The King seems to have had an idea that he might by his personal persuasion bring his unaccommodating wife to a more reasonable frame of mind. He and Wolsey had been intensely annoyed that she had learnt so promptly of the plot against her, but since some spy had told her, it was as well, thought Henry, that she should see things in their proper light. With a sanctimonious face he saw her on the 22nd June 1527, and told her how deeply his conscience was touched at the idea that they had been living in mortal sin for so many years. In future, he said, he must abstain from her company, and requested that she would remove far away from Court. She was a haughty princess--no angel in temper, notwithstanding her devout piety; and she gave Henry the vigorous answer that might have been expected. They were man and wife, as they had always been, she said, with the full sanction of the Church and the world, and she would stay where she was, strong in her rights as an honest woman and a queen. It was not Henry's way to face a strong opponent, unless he had some one else to support him and bear the brunt of the fight, and, in accordance with his character, he whined that he never meant any harm: he only wished to discover the truth, to set at rest the scruples raised by the Bishop of Tarbes. All would be for the best, he assured his angry wife; but pray keep the matter secret.[42] Henry did not love to be thwarted, and Wolsey, busy making ready for his ostentatious voyage to France, had to bear as best he might his master's ill-humour. The famous ecclesiastical lawyer, Sampson, had told the Cardinal that the marriage with Arthur had never been consummated; and consequently that, even apart from the Pope's dispensation, the present union was unimpeachable. The Queen would fight the matter to the end, he said; and though Wolsey did his best to answer Sampson's arguments, he was obliged to transmit them to the King, and recommend him to handle his wife gently; "until it was shown what the Pope and Francis would do." Henry acted on the advice, as we have seen, but Wolsey was scolded by the King as if he himself had advanced Sampson's arguments instead of answering them. Katharine did not content herself with sitting down and weeping. She despatched her faithful Spanish chamberlain, Francisco Felipe, on a pretended voyage to a sick mother in Spain, in order that he might beg the aid of the Emperor to prevent the injustice intended against the Queen; and Wolsey's spies made every effort to catch the man, and lay him by the heels.[43] She sent to her confessor, Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, begging for his counsel, he being one of the bishops who held that her marriage was valid; she "desired," said Wolsey to the King, "counsel, as well of strangers as of English," and generally showed a spirit the very opposite of that of the patient Griselda in similar circumstances. How entirely upset were the King and Wolsey by the unexpected force of the opposition