him as hard as I could with my piece of a sword, and wounded him in four several places, and did almost cut off his left hand; his two men this while struck at me, but it pleased God even miraculously to defend me, for when I lifted up my sword to strike at Sir John Ayres, I bore off their blows half a dozen times; his friends now finding him in this danger, took him by the head and shoulders and drew him from betwixt my legs, and carrying him along with them through Whitehall, at the stairs whereof he took boat, Sir Herbert Croft (as he told me afterwards) met him upon the water vomiting all the way, which I believe was caused by the violence of the first thrust I gave him; his servants, brother, and friends, being now retired also, I remained master of the place and his weapons, having first wrested his dagger from him, and afterwards struck his sword out of his hand.

"This being done, I retired to a friend's house in the Strand, where I sent for a surgeon, who, searching my wound on the right side, and finding it not to be mortal, cured me in the space of some ten days, during which time I received many noble visits and messages from some of the best in the kingdom. Being now fully recovered of my hurts, I desired Sir Robert Harley to go to Sir John Ayres, and tell him, that though I thought he had not so much honour left in him, that I could be in any way ambitious to get it, yet that I desired to see him in the field with his sword in his hand; the answer that he sent me was (repeating the charge above mentioned) 'that he would kill me with a musket out of a window.'

"The Lords of the Privy Council, who had at first sent for my sword, that they might see the little fragment of a weapon with which I had so behaved myself, as perchance the like had not been heard in any credible way, did afterwards command both him and me to appear before them; but I, absenting myself on purpose, sent one Humphrey Hill with a challenge to him in an ordinary, which he refusing to receive, Humphrey Hill put it upon the point of his sword, and so let it fall before him and the company then present.

"The Lords of the Privy Council had now taken order to

apprehend Sir John Ayres, when I, finding nothing else to be done, submitted myself likewise to them. Sir John Ayres had now published everywhere that the ground of his jealousie, and consequently of his assaulting me, was drawn from the confession of his wife, the Lady Ayres. She, to vindicate her honour, as well as free me from this accusation, sent a letter to her aunt, the Lady Crook, to this purpose:—that her husband, Sir John Ayres, did lie falsely, but most falsely of all did lie when he said he had it from her confession, for she had never

said any such thing.

*

* *

"This letter the Lady Crook presented to me most opportunely, as I was going to the Counsell table before the Lords, who, having examined Sir John Ayres concerning the cause of his quarrel with me, found him still to persist on his wife's confession of the fact; and now, he being withdrawn, I was sent for, when the Duke of Lennox, afterwards of Richmond, telling me that was the ground of his quarrel, and the only excuse he had for assaulting me in that manner, I desired his Lordship to peruse the letter, which I told him was given me as I came into the room; this letter being publicly read by a clerk of the Counsell, the Duke of Lennox then said, that he thought Sir John Ayres the most miserable man living, for his wife had not only given him the lie, as he found by the letter, but his father had disinherited him for attempting to kill me in that barbarous fashion, which was most true, as I found afterwards; for the rest, that I might content myself with what I had done, it being more almost than could be believed, but that I had so many witnesses thereof; for all which reasons, he commanded me in the name of his majesty, and all their Lordships, not to send any more to Sir John Ayres, nor to receive any message from him, in the way of fighting, which commandment I observed: howbeit, I must not omit to tell, that some years afterwards Sir John Ayres, returning from Ireland by Beaumaris, where I then was, some of my servants and followers broke open the doors of the house where he was, and would, I believe, have cut him into pieces, but that I hearing thereof came suddenly to the house and recalled them,

sending him word also that I scorned to give him the usage he gave me, and that I would set him free of the town, which courtesie of mine (as I was told afterwards) he did thankfully acknowledge."*

*Life of Lord Herbert of Cherbury, in the Autobiography,' p. 79.

219

CHAP. X.

WOLSEY AND WHITEHALL.

Regal Character of Whitehall.-York Place. Personal and moral Character of Wolsey.- Comparison of him with his Master, Henry.His Pomp and Popularity. - Humorous Account of his Flatterers by Sir Thomas More. - Importance of his Hat. Cavendish's Account of his Household State, his goings forth in Public, and his Entertainments of the King.

T

HE whole district containing all that collection of streets and houses, which extends from Scotland Yard to Parliament Street, and from the river side, with its wharfs, to St. James's Park, and which is still known by

the general appellation of Whitehall, was formerly occupied by a sumptuous palace and its appurtenances, the only relics of which, perhaps the noblest specimen, is the beautiful edifice built by Inigo Jones, and retaining its old name of the Banqueting House.

As this palace was the abode of a series of English sovereigns, beginning with Henry the Eighth, who took it from Wolsey, and terminating with James the Second, on whose downfall it was destroyed by fire, we are now in the very thick of the air of royalty; and so being, we mean to lead a princely life with the reader for a couple of chapters, whether he take the word "princely" in a good or ill sense, as first in magnificence and authority, or in wilfulness and profusion. Cavendish, Holinshed, and the poets, will enable us to live with Wolsey, with Henry, and with Elizabeth; Wilson and the poets,

with James the First; Clarendon, Pepys, and others with Charles the First, Cromwell, Charles the Second, and his brother. We shall eat and drink, and swell into most unapostolical pomp, with the great Cardinal; shall huff and fume with Henry, and marry pretty Anne Bullen in a closet (Lingard says in a "garret"); send her to have her head cut off as if nothing had happened; be an everlasting young old gentlewoman with Queen Elizabeth, enamouring people's eyes at seventy; drink and splutter, and be a great baby, with King James; have a taste, and be henpecked, and not very sincere, yet melancholy and much to be pitied, with poor Charles the First; be uneasy, secret, and energetic, and like a crowned Methodist preacher, or an old dreary piece of English oak (choose which you will) with Oliver Cromwell; saunter, squander, and be gay, and periwigged, and laughing, and ungrateful, and liked, and despised, and have twenty mistresses, and look as grim and swarthy, and with a face as full of lines, as if we were full of melancholy and black bile, with Charles the Second; and, finally, have all his melancholy, and none of his wit and mirth, with his poor, dreary, bigoted brother James.

"Now, this is worshipful society."

Whether it be happy or not, or enviable by the least peasant who can pay his way, and sleep heartily, will be left to the judgment of the reader.

The site of Whitehall was originally occupied by a mansion built by Hubert de Burgh, Earl of Kent, and Chief Justice of England in the reign of Henry the Third, one of the ancestors of the present Marquess of Clanricarde. De Burgh bequeathed it to the Brotherhood of the Black Friars, near "Oldborne," in whose church he was buried; the Brotherhood sold it to Walter Gray,