r myself towards her, and
whatever is the King's Grace's pleasure and yours, in every
thing, that I shall do.

[Footnote A: That is, in what light the king and the
government wish to have her regarded, and how they wish her
to be treated.]

My Lord Mr. Shelton would have my Lady Elizabeth to dine and
sup at the board of estate. Alas, my Lord, it is not meet
for a child of her age to keep such rule yet. I promise you,
my Lord, I dare not take upon me to keep her in health and
she keep that rule; for there she shall see divers meats and
fruits, and wines, which would be hard for me to restrain
her Grace from it. You know, my Lord, there is no place of
correction[B] there, and she is yet too young to correct
greatly. I know well, and she be there, I shall never bring
her up to the King's Grace's honor nor hers, nor to her
health, nor my poor honesty. Wherefore, I beseech you, my
Lord, that my Lady may have a mess of meat to her own
lodging, with a good dish or two that is meet for her Grace
to eat of.

[Footnote B: That is, _opportunity_ for correction.]

My Lady hath likewise great pain with her teeth, and they
come very slowly forth, and this causeth me to suffer her
Grace to have her will more than I would. I trust to God,
and her teeth were well graft, to have her Grace after
another fashion than she is yet, so as I trust the King's
Grace shall have great comfort in her Grace; for she is as
toward a child, and as gentle of conditions, as ever I knew
any in my life. Jesu preserve her Grace.

Good my Lord, have my Lady's Grace, and us that be her poor
servants, in your remembrance.

This letter evinces that strange mixture of state and splendor with
discomfort and destitution, which prevailed very extensively in royal
households in those early times. A part of the privation which Elizabeth
seems, from this letter, to have endured, was doubtless owing to the
rough manners of the day; but there is no doubt that she was also, at
least for a time, in a neglected and forsaken condition. The new queen,
Jane Seymour, who succeeded Elizabeth's mother, had a son a year or two
after her marriage. He was named Edward. Thus Henry had three children,
Mary, Elizabeth, and Edward, each one the child of a different wife; and
the last of them, the son, appears to have monopolized,