Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 4.djvu/401

1548.] it is uncertain how his suit might have eventually ended His object was to anticipate objections by the same expedient of a secret marriage, which had answered before, and Elizabeth's resolution might have possibly yielded before the persuasion of her friends, had not the many-sided schemes of the Admiral revealed themselves in time.

While intriguing with the household at Hatfield, he was preparing for the movement for which the next session of Parliament was to give the occasion. The failures in Scotland, and the religious discontent which was commencing, had already shaken the Protector's authority. Lord Seymour intended to take his brother's place. He had arranged with Sharington for money sufficient to keep ten thousand men in the field for a month. Dorset was devoted to him, and Catherine Parr's brother, Lord Northampton, was well inclined. He had fortified and provisioned Holt Castle. He had a cannon foundry in the country, and another at Southwark, where he had thirty workmen in constant employ, and twenty-four cannon, with thirteen tons of shot, ready prepared for immediate service.

Such was the aspect of England when the first