In the meanwhile Philip was doing well in Spain. He had raised both men and money in plenty to reinforce the emperor, and Alba himself was sent to command them. He pushed on vigorously the negotiations for his marriage with his Portuguese cousin, whose dowry would once more provide the sinews of war. But King John III. was less liberal with a dowry for his sister than he had been for his daughter, and the project hung fire month after month on this ground alone, notwithstanding the efforts of Ruy Gomez, who was sent by Philip to Portugal in June 1553 to persuade the king to loosen his purse strings and send his sister to Spain with a rich dowry. Then, almost suddenly, the whole aspect of affairs changed. It had been known for some time that the young King of England, Edward VI., was in failing health, and would probably die without issue, but the uncertain element in the situation had been the extent of the Duke of Northumberland’s power and the strength of Protestantism in the country. Hardly pressed as he was, Charles’s principal preoccupation with regard to England was to keep on good terms with it, although doubtless many a time his busy brain must have conjured up circumstances which would admit of fresh combinations being formed in which England should share. The events in Germany, the terms of the peace of Passau, and the unpopularity of Philip out of Spain, had convinced him that his dreams of ambition for his son in that direction were impossible of realisation. He must have seen also that the possessor of Flanders and Holland without the strength of the empire behind him, and with a covetous France on one flank and Protestant princes on the other, would be in an untenable position, unless he could depend upon England’s co-operation through thick and thin. This was the first manifestation of the evil results which logically followed his ill-starred action in attaching the dominions of the House of Burgundy permanently to the crown of Spain. Edward VI. died on July 7, 1553, and the popular acclamation of Mary and the complete collapse of Northumberland’s house of cards, caused a new departure in the emperor’s political plans. The hollow crown of the empire might go, with its turbulent Lutheran princes and its poor patrimony, but if only rich England could be joined in a lasting bond to Spain, then France would indeed be humbled, Flanders and Italy would be safe, the road to unlimited expansion by the Mediterranean would be open, and Spain could give laws to all Latin Christendom, and to heathendom beyond.