tions with these powers Mr. Motley recounts at great length.
When England, at last, adopted the side of the Netherlands, and caught
glimpses of the fact that the struggle of the latter against Spain
was her cause no less than the cause of the Dutch, the parsimony and
indecision of Elizabeth, and the hesitating counsels of her favorite
minister, Burleigh, prevented the English-Dutch alliance from being
efficient against the common enemy. An incompetent general, the Earl of
Leicester, was sent over to Holland with the English troops; yet even
his incompetency might not have stood in the way of success, had he
not been hampered with instructions which paralyzed what vigor and
intelligence he possessed, and had not his soldiers been left to starve
by the government they served. Elizabeth was trying to secure a peace
with Spain, while Philip and Farnese were busy in contriving the means
of an invasion of England; and up to the time the Spanish Armada
appeared in the British seas, she and her government were thoroughly
cajoled by Spanish craft. Mr. Motley remorselessly exposes, not only the
duplicity of Philip, but the credulity of Elizabeth; he demonstrates
the superiority of Spain in all the arts which were then supposed to
constitute statesmanship; and shows that it was to no sagacity and
vigor on the part of the English government, but to the instinctive
intelligence and intrepidity of the English people, that the nation was
saved from overthrow. Walsingham is almost the only English statesman
who comes out from the historian's pitiless analysis with any credit;
and, in respect to sagacity, Burleigh is degraded below Leicester: for
Leicester at least understood that the enmity of Philip of Spain to
England was unappeasable, and therefore justly considered his perfidious
negotiations for peace as a mere blind to cover designs of conquest.

But we have no space, in this hurried notice of Mr. Motley's work, to
linger on the fertile topics which his luminous narrative suggests. In a
future article we hope to do some justice to the facts, principles, and
judgments he has established. At present, after indicating his diligence
in exploring original authorities, and the importance of the conclusions
at which he arrives, we can only venture a few remarks on his historical
genius and method.

As regards his historical genius, it is sufficient to say that he
exhibits both sympathy and imagination. He has so completely assimilated