stood all night among the dilapidated walls of the convent of Sion, and there "the leaden coffin being cleft by the shaking of the carriage, the pavement of the church was wetted with Henry's blood. In the morning came plumbers to solder the coffin, under whose feet-I tremble while I write it (says the author) was suddenly seen a dog creeping and licking up the King's blood. If you ask me how I know this, I answer, William Greville, who could scarcely drive away the dog, told me, and so did the plumber also."* The dismantled convent alluded to had been the prison of Catherine Howard, whose execution took place five years the day before the corpse of her ruthless destroyer reached its temporary resting-place. The reader will remember the denunciation of Father Peto, at Greenwich Church, in 1533, in presence of Henry and Anna Boleyn, when the fearless friar compared the monarch to Ahab, and told him to his face, that "the dogs would, in like manner, lick his blood." Miss Strickland would condemn any assumption of this shocking incident as the fulfilment of a vaticination. Be it, however, coincidence or the verification of prophecy, the fact stands, and needs no disquisition. Doubtless the worst matter about these parentalia of a cruel despot was the conduct of Bishop Gardyner, who preached the funereal sermon at Windsor, on the 16th of February, taking for his text, "Blessed are they who die in the Lord," in which he ascribed to Henry all the virtues he possessed not, and described the loss "which both high and low had sustained in the death of so good and gracious a king."

*MS. in the Sloane Collection. This document has been quoted by several high historical authorities.

To the credit of truth the object of Gardyner's false panegyric has had no praise from writers of any repute, save Mr. Froude. Even Hume, who rejoices in that change of the national religion which was the outcome of Henry's rapacity, dishonesty, and cruelty, avers that a catalogue of this King's vices would comprehend "many of the worst qualities incident to human nature."

To show that the monarch, who has been accepted by so many unread people of England as the first Protestant King of this realm, was even buried according to the rites and observances of the Catholic Church, I copy the ceremony from the before-mentioned MS. in the College of Arms :

"The corpse being let down by a vice, with the help of sixteen tall yeomen of the guard, Bishop Gardyner, standing at the head. of the vault, proceeded with the Burial Service, and about the same (the bishop) stood all the head officers of the household-as the lord great master, the lord chamberlain, the lord treasurer, comptroller, serjeant porter, and the four gentlemen ushers in ordinary, with their staves and rods in their hands; and when the mould was brought and cast into the grave by the officiating prelates, at the words-Pulvis pulveri, cinis cineri, then first the great lord master, and, after him, the lord chamberlain and all the rest brake their staves in shivers, upon their heads, and cast them after the corpse into the pit, with exceeding sorrow and heaviness, not without grievous sighs and tears. After this, the De Profundis was said, the grave covered over with planks, and Garter, attended by his officers, stood in the midst of the choir, and proclaimed the young King's titles, and the rest of his officers repeated the same after him thrice. Then the trumpets sounded with great melody and courage, to the comfort of all them that were present."

On some of the banners carried at Henry's funeral were quartered the arms of Jane Seymour and of Catherine Parr, the only two wives he had acknowledged, out of six.

In the final arrangement of his "will," Henry struck off the name of Bishop Gardyner from the list of executors, as violent and dangerous." Lord Parr, the Queen's brother, and the Marquis of Dorset, who had married the King's niece, were set aside as sectarian or dangerous.* “ Sectarian," in this case, was meant to infer that they belonged to the Reformers, and were consequently rejected by the dying King as unfit persons to carry out his "Catholic will." Would it not appear probable that the bewildered monarch had, at this time, implicit confidence in the Catholic principles of Dr. Cranmer and Lord Hertford, or he would have likewise cancelled their appointment as executors to his "will?" But let it again be impressed upon the reader that the King's Council had most solemnly sworn, on several occasions, to faithfully carry out his "last testament," and he could not possibly consider them so wicked as to deliberately commit perjury. Besides, Henry was frequently struck by the

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solemnity and piety with which the Archbishop celebrated Mass in the Royal Closet, and the reverence with which Lord Hertford received Holy Communion on other occasions." How awfully must that unhappy King have been deceived! The venal courtiers may, no doubt, have been astounded at the fearful duplicity and blasphemous courage evinced by Lord Hertford and the Archbishop of Canterbury during the last illness of the King. Our virtuous old English ancestors considered it a wicked and heartless action to deceive the dying; but Henry's Council thought otherwise. In fact, posterity can scarcely credit those awful revelations if they had not been thoroughly authenticated.

* Domestic State Papers of the close of Henry's reign; Lingard, vol. v; Froude, vol. v.

An hour or so after Henry's death, Hertford and Paget held a conversation outside the apartment where the body of the dead King lay, still warm, and horribly convulsed in feature. This brief subdued parley between the whisperers was the first access to a deliberate perjury. Paget hesitated, remarking upon the dreadful storm raging at the time, but the sudden appearance of Cranmer upon the scene supplied him with confidence. A look from one to the other was understood; the trio communed with intelligible glances; and, fearing to speak at that awful moment, they retired to rest. The first step had been taken.*

"The will of Henry VIII.," writes Miss Strickland, was as replete with seeds of strife for his subjects as the capricious acts of his life had been. This monarch, who had on the suppression of the monasteries desecrated so many altars, and scattered the funds of so many mortuary chapels and endowed chantries, in utter disregard of the intentions of the founders, whose very tombs were afterwards violated, left by his will £600 per annum for Masses to be celebrated for his soul's health. He had likewise enjoined his executors to bring up his son in the Catholic faith.+

Miss Strickland gently reproves Lord Hertford for his duplicity and treachery about the period of Henry's demise. "Far wiser," observes Miss Strickland, "would it have been for the Protestant Protector to have boldly founded his opposition on the obvious truths, and argued on the inconsistency of Henry's 'last testament,' and his deeds; but

MS. Letter of Edward Denny, to Sir Anthony Browne; Dr. Whyte's Correspondence with Father Peto concerning the last hours of King Henry.

+ Miss Strickland's Queens of England, vol. v. first edit. p. 165.

VOL. II.

Lord Hertford, like most politicians, sacrificed the majesty of truth to expediency, which conduct involved him in a labyrinth of disputation and self-contradiction."

In Heylin's "Reformation," page 302, also Fuller and Rymer, the reader will find Henry Tudor's "last testament" printed at full length. There can be no doubt that the man who devised this carefully drawn document was a Catholic, and every allusion to the doctrines and practices of the ancient creed are put in the most emphatic manner.

Some Puritan writers question the accuracy of Henry's "Catholic Will," upon which Hume remarks, "There is no reasonable ground to suspect its authenticity."*

The executors of the will took no less than twelve solemn oaths at different times, kneeling at the bedside of the dying monarch, that they would fulfil to the letter all the instructions written in the said "will." Let it be remembered that the King's "will" was executed on the 30th of December, 1546,† one year and twenty-eight days before his death; and during that interval no part of it was revoked. According to Sir Anthony Browne - one of the Royal Household-" its Catholicity was made stronger by the alteration of words." This Royal testament, or "will," was never made public. Even Catherine Parr was left "uninformed," only to assure her that she was not to be the guardian of the child, who, by the King's command was to be educated a Catholic. Now, I would contend,

that it would appear from this circumstance that the dying Henry had confidence in the Catholicity of Hertford and Cranmer. Surely a king making a "will" so Catholic could

* Hume's History of England, vol. iii. (folio edit.) p. 279.

+Chapter House. Royal MS.