t was slowly dying, all his dreams and hopes frustrated;
and on the 13th August 1514, in the palace of Greenwich, Katharine's dear
friend and sister-in-law, Mary Tudor, was married by proxy to Louis XII.
Katharine, led by the Duke of Longueville, attended the festivity. She was
dressed in ash-coloured satin, covered with raised gold embroidery, costly
chains and necklaces of gems covered her neck and bust, and a coif trimmed
with precious stones was on her head.[24] The King at the ball in the
evening charmed every one by his graceful dancing, and the scene was so
gay that the grave Venetian ambassador says that had it not been for his
age and office he would have cast off his gown and have footed it with the
rest.

But already sinister whispers were rife, and we may be sure they were not
unknown to Katharine. She had been married five years, and no child of
hers had lived; and, though she was again pregnant, it was said that the
Pope would be asked to authorise Henry to put her aside, and to marry a
French bride. Had not his new French brother-in-law done the like years
ago?[25] To what extent this idea had really entered Henry's head at the
time it is difficult to say; but courtiers and diplomatists have keen
eyes, and they must have known which way the wind was blowing before they
talked thus. In October 1514 Katharine was borne slowly in a litter to
Dover, with the great concourse that went to speed Mary Tudor on her
loveless two months' marriage; and a few weeks afterwards Katharine gave
birth prematurely to a dead child. Once more the hopes of Henry were
dashed, and though Peter Martyr ascribed the misfortune to Henry's
unkindness, the superstitious time-servers of the King, and those in
favour of the French alliance, began to hint that Katharine's offspring
was accursed, and that to get an heir the King must take another wife. The
doings at Court were still as brilliant and as frivolous as ever; the
King's great delight being in adopting some magnificent, and, of course,
perfectly transparent disguise in masque or ball, and then to disclose
himself when every one, the Queen included, was supposed to be lost in
wonder at the grace and agility of the pretended unknown. Those who take
pleasure in the details of such puerility may be referred to Hall's
_Chronicle_ for them: we here have more to do with the hearts beneath the
finery, than with the trappings themselves.

That Katharine was striving desperately at this