surgeon's evidence gives the lie direct to part of Bailiffe's sworn statement, and so tends to invalidate the entire narrative put forward in defence of the Queen's ministers. If Northumberland died immediately after the discharge of the pistol, how was it that Bailiffe heard him "give a long and most grievous grone, and after that. . . a second grone," when, according to the warder's own story, many minutes must have elapsed from the time that he heard the shot fired "a little after midnight"? Between the firing of the shot and the Earl's last groan, Bailiffe alleged that he found time to leave his bed in the adjoining room; to call loudly upon the prisoner; to ascertain that the latter's door had been bolted upon the inside; to continue "crying and calling" until he awakened an old man sleeping without; to despatch this old man for the watch; and finally to send one of the watchmen in quest of the Lieutenant of the Tower.1 That, under the circumstances, Northumberland should have been able to utter two distinct groans appears in itself impossible; that he should have given these evidences of life so long after the infliction of the wounds is impossible indeed. And if Bailiffe was capable of perjuring himself in this part of his testimony, may not the statement relating to the bolting of the Earl's door upon the inside (to which he alone bore witness) have been also untrue? Thus at least argued the many who believed that Northumberland had been done to death at the instigation of the Queen or the Vice-Chamberlain. These people furthermore pointed out that, even granting the inner bolting of Northumberland's door, no search had been made through the cell for concealed assailants, or for any secret mode of egress by which such could escape. The facts that Bailiffe was in Hatton's employ, and that James Pryce (who was said to have supplied the Earl with pistol, powder, and bullets) had not been called upon to give evidence, either at the inquest or Star Chamber inquiry, were

1 The Lieutenant, Sir O. Hopton, deposed that he was called at "lesse than a quarter of an hour before one of the clocke "-more than forty-five minutes after the shot was said to have been fired, but only a few minutes after the Earl gave his last groan !

Al

also made use of by the accusers of the Government. together The True and Summarie Reporte rather damaged the case of the Crown than otherwise in the minds of those disposed to weigh the evidence impartially; and it is perhaps well for the memories of Sir Christopher Hatton and others that the Catholic party on the Continent did not esteem Earl Henry sufficiently to publish a reply.

It has been said that Sir Walter Raleigh and other Protestants looked upon Hatton as the Earl's assassin. In proof of this, a letter from Raleigh to Robert Cecil in 1601 may be quoted. Sir Walter, arguing against blood-feuds handed down from father to son, writes :-"For your own father, that was esteemed to be the contriver of Norfolk's ruin,1 yet his (Norfolk's) son 2 followeth your father's son, and loveth him ; Somerset made no revenge on the Duke of Northumberland's heirs; ... and Northumberland that now is, thinks not of Hatton's issue." This is plain speaking, and establishes clearly enough the fact that Raleigh regarded the connection of Hatton with the bloody affair in the Tower as a matter of history. Nor does Cecil, in replying to this letter, attempt to combat the belief. The majority of modern historians, however, prefer to disregard all discrepancies in the evidence, and to hold that, for no apparently adequate reason, the eighth Earl of Northumberland disregarded the teachings of Christianity, and deliberately took his own life.

5

The eighth Earl left behind him ten children-eight sons, and two daughters. The sons we shall meet again in the course of this history of the daughters, the elder, Lucy, was twice married, firstly to Sir John Wotton (whereby hangs a romance presently to be narrated), and secondly to Sir Hugh Owen of Anglesea; while the younger, Eleanor, became the wife of William Herbert, first Lord Powis. The Countess of Northumberland survived her first husband.

1 Burghley had been largely instrumental in bringing the fourth Duke of Norfolk to the scaffold, in 1572.

2 Allusion is made to Thomas, Lord Howard de Walden.

The downfall and death of the Protector Somerset were brought about by Dudley, Duke of Northumberland.

The ninth Earl.

" Murdin, p. 811. • See Genealogy, Table III.

eleven years.1 Having inherited much of the large estates of the Nevills, Lords Latimer, the widowed dame was much sought after by fortune-hunters, and eventually bestowed her hand and fortune upon a kinsman of the deceased Earl, one Francis Fitton of Binfield in Berkshire, who had long officiated as her steward. This alliance was vigorously opposed by the ninth Earl of Northumberland.

The eighth Earl had made his will while in the Tower, several months before his death. He desired to be buried with his ancestors in Beverley Minster, "if it should fortune him to die in the county of York." As we have seen, his death occurred far from his native country, and his body was laid to rest under the flagstones of St. Peter's-ad-Vincula within the shadow of the Tower.

1 She died October 28, 1596.