The History of England - Vols. 1 to 6 (275 page)

enemy.a
The duke of Guise, meanwhile, was aiming a mortal blow at the power of the hugonots; and had commenced the siege of Orleans, of which Andelot was governor, PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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and where the constable was detained prisoner. He had the prospect of speedy success in this undertaking; when he was assassinated by Poltrot, a young gentleman, whose zeal, instigated (as is pretended, though without any certain foundation) by the admiral and Beza, a famous preacher, led him to attempt that criminal enterprize. The death of this gallant prince was a sensible loss to the catholic party; and though the cardinal of Lorraine, his brother, still supported the interests of the family, the danger of their progress appeared not so imminent either to Elizabeth or to the French protestants. The union, therefore, between these allies, which had been cemented by their common fears, began thenceforth to be less intimate; and the leaders of the hugonots were persuaded to hearken to terms of a separate accommodation. Condé and Montmorency held conferences for settling the peace; and as they were both of them impatient to relieve themselves from captivity, they soon came to an agreement with regard to the conditions. The character of the queen-regent, whose ends were always violent, but who endeavoured, by subtilty and policy, rather than force, to attain them, led her to embrace any plausible terms; and in spite of the protestations of the admiral, whose sagacity could easily discover the treachery of the court, the articles of agreement were finally settled between the parties. A toleration, under some restrictions, was anew granted to the protestants; a general amnesty was published; Condé was reinstated in his offices and governments; and after money was advanced for the payment of arrears due to the German troops, they were dismissed the kingdom.

By the agreement between Elizabeth and the prince of Condé it had been stipulated,
b

that neither party should conclude peace without the consent of the other; but this article was at present but little regarded by the leaders of the French protestants. They only comprehended her so far in the treaty, as to obtain a promise, that, on her relinquishing Havre, her charges and the money which she had advanced them, should be repaid her by the king of France, and that Calais, on the expiration of the term, should be restored to her. But she disdained to accept of these conditions; and thinking the possession of Havre a much better pledge for effecting her purpose, she sent Warwic orders to prepare himself against an attack from the now united power of the French monarchy.

The earl of Warwic, who commanded a garrison of six thousand men, besides seven hundred pioniers, had no sooner got possession of Havre, than he employed every means for putting it in a posture of defence;
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and after expelling the French from the town, he encouraged his soldiers to make the most desperate defence against the enemy. The constable commanded the French army; the queen-regent herself, and the king, were present in the camp; even the prince of Condé joined the king’s forces, and gave countenance to this enterprize; the admiral and Andelot alone, anxious still to preserve the friendship of Elizabeth, kept at a distance, and prudently refused to join their ancient enemies in an attack upon their allies.

From the force, and dispositions, and situation of both sides, it was expected, that the siege would be attended with some memorable event; yet did France make a much easier acquisition of this important place, than was at first apprehended. The plague creeped in among the English soldiers; and being encreased by their fatigue and bad diet (for they were but ill supplied with provisions
d
) it made such ravages, that PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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sometimes a hundred men a day died of it, and there remained not at last fifteen

hundred in a condition to do duty.e
The French, meeting with such feeble resistance, carried on their attacks successfully; and having made two breaches, each of them sixty feet wide, they prepared for a general assault, which must have terminated in the

slaughter of the whole garrison.f

Warwic, who had frequently warned the English council of the Havre lost. 28th July.

danger, and who had loudly demanded a supply of men and

provisions, found himself obliged to capitulate, and to content himself with the liberty of withdrawing his garrison. The articles were no sooner signed, than lord Clinton, the admiral, who had been detained by contrary winds, appeared off the harbour with a reinforcement of three thousand men; and found the place surrendered to the enemy.

To encrease the misfortune, the infected army brought the plague with them into England, where it swept off great multitudes, particularly in the city of London.

Above twenty thousand persons, there, died of it in one year.NOTE [F]

Elizabeth, whose usual vigour and foresight had not appeared in this transaction, was now glad to compound matters; and as the queen-regent desired to obtain leisure, in order to prepare measures for the extermination of the hugonots, she readily hearkened to any reasonable terms of accommodation with England.
h

It was agreed, that the hostages, which the French had given for 2d April.

the restitution of Calais, should be restored for 220,000 crowns; and that both sides should retain all their claims and pretensions.

The peace still continued with Scotland; and even a cordial Scotch affairs.

friendship seemed to have been cemented between Elizabeth and Mary. These princesses made profession of the most entire affection; wrote amicable letters every week to each other; and had adopted, in all appearance, the sentiments as well as style of sisters. Elizabeth punished one Hales, who had published a book against Mary’s title;
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and as the lord keeper Bacon was thought to have encouraged Hales in this undertaking, he fell under her displeasure, and it was with some difficulty he was able to give her satisfaction, and recover her favour.
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The two queens had agreed in the foregoing summer to an interview at York;
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in order to remove all difficulties with regard to Mary’s ratification of the treaty of Edinburgh, and to consider of the proper method for settling the succession of England: But as Elizabeth carefully avoided touching on this delicate subject, she employed a pretence of the wars in France, which, she said, would detain her in London; and she delayed till next year the intended interview. It is also probable, that, being well acquainted with the beauty and address and accomplishments of Mary, she did not chuse to stand the comparison with regard to those exterior qualities, in which she was eclipsed by her rival; and was unwilling, that a princess, who had already made great progress in the esteem and affections of the English, should have a farther opportunity of encreasing the number of her partizans.

Mary’s close connections with the house of Guise, and her devoted attachment to her uncles, by whom she had been early educated and constantly protected, was the ground of just and unsurmountable jealousy to Elizabeth, who regarded them as her mortal and declared enemies, and was well acquainted with their dangerous character and ambitious projects. They had made offer of their niece to Don Carlos, Philip’s PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)

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son; to the king of Sweden, the king of Navarre, the archduke Charles, the duke of Ferrara, the Cardinal of Bourbon, who had only taken deacon’s orders, from which he might easily be freed by a dispensation; and they were ready to marry her to any one, who could strengthen their interests, or give inquietude and disturbance to

Elizabeth.m
Elizabeth on her part was equally vigilant to prevent the execution of their schemes, and was particularly anxious, lest Mary should form any powerful foreign alliance, which might tempt her to revive her pretensions to the crown, and to invade the kingdom on the side where it was weakest and lay most exposed.
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As she believed, that the marriage with the archduke Charles was the one most likely to have place, she used every expedient to prevent it; and besides remonstrating against it to Mary herself, she endeavoured to draw off the archduke from that pursuit, by giving him some hopes of success in his pretensions to herself, and by inviting him to a

renewal of the former treaty of marriage.o
She always told the queen of Scots, that nothing would satisfy her but her espousing some English nobleman, who would remove all grounds of jealousy, and cement the union between the kingdoms; and she offered on this condition to have her title examined, and to declare her successor to the crown.
p
After keeping the matter in these general terms during a twelvemonth, she at last named lord Robert Dudley, now created earl of Leicester, as the person on whom she desired that Mary’s choice should fall.

The earl of Leicester, the great and powerful favourite of Elizabeth, possessed all those exterior qualities, which are naturally alluring to the fair sex; a handsome person, a polite address, an insinuating behaviour; and by means of these accomplishments, he had been able to blind even the penetration of Elizabeth, and conceal from her the great defects, or rather odious vices, which attended his character. He was proud, insolent, interested, ambitious; without honour, without generosity, without humanity; and atoned not for these bad qualities, by such abilities or courage, as could fit him for that high trust and confidence, with which she always honoured him. Her constant and declared attachment to him had naturally emboldened him to aspire to her bed; and in order to make way for these nuptials, he was universally believed to have murdered, in a barbarous manner, his wife, the heiress of one Robesart. The proposal of espousing Mary was by no means agreeable to him; and he always ascribed it to the contrivance of Cecil, his enemy; who, he thought, intended by that artifice to make him lose the friendship of Mary from the temerity of his pretensions, and that of Elizabeth from jealousy of his attachments to another

woman.q
The queen herself had not any serious intention of effecting this marriage; but as she was desirous, that the queen of Scots should never have any husband, she named a man, who, she believed, was not likely to be accepted of; and she hoped, by that means, to gain time, and elude the project of any other alliance. The earl of Leicester was too great a favourite to be parted with; and when Mary, allured by the prospect of being declared successor to the crown, seemed at last to hearken to Elizabeth’s proposal, this princess receded from her offers, and withdrew the bait, which she had thrown out to her rival.
r
This duplicity of conduct, joined to some appearance of an imperious superiority, assumed by her, had drawn a peevish letter from Mary; and the seemingly amicable correspondence between the two queens was, during some time, interrupted. In order to make up the breach, the queen of Scots dispatched Sir James Melvil to London; who has given us in his memoirs a particular account of his negotiation.

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Melvil was an agreeable courtier, a man of address and conversation; and it was recommended to him by his mistress, that, besides grave reasonings concerning politics and state-affairs, he should introduce more entertaining topics of conversation, suitable to the sprightly character of Elizabeth; and should endeavour by that means to insinuate himself into her confidence. He succeeded so well, that he threw that artful princess entirely off her guard,
s
and made her discover the bottom of her heart, full of all those levities and follies and ideas of rivalship, which possess the youngest and most frivolous of her sex. He talked to her of his travels, and forgot not to mention the different dresses of the ladies in different countries, and the particular advantages of each, in setting off the beauties of the shape and person. The queen said, that she had dresses of all countries; and she took care thenceforth to meet the ambassador every day apparelled in a different habit: Sometimes she was dressed in the English garb, sometimes in the French, sometimes in the Italian; and she asked him, which of them became her most? He answered, the Italian; a reply, that, he knew, would be agreeable to her, because that mode showed to advantage her flowing locks, which, he remarked, though they were more red than yellow, she fancied to be the finest in the world.

She desired to know of him what was reputed the best colour of 1564.

hair: She asked whether his queen or she had the finest hair: She even enquired which of them he esteemed the fairest person: A very delicate question, and which he prudently eluded, by saying that her majesty was the fairest person in England, and his mistress in Scotland. She next demanded which of them was tallest: He replied, his queen: Then is she too tall, said Elizabeth: For I myself am of a just stature. Having learned from him, that his mistress sometimes recreated herself by playing on the harpsichord, an instrument on which she herself excelled, she gave orders to lord Hunsdon, that he should lead the ambassador, as it were casually, into an apartment, where he might hear her perform; and when Melvil, as if ravished with the harmony, broke into the queen’s apartment, she pretended to be displeased with his intrusion; but still took care to ask him whether he thought Mary or her the best performer on that instrument.
t
From the whole of her behaviour, Melvil thought he might, on his return, assure his mistress, that she had no reason ever to expect any cordial friendship from Elizabeth, and that all her professions of amity were full of falsehood and dissimulation.

After two years had been spent in evasions and artifices,
u
Mary’s subjects and counsellors, and probably herself, began to think it full time, that some marriage were concluded, and lord Darnley, son of the earl of Lenox, was the person, in whom most men’s opinions and wishes centered. He was Mary’s cousin-german, by the lady Margaret Douglas, niece to Harry VIII. and daughter of the earl of Angus, by Margaret, queen of Scotland. He had been born and educated in England, where the earl of Lenox had constantly resided, since he had been banished by the prevailing power of the house of Hamilton: And as Darnley was now in his twentieth year, and was a very comely person, tall and delicately shaped, it was hoped, that he might soon render himself agreeable to the queen of Scots. He was also by his father a branch of the same family with herself; and would, in espousing her, preserve the royal dignity in the house of Stuart: He was, after her, next heir to the crown of England; and those who pretended to exclude her on account of her being a foreigner, had endeavoured to recommend his title, and give it the preference. It seemed no inconsiderable PLL v6.0 (generated September, 2011)