Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 2.djvu/364

350 strictly Popish; and her Council and clergy, anxious to testify their loyalty, began to show an intolerant spirit which soon became contagious. One of her chaplains, of the name of Walker, approaching, in the Tower chapel, with the censer to the queen, Dr. Weston thrust him away, saying, "Shamest thou not to do this office, being a priest having a wife? I tell thee the queen will not be censed by such as thou."

A second proclamation was soon issued, giving note of a projected change, announcing that religion was to be settled by "common consent"—that was, by Act of Parliament. The people of Ipswich, finding the Papist party beginning to obstruct and harass them in their practice of the reformed faith, presented a petition to the queen by a Mr. Dobbs, claiming her protection on the faith of her proclamation. But the Council set the messenger in the stocks for his trouble. Before the queen arrived in London, the officious Council had committed to the Fleet Judge Hales, one of the most upright and undaunted men of the age. He had from the first positively refused to have any hand in disinheriting Mary. He had courageously told Northumberland that what he was attempting was contrary to the law, and had from the bench charged the people of Kent to keep the law as it was in King Edward's time. The unhappy judge was so affected in his mind by this treatment, that he attempted his life in the prison. Mary, on coming to London, had him liberated, sent for him, and spoke consolingly to him, but his brain never recovered the shock, and he soon effected his own destruction.

Mr. Edward Underhill, a Worcestershire gentleman, a most ardent Protestant, and thence called the "hot gospeller," but at the same time a most devoted and fearless partisan of the queen's, had also been expelled from the band of gentlemen pensioners, and thrown into Newgate, for writing a satirical ballad against Papists. Very soon after the queen's arrival, she liberated him too, and restored him to his place as a gentleman pensioner, ordering him to receive his salary for the whole time that he had been in prison. Whenever any one at this time was able to get to her presence, or to have their case mentioned by a friend, he was pretty sure of redress. But those who were too distant, or had no influential acquaintance, suffered sharply from the zeal of the Council.

With such men as Gardiner, Bonner, Heath, Day, and Vesey in the Council, we cannot wonder that even after the queen's arrival the Protestants were promptly coerced. These men sat as a junta in that secret court of the Star Chamber in Westminster Palace, which through the reigns of Henry VII. and Henry VIII. had done the godless and unconstitutional work of these sovereigns; and this English Inquisition was yet destined to do many a bloody deed, and cause many a groan from the hearts of the innocent and the good to rise to heaven in unforgotten appeal.

In another respect the new queen displayed her sound sense, and her desire for the good of her people. The depreciation of the currency by Henry VIII. had introduced much disorder and distress. She now commanded the coinage to be restored to its true value, and introduced it in a fresh issue of sovereigns, half-sovereigns, angels, and half-angels in gold, and of groats, half-groats, and pennies in silver, all of the standard purity, charging the Government and not the people with the loss. She also remitted the subsidy of four shillings in the pound on land, and two and eightpence on goods which was granted before the king's death. She made Gardiner chancellor, gave Tunstall and Lord Paget principal appointments in the ministry, and introduced a more cheerful spirit and a more gay style of dress amongst the ladies of her Court.

But it was Mary's misfortune that she had been educated to place so much reliance on the wisdom and friendship of her great relative, the Emperor Charles V. He had been her champion as he had been that of her mother. When pressed on the subject of her religion during the last reign, he had menaced the country with war if the freedom of her conscience was violated. It was natural, therefore, that she should now look to him for counsel, seeing that almost all those whom she was obliged to employ or to have around her had been her enemies during her brother's reign. Charles communicated his opinions through Simon de Renard, his ambassador, who was to be the medium of their correspondence, and to advise her in matters not of sufficient importance to require the emperor's judgment, or not allowing of sufficient time to obtain it. Renard was ordered to act warily, and to show himself little at Court, so as to avoid suspicion.

Charles advised her to make examples of the chief conspirators, and to punish the subordinates more mildly, so as to obtain a character of moderation. He insisted upon it as necessary, however, that Lady Jane Grey should be included in the list for capital punishment, and to this Mary would by no means consent. She replied that "she could not find in her heart or conscience to put her unfortunate kinswoman to death, who had not been an accomplice of Northumberland, but merely an unresisting instrument in his hands. "If there were any crime in being his daughter-in-law, even of that her cousin Jane was not guilty, for she had been legally contracted to another, and, therefore, her marriage with Lord Guildford Dudley was not valid. As to the danger existing from her pretensions, it was but imaginary, and every requisite precaution should be taken before she was set at liberty."

Mary's selection of prisoners was remarkably small considering the number in her hands, and the character of their offence against her. She contented herself with putting only seven of them on their trial—namely, Northumberland, his son the Earl of Warwick, the Marquis of Northampton, Sir John Gates, Sir Henry Gates, Sir Andrew Dudley, and Sir Thomas Palmer—his chief councillors and his associates. Northumberland submitted to the Court whether a man could be guilty of treason who acted on the authority of Council, and under warrant of the great seal; or could they, who had been his chief advisers and accomplices during the whole time, sit as his judges? The Duke of Norfolk, who presided at the trial as High Steward, replied that the Council and great seal which he spoke of were those of a usurper, and, therefore, so far from availing him, only aggravated the offence, and that the lords in question could sit as his judges, because they were under no attainder.