Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 3.djvu/62

42 had been no fulfilment; and supposing at length that the chances of success were too slight to justify the risk of his longer stay, Paul put an end to his anxieties by sending him a formal recall.

The disappointment was hard to bear. One only comfort remained to him. Henry had been evidently anxious that his book should not be made known to the world. He might revise, intensify, and then publish it and taste the pleasure of a safe revenge.

But I have now to mention a minor drama of treachery winding into the interstices of the larger. When Pole first awoke serious suspicion by being raised to the Cardinalate, Michael, younger brother of Sir George Throgmorton, volunteered to Cromwell to go to Rome, make his way into Pole's service, and become a spy upon his actions. His offer was accepted. He went, and became Pole's secretary; but, instead of betraying his master, he betrayed his employers; and to him the 'Liber de Unitate Ecclesiæ' was in all probability indebted for the fresh instalment of scandals which were poured into it before publication, and which have furnished material for the Catholic biographers of Henry the Eighth. Throgmorton's ingenious duplicity enabled him to blind the English Government through the spring and summer. He supplied them with reports in a high degree laudatory of the cardinal, affirming entire confidence in the innocency of the legatine mission; and if they were not misled as to Pole's purposes, they believed in the fidelity of the spy. It was not till the day before