TREVAlLTiN. 7 



destroyed several of the lesser monasteries in England, chiefly by the 

 advice of the Earl of Trevallyan and Thomas Cromwelb 

 then at the summit of kingly favour. It was the strenuous advice of 

 the former that the whole of the monastic establishments should be 

 destroyed at a blow, and their revenues divided between the crown 

 and its faithful vassals. This advice was exceedingly grateful to the 

 monarch; but he, witli some of his privy council, were fearful that it 

 would be proceeding with too great impetuosity, and therefore he 

 thought it prudent merely to order commissioners to examine into 

 and confiscate a few of the lesser convents. At the conference which 

 resulted in this order, the Earl of Trevallyan was so chagrined and 

 angered that his advice was not followed, that he actually forgot that 

 deference which he owed to his sovereign, and, in consequence of this 

 impolitic and uncourtier-like behaviour, had lost ground in the favour 

 of Henry. This was the circumstance to which the king's letter 

 alluded as the " lack of respect shewn in the royal presence." Henry 

 now found an opportunity for prosecuting those plans which had been 

 recommended by the earl, who, though he had temporarily disgraced 

 him, he believed to be one of his most faithful subjects. — That part 

 of the epistle relating to the Duke of Norfolk, was intended to put 

 Trevallyan upon his guard against that powerful and wily nobleman, 

 who had long borne a secret dislike to the earl. This dislike had 

 been recently discovered by the king, through some unguarded 

 expressions uttered by Norfolk, which were immediately reported to 

 him by a person inimical to that nobleman. The hatred of Norfolk, 

 who was a bigoted papist, partly took its rise from the advice given by 

 Trevallyan to the king, concerning the destruction of the monasteries, 

 but more from the following circumstance : — The Duke of Norfolk 

 had sued for the hand of Margaret Percy, daughter of the Earl of 

 Northmnberland. He was accepted by the damsel's father, but the 

 maiden was unwilling to tiiist herself to the protection of 

 Norfolk because he was a papist, the Percys having been favourable 

 to the doctrines of the Reformation, ever since they were first promul- 

 gated ; and, in addition to this, she could not bring herself to like his 

 person, which was under the middle height of man, and inelegantly 

 fonned, though his countenance bore the most imquestionable marks 

 of high birth and breeding. At this crisis, the Earl of Trevallyan, — 

 who had been with Lord Dacre, the Warden of the Western Marshes, 



