While they were confined there, the question of the Queen's marriage
came up. Out of several candidates for her hand, Mary gave preference
to her cousin, Philip II of Spain. Her choice was very unpopular, for
it was known in England that Philip was a selfish and gloomy fanatic,
who cared for nothing but the advancement of the Roman Catholic faith.
An insurrection now broke out, led by Sir Thomas Wyatt, the object of
which was to place the Princess Elizabeth on the throne, and thus
secure the crown to Protestantism. Lady Jane Grey's father was
implicated in the rebellion. The movement ended in failure, the
leaders were executed, and Mary ordered her sister Elizabeth, who was
thought to be in the plot, to be seized and imprisoned in the Tower
(1554).
A little later, Lady Jane Grey and her husband perished on the
scaffold. The name JANE, deeply cut in the stone wall of the
Beauchamp Tower,[1] remains as a memorial of the nine days' Queen.
She died at the age of seventeen, an innocent victim of the greatness
which had been thrust upon her.
[1] The Beauchamp Tower is part of the Tower of London. On its walls
are scores of names cut by those who were imprisoned in it.
370. Mary marries Philip II of Spain (1554); Efforts to restore
Catholicism.
A few months afterward the royal marriage was celebrated, but Philip
soon found that the air of England had too much freedom in it to suit
his delicate constitution, and he returned to the more congenial
climate of Spain.
From that time Mary, who was left to rule alone, directed all her
efforts to the restoration of the Catholic Church. Hallam says her
policy was acceptable to a large part of the nation.[2] On the other
hand, the leaders in Scotland bound themselves by a solemn Covenant
(1557) to crush out all attempts to reestablish the Catholic faith.
Through her influence Parliament repealed the legislation of Henry
VIII's and Edward VI's reigns, in so far as it gave support to
Protestantism. She revived the persecuting statutes against heretics
(S283). The old relations with the Pope were resumed but the monastic
lands were left in the hands of their new owners (S352). To
accomplish her object in supporting her religion, the Queen resorted
to the arguments of the dungeon, the rack, and the fagot, and when
Bishops Bonner and Gardiner slackened their work of persecution and
death, Mary, half crazed by Philip's desertion, urged them not to stay
their hands.
[2] See A. H. Hallam's "Constitutional History of England," and
compare J. Lingard's excellent "History of England," to the same
effect.