AGAINST THE TIDE.

July-December 1553.

Mary’s opportunity was in many ways a splendid one. From her earliest youth, the new Queen had been the hope, the admiration, the delight of the English people, and the poet expressed no mere conceit in the words:—

The whole country welcomed her as one man, and it may be truly said that it was the affection of Englishmen, no less than their loyalty that had placed her on the throne. Nevertheless, she was beset with difficulties. The art of reigning as she understood it was part and parcel of the mediÆval system, but it needed a spirit touched with the inspiration of the new age, to direct the restless activities of a nation already beginning to be permeated with the Renaissance. While she looked back to the past, her people had emancipated themselves from mediÆval traditions.

Moulding her conduct on the ideals which she had venerated from her youth upwards, she regarded the new needs and tendencies with suspicion and dislike; and thus gradually a breach was formed between herself and the nation. She had its interests as sincerely at heart as any English monarch either before or after her, but those interests, as she understood them, were hopelessly at variance with the seething crowd of ideas that were transforming the life of the people.

With intense honesty of purpose, Mary stood at the parting of the ways, between a mediÆvalism that seemed good in her eyes, and a progress that all her experience had taught her to interpret as revolution. It was partly her inability to distinguish between the two, to seize the good element in the new modes of thought, that brought about the catastrophe of her reign, and evolved anarchy out of aspirations, which ably led and controlled, might have contributed to the welfare of the realm. If it is unfortunate to be born in advance of one’s age, it is doubly so to be behind it; but if conscientious motives and earnest endeavour could have compensated for the mistake, Mary would have won golden opinions instead of hatred and abuse. But there were difficulties quite independent of her own limitations. At the outset, the task of forming a government was a delicate one. Nearly all the statesmen of the time had been members of Edward’s Council and had proved themselves traitors. When she had restored the Duke of Norfolk to the Council Board, had installed Sir John Gage as Constable of the Tower, had made Sir Henry Jerningham a member of her Privy Council, Vice-Chancellor and Captain of the Guard, had knighted her faithful Rochester and set him over her household, had promoted Waldegrave to the charge of the Grand Wardrobe, and had made Sir Francis Englefield a Privy Councillor, the most important of the public offices remained to be filled by those whom she could neither afford to offend nor to dispense with, but who had all failed at the critical moment. The Earl of Arundel became Lord Steward, the Marquis of Winchester retained his office of High Treasurer, while many others of doubtful loyalty, including Sir William Petre and Sir John Masone, made her Privy Council a compact body of potential conspirators. Lord Paget, the most dangerous of all, became Secretary of State and Privy Seal. Gardiner, henceforth Lord Chancellor, had once vehemently opposed the validity of her mother’s marriage, although he had since amply vindicated his claim to Mary’s regard, and stood highest of all in her counsels, a sufficient answer to the charge so often made that the Queen had foredoomed Cranmer, because he had pronounced the sentence of divorce.

Mary lost no time in acquainting the Emperor and the French King with her resolve to bring back Catholic worship. Henry congratulated her on her intention, and urged her to proceed at once; but Charles advised caution, and told her to pause until she had obtained the consent of Parliament.[316] From Rome came still other counsel. If Mary was strangely unconscious of the change that had come over the country since the days of her childhood, at the heart of Christendom a still greater optimism prevailed. Reginald Pole wrote to her, urging not only the reconciliation of her kingdom with the Holy See, but also the restitution of Church lands. He congratulated her on the manner of her accession, and trusted that as she had been tutored in the school of God how to rule herself, her realm would become a mirror of good order and true justice, to the comfort of all good men.[317] He also wrote to the Emperor, representing that as the principal foundation of her right to the Crown rested on the legitimacy of her mother’s marriage, which depended on the Papal dispensation of Julius II.; by deferring the re-establishment of Papal authority her right was in consequence deferred also.[318]

Again he wrote to Mary herself, drawing attention to her own spiritual danger and to the shipwrecked condition of the English nation, “for the Queen, or at least England, was assuredly shipwrecked, when she threw herself into the sea of this century; and having drawn a picture of the danger, her Majesty will judge whether it is the time to deliberate, or rather to act as ordained and prescribed her by divine and human counsel”.[319]

Pole was not alone in advising prompt and swift action. All over the continent the same ignorance prevailed concerning the fact that England was not the same country as in the days when Henry VIII. broke away from Rome, and this mistaken notion as to Mary’s difficulties was not strange, seeing that the Queen herself was still peacefully unaware of more than half of them. The Papal nuncio in France, writing to the Cardinal del Monte, said: “From England comes the news that the Queen is about to enter London, beloved and revered by the people, not only as Queen but as a saint. Her sister has arrived, and her Majesty caused her to be received most honourably, a thousand horses with green and white velvet trappings being sent to meet her. All the populace cry out that Northumberland, Suffolk and Jane should have their heads cut off. It is believed that they poisoned the late King. As soon as the Queen arrives in London, it is supposed that she will have the marriage between her mother and father declared valid, and she is said to desire it very much, and wills it to be declared by all Parliaments and statutes, so that her mother’s and her own honour may be fully satisfied. Another of her intentions is to re-establish religion under the obedience of his Holiness, and the feeling of the realm is with her.” This was all true enough, but to complete the picture, he should have added that the Puritan Londoners were violently opposed to the old religion, that Elizabeth was as hostile as she dared to be, and was already looked on as the champion of the Protestant party, that the French ambassador played into their hands, and was ready for any conspiracy.

The advice of the Emperor was preferred to all other. Next to Mary’s devotion to her faith was her loyalty to the Hapsburgs. She had grown up in the belief that Charles was her best friend and only refuge; and now whenever she considered herself free to choose an independent policy, she chose to follow his advice. Indeed, it is scarcely thinkable, that at thirty-seven she should have awoke from the dream of a lifetime, by the mere fact of ascending the throne. In many ways, the Emperor advised her well. He had vast experience of the kind of religious revolution that was agitating the greater part of Europe. He had been twice in England, but more perhaps by his genius for government, and his habit of working out national problems on paper, than by his actual knowledge of the English people, the knowledge that comes from contact, did he realise the amount of pressure that could with any chance of success be brought to bear upon them. So long as he applied general principles in his advice to Mary, so long was his guidance of service to her; but where his own interests were concerned, and those of the empire, he ceased to consider her advantage at all, and involved her in a policy that ultimately became her ruin. If he had so willed, she would have gone to the block cheerfully for the principles for which More and Fisher died; but her martyrdom would have availed the Emperor nothing. Rather would it have embroiled him further with Henry, whose friendship he was just then anxious to obtain. Therefore he did not scruple to entangle her conscience in the meshes of an indefensible sophistry. When Edward’s Council had brought the country to so miserable a condition that the Government, neither feared nor respected abroad, dared not try conclusions with him, it was a small matter for him to declare that he had rather Mary died on the scaffold than abandon one jot or tittle of her faith. Having therefore been the arbiter of her destiny during the years of her bondage, it was not likely that he would cease to exercise his influence when the majesty of England was centred in her person.

Although Mary had wished Edward’s obsequies to be performed in the Catholic manner, when Charles represented to her that, as her brother had died professing the new, reformed religion, she could not consistently have him buried as a Catholic, she yielded to Cranmer’s objection to having a Popish Mass said over his body. The Archbishop of Canterbury therefore conducted his funeral, in accordance with the established form, in Westminster Abbey, the Queen, at the same time, with 300 of the nobility assisting at a solemn Dirge for his soul in St. John’s Chapel in the Tower. Elizabeth refused to be present at the Mass of requiem,[320] and Renard pressed Mary to take measures against her, declaring that her profession of Protestantism was a decoy, to attract to herself the malcontents, and to form a party in the State dangerous to peace and security.[321] After events proved the truth of this opinion. Mary replied that she was thinking of sending her sister away from the court; but, meanwhile, Elizabeth still remained, and the Queen did her best to convert her.

The bulk of the nation heartily welcomed the return of the old worship, but London was Protestant to the backbone. Something like a riot took place on the occasion of an unauthorised celebration of Mass, in a church near the Horse-market, and when Gilbert Bourne, Archdeacon of St. Paul’s, attempted to preach at Paul’s Cross on the 13th August fresh disturbances arose. The occasion was unfortunate, his theme dealing with the unjust imprisonment of Bonner; and the preacher’s language became somewhat inflammatory. “In this very place, upon this very day, four years afore passed,” cried Bourne, “was the Bishop of London, who is here present, most unjustly cast into the vile dungeon of the Marshalsea, among thieves.”[322] Bonner was hated by the Londoners on account of his uncompromising Papistry, and for what they considered his want of tact, in his conduct towards Ridley, who had been intruded into his see, when Edward deprived him for religion, and whom he now replaced. The sight of him, as he sat listening to Bourne’s panegyric, incensed the partisans of Ridley. As the preacher went on, low murmurs grew into fierce cries, and at last a voice called out, “Pull him down!” A dagger was thrown at Bourne, hit a post of the pulpit, and rebounded a great way. With difficulty Bourne was conveyed to a place of safety in St. Paul’s School.[323] The following Sunday, a detachment of the Queen’s guard was sent to protect the preacher,[324] but after this event, few came to listen to the discourses at Paul’s Cross, and the Lord Mayor was ordered “to make the ancients of the companies resort to the sermons, lest the preacher should be discouraged by a small audience”.[325]

These riots produced the first tightening of the reins of government, a measure which only led to further irritation. A royal proclamation was issued, which although testifying to Mary’s benignity, describes the tumultuous state of the metropolis. A part of it ran thus: “First, her Majesty being presently, by the only goodness of God, settled in her just possession of the imperial crown of this realm, and other dominions thereunto belonging, cannot now hide that religion which God and the world knoweth she hath ever professed from her infancy hitherto: which as her Majesty is minded to observe and maintain for herself, by God’s grace, during her time, so doth her Highness much desire and would be glad the same were of all her subjects quietly and charitably embraced. And yet she doth signify unto all her Majesty’s loving subjects, that of her most gracious disposition and clemency, her Highness mindeth not to compel any her said subjects thereunto, unto such time as further order, by common assent may be taken therein: forbidding nevertheless all her subjects of all degrees, at their perils to move seditions or stir unquietness in her people, by interpreting the laws of this realm after their brains and fantasies, but quietly to continue for the time till (as before is said) further order may be taken; and therefore willeth and straitly chargeth and commandeth all her said good loving subjects, to live together in quiet sort and christian charity, leaving those new found devilish terms of papist or heretic and such like, and applying their whole care, study and travail to live in the fear of God, exercising their conversations in such charitable and godly doing, as their lives may indeed express that great hunger and thirst of God’s glory and holy word, which by rash talk and words many have pretended; and in so doing they shall best please God, and live without danger of the laws, and maintain the tranquillity of the realm,” etc., etc.[326]

This was published on the 18th August, but scarcely succeeded in quieting men’s minds. Unauthorised Masses were constantly being said in prominent places of worship hitherto given over to the services of the established religion. Machyn’s Diary records the fact that on “the xxiii day of August began the mass at Saint Nicholas Colabay, goodly sung in Latin, and tapers and set on the altar, and a cross, in old Fish Street. Item the next day a goodly mass sung at St. Nicholas Wyllms, in Latin, in Bread Street.”[327]

To many, these things appeared quite otherwise than “goodly,” and there was much murmuring at street corners and in taverns, angry discussions that might easily end in brawls; and the forbidden words “papist” and “heretic” were bandied about without much restraint. Consequently, every householder was exhorted to “keep his children, apprentices and other servants in such order and awe, as they follow their work the week days, and keep their parish-churches the holy day, and otherwise to be suffered to attempt nothing tending to the violation of common peace, and that for the contrary, every one of them to stand charged for his children and servants”.

Meanwhile, all eyes were fixed on Cranmer. It is more than probable, that if he had remained quiescent he would have been suffered to retire into private life, or to betake himself to the continent like so many others of his opinions. Strype says that he was called before the Council at the beginning of August, to answer for his share in the late rebellion; that he was severely reprimanded, and ordered to confine himself to his palace at Lambeth. But this statement is unsupported by any evidence. There are no minutes of the Privy Council between the 2nd and the 8th August, on which day Edward’s funeral took place, when certainly Cranmer was not a prisoner either on parole or otherwise. Strype seems to have been confused by a letter from the Archbishop to Cecil, dated 14th August, in which he says that he has been to court. This appearance in the Queen’s presence would account for the report that was immediately circulated, to the effect that he had pledged himself to Mary, to say Mass for her.[328] Disagreeable as the rumour must have been to him in his position as reformer, worse was to follow. Mass had once more been said in Canterbury Cathedral, and Cranmer was accredited by the public voice with having said it. This was more than he could endure, and fired with indignation, he took the first irrevocable step towards his doom. Seizing his pen, he wrote the celebrated Declaration which, if the Archbishop of Canterbury has any determining voice in the doctrine of the Established Church of England, should for ever settle the question whether that Church teaches belief in the Sacrifice of the Mass or not.

“As the devil, Christ’s ancient adversary is a liar and the father of lies, even so hath he stirred up his servants and members to persecute Christ, and his true word and religion, which he ceaseth not to do most earnestly at this present. For whereas the most noble Prince of famous memory, King Henry VIII., seeing the great abuses of the Latin masses, reformed something herein, in his time; and also our late sovereign Lord, King Edward VI. took the same whole away, for the manifold errors and abuses thereof, and restored in the place thereof, Christ’s holy Supper, according to Christ’s own institution, and as the apostles in the primitive church used the same in the beginning, the devil goeth about by lying, to overthrow the Lord’s holy Supper, and to restore the Latin satisfactory masses, a thing of his own invention and device. And to bring the same more easily to pass, some have abused the name of me Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury, bruiting abroad that I have set up the mass at Canterbury, and that I offered to say mass before the Queen’s Highness, and at Paul’s church, and I wot not where. I have been well exercised these twenty years to suffer and bear evil reports and lies; and have not been mych grieved thereat, and have borne all things quietly. Yet when untrue reports and lies turn to the hindrance of God’s truth, they be in no wise to be tolerated and suffered. Wherefore, these be to signify to the world, that it was not I that did set up the mass at Canterbury; but it was a false, flattering, lying and dissembling monk which caused the mass to be set up there, without my advice or counsel. [Here Foxe has the words omitted by Strype, ‘Reddet illi Dominus in die illo’.] And as for offering myself, to say mass before the Queen’s Highness, or in any other place, I never did, as her Grace knoweth well. But if her Grace will give me leave, I shall be ready to prove against all that will say the contrary, that the Communion Book, set forth by the most innocent and godly Prince, King Edward VI. in his high court of Parliament is conformable to the order which our Saviour Christ did both observe and command to be observed, and which his Apostles and primitive church used many years. Whereas the mass in many things not only hath no foundation of Christ, his Apostles, nor the primitive church, but also is manifest contrary to the same, and contains many horrible blasphemies in it. And although many either unlearned or maliciously do report that Mr. Peter Martyr[329] is unlearned, yet if the Queen’s Highness will graunt thereunto, I with the said Mr. Peter Martyr, and other four or five which I shall choose, will by God’s grace, take upon us to defend that not only our Common Prayers of the churches, ministration of sacraments, and other rites and ceremonies, but also that all the doctrine and religion by our said sovereign lord King Edward VI. is more pure and according to God’s word than any that hath been used in England these thousand years; so that God’s word may be the judge, and that the reason and proofs may be set out in writing, to the intent as well that all the world may examine and judge them, as that no man shall start back from their writing; and what faith hath been in the church these fifteen hundred years, we will join them in this point, that the same doctrine and usage is to be followed which was in the church fifteen hundred years past. And we shall prove that the order of the church set out at this present, in this church of England by Act of Parliament, is the same that was used in the church fifteen hundred years past—and so shall they never be able to prove theirs.”[330]

This document was copied in all the scriveners’ shops in London, circulated widely and posted up in Cheapside. Foxe, with his wonted inaccuracy, says that the Archbishop was, in consequence, summoned before the Commissioners of St. Paul’s, and interrogated by Bishop Heath, and by Scory, Bishop of Rochester. Now Scory was not at that time Bishop of Rochester, neither was Heath on the Commission, but at the Council Board, which he joined on the 4th September. Moreover, when on other occasions Cranmer was summoned before the Commissioners, he did not appear personally but by proxy. For “Commissioners” we must therefore read “Council”.

“My Lord,” said Bishop Heath gently, “there is a bill put forth in your name, wherein you seem to be aggrieved at setting up Mass again. We doubt not but you are sorry that it is gone abroad.”

“As I do not deny myself to be the very author of that bill or letter,” replied Cranmer, “so must I confess here unto you, that I am sorry that the said bill went from me in such sort as it did. For when I had written it, Master Scory got the copy of me, and it is now come abroad, and as I understand, the city is full of it. For which I am sorry that it is so passed my hands, for I had intended otherwise to have made it in a more large and ample manner, and minded to have set it on Paul’s church door, and on the doors of all the churches in London, with mine own seal joined thereto.”

He was then ordered to appear the following day in the Star Chamber, and, after a long and serious debate, was committed to the Tower, “as well for the treason committed by him against the Queen’s Highness, as for the aggravating the same his offence by spreading abroad seditious bills, moving tumults, to the disquietness of the present State”.[331]

The Archbishop had had ample opportunity for flight had he been so inclined, but he persistently refused to take advantage of it, though he advised others in like danger to escape to the continent.[332] Great numbers did so, and went to Strassburg, Antwerp, Worms, Frankfort or Geneva, in all of which cities the new doctrines obtained. Among the fugitives were the Bishops of Winchester, Wells, Chichester, Exeter and Ossory; the Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, and those of Westminster, Exeter, Durham, Wells and Chichester; and the Archbishop’s brother Edmund, Archdeacon of Canterbury.[333] Peter Martyr also applied for passports which were granted without reluctance, and five days after Cranmer’s committal, he left England “with great safety and unnecessary precaution”.[334] The government apparently connived also at Latimer’s escape, for the Bishop received warning of the coming of a pursuivant from the Council. The pursuivant did no more than deliver a letter and depart, after which plenty of time was left, in the hope that he would take flight. But he did not budge, and accordingly, on the 13th September, the Council Register states that “This day Hugh Latimer, clerk, appeared before the lords, and for his seditious demeanour was committed to the Tower, there to remain a close prisoner, having attending upon him one Austin, his servant”.[335]

Mary was Queen, but not entirely mistress of her kingdom. De Noailles was careful to keep the coals stirred continually, and was responsible for at least half the discontent that prevailed in London. Elizabeth, whose vanity prompted her to pose as the centre of attraction everywhere, coquetted with the French ambassador, with the populace, with the leaders of the Protestant party, without committing herself to any overt act of rebellion. She was already mistress in the arts of innuendo, dissimulation and intrigue. The treachery of de Noailles made her the stalking-horse of the Reformers, although the ambassador expressed to his master a fear, that her obstinacy in refusing to go to Mass would shortly land her in the Tower.[336] But he was not even sincere in his treachery, for lightly as he imperilled Elizabeth’s life by encouraging the Princess to associate herself with the factious, it was scarcely his aim in the event of a successful insurrection to place her on the throne. Mary Queen of Scots was Mary Tudor’s next legitimate heir, and as the wife of the Dauphin would, if she mounted the throne of England, bring to a glorious end the humiliation under which the French had smarted for centuries, in seeing the English monarchs, their rivals, quartering the arms, and coolly assuming the style of Kings of France. But of these ulterior views the ambassador’s friends in England were totally ignorant, and perhaps even Elizabeth, with all her cleverness, was at least once in her life completely outwitted. It was constantly represented to the Queen, that her sister’s attitude was a serious danger to the government, and the imperial ambassadors urged that the Princess should be banished from London, where she was surrounded by partisans, and if she would not conform to the Catholic faith, it would be better for her to be in prison than out of it. Mary, loth to coerce, tried to persuade her by the force of example, and would hear five or six Masses daily, surrounded by the members of her Privy Council, all of whom had been, till recently, ardent Protestants.[337] Elizabeth and Anne of Cleves were the only persons at court who still held out. At last, alarmed at the sinister reports that reached her, Mary told her sister, that if she wished to remain near her person, she must break with the new doctrines, and with those who professed them.

Considering then, that she had done enough to exculpate herself in the eyes of those who had been carefully taught to look on her as their Joshua, Elizabeth threw herself at the Queen’s feet, and with streaming eyes expressed her sorrow at having seemingly lost her Majesty’s affection. She could account for it, she declared, in no other way than her profession of the reformed religion, for which, however, she ought to be excused, as having been brought up in it, and never taught any other. Perhaps, she pleaded, if she were provided with books, and aided by the instructions of divines, she might see her errors, and embrace the religion of her fathers. Her conversion was the work of a week. She went to Mass with the Queen, on the 8th September, and soon after, opened a chapel in her own house, and sent to Flanders for a chalice, cross and vestments.[338] De Noailles, without laying claim to great sagacity, might well express his opinion that all this proceeded more from policy than from any deep religious conviction. Up to the last moment before going to Mass, Elizabeth did all she could to persuade her Protestant friends that she was merely acting under compulsion. Even on her way to the chapel, she sighed and groaned, and gave out that she was ill. Renard too, doubted the sincerity of her conversion, especially as she did not appear at Mass on the Sundays following, and he besought the Queen to secure her person, as a frequenter and abettor of rebels. Mary assured him that she had also had grave misgivings, had already sent for her sister and implored her to say frankly whether she was a Catholic and shared the Catholic belief in the Eucharist, or whether, as it had been affirmed, her conversion were a feint or the result of fear. Elizabeth, the Queen said, had professed herself ready to declare in public that she had acted in accordance with the dictates of her conscience, without feint, fear or dissimulation; but in saying these words she had trembled from head to foot.[339] Renard and his colleagues continued to regard her as the champion of the disaffected, and were careful to bring to the Queen’s notice the persistent rumours concerning her. But Mary, on her guard perhaps, lest she should lend a too willing ear, as persistently refused to act upon them, continued to call Elizabeth her “good sister,” held her by the hand at all the great court ceremonies, and showered kindnesses and gifts upon her. Among other jewels, she gave her a brooch about this time, representing the story of Pyramus and Thisbe, with a magnificent table diamond, and four rubies; two volumes bound in massive gold, the one set with rubies, with a diamond clasp, the other containing the portraits of Mary’s father and mother; a white coral rosary mounted in gold, etc.[340] Either from fear of displeasing the Puritans by ornamenting herself with gems, or for some other reason, Elizabeth avoided either wearing or using her sister’s presents.[341]

One of the distinguishing features of the new reign was the style of dress adopted by the court. By restoring something of the splendour that had distinguished it in the early days of Henry VIII., by bringing dancing and music again into vogue, and by abolishing the sombre Puritanical fashion of Edward’s reign, Mary had given a much-needed impetus to trade, and while she offended some by her sumptuous attire, the change found favour with the many, weary of the dull, colourless garments, which for six years had been supposed to indicate a state of salvation. De Noailles told his master that the Queen had abolished the former “superstition” regarding ladies’ dress, which had forbidden them hitherto to wear gold ornaments or coloured clothes, and that her Majesty herself, and the ladies of the court were adorned with jewels and dressed À la franÇaise, with wide sleeves to their gowns.[342]

In consequence of the revival of industries, money at once began to circulate more freely, and this naturally exercised a beneficial effect on the nation at large, long the prey of poverty and discontent. Those only had been satisfied who were enriched by the plunder of churches and monasteries. The monopoly of land having been one of Henry’s chief objects in seizing Church property, every stray piece of waste ground was enclosed and rack-rented, so that the poor man, who had hitherto been able to keep a cow and a few sheep, could not afterwards so much as find food for a goose or a hen. The fishing population, since days of abstinence from meat were no longer obligatory, suffered as much as the country people, for the fisheries declined, through want of a market to dispose of the smack-loads with which the ports were glutted. The suppression of the religious houses affected the arts and crafts throughout the country. Nine years afterwards, at the beginning of Edward’s reign, it was found necessary to deal with vagrancy by legislation. The indigent had become the great bulk of the nation, while those who had grown rich with the wealth which had formerly been distributed at the convent gates, thought of nothing less than of feeding the hungry. Stringent poor-laws were enacted, but failed to meet the difficulty. A vagrant might be pressed into the service of any person who met him on the King’s highway. If he refused to do the work assigned to him, how vile soever it might be, he was branded with the letter V, and adjudged a slave for two years, to be fed on bread and water and refuse meat. A first attempt at escape was punished by the slave being branded with an S, after which he was kept a slave for life. A second attempt resulted in a felon’s death. From all this Mary delivered her people. Poverty under her was no longer considered a crime, and if there is one special reason more than another for honouring her memory it is her love and care for the poor and afflicted, of which we shall presently see many examples.[343] But besides the able-bodied vagrants, a vast number of feeble, halt, blind and wretched vagabonds lay and crept begging in the miry streets of London and Westminster. Money, urgently needed to reanimate commerce, and pay the debts of the Crown, had been squandered in the erection of expensive public buildings. In Sorranzo’s report on England in 1553, the Venetian ambassador says of London, that on the banks of the river were many fine palaces, making a grand show, but that the rest of the city was much disfigured by the ruins of a multitude of churches and monasteries, belonging heretofore to friars and nuns. The population was dense, numbering 180,000 souls.[344] Mary found, not merely an impoverished exchequer, but a mass of royal debts. In 1551 Edward’s liabilities had amounted to £241,179 14s. 10d.; in 1553 they still exceeded £190,000.[345] Immediately on her accession, the Queen acknowledged herself answerable for the salaries, three years in arrear, of all the Crown officials, although she had no longer a private purse; and while one royal proclamation restored a depreciated currency, setting forth the Queen’s “tender care to her loving subjects,” adding how sensible she was of “the great intolerable charges had come to her subjects by base money,”[346] another remitted two odious and oppressive taxes levied by the late Parliament. These were subsidies of four shillings in the pound on land, and two shillings and eightpence on goods, a burden that had weighed heavily on the small merchants and farmers.

Mary’s scrupulous justice and honesty left little wherewith to make a show of generosity. It had ever been the custom for English monarchs to reward those who had fought in their quarrel, with rich gifts of land and money, but clamour as her friends might, the Queen would not make grants of Church property, and there were few other resources at her command. “She is so poor,” said de Noailles, “that her want of money is apparent, even to the dishes put upon her table.”

Her choice of Gardiner as Chancellor was fortunate for the rehabilitation of the public finances. His ability in this direction was undeniable, his integrity known to all, and while he lived, however low the state of her coffers, Mary was never in debt. An Englishman to a fault, rough, uncouth and frank, often to incivility, Gardiner was liked by few. Both the French and Imperial ambassadors hated him cordially. Renard added distrust to his relations with him, remembering the active part which he had taken in the divorce of Queen Katharine, and in the declaration of the royal supremacy. He could not believe in the sincerity of the man, who was in reality burning with desire to prove it. But apart from his past history, Gardiner’s actual attitude was an obstacle to imperial interests in England. His patriotism, no less than his honesty and common sense, led him to discern that no matrimonial alliance, however brilliant, would be acceptable to the nation, if contracted with a foreigner. Fear and abhorrence of any “foreign potentate” having jurisdiction in this realm had become part and parcel of that insular prejudice, which had sprung up since the separation from Rome, a prejudice which Mary underrated, if she did not entirely ignore it, while Renard, to make the situation acute, was entrusted with a secret mission from the Emperor to bring about a marriage between her and his son, the Prince of Spain. There were henceforth three antagonistic parties in the State—the Spanish, the loyal English headed by Gardiner, and the disloyal, leagued secretly with the French.

To de Noailles, polished, urbane and ceremonious, an ultra Frenchman, the Chancellor was peculiarly obnoxious. Gardiner had always had a reputation for want of courtesy, and on his release, the French ambassador was the first to observe that imprisonment had not civilised him.[347] But if these two, who were working to some extent for the same ends,[348] had joined forces, they might together have defeated the Emperor’s schemes. They were however natural enemies, the invincible element of deceit and treachery in de Noailles revolting Gardiner, even more than his own want of tact disgusted the Frenchman. Pugnacious, outspoken, and strong in the integrity of his intention, the Chancellor held his own in the Council, although he was opposed throughout by Arundel and Paget, who favoured the imperial policy. But highly as she esteemed him for his probity, he was powerless to influence the Queen. The subject of her marriage exercised the minds of all parties in the State. Even her ladies talked to her of nothing else, and Mary herself, who had hitherto preferred to remain unmarried, acquiesced in the general understanding, that it was for the common weal she should now choose a husband. Before her public entry into London, Renard had secretly waited upon her at New Hall, to treat of the matter. She had told him, that before succeeding to the throne, she had resolved to end her days as a celibate, but that now another duty had been imposed on her. She was resolved, she said, to follow the Emperor’s advice, and to choose the consort whom he approved, for after God, she desired to obey him as a father. Only she besought him to consider her age, and not to press her to treat of matrimony with any whom she had not seen and heard. She gave Renard to understand that she had not been deceived by the Emperor’s feigned advice to her ambassadors at Brussels, that she should marry one of her own nobles, and that she even suspected them of having interpolated the sentence in which it was contained, to suit their own inclinations. On receiving Renard’s letter, containing an account of this audience, Charles replied that the Queen plainly showed by what she had said, that she inclined towards marriage with a foreigner.[349]

A few days later (according to de Noailles, on the 12th August) Mary repeated formally what she had already said to Renard, that for State reasons she had resolved to marry, and that seeing no suitable match in her own kingdom, she would form an alliance with a foreigner, trusting that the Emperor would propose a Catholic, and arrange for her to see and speak with the aspirant to her hand. She stipulated earnestly that he should not be too young.[350]

Among the prisoners already mentioned as having been liberated on her accession was Edward Courtenay, son of the Marquis of Exeter. Descended like his cousin, Reginald Pole, from the royal family, through his mother, Courtenay possessed advantages of birth sufficient to justify his being put forward as a candidate for the Queen’s favour; but in spite of all that has been written on the subject, it is more than doubtful, whether Mary, even for a moment, thought seriously of marrying him. With the whole Renard correspondence before us, it seems certain that from the beginning she had placed her destiny in the hands of the Emperor, and was resolved to abide by his choice.

Courtenay was handsome and fascinating in appearance, of noble carriage and distinguished manners; at the time of his release from the Tower, he was twenty-six years old, fourteen of which had been spent in prison. The Queen, as if she could not do enough to compensate him for the long injustice he had suffered, lavished honours and benefits upon him. She restored to him the earldom of Devon, and his confiscated estates of the marquisate of Exeter; and de Noailles surmised that, had he continued to deserve favours, the dukedom of York was in store for him.[351] His mother was made first lady of the court, and slept with the Queen. Courtenay became for a time the idol of the people, who would gladly have seen him married to their sovereign; but the idea probably originated with Gardiner, who had conceived an affection for the young man during their common imprisonment. He did his utmost to induce Mary to marry him, and had Courtenay proved himself worthy, and had the Chancellor and de Noailles worked in concert, she might possibly have raised him to the throne, their united action overcoming the Emperor’s influence, but there was no foundation for de Noailles’ absurd theory that she was in love with him. Scarcely was he out of the Tower, than intoxicated with his first sweet draught of freedom, he abandoned himself to every kind of dissipation, and frequented the loosest company. London echoed with tales of his excesses.

Even in those early days, his name was as often coupled with Elizabeth’s as with the Queen’s, and at the beginning of August, the imperial ambassadors told Mary that Courtenay and her sister were in collusion. They were careful also to keep her informed of his new way of life, which caused her great indignation, though de Noailles persisted in declaring that she was so deeply enamoured of him, that she would put up with all his licentiousness, and marry him in spite of everything. Unfounded as these assertions were, they gained considerable credence at home and abroad, and Prosper de Sainte Croix wrote to Cardinal del Monte, that it was very likely that the Queen of England would decide on Courtenay as a husband, as she had lately given him a diamond worth 16,000 crowns, which King Henry used to wear. But while Mary declared in public, that it was not to her honour to marry a subject, she told her friends privately that his immorality would alone prove a sufficient barrier. The French ambassador was not so blinded by his illusion, as not to perceive that Courtenay was fast ruining whatever prospects he might have had, and with facile diplomacy he caught the ball at the rebound, and still carried on the game in the interests of France. If Mary’s disappointed suitor were not to be a convenient foil to Spain, by marrying the Queen, he might still be valuable as a name to conjure with in connection with Elizabeth. If only he were a little more enterprising and a trifle less timid, Courtenay and Elizabeth might well lay themselves out for popularity among the discontented Protestants. De Noailles entertained him at a banquet, under cover of his belonging to the Queen’s Privy Council, flattered and encouraged him, and let fall a few tentative words, to the effect that he should push his fortunes. A few days later, Courtenay was seen leaving the French ambassador’s house disguised, at midnight.

Meanwhile Gardiner, and with him most of the loyalists, disappointed in the new Earl of Devon, looked to Reginald Pole as their next best hope. Mary was known to have an affectionate regard for her kinsman, and she owed him, moreover, a debt of gratitude. It will be remembered that there had been once before a question of their marriage. But Pole, although not yet irrevocably pledged to the ecclesiastical state, being only in minor orders, was without ambition, and had no desire for matrimony. He even thought that the Queen, being of the age she was, should remain single, and leave the succession to take its course; and he charged his friend, Pedro Soto, to say this to the Emperor. But the Council were greatly concerned to negotiate a suitable match, and the only two eligible Englishmen being henceforth out of the reckoning, they turned their attention successively to the King of Denmark, the Infant of Portugal, the Prince of Piedmont and to Ferdinand of Austria, King of the Romans. But during this time, Renard was not idle. Having sounded Mary with regard to the Prince of Spain, he proceeded diligently to combat her objections. In his first interview at New Hall, he had merely put forward the suggestion of a marriage; by degrees Philip’s name was introduced, and when he judged that the time was come for delivering the Emperor’s message, he flattered himself that the day was won, because she smiled as she listened. Writing to the Bishop of Arras, Cardinal Granvelle, he said, “Je connais ladite reine, tant facile, tant bonne, tant peu expÉrimentÉe des choses du monde et d’État, tant novice en toutes choses.... Et pour vous dire confidemment ce que me semble d’elle, je suis en opinion que si Dieu ne la garde, elle se trouvera trompÉe et abusÉe, soit par pratiques des FranÇais, soit par conspirations particuliÈres de ceux du pays, soit par poison ou autrement.”[352]

Mary has been represented by some modern historians as eagerly desiring the marriage with Philip, as greedily swallowing the tempting bait, her passion overleaping every obstacle. Nothing is farther from the truth, and those who have carefully followed her career step by step hitherto, will readily acknowledge, that such a reading of her character is altogether at variance with the whole tenour of her life. With regard to this marriage, she saw difficulties on all sides, and observed to Renard that the suitors proposed to her were so young that she might be the mother of them all, and reminded him that his Highness, the Prince of Spain, was twelve years younger than herself. She also objected that he would naturally wish to pass much of his time in Spain, ordering and administering the affairs of his kingdom, and that this would constitute an immense drawback to the marriage, adding that she had never seriously contemplated matrimony until God had promoted her to the Crown, nor felt affection for any man.[353]

After this interview, Renard thought that Mary was more inclined to the Emperor’s brother, Ferdinand of Austria, who had attained the mature age of fifty, than to Philip, who was no older than Courtenay, but he thought, too, that Ferdinand’s son, Maximilian, had also a fair chance. Nevertheless, he ceased not to sing Philip’s praises, and before long, all London was in possession of the secret, that the Emperor was soliciting the Queen’s hand for his son. None scrupled to express a disapproval, which became general hostility, when de Noailles had dexterously insinuated, that the coming of Philip as their King would mean ruin to the English, followed by the establishment of the Inquisition. To his master he observed reasonably enough, that the Spanish marriage of the Queen would be “to the great displeasure of all, with perpetual war against your Majesty, the Scotch and her own subjects, who will unwillingly suffer the rule of a foreigner”.[354]

The simmering discontent was momentarily allayed by the prospect of the Queen’s coronation on the 1st October, and by the issuing far and wide of writs for the assembling of Parliament on the 4th.

The Londoners had ever loved a spectacle, and having been deprived for six years of every outward and visible sign of rejoicing, their whole energies were now turned to the devising of a succession of brilliant pageants, wherein they proposed to do honour to the Queen. They flattered themselves that at the meeting of Parliament, all difficulties would be adjusted.

The Queen, entirely occupied with the solemnity before her, had applied through Renard to the Bishop of Arras, Antoine Perrenot de Granvelle, to procure the chrism to be used in her anointing. The Bishop, in sending the three different unctions necessary, excused himself for not enclosing them in a more costly box, saying that, as no artist (nul maistre) had been willing to undertake the preparation of a more ornate receptacle in less than three weeks, he sent the box which he usually carried about with him, choosing to execute her Majesty’s commission in a rough and ready manner, rather than to fail altogether by being too late.[355] On the same day the Papal Nuncio told Cardinal del Monte, that Mary had resolved no longer to style herself supreme Head of the Church of England, but simply Queen of France and England, that she had caused coin to be struck with her effigy on one side, and on the other, the legend Veritas temporis filia, that she had abrogated several taxes, and had ordered that Mass should again be offered throughout the kingdom.

At two o’clock on the afternoon of the 30th September the Queen left the Tower, and passed through the city to her coronation in Westminster Abbey. Elizabeth and Anne of Cleves followed Mary’s chariot, which was covered with cloth of gold, in one only a little less splendid, covered with cloth of silver. After them came the ladies of the court. “All the streets from the Tower to Temple Bar were richly hung with divers costly pageants.”[356]

That night, the court remained at Westminster Palace, and the next day, all walked in solemn procession on foot to the Abbey, where Mary was crowned by Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester; the Archbishop of Canterbury, on whom the office would naturally have fallen, being in prison. To a superficial observer all would have appeared as satisfactory as possible; the cheers of the people were hearty and spontaneous, and the Queen, deeply impressed by the significance of the act she was accomplishing, was yet not so entirely wrapt in her devotions, but that she had a kindly look and smile for the crowd that pressed round her on all sides. Behind her stood Elizabeth, and Anne of Cleves, both Princesses wearing dresses of crimson velvet trimmed with ermine; on their heads were crowns of gold, ablaze with precious stones of great size and value. The Queen’s crown, sceptre, sword and other insignia of the regal office were carried by the highest dignitaries in the State. Renard watched Elizabeth closely, and noticed signs of intelligence between her and the French ambassador. After the ceremony, as the royal procession was moving towards Westminster Hall, he heard her complain to de Noailles of the weight of the crown she was wearing. “Have patience,” he replied, “it is only the preliminary to one that will sit more lightly.”[357]

On Thursday, the 5th October, the first Parliament of Mary’s reign met “to consider chiefly the restoration of religion”.

Great interest had been taken throughout the realm, in the election of the 430 members who made up on the opening day an unusually full House. Even Froude, who will not be suspected of partiality, admits[358] that “on the whole it was perhaps the fairest election which had taken place for many years”.

Mary opened Parliament in person, “the Queen riding from Whitehall in her Parliament robes, with all the lords spiritual and temporal in their Parliament robes; and had a solemn Mass of the Holy Ghost sung in Westminster Church, with a sermon made by Dr. Heath, Bishop of Chichester”.[359]

Afterwards, the Lord Chancellor, addressing both Houses, extolled the virtue, piety and clemency of their sovereign. The speech was received with enthusiasm, and hopes were entertained that the Queen’s measures would be passed without opposition. Five days later, Mary sent down a bill for the abrogation of all laws concerning religion that had been passed during the two preceding reigns, one clause of the bill dealing especially with her mother’s divorce, and the question of her own legitimacy. The peers passed it without debate, but in the Lower House some stormy scenes attended the reading. The Commons had imagined that Mary would be content to restore religion to the condition in which her father had left it, and now they perceived, in the proposed abrogation of the decree of divorce, not merely a recognition of the Pope’s dispensing power, but an attempt to re-establish his jurisdiction in England. For this, the majority of the nation were unprepared. For twenty years and more, the Pope’s authority had been treated with contempt, his jurisdiction denied, his claims ridiculed, his name converted into a mark of infamy, and only mentioned with the foulest abuse. The language of the Reformers admirably promoted the effect which Henry VIII. wished to produce on the national mind, and by constant repetition of every scurrilous term of opprobrium, they had gained the popular ear. Few, at the beginning of Mary’s reign, were of so judicial a mind as to distinguish the real Pope from the bugbear that had been set up. Moreover, at the back of the prejudice lurked the fear, as yet vague and undefined, of a possible contingency, involving the restoration of Church property, on which so many had become rich. But besides the old and the middle-aged, with whom these things weighed, a fresh generation had sprung up, to whom the Papacy, if not the execrable institution that it was popularly believed to be, yet savoured too much of the past, and of those dreary mediÆval times, from which the world was escaping as from a tomb. Too recent to appear picturesque, the Middle Ages were, to the pioneers of the new era, out of date and old-fashioned, terms far more injurious than the most violent word-war of the preachers. Filled with the new wine of the Renaissance, these youthful enthusiasts formed the nucleus of that phalanx of life-loving, exuberant personalities who, throwing all their energies into the glorification of liberty, fame, pleasure, and earthly beauty, gave us subsequently the Elizabethan age. To all of these the very shadow of a spiritual authority was repellant, and the whole session would doubtless have worn itself out in wrangling, had not the Queen, coming unexpectedly to the House, seen how matters stood. She promptly affixed the royal assent to three bills that had been passed, and prorogued Parliament for three days. During this interval, two separate bills were framed in the place of the one obnoxious one, the first dealing exclusively with the confirmation of Henry’s first marriage. To make this bill acceptable to the Commons, all allusion to the Pope was avoided. The royal couple, it stated, had lived together in lawful matrimony for twenty years, after which time, unfounded scruples and projects of divorce had been suggested to the King, by interested persons, who, to further their schemes, obtained by threats and bribery the seals of national and foreign universities in favour of the divorce, the sentence being ungodlily pronounced by Thomas, the newly made Archbishop of Canterbury, against all principles of equity and conscience, and in the absence of Queen Katharine. The sentence had afterwards been ratified by Parliament, but as the marriage was not prohibited by divine law, it could not be dissolved by any such authority. The bill required therefore that the marriage should be adjudged good and valid.[360]

Although what was demanded was tantamount to a decree bastardising Elizabeth, not a dissentient voice was raised against the bill in either House.[361]

The second bill was framed in such a manner as to allay the fears of the holders of Church property, and to reassure those who dreaded a return to Papal jurisdiction. It made therefore no mention of ecclesiastical property, neither did it touch the vital question of the royal supremacy, but simply aimed at the re-establishment of religion as it was left at Henry’s death, with the repeal of nine Acts passed by the influence of Edward’s Council. The debate lasted two days in the Lower House, two-thirds of which consisted of friends of the new doctrines. Nevertheless, the bill passed without a division, and Cranmer’s ingenious compromise between Catholicism, Lutheranism and Calvinism was abolished.[362]

The other bills passed in this session related to the Acts, bonds, deeds and writings passed during the nine days’ usurpation, and were made as binding in law, as if Mary’s name had stood for Jane’s. It was also decreed, that nothing should be accounted treason but what fell under the famous statute of Edward III., nor felony but what was so understood in the first year of Henry VIII. The Acts against riotous gatherings passed in the reign of Edward VI. were revived; several persons attainted were restored in blood, and their estates given back to them. Those who had been foremost in actively conspiring to exclude Mary from the throne were attainted. These were, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Guildford and Lord Ambrose Dudley, and the Lady Jane.

All these measures were passed without serious obstacle; the real crux lay in the question of the Queen’s marriage. On the 6th September, de Noailles had been informed by one of the Howards, especially trusted by Mary, of her secret interview with Renard, and of his formal proposal to her from the Emperor, to marry Philip of Spain. The French ambassador lost no time in informing his master of the threatened danger to France, requesting that his brother, the protonotary, FranÇois de Noailles, might be accredited as his coadjutor in the difficult diplomatic situation likely to ensue. The following night, he sent for one of Courtenay’s friends, and advised him and his party to acquire as many allies as possible among those who came personally into contact with the Queen and the members of Parliament, soon to be assembled. These latter were to be incensed against Spain, and brought to petition her Majesty not to take a foreigner for her consort. On the 8th, he had an interview with Sorranzo, the Venetian envoy, whom he found ready to enter into his schemes, although Sorranzo had received no instructions from his government, on the subject of the Queen’s marriage. But so great was his dread of any further aggrandisement of the House of Austria, that he was willing to listen to anything de Noailles had to propose. On the 9th, the French ambassador sought out Gardiner, and harangued him for two hours, on the dangers and disadvantages of the proposed union—to the Queen who would soon find herself forsaken by her husband—to the ministers who knew well that Spaniards were not people to suffer opposition in the government—to the realm at large which would see its fortresses occupied by foreigners, and be itself drawn into a war with France, “for,” said he, “if the Emperor married his son to the Queen of England,” it was “with the intention that she, in accepting him, should take upon herself all his quarrels”.[363]

To these arguments Gardiner more than agreed, but he was careful not to show his hand completely. He had been the first to remonstrate with Mary, urging the dislike of the English to foreigners, the arrogance of Spain in particular, and the danger of a perpetual war with the French, who would never agree to the Low Countries being annexed to England. But opposed to the Chancellor were the Duke of Norfolk, the Earl of Arundel, Paget and Rochester, so that Gardiner could no longer be said to control the Council. De Noailles declared that they were in the pay of the Emperor. His manipulation of the popular feeling was the cleverest stroke of all. He caused it to be widely circulated, that immediately on his arrival and marriage, Philip would seize the Tower and the royal treasure, and make so many innovations that the laws would be entirely subverted, the rights of Parliament suppressed, the Inquisition established and the people trodden under the heel of Spain.[364] In his anxiety to prevent the union, he overstepped his master’s commands, unless the letter which Henry II. wrote to him, prescribing moderation, was a mere blind, intended to be shown to the Queen. Henry’s private instructions to his ambassador regarding his personal dealings with Mary were, that he should go to work very delicately, not seeming to wish to prevent the marriage, which would only cause her to be still more determined in its favour, but that gently he should continue to express doubt of the possibility of such an alliance, so odious to the King of France, since her Majesty had expressed a wish to live in peace with him.

At the beginning of the second session, the Commons, largely under the influence of de Noailles, waited a fortnight for the opportunity to present the Queen with an address which they had voted on the all-engrossing subject. Pleading illness, Mary sought time for further reflection. Then she sent suddenly for the Lower House, to attend on her at once. The Speaker presented himself, accompanied by twenty members, all that could be collected in haste. In his hurry, he had forgotten to provide himself with the address, but his eloquence made up for all deficiencies of form. He spoke so long and tediously, that Mary became impatient, and sat down, contrary to her wont. With a great deal of circumlocution, he prayed the Queen to marry, but not to choose a husband among foreigners, and he expatiated on the advantages she would derive from a union with a member of the English nobility. Such language, respectful though it might be, was not such as to be acceptable to Tudor ears, and in an aside, Mary exclaimed that she would be a match for all her Chancellor’s cunning.[365] When the Speaker had finished, she rose to reply, although the answer should rightly have devolved on Gardiner, as Chancellor, an innovation that caused Paget to rally him afterwards on his disgrace, the Queen having deprived him of his office. Her words were short and characteristic: “For that you desire to see us married,” she said, “we thank you. Your desire to dictate to us the consort whom we shall choose, we consider somewhat superfluous. The English Parliament has not been wont to use such language to its sovereigns, and when private persons on such matters suit their own tastes, sovereigns may reasonably be allowed to choose whom they prefer.” Herewith she dismissed them, and a few days later, Parliament was dissolved.[366]

The truth was, that in the interval of her seclusion, Mary had been making up her mind. In an interview with Renard on the 14th October, she had questioned him minutely as to Philip’s character and disposition, entreating him several times to tell her truly, whether the Prince was in fact moderate, well-regulated, and such in very deed as he had been described to her. She seized both of Renard’s hands, and implored him to be open with her, speaking to her as if he were her confessor. Renard protested warmly that he was ready to pledge his honour and his life, that the Prince of Spain was all that she could desire in a husband. Still, only half-satisfied, Mary continued to express regret that a meeting should be considered impracticable, before her final decision.[367]

In default of the original, whom the Emperor would by no means subject to the insulting possibility of not pleasing, a portrait of the Prince by Titian, was sent for Mary’s acceptance by the Queen of Hungary, Philip’s aunt.[368]

Charles was not greatly disturbed by the manner in which his overtures had been received in England. The English opinion of Spaniards was not less flattering than his and Renard’s of the English. “Your Majesty knows,” wrote the imperial ambassador, “that the temper and self-will of the English are extremely turbulent. They love change and novelty, either because of their insular position, or by reason of their habitual contact with the sea, or because their morals are corrupt. Your Majesty is aware how in times past their kings have been obliged to treat them with rigour, even shedding royal blood, in order to maintain their control over them, for which reason they have acquired the reputation of being cruel tyrants.” He went on to draw a picture of all that a foreign prince must be, if he would hope to gain the good-will of the English people. The affection of the nobility might, he explained, be won by rich banquets and entertainments, by dazzling them with great wealth, by giving them the means of enriching themselves, and by showing them an example of valour, in arms and knighthood.

Renard was not far wrong in accusing the people of turbulence. Excited to fever heat by de Noailles’ treachery, they confounded the Queen’s marriage with purely religious questions, and in defiance of all reason, attacked the Catholic religion merely because it was that of Spain. Preachers were insulted in their pulpits; it became unsafe to say Mass in public. The rebellious tone of the Londoners communicated itself to the provinces, especially to the home counties, and to Devonshire, the cradle of the Courtenay family. A circular letter from the Queen to her Council declared, that “certain ill-disposed persons meaning, under the pretence of misliking this marriage to rebel against the Catholic religion, and divine service restored within this our realm, and to take from us their sovereign Lady and Queen that liberty which is not denied to the meanest women in the choice of their husbands, cease not to spread many false, vile and untrue reports of our said cousin and others of that nation”.[369]

The opposition of the Commons, gently as it had been expressed, seems to have brought Mary’s uncertainties to an end. That same night, she took the fatal step which was eventually to deprive her of her people’s affection, an affection that had grown with her from her childhood, had been her consolation in days of darkness, and had enabled her to triumph so splendidly over her enemies. A despatch of Renard’s, addressed to the Emperor, and dated the 31st October, describes the dramatic scene in which she pledged herself to marry Philip.

“On Sunday evening, the said Lady sent for me to a room in which the Blessed Sacrament was exposed, and declared that since I had presented to her your Majesty’s letters, she had not been able to sleep, but had wept and prayed that God would counsel her, and inspire her answer to the question of marriage, which I had asked at Beaulieu [New Hall]. She went on to say that as the Blessed Sacrament was in the room, and she had always invoked it as her protector, guide and counsellor, she would on this occasion also willingly ask it to help her. And kneeling down on both knees, she recited the Veni Creator Spiritus, there being in the room only myself and mistress Clarence, who did the same. But as for mistress Clarence, I do not know whether she heard the said prayer, but I think so because of the sign she made me. After the said lady had risen from her knees, she said, that as your Majesty had chosen me to treat of this negotiation with her, she had chosen me as her first father confessor, and your Majesty for the second, and that having weighed everything, and considered all I had told her, besides having spoken on the subject to Arundel, Paget and Petre, and trusting to what I had said of the good qualities and condition of his Highness, she begged that your Majesty would be mindful of her, and agree to all the conditions necessary for the welfare of the kingdom, and continue to be a good father to her; all the more now that he would be a double father, and would obtain from his Highness to be a good husband to her. Feeling admonished by God, who had already operated so many miracles in her favour, she gave me her royal word, before the Blessed Sacrament, to marry his Highness, declaring that she would never change, but love him perfectly, and never give him cause for jealousy. She went on to say that she had feigned illness for two days, but that her indisposition was merely the result of the difficulty she had felt in making this resolution. Sire, the joy which I experienced on hearing this declaration was as great as your Majesty can imagine, for if she invoked the Holy Spirit, I indeed invoked the Blessed Trinity, to inspire her to give this desired answer.”[370]

This interview was kept so secret, that on the 17th November, more than a fortnight afterwards, de Noailles knew nothing of it, and still expressed doubt that Mary would persist in a matter that was certain to end for her in the loss of her people’s love; and he could not believe that the Emperor would risk sending his son into a country, the inhabitants of which threatened to kill him, rather than recognise him as their King.[371] Nevertheless, it was generally understood that the Queen had made up her mind, and as a forlorn hope the people clamoured for the arrival of Cardinal Pole, whom they credited with being opposed to the match, counting on his influence with Mary to prevent it. He had been appointed by Pope Julius III. legate a latere and pro pace, and had started for England at the beginning of October. Wotton, Mary’s ambassador in France, wrote to Sir William Petre as follows:—

“The Pope has made Cardinal Pole legate a latere to the Emperor and French King, and thereafter he is to go to her Majesty. His errand is to attempt a reconciliation between the two former sovereigns, and if any Cardinal is able to do good in the matter, Pole is that person, being esteemed of an honest mind and virtuous life, and so much respected by the Emperor, that at the last vacation of the Papacy, the Imperial Cardinals laboured to have him made Pope.”[372]

Pole, we have seen, was of the opinion that, having remained thus far unmarried, Mary should not change her state, but that the succession should be left to take care of itself. But ignorant of his young cousin’s unworthiness, he had desired that, if any marriage took place, it might be with Edward Courtenay, though he abstained from giving any advice on the subject. He had reached Dillingen, near Brussels, on his way to England, when the Emperor forbade his further progress, informing Renard, on the 21st November that by reason of jealousies, and because the Cardinal might effectually oppose the Queen’s marriage with his son, Pole was better where he was.[373] Renard replied, begging the Emperor still to detain him, for being Courtenay’s relative, he might put spokes in the wheel of Spain. There is no doubt that had he come to England at that time, he would, seeing the irritation of the people, have done all he could to prevent the marriage; but the Emperor and Renard were probably wrong in suspecting him of the least desire to push Courtenay’s fortunes. A letter from him to his nephew, having been intercepted, was found to contain nothing but the advice to remain faithful to the Queen, and to cultivate gratitude for the benefits which he had received from her.

On the 13th November, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Guildford, Ambrose and Henry Dudley, with the Lady Jane, proceeded from the Tower on foot, to be arraigned at the Guildhall for high treason.[374] All pleaded guilty, Cranmer protesting that he had acted unwillingly, in deference to the authority of the officers of the Crown. Parliament confirmed their attainder, and they were condemned to death. The Archbishop appealed to the Queen, and hoped that the mercy that had been extended to so many would be shown to him.[375] Notwithstanding that the prisoners had been convicted, there was no intention on the part of the Queen to proceed to the extremity of the law. She hoped, by keeping them as hostages, to secure the loyalty of their friends, an optimistic view that was not realised. Meanwhile, every indulgence compatible with their situation was allowed to them. Both Cranmer and Ridley had the freedom of the Tower, and the Queen’s garden, in common with the Lady Jane and the others. Ridley was even sometimes invited to dine at the Lieutenant’s table. The confinement of Latimer was more rigorous. He had from the first been ordered into close prison, with his servant to attend him.

Thus were matters constituted at the end of 1553. Elizabeth had remained at court for some months, in a not very enviable position, regarded by the Imperialists as the arch-enemy, and in reality the object of every plot that was floated. Her fate seemed to keep her perpetually hovering between the scaffold and the throne, to which de Noailles bade her aspire, without intending, even if he succeeded in dethroning Mary, to help her to mount it. She besought the Queen to allow her to retire to her house at Ashridge, but Mary hesitated, in giving her leave to depart, and if she had her watched, it was with good reason. Her relations with de Noailles had been discovered, and Arundel and Paget had told the Queen that the French ambassador had visited the Princess three or four times under cover of the night, in order to treat secretly of her marriage.[376] But Elizabeth denied everything, and probably the accusation regarding the ambassador’s visits was untrue. At any rate, Mary did not believe it, and took occasion to make a new act of confidence in her sister. She embraced her, and gave her two strings of large and magnificent pearls and some rich sables. On taking leave, Elizabeth entreated Mary not to believe the reports circulated to her disadvantage without hearing her. Nevertheless, de Noailles thought that it only depended on Courtenay, for her to follow him into Devon and Cornwall, where they would have a good chance of securing the Crown for themselves. He had some reason for this belief, the mayor and aldermen of Plymouth, thanks to his interference, having sent to beg him to supplicate his master to take them under his protection. They wished, they said, to place their town in his hands, and were willing to receive whatever garrison he would place there, being resolved not to receive the Prince of Spain, nor to obey his commands in any way, assuring de Noailles that the country gentlemen of the neighbourhood would do the same.[377]

Gardiner, ignorant of the Queen’s definite step, continued to struggle against the marriage, till the Emperor, at Lord Paget’s suggestion, wrote to six members of the Privy Council, introducing the subject of the treaty. Then, seeing that all further opposition would be fruitless, the Chancellor, ever patriotic, consented to negotiate terms likely to safeguard the rights, liberties and interests of the nation.

There remained only for the Emperor to make the formal demand for Mary’s hand, on behalf of his son.