CHAPTER XVI

1594-1598

All through the year 1593 Lord Burghley’s agents in Spain had sent news of the powerful naval preparations being made at Pasages, Coruña, and elsewhere, and the war-party at home and abroad had strained every nerve to induce the Queen to assume the offensive. Raleigh,[611] Drake, and Hawkins supported Essex in his efforts; but the caution of “the Cecils,” the Queen, and the Lord Admiral restrained, as well as might be, the ardour of the forward party.

There were, indeed, many elements of danger near home which amply justified a cautious policy. James Stuart’s extraordinary lenity to the Catholic lords who had rebelled against him, and his known dallying with Spain and Rome, again suggested the possibility of a Spanish invasion of England over the Border, simultaneously with a rising of Catholics in England. The almost complete control of the coast of Brittany by the Spaniards, their recent seizure and fortification of a strong position in Brest harbour, and their continued intrigues in Ireland, all pointed to the aggressive policy against this country which Philip’s newly reorganised fleet enabled him to adopt. What would have caused but modified alarm to England a few years before, became much more terrible now that Henry IV. had become a Catholic and was making peace with the League. Elizabeth and her trusted advisers, therefore, kept Drake and Hawkins at home, and with the exception of sending Frobisher and Norris in the autumn of 1594 to oust the Spaniards from Brest harbour,[612] stood on the defensive.

Essex, often in temporary disgrace with the Queen, headstrong and inexperienced, was no match in diplomacy for Robert Cecil, fortified by the experience and sagacity of his father; but he had enlisted in his service some of the cleverest and most unscrupulous spies and agents to aid him. Wherever the Queen had an ambassador, or the Cecils an agent, Essex also had a man to represent his interest. Every envoy that came from James Stuart or Henry IV. to ask for aid which the Cecils considered it imprudent to give under the circumstances, was received by Essex and his friends with open arms; and counter intrigues were carried on through them against the policy of Lord Burghley. In Scotland, Holland, and France, it was Essex who posed as the friend at the expense of the Cecils.[613]

It had been to a considerable extent owing to the diplomacy of Antonio Perez that Henry IV. had decided to come to terms with the League, in order that the united forces of France might be opposed to the Spaniards. It was now Perez’s secret mission from the French King, with the aid of Essex, to exacerbate English feeling against Spain nationally, and to pledge Elizabeth to help him against the common enemy, independently of the question of religion. This would have been a distinct departure from the traditional policy of England, which had usually been to stand aloof whilst the two great rivals were fighting; and only the attachment of the King of France to the Protestant cause had for a time altered this policy. Elizabeth’s interests in France, now that Henry was a Catholic, were limited to preventing the permanent establishment of the Spanish power on the north coast opposite England, and to that end the Cecils directed their efforts. This, however, did not satisfy Essex and the war-party; and the persistent plots of the English Jesuits in Spain and Flanders[614] added constant fuel to the flame, which Perez so artfully fanned from Essex House.[615]

An opportunity occurred late in 1593 by which some of the instruments of the Cecils might be discredited, and a fresh blow dealt at the policy of cautious moderation. Many of the Portuguese gentlemen who surrounded the pretender, Don Antonio, had for years sold themselves both to Philip and to England—and played false to both. It has been seen that Lord Burghley’s network of secret intelligence, under the management of Phillips, was extremely extensive; and, amongst others, several of these Portuguese were employed.[616] The most popular physician in London at the time was Dr. Ruy Lopez, a Portuguese Jew, the Queen’s physician, who was frequently employed by Burghley as an intermediary with the spies, in order to avert suspicion from them. On several occasions suggestions had been made to Philip by these spies of plans to kill the pretender, and Lopez’s name had been mentioned to the Spanish Government as one who would be willing to undertake the task of poisoning him.

In 1590 one Andrada had been discovered in an act of treachery against Don Antonio, and arrested in England, and a letter of his to Mendoza had been intercepted, in which he said that he had won over Lopez to the cause of Spain. In another letter, not intercepted, he gave particulars of a proposal of Lopez to bring about peace between England and Spain, if a sum of money was paid to him. Through the influence of Lopez, however, Andrada was liberated, and sent abroad as a spy in the interests of England. Thenceforward for three years secret correspondence was known, by Lord Burghley, to be passing between Spanish agents in Flanders and Spain, and Dr. Lopez, through Andrada and others. The intermediaries were all double spies and scoundrels who would have stuck at nothing, and were so regarded by Lord Burghley; but Lopez was thought to be above suspicion, and to be acting solely in English interests. He had, however, made an enemy of Essex; and Perez artfully wheedled some admissions from him that he was in communication with Spanish agents about some great plan. In October 1593, Gama, one of the agents, was, at Essex’s suggestion, arrested in Lopez’s house and searched. The letters found upon him were enigmatical, but suspicious. Then another agent named Tinoco, with similar communications and bills of exchange in his pocket from Spanish ministers, was laid by the heels. Essex, prompted by Perez, was indefatigable in the examination of the men. They lied and prevaricated—for it is certain that they were paid by both sides; but one of them mentioned Dr. Lopez as being interested in some compromising papers found upon him, and suddenly on the 30th January the Queen’s physician was arrested. He was immediately carried to Cecil House in the Strand, and there examined by the Lord Treasurer, Sir Robert Cecil, and Essex.[617]

His answers seemed satisfactory to the Cecils, whose agent Lopez was, but did not please Essex. The Earl, however, was forestalled by Robert Cecil, who posted off to Hampton Court and assured Elizabeth of the physician’s innocence. Whilst he was assuring her that the only ground for the accusation—which had now assumed the form of a plot to murder the Queen—arose from the Earl’s hatred of Lopez, Essex was endeavouring to strengthen the proofs against the accused. When the Earl appeared at court the Queen burst out in a fury against him, called him a rash and temerarious youth to bring this ruinous accusation of high treason against her trusty servant from sheer malice, and told him that she knew Lopez was innocent, and her honour was at stake in seeing justice done. Gradually, however, the nets closed around the doctor. The Cecils did as much as they dared in his favour, but the presumptive evidence against him was too strong. The underlings competed with each other in the fulness of their confessions against Lopez, in hope of favour for themselves; and at length some sort of confession was said to have been wrung from Lopez himself,[618] Robert Cecil, with horror, was forced to admit his belief that he was guilty,[619] and Lopez and his fellow-criminals were executed at Tyburn early in June.[620] This, together with the simultaneous declaration of other Spanish Jesuit plots against the Queen, and the activity of Perez’s venomous pen, aroused a feeling of perfect fury against Philip and his country.

All eyes looked to Drake and the sailors again to punish Spain upon the sea. Talk of great expeditions to America, to the Azores, to Spain itself, ran from mouth to mouth. What had been done with impunity before, might, said the Englishmen, be done again, even though the King of France had become a Papist and was unworthy of English help. But the Queen was in one of her timid moods, and the Cecils held the reins tightly. Essex remained sulking or in disgrace for the greater part of the summer, and, we learn from a letter from Sir Thomas Cecil to his brother, only became ostensibly reconciled with the Lord Treasurer in August.

Little of the routine business passed through Lord Burghley’s hands now, thanks to the activity of his son, but we get a glance occasionally at the aged minister from friends and foes who visited him. In the latter category we may place the spy Standen, a place-hunter and double traitor, who had fastened himself upon Essex, and yet was for ever pestering Burghley for an appointment. Sometimes the Lord Treasurer pretended to forget who he was, sometimes he gravely and politely expressed his regret at his inability to help him; but on one occasion, at least, he let him know that as he had joined Essex he must expect nothing from him. Standen was hanging about Hampton Court in the spring, and when the Queen had left, thinking the Lord Treasurer would be less busy than usual, “he stepped into his Lordship’s bedchamber, and found him alone sitting by the fire.” After some compliments, the place-hunter, for the hundredth time, set forth his claims. Burghley replied as before, that Standen was in England for a long time after his return from abroad without even coming to salute him. Standen said he had been ill with ague; “but,” said the minister, “you have been about the court all the winter and must have had some good days. And,” he asked, “how is it I have not seen the statement the Queen told you to draw up about Spain and to hand to me?” Standen hemmed and ha’d, but at last had to confess that he had given the statement to Essex for the Queen six months before. “Then my Lord began to start in his chair, and to alter his voice and countenance from a kind of crossing and wayward manner which he hath, into a tune of choler,”[621] and told the spy that since he had begun with the Earl of Essex he had better go on with him, and hoped him well of it. Then angrily telling him some home-truths about his conduct, the Lord Treasurer dismissed the spy; though for the rest of the great minister’s life he was not free from his importunities.

It was not often that Lord Burghley thus exhibited anger, even to a man like Standen. We seem to know the aged statesman better in the following pathetic little word-picture contained in a letter from his faithful secretary, Sir Michael Hicks, to Sir Robert Cecil[622] (27th September): “My Lord called me to him this evening, and willed me to write to you in mine own name, to signify to you that the Judge of the Admiralty came hither to him a little before supper time, to let him understand that he was not furnished with sufficient matter to meet the French Ambassador, and required five or six days’ further respite … wherewith he (Burghley) was well contented … for at the time of his coming to him he found himself ill, and not fit to hear and deal in suits, and he doth so continue. And truly, methinks, he is nothing sprighted, but lying on his couch he museth or slumbereth. And being a little before supper at the fire, I offered him some letters and other papers, but he was soon weary of them, and told me he was unfit to hear suits. But I hope a good night’s rest will make him better to-morrow.”[623]

But though the great statesman was nearing his end, his mind was as keen as ever, and his influence was strong enough to prevent Essex from dragging England into an offensive war with Spain for the benefit of Henry IV. The Béarnais had still to cope with rebellion in various parts of his realm, and the Spaniards had secured a firm footing in Picardy and Brittany; his finances were in the utmost disorder, and against the advice of Sully he declared a national war against Philip in January. He had clamoured and cajoled in vain for more aid from Elizabeth, and in his pressing need had appealed with more success to the Hollanders.

This was the last straw. All the old distrust of the Burghley school against the French revived. The Queen was furious that these ingrate Dutchmen, whom she alone had rescued from the Spanish tyranny, should now curry favour with France. They owed her vast sums of money and eternal gratitude, they had offered her the sovereignty of their States, and yet instead of paying their debts and releasing some of her forces occupied in their service, they must needs seek fresh friends. If possible she was more indignant still with Henry; for, as we have seen, one of the two pivots upon which English policy turned was to exclude French influence in the Low Countries. Thomas Bodley was sent back to the States with reproaches for their ingratitude, and a peremptory demand that they should pay her what they owed her. Before he left England, however, he also was gained by Essex, and notwithstanding Burghley’s and the Queen’s strict instructions, was far more careful to provide excuses for the States than to press them.[624] Henry IV., too, never ceased to declare that unless much more English help was sent to him, the north of France would slip from his grasp whilst he was busy in the south; and in the autumn, point was given to his warning by the treacherous surrender of Cambray to the Spaniards. This was a direct danger to England, and Henry made the most of it by sending a special envoy to demand fresh English aid. But still Burghley was against violent measures, for a great Spanish fleet was being fitted out in Galicia, and Tyrone’s rebellion in Ireland was being actively promoted by Philip. Defence, as usual, was the first thought of the Lord Treasurer; and disabled as he was, he drew up in the autumn a complete scheme for the protection of the country against invasion.[625]

But though Elizabeth would not commence offensive warfare against Spain, she was induced to listen at last to Drake’s oft-rejected prayer for permission to raise a powerful privateer squadron to capture prizes and raid Panama. This was what people wanted. Drake’s name had not lost its magic, and volunteers joined in thousands, eager for fighting and loot under the great admiral. The ports of Spain and Portugal were panic-stricken at the mere prospect of a visit, and if the fleet had sailed promptly in the spring, Philip might have been crippled again. But the Queen and Burghley were still apprehensive, and loath to let Drake sail too far away. Suddenly on 23rd July four Spanish pinnaces landed 600 soldiers on the Cornish coast, and without resistance they ravaged and burnt the country round Penzance. It was a mere predatory raid from the Brittany coast; but it seemed to justify all Elizabeth’s fears, and, to Drake’s despair, she forbade him to go direct to Panama. He was, she said, to cruise about the Channel and Ireland for a month, then to intercept any fleet from Spain that might threaten, and finally to lay in wait for the Spanish treasure flotilla before he crossed the Atlantic. The orders doubtless originated from Howard, who was as cautious as Burghley himself; but Drake and his officers flatly refused to obey them. They had, they said, on the Queen’s commission fitted out at vast expense a private fleet for a certain purpose, and it was utterly inappropriate to the service now demanded of it. The Queen was angry, and, as usual, called upon Burghley to refute the strategical arguments of the sailors, which he did in a learned minute. But it was never sent, for Drake was obviously in the right, and the Queen was obliged to give way. She made Drake pledge his honour to be back in England again in the following May to fight the new Armada, and, on the 28th August, Drake and Hawkins sailed out of Plymouth to failure and death.

All through the year, with but short intervals of comparative ease, Lord Burghley remained ill, but manfully determined to perform his duty. His letters to his son, written, of course, with greater freedom than to others, disclose more of his private feelings than we have been able to see at any earlier period of his career. Both in these letters and those of his secretaries the note touched is intense devotion to the public service at any cost to his own repose. Maynard writes to Sir Robert Cecil (23rd December 1594) that the sharp weather had increased the Lord Treasurer’s pain. “But for your coming hither his Lordship says you shall not need, although you shall hear his amendment is grown backward.” A few months later at Theobalds, Clapham sends to Sir Robert very unfavourable news of the invalid, and in the following month of May we find him confined to his bed at Cecil House in London, suffering greatly, and fretting at his inability to go to court. In the autumn he tells his son that he is obliged to sign his letters with a stamp, “for want of a right hand”; but even then he concludes his letter thus—“And if by your speech with her Majesty she will not mislike to have so bold a person to lodge in her house, I will come as I am (in body not half a man, but in mind passable) to the muster of the rest of my good Lords, her Majesty’s Councillors, my good friends.… Upon your answer I will make no unnecessary delay, by God’s permission.”[626] In the midst of his pain his letters are full of directions upon State matters. In a letter to Cecil in October, urging the Queen to send prompt reinforcements to Ireland, which apparently she was inclined to neglect, he says, “My aching pains so increase that I am all night sleepless, though not idle in mind.”[627]

That the Lord Treasurer’s bodily weakness and overpowering political influence were recognised elsewhere than in England as a powerful factor in the international situation, is evident from the correspondence—amongst many others—of the Venetian Ambassador in France. Henry had gone north, and was besieging La Fère, in Picardy, in the late autumn, after the fall of Cambray, and had sent his agent Lomenie to England to support the efforts of Essex in his favour. But the Earl was in semi-disgrace, and the French agent went back with but small promises of aid. Henry was about to send a stronger envoy, Sancy, but Essex told him it would be useless, and the clever Béarnais, knowing best how to arouse Elizabeth’s jealousy, despatched Sancy to Holland. Thereupon the Venetian Ambassador writes to the Doge: “If Sancy went to England just now he would not find the Queen well disposed towards the policy of his Majesty (Henry IV.), not only on the grounds I have so often explained, but also because she does not approve of the conduct of the French ministers. The chief reason, however, is that there reigns a division in the councils of the Queen, and her two principal ministers are secretly in disaccord. One of these ministers, the Lord Treasurer, is very ill-disposed towards the crown of France, and uses all his influence to prevent the Queen from taking an active part in this direction. There is a strong suspicion that he has been bought by Spanish gold. The other nobleman, a prime favourite with the Queen, is of the contrary opinion, urging that every effort should be made to quench the fire in one’s neighbour’s house to prevent one’s own from being burnt. The Queen is in the greatest perplexity. The Lord Treasurer, in addition to his other arguments, urges the plea of economy, to which women are naturally more inclined than men. All the same, no efforts are being spared to dispose her mind, so that should Sancy go to England he may easily obtain all he asks for.”[628]

When it became evident that Henry was again appealing to the States, Elizabeth was forced to make a counter-move, and decided to send Sir Henry Unton to offer further English help, if certain French towns, especially Calais, were placed in her hands as security. It was clear that Henry neither could nor would agree to such terms, and probably the Queen and Burghley were quite aware of the fact; but upon Unton’s embassy Essex founded a regular conspiracy for the purpose of outwitting the Cecils and dragging England into war. Antonio Perez had already been sent back to France in July 1595, self-pitying and lachrymose at leaving the luxury of Essex House to follow a camp; but to be received in France almost with royal consideration, and to be welcomed once more as the bosom friend of the King. He betrayed everybody; but his real mission was to send alarming news to Essex as to Henry’s intentions, in order that Elizabeth might be frightened into an alliance with him to prevent his joining her enemies against her. Perez thought more of his own discomfort than of his English patron’s policy, and had to be brought to book more than once. The Earl sent Sir Roger Williams to upbraid him for not making matters more lively. “I am doing,” says the Earl, “what I can to push on war in England; but you! you! Antonio, what are you doing on that side?”

But when Unton went on his mission early in January 1596, a stronger ally than Perez was gained. He was entirely in Essex’s interests, and received secret instructions from the Earl.[629] Perez and Unton were to work together, of course without the knowledge of Sir Thomas Edmonds, the regular Ambassador, who was a “Cecil man.” Henry IV. was to be prompted to feign anger and indignation with England, and threaten to make friends with Spain. “He must so use the matter as Unton may send us thundering letters, whereby he must drive us to propound and to offer.” Perez, too, was to keep the game alive by assuring Essex that a treaty was on foot between France and Spain, and to reproach Essex for allowing Unton to be sent on such an errand as would mortally offend the King.

But the Cecils were too clever for Essex and Perez combined. One of Perez’s secretaries played him false, for which he was afterwards imprisoned in the Clink by Essex; and it is probable that the threads of the intrigue, all through, were in the hands of Burghley. In any case, there was no great change in Elizabeth’s policy,[630] and Unton himself died in France before his mission was complete (23rd March 1596). Only a few days afterwards news reached London that the Spaniards were marching on Calais. This, at all events, was calculated to arouse Elizabeth to

## action; and on Easter Sunday 1596 all the church doors in London were

suddenly closed during service, and there and then a number of the men-worshippers pressed for service. They were hurriedly armed and on the same night marched to Dover for embarkation under Essex. No sooner were the men on board and ready to sail than a counter order came from London. Essex was frantic, and wrote rash and foolish letters to the Queen and the Lord Admiral. He writes to Sir Robert Cecil on the same day: “O! pray get the order altered. I have written to the Queen in a passion. Pray plead for me, that I may not be disgraced by any one else commanding the succour whilst I have done the work. Pray do not show the Queen my letter to the Admiral; it is too passionate.”[631] Almost in sight of Essex, the day after this was written (14th), the citadel of Calais fell into the hands of the Spaniards, and Elizabeth found she had overreached herself.[632] When Unton had asked for Calais as the price of her help, the Béarnais had said, with his usual oath, that he would see it in the hands of the Spaniards first; and for once he had told the truth.

The blow to Elizabeth’s policy was undoubtedly a severe one, and a counter-stroke had to be delivered. The old project which on several occasions had been submitted by Howard to the Council for an attack upon the shipping in Cadiz harbour, was revived. Essex was all aflame in the business from the first; but the Queen changed her mind from day to day. “The Queen,” wrote Reynolds in May,[633] “is daily changing her humour about my Lord’s voyage, and was yesterday almost resolute to stay it, using very hard words of my Lord’s wilfulness.” Lord Burghley appears to have been very ill at the time of the preparations;[634] but he was sufficiently well to secure the appointment of the aged Lord Admiral to the joint command of the fleet, to the discontent, and almost despair, of Essex; and to pen an order from the Queen strictly limiting the objects of the expedition to the destruction of the Spanish ships manifestly intended for the invasion of England. The great fleet of 96 sail, with a contingent of 24 sail of Hollanders, left Plymouth on the 5th June, and on the 20th appeared before the astounded eyes of the citizens of Cadiz. The divided command, and the small experience of actual fighting at sea of Howard and Essex, was nearly bringing about a disaster to the English; but at a critical moment Ralegh’s advice was taken. The fleet sailed boldly into the harbour, and destroyed the shipping first, and then captured and sacked the city.

It was the greatest blow that had ever been dealt to the power of Spain; and it proved that Philip’s system was rotten, and that the Spanish pretensions were incapable of being sustained by force of arms. When Essex came back he found that Sir Robert Cecil had been appointed Secretary of State (July) in his absence.[635] The Queen was fractious, and offended that her orders had been exceeded, and above all, that she had not received so much booty as she expected; and for a time Essex was kept at arm’s length. But now that Cecil had obtained the coveted post of Secretary, he wisely endeavoured to make friends with Essex, who had so bitterly opposed him;[636] and, greatly to the Queen’s delight, a new appearance of cordiality between them was the result. Sir Robert even brought Ralegh into the circle of grace. He had been for five years under the Queen’s frown, but Cadiz had made him friendly with Essex, and now Cecil and Essex together brought about a reconciliation with the Queen. On the 2nd June 1597 Ralegh once more knelt before his royal mistress, and donned his long-neglected silver armour as captain of the guard.

The sacking of Cadiz had irretrievably ruined Philip’s prestige; but it had not deprived him of all material resources, heavy and ceaseless as had been the drain upon his treasury for the war in France. The Irish chiefs left him no peace from their importunities, and assured him again and again that with the aid of a few men the island might be his, and Elizabeth and the heretics at his mercy. Promises, sums of money, and slight succour were sent from time to time; but the insult of Cadiz and the exhortations of the Church, at length prevailed upon the King to attempt one great effort in Ireland to crush his enemy before swift approaching death struck him down. We understand now that such a system as his foredoomed to failure any attempt to organise promptly an efficient naval armament; for penury, peculation, delay, and ineptitude were the natural result of the minutest details being jealously retained in the hands of an overworked hermit hundreds of miles away from the centre of activity. But in England the news of his intentions caused far greater apprehension than we now know that they deserved; and Essex was again all eagerness to take out another fleet, and repeat elsewhere the _coup_ of Cadiz.

This time he found no obstacles raised by the Cecils. In a biography of Lord Burghley, it is not necessary to probe the vexed question of the sincerity of Sir Robert Cecil’s reconciliation with Essex. Most inquirers of late years have assumed, with some show of justification, that it was from the first a deep-laid plot of Cecil, perhaps with Ralegh’s co-operation, to ruin the Earl, as in its results it certainly did. But without admitting this, or at least implicating Burghley himself in such a plan,[637] it may fairly be assumed that when Cecil saw how smoothly things went for him, and how soon he obtained the Secretaryship when Essex was absent, he may have welcomed any opportunity of again getting rid of so turbulent and quarrelsome a colleague.[638] The earl’s pride and jealousy had also taken from him much of the Queen’s regard, and she was determined to humble or to break him. The first project had been to raise a small expedition under Ralegh and Lord Thomas Howard to intercept the Spanish treasure fleets; but when it became known that the Adelantado of Castile was making ready a fleet of 100 ships and a powerful army in the Galician ports, Essex proposed a great enlargement of the plan. He was authorised to raise a force of 120 ships, the Dutchmen were induced to send a strong contingent, and with infinite labour Essex and Ralegh induced the Queen to consent to their plan for burning the Spanish fleet, in port or wherever they could find it, and then to intercept and capture the homeward-bound flotillas from the East and West Indies.

Lord Burghley’s attitude is seen by a cordial letter he wrote to Essex early in May (State Papers, Domestic). “I thank you,” he says, “for not reproving my objections for the resolutions for conference. I hope to see you at Court to-morrow, if God by over-great pains do not countermand me. _I like so well to attempt something against our Spanish enemy that I hope God will prosper the purpose._”

The fleets gathered in Plymouth Sound early in July, and sailed in three fine squadrons under Essex, Thomas Howard, and Ralegh respectively.[639] On the day he sailed unsuspecting Essex in the fulness of his heart wrote a fervent letter of thanks to Cecil.[640] He would, he said, never forget his kindness whilst he lived; “and if I live to return, I will make you think your friendship well professed.” Unfortunately he returned sooner than he expected, for the fleets were caught in a storm and driven back with much suffering and danger. Famine and sickness broke out, and for a whole month the fleets were wind-bound in the Channel, whilst the Queen began to waver about allowing her ships and men to be exposed again so late in the season. Once more the aged Lord Treasurer wrote to Essex on his return (July 23), “It is not right that I should condole with you for your late torment at sea, for I am sure that would but increase your sorrow, and be no relief to me. I am but as a monoculus, by reason of a flux falling into my left eye; and you see the impediment by my evil writing and short letter.… In the time of this disaster I did by common usage of my morning prayer on the 23rd of every month, in the 107th Psalm, read these nine verses proper for you to repeat, and especially six of them, which I send to you. This letter savours more of divinity. As for humanity, I refer you to the joint-letter from the Lord Admiral, myself, and my son.”[641]

Essex and Ralegh posted to London early in August and prayed the Queen to let them resume their voyage. “Only,” said Essex, “allow me to take half the ships and to do as I please where I like, and I will perform a worthy service.” But the Queen would not hear of such a thing, nor should they with her permission enter any Spanish port at all. At last, as a compromise, she consented to Ralegh’s sending a few fire-ships into Ferrol, on condition that Essex was to keep quite away from the enterprise; and to be sure she should be obeyed, she insisted upon the soldiers being left at home. At length, on the 17th August, the truncated expedition again sailed. Disaster, jealousy and division dogged it from the first. Another great storm drove the squadrons asunder. The winds prevented them from approaching Ferrol. Ralegh, under a misunderstanding, attacked Fayal, in the Azores, in the absence of Essex, and the sycophants around the Earl bred evil blood between them. The main body of the flotillas from the Indies escaped them; and eventually Essex, with his ships battered and disabled, crept into Plymouth at the end of October, bringing with them hardly sufficient plunder to pay their expenses. Fortunately in their absence the Spanish fleet for the invasion of Ireland had also been driven back and practically destroyed by a storm, and all present danger from that quarter had disappeared.

Essex found that in his absence the Lord Admiral had been made Earl of Nottingham, which, in conjunction with his office, gave him precedence, and that Secretary Cecil had been made Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. The Earl was furious, and sulked at Wanstead instead of going to court; but the old Lord Treasurer was once more amiability itself—as well he might be, for his son was winning all along the line. On the 9th November he wrote to the Earl, “My writing manifests my sickness. Some of your friends say that the cause of your absence is sickness, so I send my servant to ascertain your health. I wish I could remedy any other cause of your absence; but writing will do no good. It requires another manner of remedy, in which you may command my service.”[642] And again, ten days later, “I hoped you would have come to court for the fortieth anniversary of her Majesty’s coronation. I hear, to my sorrow, that you have been really sick, but hope you will soon be back at court, where you shall find a harvest of business, needful for many heads, wits, and hands.”[643]

Although the young Earl obstinately absented himself from court, he seems to have sent a letter of thanks and friendship to Lord Burghley; for the latter on the 30th November writes expressing his joy at the Earl’s contentment, but chiding him for his continued absence, which he says is exposing him to “diversity of censures.” “I find,” he says, “her Majesty sharp to such as advise her to that which it were meet for her to do, and for you to receive. My good Lord, overcome her with yielding without disparagement of your honour, and plead your own cause with your presence; whereto I will be as serviceable as any friend you have, to my power—which is not to run, for lack of good feet, nor to fight, for lack of good hands, but ready with my heart to command my tongue to do you due honour.”[644] At length, probably at the suggestion of Burghley, the angry Queen made Essex Earl-Marshal, which gave him precedence over Howard, and he came back to court sulky and quarrelsome, galled that cooler heads and keener wits than his could work their will in spite of him.

In the meanwhile the war between France and Spain was wearing itself out. Since the conversion of Henry IV. matters were gradually working back into their natural groove of nationalities instead of faiths. Philip was bankrupt in purse, broken in spirit, and already on the brink of the grave; but the awful sacrifices his ruined country had made had at least prevented France from becoming a Protestant country. He was leaving Flanders to his beloved daughter Isabel, and wished to bequeath to her peace as well. By Henry’s treaty with England and the United Provinces two years before he had bound himself to make common cause with them against the King of Spain; but the main cause of his own quarrel with Spain had nearly disappeared, for the Leaguers were now mostly on his side, and for a year past the Pope (Clement VIII.) had been busy trying to bring about a reconciliation between the two great Catholic powers. The pontiff assured Henry that he was not bound to keep faith with heretics, and might break the treaty with Elizabeth and Holland. “I have,” replied the Béarnais, “pledged my faith to the Queen of England and the United Provinces. How could I treat to their detriment, or even fail in a single point, without betraying my duty, my honour, and my own interests? No pretext would excuse such baseness and perfidy, and if it could, sooner than avail myself of it I would lose my life.”

But when, in the autumn of 1597, the Spaniards were finally routed at Amiens, it was evident that Spain could fight no longer, and that the moment for peace had come. The Archduke, who was to marry the new sovereign of Flanders, was especially anxious for peace before the Spanish King died, and at his instance advances to Henry were made. This was the last great international question in which Burghley was personally interested, and by a curious coincidence it brought once more to the front the traditional English policy, of which he was the representative; a policy which had for many years past been broken and interrupted by the religious position on the Continent. The growing power and ambition of the Dutch United Provinces, and their aid sent to Henry IV. against Spain, together with Henry’s conversion to Catholicism, had once more aroused the fear of England that by an arrangement between them the French might dominate Spanish Flanders. The project of making the Infanta and her husband practically independent sovereigns of the Belgic provinces was therefore eminently favourable to English interests, and drew England once more irresistibly to the side of Spain, as against the Dutchmen and Henry IV.; for the possession of Flanders by the French (or now even by the strong pushing young Republic under French influence) was one of the two eventualities against which for centuries the traditional policy of England had been directed. Coincident, therefore, with Henry’s negotiations, secret approaches were made by England to the Archduke, and once more, after a half-century of fighting, England was smiling as of old on a “Duke of Burgundy,” as against a French King.[645]

In November Henry sent envoys to the States and to England to demand further aid, but with the alternative of a peace conference. The Dutchmen thought they had been betrayed, and indignantly said so; refusing absolutely to make peace with ruined, defeated Spain, except on their own terms, and in their own time. Elizabeth had far greater reason than they for indignation with her ally, and had to be approached more gently and with greater diplomacy. De Maisse, Henry’s envoy, arrived in London on the 2nd, and was received by the Queen on the 8th December. He found the Cecils absolute masters of the Council; for all of Burghley’s predictions of the falsity of Frenchmen had come true, and his objection to the treaty of alliance (May 1596) had been more than justified. Essex, only just returned to court from his sulky fit at Wanstead, took in earnest Henry’s demands for reinforcements against Spain, and was all for fighting again, whilst Burghley of course understood them to be only a mask for the peace suggestion. The Queen and Burghley were determined to assume indignation and grievance in order that, in the coming peace, they might get the best possible terms for England; indignant, however, as they might pretend to be, there was nothing they desired more than a pacification that should open all ports to English trade and leave Flanders in the hands of a modest, moderate sovereign under the guarantee of Spain. But withal it behoved them to walk warily, for Spain had outwitted them in the peace negotiations of 1588, and Protestant Holland could not be abandoned.

On the 8th December De Maisse was received in State by Elizabeth at Whitehall,[646] whither Lord Burghley was brought in a litter, but Essex was still absent. The Queen was enigmatical but polite, and referred the envoy to Lord Burghley, with whom he conferred on the 10th, when it became evident that the object of the English was to gain time whilst other negotiations were proceeding. The Queen exerted all her wiles and ancient coquetry on De Maisse to delay matters, and not without success; whilst she inflamed Caron, the envoy of the Dutch States, with hints of Henry’s desertion and perfidy, in order to embitter French relations with them.

At length Henry IV. got tired of this buckler play, and De Maisse plainly told Elizabeth that the King considered that her delay in giving him a definite answer released him from his pledges under the treaty of alliance. Again he was referred to Burghley, whom he saw again early in January. The Queen could not treat with the Archduke, said the Treasurer. If her envoys were to attend a peace conference, it could only be with the representatives of the King of Spain; besides, he said, the Queen must settle with States before she entered into any negotiations at all. It was well known to Henry and his minister at this time that brisk secret negotiations were being conducted between Elizabeth and the Archduke; and in a final interview with Burghley on 10th January, De Maisse gave him an ultimatum. His master must make peace or be supported in war. Essex was present at the interview; and although the Lord Treasurer invited him to speak he remained obstinately silent, except to say that he did not see how religious dissensions would allow of peace being made with Spain.

At length Burghley announced that the Queen would send an embassy to France to settle with Henry the whole question of peace or war, in conjunction with an embassy from the States. The embassy consisted of Sir Robert Cecil, Sir Thomas Wilkes, and Dr. Herbert; and the instructions taken by them are contained in the last of the important State papers written by the failing hand of the great statesman. The document is a long and sagacious one, laying down as an absolute condition of any peace with Spain that the United Provinces should be secured from all fear of future attempts to subdue them. An earnest desire for peace breathes all through the document, but it must be a real peace, which acknowledged accomplished facts, abandoned inflated claims, and recognised the rights of Protestantism to equal treatment.

Cecil and his companions embarked from Dover on the 17th February, and on the death of Wilkes in Rouen, the whole burden of the embassy fell upon the Secretary. It was not until they reached Angers on the 21st that Cecil saw the King. In effect the Béarnais had already made peace secretly with the Archduke; the States were determined that they would give up no tittle of their hard-won independence, and haughtily refused even a truce if their rights were not recognised. England dared not abandon them, so that Cecil on his interview with Henry could only reproach him for his desertion of the ally to whom he owed so much. Henry replied that his position was such that he could not do otherwise. “I am,” he said, “like a man clothed in velvet that hath no meat to put in his mouth.”[647]

On the 28th March Cecil received a letter from his father dated the 1st, which caused him deep alarm. “The bearer,” it said, “will report to you my great weakness. But do not take any conceit thereby to hinder your service; but I must send you a message delivered to me in writing by Mr. Windebanke. I make no comment, not knowing out of what shop the text is come, but in my opinion _non sunt ponendi rumores ante salutem_. God bless you in earth and me in heaven, the place of my present pilgrimage.”[648] Cecil unwillingly followed Henry to Nantes on his hollow errand; but this letter disturbed him, and at the earliest moment he took leave of France and returned, although on the way somewhat better news reached him. “Mr. Secretary returned the 1st of the month” (May), says Chamberlain, “somewhat crazed with his posting journey, the report of his father’s dangerous state gave him wings; but for aught I can learn the old man’s case is not so desperate but he may hold out another year well enough.”[649]

Before Cecil had left on his mission, greatly against his inclination, he had received a promise from Essex that during his absence he would not cause any alteration to be made either in policy or court affairs. The Earl had been as good as his word, and for a few days after Cecil’s return they were friendly; but when the Peace of Vervins was actually signed between Henry and Philip the old feud between the policies of peace and war broke out again. This was one of those junctures when France and Spain being friendly, it had always been the Burghley policy to draw closer to the latter power, whilst at the same time fortifying those who were opposing her; and this was the course adopted by the Cecils on the present occasion. Francis Vere was sent to Holland with promises and encouragement for the States to stand firm; whilst the Archduke in Flanders was secretly informed that the Queen desired peace, and would enter into negotiations if she were assured that her desires were reciprocated. This policy soon alienated Essex and the war-party, and after one stormy interview on the subject with the dying Lord Treasurer, the latter handed to the Earl a book of Psalms and silently pointed with his finger to the line, “Bloodthirsty men shall not live out half their days;” a last prophecy which the Earl’s pride and folly hastened to fulfil.[650]

All the summer the aged minister lingered sick unto death in his palace in the Strand, sometimes taking the air in a coach or litter, and on two occasions going as far as Theobalds. During the time his great yearning was to bring about a peace before he died between his mistress and the old enemy, who, in the bitterness of defeat, was dying too in the frowning mountains of the Guadarrama far away. For forty years these two men had striven as none ever strove before to maintain peace between England and Spain; and their efforts had been unavailing, for religious differences had for a time obliterated national lines of policy. But Burghley had had the supreme wisdom of bending before superior force and adapting his varying means to his unvarying objects. England thus had gained, whilst Philip, buoyed up with the fatuous belief in his divine power and inspiration, scorning to give way to considerations of expediency, had been ruined by war and had failed in most of his aims. And yet through the welter of wrong and slaughter, Providence had decreed that the objects that both men aimed at should not be utterly defeated. The alliance between the countries was needed both by Spain and England in order that Flanders should not fall into the hands of the French, and this at least had been attained. By England it was required to counterbalance a possible French domination of Scotland, and this had ceased to be a danger. On the side of Philip had been gained the point that France was still a Catholic country; whilst to England it was to be credited that Protestantism was now a great force which demanded equality with the older form of belief, and, above all, that England was no longer in the leading strings of France or Spain, but had, in the forty years of dexterous balance under Elizabeth and Burghley, attained full maturity and independence, with the consciousness of coming imperial greatness.

To say that this was all owing to the management of the Queen and her minister would be untrue. Circumstances and the faults and shortcomings of their rivals—nay, their own shortcomings and weaknesses as well—aided them powerfully to attain the brilliant success that attended them; but it may safely be asserted that without a man of Burghley’s peculiar gifts at her side Elizabeth would at an early period of her reign have lost the nice balance upon which her safety alone depended.

It was curious that the last hours of Burghley should have been occupied in striving still to bring about peace with Spain, which had been his object through life, though he had attained for England already most of the political advantages which a peace with Spain might bring; but old prejudices against France were still as strong as they had been in his youth, for, as he had truly foretold, the Béarnais had played them false, and thenceforward no Frenchman should ever be trusted again. Spain, in any case, would keep the false Frenchmen out of Flanders; so Spain was England’s friend.

For twelve days the Lord Treasurer lay in his bed at Cecil House before he died, suffering but slightly, and resigned, almost eager for his coming release. On the evening of the 3rd August he fell into convulsions, and when the fit had passed, “Now,” quoth he, “the Lord be praised, the time is come;” and calling his children, he blessed them and took his leave, commanding them “to love and fear God, and love one another.”[651] Then he prayed for the Queen, handed his will to his steward Bellot, turned his face to the wall, and died in the early hours of the next morning; decorous, self-controlled, and dignified to the last.

His death, though long expected, was a blow which the aged Queen felt for the rest of her life. She wept, and withdrew herself from all company, we are told, when she was informed of her loss;[652] and two years afterwards Robert Sidney, writing to Sir John Harrington, says, “I do see the Queen often; she doth wax weak since last troubles, and Burghley’s death doth often draw tears from her goodly cheeks.”

Even Essex, who had wrought so much against him, felt the loss the country had sustained. At the splendid funeral in Westminster Abbey[653] on the 29th August, we are told by an eye-witness that “my Lord of Essex to my judgment did more than ceremoniously show sorrow”;[654] and Chamberlain, writing on the next day, says, “The Lord Treasurer’s funeral was performed yesterday with all the rites that belonged to so great a personage. The number of mourners were above 500, whereof there were many noblemen, and among the rest the Earl of Essex, who (whether it were upon consideration of the present occasion or for his own disfavours), methought, carried the heaviest countenance of the company.”[655]

Throughout Europe the death of the Lord Treasurer was looked upon as a loss to the cause of peace. Essex, it was thought, would now hold sway and launch England upon a policy of warlike adventure. But Essex was himself hurrying to his doom; and Robert Cecil held firmly in his hand the strings of his great father’s policy—a policy which was on the death of the Queen to bring a Scottish king to the English throne, and unite England and Spain again in a friendly alliance. The baseness and trickery that accompanied the reunion of the countries belong to the history of the reign of James, and formed no part of the plan of Lord Burghley or his mistress. There was no truckling in their relations with foreign nations, however powerful they might be, and the servile meanness of the Stuarts in carrying out Lord Burghley’s traditions must be ascribed to their degeneracy rather than to the policy itself.

Of Lord Burghley’s place amongst great statesmen it may be sufficient to say that his gifts and qualities were exactly what were needed by the circumstances of his times. He was called upon to rule in a time of radical change, when vehement partisans on one side and the other were fiercely struggling for the mastery of their opinions. It is precisely in such times as these that the moderate, tactful, cautious man must in the end be called upon to decide between the extremes, and to prevent catastrophe by steering a middle course. This throughout his life was the function of William Cecil. His gifts were not of the highest, for he was not a constructive statesman or a pioneer of great causes. He often stood by and saw injustice done by extreme men on one or the other side rather than lose his influence by appearing to favour the opposite extreme; and, as we have seen in his own words, he was quite ready to carry out as a minister a policy of which as a Councillor he had expressed his disapproval. This may not have been high-minded statesmanship, but at least it enabled him to keep his hand upon the helm, and sooner or later to bring the ship of State back to his course again. He was a man whose objects and ideals were much higher than his methods, because the latter belonged to his own age, whereas the former were based upon broad truths and great principles, which are eternal. But it may safely be asserted that the rectitude of his mind and his great sense of personal dignity would prevent him from adopting any course for which warrant could not be found, either in the law of the land or what he would regard as overpowering national expediency. The first cause he served was that of the State; the second was William Cecil and his house. Through a long life of ceaseless toil and rigid self-control these were the mainsprings of his activity and devotion. If he was austere in a frivolous court, if bribes failed to buy him in an age of universal corruption, if he was cool and judicious amidst general vehemence, it was because the qualities of his mind and his strict self-schooling enabled him to understand that his country might thus be most effectively served, and that it would be unworthy of William Cecil to act otherwise. The gifts which made him a great minister at a period when moderation was the highest statesmanship, would have made him a great judge at any period, and it is in its judicial aspect that the finest qualities of his mind are discovered. It was to the keen casuist who weighed to a scruple every element of a question and saw it on every side; it was to the calm, imperturbable judge, that from the first hour of her reign Elizabeth looked to save her against herself; and whatever may be said of Cecil’s statesmanship in its personal aspect, it had the supreme merit of having kept the great Queen upon the straight path up which she led England from weakness, distraction, and dependence, to unity and strength.

FOOTNOTES

[1] “Sadler State Papers,” vol. i. p. 375.

[2] _Memoires sur les affaires d’Angleterre MS._ Bibliothèque Nationale. Colbert, 35.

[3] Naunton, in _Fragmenta Regalia_, says that he was personally acquainted with the senior branch of Cecil’s family in Herefordshire, which was of no mean antiquity: but he speaks of David Cecil, the statesman’s grandfather, as “being exposed, and sent to the city, as poor gentlemen used to do their sons, became to be a rich man on London Bridge, and purchased (an estate) in Lincolnshire, where this man (_i.e._ Sir William) was born.” Cecil’s enemies in his lifetime, especially Father Persons, spoke of David Cecil as having been an innkeeper at Stamford; but this is very improbable, though he may well have owned inns in the town, of which he was an alderman.

[4] The date of his death in the “journal” at Hatfield is given as 1536, and Collins states it to have happened in 1541, his will being proved in that year.

[5] Peck, _Desiderata Curiosa_.

[6] “Courtships of Queen Elizabeth.”

[7] That Cecil’s father was much displeased at his marriage is seen by a letter from Alford, his steward, at Burghley, after the death of Richard Cecil. Mrs. Cecil, the widow (to whom Burghley belonged), appears to have been an extremely self-willed old lady, and refused to exhibit her husband’s will to her son’s agents. In conversation with one of them, she said she knew that her husband had made a will (besides the one in her possession) touching his goods, when he went to Boulogne (_i.e._ 1544). Alford says: “Thinking this might have been about the time he conceived displeasure against you for your first marriage, I rode off immediately to the attorney who, according to Mrs. Cecil, held it, in order, if possible, to learn the contents of the will in your (Cecil’s) interests” (Alford to Cecil, 9th April 1553; Hatfield Papers).

[8] Perpetual Calendar MS., Hatfield.

[9] _Desiderata Curiosa._ This is confirmed by a letter at Hatfield from Griffin, the Queen’s attorney (27th April 1557), saying, “I am sorry that you never were of Gray’s Inne nor can skill of no lawe,” by which it is clear that Cecil was never called to the bar, and probably never seriously studied law.

[10] _Ibid._

[11] Roger Ascham, writing to Sturmius (August 1550), says: “But there are two English ladies whom I cannot omit to mention.… One is Jane Grey … the other Mildred Cooke, who understands and speaks Greek like English, so that it may be doubted whether she is most happy in the possession of this surpassing degree of knowledge, or in having for her preceptor and father Sir Anthony Cooke, whose singular erudition caused him to be joined with John Cheke in the office of tutor to the King; or finally, in having become the wife of William Cecil, lately appointed Secretary of State: a young man, indeed, but mature in wisdom, and so deeply skilled, both in letters and affairs, and endued with such moderation in the exercise of public offices, that to him would be awarded, by the consenting voice of Englishmen, the fourfold praise attributed to Pericles by his rival Thucydides: ‘To know all that is fitting, to be able to apply what he knows, to be a lover of his country, and superior to money.’”

[12] _Desiderata Curiosa_, and Camden.

[13] State Papers, Dom., 1547-80.

[14] _Ibid._, and Tytler.

[15] December 1547, Lansdowne MSS., 2, 16.

[16] _Diarium Expeditionis Scoticæ._

[17] _Desiderata Curiosa._

[18] This is the assertion made by Nares, but it is very questionably correct, as a letter dated 1st July 1548 from Sir Thomas Smith in Brussels (State Papers, Foreign) is addressed to Mr. Cecil, Master of Requests to the Lord Protector’s Grace, and a similar letter from Fisher at Stamford on the 27th July 1548 bears the same superscripture (State Papers, Dom.).

[19] Harl. MSS., 284.

[20] State Papers, Dom.

[21] State Papers, Dom., and also in Tytler.

[22] State Papers, Dom.

[23] The correspondence will be found in Ellis’s original letters, and State Papers, Dom., and also in Strype’s “Memorials.”

[24] Burnet.

[25] State Papers, Dom.: Northumberland to Cecil, 31st May 1552.

[26] This disposes of the suggestion that Cecil was Secretary of State at this time.

[27] See Correspondence, Lady Mary and the Council. “Foxe’s Acts and Monuments.”

[28] She afterwards became the third wife of Philip II. of Spain, 1560.

[29] State Papers, Dom.: Duchess of Suffolk to Cecil, 2nd October 1550.

[30] Or 1553, according to the Perpetual Calendar at Hatfield.

[31] Hatfield Papers.

[32] State Papers, Foreign.

[33] Hatfield Papers, part i., p. 88.

[34] _Desiderata Curiosa._

[35] King Edward’s Journal, printed in Burnet.

[36] There is, however, a memorandum in the Cotton MSS., Titus B 11, (printed in Ellis’s original letters) which proves that, though Cecil may not have been publicly prominent in the condemnation of Somerset, his acumen and diligence were, as usual, made use of to that end. The document is entirely written by Cecil, and is a list of fifteen questions to be put to Somerset in the Tower, all of them of a leading character and calculated to compromise the prisoner. In Cotton, Vesp. 171, will be found the minutes of the Council which discussed the execution of Somerset. Cecil has written thereon, as if to exonerate himself from all responsibility, that the minutes are in the King’s hand.

[37] State Papers, Dom.

[38] State Papers, Foreign.

[39] _Ibid._

[40] Strype.

[41] King Edward’s Journal (Burnet).

[42] In Sir William Cecil’s handwriting.

“_Question_:—

[Sidenote: 1552 Windsor. 23d Sep., 6ᵒ Ed. VI.]

“1. Whether the K. Mt̅i̅e̅ shall enter into the ayd of the Emperor.

“_Answer._ HE SHALL.

[Sidenote: _a pacto_]

“1. The Kyng is bound by the treaty, and if he will be helped by that treaty he must do the reciproque.

[Sidenote: _a periculo vitando_]

“2. If he do not ayde, the Emperor is like to ruyne and consequently the House of Burgundy come to the French possession, which is perilous to England, and herein the greatness of the French King is dreadfull.

[Sidenote: _Religio Chr̅i̅s̅ana_]

“3. The F. King bringeth the Turke into Chre̅n̅dome and therefore that exploit be stayed.

[Sidenote: _periculum violati pacti_]

“4. If the Emperor for extremitie should agree now with the F. the said perill were dooble grettur. First th’ Emperor’s offence for lacke of ayde. 2. The F. King’s enterprises towards us; and in this peace the bishop of Rome’s devotion towards us.

[Sidenote: _pro Republica et patria_]

“5. Merchants be so evill used that both for the losse of goods and honour some remedy must be sought.

[Sidenote: _pericula consequentia_]

“6. The F. Kynge’s procedings be suspisiose to the realm by breaking and burning of our shippes, which be the old strength of this isle.

“_Answer._ HE SHALL NOT.

[Sidenote: _difficile quasi impossibile_]

“1. The ayde is too chargeable for the cost, and almost impossible to be executed.

[Sidenote: _solitudo in periculis_]

“2. If the Emperor should dye in this confederacy we should be left alone in the warr.

[Sidenote: _amicorum suspitio vitanda_]

“3. It may be the German Protestants might be more offended with this conjunction with the Emperor, doubting their owne cause.

[Sidenote: _sperandum bene ab amicis_]

“4. The amytie with France is to be hooped will amende and continue and the commissioner’s coming may perchance restore.

“COROLLARIUM OF A MEANE WAY.

[Sidenote: _judicium_]

“1. So to helpe the Emperor as we maye also joine with other Christian princes and conspyre against the F. King as a common enemy to chr̅e̅dome.

“REASONS FOR COMMON CONJUNCTION.

[Sidenote: _auxilia communa_]

“1. The cause is common and therefore there will be more parties to it.

[Sidenote: _sumptus vitandi_]

“2. It shall avoyd the chargeable entry into ayde with the Emperor accordyng to the treaties.

[Sidenote: _amicorum copia_]

“3. If the Emperor should dye or breake off, yet it is most likely some of the princes will remayne so as the K. Mā shall not be alone.

[Sidenote: _dignitas causæ_]

“4. This friendship shall much advance the King’s other causes in Chre̅n̅dome.

[Sidenote: _pro fide et religione_]

“5. It shal be more honourable to breake with the F. Kyng for this common quarrel of Chre̅n̅dome.

“REASONS AGAINST THIS CONJUNCTION.

[Sidenote: _inter multos nihil secretum_]

“1. The treaty must be with so many parties that it can nether be spedely nor secretly concluded.

[Sidenote: _amiciæ irritatæ_]

“2. If the matter be revealed and nothing concluded then consider the F. Kyng’s offence, and so may he at his leisure be provoked to practice the like conjunction agaynste England with all the papists.

“The above is in Cecil’s handwriting. To it the young King himself has added in his own boyish hand.

“CONCLUSION.

1. “The treaty to be made wᵗʰ the Emperor and by the Emperor’s meanes wᵗʰ other princes.

“2. The Emperor’s acceptation to be understood before we treat anything against the F. King.”

After long reasoning it was determined to send to Mr. Morysine willing him to declare to the Emperor that “i haveing pitee as al other Christian princes should have on the envasion of Christendome by the Turkes would willingly joine with the Emperor and other states of the Empire if the Emp. could bring it to passe in some league against the Turke and his confederates but not to be knowen by the F. King … Morysine to say he hath no more commission but if the Emperor will send a man to England he shall know more. This was done on intent to get some friends. The reasonings be in my deske.”

[43] _Desiderata Curiosa._

[44] Nares.

[45] State Papers, Dom.

[46] Another remedy was a hedgehog stewed in rose-water.

[47] The office at first entailed considerable expense to him. In his diary there is an entry on 12th April, “Paid the embroiderer for xxxvi. schutchyns for my servants coats at iiˢ each. iiiˡ xiiˢ;” and in a letter (State Papers, Dom.) from Petre to Cecil he tells him that the “fashion of his robes” will be decided when _Garter_ comes to court.

[48] Strype regards the illness as being a diplomatic one, and I am inclined to side with him; but it is only fair to say that Cecil’s old friend Dr. Wotton, Ambassador in France, attributed it to overwork. He writes (State Papers, Foreign), 21st June: “Yow perceive yow must needes moderate your labour, your complexion being not strong ynough to continue as yow begone; and my Lords, I doubt not, will not be so unreasonable as to requyre more of yow than yow be able to do. A good parte of the labour which was wont to lye on the Clerkes of the Counsell’s hands is now turned to yow, whereof I suppose yow may easily disburden yourself. It is better to do so betimes than to repent the not doinge of it after, when it shalle be too late.”

[49] The ceremony took place at Durham House, in the Strand, which had been granted by Somerset as a town residence for the Princess Elizabeth, but which Northumberland had, much to Elizabeth’s indignation, exchanged, without her acquiescence, for Somerset’s unfinished palace in the Strand. In answer to her remonstrances, Northumberland humbly protested that he had no desire to offend her Grace, but he made no alteration in his arrangements.

[50] Strype’s “Annals,” vol. iv. Alford’s deposition was made at Cecil’s request twenty years afterwards, and doubtless echoes what Cecil desired to be said.

[51] This statement also must be taken for what it is worth. It was written in Cecil’s extreme old age—or soon after his death—and of course reflected his own version of affairs. It was natural that after the fall of Jane, and particularly when he was Elizabeth’s minister, he should be anxious to dissociate himself from an act which deprived the Queen of her birthright.

[52] B. M. Lans. MSS., 2, 102.

[53] Notwithstanding this protest, there is in Lansdowne MSS., 1236, No. 15, a draft or copy, _in Cecil’s own handwriting_, of the document referred to, addressed to the Lords-Lieutenant of counties, in which they are begged “to disturbe, repell, and resyste the fayned and untrue clayme of the Lady Mary, basterd daughter of … Henry VIII.” The date of this is the 10th July; but the Duke of Northumberland’s draft of the same letter is endorsed by Cecil, 12th July. This would seem to suggest that at all events Cecil had helped the Duke in the composition of the first draft of the document. On the dorse of Northumberland’s copy (Lansdowne MSS., 3, 34), Cecil has written: “First copy of a l’re to be wrytte from ye Lady Jane … wrytte by ye Duk of Northūblā.” But, as stated above, the date of his own copy is two days earlier.

[54] This interesting document is also printed in Tytler’s “Edward VI. and Mary.”

[55] An early copy of this document is in Harl. MSS., 35, and the original draft or “devise” is in Petyt Papers, Inner Temple Library. See also Strype and Burnet.

[56] “Queen Jane and Queen Mary,” Camden Society.

[57] Harl. MSS., 194. Also Hollingshead and “Queen Jane and Queen Mary.”

[58] Harl. MSS., 353.

[59] It is not quite clear whether Cecil preceded or followed Arundel and Paget in their journey to meet the Queen. It is nearly certain that Cecil started after them. They were certainly present at the proclamation at Baynard’s Castle on the 19th July, whereas Cecil does not appear to have been there. The letter, moreover, written the same morning from the Tower by the Council to Lord Rich, exhorting him to stand firm for Jane (Lansdowne MSS., 3) which Cecil said was written by Cheke, is signed by all the Councillors in London, including Arundel, Paget, Petre, and Cheke, _but not by Cecil_. The letter to Mary from the Council, carried by Arundel and Paget, appears to have borne no signatures (Strype’s “Cranmer”); but the letter to Northumberland shortly afterwards ordering him to obey the Queen bears Cecil’s signature. Probably, therefore, Cecil found some excuse for absenting himself on the critical 19th July, and when Mary’s triumph was assured, signed the denunciation of Northumberland, and at once started to greet the Queen.

[60] 7 Julii Libertatem adeptus sū morte regis et ex misere aulico factus libertas mei juris.

[61] An interesting letter from Northumberland to the Council and Secretaries of State, written during his illness (27th November 1552, State Papers, Foreign) shows how much Cecil and his colleagues distrusted Northumberland’s new departure in foreign policy. The French Ambassador’s secretary had desired audience of the Duke alone, to convey a private message from Henry II. to him. Northumberland knew that this would be resented by the Council, and wrote: “I have availed myself of my sickness to direct the Secretary, who was very importunate, to communicate what he had to say, to one of the Secretaries of State or to the Council. And thus I trust within a while, although I may be thought affectionate to the French, as some have reported me, yet I doubt not this way which I intend to use with them to continue but a little while in their graces, which I never desired in all my life but for the service of my master, as knoweth the Lord.”

[62] Dalby’s letter in Harl. MSS., 353.

[63] Hatfield Papers.

[64] Strype.

[65] In Lansdowne MSS., 2, will be found many letters on these subjects to and from Cecil, showing the deep interest he took in educational matters.

[66] _Ambassades de Noailles_, vol. ii., and Hatfield Papers, part i. 25.

[67] Hatfield Papers, part i., and Haynes.

[68] Hatfield Papers.

[69] Reproduced by Tytler.

[70] Lansdowne MSS., 3.

[71] State Papers, Foreign.

[72] “Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth,” vol. iv. 629.

[73] Lansdowne MSS., 3.

[74] See an account of the pursuit of these exiles in the narrative of John Brett (“Transactions Royal Hist. Soc.,” vol. xi.), and also Foxe’s “Acts and Monuments.”

[75] A few months afterwards his brother-in-law, Sir John Cheke, wrote from abroad (February 1556), evidently in fear that Cecil was going too far in his conformity. “He hoped,” he said, “that he would not suffer his judgment to be corrupted in these evil times by what a multitude of ignorance might approve” (Lansdowne MSS., 3). Cheke’s evil fate fell upon him very shortly, as if in judgment for his own pharisaism. In the same spring he was lured by promise of pardon into Philip’s Flemish dominions with Sir Peter Carew. He was treacherously seized, bound, and kidnapped on board a vessel at Antwerp (much as Dr. Story was in the reign of Elizabeth), brought to England, and lodged in the Tower. Threatened with the stake, he allowed Dr. Feckenham to persuade him to recant. Mary’s Government made him publicly drink the cup of degradation to the dregs, and the unhappy man—pitied by his friends, and betrayed and scoffed at by his enemies—died of a broken heart the following year (September 1557). See Strype’s “Memorials.” Archbishop Parker’s remark, written on the margin of one of Cheke’s recantations, is the most merciful and appropriate to the case, “_Homines Sumus_.”

[76] _Desiderata Curiosa._

[77] _Desiderata Curiosa._

[78] Sir Thomas Cornwallis to Cecil: Hatfield Papers, part i.

[79] Hatfield Papers, part i.

[80] Hatfield Papers, part i.

[81] The powerful Earl of Bedford was a prime favourite of Philip—though afterwards so strong a Protestant—and had been sent to Spain to accompany the Queen’s consort to England. He appears to have been on close terms of friendship with Cecil, who managed his affairs in his absence, and to whom he wrote an interesting account of the great victory of St. Quentin (Hatfield Papers). The friendship of such men as Bedford, Clinton, and Paget would of itself almost account for Cecil’s immunity and favour under Philip and Mary.

[82] State Papers, Dom.

[83] _Ibid._

[84] Cecil seems to have been greatly in request for commissions involving a knowledge of rural dilapidations and the management of landed estates. In March 1557 the Lords of Queen Mary’s Council commissioned him to examine the damage done to Brigstock Park, Northamptonshire, and to place Sir Nicholas Throgmorton there as keeper (Lansdowne MSS., 3). He was also steward of Colly Weston and other manors belonging to Princess Elizabeth.

[85] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth.

[86] Feria had visited Elizabeth at Hatfield a few days before the Queen died, and had then written to Philip: “I am told for certain that Cecil, who was Secretary to King Edward, will be her Secretary also. He is considered to be a prudent, virtuous man, although a heretic.”

[87] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth.

[88] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth.

[89] _Fragmenta Regalia._

[90] Cotton MSS., Titus cx.

[91] A proclamation was issued on the 27th December, that no alterations should be made in the rites and ceremonies of the Church, and that no unauthorised person should preach; but a few days afterwards orders were given that the Litany, Epistle, and Gospel should be read in English, as in the Queen’s chapel, which was done on the following day, 1st January, Sunday (Hayward).

[92] Hayward’s reference to this point would seem to prove that the sermons at Paul’s Cross were discontinued altogether for some months. He says preachers had been warned—in accordance with Cecil’s note—to avoid treating of controversial points, and to the raising of any “dispute touching government eyther for altering or retayning the present form. Hereupon no sermon was preached at Paules Crosse until the Rehearsall sermon was made upon the Sunday after Easter; at which tyme, when the preacher was ready to mount the Pulpit, the keye could not be found; and when by commandment of the Lord Mayor it was opened by the smyth, the place was very filthy and uncleane” (Hayward’s “Annals,” Camden Society).

[93] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth.

[94] Original draft in Cotton MSS., Cal. E. V.

[95] State Papers, Foreign; also printed _in extenso_ in Forbes.

[96] Cotton MSS., Cal. E. V.; printed in Forbes.

[97] It must not be forgotten that Mary Stuart, the young Queen of Scots, was married to Francis, the heir to the French throne, and that the disappearance of Elizabeth from the throne would almost inevitably have meant the complete dominion of both Scotland and England by the French. This would have rendered the position of Spain in the Netherlands untenable, and would have destroyed the Spanish commerce, and the fact explains Philip’s forbearance with Elizabeth in the earlier years of her reign. Both Cecil and the Queen were fully cognisant of the advantage they derived from the situation.

[98] Hatfield Papers, part i. p. 151.

[99] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth.

[100] _Ibid._

[101] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i. p. 11.

[102] Parry had just been made Treasurer of the Household _vice_ Sir Thomas Cheynes.

[103] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[104] The treaty was ratified simultaneously by the French King at Notre Dame, the English special Ambassador being the Lord Chamberlain, Lord Howard of Effingham. The correspondence on, and descriptions of, the ceremonies in France, will be found printed _in extenso_ in Forbes. An account of the festivities in England will be found in Nichols’ “Progresses of Queen Elizabeth,” and in the Calendar of Venetian State Papers.

[105] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[106] Strype.

[107] A great impetus had been given to the building of warships on the accession of Elizabeth, and a programme of naval construction was presented, providing for the building of twenty-eight ships during the ensuing five years; an enormous increase when it is considered that the whole navy when Mary died consisted of only twenty-two sail. The first measure of Elizabeth was to turn a large number of the merchantmen, which had been built under subsidy, into warships. These were probably the ships referred to by Cardinal Lorraine. On the 3rd July, shortly afterwards, the Queen was present at the launch of a fine new warship at Woolwich, which she christened the _Elizabeth_.

[108] State Papers, Foreign; _in extenso_ in Forbes.

[109] See also Throgmorton to Cecil, 1st July. _Ibid._

[110] The Queen to Throgmorton, 17th and 19th July (State Papers, Foreign).

[111] Sadler to Cecil, 16th September 1559 (Sadler Papers, vol. i.).

[112] Printed _in extenso_ in Sadler Papers, vol. i.

[113] Arran travelled as a Frenchman under the name of De Beaufort.

[114] Sadler Papers, vol. i.

[115] The scandalous gossip sent by all the foreign agents in England, especially by Feria and his successor, caused much heart-burning. Challoner had been sent to the Emperor in connection with the Archduke’s match, and in the Imperial court found scandal rife about his mistress and Lord Robert. He writes to Cecil a cautious, confidential letter (6th December 1559), saying that “folks there are broad-mouthed” about it. Of course, he says, it is a false slander; “but a Princess cannot be too wary what countenance of familiar demonstration she maketh more to one than another. No man’s service in the realm is worthy the entertaining with such a tale of obloquy” (Hatfield Papers, part i.).

[116] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[117] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[118] Feria to the Bishop of Aquila, 1st October 1559 (Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.).

[119] The original of the address of the Lords of the Congregation to Elizabeth will be found in the Cotton MSS., Caligula B x. (printed by Burnet). In November the famous William Maitland of Lethington was sent by the Lords to England for the purpose of pressing the cause of the Scottish reformers. He was secretly received by Sir James Crofts in the castle of Berwick, and there, by Cecil’s instructions, Crofts gave him a draft written by Cecil of the best form in which to make his representation to the English Queen and Council. This is a good example of Cecil’s foresight and thoroughness. He knew that Dudley and other French partisans would oppose in the Council the sending of an army to Scotland, and in order to strengthen Maitland’s hands and avoid the introduction of anything upon which his opponent could seize, he himself drafted the address of the Scottish Protestants to the Queen and Council. It is needless to say that Maitland adopted his suggestions. The original Scotch draft is in the Cotton MSS., Caligula B ix., and extracts of it have been printed by Dr. Robertson and Dr. Nares. See also Sadler Papers, vol. i. p. 602.

[120] Sadler State Papers, vol. i.

[121] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i. 121.

[122] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[123] The drafts of De Glajon’s letters to the Duchess of Parma, describing his mission to England, are in B. M. Add. MSS. 28, 173_a_, printed in Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[124] Although I can find no hint of such a thing in De Glajon’s letters to the Duchess of Parma, an entry in Cecil’s diary seems to prove that Philip’s jealousy of France was now so keen as to have led him secretly to approve of the English attack in Scotland. The entry in Cecil’s own hand runs: “April 10, M. de Glason came and joined with the Bishop of Aquila to move the revocation of the army out of Scotland, _but Glason privately to my Lord Admiral and me the Secretary counselled us to the contrary_.” There is in the Record Office (printed _in extenso_ by Forbes) a long Latin document in Cecil’s hand, being his reply or speech to the official representations of De Glajon and the Bishop of Aquila.

[125] The French protest is printed by Forbes.

[126] All in Hatfield Papers, part i.

[127] The “device” proposed by Cecil would appear to have been the clause that if the article relative to the abandonment of the royal arms of England by Mary and her husband was rejected by them, the point was to be submitted to the arbitration of the King of Spain. Cecil’s own draft of the clause is at Hatfield (Papers, part i.). There is no doubt that Cecil was safe in making this condition, as he must have known from his interview with De Glajon what Philip’s real sentiments were.

[128] Cecil was paid during his absence £4 per diem—£252; and for postage with twenty two horses from London to Edinburgh and back, £117.

[129] That this would be the case was foreseen before he started from London in May. Killigrew writes to Throgmorton (in France) on the day before Cecil’s departure, “who (Cecil), for his country’s sake, hath been contented to take the matter in hand. The worst hath been cast of his absens from hence by his frendes, but at length jugged (judged) for the best.… I know none love their country better; I wold the Quene’s Majesty could love it so well” (Throgmorton Papers, _in extenso_ in Forbes).

[130] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[131] The twentieth Earl of Huntingdon (Hastings) was the son of Catharine Pole by the nineteenth Earl. He was consequently the grandson of Henry, Lord Montacute, the eldest of the Poles, and great-great-grandson of George Plantagenet, Duke of Clarence, the younger brother of Edward IV. His claim to the crown could only be made good by the failure or invalidation of those of all the descendants of Henry VII. and Elizabeth of York, daughter of Edward IV.

[132] Hatfield Papers, _in extenso_ in Haynes.

[133] Bedford writes to Throgmorton, 16th March 1561, “Cecil is now more than any other in special credit, and does all” (Foreign Calendar). The Spanish Ambassador says the same.

[134] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i. 177.

[135] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[136] Cecil appears at this time to have satisfied himself that the Queen did not mean to marry Dudley. He writes to Throgmorton, 4th April, saying that the Queen was making the Swedish envoy Guldenstern very welcome. “I see no small declensions from former dealings (_i.e._ with Dudley); at least I find in her Majesty by divers speeches a determination not to marry one of her subjects” (State Papers, Foreign).

[137] Anthony de Bourbon, titular King-Consort of Navarre, husband of Jeanne d’Albret, and father of Henry IV. of France.

[138] Hatfield Papers, part i.

[139] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, i.

[140] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[141] Throgmorton, a zealous Protestant, who was in France, and, of course, not behind the scenes in London, appears to have been seriously alarmed, and to have thought that Cecil was really about to change his religion. He wrote (29th April) almost vehemently exhorting him not to ruin the country by doing so (Foreign Calendar).

[142] When Throgmorton first heard that James Stuart was on his way to France he was in great alarm. He was sure that he would be bought over by Mary and the Catholic party, who intended to obtain for him a Cardinal’s hat. Throgmorton thought that no prominent or powerful Scotsman should come to France for fear of his falling under the influence of the anti-English party. But Cecil saw young Stuart on his way and satisfied himself that he might be trusted; and when Stuart returned to Paris from Rheims on his way home, Throgmorton was almost extravagant in his praise of him, and regarded him as firmly wedded to English interests, as indeed he was. Mary, on the advice of Cardinal Lorraine, refused to ratify the treaty of Edinburgh until she arrived in Scotland; but she consented to hand over the government of her realm to James and his friends until her return. She promised to send after him patents under her great seal constituting him Regent, but this she failed to do. Nevertheless he went back to Scotland with practically a free hand, pending the Queen’s arrival in her realm. (Foreign Calendar.)

[143] Hatfield State Papers, _in extenso_ in Haynes.

[144] For months Throgmorton’s spectre was that Mary might marry Philip’s only son, Don Carlos, which, he pointed out to Cecil, would inevitably ruin England and Protestantism. It may be doubted whether Cardinal Lorraine had reached this point yet; though, as will be told, it was broached later from another quarter. It is more likely that at this time—the early summer of 1561—the Cardinal’s view was to marry his niece to the Archduke Charles, Elizabeth’s former suitor, which would have greatly strengthened the Catholics of Germany and the House of Lorraine. The English Catholics at the same time, at the instigation of the Countess of Lennox, were anxiously advocating a marriage between her son, Lord Darnley, and his cousin, Mary Stuart.

[145] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[146] Hatfield Papers, part i.

[147] Throgmorton to Elizabeth, 26th July, in Cabala.

[148] For Maitland’s interviews with the Queen, see Hayward (Camden Society).

[149] Hatfield Papers, part i.

[150] Lady Margaret, and the Earls of Westmoreland and Northumberland, with the Duke of Norfolk, were summoned to London, whilst the Earl of Arundel was obliged to absent himself from court (November 1561), and the students of the University were in a condition of revolt at the attempt to reform the worship in the college chapels. “The whole place,” said the Mayor of Oxford, “was of the same opinion (_i.e._ Catholic), and there were not three houses in it that were not filled with papists,” “whereat the Council were far from pleased, and told the Mayor to take care not to say such things elsewhere” (Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.).

[151] Quadra to the King, 13th September 1561 (Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth).

[152] The Perpetual Calendar at Hatfield frequently mentions attacks of illness about this time, “fitts of ague,” or gout, fever, and so on.

[153] At first the difficulty of obtaining the new coins caused some inconvenience, and several of Elizabeth’s Councillors were in favour (1562) of a fresh debasement of the coinage. By Cecil’s and Paget’s efforts, however, this was avoided, as it was feared that such a measure would cause disturbance. For the first year or two the demand was so great for the new money that the supply was quite inadequate to the demand, but the people greatly resented the idea of a fresh debasement.

[154] As early as 1555, in the reign of Mary, Cecil had been one of the original promoters and shareholders of the Russia Company, but he always steadily refused to share in privateering.

[155] The expedition and its object had first been suggested to Throgmorton in Paris by an old Portuguese pilot, named Captain Melchior, who had formerly lived for many years on the Sus coast and other parts of West Africa. He had been a pensioner of Francis I. and Henry II., but on the death of the latter, lost his pension. The King of Navarre (Anthony de Bourbon) supported him for a time, and then sent him with his scheme to Throgmorton, who referred him to Cecil. The expedition itself was unsuccessful, but was followed by others under the younger Hawkins, which established a lucrative trade in slaves and produce between Africa, the Spanish Indies, and England. There is an interesting paper in the Record Office, dated 27th May of the following year, 1562, when a Portuguese Ambassador was in England remonstrating against the despatch of a new expedition to Guinea. It is a full description of the coast by Martin Frobisher, who had been for nine months a prisoner of the Portuguese at Elmina. He shows that the Portuguese on the coast exercised no control outside of their forts, and were so detested by the natives that Frobisher and other Englishmen were employed as intermediaries.

[156] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[157] Foreign State Papers.

[158] Foreign State Papers.

[159] Foreign State Papers.

[160] In 1559 Throgmorton speaks of the youth at that period as being of great promise—unfortunately unfulfilled.

[161] Foreign Calendar.

[162] The first war of religion in France.

[163] The massacre of Vassy, which began the civil war, took place on the 1st March 1562.

[164] See Grindall’s long list of recusants in prison, in hiding, and in exile at the end of 1561 (Domestic Calendar).

[165] See Sidney and Throgmorton’s letters to Cecil (Foreign Calendar, May 1562).

[166] Almost every letter from Throgmorton to Cecil at this juncture sounds the note of alarm at the possibility of such a combination. A Portuguese Ambassador had recently been sent to England, once more to remonstrate about the English trade with Guinea (as fruitlessly as in the previous year). He lodged with the Bishop of Aquila at Durham Place, and Throgmorton was confident that the real object of his mission was to perfect the arrangement of a Catholic rising in England in conjunction with Mary Stuart, the Guises, and Philip. The fears, however, were perfectly groundless as yet so far as regarded Philip. He was in no hurry to help the Guises until he had them pledged body and soul, and had crushed reform in his own Netherlands. But of course Cecil was unable to penetrate Philip’s policy so well as we can, with all his most private correspondence before us. It is worthy of mention that D’Antas, the Portuguese Ambassador above referred to, offered Cecil a regular pension from his sovereign if he would look favourably upon his interests. Cecil’s reply is not forthcoming; but the offer cannot have been accepted, for the Secretary never varied in his assertion of the right of English merchants to trade on the West African and Brazilian coasts.

[167] See statements of Borghese Venturini (State Papers, Foreign).

[168] Throgmorton Papers; _in extenso_ in Forbes.

[169] State Papers, Foreign; _in extenso_ in Forbes.

[170] See the examinations in State Papers, Foreign, 1562.

[171] Sir Henry Sidney divulged it to the Bishop.

[172] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[173] Bitter as the Bishop was against Cecil’s policy, which checkmated him on every side, it is only fair to say that he usually speaks of his character with great respect.

[174] Dudley wrote to Throgmorton (May 1562) that the Queen was favourable to Condé and the Huguenots, “but her Majestie seemeth very wareful in too much open show towards them” (State Papers, Foreign).

[175] _In extenso_ in Forbes.

[176] Smith sent a message to Throgmorton (21st November 1562) assuring him that his peace negotiations with the Queen-mother and his friendship with the Cardinal were not sincere, but only to “discover their minds.” It is hardly probable that this was the case; although Smith, as a zealous Protestant, certainly did not anticipate the abandonment of the cause of the reformers. Much less did he intend for England to be thrown over by both sides as she was. In a letter to Cecil (17th December) he relates his indignant remonstrance to the Queen-mother when he heard that the Guisans in Paris had issued a proclamation of war against Queen Elizabeth as an enemy of the faith. (Letters _in extenso_ in Forbes.)

[177] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[178] Cecil had built for himself (1560) a splendid mansion in the Strand, on the site of the present Exeter Hall, the grounds extending back to Covent Garden. It was joined on the west by the Earl of Bedford’s estate, for which in a subsequent generation it was exchanged. Cecil appears to have continued in the possession of his house at Westminster, adjoining Whitehall, no doubt for business purposes.

[179] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[180] Sir Simon D’Ewes’ Journal.

[181] Strype.

[182] The Bishop of Aquila, in giving an account of these measures, says, that it would seem as if they were designed to mimic the Spanish Inquisition.

[183] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[184] The marriage of the unfortunate Lady Catharine Grey with Lord Hertford—the eldest son of Somerset—was contracted secretly, and when the birth of a son made the matter public, the Queen was intensely indignant, and refused to acknowledge the union, both Lord and Lady Hertford being committed to the Tower. Guzman says that Cecil brought about the marriage; but there is no evidence whatever of this. Lord Hertford was in Paris with Cecil’s son, Thomas, when the affair was discovered, and was recalled in haste by the Queen. As soon as Cecil heard of it, he warned his son not to associate with Hertford. Cecil wrote to his friend Smith at the same time, “I pray that God may by this chance give her Majesty a disposition to consider hereof (_i.e._ the succession), that either by her marriage or by some common order we her poor subjects may know where to lean and adventure our lives with content to our consciences.” Greatly to Cecil’s annoyance the question of Catharine’s guilt was referred to him for examination and report. He assured Smith in a letter that he would judge impartially, and he did so; for Parker, the Archbishop, on his report, pronounced against the marriage, but Cecil continued on close terms of intimacy with the Grey family, who all called him cousin (Lady Cecil’s brother married Catharine Grey’s cousin), and certainly favoured Lady Catharine’s claims under the will of Henry VIII. Cecil cautiously did his best to soften the punishment, and finally obtained the removal of both husband and wife from the Tower into private custody. Many letters on the subject from the Greys to Cecil will be found in Lansdowne MSS. 2.

[185] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[186] She was probably correct in this. When Elizabeth saw Maitland in London she suggested Dudley as a suitable husband to Mary; and when the Scotsman hinted that his mistress was not so selfish as to deprive Elizabeth of a person so much cherished by herself, the English Queen, greatly to Maitland’s confusion, hinted at the Earl of Warwick, Dudley’s brother. Maitland cleverly silenced the Queen by suggesting that, as Elizabeth was so much older than Mary, she should marry Dudley first herself, and when she died, leave to the Scottish Queen both her widower and her kingdom.

[187] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[188] Cecil was also much interested in the promotion of mineralogy. A patent was granted in 1563 to a German named Schutz who was skilled in the discovery of calamine and the manufacture of brass therewith. For the working of this patent a company was afterwards formed, Cecil, Bacon, Norfolk, Pembroke, Leicester, and others being shareholders, and a great impetus was given in consequence to the founding of brass cannon. Much encouragement was also given by Cecil at this and later periods to German mineralogists for the working of English mines.

[189] In a letter to the Vice-Chancellor (Dr. Perne) in April 1560, Cecil conveyed the pleasant news of the Queen’s intention to grant a number of prebends and exhibitions to those divinity students that shall be recommended “as fittest to receive the same promotions and exhibitions.” The object of this was to encourage the divinity students to embrace the Protestant form of worship, which they were loth to do. (Harl. MSS., 7037, 265-66).

[190] There is in the Domestic State Papers of 1565 a draft letter of the Council, written by Cecil to the Vice-Chancellor, forbidding and ordering the suppression in Cambridge of all shows, booths, gaming-houses, &c., as being unseemly and dangerous.

[191] Full account of the visit, with the speeches, &c., will be found in Nichol’s “Progresses of Queen Elizabeth.”

[192] The old Bishop of Aquila had died, probably of the plague, in the previous autumn at Langley, near Windsor. He had been succeeded by Don Diego Guzman de Silva.

[193] The official account makes no mention of this. It says only that great preparations had been made to represent Sophocles’ tragedy of Ajax Flagellifer. “But her Highness, as it were, tyred with going about the colleges and hearing disputations, and overwatched with former plays, … could not, as otherwise no doubt she would, … hear the said tragedy, to the great sorrow not only of the players but of the whole University.” If the scene as described by the Spaniard took place, it must have been at the house of Sir Henry Cromwell, the great Oliver’s grandfather, at Hinchinbrook, where the Queen slept on the night of the day she left Cambridge.

[194] The Queen had, however, supped with him at his yet unfinished mansion in London—Cecil House—in 1560, and had there stood godmother to his infant daughter Elizabeth (6th July 1564).

[195] This splendid place, to which further reference will be made, was visited on his first voyage south by James I., who was so enamoured of it that he obtained it from the first Earl of Salisbury, Cecil’s younger son, in exchange for Hatfield. It was at Theobalds that King James died.

[196] The details of, and correspondence with relation to this commercial war, with the various negotiations, and especially those of the conference of Bruges, will be found in the Hatfield Papers, correspondence of the Merchant-Adventurers, Foreign Papers, correspondence of Valentine Dale, Sheres, &c., and in the B. M. Add. MSS., 28,173, correspondence of Dassonleville and other Flemish agents, as well as in Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[197] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[198] The book in question was that written by John Hales, Clerk of the Hanaper, in favour of the succession of Lady Catharine Grey and her children. He had been indicted in January 1564 for “presumptuously and contemptuously discussing, both by words and in writing, the question of the succession to the imperial crown of England, in case the Queen should die without issue;” and thenceforward for months interrogatories and depositions with regard to his sayings and doings, and those of Catharine Grey and her husband, Lord Hertford, continued before Cecil without intermission. (The papers in the case are all at Hatfield, and are mostly published _in extenso_ by Haynes.) Hales himself was the scapegoat, and was in the Fleet prison for six months; but in all probability, as Dudley said, Cecil and his brother-in-law, Bacon, had a great share in drawing up the book. Cecil was probably too powerful and useful to touch; but Bacon was reprimanded, and Lord John Grey of Pyrgo, an old friend of Cecil’s, was kept under arrest until his death, a few months later.

[199] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[200] Philip s reply, partly in his own hand, to his Ambassador’s reports of Dudley’s offers is characteristic: “I am pleased to see what Lord Robert says, and will tell you my will on the point. I am much dissatisfied with Cecil, as he is such a heretic; and if you give such encouragement to Robert as will enable him to put his foot on Cecil and turn him out of office, I shall be very glad. But you must do it with such tact and delicacy, that if it fails, none shall know that you had a hand in it” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.).

[201] Hatfield Papers, part i.

[202] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[203] This refers to the order issued shortly before, called “Advertisements for the due order of the administration of the Holy Sacrament, and for the apparel of all persons ecclesiastical”; which commenced the bitter “vestments controversy.”

An interesting series of returns from the bishops, of this date (October 1564) is at Hatfield. Their lordships had been directed to make reports of the persons of note in their respective dioceses, classified under the heads of “favourers of true religion,” “adversaries of true religion,” and “neutrals.” To the reports the bishops append their recommendations for reform. The Bishop of Hereford says that all his canons residentiary “ar but dissemblers and rancke papists.” He suggests that all those who will not conform should be expelled; and most of his episcopal brethren advocate even stronger measures than these. Another paper of this time (1564) addressed to Cecil, and printed by Strype in his “Life of Parker,” shows the remarkable diversity of the service in English churches. As will be seen later, Cecil’s attitude on the great vestment question divided him from many of his Protestant friends.

[204] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[205] Memoirs of Sir James Melvil of Hallhill.

[206] Bedford and Maitland subsequently met at Berwick to discuss the proposed match. It suited Mary to pretend some willingness to take Leicester in order to obtain leave for Darnley to come to Scotland. She was probably right in supposing that finally Elizabeth did not mean to allow Leicester to marry the Scottish Queen. Cecil was of the same opinion. Writing to his friend Smith at the end of December 1564 (Lansdowne MSS., 102), he says, “I see her Majesty very desyroose to have my L. of Leicester placed in this high degree to be the Scottish Queen’s husband, but when it cometh to the conditions which are demanded I see her then remiss of her earnestness.”

[207] Melvil’s Memoirs.

[208] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[209] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[210] Humphrey and Sampson, both eminent divines and friends of Cecil, amongst others, stood out. The former, after much hesitation, was forced into obedience; but the latter was dismissed from his deanery of Christ Church (Strype’s “Annals”). The students and masters of Cecil’s own College of St. John gave him as Chancellor much trouble by refusing to wear their surplices and hoods. After much correspondence and remonstrance with them, the Chancellor became really angry, and the students assumed a humbler attitude.

[211] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[212] _Dépêches de De Foix, Bibliothèque Nationale._

[213] Foreign State Papers.

[214] _Dépêches de De Foix, Bibliothèque Nationale._

[215] Castelnau de la Mauvissière was in London in May 1565 on his way to France from Scotland, and gives, in a letter to the Queen-mother, a most entertaining account of a conversation with Elizabeth at a night garden-party given by Leicester in his honour (the letter itself is in a private collection, but is printed in Chéruel’s _Marie Stuart et Catharine de Medici_). She said how much more popular in England Frenchmen were than Spaniards; praised the young King as “the greatest and most virtuous prince on earth.” She asked Castelnau whether he would be vexed if she married the King. “Although she had nothing,” she said, “worthy of so great a match: nothing but a little realm, her goodness and her chastity, on which point at least she could hold her own against any maiden in the world,” and much more to the same effect. Castelnau says he never saw her look so pretty as she did. Catharine took the hint, and her industrious approaches to Smith were largely prompted by Elizabeth’s coquetry to Castelnau on this occasion.

[216] Hatfield Papers, _in extenso_ in Haynes.

[217] Cecil writes to Smith, 3rd June 1565 (Lansdowne MSS., 102). “My Lord of Lecester furdereth the Quene’s Majesty with all good reasons to take one of these great princes, wherein surely perceaving his own course not sperable, he doth honourably and wisely. I see few noblemen devoted to France; but I being _Mancipum Reginæ_, and lackyng witt for to expend so great a matter, will follow with service where hir Majesty will goo before.” This attitude is very characteristic of the writer.

[218] There is an enigmatical entry in Cecil’s journal at this period, August 1565, saying, “The Queene’s Majestie seemed to be much offended with the Earle of Leicester, and so she wrote an obscure sentence in a book at Windsor.” Strype, who has been followed by most other historians, thought that this referred to Leicester’s opposition to the Archduke’s suit. The real reason for the Queen’s squabble with Leicester is given by Guzman (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.). August 27: “I wrote to your Majesty that the Queen was showing favour to one Heneage, who serves in her chamber. Lord Robert and he have had words, and as a consequence Robert spoke to the Queen about it. She was apparently much annoyed at the conversation.… Heneage at once left the court, and Robert did not see the Queen for three days, until she sent for him. They say now that Heneage will come back at the instance of Lord Robert, to avoid gossip.”

[219] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[220] Harl. MSS., 6990.

[221] Randolph to Cecil, 3rd June. Harl. MSS., 4645.

[222] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[223] The action of the French representatives was extremely perplexing. On the one hand, they offered help to Elizabeth against Scotland, and urged Mary to make terms with Murray; whilst on the other, they continued to intercede with Elizabeth for Lady Margaret and Mary, and conveyed the kindest messages to the Queen and Darnley. (See Randolph’s letters.)

[224] Yaxley was sent back from Madrid with glowing promises and encouragement from Philip to Mary and Darnley, and 20,000 crowns in money. The ship, however, in which he sailed from Flanders was wrecked, and Yaxley’s lifeless body was washed up on the coast of Northumberland, with the money and despatches attached to it. The money, of course, never reached Mary, but formed the subject of a long squabble as to the respective claims for it, of the Crown and the Earl of Northumberland. (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.).

[225] State Papers, Scotland.

[226] Randolph’s letter, 6th February 1566, gives particulars of Mary’s adhesion to the League of Bayonne (Harl. MSS. 4645); but she does not appear actually to have signed the “bond” sent to her, as she was urged to do by the Bishop of Dunblane and other papal emissaries. There is not the slightest doubt, however, that she looked at this time to the Catholic league alone for help in her claims, and had decided to defy England and the Protestant party.

[227] Randolph to Cecil, 1st March; and Randolph and Bedford to Cecil, 6th March (Scottish State Papers).

[228] Randolph wrote to Leicester on the 13th February 1566, telling him of a plot to kill Rizzio, and probably the Queen, in order that Lennox and his son Darnley might seize the crown. He says he thinks it better _not_ to tell Cecil, but to keep the secret between the writer and Leicester. On the 1st March, Randolph sent to Cecil copies of the two “Conventions,” signed by the Earls—namely, that of Darnley, Morton, and Ruthven, to kill Rizzio; and that of Murray, Argyll, Rothes, &c., to uphold Darnley in all his quarrels. Bedford, writing to Cecil on the 6th March, begged him earnestly to keep the whole matter secret, except from Leicester and the Queen. It will thus be seen that, far from being a promoter of the Darnley plot to kill Rizzio, Cecil did not know of it in time to stop its perpetration, if he had been inclined to do so, as the murder was committed on the 9th March. Against this, however, must be placed, for what it is worth, Guzman’s statement that Cecil had told Lady Margaret of Rizzio’s murder as having taken place the day before it really occurred.

[229] From a statement of Guzman (28th January 1566) it would appear that Cecil, probably in union with Murray, had some idea of bringing Darnley round to the English interest. The Queen (Elizabeth), he says, had refused Rambouillet’s suggestion that when he arrived in Scotland he might bring about a reconciliation between the two Queens. “Afterwards, however, Cecil went to his (Rambouillet’s) lodgings, and told him that when the King of Scotland, bearing in mind that he had been an English subject, should write modestly to the Queen, saying that he was sorry for her anger, and greatly wished that it should disappear, he (Cecil) believed that everything would be settled, if at the same time the Queen of Scotland would send an Ambassador hither to treat of Lady Margaret’s affairs” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.).

[230] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[231] Only two days before this Guzman gave the same advice to Elizabeth. Both she and Cecil then assured him of their desire for such a settlement, which would have checked French designs in Scotland, and disarmed Spain.

[232] We do not often hear of Lady Cecil’s action in politics, but on this occasion she seems to have seconded her husband. Guzman writes (22nd April 1566): “Cecil’s wife tells me that the French Ambassador says that if the Archduke comes hither, he will cause discord in the country, as he will endeavour to uphold his religion, and will have many to follow him. She thinks the Queen will never marry Lord Robert, or, indeed, any one else, unless it be the Archduke, which is the match Cecil desires. Certainly, if any one has information on the matter, it is Cecil’s wife, as she is clever and greatly influences him.”

A few days after the above was written, Guzman visited Cecil, who was ill, and mentioned how annoyed the French were when they saw the Archduke’s suit prospering. “They then at once bring forward their own King to embarrass the Queen. When this trick has hindered the negotiations, they take up with Leicester again, and think we do not see through them.” “Yes,” replied Cecil, “they are very full of fine words and promises, as usual, and they think when they have Lord Robert on their side their business is as good as done, but their great object is to embroil the Emperor with the King of Spain.” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.)

[233] When news came of Brederode’s “protest” in the Netherlands and the rising of the “beggars,” Guzman tried hard to discover from Cecil whether any connection existed between the rebels and the English. He concluded that there was none, although the eastern counties’ ports were full already of Flemish Protestant fugitives. The Queen was very emphatic in her condemnation of the “beggars” at first. “Fine Christianity, she said, was this, which led subjects to defy their sovereign. It had begun in Germany and in France, and then extended to Scotland, and now to Flanders, and perhaps some day will happen here, as things are going now. Some rogues, she said, even wanted to make out that _she_ knew something about the affairs in Flanders. Only let me get them into my hands, she exclaimed, and I will soon make them understand the interest I feel in all that concerns my brother, the King” (_i.e._ Philip). (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.)

[234] See the letters of Cecil’s spy, Ruxby (or Rooksby), _in extenso_ in Haynes. This man had fled from England to Scotland for debt. He was known to Cecil, who, when he heard that he was dealing with Mary Stuart in Edinburgh, warned him. Ruxby then offered his services as a spy, and sent Cecil very compromising information about Mary’s plans. Melvil discovered this, and Ruxby was seized by the Scots and put in prison, Killigrew’s attempts, at the instance of Cecil, to convey him to England as an escaped recusant, being thus frustrated. (Hatfield Papers.)

[235] He started from Edinburgh a few hours after James’s birth, and reached London in four days (Melvil Memoirs).

[236] Melvil Memoirs.

[237] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i. On the 20th July, Cecil writes to Lord Cobham, “I trust I shall not be troubled with the Scottish journey” (Hatfield Papers).

[238] Nichol’s “Progresses of Queen Elizabeth.”

[239] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[240] Although Cecil was a member of the Commons deputation, he was, of course, known to be against the measure, and escaped the Queen’s vituperation. Cecil himself in his notes thus refers to the matter: “1566. October 17. Certen Lords, viz., Erle of Pembroke and Lecester, wer excluded the presence-chamber, for furdering the proposition of the succession to be declared in Parliament without the Queen’s allowance.”

[241] The Parliament was dissolved on 2nd January 1567. The principal measure adopted in it was that which gave Parliamentary confirmation to the consecration of the bishops and archbishops, in order to counteract the attacks promoted by Bonner against the Protestant consecration. The measure was principally urged by the bishops themselves, and in the Lords was carried to a great extent by their votes, there being twenty-eight bishops present, and thirty-two lay peers. The House of Commons was strongly Protestant, and was dissolved instead of being prorogued, as was expected. Although the measure referred to was passed, the Government refrained from proceeding further against the Catholic bishops who had refused the oath of supremacy. (See Strype’s “Annals,” &c.)

[242] _Scrinia Ceciliana._

[243] Spanish State Papers: Guzman to Philip, 1st March.

[244] _Scrinia Ceciliana._

[245] These letters will be found in Labanoff, vol. ii.

[246] Catharine de Medici’s attitude when she heard the news was characteristic. She thus wrote to Montmorenci: “Gossip: my son the King is sending you this courier to give you the news he has received from Scotland. You see that the young fool (Darnley) has not been King very long. If he had been wiser he would have been alive still. It is a great piece of luck for the Queen, my daughter, to be rid of him.” (MSS. Bibliothèque Nationale, Bethune.)

[247] Drury to Cecil, April 1567 (State Papers, Scotland).

[248] _Scrinia Ceciliana._

[249] _Scrinia Ceciliana._

[250] Again, on the 3rd September, Cecil writes to Norris: “The Queen’s Majesty, our sovereign, remaineth still offended with the Lords (of Scotland) for the Queen: the example moveth her.” Later in the month (27th September) a French envoy came through England on a mission to Scotland, and proposed to Elizabeth that joint action should be taken to secure Mary’s liberation. The envoy was persuaded in London to refrain from continuing his journey, and we see that Cecil’s feeling in favour of the Protestant party was gradually gaining ground in Elizabeth’s counsels. He writes: “Surely if either the French King or the (English) Queen should appear to make any force against them of Scotland for the Queen (of Scots’) cause, we find it credible that it were the next way to make an end of her; and for that cause her Majesty is loth to take that way.” As an instance of the divergence of the Queen and Cecil during the summer, Guzman, detailing a private conversation he had with the Queen in July, during which he warned her again against French interference in Scotland, writes: “Certain things passed in the conversation which she begged me not to communicate _even to Cecil_.”

[251] _Scrinia Ceciliana._

[252] The object of the French was to retain their alliance with Scotland in any case, which, indeed, was their great safeguard against England and Spain. De Croc was sent as Ambassador in 1566 for this especial purpose. Villeroy and Lignerolles were subsequently despatched respectively to conciliate Murray and Bothwell. When Murray assumed the Regency, the French were just as anxious to recognise him as they had been to welcome other régimes, and Charles IX. himself assured Murray of his continued friendship. (See letters and instructions in Chéruel.)

[253] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. i.

[254] Cecil writes to Lord Cobham (27th May): “Lady Clinton hath procured my wife to make a supper to-morrow, where a greater person will covertly be, as she is wont. The Queen hath made asseverations to persuade the Duke (of Norfolk) of her effectual dealing to marry, and to deal plainly in this embassy” (Hatfield Papers). The object of the supper was to enable the Queen privately to meet the Emperor’s Ambassadors before their public reception. She seems to have been much disappointed that they had nothing to say about the marriage, and as a result decided at last to send the Earl of Sussex to the Emperor.

[255] Guzman expressed his disbelief in any such intelligence having been received, whereupon Cecil showed him the paper. The document had reached Cecil in German from one of his agents, and is still in the Burghley Papers. Guzman pointed out to Cecil the undiplomatic form in which the articles of the alleged treaty were drawn up and their inherent improbability, which Cecil admitted. The particulars are now known to have been a fabrication, although the main object of the league was unquestionably to suppress Protestantism by extermination.

[256] The answer, which Guzman calls a very impertinent one, will be found in State Papers, Foreign, June 1567, and the original draft, in Cecil’s hand, at Hatfield.

[257] Guzman writes (5th July): “Everything that can be done to arouse the suspicion of the Queen against your Majesty is being done by certain people, and I am trying all I can to banish such feeling and keep her in a good humour, without saying anything offensive of the King of France … I think I have satisfied and tranquillised her; although when they see your Majesty so strongly armed, suspicion is aroused, and not here alone.” On the 21st July, he says, “With all the demonstrations of friendship and the friendly offers I make to the Queen from your Majesty, I find her rather anxious about the coming of the Duke of Alba to Flanders.”

[258] Murray very closely describes the contents of the “first” casket letter, of which so much has been written. The arguments of Mary’s defenders, founded on the long delay in the production of the letters, therefore fall to the ground, as Murray had evidently seen a copy, or the originals, before the end of July. To those who accuse Murray himself of having caused the letters to be forged, it may be replied that, on the 12th July, De Croc, on his way from Scotland to France, mentioned to Guzman in London the existence of the letters. As Dalgleish, with the letters, was captured in Edinburgh on the 20th June, there was no time in the interval for Morton in Scotland and Murray in Lyons to have concocted an elaborate forgery such as this. Murray, at all events, must be acquitted, as De Croc, leaving Scotland at the end of June, had copies of the letters in his possession.

[259] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[260] How wavering Elizabeth’s policy was at the time, according as Leicester or Cecil was near her, may clearly be seen. By Throgmorton’s instructions of 30th June (State Papers, Scotland; _in extenso_ in Keith), it is evident that his mission was to blame both Mary and the Lords, making Elizabeth the arbiter between them, and to negotiate the restoration of Mary to liberty, but without political power. The Lords would not allow this, and Throgmorton failed. On the other hand, Melvil was sent back to Scotland shortly before Throgmorton, taking a message from Elizabeth to the Lords, in reply to their secret intimation that they intended to depose Mary, and a promise to the effect that she would aid them “in their honourable enterprise” (Melvil to Cecil, 1st July—State Papers, Scotland; _in extenso_ in Tytler).

[261] Guzman to Philip, August 9, 1567, Spanish State Papers. Guzman at this time had a conversation with a French envoy, Lignerolles, who was returning from Scotland. He told him that Leicester’s henchman Throgmorton, on his embassy to Scotland, had acted earnestly and vigorously in favour of Mary. “Which,” writes Guzman, “I quite believe, as he has always been attached to her. He is also a great friend of Lord Robert’s, and an enemy of Cecil, whom the Queen does not consider to be in favour of the Queen of Scots, but a partisan of Catharine” (Grey).

[262] “Her Majesty much dislikes of the Prince of Condé and the French Lords. The (English) Council do all they can to cover the same. Her Majesty, being a Prince herself, is doubtful to give comfort to subjects. You (Norris), nevertheless, shall do well to comfort them as occasion shall serve” (_Scrinia Ceciliana_). The day before this was written, Guzman writes to Philip, speaking of the suspicion that exists that the Queen is helping the Huguenots, of which, however, he cannot find any confirmation: “But still I notice that when news comes favourable to the heretics, these Councillors are more pleased than otherwise, whilst they grieve if the heretics fail” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth).

[263] Guzman’s comment upon this is curious: “These heretics are so blind as to marvel why your Majesty does not allow full liberty to all in your dominions to enjoy their own opinions and schisms against the Catholic religion, and yet they themselves refuse to let people live freely in the ancient religion which for so many years they have followed without molestation.”

[264] This second “plough” was probably an arrangement to subsidise Murray to send a privateer naval force to intercept some of Philip’s vessels conveying a number of Flemish nobles to Spain, amongst others Count de Buren, the young son of the Prince of Orange.

[265] Dr. Allen had recently established the English seminary at Douai, and a Dr. Wilson was apprehended in March 1568 for collecting money from English Catholics for the seminary at Louvain. Cecil himself, in his essay on the “Execution of Justice,” mentions the large number of papal emissaries in England at this time. Thomas Heath, brother of the Archbishop, and Faithful Cummin, a Dominican monk, were both arrested during this spring for carrying on a Catholic propaganda under the guise of Puritan Nonconformists. (See Strype’s Parker, &c.).

[266] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[267] He was said to have called the Pope a “canting little monk.” Amongst those who testified against him was Gresham’s agent Huggins, who afterwards became one of Cecil’s spies in Spain, and betrayed both sides.

[268] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. ii.

[269] Drury to Cecil, 28th November 1567 (State Papers, Scotland).

[270] In Labanoff, vol. ii. Copy in Hatfield Papers, part i., and Haynes.

[271] _Scrinia Ceciliana._

[272] It is possible that these jewels may be those referred to in a memorandum at Hatfield, of the date 17th May, in Cecil’s writing, as having been bought from one Felton.

[273] Drury to Cecil, 15th May, describing Langside (Cotton MSS., Caligula, c. i.)., &c.

[274] Mary to Elizabeth (_ibid._).

[275] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[276] Cotton MSS., Caligula, c. i.

[277] See Cecil’s letters to Norris of this period, detailing the discussions which this gave rise to in the Council. Cecil’s whole efforts were directed against preventing French troops being sent to Scotland at any cost. In Cecil’s own memoranda (Harl. MSS., 4653), when Mary first entered England, this is the main point dwelt upon. No person was to see Mary without permission of the English guard, all the known accomplices of Darnley’s murder were to be arrested, all interference of the French was to be prevented, and if it was decided to restore Mary, it was only to be on conditions which insured the exclusion of the French. The summing up of the document consists of a statement of the dangers that would ensue to England if Mary were to be allowed to return to France, or if, on the other hand, she remained in England. At this time Cecil was in favour of Mary’s restoration under the strict tutelage of England.

[278] See letters 21st June, &c., Hatfield Papers (_in extenso_ in Haynes), and 13th June and 5th July, Cotton MSS., Caligula, c. i.

[279] See Cecil’s report and recommendations, Harl. MSS., 4653.

[280] A journal of the proceedings made by the English president, the Duke of Norfolk, is at Hatfield, part i. (No. 1200), and many letters on the subject _in extenso_ in Haynes. In November the sittings were transferred to Westminster. On the 30th October a Council was held at Hampton Court, at which the “casket letters” were considered, and it was decided that Mary’s representatives, the Bishop of Ross and Lord Herries, should first have audience of Elizabeth. They were to be so questioned as to “move them to confess their general authority to answer all charges.” The representatives of the Lords, Maitland and MacGill, were then to be introduced and asked what answer they could give to Mary’s accusations, and why, in face of the letters they produced, they refrained from charging the Queen openly with murder. It was decided in the Council to remove Mary from Bolton to Tutbury. (See Minutes in Cecil’s hand, Hatfield Papers, part i. 1203-1205; _in extenso_ in Haynes.)

[281] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[282] Odet de Coligny, brother of the Admiral of France.

[283] Hatfield State Papers, 18th September 1568.

[284] 28th October (_Scrinia Ceciliana_).

[285] Hatfield Papers, part i. 1237.

[286] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[287] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. ii.

[288] Hatfield Papers, part i. No. 1243.

[289] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[290] Spinola had been concerned in John Hawkins’ ventures, and it has usually been assumed that he had already received from his correspondents in Spain news of the attack on Hawkins’ fleet at St. Juan de Ulloa two months before. It is asserted that the seizure of the treasure was urged upon Cecil as a reprisal for this. I am of opinion that such was not the case, as the seizure of the money was under consideration before it was possible for the affair of St. Juan de Ulloa to be known.

[291] The safe conduct for the money sent to the ports by De Spes was closely followed by contrary orders from the Council to Sir William Horsey at Southampton, and Champernoun at Plymouth, and the treasure was landed in accordance therewith. On the 13th December, William Hawkins wrote to Cecil from Plymouth with rumours of the attack on John Hawkins at St. Juan de Ulloa, but the seizure must have been decided upon before Cecil received the letter.

[292] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[293] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[294] The seizure of Spanish property had greatly alarmed the English merchants and bankers, and was the pretext seized upon by Cecil’s enemies to ruin him.

[295] _Desiderata Curiosa._

[296] Fuller’s “Holy State.”

[297] How moderate and cautious Cecil was in his triumph, after he had discovered and apprised the Queen of the plot to ruin him, and had barely escaped the dagger of the hired assassin who was to kill him, is seen in his subsequent demeanour towards the conspirators. Instead of trying to disgrace or punish them, he continued to work loyally with them. The real prime mover in the plot was Leicester, with whom outwardly Cecil was always friendly. Cecil, writing to a friend at the time, thus expresses himself: “I am in quietness of mind, as feeling the nearness and readiness of God’s favour to assist me with His grace, to have a disposition to serve Him before the world; and therein have I lately proved His mere goodness to preserve me from some clouds or mists, in the midst whereof I trust mine honest actions are proved to have been lightsome and clear. And to make this rule more proper, I find the Queen’s Majesty, my gracious lady, without change of her old good meaning towards me, and so I trust by God’s goodness to observe a continuance. I also am moved to believe that all my Lords, from the greatest to the meanest, think my actions honest and painful, and do profess inwardly to bear me as much good-will as ever they did.” That this was the case, at least with one of the conspirators, is proved by the fact that Lord Pembroke, who died at the end of the year, left Cecil one of his executors, jointly with Leicester and Throgmorton.

[298] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[299] Although in all her letters Mary designates Cecil as her enemy, she could, when not carried away by anger, perceive his good qualities. In February 1569 she was removed to Tutbury, and was extremely angry and alarmed at this. In conversation with Henry Knollys, who repeated the conversation to a correspondent of Cecil’s (Hatfield Papers, part i. 1279), “she spared not to give forth that the Secretary was her enemy, and that she mistrusted by this removing he would cause her to be made away.” But when her passion was over, she said that though the Secretary were not her friend, he was an expert, wise man, wishing it might be her luck to get the friendship of so wise a man.

[300] Hatfield Papers; _in extenso_ in Haynes.

[301] Denied afterwards by Norfolk, but confirmed by Melvil. (See State Trials, and Melvil’s Memoirs).

[302] The Bishop of Ross deposed afterwards that Norfolk was so much exasperated at Murray’s having finally brought forward the whole of the evidence to convict Mary of murder, that he formed a plot for his assassination. Melvil says, however, that before Murray returned to Scotland, Throgmorton had fully gained his acquiescence in the projected marriage, and had reconciled the Regent and the Duke.

[303] Alba was very angry with De Spes for the way in which he was compromising Spain. He wrote again to him in July, saying that he “was informed from France that the Queen of Scotland was being utterly ruined by the plotting of her servants with you, as they never enter your house without being watched. This might cost the Queen her life, and I am not sure that yours would be safe.” The evidence given afterwards at the Duke of Norfolk’s trial, and the examinations of Bailly and the Bishop of Ross, proved that Cecil had information of everything that occurred.

[304] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth. Alba, writing to Philip soon afterwards (8th August), says, “I have written several times to Don Gerau, telling him to suspend negotiations, as I plainly see they are tricking him, so as to get all they can from him, and then say they have negotiated without authority. He is zealous … but he is inexperienced; he allows himself to be led away, and is ruining the negotiation.” It will be seen that it was comparatively easy for Cecil to outwit such an instrument as this.

[305] Mary consented to the condition; and the whole arrangement was, according to Norfolk and the Bishop of Ross, acquiesced in by Leicester and the majority of the Council. How far sincere Mary was in accepting the condition, may be seen by her message to De Spes. “She says if she were at liberty, or could get such help as would enable her to bring her country to submission, she would deliver herself and her son entirely into your Majesty’s hands, but now she will be obliged to sail with the wind” (De Spes to Philip, 27th August). This, no doubt, referred to her having consented to the marriage with Norfolk, and to the proposals submitted by the English Government to Murray and the Parliament of Perth for Mary’s return to Scotland. Murray was opposed to his sister’s return in any form, and neither of the Queen’s propositions, nor Mary’s petition for a divorce from Bothwell, was granted. That Cecil was at this time (the spring and summer of 1569) desirous of getting rid of Mary from England, without allowing her to go to France, where the Catholics had just beaten the Huguenots, is certain, and also that he did not wish her to be ill used in Scotland. See his minute sent to Murray by Henry Carey, demanding to know what hostages would be given for her safety if she was returned. (Hatfield Papers, Haynes; also Strype’s Annals, and Rapin.)

[306] Harl. MSS., 6353.

[307] _Scrinia Ceciliana_, 3rd October.

[308] In a postscript to a letter from the Earl of Huntingdon to Cecil from Coventry, where he was in joint charge of Mary Stuart, 9th December 1569, he mentions “the speech that passeth amongst many, how earnest a dealer you were for this marriage for which the Duke and others do suffer her Majesty’s displeasure: yea, it is reported from the mouth of some of the sufferers that, in persuasion, you (Cecil) yielded such reasons for it as he (the Duke), by them, was most moved to consent.” Cecil can hardly have been so forward in the matter as is here suggested, or it surely would have been mentioned in the rigorous examinations of those implicated. (Hatfield Papers, part i.)

[309] De Spes went so far as to say that it was Cecil who was urging that Norfolk should be sent to the Tower—the very reverse, as we now know, being the case. Cecil afterwards thought it worth while to defend himself against this charge in a note of his still existing in the Cotton MSS. It runs: “Whoso sayeth that I have in any wise directly or indirectly hindered or altered her Majesty’s disposition in the delivery of the Duke of Norfolk out of the Tower, I do affirm the same is untrue, and he that sayeth so doth speak an untruth. If any man will affirm the same to be true against this, my assertion, the same doth therein maintain an untruth and a lye. W. Cecil, xii. Julii, 1570.”

[310] 2nd November (_Scrinia Ceciliana_).

[311] Full details of the operations against the rebels will be found in the Sadler Papers; Sir Ralph Sadler being the Warden of the East and Middle Marches, and Paymaster-general of the army.

[312] The Earl of Westmoreland succeeded in escaping to Flanders, and thence to Spain. He remained a pensioner of Philip’s for years afterwards, plotting against England, and beseeching payment of the grudging dole which the Spanish King had assigned to him. Northumberland was captured by Murray and imprisoned in Lochleven; and at the time of the Regent’s assassination, Elizabeth’s special envoys from the Border were negotiating for Northumberland’s surrender. He was delivered to the English Government in 1572 by the Regent Morton, and beheaded at York.

[313] On the pretext of negotiating once more for the return of the Spanish property seized, Alba sent to England, in October, the famous Italian general, Ciapino Vitello, and in his letters to Sadler, Cecil expresses great anxiety as to the probability of an attack being made by Alba on Hartlepool at the time. English writers have always assumed that Ciapino came to England in order to take command of a force to be sent by Alba to England, but there is no trace of such a project in Alba’s or Guzman’s letters. Ciapino was forced, however, to leave his large retinue at Dover, and considerable delay took place before even he was received. Alba states to Philip that Cecil and Leicester had been, or were to be, bribed by the bankers Spinola and Fiesco, to allow Ciapino to come to England (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth), but Leicester sent word to Ciapino, as soon as the rising in the north was known, that his stay in England was considered very suspicious. He was then hurried away as soon as possible. There was really, however, not the slightest ground at the time to fear an armed invasion by Alba in favour of Mary. He wrote to Philip, 11th December, that he expected the rising “would all end in smoke,” and he would not move a step without Philip’s precise instructions.

[314] See _inter alia_ the Bishop of Ross’s letter to Philip, 4th November 1569 (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth). His mistress, he says, had ordered him to remonstrate with Elizabeth against her imprisonment at Tutbury, and to demand either her restoration to her throne, or that she should be allowed to go over to France or Spanish Flanders. He can get no answer from Elizabeth, he says, and therefore in Mary’s name fervently begs for Philip’s aid.

[315] Very large sums were granted by Elizabeth for this purpose. To Count Mansfield alone she promised 100,000 crowns payable in three months, and a like sum in two years. In February the Prince of Orange sent an envoy to England to beg for similar aid, which was to be largely supplemented by the Flemings in England. The envoy was secretly lodged in Cecil House.

[316] There is an interesting memorandum of this period in Cecil’s hand (Hatfield Papers, part i., Nos. 1452 and 1455), entitled, “Extract of ye booke of ye state of ye realme,” in which the various dangers set forth in this page and the remedies therefor are described. The dangers are—the conspiracy of the Pope and the Kings of France and Spain against England; that of Mary Queen of Scots; the decay of civil obedience and of martial power in the country; the interruption of trade with Flanders, and the shortcomings in England’s treaties with foreign princes.

[317] Hatfield Papers, part i.

[318] _Ibid._

[319] See her letters in Labanoff, iii., and also Banister’s Confessions (Hatfield).

[320] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[321] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[322] The whole of the documents are at Hatfield; most of them _in extenso_ in Haynes.

[323] See Morton to Cecil, 9th February 1571 (Hatfield Papers, part i., 1541); and Elizabeth to Shrewsbury, 24th March (_ibid._, 1546).

[324] _Correspondance de la Mothe Fénélon._

[325] Walsingham Papers. Most of the letters _in extenso_ in “The Compleat Ambassador.”

[326] There are in the Foreign State Papers of the year several of Cecil’s balancing considerations of the advantages and disadvantages of the match. From them it is clear that the Secretary himself was uncertain of the Queen’s intentions. In one important letter to her (31st August), Cecil suggests a way by which she may extricate herself, if she pleases, from the agreement she had made on the matter with Catharine’s special envoy, De Foix, at Knebworth. But he warns her very seriously of the dangerous position in which she stands unless she does marry. “It will,” he says, “also be necessary to seek by your Majesty’s best council the means to preserve yourself, as in the most dangerous and desperate sicknesses, the help of the best physicians; and surely how your Majesty shall obtain remedies for your perils, I think, is only in the knowledge of Almighty God.”

[327] Norris to the Queen (Foreign State Papers), 31st August 1570; also Warcop’s communications from Walsingham to Cecil, 16th July 1571, &c.

[328] Walsingham Papers.

[329] His eldest son Thomas, afterwards Lord Exeter, also sat in this Parliament as representative of the borough of Stamford. He had ended the sowing of his wild oats, to which reference has been made, by running away with a nun from a French convent; and was now married to Dorothy Nevil, a daughter of the last Lord Latimer, whose sister had married Sir Henry Percy, brother of the rebel Earl of Northumberland. Lord Burghley, in the little Perpetual Calendar at Hatfield, duly records the birth of all of Thomas’s children, three of whom had been born by this time.

[330] The young Earl of Rutland, one of his wards, especially at this time seems to have occupied much of his attention. He was sent with Lord Buckhurst’s embassy to France to congratulate Charles IX. on his marriage with Elizabeth of Austria, and at every stage of the journey a correspondence was kept up between them, the Secretary being solicitous for the lad’s welfare and good treatment even to the smallest detail. In the State Papers, Domestic, of 20th January 1571, there is a curious document in Cecil’s handwriting, headed “Directions for a Traveller,” laying down for Lord Rutland’s guidance strict rules for his conduct whilst abroad.

[331] Mary to the Bishop, 8th February 1571 (Cotton MSS., Caligula, c. xi.).

[332] Hatfield Papers and State Trials.

[333] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[334] That this possibility was ever present to the minds of Elizabeth’s advisers, is seen by the constant warnings on the subject by Cecil’s agents in Flanders, and by Walsingham. In one of Cecil’s statements as to the advantages and disadvantages of the Queen’s marriage with Anjou (Foreign State Papers, 14th January 1571), he enters on the contra side the possibility that, in the case of there being no issue, the King-consort might shorten the Queen’s life and marry Mary Stuart. The confessions of the men who were to murder Burghley in connection with the Ridolfi plot are at Hatfield.

[335] Details of all the examinations and the letters are at Hatfield. Burghley alleged that Bailly was a Scotchman. His claim to be considered a servant of the Queen of Scots was merely a technical one, although on his tomb in a church in a suburb of Brussels he is called a secretary of the Queen, which he certainly was not, and there is a bas-relief of her execution. This has led on several occasions to the incorrect assertion that Charles Bailly was present at the scene represented. He lived for many years in Flanders in the pay of Spain; and, at least on one occasion (1586), he took part in a Spanish attempt to foment a Catholic invasion and revolution in Scotland.

[336] The Pope had sent by Beton, early in the year, as much as 140,000 crowns to Mary Stuart, which she received through Ridolfi. (Examination of Ross: Hatfield.)

[337] The conspiracy included also a design to assassinate Burghley himself. (See the confessions of Edmund Mather, the proposed murderer, and Kenelm Berney, January 1572. Hatfield State Papers, part ii.).

[338] The cipher letter from Hickford will be found in Harl. MSS., 290.

[339] Examination of the Duke (Hatfield; _in extenso_ in Murdin).

[340] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[341] The English draft of Burghley’s speech is in Foreign State Papers; De Spes’ version in the Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[342] It added to De Spes’ rage that the time he was thus contemned Burghley was celebrating with great magnificence the marriage of his eldest daughter, Elizabeth, with the young Earl of Oxford, a connection which in after years brought him much trouble and anxiety. During the wedding festivities the open slight to Spain was made the most of. Cavalcanti was flattered and caressed, the Guises were denounced as “Hispaniolised traitors,” and the Queen’s connection with the Protestants of Germany and Flanders boasted of; whilst De Spes and his master were scornfully held up as an object-lesson of England’s boldness and strength. De Spes, in his last letter to Alba before his embarkation, says that “Burghley has received certain threatening letters, and had informed the Queen that if I stay here during the trial of the prisoners the country will rise up in arms; and he, timid, contemptible fellow that he is, commits so many absurdities that people are quite astonished.”

[343] The alcabala or tenth penny—ten per cent. on every sale.

[344] Foreign State Papers.

[345] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[346] _Correspondance de la Mothe Fénélon._

[347] Burghley writes to Walsingham, 11th February 1572, an account of the Queen’s vacillation about Norfolk’s fate: “Suddenly on Sunday, late at night the Queen’s Majesty sent for me, and entered into a great misliking that the Duke should die next day, and said she was, and should be, disquieted; and said she would have a new warrant made that night to the sheriffs to forbear, until they should hear further. God’s will be fulfilled, and aid her Majesty to do herself good.” (Walsingham Papers: Complete Ambassador). In another letter from Burghley to Walsingham a few weeks earlier than this, he complains of the Queen’s clemency: “The Queen’s Majesty has always been a merciful lady, and by mercy she hath taken more harm than by justice, and yet she thinks she is more beloved in doing herself harm.” And again: “Here is no small expectation whether the Duke shall die or continue prisoner. I know not how to write, for I am here in my chamber subject to reports which are contrariwise.”

[348] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[349] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[350] Walsingham Papers.

[351] A copy of the charges with Lord Burghley’s signature erased is in Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[352] There was in the Parliament in question a strong Puritan element. An attempt was made by it to alter the rites of the Established Church in the Genevan direction, which Elizabeth regarded as an interference with her prerogative; and the pressure put upon her to consent to the trial of Mary Stuart led her to dismiss the Parliament, which did not meet again till 1575. When Parliament did meet again, the clemency of the Queen towards Mary was made a source of complaint by the Puritan Wentworth, who was imprisoned for his undutiful speech. For the consultation and report of the joint committee of the two Houses in 1572 respecting Mary Stuart, see D’Ewes’ “Compleat Journal.”

[353] It is probable that on this occasion the Queen made the celebrated remark to Burghley’s servant. He told her Majesty, who wore a very high head-dress, that it would be necessary to stoop to enter the door of the chamber where the sick man lay. “For your master only will I stoop,” said the Queen, “but not for the King of Spain.” It may be worth while to repeat De Guaras’ remark when giving an account of this sickness of Burghley. The latter had been showing an inclination to come to terms with Spain about the seizures (it was shortly before the French alliance was signed), and his illness had interrupted the negotiations. “If this man dies,” writes De Guaras, “it will be very unfortunate for the purpose which he declared to me.… It is true that hitherto he has undoubtedly been the enemy of peace and tranquillity, for his own bad ends; but I am convinced that he is now well disposed, which means that the Queen and Council are so, for he, and no one else, rules the whole affairs of the State. God grant that if it be for His service he may live.” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. ii.)

[354] These are the dates in the diary, but they do not quite agree with the entries in the little Perpetual Calendar at Hatfield, which run thus:—

“19 July 1572. W. Cecill admiss. Thesaurus Angl.

“19 July 1572. Quene’s Majestie at Theobalds, 5 to 6.”

[355] A curious letter from Sir Nicholas Bacon to Burghley respecting this visit is in Lansdowne MSS., 14 (printed by Ellis), in which he prays for advice and guidance, “ffor in very deede no man is more rawe in such a matter than myself” (12th July 1572. Gorhambury).

[356] There is another letter in the same collection from the Earl of Bedford to Burghley, begging him to arrange that the Queen should not stay at Woburn longer than two nights and a day. “I pray god the Rowmes and Lodgings there may be to her Majesty’s contentation for the tyme.… They should be better than they be” (16th July 1572. Russell House).

[357] Spanish State Papers, 22nd July 1572, a month before St. Bartholomew. If this be true, it to some extent confirms the subsequent allegations of the Catholics as to a plot of the Huguenots.

[358] Foreign State Papers; _in extenso_ in Digges.

[359] Smith to Walsingham, 27th September (Foreign State Papers; _in extenso_ in Digges).

[360] When Orange entered Brabant in September he sent an envoy to England to ask for aid. An agent at once started from London with £16,000 in money, and a few days afterwards £30,000 in bills on Hamburg were sent, for which the Prince wrote thanking Burghley. Large quantities of stores were also shipped from England, and a force of 12,000 men collected at the ports in case of emergency.

[361] See his letters in Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth; and also “Antonio de Guaras,” by Richard Garnett, LLD.

[362] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[363] How deeply interested Burghley was in the question of trade is seen in the active efforts he was making at this time to establish the Flemish fugitives in various parts of England, to exercise the handicrafts in which they excelled. During the negotiations with De Guaras, he was establishing a community of cloth-workers in his own town of Stamford, lodging them at first in a house of his own, giving them a church and aiding them with money. (Dr. Cunningham’s “Alien Emigrants in England”; State Papers, Domestic; and Strype’s Parker.)

[364] Burghley, on a previous occasion, had frightened De Guaras out of his wits by charging him with conspiring against the Queen. Throughout the whole negotiation the Spaniards were alternately flattered and threatened. De Guaras himself was one day overjoyed with Burghley’s amiability and admiration for all things and men Spanish; and the next day cast into the depths of gloom, by haughty indifference, or hints at punishment for treason, of which the poor man was as yet quite innocent; or, again, by talk of the diversion of all English trade to France or Hamburg, the abundant aid being sent to Orange, or the welcoming of the Dutch privateers into English ports. The negotiation and its result are a good specimen of Lord Burghley’s diplomatic methods.

[365] The documents relating to the protracted negotiations with regard to the seizures, and the resumption of trade, will be found in the Cotton MSS., Galba ciii., civ., cv., cvi., and Vesp. cxiii.

[366] Hatfield Papers; _in extenso_ in Murdin; also State Papers, Scotland.

[367] See letters in Cotton MSS., Caligula, ciii.

[368] The terms were—that the hostages should be delivered within four hours of the surrender of Mary; that James should be taken under the protection of Elizabeth, and his rights remain intact, and be recognised by the English Parliament; that a defensive alliance should be concluded between the two countries; that the Earls of Bedford, Huntingdon, and Essex should be present at the Queen’s execution with a force of 3000 men, and immediately afterwards join the King’s troops to reduce Edinburgh Castle, which should then be delivered to the Regent; and, finally, that all arrears of pay owing to the Scottish army should be paid by England. The Spanish agents attributed the failure of Killigrew’s mission to the efforts of De Croc, the French Ambassador in Scotland. Elizabeth told the latter, when she saw him in London in October, that she was well aware of all his plots in Scotland. Her uneasiness at the time was increased by the news of the arrival in Paris of Cardinal Orsini, a papal envoy with a fresh plan for the release of Mary.

[369] State Papers, Foreign. See also Burghley’s letters to Copley. Roxburghe Club.

[370] Foreign State Papers; _in extenso_ in Digges.

[371] Foreign State Papers; _in extenso_ in Digges.

[372] The progress of each stage in the complicated business is related in the author’s “Courtships of Queen Elizabeth.”

[373] The Bishop of London’s letter to Burghley is at Hatfield, part ii.; _in extenso_ in Murdin. “These be dangerous days,” he says, “full of itching ears mislying their minds, and ready to forget all obedience and duty.… A soft plaister is better than a sharp corosy to apply to this sore.… If Mr. Deryng be somewhat spared, yet wal scoled, the others, being manifest offenders, may be dealt withal according to their deserts” (3rd June 1573).

[374] In one case his love of justice had an unfortunate termination. A crazy Puritan named Birchett stabbed Sir John Hawkins in the Strand, under the belief that he was Sir Christopher Hatton, the declared rival of Leicester in the Queen’s affection; and it was surmised also, his opponent in his Puritan leanings. The Queen issued a commission for Birchett’s summary trial and punishment by martial law, but was persuaded by Burghley to remand him to safe custody for further inquiries. He was imprisoned in the Lollard’s Tower, and a few days afterwards killed his keeper. He was clearly a maniac, but the affair brought great odium upon Puritanism, and led to the arrest of Mr. Cartwright, the leader of the party. It is to be noticed that Burghley provided suitable preferment for all the eminent Puritan nonconformists who were dismissed from their positions in the Church; Cartwright, Lever, and Sampson being made respectively “masters” of charitable foundations where their opinions on ritual were of little importance.

[375] Original letters, Ellis.

[376] Gilbert Talbot to the Earl of Shrewsbury, 9th May 1573 (Lodge’s Illustrations).

[377] The number and variety of remedies sent to Burghley from all parts of the world for the cure of the gout are truly marvellous. We have already mentioned some in an earlier page, but they became much more frequent after this year (1573), when a Mr. Dyon sent one which Burghley endorses as “Recipe pro podagra,” as well as Lady Harrington. Dr. Nuñes, the Queen’s Portuguese physician, sent quite a collection of nostrums in Latin, and a German doctor recommended certain medicated slippers; a tincture of gold was advocated by a Nicholas Gybberd, and the Earl of Shrewsbury was loud in his praises of “oyle of stagg’s blood.” Most of the recipes mentioned will be found in the Lansdowne MSS., 18, 21, 27, 29, 39, and 42.

[378] See letters from Mary, in Labanoff, vol. iv. Elizabeth showed some amount of jealous suspicion at Burghley’s interview with Mary, of which Leicester and the Treasurer’s enemies made the most during his absence.

[379] Burghley, as Lord Treasurer, seems to have been seriously concerned at the heavy cost of these progresses. In the Lansdowne MSS., 16, there is a document, altered and corrected by Lord Burghley himself, of this date (1573), showing how the royal household expenses had been increased by this particular progress. It is to be deduced from the document that extra expenditure entailed was £1034, 0s. 6d.

[380] See a curious letter from Lord Windsor to Burghley, 10th January 1574, exculpating himself for this letter (Hatfield Papers, part ii., No. 181).

[381] Hatfield Papers; _in extenso_ in Murdin.

[382] As a matter of fact he was straining every nerve at the time to hold back his half-brother, Don John of Austria, who, with papal support, was full of all manner of grand plans for the founding of a great Christian Empire in Africa or the East, with himself as Emperor; or else for invading England from Flanders, marrying Mary Stuart, and reigning over a Catholic Great Britain. Don John and Gregory XIII. were very serious in their plans; but Philip was determined that nothing of the sort should be done with Spanish forces. He was absolutely bankrupt at the time, and had recently been obliged to repudiate the interest upon the vast sums he had borrowed. This had caused wholesale financial disaster in Italy and Flanders, and Philip’s credit was at its lowest ebb.

[383] Mary’s own hopes were high for a short time after the accession of her favourite brother-in-law. But she soon found out her mistake. Catharine’s aim was not to benefit Mary Stuart, but to prevent the extinction of French influence in Scotland. Her first act after Henry III. ascended the throne was to project an embassy to Scotland, accredited, not as all previous French embassies had been, to Mary Stuart’s party alone, but to both parties. Mary indignantly protested at this proposed recognition of the “usurpers,” and the embassy was abandoned. La Chatre was sent to London in March 1575, to confirm the treaty of Blois (in which Elizabeth and the Huguenots were comprised), but he did not say a word in favour of the liberation of the Queen of Scots. The withdrawal soon afterwards of the Guisan La Mothe Fénélon from England, and the appointment, as Ambassador, of Castelnau, a great friend of the English alliance, quite convinced Mary that she had nothing to hope for from Henry III., who, sunk in sloth and vice, left everything to his mother.

[384] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[385] 16th April 1575 (Hatfield Papers).

[386] Woodshaw’s interesting letters of this period to Burghley are in Hatfield Papers. See also “Copley’s Correspondence,” Roxburghe Club.

[387] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[388] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[389] See Philip’s minute of his conversation with Cobham, October 1575 (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth), and also Lord Burghley’s Diary.

[390] Burghley, in his Diary, refers to this embassy, giving the names of the envoys. He says they based their offer of Holland, &c., to the Queen upon her descent from Philippa of Hainault and Holland, who married Edward III.

[391] Gerald Talbot writes: “Her Majesty is troubled with these causes, which maketh her very melancholy, and she seemeth to be greatly out of quiet. What shall be done in these matters is at present unknown; but here are ambassadors on all sides, who labour greatly, one against the other. Her Majesty hath put upon her to deal betwixt the King of Spain and the Low Country; the King of France and his brother. Her Majesty may deal as pleaseth her, for I think they both be weary of war, especially Flanders, which, as report goeth, is utterly wanting of money, munition, &c.” Hampton Court, 4th January 1576.

[392] Burghley was at the time unable to attend the Council in consequence of an attack of his old enemy the gout.

[393] A few days later Burghley had reason to be still more angry with Oxford himself, though with his reverence for rank he appears to have treated him with inexhaustible patience and forbearance. Oxford had been very extravagant and got into difficulties. During his absence abroad he had made some complaint to Burghley about his steward or agent, but nothing apparently of consequence. In March, Lord Burghley wrote to him in Paris, saying that his wife was pregnant; and the Earl’s answer was most cordial, full of rejoicing at the news, and announcing his immediate return. The Treasurer’s eldest son, Sir Thomas Cecil (he had been knighted the previous year at Kenilworth), travelled to Dover to meet his brother-in-law. All went well until they arrived in London, when Oxford declined to meet his wife or hold any communication with her. Burghley reasoned, remonstrated, and besought in vain. Oxford was sulky and intractable. His wife, he said, had been influenced by her parents against him, and he would have no more to do with her. The whole of the documents in the quarrel are in Hatfield Papers. As some indication of the state in which noblemen of the period travelled even short distances, two entries in the uncalendared household account-book at Hatfield may be quoted: “Saturday, December 1576. My Lord and Lady Oxford came from London to Theobalds; 28 servants with them.” And again, “Monday, 14th January 1577. My Lord and my Lady of Oxford and 28 persons came from London.”

[394] State Papers, Foreign.

[395] State Papers, Foreign.

[396] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[397] How true this is may be seen by the account of an important conversation De Guaras had with Burghley on the 30th January 1576 (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth). De Guaras had prayed Burghley to prevent the Queen from accepting the offer of Orange’s envoys for her to take Holland and Zeeland. The Treasurer replied that, if the offer were accepted, it would only be in the interests of Spain, and to prevent the French from obtaining a footing. The Spaniard derided such a possibility, and Burghley said that England, in pursuance of its ancient policy, would defend the rights of the House of Burgundy, but that “foreign intruders” had misgoverned the States to an extent which endangered England itself. “Foreign intruders” indeed, retorted De Guaras; “your Lordship cannot call Spaniards ‘foreign intruders’ in Flanders.” Burghley got angry at this, and said, “You people are of such sort that wherever you set foot no grass grows, and you are hated everywhere.” Hollanders, he continued, were fighting for their privileges, and would be successful in upholding them. The end of the colloquy was a renewal of the Queen’s wish to mediate between Orange and Spain. The great object was to prevent the French from obtaining influence in Flanders, and here Spanish and English aims were identical.

[398] A violent attack against the hierarchy, and even against the Queen, was made in Parliament (February 1576) by Paul Wentworth, member for Tregony, a strong Puritan, who declared against the powers given to the bishops to regulate ritual without the intervention of Parliament, and complained of the rejection by the Queen of the bills against the Queen of Scots in the previous session of 1572. Wentworth was imprisoned in the Tower for a few days for his boldness. (D’Ewes’ Journal.)

[399] As Sussex for once was on the side of Leicester and the Puritans, Burghley seems to have depended as an ally at this time principally upon Hatton. A letter from the latter to the Treasurer (26th August 1576, Lansdowne MSS., 22) shows that Burghley was urging him to return to court from the country, where he was lying ill, and apparently unhappy. His recent unjust extortion of the lease of Ely Place, Holborn, from the Bishop of Ely (Cox), had rendered him very unpopular.

[400] A similar but more flattering offer was made in 1573 by the unfortunate Earl of Essex, who proposed that his eldest son, then only about six years old, should be betrothed to Burghley’s daughter (Lansdowne MSS., 17). A few hours before he died (21st September 1576) the Earl wrote a most pathetic letter to Lord Burghley, praying him to take the same son into his household, and beseeching him to be good to him for the sake of his father, “who lived and died your true and unfeigned friend” (Hatfield Papers). It is sad to consider that the son grew up to be the enemy of his father’s friend; to succeed, in his enmity of Burghley, the vile Leicester, who dishonoured his mother and deliberately ruined his father.

[401] Hatfield Papers.

[402] _Ibid._

[403] Philip’s reception of Smith was cold, more so even than had been his treatment of Sir Henry Cobham. Smith writes to Burghley (5th February 1577) saying that he “has had special care to make known the Queen’s noble nature and the great love and obedience of her subjects; in which he has not detracted any title of honour that your Lordship is worthy of. Yea, even the Duke of Alba himself gives you the honour to be one of the most sufficient men in Christendom in all politic government.” Smith’s reports of the extremity of Philip’s financial exhaustion caused great surprise amongst the friends of Spain in Elizabeth’s court, many of whom disbelieved them. When Smith returned and begged the Queen for a reward for his services, she refused to accord him anything except to take his bills payable in twelve months for £2000 instead of a mortgage she had on his lands. (See letter 21st September 1578, Hatton to Burghley: State Papers, Domestic.)

[404] A sum of no less than 400,000 crowns was openly provided by Elizabeth for the States at the request of the Catholic Flemish nobles.

[405] Hatfield Papers.

[406] See the extraordinary Italian letter of this period from Baptista de Trento to the Queen, in which nearly the whole of her nobility (including Leicester and Sussex) are accused (Hatfield Papers), and also a letter written by Burghley to Lord Shrewsbury, after his return from Buxton, warning him to keep his eyes on Mary, who was, he said, suspected of suborning some of Shrewsbury’s servants. The persecuting Bishop of London (Aylmer) also wrote at the same time to Burghley urging him to “use more severity than hath hitherto been used; or else we shall smart for it. For as sure as God liveth they look for an invasion, or else they (the Catholics) would not fall away as they do” (Strype’s Aylmer).

[407] According to his own statement the case against him was divulged to Burghley by some of the Catholic Flemish nobles who were aware of his former practices; but there are many indications in his letters up to the time of his arrest, that he was a party to plots then in progress, especially one with Colonel Chester and others.

[408] An interesting minute on the subject, in Burghley’s writing, is in Hatfield Papers (part ii., No. 531). Two personages were to be sent from England to bring about peace: one to the States, and the other to Don Juan. The States were to be reminded that they owed gratitude to Elizabeth for risking war with Spain on their behalf, and aiding them with £85,000; and the envoy was to point out to them the danger of their receiving French help. The French, they are to be told, may either turn and side with the enemy, or try to keep the country for themselves. As a last resort, the English envoy is to be authorised to offer English aid if the States will desist from dealing with the French.

Don Juan, on the other hand, is to be told that if he does not make terms with the States, the French will conquer the country, in which case the Queen will send such aid to the States as will enable them to hold their own against everybody. As usual with Burghley’s minutes, there is at the end a carefully-balanced summary of possibilities, and courses to be pursued, all tending to the same end—the exclusion of the French from Flanders. The mission in question was that of June 1578, the envoys being Lord Cobham and Walsingham.

[409] For a wonder, on this occasion Sussex sided with his enemy Leicester, although, as will be seen, only for a short time.

[410] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[411] Grindall, Archbishop of Canterbury, had been deprived by the Queen for neglecting to suppress the “prophesying”; and Sandys, Archbishop of York, was also in disgrace; but, as Strype says, “his good friend Lord Burghley stood up for him.” He certainly did so in the case of Grindall, who kept up a constant correspondence with the “good Lord Treasurer.”

[412] Add. MSS., 15,891; 21st April 1578.

[413] To such an extent was this so, that whilst, according to Mendoza, money and men were constantly being sent to Flanders, and Leicester and Walsingham were planning the murder of Don Juan and the expulsion of Mendoza from England, “I can assure your Majesty that the Earl of Sussex is sincerely attached to your Majesty’s interests, and Cecil also, though not so openly. But if he and Sussex are properly treated they will both be favourable, and their good disposition will be much strengthened when they see it rewarded.” His suggestion was that Burghley and Sussex should be granted large pensions. It will be observed that Sussex had already broken free from Leicester.

[414] Elizabeth appears to have been very angry about Gondi’s mission. “She told him,” says Mendoza, “loudly in the audience chamber, that she knew very well he had come to disturb her country, and to act in favour of the worst woman in the world, whose head should have been struck off long ago. She was sure he had not come with the knowledge of his King, but only of some of those who surrounded him. Gondi replied that the Queen of Scots was a sovereign, as she was, and her own kinswoman, and it was not surprising that efforts should be made on her behalf. The Queen answered him angrily, that she should never be free as long as she lived, even if it cost her (Elizabeth) her realm and her own liberty. The Queen-mother, she said, must surely know what Mary had attempted against her.” (5th May 1578; Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.)

[415] Mendoza dilates much upon the venality of the English Council, and says, “I am told by a person in the palace, that, even in the matter of giving me audience readily, the Queen has been considerably influenced by the gloves and perfumes I gave her when I arrived.”

[416] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, and also a letter from Sussex to Burghley in November, printed by Lodge, vol. ii.; also Sussex to Burghley, Hatfield Papers, part ii., where he mentions that “Burghley also had been ill-used by lewd speech. I will on all occasions stick as near to you as your shirt is to your back.” (5th November 1578.)

[417] This was true. The treaty of Nerac was signed in February 1579 by Henry of Navarre, now the acknowledged leader.

[418] Cobham, Wilkes, and Smith had all been sent back with a short answer.

[419] Sir Thomas Cecil to Burghley, and Lord Lincoln to the same (Hatfield Papers).

[420] Hatton to Burghley, 28th September 1578 (Hatfield Papers).

[421] There are many hundreds of such letters as these at Hatfield and in the Lansdowne MSS.

[422] Hatfield State Papers, part ii.

[423] Mendoza, writing on 8th April, says, “Lord Burghley is not so much opposed to the match as formerly; but I cannot discover whether he and Sussex have changed their minds because they think that they may thus bring about the fall of Leicester, and avenge themselves upon him for old grievances, and for his having advanced to the office of Chancellor an enemy of theirs” (_i.e._ Bromley). On another occasion, when the Queen learned of the Papal-Spanish expedition to Ireland to aid the Desmonds in Munster, she was so much alarmed that she dropped the French negotiations for some days and refused to see Simier.

[424] It has not been noticed by Burghley’s biographers that, true to his cautious character, he found an excuse for going into Northamptonshire shortly before Alençon arrived in London. He writes an interesting letter to Hatton from Althorpe, dated 9th August (Nicholas’s “Life of Hatton”), in reply to the advices respecting the fortifying of the Papal force at Dingle, in Kerry. The ships must be sent against them, he says, double-manned, “as there is no good access by land.” He is very jealous of foreigners setting foot in Ireland, for fear any “discontentation grow betwixt France and us upon a breach of this interview (_i.e._ with Alençon), or if the King of Spain shall be free from his troubles in the Low Country.” He approves of the agreement of Cologne and the pacification of Ghent, whereby Holland and Zeeland were to remain Protestant, and Flanders Catholic, rather than the war should go on. “On Tuesday morning we will be at Northampton, where after noon we mean to hear the babbling matters of the town for the causes of religion, wishing that we may accord them all in mind and action; at least we will draw them to follow one line by the rule of the laws, or else make the contrariant feel the sharpness of the same law.” On the same day Burghley wrote a vigorous letter to Walsingham directing energetic action in Ireland.

[425] Burghley’s minutes of the deliberations are in Hatfield Papers,

## part ii.

[426] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[427] The original draft of the protocol in Simier’s handwriting is in the Hatfield Papers. A most valuable digest or “time-table,” in Burghley’s handwriting, of the whole of the negotiations for the Queen’s marriage up to the period of Simier’s departure, will be found in the Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[428] Allen’s famous English seminary had been transferred to Rheims under the patronage of the Guises, and a great number of young priests were continually sent into England, especially after 1579, the first members of the Jesuit mission, Persons and Campion, arriving in 1580.

[429] Mendoza at this period writes to the King of the enormous number of ships being built. “This,” he says, “makes the English almost masters of the commerce … as they have a monopoly of shipping, whereby they profit by all the freights.” Burghley was an untiring promoter of extension of legitimate trade, as he was a constant enemy to piracy. He was at this time promoting Humphrey Gilbert’s colonisation schemes in North America, the enterprises of Frobisher and his friends in Hudson’s Bay, the trade of the Muscovy Company, the overland route to the Caspian by the White Sea and the Volga, and other similar adventures; but, as we shall have occasion to see later, he disapproved entirely of Drake’s proceedings in the Pacific, and other expeditions of a wantonly aggressive character.

[430] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[431] Sadler State Papers.

[432] The intention, however, was not carried out. In the summer Lord Shrewsbury wrote to Lady Burghley asking her to prevail upon her husband to obtain the Queen’s permission for Mary Stuart to go to Buxton and Chatsworth. Lady Burghley in her reply suggests that the Queen was angry and refused. Mary, however, did go to Buxton later, but not to Chatsworth.

[433] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth. Burghley’s interest in naval affairs was great. He had, when danger threatened from Alba, in the summer of 1578, elaborated a scheme for the mobilisation of the navy, and had put fourteen ships into commission. The Council appear to have addressed to him most of their minutes respecting naval organisation, instead of to the Lord Admiral.

[434] The Duke Hans Casimir was in England at the time (January 1580), and took a large sum of money back with him for the purpose in question.

[435] This was actually the case at the time so far as Scotland itself as apart from Mary was concerned. There is in the Hatfield Papers of this date (1580) a fervent appeal from James VI. to the King of France, begging for assistance in force to release his mother, and support him against his heretic subjects. Mendoza also reports (4th September 1580) that Guise had just recognised James’s title of King for the first time, and that intimate relations were being formed between the courts of Scotland and France. This probably arose from the long delay of the reply from Spain to Mary, Guise, and the Archbishop of Glasgow, relative to their offer of complete submission to Philip. The whole matter, however, was changed in the following year, and thenceforward Mary and her friends depended upon Spain alone.

[436] In Strype’s “Annals,” _in extenso_.

[437] Hatfield Papers. Another letter of this period (June 1580) from Sussex to Lord Burghley (Hatfield Papers) shows forcibly the affection and veneration he felt for him. “I do love, honour, and reverence you as a father, and do you all the service we can as far as any child you have, with heart and hand.… The true fear of God which your actions have always shown to be in your heart, the great and deep care you have had for the honour and safety of the Queen … and the continual trouble you have of long time taken for the benefit of the commonwealth, and the upright course you have always taken respecting the matter, and not the person, in all causes … have tied me to your Lordship in that knot which no worldly frailty can break.”

[438] See her letter to Henry III. (Hatfield State Papers, 27th July 1580).

[439] According to Drake’s statement given in Cooke’s narrative in Vaux, Drake was presented to the Queen by Walsingham; but Doughty, of whom we shall speak presently, asserted when he was on his trial that he, who was a great friend of Drake, and private secretary to Hatton, had interested the latter in the project, and that it was he who persuaded the Queen to countenance Drake.

[440] 20th June 1578. Doughty confessed that he had given Burghley a plan of the voyage. It was this, unquestionably, that sealed Doughty’s fate.

[441] Mendoza writes to the King (23rd October 1580): “Sussex, Burghley, Crofts, the Admiral, and others insist that the Queen should retain the treasure in her own hands in the Tower, and if your Majesty will give them the satisfaction they desire about Ireland, the treasure may be restored, after reimbursing the adventurers for their outlay.… Leicester and Hatton advocate that Drake should not be personally punished, nor made to restore the plunder if the business is carried before the tribunals. The fine excuse they give is that there is nothing in the treaties between the countries which prohibits Englishmen from going to the Indies.”

[442] Spanish State Papers.

[443] D’Ewes’ Journal.

[444] Sir Walter Mildmay introduced a bill in this Parliament by which reconciliation to Rome should be punishable as high treason, the saying of mass by a fine of 200 marks and a year’s imprisonment, and the hearing of mass half that penalty. Absence from church was to be punished by a fine of £20 a month, and unlicensed schoolmasters were to be imprisoned for a year. The bill met with much opposition by the Lords and by Burghley’s party, and was somewhat lessened in severity before it became law.

[445] How entirely Elizabeth herself depended upon the Burghley policy now, is proved by a remark reported by Mendoza (27th February). D’Aubigny was quite paramount in Scotland, and Morton was in prison, his doom practically sealed. Mendoza reports that the Earl of Huntingdon, Leicester’s brother-in-law, Warden of the Marches, had connived at a raid of Borderers into England as far as Carlisle, where some Englishmen were killed, in order that he might have an excuse for crossing into Scotland and attacking Morton’s enemies. When the Queen heard of this she was extremely angry. “What is this I hear about Scotland?” she asked Walsingham. “Did I order anything of this sort to be done?” Walsingham minimised the affair. The answer was, “You Puritan! you will never be content until you drive me into war on all sides, and bring the King of Spain on to me.” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.)

[446] It consisted of two very young princes of the blood sent for appearance’ sake, Francis de Bourbon, Dauphin d’Auvergne, and Charles de Bourbon, Count de Soissons; Marshal de Cossé, Pinart, La Mothe Fénélon, Brisson, and a great number of courtiers of rank. So desirous was Elizabeth that they should be impressed with the splendour of her court, that she ordered that the London mercers should sell their fine stuffs at a reduction of 25 per cent. in order that the courtiers might be handsomely dressed.

[447] Lodge, vol. ii.

[448] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[449] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[450] Hatfield Papers, part ii.

[451] Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris: _Fonds français_, 3308.

[452] In addition to the letter of the Queen, there is another document signed by the Ambassadors and by the English Council, saying that the terms shall not be considered binding upon the Queen, unless within six weeks she and Alençon report in writing to the King of France that they have arranged certain personal questions to their mutual satisfaction. Both documents are printed _in extenso_ in Digges.

[453] Spanish Calendar, Elizabeth.

[454] The real reason for the Queen’s ostentatious slighting of Mendoza at the time was to draw the King of France on, and make him believe that she was willing to break with Spain.

[455] Walsingham to the Queen: “fearing lest when he should be embarqued your Majesty would slip the collar” (Walsingham Papers). See also Walsingham’s letters to Burghley, in the same.

[456] Burghley to Walsingham; _in extenso_ in Digges.

[457] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[458] Hatfield State Papers, part ii.

[459] Burghley to Walsingham; _in extenso_ in Digges.

[460] “Courtships of Queen Elizabeth,” by the present writer.

[461] See Camden; _Memoires de Nevers_; Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth; and “Courtships of Queen Elizabeth.”

[462] Wilkes, Clerk of the Council, was sent to confer with Mary upon the subject. His report in full is in State Papers, Scotland, and at Hatfield.

[463] See his own book, “Treatise on the Execution of Justice,” written in 1583 in answer to Allen’s attacks.

[464] See Simpson’s Life of Campion, Spanish State Papers, Camden’s Elizabeth, and Allen’s _De Persecutione Anglicana_.

[465] Burghley, writing to Lord Shrewsbury (Lansdowne MSS., 982) in August 1581, telling him of the trial and execution for treason of the priest Everard Duckett, who had denied the Queen’s authority, says in reference to Campion and his companions, “If they shall do the like, the law is like to correct them. For their actions are not matters of religion, but merely of state, tending directly to the deprivation of her Majesty’s crown.” Campion, he says, had been brought before Leicester and Bromley, but had not confessed anything of importance. It appears to have been the result of the admissions wrung from Campion and others about this time as to the houses in which they had lodged that led to the great number of Catholic arrests all over England.

[466] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[467] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[468] _Ibid._

[469] Ralegh was certainly known to Leicester before this. He was attached to his suite when he accompanied Alençon to Antwerp in February; and always professed to be specially attached to him personally, even when he was lending his aid to his political opponents.

[470] B. M. Add. MSS., 15,891: Walsingham to Hatton.

[471] B. M. Lansdowne MSS., 36: Hatton to Burghley.

[472] The probable cause of the Queen’s displeasure with Oxford on this occasion was an affray between him and Sir Thomas Knyvett, one of the Queen’s Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber, in March 1582. Nicholas Faunt writes to Anthony Bacon (Bacon Papers, vol. i.): “There has been a fray between my Lord of Oxford and Knyvett, who are both hurt, but Lord Oxford more dangerously. You know,” he adds, “Master Knyvett is not meanly beloved at court, and therefore is not likely to speed ill, whatsoever the quarrel be.” There is also a most interesting letter from Burghley to Hatton (12th March 1582, B. M. MSS., Add. 91), in which he begs him to intercede with the Queen for Oxford, and recites the whole of the accusations against him.

[473] State Papers, Domestic.

[474] Mary to Beton, 18th November 1582 (Spanish State Papers).

[475] Harl. MSS., 5397.

[476] Full particulars of De Maineville’s and La Mothe Fénélon’s missions in M. Chéruel’s _Marie Stuart et Catherine de Medicis_, drawn from the correspondence of La Mothe Fénélon and the archives of the D’Esneval family.

[477] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[478] See Beale’s instructions, Harl. MSS., 4663; also Beale’s report of his proceedings in Lord Calthorpe’s MSS.

[479] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[480] This is according to Beale’s official report. But on the following day (17th April 1583) Beale wrote to Lord Burghley (Harl. MSS., 4663), saying that she had abandoned all ambition, she was old and ill, and was ready to swear to anything for her liberation. This, however, was before she received Mendoza’s letter (6th May?) advising her on no account to accept her release (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth).

[481] The Queen had nicknames for most of her friends; Burghley was the Leviathan or the Spirit, Hatton was Bellwether or Lyddes, Walsingham was Moon, Alençon was Frog, Simier was Ape, Ralegh was Water, Leicester was Sweet Robin, and so forth.

[482] Printed in Dr. Nares’ Life of Burghley.

[483] See letter from a Scottish gentleman to De Maineville, 13th July (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth), and Mary to Mendoza, of same date (_ibid._).

[484] See letter of Castelnau to Henry III., 1st July; _in extenso_ in Chéruel’s _Marie Stuart_. How completely Mary distrusted the French and Castelnau at the time, notwithstanding her cordial letters to them, may be seen by a paragraph in her letter to Mendoza of 13th July (Spanish State Papers). The recognition of James as King by La Mothe’s embassy had confirmed Mary’s determination to depend only upon the Spaniards.

[485] One of Elizabeth’s movements as soon as she heard the news was to summon Lord Arbroath, the eldest of the Hamiltons, from France, to proceed to Scotland in her pay. See letter, Mary to Castelnau, September (Hatfield Papers), and Mendoza to the King, 19th August (Spanish State Papers).

[486] Guise sent Persons (alias Melino) to the Pope in August, giving him an account of his plans. Four thousand Spaniards were to land at Dalton-in-Furness, Lancashire, whilst Guise made a descent on Sussex, simultaneously with a rising of Catholics in the North of England and on the Scottish Border (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, 22nd August).

[487] Walsingham’s disinclination to undertake the mission is quite comprehensible. He was at the time engaged in a complicated intrigue with the triple traitor Archibald Douglas, by which he learnt the secrets of Mary Stuart; and at the same time he and Leicester were making approaches to Mary Stuart and James, for a marriage between the latter and Lady Dorothy Devereux, the step-daughter of Leicester, on condition of James being declared the heir of England. See letters from Mary to Castelnau, September 1583 (Hatfield Papers, part iii.), and Mendoza to the King, 13th March 1583 (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth); also Castelnau to Henry, 1st January 1584 (Harl. MSS., 1582), and the same to Mary (Harl. MSS., 387). The heads of Walsingham’s instructions are in Hatfield Papers, part iii.

[488] Mendoza to the King, 19th August (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth).

[489] Many of her compromising letters to Mendoza were intercepted and read. Mary herself, writing to Elizabeth from Tutbury (29th September 1584), thanking her for her change of lodging, protests against the stoppage of her correspondence with the French Ambassador Castelnau. “All that I write,” she says, “passes through the hands of your people, who see, read, examine, and keep back in order to point out to me any fault if they find in it anything offensive or injurious to you” (Harl. MSS., 4651). This was more true than Mary thought when she wrote it, for she had no idea that some of her more compromising letters to the Spaniards were read. A letter from Mary to Sir Francis Englefield, Philip’s English Secretary (9th October 1584), contains the following dangerous words: “Of the treaty between the Queen of England and me I may neither hope nor look for good issue. Whatsoever shall come of me, by whatsoever change of my state and condition, let the execution of the great plot go forward without any respect of peril or danger to me.” And she continues by saying that the plan (_i.e._ the rising and invasion) must take place at latest next spring or the cause will be ruined.

[490] There are several reasons for believing that the prosecution of Somerville, the Ardens, Throgmorton, and others, was not entirely honest on the part of Leicester. Somerville was obviously a madman, and was strangled in his cell; the estates of Arden, whose wife was a Throgmorton, went to enrich a creature of Leicester; and the priest, Hall, on whose evidence the prisoners were condemned, was quietly smuggled out of the country by Leicester’s favour. Although it is possible that Throgmorton may have participated in Guise’s murder plot—he certainly did in the invasion plot—there is no satisfactory evidence to prove it.

[491] Hatfield State Papers, part iii.

[492] How keenly Whitgift felt the attacks upon him for doing what he conceived to be his duty, may be seen by his letters in Strype’s Whitgift. In a letter to Anthony Bacon (Birch’s Elizabeth) he writes: “I am, thank God, exercised with like calumnies at home also; but I comfort myself that lies and false rumours cannot long prevail. In matters of religion I remain the same, and so intend to do by God’s grace during life; wherein I am daily more and more confirmed by the uncharitable and indirect practices, as well by the common adversary the Papist, as also of some of our wayward, unquiet, and discontented brethren.”

[493] Hatfield State Papers, part iii.

[494] Even whilst the bill was passing through Parliament, however, the effects of his moderation were seen. In March twenty Catholic priests and one layman, either convicted or accused of treason, were released from prison and sent to France. Father Howard himself told Mendoza that he was at a loss to account for this leniency.

[495] He certainly was not benefited in purse; for one of the first things Parry did was to borrow fifty crowns of the young man, which he never returned (Birch’s Elizabeth). In the correspondence of Sir Thomas Copley with Burghley at this period (1579-80), Parry is presented in a more favourable light than that in which he is usually regarded, and so far as can be judged by his letters he retained the Lord Treasurer’s esteem almost to the time of his arrest.

[496] Mendoza, writing to Philip from Paris at the time, says that this letter was forged (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth), but in any case the letter did not necessarily imply approval of murder.

[497] Hatfield Papers, part iii.

[498] Harl. MSS., 4651.

[499] Hatfield Papers, part iii.

[500] See letter (Nau?) to Mary (Hatfield Papers, part iii. p. 125).

[501] See letter from Burghley’s nephew Hoby, at Berwick, to the Treasurer (Hatfield Papers, part iii. p. 71).

[502] Hatfield State Papers, part iii.

[503] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, part iii. p. 536; and Hatfield Papers, part iii. p. 99.

[504] Carliell to Walsingham, 4th October 1585 (State Papers, Domestic).

[505] Cotton, Galba, cviii. (Leycester Correspondence).

[506] Harl. MSS., 285 (Leycester Correspondence).

[507] Harl. MSS., 6993 (Leycester Correspondence).

[508] The unfortunate Davison, born apparently to be made a scapegoat, had to bear Leicester’s reproaches for the Queen’s anger, which the Earl said was owing to Davison’s ineffective or insincere advocacy—Davison being a distant connection both of Burghley’s and Leicester’s. The latter even had the meanness to allege that it was mainly owing to Davison’s persuasion that he accepted the sovereignty, and Davison was disgraced and banished from court for a time in consequence. See Sir Philip Sidney’s letters to Davison (Harl. MSS., 285).

[509] Cotton, Galba, cx. (Leycester Correspondence).

[510] Harl. MSS., 6994 (Edwards’ “Letters of Ralegh”).

[511] Amongst many other proofs may be mentioned her letter to Charles Paget, 27th July 1586 (Hatfield Papers, part iii.), in which she says: “Upon Ballard’s return the principal Catholics who had despatched him oversea imparted to her their intentions;” but she advises that “nothing is to be stirred on this side until they have full assurance and promise from the Pope and Spain.” In another letter of the same date to Mendoza she says that although she had turned a deaf ear for six months to the various overtures made to her by the Catholics, now that she had heard of the intentions of the King of Spain, she had consented thereto (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, part iii.). Again, on the same day, she instructed the French Ambassador to ask Burghley to be careful in the choice of a new guardian for her, “so that whatever happen, whether it be the death of the Queen of England, or a rebellion in the country, my life may be safe” (Labanoff).

[512] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. iii. The reference to Parma applies to certain negotiations for peace which had been attempted by Andrea de Looe, Agostino Graffini, and William Bodenham. In a statement furnished by an English agent to Philip in November, it is also asserted that these negotiations were initiated by Burghley “who was always against the war.”

[513] Mendoza wrote to Philip (8th November): “When Cecil saw the papers (taken in Mary’s rooms) he told the Queen that now that she had so great an advantage, if she did not proceed with all rigour at once against the Queen of Scotland, he himself would seek her friendship. These words are worthy of so clever a man as he is, and were intended to lead the other Councillors to follow him in holding the Queen of England back.” It is evident from this that Mendoza did not consider Cecil to be Mary’s enemy.

[514] Babington, Savage, Ballard, Barnewell, Tylney, Tichbourne, and Abingdon were executed at St. Giles-in-the-Fields on the 20th September. Mendoza says that as Babington’s heart was being torn out he was distinctly heard to pronounce the word “Jesus” thrice.

[515] State Papers, Domestic.

[516] Camden.

[517] Davison, who had just been appointed an additional Secretary of State, wrote to Burghley from Windsor (5th October) that the Queen did not like the wording, “Tam per Maria filiam et hæredem Jacobi quinti nuper Scotorū Regis ac communiter vocatam Scotorū Regis et dotare Franciæ.” She wished it to be, “Tam per Maria filiam &c. … Scotorū Regis et dotare Franciæ _communiter vocata Regina Scotorū_.” Thus it is seen that, although Elizabeth made no difficulty about acknowledging Mary as Queen Dowager of France, she would not recognise her as of right Queen of Scots. Davison adds that she was sending a special messenger to Burghley to discuss the matter with him.

[518] He was the secret means of communication between Mendoza and his spies in England.

[519] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[520] Nau and Curll, the two Secretaries, had been closely examined by Burghley in London, and at first had denied everything, but subsequently when confronted with their own handwriting, were obliged to acknowledge—especially Nau—Mary’s cognisance of Babington’s plans. Nau afterwards (1605) endeavoured to minimise his admissions, but Mary’s letter to Mendoza (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, 23rd November) which was not delivered or opened until long after Mary’s death, leaves no doubt whatever that Mary considered he had betrayed her. Curll lived for the rest of his life on a handsome pension from Spain, but Nau got nothing. Mary’s first answer to her accusers, that she was a free princess and not subject to Elizabeth’s tribunal, had been foreseen by Beale (see his opinion, Harl. MSS., 4646).

[521] Queen to Burghley, 12th October (Cotton, Caligula, cix.).

[522] Camden Annals, and Life of Sir Thomas Egerton.

[523] Hatfield Papers, part iii.

[524] Howell’s State Trials. Burghley writes to Davison (15th October, Cotton, Caligula): “She has only denied the accusations. Her intention was to move pity by long artificial speeches, to lay all blame upon the Queen’s Majesty, or rather upon the Council, that all the troubles past did ensue from them, avowing her reasonable offers and our refusals. And in these speeches I did so encounter her with reasons out of my knowledge and experience, as she hath not the advantage she looked for. And, as I am assured, the auditory did find her case not pitiable, and her allegations untrue.”

[525] Hollingshead.

[526] Mary to Mendoza, 24th November (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth,

## part iii.).

[527] Paris Archives; _in extenso_ in Von Raumer.

[528] Philip’s secret agent in London wrote at the time urging that “a message should be sent from Spain to the Lord Treasurer, who is the ruling spirit in all this business, and is desirous of peace, to let him know that your Majesty wished for his friendship” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, part iii.).

[529] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, part iii.

[530] Bellièvre did not arrive in England until 1st December. An account of his embassy will be found printed in Labanoff. The regular Ambassador, Chateauneuf, did his best, for he was a Guisan, but Elizabeth flatly told him she believed he was exceeding his instructions. His own doubts as to his master’s real wishes are expressed in a letter to D’Esneval in Paris (20th October): “Je vous prie me mander privément, ou ouvertement, l’intention de Sa Majesté sur les choses de deça; car il me semble que l’on se soucie fort peu de par dela du fait de la Reine d’Ecosse.” Davison wrote to Burghley at Fotheringay (8th October), telling him of the “presumption” of Chateauneuf’s first remonstrance, and the rebuke sent to him by the Queen “for attempting to school her in her actions.”

[531] Mendoza to Philip, 7th December (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth,

## part iii.).

[532] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, part iii. In a marginal note to another letter, Philip himself expresses an opinion that Bellièvre has gone, not to save Mary’s life, but for another purpose.

[533] See Lord Burghley’s notes of this appeal for his reply thereto (Hatfield State Papers, part iii.); and also Elizabeth’s own most interesting letter to Henry III. (Harl. MSS., 4647). She ends by a hit at Henry’s helpless position: “I beg you, therefore, rather to think of the means of preserving than of diminishing my friendship. Your States, my good brother, cannot bear many enemies; do not for God’s sake give the rein to wild horses, lest they throw you from your seat.” Another characteristic step taken in England at the same time was to concoct a bogus plot to murder Elizabeth, in which it was pretended that the Ambassador Chateauneuf was concerned. This gave an opportunity for much anger and complaint on the part of Elizabeth, especially against the Guises; and in Lord Burghley’s memoranda giving reasons for Mary’s execution, this so-called plot of Stafford, Moody, and Destrappes is gravely set forth as a contributing factor.

[534] Gray’s own feelings in the matter may be seen by his copious correspondence with Archibald Douglas, at Hatfield. He had, when he was in Flanders, proposed that Mary might be put out of the way by poison, and was hated by Mary’s friends in consequence. “If she die,” he said, “I shall be blamed, and if she live I shall be ruined;” but he was forced against his will to accept the embassy and acted in a similar way to Bellièvre—pleaded with strong words but weak arguments, in order that his own position might be saved whether Mary lived or died.

[535] Mendoza to Philip, 24th January 1587 (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth, vol. iv.).

[536] The matter is fully discussed in Nicolas’s Life of Davison.

[537] It is curious that the warning should come from Howard, a Catholic and a Conservative, several of whose relatives were Spanish pensioners.

[538] Hatfield Papers, part iii. There is no mention of the poison letter to Paulet, but it was written, and is printed in Nicolas’s Life of Davison, with Paulet’s reply.

[539] The Queen kept up a pretence of anger against the Councillors for some time, and especially against Burghley, who on the 13th February wrote her a submissive letter praying for her favour. He was excluded from her presence, and complains that she “doth utter more heavy, hard, bitter, and minatory speeches against me than against any other,” which he ascribes to the calumnies of his many enemies, and to the fact that he alone was not allowed to justify his action personally to her. “I have,” he says, “confusedly uttered my griefs, being glad that the night of my age is so near by service and sickness as I shall not long wake to see the miseries that I fear others shall see that are like to overwatch me.” When at length he obtained audience of the Queen, she treated him so harshly that he again retired, and was only induced to return again by the intercession of Hatton. Elizabeth’s special anger with Burghley may have been an elaborate pretence agreed upon between them, or, what is more probable, the result of some calumnies of Leicester.

[540] An interesting statement of Burghley’s treatment of Davison in later years will be found in Harl. MSS., 290. Part of his unrelenting attitude to him is commonly attributed to Burghley’s desire to secure the Secretaryship of State for his son, Sir Robert Cecil. It is evident, however, that Davison was adopted by Essex as one of his instruments to oppose Burghley’s policy, and the restoration of Davison would thereafter have meant a defeat for the Cecils. This, it appears to me, amply explains the Lord Treasurer’s attitude.

[541] Hatfield Papers, part iii. 223.

[542] That Lord Burghley was desirous of dissociating himself personally from the execution, and of remaining on good terms with the Catholic party, is further seen by a remark made in a letter from Mendoza to Philip (26th March 1587): “Cecil, the Lord Treasurer, said publicly that he was opposed to the execution, and on this and all other points feeling was running very high in the Council; Cecil and Leicester being open opponents” (Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth).

[543] Walsingham, conveying this news to Leicester in Flanders (17th April), says: “There are letters written from certain of my Lords, by her Majesty’s effectual command, to inhibit him (Drake) to attempt anything by land or within the ports of Spain.” On the 11th he wrote: “This resolution proceedeth altogether upon a hope of peace, which I fear may do much harm.”

[544] The first hint to this effect reached Philip too late to be useful. It was conveyed by Mendoza from Stafford in Paris on the 19th April, the day that Drake reached Cadiz.

[545] Foreign Office Records, Flanders, 32.

[546] This was the great galleon _San Felipe_, one of the richest prizes ever brought to England.

[547] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[548] His mother, the owner of Burghley, had just died, aged eighty-five; and his unmanageable son-in-law, the Earl of Oxford, still caused him endless trouble. His only family consolation at the time was the promise of his favourite son, Sir Robert Cecil, whose great talents and application were already remarkable. How incessant and varied Lord Burghley’s labours still were may be seen by the great number of letters addressed to him, entreating him for help, influence, or advice. The Catholic Earl of Arundel from the Tower, the Earl of Huntingdon, Lord Buckhurst, Lord Cobham, and a host of other nobles appealed to him to forward their suits; Puritan divines like Hammond, Cartwright, Humphreys, and Travers; prelates like Whitgift, Aylmer, Herbert, and Sandys, by common accord chose him as the arbiter of their constant disputes. The Court of Wards, too, entailed a large correspondence and much personal attention; whilst at this period Burghley was also deeply concerned in checking the tendency of Cambridge students to indulge in “satin doublets, silk and velvet overstocks, great fine ruffs, and costly facings to their gowns.”

[549] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[550] As instances see letters—Ralegh to Burghley, 27th December 1587 (State Papers, Domestic, ccvi. 40); Howard to Burghley, 22nd December (State Papers, Domestic, ccvi. 42); same to same (Harl. MSS., 6994, 102); Burghley’s own holograph list of ships and their destinations, 5th January 1588; Hawkins to Burghley, 18th January 1588 (both in State Papers, Domestic, cviii.); and many similar papers of this period in State Papers, Domestic, cviii., and Harl. MSS., 6994.

[551] Stafford told Mendoza (25th February) that Burghley had written to him saying, that he would do his best to prevent Drake from sailing, as his voyages were only profitable to himself and his companions, but an injury to the Queen and an irritation to foreign princes; and in May, Burghley told Stafford that if he had remained out of town two days longer, his colleagues would have let Drake go.

[552] Hatfield Papers, part iii.

[553] Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[554] This mission was said to have been entrusted originally to Paulet, and afterwards to Herbert; but as they did not go to Flanders, it is more likely to have been left to Crofts. I can, however, find no record of it except in Spanish account.

[555] The Commissioners were the Earl of Derby, Lord Cobham, Sir James Crofts, with Valentine Dale and Rogers. Burghley’s son, Sir Robert Cecil, was also attached. The whole correspondence of the Commissioners, mostly directed to Lord Burghley, will be found in Cotton, Vesp., cviii.

[556] Motley thought that Burghley was referred to, but surely Howard would not call him witless. Probably Crofts is meant.

[557] State Papers, Domestic, ccix.

[558] Howard, writing on the 13th June to Walsingham, says: “I forbear to write unto my Lord Treasurer because I am sure he is a very heavy man for my lady his daughter, for which I am most heartily sorry.”

[559] Writing to Walsingham, “from my house near the Savoy,” 17th July, he says: “I am at present by last night’s torment weakened in spirits, as I am not able to rise out of my bed; which is my grief the more, because I cannot come thither where both my mind and duty do require;” and yet on the same day he (Burghley) sent a long minute corrected with his own hand to Darrell, giving directions for the victualling of the navy.

[560] In September, when the news came of the flight of the Armada, grand reviews of these forces were held previous to their being disbanded. Lord Chancellor Hatton entertained the Queen at dinner in Holborn, and his hundred men-at-arms in red and yellow paraded before her Majesty. The next day (20th August) a similar ceremony took place at Cecil House, and shortly afterwards Leicester’s troop was reviewed. But they were all thrown into the shade by Essex’s splendid force of sixty musketeers and sixty mounted harquebussiers, in orange-tawny, with white silk facings, and two hundred light horsemen, in orange velvet and silver.

[561] See his letter, 30th July (O.S.), to his father, giving him an account from hearsay of what had happened off Calais (State Papers, Domestic, ccxiii.).

[562] The ordinary Arabic numbers were never used by Burghley, even in calculations.

[563] One of the last letters that Leicester wrote was to Burghley, from Maidenhead, two days only before his death, asking for some favour for a friend, Sir Robert Jermyn, and apologising for leaving court without taking leave of the Lord Treasurer; and in November the widowed Countess of Leicester—the mother of Essex—wrote begging Burghley to use his influence with the Queen to buy a vessel belonging to her late husband.

[564] Lord Burghley’s memoranda (State Papers, Domestic). For particulars of the expedition see “The Year after the Armada,” by the present writer.

[565] Don Antonio had been deceived so often in England, that although preparations for the expedition were being made for some months previously, he was not convinced that it was really intended for him until the end of the year 1588.

[566] On the eve of his flight Essex thus explained his action in a letter to Heneage (Hatfield Papers, part iii. 966): “What my courses have been I need not repeat, for no man knoweth them better than yourself. What my state now is I will tell you. My revenue is no greater than when I sued my livery, my debts at least two or three and twenty thousand pounds. Her Majesty’s goodness has been so great I could not ask her for more; no way left to repair myself but mine own adventure, which I had much rather undertake than offend her Majesty with suits, as I have done. If I speed well, I will adventure to be rich; if not, I will not live to see the end of my poverty.”

[567] His entry in his diary recording the fact runs thus: “1589. April 4 _Die Veneris inter hor 3 et 4 mane obdormit in Domino, Mildreda Domina Burgley_.” She is interred at Westminster Abbey, with her daughter the Countess of Oxford; a very long Latin inscription is on the tomb, written by Burghley, recording their many virtues and the writer’s grief at their loss. There is at Hatfield (part iii. 973) a note of the mourners and arrangements for the funeral in Lord Burghley’s handwriting.

[568] MSS. Lansdowne, ciii. 51.

[569] This is a not unnatural mistake under the circumstances for 9th April 1589. The year then began on the 1st April, and in his sorrow Lord Burghley had overlooked the change of year. More than a month after this he wrote a letter, full of grief still, to his old friend the Earl of Shrewsbury, by which we see that he was still living in retirement in one of the lodges of his park at Theobalds, as it is signed “From my poore lodge neare my howss at Theobalds, 27 Maii 1589. _P.S._ The Queene is at Barn Elms, but this night I will attend on her at Westminster, for I am no man mete for feastings.”

[570] For the particulars of the Catholic plots of Huntly, Crawford, Errol, Claud Hamilton, and Bothwell (Stuart), see Spanish State Papers, Elizabeth.

[571] State Papers, Domestic.

[572] The Vidame de Chartres was the Huguenot agent in Elizabeth’s court for some years, and was constantly craving aid for the cause. His promises of repayment were very rarely kept, as the Huguenots had most of the wealth of France against them. Hence the saying quoted.

[573] Egerton MSS., 359.

[574] “November 30. I have heard a rumour that you have arrived at Calais, and that if the enemy comes to attack that place you will be there with troops to defend it. If this news be true I pray you let me hear it from yourself, and advertise me by the ordinary courier what the enemy is doing and what you think of these designs. For I shall be very happy to see some opportunity by which we could together win honour and serve the common weal. I am idle here, and have nothing to do but to hearken for such opportunities.” (Essex to La Noue; Hatfield Papers, part iii.)

[575] Hatfield Papers, part iv.

[576] A letter from Sir John Smith to Burghley, 28th January 1590, expresses sorrow “to hear that you were very dangerously sick, being next unto her Majesty, in my opinion, the pillar and upholder of the Commonwealth. Howbeit, I am now very glad to hear you have recovered your health;” to which the Lord Treasurer appends the note “relatio falsæ” (Hatfield Papers, part iv.). Later in the year, however (October), the Clerk of the Privy Seal, writing to Lord Talbot, says, “I never knew my Lord Treasurer more lusty or fresh in hue than at this hour.” How heavily business still pressed upon the Lord Treasurer is seen by a remark of his in a letter to Mr. Grimstone (January 1591): “The cause” (of his not having written) “is partly for that I have not leisure, being, as it were, roundly besieged with affairs to be answered from north, south, east, and west; whereof I hope shortly to be delivered by supply of some to take charge as her Majesty’s principal secretary” (Bacon Papers, Birch).

[577] Soon afterwards, Essex was at issue with Robert Cecil about the appointment of a successor to one of Heneage’s offices (Essex to Sir Henry Unton; Hatfield Papers, part iv.). How bitter Essex was against the Cecils is shown by a letter from him to Sir Henry Unton in Paris (June 1591): “Things do remain in the same state as they did. They who are most in appetite are not yet satisfied, whereof there is great discontentment. If it stand at this stay awhile longer they will despair, _for their chief hour-glass hath little sand left in it, and doth run out still_.”

[578] In one of the letters suggested by the secret intelligence secretary, Phillips, to be written to English Catholics abroad (31st August 1591), Robert Cecil’s appointment to the Council is noted; “but the Queen seems determined against Robert Cecil for the Secretaryship; but my Lord being sick, the whole management of the Secretary’s place is in his (Robert’s) hands, and as he is already a Councillor, any employment of him between the Queen and his father will be the means of installing him in the place” (State Papers, Domestic).

[579] He expressed this wish as soon as Essex’s opposition to Robert Cecil’s appointment became manifest. A letter (State Papers, Domestic) from Hatton, 15th July 1590, thus refers to the matter: “We can well witness your endless travails, which in her Majesty’s princely consideration she should relieve you of; but it is true the affairs are in good hands, as we all know, and thereby her Majesty is the more sure, and we her poor servants the better satisfied. God send you help and happiness to your better contentment.” Nearly all through 1590 and 1591 repeated reference is made in his correspondence to Burghley’s infirmities. This, added to the everlasting disputes between the Prelatists and the Puritans, in which he was between two fires, and the galling opposition of Essex to his son’s appointment, might well have excused his desire to be relieved of his heavy burden.

[580] Bacon Papers, Birch. Sir John Norris had recently gone to Brittany with a small English auxiliary force, and had captured Guingamp. There were also 600 Englishmen in Normandy and an English squadron on the Brittany coast. Burghley holds out hopes also of sending 600 more men to Brittany.

[581] Henry wrote one of his clever characteristic letters to Elizabeth (5th August), expressing in fervent terms his delight at hearing of her intention of coming to Portsmouth during his visit to Normandy. He swears eternal gratitude, and begs her to allow him to run across the Channel; “et baiser les mains comme Roi de Navarre, et etre aupres d’elle deux heures, a fin que j’aie ce bien d’avoir veu, au moins une fois, en ma vie, celle a qui j’ai consacré et corps et tant ce que j’aurai jamais; et que j’aime et révère plus que chose que soit au monde.” Referring to Essex’s force, he says: “Le secours que qu’il vous a pleu à présent m’accorder m’est en singulière grace, pour la qualité de celluy auquel vous avez donné la principale charge, et pour la belle force dont il est composé.” (Hatfield Papers, part iv.)

[582] The Earl’s brother, Walter Devereux, was killed in the siege.

[583] Essex seems to have quarrelled with every one in France, and the Council in England condemned his proceedings from the first. In a letter to the Council (September) he says the whole purport of their letters is “to rip up all my actions and to reprove them” (Hatfield Papers,

## part iv.). The Queen also wrote him a very angry letter (4th October)

consenting on strict conditions that the English shall only be allowed to remain a month longer in France.

[584] From a long letter from Burghley (22nd October), Essex appears to have again left his command and run over to England. He begged Burghley to ask the Queen’s permission for him to join Biron at the siege of Caudebec. The Lord Treasurer says he had not done so, as he was sure the Queen would refuse. Her strict orders were that neither Essex nor his men should risk themselves at the siege of Havre or elsewhere except by her orders. Essex appears to have disobeyed, and returned to France at once without seeing the Queen. During his absence the Englishmen had deserted wholesale. Burghley says there were not 2000 of them remaining—they were unpaid and mutinous, and, according to Biron and Leighton, were committing outrages on all sides. Beauvoir de Nocle wrote to Essex as soon as he had gone back to France (22nd October), “Les courroux de la reine redoublent.”

[585] See the Queen’s very angry letter peremptorily recalling him (24th December 1591), (Hatfield Papers, part iv.).

[586] The heroic but unprofitable result of the expedition was the famous fight of the _Revenge_ and the death of Sir Richard Grenville, who quite needlessly, and out of sheer obstinacy, engaged the whole Spanish squadron. The great difficulty of getting the expedition together is seen by the large number of towns which addressed Lord Burghley personally or the Council, begging on the score of poverty to be excused from fitting the ships, as they had been commanded to do. Southampton, Hull, Yarmouth, Newcastle, and other towns professed to be so decayed as to be quite unable to contribute ships (Hatfield Papers, part iv.).

[587] The reports of spies of plots in Flanders at the time amply justified the precautionary measures taken. Burghley was still appealed to by both religious parties, and he appears at this time to have been claimed by both. In March 1591 one of the spy-letters suggested by Phillips to be sent abroad mentions Burghley’s feud with Archbishop Whitgift and his favour to the Puritans. The Catholic spy in Flanders, Snowdon, in June of the same year, says that the _anti-Spanish_ English Catholic refugees there, Lord Vaux, Sir T. Tresham, Mr. Talbot, and Mr. Owen were opposed to the plots then in progress. “It is said amongst them that if occasion be offered they will requite the relaxation now afforded them by his Lordship’s (Burghley’s) moderation, for it is noted that since the cause of the Catholics came to his arbitrament things have gone on with wonderful suavity” (State Papers, Dom.). On the other hand, Phillips (in July) tells another spy, St. Mains, of the extravagances of the fanatics, Hacket, Coppinger, and Ardington, and speaks of Burghley as being on the side of the Puritans.

[588] In a spirited reply (Hatfield Papers) to a remonstrance of Antony Standen, Lord Burghley insists that Catholics who were punished by death in England are “only those who profess themselves by obedience to the Pope to be no subjects of the Queen; and though their outward pretence be to be sent from the seminaries to convert people to their religion, yet without reconciling them from their obedience to the Queen they never give them absolution.” Those, he says, who still retain their allegiance to the Queen, but simply absent themselves from churches, are only fined in accordance with the law. The same contention is more elaborately stated in Lord Burghley’s essay on “The Execution of Justice.” The examinations of various spies, giving alarming accounts of the plots in Flanders at this time to kill the Queen and Burghley (State Papers, Domestic), afford ample proof that Lord Burghley’s contention as to the aims of the Spanish seminarists was correct.

[589] Francis Bacon frankly confessed that he adhered to Burghley’s enemies because he thought it would be for his own personal advantage as well as for that of the State; and his brother Antony writes (Bacon Papers): “On the one side, I found nothing but fair words, which make fools fain, and yet even in those no offer or hopeful assistance of real kindness, which I thought I might justly expect at the Lord Treasurer’s hands, who had inned my ten years’ harvest into his own barn.”

[590] It was during this progress at Oxford that the circumstance thus related by Sir J. Harrington happened: “I may not forget how the Queen in the midst of her oration casting her eye aside, and seeing the old Lord Treasurer standing on his lame feet for want of a stool, she called in all haste for a stool for him; nor would she proceed in her speech till she saw him provided. Then she fell to it again as if there had been no interruption.” Harrington says that some one (probably Essex) twitted her for doing this on purpose to show off her Latin.

[591] Writing to Archibald Douglas advising him how to excuse as well as he might the depredations of Scotsmen on Danish shipping, he says in a postscript, “I write not this in favour of piracies, for I hate all pirates mortally” (Hatfield Papers, part iv.).

[592] Lansdowne MSS., lxx.

[593] Lansdowne MSS., lxx., and Hatfield Papers, part iv.

[594] Through the whole of the autumn and winter Lord Burghley was busy in the liquidation and division of the vast plunder brought in the carrack. Ralegh had risked every penny he possessed, and came out a loser. The Queen got the lion’s share, and the adventurers, with the exception of Ralegh, received large bonuses.

[595] One of Thomas Phillips’ suggested spy-letters to be sent abroad (22nd March 1591) says that although the Puritan party is the weaker, Essex has made Ralegh join him in their favour. Ralegh’s Puritan birth and breeding naturally gave him sympathy for Essex’s party, whilst his

## active temperament and his greed made him in favour of war, especially

with Spain. His only tie with the Cecils was his early political connection. Though he was usually in personal enmity with Essex, his natural bent was therefore more in sympathy with Essex’s party than with that to which he was supposed to be attached.

[596] State Papers, Domestic.

[597] Numerous similar instances of this devotion occur in the letters of Burghley to his son and others. In April 1594 he writes to Sir Robert from Cecil House, that as her Majesty desires to have him there (Greenwich) to-day, he will go, if it be her pleasure that he should leave his other engagements. He then recounts his various duties for the day, including sitting all the morning in the Court of Wards, “with small ease and much pain,” and again in the afternoon; the next day he had to preside in the Exchequer Chamber, the Star Chamber, &c.; “but if her Majesty wishes I will leave all. I live in pain, yet spare not to occupy myself for her Majesty.” In July he writes to his son, “I can affirm nothing of my amendment, but if my attendance shall be earnestly required I will wear out my time at court as well as where I am” (State Papers, Domestic). How great and generally recognised his influence still was is seen by the depositions of what disaffected persons said of him. Prestall (Kinnersley’s deposition, State Papers, Domestic, 1591) said “the Lord Treasurer was the wizard of England, a worldling wishing to fill his own purse, and good for nobody; so hated that he would not live long if anything happened to the Queen.” “The Treasurer led the Queen and Council, and only cared about enriching himself.”

[598] Declarations of Kinnersley, Young, and Walpole (1594), State Papers, Domestic.

[599] _Ibid._

[600] In accordance with the practice of the time Burghley doubtless received presents from suitors for office and others (see State Papers, Domestic); but it is on record that he frequently refused such offerings when they assumed the form of bribes to influence judicial decisions or questions of account. Above all, there is no proof that he accepted any bribes from Spain, even when almost every other Councillor of the Queen was paid by one side or the other. Several mentions are made in the Spanish State Papers of the advisability of paying him heavily, and even sums were allotted for the purpose; but I have not found a single statement of his having accepted such payments; although in after years his son certainly did so.

[601] Francis Bacon answered the book in an able pamphlet published the same year (1592), called “Observations upon a Libel published in the Present Year,” in which Lord Burghley and Sir Robert Cecil are very highly lauded.

[602] One of the loyal English Catholics, St. Mains, writing (January 1593) to Fitzherbert, says that “the Lord Treasurer has been dangerously ill, but is now well recovered, thanks be to God; for the whole state of the realm depends upon him. If he go, there is not one about the Queen able to wield the State as it stands.” The principal Catholic refugees against Spain at this period were Charles Paget, William Gifford, the Treshams, Hugh Griffith, Dr. Lewis, Bishop of Cassano, the Scottish Carthusian Bishop of Dunblane, Thomas Morgan, Thomas Hesketh, Nicholas Fitzherbert, &c.

[603] Francis was member for Middlesex, whilst his brother Antony sat for Wallingford. The Queen remained angry with Francis for many months. It was only in September that Essex with the greatest difficulty obtained permission for him to appear at court (Bacon Papers, Birch).

[604] Morice was sent to Tutbury Castle and kept there in prison for some years for making a speech in this Parliament complaining of the grievances of the Puritans. Wentworth was sent to the Tower, and Stevens and Walsh to the Fleet. Puckering, the Lord Keeper, told the House that the Queen had not called it together to make new laws; there were more than enough already. “It is, therefore, her Majesty’s pleasure that no time be spent therein” (D’Ewes).

[605] Phillips’ suggestions to Sterrell (State Papers, Domestic).

[606] Elizabeth seems to have received the first hint of his intention in May, and Lord Burghley sends an indignant letter to his son about it (26th May). He ends by saying, “If I may not have some leisure to cure my head, I shall shortly ease it in my grave; and yet if her Majesty mislike my absence, I will come thither” (Hatfield Papers, part iv.). See also letters of Sir Thomas Edmunds (State Papers, France, Record Office); and Elizabeth’s curious letters to Henry (July), signed, “Votre tres assurée sœur si ce soit à la vielle mode: avec la nouvelle je n’ay qui faire, E. R.” (Hatfield Papers).

[607] State Papers, Domestic.

[608] How deeply Lady Bacon resented her son’s friendship with Perez is seen in a letter of hers to Francis Bacon: “I pity your brother; but yet so long as he pities not himself, but keepeth that bloody Perez, yea, a court companion and a bed companion—a proud, profane, costly fellow, whose being about him I verily believe the Lord God doth mislike, and doth the less bless your brother in credit and in health. Such wretches as he is never loved your brother, but for his credit, living upon him” (Bacon Papers, Birch).

[609] Nichols’ Progresses, vol. iii.

[610] Burghley appears to have been very dangerously ill a few weeks afterwards at Windsor. Essex’s spy Standen wrote to his friend Antony Bacon (6th November) that he had gone up to the Lord Treasurer’s lodging to inquire after his health; but was refused admittance by the servants, who told him, however, that his Lordship had rested better than on the previous night. Whilst Standen “was going down the stairs, the Queen was at my back, who, unknown to me, had been visiting my Lord, so I stayed among the rest to see her Majesty pass. A little while after I met Mr. Cooke, who told me, that true it was that my Lord had somewhat rested the night past; but that this morning his Lordship had a very rigorous fit of pain, and dangerous” (Bacon Papers, Birch). We hear from the same source of similar attacks in December and January following.

[611] “I hope you will remember,” wrote Raleigh to Howard, “that it is the Queen’s honour and safety to assail rather than to defend” (Hatfield Papers).

[612] Frobisher was mortally wounded in the assault.

[613] See the extraordinary letters of Foulis, Cockburn, and other Scottish agents, to Bacon, &c., in the Bacon Papers (Birch). “Mr Bowes, the English Ambassador here (in Scotland), is very much scandalised at the behaviour of Crato (_i.e._ Burghley) and his son towards me, and assures me he will remonstrate with the Queen at his return,” writes Foulis to Bacon (Bacon Papers); and similar expressions in the letters of other French and Scotch agents show clearly that Essex took care to cultivate the idea that it was only the Cecils who prevented the adoption of a generous policy towards them.

[614] See the many confessions and declarations of spies and informers (1594) as to alleged plots for the murder of the Queen, Burghley, &c., at this time (State Papers, Domestic).

[615] It was here, and at Eton College, where he was lodged when the court was at Windsor, that he wrote his bitter “Relaciones” against Philip. He alleged that men were sent to London to assassinate him, and with indefatigable zeal of tongue and pen kept up and increased the ill-feeling in the court against Spain. His copious correspondence with Henry IV. leaves no doubt whatever either as to the real object of his mission or the utter baseness with which he executed it.

[616] See Burghley’s correspondence with Andrada, Da Vega, and others (State Papers, Domestic), and Mendoza’s references to the same men in the Spanish State Papers.

[617] On the way from this examination Sir Robert Cecil and Essex rode together in a coach. The former—surely to annoy Essex—reverted to a subject which had caused intense acrimony between the Earl and the Cecils for months past, namely, the appointment to the vacant Attorney-Generalship which Essex was violently urging for Francis Bacon; an appointment to which neither the Queen nor Lord Burghley would consent, although the latter was willing for him to have the Solicitor-Generalship. The abuse and insult heaped upon the Cecils behind their backs on this account by the Earl, by the scoundrel Standen, and by the Bacons themselves, may be seen in the Bacon Papers (Birch). On this occasion the violent rashness and want of tact on the part of Essex is very clear. Cecil asked him, as if the subject was new, who he thought would be the best man for the Attorney-Generalship. The Earl was astonished, and replied that he knew very well, as he, Cecil, was the principal reason why Bacon had not already been appointed. Cecil then expressed his surprise that Essex should waste his influence in seeking the appointment of a raw youth. Essex flew in a rage, and told Cecil that _he_ was younger than Francis, and yet he aspired to a much higher post than the Attorney-Generalship, _i.e._ the Secretaryship of State, and then, quite losing control of himself, swore that he _would_ have the appointment for Francis, and would “spend all my power, might, authority, and amity, and with tooth and nail procure the same against whomsoever.” The hot-headed Earl foolishly ended by an undisguised threat against Cecil and his father (Bacon Papers), which we may be sure the former, at least, did not forget, although Essex had quite changed his tone and wrote quite humbly to Cecil on the matter in the following May (Hatfield Papers). It is hardly necessary to say that Bacon was disappointed of the Attorney-Generalship.

[618] See the extensive correspondence and proceedings in the case (State Papers, Domestic, and Hatfield Papers).

[619] Cecil to Windebanke (State Papers, Domestic).

[620] Great obscurity still surrounds the case. Apart from his own alleged confession, Lopez’s condemnation depended upon the declarations of the double spies who were his accomplices, and he solemnly asserted his innocence on the scaffold. I have carefully examined all the evidence—much of it hitherto unknown—and although there is no space to enter into the matter here, I am personally convinced that the service that Lopez was to render was to poison Don Antonio—not the Queen—and bring about some sort of _modus vivendi_ between England and Spain.

[621] Bacon Papers, Birch.

[622] _Ibid._

[623] Hatfield Papers, part iv.

[624] Correspondence with Burghley, in the Hatfield Papers, part v., and State Papers, Flanders (Record Office); and with Essex, in Bacon Papers (Birch). Burghley, apparently to occupy his mind during his illness, wrote a most elaborate minute, “to be shown to her Majesty when she is disposed to be merry, to see how I am occupied in logic and neglect physic;” proving that her demands upon the States to be made by Bodley are founded upon the maxims of civil law. “If,” he says, “my hand and arm did not pain me as it doth in distempering my spirits, I would send longer argument” (Hatfield Papers, part v.). Thanks to Burghley’s persistence, terms were made with the States.

[625] Printed in Strype’s “Annals.”

[626] The Queen at this time appears to have been desirous of saving Burghley trouble. When the court was at Nonsuch (September 1595), the Council was held in his room, the Queen being present. (Bacon Papers.)

[627] That he was not idle in mind even in his greatest pain is shown by the fact that during this autumn, whilst he was almost entirely disabled, he not only continued his close attendance to State affairs, but gave a great amount of attention to the new question which was disturbing the Church, and especially setting the University of Cambridge by the ears. A Mr. Barrett, of Gonville and Caius, had preached a sermon in which the doctrine of free grace was enunciated. This was thought by many to be “Popish,” and Burghley, as Vice-Chancellor, ordered him to recant. The doctrine was eloquently defended by Burghley’s protegé, Professor Baro. Curiously enough, Whitgift, a prelate of prelates, then came out with a series of articles (called the Lambeth articles) enforcing the extreme Calvinistic doctrine of absolute predestination. Burghley was passionately appealed to by both parties, and while supporting the authority of Whitgift, expressed his dissent from the doctrine of predestination. The Queen, annoyed at the question being raised, instructed Sir Robert Cecil to stop the dispute, which had caused much trouble both to her and Burghley.

[628] Venetian State Papers.

[629] _In extenso_ in Bacon Papers (Birch).

[630] Burghley did not prevail with the Queen at this juncture without trouble when Essex was near. In March 1596, Essex arrived at the court at Richmond, and Standen says: “The old man upon some pet would needs away against her will on Thursday last, saying that her business was ended, and he would for ten days go take physic. When she saw it booted not to stay him she said he was a froward old fool” (Bacon Papers). The following dignified letter written soon afterwards by Burghley to his son evidently refers to this incident: “My loving son, Sir Robert Cecil, knt., I do hold, and will always, this course in such matters as I differ in opinion from her Majesty. As long as I may be allowed to give advice I will not change my opinion by affirming the contrary, for that were to offend God, to whom I am sworn first; but as a servant I will obey her Majesty’s command and no wise contrary the same; presuming that she being God’s chief minister here, it shall be God’s will to have her commandments obeyed—after that I have performed my duty as a Councillor, and shall in my heart wish her commandments to have such good success as she intendeth. You see I am a mixture of divinity and policy; preferring in policy her Majesty before all others on earth, and in divinity the King of Heaven above all.” This letter seems to enshrine Burghley’s lifelong rule of conduct as a minister.

[631] Hatfield Papers, part v.

[632] Lord Burghley must be absolved from all blame for the hesitation to succour Calais. The delay and failure were entirely the fault of the Queen. Whilst Burghley held back and resisted attempts to drag England into war with Spain unnecessarily; when English interests were really at stake, as in the case of Calais, he could be as active as any one. On the 6th April, as soon as the news arrived, his secretary wrote to Robert Cecil—the Lord Treasurer being “freshly pinned” with the gout and unable to write—approving of Essex’s plan to relieve Calais; and on the 10th he writes himself, after the town had surrendered, but whilst the citadel held out: “I am heartily sorry to perceive her Majesty’s resolution to stay this voyage, being so far forward as it is; and surely I am of opinion that the citadel being relieved the town will be regained, and if for want of her Majesty’s succour it shall be lost, by judgment of the world the blame will be imputed to her.… These so many changes breed hard opinions of counsell.” Sancy and the Duke de Bouillon came to Elizabeth at Greenwich to remonstrate with her, in Henry’s name, on the effect which her demand for Calais in return for her aid had produced. Sancy had a long conversation with Burghley on the 23rd April, and the latter frankly told him that the conversion of Henry had entirely changed the situation. The only common interests now, he said, between the two countries was their vicinity. Sancy says the Lord Treasurer praised the Spaniards to the skies, to the detriment of the French. The French envoy was endeavouring to secure an offensive and defensive alliance with England, which Burghley steadily opposed. How could Henry help Elizabeth? the Treasurer asked; and what more could Elizabeth do for him than she was doing? In one of their interviews Burghley flatly told Sancy that the Queen did not intend to strengthen Henry in order that he might make an advantageous peace over her head. Sancy was shocked at such an imputation on his master’s honour, and gave a written pledge of Henry that he would never treat without England, and this was embodied in the treaty (26th May 1596). Burghley made as good terms as he could, but he never was in favour of the treaty. His letter quoted above (page 479) and his quarrel with the Queen evidently had reference to this subject.

[633] Bacon Papers.

[634] Writing from Theobalds to Robert Cecil soon after the expedition sailed from Plymouth, he says, “I came here rather to satisfy my mind by change of place, and to be less pressed by suitors, than with any hope of ease or relief.”

[635] Essex had lately, and most intemperately, been trying to force Bodley into the Secretaryship. His importunity was so great as to offend the Queen, and predisposed her against his protegés. How jealous Antony Bacon was may be seen in his letter. “_Elphas peperit_; so that now the old man may say, with the rich man in the gospel, ‘_requiescat anima mea_.’” Bacon Papers.

[636] That the reconciliation was not easy will be seen in Essex’s letters in the Bacon Papers. The Earl writes in September to Lady Russell, “Yesterday the Lord Treasurer and Sir Robert Cecil did, before the Queen, contest with me, … and this day I was more braved by your little cousin (Cecil) than ever I was by any man in my life. But I was, and am, not angry, which is all the advantage I have of him.” In the following April Essex entertained Cecil and Ralegh at dinner, “and a treaty of peace was confirmed.” During the Earl’s disgrace with the Queen shortly afterwards, Cecil appears to have behaved in a friendly manner towards him.

[637] It is curious that in the previous year, when Essex was going on the Cadiz expedition, Bellièvre, the French minister, expressed an opinion that “his appointment is a suggestion of the Lord Treasurer, in order to divert the Queen from sending aid to his Majesty (Henry IV.), and to get rid of the Earl of Essex on the pretext of this honourable appointment, which would leave him (Burghley) master of the Council.” It is fair to say that the Venetian ambassador who transmits this opinion, expresses his disbelief in it. Venetian State Papers.

[638] That the sagacious Bacon saw and foretold the consequences of Essex’s willingness to absent himself in risky enterprises, is evident from his letters to the Earl in October 1596 (Bacon’s Works, ed. Montagu, vol. 9).

[639] There were about 120 ships, English and Dutch, and a force of some 6000 men, including 1000 English veterans from the Low Countries, led by the gallant Sir Francis Vere.

[640] State Papers, Domestic.

[641] State Papers, Domestic.

[642] State Papers, Domestic.

[643] _Ibid._

[644] _Ibid._

[645] De Maisse, the French peace envoy to England, wrote, “These people are still dwelling on their imagination of the house of Burgundy, … but it does not please them to have so powerful a neighbour as the King of Spain.”

[646] Full particulars of his embassy will be found in his Journal, in the Archives de la Ministère des affaires étrangères, Paris, partly reproduced in Prévost-Paradol’s “Elizabeth et Henry IV.”

[647] For Cecil’s account of his embassy see Bacon Papers, Birch. There are also a great number of papers and letters on the subject of the mission in Cotton Vesp., cviii., and B.M. MSS. Add. 25,416.

[648] State Papers, Domestic.

[649] Chamberlain Letters, Camden Society.

[650] The Venetian Ambassador in France writes at this time (24th July): “The States are sending three representatives to England to urge the Queen to continue the war, as in her councils there are not wanting those who recommend this course, chiefly the Earl of Essex; but the Lord Treasurer is opposed, and, more important still, the Queen herself is inclined to peace.”

[651] _Desiderata Curiosa._

[652] A superficial observer, Dudley Carlton, writes a few days after Burghley’s death: “There is so much business to be thought of on the Lord Treasurer’s death. The Queen was so prepared for it by the small hopes of recovery that she takes it not over heavily, and gives ears to her suitors. The great places are in a manner passed before his death.” (State Papers, Dom.)

[653] The full arrangements for the funeral will be found in the State Papers, Domestic, of the 29th August (Record Office). After the funeral at Westminster, the body was carried with great state to Stamford and buried at St. Martin’s Church, in accordance with the will. Dr. Nares appears to be in doubt as to whether the interment was at Westminster or Stamford, but the State Papers seem to admit of no question on the point.

[654] Lytton to Carlton (State Papers, Domestic).

[655] Chamberlain Letters.

INDEX

A’Lasco, his visit to England, 29

Alba, Duke of, 77, 204, 219, 223-224, 227, 245, 249, 258, 265, 282, 288

Alençon, Duke of, his relations with the Flemings, 319, 323, 328, 335, 344, 349, 354-356, 358-359, 360-362, 363-370, 372-373, 379, 382

Alençon, Duke of, suggestions of marriage with Elizabeth, 266-267, 269, 274-275, 288-290, 303, 324-327, 328-341, 344, 349, 353-354, 358-359, 362-370, 379; death of, 384

Alford, Roger, 39

Allington, 232, 249

Alterennes, seat of the Cecil family, 7

Amboise, Treaty of, 136

Andrada, a spy in the Lopez plot, 468

Anglican Church, uniformity in, 78, 139, 144, 160, 163, 166, 290-291, 367, 387

Anjou, Duke of (Henry III.), proposed marriage with Elizabeth, 252-253, 266, 279

Antonio, Don, Portuguese Pretender, 344, 356, 358, 361, 395, 403, 411, 422, 435, 467

Aquila, Bishop of, Spanish Ambassador, 80, 81, 88, 93, 100, 109, 111, 127-128, 130, 136-137, 142; death of, 147

Archduke, the, suggested marriage with Elizabeth, 77, 80, 88, 103, 155-157, 160, 168-170, 173-174, 181, 188, 199, 207

Armada, the, 402, 411, 423, 427, 431, 433-434

Arran, Earl of, 85-86, 88, 114, 126

Arundel, Earl of, 36, 65, 72, 99, 174, 180, 225, 230, 238

Arundell, Charles, 415

Ascham, Roger, 9; appointed tutor to Princess Elizabeth, 12, 13, 62

Audley, Lord, his remedies for gout, 37

Babington plot, 402-405

Bacon, Antony, 450, 458

Bacon, Francis, 450, 458; his attempts to obtain the Attorney-Generalship, 469

Bacon, Lady, 45, 61, 460

Bacon, Sir Nicholas, 9, 61, 71, 79, 138, 192, 273, 294, 373

Baden, Margravine of, Cecilia of Sweden, 174

Bailly, Charles, 258-259

Balfour, Sir James, 295

Ballard, agent in the Babington plot, 403-404

Barker, 257

Barrow, a Brownist leader, 459

Beale, Clerk of the Council, 378, 381, 403, 411, 420

Beaton, 213

Beaton, Cardinal, 15

Beaumont, 36

Beauvoir de Nocle, envoy from Henry of Navarre, 442-444, 461

Bedford, Countess of, 61

Bedford, Earl of, 19, 61, 66-67, 71, 79, 99, 106, 110, 327, 382

Bellièvre Pomponne de, sent to England about Mary Stuart’s condemnation, 412-413, 415

Berchamstow granted to Cecil, 47

Bertie, Francis, 51

Bill, Dr., 9

Biron, Marshal de, 379, 382

Bôchetel de la Forest, French Ambassador, 188, 205, 221-222

Bodley, Sir Thomas, sent to the States, 473

Bonner, Bishop, 18, 23, 50

Borough, Sir John, 423-424

Boston, W. Cecil appointed Recorder of, 32

Bothwell, Earl of, 179, 180, 193-196

Boulogne, 15, 18, 24

Bourne, Lincolnshire, birthplace of Lord Burghley, 6, 8

Bowes, Robert, 378

Boxall, Dr., 206, 223, 224

Briant, Father, 367

Brille, capture of, 264-265

Briquemault, Condé’s envoy to Elizabeth, 136

Brisson, French envoy, 355

Brittany, Spaniards in, 444, 447, 465, 466, 473

Bromley, Lord Chancellor, 365, 408, 419

Brownists, 459

Bruce, Robert, 395

Buckhurst, Lord, 411

Buiz, Paul, 305, 306, 307

Burghley, Lady, 50, 61, 189, 292; death of, 438

Burghley, Lord, birth of, 5; pedigree, 6; education, 8; at Cambridge, 9; first marriage, 10; his first recommendation to Henry VIII., 11, 12; _custos brevium_, 14; Master of Requests to Somerset, 14; present at the battle of Pinkie, 16; secretary to Somerset, 16; grants to, 18; his attitude on the downfall of the Protector, 19-22, 28-31; sent to the Tower, 22; appointed Secretary of State, 24; his character, 25; his attitude towards Northumberland’s foreign policy, 27; knighted, 31; Recorder of Boston, 32; his report upon the Emperor’s demand for help, 33; his care for English commerce, 35; illness of, in the last days of Edward VI., 37; grant of Combe Park, 37; made Chancellor of the Garter, 37; his attitude towards Queen Mary’s succession, 38-43; his justification to Mary, 40-46; grants to him during Edward’s reign, 47; splendour of his household, 47; his love of books, 48; patronage of learning, 49; his liveries, 50; conforms to Catholicism, 52; brings Pole to England, 55; accompanies him to Calais, 56; represents Lincolnshire in Parliament, 57; his action in favour of the Protestants, 58-59; his habits, 60; his devotion to his wife, 61; his connections with Princess Elizabeth, 62-63; his position on the succession of Elizabeth, 66-67; his first arrangements for Elizabeth’s government, 69; his foreign policy on the accession, 72-73, 76-77; his action in passing the Acts of Supremacy and Uniformity, 78; Spanish plan to bribe him, 79; his approaches to Spain, 81; his Scottish policy, 82, 85, 86, 88; war with Scotland, 91-94; arranges the terms of peace in Edinburgh, 95-96; court intrigue against him, 99; checkmates Dudley, 103, 105; the suggestion as to the Council of Trent, 107-109; proceedings against Catholics, 111; his counsel to Knox, 115; his attitude towards Mary Stuart, 116; his numerous activities, 117; against piracy, 118; his assertion of English right to trade, 119; distress at his son’s conduct, 120-125; his attitude towards the Huguenots, 128-129, 132-133; his relations with the Bishop of Aquila, 130-131, 136-138; distrust of the French, 142; his activity in defensive measures, 144; his interest in mineralogy, 144; appointed Master of the Court of Wards, 145; his action as Chancellor of Cambridge University, 145-146; his character, 150; Dudley’s intrigues against him, 152-153; renewed approaches to Spain, 154-157; continued intrigues of Dudley, 158, 160, 164-165; his conditions for the Archduke’s match, 169, 174; his distrust of Catholic interference in Scotland, 175; his support of Murray, 176-177; his connection with the murder of Rizzio, &c., 179-180; urges the Archduke’s match, 181-182; again approaches the Spaniards, 183; with the Queen at Oxford, 186; visited by the Queen at Burghley, 187; dispute with Leicester, 187; urges the Archduke’s match, 189, 190; opposes the Netherlands revolt, 190; his reception of the news of Darnley’s murder, 192-194, 197; again approaches Spain, 198; his attitude towards Murray, 201-202; again leans to the Protestants, 206-207; renewed severity towards Catholics, 210-212; letter from Mary Stuart to him, 216; his treatment of her, 218; aids the Huguenots, 221-222; his rebuke to De Spes, 228; Leicester’s plot against him, 231; magnanimous treatment of his enemies, 238; his despair, 248; visits Mary at Chatsworth, 248; made a peer, 254; his activities, 255; his mode of life, 255-256; Ridolfi plot and expulsion of De Spes, 256-263; execution of Norfolk, 268; entertains the French envoys, 269; urges the measures in Parliament against Mary, 271; serious illness of, 271;

## action after St. Bartholomew, 278-279;

approaches Spain again, 280; negotiations with De Guaras, 280-283; suggests sending Mary to Scotland, 285-286; his conditions for the Alençon match, 289; religious anxieties, 290-291; his household, 292-293; interview with Mary at Buxton, 294; book against him, 294-295; renewed approaches to Spain, 296-305; his anger at the Flushing pirates, 305-306; visit to Buxton, 311-312; his moderating influence, 320-321; in semi-retirement, 327; his attitude towards the Alençon match, 330-335; his foreign policy as an alternative of the Alençon match, 336-340; efforts in favour of peace, 343-344; opposes the retention of Drake’s plunder, 346-348; approaches to France, 351-352; entertains the embassy, 352; details of the feast, 353; his review of the political situation, 353-354; his attitude towards Alençon, 363; renewed approach to Spain, 365; his treatment of the Jesuits, 367-368; fresh predominance of the Protestant party, 372-373; demands new Councillors of his party, 374; wishes to retire, 379-380; his attitude towards the Throgmorton plot, 384; his review of foreign policy, 385; his attitude towards the religious controversy, 387-390; his relations with Dr. Parry, 391-392; slandered by the Leicester party, 393; his kindness to Mary Stuart, 394; his relations with Leicester in the Netherlands, 396-401; his conduct towards Mary Stuart after the Babington plot, 404-409; fresh approach to Spain, 411-412; intrigues against him, 416; his conduct towards Davison, 417-422; his attitude towards Drake’s Cadiz expedition, 424-426; negotiations for peace with Spain, 425, 427-428, 429-432; organises the defence of England, 429, 432-434; visits the camp at Tilbury, 433; his troop of soldiers, 433 _note_; his share in the Lisbon expedition, 436-438; death of his wife and his meditations thereon, 438-439; change of policy, 440-442; opposition of Essex, 445-446, 450; Spenser’s accusation of jealousy, 454; grant of Rockingham Forest, 455; his devotion to duty, 455; persistent attacks upon him, 456-457; his influence on the religious controversy, 459; his son to succeed him, 463-464; his cautious influence on the war-party, 465-466; his attitude in the Lopez plot, 468-470; description of him by Standen, 471; by Sir Michael Hicks, 472; renewed distrust of the French, 473; a scheme of national defence, 474; continued illness, 475; ill-disposed towards France, 477; Essex’s attempt to force his hands, 478-479; his disagreement with the Queen, 479; his attitude towards Essex’s attempt to relieve Calais, 480; towards “the islands voyage,” 484-486; his negotiations with De Maisse, 490-491; strives for peace with Spain to the last, 494-495; results of his national policy, 494; funeral, 496; appreciation of his character, 497-498

Burghley, Lord, his diary, 5, 22, 24, 37, 55, 59, 61, 83, 185, 187, 194, 272, 432, 439

Burghley House, 47, 188-189, 327

Cadiz, Drake’s attack upon, 423-424

Calais, loss of, 64, 72-73, 75-76

Calais, restitution of, claimed, 198, 208, 369, 478

Calais, capture of, by the Spaniards, 479-480

Cambridge University, 9, 15, 145-146, 290

Campion, Father, 367

Cannon Row, Burghley’s house at, 31, 60, 66, 120, 256

Carbery Hill, 196

Carew, Arthur, 228

Carew, Sir Peter, 95

Carrack, the great (_Madre de Dios_), 452-453

Cartwright, leader of the Puritans, 290

Castelnau de la Mauvissière, 175, 277, 341-343

Cateau-Cambresis, peace of, 76, 80

Catharine de Medici, 10, 92, 128, 133, 142, 154, 157, 166, 213, 221-222, 251, 266, 273, 297, 326, 341, 369, 384, 413

Catharine of Aragon, 3, 4, 7

Catholic plots against Elizabeth and Burghley, 225, 244, 256-259, 270, 317, 364-366, 371, 376, 383-384, 389, 390-392, 402-405, 422, 450, 456, 470

Cavalcanti, Guido, 73, 75, 232, 251, 267

Cave, Sir Ambrose, 71

Cecil, David, grandfather of Burghley, 7

Cecil, Mrs., 293, 427

Cecil, Richard, Burghley’s great-grandfather, 6

Cecil, Richard, Burghley’s father, 7, 8, 37

Cecil, Sir Robert, 433, 437-438, 445, 450, 453-454, 454 _note_, 457-458, 461-464, 466-470, 475, 479-480, 482-483, 486; his mission to France, 491-493

Cecil, Thomas, birth of, 10; his journey to Paris, 120-122; his bad conduct, 122-125, 327, 336, 433; quarrel with his brother, 454

Cecil (or Burghley) House, in the Strand, 269; grand banquet at, to the French envoys, 352-353, 411, 442, 476; Burghley’s last days there, 494-495

Chark, a preacher at Cambridge, 291

Charles V., 3, 4, 13, 27, 32, 33, 53

Charles IX., King of France, 157, 166-168, 188, 205, 250, 273, 297; death of, 298

Chartres, Vidame of, 73, 133, 137, 251, 279

Chastelard, 143

Chateauneuf de l’Aubespine, French Ambassador, 407, 413, 416

Chatillon, Cardinal, 221, 244, 251

Cheke, Mary, marriage with W. Cecil, 10; her death, 11

Cheke, Sir John, 9; appointed tutor to Edward VI., 12, 14, 31, 32, 38, 45; exiled, 51; lured to England, conforms and dies, 58

Chester, Colonel, 301, 302, 307

Clerivault, a messenger of Mary Stuart, 194

Clinton, Lord Admiral, 31, 47, 66, 99, 269, 327, 365

Cobham, Lord, 16, 60, 208, 221, 258

Cobham, Sir Henry, sent to Spain, 302; sent to France, 381

Cobham, Thomas, 258

Coinage, Burghley’s care of, 28, 117

Coligny, 106, 110, 133, 136, 183, 206, 221, 242, 270

Combe Park granted to Cecil, 37

Commerce, Burghley’s care of, 35, 118, 151, 183, 211, 283, 338, 345

Commercial war with Spain, 151-153, 158, 227, 280-283

Condé, Prince of, 127-128, 133, 136, 154, 157, 204, 221, 225; killed, 242

Condé, Prince of, the younger, 278, 297, 342-343

Cooke, Sir Anthony, W. Cecil’s father-in-law, 12, 14; exiled by Mary, 51, 58, 61

Cooke, Mildred, married to W. Cecil, 12

Cornwall, Spaniards land in, 474

Courtney, Earl of Devonshire, 50-51

Courtney, Sir William, 59

Cranmer, 14, 19-21, 32, 53, 57

Creighton, Father, 366, 389

Crofts, Sir James, 347, 365, 372, 374, 424, 430-431, 444

Curll, Mary Stuart’s secretary, 404

Dacre, Lord, 234

Dale, Dr., English Ambassador in France, 290

Danett, Thomas, sent to Vienna, 188-189

Darcy, Lord, 240

Darcy, Sir Thomas, 14

Darnley, 93, 130, 144, 161, 163, 171-72, 173, 179-180, 181-182, 192-193

D’Aubigny (Lennox), 341, 354, 364-366, 371, 376

Davison, William, 378, 399; his connection with the execution of Mary Stuart, 417-422; Essex proposes him for Secretary of State, 445

De Cossé, Marshal, 298, 303

De Maineville, Guisan envoy to Scotland, 376-377

De Maisse, Henry IV.’s envoy to Elizabeth, proposes peace with Spain, 489-491

Deeping granted to Cecil, 47

Dering, Edward, Lecturer at St. Paul’s, 291

Doughty, Lord Burghley’s agent with Drake, 346-347

Douglas, Archibald, 414

Drake, Sir Francis, his voyage round the world, 346-348; the question of his plunder, 358, 365; his expeditions to aid Don Antonio, &c., 361, 422, 436-438; his expedition to Santo Domingo, &c., 395-396, 402; his attack upon Cadiz, 423-425; urges reprisals against Spain, 465; his last expedition, 470, 474-475

Dreux, battle of, 135

Drury, Sir William, 215, 295, 300

Drury, Thomas, 19

Dudley, Guildford, 38

Dudley, Lady Robert, 101

Dudley, Lord Robert. _See_ Leicester

Durham Place, 38, 44, 128, 137; the Spanish Ambassador expelled, 138; Cecilia of Sweden lodged there, 174

Dymoke, Sir Edward, champion, 51

Edmunds, Sir Thomas, 393, 479

Edward VI., 12-13; his appeal for Somerset, 20; betrothed to Elizabeth of Valois, 24; his journal, 33; his will, 38; death of, 43; his educational foundations prompted by Cecil, 49

Egmont, Count, 138, 204

Elizabeth, Princess, 12, 49; enters London with Mary, 50, 51, 52, 62, 63; proposals for marriage of, 63-64, 65; her accession, 66

Elizabeth, Queen, her accession, 66-68; suggestions for marriage, 75, 76-77; her first religious measures, 78, 79, 80; proposal for marriage to Nemours, 84; with Arran, 85; with the Archduke, 80, 88; with the Prince of Sweden, 89-90; war with Scotland, 91-96; talk of marriage with Dudley, 100-103; her religious intrigues with Spain, 104-105, 111; fears of plots to poison, 111; her distrust of Mary Stuart, 113; illness of, 117; her attitude towards the Darnley match, 132; aids the Huguenots, 133; falls ill of smallpox, 134; anger at Condé’s defection, 136; her anger with Parliament on the succession question, 141; visits Cambridge University, 147; renewed approaches to Spain, 157; suggested marriage with Charles IX., 157, 166-168; approaches to the Catholics, 165; her attitude towards the Darnley match, 172-173; her reception of Murray, 176-177; renewed approach to Leicester, 181; her reception of the news of James Stuart’s birth, 185-186; illness of, 186; visits Oxford, 186-187; renewal at Burghley House of negotiations for marriage with Charles IX., 188-189; her anger with Parliament respecting the succession, 191; her reception of the news of Darnley’s murder, 192-193; condemns the rising in the Netherlands, 198; her attitude towards Murray, 202; towards the Catholics, 209; removes Mary from Carlisle, 217; aids the Huguenots, 221-222; seizure of the Spanish treasure, 227; her treatment of Norfolk, 231-241, 246; her danger, 242, 247-248; suggestions for marriage with Anjou, 251-253; Ridolfi plot, 256-263; alliance with France, 264-267; in favour of Mary Stuart, 270-271; receives the news of St. Bartholomew, 275; progress in Kent, 293; approaches to Spain, 299-300; projected war with Henry III., 301; refuses aid to Orange, 303-305; rejects the sovereignty of Holland, 304; her treatment of Burghley, 310; her reception of Mendoza, 320; her difficulty with Alençon, 330-332; interview with Condé, 342; danger of war, 350; her relations with France and Alençon, 353-362; her parsimony, 361-362; pledges herself to Alençon, 363; her trouble to get rid of him, 368-370; negotiations with Mary Stuart, 378; letter to Burghley, 380; assumes the Protectorship of the Netherlands, 396; her rage at Leicester’s conduct there, 399-401; her treatment of Mary after the Babington plot, 404-408; her answers to Parliament, 410; her reception of French and Scotch remonstrances, 412-415; her conduct in the execution of Mary Stuart, 417-422; her perplexity, 426-429; anger with Essex for going to Lisbon, 437-438; her aid to Henry of Navarre, 442-444; anger with Essex, 448-450; dangerous position, 451-452; anger at Henry IV.’s conversion, 461; fears of attack from Spain, 465-466; anger with Essex about Lopez, 470; her anger with the Hollanders, 473; Drake’s last voyage, 474; her policy towards Henry of Navarre, 478; her hesitation to relieve Calais, 479-480; her fickleness about Essex’s Cadiz voyage, 481; about “the islands voyage,” 484-486; her anger with Essex, 486-487; her indignation at Henry IV. for entering into peace negotiations with Spain, 489-493; urges the States to stand firm, 493; grief at the death of Burghley, 495-496

Elizabeth of Valois marries Philip II., 76, 84

English Jesuit party in favour of Spain, 456-457, 467, 470

English troops in France against the League, 443-444, 466

Erasmus at Cambridge, 9

Essex, Earl of (Robert Devereux), 421, 435, 443, 445, 448, 449, 450-451, 454, 457-458, 460-462, 466-467, 472-473, 477; his plan to force war with Spain, 478-480; his attempt to relieve Calais, 480; his expedition to Cadiz, 482-483; “the islands voyage,” 484-486; retires from court, 486-487; urges war with Spain, 493; attends Burghley’s funeral, 496

Essex, Lady, marriage with Leicester, 332

Farnese, Alexander, 316, 318, 328; peace negotiations with England, 425-432

Felton, 243

Fère, La, siege of, 477

Feria, Duke of, Spanish Ambassador, 65-67, 72-73, 76-77

Fitzwilliam sent to Spain, 260

Flanders, revolt against the Spaniards in, 133, 184, 189, 204, 209, 219, 224, 229, 242, 245, 264-265, 273, 283-285, 303-307, 313-319, 320-321, 325, 328, 335, 359, 370-373, 379, 382-385, 395-401, 411, 422, 488-489

Foix, De, French Ambassador, 157, 158, 166, 169-170, 175, 265, 269

Foreign policy of England, 4, 26, 33, 46, 64, 72-73, 74, 80-81, 85, 88, 91-92, 112-114, 128-129, 136-138, 154-155, 166-168, 175-176, 182, 198-200, 205, 211, 219, 223-224, 228-229, 256-263, 269, 273-279, 280-283, 300-303, 308, 322, 328-329, 336-337, 353-354, 370, 379, 383-384, 385, 395-396, 407, 411-412, 426, 440-444, 473, 488-493

France, civil wars in, 126, 133-136, 205, 221, 242, 251, 273, 276-279, 297, 300-303, 319, 342-343; wars of the League, 442-444, 447, 461-480

Francis I., 13

Francis II., King of France, 92; death of, 106

French embassy to England (1581), 351-359

French influence in Scotland, 15, 82, 91-92, 94-96, 107, 132, 144, 175, 198, 213, 217, 243, 285, 326, 365, 378

Frobisher, death of, 466

Gama, a spy in the Lopez plot, 468

Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, 14, 23, 29-30, 50

Garrard, Sir William, 118

Gemblours, battle of, 318

German mercenaries, 301-302

Gifford, agent in the Babington plot, 403-404

Gilbert, Sir Humphrey, 283

Glajon, De, his mission from Philip to Elizabeth, 93

Glasgow, Archbishop of, exhorts Mary to clear herself, 195, 285, 367

Gondi, 323

Gonson, Controller of the Navy, 118

Gout, curious remedies for, 37, 293 _note_

Granvelle, De, 77, 172

Gray, Master of, 394, 411, 414, 417

Gray’s Inn, Burghley a student at, 11

Greenwood, a Brownist leader, 459

Grenville, Sir Richard, 449 _note_

Gresham, Sir Thomas, 221

Grey, Catharine, 93, 134, 140, 192

Grey, Lady Jane, 36, 38, 43, 44

Grey, Lord, 73, 374, 429

Grey, Lord John, 60, 91, 99

Grimstone, Mr., 447

Grindall, Archbishop, 387

Guaras, Antonio de, Spanish agent, 248, 271, 280-283, 296, 299, 302, 308, 318

Guise, Francis, Duke of, 126

Guise, Henry, Duke of, 299, 341, 359, 371, 381, 383-384, 411; murder of, 440

Guzman de Silva, Spanish Ambassador, 152, 158, 165, 170-171, 174-175, 181-182, 190, 192-194, 199, 201, 210-212, 219

Haddon, Dr., 9

Hales, Sir John, 39

Hampton Court, 19, 469, 471

Hatfield, 5, 6, 51, 65-66, 120, 255

Hatton, Sir Christopher, 292, 321, 329, 334, 336, 347, 364-365, 369-370, 372, 374, 399, 408, 419, 424

Havre de Grace, 133-134, 142, 190

Hawkins, John, 204, 344-345, 361, 452, 465, 475; lays a trap for Philip, 260-261

Heath, Archbishop of York, 66, 71

Heckington, William, grandfather of Burghley, 8

Heneage, Sir Thomas, 399-401

Henry II. of France, 27, 75; death of, 84

Henry III. of France, 297-298, 303, 313, 325, 328, 359, 370-371, 379, 384-385; his attitude towards Mary Stuart’s trial and execution, 407, 412-414, 416; his fear of the Guises, 426, 440; rallies to the Huguenots, 440; murder of, 441

Henry of Navarre, 278, 297, 301, 303, 342, 385, 440-444, 447-449, 461, 465-466, 473, 477-480, 488; makes peace with Spain, 488-493

Henry VIII., 4; favours W. Cecil, 11-12; his death, 13

Herbert, Lord, 19

Herll, 306-307, 314

Herries, Lord, 215, 262

Hertford, Earl of, 140, 192

Hertford, Earl of. _See_ Somerset

Hoby, Lady, 234

Hoby, Sir Philip, betrays Somerset, 20; friendly with Cecil, 60

Hoby, Sir Thomas, English Ambassador in France, 187

Holt, Father, 366, 456

Horn, Bishop of Winchester, 109

Horn, Count, 204

Howard, Lady, 193

Howard, Lord Thomas, 484, 485

Howard, Lord William, 66, 72, 99

Howard of Effingham, 187, 370, 417, 429, 465, 475, 480-481; Earl of Nottingham, 486

Huguenots. _See_ France, civil wars in

Hume, Lord, 295

Humphreys, Dr. Laurence, 186-187

Hunsdon, Lord, 245, 370, 403, 429

Huntingdon, Earl of, 101-102, 134, 140

Huntly, Earl of, 180

Ireland, Papal intrigues in, 111, 243, 247, 317, 335, 348, 355, 357-358, 374, 474

Ivry, battle of, 444

James VI., his birth, 185; coronation, 202; Catholic plans to kidnap him, 296; English mission to, 378, 380-382; sends the Master of Gray to England, 394; alliance with England, 403; his remonstrance with Elizabeth at Mary’s condemnation, 414; attempts of Catholics to convert him, 426; his alliance with England, 441; again listens to the Catholics, 451, 465; Essex’s attitude towards him, 466

Juan, Don, 313-316, 318

Keith, Sir William, 414

Kent, Earl of (Reginald Grey), 419

Killigrew, 199, 285, 286, 419

Kingston, Sir Anthony, 59

Kirkaldy of Grange, 262, 285, 295

Knollys, Henry, 228

Knollys, Sir Francis, 71, 79, 187, 192, 217, 218, 334, 365, 367, 372, 382, 388, 392, 403

Knox, John, 86, 114-115, 287

Knyvett, Sir Henry, 228

La Mark, capture of Brille by, 264-265

La Mole, French envoy, 274-275

La Mothe Fénélon, French Ambassador, 252, 275-277, 376-377

La Motte, Spanish Governor of Gravelines, 300

La Noue, Huguenot leader, 136, 443

Langside, battle of, 214

Latimer, 57

League, the Catholic, 154, 157, 199-200, 205, 251, 265, 273, 277, 288, 326, 371, 442-444, 447, 461-466

Leicester, Earl of, 70, 87, 90, 99, 100, 112, 132, 135-136, 138, 152, 157-158, 159, 161, 163-164, 165, 167-170, 174, 181, 186-187, 191-192, 231, 249, 252, 282, 286, 291-292, 296, 307-309, 311, 317, 320, 322, 324, 327, 329, 330-332, 334, 336, 340, 342-343, 347, 352, 356, 359, 363-364, 365, 368-370, 372-374, 382-384, 386, 388, 392-393, 395-401, 406, 411, 416, 418, 423, 429-430, 433; death of, 434-435

Leith, siege of, 93-96

Lennox, Lady Margaret, 114, 127, 130, 143, 171, 175, 182, 193

Lennox, the Regent, 130, 195, 248, 285

Lincoln, Lord. _See_ Clinton

Lisbon, the English expedition to, 436-438

Liturgy, Cecil aids Cranmer in settling, 32

Livingston sent to Scotland, 248

Lochleven, 196

Longjumeau, peace of, 221

Lopez, Dr. Ruy, 467-470

Lorraine, Cardinal, 83, 113, 154, 171, 178, 205, 222, 251, 285, 288

Lumley, Lord, 232, 234

Maitland of Lethington, 113-114, 126, 132, 141-144, 171, 285

Man, Dr. English, Ambassador in Spain, 210, 263

Mary, Queen, 17, 23, 30, 36; her succession, 38-43, 46, 50; coronation of, 51; her marriage, 53; her reign, 53-65; her death, 66

Mary of Lorraine, 15, 17; death of, 95

Mary Queen of Scots, 15; to marry Edward VI., 15; to marry the Dauphin, 17, 75, 78, 82-83, 85-86, 92-93; refuses to ratify the peace of Edinburgh, 106; intrigues for her marriage, 112-113; arrives in Scotland, 113-115; her approaches to Elizabeth, 131-132; her claims to the succession, 140-142; proposal to marry Don Carlos, 142-143; suggested marriage with Leicester, 162; with Darnley, 170-171; her approaches to Spain, 171-173, 175, 184; suspicions of her complicity in the murder of Darnley, 193-198; Lochleven, 196; the casket letters, 201; appeals to Elizabeth and France, 213; escapes to England, 214; her interview with Knollys, 216-217; removed from Carlisle, 217; the Commission at York, 219; her approaches to Spain, 223; English plots in her favour, 225-246; Elizabeth negotiates for her release, 247-250; leans entirely on Spain, 256-257; her connection with the Ridolfi plot, 261; suggestion to send her to Scotland, 286; goes to Buxton, 293; adheres entirely to Spain, 341; approaches to D’Aubigny’s government, 364-366; Spanish-Jesuit plot in her favour, 371, 376; her negotiations with Elizabeth, 378, 381; sent to Tutbury, 394; sends Nau to Elizabeth, 394; her letters intercepted, 395; disinherits James in favour of Philip, 402; her connection with the Babington plot, 404; removed to Tixhall, 404; to Fotheringay, 407; her trial, 408-409; condemned and sentenced, 409-410; executed, 417, 420

Mason, Sir John, 26, 27, 99;

Mathias, Archduke, 315, 318

Maurice of Saxony, 13, 32

Mayenne, Duke of, 444

Maynard, Sir Thomas, 475

Melancthon, 9

Melvil, Sir Andrew, 408

Melvil, Sir James, 161-162, 185, 192

Melvil, Sir Robert, 182, 184, 415

Mendoza, Spanish Ambassador, 319, 324, 326-327, 339, 348, 356, 363-364, 366, 372-373, 376, 378, 381-382, 402-404, 411, 423

Mercœur, Duke of, 443

Mewtys, Sir Peter, 106, 130

Mildmay, Sir Walter, 248, 350, 381, 407, 435

Monluc, Bishop of Valence, 95

Montagu, Chief-Justice, 38

Montgomerie, Count de, 84, 133, 206, 278-279, 297

Montmorenci, Constable, 81, 84, 269, 299, 303

Morette, the Duke of Savoy’s agent, 194

Morgan, Thomas, 395, 402

Morice, a Puritan Parliament man, 459

Morton, Earl of, Regent, 285, 295, 324, 341; execution of, 364

Morysine, Thomas, 26, 31

Muhlberg, battle of, 13, 27

Mundt, Dr., 155

Murray, Earl of, 110, 113-114, 126, 132, 175-176, 177-180, 182, 197, 201, 212, 218-219, 223; murder of, 243

Nantouillet, Provost of Paris, a hostage in England, 137

Nau, Mary’s secretary, 394, 404

Navarre, King of (Anthony de Bourbon), 106, 110, 127; death of, 135

Navy, English, 144, 248, 338

Noailles, De, French Ambassador, 36

Norfolk, Duke of, 50

Norfolk, Thomas Howard, fourth Duke of, 90, 101, 165, 169, 180, 191, 192, 231-241, 246-257; condemned to death, 267; executed, 268

Norris, Sir Henry, English Ambassador in France, 193, 201, 205, 208, 213, 222, 225, 237, 244, 252

Norris, Sir John, 379, 396, 429, 436-438, 447, 466

Northampton, Marquis of, 71, 191

Northern Lords, rising of, 240-241

Northumberland, Duke of, 16, 18-25; his foreign policy, 27; his religious policy, 36; his action as to the succession, 38-39; leads the forces against Mary, 43-44; his betrayal by the Council, 45-46; his execution, 50

Northumberland, Earl of, 185, 239

Nowell, Dean of St. Paul’s, 165

O’Neil, Shan, 127, 136, 185

Orange, Prince of, 242, 283-284, 288, 296, 302, 304, 307, 316, 328, 335, 372, 379, 382; murder of, 384

Oxford, Countess of (Anne Cecil), 61, 263 _note_, 292, 305-306 _note_; death of, 432

Oxford, Earl of, 263 _note_, 292, 301, 305, 375-376

Paget, Charles (Mopo), 383, 395

Paget, Sir William, 19-21, 36; Lord Paget, 59, 64, 66, 76-77, 99

Palmer, Sir Thomas, divulges Somerset’s alleged plot against Northumberland, 28

Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury, 108, 140, 206, 296

Parry, Dr. William, 390-392

Parry, Sir Thomas, 62, 66-67, 71; is jealous of Cecil, 79-80

Passau, peace of, 33

Patten, William, his description of the Scotch campaign, 16

Paulet, Sir Amias, 394-395, 404-405, 407; his refusal to poison Mary Stuart, 418, 420, 430

Peace negotiations with France (1555), Cecil present at, 56; (1558-1559), 65, 72-76, 80

Pembroke, Earl of, 45, 66, 191-192, 238

Percy, Sir Henry, 95; Earl of Northumberland, 384

Perez, Antonio, 461-462, 466-467, 478-479

Persons, Father, 366; his books against Burghley, 456-457

Petre, Sir William, 19-22, 24, 59, 95

Philip II., 53, 57, 64-65, 74-75, 84, 89, 92, 113, 133, 190, 208, 220, 225, 249, 314-315, 318, 364, 372, 402-403, 443, 483; death of, 495

Philip II. and Mary Stuart, 142-143, 171-172, 223, 245, 256-259, 266, 341, 371-372, 378, 381-382, 395, 402-403

Phillips, T., cipher secretary, 404, 467

Pickering, Sir William, 27, 31; flight under Mary, 52

Pinart, Secretary, French envoy, 356

Pinkie, battle of, 16, 17

Plague in London, 246, 375

Pole, Cardinal, 53; brought to England by Cecil, 55; accompanies him to Calais, 56

Pollard, Sir John, 59

Popham, Attorney-General, 408

Portugal, 211; succession to the crown of, 329, 341

Poynings, Sir Adrian, 134

Privateers, 220, 224-225, 298

Protestant exiles under Mary, 51, 57-59

Puckering, Lord Keeper, 458

Ralegh, Sir Walter, 374, 376, 401, 411, 421, 424, 429, 435, 452-453, 458, 465, 482-483, 484-486

Rambouillet, 181

Randolph sent to Scotland, 107, 110, 127, 130, 162, 172-173, 179

Reformation, birth of, 2-3, 13

Religious matters, Cecil’s participation in them, 32, 53-54, 70, 99, 104-106, 107-109, 139, 144, 160, 163, 186, 203, 206-207, 209, 270, 290-291, 296, 322, 327, 350, 367, 387-390, 450, 457-460

Renard, Imperial Ambassador, 53, 57

Rennes, Bishop of, 222

Requesens, Spanish Governor of Flanders, 296, 298

Ridley, 57

Ridolfi plot, 225, 229-230, 235, 257-259

Rizzio, 173, 179, 182

Rogers, Edward, 71, 141

Ross, 257

Ross, Bishop of, 225, 232, 243, 250, 256-259, 295

Rouen, siege of, 448-449

Russell, Lord. _See_ Bedford

Russian Company, Cecil one of the founders of, 36

Ruthven, raid of, 376

Ruy Gomez, 77

Sadler, Sir Ralph, 86, 91, 95

St. Aldegonde, 305

St. Bartholomew, 275-276, 288

St. John’s College, Cambridge, 9, 15, 146

St. Quentin, battle of, 64

Sandys, Archbishop, 339

Sarmiento de Gamboa, 411

Savage one of the Babington conspirators, 404

Savoy, Duke of, 63

Scotland, anarchy in, 15; war with, 16; invasion of, by Somerset, 16; battle of Pinkie, 16; French forces in, 82; war with England, 91; peace of Edinburgh, 95-96; English support of Protestants in, 107, 110; Mary and the Protestants, 113-114; Mary refuses to ratify the peace of Edinburgh, 115; marriage with Darnley, 173; revolt of Murray, 173, 175; murder of Rizzio, 182; murder of Darnley, 192-193; French plots in, 197-199; Murray as Regent, 212; Langside, 214; civil war, 218; murder of Murray, 243; Catholic influence dominant, 243; Morton Regent, 285; rise of the Protestant party, 295; rise of D’Aubigny, 341, 354, 364; Spanish Jesuit plot in, 371; Master of Gray sent to England, 394

Scrope, Lady, 232

Scrope, Lord, 216

Seminary priests in England, 209, 336, 349, 354, 366, 389-390, 402, 450-451

Seymour, Lord Admiral, 17

Sherwin, Father, 367

Shrewsbury, Countess of, her accusations against her husband and Mary Stuart, 394

Shrewsbury, Earl of, 66, 293, 310-311, 352, 378, 394

Sidney, Lady, 88, 90

Sidney, Sir Henry, 104

Simier, 326, 328-329, 330-332, 334-335, 336, 354

Smalkaldic league, 13

Smith, Sir John, sent to Madrid, 314

Smith, Sir Thomas, 9, 16, 19-22, 24, 62, 134, 157, 266, 274, 290

Somers, English envoy to France, 359

Somerset, Duke of, 12-14; his invasion of Scotland, 16; Cabal against him, 17; his downfall, 19-25; execution of, 28; Burghley’s behaviour towards him, 28-31

Southampton, Earl of. _See_ Wriothesley

Spain, English relations with, 33, 72-73, 76-77, 80-82, 88, 92-94, 103-106, 129-130, 136-139, 152, 154, 158-160, 181-183, 187, 189, 210-211, 219, 227-229, 232-241, 248, 257-263, 280-283, 296, 300-308, 313-316, 319-320, 326-327, 336-337, 346-347, 356-359, 385-386, 411-412, 422, 453, 457-458, 465, 474

Spalding, 18

Spanish fury in Antwerp, 314

Spes, Gerau de, Spanish Ambassador, 220, 223-224, 225, 227-228, 232-239, 245-248; expelled from England, 263

Spinola, 159, 224

Stafford, Sir Edward, English Ambassador in France, 415, 423

Stamford Grammar School, 49

Standen, Anthony, 460, 464 _note_, 471

Stanhope arrested on Somerset’s downfall, 21

Stolberg, Count, 199

Storey, Dr., 262

Stuart, Arabella, 457

Stubbs’ book against the French match, 330

Succession to the crown of England, 140, 191, 231, 402, 413, 419, 457-458

Suffolk, Duchess of (Lady Willoughby), 7, 15, 26, 31; flight under Mary, 51, 58, 99, 327

Suffolk, Duke of (Grey), 31, 43

Supremacy, Act of, 78

Sussex, Earl of, 60, 169-170, 174, 181, 190, 192, 240, 245, 292, 301, 324, 326, 331, 333-334, 340, 343, 347, 353, 365, 372

Swetkowitz, Adam, an envoy of the Emperor, 168-170, 174

Sweden, King of (Eric XIV.), 89-90, 103, 112, 113, 174

Talbot, Gilbert, 322, 420

Theobalds, Burghley’s house, 255; the Queen visits, 272, 321-323, 327, 358, 375, 446, 463, 476; Burghley’s last visits, 494

Thetford granted to Cecil, 47

Thirlby, Bishop of Ely, 65, 72, 206

Throgmorton, Francis, his plot, 383

Throgmorton, Sir Nicholas, 83-84, 92, 106, 110, 120-124, 128-129, 130, 134, 172-173, 174, 192, 203, 221, 230

Thynne arrested on Somerset’s downfall, 21

Tinoco, a spy in the Lopez plot, 468

Trent Council, 105, 108-109, 111

Tyrone’s rebellion, 474

Unton, Sir Henry, his mission to France, 478-479

Valdés, Pedro de, 302

Venturini, Borghese, 128, 130

Verstegen, his book against Burghley, 457

Vervins, peace of, 493

Vielleville, Marshal, 133

Waldegrave, Sir Edward, in the Tower, 111

Walsingham, Sir Francis, 252, 264-265, 275-277, 290, 310, 320, 322, 331, 336, 347, 354-355, 356, 359-360, 363, 365, 367, 372-373, 378, 381-382, 386, 392, 396, 399-401, 403, 416, 418, 429

Warwick, Earl of. _See_ Northumberland

Warwick, Earl of (Ambrose Dudley), 134, 159

Watson, Dr., 9

Wentworth, Mrs. (Elizabeth Cecil), 375

Wentworth, Peter, 458-459

West, rising of the, 17

Westmoreland, Earl of, 240

Whalley, 29

White, Bishop of Winchester, 70

White, Nicholas, 254

Whitgift, Archbishop, 387-389, 460

Wilkes, Clerk of the Council, 301, 317

Williams, Sir Roger, 478

Williams, Speaker of the House of Commons, 139

Willoughby D’Eresby, Lord, 7

Willoughby D’Eresby, Lord (Peregrine Bertie), 370, 443

Wilson, Dr., sent to the States, 314; Secretary, 347

Wimbledon, 18, 31, 37, 47, 51, 60

Winchester, Marquis of, 31, 37, 47, 99, 139; death of, 271

Windebank, 121-124

Wolsey, 3

Wotton, Dr., Secretary of State, 22; succeeded by Burghley, 24, 65, 72, 74, 95

Wotton, Sir Henry, sent to France respecting Mary Stuart’s condemnation, 412

Wrangdike granted to Cecil, 47

Wriothesley, Lord Chancellor, 13, 18, 36

Wroth, Sir Thomas, 129

Wurtemburg, Duke of, 155, 168

Wyatt’s Rebellion, 51

Wynter, 118

Yaxley, an envoy of Mary Stuart to Spain, 176

Yeoman of the Robes. _See_ Cecil, Richard

THE END

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