TONKIN.
Sir Henry Killigrew, Knt. married Katherine, the second daughter and coheir of Sir Anthony Cooke, of Giddy Hall,
in Essex. Her other sisters married Sir William Cecil, Lord Treasurer, Sir Nicholas Bacon, Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas Hobby, and Sir Ralph Howlet, Knts. Which ladies were all accounted of the most learned in the kingdom, eminently skilled in the Latin and Greek tongues. To give an instance for the whole:
Sir Henry Killigrew being appointed by Queen Elizabeth, ambassador to Henry the Fourth of France, lately turned Papist, was not very fond of that employment, and would have excused himself, but knew not how: whereupon his lady wrote a letter to her sister Mildred, wife to Sir William Cecil, to try her interest with his lordship to get the Queen to excuse him, and that some other person might be appointed for that employment. The letter was these words:
Si mihi quem cupio cures, Mildreda! remitti,
Tu mihi, tu melior, tu mihi sola soror;
Sin male cunctando retines, vel trans mare mittes,
Tu mala, tu pejor, tu mihi nulla soror:
It si Cornubiam, tibi pax sit, et omnia læta,
Sin mare—Cœcile! nuncio bella.—Vale!