It was not the part of a child, however great her imagined wrongs, deliberately to promote an insurrection against her father. Henry II.'s sons had done it, but times were changed. The Princess Mary was determined to justify such of Henry's Council as had recommended the harshest measures against her. She wrote a letter to Chapuys which, if intercepted, might have made it difficult for the King to save her.
"The condition of things," she said, "is worse than wretched. The realm will fall to ruin unless his Majesty, for the service of God, the welfare of Christendom, the honour of the King my father, and compassion for the afflicted souls in this country, will take pity on us and apply the remedy. This I hope and feel assured that he will do if he is rightly informed of what is taking place. In the midst of his occupations in Africa he will have been unable to realise our condition. The whole truth cannot be conveyed in letters. I would, therefore, have you despatch one of your own people to inform him of everything, and to supplicate him on the part of the Queen my mother, and myself for the honour of God and for other respects to attend to and provide for us. In so acting he will accomplish a service most agreeable to Almighty God. Nor will he win less fame and glory to himself than he has achieved in the conquest of Tunis or in all his African expedition."[1]
Catherine simultaneously addressed herself to the
- ↑ "Et luy supplier de la part de la Reyne, ma mère, et myenne en l'honneur de Dieu et pour aultres respects que dessus vouloit entendre et pourvoyr aux affaires dyey. En quoy fera tres agréable service a Dieu, et n'en acquerra moins de gloire qu'en la conqueste de Tunis et de toute l'affaire d'Afrique." De la Princesse de l'Angleterre à l'Ambassadeur, October, 1535.—MS. Vienna; Spanish Calendar, vol, v. p. 559.
