. To form an approach to these upper rooms he built a handsome
interior staircase, which may be seen in perfect condition at the
present day. A tradition exists that in order to give himself a little
more room he pulled down the east side of the little cloister, and
re-erected it in the same style, fourteen feet in the eastern direction.
These works were executed during the years 1565 to 1571, during part of
which time the Duke made the Charterhouse his residence.

In the year 1569 Norfolk was committed to the Tower for contemplating
marriage with Mary, Queen of Scots, and of being implicated in a plot
against the throne and life of Elizabeth. He was released after some
months' imprisonment upon pledging himself to abandon all thoughts of
the contemplated union. This promise, however, he did not keep. A cypher
correspondence was discovered under the tiles of the roof of the house,
and other papers were found concealed under the mat outside his bed
chamber. For this he was arraigned on a charge of high treason, and
executed in 1571.

As the Duke was executed for high treason his land escheated to the
Crown. The Charterhouse, however, continued in the possession of his
sons. It was first held by the Earl of Arundel, and on his death it
passed to Lord Thomas Howard, his younger brother, when it became known
as Howard House. Whether this arose from the favour with which Elizabeth
was always disposed to treat her great nobility, or whether it was that
the Duke had granted leases to his sons, which leases protected the
property from "escheat," is not very clear. Certainly, however, the
Howards held the property until the younger son sold it for L13,000 to
Mr. Thomas Sutton in 1611, for the purpose of founding his "Hospital."

III.--THE HOSPITAL, 1611-1908

Of the early life and ancestry of Thomas Sutton little is recorded. He
was born in 1532, the son of Richard Sutton, a native of Knaith, in
Lincolnshire. His father died in 1558. Thomas Sutton went to Eton, but
there seems little reason to believe, as Bearcroft endeavours to prove,
that he proceeded to Cambridge. It is certain that he entered as a
student at Lincoln's Inn, but did not complete his studies. Shortly
afterwards he went abroad and travelled extensively, visiting Holland,
France, Italy, and Spain. He had inherited a modest competence from his
father.

On returning home Sutton entered the service of Thomas, Duke of Norfolk,
and later engaged himself in the