gained no support for his master, and attributed his failure to his late arrival on the field. He suffered a severe attack of fever in Germany, which recurred in November, a few months after his return. His sovereign and Wolsey were satisfied with his exertions, and the deanery of St. Paul's was one of many rewards conferred upon him (25 Oct. 1519). He was prebendary of Bugthorpe, York, 1514; archdeacon of Dorset, 20 May 1514; treasurer of Lichfield 1516, resigned 1522. He was also made archdeacon of Colchester on 16 Feb. 1518–19, resigned in October of the same year; prebendary of Exeter on 21 March 1519; vicar of St. Dunstan's, Stepney, on 12 May 1519, resigned in 1527; prebendary of Finsbury, London, on 22 Oct. 1519; vicar of Llangwrig, Montgomery (this Pace?) 1520; prebendary of Combe, Salisbury, on 16 Dec. 1521; rector of Bangor, Flintshire (this Pace?) 1522 to 1527; dean of Exeter, 1522, resigned 1527. It is doubtful whether he was also rector of Barwick in Elmet, near Leeds, a benefice which was resined by a Richard Pace in 1519 (see Cox, History of Heath School, 1879, p. 1). He was undoubtedly dean of Salisbury for some years (Cal. of Letters and Papers, Henry VIII, vol. iv. pt. iii. p. 2699, and v. No. 364, under 1529 and 1531 respectively).
In April 1520 he was made reader in Greek at Cambridge, with a yearly stipend of 10l. (Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, iii. 1540). There seems no evidence of his having discharged this office; Richard Croke was the actual lecturer during that year. There is little doubt, however, that it was largely owing to the representations made to the king by Pace and More that Greek chairs were now founded both at Cambridge and Oxford. Erasmus has preserved for us a lively scene in which one of the Oxford ‘Trojans,’ who resented the introduction of the new learning into the university, was playfully confuted in argument in Henry's presence by those two congenial spirits (Ascham, Scholemaster, ed. Mayor, p. 245).
But events more exciting than academic lectures soon occupied Pace. In June 1520 he was in attendance on his sovereign at the Field of the Cloth of Gold, and when all the jousts and feasting were over, he again preached there on the blessings of peace. The strain of incessant work and excitement told upon him, and he wrote to Wolsey that he was ill both in mind and body. In the following year Pace translated into Latin Fisher's sermon preached in support of the papal bull against Luther, which was promulgated in London on 12 May 1521.
On 2 Dec. 1521 Leo X died. Wolsey aimed at the papal throne, and the king entered cordially into the plans for his minister's advancement. Accordingly Pace was at once despatched to further Wolsey's interest with the powerful republic of Venice. Henry said that he was ‘sending his very heart.’ Pace was a favourite with the Venetian cabinet. Their ambassador in London, Giustinian, mentions that he ‘had already received [probably on his return from Switzerland, some five years before] greater honours’ from the republic ‘than became his private capacity; that he had been admitted into the bucintor on Ascension Day’ (RAWDON BROWN, ii. 142). But, with all his adroitness, Pace could not effect the object of his mission. On 9 Jan. 1522 Cardinal Tortosa was elected as Adrian VI. Pace continued some time in Rome, but in the intervals of business sought rest, as he had done before, at Constance, by translating into Latin some short treatises of Plutarch. The book was printed at Venice in January 1522 (i.e. 1522–3), and a second and corrected edition appeared in the same year. In the preface to the later edition, dedicated to Campeggio, he speaks of the pestilence at Rome, and of his own infirm health.
Pace remained in Italy for more than a year. On the death of Adrian VI, on 14 Sept. 1523, he was at Venice, but was ordered to Rome to support once more Wolsey's candidature for the papacy; but Clement VII was elected, and Pace went home. He was welcomed by an ode from his friend Leland. Pace had soon fresh employment abroad. He had been commissioned to detach the republic of Venice from the side of France, in the conflict in which it was expected Francis I would soon be engaged with his powerful vassal, Charles, constable of Bourbon. Pace's conduct in these transactions shows to less advantage than before. Vanity and presumption betray themselves. Wolsey was believed to be jealous of his influence with the king, and to be keeping him away from court. It is possible that he was conscious of Wolsey's secret dislike. More probably his health was failing, and his mind was sharing the weakness of the body. In October 1525 the doge himself urged Pace's recall, on the ground of his ill-health (Rymer, xiv. 96).
No permanent improvement followed his return to England. On 21 Aug. 1526 coadjutors were appointed for him in his deaneries, and his mental malady increased. In 1527 he removed from the deanery of St. Paul's to Sion, near Twickenham; and letters written by him from that retreat to a foster-brother, John Pace, refute any notion of ill-usage at
