) was his descendant Carew (the author of the learned in the female line, and has been his chief chronicler. his religion, "Though the days wherein He says, touching he mostly lived savoured of Romish rust, yet this Richard's upright dealings bore witness that he had the fruits his learning in the arts, he attained it of a good conscience. *** And for by his study in the University of Oxford, where he spent some parts of his youth, not idly, nor only whilst he baited his horse, but both orderly and profitably." We should not readily conjecture what Carew, in this instance, considered "profitably,” had he not told us, when he appends to this eulogy that Sir Richard "could tell by cererrand was that came unto him. Richtain rules of astrology what any man's In Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, there is a curious chapter on Astrology, which shows how universal was the belief and the practice of it in his time. seems somewhat to doubt its powers himself, when he writes: "If thou shalt ask me Yet he what I think, I must answer, nam et doctis hisce erroribus versatus sum (for I am |