Bedford, out of the issues of her lands (_Rot Pat._ 1 H. IV, Part 8); but on the 3rd of March, the custody of her son Richard was granted to her, and 30 pounds worth of gold and silver of her late husband's goods in the hands of the Mayor of Bristol. (_Ibidem_, Part 6.) Moreover, on the 19th of February, a concession was made to her of eleven manors, two towns, two castles, two lordships, and other lands (_Ibidem_, Part 5); followed by a grant of "the price of certain vessels of silver, brooches, jewels, and other goods" which had belonged to her husband. (_Rot. Ex, Pasc_, 1 H. IV.) In 1404 she was restored to her dower by Act of Parliament. (_Inq. Post. Mortem_ 4 H. V 52.) When and where she met with her second husband can only be guessed; for that Edmund Earl of Kent was really her second husband I think there is the strongest reason to believe. His sisters afterwards chose to deny the marriage; it was their interest to do so, for had the legitimacy of his child been established, they would have been obliged to resign to her her father's estates, which, as his presumptive heirs, they had inherited. Their excessive anxiety to prove her illegitimate, the persecution which Constance subsequently underwent, the resolute determination of Henry the Fourth that Kent should marry Lucia, and the remarkable coincidence of time between Constance's imprisonment and Lucia's marriage, go far to show that the marriage (though perhaps clandestine) was genuine, as alleged by Alianora; and I cannot avoid a strong conviction that a great deal of this hate and persecution were due to the fact that Constance was actually or suspectedly a Lollard. The denials of Kent's sisters may be attributed to their wish to retain his estates; while as for his nephews and nieces, who nominally joined in the petition, they could only know what they were told; for Joyce Lady Tibetot, the eldest of the group, was only three years old at the death of Kent. But to what cause can be attributed the violent determination of Henry the Fourth? If it be supposed that he wished to benefit and advance Kent, how did he do it by preventing his acknowledged marriage with a well-dowered Princess of England?--or if to lower him, how was this done by purchasing for him, at the cost of 70,000 florins, the hand of a foreign Princess? Beside this, Henry showed throughout that while he had no mercy for Constance, he was on the best possible terms with Kent. Modern writers are altogether at fault on the subject, most of them alleging that Constance's daughter Alianora was born before her marriage with Thomas Le Despenser; whereas it is shown by the Register that when Le Despenser and Constance were married, the latter was only four or five years old, while Kent was not even born. The rescue of the Mortimers comes in to complicate matters; but what shall be said, from the point of view of some writers, who submit that the whole was a mere pretext to imprison Constance and her