casion of disorder and
unquiet in the realm" &c. "It is not unknown to us but some near about
the said lady Mary have very lately in the night seasons had privy
conferences with the emperor's embassador here being, which councils can
no wise tend to the weal of the king's majesty our master or his realm,
nor to the nobility of this realm. And whatsoever the lady Mary shall
upon instigation of these forward practices further do, like to these
her strange beginnings, we doubt not but your lordship will provide that
her proceedings shall not move any disobedience or disorder--The effect
whereof if her counsellors should procure, as it must be to her grace,
and to all other good Englishmen therein seduced, damnable, so shall it
be most hurtful to the good subjects of the country" &c.[15]

[Note 15: Burleigh Papers by Haynes.]

Thus did the fears, the policy, or the party-spirit, of the members of
the council lead them to magnify the peril of the nation from the
enterprises of a young and defenceless female, whose best friend was a
foreign prince, whose person was completely within their power, and who,
at this period of her life "more sinned against than sinning," was not
even suspected of any other design than that of withdrawing herself from
a country in which she was no longer allowed to worship God according to
her conscience. Some slight tumults in Essex and Kent, in which she was
not even charged with any participation, were speedily suppressed; and
after some conference with the chancellor and secretary Petre, Mary
obeyed a summons to attend them to the court, where she was now to be
detained for greater security.

On her arrival she received a reprimand from the council for her
obstinacy respecting the mass, with an injunction to instruct herself,
by reading, in the grounds of protestant belief. To this she replied,
with the inflexible resolution of her character, that as to protestant
books, she thanked God that she never had read any, and never intended
so to do; that for her religion she was ready to lay down her life, and
only feared that she might not be found worthy to become its martyr. One
of her chaplains was soon after thrown into prison; and further
severities seemed to await her, when a message from the emperor,
menacing the country with war in case she should be debarred from the
free exercise of her religion, taught the council the expediency of
relaxing a little the sternness of their intolerance. B