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duced in the House of Lords,' the Commons in a full house of four hundred passed the bill, not above ten or twelve voting in the negative. The royal assent was given on the fifth of March 1549, and on the tenth of the same month the council * resolved to press the King, that justice might be executed upon the criminal. His Majesty, in reply, remarked; ⚫ He had well observed their proceedings, and thanked them for their great care of his safety, and commanded them to proceed in it, without farther molesting him or the Protector:' ending, "I pray you, my Lords, do so." Upon this, the Bishop of Ely had orders to attend the Admiral, to administer spiritual advice, and to prepare him to meet his fate with patience and resignation: and, on the seventeenth of March, the council signed a warrant for his execution, in pursuance of which he was beheaded March 20, 1549.

The Protector upon this occasion incurred very severe censures, for having consented to his death. It was contended that, if the Admiral was guilty, it was only against his brother, whom he would have supplanted; and who, from at least an equal violation of the fraternal duty, had brought him to the scaffold. Rapin remarks, that they who then meditated the ruin of the Protector, feigning to be his friends, spurred him on to be revenged on his brother, and were very ready to serve as his instruments. † Ac

* It is stated in the council-book, that "since the case was so heavy and lamentable to the Protector, though it was also sorrowful to them all, they resolved to proceed in it, so that neither the King nor he himself should be farther troubled with it."

"As many there were," says Fox, "which reported that the Duchess of Somerset had wrought his death; so many more

cordingly, this catastrophe aggravated the hostility of the nobles against him, and it was carried to the highest pitch by his conduct in countenancing the people upon the following just occasion.

After the suppression of the abbeys, vast numbers of monks were dispersed throughout the kingdom, who were constrained to work for their bread, their pensions being ill paid, or insufficient for their subsistence. Hence the supply of labourers was increased, and at the same time the demand was diminished: for so long as the monasteries stood, their lands had been let out at easy rents to farmers, who could therefore afford to employ a large number of people in their cultivation. But after they fell into the hands of the nobility and gentry, their rents being considerably raised, the occupiers were obliged at once to retain fewer labourers, and to lower the rate of wages. Besides, the new proprietors, finding that since the last peace with France the woollen trade flourished, so that sheep were a more profitable article of produce than corn, had caused their grounds to be enclosed. From this source arose several inconveniences. In the first place, the price of corn was enhanced, to the great detriment of the lower classes of the community; and next, the landlords or their tenants had occasion only for few persons to look after their flocks. Thus many were deprived of the means of earning a livelihood, and the profit of the lands, which had previously been shared by numbers, was now almost

there were who, misdoubting the long standing of the Lord Protector in his state and dignity, thought and affirmed no less, but that the fall of the one brother would be the ruin of the other; the experiment whereof, as it hath often been proved, so in these also eftsoons it ensued."

wholly engrossed by their owners. This naturally excited murmurs among the common people, who saw themselves on the point of being reduced to extreme misery; and several little books were published, setting forth the mischief which must result from such proceedings. The Protector openly espoused their cause; and appointed commissioners to examine, whether those who held the abbey-lands kept hospitality, and performed all the conditions upon which those lands had been transferred to them: but he met with so many obstacles in the execution of his order, that it produced no effect.

By such measures he continued to inflame the hatred of the higher orders, who found their account in countenancing these abuses: for, in the preceding session of parliament, the Lords had passed a bill, giving every one leave to enclose his grounds if he pleased: and, though it was thrown out by the Commons, the great proprietors ventured to act upon it. This occasioned universal discontent. The people, beginning to apprehend that a regular project had been formed to reduce them to a state of slavery, rose about the same time in Kent, Sussex, Hampshire, Wilts, Gloucestershire, Suffolk, Warwickshire, Essex, Herts, Leicestershire, Rutlandshire, and Worcestershire. The Protector, perceiving the flames kindling all over the kingdom, announced that he was ready to redress the public grievances:' and, agreeably to his promise, he laid the affair before the council, hoping that some expedient might be found to satisfy the general complaints. Encountering strong opposition, however, from the board, he thought it absolutely necessary to have recourse to his sole authority; and therefore, contrary to the opinion of

his brother-regents, he issued a proclamation against all new enclosures, granted a general pardon to the people for their late excesses, and even appointed commissioners with unlimited power to hear and determine causes about enclosures, highways, and cottages. The nobility and gentry now openly asserting, that it was an invasion of their property to subject them to these arbitrary functionaries, and by their pertinacious resistance to some extent obstructing the Protector in his humane efforts, the people rose again in several places, particularly in Oxfordshire, Devonshire, Norfolk, and Yorkshire. The Oxfordshire insurgents were immediately dispersed by Lord Grey: but the insurrection in Devonshire was far more dangerous. That county abounding with people, who had only complied outwardly with the alterations made in religion, the priests and monks successfully fomented their discontents, and in a short time the rebels were ten thousand strong. They were quelled however at last, without much difficulty, by a small force under Lord Russel; and Somerset proclaimed an amnesty of all that had been done before the twenty-first of August, with the exception of only a few prisoners. The council themselves were now highly mortified to perceive, that they were consulted only as mere matter of form, and that their opinions had no weight in the ultimate determination of affairs. But by this prudent exertion of an illegal prerogative, it is certain that the Protector put an end to a rebellion, which had almost threatened the nation with a civil war.*

* The still more formidable insurrection in Norfolk was quelled by the address of the Earl of Warwick.

The Scottish war, as it had been anticipated, had been productive of another with Henry II. of France, who ascended the throne of that kingdom upon the death of Francis I. in 1547. A rupture with the Emperor Charles V. was likewise to be apprehended, on account of the assistance given by the English ministry to his discontented subjects, the German Protestants. This situation of foreign affairs embarrassed the limited capacity of Somerset. Dreading therefore the machinations of a powerful domestic faction, with whom the Romish party were secretly allied, he resolved to listen to the overtures of France, which offered peace and it's assistance to the Protestants of Germany, as the price for the restitution of Boulogne.

While this treaty was privately negociating, the Earl of Warwick, and the Earl of Southampton (the disgraced Chancellor) who had recovered his seat in the privy-council, associating themselves with eighteen of the other lords, agreed to withdraw from court, and openly to oppose the Protector.

Among the numerous causes of general jealousy and hatred of the Duke, none had a more powerful effect upon the public at large, than the superb palace* which he was building in the Strand; and, as this impolitic undertaking greatly lessened his popularity, we shall borrow from Sir John Hayward's Life of Edward VI.' his curious relation of it.

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Many well-disposed minds conceived a hard opinion of him, for that a church by Strand-Bridge and two bishops' houses were pulled down, to make a seat for his new building; in digging the founda

* Somerset-House.

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