A HISTORY OF NORTHAMPTONSHIRE 



in the Court of Augmentations accounts' for i 550-1 there is a payment 

 of_^i3 6j. %d. to John Sadler, 'Schoolmaster (Ludimagistro) in Fodering- 

 hage,' who next year' received the large sum of ^43 6s. Sd., viz. at the 

 rate of jC2o a year, including £6 3J. 4^. augmentation {de incremento) and 

 four years' arrears of the augmentation, apparently, to Michaelmas last, 

 1552, by virtue of a warrant of 4 February, 1553. 



In 1554-5 Sadler duly received ^Tao as master of Fotheringhay; 

 but in the following year he had transferred his services to the newly 

 refounded school at Oundle. His successor at Fotheringhay, who from 

 1554—5 duly received the crown stipend,' was John Lowthe. He is 

 almost certainly the scholar of Winchester and fellow of New College 

 of that name, who came from Sawtrey in Northamptonshire, and had 

 been driven out of his fellowship for his reforming views,* and in after 

 years as Archdeacon Loud contributed some curious tales of Romanist 

 persecutions to Foxe's Book of Martyrs. We do not know exactly when 

 he left, but we are helped by an inscription ' on the only remaining brass 

 in Fotheringhay church, in memory of one who has hitherto been 

 reputed the first schoolmaster of Fotheringhay : — 



Here lieth buried Mr. Thomas Hurland, 



Scholemaster of Fotheringhay 33 years, 



Who deceased Jan. 5, a.d. 1589, 



setatis sue 70. 



This would bring Hurland's mastership back to 1557, two years 

 before his formal appointment by decree of the Court of Exchequer, 

 8 May, 1559.* 



The lines were by one of Hurland's near successors, John Johnson. 

 We learn from his epitaph in Tansor church that, educated in Leicester 

 Grammar School and then at Cambridge, he was tutor 'at Burleigh house 

 by Stamford town ' to the children of Burleigh's eldest son, the earl of 

 Exeter, and after four years as ' gymnasiarch ' of Fotheringhay, became 



' P.R.O. Exch. Mins'. Accts. 4-5 Edw. VI, No. 87. 



' Ibid. 5-6 Edw. VI, No. 78. These accounts could not have been made up till a year after 

 their d.ite, as the warrant of February, 7 Edw. VI, is mentioned in them. 

 ' Ibid. 2 Ph. and 3 Mary-3 Ph. and 4 Mary, No. 63. 

 • History of Winchester College, p. 254; and Letters on the Reformation (Camden Society). 



' Paedotriba bonus jacet hoc sub marmore tectus, 



Prasclarus methodo clarus et arte fuit, 

 Discipulos omnes pura pietate beavit 



Moribus instruxit pectora prima bonis. 

 Formandis pueris animum transmisit et annos ; 



^tate exhausta caelitus hospes ovat ; 

 Vita licet cessit, jaceatque cadaver in urna, 



Virtutes remanent ; nomen in orbe manct. 



A good boy -polisher beneath lies still. 

 Famous alike for method and for skill ; 

 With pure religion he his scholars blest. 

 Instilling goodness into every breast. 

 He spent his strength and years in teaching boys, 

 And age o'erpast, heaven's guest, his rest enjoys ; 

 Though life be gone and corpse be laid in grave, 

 His virtue lives and fresh his name doth save. 

 '■ P.R.O. Exch. Special Commission, 13 Eliz. 



224 



