BOOK

II.

33

34

ments of the government were observed. Messengers were dispatched to their ambassadors at the French and imperial courts; 32 artillery was hastened to the coast, and a fleet was suddenly put into active preparation. It was not certain, amid the commotions which might arise on this daring revolution of the dynasty, how far either Charles V. or the king of France would act. The latter might attempt to seize Calais, while the military force of England was occupied in its interior; and the emperor, who was keeping up his secret intercourse with Mary," might invade to enthrone her. The chiefs of the city municipality were then privately summoned to the state council, and both the royal death and the intended succession were imparted to them, under an oath of secrecy, until further orders.36

During these schemes and precautions, the appointed queen was ignorant of her impending dignity, till, as the king became despaired of, the duchess of Northumberland told her, that if he died, she must go to the Tower, as he had made her the heiress of his kingdoms. This information disturbed her;

32 Lett. Noail. 22 June, p. 43.

33 Ib. 23 June, p. 45.

34 Lett. ib. 26 June, p. 47. The ambassador remarked to his sovereign, The duke [Northumberland,] who is close and guarded in all things, would not acknowlege these preparations. He would only admit that some ships were to go to Barbary and the Spice Islands: an actual dissimulation, sire! for above 20 ships are making ready, and they are arming all whom they can trust.' ib. 48.

35 On 23d June, Noailles wrote, that he had learnt from his ambassador, that the emperor was at that moment resolved to undertake earnestly la poursuite de la practique qui est ja encommencée avec Mad. Marie, that this succession might not escape him.' Lett. p. 45. 36 Stowe, 609. Heylin, p. 154. The lord mayor, six of the principal aldermen, and as many of the staple merchants, and of the Company of Merchant Adventurers, were the persons who attended on this

official call. ib.

upon

XI.

but not accrediting it, she chose to reside with her CHAP.
mother, to the displeasure of the more ambitious
lady. After a few days, she obtained leave to be
at her own more quiet home, at Chelsea, where an
indisposition detained her, till she was sent for by
the state council, to meet them at Sion House, and
receive the ordination of the departed king. One of
her sisters-in-law brought her the message, and carried
her to the ducal mansion." She found no one there
her arrival, but, after a short interval, five of
the chief lords entered, and formally acquainted her
with Edward's death. Two of them, the earls of Hun-
tingdon and Pembroke, addressed her with a courtesy
and reverence so unusual as to startle her. They
knelt on the ground, and called her their sovereign
lady, while she blushed, and trembled with confusion
at the unexpected homage. The noble ladies of
the united families then entered; and the duke of
Northumberland, as president of the council, after a
panegyric on Edward, described his disinheritance
of the princesses Mary and Elizabeth, and declared
her to be the person whom he had appointed to be
his successor, and her sisters in case she died without
issue. All the lords knelt down as he closed his
oration, assured her that she was the right and true
heir to the crown, and promised to shed their blood
and
expose their lives in her defence.38 She heard
and saw with a pain of mind which she could neither
suppress nor conceal; a stupefaction came over her;
she tottered, and fell to the ground-and only reco-
vered to burst into a flood of tears, with convulsive

37 Jane's letter to Mary, in Pollini, p. 356.
Lady Jane's letter, p. 356.

BOOK lamentation.39

II.

As the power of speech returned, she modestly declared her insufficiency for so grand a station. This was not listened to; nor did she doubt or deliberate farther; unfortunately, her judgment, if not dazzled by the splendid prize, was at least overborne by the presence and homage of the most powerful and distinguished men of the kingdom acknowleging her to be their queen. Pausing only to offer before them a prayer to her Maker for his assistance, she yielded to their wishes, and unresistingly took the sceptre which they placed within her hands.40 Such is her own account of this eventful moment, of their solicitation, and of her decision. She does not intimate that she refused the tempting diadem, or recollected the prior claims of the excluded princesses. Her unaffected diffidence doubted her own qualifications; but no moral perception of the injustice of accepting another's right, to the prejudice of the injured, appears to have impressed her. The crown was offered-she was urged-she was astonished-and she consented.

The next day, she was taken in great state down the Thames, with a splendid company of nobility, of both sexes, to the Tower. Her mother, as the lady of the highest rank there, held her train as she

41

39 As soon as I had, with infinite pain to my mind, understood these things, how much I remained beside myself, stunned and agitated, I leave to those lords to testify, who saw me fall to the ground, overwhelmed with sudden and unexpected dismay, and who knew how grievously I wept.' Lett. ib. 357.

40 I turned to God, and humbly petitioned and supplicated him, that if what had been given to me were rightly and lawfully mine, he would grant me so much grace and spirit that I might govern these kingdoms to his glory and service and advantage.' ib. p. 357.

41 6

Accompagnata da gran Baronia d' huomini et dame.' Lett. Princ. 133.

ap

entered it. Her husband stood by her side with his bonnet in his hand, while all the lords, as she peared, bent the knee of reverence on the ground."2 The lord high treasurer, unasked, produced the jewelled crown, and desired to place it on her head, to see how it fitted. She refused this distinction. He told her she might boldly take it, and that he would have another made, to crown her husband with her.43

It is remarkable that these words alarmed her. Mild and modest, and young, as she unquestionably was, the spirit of royalty and power had within twenty-four hours gained such an ascendancy in her studious mind, that she heard the intimation of her husband being elevated to the same dignity as herself, with vexation and displeasure." As soon as she was left alone with him, she remonstrated against this measure; and after much dispute, he agreed to wait till she herself should make him king, and by an act of parliament." But even this concession to take the dignity as a boon from her, did not satisfy the sudden expansion of her new-born ambition. She soon sent for the earls of Arundel and Pembroke, and informed them that she was willing to create her husband a duke, but would never consent to make him king. This declaration brought down his mother in great fury to her, with all the force of enraged language and imperious 42 Lett. Prin. 133. 43 Jane's letter, p. 357. "This is her own account: Which thing I certainly heard with a troubled mind, and with an adverse will; even with the infinite grief and displeasure of my heart.' Jane's lett. ib.

46

45 After the lord was gone, I reasoned much with my husband; and he consented, that as he ought to be king, he should be made so by me by an Act of Parliament.' Jane's lett. ib.

46 Jane, ib.

CHAP.

XI.

II.

BOOK disdain. The violent duchess scolded her young queen, and roused the mortified Dudley to forsake her chamber of repose, and to vow that he would accept no title but the regal honor." The timid Jane of the preceding day was now so completely transformed into the determined queen, that she sent the two nobles, whom she had already selected to be her trusted messengers, to him, to persuade him not to go to Sion House to imbibe the resentments of his parent, but to come back friendlily to her.48

A proclamation was immediately printed, and affixed in the most public places, to which she attached her name. 49 In this Edward's last appointment was recited, with his disqualification of Mary and Elizabeth, for their asserted illegitimacy, for their being only half-blood to Edward,50 and from the possibility of their marrying a foreigner. On these grounds she desired their obedience to her as 'their natural liege queen and lady,' and promised to shew herself a most gracious and benign sovereign to all.' The French ambassador directed

47 Jane's lett. p. 357.

48 Ib. "Otherwise I knew that the next morning he would have gone off to Sion.' Jane's lett. 357. She adds,' and thus I was in truth deluded by the duke and the council, and ill treated by my husband

and his mother.' ib.

49 It was printed by Grafton in 1553; and in French, by Vertot, among the Ambassades de Noailles, 2062, as this minister sent it immediately to his sovereign; and since by Mr. Nicolas, in his Memoir, p. 41-7.

50 This legal point would have been effectual, if it had concerned only Edward's freehold estate as a private individual, and if a previous settlement had not so entailed it on the princesses, that it did not descend, as his own heritable land, to his next legal heir; for in this case, his two half sisters, being by different mothers, would not have taken it as an inheritance from him as his heirs by the common law of the country.

She promised to the uttermost of our power we shall preserve and maintain God's most Holy Word, Christian polity, and the good laws, customs and liberties of these our realms and dominions." ib.