rice, and a woman into her chamber who bad known their former ill life, and thus rendered her intentions apparent; and as she had admitted Culpepper to be with her in a suspicious place, for several hours in the night, with no one present but Lady Rochford ; it is desirable that the Queen, Derham, Culpepper, and Lady Rochford, be attainted of treason, and that the Queen and Lady Rochford should suifer death. Fourth, That the King would not trouble to give his assent to this act in person, but grant it by letters patent, under his hand and seal. Fifth, That the Duchess Dowager of Norfolk, the Countess of Bridgewater, the Lord \VilIiam Howard, and his wife, and four other men, and five women, who were already attainted by the course of common law (the Duchess of Norfolk and the Countess of Bridgewater excepted), that knew the Queen's vicious life, and had concealed it, should be all attainted of misprision of treason. An act to this effect was hurried through both houses of parliament, and passed on the sixth of February. On the tenth, the hope-blighted, penitent Queen was removed by water from Sion House to the Tower, where, on passing under tho arch of the deathboding Traitors' Gate, she shuddered, shrieked, and fainted. How she conducted herself the first night in her new prison-lodging, no pen has detailed ; but on the following day, the lord chancellor brought the bill to the lords, signed by the King, with the great seal appended to it ; and whilst the commons were being summoned to attend, the Duke of Suffolk arose, and said that he and several others had that morning visited the Queen ; that she acknowledged her offence against God, the King, and the nation, implored his Grace not to punish her brothers, or family, for her faults ; and, as a last request, desired permission to divide her clothes amongst her maidens, as she had nought else to recompense their services with. The Earl of Southampton confirmed this statement, and added more which has not been entered on the journal of that day's proceedings, —the clerk, unaccountably, having began the entry with these words : hoc etiamadjiciens—and added nothing more. AVhen the commons had assembled, the royal assent was read in due form to the act, which condemned Katherine Howard as a traitress and an adulteress, without her having been permitted to speak one word in her own defence, and without one single proof of her guilt having been adduced. Her confession to Norfolk was evidently only a penitent acknowledgment of the sins she had been guilty of before lier marriage to the King ; for, had she have been brought to confess adultery, the only crime with which she was charged, that nobleman, in his address, would doubtless have so stated, in broad and unequivocal terms. The bill of attainder would have been based on her own admission, and not on the supposition of her intention to commit the crime, and a full and clear statement of her guilt would have been made, both to the commons and to the lords. In fact, neither the original letters in the state papers, the act of attainder, nor the proceedings in parliament, justify a belief that Katherine Howard, base and incontinent as she was previous to her marriage with Henry the Eighth, was guilty of adultery—the crime for which she suffered death ; and if she was innocent, so also were Lady Rochford, Culpepper, and Derham. Indeed, Derham evidently suffered not because he had committed the act imputed to him, but because he might possibly have intended to do so. According^ to those valuable national records, the State Papers : when the King, in his wrath, expressed a desire to take the life of the aged Duchess of Norfolk, the judges for once had the boldness to dissent ; declaring that the Duchess, having opened Derham's chests, and willingly destroyed his papers, could not constitute high treason, without it could be proved that the papers were of a treasonable nature, and the Duchess knew them to be such; —an opinion which so irritated the despotic monarch, that, on hearing it, he vehemently exclaimed, "They cannot F F 2