had an intimate acquaintance with Dr. Paget, a physician of note in London, and he with John Milton, a gentleman of great note for learning throughout the learned world, for the accurate pieces he had written on various subjects and occasions; this person having filled a public station in the former times, lived now a private and retired life in London, and having wholly lost his sight, kept always a man to read to him, which usually was the son of some gentleman of his acquaintance whom in kindness he took to improve his learning.' For the advantage of thus reading with Milton, Elwood took a lodging in Jewin Street. When the plague came, Milton desired him to take a house in the neighbourhood where he resided. He says, 'I took a pretty box for him in St Giles's Chalfont, a mile from me, of which I gave him notice.' Elwood was imprisoned, but on his release he made a visit of welcome to him, and proposed Paradise Found as a theme for the poet, and a pendant to his greater work. Milton made no answer; but on his return to London wrote 'Paradise Regained,' and in a pleasant tone said to me, 'This is owing to you, for you put it into my head by the question you put to me at Chalfont, which before I had not thought of.'*

We stood beneath the over-hanging beams, where a tall man could not more than stand erect. We noted the thick walls, the deep embrasure of the quaint windows, the ochrey hue of the cracked tiles, the ambitious roses, blushing beneath the broad vine-leaves, and vying in beauty with the purpling grapes; the housewife's pride, sweet rosemary, which only flourishes where woman loves to labour; the antique lavender knotted and knarled to the root, but sending forth such spikes of fragrance, that the very earth was grey from its sweet blossoms; the sheds around, such as an artist loves; their patched, worm-eaten roofs, mosaiced by all hues and growths of moss: the shining path-stones that marked the way from the low unprotecting gate to the house-door, might have been hallowed by the poet's tread, and the huge trees on the other side of the road, screened him from the hot sun during his hours of meditation, or while listening for the horses' tramp, that told of news from the plague-stricken city. What a day of interest and emotions-of mysterious combinations between the

* Life of Elwood by himself.

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present and the past-did we spend amid these scenes! How all the move ment of our own actual times seemed low, and speculative, and void of high ambition! But that feeling did not often jar upon our senses; there was

so much to see beyond the beauty of the full, rich, ripe, glowing scenery of the hills and valleys, so much that made the heart beat and the eyelids moist, so much to make us proud that England reared such men ; for we had recognised the outline of those well-known hills- the Chilternswhere HAMPDEN drank in the pure air of liberty; and we had sheltered beneath the roof that sheltered MILTON, and we had knelt beside the tomb of BURKE, and then, forward!-to seek the grave of PENN, in the lonely burying-ground of Jordans! What a subject for a pilgrimage is here-for Penn after his varied life and many wanderings was laid among "the people called quakers."

But we have lost sight of the sad story of the Lady Mary Grey, and its associations with the ancient and venerable Mansion of Chequers Court; we must therefore entreat the reader to accompany us thither once again.

While we think over the sad destinies of many noble houses, some claim more than others the sympathy it is impossible not to bestow, in different degrees, upon all. More of this has been given to the lovely Queen of Scotland than perhaps to any other woman, and to the end of time her history will suggest themes for poetry and painting; but the unoffending

daughters of the house of Grey command, in addition to our sympathy, feelings of reverence and resprect which cannot be yielded to Mary Stuart. The deplorable destiny of Lady Jane Grey, eldest born of Henry, Duke of Suffolk, by the imperious daughter of Henry VIII., is recorded on one of the darkest pages of English history. The fate of Jane's sister Catherine was almost as unhappy ;-in punishment for contracting a marriage with the Earl of Hertford without previously obtaining the Queen's consent, she was doomed to the Tower, where she passed the remainder of her days, and was only liberated by God's mercy, in 1567, from the vile prison-house of earthly bondage, in which her youth and loveliness withered like a sickly plant deprived of light and air. One of the Harleian MSS. contains a most affecting paper entitled 'The Manner of her Departing,' which no eye can linger over without being dimmed by tears. But there was yet another sister-from what can be gathered, not over wise, or witty, or even blessed with comeliness-appointed, in the spirit of concentrated cruelty, by the Queen, as one of her Maids of Honour; described by Cecil as the most diminutive lady at Court, and by Sandford as slightly deformed. It has been argued, that with the example of the fate of her two sisters before her, this little creature should never have thought of matrimony! Those who so said, knew little of the deep-seated yearning in every woman's heart for affection; yet, in bestowing her affections upon the giant-like Serjeant-Porter-Mr. Thomas Keys-she doubtless considered he was far too humble to be suspected of any treason,' and fancied that with her lowly choice she might have been permitted to pass into the disgrace and obscurity, which would have been elysium compared to her position about the Royal person. But no. All the ruffs at court stood upright at the outrage perpetrated against propriety by the Lady Mary Grey. Sir William Cecil noted it in a letter to Sir Thomas Smith, saying The, Serjeant-Porter, being the biggest gentillman in all this Court, hath marryed secretly the Lady Mary Grey, the lest (i.e., smallest) in all the Court. They are committed to several prisons; and again, the offence is very great.'

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It was evident that her Royal Mistress lay in wait for an opportunity to destroy the last of these ill-starred sisters. The insignificance of the 'great giant Porter,' the witlessness and simplicity of his lady-wife, their

incapacity to injure or even offend, might have protected them against any tyrant in the world-even in those days-except Elizabeth Tudor; but the indignation of the sycophant court rose in arms against the sister of Lady Jane Grey! And in the State-Paper Office are some documents, a portion in the handwriting of Sir William Cecil, entitled Articles for the Examination of the Lady Mary Grey. The marriage was performed, it appears, by a somewhat unsightly priest-old, fat, and of low stature '—in the Serjeant-Porter's Chamber, by the Water Gate, at Westminster;' and the questions asked at that examination were no less frivolous than impertinent; the little gifts she confesses to the 'love-tokens '—are touching from their simplicity. The giant-lover' had given her first two little' rings; next a ring with four rubies and a diamond ;' a chain,' and 'a little hanging bottle of mother-of-pearl.' The honeymoon was certainly passed in separate prisons; two days after the marriage it was known to the Queen; the husband was committed to the Fleet; and a letter was despatched to the keeper, stating that her Majesty had taken his offence much to heart.' The words in italics are underlined in the original.

The poor lady's immediate fate is more obscure; but at last it was determined by the PRIVY COUNCIL that she should be sent to the country, and given in charge to a certain Mr. Hawtrey, of Chequers,' in Buckinghamshire; there to remain without conference with any, suffering only one waiting-woman to attend upon her, without liberty of going abrode, for whose charges the Queen's Majesty will see him the said Mr. Hawtrey, in reason, satisfied;' subsequently, however, the Lady Mary was allowed a groom as well as a gentlewoman, and the clause concerning her going abroad' was in a degree modified; she was treated with a little more humanity than she had been; but she was a prisoner still.

Any one not sleeping under the nightmare of Elizabeth, and whose dreams were not disturbed by memories of the absent, must have enjoyed Chequers Court, even as a prison! It is a place to linger in and love, a delicious vision of beauty and romance, one of the 'places '-see one ever so many― that can never be forgotten.

Whether the poor prisoner was permitted to wander over 'velvet lawn, ' or visit the silver spring,' or enjoy the refreshment of the happy valley,' we cannot now ascertain; the persecutor and the persecuted have long since

gone to 'their account;' and the dark waters of oblivion have passed over the sufferings of the young bride. Perhaps she never lost herself or her sorrows in the labyrinths of "the Hill "-she could not even see it from the window of her attic. We must not look upon the abundant beauties of the beautiful seat of the Russells, and conjure up the fairy-like form of the Lady Mary Grey as adding to their interest.

It seems that Lady Mary was removed from Chequers Court after an imprisonment of two years, and delivered to the care of her maternal stepmother, the Dowager Duchess of Suffolk, who lived-in the Minories! but the Minories then and now were very different. Still the change must have been great from Chequers to a neighbourhood so unhealthy. Her stepmother had small 'plenishing' to store her rooms, and even entreats the Queen to lend her 'some old silver pots to fetch her drink in.' 'A basin and an ewer,' she adds in a housewifely letter extant, I fear were too much; but what it shall please her Majesty to appoint for her (i.e., the Lady Mary), shall be always redy to be delyvered againe whensoever it shal please her Majestie to call for it.'

Toward the latter

Sir Thomas writes and that she desires The entire kindness

The Queen seems to have had pleasure in moving her victim from place to place; for we next find her under the roof of Sir Thomas Gresham, who sorely felt the heavy weight of the charge, frequently, during a period of three years, praying she should be removed from him. end of this time poor Keys died, most likely in prison. that she (Lady Mary) hath grievously taken his death, the Queen's leave to keep and bring up his children. and lovingness of her nature is greatly shown in this simple and beautiful request; moreover, during his lifetime, though she had always signed herself 'Mary Grey,' doubtless to pleasure Elizabeth, after his death her womanly sense of right conquered every other feeling, and in her heart's first grief she signed herself Mary Keys.'

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It was of his children she spoke of her own she had none: dearly had she paid by a long life of suffering for an act which the Sovereign could not have overlooked.

In process of time her liberty was restored, and it may be she was restored also to what the world would call 'favour;' for on the first of January, 1577-8, she presented the Queen at Hampton Court with two