three hundred men but indomitable, was nearing his goal. At the shouts of some of his men, "The Queen grants our prayer! and pardons us!" Mary's defenders, with less zeal than apparent devotion, might be seen forming on the other side of the street, or better still, opening their files to let them pass quietly, without a word or a gesture in hindrance. At last the band arrived at Ludgate; but there, when Wyatt knocked at the gate repeating the lie about reconciliation with the Queen, Lord William Howard shouted to him, "Avaunt! traitor! thou shalt not come in here." This firmness disconcerted the malcontents within, the rebel lost hope, and retired fighting as far as Temple Bar. There his enterprise was hopelessly ruined; he gave up his sword to Sir Maurice Berkeley. He was taken to Westminster, and the same evening to the Tower, with other prisoners.

Thus ended this insurrection, having put the crown of Mary Tudor in danger for a week, from the 1st to the 7th of February, 1554. If the Queen had flinched in this extremity of danger, and shared the terror of her companions; if she had been unable to keep up the same valour before Wyatt as

before the Duke of Northumberland, a few months earlier, she would have sunk, and Elizabeth's reign would have begun four years

sooner.

285

CHAPTER XVII.

ARREST OF ELIZABETH AT ASHRIDGE.

Rigorous Measures after Wyatt's defeat-Death of Lady Jane Grey-The Arrest of Elizabeth at Ashridge is decided uponElizabeth is brought from Ashridge to Westminster.

HIS success which Mary had the right

TH

to attribute principally to her force of character, was not without a share of glory; but how much more glorious would it have been if she had been able to vanquish herself after vanquishing her enemies. Mary was born kind and merciful. We know she had been pained after Northumberland's defeat, at meting out a well-deserved chastisement to three of the most guilty--Northumberland and his two chief followers. Against the suggestions of her Ministers and the Imperialists, she had spared the others and respected the life of Jane Grey, her unwilling rival, but still her rival. In

order to appreciate the merit of this moderation, reference must be made to the ferocity of manners that characterises the history of England at this time. The strongest shed profusely and unscrupulously the blood of the highest or nearest. The terrible right of kings, the right of the sword, was understood as Henry VIII. had exercised it, as Elizabeth afterwards also exercised it; no one ever confined it within narrower limits than Mary, when she gained her throne by conquest. Inexperienced and simple, on coming forth from retirement, believing in goodness, notwithstanding the long martyrdom of her youth, she had faith in generosity and mercy. She thought pardon would disarm the factions-vain illusion! One fine day the hour struck, whose premonitory signs Renard had long foreseen. Her enemies, whose lives and wealth she had spared, flocked to Wyatt for her overthrow, and did not even recoil from the idea of assassination. Then a total change was wrought in her. She resolved to harden her heart, outraged by so much hatred and ingratitude, and embittered by meeting deception; perhaps she also thought she was conscientiously accomplishing a duty, by securing the peace of the State

together with the security of her crown. Unfortunately around her, her surest and most trusted councillors, Gardiner and Renard, as well as those who had in July been infected. with the plots of Northumberland and Suffolk, those who had been suspected during these last troubles of Wyatt, all equally cried out for severity and punishment. punishment. They said that indulgence had no effect but to encourage the factious to renew their attempts; and that just punishment must teach the designers of evil, that they risked life and fortune in attacking the royal power. Mary yielded too much to these suggestions, but not enough (according to the opinion of some) as she did not give them up her sister's life.

The persons who had placed Jane Grey on the throne against her will, pressed for her death, for the crime of having been Queen.* The day after the victory, Mary was persuaded to sign the warrant for the execution of the capital sentence pronounced on the unhappy captive the preceding November.† A victim at twenty-seven *Strype: Vol. III. pp. 91, 92.

It is also clear from Renard's correspondence that Mary must have given a first order for the execution during Wyatt's insurrection. "Si son commandement a été faict," he writes to the Emperor, " on trancha Mardy la teste à Jeanne de Suffocq et à son mary." Letter to Charles V. London, Thursday, February 8th, 1553-4. Manuscript in the Record Office, Vol. I. p. 1180.