The Greatest Works of Charles Carleton Coffin. Charles Carleton Coffin
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soon as Louis died, married Charles Brandon.
Mary and Charles have a granddaughter — Jane Grey — a lovely girl, seventeen years old, and just married. Edward wished the crown to go to her, and the day after Edward died, the council proclaimed Jane Grey queen. She was in the country, and when word came to her that Edward was dead, and that she was to be queen, she burst into tears. She did not desire to wear the crown, and to be burdened with all the cares and responsibilities of State.
Not so with Mary. She wished to be queen. She sent word to the council that the crown belonged to her. There was a great party that wished her to be queen, and she was proclaimed in August Her party has succeeded, and she wears the crown. There is eating and drinking and great rejoicing by all good Catholics, for Mary is a devoted friend of the Church. Some of her councillor are hard-hearted, revengeful men. They suffered under Henry, were obliged to keep quiet while Edward was king, but now they are in power, and will make their power felt.
The news of what is going on in England reaches Charles V., who is in the Netherlands. He has been negotiating a marriage for his son Philip with the daughter of the King of Portugal; but here is a chance to make a better bargain. He will bring about a match between Philip and the woman to whom he himself was once betrothed, and whom he agreed to many when she was twelve years of age, but saw fit to break the agreement Mary is thirty-seven, and Philip twenty-seven.
Charles sends Count Egmont to England to make a proposal. Mary accepts the offer, but many of the English people do not like the match. "No foreigner for us!" they shout, and Sir Thomas Wyatt heads a party and raises an insurrection j but Mary's troops soon suppress it, and Wyatt and many of the men who joined him are executed. Jane Grey's husband is one. Jane looks out of her prison in the Tower, and sees his headless body in a cart. The executioner then comes for her. She walks to the scaffold with a firm step, and ascends the stairs as lightly as if going to her chamber to a night's repose. there are no tears on her cheek, nor is there any trembling of her eyelids. She reads a prayer, and then ties a handkerchief over her eyes.
"What shall I do?" she asks of the executioner.
"Kneel by the block."
"Where is it?"
She feels for it, lays her head upon it, to receive the fatal stroke.
"Lord, into thy hands I commit my spirit."
The axe falls, and the head of the brave girl drops from the body.
What has she done to merit such a fate? Nothing. A great political party has used her to advance its own interests; that is all. Perhaps Mary breathes easier when she hears that her cousin is dead, and perhaps not, for on this same " Black Monday," as people call it, from eighty to one hundred men are hanged — some in St. Paul's church-yard, some on London Bridge, some at Charing Cross, others at Westminster. The next week she hangs forty-eight more; and a few days later, twenty-two common men, besides several officers.
Now comes the arrest of her sister Elizabeth, who is in the country, sick. She is brought to London, and taken to the Tower in a boat, entering it through the dark and gloomy Traitor's Gate. Mary is determined that Elizabeth's head shall roll upon the pavement in the Tower yard; but Archbishop Gardiner and Bishop Bonner, and other men among Mary's councillors, much as they wish it, see that it will not to do to cut off the head of one on whom the people have already set their affections, and who has had nothing whatever to do with the insurrection.
On the 20th of July, 1554, a fleet of Spanish ships — one hundred and fifty or more — sails into the harbor of Southampton. Philip of Spain has come to be married, with a great train of Spanish noblemen, and six thousand troops. The English noblemen meet him at Southampton. Philip is accompanied by a gray-bearded man, sixty years of age, who has done a deal of fighting for Charles V. — the Duke of Alva, who has a hard countenance and a harder heart His eyes have a cruel look. We shall see him again.
Mary is at Winchester impatiently waiting for Philip. He sets out on Monday morning, in a driving rain-storm, on horseback, and splashes through the mud, reaching Winchester at sunset. He goes at once to the cathedral, and listens to a Te Deum. In the evening he goes to the bishop's palace, where Mary, with a company of ladies, is waiting. She never has seen her future husband. He enters the hall, and she beholds a small man with spindle-legs, small body, a broad forehead, blue eyes, large mouth, heavy underlip, and protruding jaw. Ho has a deep sepulchral voice; but Mary could sing the bass quit« as well as he, for she has a tremendous voice. He is proud and haughty, and cares nothing for men except to see them; but on this occasion he kisses his wife that is to be, and not only her, but all her ladies. He has already been once married — in 1544, to Maria of Portugal, when he was only sixteen. The next year a son was born to him. One day, soon after the birth of the babe, there was a grand spectacle in front of the royal palace at Valladolid — the burning of a lot of heretics by the men who ask questions — and Maria's nurses left her alone, that they might see the men and women roasted to death; and while they were gone Maria helped herself to so much watermelon that she sickened and died the next day.
The marriage between Mary and Philip is consummated, and the wedded pair enter London beneath triumphal arches and amidst the blazing of bonfires, the roaring of cannon, and ringing of bells.
Mary is firmly seated on her throne. She is married to the son of the mightiest monarch in the world. She has put out of the way her political enemies; and now she will begin with heretics. Her father Henry, through his guilty passion for Anne Boleyn, severed England from the Church ; she will bring it back again. Men shall no longer think for themselves, but shall be in subjection to the Pope. There shall be no more reading of the Bible. The thousands of married ministers shall be turned out of their pulpits. Heresy shall be crushed out In 1547, all acts punishing heretics were repealed; but now Parliament restores them.
On St. Andrew's Day, June, 1554, a high mass is sung in Westminster Abbey. Philip, the Duke of Alva, and another great don from Spain (Ruy Gomez), with six hundred Spanish grandees, the Knights of the Garter, the English nobles, the archbishop and bishops whom Mary has appointed in place of those appointed by Henry and Edward, whom she has turned out, are there, dressed in gorgeous apparel. After mass, they hare dinner; and then there is another gathering in Westminster Hall. On a platform, in three golden chairs, are seated Mary, Philip, and Cardinal Pole, the Pope's ambassador. Above them is a canopy of gold. The bishop sits Dear by. The Hall is the place where the Commons meet, and the members are in their places.
Stephen Gardiner, Lord Chancellor, in his big wig, bows to Mar; and Philip, kneels, and presents a petition to the Pope's legate, requesting his forgiveness for all that has been done against his authority in the past, and praying that the nation may be taken back again into the bosom of the Church.
Cardinal Pole rises to reply for the Pope. Mary and Philip and all the rest fall on their knees, and receive the absolution which the Pope gives through the cardinal.
"Amen! Amen!"
The voices of the assembled multitude echo amidst the oaken rafters. The organ peals; the choir sing a Te Deum. Tears of joy roll down the cheeks of the queen. Her heart's desires are gratified. The nation is once more in the fold of the Church. She has been the one to lead it back. Some persons in the assembly, in their ecstasy and joy, throw themselves into the arms of their friends.
"We are reconciled to God. Blessed day for England," they say.
Cardinal Pole, sitting in his chamber at midnight, writes to the Pope: "What great things may the Church, our