Page:Divorce of Catherine of Aragon.djvu/191

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Attitude of the Emperor.
173

really intolerable, and he drew a more moderate reply; but he still persisted that the Pope alone should hear the case, and decide it in the Queen's favour. "The affair," he said, "was of such a nature as to admit of no solution save the declaring that a marriage contracted with the authority and license of the Holy See was valid and indissoluble. As the patron and defender of the Apostolic See he was more in duty bound than any other Prince to remove and defend all small offences and disputes." In fact he still advanced a claim of sovereign jurisdiction which it was impossible for England to allow.[1]

Catherine was well aware that the Pope had been a party to the request for the removal of her cause, and bitterly she railed at him. Charles sent her a copy of his own answer. It reassured her, if she had doubted; she saw that, let Clement struggle how he would, she could be confident that her nephew would compel him to decide for her. The Pope, she announced, was responsible for all that had happened by refusing to do her justice. This last move showed that he was as little disposed to apply the remedy[2] as he had been. If the cause was removed from Rome, the judges, whoever they might be, would declare that black was white.[3]

Up to this time Catherine had continued at the Court with her own apartments, and with the Princess Mary as her companion. She had refused the only available means of a peaceful arrangement, and was standing out, avowedly resting on the Emperor's protection. She was not reticent. She spoke out

  1. The Emperor's Answer to the Legate, July 26, 1531.—Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. part 2, p. 218.
  2. Catherine's phrase for the excommunication of her husband.
  3. Queen Catherine to Charles V., July 28.—Spanish Calendar, vol. iv. part 2, p. 220.