Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 5.djvu/376

356 The Queen's blood is up at last, Renard wrote exultingly to the Emperor on the 8th of February; 'the Duke of Suffolk, Lord Thomas Grey, and Sir James Crofts have written to ask for mercy, but they will find none; their heads will fall, and so will Courtenay's and Elizabeth's. I have told the Queen that she must be especially prompt with these two. We have nothing now to hope for except that France will break the peace, and then all will be well.' On the 12th of February the ambassador was still better satisfied. Elizabeth had been sent for, and was on her way to London. A rupture with France seemed inevitable, and as to clemency, there was no danger of it. 'The Queen,' he said, 'had told him that Anne of Cleves was implicated;' but for himself he was sure that the two centres of all past and all possible conspiracies were Elizabeth and Courtenay, and that when their heads, and the heads of the Greys, were once off their shoulders, she would have nothing more to fear. The prisoners were heretics to a man; she had a fair plea to despatch them, and she would then settle the country as she pleased; 'The house of Suffolk would soon be extinct.'

The house of Suffolk would be extinct: that too, or almost that, had been decided on. Jane Grey was guiltless of this last commotion; her name had not been so much as mentioned among the insurgents; but she was guilty of having been once called Queen, and Mary,