upon the mission to Elizabeth, he was still
clinging, or affecting to cling, to the wretched delusion of French
assistance. "I regret infinitely," said Falck to the French agent just
mentioned, "that I am employed in this affair, and that it is necessary
in our present straits to have recourse to England. There is--so to
speak--not a person in our Province that is inclined that way, all
recognizing very well that France is much more salutary for us, besides
that we all bear her a certain affection. Indeed, if I were assured that
the King still felt any goodwill towards us, I would so manage matters
that neither the Queen of England, nor any other prince whatever except
his most Christian-Majesty should take a bite at this country, at least
at this Province, and with that view, while waiting for news from France,
I will keep things in suspense, and spin them out as long as it is
possible to do."

The news from France happened soon to be very conclusive, and it then
became difficult even for Falek to believe--after intelligence received
of the accord between Henry III. and the Guises--that his Christian
Majesty, would be inclined for a bite at the Netherlands. This duplicity
on the part of so leading a personage furnishes a key to much of the
apparent dilatoriness on the part of the English government: It has been
seen that Elizabeth, up to the last moment, could not fairly comprehend
the ineffable meanness of the French monarch. She told Ortel that she saw
no reason to believe in that great Catholic conspiracy against herself
and against all Protestantism which was so soon to be made public by the
King's edict of July, promulgated at the very instant of the arrival in
England of the Netherland envoys. Then that dread fiat had gone forth,
the most determined favourer of the French alliance could no longer admit
its possibility, and Falck became the more open to that peculiar line of
argument which Leicester had suggested with regard to one of the other
deputies. "I will do my best," wrote Walsingham, "to procure that Paul
Buys and Falck shall receive underhand some reward."

Besides Menin, Falck, and Buys, were Noel de Caron, an experienced
diplomatist; the poet-soldier, Van der Does; heroic defender of Leyden;
De Gryze, Hersolte, Francis Maalzoon, and three legal Frisians of pith
and substance, Feitsma, Aisma, and Jongema; a dozen Dutchmen together--as
muscular champions as ever little republic sent forth to wrestle with