Duke of Norfolk

“ As to my name, rank, station, et cetera, my name is Ralph Woodhall, a distant relation of a nobleman of that name, without any rank but that of a Master of Arts, without any condition which can particularly designate me but that of being at present a guest of the Duke of Norfolk, and having undertaken, at his request, to escort Lady Danvers on a part of her way to the West."
The magistrates all looked very blank, for the Duke of Norfolk was the great man in those parts; and great men, whether good men or not, obtained much more deference in those days than at present. ”

“ BILBO.
And do you serve the good duke of Norfolk still?
HOST. Still, and still, and still, my souldier of S. Quintins: come, follow me; I have Charles waine below in a but of sack, t’will glister like your Crab-fish.
BILBO. You have fine Scholler-like terms; your Coopers Dixionary is your only book to study in a celler, a man shall find very strange words in it. Come, my host, let’s serve the good duke of Norfolk.
HOST. And still, and still, and still, my boy, I’ll serve the good duke of Norfolk.
[Exeunt Host and Bilbo.]
[Enter Sir Arthur Clare, Harry Clare, and Milliscent.] ”

“ The Duke of Norfolk is a very good lord and father to me; but when there are more ways of thinking than one in a house, 'tis no easy matter to please all which have a right to be considered; and, in the matter of religion, 'tis very hard to avoid giving offence. ”

“ For hundreds of years titles in England have been essentially unmeaning; void of that very weak and very human instinct in which titles originated. In essential nonsense of application there is nothing to choose between Northcliffe and Norfolk. The Duke of Norfolk means (as my exquisite and laborious knowledge of Latin informs me) the Leader of Norfolk. It is idle to talk against representative government or for it. All government is representative government until it begins to decay. Unfortunately (as is also evident) all government begins to decay the instant it begins to govern. ”

“ Anne, their only daughter, who married Richard Plantaginet of Shrewsbury, Duke of York, second son to King Edward IV. who, because the title of Duke of Norfolk was by the creation limited to the heirs male of the Mowbrays, he obtained a patent from his father, creating him Duke of Norfolk, and Earl Warren; with annuities of 40l. a year, out of the revenues of the counties of Norfolk and Suffolk, and 20l per annum out of the profits of the counties of Surrey and Sussex, to be paid by the sheriff's of those counties. ”

“ All aristocrats were first meant as envoys of democracy; and most envoys of democracy lose no time in becoming aristocrats. By the old essential human notion, the Duke of Norfolk ought simply to be the first or most manifest of Norfolk men. ”

“ If we analyse the characters of the men themselves, we shall not find in them anything particularly noble or elevated, if we except the gifted and chivalric son of Norfolk—the poetical Earl of Surrey. The Norfolk family was singularly destitute of unity in itself—of warm natural affection. We have seen the old duke, with the utmost willingness, nay, even eagerness, and a cruel asperity, lending himself to the destruction of his nieces—Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard. ”

“ This nobleman died unmarried in 1677, and his brother Henry (who had been created Earl of Norwich, and in 1672 Earl Marshal of England, to him and the heirs male of his body, with other limitations in default) thereupon became sixth Duke of Norfolk. By him the marbles and library were finally dispersed. ”

“ All who stood near the throne foresaw his speedy death and the horrors of a minority, and were naturally anxious about their own position in the coming reign. Suddenly, on 12 Dec. 1546, the Duke of Norfolk and his son Henry Howard, earl of Surrey, the poet, were made prisoners. Evidence had been collected against them beforehand that they were speculating upon a regency, and gentlemen were despatched into Norfolk before his apprehension got wind to take possession of the duke's house at Kenninghall, and to examine his friends there. ”

“ He commanded the army which defeated the Scots at Flodden in September 1513, and was created duke of Norfolk in February of the following year, with precedence as of the creation of 1483. In his later years Norfolk worked more harmoniously with Wolsey. He was guardian of England during Henry's absence in France in 1520, and he acted as lord high steward at the trial of his friend Edward Stafford, duke of Buckingham, in 1521. ”

“ The height of his prosperity alone was the source of his misfortunes, and engaged him in attempts from which his virtue and prudence would naturally have forever kept him at a distance.
Norfolk was at this time a widower; and being of a suitable age, his marriage with the queen of Scots had appeared so natural, that it occurred to several of his friends and those of that princess: but the first person who, after Secretary Lidington, opened the scheme to the duke, is said to have been the earl of Murray, before his departure for Scotland. ”

“ After several attainders and partial restorations in the reigns of the Tudors and the Stuarts, the earl marshalship was granted anew to the Howards by Charles II. in 1672 and entailed on their male line, with many specific remainders and limitations, under which settlement it has regularly descended to the present duke of Norfolk. ”

“ After the Dissolution, the site, &c. with Windham abbey manor, was given, in 1545, to Thomas Howard Earl of Surrey, during the life of Thomas Howard Duke of Norfolk, his father, if the Earl so long lived, paying into the Court of Augmentations 9l. 7s. 7d. a year. It came after to the Crown, belonged to Queen Mary, and was granted by Queen Elizabeth, in 1564, to Walter Haddon, to be held by the fee-farm of 11l. 9s. 8d. per annum. ”

“ Norfolk. It is a marvellous and false world that we live in; for I know well that, had it not been for some persons, my lord your father of Lancaster and yourself would have been taken or killed, when you went to Windsor after the Parliament. The Dukes of Albemarle and Exeter, and the Earl of Worcester and I, have pledged ourselves never to assent to the undoing of any lord without just and reasonable cause. But this malicious project belongs to the Duke of Surrey, the Earls of Wiltshire and Salisbury, drawing to themselves the Earl of Gloucester. ”

“ And soon after, Richard Duke of Gloucester, to settle his brother Edward firmly on the throne, murdered good King Henry in the Tower, he being then 52 years of age; a prince, as all historians agree, of great virtue, immense charity, and exemplary life, reputed so holy, that miracles were said to be wrought by him; King Henry VII. would have had him canonised or made a saint, and his holiday inserted in the Calendar, but the Pope insisting on too large a sum for it, it was not done.
This year died John Mowbray Duke of Norfolk, a great favourite of King Edward's ”

“ Old John of Gaunt, time-honoured Lancaster, Hast thou, according to thy oath and band, Brought hither Henry Hereford, thy bold son, Here to make good the boist'rous late appeal, Which then our leisure would not let us hear, Against the Duke of Norfolk, Thomas Mowbray? ”

“ The number can hardly be correct. York having summoned a parliament for 9 July, Norfolk nominated his cousin, John Howard, afterwards Duke of Norfolk himself, and Sir Roger Chamberlain to be knights of the shire for Norfolk, and the duchess wrote in their favour to John Paston, who had again aspired to the position, urging that her lord needed in parliament 'such persons as long unto him and be of his menial servants' (ib. p. 337) . ”

“ He soon found that the first line ran: ‘Fallete tollite Norfolk’ (Betray and take Norfolk) ; whence it was evident{153} that the man in the cave had played false to all parties, and after engaging in the conspiracy, had leagued with some fellow-conspirators to betray their chief, the unhappy Duke who preceded Mary of Scotland to the scaffold instead of sharing her throne. ‘Betray and take Norfolk!’ It was not good Latin certainly, but good enough for an inscription where there were so many breaks, which imagination could fill up with the elegances of language ”

“ The House of Lords, as at present constituted, consists of something less than five hundred temporal peers. The first in order of hereditary precedence, after the princes of the blood royal, is the Duke of Norfolk, a blameless young gentleman of eight-and-twenty years, and a zealous Catholic, as it is generally supposed that a Howard is compelled to be by a mysterious law of his nature. As a matter of fact, however, no family in England has changed its religion so often. Henry Charles, thirteenth duke, seceded from the Church of Rome on the occasion of the papal aggression. ”

“ This year, the Earls of Northumberland and Huntington, the Lords Tho. Howard and Willoughby, with many other lords and knights, came to Norwich, to visit the Duke of Norfolk there, and were all lodged with their retinue at the Duke's palace; and during their stay, they diverted themselves with shooting and other martial exercises on Moushold-Heath; and it being at the time that the mayor's feast was to be held at the New-hall, Will. Mingay, Esq. then mayor, invited them and their ladies to the feast, John Suckling, baker, Tho. ”

“ There had not long before been a secret negociation entered into between some of the Scottish and English nobility, to bring abont a marriage between Mary Q. of Scots, at that time a prisoner in England, and the Duke of Norfolk, a nobleman of excellent character. This match was proposed to all the most considerable of the English nobility, and among the rest to the Earls of Northumberland and Westmoreland, two noblemen very powerful in the North. ”