Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/286

266 constant in its alliances, if it looked for help in services of danger. The refusal filled the cup of the Papal displeasure; the panic revived at Trent with augmented force, as the frightened ecclesiastics saw themselves with open enemies and ambiguous friends in so dangerous a position; and at last, in an ecstasy of terror, they rose with scream and cry into the air, like Homer's birds from the banks of the Cayster, and alighted only within the safe precincts of Bologna. The Emperor was furious; the œcumenical council of Christendom was thus converted into a private Pope's council, to which it was idle to hope that the Germans would submit. He sent imperative orders to the Spanish bishops to remain at their posts; but over the rest his anger was powerless; they were gone, and refused to return.

So long as this state of affairs continued, England had nothing to fear from Charles. It seemed, however, not impossible that England might be forced itself to take the initiative in a quarrel. The personal dislike of the Elector of Saxe for Henry VIII. had been the real ground for the rejection of the alliance when it was offered. No sooner was the King gone than John Frederick became as eager as he had been before unwilling. He sent commissioners to England to beg for assistance, and a State paper of Sir William Paget's remains to show that the acutest of English statesmen hesitated as to the course which it would be prudent to pursue.

The French, Paget said, were sore at the loss of Boulogne, which they were bent on recovering. The