among the many acts of severity practised against his nobles by henry viii, few are more remarkable than the terrible persecution suffered by fitzgerald, earl of kildare, and his unhappy family. this nobleman, whose second wife, lady elizabeth grey, was a daughter of the marquis of dorset, and first cousin to the king, was for some time favored at court, and had been made lord deputy of ireland; but the country being much disturbed, he was summoned to answer for this before the king in council, and proceeded to london, leaving his eldest son to administer the irish affairs in his absence.
but on reaching the court, fitzgerald was committed to the tower; and his son, exasperated by a false report of his father’s being beheaded, broke into open rebellion. succeeding for a short time, but afterwards reduced to difficulty, thomas fitzgerald received a promise of[46] pardon; and confiding in this, he surrendered himself to lord leonard grey, brother of his step-mother, the countess of kildare. his five uncles, who had taken part with him in the rebellion, also submitted, and the whole six were conveyed to london; but in spite of the remonstrances of lord leonard grey, who declared his honor pledged for their safety, they were all hanged at tyburn.
the earl, worn down by these heavy sorrows, died in the tower; an attainder was issued against him (after his death), and his lands and goods declared forfeited to the crown. not content with this cruel injustice, the king sought by all means to get into his power the young heir of this unhappy house, gerald fitzgerald, then not more than twelve years old; but his evil designs were frustrated by the zeal and affection of the martyred earl’s foster-brother, a priest named leverous, to whom the boy had been confided for education. when this good man received notice that the brother and uncles of his ward had been sent to england, he became fearful for the young gerald’s safety; the child was then lying ill of the small-pox, but intrusting the care of his nursling to no arm less zealous than his own, he wrapped him up warmly, and as carefully as he could, and carried him by night to the house of his sister, where he was nursed in concealment[47] till quite recovered. but, justly judging that the child would not be safe with any one known to be connected, however humbly, with his own family, the good priest removed him successively into the territories of two or three different irish chieftains, by whom he was sheltered for nearly twelve months; after this he contrived to place the boy in the protection of his aunt, the lady eleanor, widow of a chieftain named macarty reagh. now this lady had been long sought in marriage by o’donnel, lord of tyrconnel, whom she had hitherto refused; but hoping to secure an efficient protector for her nephew, she now consented to an immediate marriage, and taking gerald with her to her new home in donegal, she hoped he would here remain in safety.
the devoted leverous had refused to leave his charge even in care so seemingly unexceptionable as this; and the king, having ordered a large reward to be offered for the boy, o’donnel was soon discovered by this watchful guardian to be meditating the baseness of delivering the orphan into henry’s hands. seeking the lady eleanor, leverous unfolded this intended villany, and causing gerald to assume a sufficient disguise, his aunt gave him what money she could gather in haste, and shipped him at once with his tutor and another old servant of his father’s, in a vessel bound to[48] st. malo, in brittany. the safety of the boy thus secured, she next sought her husband, and bidding him remember that her interest in this child had been the sole cause of her marriage with him, she declared that all future intercourse with a man who had so basely broken his promise, and that for so mercenary a motive, was impossible, and gathering her possessions together, she departed to her own country. gerald meanwhile had been well received by the king of france; but sir john wallop, the english ambassador, having demanded him in the name of king henry, the french king took time to consider; and leverous, fearing the result, again bore his charge from the threatening danger, and took refuge with him in flanders, in the house of a cottager, whose daughter waited upon gerald with the utmost kindness. they had not been long here before it was perceived that their every step was dogged by an irish servant of sir john wallop. the governor of valenciennes, befriending the orphan, threw this man into prison; but he was liberated by the generous intercession of the youth whom he had sought to betray, and gerald reached the emperor’s court at brussels without farther molestation.
he was here again demanded by the english ambassador, but the emperor excused himself on the plea that gerald’s youth sufficiently attested his innocence,[49] and sent him privately to the bishop of liege, with a pension of one hundred crowns a month. here he remained in comfort and safety for six months, when cardinal pole, his mother’s kinsman, invited him into italy, and, allowing him an annuity, placed him first with the bishop of verona, and afterwards with the duke of mantua; but would not admit him to his own presence until he had first acquired the italian language, an extraordinary condition, the cardinal’s english parentage considered.
this accomplished, however, the cardinal summoned his young kinsman to rome, and had him instructed, under his own eye, in all the accomplishments then required to constitute the finished gentleman. at the age of nineteen, his generous patron permitted him to choose between continuing his studies or traveling for adventures, as was then the custom. gerald chose the latter, and falling in with some knights of rhodes, he joined them in the fierce wars they were then waging against “the turks and miscreants.”
returning to rome laden with rich booty, “proud was the cardinal to hear of his exploits,” and proud also we may be sure was another priest; for the faithful leverous still clung to the fortunes of the child he had saved. soon after this “fighting with turks and miscreants,” the cardinal having increased the pension[50] of gerald to ￡300 a year (a very large income in those days), permitted him to enter the service of cosmo, duke of florence, with whom he remained three years as master of the horse; a very honorable appointment.
his exile at length terminated by the death of henry. gerald fitzgerald proceeded to london, still accompanied by his attached leverous. appearing at king edward’s court, he saw the daughter of sir anthony brown at a ball, and afterwards marrying this lady, her family procured the restitution of a part of his estates from the king, who also knighted him. under mary he was restored to all the titles and honors of his house, all which, and the prosperity of his middle life, was witnessed by the happy leverous, who died at a good old age under the roof of his grateful pupil, by whom he was ever honored as a father. the earl himself lived till far into the reign of elizabeth, closing his life peacefully in the year 1585.
