Chapter IX (3)

The Tagus was crowded with ships when, in March, 1588, Medina Sidonia took command. Eleven huge galleons, contributed by Portugal, headed by the flagship _San Martin_, was to be the squadron of the high admiral. The Andalusian squadron of fifteen vessels was to be led by Don Pedro de Valdés; and the famous Biscay seamen Oquendo and Martinez de Recalde were to lead other squadrons, and Diego Flores yet another. There were thirty-one armed store-ships, all carrying their quota of fighting-men as well as sailors, seven-and-twenty pinnaces and sloops, and four armed galleys, such as in the Mediterranean formed the Spanish fighting force. In all 114 ships lay there before the white city of Lisbon on its amphitheatre of hills. Gallant and strong they looked with their carved and gilded prows, their fluttering silken banners, and the soaring crucifix upon the highest pinnacle of their bows. But, alas! the dry-rot of Philip’s system was at the very heart of the enterprise. The soldiers came still in driblets and unwillingly. Arms were accumulating in one part of Spain, whilst the men to bear them were mustered in another. Stores went astray or remained bogged and derelict many miles from their destination; wine ran short and water went bad upon the ships. The long delay had caused the bottoms to foul and the seams to gape; and the overburdened Duke of Medina Sidonia could but clamour more piteously than Santa Cruz had done for more supplies, more men, more arms, more money, more everything, unless disaster were to fall upon the expedition. The Irish and English Catholics on the quays of Lisbon, and the priests and friars who flocked everywhere, made light of difficulties. Was it not God’s own fleet, going upon His errand, and could He be beaten? Was not England tired to death of their heretic Queen and her ministers? and was not a whole nation waiting with open arms to welcome those who came as friends and deliverers? And the haughty, confident Spanish nobles, courtiers, and soldiers, fretting in idleness, scoffed and reviled the timid councils of the Duke of Medina Sidonia. But the sailormen shook their heads sadly. They knew that Biscay storms and Channel gales could not be controlled by swords and pikes, and that at sea Drake and the West-country ships could sail several points closer to the wind than could their lumbering round-bowed galleons that looked so mighty.

No day passed without some fresh demand from Medina Sidonia; and at last Philip himself, long-suffering as he was, began to lose patience, for the spring was wearing on, and Parma, in despair, was, as we have seen, praying him either to abandon the enterprise or send him means for keeping together his dwindling army. At length, in April, it was impossible to hide any longer the open complaints of the soldier nobles. Medina Sidonia’s insatiable demands, they said, were prompted by sheer cowardice, with a view to preventing the sailing of the expedition altogether. Already he had under his command the strongest force that ever sailed the seas—130 vessels of an aggregate tonnage of 58,000 tons, 2,431 cannon, and 30,000 men, between soldiers and sailors. All was ready. The orders to the fleet had been given long since—orders that prescribed a code of conduct for the rough seamen and men-at-arms such as would have befitted a convent school. There was to be no bad language or loose talk, no dicing or card-playing, no evil living. Prayers and Masses were to be sung daily, and every man, high and low, was to be confessed and absolved; for all were going on a sacred crusade against the foes of God and the faith. The friars and priests, both on the ships and ashore, exhorted ceaselessly all these reckless soldiers and half-savage sailors, until, with hearts aflame, they too began to scowl at the tardy Duke, who alone seemed to hold them back from their heaven-sent mission.

At length, at the end of April, peremptory command came from Philip that the Armada must sail at once. The old orders to Santa Cruz were repeated. The fleet must go straight up the Channel to the North Foreland, avoiding an engagement if possible, until the main body of the English fleet should be met, as he thought it would, off Margate, where it was to be defeated or held in check, and then Parma and his army were to be protected on their way across to the Thames. All difficulties and dangers in such a plan were ignored or smoothed over by Philip. The warnings of years had been lost upon him. He still counted upon his big ships outmanœuvring and gaining the wind of the English craft; he still believed that the old grappling tactics were possible, in the face of Drake’s new strategy and the superior build of the English ships. And he broke faith with Parma too. Parma had never wavered in his condition. He would not cross the sea until he was reinforced by six thousand Spanish veterans from the Armada; and yet in these last instructions to Medina Sidonia it was left to his discretion whether these veterans should be sent. Thus all the elements of discord existed before the great fleet sailed. An almost monkish discipline was enjoined on the fleet by the King, and it is clear that Philip himself had worked his spirit into a state of fervour which made him believe that sanctimoniousness would compensate for the absence of practical provisions for success. Saints’ names alone formed the watchwords, Jesus for Sunday, the Holy Ghost for Monday, the Holy Trinity for Tuesday, and so on; whilst the ships’ boys were to chant the Salve and good-morrow at daybreak and the Ave Maria at sunset on every vessel.

On the 25th April, 1588, the sacred banner was delivered to the Duke by Philip’s Viceroy, the Archduke Albert, in Lisbon Cathedral; and thence with raised crosses, swinging censers, flaming candles, and chanting priests it was borne before the whole kneeling hosts of the Armada in the great square of the city. And then, sped by prayers and psalms of rogation, the Armada, with its cargo of hopes and fears, tried for a month in vain to get out of the Tagus, with a boisterous westerly gale blowing full into the mouth of the river. But at length, at the end of May, 1588, the fleet got clear out to sea; the Duke complaining to the last of his subordinates and of his ships to the King, and praying that God would avert disaster. Contrary winds still held the fleet back for a fortnight more on the coast, and then, on the 19th June, a great storm came and scattered the ships like chaff. Some, with the Duke, fled in dire danger to shelter in Corunna, some even were blown within sight of the Scilly Isles, and many ran into the Biscay and Galician ports. Confusion, utter and complete, overcame the host. Many of the ships were crippled, spars broken, sails split, and planks started. Provisions were spoilt; the long delay had consumed stores and water; and again Medina Sidonia appealed to the King to abandon an enterprise which seemed so ill-starred, and again he clamoured for more stores, more men, more money, more arms.

On the 24th June, in despair, he wrote to the King as follows: “When your Majesty ordered me to take command of this fleet I gave many reasons why I ought not to undertake it.... I saw that it was going against a powerful nation, which had the help of its neighbours, and that the task would require a much larger force than that collected at Lisbon; I therefore declined the command.... Since then the ships have suffered much, and the fleet is now greatly inferior to that of the English; the crews are weakened by sickness, and numbers fall ill daily in consequence of bad food.... The provisions are rotten, the water is stinking, and our stores will not last two months under the most favourable conditions.”[291] Then he goes on to say that all the power of Spain, all the King’s hopes, credit, and prestige, are entrusted to this Armada, and its loss would mean irretrievable ruin. “It would be unwise,” he says, “to run such a risk even with equal forces, but much more so with such an inferior force as we have now, the men inexperienced, and the officers, on my conscience I assure your Majesty, hardly any of them knowing or capable of doing their duty.... Believe me, your Majesty, we are very weak; pray do not allow any one to persuade you otherwise.” The timid Duke was full of forebodings, but Don Pedro de Valdés and other officers were writing at the same time to the King, impatiently scoffing at the delay, and Philip sternly, almost angrily, ordered Medina Sidonia to carry out his instructions without further parley—to patch up and collect his vessels again and sail up the Channel, with God’s blessing, to conquer the heretics who were holding the fair land of England.

And thus Philip the Prudent cast to the winds all the dictates of prudence. Parma, at all events, could not be accused either of ineptitude or of cowardice, and yet he had twice solemnly warned his uncle to abandon his plan, now that all Europe knew of it and was prepared to frustrate it. If Philip had determined (as indeed he had) to run all risks and depend upon the special interposition of Providence in his favour, it was surely the height of folly to entrust the task, upon the success of which the whole future of his cause depended, to two unwilling commanders, both of whom deliberately foretold failure. It was, perhaps, impossible for him to dismiss Parma at short notice; but the letter from Medina Sidonia quoted above would amply have justified either his recall or the abandonment of the enterprise for which he, the commander, foretold defeat. Like Villeneuve at Trafalgar, Medina Sidonia was a beaten man before he met his enemy; but Philip, blind to all worldly considerations and steadfast in his faith in himself and his cause, elected to strike his supreme blow against Elizabeth with an obsolete and faulty weapon wielded by a feeble hand.

With plentiful prayers and the blessings of Churchmen, with abundant copies of Father Parsons’s allocutions to his countrymen on the blessings of Spanish rule, and Cardinal Allen’s exhortations in favour of the old faith, the Armada sailed. The victuals were scanty and bad, the water was putrid, the craft overcrowded and fever-haunted; the admiral was faint-hearted and prophesied disaster; but the crank ships, with strained spars and gaping seams, though they looked so brave and loomed so high, sailed out of Corunna on the 12th July, 1588, doomed beforehand to disaster, which only a miracle from on high could avert from them. How the disaster fell there is no space here to relate; but a week’s running fight up the Channel, and one hopeless battle at bay, struck the first irreparable blow at the fable of Philip’s irresistible power, and the prestige that clung still around the name of the Emperor and his son.

We have followed the process by which circumstances and the personal character of the chief actors in the great drama had driven Philip, after thirty years of diplomacy in trying to win England to his side without any concessions on his part, into a violent course at last. The result of his over-caution for so many years had been that he was forced to be reckless after all or fail entirely; the outcome of his fatal desire to win all for himself without risking anything was that when the crisis came he had to risk everything on a losing hazard. Elizabeth was more fortunate in the issue than her brother-in-law, but hardly more wise. Almost to the day when the Armada sighted her coasts she was beguiled into a belief that her negotiations with Parma might avert war, though Walsingham and the sailors were almost in despair at what they saw was the terrible risk she ran. She was far more hard-fisted and parsimonious than Philip, too, when once it was brought home to her that she and her people would have to fight for the independence of England. Her men, unlike those at the bidding of Philip, were full of initiative and boldness, though they had to cope with material obstacles almost as great as his. All was unready in England when the peril loomed near, and even if the Queen had been as liberal as she was stingy, sufficient stores could not in the circumstances have been improvised and concentrated.

But every one in England, high and low, did his best. There was but little of the vapouring self-confidence that led the Spanish soldiers into the disillusionment which destroyed their nation’s potency; but the predictions and assurances with regard to England of Parsons and the English Jesuits and Spanish pensioners, were all signally falsified. The moderate English Catholics, who quite conceivably might have welcomed the adoption of an English Catholic successor to Elizabeth under Spanish patronage, were indignant at the Jesuit-Spanish plan to foist Philip’s daughter upon the throne after deposing Elizabeth and submitting the country to conquest. The treatment meted out to Englishmen in Spain by the Inquisition had given even to Catholics no desire to live under a rule which made such an institution a branch of Government. So, when the time of trial came, the Howards, Catholics though they were, and often as they had been parties to Philip’s plans, fought against him as stoutly as the veriest Puritan of them all. A generation had passed away since Philip had personally felt the pulse of England. Allen, Englefield, and Parsons had not, for many years before the Armada sailed, seen with their own eyes the growing spirit of patriotism which under Elizabeth was binding Englishmen as such together, independent of their creeds; and the Jesuit Churchmen and pensioned laymen who advised Philip that the English people would welcome the men on the Armada with open arms as liberators were as the blind leading the blind, for they were not in touch with nor understood the England that had arisen since their time.

For the rest of Philip’s life, ten years, a more pressing task even than that of winning England by finesse or force claimed his every effort. The murder of Henry III. made a Protestant King of France; and to prevent the country from joining the Reformation Philip and Spain would have to fight until the last dollar was spent and the last Spanish soldier was dead. Again, the Infanta was his candidate for the Crown of all or a portion of her mother’s land; and, as in the case of England, the forces of patriotism in the end overrode the differences of creed, and all Frenchmen coalesced to oppose foreign aggression. Henry IV. “went to Mass,” it is true, and that France remained a Catholic country through his efforts was the only great triumph of Philip’s strenuous life.

From the time when the Armada, or such of the ships as escaped the wild Atlantic gales, crept home, plague-stricken, battered wrecks, and the cry of mortal anguish went up from all Spanish hearts at the cruel disappointment of their hopes, Philip, it is true, continued to strive against the woman who had beaten him. These efforts I have described elsewhere: but with no hope of conquering England by frontal attack was one little expedition after another with infinite difficulty and friction fitted out thenceforward in Corunna. For that Philip knew well the time had passed, notwithstanding the continued exhortations of the Churchmen and pensioned refugees. Thenceforward it was his plan to incite Irish Catholics to revolt, to render Elizabeth unsafe and uneasy, in order to prevent her from aiding Henry of Navarre in France; to look forward to the time when her death, by natural or unnatural means, should give him a chance of manœuvring a sovereign apt for his purpose upon the throne of England. With the failure of Philip’s thirty-five years’ struggle to gain the control of England for his ends under two sister Queens, the downfall of his own system and the decay of Spain were absolutely inevitable, though the tradition of its potency died hard and was maintained long after its reality had fled.

It is bootless to consider what would have been the result if Philip’s methods had been less rigid, and if he could have fought his enemies with their own weapons; for if such had been the case he would not have been Philip, and the situation that made the long struggle incumbent upon him would never have been created. But, though on his agonising death-bed in his poor cell at the Escorial, in the autumn of 1598, he knew that Elizabeth still defied him, and the Dutch Protestants repudiated his rule, that wherever the yoke of Rome was shaken off it could be imposed no more, he still held firmly to his faith beyond all earthly evidence, that God in His good way and time would send triumphant victory to the cause for which He and Philip had fought in partnership—the supremacy of Catholicism and the preponderance of Spain amongst the nations.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Moryson to the Council, 7th October 1552. Record Office.

[2] Thirlby, Hoby, and Moryson to the Council. State Papers, Germany.

[3] Sir Philip Hoby to Cecil. Hatfield Papers and Haynes.

[4] Papiers d’État du Cardinal de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[5] The envoys to the Emperor. Papiers d’État de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[6] The Emperor to the envoys. Papiers d’État de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[7] The Imperial envoys to the Emperor. Papiers d’État, vol. iv.

[8] The Emperor to the envoys, 20th July.

[9] Contemporary account by Antonio de Guaras. Edited by Garnett.

[10] Ambassades de Noailles, vol. ii

[11] Renard to the Emperor. Papiers d’État de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[12] He had, in fact, several children by the Lady Doña Isabel de Osorio, with whom he had lived since his young wife’s death. The fact that Granvelle puts the word in the plural proves that this was quite recognised.

[13] In the private letter which the Emperor wrote to his son on the subject he says: “if the choice falls upon a foreigner, I think the English would rather have me than any one else, as they have always been well disposed towards me. But I can assure you that even greater dominions” (_i.e._, than England) “would not seduce me nor divert me from the very different intention which I hold. If, therefore, they should send and propose this marriage to me, I have thought that it would be better to suggest you, and the matter could then be carried through successfully. The benefits and advantages which would accrue are so great and notorious that they need not be particularised. I only place it before you for your consideration. Let me know at once what you think of it, so that we may act accordingly; but keep it strictly secret.”—MS. Simancas. Printed in the _Retiro, estancia y muerte del Emperador Carlos V._

[14] Granvelle to Renard. Papiers d’État, vol. iv.

[15] Although Renard at this interview of 6th August did not, according to his own statement, bring forward Philip’s name to the Queen, public rumour was already busy with it. Noailles three days afterwards wrote to the King of France saying that the Imperial ambassadors had proposed Philip to the Queen: “and it was not now so sure that she would marry Courtenay. It is thought that the effect of his presence has greatly damaged his reputation, although he is quite handsome and well bred.”—“_Mais la nourriture que vous, Sire, pouvez penser qu’il á pris ayant été toujours fermé dés son enfance dans des murailles lui a laissé si peu de gravité et d’experience qui je crains beaucoup qu’il soit pour se conduire á telle fortune, Combien que la commune de toute cette province la lui desire._”—Ambassades de Noailles.

[16] The Princess in question was the daughter of Eleanor, sister of the Emperor, and now the widow of Francis I. of France.

[17] Renard had seen Bishop Gardiner, the Queen’s principal minister, the day before, and had tried to draw some declaration from him, although he was known to be in favour of the Courtenay match. The Bishop said that he would not suggest any name to the Queen; but if she asked his advice as to marrying a foreigner, he would tell her that, for the good of her country and her own safety, it would be better to marry an Englishman, as the very name of foreigner was hated by the English. “As for the Prince of Spain,” continued Gardiner, “if she married him, the people would never tolerate the Spanish character; which even the Flemish subjects of the Emperor detest; besides which, the marriage would mean for England a perpetual war with France.”—Papiers d’État de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[18] Philip wrote to his father, “If the marriage should be proposed for your Majesty, that would be the best course. But if your Majesty persists in the view you state to me in your letter and you think better to treat of the marriage for me, you know already that as an entirely obedient son I have no other will than yours, and above all on an affair of this importance. I therefore leave it to your Majesty to act as you deem best.”—MS. Simancas. _Retiro estancia y muerte del Emperador_, etc.

[19] A curious account of these preparations will be found in Machyn’s Diary.

[20] Ambassades de Noailles, vol. ii. Noailles, in describing the scene to the King of France, says that when de Geneda entered the boat that was to convey him down the Thames on his way to Spain, he announced that Prince Philip would visit Queen Mary in the following March on his way to Flanders; and Noailles advises the King of France to muster his ships in the Channel to prevent the Prince’s passage.

[21] Antonio de Guaras.

[22] Antonio de Guaras, who was present in the Abbey. It was noticed by the Imperial ambassadors that Princess Elizabeth, who at the ceremony took the place due to a Royal Princess, with Anne of Cleves, exchanged significant glances with Noailles whenever she met him. In the course of the day she complained to the French ambassador of the weight of the coronet she was wearing. “Patience!” was his reply, “it will soon produce a better one.”—Record Office, Brussels Transcripts, i. p. 436.

[23] The details of these interesting interviews are in Renard’s Letters, Record Office, Brussels Transcripts, vol. i.

[24] Renard to the Emperor, 31st October. Record Office, Brussels Transcripts. Mary had apparently waited until the Acts had passed declaring her mother’s marriage legal. This was effected on the 28th October.

[25] The Emperor to his son, 21st January, 1554, asking him to ratify the treaty, notwithstanding the hardness of the conditions. MSS. Simancas, Estado 808.

[26] Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[27] Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[28] Record Office, Brussels Transcripts, vol. i. 979.

[29] Documentos Ineditos, vol. iii.

[30] Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[31] Ambassades de Noailles, Instruction à Lamarque, vol. iii.

[32] Documentos Ineditos, iii.

[33] Renard to the Emperor, 8th March. Record Office, Brussels Transcripts, vol. i.

[34] Renard to the Emperor, 8th March. Record Office, Brussels Transcripts, vol. i.

[35] Ibid.

[36] As showing the excited condition of the public mind even yet with regard to the marriage, it may be mentioned that the day before this scene was passing, on the 6th March, two bands of about 300 London urchins collected in a field—probably Moorfields—and engaged in strenuous combat against each other; one band representing the Queen’s and Philip’s forces, and the other those of the King of France and Wyatt’s. Noailles, in his account of the affair—though Renard does not mention the detail—says that the unfortunate boy who was made to represent the Prince of Spain was captured and hanged, very nearly fatally. The leaders of the fight on both sides were well whipped and imprisoned by the Queen’s orders.—Ambassades de Noailles, iii. 130. Renard’s Letter, 9th March. Record Office, Brussels Transcripts, and Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[37] Muñoz’s narrative, Sociedad de Bibliofilos.

[38] Muñoz’s narrative.

[39] On this and on all occasions that English fashions of the time are described by Spaniards, mention was made of the enormous number of ornamental buttons that English gentlemen wore on their garments.

[40] Muñoz’s narrative.

[41] Muñoz’s narrative.

[42] In fact they shipped a large number of horses.

[43] Muñoz’s narrative. Sociedad de Bibliofilos.

[44] Record Office, Brussels Transcripts.

[45] Renard to the Emperor. Record Office, Brussels Transcripts.

[46] Renard to the Emperor, 9th June. Record Office, Brussels Transcripts.

[47] Noailles to the King, 17th June, 1554. Ambassades.

[48] Renard to the Prince, 13th March, Record Office, Brussels Transcripts.

[49] Papiers d’État de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[50] The only warrant for the seasick story is that contained in a letter from Bedford and Fitzwalter in Spain to the Council, saying that the Prince “was wont to be very sick upon the sea,” and proposing that some preparations should be made at Plymouth for his landing there in case of need. But, in fact, Philip had a smooth voyage, and remained at anchor on the _Espiritu Santo_ in Southampton harbour for nearly twenty-four hours before he landed, and was in perfect health.

[51] The bulk of the Spanish fleet was not allowed even to enter the harbour of Southampton for provisions and water, which only after much unpleasantness and discourtesy they were able to obtain at Portsmouth.

[52] Whilst they all praise the sumptuous fittings of the rooms, not a single Spanish narrator says a word of the story told by the malicious Venetian, that Philip was shocked by the words “Fidei Defensor” being embroidered on the hangings.

[53] Enriquez’s narrative. Sociedad de Bibliofilos.

[54] Philip’s courtiers sneered that Browne took the King’s horses to his own stables to recover from the voyage, in order that he might have a chance of keeping them altogether.

[55] Muñoz’s and Enriquez’s narratives. Sociedad de Bibliofilos.

[56] Narrative by Car, who was a servant to Pescara. Printed in Milan, 1554. See the author’s “Year After the Armada.”

[57] All foreign visitors to England in the sixteenth century remarked upon the great profusion of plate used for household purposes at the time.

[58] Enriquez’s narrative.

[59] Philip had sent a Spanish magistrate, Alcalde Bribiesca, to England before him, to dispose of cases in his own following. The English were bitterly jealous of this, and refused to acknowledge any jurisdiction for him.

[60] Enriquez’s narrative. The narrator was a kinsman of the Duchess.

[61] This reminds one of Queen Elizabeth’s dancing, which was praised as “high and disposedly.”

[62] Queen Jane and Queen Mary (Camden Society), Foxe’s Acts and Monuments, and other contemporary chronicles.

[63] John Elder’s Letter, Camden Society.

[64] John Elder’s Letter, Camden Society.

[65] MSS. Simancas, Estado 808.

[66] Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[67] Ambassades de Noailles, vol. iii. 311.

[68] Letters from both Mary and Pole to the King of France advocating the conclusion of Peace are in Ambassades de Noailles, vol. iii. 323-4.

[69] Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[70] Queen Jane and Mary, and Holingshed.

[71] We get at this time (October, 1554), whilst the royal couple were at Hampton Court, a glimpse of their life together. “As for newes you shall understand that the King’s and Queen’s Majesties be in helth and merry, whom I did see daunce togethers uppon Sunday night at the Court, where was a brave maskery of cloth of gold and silver apparailed in mariners garments, the chief doer whereof I think was my lord Admiral.”—Francis Yaxley to Sir W. Cecil, Landsdown MSS. (Cotton), vol. iii. 44.

[72] Venetian Calendar.

[73] Ibid.

[74] In the Venetian Calendar, 21st September, 1554, there is a dignified letter from Pole to Philip reproaching him for allowing him, a Prince of the Church, an Englishman exiled for Mary’s sake half a lifetime, and a Legate of the head of the Church, thus to knock at the door of his country unheeded by a Catholic King.

[75] Mason to the Queen and King, 9th November, Foreign Calendar.

[76] Ibid.

[77] Enriquez’s narrative (Sociedad de Bibliofilos) and John Elder’s letter, Camden Society. Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[78] John Elder says that, as an instance of Pole’s good repute, that when he (Elder) was in Rome it was a common saying there, not only amongst Englishmen, but amongst Italians as well, “_Polus Cardinalis natione Anglus pietatis et literarum testimonio dignus, non qui Polus Anglus, sed qui Polus angelus vocetur_.”

[79] Enriquez’s narrative.

[80] John Elder’s letter.

[81] Papiers d’État de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[82] Enriquez’s narrative.

[83] Enriquez’s narrative.

[84] Michaeli says that ten thousand people listened to the sermon.

[85] Signor Claretta has published (Pinerolo, 1892) an interesting series of documents from the Turin Archives giving full particulars of the visit.

[86] The assertion of so many historians that she came to Whitehall at Christmas, 1554, is erroneous. She did not come till the end of April, long after Savoy’s departure.

[87] At this time (late in 1554) a large number of Spanish shopkeepers and artisans had established themselves in London under the erroneous belief referred to in an earlier page, that the marriage of Philip meant their entering into possession of the kingdom. This had been so much resented by the Londoners that not only were attacks upon these people constant, as recorded by Enriquez and others, but on the 12th October Mary had been obliged to issue a decree commanding all Spanish tradesmen to shut up their shops. This, of course, was a new source of complaint with them.

[88] Foreign Calendar.

[89] Queen Jane and Queen Mary.

[90] Papiers d’État de Granvelle, vol. iv.

[91] On occasion of a grand tilting at Whitehall on the 25th March twenty gentlemen made a brilliant show, and Philip distinguished himself so much that the Queen became anxious and apprehensive, sending to beseech him, as he had run so many courses and done enough, not to encounter any further risk for her sake. He also attended another grand tilt at the weddings of Lords Maltravers and Fitzwalter in the following month.

[92] Venetian Calendar.

[93] “Acts and Monuments.”

[94] Elizabeth’s Italian master was arrested in connection with one of these publications, called “A Dialogue.”—Michaeli, Venetian Papers.

[95] Michaeli’s advices, Venetian Calendar.

[96] Michaeli on this visit mentions that he saw Queen Mary, “who was looking very well; for, placing herself every morning at a small window, she likes to see the procession pass, which at her desire, goes round the palace court, she most courteously bowing her head in acknowledgment to all persons who salute her ... as she did twice with extraordinary cheerfulness and graciousness to the Portuguese ambassador and myself, we having gone into the court to accompany the King to Mass, and joined the procession on the invitation of the Lords of the Council. Her Majesty expects and hopes during this week to comfort the realm by an auspicious delivery, but the greater part of her women think that she will go beyond.”

[97] Renard to the Emperor, 27th June, 1555.—Papiers d’État de Granvelle.

[98] Michaeli, Venetian Calendar.

[99] Ambassades de Noailles, vol. v. 136.

[100] Ambassades de Noailles, vol. v. 98.

[101] Ambassades de Noailles.

[102] Michaeli to the Doge, 3rd September, 1555.—Venetian Calendar.

[103] It must be recollected that Philip’s tolerance and moderation with regard to the extreme persecution of heresy in England was purely a matter of policy, as his after life clearly proved. At a later period, moreover, he actually claimed for himself the credit of the religious persecution. Cabrera de Cordoba quotes a letter from him to his sister Juana, in which he says, “I, having diverted the realm [England] from the sects and brought it into obedience to the Church, and having always been in favour of the punishment of the heretics, which is now being carried out so smoothly in England” (Cabrera, “Vida de Felipe II.”).

[104] State Papers, Domestic, September, 1555.

[105] Ambassades de Noailles.

[106] This, of course, was late in 1555, before the truce of Vaucelles in February, 1556.

[107] Michaeli to the Doge, Venetian Calendar, 28th April, 1556. She had been asked many times to go to Flanders to stay with Philip’s aunt, Mary of Hungary.

[108] The process of these conspiracies may be followed step by step in the Letters of Noailles (Ambassades), Michaeli (Venetian Calendar), and Wotton (Foreign Calendar).

[109] Michaeli, Venetian Calendar.

[110] In a pathetic and submissive letter (Cotton, Titus B. 2, 57, British Museum) Mary beseeches Philip to allow her to defer the matter until he comes to England. Her doubts on the matter seem to have been partly inspired by jealousy of her sister, who if she married Emmanuel Philibert in Flanders would be near Philip, for she adds: “If you will not defer it I shall be jealous of your Highness, which would be worse for me than death—I have already begun to feel uneasy.”

[111] Noailles and Michaeli.

[112] The particulars of this treaty will be found in the author’s Calendar of Spanish State Papers, Henry VIII., vols, vi., vii., and viii.

[113] Sorzano to the Doge, May, 1557, Venetian Calendar, detailing a conversation with Henry on the subject.

[114] The Earl of Bedford, writing to Cecil on the 21st August, says that “the Count of Egmont with two thousand Spaniards and Schwartzreiters and as many of us made a ride into France of twenty-two miles, and found no great resistance, nor should have done though we had gone much further.”—Haynes’ State Papers.

[115] The vast monastery palace of the Escorial owed its origin to such a promise on the part of Philip II. when he saw to his sorrow that his troops had destroyed and sacked a church and cloister dedicated to St. Laurence at St. Quintin. To appease the saint, he promised on the spot to build the grandest monastery to St. Laurence in the world, and he kept his word. For the greater part of his life the building of this stupendous pile upon the sterile Guadarrama steppes was an obsession of the King.

[116] Lord Grey de Wilton to the Queen.—Domestic Calendar.

[117] An interesting account of the defence and loss of Guisnes is given by Lord Grey himself (Camden Society).

[118] MSS. Simancas, Philip to Feria, January, 1558.—Estado, 811.

[119] Howard suspected the influence that had been exerted against him, and charged Feria with it. The Spaniard assured him that he had been misinformed; and in order to mollify him Philip wrote to the Queen asking her to give Howard some Court appointment instead of the Admiralty. Clinton was by Philip’s influence also placed in the Council, of which Howard was not a member, but became so, as well as Lord Chamberlain, shortly afterwards.

[120] Feria to the King, 12th February, 1558 (MSS. Simancas, Estado 811). Philip replied that he could not send the 10,000 crowns required at once, as he was very short of money, but would send it as soon as he could get it in Spain.

[121] MSS. Simancas, Estado 811, Feria to the King, 10th March.

[122] Philip had written to Feria a day or two before saying that the English orders for powder, &c., in Flanders were so excessive that if they were made public the dealers would at once put up the price to his detriment, and he begged that the amount might be reduced. In Rymer’s “Federa” there is a list of the munitions which Gresham was to obtain in conjunction with the Italian banker Bonvisi, who had advanced a loan to Mary: “3,500 hackequebutts, 1,000 pistolets, 500 pondera (lbs.) de Mauches, 100,000 pondera (lbs.) petre salse (saltpetre), 3,000 corselets, 2,000 mourreyens, 3,000 iron cappes, 8,000 lances and pikes.”

[123] Feria, writing to the King on the 6th April, says in reference to this: “Gresham writes that he has found much difficulty and has only taken up £10,000. I do not know how this comes to pass, for Paget and the rest of them told me at first that the loan for £100,000 was already arranged with the merchants I wrote about, and I naturally thought that as it had been settled between them and me that Gresham should go straight to your Majesty that the affair would be carried through at once.... He took letters from the Council to your Majesty, and the Queen instructed him to go straight to you. Now it seems from what he writes that he has not been to Brussels, and he deserves punishment at your Majesty’s hands, as I have told the Queen.”—MSS. Simancas, Estado 811.

[124] Foreign Calendar.

[125] MSS Simancas, 10th March, 1558, Estado 811.

[126] MSS. Simancas, Estado 811.

[127] In the letter written by Philip to Feria in reply to that quoted above he says that he has written to Clinton ordering him to go to Flanders at once to receive Philip’s orders as to what he is to do with the English fleet, “in order that the money it is costing should not be spent fruitlessly.”—MSS. Simancas, Estado 811.

[128] MSS. Simancas, Estado 811.

[129] Feria’s suggestion, to which this is a reply, runs thus: “I wrote to your Majesty that I did not see Madam Elizabeth when I came here because my principal means of carrying through what I wanted was the goodwill of the Queen, and I was anxious not to run counter to her in anything, especially as your Majesty had given me no instructions to the contrary. I afterwards sent a message of apology to Madam Elizabeth by the Admiral’s wife [_i.e._, Lady Clinton], who was brought up with her and is much in her favour. I said that after she left [London] I had received orders from your Majesty to pay my respects to her in your name. I told Paget to excuse me to her also, but I do not think he did so. On the contrary, the Admiral’s wife told me that he asked Madam Elizabeth whether I had visited her, and when she said no he expressed much surprise. Figueroa and myself think the matter should not be left thus, and that it would be best for me to go and see her before I leave. She lives 20 miles away. I shall be glad of your Majesty’s instructions” (MSS. Simancas, Estado 811, Feria to the King, 18th May).

[130] A good instance of this is given in the appointment of the commander of 1,000 English pioneers who had been raised for Philip’s service. Feria wished to send Major Randolph in charge of them. The Councillors appointed another man and said that Randolph was to be appointed to a post on shore in connection with the navy. Feria insisted, and a long quarrel resulted, Feria insisting that Philip should write peremptorily to the Queen about it.

[131] This was certainly not the case. Suriano, the Venetian ambassador, writing from Brussels on the 12th November, on Feria’s hasty voyage to England, when Mary was known to be dying, says drily: “He is in great favour with the Queen and he likewise fancies himself popular there [in England], but may God grant, in case of her Majesty’s death, that he do not experience to his detriment the perverse nature of those people, and their most inveterate hatred of foreigners and above all of Spaniards” (Venetian Calendar, 12th November). The fable of Feria’s great power in England persisted for years, probably owing to his marriage with Sir William Dormer’s daughter Jane, which brought him into relationship with the Sidneys and a powerful group of English noble families. Dr. Man, the English ambassador in Spain in 1567, writes to Cecil (Cotton MSS., Galba ciii.) that he had heard a Spanish gentleman say at table that the “Count de Feria was so beloved in England that in case he would he might have made himself King of England. Which although it be an untruth yet it argueth a confidence the Spaniards have of some great part the Count is yet able to make in England.” In fact, Feria, whose hatred of Elizabeth was intense, was extremely unpopular for his arrogance and presumption in England.

[132] MSS. Simancas, Estado 811.

[133] Philip was already in peace negotiations with the French; and the English Commissioners were holding out strongly for the restitution of Calais as a condition.

[134] Venetian Calendar, 29th October, 1558.

[135] The letter from Feria, dated 14th November, detailing this interview with Elizabeth was abstracted by Gonzalez many years ago with other papers of the period and translated into English. Unfortunately since then the letter appears to have been lost. At least I could not find it when I transcribed the other letters of the period relating to England in the Spanish Royal Archives at Simancas. The letter, however, was printed in Kervyn de Lettenhove’s “Relations Politiques,” &c.

[136] From Father Clifford’s contemporary “Life of the Duchess of Feria” (published), for the inspection of the original manuscript of which I am indebted to its present possessor, Lord Dormer.

[137] Spanish Calendars of Elizabeth (Hume).

[138] Spanish Calendars of Elizabeth, vol. i. (Hume).

[139] The English correspondence on this matter is of much interest. It is in Forbes’s State Papers.

[140] Philip to Feria, 14th February, 1559.—Spanish Calendars of Elizabeth (Hume).

[141] Elizabeth was all the time in negotiation with the Reform party in France through Guido Cavalcanti for a separate peace, if possible, on better terms than could be got in conjunction with Spain. She was quite willing to leave Philip in the lurch, if necessary, though the Catholic advisers of Henry II. had entirely different views. The correspondence is in Forbes’ State Papers of Elizabeth.

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

[143] Spanish Calendar of Elizabeth (Hume).

[144] “Queens of Old Spain,” by Martin Hume.

[145] 12th July, Spanish Calendar, vol, i.

[146] The Bishop of Aquila to Feria, 7th March, 1560.—Spanish Calendar, vol. i.

[147] This pretended _rapprochement_ may be followed in detail in Quadra’s letters in the Spanish Calendar. The intrigue was mainly engineered by Lady Mary Sidney.

[148] Spanish Calendar, vol. i.

[149] Quadra wrote a letter to the Emperor on the 26th June, before he received Philip’s instructions, worded in a way that was purposely intended to deceive. Whilst saying that the Scots were not favourable to the Archduke’s suit unless he brought enough money to keep himself and also that he was strong enough to assert Mary’s claim to the English Crown, he hinted that it was to France and not to Spain that she was looking for a husband. No word is mentioned about Don Carlos.—Spanish Calendar, vol. i. 340.

[150] Serious allegations of intrigues against the Queen had been made against the Bishop by a former secretary of his to Cecil. Shan O’Neil was known to have frequented his house; English Catholics were known to be attendants at Mass in the embassy chapel, and many other complaints were made besides the harbouring and connivance in the escape of the fugitive Italian. The Bishop himself was placed under arrest and subsequently deprived of the use of Durham House as a result of the investigation of these charges.—Spanish Calendar, vol. i., and Domestic Calendar of the same date, 1563.

[151] And not alone to Philip. The merchants of Antwerp wrote beseeching letters to Cecil, and also to Gresham, asking for their influence to procure the re-establishment of commercial intercourse. The correspondence on the subject, extending over many months, is in the Spanish Calendar, vol. i., and in the Flanders Papers of the date (1564) at the Record Office, for the most part abstracted in the Foreign Calendar.

[152] Some of the arguments he is directed to use sound strangely incongruous as coming from Philip. “You may say that they cannot fairly refuse the request about the [Catholic] churches, for even the Turk allows Christians who live in his country to worship God in their own way.”—Spanish Calendar, vol. i. 353.

[153] The meaning of this is that Dudley and his Catholic friends were saying that the suspension of commercial intercourse was favourable to them, as it was driving Englishmen to desperation, and would lead to a revolt against Cecil.

[154] Guzman was warned by his master that he must be very wary how he listened to treasonable suggestions, either from the English and Irish Catholics or from Dudley’s friends, as in either case they might be traps. If Dudley would get Cecil disgraced, Philip would be delighted, but the hand of Spain must on no account be seen in it.—Spanish Calendar, vol. i. 371.

[155] Spanish Calendar, vol. i.

[156] When Elizabeth visited the University of Cambridge on her autumn progress, she declined, in consequence of want of time, to attend a theatrical performance offered to her by the students. Before she reached her next stopping-place she was persuaded to alter her mind, and she returned to witness the play. To her annoyance the imprisoned Catholic bishops were lampooned upon the stage with much sacrilegious buffoonery, whereupon “the Queen was so angry that she at once rose and entered her own chamber, using very strong language, and the torchbearers, it being night, left them in the dark, and so ended this scandalous representation.”—Spanish Calendar, vol. i. 375, Guzman to the Duchess of Parma.

[157] The Duchess of Aerschot had written to her from Flanders to this effect at the end of 1564.

[158] The King to Guzman, 6th June, 1565.—Spanish Calendar, vol. i. 433.

[159] Randolph to Cecil, 29th April, 1565.—Scottish Calendar (Bain).

[160] Cardinal Pacheco to Philip.—Spanish Calendar, vol. i.

[161] Labanoff, vol. vii.

[162] Spanish Calendar (Hume), vol. i., 16th July, 1565.

[163] Scottish Calendar, vol. i. (Bain).

[164] Scottish Calendar (Bain), 15th September, 1565.

[165] Ibid.

[166] Labanoff, vol. i.

[167] Spanish Calendar, vol. i. 497, Philip to Guzman.

[168] Diary of Sir James Melville of Hall Hill.

[169] How serious the situation was for Elizabeth, and how wide the ramifications of the Catholic intrigue at the time, may be seen by a letter written shortly after this by the English spy Rogers to Cecil. Arthur Pole, who was a prisoner in the Tower, had surrendered in Mary’s favour his claim to the Crown of England, and if he could escape from his prison was to come to Scotland to support her with others of his kin. Darnley himself, trying to outbid Mary, had boasted that forty gentlemen and more in England were ready to serve him. Letters passed fortnightly between the Countess of Lennox in the Tower and her son, whilst every month an emissary of the northern Catholic gentry came in disguise to Darnley from Carlisle. A regular plan, moreover, was prepared for the capture and fortification of Scilly in the Catholic interest, and the representative of the Irish rebel Shan O’Neil was made much of by Darnley, who, amongst other presents, sent to Shan two hundred crowns with which to buy whiskey. The hopes that Mary and Darnley built upon the English Catholics and Spain were therefore well founded, if they had been well handled.—Scottish Calendar, vol. ii. 293.

[170] Guzman to the King, Spanish Calendar, vol. ii., 16th February, 1568.

[171] One of the English spies in Madrid, Hogan, said that it was really Feria who had got Man into the trouble.

[172] Spanish Calendar, vol. ii.

[173] Spanish Calendar, vol. ii., 9th August, 1568.

[174] “I told him that, as for arranging anything of the sort between the Cardinal and the Duke, I regarded such a statement as a silly joke, the vain babble of the idle. I could assure him that to say that such a treaty had gone through my hands was absolutely false. If I had done such a thing against the Queen I should deserve heavy punishment from your Majesty, and even from the Queen herself, such action being entirely opposed to my instructions. I had never in my life had any communication with the Cardinal, and I was quite sure the Queen would not believe such nonsense.”—Spanish Calendar, vol. ii., 65. The English did not seem to understand fully at this time Philip’s distrust of all French interference, even that of the Guises.

[175] This letter is not in Labanoff, but it is probably similar to that sent to Charles IX. from Carlisle on the 26th June.

[176] Spanish Calendar, vol. ii. 71.

[177] Paget House had been the palace of the Bishops of Exeter, and was the first of the great houses on the river side of the Strand outside Temple Bar, on the site of what is now called the Outer Temple. It had been granted by Henry VIII. to Lord Paget.

[178] Very shortly after this, 30th October, when he had got into touch with Mary’s imprudent agent, the Bishop of Ross, de Spes wrote to the King: “I am of opinion that this would be a good opportunity for taking Scottish affairs in hand successfully, and restoring the Catholic religion in this country; and if the Duke [of Alba] were out of his present anxiety and your Majesty wished, it could be discussed.”—Spanish Calendar, vol. ii. 81. A week later de Spes wrote: “It appears as if the time was approaching when this country may be made to return to the Catholic Church, the Queen being in such straits and short of money. I have already informed your Majesty of the offers made by the brother-in-law of Viscount Montagu, on condition that they may look for the protection of your Majesty.”

[179] Almost simultaneously de Spes went to the French ambassador in London (La Mothe) and proposed joint action between them first to oust Cecil from his office, and secondly to stop trade with England entirely both from France and the Spanish dominions, the ostensible object being that, if this were done, Elizabeth and her subjects would be obliged to become Catholic to avoid ruin. De Spes even proposed that the French should pull the chestnuts out of the fire for him by stopping trade first. La Mothe, in writing his account of the suggestion to Catharine, calmly points out the evident absurdity of both proposals. De Spes apparently had no notion of the incompatibility with Philip’s objects of joint action of France and Spain in England.—Correspondance de la Mothe Fénélon, vol. i.

[180] These letters are in the Spanish Calendar, vol. ii.

[181] How dangerous the position was at the time is seen by a letter (3rd December, 1568) from Sir Francis Knollys, who had charge of Mary at Bolton, to Cecil, in which he says that he has less fear that the attempt to release Mary by subterfuge as Cecil thought, than by force, and begs for more troops to resist attack from without. “We all agree herein, that this is an inconvenient and dangerous place for this Queen to tarry in.”

[182] Whilst this letter was being written, Cecil and the Lord Admiral (Clinton) with a great train of followers and the alderman of the City came to Paget House and demanded to see de Spes. Cecil angrily told him that he had advised the Duke of Alba to seize English property, for which disloyal act the Queen placed him (de Spes) under arrest, dismissing his Spanish servants, and handing the charge of the house to Henry Knollys, Arthur Carew, and Lord Knyvett. De Spes answered defiantly, and the breach became wider than ever. Proclamations and counter proclamations, or printed broadsheets, were issued by the English Council and by de Spes respectively, each claiming that justice was on their side with regard to the seizures.—De Spes to the King, 8th January, 1569, Spanish Calendar, vol. ii.

[183] The King to de Spes, 18th February, 1569.—Spanish Calendar, vol. ii.

[184] “Memoirs of Sir James Melville of Hall Hill.”

[185] Norfolk, on his trial, said that Leicester had also suggested the marriage.

[186] De Spes to the King, 5th August, 1569.—Spanish Calendar. Nonsuch House was in the occupation of the Earl of Arundel. De Spes, who had not been admitted to the Queen’s presence for many months, had hopes at this time of being received again to discuss the eternal question of the seizures. But another hitch had occurred, as the Queen refused to receive him without new credentials from Philip himself. It had been intended to take him from Oatlands, where the Queen was, to Nonsuch, after the audience, and there a meeting of the conspirators was to confer with him. This plan, however, was upset by the delay in granting him the audience with Elizabeth.

[187] The details of the Northern Rebellion may be followed closely in the Calendars of State Papers of the period (Spanish, Domestic, Border, and Scottish); in the Sadler Papers; in the Bowes Papers (Memorials of the Rebellion of 1569, by Sir Cuthbert Sharpe). Wright’s Elizabeth Papers, &c.

[188] Philip to Alba, 16th December, 1569.—Spanish Calendar, vol. ii.

[189] These letters are in Labanoff and in the Hardwick State Papers.

[190] The Regent Murray had just been murdered.

[191] Antonio de Guaras to Secretary Zayas.—Spanish Calendar.

[192] Haynes State Papers.