Page:Catherine of Bragança, infanta of Portugal, & queen-consort of England.djvu/548

502 like a royal ruler; the man she loved till her death with ardour went in silence by night, as a humble citizen, in comparison with her pomp. The Masses that for one-and-twenty years she had never ceased to offer for him were hushed at her death; those for her blameless soul went on to the number of ten thousand, as if she had needed an eternity of absolution.

So came to its close, loaded with honour and love and esteem, Catherines troubled and chequered life. She, in her tomb at Belem, lies far from the plain slab in Westminster Abbey that covers the whole of her heart. Seas and shores part them ; tides flow and winds sweep ; but perhaps in the world unseen the desire and the prayer of Catherine's life are granted, and she and the one man life held for her are face to face once more, with none between.