Chapter VII (1)

1570-1578

Desperation of Alba—Fresh Catholic conspiracies—De Spes’s
complicity—Alba and the Ridolfi plot—Discovery—The
revenge of John Hawkins—De Spes outwitted—His expulsion
from England—Guaras appointed Spanish Agent—Reopening of
trade—Guaras’ intrigues with Mary Stuart and Don Juan of
Austria—The plot discovered—Imprisonment of Guaras—Fall of Don
Juan—Bernardino de Mendoza appointed ambassador in England

Alba was driven well nigh to desperation by the contemptuous treatment extended to Ciappino in England and the evident determination of Elizabeth to hold her ground with regard to the property she had seized. Something must be done, and that quickly, he wrote to the King. If they exclude our ships from English ports, even for shelter, intercourse by sea between Spain and Flanders must cease, and we shall be absolutely obliged to commence hostilities. “Your Majesty’s present urgent needs are better known to you than to any one, and here the pressure is very great. The past wars, the emigration of the people, the stoppage of trade, and the general want of confidence here, all convince me that a rupture with England at present would be most inopportune; but if the English force it upon us, we cannot avoid it;” and the grim Duke, who had drowned Flanders in blood, had tamely to propose to his master, as the only way now open to them, that Elizabeth should be more mildly treated than ever, in the hope that at least she would allow Spanish ships to shelter in her ports, whilst the plundered Flemish merchants were allowed to go over to England unofficially and make the best terms they individually could to rescue their property.

Nor was Philip much more stout-hearted than his general. Whilst the northern nobles were yet in arms in Yorkshire, he wrote to Alba thus: “English affairs are going on in a way that may make it necessary, after all, to bring that Queen to do by force what she refuses to reason. Her duty is so plain that doubtless God causes her to ignore it, in order that by these means His holy religion may be restored in England and the Catholics and good Christians rescued from the thraldom in which they live. In case her obstinacy and hardness of heart should continue, therefore, you will consider the best direction to be given to our action. We here think that the best course will be to encourage with money and secret favour the Catholics of the North, and to help those in Ireland to take up arms against the heretics, to deliver the crown to the Queen of Scots to whom it belongs by succession.... This is only mentioned at present that you may know what is passing in our minds here [_i.e._, in Spain], and that with your great prudence and a full consideration of affairs in general, you may ponder what is best to be done. What you say is very true; we are beginning to lose prestige by delaying so long to provide a remedy for the great grievance done by this woman to us.”[188]

Mary Stuart, closely watched and in prison, alone never lost heart or courage. Norfolk’s weak poltroonery, the disastrous collapse of the northern lords, the slow hesitancy of Philip, were all met by her with confident predictions of coming success, if only the King of Spain would take her cause in hand. Letter after letter went from her and from the restless Bishop of Ross in her name to Philip and Alba. “The Queen is in good heart,” the Bishop of Ross assured de Spes, “and the principal Catholics of this country have sent me word not to desist from the first intention, for that, as soon as they learn that they will have foreign help, and arrangements are made for it to reach them, they will rise and stand out until this country is Catholic and the succession assured to Queen Mary.” This was soon after the flight of the northern lords (18th January, 1570), and at the same time a warm love correspondence was passing between Mary and Norfolk, she with honeyed words, and at serious risk to herself, urging him not to abandon the great plan that was to make them both free and great,[189] though he was still a prisoner in the Tower.

Meanwhile the dangerous attempt at a Catholic rebellion in England and the known confidence of the Queen of Scots had drawn the Protestants of Europe together: a close union existed between Elizabeth and the Lutheran Princes of Germany, whilst Hans Casimir and other mercenary leaders were raising troops subsidised by England and the Huguenots to renew the religious war in France. The privateers in the Channel were more aggressive than ever, and Cardinal Chatillon still flaunted his unecclesiastical equipment at the English Court. Hardly a letter was written by de Spes at the time (1570) that does not contain some suggestion for striking at Elizabeth’s power. The Queen of Scots might be captured by a _coup de main_ and carried off to Spain, as she herself suggested; the Bishop of Ross assures him that a few Spanish troops landed in Scotland might easily overturn the new Regent Lennox;[190] a small force sent to aid the Irish rebels would enable them to expel the English; “and it looks as if the enterprise might be effected in both islands at the same time, for in Ireland most of the nation will rise as soon as they see your Majesty’s flag on the coast, and no resistance would be made except in Dublin and the fortresses.”

To all these suggestions of his intemperate ambassador Philip had still no answer but to enjoin prudence and secrecy. Information, pledges, assurances without end were requested, whilst Philip pondered and considered. Everything was referred to the Duke of Alba for decision, and Alba would not move without specific orders; whilst in this deadlock the Spanish commerce was swept from the seas and the legendary power of the Catholic King was made a mock and derision of the heretics. Once Philip’s hands were nearly forced by the impatience of Mary’s friends. The more extreme school of English and Scottish Catholics had been urging for some time that a Papal Bull of Deprivation against Elizabeth should be obtained, in order that Mary’s immediate claim to the Crown of England might be regularised. Philip had gently put aside all such requests or left them unanswered. He was not yet ready for Elizabeth’s forcible deposition; for, as we have seen, his cumbrous methods forbade prompt action, and he had no intention of ousting Elizabeth until he had made himself quite certain that he, and he alone, would be master of England under her successor. But the action of the Scottish and Guisan Catholics in Rome, greatly to Philip’s annoyance, procured the Bull from the Pope over Philip’s head; and de Spes’s chaplain, Father Berga, doubtless with the full connivance of the ambassador, who was apparently incapable of understanding high politics, persuaded John Felton to court martyrdom by fixing the Pope’s Bull on the Bishop of London’s door on Corpus Christi Day late in May, 1570. De Spes, in the innocence of his heart, wrote off in jubilant strain to Philip, recording the event and foretelling all sorts of great consequences from it. But the King had nothing but condemnation and annoyance that his plans should thus be interfered with by the meddling of priests, and de Spes had to read some very plain talk from his master, whilst the share of his fugitive chaplain in the outrage still further brought the ambassador and his master into the black books of Elizabeth.

The bold action of Felton, however, frightened the Government into a milder attitude towards the moderate English Catholics, and the mustering of a strong fleet in Spanish Flanders, for the purpose of conveying to Spain Philip’s fourth wife, Anna of Austria, heightened the alarm. Elizabeth was so much perturbed that she kept her room for days together, bewailing the vengeance that she thought at last was about to fall upon her for all her provocations of her brother-in-law. Cecil (now Lord Burghley) appears to have been the great object of his mistress’s wrath. To him, she cried, alone was due the trouble in which she found herself. Here, thanks to Cecil’s policy, she said, was a great army and fleet ready to attack her in the Channel, and Philip was causing another force to be mustered in Spain under the traitor Stukeley to invade Ireland. But this was only a momentary weakness, which even steadfast Burghley himself shared to the extremity of preparing for timely flight with such portable property as he could gather.[191] The unwonted fit of despair did not last long. English forces were got together rapidly, the English conservative and moderate Catholics were conciliated, and the Duke of Norfolk was released from the Tower to only nominal arrest in his own house; for if the conservative nobles of his party considered themselves absolved by the Pope’s Bull from their oath of allegiance to the Queen, then, indeed, might Elizabeth tremble. This was on the 4th August, and, on the 23rd June previous, the Duke of Norfolk had made in writing the most abject submission to the Queen, pledging himself “freely, voluntarily, and absolutely, by my allegiance to your Majesty, my Sovereign Lady, never to offend your Highness, but do utterly renounce and revoke all that which on my part any wise hath passed, with a full intention never to deal in that cause of marriage with the Queen of Scots, nor in any other cause belonging to her.”[192] Even Mary herself was now smiled upon by Elizabeth, and negotiations for a reconciliation were opened with her; for the Spanish fleet was still in English waters, and a peace between the warring parties had been patched up in France.

With these numerous signs of yielding on the part of the Protestants, it is not surprising that the Spanish partisans should pluck up courage. De Spes, raging with wounded pride at the indignities continually heaped upon him,[193] all of which, Philip told him, he must bear patiently, never ceased to plot with the Bishop of Ross and Mary Stuart. On the 2nd September he wrote to Philip details of another dangerous conspiracy that had been broached to him by Mary through the Bishop of Ross. The Catholics, he said, feeling themselves now absolved from their allegiance to Elizabeth by the Pope’s Bull, were willing to rise. The sons of the Earl of Derby and the gentry of Lancashire were ready to release Mary—one of the Earl of Shrewsbury’s sons having also been brought into the plan, which would make it easy, as Mary was in Shrewsbury’s keeping. This combination looked askance at Norfolk as a doubtful Catholic and a backslider, though it was joined by his kinsmen Arundel and Lumley, as well as by the thoroughgoing Catholics, Southampton, Worcester, and Montagu (Sir Anthony Browne). The plan now advanced was for a Spanish fleet to go to the Stanley country, the Isle of Man, or the Lancashire coast, and carry Mary Stuart thence to safety. The scheme, however, was thrown away by the kidnapping and forcible abduction to England of Dr. Story, the English Catholic Agent in Antwerp, who upon the rack had torn from him all he knew, which was not much, of the communications on the subject that had passed between Mary Stuart’s friends and the Duke of Alba. The ostentatious but insincere negotiations going on between Elizabeth and the Queen of Scots, and the redoubled vigilance of Cecil’s Government, completed the impracticability of this scheme, and then once more Norfolk took the lead.

On the 15th October de Spes wrote to the King that approaches were being made by the French to marry the young Duke of Anjou to Mary, this, of course, being one of Catharine’s tricks to frustrate the Spanish attempts to dominate Britain through the Queen of Scots. “It may be,” says de Spes, “that the Queen [Mary] will consent, but it will not please the majority of the English people, and it certainly does not please me. The Catholics are not very much in favour of the marriage with the Duke of Norfolk, as they are uncertain about his orthodoxy, although Arundel and Lumley assert that he will be obedient to the Church. His desire to reign may well lead him from bad paths to good ones. The Duke [of Norfolk] himself has been very cool about this marriage, but he now seems to wish to renew the project, particularly as he expects shortly to be quite at liberty, in accordance with the Queen’s promise to him. If your Majesty’s wishes are to be represented ... the Bishop of Ross will be a good negotiator, and I could conduct the matter with him or with Ridolfi, who has been in communication with them; and if it should be necessary for the Duke of Norfolk to bind himself separately to other conditions, steps may be taken at once in the matter. Pray your Majesty send me orders, for it is certain that the release and marriage of the Queen of Scots carries with it the tranquillisation of Flanders and the restoration of religion in this country.”

Philip, in answer to this and many similar hints, had nothing but vague expressions of sympathy to send in reply, with fresh orders to his ambassador to follow strictly the instructions of the Duke of Alba. For months, until the Spanish fleet had passed harmlessly down Channel, the hollow negotiations between Elizabeth and Mary went on, and a similar pretence of conferences with regard to the reopening of trade with the Duke of Alba, whilst Elizabeth checkmated the French advances to Mary Stuart by herself suddenly displaying a desire to marry the boy Duke of Anjou. “They think,” wrote de Spes early in February, 1571, “that with this talk about the marriage of the Queen [Elizabeth] with the Duke of Anjou we shall be afraid to offend them, and the pirates are more welcomed than ever, whilst the Queen of Scot’s business is being delayed. It is true that so far as the Catholics are concerned matters were never more favourable than now. I did not dare to accept their offers, in the face of the Duke of Alba’s instructions; but whenever his Majesty wishes, a great service can be done to God, and at the same time the safety of the Netherlands secured and the throne of Spain aggrandised. The position of the King’s ambassador here does not add much to his dignity.... I have suffered more than can be imagined.”[194] De Spes had his personal grudge as well as his Catholic zeal now to spur him on to vengeance. The irresponsiveness of his master and of Alba to the repeated suggestions that armed aid should be sent to the English Catholics suggested for the first time a viler method by which Elizabeth, the main obstacle to the Anglo-Spanish alliance, might be removed. The above letter is different from any that had preceded it, and was written privately, not to the King, as usual, but to his Secretary, Zayas. A “great service might be done to God whenever his Majesty wished.” It was no longer dependent, apparently, upon the ability of Philip to send large armed forces, though they might be needed later to hold the conquest.

We will see from other sources what this new feature in the plan was. Two days after de Spes wrote the above letter, on the 8th February, 1571, Mary, who had learnt that the ambassador could do nothing, as he says, but refer the conspirators to the Duke of Alba, wrote as follows to the Bishop of Ross.[195] After saying that she would, as soon as she was released, go to Spain and throw herself entirely upon the protection of Philip, she proceeds: “I would advise to send some faithful man towards the King of Spain whom he might trust, to make him understand the state of my realm, and also of the friends I have here, their deliberations and the means they may have to set themselves to the fields and saist [_i.e._, obtain possession] them of me, if the said King of Spain will embrace and sustain my cause and theirs. I think Ridolfi may best acquit himself of this charge securely ... under colour of his own traffic.” She continues by saying that Philip’s fears of Norfolk’s orthodoxy must be banished. “I see no other means but to assure them of the Duke, for that is the knot of the matter. My whole hope is in the Catholics of this realm.” When the Bishop of Ross transmitted this proposal to Norfolk the latter at once acquiesced in the despatch of Ridolfi to Flanders, Spain, and Rome,[196] for the purpose of demanding aid to seize and depose Elizabeth; and on the 10th March de Spes wrote to the King, “The Queen of Scotland, the Duke of Norfolk, and the Catholic leaders have wisely resolved to send a gentleman to your Majesty, who will see the Duke of Alba first, but without the knowledge of the French. I have, after much difficulty, obtained a copy of his instructions, and send them herewith.”

On the 25th March Ridolfi was ready to start, and de Spes wrote to Philip: “The Queen of Scots and the Duke of Norfolk, in the names of many other lords and gentlemen attached to your Majesty’s interests, and the promotion of the Catholic faith, are sending Rodolfo Ridolfi, a Florentine gentleman, to offer their services to your Majesty, and to represent to you that the time is now ripe to take a step of great benefit to Christendom, as Ridolfi will set forth to your Majesty. The letter of credence from the Duke [of Norfolk] is written in the cipher that I sent Zayas, in case the letter is intercepted ...;” whilst to Secretary Zayas, de Spes wrote at the same time: “The bearer is Rodolfo Ridolfi, whom the Queen of Scots and the Duke of Norfolk are sending to his Majesty.... It is necessary that he should have audience of his Majesty with the utmost secrecy, as you will be able to arrange, on so important a matter as this.”[197] Almost simultaneously Henry Cobham was sent to Spain by Elizabeth in order ostensibly to negotiate direct about the seizures, but really to ascertain how far Philip was helping the Irish rebels, and de Spes does not conceal his glee that “these thieves and pirates” will find, “though they send ambassadors and play their old tricks,” and he (de Spes) “is still mixing his words with honey,” “all this will not hinder what his Majesty will decide to do.”[198]

Ridolfi arrived in Brussels at the beginning of April, and his mission was discussed exhaustively by Alba and his Council. The long report which Alba thereupon sent to Philip is a State paper of the highest interest, because it not only sets forth fully the whole position, but for the first time formulates clearly the plan of murdering Elizabeth as a political measure. We have traced in previous pages how the provocation had grown, how the powerlessness of the Spaniards to vindicate their prestige and their interests had embittered them. In all the previous suggestions for the substitution of Mary Stuart for Elizabeth on the English throne, it is true that there could have been little doubt as to what would have been the fate of the deposed Queen at the hands of the victors; but in Alba’s minute to Philip the killing of Elizabeth as a preliminary measure is recommended as a condition of Spanish support. Alba sets forth with great prolixity the pros and cons of the position, the saintly character of the objects, the liberation of the captive Mary, and the restoration of the faith in England. Norfolk, he says, will undertake to rise and hold his own country for forty days after liberating the Queen of Scots if Philip will promise before the expiration of that time to send him 6,000 arquebusiers. He has means, he says, to seize the Tower of London and secure the person of Elizabeth, and he and Mary will look alone to the King of Spain for guidance. Alba, as usual, is full of doubts, limitations, and misgivings. Suppose after the Spanish aid had been sent the enterprise were to fail! Not only would the Queen of Scots and Norfolk lose their heads, but the Catholic religion would be utterly crushed thenceforward in England, and Elizabeth would throw herself entirely into the hands of France. Ridolfi, too, seemed to Alba rather a talkative person for such a mission. He had to pass through France: what if he opened his mouth too wide there, or in Rome? Besides, the Pope himself was rather too fond of consulting French Cardinals....

And so on, and so forth, until at last Alba gives to Philip his final recommendation. Ridolfi was to be warned that the French must have nothing whatever to do with the affair, and he was to be sent on his way to Rome and Madrid. The King is recommended to embark the 6,000 men required for England in the fleet being prepared in Spain to bring out the new Governor of Flanders, Medina Celi; but that on no account should the aid be sent to England on the conditions proposed by Norfolk and Mary, for fear of failure. “But in case that the Queen of England should first have died, _either of natural death or otherwise_, or the confederates had seized and secured her person without your Majesty having had anything to do with it, then I should find no objection whatever to it, for the affair would be quite on another footing.” “Everything,” added Alba, “should be prepared secretly in Flanders, but no move should be made until Elizabeth was dead, _naturally or otherwise_. As soon as _that_ happened your Majesty ought not to miss such a fine opportunity to attain the end desired—the restoration of our holy Catholic faith and the future tranquillity of your dominions.”[199]

Whilst Ridolfi, duly warned to be secret, went on his way to Rome, where the Pope heartily blessed his mission, and thence to Madrid, where he arrived in the last days of June, evil fell upon the project in England. The Flemish Secretary of the Bishop of Ross, Charles Bailly, had accompanied Ridolfi to Flanders, in order to bring back news of the reception of Norfolk’s proposals by Alba. The latter had, of course, not gone beyond general approval in his intercourse with Ridolfi, the murder condition being reserved for Philip’s own consideration; but he had said enough to prove conclusively that he regarded with sympathy, and hoped to aid, a project intended to depose Elizabeth in favour of Mary and Norfolk. Bailly wrote letters in cipher at Ridolfi’s dictation, giving Alba’s provisional answers to the Bishop of Ross and two other correspondents identified by numbers only. Bailly, who had been closely watched by Cecil’s spies in Flanders, carried the letters to England himself, and on the 15th April de Spes reports to the King that this man had been stopped at Dover and his packets taken from him. The letters he bore were in cipher, which of itself was suspicious; but in addition to this, every movement of Ridolfi in Brussels was known to Elizabeth’s Government, and the Secretary’s coming had been looked for. The packet of letters was given into the custody of Lord Cobham, the Governor of Dover Castle, until the Council in London should send instructions, whilst the unhappy youth, Bailly, was sent to the Marshalsea in Southwark pending inquiries.

The Cobhams belonged to the party of conservative nobles, ready to turn against Elizabeth the moment she was in danger, and by a trick of one of the younger brothers, Thomas—they were notoriously a turbulent lot—the precious packet of letters was spirited away to the Spanish ambassador in London and a dummy packet substituted for it. When this was opened with great anticipation before the Queen’s Council in London, to their dismay they found nothing but a confused jumble written in the same cipher. But they were not to be baulked. At least they had Charles Bailly safe under lock and bars, and the rack might induce him to talk. He began by making a grave mistake, writing letters—of course intercepted—to the Bishop of Ross that, now that the real letters had reached their destination without being deciphered, they had nothing to fear; that though they tore him to pieces on the rack he would confess nothing; and he begged the Bishop to tell him what answers he should give to his examiners. The Bishop, claiming ecclesiastical and diplomatic immunity, was just as imprudent as his secretary, urging him to stand firm and defy the English and gain the lasting gratitude of Mary. The poor wretch knew little of the details of Ridolfi’s mission, but he had written the cipher letters he bore; and gradually the agony of torture wrung from him all he knew.[200] Every day he sent fresh appealing letters to the Bishop of Ross, with the only result at length of lodging the Bishop himself in the Tower, threatened with the rack, notwithstanding his mitre and diplomatic position. Bailly deposed that Alba had received Ridolfi favourably, and had sent him on to Rome and Madrid to demand armed help in England for the two persons whose identity had been concealed by numbers.

For some time the authorities could get no further than this. Of course they knew that the two persons unnamed were Mary and Norfolk, but they needed legal proof, and gradually Cecil’s net was widened and swept into gaol one after the other of the confidants and tools of the plotters. In August a false follower of Norfolk brought to the Council a bag of £600 with a cipher letter that had been entrusted to him by Norfolk’s secretary to forward to Lord Herries, the leader of Mary’s Catholic friends in Scotland. Curiously enough this sum of money had been received from the French ambassador, so it is clear that Mary and Norfolk were playing false and doing what Alba dreaded most, namely, bringing the French into the business. But this fact made matters no better from the point of view of the English Council, and suddenly the Duke of Norfolk, the first noble in England, found himself in prison with all his confidential servants. The torture did its fell work promptly, and the secrets of the underlings were drawn from them, implicating the Duke beyond redemption. The Bishop of Ross, seeing his most secret papers deciphered, became almost loquacious in his fright, and went out of his way to vituperate his unhappy mistress.

Norfolk collapsed as abjectly as before. He had hoped at first, he said, to wed Mary by Elizabeth’s permission. He was sorry and repentant for having acted so falsely after he had promised not to do so, and would never do it again. He had not really been a Catholic, he said, and now submitted himself entirely to her Majesty’s mercy. He had never, he solemnly avowed, intended to bring foreign troops into England, or to touch the sacred person of his revered sovereign. It was all the fault of the Bishop of Ross, of Mary, of anybody but himself, ... and so, with such sorry lies as this, the most beloved and highest noble in England whined for mercy and his bare life. Elizabeth was loath to sacrifice him, for he was her cousin and the head of a powerful group of Englishmen, but at length the Protestant influences around her were too strong for her to resist, and Norfolk’s head fell on Tower Hill on the 2nd June, 1572.

Before this happened, Philip’s Council in Madrid had exhaustively discussed Alba’s recommendation that the murder of Elizabeth should precede the sending of Spanish forces to England. They not only approved fully of it, but laid down that the act should be committed, not in London, but whilst the Queen was on a progress. Much sanctimonious talk there was in the Council about the sacredness of the cause excusing the means, and even the Pope’s Nuncio smiled upon the nefarious plan and called it righteous. As for Philip himself, he was perfectly willing, and said that the whole thing now turned upon the ability to get the money together for the purpose, “and it would be a great pity to miss so important a matter or so small an amount, as later it would cost so much more.”[201] It is probably true, as was urged for them, that neither Mary nor Norfolk consented in so many words to this openly avowed condition of the Spaniards to make the prior murder of Elizabeth a condition of armed aid being sent from Flanders. The proposal was certainly not contained in the instructions carried by Ridolfi from Norfolk, though it is, in my opinion, indicated in the letter from de Spes to Zayas of 25th March quoted on an earlier page. It is first put clearly in black and white by Alba himself, and warmly adopted by Philip and his Council. But though Mary and Norfolk were not therefore necessarily parties to the proposed crime, there can be no doubt in the mind of any reasonable person what would have befallen Elizabeth if success had attended the attempt, and Norfolk had carried out the pledge he gave to Alba to seize the Tower of London and secure the person of the Queen.

We have here, however, not to deal with the culpability of the English actors so much as with that of the Catholic King, so full of saintly professions and so devoutly pious himself, who in his helplessness and desperation was willing at last, in order to extricate himself from a political impasse, to consent to treason and murder as a means to righteousness. In the letter Philip wrote to de Spes (4th August, 1571)—in ignorance, of course, of the collapse of the plot—he conveys his intention to patronise the murder of Elizabeth in the following characteristic words: “After carrying the whole question before Almighty God, whose cause it is, and in whom we trust for the guidance and direction of the affair better than human prudence can effect or understand, since the object is entirely, purely, and simply directed to His glory and service and the exaltation of His holy faith, I have resolved to adopt the course which you will learn from the Duke of Alba, to whom I write about it at great length. In conformity therewith and the orders he will give to you, you will act in the business with the discretion, dexterity, suavity and prudence which we expect of you, keeping in close communication with the Duke (of Alba) and carrying out his orders explicitly.”[202]

As the damning facts were gradually wrung out of the miserable accomplices in the plot, during the summer and autumn of 1571 the position of de Spes became daily more impossible in England. His name was constantly cropping up in the depositions, and every deponent had some evidence to give of his activity in forwarding this conspiracy to overturn the Government to which he was accredited. Even then, semi-prisoner as he was, and himself in danger of punishment or ignominious expulsion, he never ceased to plot; and his eagerness made him and his master an easy prey to an amusing piece of successful mystification that any person less blinded by hate than he would have seen through at once. It will be recollected that John Hawkins’s trading expedition to Central America had been treacherously attacked by a superior Spanish force at St. Juan de Lua, Mexico, in October, 1568, Hawkins with difficulty escaping with only two tiny ships. Property of great value and over a hundred men had been captured by the Spaniards and sent to Seville, the unfortunate sailors being delivered to the Inquisition and condemned to slavery. John Hawkins was the last man in the world to reconcile himself tamely to such a loss; and through a Catholic friend of his, George Fitzwilliam, a kinsman of the Duchess of Feria, he opened negotiations in Spain for the release of his sailors and the return of his property, on condition that he deserted the English service with the Queen’s fleet of fourteen armed ships, and joined that of the King of Spain for the invasion of England in favour of Mary Stuart.

Poor Mary, as usual, was easily hoodwinked, as indeed was Fitzwilliam himself at first, and the Ferias eagerly listened to the suggestion of apostasy of such a man as John Hawkins. Fitzwilliam returned to London from Spain with an encouraging answer and tokens for the Queen of Scots, in order that she might be asked to assure the Ferias and Philip of the genuineness of Hawkins’s offer. Cecil, who was behind Hawkins in the whole negotiation and enjoyed the position almost as much as the great sailor, smoothed over the difficulties of access to Mary, who, only too ready to believe in the honesty of others, sent him back to Spain with all sorts of assurances, letters for Philip and the Ferias, and a beautiful missal bound in gold for the Duchess of Feria, wherein she had written “_Absit nobis gloriari nisi in cruce Domini nostri Jesu Christi.—Marie R._” When Fitzwilliam came to him, de Spes was easily drawn into the plan, and became enthusiastically certain of the _bonâ fides_ of Hawkins. The more he sees of him, he says, the more convinced he is of his honesty. He is a Catholic, and very ambitious; and only once, and then but for a moment, did the gullible ambassador somewhat distrust Cecil’s complaisancy in allowing Fitzwilliam easy access to Mary Stuart, and to run backwards and forwards unimpeded between England and the coast of Spain.

Fitzwilliam again returned early in September to England entirely successful in his mission, and Hawkins wrote full of glee to Lord Burghley. The King and the Duke of Feria had jumped at Hawkins’s offer, his sailors had all been released and embarked for England, and the agreement between Hawkins and the Spaniards with orders for a great sum of money to be paid to Hawkins had been sent to de Spes, who was to forward the enterprise with all diligence. “The design is,” wrote Hawkins, “that my power should join with the Duke of Alba’s power, which he doth secretly provide in Flanders, as well as with the power which cometh with the Duke of Medina from Spain, and so all together to invade this realm and set up the Queen of Scots. They have practised with us for the burning of Her Majesty’s ships; therefore there should be some good care had of them; but not so as to appear that anything is discovered.... The King hath sent a ruby of good price to the Queen of Scots, with letters also, which in my judgment were good to be delivered. The letters be of no importance, but his message by word is to comfort her and say that he hath now none other care than to place her in her own. It were good, also, that the ambassador (de Spes) did make request unto your Lordship that Fitzwilliam may have access to the Queen of Scots to render thanks to her for the delivery of our prisoners [_i.e._, in Spain] now at liberty. It will be a good colour for your Lordship to confer with him more largely. I have sent your Lordship a copy of my _pardon_ from the King of Spain, in the very order and manner I have it. The Duke of Medina and the Duke of Alba hath, each, one of the same _pardons_ more amplified to present to me; although this be large enough! with very great titles and honours from the King: from which God deliver me!... Their practices be very mischievous, and they be never idle. But God I hope will confound them and turn their devices upon their own necks.”[203]

There was no limit to the credulity of de Spes. The great sum of money passed from him to Hawkins, but though the fourteen ships that the latter had promised to the King of Spain came not, for the discovery of the Ridolfi treason upset for the time the whole plan of murder and invasion, the ambassador never lost faith in Hawkins and Fitzwilliam. Norfolk was condemned to death, Mary Stuart, herself in closer confinement than ever, was in dire danger of the block, de Spes threatened and insulted hourly, and his henchman, Luis de Paz, haled to prison, and Antonio de Guaras, his close friend, not daring to leave his house for many months together, and yet de Spes firmly believed that John Hawkins, an Englishman if ever there was one, was only waiting the signal from the King of Spain to desert with the English fleet and join his country’s enemies. At length, on the 14th December, Elizabeth determined she would have no more of de Spes. His complicity in the Ridolfi plot had been made absolutely clear; his pernicious activity had been watched for three years, and every effort had been made to drive him out of England without avail. So, on the 14th December, 1571, the Lords of the Council summoned him to Westminster. Lord Burghley spoke and told him that repeated requests had been made to the King of Spain to withdraw him, and now the Queen wished to know when he was going, as she did not want him in England. De Spes replied defiantly that he knew nothing about her wants. When he received proper instructions from his own Sovereign to go he would go, and not before.

A long statement of all his misdeeds in England was then read to him in Spanish, to which he replied that much of it was false, and he desired to send an answer to it. “Oh no!” quoth Cecil, “your King would have no reply from Dr. Man, and our Queen will have none from you.” Then, after a few more heated words, the ambassador was told roughly that he would have to leave England in three days, and in the meanwhile he would be in charge of Henry Knollys. Could he send a courier to his King? he asked. No; that would take too long, he was told. To the Duke of Alba, then? Certainly not; they cared nothing for the Duke of Alba, replied Burghley. “It was impossible to leave,” objected de Spes, “until I send and get money from Antwerp to pay my debts.” “We will lend you the money you need,” replied Cecil; and at last de Spes had to make the best of it. Lagging on the road as long as he could upon all sorts of pretexts, his servants imprisoned and he himself threatened and insulted at every step, the ambassador of Spain was at last hustled out of England, fuming with rage and full of hare-brained projects by which, with the help of Hawkins, the King of Spain might be avenged on the heretic Queen and become the master of England.

The Huguenots were now in unrestrained power in France, and Elizabeth, as usual when she was in fear of Spain, was carrying on a desperate flirtation with the Duke of Anjou, and surpassing herself in her blandishment to Catharine de Medici. Simultaneously with the expulsion of de Spes from England, the Spanish ambassador in Paris, Don Francés de Alava, found France similarly uncongenial to him; for he had been plotting against the Huguenots as de Spes had plotted against the Protestants, and had fled in disguise to Flanders, so that Philip found himself alienated both from England and France at the same time, a position that always made him uneasy, especially now that not only a marriage but a national alliance was in full negotiation between Elizabeth and Catharine.[204] For the next six months the farcical political courtship of the young Duke of Alençon, the boy brother of Anjou and the King of France, was carried on furiously by the middle-aged Queen of England as an antidote for the unappeasable anger of Spain. But with her usual diplomacy, now that she had worked her will in everything, Elizabeth thought best not to drive Philip into violent courses against her. She had seized his million ducats and all the property of his subjects in England, she had unmasked all his plots, had expelled his ambassador, flouted his great viceroy Alba, her subjects had harried Spanish ships on every sea, and helped unchecked the Dutch rebels who defied him; but she did not wish to go to war with him if she could help it, especially if she could gain all she wanted without doing so.

When the Spanish ambassador in Paris was about to escape, Walsingham, the English ambassador, had gone and congratulated him upon the great naval victory over the Turks in the Mediterranean that King Philip’s brother, Don Juan, had just gained at Lepanto; and then, after asking many curious questions about Don Juan, Walsingham had said to Don Francés, as if in joke, “This sounds like a marriage, does it not?” The Spaniard retorted in the same tone, “Yes; let you and I manage it together.” With this opening Walsingham became serious, and enlarged upon Elizabeth’s personal obligations and liking for her Spanish brother-in-law, and the turpitude of certain ministers in sowing discord between them. If it were not for the obstacle of religion, he continued, the marriage hinted at might take place. It was, of course, mere talk, and was intended to be no more; but Walsingham spoke with a purpose, and knew that his mistress thought it time to repair some of the broken ties that held her country to Spain.

More marked and authoritative approaches were made simultaneously in England itself. The man who had been instructed by Alba to keep an eye on Spanish affairs unofficially when de Spes left England was Antonio de Guaras, an Aragonese merchant living on Dowgate Hill, Thames Street. He had been established in London for many years as a prosperous importer of Spanish produce, and had a perfect craze for writing descriptions of public events and taking part in public affairs; a zealous busybody, whose flamboyant patriotism and Catholicism had made him the friend and companion of successive Spanish ambassadors, especially of de Spes. In the anti-Catholic excitement in May, 1569, his house had been raided by the officers of the law deputed to destroy superstitious images, and a considerable stock of church ornaments of this description seized. One half of the stock was piled into a heap before Guaras’ door and burnt, the other half being similarly treated by the Standard in Cheapside; whilst the people, who only a dozen years before, under Mary, had been so devoutly Catholic, cried in derision that they were burning the Spanish gods.[205] Since that time, as Guaras had been the principal importer of such wares from Spain, he had shown himself as little as possible in the streets to avoid unpleasantness, though of course he, like so many other Spaniards interested, had tried his hand again and again to make some private arrangement for the ransom of the Spanish commercial property seized by the English.

The Flemish noble Zweveghem, and the Genoese merchant Fiesco, who had both been negotiating in London about the seizures, were packed off at the same time as de Spes, for Elizabeth and Cecil were bent upon making the demonstration as political and public as possible; but though it did not suit the economical Queen to disgorge what she had taken, she had no wish to drive Philip to extremities, and the stoppage of the great English cloth trade with Flanders and of the importation of Spanish produce into England was causing serious distress in the country. So, having thoroughly humbled the Spaniards, whose hands were fuller than ever now with the capture of Brille by the Beggars and the rising of all Zeeland, supported by ample English aid, Elizabeth thought that the time had come for her to unbend a little to her sorely pressed brother-in-law. Walsingham’s half joking colloquy with Alava in Paris, in January, 1572, had been a straw cast into the air; the warning of the Dutch privateer fleet out of Dover, though ostensibly to satisfy the remonstrances of the Hamburg merchants, was another; and in March Guaras, a mere merchant, hitherto so unpopular, suddenly found himself made much of by emissaries from the Court. Friends of Cecil told him that the Queen was only too willing to come to an amicable arrangement about trade, and any person who brought it about would be doing a great service to God and to both countries. What a pity it was that there was no person accredited in London who could undertake it! Would Guaras convey these expressions to Alba? If so, the interlocutor would approach Lord Burghley.

After many hints of this sort Burghley himself sent for Guaras, and told him that they were anxious to settle matters. “He spoke of your Majesty’s person with due reverence, confessing to me that they had always hitherto feared and suspected greatly that the Duke of Alba, being a declared enemy, might oppose a settlement, but they had lately been informed that the evil did not arise with him entirely, but from certain persons in your Majesty’s Court, mentioning the late Duke of Feria, who, he said, though ostensibly a good friend of the Queen, was in matters of State her enemy.” Guaras, who loved to play the statesman, boasted somewhat of his master’s greatness and of the benefit his friendship would bring to England, but, of course, in diplomacy he was no match for Cecil, who firmly put him into his place. Thenceforward for weeks the game of advance and retire on the part of Cecil went on. Sometimes Guaras would go home to Thames Street in the seventh heaven of delight, with the idea that he was settling great national affairs where professional diplomatists had failed; at other times he would stand for hours in Cecil’s anterooms of Whitehall, only to be passed by silently with a cold nod when the Minister came out.

When at last it was agreed (8th April) that Zweveghem, the Flemish Councillor, should come again to England and settle matters, Guaras, much pleased at his success, entered his barge from Whitehall stairs to return home with the friend who served as his intermediary with Lord Burghley. As the boat pushed off into the stream, he says, “I saw the Queen approaching the landing-place of the Palace in her barge, in which, the day being fine, she had been taking the air in company with my Lord of Leicester and many other gentlemen, and followed by a large number of boats filled with people who wished to see her Majesty. We, being amongst the press of people, stayed our boat to look upon her, and when I made my bow like the rest, the Queen, as usual, saluted the people, and noticing me, either because she recognised me or because I was a foreigner or some one told her my name, to the surprise of every one, I being such a humble person, she, calling out to me in Italian, my boat being somewhat distant from hers out of respect to her, asked me very gaily and graciously if I was coming from the Court and had seen Lord Burghley I knelt, as was my duty, and replied, ‘Yes, Madam, at your Majesty’s service.’ As the boats approached the landing-place her Majesty’s barge was delayed a moment, when she smilingly seemed to desire to say something more to me, whereupon I endeavoured to bring my boat alongside the Queen’s barge, and she turned towards me and asked, ‘When were you with Lord Burghley?’ to which I replied, ‘Madam, I have just left him,’ whereupon she waved her hand several times, apparently with great pleasure, and said, ‘That is all right,’ and her barge then proceeded, she bidding me farewell with so many signs of pleasure and favour that people noticed it much, and I was more surprised than any one to receive these favours from the Queen, to whom I have never rendered any service.”[206]

Elizabeth had no intention, however, of allowing the Spaniards, and particularly Alba, to assume any airs of superiority on the strength of her willingness to negotiate about trade. When Zweveghem saw her a few days afterwards, sent by Alba to discuss terms, she thought that his tone was too haughty, and that he seemed to assume that she was pleading for an arrangement. Guaras, of course, had to bear the blame. It was at once said that he had misrepresented matters to Alba, and there was nothing but black looks for him. “Tell Guaras,” said Burghley, “that if he wants to come and see me let him come, or stay away, as he likes.... If the Duke of Alba, through Guaras, pretends to be willing for peace and concord, whilst on the other hand through Zweveghem he treats the matter in a different spirit, it is clear that, however good our intentions may be, theirs are not equally so.” Alba was in no melting mood now, for English men and arms were being poured into Zeeland, and the Huguenots also were helping the Netherlanders against him. The Dutch privateers were still sheltered in English ports, whilst Constable Montmorenci, and one of the most splendid embassies that ever represented France, was in England for the ratification of the offensive and defensive alliance of the two countries that had been signed at Blois on the 12th April. By it the Spanish Netherlands were to be partitioned, the ancient rivals were never to quarrel again, the Huguenot Navarre was to marry the King of France’s sister. Elizabeth might, perhaps, marry young Alençon, but in any case she and Catharine, with the Huguenots, were bound together for ever to resist the arrogance of Spain. All this was gall and wormwood to Alba, and, busy as he was with his bloody work, it is no wonder that he was now in no hurry to respond to the English approaches for a settlement, and Guaras for a time found himself cold-shouldered.

The affection between the French and English, however, was too pronounced to last very long. The offensive and defensive alliance against Spain had given to the Huguenots more power than quite suited Catharine, and the Colignys and their friends of the “religion” were speaking too boldly to please her. The Emperor (whose daughter the young King Charles IX. had married), the Pope, and the Doge of Venice sent to remonstrate with the Most Christian King for thus joining rebels and heretics against good Catholics, whilst the Gondis, Biragos, and Guises were whispering to Catharine that she was provoking Philip too far. So, as the summer of 1572 wore on, the messages sent from France to England grew cooler, and Charles IX. began to cry off the bargain for the joint action with Elizabeth in the Spanish Netherlands. But still Catharine pushed industriously the love-making of her favourite boy Alençon with Elizabeth, in order that England and the Huguenots might not be driven into open opposition to her. A pretty lad named La Mole, one of the _mignons_, was sent to England in July, ostensibly to do the vicarious love-making for Alençon, but really to discourage the idea of any act of overt hostility on the part of France in the Spanish States,[207] and thus practically to withdraw from the much-lauded treaty of alliance, of which the ink was hardly dry.

La Mole performed the philandering part of his mission entirely to Elizabeth’s satisfaction. She was on her progress to Kenilworth, and carried the young French gallant along with her from place to place, exerting all her mature witcheries upon him, but keenly alive and not a little apprehensive at the way in which she had been thrown over with regard to the alliance. The danger to her was great, for she had been drawn into a position of open hostility to the Spaniards in Flanders on the strength of the alliance with France, and now found herself alone. So she told everybody, and most people believed her this time, that she meant to marry the French prince without fail, and when she bade goodbye to La Mole at Kenilworth, he went on his homeward way loaded with sweet messages for the Prince and rich presents for himself.