8. JOHN AYLMER: born at Aylmer-Hall in Tilney, about 1521. When very young, Henry Grey, Marquis of Dorset, afterward Duke of Suffolk, took a great liking to him, entertained him as his scholar, and gave him an exhibition at Cambridge, where his proficiency was so considerable, that he was afterward deemed one of the best scholars of his time. {126} From the University his noble patron took him to his family, and made him tutor to his children, among whom was the memorable _Lady Jane Grey_. He early imbibed the opinion of the reformers, and was very instrumental, under the patronage of the Duke of Suffolk, and the Earl of Huntingdon, in diffusing the same about Leicestershire, (in which bounty was the Duke’s chief seat and residence,) where he seems to have had some preferment, and to have been tor sometime the only preacher of that description. In time he was promoted to the archdeaconry of _Stow_, in the diocese of Lincoln, which qualified him to sit in Convocation, the first year of the reign of Mary, where he defended protestantism with so much zeal, learning, and acuteness, that he was soon after deprived of his archdeaconry, and obliged to abscond and quit the kingdom, to avoid the approaching storm. After he had embarked he was in no small danger from the searchers, who came onboard, in quest of fugitives; but he happily escaped, partly through his own diminutive size, (being of small stature like _Zaccheus_,) and partly through the friendship of the Captain, who placed him in the empty end of a wine _butt_, that had a partition in the middle, where he sat very snugly, while the searchers were drinking wine, which they saw drawn out of the other end. He was sometime after landed on the continent, and got safe to Strasburgh, whence he shortly after removed to Zurich, where he diligently prosecuted his studies, and attended the Lectures of Peter Martyr. He afterwards visited most of the universities of Italy and Germany, and at _Jena_, in Saxony, he had the offer of the Hebrew Professorship, which he declined. After the accession of Elizabeth he returned home, and was one of the divines appointed to dispute at Westminster with an equal number of popish bishops. He sometime after was made archdeacon of Lincoln; but got no higher for a long while. At last, upon the translation of Sandys to York, he was appointed his successor in the see of London. This elevation he is said to have owed, in a great measure, to the interest and friendship of that prelate, but which he afterward very ill requited. He now forgot his former affection to the puritans, and became a bitter persecutor. On Sunday afternoons he was fond of playing at bowls, and would use such language at this game as justly exposed him to reproach. When he happened to preach, if he observed his audience inattentive, he would take a Hebrew bible out of his pocket, and read them a few verses, and then resume his discourse. {128a} He was a man of great courage,