(Continued from page [143].)
5. The following illustrative documents, now in the State Paper Office, London, carry on the story of the Spanish Fury to a somewhat later date.
The spelling of the word Gascon is so important, that we took the opinion of several experts at the State Paper Office upon it. They were all unanimous that the word is written Gascon, and not Gaston as printed in Volume 140 of the Calendar of those Foreign State Papers. That being so and the Christian name being given as George: it is clear that Thomas Heton, in the flurry in which he wrote the Memorial from the Company, wrote George Gascon phonetically for George Gascoigne.
6. The next two documents are the letters which the Soldier-Poet brought to England, when he got out of Antwerp on 12th November 1576, as stated at page [162].
S. P. Foreign. Eliz. Vol. 140.
1,009. Thomas Heton to Sir Francis Walsingham.
From Antwerp, 10 November 1576.
Right Honourable, the 3rd of this month the States' men, Horsemen and Footmen, entered this town with consent: and on the morrow, which was Sunday the 4th of this present, the Spaniards with certain Almains, out of the Castle, entered the town and drave away the States' Power and they fled as they could: the town [being] put to sack, with a pitiful slaughter and a miserable spoil.
Our House [was] entered by Twelve Spaniards, soldiers, who put me and the rest of the Company in great fear. We were put to ransom first at 12,000 crowns; and since it is grown one way and [an]other to 3,000 more: and what the Company have lost, that had their chambers and pack-houses in the town in burghers' houses, at this present, I know not; but they are spoiled of all.
In the name of the Company there is a letter written to the honourable [Privy] Council of our state [See next document] most humbly beseeching that their Honours would be a mean for us to Her Majesty, as to their Honours in this case they shall think good.
If we might have had passport when I required it, first of the States, then of Monsieur [DE] Champagney Governor of this town, and after of the Lords of this town, as both by the Intercourse [of 1507] and Privileges we ought in right to have had; then had we avoided this great peril of life and miserable spoil which we have sustained.