her this was the part the English power should have played at this
moment. By his father's abdication and retirement into the cloister
Philip had become lord and master of the Spanish monarchy. Could it be
the mission of the English to help in consolidating it in his hands?
On the foundation then laid, and mainly through the peace which France
saw herself compelled to make, its greatness was built up. For the
Spanish monarchy the union with England, which rested on the able use
to which the existing troubles and the personal position of the Queen
were turned--and which, strictly speaking, was still a result of the
policy of Ferdinand the Catholic--was of indescribable advantage: to
the English it brought a loss which was severely felt. They had
neglected to put Calais in a proper state of defence; at the first
attack it fell into the hands of the French. The greatest value was
still laid in England on a possession across the sea, which seemed
indispensable for the command of the Channel; its extension was the
main object of Henry VIII's last war: that now it was on the contrary
utterly lost was felt to be a national disaster; the population of the
town, which consisted of English, was expelled together with the
garrison.

And as Pope Paul IV was now allied with the King of France, the result
was that he found himself at war with Philip II (whom he tried to
chase from Naples), and hence with England as well. His hatred to the
house of Austria, his aversion to the concessions made in England with
reference to church property, and to the religious position which
Cardinal Pole had hitherto taken up in the questions at issue within
the Catholic Church, determined the Pope to interfere in the home
affairs of England with a strong hand. For these Cardinal Pole was the
one indispensable man, on whose shoulders the burden of affairs
rested. But it was this very man whom Paul IV now deprived of his
legatine power, on which much of his consequence rested, and
transferred it to a Franciscan monk.

But what now was the consequent situation of affairs in England! The
Queen, who recognised no higher authority than that of the Papal See,
was obliged to have Paul IV's messages intercepted, lest they should
become known. While the ashes of the reputed heretics were still
smoking on their Calvaries, the man who represented the Catholic form
of religion, and was working effectively for its progress, was accused
of falling away from the o