85. In Swinsted abbie witnesse of my wrong, A monke there was, the worker of my bane, Who heard me vow that if I liued long, Through England I would raise the price of graine, To plague my subiects for their proud disdaine: Which was the cause, as fates did first decree, For which this villan monke did poyson mee. 86. To vent the poisned thoughts of his false brest, Loe all alone in dead time of the night, When euery one had laid him downe to rest, When aire was husht, when from the welkin bright The golden stars did cast a glimmering light, He forth did walke into a garden by, For to effect his wicked treacherie. 87. There as this villan wandred to and fro, To find some weed that had the power t’expell The vitall spirit, or any aduerse foe To humane life, some kind of serpent fell, Or any thing that did with poyson swell: At last an vglie toad he haplesse found, Big swolne with poyson crawling on the ground: 88. With which full glad he did returne againe, And to his chamber secretly did goe, Where with his pen-knife he did pricke and paine The lothsome toade, from whom the blood did floe, By which the wicked monke did worke my woe: For poison which the toade did vomit vp, With wine he mixed in a fatall cup. 89. With which to me he came, and thus he spake, “My liege,” said he, “a cup of wine I bring, Of which if that your grace a taste will take, It will abate the edge of sorowe’s sting, Which deepely seemes to wound my grieued king: With it to England’s health I will begin, Whose woes for euermore be drown’d herein.” 90. Thus did this villan drinke, and dranke his last, And after vnto me the cup he gaue, Of which misdeeming nought, I straight did taste, Which done, not all the world my life could saue, So deadly was it tempered by the slaue: Th’effects whereof before my death were knowne, Which came to passe immediatly thereon. 91. For when the raging venome had dispread It selfe throughout my bodie by the veines, My blood did boile, my heart began to dread, My bodie swell’d, and when no hope remaines Of any helpe to remedie such paines: I for the monke did call to haue his head, But one did answere make, that he was dead. 92. “Then God,” quoth I, “haue mercie on my soule, For of this wretched world no man am I, Seeing nothing may this venom’s force controule: For sensiblie I feele how it doth lie Vpon my woefull heart, and I must die: Wherefore my sonne fetch hither vnto mee, That I before I die his face may see.” 93.