But to return to history. The conduct of Lady Jane in this sudden transition was such as was to be expected from one so humble, gentle, and pious. “She had,” says Bishop Burnet, “a mind wonderfully raised above the world; and at the age wherein others are but imbibing the notions of philosophy, she had attained to the practice of the highest precepts of it; for she was neither lifted up with the hope of a crown, nor cast down when she saw her palace made afterwards her prison; but carried herself with an equal temper of mind in those great inequalities of fortune that so suddenly exalted and depressed her.” In the words of the quaint Fuller, “she made misery itself amiable by her pious and patient behavior; adversity, her night clothes, becoming her, as well as her day dressing, by reason of her pious disposition.”
On the 19th of November, Lady Jane and her husband were arraigned for high treason. Conscious that a defence would be useless, they each pleaded guilty. The description of the scene, as given by contemporaries, has been well embodied by the poet already quoted. Bishop Gardiner, in reply to the expostulations of one of the council in favor of mercy, is represented as speaking thus:—
“These are romantic, light, vain-glorious dreams.
Have you considered well upon the danger?
How dear to the fond many, and how popular,
These are whom you would spare? Have you forgot
When at the bar, before the seat of judgment,
This Lady Jane, this beauteous traitress, stood,
With what command she charmed the whole assembly?
With silent grief the mournful audience sat,