The Reign of Mary Tudor | Page 6

l'on concite en ceste saison les Angloys contre vostre Majest�� et ses pays.
Comme n'avons peu communiquer verbalement avec elle, l'avons advertie desdicts difficult��s.... Que si la noblesse ses adh��rens, ou le peuple la desiroit et maintenoit pour royne, il le pourroit d��monstrer par l'effect; que la question estoit grande m��sme entre barbares et gens de telle condition que les Angloys ... luy touchant ces difficultez pour le respect de sa personne et pour suyvre la fin de la dicte instruction qu'est de non troubler le royaulme au d��sadvantaige de vostre Majest��--The Ambassadors in England to the Emperor: Papiers d'��tat du Cardinal de Granvelle, vol. iv. pp. 19, 20.]
[Footnote 4: Nous avons veu par vos lectres l'advertissement qu'avez donn�� soubz main �� Madame la princesse nostre cousine, affin qu'elle ne se laisse forcompter par ceulx qui luy persuadent qu'elle se haste de se d��clairer pour royne, que nous a sembl�� tres bien pour les raisons et considerations touschez en vosdictes lectres.--The Emperor to the Ambassadors: Ibid. pp. 24, 25.]
[Footnote 5: Ne se pouvoient faire grand fondement sur la faveur et affection que aulcuns particuliers et le peuple peuvent porter �� nostredicte cousine, ne fust que y en y eust plus grant nombre ou des principaulx, n'estant cela souffisant pour contreminer la negociation si fond��e et de si longue main que le dict duc de Northumberland a empris avec l'assistance que doubtez de France.--Ibid. pp. 25, 26.]
[Footnote 6: Baoardo.]
In London, during Friday and Saturday, the death of Edward was known and unknown. Every one talked of it as certain. Yet the Duke of Northumberland still spoke of him as living, and public business was carried on in his name. On the 8th of July the mayor and aldermen were sent for to Greenwich to sign the letters patent. From them the truth could not be concealed, but they were sworn to secrecy before they were allowed to leave the palace. The conspirators desired to have Mary under safe custody in the Tower before the mystery was published to the world, and another difficulty was not yet got over.
The novelty of a female sovereign, and the supposed constitutional objection to it, were points in favour of the alteration which Northumberland was unwilling to relinquish. The "device" had been changed in favour of Lady Jane; but Lady Jane was not to reign alone: Northumberland intended to hold {p.004} the reins tight-grasped in his own hands, to keep the power in his own family, and to urge the sex of Mary as among the prominent occasions of her incapacity.[7] England was still to have a king, and that king was to be Guilford Dudley.
[Footnote 7: In the explanation given on the following Tuesday to the Emperor's ambassadors, Madame Marie was said--"N'estre capable dudict royaulme pour le divorce faict entre le feu Roy Henry et la Royne Katherine; se r��f��rant aux causes aians meu ledict divorce; et mesme n'estre suffisante pour l'administration d'icelluy comme estant femme, et pour la religion."--Papiers d'��tat du Cardinal de Granvelle, p. 28. Noailles was instructed to inform the King of France of the good affection of "the new King" ("le nouveaulx Roy"). He had notice of the approaching coronation of "the King;" and in the first communication of Edward's death to Hoby and Morryson in the Netherlands, a "king," and not a "queen," was described as on the throne in his place.]
Jane Grey, eldest daughter of the Duke of Suffolk, was nearly of the same age with Edward. Edward had been precocious to a disease; the activity of his mind had been a symptom, or a cause, of the weakness of his body. Jane Grey's accomplishments were as extensive as Edward's; she had acquired a degree of learning rare in matured men, which she could use gracefully, and could permit to be seen by others without vanity or consciousness. Her character had developed with their talents. At fifteen she was learning Hebrew and could write Greek; at sixteen she corresponded with Bullinger in Latin at least equal to his own; but the matter of her letters is more striking than the language, and speaks more for her than the most elaborate panegyrics of admiring courtiers. She has left a portrait of herself drawn by her own hand; a portrait of piety, purity, and free, noble innocence, uncoloured, even to a fault, with the emotional weaknesses of humanity.[8] While the effects of the Reformation of England had been chiefly visible in the outward dominion of scoundrels and in the eclipse of the hereditary virtues of the national character, Lady Jane Grey had lived to show that the defect was not in the reformed faith, but in the absence of all faith--that the graces of a St. Elizabeth could be rivalled by the pupil of Cranmer and Ridley. The Catholic saint had no