In process of time, Sir John Markham became Lord Chief Justice of the Common Pleas; according to Lord Campbell, he filled that office from the year 1396 to 1406, but it is elsewhere stated that he did not resign till 1408, the year before his death. The interesting anecdote of Prince Henry, the son of Henry IV. Having insulted the Chief Justice while on the bench, and been committed to prison for it, has popularly been applied to Sir W. Gascoigne; though the credit has also been claimed for others, and the circumstance would not have been noticed here, had it not been prominently brought forward by Lord Campbell in his Lives of the Chief Justices. After alluding to several whose friends have imagined them to be the persons, he easily disposes of Chief Justices Hankford and Hody; and then goes on to say "the same impossibility does not stand in the way of a claim set up for Sir John Markham by his descendants, on the strength of some supposed family papers which have not been communicated to the public. He was a chief justice from the twentieth of Richard II. To the ninth of Henry IV.; but then he was Chief Justice of the Common Pleas, and, although the commitment is sometimes said to have been to the Fleet (the prison of that court), it is quite clear that no arraignment of Bardolph, or any other associate of the Prince, could have taken place in the Court of Common Pleas, which has-cognizance only of civil actions." Lord Campbell then proceeds, "I think I am entitled to a verdict in favour of my client, Sir W. Gascoigne." The evidence, such as it is, does probably preponderate in favour of Sir W. Gascoigne, though all that is really given is on the authority of Sir John Whidden, a puisne judge in the time of Elizabeth, who cites the case as taking place before Chief Justice Gascoigne; for no reliance can be placed on Shakespeare, who makes so interesting a scene of the circumstance in the second part of Henry IV; or on Sir Thomas Elyott, beyond their belief of the fact, for neither one nor the other so much as mention the name of the Chief Justice in question, which is the point at issue. Now in opposition to the case as cited by Sir John Whidden, wherein Gascoigne is said to have committed the Prince to prison, I will adduce the evidence of the "supposed family papers." They consist of memoranda* written by Francis Markham, a lawyer and author, a soldier too, and an accomplished scholar, who was a contemporary of Sir John Whidden and Shakespeare (whose play of Henry IV. He must often have witnessed acted, without ever dreaming that he had other than his own ancestor in his eye, when the chief justice was personated), bearing upon them however evident stamps that they were never intended for the "public," but certainly claiming Sir John Markham as the judge who committed the joyial Prince to the Fleet. The memorandum runs thus:"In H. the IV.'s time Sir John Markham was Lord Chief Justice of Common Pleas, when a servant of ye Prince of Wales, for coyning of money, was in Newgate to be judged before him: ye Prince sendeing to have him released, ye Judge refused, ye Prince with an unrulie route came and required it, ye Judge refused, ye Prince stroke ye Judge on the face, the Judge committed ye Prince to ye Fleet: ye King being told it, thanked God he had so good a Judge, and so obedient a sonne to yield ye lawe." * Bought a few years ago, when the Fairfax library was sold, and now in my possession - C.R.M. Now, considering the position that Francis Markham held both in learned and literary society, as a scholar and a lawyer, he was as likely to be well informed on such a subject, and to have as easy access to the same authorities, as the "very dull" Sir John Whidden, and his compeer Sir Robert Catlyne; nor was he likely to assert the fact without proper investigation, as in those days, so soon after the event, he might have been easily refuted. Moreover he seems to make the claim with so much ingenuousness, and little fear of being impugned, that at least he must have believed what he asserted to be true, which would scarcely have been the case if the common impression had run in the contrary direction. But Lord Campbell points out another piece of evidence in favour of his client, the circumstance of felonies being invariably tried at the court of King's Bench, and therefore that it was from that court that the Prince must have been committed; but I believe every authority agrees that the Prince was committed to the Fleet, the prison of the Common Pleas, so that on that score it may equally justly be said on the other side, as the Prince was committed to the prison of the Common Pleas, so that act was performed by the judge presiding there, and consequently that it was Markham and not Gascoigne who resented the outrage of the Prince. On the whole then, the evidence seems to be so equally balanced, that it requires all the penetration and acumen of a Chief Justice to decide which scale kicks the beam. But as the eminent lord who now fills that office has given his decision in favour of the judge to whom. "so many chroniclers, moralists, and poets" have attributed the fact, so in courtesy will the descendants of Sir John Markham resign their claim, and leave Sir William Gascoigne in peaceful possession of his high-souled deed. Nothing marks the difference that exists between one period of history and another, more than the value of money, and if we take an interval of several centuries the difference is perfectly surprising. To go back to about Edward the Fourth's reign, we shall find the price of various articles, or the pay of common labourers, or the salaries of high officers of the crown, as compared with those of the present day, to be almost incredible. For instance, good arable or pasture land in those times would let for six pence an acre, worth now from thirty to forty shillings: wheat in the year 1463 sold for two shillings a quarter, when in our time sixty or seventy shillings was not an unusual price: sheep then could be bought for four pence, and are now worth from thirty to forty shillings: a labourer's wages were a penny a day, a master carpenter's four pence, a bailiff twenty-three shillings a year. And if we go higher in the scale, we find that the emoluments of the officers of the crown were at the same ratio. It is recorded by Dugdale, that Chief Justice Markham, who lived in the reign of Henry IV. had for his salary only one hundred and seventy marks, little more than one hundred and fourteen pounds per annum; and even in the time of Henry VIII. the salary was only increased by thirty pounds. The salaries however were probably much increased by fees. What a change took place very soon after; for we find in Sir Edward Coke's time the salary, comprising fees, had risen to four thousand pounds a year; and in our own time both salary and fees have been computed at seven thousand pounds. In the fifteenth year of Richard II., the whole of East Markham became the property of Sir John Markham, and it was handed down entire to his descendants. Of the habits of thriftiness of his ancestor, Francis Markham gives but a sorry account, "for he added," says he, "to his father's land but twenty nobles a yeare and tyed yt with more fynes and assurances than all his rest was." Whether Sir John was addicted to feats of arms, as Sir John Fortescue the Chief Justice of the King's Bench was, some years after, will admit of more than a doubt when we consider the nature of a bequest made to him in the year 1392, by one Robert Usher de Est Retford, in which probably the taste and habits of the legatee were consulted. After a long list of legacies to different persons, follow these to himself and wife -"j pannum deauratum et chaumpe de bleu, et j coupe argenti stantem super tres leones, cum cooperculo in parte deauratio et inamyld." These were for his own use. For his wife, "j unam ollam argenteam enamyld cum cooperculo eidem pertinenti, et j annulum aureum cum quatuor marjoryss et j diamond interpositis." "Item lego Johanni Markham omnem armaturam meam exceptis uno hauberjon et j payr glovys de playt, quas lego Ricardo de Thyrston.* * Festamenta Eboracensia. Sir John Markham was married twice: his first wife was Elizabeth, daughter and coheir of Henri de Cressi, in direct descent from Sir Roger de Cressi lord of Hodsac in the time of Henry II. Sir John de Clifton, of Clifton, who was afterwards killed at the battle of Shrewsbury, married the elder sister Katharine, and at the death of their brother Hugo de Cressi, his property was divided between the two sisters at Retford, in the tenth year of Henry IV., when Hodsac fell to the Cliftons; and Cressi Hall, Risegate, Braytoft, and Exton in Lincolnshire to the Markhams. Sir John married for his second wife Milicent, daughter and heir of Sir Thomas de Bekeryng, and widow of Sir Nicholas Bourdon, by whom he had two children: Sir John, afterwards Lord Chief Justice of England,† "the greatest ornament," says Camden, "of this family, who tempered his judgments with so much equity that his name will endure as long as time itself;" and Margaret, who married Sir Walter Pitwardyn. Milicent died in 1419. Upon a fair marble tomb in the church of East Markham was this inscription - Hic jacet Domina Milicensia quæ obiit 27 Sept. 1419. Upon it are impaled the arms of her different husbands on several coats. † He was the founder of the Sedgbrook line of Markhams, in the chapter on which family his life will be found. In an autograph at Clifton was to be seen, "not many years ago, the seal of Sir John Markham, l0 Henry IV., which is, Party per fesse, and on the upper part a demi lion rampant, which the elder branch still bear." The judge died in the tenth year of Henry IV., as may be seen by his monument still existing in East Markham church on the north side of the chancel. It bears the following inscription - Orate pro anima Johannis Markham Justiciarii, qui obiit in festo Sti Silvestri, anno Dom. 1409.* * Festamenta Eboracensia. By his first wife, Elizabeth de Cressi, Sir John had two sons and one daughter, Adela, the wife of Sir Robert Stanhope, who had a monument erected to their memory in York Minster now destroyed; Henry was the second son, who appears never to have been married, and the eldest succeeded his father. SIR ROBERT MARKHAM married Elizabeth, daughter and heir of Sir John Burdon and Elizabeth de Bekeryng his wife; by which marriage the manors of Maplebec and Boughton were settled upon him. By this lady, Sir Robert had four children: Elizabeth, married to Sir Thomas Molineux of Hawton, created Knight Banneret by Richard III. At Berwick; Margaret, the wife of Sir Henry Willoughby, also a Knight Banneret; and Katharine, the wife of Sir Henry Bozome of Screveton. The fourth child was his son Robert, who succeeded him. The exact time of his death is uncertain; it was probably in the early part of the reign of Henry IV. Both Sir Robert and his lady were buried at Sedgbrook, the seat of his brother the chief justice, and in the "quayer of the church, in a window on the syde of the Ladyes chapel," are three pictures with inscriptions as follows - 1st. A man in coat armour, whereon the Markham coat; under it "Sir Robert Markham." 2d. A woman, and under her "Dame Elizabeth Markham." 3d. A man as before, and underneath "Sir Robert, Knt. Son of Sir Robert." A pious act is recorded of this worthy couple, of having founded, July the fifteenth, 1434, an oratory in the church of Southwell; and the arms of Markham of Cotham are stated to have been standing in one of the windows of the great hall of the palace of Southwell, probably thoes of his son and heir. * I visited the church of East Markham in 1831, when I was told by the sexton that a very short time before the monument had been moved from the centre to the north side of the chancel, where it then was. A stone-coffin was found under it on a level with the pavement, containing human bones, the last mortal remains of the judge. On the upper surface of the lid of the coffin, which I saw, was engraved a recumbent figure, shrouded in grave clothes; at each upper corner of which was a lion`s head. The coffin was reburied in the churchyard, on the south side of the church. The name of Judge Markham was still regarded with veneration by the inhabitants of the place.-D.F.M. SIR ROBERT MARKHAM married Joan the daughter and heir of Sir Giles Daubeny, and Mary, daughter of Sir Simon Leake, in whose right he held the manors of Cotham and Houghton by Newark; Joan carried the lordship, as heir, to Sir Robert Markham her husband. "The family of Markham," says Thoroton, "then made Cotham their principal residence and were of great note." Sir Robert was a warm supporter of the side of the White Rose in the wars between the rival factions of York and Lancaster, and did good service to the cause, for which he was rewarded at the coronation of Edward IV. immediately after the great victory of Towton-field, by being created a Knight of the Bath. He served the office of High Sheriff for the counties of Derby and Nottingham 10 Edw. IV. and also for the county of Lincoln·16 Edw. IV. Sir Robert had two sons, John who succeeded him, and Robert,* who married Elizabeth the daughter of Sir William de Mering, a decendant of Agnes Markham and William de Sancta Cruce, mentioned above. He settled at Oxton in the county of Nottingham, and had a son Robert, who married Ela, daughter and heir of John Saperton, by whom he had five children. The eldest of these was William, whose grandson James died without issue, and thus the Oxton family of Markhams became extinct. * In Newark church, at the south-east corner of the choir, is a chantry chapel, "and in it a monument of Markham" (now disappeared) "over which there is an arch of freestone and on the side of that 'Orate pro animis Roberti Markham armigeri et. Elizabethæ uxoris ejus.'" On the outside of the tracery, which still remains, are several coats of arms coarsely cut.- Markham quartering Leake, and impaling Mering, Burdon, Bozome, &c.- D.F.M. Sir Robert died about the year 1476, and was succeeded by his eldest son. ...