t ill
state of health, and the resolute refusal of the parliament to permit
the coronation of her husband, who had quitted England in disgust to
attend his affairs on the continent, conferred, in spite of all the
efforts of the catholic party, a daily augmenting importance on
Elizabeth. When therefore in November 1556 she had come in state to
Somerset Place, her town-residence, to take up her abode for the winter,
a kind of court was immediately formed around her; and she might hope to
be richly indemnified for any late anxieties or privations, by the
brilliant festivities, the respectful observances, and the still more
welcome flatteries, of which she found herself the distinguished
object:--But disappointment awaited her.

She had been invited to court for the purpose of receiving a second and
more solemn offer of the hand of the duke of Savoy, whose suit was
enforced by the king her brother-in-law with the whole weight of his
influence or authority. This alliance had been the subject of earnest
correspondence between Philip and the English council; the Imperial
ambassadors were waiting in England for her answer; and the
disappointment of the high-raised hopes of the royal party, by her
reiteration of a decided negative, was followed by her quitting London
in a kind of disgrace early in the month of December.

But Philip would not suffer the business to end here. Indignant at the
resistance opposed by the princess to his measures, he seems to have
urged the queen to interfere in a manner authoritative enough to compel
obedience; but, by a remarkable exchange of characters, Mary now
appeared as the protectress of her sister from the violence of Philip.

In a letter still preserved, she tells him, that unless the consent of
parliament were first obtained, she fears that the accomplishment of the
marriage would fail to procure for him the advantages which he expected;
but that, however this might be, her conscience would not allow her to
press the matter further. That the friar Alphonso, Philip's confessor,
whom he had sent to argue the point with her, had entirely failed of
convincing her; that in fact she could not comprehend the drift of his
arguments. Philip, it is manifest, must already have made use of very
harsh language towards the queen respecting her conduct in this affair,
for she deprecates his further displeasure in very abject terms; but yet
persists in her resolution with laudable firmness. Her husband w