There had been little difficulty in gaining Edward’s consent, but it was no such plain sailing to win Mary’s good-will towards the marriage. In spite of all she had suffered at her father’s hands, Mary was astonishingly devout to his memory, and her letter in answer to the Admiral’s hypocritical pleading that she would intercede with the Queen in his behalf, when he had already been married to her for months, is dignified and sensible. “MY LORD, “After my hearty commendations, these shall be to declare that according to your accustomed gentleness, I have received six warrants from you by your servant this bearer, for the which, I do give you my hearty thanks, by whom also I have received your letter wherein (as me thinketh) I perceive strange news, concerning a suit you have in hand to the Queen for marriage, for the sooner obtaining whereof, you seem to think that my letters might do you pleasure. My lord, in this case I trust your wisdom doth consider that if it were for my nearest kinsman and dearest friend on live, of all other creatures in the world, it standeth least with my poor honour to be a meddler in this matter, considering whose wife her grace was of late, and besides that if she be minded to grant your suit, my letters shall do you but small pleasure. On the other side, if the remembrance of the King’s Majesty my father (whose soul God pardon) will not suffer her to grant your suit, I am nothing able to persuade her to forget the loss of him, who is as yet very ripe in mine own remembrance. Wherefore I shall most earnestly require you (the premisses considered) to think none unkindness in me, though I refuse to be a meddler any ways in this matter, assuring you, that (wooing matters set apart, wherein I being a maid am nothing cunning) if otherwise it shall lie in my little power to do you pleasure, I shall be as glad to do it as you to require it, both for his blood’s sake that you be of, and also for the gentleness which I have always found in you. As knoweth Almighty God, to whose tuition I commit you. “From Wanstead, this Saturday at night, being the 4th June. “Your assured friend to my power, “MARYE.”[257] [Illustration: [++] FACSIMILE OF MARY’S LETTER] The marriage was concealed till the end of June, when it was supposed to have taken place at Edward’s request. Elizabeth’s indignation, real or feigned, was thus expressed in a letter to Mary:— “PRINCESS, AND VERY DEAR SISTER,