But the autumn of 1534 saw several events which served to encourage the King and his minister, and seemed temporarily to postpone the necessity of coming to terms with the Emperor. The first of these events was the death of the Pope in September, an occurrence which, according to Chapuys, caused Henry and Cromwell such joy that the latter was ‘unable to refrain from saying several times in public that this great devil was dead, and it seemed as if he was very sorry that he could find no worse name for him than devil[566].’ Francis moreover, solely on account of his very strained relations with Charles, had slowly begun to recover from the effects of Henry’s discourtesy at Marseilles, and had made fresh efforts to come to terms with England again; while Henry, unwilling as yet to proceed to extremities in order to gain the friendship of Charles, welcomed the prospect of a renewal of amity with France. But the satisfaction which the King derived from the attitude of Francis was rudely dispelled in a few months. Several interviews which had been arranged between the two sovereigns had failed, for various reasons, to take place, but the Emperor meantime had not been idle. Imbued with the idea of vindicating the rights of the Princess Mary by some decisive stroke, he had actually sent the Count of Nassau to the French Court to suggest that Francis should ask Henry to give her to the Duke of Angoulême[567]. Francis considered the Emperor’s plan worth a trial, and in October sent over an embassy under Admiral de Brion to propose it to the King of England. Henry had little idea of the unpleasant surprise that was in store for him, and made great preparations for the reception of the Frenchmen, and Cromwell sent for a number of beautiful young ladies to come to the Court to entertain them[568]. There seems to be some doubt whether de Brion first proposed that Mary should be given to the Duke of Angoulême or to the Dauphin[569], but both suggestions were equally disagreeable to Henry. An acceptance of either proposal would of course involve retracting his declaration that Mary was illegitimate, and annulling his hard-earned invalidation of his first marriage, and yet he dared not insult Francis a second time. His first reply, according to Chapuys, was that he would agree to give Mary to Angoulême if both would make a solemn renunciation of all claims that they could bring forward to the English throne[570]. But the Spanish ambassador seemed to think that this proposal would not prove satisfactory, and we gather from the official report of Henry’s answer that the suggestion was dropped. Instead, however, the King finally replied that if Francis could obtain from the new Pope a decision that the sentence of Clement was void, he might be induced to renounce his claim to the French throne in exchange for certain lands and titles in the Netherlands, and further hinted that it might be possible to arrange a match between Elizabeth and the Duke of