The origin of that name Huguenot, by which the Protestants in France were known, is doubtful, nor does it greatly matter. Beginning in the reign of Francis, the reformed party in France grew stronger during the reign of several succeeding kings. There were two great families in France at this time, the Bourbons and the Guises. The former became leaders of the Protestants and the latter of the Catholics. Civil war broke out in 1562. Elizabeth of England sent troops to help the Huguenots, but the fortune of the war went against them. A Catholic League was formed for their extermination. A general massacre of Huguenots on St. Bartholomew's Day, in 1572, has made that day lamentable in the reformed Church ever since.

Still the Protestants held on, in the far west of France, under the leadership of that Henry of Navarre who became King of France in 1589. To bring peace to his country he formally declared himself a Catholic, but he so favoured the cause of reform that two years before the end of the century he passed a famous measure, the Edict of Nantes, by which the French Protestants were granted freedom to think and act as they pleased in all religious matters, without penalty of any kind.

Such being the divisions in France during the struggle of the Netherlands against Spain, it was not likely that she would give much assistance to either side. Elizabeth sent a small army, which effected little. She might perhaps have been more liberal with her help, but England had her full share of troubles too. There was still a large English party sympathising with Rome. The change in the State religion which Elizabeth effected as soon as she succeeded her half-sister Mary—the Catholic and the wife of the King of Spain—was not easy. She found herself with a French war on her hands, a war into which Philip had persuaded Mary towards the end of her reign. Almost its only result had been that Calais, England's last possession in France, had been lost to her.

Elizabeth quickly made peace with France; and that peace included Scotland also. We have seen, and we shall see again, how ready France always was to embarrass England by taking the side of Scotland in the constant Scottish and English wars. Elizabeth made peace with France; but since at this moment there really were two parties dividing France, it was not easy to be at peace with both. Elizabeth, as we also have seen, so far helped the Bourbons, the Huguenots, as to send some troops to their aid; and for that aid Havre, with its fine harbour at the mouth of the Seine, was handed over to England. But the Huguenots were defeated. Havre was English only for a very short time.

And Catholic France was now again helping Scotland, favouring the cause of Mary, Queen of Scots, who married a short-lived French king. In Scotland the reformed religion, of Calvin's type, had taken a hold which was destined to grow firmer as time went on; but for the present the Catholics were in strength there too. Their queen was Catholic. She was hardly more than in name a queen, for she was but a child when she came to the throne, and spent years of her short life as Elizabeth's prisoner. Finally she was executed, most probably by Elizabeth's order, although it was an order which Elizabeth denied.

It was almost wholly by their own stout courage that the United Provinces, as they were called, of the Netherlands did at length gain their freedom, and not only freedom to serve God as they saw fit, but also freedom from the sovereignty of Spain. It was a freedom which was not formally acknowledged till many years later; but it was practically won in 1579. These United Provinces were seven in number, of which one was called Holland: and this Holland came, after a while, to be the name for the whole. The seven lay in the north, and were united as a federation under the rule of William of Orange. The southern provinces remained for a while longer under the power of Spain.

Into this new and free State came many of the reformed religion flying from persecution in their own countries. Holland became populous. Her industries developed. Her foreign trade increased. She had a large trading fleet. It ventured into those waters round the Cape of Good Hope which the Portuguese claimed as their own. It disputed with them the trade of the islands in the Malay Archipelago. And even here the fighting took on something of a religious character, for the battle was between ships of Protestant Holland and of Catholic Portugal.

Exactly the same character pertained to certain encounters of ships which began to take place more and more frequently westward of the line which the Pope's Bull had marked out to divide the sphere of Portugal from that of Spain—encounters between the ships of Elizabeth and of Philip of Spain. By the year 1581 that line lost what importance it ever had, because Philip made good, by force of arms, his rather doubtful claim to the throne of Portugal. For three reigns, lasting over sixty years, the King of Spain was King of Portugal also, although the smaller kingdom never lost her national identity.

England's Navy

England had begun to have a considerable fleet. She had long had necessity for ships of war to protect her exports, principally of wool, to the Continent. She was under the necessity of making her fleet stronger and stronger by reason of the growing strength, just noted, of the Dutch fleet, which came from all the ports across the Channel. And especially she had need to strengthen it since Philip, whose proposal of marriage Elizabeth had declined, threatened her with his Armadas. Hostility to England had become a religious duty in his sight. Elizabeth had been excommunicated. The Act of Supremacy, by virtue of which her father had been declared head of the Church in England, had been passed again in her favour, in order to wipe out the measures of reaction towards Rome which had marked the reign of Mary. Ireland had risen in revolt in 1560, and a joint expedition of Spaniards and Italians landed to aid the rebels. They were overwhelmed and destroyed by one, Raleigh, whom Elizabeth knighted as Sir Walter.