Page:Archaeologia Volume 13.djvu/100

74

About the year 1562 the commotions in France, during the minority of Charles the IXth, between the princes of the popish and the reformed religion, soon spread themselves by a kind of contagion to this island; and Arthur Poole, and his brother, great-grand- children to George, duke of Clarence, brother to king Edward the IVth, and Anthony Fortescue, who had married their sister, with others, were accused of conspiring to withdraw themselves into France, upon a design formed of landing an army from thence in Wales, there to proclaim the queen of Scots queen of England, and to declare this Arthur Poole duke of Clarence; all which they confessed at their trials, protesting, however, that they had no de- sign in it during the life of queen Elizabeth, but had been rashly induced to credit some who pretended to foretell that her majesty would not outlive that year. The words of Camden are, "Quæ singula pro Tribunali ingenue sunt confessi, protestati tamen non hæc suscepturos Elizabetha superstite, quam anno vertente moritu- ram illicitis ariolorum artibus feducti crediderant."

Arthur Poole's brother, whose name was Edmund, has left two inscriptions: "Æ. 21. E. Poole, 1562," and "Æ. 27. E. P. A°. 1568." Pl. VI. Fig. 1, 2.

In Strype's Annals of the Reformation, Vol. I. p. 373, we are told that "Arthur Pole, Edmonde Pole, Anthonye Fortescue, john