w abandoning your cause.' That much she had learnt from Udal five
minutes before. But she could not bring herself to betray
Throckmorton, who was a traitor for the sake of her cause. ''Tis such
pity,' she repeated again.

'Good wench,' Cromwell said, 'you are indifferent honest; but never
while I am the King's man shall the Bishop of Rome take toll again in
the King's land.'

She threw up her hands.

'Alack!' she said, 'shall not God and His Son our Saviour have their
part of the King's glory?'

'God is above us all,' he answered. 'But there is no room for two
heads of a State, and in a State is room but for one army. I will have
my King so strong that ne Pope ne priest ne noble ne people shall here
have speech or power. So it is now; I have so made it, the King
helping me. Before I came this was a distracted State; the King's writ
ran not in the east, not in the west, not in the north, and hardly in
the south parts. Now no lord nor no bishop nor no Pope raises head
against him here. And, God willing, in all the world no prince shall
stand but by grace of this King's Highness. This land shall have the
wealth of all the world; this King shall guide this land. There shall
be rich husbandmen paying no toll to priests, but to the King alone;
there shall be wealthy merchants paying no tax to any prince nor
emperor, but only to this King. The King's court shall redress all
wrongs; the King's voice shall be omnipotent in the council of the
princes.'

'Ye speak no word of God,' she said pitifully.

'God is very far away,' he answered.

'Sir, my lord,' she cried, and brushed again the tress from her
forehead. 'Ye have made this King rich with gear of the Church: if ye
will be friends with me ye shall make this King a pauper to repay; ye
have made this King stiffen his neck against God's Vicegerent: if you
and I shall work together ye shall make him re-humble himself. Christ
the King of all the world was a pauper; Christ the Saviour of all
mankind humbled Himself before God that was His Saviour.'

Cromwell said 'Amen.'

'Sir,' she said again; 'ye have made this King rich, but I will give
to him again his power to sleep at night; ye have made this realm
subject to this King, but, by the help of God, I will make it subject
again to God. You have set up here a great State, but oh, the children
of God do weep since ye came. Where is a town where lamentation is not
heard? Where is a town where no orphan or widow bewails th