44 THE GENTLE ART OF BLAZON 



Ogre King. Percy never got over it ; his married life 

 was one continued wrangle with a jealous woman. At 

 last, in one of their quarrels, he bade her hold her 

 peace, for she was no wife of his, in that, having been 

 betrothed to Anne Boleyn, any subsequent marriage 

 was illegal. The countess was but too well pleased to 

 hear of anything that might rid her of a husband she 

 hated. She laid the matter before her father; and 

 Northumberland (he had succeeded to the earldom in 

 1527) was summoned before the Privy Council to 

 explain the affair. 



Now King Henry had not waited until the slow 

 process of ecclesiastical law should rid him of poor 

 Katherine of Aragon. Decree of divorce was not pro- 

 nounced till May 1533, meanwhile he had secretly 

 married Anne Boleyn; wherefore Northumberland stood 

 in jeopardy of his head for high treason. He had no 

 nerve for the fruitless sacrifice, especially as Anne had 

 broken her troth to him. He escaped the scaffold by 

 denying his mistress upon the Holy Sacrament. 



Three years later King Henry had the devilish cruelty 

 of naming him as one of seven-and-twenty peers to try 

 Queen Anne upon a disgraceful charge. Her uncle, 

 the Duke of Norfolk, was president of the court, and 

 flinched not from carrying the bloody farce to a con- 

 clusion. But Northumberland could not sit it out. 

 When Anne rose to defend herself, he quailed before 

 her defiant glance, and hurriedly left the court, ' com- 

 pelled by sudden illness,' as the Venetian ambassador 

 had the charity to report. Thus did this feeble earl 

 avoid the awful ordeal of condemning to the scaffold 



