Mary Tudor (47 page)

I
N A PRIVATE LETTER TO A FRIEND, RUY GÓMEZ DE SILVA, A MEMBER
of Philip’s entourage, revealed a somewhat different view: “To speak frankly with you, it would take God himself to drink this cup … and the best one can say is that the King realises fully that the marriage was made for no fleshly consideration, but in order to cure the disorders of this country and to preserve the Low Countries.”
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Philip had intended to stay in England for only a short time, though Mary was probably unaware of this. On the eve of his arrival in England, the French had defeated imperial forces at Marienburg, the gateway to the Netherlands. Brussels had looked vulnerable to French attack, and Philip had brought 4,000 troops to go on to the Netherlands. Charles had instructed Philip to take only a few of his servants ashore with him in England and, immediately after the marriage and having spent just six or eight days with his bride, to sail straight to Flanders.
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But then the military situation improved, and the emperor decided to
delay his son’s journey to Flanders: “You had better stay where you are and be with the Queen, my daughter, busying yourself with the Government of England, settling affairs there and making yourself familiar with the people, which it is most important you do for present and future considerations.”
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Mary was delighted that Philip was to remain in England, and in a letter to her father-in-law she declared:

IN A LETTER
to a friend in Salamanca, a Spanish courtier wrote of Philip’s first months in England:

But, he continued:

The dominant style at the English court and that favored by Mary was French. Her clothes were not to Spanish tastes, and, as the Spaniard added, neither were the English revelries:

Philip’s efforts to secure the goodwill of the English were being undermined by tensions between the Spanish household Philip had brought with him and the English entourage that had been prepared for his arrival. “The English hate the Spaniards worse than they hate the devil,” wrote one of his household. “They rob us in town and on the road; and one ventures to stray two miles but they rob him; and a company of Englishmen have recently robbed and beaten over fifty Spaniards. The best of it is that the councillors know all about it and say not a word.”
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Philip looked to resolve the issue by retaining the English in formal ceremonial positions, such as cupbearers, gentlemen waiters, and carvers, while Spaniards remained in his personal suite. But complaints and tensions continued. Philip would write to Francisco de Eraso, his father’s secretary, of the embarrassment caused by the two households, “not so much on account of the expense as of the troubles it gave me.” Of the English servants, Philip expressed major reservations: “They are accustomed to serving here in a very different manner from that observed at his Majesty’s Court, and as you know I am not satisfied that they are good enough Catholics to be constantly about my person.”
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By the beginning of September, Renard was reporting, “very few Englishmen are to be seen in his Highness’s apartments.”
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Given the acrimony, a number of Spanish noblemen and gentlemen obtained permission to depart. As the Spanish correspondent put it, “we are all desiring to be off, with such longing that we think of Flanders as a paradise.”
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On Sunday, November 25, Spanish courtiers staged a cane play—a
juego de cannas
, a joust in which canes replaced lances—before the queen and English noblemen at Whitehall. The king rode in red, everyone else in yellow, green, white, or blue, “with targets and canes in their hand, hurling rods one at another, and the trumpets in the same colours and drums made of kettles, and banners in the same colours.”
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It was a spectacular display of color and sporting prowess, but it did little to win over English hearts, as the Count Gian Tommaso Langosco da Stroppiana noted: “It left the spectators cold, except for the fine clothes of the players, and the English made fun of it.”
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Months later, it emerged that the cane play had been the occasion of a treasonous conspiracy. A man named Edward Lewkner alleged that he had arranged with Sir Francis Verney and Captain Edward Turner to kill Philip and his Spanish attendants during the contest.
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He claimed that more than three hundred people had been involved in the plot, which was to have been carried out in the third round of the tournament. But when only two rounds were staged, the plan could not be executed.
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DESPITE THE TREASONOUS
plottings against him, Philip quickly began to appropriate the images of royalty. Substantial sums were spent on embroidered cloths of estate, badges, and heraldic devices decorated with the king’s and queen’s initials.
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In September 1554, new coins were issued on which both Mary and Philip appeared in profile, “the double face.”
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The king’s was pictured on the dominant left-hand side, the position hitherto reserved for the reigning monarch, with a single crown floating above them both. One pamphleteer complained that Philip was being turned into a “King of England indeed,” his name appearing on proclamations and on charters and “on the coined money going abroad current.”
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Before Mary’s wedding, Stephen Gardiner had stipulated that English subjects be explicitly assured that after the marriage Philip would be “rather as a subject than otherwise; and that the Queen should rule all things as she doth now.”
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Yet two days after the wedding the Privy Council stipulated that “a note of all such matters of
Estate as should pass from hence should be made in Latin and Spanish from henceforth.”

Mary also issued an instruction, written in her own hand, to the lord Privy Seal, “First to tell the King the whole state of the Realm with all things appertaining to the same, as much as you know to be true. Second to obey his commandment in all things” and to declare his opinion on any matter the king wished “as becometh a faithful counsellor to do.”
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The Spaniards’ view of the marriage was quite different from that of the English. They believed that Philip would provide the male element lacking in Mary’s monarchy: he would “make up for other matters which are impertinent to women.”
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The focus of Philip’s energies quickly became reconciliation with Rome. He petitioned the pope to augment Cardinal Pole’s powers so that he might negotiate for a general settlement with regard to Church property.
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Finally the pope was persuaded. “It would be far better,” he agreed, “for all reasons human and divine, to abandon all the Church property [in England], rather than risk the shipwreck of this understanding.”
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Philip sent Renard to Flanders to reason with Pole, who agreed not to exercise any jurisdiction without the king and queen’s consent.
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On November 3, 1554, the Council consented to admitting Pole into the realm. Lord Paget and Sir Edward Hastings were sent to conduct him from the imperial court, and Parliament was summoned to repeal Pole’s attainder and condemnation for treason.

England’s imminent return to Roman Catholicism was a tremendous coup for the Habsburgs. As Renard wrote to the emperor:

A week later, the king and queen returned to Westminster Abbey for the opening of Parliament. According to Count Langosco da Stroppiana, the waiting crowds called out, “Oh how handsome the King is! … Oh! What a good husband he is! How honourably and lovingly he treats the Queen!”
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At the abbey the king and queen knelt and kissed the cross. The new bishop of Lincoln, John White, preached an English sermon, which was then summarized in Latin. The text was from Jeremiah. It said that those who had separated from the Roman Church did not harbor thoughts of peace any more than those guilty of sedition or disobedience to the king and queen. In conclusion the bishop urged the “firm establishment of our true Catholic religion.”
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