Marchaumont continued to urge his master’s need for money, and besides the £22,000 which had been taken by Walsingham a further sum of £20,000 in gold was secretly sent from Drake’s plunder to Alençon. But Elizabeth herself was somewhat short of money, and still not without suspicion, besides which she had no intention whatever of defraying the whole expense of Alençon’s army, and would send him no more money. Things went from bad to worse. The French troops deserted in bodies and fell to pillage; the young noblemen slipped back over the frontier by hundreds. By the first week in September Alençon had retired to Chatelet, leaving a garrison in Cambrai; only 3,000 of his men remained with him, and he sent again de Bex to the Queen to beg for more help before they were all gone. His victory at Cambrai he attributes all to the “belle jartière,” which he says he will never surrender whilst he lives, nor the desire to see again “vostre belle Majesté a la quelle pour la hate de ce porteur je me contenteré de bayzer les belles mins et les belles greves qui ont porté la belle jartière.” But the Queen was not to be wheedled out of her money by talk about the beautiful garter, and Marchaumont began to hint that his master’s only course would be to once more cross the Channel and press his own suit.
In the meanwhile Walsingham was making no progress in Paris, and the Queen as usual was reproaching in no measured terms. Walsingham, who knew his mistress well, gave her on this occasion at least as good as she sent.[140] He told her bluntly that if she was sincere about the marriage she was losing time she could ill spare; whilst, if otherwise, it “is the worst remedy you can use.” “Sometimes when your Majesty doth behold in what doubtful terms you stand with foreign princes, then you do wish with great affection that opportunities offered had not been overslipped; but when they are offered to you, accompanied with charges, they are altogether neglected. The respect of charges hath lost Scotland, and I would to God I had no cause to think it might put your Highness in peril of the loss of England.” He reproaches her almost rudely for her niggardliness, which he compares with the wise liberality of her predecessors where expenditure was needful for the safety of the realm. “If this sparing and provident course be held on still, the mischiefs approaching being so apparent as they are, there is no one that serveth in place of councillor ... who would not wish himself rather in the farthest part of Ethiopia than enjoy the fairest palace in England.” On his way back to England Walsingham saw Alençon at Abbeville, in Picardy, and rather encouraged the Duke in his desire to come to England again. It is evident that, much as Walsingham was attached to Leicester, he was in grave alarm that the Protestant religion, to which he was devoted, might be overborne by the threatened union against England of the Catholic powers, and at this time would have gladly welcomed the marriage of the Queen and Alençon, which would have prevented France from joining the coalition and have banished the danger. When Walsingham arrived in London at the end of September, however, he found the Queen very strongly opposed to her suitor’s proposed visit, not wishing to have her hands forced in this way. She told Marchaumont that his master must not come on any account, or a rising of the people might be feared, so angry were they at the idea of the match. On the other hand, both Marchaumont and Castelnau, the ambassador, took care to spread broadcast the intelligence that the Duke would soon be here; and when no open discontent ensued they pointed out that the Queen’s fears were groundless. Leicester, as usual, tried to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds, to retain French bribes and yet to stand in the way of French objects. Mendoza says that he took good care to turn the Queen against Alençon’s coming, but as soon as he was sure that his efforts were effectual he went out of town and hypocritically professed to the French that Hatton and Walsingham alone were to blame for the opposition.
But by the end of October the Queen’s apprehensions seem to have been dissipated. Walsingham must have made it clear to her that unless the marriage were again taken up with some show of sincerity she had no chance of getting the close understanding with France which was necessary to her plans. She had, moreover, spent large sums of money in Flanders, which she could never get back unless the States could be enabled to hold their own, and she accordingly decided to make the best of Alençon’s coming in the assurance that, if the worst came to the worst, she could avoid a marriage by supplying funds for his maintenance in Flanders.
Shortly before the Duke’s arrival the “monk” (Marchaumont) wrote to de Bex saying that every one, from the Queen downwards, was expecting his Highness’s arrival with pleasure, but he hints that he had better make haste as the Spanish ambassador was making certain proposals to the Queen; which we now know to be true.[141] He says that even Leicester had now been won over, his only fear being that if the marriage took place his bitter enemy, Simier, might come, who, he was sure, would plot his ruin. This state of things had not been brought about without a good deal of friction. Several sums of money had been sent by the Queen with the hope of staving off the visit, but with no effect. The Queen had a great row with Walsingham in consequence of mischief-making of Sussex, who had shown Marchaumont a letter written by Walsingham from France, containing some slighting expressions towards Alençon which had been repeated to the Queen; “although,” says Mendoza, “some people think that it is all put on, and that she herself ordered Walsingham to write this so as to hinder the marriage, as she is a woman very fond of adopting such tricks. At all events Walsingham takes very little notice of her anger, and Alençon turns a deaf ear to everything, and only asks for money, whilst Marchaumont keeps the negotiation alive by pressing for a decision with regard to the marriage.”
The Queen had lent Marchaumont a small house attached to her own palace at Richmond, to which entrance could be gained through it by means of a connecting gallery. Two chambers were refurnished and warmed in this house for the Prince’s use, the Earl of Arundel (son of the attainted and executed Duke of Norfolk) and his uncle, Lord Harry Howard, were charged by the Queen to make all arrangements for his comfort; and her Majesty herself superintended the installation in one of the rooms of a crimson bed, which she told Marchaumont archly that his master would recognise. A day or so before the Duke was expected Marchaumont wrote to de Bex, who was with his master on his journey hither, that he learnt by a message the Queen had sent him “that every hour seemed a month to her so anxious was she to see her lover, for whose reception great preparations had been made, although the Queen will pretend that nothing special had been done.”[142]
When Walsingham had seen the Prince in France the latter had expressed a desire to rest a day and a night in Walsingham’s house in London before going to see the Queen at Richmond, but when the time approached for the visit Walsingham managed to avoid the trouble of entertaining the guest by saying that the plague was raging round the house, and it was settled that he should be lodged for the night in the house of Sir Edward Stafford, the son of Elizabeth’s friend and Mistress of the Robes. “But I need not tell you,” says Marchaumont to de Bex, “to keep strict secrecy as to the Prince’s movements, for if Lady Stafford knows anything it will be easier to stem a torrent than to stop the woman’s tongue.”
Alençon embarked from Calais at the end of October, 1581, having met the Portuguese pretender, Don Antonio, before going on board, and promised him to plead his cause with the English Queen. The heavy weather necessitated his anchoring in the Downs instead of entering Dover, and it was only at the cost of some risk and trouble that he landed. Leaving the Prince Dauphin and most of his suite of gentlemen to follow him, he pressed on in disguise with de Bex to London, where he arrived and slept at Stafford’s house on the night of the 1st of November. The next morning he started off to see the Queen privately at Richmond, the first public reception being fixed for the 3rd of November, when the Prince Dauphin and the rest of the suite were fetched from London in the Queen’s state coaches. It was, in truth, high time the Prince came, for the Queen was very much out of temper with him and every one else. She complained to Castelnau that the Prince had acted in Flanders without her permission, that the King of France was intriguing with Spain for her ruin, that the States were a lot of drunkards, who only thought of borrowing money and not paying it back. She was too old, she said, to be played with, and would let them all see it. But when her young lover came she was full of smiles and blandishments. Fortunately he had plenty of money with him—money, however, brought to him by St. Aldegonde, at Calais, collected by the sorely pressed Flemings for the support of his army, and not to be squandered in England; but he bribed the ladies and the councillors liberally with it. At first all went as merrily as a marriage-bell. The Queen again took to calling Alençon her little Moor, her little Italian, her little frog, and so on; whilst she, as before, was to him all the orbs of the firmament. Leicester was radiant, however, which was a bad sign, and Sussex was in the sulks, which was equally so; but the French, and Alençon himself, grew more and more confident of success. The Queen was playing her usual game, and Leicester understood it perfectly, but she could not help having her fling at Walsingham when he tried clumsily to humour her. He was praising the good parts and understanding of Alençon one day to the Queen, and said that the only thing against him was his ugly face. “Why, you knave,” she replied, “you were for ever speaking ill of him before: you veer round like a weathercock.”[143] At the same time all sorts of scandalous tittle-tattle began to arise. Every morning little love-letters signed “your prince frog,” were sent from Alençon to the Queen, and Lippomano, the Venetian ambassador, assures the Doge and Senate that the Queen entered his chamber every morning before he was out of bed, and brought him a cup of broth. He was with her, says Mendoza, all day and every day, no one being present but Sussex and Stafford, and even they were not allowed to hear their conversation. In order to allay the fears of her Protestant subjects, some of whom were grumbling because Alençon heard mass daily, unwonted severity was used towards the Catholics during Alençon’s visit, and the Jesuit priests Campion, Sherwin, and Briant, were executed at Tyburn under circumstances of the most heartrending cruelty. The Spanish ambassador at last got somewhat anxious, and by Philip’s orders began to approach Cecil with suggestions of the falsity of Frenchmen and the advisability of a close union between England and Spain, all injuries on each side being forgiven and forgotten. He went to the length, indeed, of hinting that the French were intriguing with Mary of Scotland under cover of the marriage negotiations, although he himself at the time was plotting with and for her. But Cecil was a match for him, and let him understand that the friendship proposed was more necessary for Spain than it was for England. The position at the time of Alençon’s visit is well summarised by Mendoza in a letter to King Philip[144] as follows: “As soon as the Queen learnt that Alençon had arrived, she said to certain of the councillors separately that they must consider what would have to be done with him; to which they replied that they could hardly do that unless she made her own intentions upon the subject clear. To this she answered that she was quite satisfied with the person of Alençon. When he arrived here he told those who he knew were in his favour that he would not go out in public nor undertake any other affairs until he had settled with the Queen the subject about which he came. If this be so, present indications prove that he has got an affirmative answer, as he now shows himself almost publicly, and appears to be in high spirits, all the principal people at Court being allowed to see him at dinner and supper. Leicester leaves nothing undone, and in the absence of the Prince Dauphin, always hands Alençon the napkin, publicly declaring that there seems to be no other way for the Queen to secure the tranquillity of England but for her to marry Alençon; and Walsingham says the same. The Frenchmen who came with him, and the ambassadors who were here before, look upon the marriage as an accomplished fact, but the English in general scoff at it, saying that he is only after money, and that he has already begged the Queen to give him £100,000 and 4,000 men to aid your Majesty’s rebels. The principal Englishmen indeed are saying that if he wanted a regular pension they would grant him £20,000 a year, so there are more indications of money being given him than anything else. It is certain that the Queen will do her best to avoid offending him, and to pledge him in the affairs of the Netherlands, in order to drive his brother into a rupture with your Majesty, which is her great object, whilst she keeps her hands free, and can stand by looking on at the war.” Few men were better informed than Mendoza; part of the Privy Council was in his pay, and the most secret information was conveyed to him at once by his spies, who were everywhere. He was, moreover, one of the most keen-sighted statesmen of his time, and we may accept his opinion therefore, confirmed as it is by much other evidence, that up to this time (November 11th) Elizabeth was once more playing her old trick, and befooling Alençon and the French.
When Leicester thought that matters were going a little too far he persuaded the Queen to urge her lover to start at once for Flanders, for which purpose she would give him three ships and £30,000, in order to receive the oath of allegiance which the States were offering him, and then to return and marry her; but Sussex saw through the device, and privately warned Alençon that whatever pledges might be made to him now, he might be convinced that if once he went away without being married the marriage would never take place. He entreated him on no account to be driven out of England, and as Alençon well knew that Sussex at least was honest in his desire to see the Queen married and freed from the baleful influence of Leicester, he put his back to the wall and plainly told the Queen that not only would he refuse to leave England, but he would not ever vacate the rooms in her palace until she had given him a definite answer as to whether she would marry him or not. Crofts, the privy councillor in Philip’s pay, told Mendoza that “when the Queen and Alençon were alone together she pledges herself to him to his heart’s content, and as much as any woman could to a man, but she will not have anything said publicly.”
Things were thus getting to a deadlock again. The King of France wrote to the Queen saying that under no circumstances, whether his brother married or not, would he help him against Spain in the Netherlands, and the Queen-mother began pressing her son with all sorts of promises, to return and abandon his hopeless quest before he became the laughing-stock of the world. This of course made the Queen warmer in her protestations, and by the third week in November she had contrived to convince Alençon again of her sincerity. He at once wrote off to his brother, requesting that commissioners might be sent to settle the conditions of the treaty which had been discussed with Walsingham when he was in France. The Queen encouraged him to do this, knowing full well that Henry III. would refuse to take his brother’s unsupported word as to her bona fides, and send another embassy, whilst his refusal to do so would furnish her if necessary with an excuse for proceeding no further in the matter.
On November 21, 1581, the Queen and Court moved to Whitehall, where Alençon was lodged in the garden-house, and on the following morning—coronation day—he and the Queen were walking in the gallery, Walsingham and Leicester being present, when Castelnau, the French ambassador, entered, and said that he had been commanded by his master to learn from her own lips what her intentions were with regard to her marrying the King’s brother. Either because she was driven into a corner from which there was no other escape, or because once more her passions overcame her, she unhesitatingly replied to Castelnau, “You may write this to the King: that the Duke of Alençon shall be my husband, and at the same moment she turned to Alençon and kissed him on the mouth, drawing a ring from her own hand and giving it to him as a pledge. Alençon gave her a ring of his in return, and shortly afterwards the Queen summoned the ladies and gentlemen from the presence-chamber to the gallery, repeating to them in a loud voice in Alençon’s presence what she had previously said.”[145]