Note 195.1 — THE PASTON LETTERS Henry VI (continued 4)

[From Fenn, iii. 346.] This letter belongs to the latter part of the year 1459. After the dispersion of the Duke of York’s army near Ludlow in October of that year, commissions were granted to various persons to arrest and punish his adherents. Even as early as the 14th of October, Lord Rivers and others were commissioned to seize their lands and goods in different counties (see Patent Roll, 38 Hen. VI., p. 1, m. 12, in dorso). But this letter, we are inclined to think, was written about six or seven weeks later, for it will be seen by the next that Bocking, who is here stated to have been with my Lord Chancellor ‘this term,’ must have been in attendance on him before the 7th December, and therefore, we may presume, during Michaelmas term, which ended on the 28th November. It is, however, difficult to judge, from the very slender allusion to Sir John Fastolf, whether this letter was written before or after the old knight’s death. Brackley here speaks of having been quite recently in Somersetshire, which is not unlikely to have been in the middle of October, when the Earls of March, Warwick, and Salisbury withdrew into the West. Brackley, as will be seen, was a great partisan of these Lords, and may very well have accompanied them; but not long before Fastolf’s death he appears to have been at Norwich.

195.2 Love days were days appointed for the settlement of disputes by arbitration.

196.1 Sir Thomas Tuddenham.

196.2 John Heydon.

196.3 Meaning the Earls of March, Warwick, and Salisbury.

196.4 William Waynflete, Bishop of Winchester.

196.5 The original letter is here defective.—F.

196.6 Edward, Prince of Wales.

197.1 Psalm xxxvi. (or xxxvii.) 1-4.

197.2 Psalm liv. (or lv.) 22.

197.3 Gal. v. 12.

197.4 2 Thess. iii. 2.

197.5 ‘Feria quarta’ means Wednesday.