42 The Eminent Ladies of Wiltshire History. 



disagreeable situation, and to determine what you would have done. 

 You would have had various similar examples to enable you to come 

 to some conclusion. There was Blechington House, in Oxfordshire, 

 commanded by Colonel Windebank, the governor, attacked by 

 Cromwell. The governor's wife, a young and beautiful bride, per- 

 suaded her husband to give up at once without a blow, which he 

 did : for which afterwards a council of war condemned him to lose 

 his head. On the other hand, there was Corfe Castle, in Dorsetshire, 

 defended by Lady Bankes for several weeks successfully. There 

 was Lathom House, in Lancashire, defended by the Countess op 

 Derby, who sent back by the summoner this intrepid reply, " I'll 

 neither give it up nor desert it. I'll set fire to it first and burn it 

 and myself in it." Then there is for further encouragement to the 

 valiant, that fine old French General, who was besieged in the Castle 

 of Vincennes, close to Paris, and who had lost a leg in the siege. 

 One more chance was offered him, but his answer was, " Je vous 

 rendrai le fort, quand vous me rendrez ma jambe." [I'll give you 

 up the castle when you give me back my leg.] Well, our Wiltshire 

 heroine's reply, when summoned to give up Wardour, was this : — 

 " I have a command from my husband to keep it, and I shall obey 

 his command." She stood out for five days most bravely ; but 

 having so few people, the very maid-servants being obliged to help in 

 loading the guns, a great part of the castle having been blown up 

 by a mine, and another mine being ready to blow up the rest, it 

 was hopeless to continue the struggle, but she still refused to sur- 

 render, unless upon written conditions, that all lives should be 

 spared, and no damage done. The original document so written is 

 still preserved at Wardour. The first condition was observed, but 

 not the second. Lady Arundell was 60 years of age at the time of 

 this event. There is a portrait of her at the Duke of Beaufort's 

 house at Badminton. 



We have in this county a partial claim to another heroine, who 

 has earned undying memory in the history of England, the lady 

 who, as Miss Jane Lane, risked her life in assisting King Charles 

 II. in his escape from Boscobel, after the battle of Worcester. The 

 king, in disguise as her servant, rode on horseback with Miss Jane 



