Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 3.djvu/324

304 champion of their domestic wrongs. Justly and unjustly, he had dragged down upon himself the animosity of peers, bishops, clergy, and gentlemen, and their day of revenge was come.

On the 10th of June he attended as usual at the morning sitting of the House of Lords. The privy council sat in the afternoon, and at three o'clock the Duke of Norfolk rose suddenly at the table: 'My Lord of Essex,' he said, 'I arrest you of high treason.' There were witnesses in readiness, who came forward and swore to have heard him say 'that, if the King and all his realm would turn and vary from his opinions, he would fight in the field in his own person, with his sword in his hand, against the King and all others; adding that, if he lived a year or two, he trusted to bring things to that frame that it should not lie in the King's power to resist or let it.' The words 'were justified to his face.' It was enough. Letters