were placed about her as inspectors and
superintendants of her conduct, under the name of officers of her
household.

The marriage of Mary to Philip of Spain was now openly talked of. It was
generally and justly unpopular: the protestant party, whom the measures
of the queen had already filled with apprehensions, saw, in her desire
of connecting herself yet more closely with the most bigoted royal
family of Europe, a confirmation of their worst forebodings; and the
tyranny of the Tudors had not yet so entirely crushed the spirit of
Englishmen as to render them tamely acquiescent in the prospect of their
country's becoming a province to Spain, subject to the sway of that
detested people whose rapacity, and violence, and unexampled cruelty,
had filled both hemispheres with groans and execrations.

The house of commons petitioned the queen against marrying a foreign
prince: she replied by dissolving them in anger; and all hope of putting
a stop to the connexion by legal means being thus precluded, measures of
a more dangerous character began to be resorted to.

Sir Thomas Wyat of Allingham Castle in Kent, son of the poet, wit, and
courtier of that name, had hitherto been distinguished by a zealous
loyalty; and he is said to have been also a catholic. Though allied in
blood to the Dudleys, not only had he refused to Northumberland his
concurrence in the nomination of Jane Grey, but, without waiting a
moment to see which party would prevail, he had proclaimed queen Mary in
the market-place at Maidstone, for which instance of attachment he had
received her thanks[20]. But Wyat had been employed during several years
of his life in embassies to Spain; and the intimate acquaintance which
he had thus acquired of the principles and practices of its court,
filled him with such horror of their introduction into his native
country, that, preferring patriotism to loyalty where their claims
appeared incompatible, he incited his neighbours and friends to
insurrection.

[Note 20: See Carte's History of England.]

In the same cause sir Peter Carew, and sir Gawen his uncle, endeavoured
to raise the West, but with small success; and the attempts made by the
duke of Suffolk, lately pardoned and liberated, to arm his tenantry and
retainers in Warwickshire and Leicestershire, proved still more futile.
Notwithstanding however this want of co-operation, Wyat's rebellion wore
for some time a very formidable appearance. The London trained-ban