Third Series, No. 32, VOL. VIII. OCTOBER, 1917. Downloaded from THE LIBRARY. http://library.oxfordjournals.org/ JOHN HEYWOOD AND HIS FRIENDS. , , . v {Conclusion.) }HE first part of this paper dealt with Heywood's life up to the year 1528, I when his first period of Court favour at Indiana University Libraries Technical Services/Serials Acquisitions on May 11, 2015 closed and he was granted a pension, but before proceeding to his second period of activity at Court under Edward VI and Mary, we have to examine the gap between 1528 and 1552, during which time he received no mark of the King's favour except the New Year's gift in 1532-3 (p. 260). A shadow now falls over the reign of Henry VIII. The frivolous glories of the Field of the Cloth of Gold give place to the tragedies of the Divorce; the dreams of Utopia are dispersed by the rude breath of intolerance. Wolsey, the domin- ant spirit of the earlier period, fell in 1529, and before long the reign became indeed the reign of Henry VIII. After three years of unusual activity as a printer, Rastell issued in 1530 his last important book, * A New Book of Purgatory,' in which he defended the old Do&rine' by natural reason and good philo- sophy1 in a dialogue between a Christian * Almeyne' VIII X 290 JOHN HEYWOOD and a Mohammedan Turk. More, now Lord Downloaded from Chancellor, also entered the lists. Frith's answer, according to Bale, converted the exponent of ' natural reason' and from this time up to his death in 1536 Rastell was the untiring supporter and agent of Cromwell. As member for Dunhevcd in http://library.oxfordjournals.org/ Cornwall he sat in the Reformation Parliament (1529-36) that destroyed the Papal jurisdiction in England. Meanwhile his son William had set up his own press and printed his first book, * Csesar's Commentaries' in Latin and English, in 1530 (Duff's * Century of English Printing'); and in 1532, the year in which More resigned the Chancellorship, he was admitted at Lincoln's Inn. at Indiana University Libraries Technical Services/Serials Acquisitions on May 11, 2015 Cranmer succeeded Warham in 1533, and on 23rd May pronounced, at Dunstable, the King's marriage void. Pole had left England in the Spring to return on Mary's accession. It was at this juncture that the younger Rastell began, as though to close a chapter of old history, to print the plays associated with the name of Heywood.1 Meanwhile old Rastell in his new allegiance was separating from his former friends. The years 1532-4 witnessed a determined revival in the City, led by the Common Council, of hostility to the 4 curates' and their claims to tithes and fees. The subject is treated fully in the Victoria County History of London, pp. 250 ff. A Commission 1 1. The Play of Love 'made by John Heywood,' 1533 and »534- a. The Pardoner and the Frcre, 5th April, 1533. 3. The Play of • Wether,'«by John Heywood,' 1533. 4. John, the Husband, 12th February, 1533-4. AND HIS FRIENDS. 291 consisting of Cranmer, Cromwell, the Chancellor, Downloaded from Winchester and the two Chief Justices, settled the matter by fixing the payment at 2s. 9d. in the pound on rental, and the Common Council re- warded the suitors who had led the agitation. The decision was enforced by Royal Proclamation http://library.oxfordjournals.org/ (1534-5) and an A<51 of Parliament in 1536. Rastell, however, was apparently opposed to the principle of tithes, and, continuing the agitation in the face of the Act and Proclamation, was thrown into prison, where he died in 1536, impoverished and forsaken alike by his old and new friends. Almost exactly a year earlier, on 6th July, 1535, at Indiana University Libraries Technical Services/Serials Acquisitions on May 11, 2015 More had paid the penalty of his loyalty to the old order, and the following passage, from Roper's * Life,' shows us not only the deep impression this crime made on the wider world of Western Christendom, but also the weight with which the blow fell on Heywood's circle, the little band ot the ' familiarissimi.' 'Soon after (More's) death,' writes Roper, 'came in- telligence thereof to the Emperor Charles, whereupon he sent for Sir Thomas Eliot, our English Embassadour, and said to him, " My Lord Embassadour, we understand that the king your master hath put his faithful servant and grave councellor, Sir Thomas More, to death . had we been master of such a servant ... we would rather have lost the best cittee in our dominions, than have lost such a- worthy councellor." Which matter was by the same Sir Thomas Eliot to myselfe, to my wife, to Mr. Clement and his wife, to Mr. John Heywotd and his wife, and unto divers others his freinds accordingly reported.' It was probably while More and Rastell were JOHN HEYWOOD in prison that Hcywood began 'The Spider and Downloaded from the Flic.' He published it in 1556, but it was begun twenty years before : I have (good readers) this parable here pende: (After owe beginning) newly brought to ende. http://library.oxfordjournals.org/ The thing, yeres mo then twentie since it begoon. To the thing: yeres mo then ninetene, nothing doon. ' Spider and Flie' (The Conclusion). The work had been untouched for at least twenty years and was begun earlier. I think there are good reasons for supposing that John Rastell was the original' flic' In 1534 Hey wood wrote the Ballad to Princess at Indiana University Libraries Technical Services/Serials Acquisitions on May 11, 2015 Mary 'Give place ye ladies,' which is found in Tottel's Miscellany, where it is printed without the last two quatrains: This worthye ladve to beewraye A kinges daughter was she Of whom John Heywood lyste to say . In such worthy degree. And Maire was her name weete yee With these graces indude At eighteen yeares so flourisht shee So doth his meane conclude. This fuller version appears in Harl., 1703, a book of poems mostly by Hey wood's friend, William For- rest, ' the symplc and unlearned priest' (see p. 267). Mary was born on 18 th February, 1515-16, and it is significant of Heywood's sympathies that this ballad was written within a year or so of the divorce, and soon after Mary had been declared illegitimate. AND HIS FRIENDS. 293 Sir A. W. Ward (D.N.B. art. Heywood) says that c the opening and the prettiest passages of the Downloaded from poem arc borrowed from Surrey,' but as Surrey was born in 1517 according to the inscription on the Arundel portrait, I think it more likely that he borrowed from Heywood. In any case it is http://library.oxfordjournals.org/ not clear to what passages in Surrey allusion is made. As a musician, Heywood appears to have been associated particularly with John Redford, the com- poser of instrumental music and writer of plays. The signatures or ' Acknowledgments of Supre- macy* taken in 1534, are collected and printed in Deputy Keeper's Report 7, App. 2, pp. 279-336, at Indiana University Libraries Technical Services/Serials Acquisitions on May 11, 2015 and among the six Vicars-Choral or singing men of St. Paul's we find Redford's name. In his will (P.C.C. 50 Alen.) which was proved in 1547, Redford describes himself as c oon of the Vicars of the Cathedral Church of Saynt Paulc and maister of the Almerie there.' One of the most valuable collections of Tudor instrumental music, the famous * Mulliner' book (Add. MS. 30513), contains a considerable amount of Redford's best work,1 and it is made more in- teresting by the inscription on the first flyleaf, in a stiff, youthful hand: ' Sum liber thomae Mullineri iohanne heywoode teste.' 1 This was a period of English pre-eminence in music. The Chapel Royal attracted a remarkable concentration of musical talent, but the greatest composer of instrumental music under Henry VIII was John Redford of St. Paul'i (Davey Hist. Eng. Mus. (1895), see pp. 141 and 166). 294 JOHN HEYWOOD It is a small oblong book in an original binding with rolled border of conventional ornaments alter- Downloaded from nating with the portcullis, rose, fleur-dc-lys and the letters H.R. A similar binding at the Record Office is described by Weale (No. 191), and I believe it occurs again on the Eton College MS. http://library.oxfordjournals.org/ which Davcy (p. 89) describes as the most im- portant of the musical remains of the time of Henry VII. This last book was almost certainly written originally for Eton. The 'Mulliner' bind- ing has, so far as I know, not been authoritatively described. Mulliner's compositions arc well known, but little is known of him, except that he is said to at Indiana University Libraries Technical Services/Serials Acquisitions on May 11, 2015 have been at St. Paul's (D.N.B.). He appears from the inscription above to have been Heywood's pupil and under him to have collected a good deal of Redford's music. Perhaps he was the Thomas Mulliner who in 1564 was organist of Corpus Christi, Oxford (Davey, p. 129). I think there is no doubt that Heywood was associated with Redford both as a musician and dramatist. With his successor at St. Paul's as Almoner, Sebastian Westcott, sole executor of Redford's will, he was certainly closely associated. There is a kindly reference to Redford in Thomas Tusser's autobiographical verses.