Note (Back to Main Text) — Chapter I · QUEEN JANE AND QUEEN MARY.

The men being thus collected, Suffolk was first thought of to lead them, or else Lord Grey de Wilton;[25] but Suffolk was inefficient, and his daughter could not bring herself to part with him; Grey was a good soldier, but he had been a friend of Somerset, and the duke had tried hard to involve him with Arundel and Paget in Somerset's ruin.[26] Northampton's truth could have been depended upon, but Northampton four years before had been defeated by a mob of Norfolk peasants. Northumberland, the council said, must go himself—"there was no remedy." No man, on all accounts, could be so fit as he; "he had achieved the victory in Norfolk once already, and was so feared, that none durst lift their weapons against him:"[27] Suffolk in his absence should command the Tower. Had the duke dared, he would have delayed; but every moment that he remained inactive added to Mary's strength, and whatever he did he must risk something. He resolved to go, and as the plot was thickening, he sent Sir Henry Dudley to Paris to entreat the king to protect Calais against Charles, should the latter move upon it in his cousin's interest.