JOHN DUDLEY, EAEL OF WARWICK, FOURTH MASTER. 55 



On January 26, 1543, he received the high preferment of Lord 

 High Admiral for life. In this capacity his lordship displayed 

 great gallantry, and did good service for his country against 

 France and Scotland. He became a Privy Councillor on 

 April 23, 1543, and on the concurring festival of St. George 

 was elected a Knight of the Garter. In 1544-45 his lordship 

 was appointed Captain of Boulogne. Up to this period he 

 owed all his honours and fortunes to Henry VIII., from whom 

 he received very large grants of Church lands ; which, how- 

 ever, created him many enemies. He was also named by 

 Henry VIII. in his will to be one of his sixteen executors; 

 and received from him a legacy of 5001. which was the highest 

 he left to any of them. 



After the death of Henry VIII., which occurred on January 28, 

 1547, the Earl of Hertford, afterwards Duke of Somerset, who 

 was the young king's uncle, without having any regard to 

 Henry's will, got himself proclaimed Protector of the Kingdom, 

 and set on foot many projects. Among the first, one was to 

 get his brother, Sir Thomas Seymour, made Lord High Admiral, 

 in whose favour Lord Viscount Lisle was obliged to resign; 

 but in recompense for the loss of that office he was created 

 Earl of Warwick, with a grant of Warwick Castle, by patent 

 dated February 17, 1547. But in 1550 he was again made 

 Lord High Admiral. His lordship was appointed Master of 

 the Buckhounds to Edward VI. on April 15, 1551, with an 

 annual fee of 33^. 6s. 8d., payable half yearly, by even pro- 

 portions, at Easter and Michaelmas, in as full and ample a 

 manner as enjoyed by his predecessors in that office. However, 

 after holding the horn for a short time, he resigned the appoint- 

 ment, apparently in favour of his son, Lord Robert Dudley 

 (afterwards Earl of Leicester). In the following year the 

 Earl of Warwick was constituted Lord Steward of the House- 

 hold. Henceforward his lordship's ambition appears to have 

 known no bounds, and to have hurried him into acts of great 

 baseness and atrocity. Through his intrigues the quarrel arose 

 between the Protector Somerset and his brother Thomas, Lord 

 Seymour, which terminated in the public execution of the 



