Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 14.djvu/445

 LEICESTER 425 and regular, and the sanitary and water arrangements are very satisfactory. The most important of the churches are St Martin s, near the site of an old Franciscan convent, restored in 1881 at a cost of 20,000; St Mary s, Early English and Norman, originally built in the 12th century, and restored in 18G1 at a cost of 10,000; All Saints, an ancient structure in the Early English style, restored in 1875 ; St Margaret s, a beautiful and spacious building erected in 1444, Early English and Decorated, recently restored at a cost of 6000 ; and St Nicholas s, in the Early Norman style. Of the old castle two gateways are still standing, and also a portion of the Norman Hall. The other principal buildings are the old town-hall, formerly the guild-hall of Corpus Christi, the new town-hall erected in 1875, the town museum, the school of art, and the public baths, erected in 1879 at a cost of 11,000. One Plan of Leicester. of the ornaments of the town is the memorial clock-tower erected in 1868 in honour of Simon de Montfort and three other less known persons connected with the district. In the neighbourhood of the town are the remains of the abbey of Black Canons, founded in 1143. On the site of St Margaret s church was the old Saxon cathedral, and in the adjoining abbey Cardinal Wolsey was buried. Besides Trinity Hospital, founded in 1331 by Henry Plantagenet, earl of Leicester, and Wyggeston s Hospital, founded in 1513, there are a large number of minor charities. There is a fine promenade from the town to the Victoria park and racecourse, in addition to which the Abbey park of 40 acres has lately been opened. The staple trade of Leicester is hosiery, including stockings and all kinds of fancy goods. There are also iron-foundries, and manufac tures of boots and shoes, elastic webs, and sewing cotton. The population of the municipal and parliamentary borough, 17,005 in 1801, had increased in 1871 to 95,220, and in 1881 to 122,351. Leicester was an ancient British town, and under the name of Jlatie or Eatiscorion an important Roman station. It was also one of the five old Danish burghs, and until 874 it was an ecclesiastical see. Its charter of incorporation was obtained from King John, and from the 23d of Edward I. it returned two members to parliament. Parliaments were held in the town by Henry V. in 1414 and by Henry VI. in 1426. Richard III., who passed anight in it on his way to the fatal battle of 1 osworth, was buried in the Francis can convent. The town was stormed by Charles I., May 31, 1645, and recovered by Fairfax in the June following. See the Histories of Throsby (1777), Robinson (1791), and Thompson (1871). LEICESTER, SIMON DE MONTFORT, EARL OF. See MONTFORT. LEICESTER, ROBERT DUDLEY, EARL OF (c. 1531- 1588). This favourite of Queen Elizabeth came of an ambitious family. They were not, indeed, such mere upstarts as their enemies loved to represent them ; for Leicester s grandfather the notorious Edmund Dudley who was one of the chief instruments of Henry VII. s extortions was descended from a younger branch of the barons of Dudley. But the love of power was a passion which seems to have increased in them with each succeed ing generation, and though the grandfather was beheaded by Henry VIII. for his too devoted services in the preced ing reign, the father grew powerful enough in the days of Edward VI. to trouble the succession to the crown. This was that John Dudley, duke of Northumberland, who contrived the marriage of Lady Jane Grey with his own son Guildford Dudley, and involved both her and her husband in a common ruin with himself. Robert Dudley, the subject of this article, was an elder brother of Guild- ford, and shared at that time in the misfortunes of the whole family. Having taken up arms with them against Queen Mary, he was sent to the Tower, and was actually sentenced to death; but the queen afterwards not only pardoned and restored him to liberty, but appointed him master of the ordnance. On the accession of Elizabeth he was also made master of the horse. He was then, perhaps, about seven and twenty, and was evidently rising rapidly in the queen s favour. At an early age he had been married to Amy, daughter of Sir John Eobsart. The match had been arranged by his father, who was very studious to provide in this way for the future fortunes of his children, and the wed ding was graced by the presence of King Edward. But it was not a happy marriage. The lady lived alone at Cumnor Hall in Berkshire, the house of one Anthony Forster, and there in the year 1560 she died under circumstances which certainly aroused some suspicions of foul play. The scandal was the more serious as it was insinuated that Dudley stood so high in the queen s favour that he might reasonably hope to marry her, and that a murder had been deliberately planned to remove an obstacle to his advance ment. The point, it must be owned, is not free from obscurity, and recent revelations from the archives of Simancas prove that even before the unhappy lady s death it was said there was a design to poison her. After the event, however, the story was that she had broken her neck by a fall down stairs, and, suspicious as the case may appear, there is much to be said in favour of Dudley s innocence, which cannot be discussed within our limits. Certain it is that he continued to rise in the queen s favour. She made him a Knight of the Garter, and bestowed on him the castle of Kenilworth, the lordship of Denbigh, and other lands of very great value in Warwickshire and in Wales. In September 1564 she created him baron of Denbigh, and immediately afterwards earl of Leicester. In the preceding month, when she visited Cambridge, she at his request addressed the university in Latin. The honours shown him naturally excited jealousy, especially as it was well known that he entertained still more ambitious hopes, which the queen apparently did not altogether discourage. The earl of Sussex, in opposition to him, strongly favoured a match with the archduke Charles of Austria. The court was divided, and, while arguments were set forth on the one side against the queen s marrying a subject, the other party insisted strongly on the disadvantages of a foreign alliance. The queen, however, was so far from being foolishly in love with him that in 1564 she recommended him as a husband for Mary Queen of Scots. But even this, it was believed, was only a blind, and indeed it may be doubted how far the proposal was serious. After his creation as earl of Leicester great attention was paid to him both at home and abroad. The XIV. - 54