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HENRY VIII. (1491–1547)

From the portrait by Holbein in Windsor Castle.

KATHERINE OF ARAGON (1485–1536)

From the painting in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

And I will first take the relations of the City and the King.

They began with a manifest desire of the young King to conciliate the City. Evidently in answer to some petition or representation, he banished all “foreign” beggars, i.e. those who were not natives of London; and ordered them to return to their own parishes. It is easy to understand what happened: the “foreign” beggars, in obedience to the proclamation, retired to their holes and corners; the streets were free from them for some days; the Mayor and Sheriffs congratulated themselves; then after a decent interval, and gradually, the beggars ventured out again. The difficulty, in a word, of dealing with rogues and vagrants and masterless men was already overwhelming. In the time of Elizabeth it became a real, a threatening, danger to the town. We must remember that one effect of a long war, especially a civil war, which calls out a much larger proportion of the people than a foreign war, is to throw upon the roads, at the close of it, a vast number of those who have tasted the joys of idleness and henceforth will not work. They would rather be flogged and hanged than work. They cannot work. They have forgotten how to work. They rob on the high road; they murder in the remote farm-houses; in the winter, and when they grow old, they make for the towns, and they beg in the streets. However, Henry greatly pleased the City by his order, and for a time there was improvement. He then took a much more important step towards winning the affection of the City. He committed Empson and Dudley to the Tower. They were accused of a conspiracy against the Government—in reality they had been the approved agents of the late King; but this it would have been inconvenient to confess. They were therefore found guilty and executed—these unfortunately too willing tools of a rapacious sovereign. Henry offered restitution to all who had suffered at their hands. It was found on subsequent inquiry that six men, all of whom had been struck off the lists for perjury, had managed to get replaced, and had been busy at work for Empson and Dudley in raking up false charges against Aldermen or in taking bribes for concealing offences. These persons, as being servants and not principals, were treated leniently. They were set in pillory, and then driven out of the City.