GARDENS OF CELEBRITIES 



Chelsea Church; ' and ". whereas,' says his great-grandson, 'at 

 other times, before he departed from his wife and children, they 

 used to bring him to his boat, and he there leaving them, bade 

 them farewell ; at this time he suffered none of them to follow him 

 forth of his gate, but pulled the wicket after him, and with a heavy 

 heart he took boat with his son Roper.' He was leaving his house 

 for the last time, and he knew it. He sat silent for some minutes, 

 and then with a sudden start said, 4 I thank our Lord the field is 

 won.' : Lambeth Palace was crowded with people who had come 

 on the same errand as himself. More was called in early, and 

 found Cromwell present, with the four Commissioners and also 

 the Abbot of Westminster. The oath was read to him. " He 

 desired to see the Statute of Succession himself, and, after reading 

 it, said he would swear to the part of it that secured the succes- 

 sion to the children of Queen Anne, but he refused to ' peril his 

 soul ' by subscription to the remainder of the statute. He was asked 

 to reconsider his answer." To do so he was sent into the garden, 

 and in his absence others were called in ; among these, Fisher, 

 Bishop of Rochester, who replied in the same terms. Returning 

 from the garden, More made his choice. It is a matter of history 

 what that choice was. 



Here, so far as Lambeth is concerned, ends a momentous 

 chapter in the history of Tudor England, for the well-known 

 melancholy sequel belongs of right to that of the Tower, to which 

 prison More and Fisher were committed. Thus Henry VIII. had 

 his Catholic martyrs, as his daughter Mary had her Protestant 

 ones. 



Meanwhile the Succession was seemingly securely settled on the 

 children of Anne Boleyn, whose star was now in the ascendant. 

 But wait ! Two short years only, and another chapter is opened, 

 another and very different page is turned. Again the stage is 

 Lambeth ; again the instrument of Henry's will is Cranmer ; 

 again the season is Spring the lovely English Spring ; everything 

 is green and bursting into beauty in the large gardens behind the 

 Palace, the same in which More had been sent to walk to reconsider 

 his refusal. But this time the scene is laid neither in the Great Hall 

 nor the Guard-room, but in the gloomy crypt beneath the beautiful 

 chapel of the Palace. 



Conveyed hither by water from her prison in the Tower, pale, 



44 



