The death of Cranmer was followed by a long succession of martyrdoms. Cardinal Pole became the Archbishop of Canterbury, and in Philip's absence the principal adviser of the Queen. He did not manage, if he tried, to stop the burnings. Sometimes he rescued prisoners from the vindictive Bonner; at others he seems to have hounded on the persecutors. Mary's conscience, never satisfied at the confiscation of property, compelled her to restore the lands still in possession of the Crown, and to give up the "first fruits" of English benefices--the only result being to awaken the fears of thousands of proprietors, and set them against the papal claims. She attempted to restore the monastic institutions, with but scanty results; to revive pilgrimages to shrines, which were very forced affairs, and had to be kept alive by fining the parents of children who did not join them. The elevation of Pope Paul IV. (Cardinal Caraffa) to the See of Rome increased her difficulties. The new Pontiff, a Neapolitan, hated her Spanish husband, and personally disliked Cardinal Pole, her chief adviser. Her last years were full of troubles. Mary died in 1558 (Nov. 17th). "The unhappiest of queens, and wives, and women," she had been born amidst the rejoicings of a nation, her mother a princess of the haughtiest house in Europe. In her girlhood she had been the bride-elect of the Emperor--a lovely, winning young creature, all men say. In her seventeenth year, at the age when girls are most sensitive, the crushing stroke which blasted her whole life fell upon her. Her father, the Parliament, and the Church of her country called her illegitimate; and thus branded, she was sent into solitude to brood over her disgrace. When almost all England hailed her Queen in her thirty-seventh year, she was already an old woman, with sallow face, harsh voice, her dark bright eyes alone telling how beautiful she had once been. But the nation seemed to love her who had been so long yearning for affection; she married the man of her choice; and she felt herself the instrument selected by Heaven to restore an excommunicated nation to the peace of God. Her husband, whom she idolised, tired of living with her after a few years. The child she passionately longed for and pathetically believed to be coming never came.[517] The Church and the Pope she had sacrificed so much for, disregarded her entreaties, and seemed careless of her troubles. The people who had welcomed her, and whom she really loved, called her "Bloody" Mary,--a name which was, after all, so well deserved that it will always remain. Each disappointment she took as a warning from Heaven that atonement had not yet been paid for England's crimes, and the fires of persecution were kept burning to appease the God of sixteenth century Romanism. CHAPTER IV. THE SETTLEMENT UNDER ELIZABETH.[518]