Tyndale’s fears were but too well founded. Sir Thomas More held Fryth’s new treatise in his hand: he read it and, gave way by turns to anger and sarcasm. ‘Whetting his wits, calling his spirits together, and sharpening his pen,’ to use the words of the chronicler,[302] he answered Fryth, and described his doctrine under the image of a cancer. This did not satisfy him. Although he had returned the seals to the king in May, he continued to hold office until the end of the year. He ordered search to be made for Fryth, and set all his bloodhounds on the track. If the reformer was discovered he was lost; when Sir Thomas More had once caught his man, nothing could save him—nothing but a merry jest, perhaps. For instance, one day when he was examining a gospeller named Silver: ‘You know,’ he said, with a smile, ‘that silver must be tried in the fire.’ ‘Yes,’ retorted the accused instantly, ‘but not quicksilver.’[303] More delighted with the repartee, set the poor wretch at liberty. But Fryth was no jester: he could not hope, therefore, to find favor with the ex-chancellor of England. [Sidenote: Fryth Hunted By More.] Sir Thomas hunted the reformer by sea and by land, promising a great reward to any one who should deliver him up. There was no county or town or village where More did not look for him, no sheriff or justice of the peace to whom he did not apply, no harbor where he did not post some officer to catch him.[304] But the answer from every quarter was: ‘He is not here.’ Indeed, Fryth, having been informed of the great exertions of his enemy, was fleeing from place to place, often changing his dress, and finding safety nowhere. Determining to leave England and return to Tyndale, he went to Milton Shone in Essex with the intention of embarking. A ship was ready to sail, and quitting his hiding-place he went down to the shore with all precaution. He had been betrayed. More’s agents, who were on the watch, seized him as he was stepping on board, and carried him to the Tower. This occurred in October 1532.