en though the nobles known to
favour Katharine were not summoned, a bill granting a dowry to the Queen
as Dowager Princess of Wales was passed; but the House of Commons,
trembling for the English property in the imperial dominions, threw it
out. The prospect for a time looked black for the great ecclesiastical
changes that were contemplated, and the hopes of Katharine's friends rose
again.

The Bishop of Paris in the meanwhile had contrived to frighten Clement and
his Cardinals, by his threatening talk of English schism and the universal
spread of dissent, into an insincere and half-hearted acquiescence in a
compromise that would submit the question of a divorce to a tribunal of
two Cardinals sitting at Cambray to save appearances, and deciding in
favour of Henry. When the French ambassador Castillon came to Henry with
this news (early in March 1534) the King had experienced the difficulty of
bringing Parliament and Convocation to his views; and, again, if left to
himself, he would probably have yielded. But Anne and Cromwell, and indeed
Cranmer, were now in the same boat; and any wavering on the part of the
King would have meant ruin to them all. They did their best to stiffen
Henry, but he was nearly inclined to give way behind their backs; and
after the French ambassador had left the Council unsuccessful, Henry had a
long secret talk with him in the garden, in which he assured him that he
would not have anything done hastily against the Holy See.

But whilst the rash and turbulent Bishop of Paris was hectoring Clement at
Rome and sending unjustifiably encouraging messages to England,
circumstances on both sides were working against the compromise which the
French desired so much. Cromwell and Anne were panic-stricken at the idea
of reopening the question of the marriage before any Papal tribunal, and
kept up Henry's resentment against the Pope. Henry's pride also was
wounded by a suggestion of the French that, as a return for Clement's
pliability, Alexander de Medici, Duke of Florence, might marry the
Princess Mary. Cromwell's diplomatic management of the Parliamentary
opposition and the consequent passage of the bill abolishing the
remittance of Peter's pence to Rome, also encouraged Henry to think that
he might have his own way after all; and the chances of his making further
concessions to the Pope again diminished. A similar process was going on
in Rome. Whilst Clement was smilingly listening to talk of reconcili