forse (il che Dio non voglie) ogni
speranza della reduttione di quella patria, levando
se le forze a questa buona e Catholica regina,
overo alienando la de noi par offesa
ricevuta."--Ibid.]

About the marriage Charles was more anxious than ever; Pole was
understood to have declined the honour of being a competitor;[125]
Renard had informed the emperor of the present direction of the
queen's own inclinations; and treating himself, therefore, as out of
the question on the score of age and infirmities, he instructed his
minister to propose the Prince of Spain as a person whom the religious
and the political interests of the world alike recommended to her as a
husband. The alliance of England, Spain, and Flanders would command a
European supremacy; their united fleets would sweep the seas, and
Scotland, deprived of support from France, must become an English
province; while sufficient guarantees could be provided easily for the
security of English liberties. These, in themselves, were powerful
reasons; Renard was permitted to increase their cogency by promises of
pensions, lands, and titles, or by hard money in hand, in whatever
direction such liberality could be usefully employed.[126]

[Footnote 125: "Ayant le Cardinal Pole si
expressement declaire qu'il n'a nul desir de soy
marier, et que nous tenons, que pour avoir si
longuement suivi l'etat ecclesiastique, et
s'accommode aux choses duysant a icelluy et estant
diacre."--Charles V. to Renard: _Granvelle Papers_,
vol. iv.]

[Footnote 126: Ibid.]

{p.056} The external advantages of the connection were obvious; it
recommended itself to the queen from the Spanish sympathies which she
had contracted in her blood, and from the assistance which it promised
to afford her in the great pursuit of her life. The proposal was first
suggested informally. Mary affected to find difficulties; yet, if she
raised objections, it was only to prolong the conversation upon a
subject which delighted her. She spoke of her age; Philip was
twenty-seven, she ten years older; she called him "boy;" she feared
she might not be enough for him; she was unsusceptible; she had no
experience in love;[127] with such other phrases, which Renard
interpreted at their true importan