Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 11.djvu/274

 the queen was dead, 'and thus God preserved the protestants in Ireland.' This singular anecdote is related on the authority of Archbishop Ussher (, Hist. of Ireland, i. 308). Cardinal Pole constituted Cole one of the overseers of his will (, Eccl. Memorials, iii. 468).

He was one of the eight Roman catholic divines appointed to argue against the same number of protestants in the disputation which began at Westminster Abbey, 31 March 1559, before a great assembly of peers and members of the House of Commons. Cole was appointed spokesman of the catholic party, and on the first day defended the use of the Latin language in the public services of the church. Jewel, in a letter to Peter Martyr, says: 'I never heard any one rave after a more solemn and dictatorial manner. Had my friend Julius been present, he would have exclaimed a hundred times over, Poh! whoreson knave!' (, Works, iv. 1202, 1203). On the second day the conference was abruptly brought to a termination by the lord keeper (Bacon). Cole was fined five hundred marks for contempt, and then, or soon afterwards, lost all his preferments. On 20 May 1560 he was committed to the Tower, whence he was removed to the Fleet on 10 June following (, Diary, 235, 238). His subsequent history is involved in some uncertainty. It is said that he regained his liberty on 4 April 1574, but his name occurs in a list of prisoners in the Fleet in 1579. According to some accounts, he died in or near Wood Street compter in December that year; and, according to another statement, he was buried on 4 Feb. 1579-80. He was probably eighty years of age. It has, indeed, been asserted that he was in his eighty-seventh year, but this may be reasonably questioned.

Leland, the antiquary, who was personally acquainted with Cole, speaks of him in terms of high praise (Encomia, 79). Roger Ascham also commends him, remarking in a letter addressed to him: 'I have heard so much by common report of your erudition, and by Mr. Morysin of your humanity, that I must renounce all pretensions to learning if I did not esteem you, and be altogether inhuman if I did not love you' (Epistolœ, 261, 270). Strype, on the other hand, describes Cole as 'a person more earnest than wise.'

His works are:
 * 1) Disputation with Cranmer, Ridley, and Latimer at Oxford. In Foxe's 'Acts and Monuments.'
 * 2) The sum and effect of his sermon at Oxford, when Archbishop Cranmer was burnt. In Foxe's 'Acts and Monuments.'
 * 3) Answer to the first proposition of the protestants at the disputation before the lords at Westminster, 1559. Manuscript in library of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, 121, p. 185; printed in Burnet's 'Hist. of the Reformation,' Records, pt. 2, b. 3, n. 4.
 * 4) 'Letters to John [Jewel], Bishop of Sarum, upon occasion of a Sermon that the said Bishop preached before the Queen's Majesty and her most honorable Counsell, an. 1560,' London, 1560, 8vo. Also in Jewel's 'Works.'
 * 5) 'Answer to certain parcels of the letters of the Bishop of Sarum' (respecting the said sermon). In Jewel's 'Works.'

 COLE, HENRY (1808–1882), official, was born at Bath 15 July 1808. He was the son of Captain Henry Robert Cole, then of the 1st dragoon guards, by his wife Lætitia Dormer. He was sent in 1817 to Christ's Hospital, and upon leaving school in 1823 became clerk to Francis (afterwards Sir Francis) Palgrave, and then a sub-commissioner under the record commission. Cole was employed in transcribing records, but found time to study water-colour painting under David Cox, and exhibited sketches at the Royal Academy. He lived with his father in a house belonging to Thomas Love Peacock, who retained two rooms in it, and became a friend of young Cole. Cole drew for him, helped him in writing critiques of musical performances, and was introduced by him to J. S. Mill, Charles Buller, and George Grote. The friends used to meet at Grote's house in Threadneedle Street for discussions twice a week. A new record commission was issued in 1831, and in 1833 Cole was appointed a sub-commissioner. The secretary, [q. v.], quarrelled with the commission, and with Cole, who applied to Charles Buller for protection. A committee of the House of Commons was appointed upon Buller's motion in 1836, which reported against the existing system, and the commission lapsed on the death of William IV, 20 June 1837. Cole wrote many articles in support of Buller. He was appointed by Lord Langdale, who, as master of the rolls, administered the affairs of the commission, to take charge of the records of the exchequer of pleas. The record office was constituted in 1838, and Cole became one of the four senior assistant-keepers. He 