VI.
At length the eagerly-expected courier reached Brussels, but, as usual, the Queen and Duchess were away hunting, and it was only on the 1st of February that the Ambassadors obtained their desired audience. Mary received them in her bedroom between seven and eight in the morning, and told them that the Emperor had decided to await the arrival of the Count Palatine, who with his wife, the Duchess's elder sister, was shortly expected at Toledo, in order that he might discuss the subject fully with them; but, since she knew Henry to be impatient for an answer, she had despatched a trusty messenger, Cornelius Scepperus, to Spain to beg her brother for an immediate decision.[227]
Feb., 1539] AN AWKWARD QUESTION
Wriothesley now ventured on a bold step. As the Queen rose to leave the room, he begged, in order to satisfy his own peace of mind, to be allowed to ask her one question, hoping that she would give him a frank answer. At these words Mary blushed deeply, conscious of the double part that she was playing, and bade him speak, assuring him that she would take whatever he said in good part. "Madame," returned Wriothesley, "I beseech Your Grace to tell me plainly how you find the Duchess herself affected towards this marriage with the King my master." If, as was commonly reported, the Duchess had really said that she minded not to fix her heart that way, all his efforts were but lost labour. And he made bold to ask this question because he knew that of late "divers malicious tongues, servants of the Bishop of Rome, had dared to speak lewdly in hugger-mugger of the King's Majesty." The question was an awkward one, but Mary proved equal to the occasion. She thanked the Ambassador for his frankness, and replied with some warmth that she was quite sure her niece had never spoken such words, and that, if evil men spoke lewdly of the King, she would know how to deal with them. "Touching my niece's affection," she added, "I dare say unto you, that if the Emperor and your master the King agree upon this marriage, she will be at the Emperor's command."
Wriothesley could only express his gratitude for this gracious answer, even if it were not so plain as he could have wished. Seeing that nothing else would satisfy him, the Queen referred him to the Duchess herself, and at two o'clock the same afternoon the Ambassador was conducted to Christina's lodgings. He found her standing under a canopy in a hall hung with black velvet and damask, with five or six ladies near her, and a dozen gentlemen and pages at the other end of the room. Christina received him with a graceful salute, bade him heartily welcome, and asked the purpose of his errand. Wriothesley proceeded to explain the object of his visit at great length, saying that he was quite sure that a lady of her gravity and discretion would never allow such unseemly words to pass her lips; yet, since untrue and wicked reports might have reached her ears and cooled her inclination towards the King, he felt it would be his bounden duty, were this true, to inform His Majesty, in order that he might withdraw his suit without further waste of time and dishonour.
Christina listened to this long harangue without moving a muscle. When the Ambassador had ended, she desired him to put on his cap, saying it was a cold day, and that she regretted not to have noticed that he was uncovered before. Wriothesley replied that this was his duty, and that he hoped often to have the honour of talking with her bareheaded in the future. Without paying any heed to this last remark, Christina replied in the following words:
"Monsieur l'Ambassadeur, I do heartily thank you for your good opinion of me, wherein I can assure you, you have not been deceived. I thank God He hath given me a better stay of myself, than to be of so light a sort as, by all likelihood, some men would note me. And I assure you that neither these words that you have spoken, nor any like to them, have passed at any time from my mouth, and so I pray you report for me."
Feb., 1539] CHRISTINA'S ANSWER
But grateful as Wriothesley expressed himself for this frank answer, he was not yet satisfied. "It is an evil wind, as we say in England, that bloweth no man good," and at least the Duchess would see by this, how little faith was to be placed in idle tales. "There are those," he said mysteriously, "who play on both hands; they tell Your Excellency many things, and us somewhat." But would she go farther, and tell him if he might assure the King his master of her own good inclination towards the marriage? At these words Christina blushed exceedingly, and said with some hesitation: "As for my inclination, what should I say? You know I am at the Emperor's commandment." And when the Ambassador pressed her to be a little plainer, she smiled and repeated: "You know I am the Emperor's poor servant, and must follow his pleasure!"
"Marry!" exclaimed Wriothesley; "why, then I may hope to be one of the first Englishmen to be acquainted with my new mistress. Oh, madame, how happy shall you be if you are matched with my master—the most gentle gentleman that liveth, his nature so benign and pleasant that I think no man hath heard many angry words pass his mouth. As God shall help me, if he were no King, instead of one of the most puissant Princes of Christendom, I think, if you saw him, you would say that for his virtues, gentleness, wisdom, experience, goodliness of person, and all other gifts and qualities, he were worthy to be made a King. I know Your Grace to be of goodly parentage, and to have many great Princesses in your family, but if God send this to a good conclusion, you shall be of all the rest the most happy!"
This fulsome panegyric was too much for Christina's gravity. She listened for some time, like one that was tickled, then smiled, and almost burst out laughing, but restrained her merriment with much difficulty, and, quickly recovering herself, said gravely that she knew His Majesty was a good and noble Prince. "Yes, madame," replied the Ambassador, with enthusiasm, "and you shall know this better hereafter. And for my part, I would be content, if only I may live to see the day of your coronation, to say with Simeon, "Nunc dimittis servum tuum, Domine." And he dwelt with fervour on the wish of the English to have her for their Queen, and on the admiration and love which the fame of her beauty and goodness had excited in the King. Christina bowed her thanks, saying that she was much bounden to His Majesty for his good opinion, and then, calling her Grand Master, bade him escort the Ambassador home.
"Your Majesty," wrote Wriothesley to the King that evening, "shall easily judge from this of what inclination the women be, and especially the Duchess, whose honest countenance, with the few words that she wisely spoke, make me to think there can be no doubt in her. A blind man should judge no colours, but surely, Sir, after my poor understanding and the little experience that I have, she is marvellous wise, very gentle, and as shamefaced as ever I saw so witty a woman. I think her wisdom is no less than the Queen's, which, in my poor opinion, is notable for a woman, and I am deceived if she prove not a good wife. And somewhat the better I like her for that I have been informed that, of all the whole stock of them, her mother was of the best opinion in religion, and showed it so far that both the Emperor and all the pack of them were sore grieved with her, and seemed in the end to hold her in contempt. I would hope no less of the daughter, if she might be so happy as to nestle in England. Very pure, fair of colour she is not, but a marvellous good brownish face she hath, with fair red lips and ruddy cheeks. And unless I be deceived in my judgment, she was never so well painted but her living visage doth much excel her picture."[228]
Feb., 1539] WORTHY TO BE A QUEEN
Two things, Wriothesley told Cromwell, in a letter which he wrote to him the next day, were plain: the Queen would be very loth to let them go with nothing settled, and the Duchess was well inclined, considering that nothing had as yet been said to her on the King's behalf. And he suggested that he might be allowed to show her a portrait of Henry, the sight of which, he felt sure, would make her die a maid rather than marry anyone else. "The woman is certainly worthy to be a Queen," he adds, "and in my judgment is worth more than all the friendship and alliances in the world."[229]
Unfortunately, these letters, which the writer hoped would give the King so much pleasure, found Henry in a furious temper. In January, 1539, Pope Paul III. issued the long-delayed Bull of excommunication, and called on the Emperor and the French King to declare war on the heretic monarch, and forbid all intercourse between their subjects and the misguided English. Cardinal Pole, whose kinsmen Henry had beheaded, and whose own life had been attempted by his emissaries, was sent to Spain to induce Charles to take up arms against "this abominable tyrant and cruel persecutor of the Church of God."[230] At the same moment a treaty was signed between Charles and Francis at Toledo, by which the two monarchs pledged themselves to conclude no agreements with Henry excepting by mutual consent.[231]
Henry now became seriously alarmed. He complained bitterly to Castillon of the way in which he was reviled in France, not only by the vulgar, but by the Cardinal of Paris and members of the Council. And he sent Cromwell to Chapuys with an imperative summons to come to Court without delay. The Imperial Ambassador obeyed, and came to Whitehall on the Feast of the Three Kings. Henry was on his way to Mass, but he stopped to greet Chapuys, and complained once more of the Queen of Hungary's interminable delays and of the scandalous treatment of his Ambassadors. Chapuys made the best excuses which came into his mind, and assured the King that Mary was only awaiting the Emperor's instructions as to the Papal dispensation, and that he would hear from Spain as soon as the Palatine had reached Toledo. To this Henry vouchsafed no answer, but walked straight on, to the door of the chapel.
During Mass Cromwell entered into conversation with Chapuys, and told him that the Pope had thrown off the hypocrite's mask, and was doing his best to kindle a flame in Italy. Before the Ambassador could reply he changed the subject, and said he saw clearly that the Emperor intended to marry his niece to Cleves or Lorraine. Chapuys laughed, and remarked that the Duchess could hardly be given to both Princes, but added in all seriousness that his master knew the difference between the King of England and these suitors. After dinner Henry seemed in a better temper, but told Chapuys in confidential tones that he was growing old, and that his subjects pressed him to hasten his marriage, and that these vexatious delays were all due to the French, who boasted that the Emperor could do nothing without their consent.
Feb., 1539] A COLD FROST
"He seemed in great trouble," reported Chapuys, "and it is plain, as everyone about him tells me, that he is very much in love with the Duchess of Milan. He told one of his most intimate friends the other day that he would gladly take her without a penny.... And just now the French Ambassador asked me if it were true that he had sent her a diamond worth 16,000 ducats."[232]
At the same time Chapuys heard that Henry was negotiating with the German Princes, and offering his daughter Mary to the young Duke of Cleves, in order to prevent him from marrying the Duchess. "He is so much in love," wrote Castillon, "that for one gracious word from her I believe he would go to war to recover Denmark."[233]
The same week Henry wrote to Wyatt, complaining bitterly of the treatment which he had received from his imperial brother, as being wholly unworthy of a Prince who professed to be his zealous friend. "After so hot a summer we saw never so cold a winter; after all these professions of love and friendship, in the end nothing but a cold frost." He ended by declaring he would no longer be kept "hanging in the balance," and must have an immediate answer, even if it were a flat denial.[234] At length even Charles could procrastinate no longer, and on the 15th of February he told Wyatt that it was impossible for the marriage to take place without the Pope's dispensation, as the King's dispensation would never satisfy the Duchess herself, or any of her relations, and might cause endless inconvenience if children were born of the union. "All the stay," wrote Cromwell to Wriothesley, "is upon the dispensation, to which they object now, but whereof they never spake before."[235]
Even before the courier from Spain arrived, Henry's face was so black that Castillon wrote home begging to be recalled, and declaring that this King was the most cruel and dangerous man in the world. He was in such a rage that he had neither reason nor understanding left, and once he found out that Francis could do nothing for him, Castillon was convinced that his own life would not be worth a straw. A few days later the Ambassador left London, and rejoiced to find himself safely back in France.[236]