Wol. Your grace has given a precedent of wisdom Above all princes, in committing freely Your scruple to the voice of Christendom: Who can be angry now? what envy reach you? The Spaniard, tied by blood and favour to her, Must now confess, if they have any goodness, The trial just and noble. All the clerks,

I mean, the learned ones, in Christian kingdoms, Have their free voices; Rome, the nurse of judgment,

Invited by your noble self, hath sent

One general tongue unto us, this good man,
This just and learned priest, Cardinal Campeius;
Whom, once more, I present unto your highness.
K. Hen. And, once more, in mine arms I bid
him welcome,

And thank the holy conclave for their loves;
They have sent me such a man I would have wish'd
for.

Cam. Your grace must needs deserve all strangers'

loves,

You are so noble: To your highness' hand

I tender

my commission; by whose virtue, (The court of Rome commanding),—you, my lord Cardinal of York, are join'd with me their servant, In the unpartial judging of this business.

K. Hen. Two equal men. The queen shall be acquainted

Forthwith, for what you come :-Where's Gardiner?

Wol. I know, your majesty has always lov'd her So dear in heart, not to deny her that

A woman of less place might ask by law,

Scholars, allow'd freely to argue for her.

K. Hen. Ay, and the best, she shall have; and favour

my

To him that does best; God forbid else. Cardinal,

Pr'ythee, call Gardiner to me, my new secretary;

I find him a fit fellow.

[Exit WOLSEY.

Re-enter WOLSEY, with GARDINER.

Wol. Give me your hand: much joy and favour

to you;

You are the king's now.

Gard.

But to be commanded

For ever by your grace, whose hand has rais'd me.

K. Hen. Come hither, Gardiner.

[Aside.

[They converse apart. Cam. My lord of York, was not one Doctor Pace In this man's place before him?

Wol.

Yes, he was.

Cam. Was he not held a learned man?

Wol. Yes, surely. Cam. Believe me, there's an ill opinion spread then Even of yourself, lord cardinal.

Wol.

How! of me?

Cam. They will not stick to say, you envied him; And, fearing he would rise, he was so virtuous, Kept him a foreign man still; which so griev'd him, That he ran mad, and died9.

Wol. Heaven's peace be with him! That's Christian care enough: for living murmurers, There's places of rebuke. He was a fool;

For he would needs be virtuous: That good fellow,

i.e. kept him out of the king's presence, employed in foreign embassies.

96 Aboute this time the king received into favour Doctor Stephen Gardiner, whose service he used in matters of great secrecie and weight, admitting him in the room of Doctor Pace, the which being continually abrode in ambassades, and the same oftentymes not much necessarie, by the Cardinalles appointment, at length he toke such greefe therwith, that he fell out of his right wittes.'-Holinshed.

If I command him, follows my appointment;
I will have none so near else, Learn this, brother,
We live not to be grip'd by meaner persons.

K. Hen. Deliver this with modesty to the queen. [Exit GARDINer.

The most convenient place that I can think of,
For such receipt of learning, is Black-Friars;
There ye shall meet about this weighty business :—
My Wolsey, see it furnish'd.-O, my lord,
Would it not grieve an able man, to leave

So sweet a bedfellow? But, conscience, consci

ence,

O, 'tis a tender place, and I must leave her.

SCENE III.

[Exeunt.

An Antechamber in the Queen's Apartments.

Enter ANNE BULLEN, and an old Lady. Anne. Not for that neither;-Here's the pang that pinches :

His highness having liv'd so long with her and she
So good a lady, that no tongue could ever
Pronounce dishonour of her,-by my life,
She never knew harm-doing;-O now, after
So many courses of the sun enthron'd,

Still growing in a majesty and pomp, the which
To leave is a thousand-fold more bitter, than
"Tis sweet at first to acquire,-after this process,
To give her the avaunt1! it is a pity

Would move a monster.

Old L.

Hearts of most hard temper

Melt and lament for her.

1 To send her away contemptuously; to pronounce against her a sentence of ejection.

Anne.

O, God's will! much better, She ne'er had known pomp: though it be temporal, Yet, if that quarrel, fortune, do divorce 2

It from the bearer, 'tis a sufferance, panging
As soul and body's severing 3.

Old L.

She's a stranger now again*.
Anne.

Alas, poor lady!

So much the more

Must pity drop upon her. Verily,

I swear, 'tis better to be lowly born,
And range with humble livers in content,
Than to be perk'd up in a glistering grief,
And wear a golden sorrow.

Old L.

Is our best having 5.

Anne.

Our content

By my troth, and maidenhead,

I would not be a queen.

Old L.

Beshrew me, I would,

And venture maidenhead for't; and so would you, For all this spice of your hypocrisy:

You, that have so fair parts of woman on you,

2 I think with Steevens that we should read:

'Yet if that quarrel, fortune to divorce

It from the bearer,' &c.

i. e. if any quarrel happen or chance to divorce it from the bearer. To fortune is a verb, used by Shakspeare in The Two Gentlemen of Verona :

I'll tell you as we pass along

That you will wonder what hath fortuned.'

3 Thus in Antony and Cleopatra:

'The soul and body rive not more at parting

Than greatness going off.'

To pany is used as a verb active by Skelton, in his book of Philip Sparrow, 1568, sig. R v.:—

What heaviness did me pange.'

4 The revocation of her husband's love has reduced her to the condition of an unfriended stranger. Thus in Lear:

'Dower'd with our curse, and stranger'd with our oath.'

5 Our best possession. See vol. i. p. 236, note 4.

VOL. VII.

U

Have too a woman's heart; which ever yet
Affected eminence, wealth, sovereignty;

Which, to say sooth, are blessings: and which gifts (Saving your mincing) the capacity

Of your soft cheveril conscience would receive,
If you might please to stretch it.

Anne.
Nay, good troth,-
Old. L. Yes, troth, and troth,-You would not

be a queen?

Anne. No, not for all the riches under heaven. Old L. 'Tis strange; a threepence bowed would hire me,

Old as I am, to queen it: But, I pray you,
What think you of a duchess? have you limbs
To bear that load of title?

Anne.

No, in truth.

Old L. Then you are weakly made: Pluck off a little7;

I would not be a young count in your way,
For more than blushing comes to: if your back
Cannot vouchsafe this burden, 'tis too weak

Ever to get a boy.

Anne.

How you do talk!

I swear again, I would not be a queen

For all the world.

Old L..

In faith, for little England You'd venture an emballing: I myself

6 Cheveril is kid leather, which, being of a soft yielding nature, is often alluded to in comparisons for any thing pliant or flexible. We have this epithet applied in the same way in Histriomastix, 1610 :

'The cheveril conscience of corrupted law.'

7 Anne Bullen declining to be either a queen or a duchess, the old lady says, pluck off a little:' let us descend a little lower, and so diminish the glare of preferment by bringing it nearer your own quality.

8 i. e. you would venture to be distinguished by the ball, the ensign of royalty, used with the sceptre at coronations.-Johnson.