y; a link in the chain which could not be broken. The harassed
nation insisted above all things that no doubt should hang over the future,
and it was impossible in the existing complications to recognise the
daughter of Catherine without excluding Elizabeth, and excluding the prince
who was expected to follow her. By asserting her title, Mary was making
herself the nucleus of sedition, which on her father's death would lead to
a convulsion in the realm. She might not mean it, but the result would not
be affected by a want of purpose in herself; and it was possible that her
resolution might create immediate and far more painful complications. The
king's excommunication was imminent, and if the censures were enforced by
the emperor, she would be thrust into the unpermitted position of her
father's rival.

The political consequences of her conduct, notwithstanding, although
evident to statesmen, might well be concealed from a headstrong, passionate
girl. There was no suspicion that she herself was encouraging any of these
dangerous thoughts, and Henry looked upon her answer to Lord Hussey and her
letter to himself as expressions of petulant folly. Lord Oxford, the Earl
of Essex, and the Earl of Sussex were directed to repair to Beaulieu, and
explain to her the situation in which she had placed herself.

"Considering," wrote the king to them, "how highly such contempt and
rebellion done by our daughter and her servants doth touch not only us, and
the surety of our honour and person, but also the tranquillity of our
realm; and not minding to suffer the pernicious example hereof to spread
far abroad, but to put remedy to the same in due time, we have given you
commandment to declare to her the great folly, temerity, and indiscretion
that she hath used herein, with the peril she hath incurred by reason of
her so doing. By these her ungodly doings hitherto she hath most worthily
deserved our high indignation and displeasure, and thereto no less pain and
punition than by the order of the laws of our realm doth appertain in case
of high treason, unless our mercy and clemency should be shewed in that
behalf. [If, however, after] understanding our mind and pleasure, [she
will] conform herself humbly and obediently to the observation of the same,
according to the office and duty of a natural daughter, and of a true and
faithful subject, she may give us cause hereafter to incline our fatherly
pity to her reconciliation, her benefit an