ENRY the EIGHTH, only surviving son and successor of Henry the Seventh, took to his father's crown and sceptre on the 22nd of April, 1509, amid general rejoicing, for he was an exceedingly gentlemanly youth of eighteen when he came to the throne, of which his parent had recently been but a bearish occupant. If young Harry had never lived to play old Harry, his popularity might have survived him, for the people had become disgusted with the conduct of his father, and there never was a finer chance for a young man than that which offered itself to the new sovereign.

Nothing could exceed the grossness of the adulation which was poured out upon him at his accession, and the perfection of the art of puffing in England may, perhaps, be ascribed to this period of our history. His countenance was likened to that of Apollo—a falsehood for which, in his features, no apology can be found; his chest was declared to be that of Mars, though it was evidently his pa's, for in early youth his resemblance to his father was remarkable. Clemency was declared to be seated on his ample forehead, equity was pronounced to be balancing itself on the bridge of his nose, intelligence was recognised lurking in ambush among his bushy hair; and even Erasmus attributes to him the acuteness of the needle, with other intellectual qualities of an exalted character. *

It is sad to reflect that the philosopher, when he takes the paintbrush in hand to dash off the portrait of a king, is apt to become a mere parasite, and will not abstain from staining his own character by daubing with false colours the canvas of history. Thus, even Erasmus used hues his friends would be glad to erase, and has covered over the black spots in Henry's character with that pink of perfection which makes couleur de rose of everything. It is not to be wondered at, that in setting out upon the voyage of government, Henry received "one turn a-head"—if we may be allowed a nautical expression—while the engines of flattery were at work on all sides of him. It is to be regretted, for the sake of himself as well as for the good of his subjects, that truth was not at hand to give him that friendly "shove astern" which has saved many from precipitating themselves on the rocks that always lie in the course of greatness and power.

As if determined to begin as he intended to go on, Henry looked out at once for a wife, and, considering how often he was destined to undergo the marriage ceremony in the course of his reign, it was as well that he should lose no time in commencing the career that lay before him. In his first matrimonial adventure he appears to have let others choose for him, instead of making a selection for himself, and Catherine of Aragon, the widow of his elder brother Arthur, was pointed out to him as an eligible parti for nuptial purposes.

This marriage was strongly recommended by the political faculty as a saving of expense, for the lady would have been entitled to a large pension as widow of Prince Arthur, and her friends in Spain, had she been returned upon their hands, would have wanted to know something about the 150,000 crowns she had received as a marriage portion. Of course, the whole of it was gone, and it was thought that Henry would be killing a whole covey of birds with one stone if he would consent to take her as his wife, inasmuch as he would thus extinguish her claims to a pension, and prevent any awkward questions being asked in Spain as to the portion she had brought with her to England. Henry, feeling a sort of intuitive consciousness that he should have plenty of opportunities to select a wife for himself, agreed to take, as a beginning, the one that had been chosen for him by others, and accordingly, on the 3rd of June, 1509, the lady, who was eight years older than himself, became his wife, at Greenwich. The royal couple were not destined to roll down the hill together in after life, whatever they may have done on the day of their union, which was doubtless marked by all those sports of which the locality was susceptible. Catherine, though a little passÉe, looked exceedingly well, for, in order to render her appearance more attractive, she was dressed in white, and "all Greenwich," says Lord Herbert, "did not, on that day, contain a daintier dish of whitebait than the Lady of Aragon." The royal pair were crowned on the 24th of June, 1509, being exactly three weeks after marriage, up to which period, at least, there was no indication of that Bluebeardism which subsequently broke out with so much fury in the royal character.

Henry had on his accession thrown himself into the arms of his grandmother, the old Countess of Richmond, upon whose advice he acted in the selection of his ministers. The old lady died in the same month in which her grandson was married and crowned, at the respectable age of sixty-eight; and it is a curious fact that she had been married three times, so that in his multiplicity of wives, Henry the Eighth may be said to have simply improved upon the example set him by his grandmother. *

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The first political act of Henry the Eighth's reign, was to lay the heads of Empson and Dudley upon the scaffold. These rapacious extortioners had been the tools of his father's avarice, but had contrived to feather their own nests tolerably well; and Henry kept them in prison for the purpose of getting out of them the wealth they had acquired by their rapacity. He detained them in the Tower a whole year before he beheaded them, and continued to squeeze out of them everything they possessed, for he was one of those who never threw an orange away without thoroughly sucking it. Having drained it at length completely dry by about the 17th of August, 1510, he, on that day—to pursue the allegory of the orange—declined allowing them any quarter, but sent them to Tower Hill, where execution was done upon both of them.

Henry finding everything going smoothly in England, fell into the common error of those who having every comfort at home must needs look abroad for the elements of discord. He entered into a league against Louis the Twelfth of France, in favour of Pope Julius the Second and his father-in-law, Ferdinand of Aragon; but the latter kept helping himself to large slices of territory, and made use of his allies for the purpose of furthering his own interests. Henry's troops were therefore compelled to play an ignoble part, being cooped up in a French town, while the other soldiers overran Navarre, and appropriated everything they could lay their hands upon. Amazed at their moderate success upon land they attempted to retrieve themselves by a sea-fight, but the ruler was not then found by which Britannia subsequently learned to rule the waves, and the French fleet escaping into Brest, found shelter in their country's bosom.

In 1513, Henry being anxious to obtain ascendency over the seas, appointed Sir Edward Howard, one of the sons of the Earl of Surrey, to accomplish the grand object. Howard was so exceedingly confident of success that he sent a private note requesting the king to come and see how beautifully he (Howard) would "spifflicate"—for such was the word—the presumptuous enemy. Henry by no means relished the invitation, and replied to it by desiring Howard to "mind his own business" as admiral. This nettled the naval commander, who, during the engagement, jumped into one of the enemy's ships, and could not jump back again; while Sir John Wallop, upon whom he had relied, exhibited little of that usefulness which his name seems to indicate. Poor Howard was, accordingly, killed; and Henry, flattered by his parasites, came to the resolution that no good would be done till he himself set out for France at the head of an army.

In a few days he arrived off Boulogne, where he instructed the artillery to make as much noise as they could with their guns, in order that he might intimidate the foe, and encourage himself by the roaring of his own cannon. His object was undoubtedly to insinuate to the enemy, "We are coming in tremendous force, and so you had better keep out of the way for fear of accidents."

Henry, who had various other great guns on board besides his artillery, was accompanied by Thomas Wolsey, his almoner, lately risen into favour, together with the celebrated Bishop Fox, and a number of courtiers. He passed his time very pleasantly at Calais for about three months, when he heard that the celebrated Bayard—the chevalier sans peur et sans reproche—was moving forward. The English king bounded on to his horse with the elasticity of indiarubber, and advanced at the head of fifteen thousand men—Bishop Fox, with characteristic cunning, keeping in the rear, and Wolsey following the Fox at a prudent distance.

Twelve hundred French approached under the cover of a regular English fog, which with a most anti-national spirit favoured the enemies of the country to which it owed its origin. Bayard would have commenced an attack, but he was overruled by some of his companions; and Henry, thinking the foe afraid to "come on," sat himself down in a pavilion made of silk damask, foolishly believing that the art of the upholsterer could uphold the dignity of a sovereign.

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Thus he sat, like the proprietor of a gingerbread stall at a fair, until a terrific shower came on, and the silk streamers were streaming with wet, and the satin chairs could no longer be sat-in with comfort or convenience. The tent was turned literally inside out by the wind, like an umbrella in a storm, and Henry was glad to exchange his gaudy booth for a substantial wooden caravan, that was speedily knocked together for his reception. Though the two armies did not fight they commenced operations by mining and countermining, but instead of making receptacles for gunpowder, they were only making gutters for the rain, which took advantage of every opening. The Count of AngoulÊme (afterwards Francis the First) now arrived at headquarters, and scoured the country, which he was the better able to do from the quantity of water which had fallen on many parts of it.

Henry now received a visit from the Emperor Maximilian, and the English king made the most magnificent preparations for the interview; he equipped himself and some of his nobles in gold and silver tissue—though it was said the latter wore a tissue of falsehoods, for their finery was all sham—and he borrowed every bit of jewellery in his camp for his own personal bedizenment. He had a garniture of garnets in his hat, and even his watch, a tremendous turnip, had a diamond, weighing several carats, on its face, while a magnificent ruby matched with the rubicundity of his forehead, over which the gem was gracefully disposed. The nobles were sprinkled all over with paste, and looked effective enough at the price which Henry had given for their embellishment. Maximilian, who was in mourning, presented a dismal contrast to all this finery, for he wore nothing but a suit of serge, which, however, turned out for more serviceable than the fancy costume of Henry and his courtiers. The rain came on so furiously that unless the silks were washing silks they must have been fearfully damaged by the wet, while the running of the hues one into the other, caused Henry's party to come off with—in one sense—flying colours. It was at length determined to make an attack upon the French, and the Emperor Maximilian having got his old serge doublet trimmed up with a red cross, and pinned an artificial flower in his hat, directed the operations of the English. The French cavalry began pretty well; but whether Maximilian looked so great a guy as to terrify the horses, or through any other cause, it is certain that a panic ran through the ranks, and they commenced a retreat at full gallop, using their spurs with tremendous vehemence.

One of the fugitives, a venerable marshal, broke his baton in beating a retreat over the back of his charger; and Bayard, who had refused to run, seeing the baton of his comrade broken, exclaimed, "Ha! he has cut his stick!" which afterwards became a by-word to describe the act of a fugitive. The illustrious chevalier sans peur et sans reproche became a prisoner, but thoroughly enjoyed the joke of his countrymen having run away, and laughingly called it the battle of the spurs, from the energy with which they had plunged their rowels into the flanks of their chargers.

A meeting between Bayard, Maximilian, and Henry, has been described very graphically in the Histoire de Bon Chevalier; * and it appears from this authority that the two latter bantered their prisoner in a somewhat uncourteous manner. Bayard contended that he had become captive by a voluntary surrender; upon which the emperor and the king burst out into a fit of rude laughter, as if they would have said, "That's a capital joke;" but Bayard protested that he might have got away had he chosen to run for it. They only replied to him by saying "Well, well, my fine fellow, we've got you, and it matters little whether you took yourself into custody or now else you came here; but here you unquestionably are, and there's an end of the discussion."

After taking Tournay, where he held a number of tournaments, and which was actually sacrificed by the inhabitants for the sake of a bad pun *—worse even than the accidental one in the text—Henry returned to England, and arrived on the 24th of October, 1513, at Richmond.

Thus ended the expedition to France; but important events had been happening at home, for the Earl of Surrey had been chevying the Scotch over the Cheviot Hills, and at last fought them at Flodden, where James the Fourth unfortunately fell; and the English queen, making a parcel of his coat, hat, and gloves, sent them to Henry as a proof of the dressing the Scotch had experienced.

It had been intended to resume the war with France, but Louis the Twelfth suggested a compromise, by which he married Mary, the sister of the English king, and Mary thus had the honour of mollifying the asperity of the feelings that the two monarchs had hitherto indulged.

We have already mentioned the name of Wolsey, who accompanied Henry abroad in the capacity of almoner; and it is now time that we give some particulars of a person who played one of the most important parts in the drama of history.

Thomas Wolsey was born at Ipswich, in March, 1471, of humble parents; but the popular story of his father having been a butcher is probably a fable, to which the fact of his having had a stake in the country has perhaps given some likelihood. It is doubtful whether he was brought up to the block, though he might have been obliged to give his head to it at a later period of his life, when he incurred his master's displeasure. It has been said that Wolsey senior could not have been a butcher, because he left money to his son by will; but business must have been bad indeed if he could not bequeath a couple of legacies of thirteen-and-fourpence each, with one of six-and-sevenpence, and another of eleven shillings, in addition to a sura of ten marks, which constitute altogether the entire amount of cash that was actually disposed of by the old gentleman to his wife, his son, and his executors, ** If the elder Wolsey was really a butcher, it is certain that he had not a sharper blade in his establishment than his son Tom, who was sent early to school, and having proceeded to the University of Oxford, got on so well as to acquire the name of the Boy Bachelor. He soon became a fellow, and was one of the cleverest young fellows in the college, where he was intrusted to educate the three sons of the Duke of Dorset. In this capacity, by the application of a great deal of flattery—or, as some would have termed it, Dorset Butter—while at home with the young gentlemen for the Christmas holidays, he got the patronage of their noble father, who presented him with the rectory of Lymington. Here he is said to have disgraced himself by getting into a row at a fair, but we can scarcely believe that the clergyman of the parish would have forgotten himself so far as to give his love of gaiety full swing, and allow him to carry absurdity to the height which such a proceeding seems to indicate. He could not have very far compromised his character, or he would not have been employed by Henry the Seventh, on delicate and important missions which a parson fresh from "the fun of the fair" would never have been allowed to execute. Some of his detractors have broadly asserted that Wolsey was inebriated, and fled in shame from his cure, but we really believe that he was never at any period of his life intoxicated with anything but ambition, which undoubtedly is quicker in turning the head than the strongest juice that ever dropped from the ripest juniper. Fox, the Bishop of Winchester, strongly recommended Wolsey to Henry the Eighth, who, already knowing something of the young man, made him King's Almoner; and on taking Tournay, in France, hesitated whether he should burn it down, or make Wolsey its bishop. The latter of the two evils fell upon the town, which was placed under the ambitious churchman's ecclesiastical cognizance. He rose rapidly to the sees of Lincoln and York, became Lord High Chancellor of England, and, on the 7th of September, 1515, received his crowning honour, in the hat of a cardinal.

We must now put Wolsey by for a little bit, though we shall have to bring him out again and again, for we must not keep others waiting by lingering too long in the accomplished churchman's company. We left the Princess Mary just married to Louis the Twelfth, though her heart had long been given to Charles Brandon, Viscount Lisle, who retained the principal of her affections, though the French king got for a time the interest. He however enjoyed it for only two months when he died, and Brandon, the remainder-man, became the tenant in possession, by marrying Mary after three months' widowhood. Henry was at first very angry with the match, but the young couple rushing into his presence like two repentant lovers in a farce, and Wolsey interceding with all the air of the "smart servant," the king was persuaded to give that cheapest of all donations—his blessing.

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Brandon's good sense and modesty went some way in reconciling Henry, for Viscount Lisle never presumed upon his connection with the family of royalty. He did not talk continually of "My brother-in-law the king," as he might have done; but he took the following motto, in which there is a strong indication of his "knowing his place," and being determined on keeping it.

Francis the First had succeeded to the French throne and the Archduke Charles of Austria had come in for the whole of the Spanish monarchy by the death of his maternal grandfather, Ferdinand of Aragon. He was a maternal grandfather in a double sense, for he had grown very old womanish, and the adjective maternal was by no means inappropriate. Francis and Charles became competitors for the empire just vacant by the death of Maximilian, and the countenance of Henry was eagerly sought by both of the disputants. Henry had formerly hoped to have been himself a successful candidate, but finding he had no chance, he wrote to Charles, saying he "wished he might get it," which were the genuine sentiments no doubt of the English sovereign. The election fell upon Charles, and Francis affected to take the consequence as if it had been of no consequence at all, though it was clearly otherwise.

The election for the rank and dignity of Emperor was one of the most disgracefully corrupt proceedings that was ever witnessed, even in the palmiest days of the boroughmongering system in England, some centuries afterwards. The candidates were Francis the First of France, Charles the Fifth, king of Castile, Henry the Eighth of England, and the Elector Frederic of Saxony. The bribery was on a scale of vastness never before heard of, and it is said that Charles scattered his—or his people's—money among the independent electors with frightful prodigality. The electors of Cologne, which was not then in such good odour as might have been expected from the pleasant purity of its Eau, pocketed no less than 200,000 crowns; but the mother of Francis the First declared, that "the electors, among them all, had not received from the king, her son, more than 100,000 crowns," * so that the loss of his election is very easily accounted for. Francis, nevertheless, imagined he had secured five electors out of the seven; but those worthies, who were dishonestly receiving bribes from both parties at once, eventually gave to Charles, who paid them best, the benefit of their suffrages. Poor Saxony, expecting in a contest with such powerful opponents that he might get "double milled," resigned in favour of Charles; and Henry, whose committee had been sitting to conduct his election, until it was clear there would be nothing to conduct, threw his influence into the same scale.

On the 28th of June, 1519, the polling commenced, and each elector as he came up to give his vote was, no doubt, received with the shouts and salutations that are usual on all similar occasions. When the Elector of Cologne appeared to plump for Charles, after having quite as plumply promised his support to Francis, the jeers of the populace were tremendous, and an egg was even thrown for the purpose of egging on the crowd to acts of violence. The unprincipled elector looked contemptuously on the oval missile, as if he would have said that he did not care about submitting to the yolk, after the extensive "shelling out" that had already taken place for his benefit.

The countenance of Henry was still the object of both their wishes, and Francis asked the English king for an interview, which was arranged to take place in France in the ensuing summer. Upon the appointment having been made, Charles ran over to England, to be the first to get Henry's ear, and seeing Wolsey's influence, did his utmost to win over that wary individual. The latter secretly aspired to the papal chair, and it may perhaps be said that his origin is proved to have been that of a butcher's son, because he began to look at everything with a pope's eye, and hoped to eat his mutton in the Vatican. Such frivolous reasoning is so unworthy the dignity of history, that we reject it at once, and confine ourselves to the simple fact, that the triple crown of Rome was always running in or about the head of the ambitious churchman.

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The time now drew near for Henry to meet Francis the First, who, thinking to flatter Wolsey, requested that the management of the gorgeous scene might be left entirely to the taste of the cardinal. Wolsey's reputation as a getter-up of spectacles was exceedingly well deserved, for even when at home, he lived in a style of gorgeous magnificence. Every apartment in his house at Hampton was a set scene of itself, with decorations and properties of the most costly character. He kept eight hundred supernumeraries always about him as servants, "of whom nine or ten were noblemen, fifteen knights, and forty esquires." * Not contented with an ordinary chair, he always sat with a canopy over his head, and he allowed no one to approach him except in a kneeling attitude. His dress matched his furniture, for he wore a crimson satin surtout, with hat and gloves of scarlet, and even his shoes were silver-gilt—like a pair of electrotyped high-lows. His liveries surpassed even those of the sheriffs of London; and his cook positively wore satin or velvet, so that this functionary was dressed more daintily and delicately than the most recherchÉ of his own dinners. Wolsey, when he appeared in public, carried an orange, stuffed with scents, in his hand; for he used to say affectedly that there was always an exhalation from a vulgar crowd, which gave him the vapours.

The preparations for the interview between Francis and Henry having been entrusted to such a master of all ceremonies as Cardinal Wolsey, could not fail to be made on a scale of unprecedented grandeur; and the place where the two monarchs met acquired the name of the "Field of the Cloth of Gold," from the extreme gorgeousness of the scene in which they acted. The arrangements were nearly complete, and Henry had removed to Canterbury, for the convenience of the journey to France, when Charles of Spain, being jealous of the anticipated meeting, ran over to the Kentish coast, to say a few words to the English king before he left for the Continent.

Charles was received in a most amicable manner, but happening to see the late Queen Dowager of France, then Duchess of Suffolk, who might, could, would, or should have been his own wife, he turned so spoony and sentimental, that he could take no pleasure in the festivities prepared for him. "No, thank you, none for me!" was his almost uniform answer to every inquiry whether he would have a little of this, that, or the other, that was placed before him. He lost first his spirits, then his appetite, and ultimately his time, for he was fit neither for nÉgociation nor anything else during his stay in England. Having remained four days, he went home with a "worm in the bud" of his affections, and as he looked at the sea before him, he was overheard muttering that he "should never get over it." His courtiers thought he was alluding to the ocean but he was in reality soliloquising on the loss of his heart, which he left behind him; but happily this is a sort of parcel that can without much difficulty be recovered. On the day he re-embarked for Flanders, Henry set sail for France, having only put off his putting off out of compliment to his illustrious visitor.

A plot of ground between Guisnes and Ardres was fixed upon as the place of meeting, and a temporary palace—of wood, covered with sailcloth—was erected there, for the person and the suite of the English sovereign. Cunning workmen had painted the sacking at the top to look like square stones; but it was sacking, nevertheless, as the inmates found out in rainy weather. The walls glittered with jewels, like the gingerbread stalls at a fair, and the tables groaned, or rather creaked, under massive plate, which proves that the wood must have been rather green which had been used in making the furniture. Francis, making up his mind not to be outdone, got an enormous mast, and throwing an immense rickcloth over the top, stuck it up umbrella-ways in the part of the field he intended to occupy. A whirlwind having come on, the old rickcloth got inflated with the height of its position, and was soon carried away by the puffing it experienced. The whole apparatus took, for a moment, the form of a balloon; and the workmen, seeing it was all up, ran away just in time to avoid the consequences of a collapse, which almost instantly happened. Francis was glad to find more substantial lodgings in an old castle near the town of Ardres, where Wolsey speedily paid him a morning visit. The cardinal, who had only intended to make a short call; remained two days, in which he arranged an additional treaty with the French king, who agreed to pay a large sum for the neutrality of England in Continental matters, and "as to Scotland," said Francis, "you and my mother shall settle that between you!"

"I?" exclaimed Louisa of Savoy, with surprise, "I don't know anything about diplomatic affairs!" but the cardinal flattered the old lady that she did; and by blandly remarking "he was positive that they should not fall out," he persuaded her to join him in the arbitration, for he felt pretty sure he should get the best of the bargain.

Business being concluded, Henry took out of his portmanteau a new dress of silver damask, ribbed with cloth of gold, and in this splendid suit of stripes he went forth to meet his brother Francis. The 7th of June, 1520, and the valley of Andren, were the time and place of their first coming together, when, according to previous arrangement, they saluted and embraced on horseback. Had one waited for the other to dismount and advance, they might have been standing there to this day, but by a clever act of equestrianism, they contrived to go through the form of introduction on the backs of two highly-trained steeds, to the great admiration of the circle in the midst of which they exhibited. Francis spoke first, but confined himself to a commonplace observation on the length of the distance he had come, and an allusion to the extent of his possessions and power. Henry replied somewhat cleverly, that "the power and possessions of Francis were matters quite secondary in importance to Francis himself, whom he, Henry, had come a long way to see," and thus contempt was adroitly blended with compliment. The royal couple then dismounted, and took a turn arm-in-arm, as if in friendly conversation, after which they went together into a tent and partook of a very sumptuous banquet. Spice and wine were served out in great profusion, in a spirit of liberality equivalent to that which dispenses "hot elder, with a rusk included, a penny a glass," from many modern refectories. There was plenty of a sort of stuff called "ipocras," given to the people outside; but as we never tasted any "ipocras" and strongly suspect that it is a decoction from ipecacuanha, we cannot answer for the quality of the article in which the people "outside" were allowed to luxuriate.