'Good sir,' it said, 'you know Father Peto is gone to Canterbury to a provincial council, and not fled for fear of you; for to-morrow he will return again. In the mean time I am here as another Micaiah, and will lay down my life to prove those things true which he hath taught. And to this combat I challenge thee; thee, Kirwan, I say, who art one of the four hundred into whom the spirit of lying is entered, and thou seekest by adultery to establish the succession, betraying thy King for thy own vain glory into endless perdition.'
A scene of confusion followed, which was allayed at last by the King himself, who rose from his seat and commanded silence. It was thought that the limit of permissible license had been transcended, and the following day Peto and Elstowe, the other speaker, were summoned before the council to receive a reprimand. Lord Essex told them they deserved to be sewn into a sack and thrown into the Thames. 'Threaten such things to rich and dainty folk, which have their hope in this world,' answered Elstowe, gallantly, 'we fear them not; with thanks to God we know the way to heaven to be as ready by water as by land.'[1] Men of such metal might be broken, but they could not be bent. The two offenders were hopelessly unrepentant and impracticable, and it was found necessary to banish them. They retired to Antwerp, where we find them the fol-
- ↑ Stow's Annals, p. 562. This expression passed into a proverb, although the words were first spoken by a poor friar; they were the last which the good Sir Humfrey Gilbert was heard to utter before his ship went down.
