224 THE HISTORY OF NEWMARKET. [Book IV. 



there be fit subjects to entertain it, as lately they have 

 been at Sir John Crofts near Bury, and in 

 requital those Ladies have invited them to 

 a Masque of their own invention, all those fair 

 sisters "" being summoned for the purpose, so that 

 on Thursday next the King, Prince, and all the 

 Court go thither a Shroving. Some ten or twelve 

 days since there fell out an unlucky accident by 

 reason of a quarrel and challenge betwixt two Scots- 

 men, Sir Robert Kerr,f near about the Prince, 

 and [Charles] Maxwell, brother of him of the Bed- 

 chamber, who was left dead in the field, though he 

 held himself the braver man upon the success of 

 having killed one before in Scotland and another in 

 France. But the King says, though he pardoned him 

 then, and the French King after, yet it seems that 

 God would not pardon him now. Upon the Prince's 

 humble and earnest entreaty, assisted by the Duke of 

 Lennox and Marquis of Hamilton, together with the 

 Coroner's Inquest finding it ' Manslaughter,' the King 

 is pleased to remit the offence ; and Ker be restored 

 to former favour, the rather for that he was earnestly 

 urged, and could not by any reasonable means avoid it. 

 The quarrel occurred at Sir Thomas Murray's table, 

 upon some speech Ker used touching the deportment 



* Of "those fair sisters," Anne was Lady Wentworth, and Dorothy 

 was the wife of Sir John Bennet, and mother of John, ist Lord Ossulston, 

 and Henry, ist Earl of Arlington. Another sister was Cecily, reputed 

 mistress of the Prince of Wales, subsequently a maid of honour to 

 Queen Henrietta Maria. Charles I. gave her a pension of ^500 a year. 

 An interesting account of the costumes provided by the prince for this 

 masque will be found in the accounts of his Royal Highness's wardrobe, 

 preserved in the Public Record Ofhce. 



t Created Earl of Ancrum in 1633.— Nichols, vol. ii., p. 514. 



