[135] Before Chapuys left Kimbolton he asked De la Sá if he had any suspicion that the Queen was being poisoned. The Spanish doctor replied that he feared that such was the case, though some slow and cunningly contrived poison must be that employed, as he could not see any signs or appearance of a simple poison. The Queen, he said, had never been well since she had partaken of some Welsh beer. The matter is still greatly in doubt, and there are many suspicious circumstances--the exclusion of De la Sá and the Bishop of Llandaff from the room when the body was opened, and the strenuous efforts to retain both of them in England after Katharine's death; and, above all, the urgent political reasons that Henry had for wishing Katharine to die, since he dared not carry out his threat of having her attainted and taken to the Tower. Such a proceeding would have provoked a rising which would almost certainly have swept him from the throne. [136] Even this small gold cross with a sacred relic enclosed in it--the jewel itself not being worth, as Chapuys says, more than ten crowns--was demanded of Mary by Cromwell soon afterwards. [137] This account of Katharine's death is compiled from Chapuys' letters, Bedingfield's letters, and others in the _Spanish_ and _Henry VIII. Calendars_, and from the _Chronicle of Henry VIII._ [138] The letter tells Henry that death draws near to her, and she must remind him for her love's sake to safeguard his soul before the desires of his body, "for which you have cast me into many miseries and yourself into many cares. For my part I do pardon you all, yea I do wish and devoutly pray God that He will also pardon you." She commends her daughter and her maids to him, and concludes, "Lastly, I do vow that mine eyes desire you above all things." Katharine, Queen of England. (Cotton MSS., British Museum, Otho C. x.) [139] The death of Sir Thomas More greatly increased Anne's unpopularity. It is recorded (More's _Life of More_) that when the news came of the execution the King and Anne sat at play, and Henry ungenerously told her she was the cause of it, and abruptly left the table in anger. [140] Even the King's fool dared (July 1535) to call her a bawd and her child a bastard. [141] Chapuys to the Emperor, 24th February 1536. [142] Chapuys to the Emperor, 29th January 1536.