at daggers drawn. "Would God I were rid of this place!" he exclaimed.
"What man living would go to the field and have his officers divided
almost into mortal quarrel? One blow but by any of their lackeys brings
us altogether by the ears."

It was clear that there was not room enough on the Netherland soil for
the Earl of Leicester and the brothers Norris. The queen, while
apparently siding with the Earl, intimated to Sir John that she did not
disapprove his conduct, that she should probably recall him to England,
and that she should send him back to the Provinces after the Earl had
left that country.

Such had been the position of the governor-general towards the Queen,
towards the States-General, and towards his own countrymen, during the
year 1586.

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Are wont to hang their piety on the bell-rope
Arminianism
As logical as men in their cups are prone to be
Tolerating religious liberty had never entered his mind

CHAPTER XI. 1586

Drake in the Netherlands--Good Results of his Visit--The Babington
Conspiracy--Leicester decides to visit England--Exchange of parting
Compliments.

Late in the autumn of the same year an Englishman arrived in the
Netherlands, bearer of despatches from the Queen. He had been entrusted
by her Majesty with a special mission to the States-General, and he had
soon an interview with that assembly at the Hague.

He was a small man, apparently forty-five years of age, of a fair but
somewhat weather-stained complexion, with light-brown, closely-curling
hair, an expansive forehead, a clear blue eye, rather commonplace
features, a thin, brown, pointed beard, and a slight moustache. Though
low of stature, he was broad-chested, with well-knit limbs. His hands,
which were small and nervous, were brown and callous with the marks of
toil. There was something in his brow and glance not to be mistaken, and
which men willingly call master; yet he did not seem, to have sprung of
the born magnates of the earth. He wore a heavy gold chain about his
neck, and it might be observed that upon the light full sleeves of his
slashed doublet the image of a small ship on a terrestrial globe was
curiously and many times embroidered.

It was not the first time that he had visited the Netherlands. Thirty
years before the man had been apprentice on board a small lugger, which
traded between the English coast and the ports of Zeeland. Emerging in
ear