Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 36.djvu/350

Mary I she was about to commit. The French and Venetian ambassadors, who had protested against the whole scheme, secretly fanned the opposition and encouraged the sentiment that Mary was placing England in subjection to Spain, and that if she persisted in the marriage she must be forced from the throne. The Duke of Suffolk agitated for the restoration of his daughter, Lady Jane Grey, who was still in prison ; Sir Peter Carew rose in arms in Devonshire to set Elizabeth and Courtenay on the throne; but neither of these outbreaks proved serious. Suffolk's rising was quickly suppressed by Lord Huntingdon in a skirmish near Coventry. On 10 Feb. he was brought to the Tower. On 1 Feb. Mary learned that Carew had fled to France. More formidable was the rising in Kent of Sir Thomas Wyatt, a young catholic twenty-three years old. France, it was rumoured, was supporting him, and facts soon proved that all classes m the south-eastern counties sympathised with him. On 26 Jan. troops were hastily despatched from London, under the Duke of Norfolk, who carried a proclamation promising pardon to all who straightway laid down their arms {Chron. p. 38), but the campaign opened badly for the queen. Wyatt marched from Rochester to Deptford with fifteen thousand men, sent demands for the surrender of the persons of the queen and council, and was soon on his way to Southwark. Consternation spread through London, but the crisis gave the queen an opportunity of displaying her personal courage. Just before Wyatt reached Southwark, she rode to the Guildhall (1 Feb.), and addressed the citizens in a speech of remarkable power. ' I am come,' she began, ' in mine own person to tell you what you already see and know. I mean the traitorous and seditious assembling of the Kentish rebels against us and you.' ' They pretend,' she continued, ' to object to the marriage with the Prince of Spain,' but she was their queen, bound in concord to her people. As for her intended marriage, unless parliament approved it, she would abstain from it.

Doubtful as to the possibility of entering the city by way of Southwark, Wyatt soon retraced his steps, and crossed the river at Kingston, determined to reach London by way of Hyde Park Corner. Whitehall was thus near his line of march, and Mary was entreated to remove to Windsor, but she declined to leave a post of danger. On 7 Feb. Wyatt arrived at St. James's, within a short distance of tlie palace. A slight attack was made by a detachment of his troops on the back of it, as the main army passed on its way to the city. The queen, who spent most of her time during the crisis in prayer, is said to have witnessed the rebels' progress from the Gatehouse. But in the city Wyatt and his forces were easily defeated, and he was taken prisoner. As soon as the rebellion was suppressed, Mary agreed to make an example of the ringleaders, although a general pardon was proclaimed in Kent. Sixty persons were publicly hanged in London (Tytler, ii. 309, 346 ; Chron. p. 59). Lady Jane Grey and her husband were executed under their old sentence on 12 Feb., the Duke of Suffolk on 23 Feb., and Sir Thomas Wyatt, who pleaded guilty, on 11 April. On 12 Feb. Courtenay was again sent to the Tower, on suspicion of complicity in Carew's rising. Renard declared that Elizabeth had encouraged Wyatt, and in his confession Wyatt directly implicated her. She was accordingly arrested and sent to the Tower on 18 March. Gardiner argued that Mary's security could only be purchased by the execution of Elizabeth, but Mary hesitated to proceed to extremities, and listened in much perplexity to hot debates on the subject in her divided council (cf. Tytler, ii 311, 365 sq., and esp. 422-8). In May Elizabeth was summoned to join Mary at Richmond, and was thence sent to Woodstock under the care of Sir Henry Bedingfield (19 May).

The rebellion spurred Mary into a more vigorous assertion of her religious policy. Protestantism she identified with lawlessness, and she declined to temporise with it further. All foreign congregations were ordered to quit the realm (ib. p. 312). Married clergy were to be expelled from their benefices or separated from their wives. On 21 March the council ordered country gentlemen to set up altars in their village churches within a fortnight on pain of a fine of 100l. (Acts P. C. 1552-4, p. 411, cf. p. 395). At the same time Mary was unwilling to take any action that should lack the appearance of legality, and a printed paper which suggested that she could restore the papal supremacy and the monasteries besides punishing her enemies by her own will was burnt by order of the council. In Rogation week she attended in state the churches of St. Giles's-in-the-Fields, St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, and Westminster Abbey, and was accompanied by four bishops wearing their mitres.

Peace being outwardly restored, the arrangements for the marriage continued. In March Egmont returned as proxy to espouse Mary, bearing a ring of betrothal from Philip and a ratification of the matrimonial treaty from his father. Meeting Egmont and the council in her private oratory, the queen declared that she had no strong desire to marry at all, nor had she chosen Philip on account