ness of her position; and paying small attention to her religious opinions, he supposed that by a safe marriage he could secure her ultimate allegiance both to Spain and to the Church. Let her be married to a Catholic prince, and the English lords themselves undertook that the religious questions settled by the reunion with Rome should not be re-opened. Except for the singular position of the Queen of Scots, the courts of France and Spain would have agreed upon a common course of action; and although the cause of freedom in England would probably have triumphed eventually, the victory would have been won by a struggle protracted through the century, and Elizabeth herself, in all human likelihood, would have been shaken from her throne on the first outburst of civil war. But Philip intimated to the king of France that he would not permit her succession to be disturbed. He directed the English Catholics to remain loyal. He first offered himself as a husband to his sisterin-law, and when he was declined on the ground of relationship, he pressed on her a marriage with a prince of the house of Austria, which her critical situation would not permit her wholly to reject. The claims of Mary of Scotland hung before her as a perpetual menace, for the French did not disguise their intention of enforcing them, with Philip's permission or without it. The Austrian suitor was supported by the Duke of Norfolk, the Earls of Westmoreland and Northumberland, Lord Montague, Lord Arundel, and the whole strength of the English Catholics; and she was obliged to coquette with the proposal, to play with it, to discountenance or seem to welcome it, as her danger was more or less threatening. England at this crisis owed much, perhaps every thing, to Sir William Cecil. Cecil, whom the queen had chosen as her chief political adviser, was described by De Quadra as a man of infinite ability, a heretic to the heart, "possessed by ten thousand devils," caring for nothing except the Reformation, which he was determined to carry out;"The heart of the whole Protestant movement," who sooner than fail would shake every throne in Europe; and yet at the same time a man who spoke the truth, "not a liar like the rest of them," a person to be hated with a deadly hatred, but to be respected and feared. While the marriage project was allowed to remain in suspense, Cecil seized the moment while the Catholics were divided and perplexed, and hurried Elizabeth forward into a restoration of the laws of Henry VIII. To him kings and queens were of small moment, compared to English liberty; and while the numerical strength lay with the Conservatives, the vitality, the energy, the truth, was with the Protestant. Trusting therefore to time, he appealed to the nobler side of Elizabeth's nature. He assured himself that before Spain and France could. coalesce, he could re-establish the Reformation on so strong a basis that if by and by times changed he could afford to defy them. The Parliament met; the laws of Mary were repealed, the pope's supremacy was abolished, the Catholic bishops were deprived, and a Protestant episcopate established in place of them; and careless of Philip's anger, he openly offered an asylum to the persecuted reformers in Flanders, who swarmed across the Channel in thousands. It I shall hope hereafter to tell the story of these great doings in its fulness. is enough at present to say that Philip, after remonstrating with Elizabeth in vain, watched her proceedings with an agony of indignation. The English Catholics, unable to understand his apathy, threatened to go over to the French. In incessant interviews with De Quadra, they protested that they were betrayed, that they would sell themselves to the Turk sooner than bear "to see heresy successful." De Quadra shared their passion and united in their remonstrances. "Let my master hold up his hand," he wrote to De Feria, "and this woman, this devil, will be in the dust to-morrow." The Catholic programme was drawn in a form which would give Philip every security he could wish. They offered to proclaim a woman incapable of the succession, and to make a king of Lord Darnley. But still Philip hesitated. He dreaded the Queen of Scots. He distrusted the orthodoxy of France, he was afraid of a general war and of a revolt in Flanders; he still prescribed patience, and trusted to the success of the Austrian marriage, while Cecil went on upon his way. gained strength, and Cecil had leisure to carry out his own policy in the Council. Ten thousand men were raised in the counties where they could be most relied on. A Meantime the French were not idle. On Austria, and the ambassador; and as it was the peace of Cambray the Italian army was understood in Europe generally that, could recalled, but not disbanded. Shipyards and the marriage be brought about, the French armories rang with preparation. In 1559 designs on England were to cease, some the Scotch Calvinists broke into insurrec- time was gained. The French preparation, not without Cecil's secret connivance; tions were suspended, the Scotch insurgents and the French catching at this opportunity, prepared to fling into Scotland their whole available strength, intending, after they had crushed the Reformers, to cross the Tweed, where the northern nobles were already pre-fleet of eighty sail was equipped and armed pared to join them. The strength of the Protestants lay in the southern and western towns and counties; while north of Derby, if the muster were called out, they would in all likelihood go over to the invaders to No resistance was anticipated short of London; and the general expectation on all sides, so far as it can be gathered from the correspondence, was that Elizabeth would fall without a blow. a man. with haste and secrecy. Elizabeth grew cold again about the archduke; and in December the course which England was about to take was formally announced. Six thousand French were already in Scotland, but no more should arrive there. The English fleet was at sea in force strong enough to prevent reinforcements from crossing the Channel. The English army crossed the Tweed and joined the Protestants. "That accursed Cecil," wrote Granville to Philip, "has ruined every thing. What are we to do? He knows we cannot suffer France to conquer England; and yet, if we support that woman, we are defending the only hope was, that come what would, that she-devil Elizabeth, would be ruined. Philip, more perplexed than ever, wrote and threatened. He trusted that at all events the English would be defeated in Scotland; and Elizabeth would be forced in spite of herself to fall back on the archduke. Two ways were open to her by which to escape from the danger: one to make terms with Philip, and agree to marry the Austrian; the other, to anticipate the invasion and fight the French on the other side of the Tweed with the help of the Scottish Prot-cause of the enemies of God." De Feria's estants. The first was recommended by the Duke of Norfolk, the country party, and the Catholics; the second by Cecil and the Earl of Bedford. Cecil's policy went even further. He wished the queen to marry the Earl of Arran, to declare Mary to have forfeited her crown, and to unite the kingdoms. The queen herself, however, as will be seen, had private views of her own which she communicated to none of her advisers. While the Privy Council was sitting day after day, discussing what was to be done, the queen sent Lady Mary Sidney, sister of Robert Dudley, to the Spanish ambassador, and told him that she wished the Archduke Charles to come privately to London, as she could not marry a man whom she had never seen; but she was so convinced of the peril of her position that she felt she could not stand alone, and she trusted she would be able to bring herself to do what the king of Spain and so many of her own subjects so ardently desired. De Quadra could not be certain of the queen's sincerity, especially as her communications with him were unofficial and mysterious. At all events, however, he reported what had been said. A correspondence followed between Philip, the emperor of But the fortune of war went otherwise. The French were shut up in Leith; the English fleet did their duty, and no more reinforcements could reach them. At last, in despair and in the simple interests of the Church, Philip determined to send a Spanish army across from Flanders to occupy ScotJand against both parties, and either to coerce Elizabeth into submission, or else, with the support of the English Catholics, to dethrone her and give the crown to Darnley. That this was his secret intention there can be no doubt, from a comparison of the Spanish and French correspondence; and the fear of the court of Paris that something of the sort would be attempted was the real cause of the capitulation of Leith, the treaty of Edinburgh, and the apparently easy acquiescence of the French Government in the defeat of their policy and in their expulsion from Scotland. As determined as ever to support the pretensions of the Queen of Scots | house, and told him that all his efforts had when the opportunity should offer itself, they been fruitless. The queen was rushing were as little ready as England to acquiesce in the interference of the Spanish, while unable to risk the chances of a general war. These events, which I have been obliged to tell briefly, terminated therefore in the complete triumph of Cecil's policy. The English Catholics were confused and disheartened, believing themselves abandoned. The Reformation was established in Scotland; and Elizabeth, triumphant on all sides, was at once freed from the threat of an unwelcome marriage, and from all present danger of invasion and revolution. How did she reward the minister whose skill had saved her? From the day of her accession, Elizabeth had drawn remarks on herself by the special favor which she showed to Lord Robert Dudley, the afterwards notorious Earl of Leicester. Scandal was busy with her name, and became so loud-voiced that De Quadra was led to inquire curiously into her antecedents in such matters. The result was in the main favorable. There were many stories current to her discredit; but on the whole the ambassador did not believe them. She was a wilful woman, he said, and a wicked heretic, but that was the worst that could be said of her. Her regard for Dudley, however, was so palpable that it was a common subject of remark and censure from Protestants as well as Catholics. He had a wife, indeed, but the wife never appeared at court; and she was reported to have bad health, which report insisted was not altogether natural disease. Dudley himself was incautious in his language, and dropped hints from time to time of prospects which might possibly be before him. The queen at last was thought to be so seriously compromising herself, that Cecil attempted remonstrance; and although, when Elizabeth made the advance to the Spanish ambassador about the archduke, Dudley and his sister were the persons through whom she communicated her wishes, the Count de Feria wrote that he doubted whether they could be trusted to act honestly. Time, however, passed on; the Scotch wars drew off public attention; Amy Robsart did not die; and the scandal was dying away, when one night, in the autumn of 1560, Cecil came secretly to De Quadra's upon destruction, and this time he could not save her. She had made Lord Robert Dudley "Master of the Government and of her own person." Dudley's wife was about to be murdered, and was at that moment with difficulty "guarding herself against poison." Dead to honor, blind to danger, and careless of every thing but the gratification of her own passion, Elizabeth would be contented with nothing less than raising Dudley to the throne, and the unhappy Amy Robsart would not be long an obstacle. For himself, like a prudent mariner before a storm, he intended to retire from the public service. His interference had availed nothing; he would now only stand aside and watch the revolution which would be the instant inevitable consequence of the queen's insanity. While the ambassador was cyphering this extraordinary information to his master, the news arrived in London that Amy Robsart was actually dead. She was staying (as all readers of Kenilworth know) at Cumnor Hall, a place about three miles from Oxford. For what purpose she had been placed there no sufficient evidence remains to show: but there she was, and there by accident, as Elizabeth assured De Quadra, she fell down a staircase and was killed. A cabinet council was immediately held. Who were present De Quadra does not say; but the chief actor was still Cecil, in whom indignation for the moment swept away all restraints of policy. It was proposed to dethrone Elizabeth and send her at once with Dudley to the Tower. The Protestants would be satisfied with the proclamation of the queen's infamy; and out of the many claimants for the vacant throne, some one could be found whom the country would agree to accept. Some one; but who was this some one to be? For many days it was uncertain how the balance would turn. Elizabeth probably knew her danger, but durst not move to defend herself. Darnley, the nominee of the Catholics, was unacceptable to Cecil; he would be a mere plaything in the hands of the reactionists. Cecil proposed to change the dynasty, to declare the Tudors usurpers, and proclaim the Earl of Huntingdon as the representative of the House of York; but the Earl of Hunting don, as a Protestant, would be rejected by it must be said, had made it necessary for one-half of the country, as Darnley would Cecil to take the promise from her, for no be rejected by the other. Philip, too, who sooner was the first danger over than she would look patiently on Elizabeth's de- seemed to think she might go her own way thronement, would not countenance the sub- with impunity, and made no secret of her stitution of a heretic. Many plans were intentions. If Amy Robsart was murdered, suggested and laid aside; and among other it was not Elizabeth's fault that she did not measures taken hastily in the confusion was expose herself to the same suspicions which the secret marriage, supposed to be Cecil's attach to Mary Stuart for her marriage with work, between Lady Catherine Grey and the Bothwell. She had already intrigued with Earl of Hertford. But after all was said, Dudley. So at least the Spanish ambassaagreement was found to be impossible. A dor says that Cecil told him, and Cecil was civil war, a French invasion, and Mary the last person in England to have invented Stuart, seemed the certain consequence of such a calumny, or to have chosen De Elizabeth's deposition; and if she could be Quadra for the depository of it. She was so prevented from insulting the country by the infatuated with her passion that she was marriage, it was determined for the present ready to justify the worst construction which to spare her. [Such at least seems to have could be placed either on her own conduct been the resolution, for at this point one of or on her paramour's, and risk her throne De Quadra's letters is missing, and an epit- in her eagerness to share it with him. ome of it only remains.] At any rate, there was to be no public disturbance; and if she was to remain on the throne, it was necessary to shield her honor and hush up the murder. It is indeed within the limits of bare possibility that after all there was no murder. An inquest on the body of Lady Dudley was held at Cumnor, composed, as was said, of men who were no friends either to her husband or Antony Foster, the owner of the house where she died. The inquiry was reported to have been more than usually strict by Dudley's desire, and the result was a verdict that the death was "a very misfortune." But the occurrence of a convenient accident at the moment when it was anticipated, was a coincidence so singular that the finding of the jury gained no more credit at the time than it will find from the historian; and the world in general had but rumor as the justification of their suspicions, while we have before us the fatal evidence of Cecil's words to De Quadra, which we may reasonably believe to be genuine. The council, however, were forced to make the best of it. Amy Robsart was buried at Oxford, where some of them attended among the mourners, while Cecil by some means or other wrung a promise from Elizabeth that at least she would not marry Dudley without the consent of Parliament, which he and she alike knew could never be obtained. Thus for the first months of the winter the matter hung in suspense. The queen, This was pretty well for the Virgin Queen ; and, after allowing for all possible exaggerations and mistakes, was enough to destroy the reputation of which she boasted. Had matters gone no further, it was enough, and too much. But Elizabeth, though fettered by her ministers, was not a woman to bear restraint with patience. She would not part with her hope; and if she could not obtain her wishes in one way, she set herself to find another. In January, after an interval of quiet, in which nothing was busy except scandal and the tongue of the Protestant clergy, Sir Henry Sidney, Philip Sidney's father, and Dudley's brother-in-law, sought in his turn the secret chamber of De Quadra. Ostensibly the messenger of Lord Robert, he told the ambassador that what he had to say was to be taken as coming from Elizabeth; or, at all events, as not without her knowledge and sanction. Although the scandal in its darker features was known with certainty only to a very few persons, yet enough had oozed out to create the utmost irritation. Throgmorton the English Minister in Paris, had written to Cecil, urging him, as he valued his country and his queen's honor and life, to save her from the infamy into which he believed she was about to precipitate herself. In his honorable fidelity, he went so far as to write in the same tone to Elizabeth herself; and those letters which are in our own record-office fit in but too accurately with the despatches of De Quadra at Simancas. said; and if the public belief that there had been foul play was well founded, they might spare themselves the trouble of speaking with him any more upon the subject. The Protestant populace had been equally He then referred to the affair at Cumnor. plain-spoken; and the preachers in London God would never send a blessing on measand out of it had not scrupled to use lan-ures which had begun with a murder, he guage of open menace if the detested marriage scheme was not abandoned. It happened that the pope, who was about to re-open the Council of Trent, was just about the same time making pacific overtures to Sidney replied that his own feeling had the English Government. He had not yet been the same as the ambassador's; and if abandoned the hope that England might he believed that Amy Robsart had been made consent to be represented in the Council: away with unfairly, he would never have been and in language unusually mild, was en- the bearer of Dudley's message. He was, treating permission to send over a nuncio, however, convinced that the public suspicion who would explain his wishes. The king was unfounded. He had himself examined of Spain had endorsed the pope's request, into the circumstance with the nicest scruand had urged compliance with it as a mat-ple. The death was an accident, and nothter of favor to himself; but Cecil had re- ing more. plied resolutely in the old language of Henry VIII., that England would take a part with readiness in a free Council which should meet in France or Germany, on this side the Alps, where the questions which disturbed Europe could be fairly discussed; but it could have nothing to do with a council called by the pope at Trent; while the coming of a nuncio was forbidden by the law. De Quadra's next visitor was Dudley himself, who confirmed all that Sidney had stated; and insisted emphatically that he was speaking for the queen as well as himself. They were both weary of the Reformers, he said, and longed for order and union. An ambassador should be sent to Trent. He would go himself, if no one else could be found. They required nothing except a promise of the king of Spain's countenance. Sir Henry Sidney's communication to the In fact, what Elizabeth desired was that Spanish ambassador was this: That Eliza- Philip should write a letter himself to the beth was furious at the preachers for the lib-queen, suggesting and proposing the marerties which had been taken with her name; riage. He might say that, for the interests that she was sick of the excesses into which the Reformation was running, and indignant at the thraldom in which she was held by Cecil: Lord Robert Dudley, therefore, had sent him to say that, if the king of Spain would consent to his marriage with the queen, and would give them the support of the Catholic party, they on their side would undertake to break finally with the heretics, re-establish "religion," receive the nuncio, and send deputies to Trent. of Christendom, it was desirable that the queen of England should marry some one devoted to the Church; that there seemed no hope of her marrying a foreign prince; and that among her subjects she could choose no one who would be more satisfactory to himself than Lord Robert Dudley. In this way all difficulty would be obviated; and invited by the sovereign to whom all Catholics in Europe looked for guidance, they would be certain of support from the English lords. The ambassador, who for the moment could scarcely believe he was not asleep and The bishop listened, and said but little. dreaming, replied, as soon as he could col-As in duty bound, he reported to his master lect himself, that it was a strange business. the advances which had been made to him ; If the queen was convinced she ought to "re-establish religion," she should do it without stipulating any conditions, or mixing with it matters of such questionable import. He would write to his master; but he could not answer for what Philip would say. Indeed, before a resolution could be taken, he must see the queen herself, and hear her wishes from her own lips. yet he scarcely concealed to Philip the contempt with which he regarded them. He despised Dudley as a vain and shallow fool, and he knew too well the humor of the Howards and the Percies to believe that they would trust the guidance of England to the son of the parvenu Northumberland, while both he and they had other views for the restoration of Catholicism. Francis II. had |