the Pope's direct sanction the movement
would lose its inspiration. The Irish rebellion had collapsed for the want
of it. Lord Thomas Fitzgerald had surrendered and was a prisoner in the
Tower.

It was not the part of a child, however great her imagined wrongs,
deliberately to promote an insurrection against her father. Henry II.'s
sons had done it, but times were changed. The Princess Mary was determined
to justify such of Henry's Council as had recommended the harshest
measures against her. She wrote a letter to Chapuys which, if intercepted,
might have made it difficult for the King to save her.

"The condition of things," she said, "is worse than wretched. The realm
will fall to ruin unless his Majesty, for the service of God, the welfare
of Christendom, the honour of the King my father, and compassion for the
afflicted souls in this country, will take pity on us and apply the
remedy. This I hope and feel assured that he will do if he is rightly
informed of what is taking place. In the midst of his occupations in
Africa he will have been unable to realise our condition. The whole truth
cannot be conveyed in letters. I would, therefore, have you despatch one
of your own people to inform him of everything, and to supplicate him on
the part of the Queen my mother, and myself for the honour of God and for
other respects to attend to and provide for us. In so acting he will
accomplish a service most agreeable to Almighty God. Nor will he win less
fame and glory to himself than he has achieved in the conquest of Tunis or
in all his African expedition."[347]

Catherine simultaneously addressed herself to the Pope in a letter
equally characteristic. The "brief of execution" was the natural close of
her process, which, after judgment in her favour, she was entitled to
demand. The Pope wished her to apply for it, that it might appear to be
granted at her instance and not on his own impulse.

"Most Holy and Blessed Father," she wrote, "I kiss your Holiness's hands.
My letters have been filled with complaints and importunities, and have
been more calculated to give you pain than pleasure. I have therefore for
some time ceased from writing to your Holiness, although my conscience has
reproached me for my silence. One only satisfaction I have in thinking of
the present state of things: I thank unceasingly our Lord Jesus Christ for
having appointed a vicar like your Holiness, of whom so much good is
spoken at a time when Chris