The relief with which the settlement was regarded gave the new queen at least the good will of the nation to start with. This she gradually lost. Just as Elizabeth instinctively did the popular thing, so Mary seemed almost by fatality to choose the worst course possible. Her foreign policy, in the first place, was both un-English and unsuccessful. [Sidenote: Marriage of Mary and Philip, July 25, 1554] Almost at once Charles V proposed his son Philip as Mary's husband, and, after about a year of negotiation, the marriage took place. The tremendous unpopularity of this step was due not so much to hostility to Spain, though Spain was beginning to be regarded as the national foe rather than France, but to the fear of a foreign domination. England had never before been ruled by a queen, if we except the disastrous reign of Mathilda, and it was natural to suppose that Mary's husband should have the prerogative as well as the title of king. In vain Philip tried to disabuse the English of the idea that he was asserting any independent claims; in some way the people felt that they were being annexed to Spain, and they hated it. The religious aim of the marriage, to aid in the restoration of Catholicism, was also disliked. Cardinal Pole frankly avowed this purpose, declaring that as Christ, being heir of the world, was sent down by his Father from the royal throne, to be at once Spouse and Son of the Virgin Mary and to be made the Comforter and Saviour of mankind; so, in like manner, the greatest of all princes upon earth, the heir of his father's kingdom, departed from his own broad and happy realms that he, too, might come hither into this land of trouble, to be the spouse and son of this virgin Mary . . . to aid in the reconciliation of this people to Christ and the church. For Mary herself the marriage was most unhappy. {319} She was a bride of thirty-eight, already worn and aged by grief and care; her bridegroom was only twenty-seven. She adored him, but he almost loathed her and made her miserable by neglect and unfaithfulness. Her passionate hopes for a child led her to believe and announce that she was to have one, and her disappointment was correspondingly bitter. So unpopular was the marriage coupled with the queen's religious policy, that it led to a rebellion under Sir Thomas Wyatt. Though suppressed, it was a dangerous symptom, especially as Mary failed to profit by the warning. Her attempts to implicate her sister Elizabeth in the charge of treason failed.