How thy restless wavering state
Hath fraught with cares my troubled wit!
Witness this present prison whither fate
Hath borne me, and the joys I quit.
Thou causedest the guilty to be loosed
From bands wherewith are innocents enclosed;
Causing the guiltless to be strait reserved,
And freeing those that death had well deserved:
But by her envy can be nothing wrought,
So God send to my foes all they have thought.
A.D., M.D.L.V."
"Elizabeth, Prisoner.
Not far from this palace are to be seen, near a spring of the
brightest water, the ruins of the habitation of Rosamond Clifford,
whose exquisite beauty so entirely captivated the heart of King
Henry II. that he lost the thought of all other women; she is said
to have been poisoned at last by the Queen. All that remains of her
tomb of stone, the letters of which are almost worn out, is the
following:-
" . . . Adorent,
Utque tibi detur requies Rosamunda precamur."
The rhyming epitaph following was probably the performance of some
monk:-
"Hic jacet in tumba Rosamundi non Rosamunda,
Non redolet sed olet, quae redolere solet."
Returning from hence to Oxford, after dinner we proceeded on our
journey, and passed through Ewhelme, a royal palace, in which some
alms-people are supported by an allowance from the Crown.
