78 ENGLISH OPINION resolution rather to see him die, than to persuade him to any dishonourable means to preserve his life ;-whether -wheth we see her superiority to resentment afterwards to- wards the promoters of his execution, - no expression of an unforgiving spirit ; no hard sentence escaping her, even against the savage Jeffries, who pro- nounced his condemnation, adding in- sult to cruelty ; no triumph when that infamous judge was afterwards disgraced and imprisoned ; = if we view her in that more than temperate letter to the King a few days after her dear lord's execu- tion, declaring that, if she were capable of con-olatior, it would only be that her lord's fame might be preserved in the King's more favourable opinion : -- had long habits of voluptuousness left' any sense of pity in this corrupt king ; or, rather, if a heart had not been forgotten in his anatomy, it must have been touched at her humble entreaty that " he would `grant his pardon to a woman amazed with grief, to the daughter of a .MIVii
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