1555-1558

Religious persecution in England—Philip’s attempts to restrain it—His efforts to keep control of English policy—Elizabeth comes to Court—Return of Philip to England—French intrigues—The English drawn into the war—St. Quentin—Loss of Calais—Penury of the English treasury—Illness and death of Mary—Feria’s approaches to Elizabeth

Renard had been right in his prediction. The moment that the restraining presence of Philip was removed from England the ecclesiastics carried things with a higher hand than ever.[103] Not only did the fires to burn heretics increase in number, but proposals were made in the Council to resume possession for the Church of the alienated first-fruits and tithes, as well as the benefices in lay hands. The minutes of the discussion were sent to Philip in Flanders with the report of the publication of the Bull confirming the possession by private people of the confiscated monastery and Church lands. To the latter Philip gives his readiest acquiescence; but for the proposal to restore the dues to the possession of the Church he has nothing but doubt and evasion. The question, he says, should be maturely discussed by eight selected Councillors, who should report to him before anything decisive is done, and he warns them that in the forthcoming Parliament nothing must be proposed without his prior consent. So, also, in the matter of the English Navy. The Council reported to him that the ships were mostly unseaworthy and should be brought into the Thames for repair, whilst the few good vessels should be reinforced and stationed between Dover and Calais. There was nothing that Philip needed more than that the French should be held in check in the Channel, and he is emphatic in his endorsement of the Council’s suggestion. “England’s chief defence depends upon its Navy being always ready to defend the realm against invasion, so that it is right that the ships should not only be fit for sea but instantly available.... The vessels ought to be stationed at Portsmouth, where they can much more easily be brought into service.” That Philip had his own interests in mind quite as much as those of England in the matter is seen by what follows. “The King is the more inclined to this course, as the Emperor has decided to sail for Spain about the end of October ... and has expressed a wish that twelve or fourteen English ships should escort him beyond Ushant. This makes the King more anxious that these ships should be ready and in excellent order; so that, besides other necessary uses, they may go upon this service, which will be especially grateful to his Highness.”[104]

Mary, it will be seen, counted for nothing. The sole object in view was Philip’s interests, and, although decently cloaked with his usual bland professions of his desire to serve England, everything he did at this time was directed to using the country for his ends whilst his wife lived. After that he would have to deal with a new state of affairs. Another instance of the postponement of English interests for his benefit is seen in the delay in summoning Parliament until after he had left England. The sole object of the session was to raise money. Mary’s Government was in the deepest penury. Extravagance, corruption, and demoralisation existed everywhere in the administration; but pressing as was the need for funds, Philip could not face the certain unpopularity that would have fallen upon him if the demand for large taxation before his departure had given a pretext to the suspicious English for the belief that the money was being raised for him.

In great state Mary, with Pole by her side, proceeded from St. James’s Palace in a sort of throne-litter on the 21st October, 1555, to open Parliament at Westminster, and Gardiner as Lord Chancellor, now a dying man, appealed in the Queen’s name for liberal supplies to conduct the business of the nation. It was his last effort, and though Parliament voted a million crowns, to be paid in two years, the Chancellor took no further share in public business, dying three weeks after at Whitehall, whither he was carried from the Parliament Chamber. The death of Gardiner was an irreparable loss to Mary. The man had many faults; he was arrogant, unscrupulous, and violent, but he was a bold and experienced statesman, who kept his shifty, greedy colleagues in something approaching subjection; and he was determined to prevent, if he could, either of the great Continental rivals from obtaining control of English policy for their ends. He had opposed the Spanish match as long as opposition might have prevented it; but when it was effected he minimised its disadvantages and never allowed either the Queen or Philip to subordinate English interests to those of others. He was as unpopular with the French faction as he was with the Spanish, and his death left the greedy cliques of Councillors, of whom Paget was the most active and corrupt, most of them bribed by one or both rivals, to wrangle uncontrolled in the interests of their paymasters or their own, with little thought for England. Pole had lost touch of English politics, for he was, to all intents and purposes, an Italian ecclesiastic, with a first thought for his papal mission. He lived in the Palace during Philip’s absence, and every day solemnly prayed with Mary for the King’s safe return; but he had refused to act as leading political Councillor, and was only consulted, as the Queen was, on subjects of high importance or upon which the Councillors differed. He, like the Queen, undoubtedly meant well by England; but, like her also, his views were exalted and unpractical, and thenceforward there was little restraining power upon the Council, except such as could be exerted by Philip, far away in Flanders and overwhelmed with his own affairs.

Philip had found his father in the last stage of mental and physical depression, and soon after the son arrived from England, on the 25th October, 1555, Charles V., in one of the most dramatic scenes in history, surrendered to him the sovereignty of the land of his birth, his beloved Flanders. This was soon followed by the abandonment of the rest of his crowns; and Philip, in January, 1556, found himself monarch of all the vast inheritance of Burgundy and Spain, whilst his uncle Ferdinand took the exalted but powerless crown of the Empire. Almost simultaneously with Philip’s accession to the Spanish Crown the Emperor, desirous above all things of leaving his son at peace, brought the long-drawn peace negotiations to an end by signing a five years’ truce at Vaucelles with his rival, France. England was thus for a short time relieved from the dread of being drawn into the war to please the King Consort.

In the meanwhile, Mary had been fretting and pining for her absent husband. He had promised her faithfully to return in a month, but that, of course, was out of the question. Stories came to her, also, that he was enjoying himself there with ladies younger than herself, not wisely but too well for the faithful spouse of so saintly a wife. “This has so much upset her that in conversation with one of her most intimate friends she said that if it should so happen that the King never came back, notwithstanding all her efforts to recall him, she must put up with living the rest of her life without the company of a man, as she had done before her marriage, and with such patience as she could. This gives food for the reflection that in order to persuade him to return the sooner she will make incredible efforts in this Parliament in his favour.”[105] Philip’s revenge for his enforced good behaviour in England, indeed, almost alarmed the Emperor. For the only time in his life the King Consort now became dissipated, carrying on vulgar intrigues and scouring the streets of Brussels in disguise in search of adventure. News came to Mary that he had fallen ill, though there was nothing the matter with him but the effects of too much gaiety, and a special English courier sent by the anxious Queen to learn the truth with regard to his health was received by Philip in Brussels in December, 1555. The King sent reassuring news to his wife with affectionate greetings, and a faithful promise to go over to England at once, and the English messenger, overjoyed at the good tidings he bore, promised the Spanish courtiers that he would not damp the Queen’s delight by telling her of her husband’s high jinks, “as she was so easily upset, and was so anxious about him that it would afflict her too much.” For a few days after she got Philip’s message Mary lived in a heaven of anticipation, but, alas! orders came anon that the King’s Spanish household in England was to make ready to depart, and this cast her into despair, for she believed it portended Philip’s own return to Spain. The English people, unlike their Queen, were rejoiced at the departure of the Spaniards, and as they went on their way to Dover followed them with reviling and insults, for Philip’s new dignity had in no way increased the popularity of himself and his countrymen in Spain, because it was feared that when the war broke out again with France, as it evidently soon would, his position as King Consort of England and Sovereign of Flanders would make it impossible for the English to keep out of the conflict.

One of Mary’s baits to draw Philip back to her was to persuade her Council to consent to his coronation in England. From the first both Philip and his father had laid great stress upon this, but the successive English Parliaments, and even the English Council, had vetoed it. Now that the strongest man who opposed it was dead, Philip urged his wife to press the proposal again, certain that she would do so, if possible, in order to bring him to London, if for no other reason; but Mary had to face for the first time a Parliament of some spirit and independence, consisting largely of gentry, and she wrote to her husband saying that she did not dare to propose his coronation yet, as so many disaffected members had been returned. Noailles was busy inciting opposition in Parliament, and he noted with glee that now that the King had gone people spoke more freely about him than ever. Another demand was repeated by Philip to his wife, namely, that she should join him in the war with France.[106] Mary, through an envoy of Cardinal Pole, was obliged to tell her husband that she was surrounded by people whom she could not trust, that the nation was already unquiet, if not disaffected, and that any attempt to draw England into the war at present might cost her her crown. But she ended with another earnest prayer that he would return to her, and all might then be well. Once more Philip promised to come immediately, and the English fleet was made ready to receive him at Calais; but the truce of Vaucelles, already mentioned, for the next few months made Philip’s need less pressing, and he came not.

Gradually the centre of interest in English politics was changing from Mary to her sister Elizabeth. Notwithstanding the Queen’s continued assertion of hope that she yet might become a mother if Philip would return to England again, every one but the deluded lady herself had now abandoned such a hope. By the will of Henry VIII., which Mary did not dare to alter, Elizabeth was the next heir. The Princess was idolised by the people, and although she was to all appearance a devout Catholic, the Reform party and the friends of France looked towards her as their leader. Paget was more than suspected of intriguing in her favour, for he was now receiving French pay; her kinsman, Lord William Howard, treated her, to Mary’s anger, almost as a queen already; and other Councillors, uncertain of the future, were unblushingly hedging in her favour. When Philip left England he specially commended the Princess to the kindness of the Queen; and according to Noailles, his chamberlain in England, Don Diego de Geneda, with the other Spanish courtiers, paid marked attention to her, visiting her in her apartments at Greenwich during her stay there every day. Geneda appears, indeed, to have secretly offered to Elizabeth Philip’s ten-year-old son as a husband, but the Princess again took refuge behind her impenetrable reserve. She was determined, she said, neither to marry nor to leave the country.[107]

The Spanish attempts to win Elizabeth were watched closely by Noailles, as were the suspected intentions of the Queen in her disfavour whilst Parliament was sitting. Mary, as we have seen, however, found the newly elected Commons so stout and outspoken that she was afraid to advance any of her dearly cherished designs to them, and hastened to dissolve them in December, clapping some of the bolder members into prison for speaking too freely. The group of English exiles still in France were continuing to demand fresh help to aid their disaffected brothers in England, and in the circumstances it is not surprising that Noailles and his master should consider the juncture a favourable one for making a clean sweep of Mary and the Spanish interest in England. Courtenay, in Italy, was secretly warned to hold himself in readiness, but this was only a matter of precaution, for poor Courtenay was in the hands of the enemy and already a dead force. The principal card by which Noailles hoped to win the game for France was Elizabeth, now living quietly and devoutly at Hatfield, surrounded by servants upon whom she could depend. Through a French agent named Bertheville Noailles approached a number of disaffected gentlemen, several of them members of the late Parliament, from Devonshire; and Sir Henry Dudley, Sir Anthony Kingston, Sir William Peckham, Ashton, Daniel, the two Tremaynes, and others, agreed to proclaim Elizabeth, expel or otherwise dispose of Mary, marry the new Queen to Courtenay, and free the country finally from the Spanish nightmare. The aid of France was, of course, a necessary condition of success; but when the moment for action came Henry II. had just signed the truce of Vaucelles, and he counselled prudence and a waiting policy, knowing that the blow might be more effectually dealt when the inevitable war recommenced. That Elizabeth was at least cognisant that something was afoot is evident from Montmorenci’s letter to Noailles of 7th February, 1556 (Ambassades, vol. v.), in which he says: “And, above all, prevent Madam Elizabeth from moving in the slightest degree to undertake what you say; for if she do it will spoil everything and prevent the fruition of their designs, which must be deferred until a good opportunity offers.”

The French Embassy in London became the rallying-point for treason against Mary; crowds of disaffected Englishmen begged for means of joining Dudley, who had gone to France, and there with French aid to organise a descent upon England simultaneous with a rising at Court. Noailles himself was an eager conspirator, but the French Government advised delay, and the ambassador was obliged to temporise. The conspirators were in no mood now for half-measures, for the country was growing indignant at the religious persecutions and the unfounded belief that Mary was impoverishing her country by sending out money to her Spanish husband, and it was determined by the conspirators to act at once. Sir Anthony Kingston, with the Devonshire men, was to march to London, raising the country on the way; the Captain of the Isle of Wight, Uvedale, was to place the island at the disposal of the English refugees from France, whilst Heneage and other courtiers undertook to raise London, pillage the treasury, and proclaim Elizabeth Queen. Pole always distrusted Elizabeth, even in her most submissive and Catholic moods; and, thanks to a spy, he had already been informed of the whole plan of the conspirators; whilst Wotton, the English ambassador in France, had kept the English Council well informed of the movements and gossip of the English refugees. Just before the time fixed for the rising, therefore, the hand of the Council came down heavily upon the conspirators, and by the end of March all the principals found themselves behind the bars, most of them on the way to the scaffold.

There was no direct evidence of Elizabeth’s guilt—she had taken good care of that; but Mary and Philip were well aware that she was the person to supplant them, and they determined, if possible, to remove her from future temptation. The idea at first was to send her to Flanders or Spain, with or without her consent; and this probably would have been done but for the efforts of Pole’s secretary, the Abbé of St. Salut, a Piedmontese, who had been gained over to the French side, and convinced the Cardinal of the danger to England of thus handing the heiress to the Crown to the keeping of Spaniards. As an alternative Mary determined to search Hatfield House, arrest her sister’s confidential servants, and place the Princess herself under arrest. Protestant books and seditious publications against the King and Queen were discovered in a hiding-place, and some of her household, when pressed in the Tower, gave evidence seriously implicating Elizabeth herself. Again her fate trembled in the balance. To carry her to the Tower or to deal with her as a rebel might precipitate a rising in London, where she was greatly beloved; to send her to Spain might be to perpetuate the hold of Philip upon the country, and not even Pole wished for that. So in her perplexity, whilst guarding Elizabeth straitly, Mary begged her absent husband’s direction.

Philip’s need for England’s co-operation was greater than ever, for he was faced with a new formidable coalition of France, the Pope, and the Turk against him, sworn to crush him finally; and he knew that his wife was failing. To drive Elizabeth into the hands of the French now would be impolitic, and for him policy was everything. So Mary was enjoined to treat her sister gently, to release her from arrest, and to assure her of future favour. Two members of the Council went to Hatfield with the Queen’s message. Her Majesty did not believe the allegations against her sister, they said, and so long as the latter was obedient and loyal she would find that, very far from being distrusted, she would be beloved and esteemed; and this kind message was sealed by the gift of a costly ring. But blandishments had no more influence over Elizabeth than threats. She had begun to realise her power and importance, and declined to play the game of Spain by going to Court and allowing herself to be cajoled into a marriage to suit her brother-in-law.

In the meanwhile the English refugees in France, led by Sir Henry Dudley, were more active than ever, and the reports of the spies with regard to the intention of Henry II. kept Mary in a state of constant alarm,[108] for invasion was threatened at a dozen distinct points on the English coast, and her navy was in a deplorable condition. Some check was afforded to the intrigues by the premature death of Courtenay in September, but this rendered more necessary than ever assurance of Elizabeth to the Spanish party. In response to a peremptory command Elizabeth was fain at last, in November, 1556, to travel from Hatfield to London. Attended by two hundred horsemen in her livery, her ride through the capital to her Palace of Somerset House was like a triumphal progress. Cheers and blessings resounded on all sides, for she knew well how to draw the affectionate greeting of the common people: but what was more surprising was that the courtiers and Councillors, even Cardinal Pole, who had previously refused even to see her, hastened to salute her, and on her appearance at her sister’s Court no honour was considered sufficient for her.[109] What could it mean, asked her French friends, this sudden favour? and perhaps the Princess herself was puzzled at first. She had not, however, many days to wait. Philip had written to Mary and the Council directing them to press urgently the suit of Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy for Elizabeth’s hand, and Mary left no effort untried to carry out her husband’s wishes.[110] Letter after letter came from the King in Flanders expressing his profound interest in the result, for the new Pope had united the enemies of Spain, Henry II. had broken the truce of Vaucelles, and, beset on all hands, Philip saw that unless he could depend upon England even after his wife’s death, his cause could never prevail. But Elizabeth was as adamant. To all the arguments and desires of her sister she would only give one reply: she was determined not to marry.

In vain Mary, losing all patience, stormed and threatened. She would deprive her of the succession in favour of Mary of Scotland, she would have her proclaimed a bastard, she would send her to the Tower as a traitor, and much else of the same sort, said the angry Queen; and Elizabeth, alarmed at the violence, fell ill. She thought, too, of seeking safety by flight to France, though from this she was dissuaded by Noailles. But, ill and frightened though she was, she never wavered for a moment in her refusal to marry Emmanuel Philibert at the bidding of her brother-in-law; and after only five days’ stay in London she stolidly went in disgrace again under guard to Hatfield.[111]

The intemperate violence of the Neapolitan Pope Paul IV. (Caraffa) against Philip and the Spaniards, and the war which the Pontiff had precipitated, made it more difficult than ever for Philip to persuade the English to join him in the fight: for to war against the Papacy seemed to Mary impious, and Pole, now in the place of the martyred Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury as well as Papal Legate, strongly discountenanced any such an attitude on the part of a country only just reconciled to the Holy See. The Lord Chancellor, Heath, Archbishop of York, and a devout Catholic, was shocked at the idea of entering into a war, and above all a war without any provocation, against the apostolic power; and Philip found now that not only were the common people in England against his adventure, but the principal advisers of his wife, and, for the first time, even his wife herself. She was willing, even eager, to make war upon France; for she had her own grudge against a Power which harboured her rebels and subsidised all the plots against her; but to go to war with Henry was now also to oppose Rome, and the main bone of contention was the Spanish dominion over Italy, which concerned England not at all. She was, moreover, in the deepest poverty, for, against Philip’s wish, she had insisted upon restoring to the Church all the ecclesiastical property in the hands of the Government; and the country itself was seething with discontent; so that, whatever her own wishes were, she was perfectly powerless to help Philip as he wished with men, arms, and ships for his purpose.

Alba, whom Philip had sent from England to represent him in Italy, was no weakling, and, like his master, though a devout Catholic he looked upon the Papacy as a mere instrument for Spain’s exaltation, and he promptly answered Paul’s denunciations by marching in September, 1556, boldly upon Rome, submitting town after town in the Pope’s dominions. In vain Paul shrieked anathemas and flung defiance at the hated Spaniards, and threatened with instant death any one who dared to speak of peace with them. Guise with the French army hastened to relieve Rome from imminent capture; and in the hope of delaying matters until he could arrive, the Pope entered into negotiations with Alba for a forty days’ truce, leaving the Spaniards in possession of most of the papal fortresses. Guise and his army soon altered the aspect of affairs, and through the summer of 1557 Alba and Guise fought out the quarrel of Spain and France upon Italian papal soil, whilst on the frontiers of Flanders Emmanuel Philibert was at close grips with Henry II. himself.

Now, if ever, was the time when the English connection might help Philip, but it was obvious that unless he could exert his personal influence upon Mary and her Councillors he could not hope to obtain it. So, at length, in February, 1557, Philip, sorely pressed though he was, announced to Mary his intention of visiting her again. The Queen’s joy at the news was pathetic in its intensity, though Pole warned her not to build too much upon a promise that had been broken so often before. She had been ill and disconsolate with hope deferred, but the news of Philip’s coming gave her new life, and she hurried to London from Hampton Court, visiting Pole at Lambeth on the way, exerting all her influence to win him to her side. Thenceforward for some weeks, whilst the King’s voyage was pending, the English Council sat nearly night and day, and couriers hastened backwards and forwards between London, Brussels, and Paris. The English refugees in France had treacherously given to Henry II. much information about the weakness and disaffection in the English fortresses of Calais and Guisnes; and at the first news of Philip’s fresh visit to England the French forces around Calais were increased, for it was evident now that Mary would be dragged into the war, and her most vulnerable point of attack was Calais.

Philip landed at Dover on the 18th March, 1557, and took horse with all speed to Gravesend. At Canterbury he alighted to attend service at the cathedral; but so hurriedly that he did not wait to take off his spurs. This being against the rule, a young student was bold enough to claim the forfeit, or fine: and the King smilingly emptied his purse of gold in the youth’s cap before he rode on his way. Again his habitual haughty frigidity was changed for the genial _bonhomie_ that he found suited his purpose best in England. At every stage messengers from the Queen met him, one of whom galloped back to her immediately with news of his progress, and on his arrival at Greenwich poor forlorn Mary hailed him with love unutterable. For two days he remained with her alone, draining, as he formerly said, the chalice of his sacrifice to the dregs; and then they passed through London together once more, she borne in a litter, he riding by her side. His reception was not unfriendly by the people, whom he tried to gain by his affability and moderation, though the fear that war might be the result of his visit made them uneasy. So far as the Councillors were concerned, they were now but feeble folk to stand against him and the Queen; though Pole, the Pope’s legate, did not even officially greet one who was in arms against the Papacy, and the Cardinal departed as quickly as might be to his diocese, so as to be out of the way whilst Philip was at Court.

But still, bribed though the Council was and however submissive the Queen, the state of feeling in England was such as to make a declaration of war against France a dangerous matter. A series of bad harvests, the depreciation of the coinage, and the enclosure of the commons and parks had reduced the country to a condition of the utmost misery. Money was extremely scarce, and the idea of squandering large sums upon a foreign war drove the distracted Council to despair, though Philip in the course of many conferences with them urged it incessantly. The Councillors admitted that, in accordance with the old treaty of 1543 between the Emperor and Henry VIII.,[112] England might be called upon to provide an armed contingent if Flanders were attacked by France: but Philip wanted more than that, and to some extent he was successful, notwithstanding that Archbishop Heath tearfully protested that the country was quite unable to meet the necessary expenditure. It was at last arranged that eight thousand English infantry should be raised for service and one thousand cavalry, three thousand of the former to reinforce the English fortresses in France, and the rest to be at Philip’s service for four months, under the command of Lord Pembroke, Sir Thomas Cheyne, Lord Bedford, and Lord Grey de Wilton, one-half the cost only to be borne by England. But there was also a promise on the part of the Council to fit out and man with six thousand soldiers the English fleet to hold the Channel against the French. Upon one point the Council was firm: these forces were simple auxiliaries contributed in accordance with the old treaty, and must not entail a national war between England and France.

But this arrangement did not suit France better than it did her enemy. If England was to join Philip in the war, she must be open to counter attack and reprisals. But if England could strike indirectly so could France, and by such means a national rupture might be precipitated which would allow of a French invasion over the Scottish border and the siege of the English fortresses in France. So again the English Protestant exiles in France were feasted and made much of by Henry II. They were a turbulent lot of young gallants whose brawls and adventures had scandalised the French Court: but now they suddenly assumed a new importance. Thomas Stafford, the nephew of Cardinal Pole, a cadet of his family with no valid claims whatever, was the most hairbrained of the crew, and took it into his head to pose as the rightful pretender to the English Crown. Henry could not openly countenance such a pretension, but Stafford was allowed to recruit men for his attempt. Frenchmen, Scots, and discontented English, a motley rabble of lawless adventurers, flocked to his standard at Rouen, in ignorance of their exact destination. Sailing in two well-armed ships from Dieppe, he suddenly descended upon Scarborough. Affairs were in so critical a condition in England that anything might have happened, and Wotton, the English ambassador in France, believed that if Thomas Stafford once secured a footing in England he might draw to him all the discontented element, to Mary’s undoing. Stafford, however, was not of the stuff from which successful pretenders are made. He seized Scarborough Castle in April, whilst Philip was still in England, and at once announced that he came to claim the Crown and deliver the country from the yoke of the Spaniards, who intended to rule it by force. But in a day or two the Catholic Earl of Westmorland with his militia took him by surprise and Thomas Stafford’s bubble burst before it was well inflated, greatly to Noailles’ scorn and annoyance. The retribution for treason came swiftly, and before a month was out the heads of the principal rebels had fallen on the block on Tower Hill. But a gust of indignation passed over England at the attempt, prompted as it had been by the French, and suddenly the idea of war with France, the enemy of the Queen, became popular. Henry II. did his best to explain away his complicity;[113] but Mary, transported with rage, dismissed Noailles, and Philip was delighted to find that England was now ready to join him nationally in a war against France.

On the 6th June heralds in London proclaimed hostilities, and Philip for the first time, even at this eleventh hour, saw some return for the sacrifice he had made in marrying the Queen of England. He hated war, and his methods were essentially peaceful and diplomatic; but he knew that his best chance of securing a durable peace was to exert his utmost power whilst his control of English resources lasted, which it was evident could not be very long, for the Queen’s declining health was plain now to every one but herself, though she clung still tenaciously to her pathetic dream of happy maternity. Satisfied with the results of his mission, Philip rode on the 1st July, 1557, from Gravesend through Canterbury to Dover. Mary would not leave him whilst he remained on English soil, and, weak and ailing but happy with her new fallacious hope, she was carried in a litter by her husband’s side to the coast. On the 3rd July she bade him a last farewell, as he stepped upon the barge that was to carry him to the waiting galleon, and then, with sorrow and satisfaction mingled, she turned her back upon the sea and was carried to her desolate palace at Greenwich.

The gentry of England, at all events, were ready to welcome the war with France that gave them the taste of warlike adventure which they loved, and the contingent to fight in Flanders was soon made ready, whilst the Lord Admiral with his fleet of twenty-three ships held the Channel. Philip’s General-in-Chief was his young cousin Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy, who had an army of fifty thousand men under him ready for the autumn campaign; whilst the French on the Flemish frontier, under Constable Montmorenci, numbered less than half that strength, for the flower of the French troops were under Guise in Italy, with difficulty defending the Pope from the great Duke of Alba, and Emmanuel Philibert opened his campaign as soon as the English arrived. By a series of rapid and unexpected movements, which entirely misled the French, he suddenly concentrated his attack upon the rich and important city of St. Quintin, weakly garrisoned and in poor condition of defence. Montmorenci hurried with his main army to relieve the fortress, and on the 10th August was cleverly outflanked by Emmanuel Philibert; caught in a trap between a stronger enemy and a morass, the French were utterly routed with a loss of half their numbers, Montmorenci himself being captured, and the whole force dispersed. Coligny with his tiny garrison in St. Quintin heroically held out for a fortnight longer; but from the day of Montmorenci’s defeat there was no force to prevent Philip from marching upon Paris and crushing his enemy for good.[114] This was his chance, and he missed it, as he did every great opportunity in his long life by that “prudent” leaden foot of his which always lagged when it should have hastened. In vain Savoy begged his permission to march on, and was refused, to the indignant surprise of the old Emperor when he heard of it in his cloister at Yuste.

Philip had been at Cambrai on the day of the battle, but when he saw the awful sack and sacrilege after the surrender of St. Quintin he was horrified at the sight. Te Deums were chanted, votive offerings of unheard of richness were promised,[115] joy bells were rung in Flanders, Spain, and England for the great victory; but Philip’s host moved no further onward towards Paris. The German Schwartzreiters, mercenary troops in Philip’s service, unpaid ruffians, held high revel in the ruined town, burning and ravaging unchecked. The Earl of Bedford, writing to Sir William Cecil from St. Quintin a few days after the surrender, says that these rascals, “being masters of the King’s whole army, used such force as well to the Spaniards, Italians, and other nations as unto us, that there were none could enjoy nothing but themselves. They have now shown such cruelty as the like hath not been seen for greediness. The town by them was set afire, and a great piece of it burnt. Divers were burnt in cellars, and were killed immediately; women and children gave such pitiful cries that it would grieve any Christian heart.” The Germans, discontented with their loot, quarrelled and deserted in thousands, for Philip’s fatal deliberation had left them idle; the English, sulky and unpaid, grumbled incessantly. Bedford reports that “they are pinched with scarcity and divers have fallen sick”; and, again, a month later: “Our General is sick of ague, our pay very slack, and people grudge for want. I trust we shall speedily be discharged.” The Spaniards asserted that the English had shown no stomach for the fight before St. Quintin, and certainly they did not shine in it. Their discontent at last became so pronounced that Philip, realising their uselessness, and being, as usual, short of money, acceded to their clamour to be allowed to return home at the end of the stipulated four months of their service. Much was made of the King’s victory in London. Mary and Pole congratulated him upon the signal mark of God’s favour. Bonfires, free feasts, and official rejoicings were provided; but London wanted to gain no victories for Spaniards, and refused to be glad.

Whilst Philip’s army was melting away in idleness Guise, realising where the danger lay, quietly abandoned the Pope to the mercy of Alba, and by forced marches hurried to the Flemish frontier. The intemperate Pontiff was then obliged to make terms with Alba, who entered Rome, as a pretended penitent instead of a conqueror, and once more the two great antagonists were left to fight out their quarrel without papal interference. Henry II. had long had his eye upon England’s important foothold on France, the citadel and town of Calais. The English refugees had exposed to him the weak points in its defence, it had been starved and neglected both by Edward VI. and Mary; and the younger Noailles on his way home when Mary had dismissed him, carefully scrutinised the fortress and reported to the King that it might easily be captured. Guise, on his hurried return from Italy, directed himself straight towards the place and beleaguered it, capturing the Rysbank, the island fort defending the harbour, on the first days of January, 1558. Philip had long known that Calais was weakly held, and in many of his letters to the Queen and Council he had urged that it should be effectively reinforced. On Guise’s approach the King sent his favourite, the Count de Feria, hurriedly to England to say how desperate the condition now was with the Rysbank in the hands of Guise; but the preparations for the voyage of so important a person as Feria took much time, and the Queen in London learnt of the disaster immediately by a letter from Lord Wentworth, the Governor of Calais.

Mary, still full of her renewed hope of maternity, which all but herself knew was piteously fallacious, received the news courageously and set to work to reinforce the town. Pembroke was ordered to raise five thousand men and cross at once to Philip’s harbour of Dunkirk, whence Calais might be reached by land. Unfortunately, the English town of Guisnes, near Calais, was in as perilous a condition as Calais itself, and Lord Grey de Wilton, the Commander, found himself, as he says, “clean cut off from all aid and relief. I have looked for both out of England and Calais, and know not how to have help by any means, either of men or victuals. There resteth now none other way for the succour of Calais, but a power of men out of England or from the King’s Majesty or both.”[116] Alas! the King’s Majesty himself had now few fit troops to meet Guise’s veterans. His demoralised army, scattered wide in winter quarters through Flanders, were difficult to collect rapidly, and Lords Wentworth and Grey de Wilton in vain sent daily beseeching letters to Philip to come to their aid, as Guise pressed Calais and Guisnes more closely. Calais particularly was crowded with traitors and enemies of the Spaniard, anxious to deliver the place to the French; and, although the English troops repulsed one attempt to storm the town on the 6th January, it cheerfully surrendered to the besiegers two days later; and Guisnes fell with but little more resistance directly afterwards.[117]

The news fell like an aerolite upon the English Queen and nation. The possession of Calais had been regarded for centuries as the keystone to England’s commercial prosperity and political importance in Europe, and the surrender of the last foothold in France seemed a loss irreparable. That it should have been lost in a war undertaken on behalf of the Queen’s Spanish Consort, whilst he with a great though scattered force was in the immediate neighbourhood, added bitterness to the humiliation; and the Count de Feria, foreseeing the storm of anger that in England would greet the news, tarried a day or two in Dunkirk rather than cross the Channel with the sinister tidings. His first mission had been to induce the English Council to send forces to defend Calais and Guisnes, but he knew full well that behind this demand there was the need for English forces again to aid his master in the coming campaign; so, interpreting his instructions freely, he determined to proceed on his journey and turn his request into one for troops to recover the fortresses with the King’s help.

Feria arrived in London on the 26th January, 1558, and to his surprise he found the people and the Queen quite changed in temper since he had left them with the King six months before. There was no despondency anywhere now; for though the blow had been a shrewd one it had aroused the spirit of the nation. The Queen was like a lioness; for she was fighting now, as she thought, poor soul, for the inheritance of her unborn offspring; and she threatened to have the head of any Councillor of hers who dared to talk of peace with France until she had recovered the towns her ancestors had held for centuries. She would win them again, she said; her son would be born, and she and Philip, triumphant and at peace, would live happily. It was a dream, but it was shared, so far as concerned the recovery of the English territory in France, by the nation at large, which was now on its mettle; and clergy, gentry, and merchants opened their coffers, melted their gold chains, and mortgaged their belongings to provide funds for avenging English honour and protecting the English soil against the foreigner.

The moment the news of the peril of Calais had reached Mary she despatched the Earl of Sussex and her Controller, Sir R. Rochester, to assure Philip that she would send the forces to defend or recover Calais without loss of time. When both Calais and Guisnes had been surrendered, however, it seemed better to Philip to curb somewhat the Queen’s ardour in the matter. It was too early in the year for him to begin his regular campaign, and it was obvious that without his powerful co-operation the English troops alone would be unable to recapture the lost fortresses. So the first letter written by the King to Feria after the arrival of the latter in England was couched in the cool, prudent tone so characteristic of him. The ambassador was to thank the Queen heartily for her goodwill to send him the troops, even after Calais had been lost, but as his own territories were not in present danger, “I do not wish the Queen to begin yet to incur expense, especially as we shall have to spend a great deal later in attempting to recover the ancient English territory. You will therefore tell the Queen how highly I appreciate her affectionate regard for my interests; but as I have now sufficient forces to hold my own I hope she will countermand the sending of troops, and apply the money to defending the English coast, which is of the greatest importance.”[118]

Before receiving this letter Feria saw Mary in the Palace of Greenwich on the day he arrived, 26th January, 1558, and found her, as usual, eager to serve Philip’s interests. Feria said he only wished that her Councillors were as willing as she. She would, she said, summon the Council at once that Feria might discuss matters with them; but as Parliament was sitting it was Friday, 28th, before Feria and the resident ambassador, Figueroa, met the Councillors in Cardinal Pole’s room. Feria had agreed with the Queen as to the tone he should adopt with the Council. It was being murmured in London, and even in the Council itself, that this misfortune had fallen upon the nation because Philip had dragged it into the war; and Mary urged upon Feria that he should anticipate any such talk as that by saying at once that as Calais had been lost during a war which the English had undertaken on Philip’s behalf, he considered it his duty to help them to recover the fortress. The first need, however, he said, was to ensure the coasts of England from attack. What did the Council propose to do in the matter? Heath, who was the spokesman, was apologetic and despondent. The nation was in dire danger and its resources were very low: they agreed that defence of England must precede recovery of the fortresses on the other side of the Channel, and thought it best not to send across the hasty levies already collected at Dover. Feria, who had seen the mob of recruits as he passed through Dover, quite agreed with them. They had only been sent, said the Councillors apologetically, because the Queen had insisted. As for the broad question of national defence, they asked for time to consider what they proposed; and although Feria and Mary urged expedition, three days passed before the Council, headed by Heath, came in a body to Feria’s lodging and laid before him their plan of campaign.

In a harangue full of honied words for Philip the Chancellor set forth the poverty of the country, the need for a strong force on the Scottish border to defend the north from a French incursion, the undefended condition of Ireland, and, above all, the danger of the Isle of Wight and Portsmouth, now that eighty French ships were collected at Dieppe with, it was feared, hostile intent. What they proposed was to fit out a hundred English vessels with fifty victualling smacks for service in the Channel, carrying an army of some fifteen thousand soldiers, ready, if Philip needed it, to land upon any spot on the northern French coast as a diversion. They were in fear, too, of a league of Denmark and the Free Cities to attack the northern coast of England in the interests of France; and they knew of no other means of raising a force to defend that part of the country than to beg the King to choose for them some good German mercenary leader who would engage to come over in their service with some three thousand Germans, to embark in Amsterdam for Newcastle. When they had found the money for all this, they said, they did not see how they could do more even to recover Calais.

These proposals, which had indeed been suggested first by the Queen and Philip, were exactly those which suited the latter. Under the guise of defending the English south coast a large English fleet and army would be practically at his orders, to alarm and divert the French wherever he needed. Lord William Howard,[119] the Lord Admiral, a great-uncle of Elizabeth’s, and little in Philip’s favour, was by Feria’s intrigues superseded by Clinton, who was his obedient servant. The great difficulty, of course, was money. Everyday Feria urged the need for raising large sums at once. Parliament was sitting, and it was believed would vote liberal supplies in view of the national danger; and Mary herself once complaisantly told Feria that she believed Parliament would vote her a larger amount than had ever been granted to her father. “That is not to the purpose,” replied Feria, “but to get all the money you want in the circumstances.” The Earl of Sussex when in Flanders had given the King an idea that the nobles in England might still be induced, as Spanish nobles were, to supply feudal contingents of mounted men on the Sovereign’s demand; but when Feria suggested this to the Queen she told him flatly that all the nobles of England together would not contribute a hundred horse.

The loss of Calais was unquestionably a serious blow to the prestige of Mary. Already people were grumbling that this was what she and her Spanish husband had brought the nation to. Here was this haughty Count of Feria, too: what had he come over for but to carry some more English money out of the country to feed Philip’s armies? This, of course, had no foundation whatever in truth, but the mere whispering of it made people stay away from the Catholic churches, and frown more sourly at the persecutions than they had done before. So far from carrying English money out, except to pay for the recruiting of the German mercenaries, whom Philip all along, however, meant to use for his own purposes, the Councillors to a man began dunning Feria for their unpaid Spanish pensions;[120] for although the Spaniard scornfully complains of their unwillingness to serve Philip’s interests first, they were all anxious for his money. The fear of invasion, which was, in fact, very remote, was industriously promoted by Feria and the Spaniards in order to keep the English Council up to their determination in raising forces which might be, and were, subsequently used by Philip for his own purposes when his summer campaign opened. These forces, however, did not satisfy Philip, who was somewhat chagrined to find that the English Council was so ready to limit its efforts to the defence of the coasts, without insisting upon the recovery of Calais. He had counted upon using the national anger at the loss to bring when he most needed them a good English contingent across the Channel to join his army, though the hasty levies in January would have been worse than useless to him.

Both the King and Feria were impatient at the cumbrous English constitutional way of raising money, and pestered poor Mary daily by word and letter to obtain resources by other means. This she knew, and said, was impossible in England, and might cost her her crown. One day Paget came to Feria with a great plan to raise the vast sum of 800,000 crowns, in addition to the parliamentary vote, and the Spaniards were all eager to put it into practice; but when the time to discuss it seriously came, Paget’s proposal, to Feria’s anger, reduced itself to a loan of £100,000 to be raised by Gresham in Antwerp and £80,000 to be borrowed from the London bankers. All would have been well managed, grumbled Paget, if he had the direction of affairs; and the other Councillors thereupon fell to wrangling with him as to their responsibility. This was early in March, 1558, and Feria had quite lost patience with what he considered the ineptitude of Mary’s advisers, which really meant their disinclination to subordinate English interests entirely to the wishes of Philip and his minister. From the sitting of the Council just referred to, Feria and his colleague Figueroa went off in a rage to the Queen to: “complain of the reply [about the money], and to warn her again of the danger in which the country and she herself are, her Councillors being so inept that, although they say that the country is not rich, they cannot devise means even to raise sufficient money to defend themselves and recover the prestige that has been lost. We dwelt much upon this, as much indeed as we could; for the Queen was not fully aware of the poor service rendered by the English contingent which you had with your army last year. She was not even yet undeceived as to their not having been the first to enter St. Quintin until yesterday, we told her amongst other things. She was much grieved and promised that she would press them again about the money at Greenwich, where she will go to-day. Her one thought is that your Majesty should come to her again. She seems still to believe that she is pregnant, though she does not say so openly. She promises me to send Gresham to Antwerp at once to borrow the £100,000 they say have arranged. I think if that be the case, it would be easy to get them to borrow another £100,000, though I have not pressed it until he is there.”[121]

Gresham’s instructions are dated two days after this letter was written, 12th March. He had previously been dismissed from his former post as royal financial agent at Antwerp, and his reappointment was probably owing to the fact that in the narrow condition of the national finances he alone had sufficient authority on the Continental money market to raise the funds required. He was to bargain for the loan of £100,000 that had been offered through one Germayn Scholl for one year, and to ascertain what powder and other munitions of war could be obtained in Flanders for English use.[122] Scholl was Gresham’s kinsman by marriage, but the bargain does not seem to have been fully concluded, only £10,000 being obtained from that source,[123] Gresham remaining in Flanders until the summer, spending much of the money he could raise in munitions of war. He had been instructed to present letters of recommendation to King Philip, and to acquaint him with all he did. But Gresham, who was no admirer of the Spanish faction, appears to have been somewhat remiss in paying court to the King, for he failed to mention anything about him in his letters. Mary, who was always hankering for news of her husband, began to get restive at the omission, and her Secretary, Boxall, writes a private letter to Gresham in April hinting to him that he will make things easier all round if he will pay more court to the King, as the Queen asked about him. Gresham promptly took the hint and wrote a long letter to Mary, saying that he had just seen King Philip at a monastery outside Brussels, where he had passed Easter, “who is in right good health as your Majestie’s own harte can desyre.”[124]

Whilst Gresham in Flanders was thus borrowing and spending money, Feria was chafing at the lack of sympathetic activity in the Councillors in the direction he desired. Writing to Philip in March, he says: “Before God, I can do no more, Sire! I do not know what to make of these people. For, believe me, your Majesty, from morning to night and from night to morning they are changing their minds about everything, and do what I can it is impossible for me to make them understand what a state they are in—the worst, surely, that ever people were in before. If it were only for their own sakes, I should like to leave them to the mercy of those who would treat them as they deserve; but I am afraid that they will drag us after them, as your Majesty knows. The Queen does, and says, all she can, and she really has spirit and goodwill; but in all else there is nothing but trouble. As for the Cardinal, he is a dead man; and although he has plucked up a little with what they write to him every day from Italy since the loss of Calais, he is not so warm as I should have liked to see him. Of all the rest of them, I really do not know which is the worst disposed to your interest. But I know that those whom you have favoured most serve you the least.”[125]

Feria noticed that Mary grew ever thinner and more despondent. She slept badly and was devoured with anxiety and yearning for her husband, whose letters came to her so rarely. Both she and Pole, indeed, were now almost negligible forces; and Feria began to plot with a few of the Councillors upon whom he could depend to take into his own hands practically the direction of affairs. How it was managed is well set forth in a letter of his to the King of 1st May, 1558. He has, he says, been able to hold a private conference with Privy Seal (Bedford) and the Admiral (Clinton) “about that enterprise they had proposed to me, and also to press them about the land armaments.” They were of opinion that they could raise a land army, and that the recovery of Calais would not be so difficult as people imagined. “They say that they could get together 12,000 English and German infantry, 3,000 horse (2,000 Germans and 1,000 English), 2,000 English pioneers, and if your Majesty did not think well of the _enterprise_ they might be used for other purposes. I did not dwell so much upon this point as upon getting the force together. They think, and quite rightly, that it is useless to deal with this matter with more than four or five persons who will be in favour of it; and they propose besides themselves Jerningham, the Master of the Rolls, who was the Solicitor-General (Cordell), and the Controller (Rochester), although the latter is a man who always raises difficulties to everything. I think that these three will suit best for the purpose, as they are favoured by the Queen.

“I know of no other way to remedy matters but this: that your Majesty should write to the Queen saying that on mature deliberation you have decided that the best course will be for her Majesty to raise these troops, beginning with the money voted by Parliament: for as soon as the people see your Majesties determined to avenge the loss of Calais you believe that they will favour the enterprise, since no prince ever begins a war with all the money in hand necessary to finish it. You might add that nothing should be said about spending the Parliament money, but that it should be entrusted to some person for the object in view. Paget thinks that Bacon would be a fit person for this, and the Queen would agree to him. Your Majesty should also write to her that the business should be discussed with nobody but the five persons mentioned. Paget, Clinton, myself, and Figueroa think that this is the last thing we can do. Paget thought lately that Rutland would be the best man to command this force, and we think that Clinton and the Vice-Admiral should conduct the fleet. The fleet is now ready and is costing money with no profit. Even if your Majesty does not think well to press the Queen about the foregoing business you might send her instructions at once as to what she is to do with this fleet.”[126]

It will be seen by this that the plan was to use every atom of the force raised in England and with English money, not for the defence of the country itself, which had been the first pretext for raising it, but to send across the sea, either to aid in the recovery of Calais or, at Philip’s option, for any other purpose he might choose, and that similarly the fleet was to be placed at his disposal.[127] It is quite plain from the way in which Feria writes of her that Mary was simply to be told what to do by Philip, and that she was expected to do it without demur. How completely she hung upon Philip’s words, and subordinated everything to his wish, is seen in a paragraph in the same letter as that quoted above from Feria to the King. A Swedish envoy had arrived in England with an offer of marriage to Elizabeth from Prince Eric, the heir to the crown. He had been already several days in London and had not even asked audience of the Queen, though he had committed the gross breach of propriety of going down to Hatfield and delivering the Prince’s letter to Elizabeth before he saw Mary. The poor Queen was terribly upset at this; and hearing that Feria was despatching a courier to Antwerp, she feared that he was going to write to Philip about it. Sending for Feria she with tears and reproaches upbraided him for his supposed intention, and said that she herself was going to write to her husband telling him all about it. “When the ambassador from Sweden first came,” writes Feria, “she was in great trouble, fearing that your Majesty would blame her for not having carried through that affair last year [_i.e._, the marriage of Elizabeth with Savoy]. Since then, however, Madam Elizabeth has replied that she will not marry; and the Queen is more tranquil, but she is intensely impassioned in the matter; and one of the reasons for her grief at the pregnancy having turned out fallacious is the fear that it will cause you to press her in this other business [_i.e._, the marriage of Elizabeth]. Both Figueroa and I think that your Majesty ought to do so _apropos_ of the coming of this Swedish ambassador and the failure of the pregnancy. But it is necessary that such pressure should not come at the same time as the matter of the land armament, or it will upset the business altogether. In short, Sire, I believe that the Queen will not stand in the way of her [_i.e._, Elizabeth] being Queen if God does not send you children.”[128]

Already Elizabeth’s sun was seen to be in the ascendant, and, regardless of the feelings of her sister the Queen, it suited Spanish policy to ensure her marriage, if possible, with a nominee dependent upon Philip. How anxious Philip personally was not to lose touch of Elizabeth at this juncture is seen in his reply at the end of May to a suggestion of Feria that the latter should go to Hatfield and pay his respects to her before he left England: “What you say about visiting Madam Elizabeth before you depart appears to me to be very wise, for the reasons you point out, and I am writing to the Queen, saying that I have ordered you to go. You will act accordingly; and I have no doubt that when the Queen sees the firmness with which I write on the subject she will consent.”[129] Philip’s fiery and impetuous ambassador Feria went considerably beyond his master in his high-handed dealing with the English Government; for Philip’s methods were diplomatic and far-seeing, and his object was not to ride roughshod over his wife’s country, as Feria would have done, but to use its resources for his ends, as if without design, and to perpetrate his hold upon it after his wife’s death.

Mary, still suffering from her usual indispositions, persuaded herself in May that Philip was coming over to see her again. It was, as Feria said, unreasonable; for Philip was overweighted with business, arranging the summer campaigns and a thousand other things: but Mary, full of hope again, caused herself to be carried to St. James’s to be ready to receive her husband, and had horses and lodgings prepared for him from Dover to Gravesend and an escort of ships at Dover to convey him across. Feria told her blankly that the King was too busy to come, and again pressed her about raising the land army to reinforce Philip in Flanders. He found her less ready in the matter than he had hoped—“for the Cardinal and Council persuade her as they like”—and she wearily suggested that Clinton should go to Brussels to discuss the matter with the King. “This,” said Feria, “was only because they think that I push them too hard; and they believe they can deal more easily with your Majesty, their real object being to upset the scheme altogether;” and the ambassador continues by recommending the King when Clinton arrived in Brussels to deal with him high-handedly, blaming the Council angrily for their slackness in the past. Clinton was evidently the most pliant tool of all; and yet, even of him, Feria writes: “Nothing that he says will be true, unless he thinks it will be investigated. I have had no end of trouble about this, for they do nothing but lie and prevaricate.”

All this haughty pressure on the part of Feria, and the servile compliance of Paget and the rest of the Spanish clique, in order to bully the English into raising a large force to join Philip’s army on the pretext of recovering Calais, was seen by the politic King to be unwise. The English fleet, with its seven thousand soldiers on board, might be useful for him in many ways, and he made much of Clinton when he saw him in Brussels, urging him to have the fleet provisioned and ready for service whenever ordered from June to September; but the raising of a land army of Englishmen did not suit him: in the first place because it would pledge him to a regular campaign against the French in Calais for the ultimate benefit of England alone, to the neglect of the Flemish frontier that concerned him most, and secondly, as he says, because “the English, as they would arm unwillingly, however much they were pressed and encouraged, would not be of much use. I can even see that they might cause more inconvenience than otherwise. Either they might come so badly organised and weak as to be easily defeated, which would be most injurious, or they might force me to go to their rescue, and upset my own plans.” The King was of opinion that the English had much better concentrate their land strength on the Scottish frontier and in Ireland, so long as he was allowed to do as he liked with the English fleet.

The meaning of this is made abundantly clear, and Philip’s own foresight vindicated by the sequel. If the English Council were encouraged to employ all their own forces on the Scottish Border it was foreseen that they would not need the three thousand or more German auxiliaries which were now mustering on the Rhine under the leader Wallerdun, much of the money for them having been already disbursed by the English special agents in Flanders, Sir William Pickering and others. Feria, in his letter of 18th May to the King, says: “I understand that these people already repent of having asked for the three thousand Germans, for their view now is only to defend their own shores, and the Scots will not trouble them. They have said nothing to me about it yet, but I know that what I say is true.... If they do not want to bring these 3,000 Germans over, your Majesty might consider whether you will ask for them for yourself.” This, although it was exactly what Philip himself desired and intended, was only effected after much wrangling about the money spent and the responsibility incurred by the English Council. Philip, writing on the 10th June, instructs Feria cunningly to manage so that the Council may be got to propose that the German mercenaries might be taken off their hands as a favour; but if they could not be got to see it in this light that the Queen should be told in confidence that the King needed the Germans very much. The Council proved recalcitrant; for, as they said, they had spent already a large sum upon the mercenaries, and might need them; but they had to give way before the pressure of the Queen and Feria, insisting ultimately, however, that Philip should pay the sum of £2,000 for which Gresham had made himself responsible but had not paid for the arms supplied. The recruiting money of the Germans and first month’s pay was lost.

Relations between the imperious Feria and the English Council became daily more strained, every unimportant point was made a question of dignity by the ambassador,[130] and the sick, disconsolate Queen between the jarring elements, wishing to conciliate both sides, was rendered doubly unhappy. From Feria’s contemptuous and insulting references to Pole it is evident that the Cardinal declined to become an instrument for purely Spanish ends; whilst all the rest of the Councillors are dismissed by the ambassador in his letters to the King as lying rascals intent only upon plunder. Looking beyond Feria’s intemperate, angry words, the principal sin of the Councillors in his eyes seems to have been a disinclination to squander money of which the nation was so sorely in need upon raising forces without some assurance that they would be used for English ends. Already people were grumbling that the powerful fleet under Clinton was to be merely an auxiliary of Philip in the war, at his entire disposal, and the continued bad fortune that followed the Spanish arms increased the anger in England at being thus tied to the tail of Philip in the war, without any attempt being made by him to recover the lost English fortresses.

So far from doing this, indeed, news came early in July that Dunkirk, one of the most useful of his ports, within a few miles of Calais, had been captured by the French, as well as Thionville, an important fortress. Mary was panic-stricken at the news, and summoned Feria from Durham House to say that she must at once send off a courier to Philip to know the truth. Feria made light of the news, and said it was not worth while to send in such haste, and the overburdened Queen broke out in angry reproaches at his indifference. How could her merchants send their wool to Flanders, she asked, if Dunkirk was in French hands? and yet Feria treated the matter as of no importance. But when the ambassador suggested that the English fleets in Plymouth and Dover should at once sail to Dunkirk to help the King, Mary eagerly assented, though the Council at once vetoed it; for, said they, the French have also captured Alderney, and it behoved the admiral to go there first. “And really, to tell your Majesty the truth,” wrote Feria, “I did not dare to contradict them, for I saw that if but four French ships were to land their companies in England they would overturn everything.” This was written in July, and shortly afterwards Feria, having hectored the English Queen and Council thus into placing the English fleet almost entirely at Philip’s disposal, and having raised and paid three thousand German mercenaries which he had appropriated, took his leave and returned to Flanders, first visiting Elizabeth at Hatfield, much, he says, to her and his pleasure: “for reasons which I will tell your Majesty when I see you.”

Mary now was a mere shadow. The cruel persecutions and the loss of Calais together had completely destroyed the belief of the people in her power to rule England for its own benefit. Her father and grandfather, and even the greatly inferior Northumberland, had managed to maintain the balance of power between the two great Continental rivals upon which the importance of England depended. Mary from the first day of her accession, as we have seen, had neglected this essential point in English policy, and had ended by becoming a mere satellite of the Spanish King, involving her country thus in a ruinous war, in which it had lost much and had nothing to gain. The Council, against which Feria raged so savagely, was, it is true, after the death of Gardiner, composed of men of no commanding ability; but it had done its best to prevent the utter subjection of England to Philip’s aims. The success of its efforts was not great; for as Feria’s correspondence shows the most active members of the Council were bought body and soul by Spain, and Mary was in most cases ready to back up Feria’s arrogant hectoring with her royal authority. For her, in her forlorn condition, the first consideration was to please her husband and prevent the Catholic power, upon which she increasingly depended, from collapse.

Her great hope was that Philip might be lured back again to her side to live in prosperity and peace. Again and again her fond hopes were disappointed, and, a prey to a constitutional disorder, she sank deeper and deeper in despondency. After Feria left her in July she continued ailing, whilst those around her, seeing the approach of the inevitable change, busied themselves in plans which might, if they were fortunate, save them from disaster in the future. For men of all opinions recognised that it was not alone a woman who was dying, but a political and religious system that had failed; and vengeance was sharpening its knife, whilst those who had thus made England the servant of a foreigner and a prey to the bigots were trembling for the wrath to come.

Early in September a fever came to add to the Queen’s ailments, and this, being an unusual symptom with her, caused grave anxiety; but Philip’s Flemish councillor Dassonleville, who was in London to inquire whether any league was being negotiated between England, Sweden, and Denmark, wrote early in October that both the Queen and Cardinal Pole were better than they had been since the beginning of their maladies. Parliament met at Westminster on the 5th November, and in it resounded loud complaints, bold and unsuppressed now, of the cost and damage to England caused by the war undertaken to please King Philip, and suggestions were made that the peace negotiations already in progress should be actively pushed. The great question, moreover, that was occupying all minds was that of the succession to the Crown when the Queen should die. “If your Majesty could have been present it would have been of the greatest importance in moving the Parliament to your desires,” wrote Dassonleville. “But if that be impossible, and important affairs should detain you in Flanders, the coming of the Count de Feria, who is much liked here,[131] would serve, nevertheless, to direct affairs so far as the time will allow. Many of the Council are beginning to understand how necessary the alliance of Flanders is to this realm, the salvation of which depends upon it, as England cannot alone withstand for long the efforts of its old enemies, the French and Scots, without the aid of your Majesty. The common people do not understand it yet, and talk of allying the Lady Elizabeth with the Earls of Westmorland or Arundel, and sometimes with a Prince of Sweden or Denmark, so inconstant are they.”[132]

It is quite evident that when Dassonleville speaks of the impossibility of England holding its own without Philip’s aid he meant under the existing system. In this, of course, he was right; but he overlooked the fact that if the country freed itself from the Spanish connection, which had dragged it down, and once more dexterously held the balance between the two Powers, neither would attack it, because neither would be benefited by weakening a possible useful ally. But the English people were quite awake to the alternative if Dassonleville was not, and were looking anxiously away from the sad sufferer who had failed as a Queen and was awaiting extinction in St. James’s, to the demure, self-controlled young woman who bided her time so patiently and so confidently at Hatfield. She knew now she would not have to wait long. “Sire,” continued Dassonleville, “the Queen has had some good intervals since her grave malady; and for some days past has been quieter from her paroxysms. The issue of her illness is as yet uncertain. The people make her out to be worse than the doctors say, and rumour says that a change is so imminent that it will cause the enemy to be the more obstinate about the restoration of Calais. Nevertheless, if your Majesty insists upon not making peace without it, they will have to put up with it.”[133]

This was written on the 6th November; but before the letter was despatched Dassonleville heard from Paget that the Queen’s malady being recognised as grave, the Council had requested her to make some pronouncement with regard to the succession. Mary, feeling the hand of death upon her, consented to a deputation of the Council waiting upon the Princess at Hatfield on the morrow, to tell her that the Queen was willing that she should succeed when she (Mary) should die, only begging two things of her—one to maintain the old religion, and the other to pay the debts she (Mary) had incurred. It was known by this that the gravest anticipations of the people were justified. Ten days before this Philip had learnt that his wife was not likely to live, and he had at once instructed Feria to start for England, for the special purpose of pushing forward urgently the question of Elizabeth’s marriage, which was now seen to be the only means by which he might still hold England. As has been already explained in previous pages, Mary had on each former occasion when the matter had been urged firmly stood out against it, as well as Elizabeth herself. Once the Queen had been won over for a day to the Savoy project, but Cardinal Pole had changed her mind, and nothing had been done. The bold offer of the Swedish prince had shown to Mary as well as to Philip the danger of Elizabeth’s accepting a Protestant marriage; and even at this late hour Philip determined to make a desperate effort through Feria to win Elizabeth for a nominee who would suit him. Suriano, the Venetian ambassador with Philip, writes[134] with regard to Feria’s mission: “The Count’s instructions are that he is to try and dispose the Queen to consent to Lady Elizabeth’s marriage as her sister, and with the prospect of succeeding to the Crown. This negotiation is being conducted with the utmost secrecy, as they suspect that were the French to learn of it they would easily find means to thwart the project, as the greater part of England is opposed to the Queen and most hostile to King Philip and his party, whilst strongly inclined to Lady Elizabeth, who was always attached to the French faction rather than the other.” Feria tarried a few days in Flanders when the news came that Mary was somewhat better; but Dassonleville’s and Cordova’s letters, foreshadowing, as they did, Mary’s rapid passing, sent him hurrying across to England in order to perform his mission before she should die. The great obstacle to the marriage with Savoy—apart, of course, from Elizabeth’s own reluctance—had now disappeared, for Mary had recognised her sister as her successor, without which her marriage would have been useless to Philip.

Feria arrived in London on the 9th November, and he found England in a turmoil. Whispers spread every few days that the Queen was indeed dead, and that her Council only kept back the news until King Philip should come with the strong hand. “Every man’s mynde was then travayled with a strange confusione,” says Hayward, who lived through the crisis, “all things being immoderately eyther dreaded or desired. Every report was greedily both inquired and received, all truthes suspected, diverse tales believed, many improbable conjectures hatched and nourished. Invasion of strangers, civil dissentions, the doubtfull dispositione of the succeeding prince, were cast in every man’s conceite as present perills; but noe man did buysy his witts in contriving remedyes.” Whilst her people were anxiously looking to the future, some with dread and some with hope, the Queen lay in anguish waiting for the end. It was only five years since, full of faith and belief in her system, she had passed over ruined ambitions amidst the acclamations of the people to the throne of her fathers. In that short time, with the best of intentions, she had sapped the basis of England’s international importance, she had opened wide the doors of religious persecution, and, so far as she could, had laid the resources of her country at the feet of her foreign husband. She was leaving England poorer in possessions, in power and in spirit, than it had been at any time since her grandfather brought to an end the civil strife of a century. She had sacrificed her people’s welfare and happiness, as well as her own popularity, by obstinately ignoring accomplished facts and leaning upon a foreign Power to enable her to restore a state of things that was dead.

The Queen was only partially conscious and unable to read Philip’s letter when Feria came to bring her a message from her husband, and he lost no time in travelling to Hatfield on his principal mission. Elizabeth had been so wary and diplomatic in her difficult circumstances that she was as yet an unknown quantity; and doubtless the crafty men of the world who proposed to win her for Spain anticipated no great difficulty from this reticent young woman of five-and-twenty, who had accepted Catholicism so readily. The country was profoundly divided, and it was thought that the new Queen—as Dassonleville wrote, in good faith—would be unable to establish her authority without help from abroad. It was therefore, on the face of it, not an extravagant presumption that she might prefer to follow her sister’s lead and adhere to the traditional policy of England in allying herself with the sovereign of Spain and Flanders.

When Feria arrived at Hatfield he received his first surprise. Before starting from London he had summoned the Council, and in Philip’s name had approved of Elizabeth as the heir to the Crown. Believing that this would enable him to claim Elizabeth’s thanks, he began at Hatfield to enlarge upon the service Philip had done her in thus securing to her the succession. So long as high-flown compliment had been the staple of conversation Elizabeth had given Feria as good as he had brought; but the moment he bespoke her gratitude she stopped him, and said that she would owe her Crown to no one but her people; and when he broadly hinted at the advantage to her of a marriage with her Spanish brother-in-law or a nominee of his she evaded the suggestion dexterously.[135] All through the interview she showed a determination to resist any attempts to place her in the tutelage of Philip. She answered Feria, indeed, somewhat tartly at one point, that her sister had lost her people’s love by marrying a foreigner; and the ambassador left her already convinced that she would be no docile instrument in his master’s hands, as her sister had been.

Mary and Pole lay dying at the same time, fortified by the rites of their Church, whose services were celebrated ceaselessly before their weary eyes. With the Queen there were few now to do her reverence, for most of her courtiers and Councillors were flocking to Hatfield to worship the rising sun; but Mrs. Clarencius, the Countess of Feria (Jane Dormer, Mary’s favourite maid of honour), and a few other faithful friends stood by her to the last. On the morning of the 16th November the Council assembled in her room, and Cordell, the Master of the Rolls, read aloud the Queen’s will, although Mary was unconscious at the time. Feria asserts that when the reader reached the bequests to her personal attendants the Council desired him to omit that portion. In any case, little attention was afterwards paid to the Queen’s testament, for there were none who loved or mourned the forlorn woman. Before dawn on the 17th November Mass was celebrated in the dying chamber in the Palace of St. James. Like her mother on her death-bed in similar circumstances, Mary followed the sacred office devoutly, in the full possession now of her faculties, making the responses audibly and fervently. When the celebrant appealed to “the Lamb of God who took upon Himself the sins of the world,” Mary answered clearly “_Miserere nobis, Miserere nobis, Dona nobis pacem_.”[136] These cries for mercy, for mercy and peace, were the last words of unhappy Mary Tudor. A few moments afterwards, as the priest held up before her the Sacramental Host, her eyes flushed with tears, and then closed for ever. Philip had no longer any footing in England. He must win one again by force or favour, unless Spain was to surrender her proud supremacy and Catholicism cease to rule the world.