Chapter I: Preface

Anyone who writes the life of Mary Tudor, daughter of Henry VII., must owe a debt of gratitude to Mrs Everett Green, who first drove a wedge through the mass of documents dealing with the subject. Since that date, however, new evidence has come to light and fresh readings of mutilated documents have been possible. Here and there a detail has been verified, nothing in itself, but when fitted in suggesting a new meaning to the whole; for this romantic history, dealing as it does with personal detail, is a very jig-saw puzzle. The date of the princess's birth, now at last definitely ascertained, is one of these details; the fact that in France she was twice married to Charles Brandon is another; and, to give a third instance, the detailed evidence shows that in the question of the dismissal of her English train from the French Court, Mary was as much sinner as sinned against. But after all is said, the difference between a book written fifty years ago, and one of to-day lies not so much in the matter newly discovered, as in the method of handling the same documents, and in the present incorrigible habit of valuing personality above ceremony, in this case looking for the woman in the princess and finding her. So while fifty years ago Princess Mary "penned many epistles," now she writes letters; then "she was advanced to maternal honours," now her first child is born. It all means the same thing set to differing measures. We jig along: they walked solemnly.

My thanks are due in no small measure to Miss A. M. Allen and to Mr P. C. Allen for their careful and friendly help, and to the Librarian of Exeter College and the officials of the Record Office for their courtesy.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I

PAGE

CHILDHOOD AND BETROTHAL TO CHARLES OF CASTILE 1

CHAPTER II

EUROPEAN COMPLICATIONS 25

CHAPTER III

A CAMPAIGN AND A COURTSHIP 48

CHAPTER IV

THE DUCHESS REPUDIATES HER SUITOR AND THE PRINCESS
BREAKS HER CONTRACT 72

CHAPTER V

BETROTHAL TO LOUIS XII. OF FRANCE 93

CHAPTER VI

QUEEN OF FRANCE 119

CHAPTER VII

THE ENGLISHMEN IN PARIS 139

CHAPTER VIII

THE WHITE QUEEN AND THE DUKE. THE SECRET
MARRIAGE 148

CHAPTER IX

CONFESSION AND PENANCE 173

CHAPTER X

THE LOVERS COME HOME 200

CHAPTER XI

AFTERWARDS 219