This was the doc.u.ment which Cranmer handed to the King, "not having the heart to say it by word of mouth": and it must be admitted that as it was only a bit of second-hand scandal, without corroboration, and could not refer to any period subsequent to Katharine's marriage, it did not amount to much. Henry is represented as having been inclined to make light of it, which was natural, but he nevertheless summoned Fitzwilliam (Southampton), Lord Russell (Lord Admiral), Sir Anthony Browne, and Wriothesley, and deputed to them the inquiry into the whole matter. Fitzwilliam hurried to London and then to Suss.e.x to examine Lascelles and his sister, whilst the others were sent to take the depositions of Derham, who was now in Katharine's service, and was ordered to be apprehended on a charge of piracy in Ireland sometime previously, and Mannock, who was a musician in the household of the d.u.c.h.ess.

On the 5th November the ministers came to Hampton Court with the shocking admissions which they had extracted from the persons examined. Up to that time Henry had been gay, and had thought little of the affair, but now, when he heard the statements presented to him, he was overcome with grief: "his heart was pierced with pensiveness," we are told, "so that it was long before he could utter his sorrow, and finally with copious tears, which was strange in his courage, opened the same." The next day, Sunday, he met Norfolk and the Lord Chancellor secretly in the fields, and then with the closest privacy took boat to London without bidding farewell to Katharine, leaving in the hands of his Council the unravelling of the disgraceful business.

The story, pieced together from the many different depositions,[216] and divested of its repet.i.tions and grossness of phraseology, may be summarised as follows. Katharine, whose mother had died early, had grown up uncared for in the house of her grandmother at Horsham in Norfolk, and later at Lambeth; apparently living her life in common with the women-servants. Whilst she was yet quite a child, certainly not more than thirteen, probably younger, Henry Mannock, one of the d.u.c.h.ess's musicians, had taught her to play the virginals; and, as he himself professed, had fallen in love with her. The age was a licentious one; and the maids, probably to disguise their own amours, appear to have taken a sport in promoting immoral liberties between the orphan girl and the musician, carrying backwards and forwards between the ill-matched pair tokens and messages, and facilitating secret meetings at untimely hours: and Mannock deposed unblushingly to have corrupted the girl systematically and shamefully, though not criminally. On one occasion the old d.u.c.h.ess found this scamp hugging her granddaughter, and in great anger she beat the girl, upbraided the musician, and forbade such meetings for the future.

Mary Hall, who first gave the information, represents herself as having remonstrated indignantly with Mannock for his presumption in pledging his troth, as one of the other women told her he had, with Katharine. He replied impudently that all he wanted of the girl was to seduce her, and he had no doubt he should succeed in doing so, seeing the liberties she had already permitted him to take with her. Mary Hall said that she had warned him that the Howards would kill or ruin him if he did not take care. Katharine, according to Mary Hall's tale, when told of Mannock's impudent speech, had angrily said that she cared nothing for him; but he managed the next time he saw her, by her own contrivance, to persuade her that he was so much in love as not to know what he said.

Before long, however, a more dangerous lover, because one of better rank, appeared in the field, and spoilt Mannock's game. This was Francis Derham, a young gentleman of some means in the household of the Duke of Norfolk, of whom he seems to have been a distant connection. In his own confession he boldly admitted that he was in love with Katharine, and had promised her marriage. The old d.u.c.h.ess always had the keys of the maids' dormitory, where Katharine also slept, brought to her chamber after the doors were locked; but means were found by the women to laugh at locksmiths, and the most unbridled licence prevailed amongst them. Derham, with the lovers of two of the women, used to obtain access almost nightly to the dormitory, where they remained feasting and rioting until two or three in the morning: and there can remain little doubt that, on the promise of marriage, Derham practically lived with Katharine as his wife thus clandestinely, for a considerable period, whilst she was yet very young.

Mannock, who found himself supplanted, thereupon wrote an anonymous letter to the d.u.c.h.ess and left it in her pew at chapel, saying that if her Grace would rise again an hour after she had retired and visit the gentlewomen's chamber she would see something that would surprise her. The old lady, who was not free from reproach in the matter herself, railed and stormed at the women; and Katharine, who was deeply in love with Derham, stole the anonymous letter from her grandmother's room and showed it to him, charging Mannock with having written it. The result, of course, was a quarrel, and the further enlightenment of the d.u.c.h.ess with regard to her granddaughter's connection with Derham. The old lady herself was afterwards accused of having introduced Derham into her own household for the purpose of forwarding a match between him and Katharine; and finally got into great trouble and danger by seizing and destroying Derham's papers before the King's Council could impound them: but when she learnt the lengths to which the immoral connection had been carried, and the shameful licentiousness that had accompanied it, she made a clean sweep of the servants inculpated, and brought her granddaughter to live in Lambeth amongst a fresh set of people.

There is no doubt that Katharine and Derham were secretly engaged to be married, and, apart from the immoral features of the engagement, no very great objection could have been taken to it. She was a member of a very large family, an orphan with no dower or prospects, and her marriage with Derham, who was a sort of relative, would have been not a glaringly unequal one. With lover-like alacrity he provided her with the feminine treasures which she coveted, but which her lack of means prevented her from buying. Artificial flowers, articles of dress, or materials for them, trinkets and adornments, not to speak of the delicacies which he brought to furnish forth the tables during the nightly orgy. He had made no great secret of his engagement to, and intention of marrying Katharine, and had shown various little tokens of her troth that she had given him. On one of his piratical raids, moreover, he had handed to her the whole of his money, as to his affianced wife, and told her she might keep it if he came not back, whilst on other occasions he had exercised his authority, as her betrothed, to chide her for her attentions to others. When at last the old d.u.c.h.ess learnt fully of the immoral proceedings that had been going on, Katharine got another severe beating, and Derham fled from the vengeance of the Howards. After the matter had blown over, and Katharine was living usually at Lambeth, Derham found his way back, and attempted clandestinely to renew the connection. But Katharine by this time was older and more experienced, as beseemed a lady at Court. It was said that she was affianced to her cousin, Thomas Culpeper; but in any case she indignantly refused to have anything to do with Derham, and hotly resented his claim to interfere in her affairs.

So far the disclosures referred solely to misconduct previous to Katharine's marriage with the King, and, however reprehensible this may have been, it only constructively became treason _post facto_, by reason of the concealment from the King of his wife's previous immoral life; whereby the royal blood was "tainted," and he himself injured. Cranmer was therefore sent to visit Katharine with orders to set before her the iniquity of her conduct and the penalty prescribed by the law; and then to promise her the King's mercy on certain conditions. The poor girl was frantic with grief and fear when the Primate entered; and he in compa.s.sion spared her the first parts of his mission, and began by telling her of her husband's pity and clemency. The reaction from her deadly fear sent her into greater paroxysms than ever of remorse and regret. "This sudden mercy made her offences seem the more heinous." "This was about the hour"

(6 o'clock), she sobbed, "that Master Heneage was wont to bring me knowledge of his Grace." The promise of mercy may or may not have been sincere; but it is evident that the real object of Cranmer's visit was to learn from Katharine whether the betrothal with Derham was a binding contract. If that were alleged in her defence the marriage with the King was voidable, as that of Anne of Cleves was for a similar cause; and if, by reason of such prior contract, Katharine had never legally been Henry's wife, her guilt was much attenuated, and she and her accomplices could only be punished for concealment of fact to the King's detriment, a sufficiently grave crime, it is true, in those days, but much less grave if Katharine was never legally Henry's wife. It may therefore have seemed good policy to offer her clemency on such conditions as would have relieved him of her presence for ever, with as little obloquy as possible, but other counsels eventually prevailed. Orders were given that she was to be sent to Sion House, with a small suite and no canopy of state, pending further inquiry; whilst the Lord Chancellor, Councillors, peers, bishops, and judges were convened on the 12th November, and the evidence touching the Queen laid before them. It was decided, however, that Derham should not be called, and that all reference to a previous contract of marriage should be suppressed. On the following Sunday the whole of the Queen's household was to be similarly informed of the offences and their gravity, and to them also no reference to a prior engagement that might serve to lighten the accusations or their own responsibility was to be made.

Katharine Howard's fate if the matter had ended here would probably have been divorce on the ground of her previous immorality "tainting the royal blood," and lifelong seclusion; but in their confessions the men and women involved had mentioned other names; and on the 13th November, the day before Katharine was to be taken to Sion, the scope of the inquiry widened. Mannock in his first examination on the 5th November had said that Mistress Katharine Tylney, the Queen's chamberwoman, a relative of the old d.u.c.h.ess, could speak as to Katharine's early immoral life; and when this lady found herself in the hands of Wriothesley she told some startling tales. "Did the Queen leave her chamber any night at Lincoln or elsewhere during her recent progress with the King?" "Yes, her Majesty had gone on two occasions to Lady Rochford's[217] room, which could be reached by a little pair of back stairs near the Queen's apartment." Mrs. Tylney and the Queen's other attendant, Margery Morton, had attempted to accompany their mistress, but had been sent back. Mrs. Tylney had obeyed, and had gone to bed; but Margery had crept back up the stairs again to Lady Rochford's room. About two o'clock in the morning Margery came to bed in the same dormitory as the other maids. "Jesu! is not the Queen abed yet?" asked the surprised Tylney, as she awoke. "Yes," in effect, replied Margery, "she has just retired." On the second occasion Katharine sent the rest of her attendants to bed and took Tylney with her to Lady Rochford's room, but the maid, with Lady Rochford's servant, were shut up in a small closet, and not allowed to see who came into the princ.i.p.al apartments.

But, nevertheless, her suspicions were aroused by the strange messages with which she was sent by Katharine to Lady Rochford: "so strange that she knew not how to utter them." Even at Hampton Court lately, as well as at Grimsthorpe during the progress, she had been bidden by the Queen to ask Lady Rochford "when she should have the thing she promised her," the answer being that she (Lady Rochford) was sitting up for it, and would bring the Queen word herself.

Then Margery Morton was tackled by Sir Anthony Browne. She had never mistrusted the Queen until the other day, at Hatfield, "when she saw her Majesty look out of the window to Mr. Culpeper in such sort that she thought there was love between them." Whilst at Hatfield the Queen had given orders that none of her attendants were to enter her bedroom unless they were summoned. Margery, too, had been sent on mysterious secret errands to Lady Rochford, which she could not understand, and, with others of the maids, had considered herself slighted by the Queen's preference for Katharine Tylney and for those who owed their position to Lady Rochford; which lady, she said, she considered the princ.i.p.al cause of the Queen's folly. Thus far there was nothing beyond the suspicions of jealous women, but Lady Rochford was frightened into telling a much more d.a.m.ning story, though she tried to make her own share in it as light as possible.

The Queen, she confessed, had had many interviews in her rooms with Culpeper--at Greenwich, Lincoln, Pontefract, York, and elsewhere--for many months past; but as Culpeper stood at the farther end of the room with his foot upon the top of the back stairs, so as to be ready to slip down in case of alarm, and the Queen talked to him at the door, Lady Rochford professed to be ignorant of what pa.s.sed between them. One night, she recalled, the Queen and herself were standing at the back door at eleven at night, when a watchman came with a lantern and locked the door. Shortly afterwards, however, Culpeper entered the room, saying that he and his servant had picked the lock. Since the first suspicion had been cast upon the Queen by Lascelles, Katharine, according to Lady Rochford, had continually asked after Culpeper. "If that matter came not out she feared nothing," and finally, Lady Rochford, although professing to have been asleep during some of Culpeper's compromising visits, declared her belief that criminal relations had existed between him and the Queen:

Culpeper, according to the depositions,[218] made quite a clean breast of it, though what means were adopted for making him so frank is not clear.

Probably torture, or the threat of it, was resorted to, since Hertford, Riche, and Audley had much to do with the examinations;[219] whilst even the Duke of Norfolk and Wriothesley, not to appear backward in the King's service, were as anxious as their rivals to make the case complete.

Culpeper was a gentleman of great estate in Kent and elsewhere, holding many houses and offices; a gentleman of the chamber, clerk of the armoury, steward and keeper of several royal manors; and he had received many favours from the King, with whom he ordinarily slept. He deposed to and described many stolen interviews with Katharine, all apparently after the previous Pa.s.sion Week (1541), when the Queen, he said, had sent for him and given him a velvet cap. Lady Rochford, according to his statement, was the go-between, and arranged all the a.s.signations in her apartments, whilst the Queen, whenever she reached a house during the progress, would make herself acquainted with the back doors and back stairs, in order to facilitate the meetings. At Pontefract she thought the back door was being watched by the King's orders, and Lady Rochford caused her servant to keep a counter watch. On one occasion, he said, the Queen had hinted that she could favour him as a certain lady of the Court had favoured Lord Parr; and when Culpeper said he did not think that the Queen was such a lady as the one mentioned, she had replied, "Well, if I had tarried still in the maidens' chamber I would have tried you;" and on another occasion she had warned him that if he confessed, even when he was shriven, what had pa.s.sed between them, the King would be sure to know, as he was the head of the Church. Culpeper's animus against Lady Rochford is evident.

She had provoked him much, he said, to love the Queen, and he intended to do ill with her. Evidence began to grow, too, that not only was Derham admittedly guilty with the Queen before marriage, but that suspicious familiarity had been resumed afterwards. He himself confessed that he had been more than once in the Queen's private apartment, and she had given him various sums of money, warning him to heed what he said; which, truth to tell, he had not done, according to other deponents.

Everybody implicated in the scandals was imprisoned, mostly in the Tower, several members of the house of Howard being put under guard; and Norfolk, trembling for his own position, showed as much zeal as any one to condemn his unfortunate niece. He knew, indeed, at this time that he had been used simply as a catspaw in the advances towards France, and complained bitterly that the match he had secretly suggested between the Princess Mary and the Duke of Orleans was now common talk, which gave ground for his enemies who were jealous of him to denounce him to the King as wishing to embrace all great affairs of State. It is clear that at this period it was not only the Protestants who were against Norfolk, but his own colleagues who were planning the alliance with the Emperor; which to some extent explains why such men as Wriothesley, Fitzwilliam, and Browne were so anxious to make the case of Katharine and her family look as black as possible, and why Norfolk aided them so as not to be left behind. When, on the 15th December, the old Dowager-d.u.c.h.ess of Norfolk, his stepmother, his half-brother, Lord William Howard and his wife, and his sister, Lady Bridgewater, were imprisoned on the charge of having been privy to Katharine's doings before marriage, the Duke wrote as follows to the King: "I learnt yesterday that mine ungracious mother-in-law, mine unhappy brother and his wife, and my lewd sister of Bridgewater were committed to the Tower; and am sure it was not done but for some false proceeding against your Majesty. Weighing this with the abominable deeds done by my two nieces (_i.e._ Katharine Howard and Anne Boleyn), and the repeated treasons of many of my kin, I fear your Majesty will abhor to hear speak of me or my kin again. Prostrate at your Majesty's feet, I remind your Majesty that much of this has come to light through my own report of my mother-in-law's words to me, when I was sent to Lambeth to search Derham's coffers. My own truth, and the small love my mother-in-law and nieces bear me, make me hope; and I pray your Majesty for some comfortable a.s.surance of your royal favour, without which I will never desire to live.

Kenninghall Lodge, 15th December 1541."[220]

On the 1st December, Culpeper and Derham had been arraigned before a special Commission in Guildhall, accused of treason.[221] The indictment set forth that before her marriage Katharine had "led an abominable, base, carnal, voluptuous, and vicious life, like a common harlot ... whilst, at other times, maintaining an appearance of chast.i.ty and honesty. That she led the King to love her, believing her to be pure, and arrogantly coupled with him in marriage." That upon her and Derham being charged with their former vicious life, they had excused themselves by saying that they were betrothed before the marriage with the King; which betrothal they falsely and traitorously concealed from the King when he married her. After the marriage they attempted to renew their former vicious courses at Pontefract and elsewhere, the Queen having procured Derham's admission into her service, and entrusted secret affairs to him. Against Culpeper it was alleged that he had held secret and illicit meetings with the Queen, who had "incited him to have intercourse with her, and insinuated to him that she loved him better than the King and all others. Similarly Culpeper incited the Queen, and they had retained Lady Rochford as their go-between, she having traitorously aided and abetted them."

It will be noticed that actual adultery is not alleged, and the indictment follows very closely the deposition of the witnesses. The _liaison_ with Derham before the marriage was not denied; nor were the meetings with Culpeper after the marriage. This and the concealment were sufficient for the King's purpose, without adding to his ignominy by labouring to prove the charge of adultery.[222] After pleading not guilty, the two men, in face of the evidence and their own admissions, changed their plea to guilty, and were promptly condemned to be drawn through London to Tyburn, "and there hanged, cut down alive, disembowelled, and, they still living, their bowels burnt, the bodies then to be beheaded and quartered:" a brutal sentence that was carried out to the letter in Derham's case only, on the 10th December, Culpeper being beheaded.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _KATHARINE HOWARD_

_From a portrait by an unknown artist in the National Portrait Gallery_]

Although the procedure had saved the King as much humiliation as possible, the affair was a terrible blow to his self-esteem as well as to his affections; for he seems to have been really fond of his young wife.

Chapuys, writing on the 3rd December, says that he shows greater sorrow at her loss than at any of his previous matrimonial misfortunes. "It is like the case of the woman who cried more bitterly at the loss of her tenth husband than for all the rest put together, though they had all been good men; but it was because she had never buried one before without being sure of the next. As yet, it does not seem that he has any one else in view."[223] The French amba.s.sador, a few days later, wrote that "the grief of the King was so great that it was believed that it had sent him mad; for he had called suddenly for a sword with which to kill the Queen whom he had loved so much. Sometimes sitting in Council he suddenly calls for horses, without saying whither he would go. Sometimes he will say irrelevantly that that wicked woman had never had such delight in her incontinency as she should have torture in her death; and then, finally, he bursts into tears, bewailing his misfortune in meeting such ill-conditioned wives, and blaming his Council for this last mischief."[224]

In the meanwhile Henry sought such distraction as he might at Oatlands and other country places, solaced by music and mummers, whilst Norfolk, in grief and apprehension, lurked on his own lands, and Gardiner kept a firm hand upon affairs. The discomfiture of the Howards, who had brought about the Catholic reaction, gave new hope to the Protestants that the wheel of fate was turning in their favour. Anne of Cleves, they began to whisper, had been confined of a "fair boy"; "and whose should it be but the King's Majesty's, begotten when she was at Hampton Court?" This rumour, which the King, apparently, was inclined to believe, gave great offence and annoyance to him and his Council, as did the severely repressed but frequent statements that he intended to take back his repudiated wife. It was not irresponsible gossip alone that took this turn, for on the 12th December the amba.s.sador from the Duke of Cleves brought letters to Cranmer at Lambeth from Chancellor Olsiliger, who had negotiated the marriage, commending to him the reconciliation of Henry with Anne. Cranmer, who understood perfectly well that with Gardiner as the King's factotum such a thing was impossible, was frightened out of his wits by such a suggestion, and promptly a.s.sured Henry that he had declined to discuss it without the Sovereign's orders.

But the envoy of Cleves was not lightly shaken off, and at once sought audience of Henry himself to press the cause of "Madam Anne." He was a.s.sured that the King's grief at his present troubles would prevent his giving audience; and the Protestant envoy then tackled the Council on the subject. As may be supposed, he met with a rebuff. The lady would be better treated than ever, he was told, but the separation was just and final, and the Duke of Cleves must never again request that his sister should be restored to the position of the King's wife. The envoy begged that the answer might be repeated formally to him, whereupon Gardiner flew into a rage, and said that the King would never take Anne back, whatever happened. The envoy was afraid to retort for fear of evil consequences to Anne, but the Duke of Cleves, who was now in close league with the French, endeavoured to obtain the aid of his new allies to forward his sister's cause in England. Francis, however, saw, like every one else, that war between him and the Emperor was now inevitable, and was anxious not to drive Henry into alliance with Charles against him. Cleves by himself was powerless, and the trend of politics in England under Gardiner, and with Henry in his present mood, was entirely unfavourable to a union with the Lutherans on the Continent; so Anne of Cleves continued her placid and jovial existence as "the King's good sister," rather than his wife, whilst the Protestants of England soon found that they had misjudged the situation produced by Katharine Howard's fall. All that the latter really had done was to place Norfolk and the French sympathisers under a cloud, and make Gardiner entirely master of the situation whilst he carried out the King's own policy.

Henry returned to Greenwich for Christmas 1541, and at once began his bargaining to sell his alliance with the Emperor at as high a price as possible. He had already in hand the stoppage of trade with Flanders, which his ministers were still laboriously and stiffly discussing with the Emperor's representatives. Any concession in that respect would have to be paid for. The French, too, were very anxious, according to his showing, for his friendship, and were offering him all manner of tempting matrimonial alliances, and when Henry, on the day after Christmas Day, received Chapuys at Greenwich, he was all smiles, but determined to make the best of his opportunities. The Emperor had just met with a terrible disaster at sea during his operations against Algiers, and had returned to Spain depressed at his losses, and the more ready to make terms with Henry if possible. Chapuys was a hard bargainer, and it was a fair game of brag that ensued between him and Henry. Chapuys began by flattering the King: "and got him into very high spirits by such words, which the Lord Privy Seal (_i.e._ Fitzwilliam) says are never thrown away upon him," and then told him that he would give him in strict confidence some important information about French intrigues.

After dinner the ball opened in earnest, Chapuys and Henry being alone and seated, with Fitzwilliam, Russell, and Browne at some distance away. The imperial amba.s.sador began by saying that the King of France had made a determined bid to marry his second son, Orleans, with the Infanta of Portugal. This was a shock to Henry, and he changed colour; for one of his own trump cards was the sham negotiation in which Norfolk had been the tool, to marry the Princess Mary to Orleans. For a time he could only sputter and exclaim; but when he had collected his senses he countered by saying that Francis only wished to get the Infanta into his power, not for marriage, "but for objects of greater consequence than people imagined."

Besides, the French wanted the Princess Mary for Orleans, and were anxious to send an emba.s.sy to him about it: indeed, the French amba.s.sador was coming to see him about it with fresh powers next day. Chapuys protested that he spoke as one devoted to Henry's service; but he was sure the French did not mean business. They would never let Orleans marry a Princess of illegitimate birth. "Ah!" replied Henry, "but though she may be a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, I have power from Parliament to appoint her my successor if I like;" but Chapuys gave several other reasons why the match with Mary would never suit the French. "Why," cried Henry, "Francis is even now soliciting an interview with me with a view to alliances." "Yes, I know they say that," replied the amba.s.sador, "but at the same time Francis has sent an amba.s.sador to Scotland, with orders not to touch at an English port." This was a sore point with Henry, and he again winced at the blow.

Then he began to boast. He was prepared to face any one, and James of Scotland was in mortal fear of him. Chapuys then mentioned that France had made a secret treaty with Sweden and Denmark to obtain control of the North Sea, and divert all the Anglo-German trade to France, which Henry parried, by saying that Francis was in league with the German Protestants, and, notwithstanding the new decree of the Diet of Ratisbon, could draw as many mercenary soldiers as he liked from the Emperor's va.s.sals. He felt sure that Francis would invade Flanders next spring; and if he, Henry, had cared to marry a daughter of France, as her father wished him to do, he might have had a share of his conquests. This made Chapuys angry, and he said that perhaps Holstein and Cleves had also been offered shares. Henry then went on another tack, and said that he knew quite well that Francis and Charles together intended, if they could, to make war on England.

Considering, however, the Emperor's disaster at Algiers, and the state of Europe, he was astonished that Charles had not tried to make a close friendship with him. Chapuys jumped at the hint, and begged Henry to state his intentions, that they might be conveyed to the Emperor. But the King was not to be drawn too rapidly, and would not say whether he was willing to form an alliance with the Emperor until some one with full and special powers was sent to him. He had been cheated too often and left in the lurch before, he said. "He was quite independent. If people wanted him they might come forward with offers." This sparring went on for hours on that day and the next, interspersed with little wrangles about the commercial question, and innuendoes as to the French intrigues. But Chapuys, who knew his man, quite understood that Henry was for sale; and, as usual, might, if dexterously handled, be bought by flattery and feigned submission to his will, hurriedly wrote to his master that: "If the Emperor wishes to gain the King, he must send hither at once an able person, with full powers, to take charge of the negotiation:" since he, Chapuys, was in ill health and unequal to it.

Thus the English Catholic reaction that had been symbolised by the repudiation of Anne of Cleves, and the marriage with Katharine Howard, was triumphantly producing the results which Henry and Gardiner had intended.

The excommunicated King, the man who had flung aside his proud Spanish wife and bade defiance to the vicegerent of Christ, was to be flattered and sought in alliance by the head of the house of Aragon and the appointed champion of Roman orthodoxy. He was to come back into the fold unrepentant, with no submission or reparation made, a good Catholic, but his own Pope. It was a prospect that appealed strongly to a man of Henry's vain and ostentatious character, for it gave apparent sanction to his favourite pose that everything he did was warranted by the strictest right and justice; it promised the possibility of an extension of his Continental territory, and the establishment of his own fame as a warrior and a king. We shall see how his pompous self-conceit enabled his ally to trick him out of his reward, and how the consequent reaction against those who had beguiled him drew his country farther along the road of the Reformation than Henry ever meant to go. But at present all looked rose-coloured, for the imperial connection and the miserable scandal of Katharine Howard rather benefited than injured the chances of its successful negotiation. Cranmer, Hertford, and Audley had shot their bolt in vain so far as political or religious aims were attained.

In the meanwhile the evidence against Katharine and her abettors was being laboriously wrung out of all those who had come into contact with her. The poor old d.u.c.h.ess of Norfolk and her son and daughters and several underlings were condemned for misprison of treason to perpetual imprisonment and confiscation,[225] and in Parliament on the 21st January a Bill of Attainder against Katharine and three lady accomplices was presented to the Lords. The evidence presented against Katharine was adjudged to be insufficient in the absence of direct allegations of adultery after her marriage, or of specific admissions from herself.[226]

This and other objections seem to have delayed the pa.s.sage of the Bill until the 11th of February, when it received the royal a.s.sent by commission, condemning Katharine and Lady Rochford to death for treason.

During the pa.s.sage of the Bill, as soon, indeed, as the procedure of Katharine's condemnation had been settled, Henry plucked up spirits again, and with characteristic heartlessness once more began to play the gallant.

"The King," writes Chapuys, "had never been merry since first hearing of the Queen's misconduct, but he has been so since (the attainder was arranged), especially on the 29th, when he gave a supper and banquet with twenty-six ladies at the table, besides gentlemen, and thirty-five at another table adjoining. The lady for whom he showed the greatest regard was a sister of Lord Cobham, whom Wyatt, some time ago, divorced for adultery. She is a pretty young creature, with wit enough to do as badly as the others if she were to try. The King is also said to fancy a daughter of Mistress Albart(?) and niece of Sir Anthony Browne; and also for a daughter, by her first marriage, of the wife of Lord Lisle, late Deputy of Calais."[227]

Up to this time Katharine had remained at Sion House, as Chapuys reported, "making good cheer, fatter and more beautiful than ever; taking great care to be well apparelled, and more imperious and exacting to serve than even when she was with the King, although she believes she will be put to death, and admits that she deserves it. Perhaps if the King does not wish to marry again he may show her some compa.s.sion."[228] No sooner, however, had the Act of Attainder pa.s.sed its third reading in the Commons (10th January) than Fitzwilliam was sent to Isleworth to convey her to the Tower. She resisted at first, but was of course overpowered, and the sad procession swept along the wintry river Londonward. First came Fitzwilliam's barge with himself and several Privy Councillors, then, in a small covered barge, followed the doomed woman, and the rear was guarded by a great barge full of soldiers under the aged Duke of Suffolk, whose matrimonial adventures had been almost as numerous as those of his royal brother-in-law. Under the frowning portcullis of the Traitors' Gate in the gathering twilight of the afternoon, the beautiful girl in black velvet landed amidst a crowd of Councillors, who treated her with as much ceremony as if she still sat by the King's side. She proudly and calmly gloried in her love for her betrothed Culpeper, whom she knew she soon would join in death. There was no hysterical babbling like that of her cousin, Anne Boleyn; no regret in her mien or her words now. Even as he, with his last breath, had confessed his love for her, and mourned that the King's pa.s.sion for her had stood in the way of their honest union, so did she, with flashing eyes and blazing cheeks, proclaim that love was victorious over death; and that since there had been no mercy for the man she loved she asked no mercy for herself from the King whose plaything of a year she had been.

On Sunday evening, 12th February, she was told that she must be prepared for death on the morrow, and she asked that the block should be brought to her room, that she might learn how to dispose her head upon it. This was done, and she calmly and smilingly rehea.r.s.ed her part in the tragedy of the morrow. Early in the morning, before it was fully light, she was led out across the green, upon which the h.o.a.r-frost glistened, to the scaffold erected on the same spot that had seen the sacrifice of Anne Boleyn. Around it stood all the Councillors except Norfolk and Suffolk: even her first cousin, the poet Surrey, with his own doom not far off, witnessed the scene. Upon the scaffold, half crazy with fear, stood the wretched Lady Rochford, the ministress of the Queen's amours, who was to share her fate. Katharine spoke shortly. She died, she said, in full confidence in G.o.d's goodness. She had grievously sinned and deserved death, though she had not wronged the King in the particular way that she had been accused of. If she had married the man she loved, instead of being dazzled by ambition, all would have been well; and when the headsman knelt to ask her forgiveness, she pardoned him, but exclaimed, "I die a Queen, but I would rather have died the wife of Culpeper;" and then, kneeling in prayer, her head was struck off whilst she was unaware.[229]

Lady Rochford followed her to the block as soon as the head and trunk of the Queen had been piteously gathered up in black cloth by the ladies who attended her at last, and conveyed to the adjoining chapel for sepulture close to the grave of Anne Boleyn.

Katharine Howard had erred much for love, and had erred more for ambition, but taking a human view of the whole circ.u.mstances of her life, and of the personality of the man she married, she is surely more worthy of pity than condemnation. Only a few days after her death we learn from Chapuys (25th February) that "the King has been in better spirits since the execution, and during the last three days before Lent there has been much feasting.

Sunday was devoted to the lords of his Council and courtiers, Monday to the men of the law, Tuesday to the ladies, who all slept at the Court. The King himself did nothing but go from room to room ordering and arranging the lodgings to be prepared for these ladies, and he made them great and hearty cheer, without showing special affection for any particular one.

Indeed, unless Parliament prays him to take another wife, he will not be in a hurry to do so, I think. Besides, there are few, if any, ladies now at Court who would aspire to such an honour; for by a new Act just pa.s.sed, any lady that the King may marry, if she be a subject, is bound, on pain of death, to declare any charge of misconduct that can be brought against her; and all who know or suspect anything against her must declare it within twenty days, on pain of perpetual imprisonment and confiscation."

Henry, with five unsuccessful matrimonial adventures to his account, might well pause before taking another plunge; though, from the extract printed above, it was evident that he had no desire to put himself out of the way of temptation. The only course upon which he seemed quite determined was to resist all the blandishments of the Protestants, the German Lutherans, and the French to take back Anne of Cleves, who, we are told, had waxed half as beautiful again as she was since she had begun her jolly life of liberty and beneficence, away from so difficult a husband as Henry.

CHAPTER IX

1542-1547

KATHARINE PARR--THE PROTESTANTS WIN THE LAST TRICK

The disappearance of Katharine Howard and the temporary eclipse of Norfolk caused no check to the progress of the Catholic cause in England. When Gardiner was with the Emperor in the summer of 1541 he had been able to make in Henry's name an agreement by which neither monarch should treat anything to the other's disadvantage for the next ten months; and as war loomed nearer between Charles and Francis, the chances of a more durable and binding treaty being made between the former and Henry improved. When Gardiner had hinted at it in Germany, both Charles and Granvelle had suggested that the submission of Henry to the Pope would be a necessary preliminary. But the Emperor's brother, Ferdinand, was in close grips with the Turk in Hungary, and getting the worst of it; Francis was again in negotiation with the infidel, and French intrigue in Italy was busy. Henry therefore found that the Emperor's tone softened considerably on the report of Chapuys' conversation at Windsor in February, whilst the English terms became stiffer, as Francis endeavoured to turn his feigned negotiations with Henry into real ones. The whole policy of Henry at the period was really to effect an armed league with the Emperor, by means of which France might be humiliated, perhaps dismembered, whilst Henry was welcomed back with open arms by the great Catholic power, in spite of his contumacy, and the hegemony of England established over Scotland. In order the better to incline Charles to essential concessions, it was good policy for Henry to give several more turns of the screw upon his own subjects, to prove to his future ally how devout a Catholic he was, and how entirely Cromwell's later action was being reversed.

The great Bibles were withdrawn from the churches, the dissemination of the Scriptures restricted, and the Six Articles were enforced more severely than ever;[230] but yet when, after some months of fencing and waiting, Chapuys came to somewhat closer quarters with the English Council, he still talked, though with bated breath now, about Henry's submission to the Pope and the legitimation of the Princess Mary. But the Emperor's growing need for support gradually broke down the wall of reserve that Henry's defection from Rome had raised, and Gardiner and Chapuys, during the spring of 1542, were in almost daily confabulation in a quiet house in the fields at Stepney.[231] In June the imperial amba.s.sador made a hasty visit to Flanders to submit the English terms for an alliance to the Queen Regent. Henry's conditions in appearance were hard, for by going to war with France he would, he said, lose the great yearly tribute he received from that country; but Charles and his sister knew how to manage him, and were not troubled with scruples as to keeping promises. So, to begin with, the commercial question that had so long been rankling, was now rapidly settled, and the relations daily grew more cordial. Henry had agents in Germany and Flanders ordering munitions of war and making secret compacts with mercenary captains; he was actively reinforcing his own garrisons and castles, organising a fine fleet, collecting vast fresh sums of money from his groaning subjects, and in every way preparing himself to be an ally worth purchase by the Emperor at a high price.

In July 1542 the French simultaneously attacked the imperial territory in four distinct directions; and Henry summoned the amba.s.sadors of Charles and Francis to Windsor to tell them that, as war was so near him, he must raise men for his defence, especially towards Scotland, but meant no menace to either of the Continental powers. Chapuys had already been a.s.sured that the comedy was only to blind the French, and cheerfully acquiesced, but the Frenchmen took a more gloomy view and knew it meant war. With Scotland and Henry it was a case of the lamb and the wolf. Henry knew that he dared not send his army across the Channel to attack France without first crushing his northern neighbour. The pretended negotiations with, and allegations against, the unfortunate Stuart were never sincere.

James was surrounded by traitors: for English money and religious rancour had profoundly divided the Scottish gentry; Cardinal Beaton, the Scots King's princ.i.p.al minister, was hated; the powerful Douglas family were disaffected and in English pay; and the forces with which James V. rashly attempted to raid the English marches in reprisal for Henry's unprovoked attacks upon him were wild and undisciplined. The battle of Solway Moss (November 1542) was a disgraceful rout for the Scots, and James, heart-broken, fled from the ruin of his cause to Tantallon and Edinburgh, and thence to Falkland to die. Then, with Scotland rent in twain, with a new-born baby for a Queen, and a foreign woman as regent, Henry could face a war with France by the side of the Emperor, with a.s.surance of safety on his northern border, especially if he could force upon the rulers of Scotland a marriage between his only son and the infant Mary Stuart, as he intended to do.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _KATHARINE PARR_

_From a painting in the collection of the_ EARL OF ASHBURNHAM]

There was infinite haggling with Chapuys with regard to the style to be given to Henry in the secret treaty, even after the heads of the treaty itself had been agreed upon. He must be called sovereign head of the English Church, said Gardiner, or there would be no alliance with the Emperor at all, and the difficulty was only overcome by varying the style in the two copies of the doc.u.ment, that signed by Chapuys bearing the style of; "King of England, France, and Ireland, etc.," and that signed by the English ministers adding the King's ecclesiastical claims. If the territories of either monarch were invaded the other was bound to come to his aid. The French King was to be summoned to forbear intelligence with the Turk, to satisfy the demands of the Emperor and the King of England in the many old claims they had against him, and no peace was to be made with France by either ally, unless the other's claims were satisfied. The claims of Henry included the town and county of Boulogne, with Montreuil and Therouenne, his arrears of pension, and a.s.surance of future payment: and the two allies agreed within two years to invade France together, each with 20,000 foot and 5000 horse.[232] This secret compact was signed on the 11th February 1543; and the diplomatic relations with France were at once broken off. At last the repudiation of Katharine of Aragon was condoned, and Henry was once more the Emperor's "good brother";--a fit ally for the Catholic king, the champion of orthodox Christianity. As if to put the finishing touch upon Henry's victory, Charles held an interview with the Pope in June 1543 on his way through Italy, and succeeded in persuading him that the inclusion of the King who defied the Church in the league of militant Catholics was a fit complement to the alliance of France and enemies of all Christianity; and would secure the triumph of the Papacy and the return of England into the fold.

Whilst the preparations for war thus went busily forward on all sides, with Chantonnay in England and Thomas Seymour in Germany and Flanders arranging military details of arms, levies, and stores, and the Emperor already clamouring constantly for prompt English subsidies and contingents against his enemies, Henry, full of importance and self-satisfaction at his position, contracted the only one of his marriages which was not promoted by a political intrigue, although at the time it was effected it was doubtless looked upon as favouring the Catholic party. Certainly no lady of the Court enjoyed a more blameless reputation than Katharine Lady Latimer, upon whom the King now cast his eyes. A daughter of the great and wealthy house of Parr of Kendal, allied to the royal blood in no very distant degree, and related to most of the higher n.o.bility of England, she was, so far as descent was concerned, quite as worthy to be the wife of a king as the unfortunate daughters of the house of Howard. Her brother, Lord Parr, soon to be created Earl of Ess.e.x and Marquis of Northampton, a favourite courtier of the King and a very splendid magnate,[233] had been one of the chief enemies of Cromwell; who had in his last days usurped the ancient earldom which Parr had claimed in right of his Bourchier wife, whilst Katharine's second husband, Neville Lord Latimer, had been so strong a Catholic as to have risked his great possessions, as well as his head, by joining the rising in the North that had a.s.sumed the name of the Pilgrimage of Grace and had been mainly directed against Cromwell's measures. She was, moreover, closely related to the Throckmortons, the stoutly Catholic family whose chief, Sir George, Cromwell had despoiled and imprisoned until the intrigue already related drove the minister from power in June 1540, with the mysterious support, so it is a.s.serted, of Katharine Lady Latimer herself, though the evidence of it is not very convincing.[234]

Katharine had been brought up mostly in the north country with extreme care and wisdom by a hard-headed mother, and had been married almost as a child to an elderly widower, Lord Borough, who had died soon afterwards, leaving her a large jointure. Her second husband, Lord Latimer, had also been many years older than herself; and accompanying him, as she did, in his periodical visits to London, where they had a house in the precincts of the Charterhouse, she had for several years been remarkable in Henry's Court, not only for her wide culture and love of learning, but also for her friendship with the Princess Mary, whose tastes were exactly similar to her own. Lord Latimer died in London at the beginning of 1543, leaving to Katharine considerable property; and certainly not many weeks can have pa.s.sed before the King began to pay his court to the wealthy and dignified widow of thirty-two. His attentions were probably not very welcome to her, for he was a terribly dangerous husband, and any unrevealed peccadillo in the previous life of a woman he married might mean the loss of her head.