
By W. W. Ravenhill, Esq. 21 
‘ Mrs. Penruddock to my Lord Richard Cromwell. 
«My Li’. 
Were my misery less my modesty would be more and check my pen 
from a rudeness which nothing but a widow’s distress dare own. 
‘That I am a trouble to your Lordshipp I cannot but with blushes confess, and 
yet where I find such a noble pity I cannot but beg a charitable remembrance. 
_ Till, therefore, my L*, you cease to be less worthy I cannot forbear to be 
passionately importunate. Were my single self concerned I should, with a 
suffering patience earn the pread I eat, but when the want of six orphans is 
added to the distress of a widow, the calamity becomes a charm to compassion, 
and adds a confident hope of obtaining. My cousin Bowman, my L4, is the 
only sollicitour we have, whose letter acquainting me of your Lordship’s favorable 
receiving my last, gives me the boldness of this second address, beseeching your 
L'ship, to free me from the severity of those who have seized our small estate, 
by requesting it of his Highness for yourself, to whom I have a desire to owe 
the preservation of my yet unruined family, and to whom I shall ever acknow- 
ledge myself 
My L‘4, your L'ships obliged 
and most humble servant 
ae 
July 3 
1657.” , 
Whether che obtained the favours asked by her second petition I 
have not discovered. Fourteen months to a day (“his own day”) 
_ after her last letter, the Lord Protector passed away to his rest, and. 
her friend Richard Cromwell entered on his little reign. Then 
followed the Restoration, which yields one other record of her, 
commonplace enough, but still a part of her own and her husband’s 
story :—! 
“To the King’s most excellent Majesty. 
i. \ The Humble Petition of Arundell Penruddock Relict of John Penruddock. 
ov: 
Humbly sheweth 
That besydes the Irreparable Losse of her late Husband shee hath beene 
damnified in her estate by the Loyalty of her ffamily to the value of fifteen 
Thousand Pounds. 
That (being encouraged by your Sacred Mat) shee hath endeavoured to find 
out somethinge in your Ma‘’s Power to Grant that might make her some satis- 
faction for her great Losse. : 
That shee is Informed that your Ma‘*’s Royale Predecessors have ever granted 
by way of ffarme the Liberty of makinge glasses, namely to S'. Robert Mansell 
and others. 
That it being none of the English Trade or Manufacture it was never here- 
tofore accounted A Monoply but grantable by the Kinge as his Prerogative. 
1 State Papers, Domes. (A.D. 1660), vol. 22, p- 107. 
