This strange thing happened in the second time that he was elected Lord
Mayor and that was upon the twenty-seventh of April, being Tuesday in
Easter week: William Foxley, Pot maker for the Mint in the Tower of
London, fell asleep, and so continued sleeping and snoring and could not
be wakened with pricking, cramping, or otherwise burning or whatsoever
till the first day of the term, which was full 14 days and 15 nights.
The cause of this his sleeping could not be known though the same was
diligently searched for by the King's Command of his Physicians and
other learned men, yea the King himself examined the said William
Foxley, who was in all points sound at his awaking to be as if he had
slept but one night, and yet lived 41 years after. But in length of time
did call to mind how he did wish to God that he might sleep a fortnight
together if it was not so and so concerning a bargain between a
neighbour of his and himself.
One Thursday in Whitson week following the Duke of Somerset with Anthony
Rivers and four others kept Justs and Tournament before the King and
Queen and others of the nobility in the Tower of London, against three
Esquires of the Queen's Bedchamber, which were performed before some of
the French nobility that then were Prisoners to the King, which he took
in France, to the great admiration of those strangers who never saw the
like action before, being so earnestly performed. There was also Sir
Richard Whittington and the two Sheriff's, and that night the King and
Queen did sup with the Lord Mayor.
Those strangers which beheld those Justs were prisoners in the Tower at
that time, namely, the Duke of Orleance and Burbon, brother to the Duke
of Britain, the Earls of Vaudosine, of Ewe and Richmond, and the High
Marshal of France, and many other Knights and Esquires to the number of
seven hundred, all which were at one time prisoners to the King, but
nobly used and attended every one according to their rank and quality,
who when they were ransomed made it known to their King how honourably
they were attended in England, and what respect the King and our English
nation shewed them being prisoners who might have taken their lives away
as well as their persons prisoners.
The second thing that was remarkable in Sir Richard Whittington's year
was that the King kept his Christmas at Lambeth, and at the feast of
Purification seven Dolphins of the sea came up to the River of Thames
and played there up and down until four of them were kill'd.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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