Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu/676

Rh W O L W O L to appeal to Eome, and thither under imperial pressure Clement revoked the case. It was plain Wolsey had failed, and all Henry s wrath burst out against his too faithful servant. He pointedly employed a secretary, and Wolsey s occupation was gone. Wolsey s foreign policy and domestic reforms had united against him every party and class in the nation, while at the same time he bore the blame of Henry s mistakes and extravagance. So long, however, as his royal master remained true to him he could defy all hostility. But now that the king, too, had turned against him his sole support had given way, and the hungry pack of enemies was unloosed. On the 20th September Henry parted from Wolsey without any sign of displeasure, but they parted for the last time. Anne Boleyn and her uncle Norfolk were Wolsey s bitter foes. By Anne s sway over Henry Wolsey was kept from the royal presence while Norfolk plotted his rain. On the 17th October, at the king s command, Wolsey delivered up the great seal to Norfolk and the base ungrateful Suffolk. He Avas deprived of his dignities, his goods were confiscated, and, surrendering York Place, he retired to Esher. The Court of King s Bench found him guilty in a praemunire, and sentenced him to imprison ment, while a bill precluding his restoration to power or dignities reached the Commons. The bill was dropped, but not till February 1530 did Henry grant him a full pardon and restore him to the archbishopric of York, on condition that he resigned Winchester and St Albans. Dreading his proximity to the king, his enemies procured his banishment into his diocese. Thither he went in April, and won the hearts of the people by his simplicity of life and graciousness of manner. His foes were alarmed ; his death alone could quiet their fears. He Avas preparing to be installed archbishop on Monday, 7th November, when on the 4th he was arrested at Cawood Castle by the earl of Northumberland for high treason. On the way south, at Sheffield Park, Nottinghamshire, he was met by Sir W T illiam Kingston, keeper of the Tower, and at last Wolsey knew his doom. Long years of toil, anxiety, and the ceaseless vexations of his cruel enemies had shattered his health, and some pears sufficed to bring on dysentery, which was unskilfully treated, arid aggravated by Kingston s appearance. Nevertheless he set out, and by three stages reached Leicester abbey on Saturday the 26th. &quot;Father abbot,&quot; he said, as the convent with its head came out to receive him, &quot; I am come hither to leave my bones among you.&quot; He felt that he was dying. Kingston assisted him upstairs, and he at once went to bed. Vomiting and faintings came on, and he rapidly sank, yet his last moments were spent in speaking to Kingston of the objects of his life s best energies, his king and country. At eight o clock on the morning of the 29th he died ; and within twenty-four hours was buried in a rude coffin all that remained of the genius who made possible the glories of Elizabeth and the British empire of to day. He left two children, born before he became a bishop, of &quot; one Larke s daughter,&quot; a son who went by the name of Thomas Winter and was an ecclesiastic, and a daughter who passed as Dorothy Clansey and was a nun. See Lives of Wolsey by Cavendish, Fiddcs, and Grove, and J. S. Brewer s Eeifjn of Henry VIII., 1500-30. There is no complete correct account of his life up to 1509, in connexion with which see Pinkerton s History of Scotland, ii., app. 445-50, along with J. Gardiner s Letters and Papers, &amp;lt;L-c., of Richard III. and Henry VII., M. R. Series, pref. ; and Letters, &c., pref. and i., app. B, 426-52. An excellent short view of Wolsey as a statesman will be found in Prof. M. Creighton s Thomas Wolsey. (T. W. C.) WOLVERHAMPTON, a municipal and parliamentary borough and market-town of Staffordshire, England, one of the principal seats of the hardware manufacture in the Midlands, is situated on an eminence commanding an extensive view towards Wales, on the Birmingham and Liverpool, the Staffordshire and Worcestershire, and the Wyiiey and Essington Canals, and on the London and North-Western, the Midland, and the Great Western Rail ways, 13 miles north-west of Birmingham, 1G south of Stafford, and 126 from London. The principal streets diverge from Queen Square, and are for the most part regular and well built, with numerous handsome shops. Towards the west there are pleasant suburbs of villas, the country being rich and well wooded. The old church of Wolverhampton, founded by Wulfruna in 996 and dedi cated to the Virgin, was in the reign of Henry III. rededi- cated to St Peter. It has undergone frequent alterations, and in 1862-65 underwent extensive restoration. It is now a fine cruciform building, with south porch and central tower. Internally the church consists of a long and lofty nave with side aisles and north and south tran septs, and terminating in a chancel with apsidal ending. The lower portion of the tower, south transept, &c., belong to the 13th century; the nave, clerestory, upper part of the tower, and north transept were erected in the 15th century; and the chancel is wholly modern, having been rebuilt in 1865. Wolverhampton was formerly a deanery, and on its abolition in 1846 the township was divided into ecclesiastical parishes, the number of which is now thirteen. At the old free grammar school, founded in 1515 by Sir Stephen Jenyns, a native of the town and an alderman of London, Sir W. Congreve and Dr Abernethy received their education. New buildings for the school were erected in 1876 in the western part of the town at a cost of 22,000. There is also a blue-coat school, founded in 1710. The other principal public buildings are the town-hall (1871), the corn exchange (1851, 15,000), the market-hall (1853, 10,500), the agricultural hall (1863, 6000), the public baths (1850), the post-office (1873), the art gallery, museum, and school of art (1884-85), and the free library. There is a cattle market about 5 acres in extent, and also a large pig market. The theatre royal (1844) is a handsome building in the Doric style. The benevolent institutions include a general hospital, the eye infirmary, the orphan asylum, and the institute of the society for outdoor blind. In Queen Square there is an equestrian statue of the late Prince Consort, unveiled by the queen in 1866, and on Snow Hill a statue in Sicilian marble (1879) of the Right Honourable Charles Pelham Villiers, who has represented the borough from 1835 to the present time (1888). Street improvements have been carried out on a large scale within recent years. Main drainage works on a thorough method have also been completed, and a large farm purchased for the utilization of the sewage. The water- works, opened in 1847, belong to the corporation. The water is supplied from springs in the Red Sandstone by wells sunk to a great depth. The old racecourse, 50 acres in extent, has been laid out as a public park; and a new racecourse was opened in 1887. The population of the municipal borough and urban sanitary district (area 3396 acres) in 1871 was 68,291, and in 1881 it was 75,766 (males 37,827, females 37,939); while that of the parliamentary borough (18,888 acres) was 156,978 in 1871, and 164,332 (males 82,657, females 81,675) in 1881. Situated in a district abounding in coal and ironstone, Wolver hampton has become famous for the manufacture both of the heavier and the smaller kinds of iron-wares, although in the finer class of metal manufactures for which the neighbouring town of Birmingham is famous it has little or no share. It possesses large smelting furnaces, and iron and brass foundries, but is specially occupied in the manufacture of all kinds of iron implements, tools, and domestic requisites, including locks and fastenings, hinges and nails, kitchen furniture, gardeners, Wrights , and smiths tools and implements, tinplate goods, and every variety of japanned ware, of which it may be regarded as the principal seat. 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