wisdom, descent right noble and high through royal blood,[56] education in
all good and laudable qualities and manners, apparent aptness to
procreation of children, with her other infinite good qualities." Gardiner
and Fox on their way to Dover called at Hever, and showed to Anne this
panegyric penned by Wolsey[57] upon her, and thenceforward for a time all
went trippingly.

Gardiner was a far different negotiator from Knight, and was able, though
with infinite difficulty, to induce Clement to grant the new bull
demanded, relegating the cause finally to the Legatine Court in London.
The Pope would have preferred that Wolsey should have sat alone as Legate,
but Wolsey was so unpopular in England, and the war into which he had
again dragged the country against the Emperor was so detested,[58] whilst
Queen Katharine had so many sympathisers, that it was considered necessary
that a foreign Legate should add his authority to that of Wolsey to do the
evil deed. Campeggio, who had been in England before, and was a pensioner
of Henry as Bishop of Hereford, was the Cardinal selected by Wolsey; and
at last Clement consented to send him. Every one concerned appears to have
endeavoured to avoid responsibility for what they knew was a shabby
business. The Pope, crafty and shifty, was in a most difficult position,
and blew hot and cold. The first commission given to Gardiner and Fox,
which was received with such delight by Anne and Henry when Fox brought
it to London in April 1528, was found on examination still to leave the
question open to Papal veto. It is true that it gave permission to the
Legates to pronounce for the King, but the responsibility for the ruling
was left to them, and their decision might be impugned. When, at the
urgent demand of Gardiner, the Pope with many tears gave a decretal laying
down that the King's marriage with Katharine was bad by canon law if the
facts were as represented, he gave secret orders to the Legate Campeggio
that the decretal was to be burnt and not to be acted upon.

Whilst the Pope was thus between the devil and the deep sea, trying to
please the Emperor on the one hand and the Kings of France and England on
the other, and deceiving both, the influence of Anne over her royal lover
grew stronger every day. Wolsey was in the toils and he knew it. When
Charles had answered the English declaration of war (January 1528), it was
the Cardinal's rapacity, pride, and ambition against which he thun