Mary was now the most prominent princess in Europe. The character, the accomplishments, the personal charms of none were so amply discussed, so widely known, so universally admired. Her beauty is spoken of in terms which to modern ears sound extravagant. There was scarcely a marriageable representative of any royal house, who did not aspire to her hand, for strange as it seems, there is no sign that her political value was diminished by the birth of an heir to the throne. If Henry would but have consented to declare her legitimate, Francis I. would have entered eagerly into a fresh negotiation for her marriage with the Duke of Orleans, the question of which was being constantly renewed during the next few years.[218] Sir William Paget, the English ambassador in France, did his best to promote the match in 1542, and Henry would have been far more likely to make concessions to please Francis, than for any other consideration, but to give in on that point would have been to stultify all that he had done. The Emperor’s candidate had less chance still. He had never been a _persona grata_ at the English court, and however anxious Henry was to avoid war, he was far from contemplating a close alliance with Charles. There remained the German Protestant princes, the Emperor’s enemies, and they admirably suited Henry’s purpose of hampering Charles in every possible way; but when this policy threatened to push him into the arms of France, Henry abandoned the Lutherans, greatly to Cromwell’s disgust, and suggested that Charles, then a widower, should take Mary, and his son Philip, her sister Elizabeth. The proposal was sufficient to save the situation, without committing him to anything definite, knowing as he did full well, that it would be met by a demand for Mary’s rehabilitation, without which no step in the direction of such a marriage would be taken. It is easy to form a notion of Mary’s personal appearance during these years, for besides the portraits painted by Holbein, who generally aimed at faithful likenesses, remarks on her face and form are sandwiched into most of the longer despatches of the ambassadors of all the principal powers of Europe. Marillac, the French envoy, wrote more soberly than most of them, for he was not much inclined to a closer friendship between his master and a renegade of Henry’s kidney, the excesses “of this King” being a theme on which he and his colleagues dwelt freely. He describes Mary as “twenty-four years of age, of medium height, with well-proportioned features, and a perfect complexion, which makes her look as if she were but eighteen. Her voice is full and deep, and rather more masculine in tone than her father’s. Some praise her musical talents, others her proficiency in languages, others her dancing; all feel the charm of her goodness and benignity, and the pure atmosphere that surrounds her, in marvellous contrast to the tainted air of the court.”[219]