“As to the news here, most illustrious lady, I know not what to write. That which is written of stupid things, must itself be stupid, and, as Cicero complains of his times, there is little to amuse or that can be embellished. Besides, at present, all places and persons are occupied with rumours of wars and commotions, which, for the most part, are either mere fabrications or founded on no authority, so that anything respecting Continental politics would neither be interesting nor useful to you.
“The general Council of Trent is to sit on the first of May,” continues Jane’s correspondent, “Cardinal Pole, it is asserted, is to be the president. Besides there are the tumults this year in Africa, their preparation for a war against the Turks, and then the great expectation of the march of the Emperor into Austria, of which I shall, God willing, be a companion. Why need I write to you of the siege of Magdeburg, and how the Duke of Mecklenburg has been taken, or of that commotion which so universally, at this moment, afflicts the miserable Saxony? To write of all these things, I have neither leisure, nor would it be safe; on my return, which I hope is not far distant, it shall be a great happiness to relate all these things to you in person.
“Thy kindness to me, oh! most noble Jane Grey, was always most grateful to me when present with you, but it is ten times more so during this long absence. To your noble parents, I wish length of happiness, to you a daily victory in letters and in virtue, and to thy sister Katherine, that she may resemble thee, and to Aylmer, I wish every good that he may wish to Ascham.
“Further, dearest lady, if I were not afraid to load thee with the weight of my light salutations, I would ask thee in my name to salute Elizabeth Astley, who, as well as her brother John, I believe to be of my best friends, and whom I believe to be like that brother in all integrity and sweetness of manners. Salute, I pray thee, my cousin, Mary Laten, and my wife Alice, of whom I think oftener than I can here express. Salute, also, that worthy young man Garret and John Haddon.
“Farewell, most noble lady in Christ.
R. A.”
“Augustæ”
“18th January, 1551”
When we consider that this letter was addressed to a girl who was not yet fifteen years of age, making due allowance for the high-flown style of the times, we can only conclude that there was some politic motive for a mode of address so injudicious in its flattery, so fulsome and so extravagant even for that age of courtly adulation.
Lady Jane Grey spent the better part of the years 1550–1551 and 1552 at Bradgate, improving her mind by hard study, and patiently submitting to the “nips” and petty tyranny of her mother. At one time she seems to have commenced the study of such music as was then in vogue. This, Ascham promptly assured her was a frivolous occupation, unworthy of a godly maiden. In a very curious letter, dated 23rd December 1551, Aylmer writes from London to Bullinger concerning the Lady Jane, begging him to write to her direct and seek to influence her to give up practising music so zealously.