that all could not be punished, and to make exceptions would be unjust and invidious. The Emperor recommended a general pardon, from which the principal offenders only should be excluded, and Mary herself was as little inclined to harshness. Her present desire was to forget all that had passed, and take possession of her throne for the objects nearest to her heart. Her chief embarrassment for the moment was from the over-loyalty of her subjects. The old-fashioned lords and country gentlemen who had attended her with their retainers from Norfolk, remained encamped round Newhall, unable to persuade themselves that they could leave her with safety in the midst of the men who had been the ministers of the usurpation.[1]
Her closest confidence the Queen reserved for Renard. On the 28th of July she sent for him at midnight. August 2.On the 2nd of August he was again with her, and the chief subject of her thoughts was still the funeral. 'She could not have her brother committed to the ground like a dog,' she said. While her fortunes were uncertain, she had allowed Renard to promise for her that she would make no changes in religion, but 'she had now told the Lords distinctly that she would not recognize any of the laws which had been passed in the minority,[2] and she intended to act boldly; timidity
- ↑ Renard to Charles V.: Rolls House MSS.
- ↑ She, perhaps, imagined that she was not exceeding her statutable right in the refusal. The 17th of the 28th of Henry VIII. empowered any one of the heirs to the crown named in the King's will, on arriving at the age of twenty-four, to repeal laws passed not only in his or her own minority; but under circumstances such as those which had
