CATHERINE, queen of England, was the eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Parr of Kendal. She was first married to John Nevil, Lord Latimer; after whose death, by her marriage with Henry VIII. she was raised to the throne. The royal nuptials were solemnized at Hampton Court on the 12th of July 1543. Being religiously disposed, she was, in the early part of her life, a zealous observer of the Romish rites and ceremonies; but in the dawning of the Reformation, she became as zealous a promoter of the Lutheran doctrine; yet with such prudence and circumspection as her perilous situation required. Nevertheless, we are told, that she was in great danger of falling a sacrifice to the Popish faction, the chief of whom was Bishop Gardiner: he drew up articles against her, and prevailed on the king to sign a warrant to remove her to the Tower. This warrant was, however, accidentally dropped, and immediately conveyed to her majesty. What her apprehensions must have been on this occasion may be easily imagined. She knew the monarch, and she could not help recollecting the fate of his former queens. A sudden illness was the natural consequence. The news of her indisposition brought the king to her apartment. He was lavish in expressions of affection, and sent her a physician. His majesty being soon after also somewhat indisposed, the prudently returned the visit; with which the king seemed pleased, and began to talk with her on religious subjects, proposing certain questions, concerning which he wanted her opinion. She answered, that such profound speculations were not suited to her sex; that it belonged to the husband to choose principles for his wife; the wife's duty was, in all cases, to adopt implicitly the sentiments of her husband; and as to herself, it was doubly her duty, being blessed with a husband who was qualified, by his judgment and learning, not only to choose principles for his own family, but for the most wise and knowing of every nation. "Not so, by St Mary," replied the king; "you are now become a doctor, Kate, and better fitted to give than receive instruction." She meekly replied, that she was sensible how little she was entitled to these praises; that though she usually declined not any conversation, however sublime, when proposed by his majestic, she well knew that her conceptions could serve to no other purpose than to give him a little momentary amusement; that she found the conversation a little apt to languish when not revived by some opposition, and she had ventured sometimes to feign a contrariety of sentiments, in order to give him the pleasure of refuting her; and that she also proposed, by this innocent artifice, to engage him into topics whence she had observed, by frequent experience, that she reaped profit and instruction. "And is it fo, sweetheart?" replied the king; "then we are perfect friends again." He embraced her with great affection, and sent her away with assurances of his protection and kindness.

The time being now come when she was to be sent to the Tower, the king, walking in the garden, sent for the queen, and met her with great good humour; when lo the chancellor, with forty of the guards, approached. He fell upon his knees, and spoke softly with the king, who called him knave, arrant knave, beast, fool, and commanded him instantly to depart. Henry then returned to the queen, who ventured to intercede for the chancellor: "Ah, poor foul," said the king, "thou little knowest how evil he deriveth this grace at thy hands. Of my word, sweetheart, he hath been toward thee an arrant knave; and so let him go." The king died in January 1547, just three years and a half after his marriage with this second Catharine; who in a short time was again espoused to Sir Thomas Seymour lord-admiral of England; and in September 1548 she died in childbed. The historians of this period generally infinuate that she was poisoned by her husband, to make way for his marriage with the lady Elizabeth.

That Catharine Parr was beautiful is beyond a doubt: that she was pious and learned is evident from her writings; and that her prudence and fagacity were not inferior to her other accomplishments, may be concluded from her holding up the passion of a capricious tyrant as a shield against her enemies; and that at the latter end of his days, when his passions were enfeebled by age, and his peevish austerity increased by disease. She wrote, 1. Queen Catharine Parr's lamentation of a finner, bewailing the ignorance of her blind life; Lond. 8vo. 1548, 1563. 2. Prayers or meditations, wherein the mynd is stirred patiently to suffre all afflictions here, to set at nought the vaine prosperitee of this worlde, and always to long for the everlastynge felicitee. Collected out of holy workes, by the most virtuous and gracious princess Katherine, Queen of Englande, France, and Irelande. Printed by John Wayland, 1545, 4to.—1561, 12mo. 3. Other Meditations, Prayers, Letters, &c. unpublished.

Thomas, or Old Parr, a remarkable Englishman, who lived in the reigns of ten kings and queens; married a second wife when he was 120, and had a child by her. He was the son of John Parr, a husbandman of Winnington, in the parish of Alderbury, in the county of Salop, where he was born in the year 1483. Though he lived to the vast age of upwards of 152 years, yet the tenor of his life admitted but of little variety; nor can the detail of it be considered of importance, further than what will arise from the gratification of that curiosity which naturally inquires after the mode of living which could lengthen life to such extreme extreme old age. Following the profession of his father, he laboured hard, and lived on coarse fare. Taylor the water poet says of him:

Good wholesome labour was his exercise, Down with the lamb, and with the lark would rise; In mire and toiling sweat he spent the day, And to his team he whittled time away: The cock his night-clock, and till day was done, His watch and chief fun-dial was the sun. He was of old Pythagoras' opinion, That green cheese was most wholesome with an onion; Coarse mead bread, and for his daily swig, Milk, butter-milk, and water, whey, and whig: Sometimes meadglen, and by fortune happy? He sometimes sipp'd a cup of ale most nappy, Cyder or perry, when he did repair T' a Whitun ale, wake, wedding, or a fair, Or when in Christmas time he was a guest At his good landlord's house among the rest: Else he had little leisure time to waste, Or at the alehouse huff-cap ale to taste. Nor did he ever hunt a tavern fox; Ne'er knew a coach, tobacco, or the ——. His physic was good butter, which the foil Of Salop yields, more sweet than Candy oil; And garlic he esteem'd above the rate Of Venice treacle or best mithridate. He entertain'd no gout, no ache he felt, The air was good and temperate where he dwelt; While mavisies and sweet-tongued nightingales Did chant him roundelay and madrigals. Thus living within bounds of Nature's laws, Of his long lasting life may be some cause.

And the same writer describes him in the following two lines:

From head to heel, his body had all over A quick set, thick set, natural hairy cover.

The manner of his being conducted to London is also noticed in the following terms: "The right honourable Thomas earl of Arundel and Surrey, earl marshal of England, on being lately in Shropshire to visit some lands and manors which his lordship holds in that county, or for some other occasions of importance which caused his lordship to be there, the report of this aged man was signified to his honour, who hearing of so remarkable a piece of antiquity, his lordship was pleased to see him; and in his innate, noble, and Christian piety, he took him into his charitable tuition and protection, commanding that a litter and two horses (for the more easy carriage of a man so feeble and worn with age) to be provided for him; also, that a daughter of his, named Lucy, should likewise attend him, and have a horse for her own riding with him: and to cheer up the old man, and make him merry, there was an antique-faced fellow, with a high and mighty no-beard, that had also a horse for his carriage. These were all to be brought out of the country to London by easy journeys, the charge being allowed by his lordship; likewise one of his lordship's own servants, named Bryan Kelly, to ride on horseback with them, and to attend and defray all manner of reckonings and expenses. All which was done accordingly as follows:—

"Winnington is a parish of Alderbury, near a place called the Welch Pool, eight miles from Shrewsbury; from whence he was carried to Wem, a town of the earl's aforesaid; and the next day to Shifnal, a manor-house of his lordship's, where they likewise stayed one night: from Shifnal they came to Wolverhampton, and the next day to Birmingham, and from thence to Coventry. Although Master Kelly had much to do to keep the people off, that pressed upon him in all places where he came, yet at Coventry he was most oppressed, for they came in such multitudes to see the old man, that those that defended him were almost quite tired and spent, and the aged man in danger of being stifled; and, in a word, the rabble were so unruly, that Bryan was in doubt he should bring his charge no farther; so greedy are the vulgar to hearken to or gaze after novelties. The trouble being over, the next day they passed to Daintree, to Stony Stratford, to Radburne, and so to London; where he was well entertained and accommodated with all things, having all the aforesaid attendance at the sole charge, and cost of his lordship." When brought before the king, his majesty, with more acuteness than good manners, said to him, "You have lived longer than other men, what have you done more than other men?" He answered, "I did penance when I was a hundred years old." This journey, however, proved fatal to him; owing to the alteration in his diet, to the change of the air, and his general mode of life, he lived but a very short time, dying the 5th of November 1635 (A); and was buried in Westminster Abbey. After his death, his body was opened; and an account was drawn up by the celebrated Dr Harvey, part of which we shall lay before our readers.

"Thomas Parr was a poor country man of Shropshire, whence he was brought up to London by the right honourable Thomas earl of Arundel and Surrey; and died after he had outlived nine princes, in the tenth year of the tenth of them, at the age of 152 years and nine months.

"He had a large breast, lungs not fungous, but sticking to his ribs, and diffended with blood; a lividness in his face, as he had a difficulty of breathing a little before his death, and a long lasting warmth in his armpits and breast after it; which sign, together with others, were so evident in his body, as they use to be on those that die by suffocation. His heart was great, thick, fibrous, and fat. The blood in the heart blackish and diluted. The cartilages of the sternum not more bony than in others, but flexible and soft. His viscera were found and strong, especially the stomach; and it was observed of him, that he used to eat often by night and day, though contented with

(A) The author of a book entitled Long Livers, 8vo. 1722, which Oldys in his MS. notes on Fuller ascribes to one Robert Samber, against all evidence says, p. 89. that Parr died sixteen years after he had been presented to the king, 24th of November 1651. old cheefe, milk, coarse bread, small beer, and whey; and, which is more remarkable, that he ate at midnight a little before he died. His kidneys were covered with fat, and pretty sound; only on the interior surface of them were found some aqueous or serous abscesses, whereof one was near the bigness of a hen egg, with a yellowish water in it, having made a roundish cavity, impressed on that kidney; whence some thought it came that a little before his death a supputation of urine had befallen him; though others were of opinion, that his urine was suppressed upon the regurgitation of all the serosity into his lungs. Not the least appearance there was of any flony matter either in the Kidneys or bladder. His bowels were also found, a little whitish without. His spleen very little, hardly equalling the bigness of one kidney. In short, all his inward parts appeared so healthy, that if he had not changed his diet and air, he might perhaps have lived a good while longer. The cause of his death was imputed chiefly to the change of food and air; forasmuch as coming out of a clear, thin, and free air, he came into the thick air of London; and after a confluent plain and homely country diet, he was taken into a splendid family, where he fed high and drank plentifully of the best wines, whereupon the natural functions of the parts of his body, were overcharged, his lungs obstructed, and the habit of the whole body quite disordered; upon which there could not but ensue a dissolution. His brain was found, entire, and firm; and though he had not the use of his eyes, nor much of his memory, several years before he died, yet he had his hearing and apprehension very well; and was able, even to the 130th year of his age, to do any husbandman's work, even thrashing of corn."

The following summary of his life is copied from Oldys's MS. notes on Fuller's Worthies: Old Parr was born 1483; lived at home until 1500, at. 17, when he went out to service. 1518, at. 35, returned home from his master. 1522, at. 39, spent four years on the remainder of his father's lea. 1543, at. 60, ended the first lease he renewed of Mr Lewis Porter. 1563, at. 80, married Jane, daughter of John Taylor, a maiden; by whom he had a son and a daughter, who both died very young. 1564, at. 81, ended the second lease which he renewed of Mr John Porter. 1585, at. 102, ended the third lease he had renewed of Mr Hugh Porter. 1588, at. 105, did penance in Alderbury church, for lying with Katharine Milton, and getting her with child. 1595, at. 112, he buried his wife Jane, after they had lived 32 years together. 1605, at. 122, having lived 10 years a widower, he married Jane, widow of Anthony Adda, daughter of John Lloyd of Gilfells, in Montgomeryshire, who survived him. 1635, at. 152, he died; after they had lived together 30 years, and after 50 years possession of his last lease. See Longevity.