At intervals during Anne's career her alleged betrothal to the Earl of Northumberland before her marriage (see p. 126) had been brought up to her detriment; and the poor hare-brained earl had foresworn himself more than once on the subject. He was dying now, but he was again pressed to say that a regular betrothal had taken place with Anne. But he was past earthly fear, and finally asserted that no contract had been made. Foiled in this attempt, Henry--or rather Cromwell--sent Cranmer to the Tower on the 16th May on his shameful errand: to lure the poor woman by hopes of pardon to confess the existence of an impediment to her marriage with the King. What the impediment was was never made public, but Anne's latest biographer, Mr. Friedmann, adduces excellent reasons for arriving at the conclusions that I have drawn, namely, that Mary Boleyn having been Henry's mistress, he and Anne were within the prohibited degrees of affinity for husband and wife; the fact that no marriage had taken place between Henry and Mary Boleyn being regarded as canonically immaterial.[164] In any case, the admission of a known impediment having been made by Anne, no time was lost. The next day, the 17th May, Cranmer sat, with Cromwell and other members of the Council, in his Primate's court at Lambeth to condemn the marriage that he himself had made. Anne was formally represented, but nothing was said on her behalf; and sentence was hurriedly pronounced that the King's marriage with Anne Boleyn had never been a marriage at all. At the same time order was sent to Sir William Kingston that the "concubine" was to suffer the last penalty on the following morning. When the sleepless night for Anne had passed, mostly in prayer, she took the sacrament with the utmost devotion, and in that most solemn moment swore before the Host, on her hopes of eternal life, that she had never misused her body to the King's dishonour.[165]