A few days afterwards, when the French Ambassador had been driving her into a corner about Alençon, and threatening that the Prince would publish her letters, she was closeted in her chamber at Whitehall with Burghley and Archbishop Sandys. “Here am I,” she cried, “between Scylla and Charybdis. Alençon has agreed to all my conditions, and wants to know when he is to come and marry me. If I fail he will probably quarrel with me, and if I marry him I shall not be able to govern the country. What shall I do?” Sandys gave a courtier-like reply, and Burghley was silent. The Queen was impatient at this, and roughly told him he was purposely absenting himself from the Council. What was his advice? Thus pressed, the Lord Treasurer replied that if it was her pleasure to marry she should do so, as Alençon had accepted the terms which rendered her safe. “That,” said the Queen, “is not the opinion of the rest of the Council, but that I should keep him in play.” Burghley was aware of this already, and dryly told the Queen that those who tried to trick princes generally ended by being caught themselves. But Elizabeth knew her profound powers of dissimulation better even than Burghley did, and went on her way. The Lord Treasurer stood almost alone among the councillors in his mild and cautious policy. Sussex, in deep dudgeon, was generally at his mansion at Newhall; and, as we have seen, Burghley himself avoided as much as possible incurring responsibility for the present action of the Queen, except so far as to advise her how to render her policy as little harmful as possible. But it is evident that Elizabeth, in moments of difficulty like this, always turned away from Leicester, and sought the sounder aid of the Lord Treasurer.
Leicester, in March, pretended to fall ill, and during his absence from court completely turned round. Now that Lord Burghley was urging for a close friendship with France, since Leicester’s policy had alienated Spain, the Earl, with characteristic instability, suddenly professed to Mendoza a desire to “serve the King of Spain.” His enemies, he said, were plotting this French alliance and marriage only to spite him, and he would bring the Queen to a close friendship to Spain. The Queen was, doubtless, aware of Leicester’s change; because when Castelnau, the French Ambassador, addressed Elizabeth with an important message from Catharine, proposing that a joint effort should be made to prevent the domination of Portugal by Philip (17th April 1580), he was referred to Burghley alone, and only after the decision had been adopted not to commence hostilities, as suggested, was Leicester let into the secret. Dangerous as it was to England that Philip should dominate Portugal, it was of more importance to France; and it was determined to cast upon the latter power, if possible, the responsibility of preventing it.
The prospect of a serious cause for dissension between France and Spain was, indeed, a welcome one for Elizabeth, and she made the most of it. The star of Morton in Scotland was waning fast, and D’Aubigny, Earl of Lennox, had already gained a complete command of the young King’s affection. Mary Stuart from her captivity was taking the grave step of laying herself, her country, and her child at the feet of the King of Spain, with the acquiescence this time of the Duke of Guise. The English Government, however, was not yet aware of this, and looked upon France as more likely than Spain to influence Scotland under D’Aubigny.[435] Division in France was consequently promoted by Leicester and his party. Alençon was warned not to be too pliant in agreeing with his brother; and when Condé and Navarre once again raised the Huguenot standard, the former rushed over to England to beseech for funds (June 1580), and was received several times in secret by the Queen and Leicester. He immediately sent a message to his adherents in France that all was well, and that assistance would be given to him.
After some days the Queen sent word to Castelnau, the French Ambassador, saying that she had heard that Condé was in England, but she would not receive him except in the Ambassador’s presence. Burghley, writing to Sussex, says that on arriving at Nonsuch from Theobalds, “I came hither about five o’clock, and repairing towards the Privy Chamber to see her Majesty, I found the door at the upper end shut, and understood that the French Ambassador and the Prince of Condé had been a long time there with her Majesty, with none others of the Council but my Lord of Leicester and Mr. Vice-Chamberlain Hatton.” After the audience Castelnau went to Burghley and complained of Condé for raising disturbances in France. “He augmenteth his suspicions upon the sight of the great favours shown to the Prince of Condé by certain Councillors here, whom he understandeth have been many times with him (Condé) at the banqueting-house where he is lodged.” The Queen told Burghley that Condé had asked for a contribution of one-third of the cost of a Huguenot rising, the King of Navarre and the German Protestants paying the other two-thirds; but the Lord Treasurer’s opinion of it is sufficiently expressed in the following words, which probably decided the question, for Condé did not get the aid he sought notwithstanding Leicester’s efforts: “I wish her Majesty may spend some portion to solicit them for peace … but to enter into war and therewith to break the marriage, and so to be left alone as subject to the burden of such a war, I think no good counsellor can allow.”[436]
The fact that he had not been personally consulted earlier did not apparently ruffle Lord Burghley. In his quiet, prudent way he brought things round to his view, without caring for the personal aspect. Not so, irritable, hot-tempered Sussex. He replied in boiling indignation against Leicester—“I have never heard word from my Lord Leicester, Mr. Vice-Chamberlain, or Mr. Secretary Walsingham, of the coming of the Prince of Condé, or of his expectations, or to seek to know what I thought fit to do in his cause; whereby I see either they seek to keep the whole from me, or else care little for my opinion … perhaps at my coming some of them will mislike I am made such a stranger … I can give as good a sound opinion as the best of them … I am very loath to see my sovereign lady to be violently drawn into war.”[437] In any case, Burghley’s unaided efforts were sufficient to prevent the Queen from giving money to Condé, and thus setting the King of France against her as well as the King of Spain. She was, indeed, in a month, so completely turned by Lord Burghley’s influence as to exert herself to bring about some sort of accord between Henry III. and the Huguenots.[438]
During the rest of the year the haggling between Elizabeth and Alençon went on. The deputies of the States, after much discussion, offered the sovereignty to the French Prince, whose letters to the Queen grew more preposterous than ever. It was evident that if he went too far in the Protestant direction to please Elizabeth he would be useless as a means for attracting the Catholic Flemings to cordial union with Orange; whereas an uncompromising Catholic attitude, or any appearance of depending upon his brother for armed aid, would have been fiercely resisted both by the English and the Hollanders. Many points therefore had to be reconciled, and the Queen kept the affair mainly in her own hands, playing upon the hopes, fears, and ambitions of Alençon with the dexterity of a juggler.
Burghley’s main efforts in the meanwhile were directed to preventing her from drifting into war, either with France or Spain. When the envoys came from the Portuguese pretender, Don Antonio, they brought bribes and presents in plenty for Leicester, who entertained them splendidly, and urged their suit for assistance for their master; but again Lord Burghley pointed out to the Queen the expense she would incur and the risks she would run in a war with Spain, and one Ambassador after another went back discomfited, whilst Leicester pocketed their bribes, and alternately raged and sulked when his advice was not followed.
There were others besides Leicester whose recklessness or greed was dragging England to the brink of a war with Spain, in spite of Burghley’s efforts. Strong as was the great statesman’s interest in increasing the legitimate trade of the country, we have seen that from the beginning of Hawkins’ voyages to the West Coast of Africa, and thence to South America with slaves, Burghley had refused any participation in the syndicates that financed them. He had, it is true, on more than one occasion repudiated the claim of the Spaniards, and especially of the Portuguese, to exclusive dominion of the western world by virtue of the Pope’s bull, but he had always frowned upon the filibustering attempts of the syndicates, under the auspices of some of the aldermen of London, to establish posts in territory occupied by other Christian powers, or to force trade upon established settlements against the will of the authorities. He had honestly done his best to check robbery in the Channel by those who called themselves privateers, and almost alone of the Councillors, he had no share or interest in the piratical ventures under the English flag which had committed such destructive depredations upon shipping.
The attack upon Hawkins’ fleet at San Juan de Ulloa, 1568, had aroused fierce and not unnatural indignation amongst sailors and merchants in England; but the expedition was in defiance of the Spanish law, in a port belonging to and occupied by Spain, and it is more than doubtful whether Burghley advised the seizure of the specie belonging to Philip, in December 1568, in reprisal for the attack. There were ample reasons, and an excellent legal pretext, for the seizure of the money without that. In fact it was a master-stroke of policy which the foolish rashness of De Spes had put into Burghley’s power, and the latter and Elizabeth naturally welcomed the opportunity of crippling Alba. But when it became a question of revenging San Juan de Ulloa by the despatch of a strong armed expedition against Spanish colonies, Lord Burghley looked askance at what might well be made a casus belli by Spain, and could only enrich the mariners and shareholders who took part in it.