[297] This allusion to a possible inheritance by Lady Katherine of her father’s possessions, does not, as Miss Strickland thinks, “prove that the insurrection of Suffolk was intended to replace Jane on the throne.” “If,” says that writer, “it had been in favour of any other heiress or heir, it is not likely that the Lady Jane would have rested under the attainder and surrendered the means of her subsistence to increase her younger sister’s portion. Moreover, if Jane had been the sovereign of England, she would scarcely have claimed a third portion of her father’s inheritance.” As a matter of fact, what Jane wrote proves nothing; Lady Katherine, had Suffolk kept out of political strife, would, after Jane, have inherited his fortune, which was confiscated at his arrest. Jane simply penned this sentence to make the contrast stronger between the mutability of the things of this world, and the unchangeability of that better land to which she knew she was hurrying.
[298] This is an allusion to the parable of the foolish virgins.
[299] British Museum, Harleian Collection, No. 2342.
[300] This declaration of her intention of praying for her father in the next world suggests a survival of some Roman Catholic ideas in Jane’s theology; and one cannot imagine that it would have been exactly approved by the more extremely Protestant of the Reformers.
[301] This book was either mentioned to Florio, or seen by him, for he has translated these three touching sentences into Italian in his Historia di Giana Graia.
[302] It is said that Jane scratched some verses on the walls of her apartment with a pin, but, although numerous devices inscribed by the unfortunate persons who have at different times been the inhabitants of the Tower were discovered in divers parts of it some years ago, during alterations, not the slightest trace of these verses were found. This does not, however, prove that they never existed, and as they are constantly attributed to Lady Jane, we have thought it best to reprint them here:—
“Non aliena putes homini quæ obtingere possunt;
Sors hodierna mihi, cras erit ilia tibi.”
This has been thus translated:—
“To mortals’ common fate thy mind resign,
My lot to-day, to-morrow may be thine——”
These lines are also paraphrased as follows:—