Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 14.djvu/58

 that he was unable to visit him personally, owing to his ‘fulsum diseassis.’ It appears that he was suffering from a rupture. He at the same time sent Sir Arthur with messages both to Cromwell and to the Duke of Norfolk, among other things complaining that he had not been allowed to go home into Yorkshire since the parliament began. And this must mean since November 1529 when the still existing parliament began, not since the beginning of a session, for it was then vacation time. A significant part of the instructions to Sir Arthur as regards the Duke of Norfolk was to deliver a letter to him ‘for no goodness in him but to stop his evil tongue’ (ib. Nos. 1142–3 and p. 467). Yet the very month in which his son was appointed captain of Jersey he began to hold secret communications with Chapuys, the imperial ambassador, along with Lord Hussey, whom he called his brother, to invite the emperor to invade England and put an end to a tyranny in matters secular and religious, which the nation endured only because there was no deliverer (ib. No. 1206). His earnest application for leave to go home was with a view to aid the invaders when this scheme should be set on foot, and he actually succeeded in obtaining a license to absent himself from future feasts of St. George on account of his age and debility (ib. No. 1322). On the same day (28 Oct.) he also obtained a license of absence from future meetings of parliament and exemption from serving on any commission; but the latter did not pass the great seal till 12 Feb. following (ib. vol. viii. No. 291 (20)).

For these important privileges he writes to thank Cromwell on 13 Nov., dating his letter from Templehurst (ib. vii. No. 1426), where, however, he could hardly have been at that time, as Chapuys expressly says on 1 Jan. 1535 that he had not yet been allowed to retire to his own country (ib. viii. No. 1). The hope of soon going home to Templehurst seems to have influenced his pen to write as if he were actually there when he really was in or about London. The fact is that, although these exemptions were conceded to him on the ground of age and infirmity, permission to go back to his home in Yorkshire was still persistently withheld. The court apparently suspected that his presence in the north would do them little good, and he remained not only till the beginning of 1535, but through most part of the year, if not the whole of it. He kept up secret communications with Chapuys at intervals in January, March, May, and July, hoping now and again that matters were ripe for a great revolt, and sending the ambassador symbolic presents when he durst not express his meaning otherwise (ib. viii. Nos. 121, 355, 666, 750, 1018). In the beginning of May he was hopeful at last of being allowed to go home immediately. But in the middle of the month, this hope having apparently disappeared, he was thinking how to escape abroad and endeavour to impress upon the emperor in a personal interview the urgent necessity of sending an expedition against England to redeem the unhappy country from the heresy, oppression, and robbery to which it was constantly subjected. How long he was detained in London we do not know, but it was certainly till after July. He appears to have been at Templehurst in April 1536 (ib. x. 733); but there is a blank in our information as to the whole preceding interval.

His presence not being required in the parliamentary session of February 1536, he escaped the pressure which was doubtless brought to bear upon others to vote for the dissolution of the smaller monasteries, a measure which was very unpopular in the north of England, whatever it might be elsewhere. This, indeed, was one of the chief causes of that great rebellion which, beginning in Lincolnshire in October following, soon spread to Yorkshire, and was called the Pilgrimage of Grace. Almost the only place which seemed for a time to hold out against the insurgents was Pomfret Castle, of which Darcy held the command. Thither fled Archbishop Lee of York, who put himself under Darcy's protection with some of the neighbouring gentry. But Darcy, pretending that his provisions had run short, yielded up the castle to the rebels, who compelled him and the archbishop to be sworn to the common cause. The compulsion, however, was more ostensible than real. Darcy, the archbishop, and nearly all the gentry, really sympathised with the insurgents, and it was in vain that Darcy afterwards pleaded that he was doing his utmost for the king by endeavouring to guide aright a power that he could not resist. He stood by Robert Aske, the leader of the commons, when Lancaster herald knelt before him, and he negotiated in their favour with the Dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk when they were sent down to suppress the rising. His position as a friend and leader of the insurgents was recognised by the king himself, who instructed Norfolk and Fitzwilliam to treat with him as such, and authorised them to give him and the others a safe-conduct if necessary, to come to his presence, or else to offer them a free pardon on their submission. Both he and Aske wrote to the king to set their conduct in a more favourable light. A meeting with some of the king's council was