reconciled, as some have put forth."
This was the last time I did see these afflicted daughters until longafter their father's death, who was beheaded in the chapel of theTower shortly afterward. When the blow fell which, striking at him,struck a no less fatal blow to the peace and well-doing of hischildren, they all left the Charter House, and removed for a time intothe country, to the houses of divers relatives, in such wise as beforehis death the duke had desired. A letter which I received from LadySurrey a few weeks after she left London doth best serve to show themanner of this disposal, and the temper of the writer's mind at thatmelancholy time.
"My OWN DEAR CONSTANCE,--It may like you to hear that your afflicted friend is improved in bodily health, and somewhat recovered from the great suffering of mind which the duke, their good father's death, has caused to all his poor children--mostly to Megg and Phil and me; for their brothers and my sister are too young greatly to grieve. My Lord Arundel is sorely afflicted, I hear, and hath writ a very lamentable letter to our good Lady Sussex concerning this sad mishap. My Lady Berkeley and my Lady Westmoreland are almost distracted with grief for the death of a brother they did singularly love. That poor lady (of Westmoreland) is much to be pitied, for that she is parted from her husband, maybe for ever, and has lost two fair daughters in one year.
"My lord hath shown much affection for his father, and natural sorrow in this sad loss; and when his last letters written a short time before he suffered, and addressed "To my loving children," specially the one to Philip and Nan, reached his hands, he wept so long and bitterly that it seemed as if his tears should never cease. My lord is forthwith to make his chief abode at Cambridge for a year or two; and Meg and I, with Lady Sussex, and I do hope Bess also--albeit his grace doth appear in his letter to be otherwise minded. But methinks he apprehended to lay too heavy a charge on her, who is indeed a good lady to us all in this our unhappy condition, and was loth Megg should be out of my company.
"The parting with my lord is a sore trial, and what I had not looked to; but God's will be done; and if it be for the advantage of his soul, as well as the advancement of his learning, he should reside at the university, it should ill befit me to repine. And now methinks I will transcribe, if my tears do not hinder me, his grace's letters, which will inform thee of his last wishes better than I could explain them; for I would have thee know how tender and forecasting was his love for us, and the good counsel he hath left unto his son, who, I pray to God, may always follow it. And I would have thee likewise note one point of his advice, which indeed I should have been better contented he had not touched upon, forasmuch as his having done so must needs hinder that which thy fond love for my poor self, and resolved adherence to what he calls 'blind papistry,' doth so greatly prompt thee to desire; for if on his blessing he doth charge us to beware of it, and then I should move my lord to so much neglect of his last wishes as at any time to be reconciled, bethink thee with what an ill grace I should urge on him, in other respects, obedience to his commands, which indeed are such as do commend themselves to any Christian soul as most wise and profitable. And now, breaking off mine own discourse to transcribe his words--a far more noble and worthy employment of my pen--and praying God to bless thee, I remain thy tender and loving friend, "ANN SURREY."
"The Duke of Norfolk's letters to his children:
"DEAR CHILDREN,--This is the last letter that ever I think to write to you; and therefore, if you loved me, or that you will seem grateful to me for the special love that I have ever borne unto you, then remember and follow these my last lessons. Oh, Philip, serve and fear God, above all things. I find the fault in myself, that I have (God forgive me!) been too negligent in this point. Love and make much of your wife; for therein, considering the great adversity you are now in, by reason of my fall, is your greatest present comfort and relief, beside your happiness in having a wife which is endued with so great towardness in virtue and good qualities, and in person comparable with the best sort. Follow these two lessons, and God will bless you; and without these, as you may see by divers examples out of the Scripture, and also by ordinary worldly proof, where God is not feared, all goeth to wreck; and where love is not between the husband and wife, there God doth not prosper. My third lesson is, that you show yourself loving and natural to your brothers and sister and sister-in-law. Though you be very young in years, yet you must strive with consideration to become a man; for it is your own presence and good government of yourself that must get friends; and if you take that course, then have I been so careful a father unto you, as I have taken such order as you, by God's grace, shall be well able, beside your wife's lands, to maintain yourself like a gentleman. Marry! the world is greedy and covetous; and if the show of the well government of yourself do not fear and restrain their greedy appetite, it is like that, by undirect means, they will either put you from that which law layeth upon you, or else drive you to much trouble in trying and holding your right. When my grandfather died, I was not much above a year elder than you are now; and yet, I thank God, I took such order with myself, as you shall reap the commodity of my so long passed travel, if you do now imitate the like. Help to strengthen your young and raw years with good counsel. I send you herewith a brief schedule, whom I wish you to make account of as friends, and whom as servants; and I charge you, as a father may do, to follow my direction therein; my experience can better tell what is fit for you than your young years can judge of. I would wish you for the present to make your chief abode at Cambridge, which is the place fittest for you to promote your learning in; and beside, it is not very far hence, whereby you may, within a day's warning, be here to follow your own causes, as occasion serveth. If, after a year or two, you spend some time in a house of the law, there is nothing that will prove more to your commodity, considering how for the time you shall have continual business about your own law affairs; and thereby also, if you spend your time well, you shall be ever after better able to judge in your own causes. I too late repent that I followed not this course that now I wish to you; for if I had, then my case perchance had not been in so ill state as now it is.
"When God shall send you to those years as that it shall be fit for you to keep house with your wife (which I had rather were sooner, than that you should fall into ill company), then I would wish you to withdraw yourself into some private dwelling of your own. And if your hap may be so good as you may so live without being called to higher degree, oh, Philip, Philip, then shall you enjoy that blessed life which your woful father would fain have done, and never could be so happy. Beware of high degree. To a vain-glorious, proud stomach it seemeth at the first sweet. Look into all chronicles, and you shall find that in the end it brings heaps of cares, toils in the state, and most commonly in the end utter overthrow. Look into the whole state of the nobility in times past, and into their state now, and then judge whether my lessons be true or no. Assure yourself, as you may see by the book of my accounts, and you shall find that my living did hardly maintain my expenses; for all the help that I had by Tom's lands, and somewhat by your wife's and sister's-in-law, I was ever a beggar. You may, by the grace of God, be a great deal richer and quieter in your low degree, wherein I once again wish you to continue. They may, that shall wish you the contrary, have a good meaning; but believe your father, who of love wishes you best, and with the mind that he is at this present fully armed to God, who sees both states, both high and low, as it were even before his eyes. Beware of the court, except it be to do your prince service, and that, as near as you can, in the lowest degree, for that place hath no certainty; either a man, by following thereof, hath too much of worldly pomp, which, in the end, throws him down headlong, or else he liveth there unsatisfied; either that he cannot attain for himself that he would, or else that he cannot do for his friends as his heart desireth. Remember these notes, and follow them; and then you, by God's help, shall reap the commodity
of them in your old years.
"If your brothers may be suffered to remain in your company, I would be most glad thereof, because continuing together should still increase love between you. But the world is so catching of everything that falls, that Tom being, as I believe, after my death, the queen's majesty's ward, shall be begged by one or another. But yet you are sure to have your brother William left still with you, because, poor boy, he hath nothing to feed cormorants withal; to whom you will as well be a father as a brother; for upon my blessing I commit him to your charge to provide for, if that which I have assured him by law shall not be so sufficient as I mean it. If law may take place, your sister-in-law will be surely enough conveyed to his behoof, and then I should wish her to be brought up with some friend of mine; as for the present I allow best
Constance Sherwood: An Autobiography of the Sixteenth Century Page 34
