[577] Soon afterwards, Essex was at issue with Robert Cecil about the appointment of a successor to one of Heneage’s offices (Essex to Sir Henry Unton; Hatfield Papers, part iv.). How bitter Essex was against the Cecils is shown by a letter from him to Sir Henry Unton in Paris (June 1591): “Things do remain in the same state as they did. They who are most in appetite are not yet satisfied, whereof there is great discontentment. If it stand at this stay awhile longer they will despair, for their chief hour-glass hath little sand left in it, and doth run out still.”
[578] In one of the letters suggested by the secret intelligence secretary, Phillips, to be written to English Catholics abroad (31st August 1591), Robert Cecil’s appointment to the Council is noted; “but the Queen seems determined against Robert Cecil for the Secretaryship; but my Lord being sick, the whole management of the Secretary’s place is in his (Robert’s) hands, and as he is already a Councillor, any employment of him between the Queen and his father will be the means of installing him in the place” (State Papers, Domestic).
[579] He expressed this wish as soon as Essex’s opposition to Robert Cecil’s appointment became manifest. A letter (State Papers, Domestic) from Hatton, 15th July 1590, thus refers to the matter: “We can well witness your endless travails, which in her Majesty’s princely consideration she should relieve you of; but it is true the affairs are in good hands, as we all know, and thereby her Majesty is the more sure, and we her poor servants the better satisfied. God send you help and happiness to your better contentment.” Nearly all through 1590 and 1591 repeated reference is made in his correspondence to Burghley’s infirmities. This, added to the everlasting disputes between the Prelatists and the Puritans, in which he was between two fires, and the galling opposition of Essex to his son’s appointment, might well have excused his desire to be relieved of his heavy burden.
[580] Bacon Papers, Birch. Sir John Norris had recently gone to Brittany with a small English auxiliary force, and had captured Guingamp. There were also 600 Englishmen in Normandy and an English squadron on the Brittany coast. Burghley holds out hopes also of sending 600 more men to Brittany.
[581] Henry wrote one of his clever characteristic letters to Elizabeth (5th August), expressing in fervent terms his delight at hearing of her intention of coming to Portsmouth during his visit to Normandy. He swears eternal gratitude, and begs her to allow him to run across the Channel; “et baiser les mains comme Roi de Navarre, et etre aupres d’elle deux heures, a fin que j’aie ce bien d’avoir veu, au moins une fois, en ma vie, celle a qui j’ai consacré et corps et tant ce que j’aurai jamais; et que j’aime et révère plus que chose que soit au monde.” Referring to Essex’s force, he says: “Le secours que qu’il vous a pleu à présent m’accorder m’est en singulière grace, pour la qualité de celluy auquel vous avez donné la principale charge, et pour la belle force dont il est composé.” (Hatfield Papers, part iv.)
[582] The Earl’s brother, Walter Devereux, was killed in the siege.
[583] Essex seems to have quarrelled with every one in France, and the Council in England condemned his proceedings from the first. In a letter to the Council (September) he says the whole purport of their letters is “to rip up all my actions and to reprove them” (Hatfield Papers, part iv.). The Queen also wrote him a very angry letter (4th October) consenting on strict conditions that the English shall only be allowed to remain a month longer in France.
[584] From a long letter from Burghley (22nd October), Essex appears to have again left his command and run over to England. He begged Burghley to ask the Queen’s permission for him to join Biron at the siege of Caudebec. The Lord Treasurer says he had not done so, as he was sure the Queen would refuse. Her strict orders were that neither Essex nor his men should risk themselves at the siege of Havre or elsewhere except by her orders. Essex appears to have disobeyed, and returned to France at once without seeing the Queen. During his absence the Englishmen had deserted wholesale. Burghley says there were not 2000 of them remaining—they were unpaid and mutinous, and, according to Biron and Leighton, were committing outrages on all sides. Beauvoir de Nocle wrote to Essex as soon as he had gone back to France (22nd October), “Les courroux de la reine redoublent.”
[585] See the Queen’s very angry letter peremptorily recalling him (24th December 1591), (Hatfield Papers, part iv.).
[586] The heroic but unprofitable result of the expedition was the famous fight of the Revenge and the death of Sir Richard Grenville, who quite needlessly, and out of sheer obstinacy, engaged the whole Spanish squadron. The great difficulty of getting the expedition together is seen by the large number of towns which addressed Lord Burghley personally or the Council, begging on the score of poverty to be excused from fitting the ships, as they had been commanded to do. Southampton, Hull, Yarmouth, Newcastle, and other towns professed to be so decayed as to be quite unable to contribute ships (Hatfield Papers, part iv.).