Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/415

1549.] if the King's Highness was so pleased, they said that they would proceed without further troubling or molesting either his Highness or the Lord Protector.'

Somerset would still have interfered; and it was found necessary to prevent an interview between the brothers if the sentence was to be executed. From the first he had endeavoured to overcome the Admiral's jealousy by kindness. He maintained the same tenderness to the end, while the Admiral's last action showed that he too was equally unchanged. On the 17th of March, the Bishop of Ely brought notice to Seymour to prepare for death. He employed his last days in writing to Elizabeth and Mary, urging them to conspire against his brother; that the letters might not miss their destination, he concealed them in the sole of a shoe; and when before the block, and about to kneel for the stroke of the axe, his last words were a charge to his servant to remember to deliver them. For the rest, cowardice was not among his faults: he died without flinching; not, it would seem, at the first blow.

'As touching the kind of his death, whether he be saved or no,' said Latimer, 'I refer that to God. In the twinkling of an eye He may save a man, and turn