Violence such as Chapuys anticipated was not in contemplation. The opinion of Europe would have been outraged, if there had been no more genuine reason for moderation. An appeal was tried on Catherine herself. The Archbishop of York and the Bishop of Durham, both of whom had been her friends, went down to her to explain the nature of the statute and persuade her to obedience. Two accounts remain of the interview—that of the Bishops, and another supplied to Chapuys by the Queen’s friends. The Bishops said that she was in great choler and agony, interrupted them with violent speeches, declared that she was the King’s lawful wife, that between her and Prince Arthur there had been never more than a formal connection. The Pope had declared for her. The Archbishop of Canterbury was a shadow. The Acts of Parliament did not concern her.[284] Chapuys’s story is not very different, though two elderly prelates, once her staunch supporters, could hardly have been as brutal as he describes. After various rough speeches, he said that the Bishops not only referred to the penalties of the statute (they themselves admitted this) but told her that if she persisted she might be put to death. She had answered that if any of them had a warrant to execute her they might do it at once. She begged only that the ceremony should be public, in the face of the people, and that she might not be murdered in her room.[285]
The mission had been rather to advise than to exact, and special demands were rather made on Catherine’s side than the King’s. Not only she would not swear herself to the statute, but she insisted that her household should be exempted also. She required a confessor, chaplains, physician, men-servants, as many women as the King would allow, and they were to take no oath save to the King and to her. Henry made less difficulty than might have been looked for—less than he would have been entitled to make had he known to what purpose these attendants would be used. The oath was for his native subjects; it was not exacted from herself, or by implication from her confessor, who was a Spaniard, or from her foreign servants.[286] If she would be reasonable he said that some of her requests might be granted. She might order her household as she pleased, if they would swear fidelity to him, and to herself as Princess Dowager. But he could not allow them to be sworn to her as Queen.
Chapuys’s business was to make the worst of the story to the Emperor. The Court was at Richmond. Chapuys went thither, presented a complaint to the Council, and demanded an interview with the King. Henry would not see him, but sent him a message that he would inquire into what had passed, and would send him an answer. Chapuys, who had been for two years urging war in vain, exaggerated the new injuries. Others, and perhaps he himself, really believed the Queen’s life to be in danger. “Every one,” he wrote, after describing what had taken place, “fears that mischief will now befall her; the concubine has said she will never rest till she is put out of the way. It is monstrous and almost incredible, yet such is the King’s obstinacy, and the wickedness of this accursed woman, that everything may be apprehended.”[287] Anne, it is likely, was really dangerous. The King, so far as can be outwardly traced, was making the best of an unpleasant situation. The Council promised Chapuys that his remonstrances should be attended to. The Queen was left to herself, with no more petty persecutions, to manage her household in her own way. They might swear or not swear as pleased themselves and her; and with passionate loyalty they remained devoted to her service, assisting her in the conduct of a correspondence which every day became more dangerous.
The European sky meanwhile was blackening with coming storms. Francis had not forgotten Pavia, and as little could allow England to be conquered by Charles as Charles could allow France to be bribed by the promise of Calais. His Agents continued busy at Rome keeping a hand on the Pope; a fresh interview was proposed between the French King and Henry, who was to meet him at Calais again in the summer; and an aggressive Anglo-French alliance was a possibility which the Emperor had still to fear. He had small confidence in the representations of Chapuys, and had brought himself to hope that by smooth measures Henry might still be recovered. A joint embassy might be sent to England from himself and the Pope to remonstrate on the schism. If nothing else came of it, their own position would be set right before the world and in the eyes of English opinion. Clement, however, now made difficulties, and had no desire to help Charles out of his embarrassments. Charles had forced a judgment out of him without promising to execute it. Charles might now realise the inconvenience of having driven him on against his own inclination. Cifuentes had again received instructions to delay the issue of the Brief of Execution, or the calling in the secular arm. The Pope felt that he had been made use of and had been cheated, and was naturally resentful. Cifuentes made his proposal. Clement, “with the placid manner which he generally showed when a subject was disagreeable to him,... said that the embassy might go if the Emperor wished.... It would not be of the slightest use ... but it might do no harm. He must, of course, however, first consult the King of France.” Cifuentes not liking the mention of France, the Pope went on maliciously to say that, if he had not gone to Marseilles, France would certainly have broken with the Church, as England had done, and would have set up a Patriarchate of its own. Indeed he was afraid it might yet come to that. The King of France had told him how he had been pressed to consent, and had made a merit of refusing. Cifuentes could but remark on the singular character of the King of France’s religious convictions.[288]
The embassy was not sent to England, and the Pope kept back his invocation of the secular arm till a Prince could be found who would act. No one would be the first to move, and the meeting of the two Kings at Calais was indefinitely postponed. Francis complained of Henry’s arbitrary manner, “speaking to me at times as if I were his subject.” The explanation given to the world of the abandonment of the interview was that Henry found it inconvenient to leave the realm. A letter of Chapuys explains where the special inconvenience lay. The Lady Anne would be Regent in his absence, and could not be trusted in her present humour. “I have received word from a trustworthy source,” he wrote on the 23d of June to the Emperor, “that the concubine has said more than once, and with great assurance, that the moment the King crosses the Channel to the interview, and she is left Regent, she will put the Princess to death by sword or otherwise. Her brother, Lord Rochford, telling her she would offend the King, she answered she cared not if she did. She would do it if she was burnt or flayed alive afterwards. The Princess knows her danger, but it gives her no concern. She puts her trust in God.”
Imperfect credit must be given to stories set current by malicious credulity. But the existence of such stories shows the reputation which Anne had earned for herself, and which in part she deserves. Chapuys reiterated his warnings.
“Pardon my importunity,” he continued, “but, unless your Majesty looks promptly to it, things will be past remedy. Lutheranism spreads fast, and the King calculates that it will make the people stand by him and will gain the Germans. So long as danger is not feared from without, Parliament will agree to all that he wishes. Were your Majesty even to overlook all that he has done, he would persist in the same way. Good Catholics are of opinion that the readiest way to bridle France and Germany is to begin in England. It can be done with ease. The people only wait for your Majesty to give the signal.”[289]
The inaction of the Emperor was incomprehensible to Catherine’s friends. To herself it was distracting. She had fed upon the hope that when the Pope had given judgment her trial would be at an end; that the voice of Catholic Europe would compel the King to submit. The Roman lightning had flashed, but the thunderbolt had not fallen. The English laity, long waiting in suspense, had begun to think, as Chapuys feared they would, that the Pope was the shadow, and Cranmer the substance. Cut off from the world, she thought she was forsaken, or that the Emperor’s care for her would not carry him to the point of interference. If no voice was raised in her favour in her own Spain, the Spanish Ambassador might at least show that her countrymen had not forgotten her. She sent pressing messages to Chapuys, begging him to visit her; and Chapuys, impatient himself of his master’s hesitating policy, resolved to go. He applied for permission to the Council. It was refused. But the Council could not forbid his making a summer pilgrimage to our Lady of Walsingham, and the road lay near Kimbolton. He wrote to Cromwell that, leave or no leave, he was going into Norfolk, and meant to call there. The porters might refuse him entrance if they pleased. He gave him fair notice. It should not be said that he had acted underhand.
It was the middle of July. Making as much display as possible, with a retinue of sixty horse, and accompanied by a party of Spaniards resident in London, the Ambassador rode ostentatiously through the City, and started on the great North Road. Spending a night on the way, he arrived on the second evening within a few miles of Catherine’s residence. At this point he was overtaken by two gentlemen of the household, with an intimation that he would not be admitted. He demanded to see their orders, and, the orders not being produced, he said that, being so near the end of his journey, he did not mean to turn back. He would have persisted, but a message came to him from the Queen herself, or from one of her people, to say that she could not receive him; he could proceed to Walsingham if he pleased, but he must not approach within bowshot of the Castle. Some peremptory command must have reached her. A second secret message followed, that, although she had not dared to say so, she was grateful for his visit; and, though he must not come on himself, a party of his suite might show themselves before the gates.
Thus the next morning, under the bright July sky, a picturesque Spanish cavalcade was seen parading under the windows of Kimbolton, “to the great consolation of the ladies of the household, who spoke to them from the battlements; and with astonishment and joy among the peasantry, as if the Messiah had actually come.” The Walsingham pilgrimage was abandoned, lest it should be thought to have been the real object of the journey; and Chapuys, with polite irony, sent the King word that he had relinquished it in deference to his Majesty’s wishes. He returned to London by another road, to make a wider impression upon the people.