Third Gent. Stokesly and Gardiner; the one of Winchester,

Newly preferr'd from the king's secretary, The other, London.

Sec. Gent.

He of Winchester

Is held no great good lover of the arch

bishop's,

The virtuous Cranmer.

Third Gent.

All the land knows that:

However, yet there is no great breach ; when it comes,

Cranmer will find a friend will not shrink from him.

Sec. Gent. Who may that be, I pray you? Third Gent. Thomas Cromwell; A man in much esteem with the king, and

truly

A worthy friend. The king has made him

master

O' the jewel house,

And one, already, of the privy council.

Sec. Gent. He will deserve more.

Third Gent.

Yes, without all doubt.

Come, gentlemen, ye shall go my way,

Which is to the court, and there ye shall be

my guests:

Enter KATHARINE, Dowager, sick; led between GRIFFITH, her Gentleman Usher, and PATIENCE, her woman.

Grif. How does your grace?

Kath.

O Griffith, sick to death!

My legs, like loaden branches, bow to the

earth,

Willing to leave their burthen.

chair.

Reach a

So; now, methinks, I feel a little ease.

Didst thou not tell me, Griffith, as thou led'st

me,

That the great child of honour, Cardinal Wolsey,

Was dead?

Grif. Yes, madam; but I think your

grace,

ΙΟ

Out of the pain you suffer'd, gave no ear to 't.

Kath. Prithee, good Griffith, tell me how he died:

If well, he stepp'd before me, happily,

For my example.

Grif.

Well, the voice goes, madam : For after the stout Earl Northumberland Arrested him at York, and brought him forward,

As a man sorely tainted, to his answer,
He fell sick suddenly, and grew so ill
He could not sit his mule.

Kath.

Alas, poor man!

Grif. At last, with easy roads, he came

to Leicester,

Lodged in the abbey; where the reverend

abbot,

With all his covent, honourably received

him;

To whom he gave these words, 'O father

abbot,

An old man, broken with the storms of

state,

Is come to lay his weary bones among ye; Give him a little earth for charity!'

So went to bed; where eagerly his sickness Pursued him still; and three nights after

this,

About the hour of eight, which he himself Foretold should be his last, full of repent

ance,

Continual meditations, tears and sorrows,

He gave his honours to the world again, His blessed part to heaven, and slept in peace.

Kath. So may he rest; his faults lie gently on him!

Yet thus far, Griffith, give me leave to speak him,

And yet with charity. He was a man

Of an unbounded stomach, ever ranking Himself with princes; one that by sugges

tion

Tied all the kingdom: simony was fair-play: His own opinion was his law: i' the presence He would say untruths, and be ever double Both in his words and meaning: he was

never,

But where he meant to ruin, pitiful :

His promises were, as he then was, mighty; But his performance, as he is now, nothing :