the Pope from the list of those against whom the financial and political agreement which was to accompany the marriage was to be concluded: Philip, as a faithful Catholic, was apparently at first unwilling to enter a league which might bring him into conflict with the See of Rome. But the firmness of the King, coupled with the great financial profits which the match promised to Philip, finally triumphed over the religious scruples of the Wittelsbacher, and on January 24 he signed a treaty in which he accepted the marriage and the compact under the conditions on which Henry insisted: the agreement, however, was not to be considered binding unless Philip could get it ratified by his relatives in Germany before Whitsuntide, 1540. He left England, January 27, for this purpose, but his attempts were unsuccessful, and the proposal came to nothing. It was taken up a second time at a later date, and again abandoned. But though the scheme finally fell through there are a few interesting things to be noticed in connexion with the negotiations for it, which serve to make clear the trend things were taking at the time of Philip’s visit in London. The whole affair was carried on so secretly, and we have so little documentary evidence, that it is very difficult to form any certain conclusions concerning this attempted compact. The name of Cromwell figures prominently in connexion with it; we find Duke Philip consulting with the minister at his house, and visiting the Princess Mary in his company[666]; but it is pretty obvious that all the negotiations were conducted throughout with the full approval of the King, and not, as was the case with the Lutheran affair, partially in opposition to the royal wishes. For the scheme was radically different from the proposed Lutheran alliance which had failed, and not exactly similar to the union with Cleves which had just been completed. It was far more cautious and non-committal than either of them, and it was for this reason that Henry liked it. In the first place, Philip was a Catholic, so that an agreement with him involved no contradiction to the doctrines proclaimed in the Six Articles. In the second place, he was ostensibly a close ally of the Emperor’s and a member of the Imperial Order of the Golden Fleece[667], though, as we have seen, the ingratitude of Charles after his services in Germany must necessarily have tended to make their relations less cordial. Henry was doubtless accurately informed of all this, and saw in an agreement with a member of this powerful though vacillating Wittelsbach family, an opportunity to gain valuable aid in case he were really attacked, without ostensibly committing himself to a policy which would at any time prevent a return to cordial relations with France and Spain. In the next chapter we shall see that it was precisely during Philip’s visit at the English Court that Henry’s hopes of staving off the dreaded coalition of Charles and Francis against him