#because im an eejit for the longest time i couldnt figure out what 'high wind' was supposed to mean. i was genuinely so confused

[historyartthings]

'The Duke of Norfolk, speaking privately to the captain of the guard, told him to secretly arrest the Secretary after dinner, as they were going into the Council, and to take him to the Tower. The captain wondered very much at this, but the Duke said to him, 'You need not be surprised. The King orders it.'

As usual, they all went to the Parliament at Westminster, and when they came out and were going to the palace to dinner, the wind blew off the Secretary’s bonnet, and it fell on the ground. The custom of the country is, when a gentleman loses his bonnet, for all those who are with him to doff theirs, but on this occasion, when Cromwell’s bonnet blew off, all the other gentlemen kept theirs on their heads, which being noticed by him, he said, 'A high wind indeed must it have been to blow my bonnet off and keep all yours on.' They pretended not to hear what he said, and Cromwell took it for a bad omen.

They went to the palace and dined, and all the while they were dining the gentlemen did not converse with the Secretary, as they were wont to do, and as soon as they had finished all the gentlemen went to the Council-chamber. It was the Secretary’s habit always after dinner to go close up to a window to hear the petitioners; and when the gentlemen had gone to the Council-chamber, the Secretary remained at his window as usual for about an hour, and then joined the other gentlemen; and finding them all seated, he said, 'You were in a great hurry, gentlemen, to get seated.' The chair where he was in the habit of sitting was vacant, and the gentlemen made no answer to his remark; but just as he was going to sit down the Duke of Norfolk said, 'Cromwell, do not sit there; that is no place for thee. Traitors do not sit amongst gentlemen.'

Chronicle of King Henry VIII. of England being a contemporary record of some of the principle events of the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI