of bread,
Whereby my hunger might be fed,
Nor drink, but such as channels yield,
Or stinking ditches in the field.

"Thus weary of my life, at lengthe
I yielded up my vital strength,
Within a ditch of loathsome scent,
Where carrion dogs did much frequent;

"The which now, since my dying daye,
Is Shoreditch call'd, as writers saye;[6]
Which is a witness of my sinne,
For being concubine to a king."

Sir Thomas More, however, distinctly mentions Jane Shore being alive in
the reign of Henry VIII., and seems to imply that he had himself seen
her. "He (Richard III.) caused," says More, "the Bishop of London to put
her to an open penance, going before the cross in procession upon a
Sunday, with a taper in her hand; in which she went in countenance and
face demure, so womanly, and albeit she were out of all array save her
kirtle only, yet went she so fair and lovely, namely while the wondering
of the people cast a comely red in her cheeks (of which she before had
most miss), that her great shame was her much praise among those who
were more amorous of her body than curious of her soul; and many good
folk, also, who hated her living, and were glad to see sin corrected,
yet pitied they more her penance than rejoiced therein, when they
considered that the Protector procured it more of a corrupt intent than
any virtuous intention.

"Proper she was, and fair; nothing in her body that you would have
changed, but if you would, have wished her somewhat higher. Thus say
they who knew her in her youth; albeit some who now see her (for yet she
liveth) deem her never to have been well-visaged; whose judgment seemeth
to me to be somewhat like as though men should guess the beauty of one
long departed by her scalp taken out of the charnel-house. For now is
she old, lean, withered, and dried up--nothing left but shrivelled skin
and hard bone. And yet, being even such, whoso well advise her visage,
might guess and devine which parts, how filled, would make it a fair
face.

"Yet delighted men not so much in her beauty as in her pleasant
behaviour. For a proper wit had she, and could both read well and write,
merry in company, ready and quick of answer, neither mute nor full of
babble, sometimes taunting without displeasure, and not without
disport."

FOOTNOTES:

[6] But it had this name long before, being so called from its being a
common _sewer_ (vulgarly called _shore_) or drain. (See