In the meantime the Queen definitely made up her mind that she would marry Philip, and was extremely indignant when the Commons petitioned her to wed, but not to wed a foreigner. So far, parliament at any rate did not ratify the Spanish connexion, though the Lords--including Gardiner--had practically lost all hope of resisting it, and were giving their attention to introducing into the treaty stipulations for the safe-guarding of English interests.
Enough however had been done to raise the anti-Spanish sentiment to a painful pitch; the national nerves being already over-strung with excitement and uncertainty as to the coming course of events, deliberately aggravated by the subtle manipulation of the French ambassador. The marriage treaty was signed on January 12th: within a week, there was a rising in Devon--the Courtenay country--a premature movement in the great conspiracy known as Wyatt's rebellion. The leaders were all strong protestants, and it is likely enough that fear of the reaction was with them the primary motive; but their cry was anti-Spanish, not anti-Catholic, they appealed to the national not the religious sentiment. The rising in Devon forced the hand of the other conspirators, before they were really ready to act. Suffolk, pardoned for his share in Northumberland's plot, ill requited the Queen's clemency by an attempt--futile though it was--to raise the Midlands; but for a time it seemed that Sir Thomas Wyatt, who headed the rebellion in Kent--a county prolific of popular movements against the Government--might actually succeed in dethroning Mary.
Ostensibly, the cry was against foreigners. There is very little doubt that Wyatt really intended to marry Elizabeth to Courtenay, and set her on the throne. Whether Elizabeth herself, now twenty years of age, was in the plot, remains uncertain. There were suspicious circumstances, but no proofs, and Wyatt himself ultimately exonerated her. But the atmosphere was thick with suspicions which later historians have crystallised into facts according to their sympathies. Mary is charged with having desired her sister's death, but on insufficient evidence; [Footnote: Stone, _Mary I. Queen of England_, p. 270. The historian asserts Elizabeth's complicity without proof, while criticising Froude for inventing a proof of Mary's culpability.] double-dealing was not the Queen's way, and her behaviour towards her sister points rather to a desire to believe in her innocence coupled with something like a conviction of her actual guilt. Renard certainly did his best to blacken Elizabeth's character, even while he urged her arrest--a measure to which both Gardiner and Paget were opposed.