“If the emperor be willing, the King of England can then be informed; and he can be made to feel that, if he will avoid war, he must not refuse his consent.  The king, in fact, has no wish to disown the Princess, and he knows well that the marriage with the Dauphin was once agreed on.

“Should he be unwilling, and should his wife’s persuasions stil have influence with him, he will hesitate before he will defy, for her sake, the King of France and the emperor united.  His regard for the queen is less than it was, and diminishes every day.  He has a new fancy,[653] as you are aware.”

The actual conspiracy, in the form which it had so far assumed, was rather an appeal to fanaticism than a plot which could have laid hold of the deeper mind of the country; but as an indication of the unrest which was stealing over the minds of men, it assumed an importance which it would not have received from its intrinsic character.

The guilt of the principal offenders admitted of no doubt.  As soon as the commissioners were satisfied that there was nothing further to be discovered, the Nun, with the monks, was brought to trial before the Star Chamber; and conviction followed as a matter of course.[654]

The unhappy girl finding herself at this conclusion, after seven years of vanity, in which she had played with popes, and queens, and princesses, and archbishops, now, when the dream was thus rudely broken, in the revulsion of feeling could see nothing in herself but a convicted impostor.  We need not refuse to pity her.  The misfortunes of her sickness had exposed her to temptations far beyond the strength of an ordinary woman:  and the guilt which she passionately claimed for herself rested far more truly with the knavery of the Christ Church monks and the incredible folly of Archbishop Warham.[655] But the times were too stern to admit of nice distinctions.  No immediate sentence was pronounced, but it was thought desirable for the satisfaction of the people that a confession should be made in public by the Nun and her companions.  The Sunday following their trial they were placed on a raised platform at Paul’s Cross by the side of the pulpit, and when the sermon was over they one by one delivered their “bills” to the preacher, which by him were read to the crowd.[656]

After an acknowledgment of their imposture the prisoners were remanded to the Tower, and their ultimate fate reserved for the consideration of parliament, which was to meet in the middle of January.

The chief offenders being thus disposed of, the council resolved next that peremptory measures should be taken with respect to the Princess Mary.[657] Her establishment was broken up, and she was sent to reside as the Lady Mary in the household of the Princess Elizabeth—­a hard but not unwholesome discipline.[658] As soon as this was done, being satisfied that the leading shoot of the conspiracy was broken, and that no immediate danger was now to be feared, they proceeded leisurely