The agitated pope promised not to remove the suit to Rome, provided the king would give up the idea of reforming England. Then, putting on a most gracious air, he proposed to introduce the ambassador to Charles V. This was giving Wiltshire the chance of receiving a harsh rebuff. The earl saw it; but his duty obliging him to confer with the emperor, he accepted the offer. The father of Anne Boleyn proceeded to an audience with the nephew of Catherine of Aragon. Representatives of two women whose rival causes agitated Europe, these two men could not meet without a collision. True, the earl flattered himself that as it was Charles’s interest to detach Henry from Francis I., that phlegmatic and politic prince would certainly not sacrifice the gravest interests of his reign for a matter of sentiment; but he was deceived. The emperor received him with a calm and reserved air, but unaccompanied by any kindly demonstration. The ambassador skilfully began with speaking of the Turkish war; then ingeniously passing to the condition of the kingdom of England, he pointed out the reasons of state which rendered the divorce necessary. Here Charles stopped him short: “Sir Count, you are not to be trusted in this matter; you are a party to it; let your colleagues speak.” The earl replied with respectful coldness: “Sire, I do not speak here as a father, but as my master’s servant, and I am commissioned to inform you that his conscience condemns a union contrary to the law of God.”[36] He then offered Charles the immediate restitution of Catherine’s dowry. The emperor coldly replied that he would support his aunt in her rights, and then abruptly turning his back on the ambassador, refused to hear him any longer.[37] Thus did Charles, who had been all his life a crafty politician, place in this matter the cause of justice above the interests of his ambition. Perhaps he might lose an important ally; it mattered not; before everything he would protect a woman unworthily treated. On this occasion we feel more sympathy for Charles than for Henry. The indignant emperor hastily quitted Bologna, on the 22d or 24th of February. The earl hastened to his friend M. de Gramont, and, relating how he had been treated, proposed that the kings of France and England should unite in the closest bonds. He added, that Henry could not accept Clement as his judge, since he had himself declared that he was ignorant of the law of God.[38] “England,” he said, “will be quiet for three or four months. Sitting in the ballroom, she will watch the dancers, and will form her resolution according as they dance well or ill.”[39] A rule of policy that has often been followed. [Sidenote: Gramont’s Policy.]