garter, and Dr. Henry Burghurshe bishop of Lincoln, chancellor
and treasurer of England. Mr. Speight says this lady was given him in
marriage by Edward III. in return of his services performed in his
embassies in France. His second son Lewis was born in 1381, for when
his father wrote the treatise of the Astrolabe, he was ten years
old; he was then a student in Merton college in Oxford, and pupil to
Nicholas Strade, but there is no further account of him. Thomas who
now enjoyed the office of chief butler to his majesty, had the same
place confirmed to him for life, by letters patent to king Henry IV,
and continued by Henry VI. In the 2d year of Henry IV, we find him
Speaker of the House of Commons, Sheriff of Oxfordshire and Berkshire,
and Constable of Wallingford castle and Knaresborough castle during
life. In the 6th year of the same prince, he was sent ambassador to
France. In the 9th of the same reign the Commons presented him their
Speaker; as they did likewise in the 11th year. Soon after this Queen
Jane, granted to him for his good service, the manor of Woodstock,
Hannerborough and Wotten during life; and in the 13th year, he was
again presented Speaker as he was in the 2d of Henry V, and much
about that time he was sent by the king, to treat of a marriage
with Catherine daughter to the duke of Burgundy; he was sent again
ambassador to France, and passed thro' a great many public stations.
Mr. Stebbing says that he was knighted, but we find no such title
given him in any record. He died at Ewelm, the chief place of his
residence, in the year 1434. By his wife Maud he had one daughter
named Alice, who was thrice married, first to Sir John Philips, and
afterwards to Thomas Montacute earl of Salisbury: her third husband
was the famous William de la Pole, duke of Suffolk, who lost his head
by the fury of the Yorkists, who dreaded his influence in the opposite
party, tho' he stood proscribed by the parliament of Henry VI. for
misguiding that easy prince. Their son John had three sons, the second
of whom, Edmund, forfeited his life to the crown for treason against
Henry VII, by which means the estates which Chaucer's family possessed
came to the crown. But to return to our poet: By means of the duke
of Lancaster's marriage with his sister in law, he again grew to a
considerable share of wealth; but being now about seventy years of
age, and fatigued with a tedious view of hurried greatness, he quitted
the stage of grand