chair, holding on his arm as many gold angels (every one tied in a
ribbon of white silk) as there were sick to be touched, which were in
number, forty-eight. Dr. Brown, the chaplain of the Princess of Aurange,
performed the place of the king's chaplain. The chaplain then read the
sixteenth chapter of St. Mark, from the fourteenth verse to the end; and
then the chirurgeon presented the sick, (having examined them to see
that it was the evil) after three reverences on their knees, before the
king, who, whilst the chaplain said these words in that gospel: 'They
shall lay their hands upon the sick, and they shall be healed,' layed
his hands on the two cheeks of the sick, saying, 'I touch thee, but
_God_ healeth thee!' The chaplain then began another gospel; and whilst
these words were pronounced out of the first chapter of St. John: 'This
was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,'
his majesty took the pieces of gold, and put them on the necks of the
diseased, the chaplain repeating the words as many times as there were
persons to receive them, concluding with a prayer, 'That Almighty God
would bless the ceremony;' then, after the reverences as before, they
retired. The Earls of Middlesex and St. Albans held the bason, ewer, and
towel, whilst the king washed."

Shakspeare, in his _Macbeth_, thus describes this royal, but now
exploded gift:--


"Strangely visited people,
All swollen and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,
The mere despair of surgery, he cures--
Hanging a golden stamp about their necks,
Put on with holy prayers."