Lady Jane Grey and Her Times

by Ida A. Taylor

“O Duke of Somerset,” he exclaimed from his seat, “you see yourself brought into the utmost danger, and that nothing but death awaits you. I have once before delivered you from a similar hazard of your life; and I will not now desist from serving you, how little soever you may expect it.” Let Somerset appeal to the royal clemency, and Northumberland, forgiving him his offences, would do all in his power to save him.[122]

Northumberland’s tardy magnanimity fails to carry conviction. But, besides his victim’s popularity in the country, it was reported that the “King took it not in good part,” and it was thought well to delay the execution, by which means his supplanter might gain credit for exercising his generosity by an attempt to avert his doom. Christmas was at hand, and it was arranged that the Duke should remain in prison, under sentence of death, whilst the feast was celebrated at Court.

In spite of the assertion that the young King had not been unaffected by a tragedy that should have touched him closely, there is nothing in his own words to indicate any other attitude than that of the indifferent spectator—an attitude recalling unpleasantly the callousness shown by his father as the women he had loved and the statesmen he had trusted and employed were successively sent to the block. Though, in justice to Edward, it should be remembered that he had never loved his uncle, there is something revolting in his casual mention of the measures adopted against him.

“Little has been done since you went,” he wrote to Barnaby Fitzpatrick, the comrade of his childish days, now become his favourite, “but the Duke of Somerset’s arraignment for felonious treason and the muster of the newly erected gendarmery;”[123] and the journal wherein he traces the progress of the trial, varying the narrative by the introduction of other topics, such as the visit of the Queen-Dowager of Scotland and the festivities in her honour, conveys a similar impression of coldness. “And so he was adjudged to be hanged,” he records in conclusion, noting, with no expression of regret, the result of the proceedings.

“It were well that he should die,” Edward had told the Duke’s brother in those earlier childish days when incited by the Admiral to rebel against the strictness of the discipline enforced by the Protector. But, under the mask of indifference, it may be that misgivings awoke and made themselves apparent to those who, watching him closely, feared that ties of blood might vindicate their strength, and that at their bidding, or through compassion, he might interpose to avert the fate of one of the only near relations who remained to him. It appears to have been determined that the King’s mind must be diverted from the subject; and whilst the prisoner was awaiting in the Tower the execution of his sentence, special merry-makings were arranged by the men who had the direction of affairs at Greenwich, where the court was to keep Christmas. Thus it was hoped to “remove the fond talk out of men’s mouths,” and to recreate and refresh the troubled spirits of the young sovereign. A Lord of Misrule was accordingly appointed, who, dubbed the Master of the King’s Pastimes, took order for the general amusement, though conducting himself more discreetly than had been the wont of his predecessors, and the festival was gaily observed. By these means, says Holinshed, the minds and ears of murmurers were well appeased, till it was thought well to proceed to the business of executing judgment upon the Duke.

In whatever light the ghastly contrast between the uncle awaiting a bloody death in the Tower and the noisy merry-making intended to drown the sound of the passing-bell in the nephew’s ears may strike students of a later day, it is likely that there was nothing in it to affect painfully those who joined in the proceedings. Life was little considered. Men were daily accustomed to witness violent reverses of fortune. The Duke had aimed over-high; he was a danger to rivals whose turn it was to rise; he must make way for others. He had moreover been too deeply injured to forgive; and, to make all safe, he must die. The reign of the Seymours was at an end; that of Northumberland was beginning. Two more years and their supplanter, with Suffolk and his other adherents, would in their turn have paid the penalty of a great ambition, and, “with the sons of the Duke of Somerset standing by,” would have followed the Lord Protector to the grave.

There was none to prophesy their fate. Had it been otherwise, it is not probable that a warning would have turned them from their purpose. For they were reckless gamblers, and to foretell ruin to a man who is staking his all upon a throw of the dice is to speak to deaf ears.

So the merry Christmas passed, Jane—third in succession to the throne—occupying a prominent position at Court. And Aylmer, fearful lest the fruits of his care should be squandered, looked on helplessly, and besought Bullinger, on that 23rd of December, to set a limit, for the benefit of a pupil in danger, to the attention lawfully to be bestowed on the world and its vanities; a letter from Haddon, the Duke’s chaplain, following fast and betraying his participation in the anxieties of his colleague by an entreaty that, from afar, the eminent divine would continue to exercise a beneficent influence upon his master’s daughter.

Meantime the day had arrived when it was considered safe to carry matters against the King’s uncle to extremities, and on January 23, six weeks after his trial, the Duke of Somerset was taken to Tower Hill, to suffer death in the presence of a vast crowd there assembled.

Till the last moment the throng had persisted in hoping against hope that the life of the man they loved might even now, at the eleventh hour, be spared; and at one moment it seemed that they were not to be disappointed. The Duke had taken his place upon the scaffold, and had begun his speech, when an interruption occurred, occasioned, as it afterwards proved, by an accidental collision between the mass of spectators and a body of troops who had received orders to be present at the execution, and, finding themselves late, had ridden hard and fast to make up for lost time. This was the simple explanation of the occurrence; but, to the excited mob gathered together, every nerve strained and full of pity and fear and horror, the sound of the thundering hoofs seemed something supernatural and terrible. Was it a sign of divine interposition?