Before these instructions reached London, Northumberland’s house of cards had fallen. His son, Henry Dudley, had in vain prayed for help from the King of France; but the latter was now at grips with the Emperor and dared not send troops to England, where the dread and hatred of the French was one of the principal reasons of Northumberland’s fall. The Duke himself was hopeless and helpless at Cambridge, ready to save his unworthy skin by throwing up his bonnet and crying, “Long live Queen Mary!” when in spite of him the Princess he had just declared a bastard was acclaimed Queen; whilst the miserable Councillors he had coerced into being his tools in London were tumbling over each other in their anxiety to disclaim him and betray the unhappy girl whom his ambition was to lead to an untimely death. On the 19th July the Earl of Shrewsbury and Dr. Mason came to the Imperial ambassadors in a very contrite mood. There was no talk of their embassy being ended now, no haughty reproaches for their supposed support to the bastard Lady Mary. After much hemming and hawing, the deputation of the Council announced to Renard and his colleagues that they came with glad news, which they thought would be welcome to the Emperor. All that the Council had done previously had been under the coercion of the wicked Duke of Northumberland, whom they repudiated. They now all acknowledged Mary as their true Sovereign, and they had decided to proclaim her publicly that day in London. To the delight of the Imperial envoys, but still apparently to their bewildered surprise at the failure of all their predictions, Mary was proclaimed both in the Tower and the City amidst the frantic joy of the people. Bonfires blazed, feasts were spread, wine ran freely in London,[9] and coins galore were scattered; for the rightful Queen had come into her own at last, whilst the “nine-days’ Queen”—the poor fated girl in the grim fortress that had been her only palace—found herself a prisoner instead of a potentate; and the cowardly craven whose tool she had been was basely striving to win mercy, if not favour, from the proud Princess whom he had injured beyond forgiveness.