Mary Tudor - Anna Whitelock [15]
Katherine also began to petition Charles, appealing on the grounds of family loyalty. She lamented that she had heard nothing from him for a long time, choosing to attribute his silence to the “inconstancy and fickleness of the sea”:
Nothing indeed would be so painful to me as to think that your Highness had forgotten me, and therefore beg and entreat, as earnestly as I can, that your Highness be pleased to inform me of your health, and send me your orders, for love and consanguinity both demand that we should write to each other oftener.6
Katherine tried to reassure herself that “as long as our nephew keeps his promise to marry our daughter the alliance will remain unbroken; as long as the marriage treaty stands, he may be sure of England.”7
IN APRIL, AT WOLSEY’S instigation, Mary sent Charles an emerald ring as a symbol of her “constancy.” Accompanying it was a message that she sought “for a better knowledge to be had when God shall send them grace to be together, whether his Majesty doth keep constant and continent to her, as with God’s grace she will.” The envoys added that Mary’s love for Charles was so passionate that it was confirmed by jealousy, “one of the great signs and tokens of love.”8
Upon receiving the ring Charles put it on his little finger and ordered the ambassadors to say that he would wear it for the sake of the princess for the rest of his life.9 Although his affection for Mary could not be doubted, Charles now looked to disavow her as his future bride. It was still five years before Mary could marry, and Charles was now in pursuit of another cousin, Isabella of Portugal, who was of marriageable age. He was anxious to be married at once so he could leave his new empress to rule Spain while he traveled to his other territories and sought to break off the English match by proposing unrealistic terms. He would raise an army for the invasion of France provided that Henry would pay for it and that Mary was handed over at once so that she might “learn the Castilian language and the manners of the people.”10 If Henry would not agree to his requests, Charles would demand to be released from the agreement.11
Henry refused, and Wolsey made his excuses. Mary would not be given up on account of “the tenderness of her age” and, given “the respect to be had to her noble person,” it was “not meet as yet” that she “endure the pains of the sea, nor also to be brought up in an other air, that may be dangerous to her person.” Henry agreed to break off the betrothal on condition that Charles made peace with France and pay his debts to England.12 Within days the emperor signed a contract with Isabella of Portugal, whom he married in February of the following year.
The Anglo-Spanish alliance was at an end. To Katherine it was a personal affront, and she protested at her nephew’s behavior: “I am sure I deserve not this treatment, for such are my affection and readiness for your Highness’s service that I deserved a better reward.”13 For Mary, who had quickly become enamored of her Spanish cousin, it meant a painful rejection but the beginning of an attachment that would endure for the rest of her life.
CHAPTER 7
PRINCESS OF WALES
ALTHOUGH MARY WAS COURTED BY THE RULING FAMILIES OF EUROPE, Henry remained reluctant to accept her as his successor and continued to hope for a male heir. But Katherine had not conceived since 1518. She was now forty and, as the Venetian ambassador observed, “past that age in which women most commonly were wont to be fruitful.”1 Rumors had