The Venetian ambassador, Sebastian Giustinian, to whose letter we owe the account of the royal christening, makes no mention of the King as having taken part in the procession, but it is probable that Henry witnessed the ceremony from the royal closet, which connected the church of the friars with the palace. The chronicler also omits to say by whom the sacraments of baptism and confirmation were administered, a curious oversight, as the Archbishops of Armagh and Dublin, as well as the Bishops of Durham and Chester, and the Cardinal-Archbishop of York, were present.[3] When Giustinian congratulated Henry on the birth of his daughter, in the name of the Council of Ten, adding, however, that the Signory would have been better pleased if the child had been a son, the King replied:— “We are both young. If it is a daughter this time, by the grace of God, the sons will follow.”[4] Giustinian’s despatches are pæans in Henry’s honour. Who so renowned as the King of England! He is not only “very expert in arms, most excellent in bodily endowments” of every description, but he is also adorned with mental accomplishments far beyond the average. And the admiration of the envoy is not merely general, but detailed. Sagudino, his secretary, writing from the court at Richmond, where he spent a week, together with Giustinian, says that in the evening, they enjoyed hearing the King play and sing, and seeing him dance, and run at the ring by day, “in all which exercises he acquitted himself divinely”. He spoke English, French and Latin, understood Italian, and played almost every instrument. It was the prettiest thing in the world to see him play tennis, “his fair skin glowing through a shirt of the finest texture”. On hearing that Francis I., his great rival, wore a beard, although it was not the English fashion, Henry allowed his own to grow, and as it was of a reddish colour, he is described as having “gotten himself a beard that looks like gold”.[5] “Is the King of France as tall as I am?” he asked of Pasqualigo, the Venetian envoy to the French Court, who had special instructions to bring about a friendship between Henry and Francis, who was the sworn ally of the Republic of Venice. Pasqualigo answered diplomatically, that there was little difference in height between them, although Henry was in reality much taller than Francis. “Is he stout?” The envoy replied that he was not. “What sort of legs has he?” “Spare,” answered Pasqualigo guardedly; upon which Henry opened the front of his doublet, clapped his hand on his thigh, and exclaimed: “Look here, I have a good calf to my leg”.[6] Pasqualigo was to return to France, and before his departure, Henry took part in a tournament, in which he is declared to have looked “like St. George on horseback”. Sagudino adds slyly, “the king exerted himself to the utmost, that Pasqualigo might make a good report of his prowess to Francis,” and he “never saw so beautiful a sight”.[7]