It is probable Queen Elizabeth had no great liking for the Arundells, being prejudiced against them, it may be on account of their religious principles. Some years before, in 1575, when Sir Matthew Arundell had re-acquired Wardour Castle and Park, she seized upon it to enforce the payment of an old Crown debt, that seems to have been owing on property Sir Thomas Arundell acquired of Henry VIII., and had not been cleared off, and which it was probable from his relationship to that monarch was never intended should be paid. The Queen, we believe, did not insist on the payment, but it shewed her semi-hostile attitude toward them then, and this incident of the acceptance of a foreign title, did not tend to improve it. King James, however straitened and antagonistic in his religious views, and natural distaste to the Roman communion, nevertheless, recognized his merits, by creating him in the second year of his reign, 4 May, 1605, Baron Arundell of Wardour, but neither Queen Elizabeth, nor that King, we believe, ever recognized his foreign title. He died at Wardour Castle, and was buried in this chancel. The following inscription is to his memory,-- THOMAS DOMINUS ARUNDELIUS, PRIMUS BARO DE WARDOUR, SACRI ROMANI IMPERII COMES, OBIJT 7^MO DIE NOVEMBRIS, ÆTATIS SUÆ 79, ANNO DOMINI 1639. SICUT PULLUS HIRUNDINIS SIC CLAMABO. Isaiæ xxxviii. v. 14. With this we close any extended notice of the succeeding descendants of this noble and distinguished family. Thomas his son was a devoted Royalist, and "being at the battle of Lansdown was shot in the thigh by a brace of pistol-bullets, whereof the same year he died in his Majesty's garrison at Oxford,"--the devoted and heroic Blanche Somerset his wife it was who so bravely defended Wardour Castle during the war of the Commonwealth; she died at Winchester, but both are rejoined in death here. These inscriptions occur to them,-- D. O. M. Hic parte sua mortali quiescit, qui in coelo potiori parte vivit immortalis THOMAS ARUNDEL, Baro Arundel de Warder, sacri Romani imperii Comes, primogenitus nempe Thomæ Arundel, Baronis etiam de Warder, qui, ob insignia et pietatis et fortitudinis exempla in communem Christiani nominis hostem in Hungaria ad Strigonium præstita hæreditarium hunc honoris titulum a Rodolpho secundo meruit ipse, et ad posteros transmissit; cujus dignitatum virtutumque hic hæres, dum vixit, sic Deo in constanti pietatis exercito militavit in terris, ut debitum sibi in coelis triumphum expectare videretur, ita se totum in Regis Caroli primi obsequium, imminente in Anglia bello civili, impendit, ut in illud opes fortunamque profuderit, ac vitam denique ipsam lubentissime contulisset, e qua excessit Oxonii die 19^o Maij, ann. ætatis 59, annoque reparatæ salutis 1643. And on the adjoining stone:-- D. O. M.