his father in
point of ability; and then he was young, and she had been told sad
stories about him; if he was of warm temperament, he would not suit
her at all, she said, considering the age at which she had
arrived.[146] Moreover, when she was married, she must obey as God
commanded; her husband, perhaps, might wish to place Spaniards in
authority in England, and she would have to refuse; and that he would
not like. To all of which, being the fluttering of the caught fly,
Renard would answer that his highness was more like an angel than a
man; his youth was in his favour, for he might live to see his child
of age, and England had had too much experience of minorities. Life,
he added remarkably, was shorter than it used to be; sixty was now a
great age for a king; and as the world was, men were as mature at
thirty as in the days of his grandfather they were considered at
forty.[147] Then touching the constant sore--"her majesty," he said,
"had four enemies, who would never rest till they had destroyed her or
were themselves destroyed--the heretics, the friends of the late Duke
of Northumberland, the courts of France and Scotland, and, lastly, her
sister Elizabeth. Her subjects were restless, turbulent, and
changeable as the ocean of which they were so fond;[148] the
sovereigns of England had been only able to rule with a hand of iron,
and with severities which had earned them the name of tyrants;[149]
they had not spared the blood royal in order to secure their thrones,
and she too must act as they had acted, leaning for support,
meanwhile, on the arm of a powerful prince."

[Footnote 146: "Que s'il vouloit estre voluptueux
ce n'est ce quelle desire pour estre de telle
eaige."--Renard to the Emperor: _Rolls House MSS._]

[Footnote 147: Renard to the Emperor: _Rolls House
MSS._]

[Footnote 148: "Vostre Majeste seit les humeurs des
Angloys et leur voluntez estre forte discordantes,
desireux de nouvellete, de mutation, et
vindicatifz, soit pour estre insulaires, ou pour
tenir ce natural de la marine."--Renard to Mary:
_Granvelle Papers_, vol. iv. p. 129.]

[Footnote 149: "Les roys du passe on este forces de
traicter en rigueur de justice et effusion de sang