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Catherine
298
Catherine

in England who could do anything for her except Chapuys. All her counsel had refused absolutely to have anything more to do with her cause after it was revoked to Rome. Still, she carefully maintained her position as a wife, and sought opportunities of vindicating it quietly and without reproaches. At the beginning of 1532 she sent her husband a gold cup as a New Year's gift, 'with honorable and humble words.' She had been strictly forbidden to write to him or send any messages; and Henry was so far from pleased that he refused it angrily; but fearing that the servant who had presented it would return it to the queen's messenger, and that the latter might take an opportunity of presenting it himself before all the court, he sent for it again, praised its workmanship, and ordered that it should not be returned till the evening.

The people felt much for the queen's wrongs. Even Dr. Benet, the king's agent at Rome, when in England at the end of 1531, sent her a secret message desiring her pardon. He heartily prayed, he said, for the success of her cause. The women even broke out into tumults in her behalf, and insulted Anne Boleyn; shouts were also heard when the king went about, calling upon him to take back his queen; and even in the House of Commons two members made the same suggestion. In answer to a demand for aid to strengthen the frontier against the Scots, they said that the king would protect the realm much more effectively if he would only take back his queen and cultivate the friendship of the emperor. The aid demanded was refused, nor does it seem that Henry ever dared to punish the offenders. On Easter day, 31 March 1632, William Peto, the provincial of the Grey Friars, preached before the king at Greenwich, strongly opposing the divorce. The king dissembled his displeasure, and gave the friar, who desired to go to Toulouse, permission to leave the kingdom; then next Sunday got a chaplain of his own, named Dr. Curwen, to preach in a manner more agreeable to himself. Dr. Curwen fulfilled his task, and replied to Peto's sermon, insinuating that Peto had withdrawn himself for fear, and expressing a wish that he were present to answer him. On this another friar, Elstowe, started up, and offered to confirm by scripture all that Peto had said. The king was intensely irritated, and both friars (for Peto had only reached Canterbury) were soon after called before the council, where one nobleman told them that they deserved to be put into a sack and thrown into the Thames. 'Make these threats to courtiers,' Elstowe replied; 'for as to us, we know right well the way to heaven lies as open by water as by land.'

Bishop Fisher both wrote and preached in the queen's favour, and by a sermon at the beginning of June very nearly subjected himself to that imprisonment which he actually underwent a year later. Abell wrote a book in her behalf; Peto, moreover, was preparing another, and his reason for desiring to go abroad was to arrange for its publication. The pope meanwhile had sent Henry a brief 1 rebuking him for having not only put away his wife, but cohabited with Anne Boleyn. But none of these things produced much effect upon the king. Catherine was removed from the Moor, and sent to reside at Bishop's Hatfield, a place belonging to the Bishop of Ely, and there she remained at the time the king crossed to Calais with Anne Boleyn in October, in great anxiety lest they should marry over there during the interview with Francis I.

This interview was designed mainly to convince the pope that the kings of England and France were so united that he could not offend one without offending both. It was very unpopular in England. The emperor, to counteract the alliance of the two powers, held a meeting with the pope at Bologna at the close of the year. Two French cardinals sent by Francis to Bologna before the meeting was over induced Clement to avoid going further in the affair of Catherine than he had done already. Henry took advantage cf the pope's irresolution, and secretly married Anne Boleyn on 25 Jan. 1533. He also obtained from the pope bulls for Cranmer's promotion to the see of Canterbury. As soon as these were secure, he got his parliament to pass an act that no appeals in ecclesiastical causes should henceforth be carried out of the kingdom to Rome. The new archbishop was made use of to declare the nullity of the king's marriage with Catherine, and the validity of his marriage with Anne Boleyn. Even before this was done, an intimation was sent to Catherine that she must no longer call herself queen, but only princess dowager. At Easter (13 April) the marriage was divulged, and Anne Boleyn openly took upon her the name of queen. Yet it was not till 10 May that Cranmer opened his court at Dunstable to try whether the first marriage was a valid one or not! Catherine, by the advice of Chapuys, took no notice of the proceedings, I and the archbishop pronounced her contumacious. The court was three times adjourned, and sentence was finally pronounced upon the 23rd, declaring the marriage invalid. Yet it appears by a letter which he wrote to Cromwell that during the progress of the suit the