w_i_thout respect of _th_e very estate of _th_e personage?[495]’ The dispute on this point began in early February, when Norfolk wrote to protest against certain names in a list of officers for the north which the Privy Council had sent him. ‘More arraunt thev_es_ and murderers be not in no Realme,’ asserted the Duke, ‘then they haue of Long tyme been and yet ar ... and the same shall not only cause Light p_er_soun_es_ to saye and beleve that the King_es_ Highnes is fayne to Hire with Fees the moost malefactors ‹in order› to syt in rest, but also not to Loke vppon theire most detestable offenc_es_[496].’ An animated correspondence on this topic continued for several months, the dispute finally centering about the Presidency of the new Council and the Wardenships of the three Marches; Norfolk insisted that only noblemen were fitted to hold these offices[497]. In May the discussion was finally closed by the King, who had steadily supported the position adopted by Cromwell and the Council. Henry now took the matter into his own hands, and sent a peremptory letter to the Duke. ‘We doo accept in good p_ar_te,’ wrote the King, ‘the declarac_i_on of yo_ur_ opinion for the March_es_. Neuertheles we doubt not but you woll both conforme yo_ur_ owne mynde to fynde out the good order whiche we haue therin determyned and cause other by your good meane to p_er_ceyve the same. For surely we woll not be bounde of a necessitie to be s_er_ued there with lord_es_, But we wolbe s_er_ued with such men what degre soeuer they be of as we shall appointe to the same[498].’ The Presidency of the Council was finally conferred on Cuthbert Tunstall, Bishop of Durham. The death of the Earl of Northumberland in June, 1537, served as a convenient pretext for the suppression of the Lord Wardenship of the East and Middle Marches, which that nobleman had previously enjoyed; and the Earl of Cumberland, who had hitherto held a similar office on the West Marches, was not permitted long to retain it. Three Deputy Wardens, Sir William Evers, Sir John Witherington, and Sir Thomas Wharton, were appointed in their places by the King and Cromwell[499]; the three March Courts were revived, and exercised concurrent jurisdiction with the new Council[500], which was also composed as Henry and his minister had originally planned it[499]. In every point the advice of Cromwell had been taken in preference to that of Norfolk, and when the Duke finally obtained leave to return to Court in September, it must have been with the feeling that he had again suffered defeat at the hands of his plebeian rival. The rebellion, which eleven months before had threatened to hurl Cromwell from his place, had been completely quelled, and the country had been again reduced to internal quiet. The danger while it lasted had indeed been pressing, but so firmly had Cromwell been established as the King’s chief minister by the events of the years 1530 to 1536, that the storm passed over him and left him scathless. The