"
X. Of the Brief Advantage gained by the Queen and the Cardinal.
As the king, wholly unattended--for he had left the archers at the
Curfew Tower--was passing at the back of Saint George's Chapel, near
the north transept, he paused for a moment to look at the embattled
entrance to the New Commons--a structure erected in the eleventh year
of his own reign by James Denton, a canon, and afterwards Dean of
Lichfield, for the accommodation of such chantry priests and choristers
as had no place in the college. Over the doorway, surmounted by a
niche, ran (and still runs) the inscription--
"AEDES PRO SACELLANORUM CHORISTARUM COVIVIIS EXTRUCTA, A.D.
1519."
The building has since been converted into one of the canons' houses.
While he was contemplating this beautiful gateway, which was
glimmering in the bright moonlight, a tall figure suddenly darted from
behind one of the buttresses of the chapel, and seized his left arm with
an iron grasp. The suddenness of the attack took him by surprise; but
he instantly recovered himself, plucked away his arm, and, drawing his
sword, made a pass at his assailant, who, however, avoided the thrust,
and darted with inconceivable swiftness through the archway leading
to the cloisters.
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