Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 3.djvu/490

470 or ought to be discoverable. The coarse hypothesis which has been generally offered of brutality and profligacy on the part of the King, if it could be maintained, would be but an imperfect interpretation; but, in fact, when we examine such details as remain to us of Henry's relations with women, we discover but few traces of the second of the supposed causes, and none whatever of the first. A single intrigue in his early years, with unsubstantiated rumours of another, only heard of when there was an interest in spreading them, forms the whole case against him in the way of moral irregularity. For the three years that he was unmarried after the death of his third wife, we hear of no mistresses and no intrigues. For six months he shared the bed of Anne of Cleves, and she remained a maiden; nor had he transferred his affections to any rival lady. The anxiety of his subjects, so far from being excited by his disposition to licentiousness, was rather lest his marriages should be uniformly unfruitful. The vigour of his youth was gone. His system was infirm and languid; and whenever his wedded condition was alluded to by himself, by the privy council, or by Parliament, it was spoken of rather as a matter politically of importance to the realm than of interest individually to the King himself. Again, his manner to his wives seems to have been no less kind than that of ordinary men. A few stern words to Anne Boleyn form the only approach to personal harshness recorded against him; and his behaviour, when he first heard of the misconduct of Catherine Howard, was manly, honourable, and generous.