the sonne of Silvius and lastly of one Hessicio And there wanteth not as I have heard say a certaine Count-Palatine who 〈◊〉 needs have our Brutus to be called Brotus because forsooth in his birth he was the cause of his mothers death as if 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sounded so much in Greeke In the judgement of others they should have left the Originall of Britaines as probable if they had fathered their progenie either upon Brito the Centaure whom Hinginus mentioneth or that Bretanus of whose daughter Celtice Parthenius Nicaeus a very ancient authour writeth that Hercules begat Celtus the father of the Celtae and from whom Hesychius deriveth the word Britaine As for these observations and judgements of other men which I have recited I beseech you let no man commence action against mee a plaine meaning man and an ingenuous student of the truth as though I impeached that narration of Brutus forasmuch as it hath been alwaies I hope lawfull for every man in such like matters both to thinke what he will and also to relate what others have thought For mine owne part let Brutus be taken for the father and founder of the British nation I will not be of a contrary mind Let the Britaines resolve still of their originall to have proceeded from the Trojans into which stocke as I will hereafter prove they may truely ingraffe themselves I will not gain-stand it I wot full well that Nations in old time for their originall had recourse unto Hercules in later ages to the Trojans Let Antiquitie herein be pardoned if by entermingling falsities and truthes humane matters and divine together it make the first beginnings of nations and cities more noble sacred and of greater majestie seeing that as Plinie writeth Even falsely to claime and challenge descents from famous personages implieth in some sort a love of virtue As for my selfe I willingly acknowledge with Varro the best learned of all Romans such originals as these fetched from the gods to be profitable that valorous men may believe although untruly that they are descended from the gods and thereby the mind of man assuredly perswaded of some divine race may presume to enterprize great matters more boldly act the same more resolutely and upon the very securitie thereof performe all more happily By which words neverthelesse S. Augustine gathereth that the said most learned Varro confesseth although not stoutly nor confidently yet covertly that these opinions are altogether truthlesse Forasmuch then as all writers are not of one and the same mind as touching the very name and the first inhabitants of Britaine and I feare me greatly that no man is able to fetch out the truth so deepely plunged within the winding revolutions of so many ages let the Reader of his candor and humanitie pardon mee also among others if modestly and without the prejudice of any man I likewise interpose my conjecture not upon any mind I have contentiously to wrangle be that farre from mee but in my desire to search out the truth which hath wholly possessed me and brought to this point that in the question now in hand I had rather aske forgivenesse for my fault if there be any than commit no fault at all Howbeit to the end that the reason of this name may if it be possible more easily and with better successe appeare I will endeavour first as I may to find out the most ancient Inhabitours of the Island albeit they lie so hidden in the utmost nooke and secretest closer of Antiquitie as it were in a most thicke wood where no pathwaies are to bee seene that very small hope there is or none at all to fetch those things backe againe with all my diligence which oblivion hath so long removed out of the sight of our ancestours But to seeke for this matter farther off and to omit Caesar with Diodorus and others who would have the Britans to be borne of themselves in the very land and meere Aborigines that is Homelings and not forrein brought in who also imagined that men in the beginning sprang out of the earth like unto mushroomes and todstooles we are taught out of the sacred Historie penned by Moses that after the Deluge Sem Cham and Japhet the three sonnes of Noe having multiplied their issue in great number departed asunder from the mountaines of Armenia where the Arke had rested into divers parts and quarters of the earth and so propagated the nations throughout the wide world That some of their posteritie came to this Isle after the families were by little and little spred and dispersed abroad both reason it selfe and also the authoritie of Theophilus Antiochenus doe joyntly prove When as saith hee in old time there were few men in Arabia and Chaldaea after the division of tongues they encreased and multiplied more and more Heereupon some departed toward the East some gat them to the spacious and open main-land others went forward into the North seeking there to seat themselves neither gave they over to possesse ground every where untill they came as farre as to Britaine scituate in the Northerne Climates And Moses himselfe expressely sheweth the same writing that the Islands of the Gentiles were by the posteritie of Japhet divided in their Regions The Islands of Gentiles the Divines call those which lie farthest off and Wolfgangus Musculus a Theologer not of the lowest ranke thinketh that the nations and families which came from Japhet first inhabited the Isles of Europe such as saith he be England Sicilie c. Now that Europe fell unto Japet and his progenie not Divines onely but Josephus also and others have recorded For Isidorus out of an ancient writer citeth this The nations descended of Iaphet possesse from the Mountaine Taurus Northward the one halfe of Asia and all Europe so farre as to the British Ocean leaving names both to places and people both Of which very many afterward became changed the rest remaine as they were And we have seene that blessing of Noe God enlarge Iaphet and let him dwell in the Tents of Sem and let Chanaan be his servant fulfilled in the people of Europe For Europe which as Plinie saith bred up a people conquerour of all nations hath triumphed more than once over those other parts of the world which fell unto Sem and Cham and in this part hath the off-spring of Japhet spred it selfe farre and wide For of his sonnes Magog begat the Massagets Javan the Jones Thubal the Spaniards and Mesech the Moschovits But Gomer his eldest sonne in these farthest and remotest borders of Europe gave both beginning and name to the Gomerians which were after called Cimbrians and Cimerians For the name of Cimbrians or Cimerians filled in some sort this part of the world and not onely in Germanie but also in Gaul spred exceeding much They which now are the Gauls were as Josephus and Zonaras write called of Gomer Gomari
Trojane King Priams sonne was the founder of the French Nation Hence they collect that when our country-men heard once how the French-men their neighbours drew their line from the Trojanes they thought it a foule dishonour that those should out-goe them in nobilitie of Stocke whom they matched every way in manhood and proesse Therfore that Geffrey Ap Arthur of Monmouth foure hundred yeares ago was the first as they thinke that to gratifie our Britans produced unto them this Brutus descended from the gods by birth also a Trojane to bee the author of the British Nation And before that time verily not one man as they say made any mention at all of the said Brutus They adde thus much moreover that about the same time the Scotish writers falsely devised Scota the Egyptian Pharaoes daughter to bee the Foundresse of their nation Then also it was that some misspending their wit and time yea and offring violent abuse unto the truth forged out of their owne braines for the Irish their Hiberus for the Danes their Danus for the Brabanders their Brabo for the Goths their Gothus and for the Saxons their Saxo as it were the Stock-fathers of the said nations But seeing that in this our age which hath escaped out of those darke mists of fatall ignorance the French have renounced their Francio as a counterfeit Progenitor Whereas the Frenchmen quoth Turnibus a right learned man stand highly upon their descent from the Trojanes they doe it in emulation of the Romans whom they seeing to beare themselves proud of that Pedigree and noble stocke would needs take unto themselves also the like reputation And for that the Scots such as be of the wiser sort have cast off their Scota and truth it selfe hath chased away Hiberus Danus Brabo and the rest of these counterfeit Demi-gods and Worthies of the same stampe Why the Britans should so much sticke unto their Brutus as the name-giver of their Island and to the Trojane originall they greatly wonder as who would say before the destruction of Troy which happened in the thousand yeare or there about after Noahs floud there had beene no Britaines heere and as if there had not lived many valorous men before Agamemnon Furthermore they avouch that very many out of the grave Senate of great Clerks by name Boccace Vives Hadr. Jâ—nius Polydore Buchanan Vigneier Genebrard Molinaeus Bodine and other men of deepe judgement agree joyntly in one verdict and denie that ever there was any such in the world as this Brutus also that learned men of our owne country as many acknowledge him not but reject him as a meere counterfet Among whom they produce first John of Weathamsted Abbat of S. Albanes a most judicious man who in his Granarie wrote of this point long since in this manner According to other histories which in the judgment of some are of more credit the whole Discourse of this Brutus is rather Poeticall than historicall and for divers reasons built upon opinion more than truth indeede First because their is no where mention made in the Roman stories either of killing the father or of the said birth or yet of putting away the sonne Secondly for that after sundry authors Ascanius begat no such sonne who had for his proper name Sylvius for according unto them he begat but one onely sonne and that was Iulus from whom the house of Iulii afterwards tooke their beginning c. And thirdly Sylvius Posthumus whom perhaps Geffrey meaneth was the sonne of Aeneas by his wife Lavinia and hee begetting his sonne Aeneas in the eight and thirtieeh yeare of his reigne ended the course of his life by naturall death The Kingdome therefore now called England was not heeretofore as many will have it named Britaine of Brutus the sonne of Sylvius Wherefore it is in their opinion a vaine peice of worke and ridiculous enough to challenge noble bloud and yet to want a probable ground of their challenge For it is not manhood only that ennobleth a nation the mind it is also with perfect understanding and nothing else that gaineth gentilitie to a man And therefore Seneca writeth thus in his Epistles out of Plato That there is no King but hee came from slaves and no slave but hee descended of Kings Wherefore to conclude let this suffice the Britaines from the beginning of their Nobilitie that they bee couragious and valiant in fight that they subdue their enemies on every side and that they utterly refuse the yoke of servitude In a second rancke they place William of Newborough a writer of much greater authoritie who too too sharply charged Geffrey the Compiler of the British history for his untruth so soone as ever it came forth in these words A certaine writer quoth he in these our daies hath risen up who deviseth foolish fictions and tales of the Britaines and in a vaine humour of his owne extolleth them farre above the valorous Macedonians and Romans both he hath to name Geffrey and is surnamed Arthurius for that the tales of Arthur taken out of the Britaines old fables and augmented by inventions of his owne with a new colour of Latine speech laid over them hee hath invested into the goodly title of an Historie who also hath adventured farther and divulged under the name of authentike prophesies grounded upon an undoubted truth the deceitfull conjectures and foredeemings of one Merline whereunto hee added verily a great deale of his owne whiles hee did the same into Latine And a little after Moreover in his booke which he entituleth The Britans Historie how malapertly and shamelesly hee doth in manner nothing but lie there is no man that readeth the said booke can doubt unlesse hee have no knowledge at all of ancient histories For hee that hath not learned the truth of things indeede admitteth without discretion and judgement the vanitie of fables I forbeare to speake what great matter thaâ— fellow hath forged of the Britans acts before the Empire and comming in of Julius Caesar or else being by others invented hath put them downe as authentike In somuch as Giraldus Cambrensis who both lived and wrote at the same time made no doubt to terme it The fabulous story of Geffrey Others there bee who in this narration of Brutus laugh at the foolish Topographie set downe by this Geffrey as also how falsly hee hath produced Homer as a witnesse yea and they would perswade us that it is wholly patched up of untunable discords and jarring absurdities They note besides that his writings together with his Merlins prophesies are among other books prohibited forbidden by the church of Rome to be published Some againe doe observe thus much how these thaâ— most of all admire Brutus are very doubtfull and waver to and fro about their 〈◊〉 He say they that taketh upon him the name and person of Gildas and 〈…〉 briefe glosâ—es to Ninius deviseth first that this Brutus was a Consul of Rome then that hee was
contrariwise Wherefore seeing these things make nothing to his cause I will second Buchanan by way as it were of a fresh supply with the aid of Egesippus who is commonly reputed a verie ancient writer For thus writeth he where he treateth of the Romans power They make Scotland to quake which is beholden to no land for any thing before them Saxony trembleth that for Marishes is inaccessible But heare you me this author shal stand behind in the rereward for he lived after Constantines daies as may be gathered out of his owne writings neither can it bee prooved out of him that the Scots dwelt in Britain no more than out of that verse of Sidonius which erewhile I alleaged Yea mary but there is another reason of more weight and moment indeed which M. Iohn Crag a right famous and learned man found by most exquisite and curious search in Ioseph Ben-Gorion writing of the destruction of Ierusalem to wit that in an Hebrew copie the Scots are expresly named where Munster in his Latine translation hath untruely put downe Britans for Scots But in what age that Ben-Gorion lived I cannot find for certaine sure I am that hee was after Flavius Iosephus because he maketh mention of the Franks whose name long after began to be knowne But surely if I may be so bold as to interpose my selfe in this question among so great Scholars so farre as I have beene able to observe the first time that ever the Scotish nation became named in authors was whiles Aurelianus was Emperour For Pophyrie who then wrote against the Christians as Saint Ierome informeth us mentioned them in these words Neither Britaine a fertile Province of tyrants nor the Scotish nations together with the barbarous people round about as farre as to the Ocean had any knowledge of Moses and the Prophets At which time verily or somewhat before those that are well seene in Antiquities have noted that the names of the most potent nations of French and Almanes were not heard of before the time of Gallienus the Emperour It is no assured truth therefore which some write That the name and Kingdome of the Scots flourished in Britaine many hundred yeeres before the birth of Christ. But hearken to Girald who will tell you the just time When Great O-Nel saith he held the Monarchie of Ireland six sonnes of Mured King of Vlster seized upon the North parts of Britaine Hereupon from them was there a nation propagated which by a peculiar name called Scotica that is Scotish inhabiteth that part even to this day And that this befel at the very time when the Roman Empire in every mans sight grew to decay it is collected thus Whiles Lagerius the sonne of that O-Nel raigned over the Irish Patrick the Apostle of the Irish-men came into Ireland much about the yeere after Christs nativitie 430. So as it may seeme this hapned neere the daies of Honorius Augustus For then whereas before time ranging up and downe without any certaine place of abode as Ammianus doth report they had long annoyed Britaine and the places appointed for the Marches they seeme to have set their footing in Britaine But they themselves will have it thus that they did but returne then out of Ireland whither they had retired before what time they were put to flight by the Britans and driven away and so they understood that place out of Gildas of this very time The Irish spoilers returne home minding shortly to come backe againe And much about this time some think that Reuda whom Bede mentioneth either by force and armes or through favour planted himselfe in this Island upon an arme of the river Cluid Northward And of this Captaine Reuda saith he the Dalreudini even to this day take their name For in their tongue Dal signifieth a part and others think that from this Reuda it was that wee called the Irish-Scots Redshanks It is thought also that the same Simon Brech whom the Scots avouch to bee the founder of their nation flourished in these daies Sinbrech in truth was the name of the man which is as much to say as Sin with the freckled face as we read in Fordon And peradventure the same Brech he was who about the time of S. Patricke together with Thuibai Mac-lei and Auspac Scots infested Britaine as wee read in the life of Saint Carantoc But why the High-land Scots living in Britaine call that countrey which they inhabite Alban and Albin and the Irish name it Allabany were a question for an ingenuous and liberall wit to travell in as namely whether this word Allabany may not have it in some token of the ancient Albion or whether it came of whitenesse which they call Ban and therefore may import as much in Scotish as Ellan-Ban that is a white Island or whether it bee derived of Ireland which the Irish Poets name Banne so that Allabanny may sound as much as another Ireland or a second Ireland For Historiographers were wont to call Ireland Scotland the greater and the Kingdome of the Scots in Britaine Scotland the lesse Moreover seeing these Scots in their own language terme themselves Albin whereupon Blondus called the Scots Albienses or Albinenses and Buchanan Albini let Criticks consider whether that in Saint Ierome where hee inveigheth against a certaine Pelagian a Scot borne it should not be read Albinum for Alpinum when hee taketh him up in these termes The great and corpulent Alpine dog and who is able to doe more harme with his heeles than his teeth for he hath his of-spring of the Scotish nation neere neighbours to the Britans of whom also in another place he said that hee was full fatned with Scottish pottage brewesse Of Alpine dogs I never remember that I have read ought but that Scotish dogs were in much request at Rome in those daies Symmachus sheweth unto us Seven Scotish Dogs there were saith he the day going before the Games which in Rome they wondred at so as they thought they were brought thither in yron-grated Cages But after that the Scots were come into Britaine and had joyned themselves unto the Picts albeit they never ceased to vexe the Britans with skirmishes and in-roades yet grew they not presently up to any great state but kept a long time in that corner where they first arrived not daring as Beda writeth for the space of one hundred and seven and twentie yeares to come forth into the field against the Princes of Northumberland untill at one and the same time they had made such a slaughter of the Picts that few or none of them were left alive and withall the Kingdome of Northumberland what with civill dissentions and invasions of the Danes sore shaken and weakned fell at once to the ground For then all the Northerne tract of Britaine became subject to them and tooke their name together with that hithermore countrey on this side Cluid and Edenburgh Frith For that
unlesse it were for a lucky osse and foretoken of their warlicke prowesse according to that verse of Virgil. Bello armantur equi Bella haec armenta minantur For warre our horses armed are These beasts also doe threaten warre They used also casting and drawing of lots very much for they did cut downe a branch from some tree that bare fruit and slived or cleft the same into slips and twigs and when they had distinguished them with certain marks they skattered them at hap-hazard upon a white garment Straight waies if the consultation were publike the Priest if private the goodman of the house after prayers first unto the Gods looking up to heaven tooke each of them up three times and having lifted them up they interpreted them according to the marke set before upon them To trie out the event and issue of warres they were wont to set a prisoner of that nation against which they denounced warre and a man chosen out of their owne countrimen to fight together a combat each of them with the weapon used in their countrie and so to guesse by him that was victour which nation should goe away with victorie Above all other Gods they worshipped Mercurie whom they called Wooden whose favour they procured by sacrificing unto him men alive and to him they consecrated the fourth day of the weeke whereupon wee call it at this day Wednesday like as the sixth unto Venus whom they named Frea or Frico whence wee name that day Friday even as we do Tuesday of Tuisco the stocke-father of the German or Dutch nation They had a Goddesse also named Eoster unto whom they sacrificed in the moneth of Aprill and hence it commeth saith Beda that they called April Eoster monath and we still name the feast of the Resurrection Easter but rather as I thinke of the rising of Christ which our progenitors called East as we do now that part whence the Sunne riseth In generall as saith Tacitus the English and other neighbour-nations worshipped Herthus that is Dame Earth for a Goddesse and they had an opinion that she intermediated in humane affaires and relieved the people And even with us in these daies that word Earth is in use but growne out of use with Germans who in stead of Earth say Arden Of these superstitions that foresaid Ethelward writeth thus respectively unto the time wherein he lived So grievously seduced are the unbeleevers of the North that unto this very day the Danes Normanes and Suevians worship Woodan as their Lord and in another place The Barbarous people honoured Woodan as their God and the Painims offred sacrifice unto him that they might be victorious and valorous But more fully Adam Bremensis setteth these things downe In a temple saith he called in their vulgar and native speech Vbsola which is made altogether of gold the people worship the statues of three Gods in such maner as that Thor the mightiest of them hath onely a throne or bed on either hand of him Woodan and Fricco hold their places And thus much they signifie Thor say they beareth rule in the aire as who governeth thunder and lightning winds showres faire weather corne and fruits of the earth The second which is Woodan that is stronger maketh wars and ministreth manly valour against enemies The third is Frico bestowing largely upon mortall men peace and pleasure whose image they devise and pourtray with a great viril member Woodan they engrave armed like as with us they use to cut and expresse Mars And they seeme to represent Thor with the scepter of Iupiter But these errors the truth of Christian religion hath at length chased quite away After that these nations above said had now gotten sure footing in the possession of Britain they divided it into seven kingdomes and established an Heptarchie In which notwithstanding the prince that had the greatest power was called as we read in Beda King of the English nation So that in this very Heptarchie it may seeme there was alwaies a Monarchie After this Augustine whom commonly they call the Apostle of the English men being sent hither by Gregorie the great having abolished these monstrous abominations of heathenish impietie with most happy successe planting Christ in their hearts converted them to the Christian faith But for what cause and upon what occasion this Gregorie was so diligent and carefull for the salvation of this English nation Venerable Beda hath by tradition of his forefathers recounted unto us in these words The report goeth that on a certaine day when upon the comming of merchants lately arrived great store of wares was brought together into the market place at Rome for to be sold and many chapmen flocked together for to buy Gregory also himselfe among others came thither and saw with other things boies set to sale for bodies faire and white of countenance sweet and amiable having the haire also of their head as lovely and beautifull Whom when he wistly beheld he demanded as they say from what countrey or land they were brought Answere was made that they came out of the Isle of Britaine the people whereof were as welfavoured to see unto Then he asked againe Whether those Ilanders were Christians or ensnared still with the errours of Paganisme To which it was said They were Painims but he fetching a long deepe sigh from his very heart root Alas for pitie quoth he that the foule fiend and father of darknes should be Lord of so bright and light some faces and that they who caryed such grace in their countenances should be void of the inward grace in their hearts soules Once againe he desired to understand by what name their nation was knowne They made answer That they were called Angli And well may they so be named quoth he for Angelike faces they have and meete it is that such should bee fellow-heires with Angels in heaven But what is the name of that Province from whence these were brought Answere was returned that the Inhabitants of the said province were cleped DEIRI DEIRI quoth he They are in deed De ira eruti that is delivered from ire and wrath and called to the mercie of Christ. How call you the King of that province said he Answere was given that his name was Aelle Then he alluding to the name said That Allelu-jah should be sung in those parts to the praise of God the Creator Comming therefore to the Bishop of the Romane and Apostolicall See for himselfe as yet was not made Bishop he entreated that some ministers of the word should be sent unto the English nation by whose meanes it might be converted to Christ and even himselfe was ready to under take the performance of this worke with the helpe of God incase it would please the Apostolicall Pope that it should be so Concerning this conversion the same Gregorie the Great writeth thus Behold he hath now entred
and the Normans of the other did what they could and left no stone unturned But when he in a pitched field had neere unto Stamford-bridg in Yorkshire slaine his brother Tosto and Harold King of Norway whom Tosto had drawn to take part with him in this war and so obtained a bloudy victorie behold within nine daies after the said WILLIAM surnamed the Bastard Duke of Normandie taking hold of the promises of King Edward late deceased and presuming of his adoption and neere alliance having levied a great armie arrived in England among the South-Saxons Against whom Harold forthwith advanced albeit his souldiers were sore wearied and his power by the former battaile much empaired And not farre from Hastings they encounter and joyne battaile where Harold engaging himselfe into the midst of the medley and fighting manfully lost his life with a great number of Englishmen left slaine in the place but how many they were just hard it is exactly to conceive and faithfully to put downe WILLIAM thus a Conquerour presently with banner displaid marched about in order of battaile by Wallingford to London where being received he was solemnly inaugurated King as unto whom by his owne saying The Kingdome was by Gods providence appointed and by vertue of a gift from his Lord and Cosen King Edward the Glorious granted and after some few lines the story runneth on and saith that the most beauteous King Edward had by adoption ordained him his heire in the Kingdome of England And if we list to believe the Historie of Saint Stephens in Caen of Normandie at his last breath he uttered these words The Regall Diadem which none of all my predecessours ever wore I got and gained by the grace of God only and no right of inheritance And a little after I ordaine no man heire of the Kingdome of England but I commend the same to the eternall Creator whose I am and in whose hands are all things For I became not possessed of so great honour by any hereditary right but by a terrible conflict and with much effusion of bloud I tooke it from that perjured King Harold and after I had either slaine or put to flight his favourers and adherents I subdued it under my Dominion But why doe I so briefly run over this so great alteration of the English state Have therefore if you thinke not much to read it what my selfe with no curious pen haply with as little studie and premeditation howbeit according to the truth of the Historie wrote when being but young not well advised nor of sufficiencie to undergoe so great a burthen I purposed to set forth our Historie in the Latine tongue VVHen Edward the Confessour was now without issue departed this life the Nobles and people of the land were in doubtfull care distracted about the setting up of a new King in his place Edgar surnamed Aetheling King Edmund Iron side his nephewes nephew by a sonne onely of all the issue male of the Saxons line remained alive unto whom by right of inheritance the kingdome was due But considering he was thought by reason of his tender yeares not meete to mannage the State and had beside intermingled his naturall disposition with forrain manners as being borne in Pannonia and the sonne of Agathra daughter to the Emperor Henrie the third who was in so remote a countrie farther off than that he could conveniently assist the young Gentleman either with aid or counsell in these regards hee was lesse affected of the Englishmen who desired nothing more than to have a King as it were out of their owne bodie And therefore all of them for the most part had their eies fixed with much respect upon Harold Goodwins sonne a man for his good parts as well in warre as peace very glorious For albeit he was of noble parentage but by one side and his father for his treacherie and treason as also for pilling and polling had incurred everlasting infamie and shame yet with his courteous affabilitie gentill deportment liberalitie and warlike prowesse he wound himselfe into exceeding great especiall favour with the people For there could not another bee set by him in whom there was more resolute hardinesse to adventure upon danger or more advised policie in the midst of dangers His valour also and fortitude shined out so apparantly in the Welsh warres which heretofore most happily hee had brought to an end that he was reputed verily a man passing well furnished with all vertues required in a soveraigne Commander and even borne to repaire the decaied state of England Moreover good hope there was that the Danes who onely terrified this country would bee the better contented and pleased with him because he was the son of Githa daughter to Sueno King of Denmarke And in case there should arise any other power against him either forraine or domesticall he was thought sufficiently enabled to make his part good with the affectionate hearts of the common people with the alliance also and affinitie that hee had among the Nobility For hee had to wife the sister of Morcar and Edwin two brethren men of exceeding great puissance and Edric surnamed the Wild a man of high spirit and in chiefe authoritie was linked to him in the neerest bond of Affinitie besides it fell out very well for him that at one and the selfe-same time Sueno King of the Danes had his hands full of warre with Sueden and betweene William Duke of Normandy and Philip the French King there fell some dislikes and emulation for that Edward the Confessor during his exile in Normandie had in expresse termes promised unto William of Normandie the Kingdome if hee died without issue For the performance of which promise Harold became as it were surety and bound himselfe with an oath what time hee was detained prisoner in Normandie but with this condition annexed that he might espouse the daughter of the said William of Normandie Whereupon most men thought it the wisest policy to set the Crowne upon William his head to the end that by performing oath and promise the warre that they foresaw now threatned and destruction which alwaies waiteth as a due punishment upon perjurie might be averted and withall by laying Normandie to England the Kingdome under so mightie a Prince might be surely established and the common-wealth very much advanced But Harold quickly preventing all consultations whatsoever thinking it not good for him to linger and delay any whit that very day on which King Edward was enterred contrary to the expectation of most men entred upon the soveraigne government and with the applause onely of such as were then present about him who with acclamations saluted him King without the due complements and solemnitie of Coronation set the Imperiall Diadem upon his owne head By which act of his as being a breach of ancient ordinance he exceedingly provoked and stirred up against him the whole Clergie and Ecclesiasticall state But he knowing well enough
Village having nothing to boast of but a Major for the head Magistrate and in it a passing fine house of the Earles of Pembrokes raised out of the ruines of the old religious house But most of all it was over-topped and shadowed first by SORBIODVNVM and now by Salisburie that is risen out of the ruine thereof For so Antoninus in his Itinerarie calleth that which the Saxons afterwards named 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and the vulgar Latinists Sarum Sarisburia Salisburialia Moreover the account taken by miles of distant places from it and the tracts remaining of the name testifie no lesse if I should say never a word For who would ever make doubt that Searesbirig proceeded from Sorbiodunum by addition of the Saxon word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth a Burg or town in stead of Dunum which the Britaines and Gaules both used to put unto places seated on higher grounds such as this Sorbiodunum was In so much as I have beene told by one right skilfull in the British tongue that Sorviodunum is by interpretation as much as The dry hill a conjecture surely more probable that theirs who with much adoe have derived the name from one Saron in Berosus or from the Emperour Severus and have named it forsooth Severia For it mounted upon a high hill and as our Historiographer of Malmesburie saith Instead of the Citie there was a Castle fenced with a wall of no small bignesse indifferently well provided otherwise of necessaries but so scant of water that it is good chaffer there sold at a wonderfull price Whereupon these verses were made of old Sorbiodunum by one living in those daies Est tibi defectus lymph◠sed copia cretae Saevit ibi ventus sed philomela silet No water there but chalke yee have at will The winds there sound but nightingales be still By the ruines yet remaining it seemeth to have beene a strong place sufficiently fortified and to have contained in circuite some halfe a mile Kinric the Saxon after he had wonne a most fortunate Victorie of the Britans was the first of all the Saxons that forced it in the yeare 553 and Canutus the Dane about the yeare 1003. by setting it on fire did much harme unto it But it revived when by the authority of a Synode and the ascent of William the Conqueror Herman Bishop of Shirburne and Sunning translated his See hither whos 's next successour Osmund built a Cathedrall Church And King William the Conquerour after he had taken the survey of England summoned all the States of the Kingdome hither to sweare unto him fealtie at which time as it stands upon record in Domesday booke it payd after the rate of 50. hides Of the third penny of Salisbury the King hath xx shillings ad pensum de Cremento IX libras ad pondus Which I note therefore because in our forefathers daies like as among the old Romans money was wont to bee paied as well by the weight as tale but not many yeares after in the raigne of Richard the first partly for the insolencie and mis-rule that the garison souldiers made there against the Church-men and in part for want of water the Church-men first and then the Inhabitants began to leave it and planted themselves in a lower ground scarce a mile off South-East from it where there is a receit as it were of many rivelets and where Avon and Nadder meet Of this their removing Petrus Blesensis in his Epistles maketh mention For thus of old Salisburie he wrote A place that was open to the winds barraine dry and desert In it stood a towre like that of Siloam which oppressed the townes-men with the burthen of long servitude And againe The Church of Sarisburie was captive in that hill Let us therefore in Gods name goe downe to the plaine countrey where the valleies will yield store of wheat and other corne where also the large fields are rich fat in pasture And the Poet afore-said in verse thus Quid Domini domus in castro nisi foederis arca In templo Baalim carcer uterque locus What is Gods house in Castle pent but like the Arke of blisse In Baalims temple Captivate Each place a prison is And the place whereunto they descended he thus describeth Est in valle locus nemori venatibus apto Contiguus celeber fructibus uber aquis Tale Creatoris matri natura creata Hospitium toto quaesijt orbe diu Neere to a Parke well stor'd of game there lies in vale a ground Where corne and fruits in plentie grow where water-streames abound Such lodging long throughout the world when nature daughter deere Had for Creatours mother sought at last she found it heere When they were now come downe because they would begin first with the house of God Richard Poore the Bishop in a most delectable place named before Merifield began to found a most stately and beautifull Minster Which with an exceeding high spired steeple and double crosse yles on both sides carrying with it a venerable shew as well of sacred hilaritie as religious majestie was with great cost finished forty yeares after and in the yeare of our Lord 1258. dedicated even in the presence of King Henrie the third Whereof the said old Poet hath these prety verses Regis enim virtus temple spectabitur isto Praesulis affectus artificumque fides For why This Church a Prelats zeale sets forth unto the sight The workmens trusty faithfulnesse a Princes power and might But much more elegantly the most learned Daniel Rogers as concerning the said Church Mira canam Soles quot continet annus in una Tam numerosa ferunt ade fenestra micat Marmoreasque capit fusas tot ab arte columnas Comprensas horas quot vagus annus babet Totque patent portae quot mensibus annus abundat Res mira at verares celebrata fide Wonders to tell How many daies in one whole yeare there beene So many windows in one Church men say are to be seene So many pillars cast by Art of marble there appeare As houres doe flit and flie away throughout the running yeare So many gates doe entry give as monthes one yeare doe make A thing well knowne for truth though most it for a wonder take For the windowes as they reckon them answer just in number to the daies the pillars great and small to the houres of a full yeare and the gates to the twelve monethes A cloister it hath beside on the South side for largenesse and fine workmanship inferiour to none whereunto joyneth the Bishops pallace a very faire and goodly house and on the other side a high bell towre and passing strong withall standing by it selfe apart from the Minster Moreover in short time it grew to be so rich in goods and endowed with so great revenewes that it still maintained a Deane a Chaunter a Chauncellor a Treasurer and three and thirty Prebendaries of whom the Residents as they terme
Which King Henry the Fifth when he had expelled thence the Monkes aliens built for religious Virgins to the honor of our Saviour the Virgine Mary and Saint Briget of Sion like as he founded another on the Rivers side over against it for the Carthusian Monkes named Jesu of Bethelem In this Sion hee appointed to the Glory of God so many Nunnes Priests and lay brethren divided a part within their severall wals as were in number equall to Christ his Apostles and Disciples upon whom when he had bestowed sufficient living he provided by a law that contenting themselves therewith they should take no more of any man but what overplus soever remained of their yearely revenew they should bestow it upon the poore But after that in our forefathers time those religious Votaries were cast out and it became a retiring house of the Duke of Somerset who plucked downe the Church and there began a new house Under this the small water Brent issueth into the Tamis which springing out of a Pond vulgarly called Brouns-well for Brentwell that is in old English Frog-well passeth downe betweene Hendon which Archbishop Dunstan borne for the advancement of Monkes purchased for some few golde Bizantines which were Imperiall peeces of Gold coined at Bizantium or Constantinople and gave to the Monks of Saint Peter of Westminster and Hamsted-hils from whence you have a most pleasant prospect to the most beautifull City of London and the lovely Country about it Over which the ancient Roman military way led to Verulam or Saint Albans by Edge-worth and not by High-gate as now which new way was opened by the Bishops of London about some 300. yeares since But to returne Brent into whom all the small Rillets of these parts resort runneth on by Brentstreat an Hamlet to whom it imparted his name watereth Hanger-wood Hanwell Oisterly Parke where Sir Thomas Gresham built a faire large house and so neere his fall into the Tamis giveth name to Brentford a faire throughfaire and frequent Mercat Neere which in the yeare 1116. King Edmond sirnamed Ironside so fiercely charged upon the Danes whom hee compelled by force to retire from the Siege of London that as fast as their horses could make way they fled not without their great losse From Stanes hitherto all that lyeth betweene London highway which goeth through Hounslow and the Tamis was called the Forrest or Warren of Stanes untill that King Henry the Third as in his Charter we reade Disforrested and diswarened it Then by the Tamis side is Fulham in the English Saxon tongue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is The place of Fowles the greatest credit and honour whereof is the Bishop of Londons house standing there conveniently not farre from the City albeit not so healthfully Also Chelsey so named of a shelfe of Sand in the River Tamis as some suppose but in Records it is named Chelche-hith a place garnished with faire and stately houses by King Henry the Eighth by William Powlet the first Marquesse of Winchester and by others But LONDON the Epitome or Breviary of all Britaine the seat of the British Empire and the Kings of Englands Chamber so much overtoppeth all these as according to the Poet Inter viburna Cupressâ—s that is the Cypresse-tree amongst the Viornes Tacitus Ptolomee and Antonine call it LONDINIUM and LONGIDINIUM Ammianus LUNDINUM and AUGUSTA Stephen in his Cities 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 our Britans Lundayn the old Saxons 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Strangers Londra and Londres the inhabitants London Fabulous writers Troja nova that is New Troy Dinas Belin that is Belins City and Caer Lud of King Lud whom they write to have reedified it and given it the name But these few names and originall derivations together with Erasmus his conjecture who deriveth it from Lindum a City in the Isle Rhodes I willingly leave to such as well like it For mine owne part seeing that Caesar and Strabo doe write that the ancient Britains called those Woods and groves by the names of Cities and Townes which they had fenced with trees cast downe and plashed to stoppe up all passage seeing also I have understood that such woods or groves are in the British tongue named Llâ—wn I encline a little to the opinion that London thence tooke name as one would say by way of excellency The City or A City thicke of trees But if heerein I faile of the truth let me with good leave give my conjecture and heere would I have no man to charge me with inconstancy while I disport in conjecture that whence it had the fame thence also it tooke the name even from ships which the Britains in their language call Lhong so that Londinum may seeme to sound as much as a ship-Rode or City of ships For the Britains tearme a City Dinas whence the Latines have fetched their Dinum And hence it is that elsewhere it is called LONGIDINIUM and in the funerall song or Dump of a most ancient British Bard Lhong-porth that is an harbour or haven of ships and by this very terme Bononia or Bolen in France which Ptolomee calleth Gessoriacum Navale in the British Glossarie is named Bolung-long For many Cities have drawne their names from Ships as Naupactus Naustathmos Nauplia Navalia Augusti c. But of these none hath better right to assume unto it the name of a Ship-Rode or Haven than our London For in regard of both Elements most blessed and happy it is as being situate in a rich and fertile Soile abounding with plentifull store of all things and on the gentle ascent and rising of an hill hard by the Tamis side the most milde Merchant as one would say of all things that the World doth yeeld which swelling at certaine set houres with the Ocean-tides by his safe and deepe chanell able to entertaine the greatest Ships that bee daily bringeth in so great riches from all parts that it striveth at this day with the Mart-townes of Christendome for the second prise and affoordeth a most sure and beautifull Roade for shipping A man would say that seeth the shipping there that it is as it were a very Wood of trees disbranched to make glades and let in light So shaded it is with masts and failes Who was the first founder is by long time growne out of knowledge and in truth very few Cities there are that know their own first founders considering they grew up to their greatnesse by little and little But as other Cities so this of ours fathereth her originall upon the Trojanes as verily beleeving that Brutus the Nephew in the third descent of Great Aeneas was the builder thereof But whosoever founded it the happy and fortunate estate thereof hath given good proofe that built it was in a good houre and marked for life and long continuance And that it is for antiquity honourable Ammianus Marcellinus giveth us to understand who called it in his times and that was 1200. yeares
the clouds disparcled and golden dayes in deed shone upon it Since when it never sustained any great calamity to speake of but through the speciall favour and indulgence of Princes obtained very large and great Immunities beganne to bee called The Kings Chamber and so flourished a new with fresh trade and traffique of Merchants that William of Malmesbury who lived well neere about that time termed it A noble and wealthy City replenished with rich Citizens and frequented with the commerce of Occupiers and Factours comming out of all lands And Fitz-Stephen living also in those dayes hath left in writing that London at that time counted an hundred and twenty two Parish Churches and thirteene Covents of religious Orders also that when a Muster and shew was made of able men to beare Armes they brought into the Field under their Collours forty thousand footemen and twenty thousand horsemen Then was it enlarged with new buildings and the spacious Suburbs stretched forth from the gates a great length on every side but Westward especially which are the greatest and best peopled In which are twelve Innes ordained for Students of our Common law whereof foure being very faire and large belong to the judiciall Courts the rest to the Chauncery besides two Innes moreover for the Serjeants at Law Herein such a number of young Gentlemen doe so painefully ply their bookes and study the Law that for frequency of Students it is not inferiour either to Angiers Cane or Orleance it selfe as Sir Iohn Fortescue in his small Treatise of the Lawes of England doth witnesse The said foure principall houses are The Inner Temple the Middle Temple Graies Inne and Lincolns Inne Those two former named stand in the very place where in times past during the Raigne of King Henry the Second Heraclius Patriarch of Jerusalem consecrated a Church for Knights Templars which they had newly built according to the forme of the Temple neere unto the Sepulchre of our Lord at Hierusalem For at their first institution about the yeare of our Lord 1113. they dwelt in part of the Temple hard by the Sepulchre whereof they were so named and vowed to defend Christian Religion the Holy Land and Pilgrimes going to visite the Lords Sepulchre against all Mahometans and Infidels professing to live in chastity and obedience whereupon all men most willingly and with right loving hearts embraced them so that through the bounteous liberality of Princes and devout people having gotten in all places very faire Possessions and exceeding great wealth they flourished in high reputation for Piety and Devotion yea and in the opinion both of the holinesse of the men and of the place King Henry the Third and many Noble men desired much to bee buryed in their Church among them Some of whose Images are there to bee seene with their legges acrosse For so they were buryed in that Age that had Taken upon them the Crosse as they then termed it to serve in the Holy Land or had vowed the same Among whom was William Marshall the elder a most powerfull man in his time William and Gilbert his sonnes Marshalles of England and Earles of Penbroch Upon William the elder his Tombe I some yeares since read in the upper part Comes Penbrochiae and upon side this Verse Miles eram Martis Mars multos vicerat armis Of Mars I was a doughty Knight Mars vanquished many a man in fight But in processe of time when with insatiable greedinesse they had hoorded great wealth by withdrawing tith's from churches appropriating spiritual livings to themselves and other hard meanes their riches turned to their ruine For thereby their former piety was after a manner stifled they fell at jarre with other religious orders their professed obedience to the Patriarch of Ierusalem was rejected envy among the common sort was procured which hope of gain among the better sort so enkindled that in the yeere of our salvation 1312. this order was condemned of impiety and by the Popes authority utterly abolished Howbeit their possessions were by authority of the Parliament assigned to the Hospitalier Knights of S. Iohn of Ierusalem least that such Lands given to pious and good uses against the Donours will should bee alienated to other uses And yet it is apparent out of ancient writings that this place after the expulsion of the Templers was the seat and habitation of Thomas Earle of Lancaster and of Sir Hugh Spenser King Edward the Second his minion afterwards of Sir Aimer de Valence Earle of Pembroch and in the end turned into two Colledges or Innes of Lawyers Of the rest of these Innes I have found nothing at all by reading But the generall voyce goeth that the one was the dwelling house of the Lord Greies of Wilton and the other of the Earles of Lincolne Nere unto this K. Henry the third erected betweene the New and the Old Temple an house of Converts for the maintenance of those that were converted from Iudaisme to the Christian Truth which King Edward the Third appointed afterwards for rolls and records to be kept therein and thereof at this day it is called The Rowls These Suburbs with houses standing close together and stately habitations of the Nobles and great Men of the Land along the Tamis side reach out as farre as to Westminster Among which these are the most memorable here Bride-well where King Henry the Eighth built a royall house for the entertainment of Charles the Fifth Emperour but now it is an House of Correction Buckhurst house or Salisbury Court belonging sometimes to the Bishops of Salisbury the White Freers or Carmelite Freers The Temples whereof I speake Then without the Bars Essex house built by the Lord Paget Arondel house before called Hampton place and Somerset house built by Edward Semer Duke of Somerset The Savoy so named of Peter Earle of Savoy who there dwelt which Queene Aeleonor wife to King Henry the Third purchased of the fraternity of Mont-joy and gave it to her Sonne Edmund Earle of Lancaster Whose Posterity dwelt in it a long time untill that King Henry the Seaventh dedicated it as an Hospitall for the Poore Worcester-house late Bedford-house Salisbury-house Durham-house built by Antony Becke Bishop of Durham and Patriarch of Jerusalem and thereby the onely ornament of this part the Britain-Burse built by the Earle of Salisbury and so named by King Iames Yorke-house in times past Bath-house and Northampton-house now begunne by Henry Earle of Northampton But what meane I to name these places 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 None claime them wholy for their owne Fortune disposeth them every one By this Suburbs Westminster which sometime was more than a mile distant is conjoyned so close unto the Citty of London that it seemeth a member thereof whereas it is a Citty of it selfe having their peculiar Magistrates and Priviledges It was called in times past Thorney of Thornes but now Westminster of the West situation
and separateth it from Darby-shire holding on his course in a Cleyish channell without any beds or shelves of mud through a soile consisting of the said Lime-stone from whence it sucketh out such fertilitie that in the very middest of Winter the Medowes on both the bankes sides carry a most pleasant and fresh greene hew but if it chance to swell above the bankes and overflow the Medowes in Aprill it battelleth them like another Nilus and maketh them so fruitfull that the inhabitants use commonly to chant this joyfull note In Aprill Doves flood Is worth a Kings good This river in twelve houres space useth so to rise that it harieth and carrieth away with it sheepe and other cattaile to the great terror of the people dwelling thereby but within the same time againe it falleth and returnes within his owne bankes whereas Trent being once up and over his bankes floweth upon the fields foure or five daies together but now come we to the rivers that run into it The first is Hans which being swallowed up under the ground breaketh up againe three miles off Then admitteth he the fellowship of the river Churnet who passeth by De-la-Cres Abbay built by Ranulph the third of that name Earle of Chester by Leike also a well knowne Mercat towne and by Aulton a Castle in times past belonging to the Barons Verdon who founded heere the Abbay of Croxden from whom by the Furnivals it descended to the Talbots Earles of Shrewsbury A little below runneth Teyn a small brooke into Dove which having his head not far from Cheddle the ancient seat of the Bassets who derive their pedegree from the Bassets of Draiton creepeth on in such a winding and crooked chanell that within one mile I was faine to passe over it foure times Neere unto it in Checkley Church-yard there stand three stones upright erected in maner of a Pyramides two of them have little images engraven upon them but that in the middest is highest The inhabitants report by tradition that a battaile was fought there betweene two hosts of which the one was armed the other unarmed and that in it were three Bishops slaine in memoriall of whom these stones were set up But what Historicall truth indeed lieth heerein enfolded I know not as yet As for Blith it hath in this Moreland Careswell a Castler situate upon it which Sir William Careswell built with great ponds having their heads made of square stones and Draicot which gave surname to a family of great antiquity in this County But Dove after it hath received Tine having a faire bridge made over it of most hard stone and defended with piles runneth under Vtcester in ' the Saxons tongue 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Vttoxather situate upon the side of an hill with a gentle ascent a towne more rich in gay flowring medowes and in cattaile than faire built which before I saw it the name was so favourable to my conjecture I thought in vaine to have been the ancient ETOCETUM But now time hath taught me more certeinty After this when Dove is now come neerer unto Trent it visiteth Tutbury Castle in times past a large and stately thing which also is called Stutesbury and from an Alabaster hill top on which it stands threatneth as it were the whole country underneath It was built together with a little Monastery by Henry de Ferrars a Noble man of Normandy unto whom King William the First had given great lands and revenewes in this shire all which Robert de Ferrars Earle of Darby lost after he had revolted a second time from King Henry the Third For this Robert when after many troubles which he had raised in the Barons war hee was received into the Kings favour and had bound himselfe with a corporall oth in expresse and formall words that he would continue ever after loyall to his liege Lord yet was the man of such a stirring and restlesse spirit that to break and knap in peeces quite that fortune which he could not bend he put on armes against his Soveraigne and being at length taken prisoner that I may use the very words of the Record according to the forme of his obligation made this great forfeiture both of his fortunes and dignities There is in some place of this shire a lake if Alexander Necham deceive us not into which no wilde beast will in any wise enter but since the place is uncertaine and the thing it selfe more uncertaine I will onely put downe underneath these his verses before which he prefixed this Title De Lacu in Staffordia Rugitu Lacus est eventus praeco futuri Cujus aquis fera se credere nulla solet Instet odora canum virtus mors instet acerba Non tamen intrabit exagitata lacum Of a Lake in Stafford-shire A Lake there is that roreth loud whereby things are fore-showne The water whereof once to take wild beasts were never knowne Let hounds let death pursue apace them for to overtake For all this chase and hot pursuite none enter will the Lake Of another Poole or Lake also in this Country thus writeth Gervase of Tilbury in his Otia Imperialia unto Otho the fourth In the Bishopricke of Coventry and County of Stafford at the foot of an hill which the inborne people of the Country have named Mahull there is a water spread abroad in maner of a Meere in the territory of a Village which they tearme Magdalea In this Meere or Marsh there is a most cleere water and an infinite number of woods beside joyning one unto another which hath such an effectuall vertue in refreshing of bodies that so often as Hunters have chased Stagges and other Deere untill their Horses be tired if in the greatest heate of the scorching Sunne they taste of this water and offer it unto their Horses for to drinke they recover their strength of running againe which they had lost and become so fresh as one would thinke they had not run at all But whereabout this is I cannot yet learne by all my diligent inquiry As for the title of Stafford it remaineth ever since Robert de Stafford whom King William of Normandy enriched with great possessions even untill our time in his line and progeny A family as noble and ancient as any other but upon which fortune hath otherwhiles by turnes both frowned and fawned For first they were Barons of Stafford then five of them Earles of Stafford Ralfe created by King Edward the Third Earle of Stafford who married the heire of Sir Hugh Audley Earle of Glocester Hugh his sonne who died in Pilgrimage at Rhodes and his three sonnes successively Thomas and William both issuelesse and Edmund who married the daughter and heire of Thomas of Woodstock Duke of Buckingham Afterward three of them were Dukes of Buckingham and Earles of Stafford c. as is before shewed By the attainder of the last of them those so great inheritances
gold made him Lord chiefe Baron of his Exchequer conferred upon him the whole Seignorie or Lordship of Holdernes together with other lands belonging unto the Crown and that by the Kings Charter yea and ordained that he should be reputed a Baneret Yet if any man make doubt hereof the Recordes I hope may satisfie him fully in which William De la Pole is in plaine tearmes called Dilectus Valectus et Mercator noster that is Our wellbeloved Valect and our Merchant now Valect to tell you once for all was in those daies an honorable title as well in France as in England but afterward applied unto servants and gromes whereupon when the Gentry rejected it by changing the name they began to bee called Gentlemen of the Bedchamber From Hull a Promontorie runneth on forward and shooteth out a farre into the sea which Ptolomee calleth OCELLVM wee Holdernesse and a certaine monke Cavam Deiram as it were the hollow Country of the Deirians in the same signification that Coelosyria is so tearmed as one would say Holow Syria In this Promontory the first towne wee meet with in the winding shore is Headon in times past if wee list to beleeve fame that useth to amplifie the truth and which for my part I will not discredit risen to exceeding great account by the industry of merchants and sea-faring men from which so uncertaine is the condition as well of places as of people it is so much fallen by the vicinity of Hull and the choaking up of the haven which hath empoverished it that it can shew scarce any whit of the ancient state it had Although King Iohn granted unto Baldwin Earle of Aulbemarle and of Holdernesse and to his wife Hawis free Burgage heere so that the Burgers might hold in free Burgage with those customes that Yorke and Nichol that is Lincolne Yet now it beginneth by little and little to revive againe in hope to recover the former dignity There standeth hard by the Pomontorie an ancient towne which Antonine the Emperour called PRAETORIVM but we in our age Patrington like as the Italians have changed the name of a towne sometime called Praetorium into Petrovina That I doe not mistake herein both the distance from DELGOVITIA and the very name yet remaining doth prove which also in some sort implieth that this is the very same that in Ptolomees copies is written PETVARIA corruptly for Praetorium But whether this name were given it either from Praetorium that is the hall of Justice or from some large and stately house such as the Romans tearmed Praetoria it doth not appeare for certaine The inhabitants glorie much yet as touching their Antiquity and the commodiousnesse of the haven in ancient times and they may as well glorie for the pleasantnesse thereof For it hath a most delectable prospect on the one side lieth the maine sea brimme upon it on the other Humber a famous arme of the sea and over against it the fresh and greene skirtes of Lincoln-shire The high way of the Romans from the Picts wall which Antonine the Emperor followed here endeth For Ulpian hath written that such high waies commonly end at the sea at rivers or at Cities Somewhat lower standeth Winsted the habitation of the Hildeards knights of ancient descent and higher into the Country Rosse from whence the honorable family of the Barons Rosse tooke their name like as they were seated there in times past and hard by the sea-side Grimstons-garth where the Grimstons for a long time have lived in good reputation and a little from hence standeth Rise the mansion house in old time of certaine noble men bearing the name of Falconberg And then in the very necke of the promontorie where it draweth in most narrow into a sharpe point and is called Spurnhead is KELNSEY a little village which plainely sheweth that this is the very OCELLVM mentioned by Ptolomee for as from OCELLVM Kelnsey is derived so Ocellum doubtlesse was made of Y-kill which as I have said before signifieth in the British tongue a Promontory or narrow necke of land From Spurn-head the shore withdraweth it selfe backe by little and little and gently bending inward shooteth Northward by Overthorne and Witherensey two little Churches called of the sisters that built them Sisters kirks and not farre from Constable-Burton so called of the Lords thereof who being by marriages linked to right honorable houses flourish at this day in great worship and out of which familie Robert as wee read in the booke of the Abbay of Meaux was one of the Earle of Aulbemarls knights who being aged and full of daies took upon him the Crosse and went with King Richard in his voiage toward the holy land Then by Skipsey which Dru the first Lord of Holdernesse fortified with a Castle When the shore beginneth to spread againe and beare out into the sea it maketh roome for a bay or creeke that Ptolomee calleth EYAIMENON GABRANTO VICORUM which the Latin Interpreters have translated some PORTUOSVM SINVM that is the barborous Creeke others SALVTAREM that is the safe Creeke But neither of them both better expresseth the nature of the Greeke word than the very name of a little village in the nouke thereof which wee call Sureby For that which is safe and sure from danger the Britans and French men both terme Seur as wee Englishmen sure who peradventure did borrow this word from the Britans There is no cause therefore why we should doubt but that this creeke was that very EYAIMENON of the GABRANTOVICI who dwelt there abouts Hard by standeth Bridlington a towne very well knowne by reason of Iohn of Bridlington a poeticall monkish prophet whose ridiculous prophesies in Rhime I have read albeit they were not worth the reading And not farre from hence for a great length toward Driffield was there a ditch cast up and brought on by the Earles of Holdernesse to confine and bound their lands which they called Earles Dyke But whence this little nation here inhabiting were named GABRANTOVICI I dare not search unlesse happily it were of goates which the Britans tearme Gaffran and whereof there is not greater store in al Britain than hereabout Neither ought this derivation of the name to seeme absurd seeing that Aegira in Achaia borroweth the name of goats Nebrodes in Sicily of fallow Deere and Boeotia in Greece of Kine and Oxen. That little Promontory which with his bent made this creeke is commonly called Flamborough head and in the Saxon tongue Fleam 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 by Authors who write that Ida the Saxon who first subdued these Countries arrived here Some think it took the name from a watchtowre which did by night put forth a flame or burning light for to direct sailers into the haven For the Britans retaine yet out of the provinciall language this word Flam and Mariners paint this creeke in their sea-cards with a blazing flame on the
whiles in hostile manner made inrodes into his lands untill the moderate carriage of the good and worthy man and processe of time pacified these quarrels Here along the sea shore you may see in many places heaps of sand whereupon they powre water untill it gather a saltish humour which afterwards with turfes they boile untill it be white salt There be also here uncertaine sands not to bee trusted but ready to catch and swallow they call them Quick-sands so dangerous for travellers whiles at a low water when tide is past they seeke to goe the nearest way that they had need to take very good heed lest in going a foot I use Sidonius his words they suffer not shipwracke and be cast away on the land But especially about the mouth of Cocar where as it were in a field of Syrts or Quick-sands Cokar sand Abbey an Abbey not long since of the Cluniack Monkes built by Ranulph de Meschines but open to the violence of windes stood betweene the mouths of Cocar and Lune or Lone and hath a bleake prospect into the wide Irish sea This river Lone commonly called Lune springing out of the mountaines of Westmorland running Southward in a chanell now broad now narrow with many a reach in and out hindring his streame enricheth the dwellers thereby in Summer time with great store of Salmons which because they delight in cleere water and especially in shallow places that are sandy come up thicke together into this and other rivers of this coast As soone as Lune is entred into Lancashire Lace a little brooke from out of the East joyneth his streame with it In which place now standeth Over-Burrow a very small village of husbandmen which as the inhabitants enformed mee had beene sometimes a great City and tooke up all those large fields betweene Lacce and Lone and after it had suffered all miseries that follow famine was driven to composition through extremity This tradition they received from their ancestours delivered as it were from hand to hand unto them And in very truth by divers and sundry monuments exceeding ancient by engraven stones pavements of square checker worke peeces of Romane coine and by this new name Burrow which with us signifieth a Burgh that place should seeme to bee of great antiquity But if it recover the ancient name it may thanke other and not mee although I have sought as narrowly and diligently for it as for Ants pathes neither is any man to thinke that the severall names of every towne in Britaine are precisely noted and set done in Ptolomee Antonine The Notice of Provinces and other approved and principall Authors But if a man may goe by ghesse I would willingly thinke that it was BREMETONACUM which Ierome Surita a Spaniard in his notes upon Antonine or Rible-chester deemeth truely to be a different place from BREMENTURACUM and that by the distance from COCCIUM or Rible-chester From this Burrow the river Lune runneth beside Thurland Tunstalls a fortresse built by Sir Thomas Tunstall in the time of King Henry the fourth when the King had given him Licence to fortifie and kernell his mansion house that is to embatle it also by Hornby a faire castle which glorieth much of the first founder N. de Mont Begon and of the Lords thereof The Harringtons and Stanleys Barons Stanleyes of Mont-Eagle descended from Thomas Stanley the first Earle of Derby of that house and advanced to that title by King Henry the eighth of whom the third and the last named William left behind him his onely daughter and heire Elizabeth wife to Edward Parker Baron Morley mother to Sir William Parker whom in that regard King James commanded to be summoned to Parliament by the title of Lord Mont-Eagle and whom wee and all our posterity may acknowledge to have beene borne for the good of all Britain For by a short letter obscurely penned and secretly sent unto him and by him dutifully discovered in a happy houre was detected at the very last houre in a maner when the whole State was at the point to perish by the most horrible and detestable treason that ever any barbarous impiety could contrive what time certaine godlesse and irreligious monsters of men masking under the mantle of religion having bestowed a great quantity of gun-powder under the Parliament house stood ready with match in hand to give fire thereto for to blow up both Prince and Countrey with one blast in a moment Lone having passed on some few miles from hence commeth within the sight of Lancaster standing on his South banke the chiefe towne of this region which the inhabitants more truly call Loncaster as the Scots also who name it Loncastell of the River Lone Both the name still remaining and the river running under it doe argue in some sort that it is LONGOVICUM where under the Lievtenant Generall of Britaine as wee finde in the Notice of Provinces a company of the Longovicarians who of the place borrowed that name kept their station Although the towne at this day is not very well peopled nor much frequented and all the inhabitants thereof are given to husbandry for the territory all round about is well manured lying open fresh and faire and not voide of woods yet for proofe of Romane antiquity they finde otherwhiles peeces of the Emperours coine especially where the Friery stood for there they say was the plot upon which the ancient City was planted which the Scots after they had with a sudden out-road wasted all in their way in the yeere of our Redemption 1322. set on fire and burnt Since which time they have begunne to build nearer unto a greene hill by the river side on which standeth the castle great I cannot say nor of any antiquity but faire and strong And hard by it standeth upon the height of the hill the onely Church they have where the Monkes aliens had in times past a cell founded by Roger of Poictiers A little beneath which by a faire bridge over Lone in the descent and side of the hill where it is steepest hangeth a peece of a most ancient wall of Romane work seeming ready to reele Wery wall they call it after a later British name as it should seeme of this towne For they called it Caer Werid as one would say The Greene City happely of that fresh greene hill But I leave this to others John Lord of Moriton and of Lancaster afterwards King of England confirmed by Charter to his Burgesses of Lancaster all the liberties which he had granted unto the Burgesses of Bristoll And King Edward the third in the sixe and thirtieth yeere of his reign granted unto the Mayor and Bailives and Commonalty of the towne of Lancaster that Plees and Sessions should not elsewhere bee holden This towne seeth the Pole Arcticke that I may note so much elevated foure and fifty degrees and five minutes and standeth removed from the utmost line of
CONGAVATA was hereabout in which the second band of the Lergi served in garison for Congavata in the British tongue signifieth The valley by Gavata which now is called short Caud But the very place where this towne stood I cannot precisely point out Betwixt the meeting of these rivers the ancient City Carlile is passing commodiously and pleasantly seated garded on the North side with the chanell of Eden on the East with Peterill on the West with Caud and beside these naturall fenses it is fortified with strong walls of stone with a castle and a citadell as they tearme it In fashion it lyeth somewhat long running out from West to East on the West side is the Castle of a good large compasse which King Richard the third as appeareth by his Armes repaired In the midst almost of the City riseth on high the Cathedrall Church the upper part whereof being the newer is very artificially and curiously wrought yet the nether part is much more ancient But on the East side it is defended with the Citadel that K. Henry the eighth built strongly with sundry bulwarks The Romans and Britans called this city LUGU-VALLUM and LUGU-BALLIUM or LUGU-BALIA the English Saxons Luell as Bede witnesseth Ptolomee as some think LEUCOPIBIA Ninnius Caer Lualid the ridiculous prophesies of the Britans tearmed it The City of Duball we Carlile and Latine writers by a newer name Carleolum For our Historiographers accord with common consent that Luguballia and Carleolum were the same But in searching out the Etymology thereof good God how hath Leland bestirred him being in the end driven to this point that he thought verily Eden was called Lugus and Ballum came from Vallis that is a vale so that Lugu-ballum soundeth as much as the Vale by Lugus But I if so bee I may also hatch a conjecture would rather suppose but without prejudice that the said termination Vallum and Vallia are derived from that most famous military Vallum or Trench that standeth apparent a little from the City For that Picts Wall which was afterwards set upon the Trench or rampire of Severus appeareth somewhat beyond the River Eden which now hath a woodden bridge over it neere unto a little village called Stanwicke and went over the very river just against the Castle where within the chanell of the river mighty stones the remaines thereof are yet extant Also Lugus or Lucus amongst the ancient Celis or Gaules who spake the same language that once the Britans did signifieth a Tower as we may learn by Pomponius Mela. For that which in Antonine is named LUGO-AUGUSTI hee calleth TURRIM AUGUSTI that is The Tower of Augustus so that Luga-Vallum is as much to say as the Tower or Fort by the wall From this originall if the Frenchmen had derived Lugudunum as it were The tower on an hill and Lucotecia for so in old time they called that city which we doâ— Lutetia that is Paris as it were The faire Tower for so those words signifie in the British tongue peradventure they had aimed neerer unto the marke than in fetching the one from Lutum that is Dirt and that other from Lugdus an imagined King That this Carlile flourished in the time of the Romanes divers tokens of antiquity now and then digged up there and the famous mention of it in those dayes doe sufficiently prove After the furious outrages also of the Picts and Scots were allayed it retained some part still of the ancient dignity and was counted a City For in the yeere of Christ 619. Egfrid King of Northumberland passed a gift unto that holy Saint Cuthbert in this forme I have given unto him also the City called Luguballia and â—5 miles round about it at which time also it was walled strong The Citizens saith Bede brought Cuthbert to see the walls of their City and a fountain or Well in it built in times past according to the wonderfull workmanship of the Romanes who at the very same time as saith the book of Durham ordained there a Covent of Nuns with an Abbesse and Schooles Afterwards being defaced and brought to exceeding ruin by the Danes it lay about 200. yeeres buried under his owne ashes untill it began againe to flourish under the government and favour of King William Rufus who repaired it with new edifices built the Castle and placed a Colony there first of Flemmings whom streightwaies upon better advice he removed into Wales but afterwards of Southerne Englishmen Then was there seen as William of Malmesbury writeth A dining chamber after the Roman fashion built of stone arched with vaults so that no spitefull force of tempests nor furious flame of fire could ever shake or hurt it in the forefront whereof was this Inscription MARII VICTORIAE that is â—o the victory of Marius This Marius some will needs have to be Arviragus the Britan others that Marius who being proclaimed Emperour against Gallienus was named to bee of wonderfull strength that as writers report of him He had in his fingers no veines but all sinewes Yet have I learned that another making mention of this stone saith it was not inscribed MARII VICTORIAE but MARTI VICTORI that is To victorious Mars which perhaps may better content some and seeme to come nearer unto the truth Carlile being now better peopled and of greater resort had as they write for Earle or more truly for Lord thereof Ralph Meschines from whom came the Earles of Chester and at the same time being raised by King Henry the first to an Episcopall dignity had Artalph for the first Bishop Which the Monks of Durham have written was prejudiciall to their Church when Ranulph say they Bishop of Durham was banished and the Church had none to defend her certain Bishops laid Carlile and Tividale to their Dioeceses But how the Scotish under the reign of Stephen won this City and King Henry the second recovered it how also King Henry the third committed the castle of Carlile and the County to Robert Vipont how likewise in the yeere 1292. it was burnt together with the Cathedrall Church and the Suburbs and how Robert Briâ— King of Scots in the yeere 1315. land siege unto it in vaine you may finde in the common Chronicles And yet it seemes it would quit my paines to adjoyne here two inscriptions that I saw here the one in Thomas Aglion by his house neere unto the Citadell but made in the worse age DIIS MANIBU SMARCI TROJANI AUGUSTINANI TUM FA CIENDUM CUR A VIT AFEL AMMILLUSIMA CONJUX KARISS Whereunto is adjoined the image of a man of Armes on horsebacke armed at all peeces with a launce in his hand As for the other it standeth in the garden of Thomas Middleton in a very large and faire letter thus LEG VI VIC P. F. G. P. R. F. Which is as I ghesse Legio Sexta Victrix Pia Felix the rest let some other decipher The onely Earle that
either by dint of sword conquered or by surrender gat the whole into his owne hands and was the first that was stiled Earle of Ulster but when his great exploits and fortunate archievements had wrought him such envie that through his owne vertues and other mens vices he was banished out of the Realme Hugh Lacy the second sonne of Hugh Lacy Lord of Meth who had commandement to pursue him by force and armes was by King John appointed his successour being created Earle of Ulster by the sword of which honour notwithstanding the same King afterward deprived him for his tumultuous insolency and hee was in the end received into favour againe But for the sounder testimony hereof it were good to exemplifie the same word for word out of the records of Ireland Hugh de Lacy sometime Earle of Ulster held all Ulster exempt and separate from all other counties whatsoever of the Kings of England in chiefe by service of three Knights so often as the Kings service was proclaimed and be held all Pleas in his owne Court that pertaine to a Iustice and Sheriffe and held a Court of Chancery of his own c. And afterward all Ulster came into the hands of our Soveraigne Lord K. Iohn by the forfeiture of the foresaid Hugh unto whom after that K. Henry the third demised it for terme of the said Hughs life And when Hugh was deceased Walter de Burgo did that service unto Lord Edward K. Henries son Lord of Ireland before he was King And the same Lord Edward feoffed the aforesaid Walter in the said land of Ulster to have and to hold unto the same Walter and to his heires by the service aforesaid as freely and wholly as the above named Hugh de Lacy held it excepting the advowsons of Cathedrall Churches and the demesne of the same also the Pleas of the Crowne to wit Rape Forstall Firing and Treasure Trouve which our soveraigne Lord K. Edward retained to himselfe and his heires This Walter de Burgo who was Lord of Conaght and Earle of Ulster begat of the only daughter of Hugh de Lacy Richard Earle of Ulster who after hee had endured many troubles and calamities died in the yeere 1326. Richard had issue Iohn de Burgo who departed this life before his father having begotten upon Elizabeth sister and one of the heires of Gilbert Clare Earle of Glocester William who succeeded after his grandfather This William being slain by his own men when he was young left behind him a little daughter his only child who being married unto Leonell Duke of Clarence bare one daughter likewise the wife of Edmund Mortimer Earle of March by whom the Earledome of Ulster and Seigniory of Conaght came unto the Mortimers and from them together with the kingdome of England unto the house of Yorke and afterward Edward the fourth King of England adjoined it unto the Kings Domaine or Crowne land And when as at the same time England was divided into sides and factions whiles the civill warre grew hot and the English that abode here returned out of Ulster into England to follow the factions O-Neal and others of Irish blood seized these countries into their own hands and brought them to such wildnesse and savage barbarisme as it exceeded In so much as this province which in times past paied a mighty masse of money unto their Earles scarcely ever since yeelded any coin at all unto the Kings of England And verily in no one thing whatsoever pardon this my over-boldnesse have the Kings of England beene more defective in piety and policie than that they have for these so many ages seen so slightly to this Province yea and to all Ireland in the propagation of religion establishing the weale publike and reducing the life of the inhabitants to civility whether it was for carelesse neglect sparing or a fore-cast of dammage or some reason of state I am not able to say But that the same may be no longer thus neglected it seemeth of it selfe by good right to importune most earnestly being an Iland so great so neere a neigbour so fruitfull in soile so rich in pastures more than credible beset with so many woods enriched with so many mineralls if they were searched watered with so many rivers environed with so many havens lying so fit and commodious for failing into most wealthy countries and thereby like to bee for impost and custome very profitable and to conclude breeding and rearing men so abundantly as it doth who considering either their mindes or their bodies might be of singular emploiment for all duties and functions as well of warre as of peace if they were wrought and conformed to orderly civility I Intimated even now that I would speak touching the O-Neals who carried themselves as Lords of Ulster and I promised not long since a friend of mine that I would write of their rebellions raised in our age And verily I will performe my promise to his Manes whom whiles he lived I observed with all respect and being now in heaven I will not forget Thus much onely I will promise by way of Preface that I have compendiously collected these matters out of my Annales and here conjoined them which there are severed and divided according to their severall times and withall that whatsoever I shall write is not upon uncertaine rumours but gathered summarily from out oâ— their owne hand writings who managed those affaires and were present in the actions And this will I doe with so sincere an affection to the truth and so uncorrupt fidelity that I doubt not but I shall have thanks at their hands who love the truth and desire to understand the late affaires of Ireland and not incurre the blame of any unlesse they be such as having done ill take it not well if themselves be accordingly censured THE O-NEALES AND THEIR REBELLIONS IN OUR TIME TO say nothing of that GREAT NEALE who ruled by force and armes in Ulster and a great part of Ireland before the comming of Saint Patricke nor of those in the middle times who were but of meane note and memoriall to speake of this family after the arrivall of the English in Ireland lay close and obscure in remote lurking corners unlesse it were when Edward Brus brother to Robert King of Scotland named himselfe King of Ireland For then in a troublesome time Dovenald O-Neale started and rowsed himselfe out of his lurking holes and in his missives unto the Pope used this title in his stile Dovenald O-Neale King of Ulster and in right of inheritance the undoubted heire of all Ireland But after these stirres and troubles were laid this new King soone vanished away and Dovenalds posterity pluckt in their hornes and hid their heads untill that whiles England was all in a combustion kindled by the furious firebrands of civill warres betweene the houses of Yorke and Lancaster for the Imperiall Crowne those English that served and lived here abandoning Ulster and
hands upon him For which barbarous and inhumane murdering of his cousin german he was charged in England but the Queene of her royall clemency and for the hope that she had conceived of the Earle craving with repentance forgivenesse of this fault and submitting himselfe to divers good orders for his obedience pardoned him to the great griefe of some good men But this soone after more grieved him yea pricked as it were and sore galled him that the Deputy had suppressed the name of Mac Mahon in the country next adjoyning unto him and withall to abate and weaken the power of that mighty family had divided the country among many He I say hereupon conceived a feare lest the same would befall unto him and other Chieftanes of Ulster At which very time there began some secret grudges and heart burnings to arise between the Earle and Sir Henrie Bagnall the Marshall whose sister the Earle had carried away and married The Earle complained that whatsoever he had with the losse of his blood and painfull travell reduced to the obedience of the Prince the Marshall and not he reaped the fruit and gaine thereof that the Marshall by suborning most base and vile persons as witnesses had falsely brought him into question for high treason had incited Sir William Fitz-Williams then Lord Deputy his deadly enemy by corruptions and bribery to worke his destruction and that he lay in waite to take away his life And in very truth the Deputies information against the Earle found credit in the Court of England untill the said Earle wrote his letters and offred judicially to be tried either in England or in Ireland This is for certain known that much about this time he together with the chiefery or greatest men of Ulster by secret parlees combined in an association that they would defend the Romish religion for Religion now a daies is made the mantle for all rebellion that they would in no wise admit Sheriffes or Garrison souldiers in their Territories and mutually maintain one anothers right yea and withstand all wrongs offered by the English The first Champion thrust forward to sound the alarum was Mac-Gwyr a man of a turbulent spirit he by way of preying all before him maketh a road into Conaght accompanied with Gauran a Priest who being ordeined by the Pope Primate of Ireland commanded him in the name and with the helpe of God to try his fortune and to fight the Lords battell assuring him of most happy successe yet fell it out otherwise for Mac-Gwyr through the valour of Sir Richard Bingham was discomfited and put to flight and the Primate with others slaine Soone after Mac-Gwyr brake out into open rebellion whom the Earle himselfe together with the Marshall in a shew of dutifull attendance pursued and in this service with great commendation of his forwardnesse was wounded in the thigh Howbeit wholly intentive to provide for his own security he intercepteth the sons of Shan O-Neale and makes them sure for doing any harme neither would he by any meanes being requested thereto set them at liberty but minding another matter maketh most grievous complaints of the injuries offered unto him by the Deputy the Marshall and the garrison souldiers which notwithstanding within a while after he carried so covertly that as if he had forgotten all quarels he came under safe conduct unto the Deputy submitted himselfe and after hee had professed all manner of dutifull obedience returned home with great commendation When as now Sir William Fitz Williams the Lord Deputy was revoked home out of Ireland Sir William Russell succeeded in that office Unto him repaired the Earle of his own accord exhibited an humble submission upon his knees to the Lord Deputy wherein he dolefully expressed his great griefe that the Queen had conceived indignation against him as of one undutifull and disloyall Hee acknowledged that the late absenting himselfe from the state was disagreable to his obedience albeit it was occasioned by some hard measures of the late Lord Deputie as though he and the Marshall had combined for his destruction He acknowledged that the Queene advanced him to high title and great livings that she ever upheld him and enabled him that shee who by grace had advanced him was able by her force to subvert him and therefore if he were voide of gratitude yet he could not be so voide of reason as to worke his owne ruine Furthermore he made liberall promises that he would most willingly do whatsoever should be enjoyned him which hee also had promised in his letters sent unto the Lords of the Councell in England and earnestly besought that he might be received into favour againe with the Queene as before time which he had lost not by any desert of his owne but through the forged informations and suggestions of his adversaries At the same time Bagnall the Marshall was present in the place who exhibited articles against the Earle and accused him that hee had underhand suborned and sent Mac-Guir with the Primate above named into Conaght that hee had complotted secretly with Mac-Guir O-Donel and other conspirators and had aided them by Cormac-Mac-Baron the Earles brother and Con the Earles base son and some of his servants in the wasting of Monaghan and besieging of Inis-Kellin and by means drawn away the Captaines of Kilulio and Kilwarny from their loialty and obedience to the Queen Hereupon it was seriously debated among the Councellors of the kingdome whether the Earle should be staied to make his answer or no The Deputy thought good that he should be detained But when it was put to question generally the more part either upon a vaine feare or forward inclination to favour the Earle were instant to have him dismissed the matter to be put off unto a further day of hearing pretending certaine waighty considerations and that the Articles exhibited were without proofe or time Thus the Deputie in a sort was forced to yeeld to the experience of the Councell and the Earle was permitted to depart and his accusers there present had no audience Which troubled and disquieted the Queen not a little considering that his wicked designements and acts were now apparent to every one and the Queene her selfe had given warning afore hand that he should be detained untill he had cleered himselfe of those imputations The Earle being now returned home when he heard that a new supply of souldiers was comming out of England and thirteene hundred besides of old servitors out of the Low-countries who had served in little Britaine under Sir John Norris and that the English entended now to possesse themselves of Balashanon and Belik Castles upon the mouth of Logh-Earn he being privie to himself of his own evill purposes and carrying a guilty conscience on a sudden assaileth the fort at Blackwater by which the entry lay into Tir-Oen his owne country and had it surrendred up unto him And at the very same instant in maner hee wavering in his minde with one