Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 2.djvu/307

A.D. 1546.] and Lady Tyrwhitt. The king, who liked to keep his thunder to himself till it burst confoundingly on its object, had given the queen's enemies no intimation of his change of sentiment. Wriothesley appeared with forty guards, and approached. Then Henry, turning on him with a tempest of indignation, saluted his astonished ears with "beast! fool! knave!" and bade him avaunt from his presence. Catherine, seeing the chancellor amazed at this fierce reception, interceded for him, saying, "She would become a humble suitor for him, as she deemed his fault was occasioned by mistake." "Ah, poor soul!" said the king; "thou little knowest, Kate, how ill he deserveth this grace at thy hands. On my word, sweetheart, he hath been to thee a very knave."

This was one of the last scenes in which Henry VIII. displayed some redeeming touch of kindness and justice. He never forgave Gardiner for this attempt to deprive him of his true wife and unrivalled nurse. Catherine is said to have treated these her deadly enemies with great magnanimity; but she seems to have become quite aware that Gardiner's was the daring hand that was lifted to ruin her with the king, and it was probably this clear understanding betwixt the king and queen which destroyed Gardiner's influence with Henry for ever. It has been well observed that Gardiner's treason to Catherine was as complete a political blunder as it was a crime. Yet he was rather punished for speaking what he only thought and designed in common with his colleagues, than for being more malignant to the queen than they. He fell through being more officious; they escaped through their more cunning silence only. Henry struck Gardiner's name out of the list of his council, and on perceiving him one day on the terrace at Windsor, amongst the other courtiers, he turned fiercely on Wriothesley, and said, "Did I not command you that he should come no more amongst you?" "My Lord of Winchester," replied the chancellor, "has come to wait upon your highness with the offer of a benevolence from his clergy." That was a deeply politic stroke of Gardiner's; he knew that if anything could redeem the lost favour of Henry, it was a sacrifice to his avarice next to his vanity. Henry took the money, but turned away from the bishop without a word or a look, and immediately struck his name from amongst his executors, as well as that of Thirlby, Bishop of Westminster, who, he said, was schooled by Gardiner.

A deadly feud had grown up betwixt the house of Seymour and the house of Howard. The house of Howard was old, and proud, not only of its ancient lineage, but of its grand deeds. The glory of Flodden lay like a great splendour on their name. Two queens had been selected from this house during the present reign, and the Princess Elizabeth was a partaker of its blood. The Seymours, on the other hand, were of no great lineage; but the two heads of it, Sir Thomas Seymour, and Edward, who had been created Earl of Hertford, and whom we have seen executing the king's sanguinary pleasure more than once in Scotland—were the uncles to the heir apparent, Prince Edward. They had been lifted into greatness entirely through the marriage of their sister with Henry and the birth of the prince; they had no natural connection, therefore, amongst the old nobility, and were regarded by them with jealousy as fortunate upstarts. But there was a cause which gave them power besides the alliance with the crown and the heir to it, and this was the Protestant faith which they hold, and which, therefore, bound the Protestant party in England to their cause, and in hope, through their nephew, the future king. The Howards, on the other hand, held by the ancient faith, and were amongst its most positive assertors. Thus the feud betwixt these rival houses was not only the feud of the old and now aristocracy, but that of the old and new faith; and the rival factions looked up to them as their natural lords and leaders.

If we analyse the characters of the men themselves, we shall not find in them anything particularly noble or elevated, if we except the gifted and chivalric son of Norfolk—the poetical Earl of Surrey. The Norfolk family was singularly destitute of unity in itself—of warm natural affection. We have seen the old duke, with the utmost willingness, nay, even eagerness, and a cruel asperity, lending himself to the destruction of his nieces—Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard. We shall now find both himself and other branches of his family testifying the same repulsive readiness to abandon or actively sacrifice their nearest blood relations. As for the Seymours, they were the most obsequious tools of Henry's domineering tyranny—greedy of power and wealth, for which they were ever ready to sacrifice others, and though holding the reformed opinions, carefully hiding them from the knowledge of the king.

The contest which was now going on betwixt these two houses was for the ascendency in the approaching reign. The king's health, though he was resolved not to perceive it, and was ready to slay any one who should whisper such a thing, was evidently failing. Not only was he grown so unwieldy and diseased, as we have described, but his strength was waning. Even the signing of the necessary documents was become too fatiguing for him, and he had now a stamp cut for the affixing his signature. But this duty even of stamping was too much for him, and three commissioners were appointed, two of whom stamped the paper with a dry stamp bearing the letters of his name, and the third drew a pen filled with ink over the blank impression.

The question, therefore, which of these families should become the guardians and ministers of the new king was every day acquiring a more intense interest. The Howards, from their old standing and their great employments under the Crown, naturally regarded themselves as entitled to that distinction, and in this view they were, of course, supported by the whole Papist party most anxiously. But the Seymours, as the uncles of the prince, were equally bent on securing the preference. They had little connection, as we have stated, amongst the aristocracy, but had the whole Protestant party in their interest. They therefore regarded the Howards with the deepest jealousy and alarm, and they lost no time or opportunity in securing their ruin during the present king's life. There were many things which they could so bring before Henry's mind, as to excite his most deadly fear and feelings. The Howards were the determined supporters of the Roman faith. What chance, therefore, under them, of the preservation of the supremacy? What chance that they would leave the