domest Archiep Cant THE TRIUMPHS OF GODS REVENGE AGAINST THE CRYING AND Execrable sinne of Murther Expressed In thirty severall Tragicall Histories digested into six Bookes which containe great variety of memorable Actidents Historicall Morall and Divine Booke VI. Written by IOHN REYNOLDS VERTIAS FILIA TEMPORIS LONDON ¶ Printed by Iohn Haviland for WILLIAM LEE and are to be sold at his shop in Fleetstreet at the signe of the Turks Head neere the Mitre Taverne 1634. TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE Sr IAMES STANLEY KNIGHT OF the Bath Lord STRANGE Sonne and Heire apparent to WILLIAM Earle of Derby one of the most ancient Knights of the Illustrious Order of the Garter MY LORD THe first time that I had the honour to see and know your Lo. was in France when you then began your travels accompanied with your Noble and Generous younger brother Sir Robert Stanley likewise Knight of the Bath who now lives with God And if my fancie deceive not my Iudgement it is equally worthy both of my thoughts and of your Lordships memory to see how propitious God hath since proved to your content and remaines to your felicity in so highly recompensing this your losse of a Noble Brother with the rich gift of a Vertuous Wife your Right Illustrious Lady who is descended from no meaner house than the famous Dukes of Tremouille by her Father and the Victorious Princes of Orenge by her Mother and who being transplanted from France and in the Sacred Bonds of Mariage here matched and incorporated to your Lordship hath by the Mercy and Providence of God in a few yoares brought you many sweet Olive Plants and Branches to perpetuate your ancient Name and most Honourable Family of the Stanleyes And what are all these benefits of Nature and blessings of Grace which God hath so opportunely sent and graciously given you in and by them but such and so sublime and transcendent that they are strong proofes of his Mercy and Goodnesse towards you and I doubt not but in a pious resolution your Lordship reciprocally makes them the cause of your eternall gratitude and thankfulnesse to his sacred Majesty for the same And indeed who can possibly have or conceive a different thought that observes how your Lordship conducts all your actions by Reason and not by Passion That as you esteeme Vertue to be the chiefest earthly Honour so you likewise value Piety and Godlinesse to bee the best and most Soveraigne Vertues That you are confident that in Hearts and Soules which are well and fairly endowed Honour and Honesty should still be Twins or inseparable Companions and Individuals because the former without the latter is but as fire of straw to the Sunne-shine and to shut up this point that your Honour gives the chiefest functions and faculties of your Soule to God and the second to the prosperity and service of your Prince and Countrey that being the true markes of a Religious Christian and this of an excellent Subject and Honourable Patriot And this my good Lord was the Originall cause and these are the prevailing Motives and Reasons why I trench so farre upon your Lordships Greatnesse and Goodnesse in proffering up this my Sixth and last Booke of Gods Revenge against Murther to your Noble Protection and Patronage not that your Lordship is the last in my Affection and Zeale much lesse in my Respects and Observance But that I could give no satisfaction to my selfe before I had prefixed your Illustrious Name to this my unpolished Worke and before I had given a publike testimonie to the whole world in generall and more especially to our little world England in particular what place and power your Honourable Birth and Vertues have deservedly taken up in my heart and worthily purchased in my most reserved and entire affection The Histories which this Booke relates are memorable and mournfull and to give your Honour my opinion of them they are as lamentable for the bloudy facts as memorable for the sharp yet just punishments inflicted for the same wherein Gods sacred â—…ustice and Revenge with equall Truth and Glory triumphed ore their wretched Perpetrators I have cast them in a low Region of language and therefore if they come short of your Lordships accurate Iudgement my Presumption in this my Dedication to you hath no other hope of excuse or pardon then to flie to your Lordships innate Goodnesse and to appeale to your knowne and approved Generosity and Candor as making it your Honourable Ambition to cherish Vertue in all men and to defend it against unjust scandall and malitious detraction Proceed my Lord as you have fairly and fortunately beganne in the happy excercise and progresse of Piety Vertue and Honour and as the hopes are now ours so may the happy fruits and effects thereof infallibly still prove your Lordships hereafter untill it have perfected and compleated you to be a most Illustrious Patterne of Goodnesse in this world and a glorious Saint in that to come the which none shall pray to God for with more true Zeale nor desire with more unfaigned Affection then Your Honours humblest devoted Servant IOHN REYNOLDS The Grounds and Contents of these Histories History XXVI Imperia for the love she beares to young Morosini seduceth and causeth him with his two Consorts Astonicus and Donato to stifle to death her old Husband Palmerius in his bed Morosini misfortunately letting fall his gloves in Palmerius his chamber that night which he did it They are found by Richardo the Nephew of Palmerius who knowes them to be Morosinies and doth thereupon accuse him and his Aunt Imperia for the Murther of his Vnkle So they together with their accessaries Astonicus and Donato are all foure of them apprehended and hanged for the same History XXVII Father Iustinian a Priest and Adrian an Inne-keeper poyson De Laurier who was lodged in his house and then bury him in his Orchard where a moneth after a Wolse digges him up and devoures a great part of his body which father Iustinian and Adrian understanding they flie upon the same but are afterwards both of them apprehended and hanged for it History XXVIII Hippolito murthereth Garcia in the street by night for the which he is hanged Dominica and her Chamber-maid Denisa poysoneth her husband Roderigo Denisa afterwards strangleth her owne new borne Babe and throwes it into a Pond for the which she is hanged On the ladder she confessed that she was accessary with her Lady Dominica in the poysoning of her Husband Roderigo for the which Dominica is apprehended and likewise hanged History XXIX Sanctifiore upon promise of mariage gets Ursina with childe and then afterwards very ingratefully and treacherously rejecteth her and marries Bertranna Ursina being sensible of this her disgrace disguiseth herselfe in a Friers habit and with a case of Pistols kils Sanctifiore as he is walking in the fields for the which shee is hanged History XXX De Mora treacherously kils Palura in a Duell with two Pistols His Lady
THE TRIVMPHES OF GODS REVENGE Agaynst The Cryinge Execrable Sinne of Willfull premeditated Murther Expressed In Thirtye Severall Tragicall Historyes Digested into Sixe Bookes w ch contayne great variety of Mournefull Memorable Accydents Amorous Morall Divine The whole Worke nowe Compleatlye finished Written By Iohn Reynolds LONDON Printed for W. Lee and are to be sould at the Turks head in Fleetstreet ouer against Fetter Lane THE TRIUMPHS OF GODS REVENGE AGAINST THE CRYING AND EXECRABLE SINNE OF Willfull and Premeditated Murther VVith his Miraculous Discoveries and severe Punishments thereof In Thirtie severall Tragicall Histories Digested into Sixe Bookes committed in divers Countries beyond the Seas never published or Imprinted in any other Language Histories which containe great varietie of mournfull and memorable Accidents Historicall Morall and Divine very necessary to restraine and deterre us from this bloodie Sinne which in these our dayes makes so ample and large a Progression With a Table of all the severall Letters and Challenges contained in the whole sixe Bookes Written by IOHN REYNOLDS PSALME 9. 16. The Lord is knowen in executing Iudgement and the wicked is snared in the worke of his owne hand PROVERBS 14. 27. The feare of the Lord is a well-spring of Life to avoyd the snares of death LONDON Printed for WILLIAM LEE and are to bee sold at his shop in Fleetstreet at the signe of the Turkes Head over against Fetter Lane 1635. TO MY SACRED SOVERAIGNE CHARLES KING OF GREAT BRITAINE FRANCE and IRELAND Defender of the Faith c. SIR AS Rivers though in their passing they fall into many neighbour Currents yet finally empty themselves into the Sea so let these my poore Labours though formerly Dedicated to divers Illustrious Peeres of this your Realme bee suffered at last to terminate in the Ocean of your Princely Greatnesse and Goodnesse whereinto all vertuous endeavours as so many lines in their Centre desire to be united What private respests might challenge of me towards their Honors the same towards your Majesty will claime the publicke Bond of Common Allegiance whereby I am more eminently and more universally obliged I am not so overâ—… weening of my weake Endeavours as to thinke them worthy of your Majesties view much lesse able to adde any thing to your Royall Uertues Rivers adde nothing to the Maine yet thither they naturally send the Tribute of their Streames and if my Loyaltie reach me to doe the like it will not I hope be conceived as done out of an opinion of Merit but onely out of a desire to discharge the Duty of a Subject to your Majestie And I am the rather imboldned to this Confidence because I have formerly adventured the like when to your Princely View being then the Second Hope of this Kingdome I about eleven yeares since presented a Translation of a Worke of Monsieur de Refuges intituled A Treatise of the Court the Gratious and Undeserved Acceptance whereof if it hath inspired me with farther Courage to present You now advanced to a greater State with a greater Increase of mine owne Labour your Majestie will not I hope condemne me of groundlesse Presumption The former three Bookes had the Honour and Happinesse to bee perused by the Iudicious Eye of King IAMES your Renowned Father of happy Memory In whose incomparable Iudgement they failed not of Approbation though Dedicated to Inferiour Names the more am I now incouraged to Inscribe and Intitle the whole Sixe to your Sacred Majesty as being no lesse Heire of His Uertues then of His Crowne and Dignitie And one thing more arising from the Consideration of the Subject it selfe made me thinke it a Present not altogether unworthy of your Regall Estate for the Contents of it being the Execution of Iustice upon the unnaturall Sinne of Murther where can it bee more fitly addressed then to the Great Patron of Iustice among us God's immediate Vicegerent by whose Sword as the Minister of Heaven such odious Crimes are to bee chastised and Innocent Bloud justly expiated with Guilty And it may more fitly sute with your Majesty who as you excell in the carefull Administration of Iustice upon all Offenders so especially upon those most hainous of all others the Violaters of Gods sacred Image in the perpetration of wilfull Murther towards whom Clemencie even changeth her nature and becomes Cruelty to the Weal-publicke Never had any Land lesse cause to complaine of too much Indulgencie this way then ours as may well appeare both by the rarenesse of such Occurrences in your Kingdome and the severe vindication of them whensoever they happen or by whom or howsoever performed These Histories therefore which may serve as a Looking-glasse to all Nations shall to these of Yours be a speciall Ornament and Mirrour of their felicity and set forth and publish Your Praise in the peaceable and quiet Government of your People whose Climate seldome or never affords such Tragedies nor will doe whiles Your Christian resolution shall continue to prevent them in the Spring and to punish the lighter degrees of Bloudinesse with due retaliation The great Author of Iustice who is Goodnesse and Iustice it selfe long preserve your Majesty to Vs and the Happinesse Wee enjoy in your Sacred Person so neere resembling Him whose Authority and Image You beare So prayeth Your Majesties most humbly devoted in all Dutifull Allegiance IOHN REYNOLDS THE AVTHOR HIS PREFACE TO THE READER CHRISTIAN Reader we cannot sufficiently bewaile the Iniquity of these last and worst dayes of the world in which the crying and scarlet sinne of Murther makes so ample and so bloody a progression for we can now searce turne our eare or eye any where but wee shall be enforced either to heare with pitty the mournefull effects or to see with griefe the lamentable Tragedies thereof as if we now so much degenerated from our selves or our hearts from our soules to thinke that Christ were no longer our Shepheard or we the sheepe of his Pasture or as if we were become such wretched and execrable Atheists to beleeve There were no Heaven to reward the Righteous or Hell to punish the ungodly But if we will divert our hearts from Earth to Heaven and raise and erect our soules from Satan to God we shall then not onely see what engendereth this Diabolicall passion in us but also find the meanes to detest and roote it out from amongst us To which end it is requisite wee first consider that our enemies who oppose our tranquillity in this life and our felicity in that to come are neither so few in number nor so weake in power that we should thinke our selves able to vanquish ere we fight with them for wee have to encounter with the bewitching World the alluring Flesh and the inticing Devill not with three simple Souldiers or poore Pigmies but with three valiant and puissant Chief-taines subtill to incampe dangerous to assaile and powerfull to fight The World that it may bewitch us to its
knees beseech them to pray unto the Lord to forgive him Wee have seene Alibius Murther his wife Merilla wee have seene his apprehension imprisonment triall conviction and condemnation for this his execrable and bloudy fact wherein wee may observe how the justice of God still triumpheth o're the temptation and malice of the Devill and how Murther though never so secretly acted and concealed will at last be detected and punished What resteth there now but that after wee have hereby made good use of this example wee see Alibius fetched from his prison and conveyed to the place of execution whereat as wee have heard hee formerly stumbled in jest but must now in earnest where although it were timely in the morn as having the favour to dye alone and at least three houres before the other condemned malefactors an infinite number of the Citizens of Brescia of all rankes and of both sexes assembled to see Alibius take his last farewell of this World At his ascending up the ladder his faire gray beard and comely presence drew pitty from the hearts and teares from the eyes of the greatest part of the spectators to see that the Devill had so strongly inchanted and seduced him to lay violent hands on his wife and to see so grave and so proper an aged man thus misfortunately and untimely cast away His speech at his end was briefe and short onely hee freely confest his crime and with infinite sighes and teares besought the world to pray for his soule hee lamented the Vanity of his youth and the dissolutenesse of his age told them that his neglect of prayer to God and his too much confidence in the devill had brought him to this shamefull end and therefore besought them againe and againe to beware by his example and so having solemnely freed his second wife Philatea from being any way acquainted or accessary with the murther of his first wife Merilla he recommending his soule into the hands of his Redeemer dyed as penitently as hee had lived dissolutely and prophanely And thus was the life and death of Alibius the which I was the more willingly induced to publish partly because I was an eye-witnesse both of his arraignement and death as I returned from my travells but more especially in hope that his example and Historie may prove to bee as great a consolation to the Godly as a terrour to the unrighteous To God bee all Glory and prayse FINIS THE TRIUMPHS OF GODS REVENGE AGAINST THE CRYING AND Execrable Sinne of Murder Expressed In thirty seuerall Tragicall Histories digested into six Books which containe great varietie of mournfull and memorable Accidents Amourous Morall and Divine Booke II. Written by IOHN REYNOLDS VERITAS TEMPORE PATET OCCVLTA RS LONDON Printed by Aug. Mathewes for WILLIAM LEE and are to be sold at his shop in Fleetstreet at the signe of the Turks Head neere the Mitre Taverne 1634. TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE AND TRVLIE NOBLE RICHARD Lord Buckhurst Earle of Dorset and Lord Lievtennant of his Majesties Countie of Sussex RIGHT HONOVRABLE OVt of a resolution whether more bold or zealous I know not I have adventured this second Booke of my Tragicall Histories to the World under your Honours Patronage and protection Neither neede I goe farre to yeeld either your Honour or the World a reason of this my Presumption and Ambition sith your Uertues innobling your Bloud as much as your Nobility illustrates your Vertues was the first motive which drew me hereunto for whiles many others indeavour to bee great your Honour resembling your selfe not onely indeavours but strives to bee good as well knowing that Goodnesse is the glory and essence yea the life and as I may say the soule of Greatnesse and that betwixt Greatnesse and Goodnesse there is this difference and disparitie that makes us famous this immortall that beloved of men this of God that accompanyeth us only to our Graves and this to Heaven My second prevayling Motive in this my Dedication proceeded from the respect of my particular duety as my first was solely derived from the consideration of your owne generall and generous Uertues for having the honour to retaine to your Noble Brother Sir Edward Sackvile Knight to whom for many singular respects and immerited favours whiles I am my selfe Iowe not onely my service but my selfe I therein hold me obliged and bound to proffer and impart this part of my Labours to your Honour as the first publike testimony of my zeale and service eternally devoted and consecrated to the Illustrious Name and Family of the Sackeviles whereof Gods Divine providence hath made your Honour chiefe Heire and Pillar The drift and scope of these Histories are to informe the World how Gods Revenge still fights and triumphs against the crying and execrable sinne of wilfull and premeditated Murther which in these our impure and profane times is so fatally and frequently coincident to unregenerate Christians which Scarlet and bloody Crime is infallibly met with and rewarded by Gods sharpe and severe punishments having purposely published and divulged them to my deare Countrey of England that they may serve though not by the way of comparison yet of application as the sight of Iulius Caesars bloudy Robe shewed by Marcus Antonius to the Romanes in Campo Martio when hee there pronounced his funerall Oration thereby to make his Murther and Murtherers in the greater horrour and execration with the people The Histories of themselves are as different as their effects and accidents their Scenes being wilfully and sinfully laid in diuers parts of Christendome beyond the seas and the Tragedies vnfortunately perpetrated and personated by those who more adhering to impiety then Grace and to Satan then God made shipwracke if not of their soules with their bodies I am sure of their liues with their fortunes and of their fortunes with their lives They themselves or rather their sinnes first brought the Materials I onely the collection illustration and pollishing of these their deplorable Histories which are penned in so low a sphaere of speech and so inelegant a phrase as they can no way merit the Honour of your perusall much lesse of your iudgement and least of all of your Noble protection and Patronage Howsoever my hopes led and marshalled by the premises doe as it were flatter mee that your perfections will winke at my imperfections and your curiosity at my ignorance and presumption in daigning permit this my rude Pamphlet to salute and pilgrimage the World under the authenticall passe-port of your Honours favour who of her selfe is composed of so poore metall or rather drosse as without the pure gold of your Honourable Name it would runne a hazard not to passe currant with the curious wits and censures of this our too curious and too censorious age whereof could I rest assured I should then not onely rejoyce but triumph in this my happinesse as so richly exceeding the proportion of my poore Labours and merits that I could not aspire
many teares and farre fetched sighes he lastly bids the world farewell when enviting the Executioner to doe his Office he is turned over And such was the vitious life and deserved death of this Execrable Sonne and bloody Villaine Maurice wherein I must confesse that although his end were shamefull and sharpe yet it was by farre too too milde for the foulenesse of his crime in so cruelly murthering his deere Mother Christina whom the Lawes both of Nature and Grace commanded him to preserve and cherish Yea let all Sonnes and Daughters of all ages and ranckes whatsoever looke on this bloody and disasterous example of his with feare and feare to commit the like by the sight of his punishment It is a History worthy both of our meditation and detestation whether we cast our eyes on his drunkennesse or fix our thoughts and hearts on his murther Those who love and feare God are happy in their lives and fortunate in their deaths but those who will neither feare nor love him very seldome proove fortunate in the one never happy in the other and to the rest of our sins if wee once consent and give way to adde that scarlet and crying one of Murther that blood which we untimely send to Earth will in Gods due time draw downe vengeance on our Heads from Heaven Charity is the marke of a Christian and the shedding of Innocent blood either that of an Infidell an Atheist or a Devill O therefore let us affect and strive to hate it in others and so wee shall the better know how to detest and abhorre it in our selves which that we may all know to our comforts and remember to our consolaâ—…itions direct us O Lord our God and so we shall bee directed FINIS THE TRIVMPHS OF GODS REVENGE AGAINST THE CRYING AND Execrable Sinne of Murther Expressed In thirty severall Tragicall Histories digested into six Bookes which containe great variety of mournfull and memorable Accidents Amorous Morall and Divine Booke IV. Written by IOHN REYNOLDS LONDON ¶ Printed by Iohn Haviland for VVILLIAM LEE and are to be sold at his shop in Fleetstreet at the signe of the Turks-Head neere the Mitre Taverne 1634. TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE PHILIP EARLE OF PEMBROKE and Montgomery Lo. Chamberlaine to the King one of the Lords of his Majesties most Honourable Privie Counsell and Knight of the most Noble Order of the Garter RIGHT HONOURABLE HAving formerly dedicated the third Book of these my Tragicall Histories of Gods Revenge against Murder to your Incomparable Lord and Brother William Earle of Pembroke who now lives with God I therefore held my selfe bound by the double obligation of my duty and your own generous merits likewise to present this Fourth Booke to your Protection and Patronage because as England so Europe perfectly knowes that you are as true an heire to his Vertues as to his Fortunes and to his Goodnesse as to his Greatnesse and that therfore it may properly be said he is not dead because they as well as himselfe do still survive and live in you with equall lustre and glory as having made either a happie Metamorphosis or a blessed Transmigration into your Noble breast and resolutions and therefore as it was my sincere respects and zeale to his Honour that then drew me to that ambition so it is entirely the same which hath now both invited and induced me to this prâ—…sumption to your Lordship having no other ends or object in this my Dedication but that this booke of mine having the honour to be countenanced by so great a personage and the felicity to be protected by so honourable a Mecaenas may therefore encounter the more safely with the various humors it shall meet with and abide more securely the different censures of this our too fastidious age How these Histories or the memorable accidents which they containe and relate will relish with your Lordships palate or judgement I know not Only because you are a Noble Son of Gods Church and an Excellent Servant to your Prince and Countrey I therfore rather hope than presume that your Honor will at least be pleased to see if not delight to know and consider how the Triumphs of Gods Revenge and punishments doth herein secretly and providently meet with this crying and scarlet sinne of premeditated Murther and with the bloudy and inhumane Perpetrators thereof who hereby as so many mercilesse Butchers and prodigious Monsters of mankind doe justly make themselves odious to Men and execrable to God and his Angels God hath deservedly honoured your Lordship with the favour of two great Earthly Kings your Soveraignes as first of our royallKing Iames the father and now of our present most Renowned King Charles his Son and yet this externall Honour and favour of theirâ—… is no way so glorious to you as that maugre the reigning vices of the world you serve the true God of heaven in the purity of your heart and feare and adore him in the integrity of your Soule And to represent you with naked Truth and not with Eloquence or Adulation This Heavenly Piety of yours I beleeve is the prime reason and true Essentiall cause of all this your earthly Honour and sublunary Greatnesse and that this is it likewise which doth so rejoyce your heart and inrich and replenish your House with so numerous and Noble an Issue of hopefull and flourishing Children who as so many Olive branches of Vertue and Syents and Plants of Honour doe both inviron your Bed and surround your Table and who promise no lesse than futurely to magnifie the bloud and to perpetuate and immortalize the Illustrious Name and Family of the Herberts to all Posterity Goe on resolutely and constantly Noble Lord in your religious Piety to God and in your Candide and unstained Fidelity to your Prince and Countrey that your life may triumph o're your death and your Vertues contend to out-shine your Fortunes and that hereafter God of his best favour and mercy may make you as blessed and as glorious a Saint in Heaven as now you are a great Peere and Noble Pillar here on Earth which none shall pray for with more true zeale nor desire or wish with more reall and unfained affection than Your Honours devoted and Most humble Servant Iohn Reynolds The Grounds and Contents of these Histories History XVI Idiaques causeth his sonne Don Ivan to marrie Marsillia and then commits Adultery and Incest with her She makes her Father in Law Idiaques to poyson his old wife Honoria and likewise makes her owne brother De Perez to kill her Chamber-maid Mathurina Don Ivan afterwards kils De Perez in a Duell Marsillia hath her braiâ—… dasht out by a horse and her body is afterwards condemned to be burnt Idiaques is beheaded his body consumed to ashes and throwne into the ayre History XVII Harcourt steales away his brother Vimoryes wife Masserina and keepes her in Adulterie She hireth Tivoly an Italian Mountebanke to poyson La Precoverte who was Harcourts wife
Thomaso the Goldsmith after this infamous and scandalous death of his Father hee could no longer content himselfe to live in Rome but returned to Savona to his Grandfather Moron who received him with many demonstrations of Ioy and affection and after his death made him sole heire to all his wealth and Estate To God be all the Glory FINIS Decemb. XII 1633. Recensui hunc librum cui titulus The fourth Booke of Gods Revenge against the crying and execrable sinne of wilfull and premeditated Murther unâ cum Epistola Dedicatoriâ ad Honoratissimum Dominum Philip Com. Pemb. Montgom qui quidem liber continet paginas 93. in quibus nihil reperio sanae doctrinae aut bonis moribus contrarium quo minus cum utilitate publicâ imprimatur ita tamen ut si non intrá decem menses typis mandetur haec licentia fit omnino irrita Guilielmus Haywood Archiep. Cant. Capellanus domesticus THE TRIUMPHS OF GODS REVENGE AGAINST THE CRYING AND Execrable Sinne of Murder Expressed In thirty seuerall Tragicall Histories digested into six Books which containe great varietie of mournfull and memorable Accidents Amorous Morall and Divine Booke V. Written by IOHN REYNOLDS VERITAS TEMPORE PATET OCCVLTA RS LONDON Printed for WILLIAM LEE and are to bee sold at his shop in Fleetstreet at the signe of the Turkes Head neere the Mitre Taverne 1634. TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE AND TRVLY NOBLE FRANCIS Lord RVSSELL Baron of Thornehaugh and Earle of Bedford RIGHT HONOVRABLE WHEN I had the honour to referre to that Valiant Wise and Honest Nobleman Arthur Lord Chichester Baron of Belfast whose sublime merits doe here justly deserve and challenge this Testimonie from my Duety That hee was too good for Earth and therefore is now so soone crowned a Saint in Heaven I then had first the happinesse to know and to be knowne of your Honour at your Cheswicke In whom because I ever hold it a farre lesse crime to speake the truth then either to silence or dissemble it I then found so many prints and stamps of true honour and Characters of ancient Goodnesse and Nobilitie that with a pleasing content and delectation I was enforced to be againe and againe enamoured of Vertue and Honour for your sake and reciprocally to love and respect your Lordship for both their sakes Since when out of your generositie not my expectation or deserts your Honour was pleased to conferre a favour on me the which though you forget yet the remembrance thereof I will with equall Zeale and Ambition strive to make as eternall as I know my selfe to be mortall and transitorie You are a Religious Christian and a true hearted Englishman and therefore as it is your glory so it is our happinesse that you are both a constant Lover of God and his Church and a firme and faithfull honourer of your Prince and Countrey and you are now Lord Lieutenant under our Royall and Gracious Soveraigne of that famous County of Devon and faire and honourable Citie of Excester to which I owe my nativitie and in both which the Russels Earles of Bedford your Noble Ancestors have condignely left behind them many honourable Trophees of their Valour and sweet and precious perfumes of their Vertue These premises being so powerfull in truth and so considerable and prevalent in Reason I therefore flatter my selfe with this hope that your Honour will attribute it rather to Dutie then Presumption in me If I now publikely attempt to profer and sacrifice up something to the Honour of your Illustrious Name and to the Dignity of your resplendent Vertues Missing therefore of that desired happinesse by some rare or elaborate peece sufficiently to testifie to your Lordship and to the whole world what you are to mee in the height of Honour and what I am and desire to bee found of you in the lownesse of Observance and Humilitie It will therefore bee no lesse my Felicitie then your Goodnesse If you vouchsafe to accept and patronize this my Fift Booke of foraigne Tragicall Histories and also please to permit them to travell and seeke their Fortunes abroad in the world under the auspitious Planet and authenticall Passeport of your Noble Protection wherein you may behold and see how soundly how sacredly the Iustice of God meets with this crying and scarlet Sinne of Murther which in these our depraved and sinfull times in contempt of the Lawes of Heaven and Earth make so lamentable and so prodigious a progression and how sharpely and severely it deservedly punisheth those Butchers and Monsters of Nature the perpetrators thereof And if I may borrow for I desire not to usurpe any part of your Lordships houres of leisure to give first to the Knowledge and then to the Contemplation of these Histories and the severall Accidents which they report and relate I shall then triumph in my good fortune as having obtayned that Honour and Favour which I ingenuously acknowledge I am farre more capable to desire then deserve I come now to implore pardon of your Honour for this my Presumption in inscribing and adventuring so meane a worke to your noble acceptance And I have ended this my Epistle as soone as began to assure you That I will ever religiously pray unto God to accumulate all prosperities and blessings on your Honour as also on your most Vertuous Countesse and successively on your Honourable and Flourishing Posteritie who now promise no lesse then a happy and famous perpetuitie to your thrice Noble Name and Family Your Honours in all Dutie and Service IOHN REYNOLDS THE GROVNDS AND CONTENTS OF THESE HISTORIES HISTORIE XXI Babtistyna and Amarantha poyson their Eldest Sister Iaquinta after which Amarantha causeth her servants Bernardo and Pierya to stiffle her elder Sister Babtistyna in her Bed Bernardo flying away breakes his necke with the fall off his Horse Pierya is hanged for the same so likewise is Amarantha and her body after burnt Bernardo being buried his body is againe taken up and hanged to the Gallowes by his feete then burnt and his ashes throwen into the River HISTORIE XXII Martino poysoneth his Brother Pedro and murthereth Monfredo in the streete He afterwards growes mad and in confession reveales both these his murthers to Father Thomas his Ghostly Father who afterwards dying reveales it by his Letter to Cecilliana who was Widdow to Monfredo and Sister to Pedro and Martino Martino hath first his right hand cut off and then is hanged for the same HISTORIE XXIII Alphonso poysoneth his owne Mother Sophia and after shoots and kils Cassino as he was walking in his Garden with a short Musket or Carabyne from a Window Hee is beheaded for those two murthers then burnt and his ashes throwne into the River HISTORIE XXIV Pont Chausey kils La Roche in a Duell Quatbrisson causeth Moncallier an Apothecary to poyson his owne Brother Valfontaine Moncallier after fals and breakes his necke from a paire of staires Quatbrisson likewise causeth his Fathers Miller to murther and