Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 3.djvu/217

1539.] Countess of Salisbury were not tried, but they were attainted in common, with the rest; and it can be gathered only from the language of the Act that circumstances were known to the Parliament of which the traces are lost. Lady Exeter was afterwards pardoned. Lady Salisbury's offences, whatever they were, seem to have been known to the world, even before Lord Southampton's visit of inspection to Warblington. The magistrates of Stockton in Sussex sent up an account of examinations taken on the 13th of September, 1538, in which a woman is charged with having said, 'If so be that my Lady of Salisbury had been a young woman as she was an old woman, the King's Grace and his council had burnt her.'—MS. State Paper Office, second series, vol. xxxix. The Act of Attainder has not been printed (31 Henry VIII. cap. 15: Rolls House MS.); so much of it, therefore, as relates to these ladies is here inserted:—'And where also Gertrude Courtenay, wife of the Lord Marquis of Exeter, hath traitorously, falsely, and maliciously confederated herself to and with the abominable traitor Nicholas Carew, knowing him to be a traitor and a common enemy to his Highness and the realm of England; and hath not only aided and abetted the said Nicholas Carew in his abominable treasons, but also hath herself committed and perpetrated divers and sundry detestable and abominable treasons to the fearful peril of his Highness's royal person, and the loss and desolation of this realm of England, if God of His goodness had not in due time brought the same treason to knowledge:'And where also Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, and Hugh Vaughan, late of Bekener, in the county of Monmouth, yeoman, by instigation of the devil, putting apart the dread of Almighty God, their duty of allegiance, and the excellent benefits received of his Highness, have not only traitorously confederated themselves with the false and abominable traitors Henry Pole, Lord Montague, and Reginald Pole, sons to the said countess, knowing them to be false traitors, but also have maliciously aided, abetted, maintained, and comforted them in their said false and abominable treason, to the most fearful peril of his Highness, the commonwealth of this realm, &c., the said marchioness and the said countess be declared attainted, and shall suffer the pains and penalties of high treason.' I find no account of Vaughan, or of the countess's connection with him. He was probably one of the persons employed to carry letters to and from the cardinal.