n
were left to herself. Possibly they were fight. But what likelihood
was there that Gardiner would so leave her? and--a question yet more
ominous--what might Philip of Spain require in this matter? Men not yet
sixty years of age could remember the time when, previous to the
marriage of Katherine of Aragon, the Earl of Warwick, last surviving
male of the House of York, had been beheaded on Tower Hill. Once
before, the royal blood of England had been shed at the demand of Spain:
might the precedent not be repeated now? The only difference being,
that the victim then was a tercel gentle, and now it would be a white
dove.

In the middle of January, before his removal from the Limehurst, and
when he was sufficiently recovered to "walk to London an easy pace," Mr
Underhill made his appearance one afternoon in the Minories. He came
with the evident intention of telling his own story.

"And would you," said he, "hear the tale of my examination and
imprisonment?"

"That would we, and with a right good will," answered Dr Thorpe,
speaking for all. "We do know even what Mr Ive could tell us, but
nothing further."

"Then what Ive could not tell you," resumed he, "take from me [these
incidents in Underhill's life are given almost entirely in his own
words]. I guessed (and rightly so) what was the cause of mine arrest;
to wit, a certain ballad that I had put forth against the Papists, and
for that I was a Sacramentary. Well, when I came into the Tower, where
the Council sat, they were already busied with Dr Coxe and the Lord
Ferrers; wherefore I was to wait. So I and my two men went to an
alehouse to dinner in the Tower, and after that repaired to the Council
chamber door, to be the first taken, for I desired to know my lot. Then
came Secretary Bourne to the door, looking as the wolf doth for a lamb;
unto whom my two keepers delivered me, and he took me in greedily. The
Earl of Bedford was chief judge, next the Earl of Sussex, and Sir
Richard Southwell; and on the side next me sat the Earl of Arundel and
Lord Paget. By them stood Sir John Gage, the Constable, the Earl of
Bath, and Mr Mason; at the board's end stood Sergeant Morgan and
Secretary Bourne. And the Lord Wentworth stood in the bay window. Then
my Lord of Bedford (who was my very friend, owing unto the chance that I
had to recover his son, as I told you aforetime; yet would not now seem
to be familiar with me, nor called me not by my name), said,--`Did n