Cranmer took his degree of B.A. at the age of twenty-two, and proceeded M.A. three years later. The fact of his marriage, by which he forfeited the fellowship of his college (Jesus), implies that he had then no intention of taking orders; and he probably meant to adopt the law as a profession.[559] His first wife was the daughter of an innkeeper, known by the name of Black Joan. To support himself and her, he accepted a readership at Buckingham Hall, afterwards Magdalene College, and lived with his wife at the Dolphin, her father’s inn. But Black Joan died in childbirth, and Cranmer was then reinstated in his fellowship. He proceeded D.D., and was ordained in 1523, at the age of thirty-four. Either Gardiner, or Fox, Bishop of Hereford, first brought him to the King’s notice, by quoting a shrewd remark which Cranmer had made, on the subject of Henry’s “private matter”. “Who is this Dr. Cranmer?” asked the King. “Where is he? Is he still at Waltham? I will speak to him; let him be sent for out of hand. This man I trow has got the right sow by the ear.”[560] The interview proved satisfactory, and Henry charged Cranmer to draw up a statement of his view of the King’s marriage. In order to be able to confer often with him, he lodged him in the household of the Earl of Wiltshire, Anne Boleyn’s father, at Durham Place. A royal chaplaincy was conferred on him, besides the emoluments of the Archdeaconry of Taunton. He visited Rome with Lord Wiltshire, and the Pope, unsuspicious of what was being plotted, made him Grand Penitentiary for England. He then went to Germany, on private business of his own, and there married Osiander’s[561] niece. At this juncture Warham died, and Henry, who saw that Cranmer was “an admirable tool, so timid that he could ever be terrorised into submission, so tender with himself that the King’s policy admirably fitted in with his sensuality,” advanced him over the heads of better men, and made him Primate of all England. Probably the dignity was unsolicited, possibly undesired, and perhaps it was even thrust upon him with unwillingness on his part. If he had aspired to it, he would scarcely, as things then were, have married a second time, nor would he have delayed his return to England, after the death of Archbishop Warham. Ambition had no inordinate share in his character. But he had signified to the King, that sentence as to the validity of his marriage should be given, not by the Pope, but by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and it was to this opinion that his sudden promotion was due.[562] The bulls from Rome were to be obtained at the cost of any duplicity, and they were in Henry’s hands before the Pope had any inkling of what was intended.