the nursery of her infant half-sister was about to be established. The blood of Mary boiled on receiving this order, and, as it was not accompanied by a formal letter from the King or the council, she objected to its legality. This objection was imparted by Hussey in a dispatch to the council, who instantly forwarded a formal letter, signed by the comptroller of the King's household, which they commanded him to place in Mary's hands, ordering her to immediately retire from lieaulieu to Hertford castle* This invasion of Mary's right of succession, produced two letters from her, one to the council, the other to the King. To the council, she, with more boldness and candour than policy, says : " My conscience will in nowise suffer me to take any otherf than myself for Princess, or fur the King's daughter born in lawful matrimony * * * If I should do otherwise, 1 should slander the deed of our mother the holy church, and the Pope, who is the judge in this matter and none other, and should also dishonour the King my father and the Queen my mother, and falsely confess myself a bastard, which God defend I should do, since the Pope has not so declared it by his sentence definitive, to whose final judgment I submit myself," A proof that the ill-used Princess, at this time, considered Elizabeth as bastard born. To the King, she, in a more cautious strain, writes :— " This morning-a letter was brought to my chamberlain, ordering me to remove to the Castle of Hertford, wherein I was mentioned not as the Princess, but only as the Lady Mary, the King's daughter ; which when I heard I greatly marvelled, trusting verily that your grace was not privy to the same letter as concerning the leaving out of the name of Princess ; forasmuch as I doubt not that your grace doth take me for your lawful daughter born in true matrimony, wherefore, if I were to * The King and his council were as yet undecided as to whent the infant establishment of the Princess Elizabeth should befixed ; but they had fully resolved to disinherit Mary, break up her establishment, and allow her no home but the nursery palace of her half-sister. f Meaning Elizabeth. say anything to the contrary I should in my conscience run into the displeasure of God, which I hope assuredly that your grace would not that I should so do. In all other things, I will ever be to your grace an humble and obedient daughter and handmaid. From your manor of Peaulieu, October the second. " By your Highness's most " Humble daughter, " M ARY , ' Princess.' *' By these letters Mary only further provoked the King's anger against her. Her princely establishment at Beaulieu was precipitately dissolved. James the Fifth of Scotland, who at this period solicited her hand inmarriage, was promptly refused; and in the spring of 1534 tho parliament completed her degradation by illegitimatizing her, and settled the cfown on Henry's children by Anne Boleyn. Deprived of all her valued attendants and associates, even to the venerable Countess of Salisbury, and located more like a condemned prisoner than an innocent Princess at Hunsdnn, the nursery palace of that infant sister whom she believed had been born out of wedlock, and on whom was lavished all the rank and magnificence of which she had just been BO unjustly deprived, Mary endured a trial, great indeed, but which her then innocent, pure-purposed heart bravely withstood. Instead of hating or injuring her rival half-sister, she beguiled her sorrows by dandling, kissing, and kindly caressing the innocent babe. And what is further remarkable, at this very time Anne Boleyn heaped all imaginary insults on the unfortunate Mary ; and even went so far as to exhort a promise from the King, that he would kill Mary rather than permit her to reign to the exclusion of Anne's progeny—conduct which the ill-fated Anne deeply repented of at the hour of her death.\ Fortunately for Mary, the heavy dolorous period she passed at Hunsdon, was somewhat lightened by tho presence of her old attendant Margaret Bryant—chosen by Anne Boleyn as governess to the Princess Elizabeth— Î See page 396.