[148] Strype, iii. 107. He reckons the emigrants at 800. _Life of Cranmer_, 314. Of these the most illustrious was the Duchess of Suffolk, first cousin of the queen. In the parliament of 1555, a bill sequestering the property of "the Duchess of Suffolk and others, contemptuously gone over the seas," was rejected by the Commons on the third reading. Journals, 6th December. It must not be understood that all the aristocracy were supple hypocrites, though they did not expose themselves voluntarily to prosecution. Noailles tells us that the Earls of Oxford and Westmoreland, and Lord Willoughby, were censured by the council _for religion_; and it was thought that the former would lose his title (more probably his hereditary office of chamberlain), which would be conferred on the Earl of Pembroke, v. 319. Michele, the Venetian ambassador, in his Relazione del Stato d'Inghilterra, Lansdowne MSS. 840, does not speak favourably of the general affection towards popery. "The English in general," he says, "would turn Jews or Turks if their sovereign pleased; but the restoration of the abbey lands by the crown keeps alive a constant fear among those who possess them."--Fol. 176. This restitution of church lands in the hands of the Crown cost the queen £60,000 a year of revenue. [149] Parker had extravagantly reckoned the number of these at 12,000, which Burnet reduces to 3000, vol. iii. 226. But upon this computation they formed a very considerable body on the protestant side. Burnet's calculation, however, is made by assuming the ejected ministers of the diocese of Norwich to have been in the ratio of the whole; which, from the eminent protestantism of that district, is not probable; and Dr. Lingard, on Wharton's authority, who has taken his ratio from the diocese of Canterbury, thinks they did not amount to more than about 1500. [150] Burnet, ii. 298; iii. 245. But see Philips's _Life of Pole_, sect. ix. _contra_; and Ridley's answer to this, p. 272. In fact, no scheme of religion would on the whole have been so acceptable to the nation, as that which Henry left established, consisting chiefly of what was called catholic in doctrine, but free from the grosser abuses and from all connection with the see of Rome. Arbitrary and capricious as that king was, he carried the people along with him, as I believe, in all great points, both as to what he renounced, and what he retained. Michele (Relazione, etc.) is of this opinion.