new Queen tried her best to captivate the
Londoners, but without success; and only with difficulty could the
contributions be obtained for the coming festivities when the new Queen
passed through the city. On the 10th May Katharine was declared
contumacious by the Primate's court, and on the 23rd May Cranmer
pronounced the King's first marriage to have been void from the first.[97]
This was followed by a pronouncement to the effect that the second
marriage, that with Anne, was legal, and nothing now stood in the way of
the final fruition of so much labour and intrigue, pregnant with such
tremendous results to England. On the 29th May 1533 the first scene of the
pageant was enacted with the State progress by water from Greenwich to the
Tower.[98] No effort had been spared by Henry to make the occasion a
brilliant one. We are told that the whole river from the point of
departure to that of arrival was covered with beautifully bedizened boats;
guns roared forth their salutations at Greenwich, and from the crowd of
ships that lay in the stream. Flags and _feux de joie_ could be bought;
courtiers', guilds', and nobles' barges could be commanded, but the hearty
cheers of the lieges could not be got for all King Harry's power, as the
new Queen, in the old Queen's barge, was borne to the frowning fortress
which so soon was to be her own place of martyrdom.[99]

On Sunday, 31st May 1533, the procession through the crowded city sallied
from the Tower betimes in the morning. Englishmen and foreigners, except
Spaniards only, had been forced to pay heavily for the splendour of the
day; and the trade guilds and aldermen, brave in furred gowns and gold
chains, stood from one device to another in the streets, as the glittering
show went by. The French element did its best to add gaiety to the
occasion, and the merchants of France established in London rode at the
head of the procession in purple velvet embroidered with Anne's device.
Then came the nobles and courtiers and all the squires and gentlemen whom
the King had brought from their granges and manor-houses to do honour to
their new Queen. Anne herself was seated in an open litter of white satin
covered by a golden canopy. She was dressed in a surcoat and mantle of
white tissue trimmed with ermine, and wore a robe of crimson brocade stiff
with gems. Her hair, which was very fine, hung over her shoulders
surmounted by a coif and a coronet of diamonds, whilst around her neck was
hung