The Little Flower Boy, by John Foxe

❰

1 2

❱

“I PRAY you, my Lord! [interrupted the boy] give me the figs ye promised me!”

“No, marry,”* quoth he, “thou shalt be whipped if thou come any more to the Lady Elizabeth, or the Lord Courtney!” The boy answered, “I will bring the Lady, my Mistress, more flowers!” Whereupon the child’s father was commanded to permit the boy no more to come into their chambers.

And the next day, as Her Grace was walking in the garden, the child, peeping in at a hole in the door, cried unto her, saying, “Mistress! I can bring you no more flowers!” Whereat, she smiled, but said nothing; understanding thereby, what they had done.

Wherefore, afterwards, the Lord Chamberlain rebuked his father highly; commanding him to put him out of the house. “Alas, poor infant!” quoth the father. “It is a crafty knave!” quoth the Lord Chamberlain. “Let me see him here no more!”

by John Foxe 1516-1587

As given in ‘Tudor Tracts: 1532-1588’ (1903) edited by Albert Frederick Pollard (1869-1948).

* A euphemism for the oath ‘[By] Mary!’.

Précis

Growing angry, Mary’s Lord Chamberlain had the Lieutenant of the Tower summon the boy’s father and demand that he no longer play go-between for Elizabeth and Edward. The boy, however, managed to warn Elizabeth of what was afoot, which prompted the Lord Chamberlain, brushing aside the protests of the agonised father, to insist on the boy’s permanent banishment from home.

Questions for Critics

1. What is the author aiming to achieve in writing this?

2. Note any words, devices or turns of phrase that strike you. How do they help the author communicate his ideas more effectively?

3. What impression does this passage make on you? How might you put that impression into words?

Based on The English Critic (1939) by NL Clay, drawing on The New Criticism: A Lecture Delivered at Columbia University, March 9, 1910, by J. E. Spingarn, Professor of Comparative Literature in Columbia University, USA.

Précis

Questions for Critics

Tags

Read Next