Leicester had done his best to stop the embassy, but without effect, and wrote to Lord Shrewsbury that he “was greatly troubled at these great lords coming.”[447] He tried to work upon the Queen’s weak side, by assuring her that the one object of the Frenchmen was to lead her into heavy expenditure, and so to enfeeble her, that she might the more easily be conquered.[448] This, at all events, caused some restriction in the expenditure; for the Queen suddenly discovered that it would not be dignified for her to entertain the Ambassadors or pay for horses until they actually arrived in London. Burghley may be presumed to have been delighted at their coming, for he made no effort to limit the cost of his banquet to them at Cecil House, in the Strand, which was one of the most splendid entertainments offered to them. There is in the Lansdowne MSS. a full relation of this splendid feast of the 30th April, with the bills of fare, accounts of expenses, &c., which gives some notion of the splendour and extent of Burghley’s household. There were consumed two stags, 40s.; two bucks, 20s.; six kids, 24s.; six pigs, 10s.; six shins of beef, 24s.; four gammons of bacon, 16s.; one swan, 10s.; three cranes, 20s.; twenty-four curlews, 24s.; fifteen pheasants, 30s.; fifty-four herons, £8, 15s.; eight partridges, 8s., and vast quantities of meat of all sorts; and sturgeon, conger, salmon, trout, lampreys, lobsters, prawns, gurnards, oysters, and many sorts of fresh-water fish. Herbs and salads cost no less than 36s., and cream, 27s. There were consumed 3300 eggs, 360 lbs. of butter, 42 lbs. of spices, and three gallons of rose-water. £11, 7s. 3d. was paid for the hire of extra vessels and glass; flowers and rushes cost £5, 7s. 10d., and Turkey carpets, £11. This Gargantuan feast was served by forty-nine gentlemen and thirty-four servants, and was washed down with £75 worth of beer as well as Gascon, sack, hippocras, and other wine costing £21; the entire expenditure on the afternoon’s feeding being £649, 1s. 5d.
Though Burghley and Sussex had brought over the embassy in hopes of a marriage, or at least an alliance, the Queen changed from hour to hour. When Leicester complained to her, she silenced him by saying that she could avoid a marriage whenever she liked by bringing Alençon over whilst the embassy was in England, and then setting the Frenchmen at loggerheads, and by subsidising the Prince’s attempts in Flanders. At the same time she certainly led Sussex, and probably Burghley, to believe that she might be in earnest at last.
After some weeks the elder Ambassadors got tired of trifling, and begged the Queen to appoint a committee of the Council to negotiate with them. The great banquet at Burghley House was the preliminary meeting, and a paper at Hatfield, endorsed by Burghley, lays down, in the usual precise manner of the time, every aspect of the matter. The propositions are three: 1st, if the Queen should remain unmarried; 2nd, if she should marry Alençon; and 3rd, if she should enter into some strait league with the French. In the first eventuality the Queen must strengthen herself and weaken her opponents; Scotland must be reduced to the same friendship that existed before the advent of D’Aubigny; James’s marriage to a Catholic must be prevented; Mary Stuart must be held tightly; Ireland must be subdued; the entire domination of Spain over the Netherlands must be avoided, and an alliance concluded either with France or the German Protestants. In the second eventuality, that the Queen should marry Alençon, the writer urges that the wedding should take place without delay, but always on condition that religion in England must be safeguarded, and Henry III. pledged to provide most of the means for Alençon’s enterprise in Flanders. On the other hand, if the marriage is not to take place, care must be taken that no offence is given to the suitor. “Since the treaty with Simier many accidents have happened to make this marriage hateful to the people, as the invasion of Ireland by the Pope, the determination of the Pope to stir up rebellion in this realm by sending in a number of English Jesuits, who have by books, challenges, and secret instructions and seductions, procured a great defection of many people to relinquish their obedience to her Majesty. Likewise there is a manifest practice in Scotland, by D’Aubigny, to alienate the young King of Scotland, both from favouring the Protestant religion and from amity to her Majesty and her realm, notwithstanding that he hath only been conserved in his crown at her Majesty’s charges.”[449]
Although this paper has usually been treated as emanating from Burghley, I consider it much more likely to have been the work of Walsingham. There is at Hatfield, of similar date (2nd May 1581), a note, all in the Lord Treasurer’s hand, for his speech to the Ambassadors, and this is preceded by a private remark that, before a definite answer can be given, “it is necessary to know her Majesty’s own mind, to what end she will have this treaty tend, either to a marriage or no marriage, amity or no amity.” As Burghley seems not to have possessed this information, it is not surprising that the draft of his speech simply tends to delay. The Queen has written to Alençon, he says, and must have a reply before she can say anything definite about the marriage; but as there has been some talk on both sides of a close alliance, the Queen expects the Ambassadors to be empowered to deal with that also.[450]
The Ambassadors themselves give an account of a speech of Burghley’s, either on this or another occasion, in which he declared that, although he was formerly against the marriage, he now personally thought it desirable. Brisson replied in a similar strain, and then the strong Protestantism of Walsingham asserted itself. He said that the hope of the marriage had caused the Pope to flood England with Jesuits and invade Ireland, the Catholics in England were already in high feather about it, and Alençon had broken faith, and had entered into negotiations with the States General, since Simier took the draft treaty. Besides, he said, look at the danger of child-bearing to the Queen at her age. The marriage would probably drag England into war at least, and until the Queen received a reply to her letters the negotiations for the marriage must stand over.[451]
It is quite evident that the Queen desired an alliance without a marriage, and to draw France into open hostility to Spain, whilst she remained unpledged. But Secretary Pinart was almost as clever as Burghley, and played his cards well, and no progress was made. Let them marry first, said Pinart, it would be easy to make an alliance afterwards. Affairs were thus at a deadlock. Alençon was on the frontier with a body of men ready to enter Flanders to relieve Cambray, when his brother’s forces dispersed them. It was then clear to the Prince that he must depend upon the Queen of England alone; and ceding to the pressure of his agent in England, he suddenly rushed over to London (2nd June), to the confusion of the Ambassadors, who shut themselves up to avoid meeting him. The Queen was all smiles, for she was satisfied now that Alençon was obliged to look to her only for aid, marriage or no marriage. Alençon went back after a few days as secretly as he had come, but every one saw that the Queen had won the trick; and the pompous embassy went back loaded with presents, but only taking with it a draft marriage treaty, accompanied by a letter from Elizabeth, saying that she might alter her mind if she liked, in which case the treaty was to be considered as annulled.[452]
In the meanwhile Mendoza was watching closely the attempts of Leicester to persuade the Queen to aid Don Antonio in Portugal, as well as to provide means for Alençon in Flanders. Walsingham had laid a trap for Mendoza, who was induced to pay a large sum of money to some Hollanders who promised to betray Flushing to the Spaniards, but really did just the opposite. The Hollanders left with the Spanish Ambassador the child son of one of them as a hostage. By orders of Walsingham the embassy was violated and the boy taken away; and this amongst many other grievances was the source of endless squabbling with the Queen, who invariably retorted to all Mendoza’s complaints that Philip had connived at the invasion of Ireland. After one of his interviews with the Queen (24th June) he writes: “It is impossible for me to express the insincerity with which she and her ministers proceed.… She contradicts me every moment in my version of the negotiations.… I understood from her and Cecil, who is one of the few ministers who show any signs of straightforwardness, that they understood that your Majesty intended to write to the Queen assuring her that the succour had not been sent to Ireland on your behalf. I told them that the matter referred to the Pope alone, but Cecil said they wished to see a letter from your Majesty;” whereupon Mendoza angrily told him that the word of an Ambassador was sufficient.
On the same day that this conversation took place, Burghley’s task of keeping the peace was rendered still more difficult by the arrival in England of the fugitive Portuguese Pretender, Don Antonio, who was at once taken up by Leicester and Hatton. The Spanish Ambassador was told by Hatton that if he wanted his passports he could have them, and the Queen almost insultingly refused him audience. Mendoza then wrote her a letter, which he thought the Queen would be obliged to show to the whole Council, “where I was sure some of the members would point out to her the danger she was running in refusing to receive me and thus irritating your Majesty. Cecil, particularly, who is the person upon whom the Queen depends in matters of importance, had seen me a few days before, and said how sorry he was that these things should occur, and that he should be unable to remedy them, as he was sure I could not avoid being offended.”[453]
A few weeks afterwards Mendoza made another attempt to see the Queen, who was then in the country. She said that as Philip had not written any excuse about the Spanish expedition to Ireland, she did not see her way to receive the Ambassador. If he had anything to say he might tell it to two Councillors. Burghley was known to be the most favourable of them, and had expressed to Mendoza his ignorance that the audience had been refused. “He did not think it wise to refuse me; and as he is the most important of the ministers I thought best to inform him of the reply I had received, and to say I should like to see him.” Burghley was ill of gout at Theobalds at the time, but shortly afterwards he came to town and asked Mendoza to see him at Leicester House, “his gout preventing him from coming further.” Mendoza found him with Leicester together, and in reply to the stereotyped complaints of the Ambassador about Drake’s plunder, the aid to the Portuguese, and the refusal of audience, the Treasurer firmly told him that the Queen thought he had been remiss in not obtaining a letter from the King disclaiming the Irish expedition. This Mendoza haughtily refused to do, and the conference ended unsatisfactorily.[454]
It is evident that at this period (August 1581) Burghley was in despair of keeping on friendly relations with Spain. The Queen and Leicester had determined to subsidise Alençon in Flanders, and to countenance Don Antonio’s attempts on Portugal. This coming after the retention of Drake’s plunder, and refusal of audience to the Ambassador, seemed to make the continuance of peace between the two countries impossible, and Burghley was once more obliged to turn to the necessary, but to him distasteful, alternative—a close union with France.