Constance Sherwood: An Autobiography of the Sixteenth Century

a short time in my Lady Lumley's chamber, my LordArundel sent for his granddaughter, who was wont, she told me, at thathour to write letters for him; and I stayed alone with her ladyship,who, as soon as Lady Surrey left us, thus broke forth in her praise:

  "Hath any one, think you. Mistress Sherwood, ever pictured or imagineda creature more noble, more toward in disposition, more virtuous inall her actions, of greater courage in adversity or patience underill-usage than this one, which God hath sent to this house to cheertwo lonely hearts, whilst her own is well-nigh broken?"

  "Oh, my Lady Lumley!" I exclaimed, "I fear some new misfortune hathbefallen this dear lady, who is indeed so rare a piece of goodnessthat none can exceed in describing her deserts. Hitherto she hathcondescended to impart her sorrows to her poor friend; but to-day sheshut up her griefs in her own bosom, albeit I could read unspokensuffering in every lineament of her sweet countenance."

  "God forgive me," her ladyship replied, "if in speaking of her wrongsI should entertain over-resentful feelings toward her ungracioushusband, whom once I did love as a mother, and very loth hath my heartbeen to condemn him; but now, if it were not that I myself receivedhim in my arms what time he was born, whose life was the cause of mysweet young sister's death, I should doubt he could be her son."

  "What fresh injury," I timidly asked, "hath driven Lady Surrey fromher house?"

  "_Her_ house no longer," quoth Lady Lumley. "She hath no house, nohome, no husband worthy of the name, and only an old man nigh unto thegrave, alas! and a poor feeble woman such as I am to raise a voice inher behalf, who is spurned by one who should have loved and cherishedher, as twice before God's altar he vowed to do. Oh," cried the poorlady, weeping, "she hath borne all things else with a sweet fortitudewhich angels looking down on her must needs have wondered at. Shewould ever be excusing this faithless husband with many pretty wilesand loving subterfuges, making, sweet sophist, the worst appear thebetter reason. 'Men must needs be pardoned,' she would say, when mygood father waxed wroth at his ill-usage of her, 'for such outwardneglect as many practice in these days toward their wives, for that itwas the fashion at the court to appear unhusbandly; but if women wouldbe patient, she would warrant them their love should be requited atlast.' And when news came that Phil had sold an estate for topurchase--God save the mark!--a circlet of black pearls for the queen;and Lord Arundel swore he should leave him none of his lands but whatby act of parliament he was compelled to do, she smiled winsomely, andsaid: 'Yea, my lord, I pray you, let my dear Phil be a poor man as hisfather wished him to be, and then, if it please God, we may live in acottage and be happy.' And so turned away his anger by soft words, forhe laughed and answered: 'Heaven help thee. Nan! but I fear thatcottage must needs be Arundel Castle, for my hands are so tied thereinthat thy knavish husband cannot fail to inherit it. And beshrew me ifI would either rob thee of it, mine own good Nan, or its old walls ofthy sweet presence when I shall be dead.' And so she always pleadedfor him, and never lost heart until . . . Oh, Mistress Sherwood, Ishall never forget the day when her uncle, Francis Dacre--wisely orunwisely I know not, but surely meaning well--gave her to read in thishouse, where she was spending a day, a letter which had fallen intohis hands, I wot not how, in the which Philip--God forgivehim!--expressed some kind of doubt if he was truly married to her ornot. Some wily wretch had, I ween, whispered to him, in an evil hour,this accursed thought. When she saw this misdoubt written in his handshe straightway fell down in a swoon, which recovering from, the firstthing she did was to ask for her cloak and hat, and would have walkedalone to her house if I had not stayed her almost by force, until LordArundel's coach could be got ready for her. In less than two hours shereturned with so wan and death-like a countenance that it frighted meto see her, and for some time she would not speak of what had passedbetween her lord and herself; only she asked for to stay always inthis house, if it should please her grandfather, and not to part fromus any more. At the which speech I could but kiss her, and with manytears protest that this should be the joyfullest news in the world toLord Arundel and to me, and what he would most desire, if it were notfor her grief, which, like an ill wind, yet did blow us this good.'Yea,' she answered, with the deepest sigh which can be thought of, 'acold, withering blast which driveth me from the shelter which shouldbe mine! I have heard it said that when Cardinal Wolsey lay a-dying hecried, "It were well with me now if I had served my God with the likezeal with which I have served my king," or some words of that sort.Oh, my Lady Lumley!' the poor child exclaimed, 'if I had not lovedPhilip more than God and his Church, methinks I should not thus becast off!' 'Cast off,' I cried; 'and has my graceless nephew, then,been so wicked?' 'Oh, he is changed,' she answered--'he is changed.In his eyes, in his voice, I found not Philip's looks, nor Philip'stones. Nought but harshness and impatience to dismiss me. The queen,he said, was coming to rest at his house on her way to the city, andhe lacked leisure to listen to my complaints. Then I felt grief andanger rise in my breast with such vehemency that I charged him, maybetoo suddenly, with the doubt he had expressed in his letter to my LordOxford. His face flushed deeply; but drawing up haughtily, as oneaggrieved, he said the manner of our marrying had been so unusual thatthere were some, and those persons well qualified to judge, whomisdoubted if there did not exist a flaw in its validity. That heshould himself be loth to think so, but that to seek at that moment toprove the contrary, when his fortunes hung on a thread, would be toruin him.'

  "There she paused, and clasped her hands together as if scarce able toproceed; but soon raising her head, she related in a passionate mannerhow her heart had then swelled well-nigh to bursting, pride andtenderness restraining the utterance of such resentful thoughts asrose in her when she remembered his father's last letter, wherein hesaid his chief prop and stay in his fallen estate should be the wifehe had bestowed on him; of her own lands sold for the supply of hisprodigal courtiership; of her long patience and pleading for him toothers; and this his present treatment of her, which no wife couldbrook, even if of mean birth and virtue, much loss one his equal incondition, as well dowered as any in the land, and as faithfuland tender to him as he did prove untoward to her. But none of thesereproaches passed her lips; for it was an impossible thing to her, shesaid, to urge her own deserts, or so much as mention the fortune shehad brought him. Only twice she repeated, 'Ruin your fortunes, mylord! ruin your fortunes! God help me, I had thought rather to mendthem!' And then, when he tried to answer her in some sort of evadingfashion, as if unsaying, and yet not wholly denying his former speech,she broke forth (and in the relation of this scene the passion of hergrief renewed itself) in vehement adjurations, which seemed somewhatto move him, not to be so unjust to her or to himself as to leave thatin uncertainty which so nearly touched both their honors; and if thethought of a mutual love once existing between them, and a firm bondof marriage relied on with unshaken security, and his father's dyingblessing on it, and the humble duty she had shown him from the timeshe had borne his name, sufficed not to resolve him thereunto, yet forthe sake of justice to one fatherless and brotherless as herself, shecharged him without delay to make that clear which, left uncertain,concerned her more nearly than fortune or state, and without which no,not one day, would she abide in his house. Then the sweet soul saidshe hoped, from his not ungracious silence and the working of hisfeatures, which visibly revealed an inward struggle, that his nextwords should have been of comfort to her; but when she had drawn nighto him, and, taking his hand, called him by his name with so much ofreproachful endearment as could be expressed in the utterance of it, agentleman broke into the room crying out: 'My lord, my lord, thetrumpets do sound! The queen's coach is in sight.' Upon which, shesaid that, with a muttered oath, he started up and almost thrust herfrom him, saying, 'For God's sake, be gone!' And by a back-door,' sheadded, 'I went out of mine own house into the street, where I had leftmy Lord Arundel's coach, and crept into it, very faint and giddy, thewhile the queen's coach did enter the court with gay banners waving,and striking-up of music, and the
people crying out, "God bless thequeen!" I cry God mercy for it,' she said, 'but I could not say amen.'Now she is resolved," my Lady Lumley continued, "never to set her footagain in any of her husband's houses, except he doth himself entreather to it, and makes that matter clear touching his belief in thevalidity of their marriage; and methinks she is right therein. My LordArundel hath written to remonstrate with his grandson touching hisill-usage of his lady, and hath also addressed her majesty thereupon.But all the comment she did make on his letter, I have been told, wasthis: 'That she had heard my Lord Arundel was in his dotage; andverily she did now hold it