“Because the profit accruing from my Water-commanding Engine may seem uncertain, I humbly offer in lieu thereof and in token of my gratitude, a judgment of ten thousand pounds for the payment of one thousand pounds a year for four years, at the disposal of her Grace, and two hundred pounds per annum at yours; so their Graces be pleased cheerfully to sign the letter, and positively to own them and me to be their perpetual servant, not doubting then to find ways more efficaciously to testify my reality and devotion to them if accepted of, and thus obliged to them and you.
“Worcester.”
Whether the following is the draft of a letter, proposed in the preceding communication, is uncertain; it is however in a contemporary handwriting, and, therefore, may be the very letter he offered to submit for approval.[D] It runs thus:—
“May it please your Majesty,
“Upon my Lord of Worcester’s speaking to my husband for his letter to your Majesty, and laying open his sad condition, there comes into my mind a petition from his Lady to the Speaker ready to adjourn the House in Cromwell’s time, without relief to her, but upon her petition, as here enclosed, Worcester House was granted her. God forbid a greater hardness should possess your Majesty’s heart, our most gracious King, than did those regicides to one they took for their enemy; and I do, therefore, with more than confidence in remembrance of my Lady’s former pressures and miseries make myself a party with my Lord Marquis, in his most humble suit to your Majesty, in my Lord Powis his behalf, that he may not be frustrated of what the last King entitled him, of being created Earl, because it came through my Lord Marquis his hands, but further likewise to bestow a Baron’s patent upon a friend of my Lord Marquis, for both which I become a suitor with his Lordship, and beg pardon if I become more importunate to your Majesty in this case, than for myself in anything, who do already acknowledge most thankfully many great favours done to me,
“Your Majesty’s most humble servant.”
The following letter it would appear was addressed to the Duke of Albemarle:—
“May it please your Grace,
“The objections you were pleased to make against the owning and subscribing the letter to his Majesty were as I humbly conceive your Grace’s resolution not to trouble the King for money business even in your own behalf, much less in another’s; and secondly that as for Creations you had absolutely promised his Majesty you would not importune him again. To the first I answer that this is to save the King’s coffers, since certainly if either honour or conscience should take place his Majesty ought to save me harmless from the six thousand pound confessed and proved to be the Crown’s debt; so happily now upon his head by your Grace’s no less prudent and valorous, than dutiful endeavours, blest by Divine Providence, never intending the ruin of his best deserving subjects, and the only promoting of his rebels, which the child unborn may rue if not timely prevented; and as a wise Privy-Councillor your Grace’s part is to mind his Majesty so of, as not totally to dishearten, I will not say disgust his good subjects well deserving, yet that as far as loyalty and religion will give them leave; and I am sorry his Majesty should bid adieu to works of supererogation and love in his subjects, and most certainly they are not his best counsellors who advise him to it; and your Grace will be most commendable in doing the contrary, and at long running the King will love you best for it, so that this objection of your Grace I humbly conceive to be totally solved.
“As for the second, your Grace’s promise not to speak for any more Creations, be pleased to understand it rightly, and you are no motioner of this; you do but lay before him my reasonable petition therein, such as my Lord Chancellor was pleased to think so fitting as he once undertook it for me, and I am confident will thank your Grace for reviving of it, and in my conscience so will the King too in granting of it; for I cannot have so mean a thought of his Majesty but that against the hair he hath been forced to bestow honour to the highest degree upon five member men, and * * * upon earth, as subscribed to his father of happy memory his death, and that he will think much to countenance him who only assisted his late Majesty to fly from their compulsion of him, to agree to such acts as would have left himself our now gracious King the successor of a title of a King of three kingdoms, but to the substance of no one of them. It was I furnished his Majesty with money to go (to) Theobalds to go to York, when the then Marquis of Hambleton refused to pay three hundred pounds for his Majesty at Theobalds only to deliver him to the Parliament, as he had done the Earl of Strafford, and to * * * the * * * Parliament. It was I carried him money to set up his standard at York, and procured my father to give the then Sir John Byron five thousand pounds to raise the first regiment of horse, and kept a table for above twenty officers at York, which I underhand sent thither to keep them from taking conditions from the Parliament, and so were ready to accept his. It was I victualled the Tower of London, and gave five and twenty hundred pounds to the then Lieutenant, Sir John Byron, my cousin-german by my first wife’s side. It was I raised most of the men at Edge-hill fight, and after I was betrayed at * * * * * when so many gentlemen of quality were taken, and of twenty-five thousand men first and last by me raised, eight thousand men dispersed by the contrivance of such as called themselves the King’s good subjects, and some of them rewarded for it; they were my men weekly paid, without taking a farthing contribution, because the country tottered; who took * * * * * * * * * in the forest of Dean, Goodridge Castle, Monmouth, Chepstow, Carlyon, and Cardiff from the Parliamentary forces; in which, and the garrison of Raglan, I can bring proof of above an hundred and fifty thousand pounds expended; and in ready money first and last to the King’s own purse above as much more; and of above thirty-five thousand pounds received by my father and me comunely armes, in forty, forty-two, and forty-three, I have not now five and twenty hundred, and that clogged with twenty thousand pounds crying debts, that keep me not only from a competent maintenance, but even from sleep. I speak not here of above three hundred thousand pounds which it hath cost the noblemen, knights, and gentlemen, which rode in my Life-Guard * * for * * * their comporting, they making amongst them above threescore thousand pounds yearly, of land of inheritance; and I, upon my interest with seven counties, had begun an engagement of above three hundred thousand pounds yearly land of inheritance against my return with men from beyond the sea; in which endeavours my charges have been vast, besides hazard by sea even of shipwreck, and by land of deadly encounters, I do not trouble your Lordship with, but all this being true to a tittle, as upon my word and honour, dearer to me than my life, I avouch it; I cannot doubt but your Grace will call for a pen to sign the letter, and if you please send this together with it, and rest assured that if the King refuse my request, I will never importune you more, nor ever set my foot into his Majesty’s Court again, unless expressly commanded by him for his service; otherwise I will only heartily pray for him, but never hereafter shall I or any friend of mine engage for him further, than the simple duty of a loyal subject sitting quietly at home, no ways break the peace, or disobeying the wholesome laws of the land, and God send him better and more able subjects to serve his Majesty than myself; willinger I am sure he cannot, and I beseech your Grace to pardon me if passion hath a little transported me beyond good manners, and lay what penance you please upon me, so I tend not to lessen your Grace’s belief that I am