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Council Chamber in the White Tower
George Cruikshank
September 1840
Wood-engraving
10.2 cm high by 9.1 cm wide, framed
Illustration for Book II, Ch. XXV, of Ainsworth's The Tower of London, p. 288.
[Click on image to enlarge it.]
Scanned image and text by Philip V. Allingham.
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At one time, it was determined to murder Arundel, Paget, Rochester, and the chief supporters of the Spanish match, to seize the person of the queen and compel her to marry Courtenay, or depose her and place Elizabeth on the throne. This plan not suiting the views of Lord Guilford Dudley and Suffolk, was opposed by them; and owing to the conflicting interests of the different parties that unity of purpose indispensable to success could not be obtained.
Elizabeth, as has before been intimated, had dissembled her religious opinions, and though she formed some excuse for not being present at the performance of mass, she requested to have an instructor in the tenets of the Catholic faith, and even went so far as to write to the emperor to send a cross, a chalice, and other ornaments for the celebration of the religious rites of Rome, to decorate her chapel.
As to Courtenay, he appeared to have become sensible of the perilous position in which he stood, and was only prevented from withdrawing from the struggle by his unabated passion for Elizabeth. Lord Guilford Dudley still cherished his ambitious views, and Jane still mourned in secret.
Matters were in this state at the commencement of the new year, when as above related, the ambassadors arrived from the court of Spain. Shortly after their arrival, they had an audience of the queen in the council-chamber of the White Tower; and when they had declared in due form that the Prince of Spain demanded her in marriage, she replied with great dignity, but some little prudery. . . . [Chapter XXV. — "Of the Arrival of the Imperial Ambassadors; And of the Signing of the Marriage-Treaty between Mary and Philip of Spain," pp. 287-88]
The Constable Tower, which Chief Architect and Master Builder Henry de Reyns together with John of Gloucester and Robert of Beverley built between 1238 and 1272 in the Romanesque style, provided accommodation for the Constable of the Tower of London until the construction of the Lieutenant's Lodgings. Thus, it was another of those towers like the Beauchamp and Byward which were suitable for the reception of noble prisoners of state. Prior to the construction of the two-storey Tudor framed residence (circa 1530) known after 1880 as "The Queen's House," the Constable of the Tower occupied the thirteenth-century Constable Tower.
The plucky dwarf, Xit, is not expecting the kind of interrogation tactics to which the authorities customarily subject suspects with information vital to the security of the regime. Consequently, he takes the opportunity to escape when he discovers the drunken Nightgall and Wolfytt asleep in the upper chamber of the Constable Tower. Stealing Nightgall's complete set of keys to the Tower as well as his poignard, Xit discovers Nightgall's pass, "an order from the council to let the bearer pass at any hour whithersoever he would, through the fortress," which he immediately employs to get past sentinels posted on the roof and battlements. He then makes his way to the roof of the Broad Arrow Tower by way of the ballium wall.
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Last modified 22 October 2017