to the Provinces, while his political power, at the moment,
did not seem of more hopeful growth.

Leicester had been determined and consistent in this great enterprize
from the beginning. He felt intensely the importance of the crisis. He
saw that the time had come for swift and uncompromising action, and the
impatience with which he bore the fetters imposed upon him may be easily
conceived.

"The cause is such," he wrote to Walsingham, "that I had as lief be dead
as be in the case I shall be in if this restraint hold for taking the
oath there, or if some more authority be not granted than I see her
Majesty would I should have. I trust you all will hold hard for this, or
else banish me England withal. I have sent you the books to be signed by
her Majesty. I beseech you return them with all haste, for I get no money
till they be under seal."

But her Majesty would not put them under her seal, much to the
favourite's discomfiture.

"Your letter yieldeth but cold answer," he wrote, two days afterwards.
"Above all things yet that her Majesty doth stick at, I marvel most at
her refusal to sign my book of assurance; for there passeth nothing in
the earth against her profit by that act, nor any good to me but to
satisfy the creditors, who were more scrupulous than needs. I did
complain to her of those who did refuse to lend me money, and she was
greatly offended with them. But if her Majesty were to stay this, if I
were half seas over, I must of necessity come back again, for I may not
go without money. I beseech, if the matter be refused by her, bestow a
post on me to Harwich. I lie this night at Sir John Peters', and but for
this doubt I had been to-morrow at Harwich. I pray God make you all that
be counsellors plain and direct to the furtherance of all good service
for her Majesty and the realm; and if it be the will of God to plague us
that go, and you that tarry, for our sins, yet let us not be negligent to
seek to please the Lord."

The Earl was not negligent at any rate in seeking to please the Queen,
but she was singularly hard to please. She had never been so uncertain in
her humours as at this important crisis. She knew, and had publicly
stated as much, that she was "embarking in a war with the greatest
potentate in Europe;" yet now that the voyage had fairly commenced, and
the waves were rolling around her, she seemed anxious to put back to the
shore. For there was even a whisper of peace-negotiations, than whi