Paulet rose to
the Marquisate of Winchester, Sir William Herbert was created Earl of
Pembroke. The plunder of the chauntries and the gilds failed to glut
the appetite of this crew of spoilers. Half the lands of every see were
flung to them in vain; an attempt was made to satisfy their greed by a
suppression of the wealthy see of Durham; and the whole endowments of
the Church were threatened with confiscation. But while the courtiers
gorged themselves with manors, the Treasury grew poorer. The coinage was
again debased. Crown lands to the value of five millions of our modern
money had been granted away to the friends of Somerset and Warwick. The
royal expenditure mounted in seventeen years to more than four times its
previous total. In spite of the brutality and bloodshed with which
revolt had been suppressed, and of the foreign soldiery on whom the
Council relied, there were signs of resistance which would have made
less reckless statesmen pause. The temper of the Parliament had drifted
far from the slavish subservience which it showed at the close of
Henry's reign. The House of Commons met Northumberland's project for the
pillage of the bishoprick of Durham with opposition, and rejected a new
treason bill. In 1552 the Duke was compelled to force nominees of his
own on the constituencies by writs from the Council before he could
count on a House to his mind. Such writs had been often issued since the
days of Henry the Seventh; but the ministers of Edward were driven to
an expedient which shows how rapidly the temper of independence was
growing. The summons of new members from places hitherto unrepresented
was among the prerogatives of the Crown, and the Protectorate used this
power to issue writs to small villages in the west which could be
trusted to return members to its mind.

[Sidenote: Edward the Sixth.]

This "packing of Parliament" was to be largely extended in the following
reigns; but it passed as yet with little comment. What really kept
England quiet was a trust that the young king, who would be of age in
two or three years, would then set all things right again. "When he
comes of age," said a Hampshire squire, "he will see another rule, and
hang up a hundred heretic knaves." Edward's temper was as lordly as that
of his father, and had he once really reigned he would probably have
dealt as roughly with the plunderers who had used his name as England
hoped. But he was a fanatical Protestant, and his rule woul